The Prison Healer (The Prison Healer #1)(124)
“Move, and you’re dead,” the guard hissed at him.
“Naari, stop!” Kiva cried.
Raz made an alarming gurgle sound, but still Naari didn’t release him.
“He’s a friend,” Kiva said, stretching the truth but not wanting to see the stablemaster hurt. “Please, he won’t cause us any problems. Will you, Raz?”
Another gurgling sound was all that came in answer, but it must have been enough to satisfy Naari, since she returned to her feet and sheathed her blade.
Slowly, Raz stood as well, rubbing his neck, his face pale as he stared at them.
“There’s a riot happening inside the grounds,” Kiva told him, as Naari and Jaren moved away to begin preparing the carriage for their departure. “It’s a bad one—really bad.”
“I know,” Raz said, his voice trembling slightly, but not from the news of the riot. “They’ve locked the gates. No one in or out.”
Kiva didn’t waste time explaining how she and her friends had made it through the wall. Instead, she said, “We’re leaving. You should come with us.”
Raz took a moment to reply, still recovering from Naari’s attack. “I’m safe enough out here. And I can’t risk losing this job, Kiva.”
She’d known he would say as much, but she’d had to offer.
“I won’t stop you from going,” Raz continued, his voice lowering, as if he feared the Warden would hear. “You of all people deserve a chance at freedom.”
A renewed surge of emotion welled in Kiva, but she shoved it down. Now wasn’t the time, not when she had to focus on escaping, and then on everything that came next. “If you truly mean that,” she said, “can I ask for one last favor?”
Raz sighed, already knowing what she was going to request. “Be quick about it.” He jerked his head to where Naari and Jaren were coaxing a pair of horses toward the harness, the latter wincing with pain but working swiftly despite his injuries.
Aware that she was short on time, Kiva carefully lowered Tipp onto a hay bale, then searched the area for a scrap of parchment and something to write with. Finding nothing, she looked to Raz, but he made a helpless gesture. Clenching her teeth, Kiva ripped a patch from the bottom of her filthy tunic, dipped her finger in the wet blood coating her body, and began to pen her final letter as a prisoner of Zalindov.
“We’re ready to—what are you doing?”
Jaren’s voice was close enough that Kiva jumped, the last symbol of her coded note smudging across the material, but it was still legible.
“I’m writing to my family,” she answered, seeing no point in lying. She was about to tell him more, to explain about Raz playing messenger for years, but Naari called out to them, warning them to move faster, so Kiva tore her gaze from Jaren and handed the bloodied material to the stablemaster.
“Please get this to them as soon as you can.”
Kiva didn’t care whether he sent it off as it was or if he transposed her code onto parchment first, as long as her family received the message.
“I will,” Raz promised as she drew Tipp back up into her arms. “Take care, Kiva.”
“You too,” she whispered, before turning on her heel and following Jaren toward the carriage where Naari was waiting, shifting impatiently from foot to foot.
“Quick, get inside,” the guard said, leaping up front to drive them. “We need to pass through the perimeter fence before Rooke sends word to the guards there. We’ll be free after that—they won’t risk leaving their posts to chase us.”
Urgency thrummed between them as Naari prepared for them to leave and Jaren opened the carriage’s side door, holding a hand out to help Kiva. Together, they maneuvered Tipp inside, both panting when they were finally secured, with Jaren yelling out the window to Naari once they were ready to go. Seconds later, they were moving, bursting out of the stables and leaving Raz behind them, racing down the dirt road to their freedom.
Part of Kiva wanted to look back, just for a moment, to see if the Warden had retreated to the safety of his wall, watching the pandemonium far below. Or perhaps he was watching the small horse-drawn carriage as it passed safely through the perimeter fence and continued out of sight.
But she didn’t look back.
Not even for the man who had killed her father.
Zalindov was behind her now.
She was free.
Tears prickled her nose as realization swept over her, all that had just happened hitting her anew. Tilda’s death. Mot’s sacrifice. Everything that came before and after.
Glancing down, she rearranged Tipp in her lap, the young boy sleeping off what should have been a fatal wound, his gentle face at peace, oblivious to their escape. He had no idea that he wasn’t a prisoner anymore. When he woke up, he’d have a completely new life.
Just as Kiva would.
“What did you write to your family?” Jaren asked. He was sitting across from her, his hands holding his abdomen, his face deathly pale. But he was alive.
They both were.
Despite the odds, they’d survived.
And they were out.
“I let them know that I’m safe. That I’m free.” Kiva swallowed, looking down at Tipp, thinking of Tilda, whose body remained at the prison, and finished, “I told them where they can find me, if they want. That I’ll be in Vallenia. With you.”