Hers to Choose Read Free Page B

coming hours before you arrived. Sound carries great distances in the wastelands—and the dust! Your numbers hang a sign in the desert air, ‘attention—riders approach’ .”
    She swirled her robes away from her legs and vaulted onto her gelding. A whistled birdcall caught her archers’ attention. “We flank Commander DeStroia. Ride out.”
    Sophi felt the Commander’s eyes on her as she and her flight faded into the desert night.
     
    * * *
     
    When Sophi and her women had faded from sight, Eric strode into the stable yard where his four rides of the Queen’s Royal Guard assembled, preparing for the order to mount. Frustration chewed on his temper. I was prepared for a shy, withdrawn woman, not this—Valkyrie. It is difficult to “escort” a woman when you don’t know where she is, when she doesn’t want or need an escort in the first place.
    “Queen’s Guard! Prepare to mount! Mount!” he barked, swinging up onto his horse. “ Rides ! By twos. Form up!” Cavalrymen paired off and formed orderly lines, broken every eight riders by a colorful pennant bearing the insignia of their unit.
    “Queen’s Guard! At the walk! March!” Eric ordered.
    As his horse’s long stride swung through the arches of the village wall, his second-in-command rode up to him.
    “Commander?”
    “Captain.”
    “Do we leave without Lady DeLorion?”
    “No.” Eric fumed in silence.
    “Commander?”
    “What!”
    The man cleared his throat nervously. “Where is Lady DeLorion?”
    “Good question, Captain Biron. If you see her , let me know.”
     
    * * *
     
    Sophi’s flight roamed as satellites to the cavalry squadron, orbiting unseen yet always present. Sophi and her second, Petrina, rode as a pair in the deepest shadows. They skirted the small rock outcroppings and blended invisibly with the stunted vegetation. The three-quarter moons’ cast deep shadows but sufficient light to make their way. The women ghosted, unseen and unheard, across the severe landscape. Sophi paused occasionally to make use of her night-glass, sweeping the horizons, always watching. The handsome commander at the head of the column of riders regularly drew her gaze. She studied his broad shoulders and long lines. His masculine face with its strong, squared jaw and elegant nose was unmistakable in profile, even from a distance. Her memory filled in the mobile, generous mouth and thickly-lashed green eyes. He sat his enormous black warhorse with easy grace, as if one with the creature, a centaur in form-fitting battle leathers. She wondered if he rode women with the same skill as he rode his horse.
    “ He pulls the eye, doesn’t he?” Petrina murmured, teasing Sophi about her preoccupation.
    Sophi collapsed her night-glass and laughed softly. “Yes. I freely admit I enjoy looking at him.” He pulls more than just my eyes. He awakened desires in her she thought eradicated from her psyche.
    The wiry redhead , Petrina, nudged her own mount into a walk. “It is good to see you express interest in a man.”
    Sophi shrugged. “I defy any woman with eyes in her head not to notice Commander DeStroia.”
    “Yes, indeed,” chuckled Petrina. “ Particularly when Segundo DeLorion and the L’anziano might mandate his joining with her.”
    Sophi’s soft snort answered her dearest friend and second-in-command. “Yes. There is that.”
     
     
     



Chapter Three
     
    Eric hadn’t seen Sophi since they left Sh’r Un Kree , five days ago. He sometimes glimpsed their distant fires in the early dawn, but it could have been wishful thinking on his part. The morning sun burned on the horizon in a vision-searing display of fiery crimson and blazing gold.
    His weary men were nearly at the end of their night’s ride when Haarb infantry attacked out of the sun. Their attackers were mere silhouettes against its scorching light. Their foe’s blood-curdling howls echoed across the floor of the small valley as hordes of enemy foot soldiers bore down on Eric