Free The Bonemender's Choice by Holly Bennett Page B

“So, any man handle you, you scream loud. Yes?”
    Madeleine managed a shaky nod. “Yes.”
    The man nodded, then jabbed a finger at Luc. “This means you too. You take this girl, we cut your throat. Is clear?”
    Not waiting for a reply, he turned on his heel and disappeared up the hatch into the bright light that spilled in from the upper deck.
    Better to be seasick than to think about those words “at auction,” thought Madeleine. Better a storm to deal with, than another endless night drowning in memories and longings that did nothing but sharpen her grief. Better not to think about home.

CHAPTER TWELVE
    E ACH DAWN, THE SHIP WAS BATHED in a dreamy orange glow as the rising sun slanted through her ochre sails. Dominic was always up to see it. The captain had given up his tiny cabin for the two women, but the men slept cheek by jowl with the crew, tucked into rope hammocks. Only Derkh seemed to find them comfortable—it was the swell and roll of the ship in high water that gave him trouble.
    Even in a feather bed, though, Dominic would have been restless. Their flurry of preparation and packing—Dominic’s part had been to outfit the company with weaponry and wealth (“as much as possible, in gold,” Yolenka had urged), while the others had been busy acquiring remedies and herbs, smithing tools, everything needed to sustain their disguises—had been full of purpose and promise. Once on board, though, time stood still. Dominic knew they were following his children as fast as possible, but it was not like land travel, where you could count the passing leagues in horse sweat and new vistas. Every day the scenery was the same: gray ocean without end. There was no sense of progress.
    There was, at least, plenty to do. Yolenka had combed Blanchette market for the most gaudy silky fabrics she could find, and she gave lessons in Tarzine while she sewed what would evidently become her costume. Their progress varied—Dominicand Derkh managed to pick up a few words and phrases, while Féolan seemed to inhale words from the very air. Within a few days he was trying his skills out with the Tarzine crew. Dominic’s years on the coast had given him a working knowledge of sailing, and he prowled the ship, observing the differences that made the Tarzine craft superior in power and stability to anything in the Basin lands. When the weather was fine and the deck relatively free, Dominic sparred with Derkh or Féolan. They all felt rusty and were glad of the chance to sharpen their fighting edge.
    Mostly, he tried to plan. Even a rudimentary plan, cobbled together from their vast lack of information, seemed better than none. His mind chewed on it through the day and into the long wakeful nights. It had to, to fend off the terrible thoughts that lay always in wait for him—thoughts of his children, their fear and loneliness and misery.
    Yolenka answered all his questions patiently, but when Dominic asked her to draw him a map she shook her head and stood abruptly.
    “Is not my skill. Wait here.”
    It did not take her long. “Captain will see you after evening meal. Has maps of coastline, harbors, better knowledge of Turga than me. I translate.”
    His debt to this exotic woman, a complete stranger, loomed suddenly immense. Dominic reached up and grasped her hand as she turned to go.
    “Yolenka, I don’t know how we could have done this without you. I—”
    She cut him off with a smile so brittle it hurt to see it.
    “Slavers take my sister when I am ten years old, just beginningas dancer. I never see again. We take back your children. Then you thank me.”
    “T URGA’S STRONGHOLD CANNOT be entered by sea,” translated Yolenka, as the captain pointed to a tightly enclosed bay at the south end of the country’s western coast. “Is guarded at mouth, impossible.” She held up a finger to forestall Dominic’s dismay.
    “But children are going here—to Baskir.” The captain ran his finger north up the rugged coast,