Chapter 254: Wrong House, Worse Husband

DOVE’S POV

Dove had checked the garage because she wanted a second way out. She would have preferred being smug about that in the morning instead of using it before dawn.

Edrik stood beside the bedroom door, listening. The man downstairs tried the kitchen handle again. Another set of footsteps crossed the gravel toward the driveway.

"Two that I can hear," Edrik said quietly. "Maybe more outside."

Dove put the fan away, then the remaining meals and net. She kept her ready bag physical and within reach. Her mind flicked through the private room while her body stayed sitting on the bed, Edrik’s hand against her shoulder until she returned.

He did not rush her. That helped more than another instruction would have.

"Laundry stairs," she whispered. "The garage door opens away from the kitchen."

He nodded, then looked at her feet. She had already put her shoes on.

"I do learn things," she told him.

His smile was quick and dangerous. "I noticed."

They moved down the back stairs with their bags close to their bodies. Dawn gave the laundry window a dull gray edge. Through the glass above the sink, Dove could see a man bending beside the garage door.

He had chosen exactly the place they needed to pass.

Dove touched Edrik’s arm and pointed. He followed her finger, then glanced toward the ordinary chair beside the washing machine.

She understood before he said anything. She slid it gently beneath the kitchen-side handle, buying them a moment if somebody came through the house. It would not stop determined men. It did not have to stop them forever.

Edrik opened the garage door just enough to see the man outside.

The stranger lifted a knife.

Edrik caught the arm and pulled him into the garage so hard his feet left the gravel. Dove looked toward the driveway instead of the blow that followed. She heard the knife strike the floor, a sharp crack, then Edrik tell the second man to come closer if he wanted his arm broken too.

The second man chose to run.

"Go," Edrik said, reaching for her.

Dove went. At the end of the driveway she turned toward the low wall they had checked, not the main road. Edrik lifted her over only after she had put her bag across, then followed her into the next yard.

They crossed two empty properties before stopping behind a brick shed. Dove pressed her palms to her thighs, breathing hard enough to be irritated by the sound.

"They picked the one house with the bear," she said.

Edrik checked behind them. "Poor judgment."

"I hope that becomes a permanent problem for them."

He looked down at her, and she noticed blood on his sleeve that had not been there when they ate.

"Yours?"

"No."

She checked anyway. He let her, standing still while she ran her fingers along his arm. He looked much too pleased about that for a man who had just dragged somebody through a garage doorway.

They reached the staffed relief stop after sunrise. It occupied an old bus parking lot, with a portable toilet beside the fence and a trailer serving as an office. A painted arrow directed arrivals toward a shaded table where two workers checked which roads were open.

Dove approached with Edrik beside her. She wanted information, breakfast and somewhere to put her bag without a stranger deciding it belonged to him.

The worker at the table listened to the clinic name and checked a folded list.

"The dragon delivered your husband two days ago. Alive. That’s the message they wanted repeated."

Dove gripped the table edge.

She had felt the bond. She had believed it. Hearing someone say the words aloud still loosened something in her chest so suddenly she had to sit.

Edrik crouched beside her instead of asking whether she was all right.

"Say it again," she told the worker.

He did, kindly, without making her feel foolish.

A second worker brought the northern convoy record. Her father-in-law’s group had reached the station. The generator and large cooler were accounted for with the people who had taken them. Nobody was asking her to fetch them back or fix another problem first.

For several minutes she had good news and nothing she needed to do to deserve it.

She leaned her head against Edrik’s shoulder. He kissed her hair and stayed quiet.

When she could stand again, Dove opened a new meal pack for herself and two for Edrik, then found a place beside the fence where they could eat. She watched him finish the second, then handed him a sealed drink.

"Keep the husband fed," she said. "Apparently it’s important."

"I’m glad somebody finally mentioned it."

She laughed, and the sound surprised her enough to make him look up.

She asked the worker how to send a reply, then wrote that she had eaten and Edrik was with her. The pen caught on the rough paper. For a moment she wanted to fill the page with everything she hadn’t said at the clinic, but this message would pass through several hands. She added only, Tell him I’m coming, and made sure the worker knew which clinic should receive it.

They were still sitting there when a driver came into the lot with a notice folded inside his shirt. He handed it to the worker, who read it once and looked toward Dove before he could help himself.

Edrik was on his feet before the man reached their table.

"Let me see," Dove said.

The notice described her current hair, the ears, the scent people seemed incapable of keeping to themselves. It named the merchant who had refused collection orders and demanded her return alive for questioning about the source of her supplies.

She read the next line more slowly.

A bear traveling with her was to be killed if he interfered.

Dove looked up at Edrik. He was studying the people around the lot, already placing himself where he could see anybody approaching her.

The old demand was still there beneath the new words. Give us what is yours, and let us call taking it protection.

She folded the notice carefully because she wanted her hands doing something other than shaking.

"We’re not taking their road," she said.