Gallow by Nathan Hawke Read Free Book Online

get silver for a horse in Andhun, even an old nag. In Tarkhun too.’ She shook her head. ‘You’re still one of them. You just pretend you’re not because they wouldn’t have you any more.’ Now she was being nasty. His fault. He drove her to it.
    Gallow looked away. They both knew she was right, though: the other forkbeards wouldn’t even look at him, not with his bare face. He’d done that for her, years ago when she’d thought it would change him, but of course it hadn’t changed anything at all. ‘I ran away,’ he said, ‘with a band of Marroc who were as brave as anyone else. We found horses in the woods with dead men sitting on their backs. This one was alive. We shared the horses between us. I have another.’
    ‘You got two?’ Her eyes flashed. ‘Where are they?’
    ‘Out in the fields.’ Gallow shook his head. ‘There are no riders in the hills, Arda. I came that way myself. Vennic probably saw the two of us in the distance and panicked. You know what he’s like.’ He must have seen the uncertainty in her face. Yes, she did know what Vennic was like, the whole village knew. He looked away. ‘Someone should go to the Crackmarsh and bring the others back.’
    ‘Someone should get those horses brought into the yard before they’re eaten by wolves!’
    Gallow cocked his head at the man asleep on their furs. ‘His wound should be cleaned and stitched closed in the way of the Aulians.’
    ‘And are
you
going to tend to him?’ Arda let out a scornful laugh. ‘Yes, and I should let you! A fine way that would be to help him on to the Marches. Might as well just use that knife on him.’ She sighed. She didn’t want this other man here but she didn’t want him dying under her roof either. A lot of bad luck that was, and she certainly wasn’t going to open his throat in her own house, however much a part of her would have liked that. ‘Fine then. Since you say he must stay then let him get well or die quickly. When Nadric comes back we’ll see. Until then at least let someone who won’t stitch his eyes shut tend to him. I’ll do it. Go and get those horses and keep them safe!’
    They looked at one another. It was hard to be angry with Gallow for long. He’d never been cruel or unjust, he just didn’t
think
, that was all. Flesh and blood, children and household, all that came before anything else, and if it hadn’t been that way for her then she would never have married him, never even taken him into her home. ‘I won’t cut his throat,’ she snapped. ‘Much as I’d like to.’
    He gave her a hard look. She threw up her hands in disgust. ‘I swear by Modris and by Merethin’s ghost! Happy?’ Merethin had been Nadric’s son and had fathered Jelira, her oldest. The forkbeards had killed him. She hadn’t thought much of him before he’d gone off to war and had roundly cursed his name ever since, but she always held him up to Gallow whenever she was angry. She scowled. For being from across the sea, that was what it came to. That’s what he’d done wrong. Nothing else.
    Gallow nodded. He put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. He could be kind when he wanted to be, and kindness was something she secretly craved. She didn’t flinch away. ‘I’m sorry I scared you.’
    ‘I wasn’t
scared
, you idiot! Modris and Ballor! Will you get on and do what needs to be done!’ Scared? Maybe she had been, but she’d die before she’d admit it to a forkbeard, even him. When he’d cut his beard, perhaps he’d thought it would mellow the hardness she wore like armour, just like she thought it might change him, but it didn’t change either of them. It wasn’t fair. She knew that. But it wasn’t fair to see a husband and a brother killed and a home burned by the forkbeards either. The only time she let him see any other side of her was at night. Women had their urges as much as men.
    He squeezed again and then let her be when she almost kicked him away from her. ‘Stupid man!’ Ah,