Free Grudging by Michelle Hauck Page B

do not give in so easily, he thought with pride.
    Julian escorted Beatriz across the cobblestones to a flight of stairs. The stair would take them to the top of Colina Hermosa’s wall.
    Beatriz’s cool hand twined around his arm. “Did you have to send both my sons on this impossible mission?” She raised her voice to be heard above the din, moving slowly on the stair, clinging and pulling.
    He hugged close to the wall to allow a sergeant carrying a stack of arrows to pass. Here, Julian was the unimportant one; their work was more urgent. They reached the top of the wall, where all was orderly and quiet. Guards stood at attention in their spaces along the stone fortification. Julian gestured outward over the parapet at the Northern army. “Would you have them here, mi amor ? Knowing that is coming for us soon. We agreed they are safer away.”
    â€œBut sending them to the witches . . .” She held the dog close to her nose and buried her face in its fur. The stifling breeze caught the lace mantilla atop her head, lifting it in a gentle wave.
    â€œThe witches are only a plausible excuse to send them in that direction,” he said. “It had to be a reasonable fabrication, or they would see right through it. Now Salvador can scout the way for the evacuees who will follow, and only he has to know about them. Besides, no one has seen the witches in decades.”
    Beatriz stuck out her lower lip as if she were still a girl, and he couldn’t help but smile. To Julian, she would always be the beauty he’d wed before becoming rich or being elected alcalde . He wrapped an arm around her. “They are doing what is important. Making sure the way to the swamps is safe.” He squeezed her shoulders. “Now and forever.”
    â€œNow and forever,” she echoed with a sigh. “But did they truly have to go?”
    â€œWho knows?” he said. “Perhaps this side mission will succeed. Perhaps the witches still exist, and our sons will persuade them to use their magic in our favor.”
    She huffed and rolled her eyes. “By the saints, Julian. Of course the witches live. Evil doesn’t die that easily. But the witches help no one. Isn’t that so, Pietro?” The little dog under her arm panted happily. She looked back at Julian. “When do you go on this foolish quest to meet the barbarians and settle these terms so they can destroy us?”
    Julian cast a swift glance at the enemy camps spread across the plain. One group of them marched in a square formation, while elsewhere soldiers moved more freely. The siege machines waited in silent isolation near the rear. He detected no change among the enemy though the scouts assured him the numbers had grown. “In the morning. But as we’ve already discussed, I go nowhere. So you can stop worrying. They are coming here, where I’ll be well protected.”
    Her lips thinned. She’d already given ground on that issue as she had on their sons’ departure. “You’ll be guarded by bodyguards, not kin. You could have kept our sons here with you or sent them with the children.”
    â€œWhen the first group of children goes through the tunnels tonight, they will have pelotón members to protect them. We decided our sons would be safer elsewhere. It may be selfish, but I want them out of the city. Let’s not rehash that argument. They’ve been gone over a day; there is no getting them back. Besides, the children are the priority now. They will go to the swamp as long as the hill tunnels remain undiscovered—­with the pelotónes . Hopefully, the Northerners won’t find them there.”
    The little dog squirmed as she hugged it tight. Beatriz’s lip trembled. “I hate to see it come to this. Bad enough you meet with these . . . ­people. But the children, will they be safe? They are like our own.”
    â€œAs safe as anyone. And Salvador has his