Redemption by M J Marlow (librera reader .txt) 📕

and he was lying here like a helpless child while his aunt laughed down at him. He struggled to his feet wondering why his side felt so strange. Then he saw the sword sticking out of his body. He pulled it out and raised it in his hands, shaking as the weight of it made his arms ache. But that did not stop him. He had to get to Marit, and that meant he had to stop the witch. Her laughter died the moment he sent her head flying. Then he dropped the sword and collapsed to his knees.
“It will be all right, Tavin,” Margarete’s voice, so much like his beloved’s voice entered his ears. He was helped to his feet and guided to the Infirmary. “Marit is all right.” She mopped his sweating brow as the fever hit. “She will be with you soon. You hang on to that thought, boy. Marit is yours and she will be with you.” She looked over at the North men. “How are they doing, Nara?”
“They are strong these northern dogs,” the healer said with outright respect. “A lesser man would be dead from such wounds.” She looked over at the bed where Amabet’s body lay. “We will have to burn her, lady. Her evil must be purged from our house quickly.”
“Have Elder Sodu see to it, Nara,” Margarete said wearily. “Where is my brother, Nara? How could he had let Amabet do such horrible things?”
“He had no choice, lady Margarete,” a young female voice spoke up from the doorway. Margarete turned to see Reyma, Amabet’s daughter, standing there. “My mother?” she asked as she looked at the covered body. Nara nodded and the girl sank to her knees. “Thank the fates. She is gone!
Margarete wondered at the expression of glee on Reyma’s face, but didn’t have time to dwell on it as one of the other men, Badger, began to moan. Nara and Margarete went to his aid and did not see the hungry look on Reyma’s face as she looked at Tavin. She went to his side and ran her hand down his arm. He should be her mate, she thought as she looked down into his handsome face. She was his cousin, too. And she was full blooded; not like the princess Marit. How could he want a mate who could not join him fully in the delights of four and two? It made no sense to her. She added a sedative into two cups of water and gave them to her aunt and the healer. When she was sure they were asleep, she lifted Tavin to his feet and half dragged, half carried him away.
“Hello, beloved,” Reyma purred several days later when the worst of his injuries had healed. “I am happy to see you recovering.”
“Marit?” Tavin’s eyes opened and he looked at Reyma in confusion. “Reyma? What are you doing here?” He sat up and heard the rattle of metal. He looked down at the shackles on his wrists; felt the collar around his throat. “What are you doing?”
“You belong to me, Tavin,” Reyma said to him simply. “I brought you here so that I could convince you of that fact.” She ran her fingers along his bare chest, and he realized that he was naked. “By the time I am through with you, my love; you will not even remember Marit. She will be nothing to you.”
“It will never happen, Reyma,” Tavin snapped at her and tried to pull the shackles free. “Marit and I are fated. We saw it at the first place.”
“Old superstitions,” Reyma sniffed. “I can see you are going to be stubborn about this. So,” she said sadly as she forced him to drink something and the freed him from the shackles and helped him outside, “we are going to have to be harsh with you.”
“What have you done?” Tavin screamed as the pains ripped through him. He watched as his arms and legs began to transform. Not to wolf, however, as they should. He was being turned into a – a mule! “Reyma!” he screamed and turned to look at the delight in her eyes.
“I’m sorry, Tavin,” Reyma said as she put a halter on his face and snapped a lead to it to tie to the rail around the pen where two other mules were tethered. “But until you agree to be mine, you are just going to have to be a dumb animal.” She got her packs and put them on his back. “And we are going to have to go somewhere we are not known.” She finished putting packs on him and then got the other mule and untethered it. She mounted this one and moved around to pull Tavin’s lead free. “Just you, me, Susa, and your father.”
Tavin’s mind screamed as he trotted along after her like the dumb mule whose form she had locked him in. She was riding his father! Like he also was a mule. And Marit’s childhood friend was also sharing this nightmare; the poor child who knew nothing of transformation and magic. He was angry, but his mind was impotent in the new form. Whatever magicks she had used on them were unbreakable. They left Stormkeep and headed north away from the borderlands. His mind screamed out for Marit but he could not feel her now. What had the witch done to him? This was not right! He belonged with Marit. It didn’t seem to matter to his cousin, Reyma, what he wanted however. He and his father were hers now and she delighted in reminding them of this fact at every possible moment. Three days north, they came to a harbor town and she returned Tavin to his human form. She rendered him mute and chained his body to respond to her commands. He watched in horror as she sold his father and Susa, still chained as mules, and they boarded a ship headed even further north.
