Free Fire and Thorns 00.7: King's Guard by Rae Carson Page B

through the cloth. Finally, she yells, “Don’t look at me, do not look at me,” and she pulls it away from her face.
    Of course, I look, but I don’t believe what I see.
    Her nose has been sliced off her face, leaving two gaping nostril holes, like those of a skull. Her cheeks have been slashed with a knife and are covered with red, raw scars, where they are still healing.
    Solvaño intended to make a monster of Isadora, and maybe, in inciting her killing rage, he did.
    I’ve never wanted to murder anyone. Most men go through their whole lives without having to kill, and there is no glamor in it for me. But in this moment, if Lord Solvaño were here, I would kill him all over again.
    Isadora is trapped between sobbing and pushing. The baby is eager to be born.
    “It is going to be all right,” I tell her. “Everything is going to be all right.”
    “Stop lying to me!” she screams.
    So I sit and hold her hand and wipe the sweat from her forehead and from her still-healing scars, and I tell her about her cousin the queen, who made this quilt that she’s lying on, and how the commander of the Guard called me a princess for having it. I try to project calm, although I feel anything but calm.
    “Oh, God, here it comes,” she cries.
    “What do I do?”
    “Get it out of me!”
    I freeze. I’ve never . . . We need another woman here. Maybe I should go find someone. . . .
    “GET IT OUT.”
    I’m trembling as I lift the cloak and reveal her naked body. “Oh, God.” She is like a two-headed monster, with that wet, grayish-blue head poking out from between her legs. I reach for it with shaking hands, then cradle it in my palm and help support it as she pushes again. The whole thing slips out in a wave of blood-tinged wetness.
    I’ve never seen anything born before, not even a colt or a kitten. Just this squirming boy, his mouth open in a silent scream. He hardly looks like a person, all pale and glinting wet in our meager light. I lift him up, offer him to her, but she shakes her head.
    “No, I don’t want it, it’s not mine, I don’t.” She is limp on her back now, spent, her gaze shifted away.
    “What should I do?” I say. Just then, the baby shudders, and a great wail fills the empty market stall.
    “Leave it to die.”
    “No!” I say. “What do I do with the cord?” Determination settles into my core, giving me strength and new energy. If his mother doesn’t want him, that leaves me with only one course.
    Because I know whose child this is. And Alejandro will want his son. I must deliver this royal bastard to his father. It’s the right thing to do.
    “Still have your knife?” she asks.
    “Yes.”
    “Then tie a knot and cut the cord above the knot.”
    “You’ll have to hold him while I do it,” I say.
    She looks angry, but she holds out her arms, and I hand her the child. The cord is warm and slick in my fingers and slips when I try to cut it, but I soon have the job done.
    “Can you wipe him off?” she says. He is rooting around, trying to get his face at her breasts.
    “Of course,” I say. I half cut, half rip two strips from the quilt where it is still mostly clean. We use one piece to wipe him off and the other to wrap him up. By the time that’s done, the baby is feeding, and Isadora is crying, tears running down the furrows between the scars on her cheek.
    “You were marvelous,” I tell her, and I mean it. “Getting out of the tower, delivering the baby.” Killing her father.
    She shakes her head.
    “I didn’t know what to do,” I press. “Not when we ran into your father, not when the baby was coming, but you made the right decisions every step of the way. You’re a warrior.”
    She continues to shake her head. “What does it matter? I’ve nowhere to go.”
    “Yes, you do.” I know exactly where to take her.

13

    M Y brother’s ship, the Aracely —named after his wife—is the most beautiful ship in Joya d’Arena. It’s a tiny caravela with three masts