Azhure breathed a sigh of relief and relaxed her arms about the child. She knew she was lucky
not to have received a beating for her earlier remark about her mother. She had only just
recovered from the three broken ribs he had given her two months ago.
As Hagen began to snore Azhure sat by the fire, rocking the child to sleep, and planned.
She moved during the dark hours of the night. In the hours before dawn, when the human
body and spirit were at their lowest ebb.
First she wrapped the sleeping child in a warm blanket, whispering to her to be quiet,
then grabbed a cloak herself. She would have liked to take some food with her, but she dared not
take the risk that it would weigh her down.
As Azhure bent down to lace her boots her nervous excitement grew.
Courage, Azhure, she berated herself. Another hour at the latest and you and the Avar
man can be racing for the Forbidden Valley. And then you can spend the rest of your years
wandering with GoldFeather. Free from Hagen.
Azhure swore silently as one of the bootlaces stubbornly refused to tie. She had the child
tucked under one arm and, combined with her nervousness, it made her fumble-fingered. Quickly
laying the sleeping child on the floor, she began to relace the offending boot.
―Bitch!‖ Hagen grunted behind her and grabbed the child.
―No!‖ Azhure cried hoarsely, too frightened to scream. She tried to turn around, but
overbalanced and fell to the floor.
Hagen threw the now crying child on the bed. Stepping over to the table he dealt Azhure
a vicious kick in the ribs on the way.
―No!‖ Azhure wheezed, doubling up on her side, trying to draw breath. Hagen had kicked
her in the very ribs he broke two months previously; now it felt like fire flickered up and down
her ribcage. Her face contorted in agony, Azhure squinted towards Hagen.
He stood at the table, ignoring the wails of the child, riffling through the plates and
cutlery that Azhure had washed earlier and had yet to put away.
―No,‖ she whimpered. ―No!‖ She had to move, she had to do something, but the pain in
her ribs crippled her and she could hardly draw breath, let alone get to her feet.
Hagen grunted again, his hand clutching at a bone-handled knife.
―The Forbidden child dies now,‖ he said conversationally, lifting the knife to inspect its
edge.
He spent hours each week honing that knife.
Azhure knew how sharp it was.
He lifted the knife…
Azhure groaned and closed her eyes.
The flames cracked and popped.
She rolled over so that she was lying on her belly and pressed her face into the stone
floor, desperate to escape both the scene before her and the memories fighting to break free.
The smell was terrible.
Hagen stepped over Azhure‘s still body and took another step towards the child on the
bed.
The little girl. Frightened. Watching. Unable to escape.
He was not worried about Azhure. He had beaten her into submission enough over the
years to know that she would not act now. He had trained her well.
“Why not kill me?” she screamed.
Hagen reached the bed and began to pull the little girl‘s outer clothes apart.
“Because I like to see you suffer,” he replied.
Azhure finally managed to rise to her knees, but she was still bent double with pain and
fear. Not now. Not again!
“Shall I check the bandages this morning? See what’s there?”
Hagen raised the knife.
Hagen raised the knife…
Azhure raised her hands to her head, rocking backwards and forwards, keening under her
breath. Not again! Not again!
This time she could stop it. This time she could save the child, and in doing so, save
herself.
…and dug.
Azhure launched herself forward, grabbing frantically for the hem of Hagen‘s robe.
He heard her movement and half turned, the knife still raised, his face masked in rage.
Her grasping fingers caught at the hem of his robe, but the material slipped through.
Howling in anger now, Hagen raised his foot to stamp on Azhure‘s fingers, the knife
glinting wickedly in his hand.
With the last of her strength Azhure grabbed his foot and twisted, took a desperate breath,
and twisted again.
Hagen teetered backwards and forwards, his face surprised rather than angry. Then, with
a small ―Oh!‖ of utter astonishment that Azhure would actually do this to him, he toppled to the
floor.
Azhure rolled out of the way and scrambled to her feet, one hand clutching her ribs. But
her breath was coming more easily now and she stood ready, sure that Hagen would leap to his
feet with a savage roar, intent on her final murder.
But Hagen lay still, his right arm twisted under his body.
The Avar girl‘s wails began to subside and Azhure quickly checked her. She was
unharmed, but Hagen had come so close…so close…
Azhure took a quick, deep breath, fighting to forget the brief images that had flashed
through her mind.
That never happened!
―No,‖ she whispered, her mind slipping dangerously close to the edge of madness. ―That
never happened. Forget it, Azhure. Forget it. It was your imagination.‖ In her battle to
disremember the horror, Azhure unconsciously murmured the words that had been shouted at her
for so many years. ―Wicked child. That‘s what you are. Wicked.‖
She finally slammed the door on the memories, composing herself with great effort, and
stared at Hagen. Had he knocked himself unconscious in the fall? Azhure hoped so. If he was
unconscious then she and the child would still be able to scramble free.
Slowly, lest the man only be pretending, Azhure bent down and touched him quickly on
the shoulder. He didn‘t react. She shoved him and leapt back. But still Hagen didn‘t move.
―Oh, no,‖ Azhure whispered as she watched his still body, her stomach starting to churn.
―Oh no!‖
On the bed Shra rolled over and sat up, her tear-streaked face curious.
Biting her tongue to stop herself from gagging, Azhure seized Hagen by the shoulder and
rolled him over, grunting at the flare of pain in her ribs as she did so.
He was dead.
Everything told Azhure that: the spreading pool of blood beneath him; his staring eyes,
comically surprised; his hand still grasped about the hilt of the knife, its blade stuck its entire length in his lower abdomen. As she watched, his dead hand slowly unclenched and slid to his
side, hitting the floor with a sickening thud.
Azhure turned away and retched. Shra stared, then slid down from the bed, toddling over
to the body. Almost overbalancing on her plump legs, she squatted down and rested both hands
in the pool of blood.
―Azhure,‖ she lisped and Azhure looked back, stunned to see the child with both her
hands swimming in blood.
―No!‖ she cried and snatched the child from beside Hagen‘s body. What did she think she
was doing?
Then the child did something even more strange. She lifted one hand to Azhure‘s
forehead and ran her fat little fingers down the woman‘s face, leaving three trails of blood.
―Accepted,‖ she said clearly. ―Accepted.‖
Azhure sat trembling at the table for a very long time, the child in her lap, staring at
Hagen‘s body.
She had killed him. She had killed him. The words ran through her mind over and over.
Murder. There was no other way to dress it up.
And every time that thought ran through her head a wave of sickness enveloped her.
Murder.
She had not wanted to kill him. She had simply wanted to protect the child and escape
from him.
Eventually Azhure roused herself. She could not stay here now. The village people would
undoubtedly lynch her the moment someone discovered the body. Then they would burn the
Avar man and the little girl.
And Azhure would not have escaped Hagen at all.
Hurriedly she wiped her face and the child‘s hands, leaving the blood-streaked towel
lying on the table. ―Come,‖ she whispered to the child. She rewrapped the girl, adjusted her own
cloak and left the house she had called home for almost twenty-eight years behind her without a
backward glance.
Outside Azhure recovered the cloak she had secreted for the Avar man and walked to the
rear door of the Worship Hall.
Could she go through with the rest of the plan, when the initial stages had gone so
disastrously wrong?
―I must,‖ she murmured determinedly, ―if I am to save this girl and the man. We are all
dead if we stay.‖
She forced herself to think of what she needed to do. How many guards had been left to
watch over the Avar man? She stepped down the stairs to the cell, making no effort to move
silently. She did not want to appear to be sneaking.
When she walked into the cellar, the Avar girl-child held tightly in her arms, Azhure