Assassin's Heart (Assassin's Heart, #1)(74)

“Ever seen a gallows before, girl?” Lefevre sneered as he locked my wrists behind me in a pair of shackles. He shoved me away from my cell.

“No,” I replied. “In Lovero we trust steel or poison to do our death work. Rope is for sailors and the sea.”

One of the lawmen laughed. We continued to march.

Outside, the sun brushed the horizon. It would set soon and then the ghosts would rise to search for bodies they could steal.

“We wanted to deal with you as soon as possible,” Lefevre said. “You are more of a threat to the good people of Yvain than the ghosts.”

My lip curled. “I only kill people who deserve it.”

They marched me around a corner, and there, in the center of an empty square, stood a large wooden platform raised on stilts. Above it towered a beam with a dangling noose.

My heart beat faster. Val was right about one thing: this wasn’t the death for me. I was a disciple of Safraella! About to dangle from my neck.

Lefevre shoved me forward. He and his men laughed when I stumbled, but I kept my feet.

We reached the stairs, and I stopped. My legs wouldn’t move, my body wouldn’t respond. I couldn’t walk up those stairs.

The two lawmen grabbed me under the arms and carried me to the platform. I must have seemed a child to them, easy to manage. If I died here, then no one would avenge my Family.

I needed to do something. I needed to save myself!

I jerked my arms forward, trying to break free of the lawmen, but they squeezed their fingers deeper into my flesh. They dragged me to the noose as I struggled and kicked and tried to bite myself free of them. I would not go quietly!

We reached the noose, and Lefevre jerked it over my head. I swung my foot at him, trying to snare his ankle. He danced away.

Another lawman slipped a hood over my head. The musty burlap pressed against my face.

“It’ll go quick,” the lawman mumbled, tightening my noose. “A quick snap and it will be over.”

Every breath pulled the burlap across my lips, but I couldn’t slow my breathing, couldn’t calm the racing of my heart. This was it. The end of it all.

A rushing reached my ears, the sound of my blood roaring through me. Then a man’s shout from behind. A grunt and a loud thump. Yells and the smell of smoke erupted around me, heavy, even through the burlap covering my head.

Someone slammed into me. I staggered. The noose pulled taut against my neck, choking me. Below, something creaked, then banged.

I dropped through the floor.

I didn’t fall straight down. Instead, my ribs slammed into the edge of the trapdoor, interrupting my fall and saving me from a broken neck. Pain erupted across my already bruised chest and vanished again as the noose around my neck tightened.

My throat closed up, the rope clenching my neck like a snake crushing a rat. My eyes bulged as I swung back and forth.

I kicked my feet viciously, trying to find anything to rest upon, to stop the choking, to free me.

Something above snapped. I dropped, crashing to the ground in a painful heap. My bad ankle twisted beneath me, and the burlap sack flew off my head to land in the dust at my feet.

I took a deep breath, coughing at the air that rushed into my wounded throat. Tears poured down my face, the salt reaching my lips. Dank smoke filled the air, an acrid smell that could come from only one source: a smoke bomb. I climbed to my feet. My ribs and ankle screamed at the movement. Above me, the lawman who’d showed me a touch of kindness lay dead, his body draped over the trapdoor, his throat dripping blood. Shouted commands from Lefevre bounced around me, but I couldn’t see him through the thick smoke.

The noose rested against my chest, its end frayed from a cut. Someone had saved me.

Les.

I stumbled from the gallows, coughing with every step, my vision hazy. I needed to get out of here before more lawmen arrived. They’d already tried to hang me once.

“Lea Saldana!” Lefevre called from the smoke. He must have been searching for me. “I’ll find you!”

I slipped down a narrow side street, the smoke abating the farther I got from the square. The little street was almost as dark as full night against the setting sun. The ghosts would be out soon, and injured and bound as I was would make me easy prey. I tripped, crashed against a wall with my shoulder. I cried out at the pain from my ribs. At least one had to be broken.

Before me stretched a canal, its waters dark and still. I stifled a sob. I couldn’t go back. The canal could keep me safe from ghosts, but I couldn’t swim with my arms bound behind me. I leaned over the water, looking for a way across. To the left a bridge spanned the canal. The building beside me had a small ledge that traveled above the canal along the building’s length, leading beneath the bridge.

I slipped onto the stone ledge, pressed close to the wall of the building. My tied hands unbalanced me, and I wavered on each step. If I fell into the canal, I’d drown.

Finally, I reached the bridge and slipped underneath to a shadowed, hidden area. I sat on the cobblestones and calmed my breath.

I’d never come so close to death before. I didn’t care to repeat the experience. Ever.

I inched my arms beneath my legs until they were bound in front of me. Metal shackles encircled my wrists. I couldn’t remove them without help, but at least now I could slip into the water and hang on to the ledge if I needed to.

I tugged the noose off my neck and tossed it into the canal. It sank slowly into the dark water. I leaned against the curved base of the bridge and closed my eyes. I needed to rest a moment, then figure out what to do.