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After Raven had left her, Maryam lay back in their bed of soft furs and struggled to let her mind catch up with her windswept emotions. The past few hours had been such a hurricane of events and feelings that all her senses were still reeling. She had felt a strong sense of pride as they entered the Council chamber, pride in her handsome blue lover and pride in herself as a noble daughter of Karakhor. Then her whole world had capsized as she realized that Raven was fighting for his life, and even more. Sylve’s gloating sneer told her that eventually her life would be forfeit too if Raven lost his battle. After the terrible moments of pure fear had come the elation of Raven’s victory, coupled with the horror of Radd’s death. And finally, and most recently, the unexpected and most violent bout of love-making she had yet known. She felt bruised, abused, and delighted. His power, strength and virility stunned her, and yet she had matched him. He was her man and he accepted her as his woman. It was, as always, almost too much and too exciting to fully grasp.

She lay with her head spinning and her loins throbbing. Her whole body was still aroused and sensitive and she wanted him to come back. At last, however, she decided that she must get up and get dressed. She washed quickly, and here in these cold rooms, it was a purely hygienic business and nothing like the long, perfumed luxury with attendants which she would have enjoyed at home.

Afterwards, she deliberated for a few moments, and then regretfully folded away her silk shawl and sari, and donned instead the practical Gheddan garments of leather and wool. Her fine Hindu clothes she now kept only for very special occasions. She hesitated for a few more seconds over the studded belt with the sheathed knife, and then strapped it around her waist.

There were four rooms in the block they occupied: the day room, the bedroom, the wash room and the food room. Maryam wandered into the latter in search of some fruit to eat, and made herself a cup of the hot, diluted honey which was all that the Geddhans seemed to drink when they were not consuming beer or wine. She moved back to the tall window in the day room and looked out over the barrack square as she ate and sipped. At this hour of the day, there were several squads of Gheddan warriors drilling, hacking at wooden posts with their swords, or just running round and round the perimeter. She had watched Jahan drilling the warriors and young lords of Karakhor, and although there was less finesse here and the language was more crude, there was a great similarity in that it all seemed to consist of a lot of blind running, stamping and shouting.

She was still watching when she heard the faint click of a key in the door. Expecting Raven, she did not turn immediately. One of the running men had tripped and sprawled on the hard packed earth, and even through the thick closed glass she could hear the choice words of his irate drill master. Many of them were unfamiliar and her imagination was working overtime. She turned at last to teasingly ask the meaning of one particularly illustrative phrase, but it was not Raven who stealthily crossed the room toward her.

Maryam’s eyes opened wide in astonishment, and Sylve stopped and gave her a vicious smile.

“You!” Maryam blurted. “How? What?” She was too startled to frame her questions coherently.

Sylve showed her a set of iron keys on their ring and jangled them in front of her face. “I was Raven’s woman before he brought you back from the third planet. I still have the keys to these rooms.”

Maryam stared at her, and then saw the movement in the outer doorway that Sylve had left open. It was not Raven. Another man stood there grinning. Sylve was not alone.

Sylve saw the shift of Maryam’s eyes and instantly hurled the heavy key ring full into Maryam’s face. Maryam flinched and twisted her face away, bringing up her hand to protect her eyes. The keys smashed into her cheek, and then Sylve followed them up with a clenched fist that hit Maryam square on the jaw. The Hindu princess reeled and fell and the side of her head came into violent contact with the corner of one of the low tables. With the third blow, her senses blacked out with the triple shock and the pain and she slumped in a heap to the floor.

Sylve stood over her victim, breathing heavily but grinning with triumph. The man behind her quickly closed the door, and then knelt to check that Maryam was unconscious. When he was satisfied, he rolled her inert body into the window alcove and then pulled the curtains to cover it.

“Hide yourself,” he commanded Sylve. “The Sword Lord Karn is a sick man and he will not detain Raven for long. He could return at any moment.”

Sylve scowled. She did not like taking orders and this was her plan, but Tighe was a trained assassin and Doran had placed him in charge. She drew the long knife from her hip and then moved to conceal herself behind the tall curtains. It gave her a certain pleasure to hide there, standing over the fallen body of the hated brown bitch. If Tighe did his job properly, she would not be needed, and then she would be perfectly situated to slice the brown bitch’s throat before they left.

* * *

Maryam’s senses swam back slowly. The side of her face hurt and her head ached and she lay still to avoid aggravating the pain. She felt the wetness of blood trickling down her cheek and remembered what had happened to her. She felt her anger rising, but instinct warned her to remain silent and still.

When her head stopped swimming, she carefully opened her eyes, just enough to give her narrowed slit vision. She saw the bare floorboards, a glimpse of the bottom edge of the tall curtains, and a black leather boot. She could hear nothing. She lay as if frozen and then risked opening her eyes fully. Her head hurt a little more, but nothing else happened. She could see no more than she had seen through her slitted eyelids, just a few more square inches of knotted floorboard and a little higher up the curtain.

Very slowly, she turned her head a little toward the black boot. The black leather rose to a blue-skinned knee, and then there was bare blue thigh flesh, disappearing under a short leather skirt. She realized that Sylve was standing over her, and a glint of steel almost out of range of her vision told her that Sylve was holding a drawn knife.

Sylve was silent and waiting, hardly breathing, and she had not been alone. Maryam guessed that the man who had accompanied Sylve was also silent and waiting, Out of sight from the main door in either the food room or the bedroom. They were waiting for Raven to return.

Maryam steeled herself, and she too waited.

It seemed an eternity before she finally heard movement at the outer door. Raven’s key clicked in the lock and she heard the door creak as he pushed it back without any need for silence or stealth. Above her, she saw and felt Sylve go tense.

“Raven, beware!”

With both palms flat on the floorboards, Maryam pushed herself upwards. The back of her neck slammed Sylve in the crotch and her shoulders butted hard at the taut buttocks. Turning her head in the same moment that she shrieked her warning, Maryam sank her teeth into the soft flesh of Sylve’s inner thigh and bit down with all the strength of her jaws. Sylve was knocked forward, out of the window alcove and dragging the curtains down with her.