Total pages in book: 119
Estimated words: 112849 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112849 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 564(@200wpm)___ 451(@250wpm)___ 376(@300wpm)
“Were you born here or did your parents come from elsewhere?” she asked.
“Uh, I was adopted,” I told her. “I never knew my real parents.”
“Oh? That is interesting,” she said.
“I don’t even have a birthday,” I said absently, still feeling that energy surge through me, enough to make the hair on my arms and back of my neck stand straight up.
“We will have to change that,” she said, moving so that my hand fell away from her stomach. “Perhaps you can have the same birthday as our child. I do hope wherever we go, I can play my music. The only problem is, I will be too fat to play the harp.”
Mina was an accomplished musician, according to herself, but her voice was so clear and melodic when she sang to me, that I believed she had a natural talent. In a way, it was her passion for music that made me take it up over the years.
“We will have to leave without the harp,” I told her. “Without anything that won’t fit on a horse’s back. But I promise I will buy you anything you want once we are safe.”
I was such a fool. I had no money. All my wheat crop went to her father, and he barely gave me anything to survive on. I must have known that we would never be able to run away without being found, that there would be no happy ending for us. I must have known that it would only end in death.
But I believed the words I was saying, like only a fool would.
And Mina was happy. She grinned like the sun coming through clouds and she reached for me, pulling me down so I was on top of her, kissing me deeply. My hands went up her legs, eager to feel her again, and that was the last time I would ever feel her skin.
Even though it all happened so fast, I knew it was going to happen moments before it did. I could hear the footsteps creeping through the brush, I could hear whispers. I looked around, startled, but there was nothing around us at all. I didn’t quite understand what was happening to my body. I didn’t know then what I really was, or the change that was about to be underway, as it is for anyone with my background who turns thirty-five. I didn’t even know how old I really was.
And then they appeared across the pond. Five soldiers belonging to the general. They saw me with my hands on Mina and that was all they needed.
They started running for us, swords drawn, and I got to my feet and hauled her up so that she was over my shoulder like a bag of wheat. I had never moved so fast in my life and it was like I had a preternatural grace about me, like an animal taking flight from a predator. Little did I know that I was becoming the predator.
I ran to Mina’s horse, flung her over its withers, then pulled myself astride, urging it into a gallop through the woods.
The men were on foot, but there was no doubt they had their horses nearby and were trying to catch us by surprise. I wondered how far we could ride, if we could actually escape this way. It was September, but we could ride into the north of the country for at least a month until the snow set in. Perhaps the native peoples near the North Pole would shelter us in the unoccupied spaces.
The horse went as fast as it could, jumping over logs and streams, dodging trees and rock, and neither of us spoke. Mina gave out the occasional whimper or sob, and I knew she was crying because her handmaiden turned her in and that our lives had changed quicker than we were ready for.
I didn’t even know where we were going, but then I heard it over the thundering sound of Mina’s horse—the hooves of other horses, racing fast.
Coming toward us.
It was too late.
When the forest opened up to a meadow, a river cutting through it, there was an army of mounted soldiers on the other side.
A roar came out of my throat, something deep, dark and feral. It scared Mina, startled the soldiers. But it wasn’t enough to deter them. I turned the horse on its heel but now the soldiers were coming up from behind and we were surrounded.
“Mina!” the general’s voice came from the pack and the horses parted as he came through. He was a tall thin man with an imposing face, like it was carved out of pure rock. He put his hand forward as if to reach for us. He said something in Russian to her, something I couldn’t understand and yet I understood. He was making me out to seem like I was a bad man who captured her, raped her, impregnated her. He coaxed her as if she were a skittish puppy hiding under a bed, offering it scraps.