“From this night on,” Reyma said as she fixed her potion and added it to some wine, “you are mine. Body and soul, mind and heart.” She stirred the potion and repeated her spell three times. Then she handed him the cup. “Take this, Tavin and drink.” He could not refuse her, his body was hers to command. He drank the wine and screamed as he felt something settle on his mind. “Now, my cousin,” Reyma smiled as she removed her dress and came to stand before him. “You will love only me.”

*
Marit woke up screaming. Everything Tavin had gone through had flooded into her sleeping mind. She had seen it all: the abduction; the chained forms; the trip north. She had felt it all: his pain, his grief, his terror, and then the numbness. She tried to get to her feet and someone was holding her down. She opened her eyes to see the healer bringing a cup to her lips. She struck it aside and tried to get out of bed and found herself being forced back by her father. He held her as the healer readied another sedative.
“No,” Marit screamed. “I can’t sleep. She’s taken Tavin away. I must find him and free him.” They got the sedative into her and her screams became muted. “Please, Father. You have to let me go. Tavin has fallen victim to a witch!”
“I’m sorry, daughter,” Marius frowned as he watched her fall to sleep. “It’s too soon. You need time to heal.” He turned to see the door opening. He was on his feet as he saw who was walking through the door. “You’re dead.”
“A lie meant to keep you from looking,” Margarete told him. She looked at their daughter. “It is good you keep her sedated. What is happening to Tavin is not for her.” She sank down on the chair next to Marit’s bed. “Not just yet.”
“What happened?”
“My twin,” Margarete told him. She could see she didn’t need to explain further. Marius remembered the damage Amabet had done to them. “But her daughter; your other daughter, Reyma, is far worse.” She saw him go pale. “You did not know?”
“I thought she was lying,” Marius replied. “Just to make me hurt for sending Marit away.” He went to the window and ran his hand through his hair. “Even if I could have raised Reyma, I would have had to take her mother as well. And I could not have another woman,” he said as he looked at Margarete. “My heart was gone when you left.”
“Amabet damaged a lot of people in her madness,” Margarete sighed. “But I am afraid her daughter is going to be a whole different matter. She has Tavin now, and for now that is enough.” She stroked Marit’s hair, a sad look on her face. “But she is not going to be satisfied until she has destroyed Marit as well.” She heard Marit whimpering and knew the girl was suffering from her bond with Tavin. “They have bonded, Marius.” She saw his shock and shared it. “As we did, they saw Gyr and Ashya’s will in the first place.”
“There is a way to break that bond, Margarete,” Marius said as he came to lay his hand on his queen’s shoulder. “You told me so when we stood there.”
“It is cruel and could cause far more damage.” Margarete looked up at her husband. “He is a good man, Marius. He would have loved her as she should be loved; as you loved me.”
“I have asked Edmund of Fellstone to take her to wife,” Marius told his wife. “He is a good man as well, and he has stood by and watched her suffer the agonies of the past months with mounting affection. He and his sister will take her with them when they leave in the morning.” He looked down at his daughter with regret. “I have already signed the certificate as her father.”
“They will tell her he is dead?” Margarete asked him, her eyes remaining on Marit.
“It seemed the kindest lie,” Marius nodded. He sank down on his knees. “I would have spared her this, Margarete. I never wanted our daughter to know such pain as we did.”
“It would appear that pain is our heritage,” Margarete replied. “I will go with her when she leaves.” She felt him stiffen. “She will need someone with her for a while who understands the torment her mind will suffer.” She laid her hand on his shoulder now. “I will show them how to prepare the medication that will lessen the nightmares.”
“Then you will return to Stormkeep?”
“Only if you do not want me, my love,” Margarete told him.
“You are my heart, beloved one,” Marius said softly as his hand moved up to grip hers. “How could I not want you back?”
Marit woke the next morning to the news that she had been married to Edmund and was leaving with him and Naji for Fellstone. She had been given the first of the drug that was meant to help her forget Tavin and she was numb. She rose in a cart, propped up by pillows and tended by her new sister-in-law and Margarete. She was too tired to cry; too tired to move. She smiled weakly as Edmund joined her at meals and held her hand in his, smiling proudly. He was kind to her, and gentle when he joined her that night in the tent. She knew he would kill himself to make her happy and she wished with all her heart that she could give him some encouragement that his love was returned.
“It is all right, Marit,” he said to her later after he had made love to her with all the gentleness she had never experienced before. “I love you enough for both of