Wounds, Book 1 by Ilsa J. Bick Read Free Book Online

someone with no supplies to wander around on her own? In fact, Mara here,” he nodded at the blonde with the scarred jaw and no nose who stood on his left, “she says you were foraging for wood and very noisy about it. So, with friends like that—”
    “With friends like that, I don’t need enemies. Right, right.” Lense feigned impatience. “That just goes to prove my point. If I were some sort of spy, I’d be, well, kind of stealthy, wouldn’t I? Spies usually sneak around.”
    He arched an eyebrow, the left. “Maybe you’re a very poor spy.”
    “Or maybe I’m not a spy. That’s what I’m telling you. Look, I don’t know what it is about no that you don’t understand, but for the record: My name is Elizabeth Lense. I’m not a spy. I was out with friends. We were separated. I was trying to make myself comfortable before it got dark. I am confident my friends will be looking for me, are looking right now. They’ll be worried sick. Period, end of story.”
    “Then why are you dressed like that, hmm? That looks like a uniform. And what’s this?” He flipped her combadge like a coin, caught it one-handed, thrust it under her nose. “What is this, some sort of insignia?”
    Her fingers itched, and it was all she could do not to snatch the combadge from his hand. “It’s jewelry. I told you.”
    “I don’t believe you. How stupid do you think the Jabari are, eh? Hiking; that’s absurd. You don’t have a pack. You don’t even have a canteen.”
    Lense was silent. Mara, the blonde, had asked the same things. They’d shepherded her along a corkscrew trail that doglegged and cut along switch-backs through the mountains north of the sea. The terrain had turned progressively worse, the vegetation sparser, and Lense’s boots were not up to the task of hoofing it up trails filmed with crumbly scree. She’d fallen a lot, ripped her uniform pants at the knees and gotten banged up pretty good. But it was when she started coughing that they stopped to rest. Mara and the men swigged water from canteens while Lense leaned back against a boulder, dripped sweat and wheezed. Her chest was killing her and when she could work up a mouthful of spit, it came out rust-colored, and her mouth tasted like metal. That scared her.
    That’s when Mara scowled. “Where’s your canteen?”
    Lense worked at getting air. “I…I lost it.”
    “Lost it. How could you…?” Then Mara gave a horsey snort, scrubbed the spout of her canteen with the flat of her hand and thrust the canteen under Lense’s nose. “Here. But don’t get any ideas. You’re worth a lot more alive than you are dead.”
    Lense hadn’t argued. The water smelled of a combination of tin and petrochemicals. Probably the stuff was going to make her as sick as a Klingon on fish juice, but it was wet and she gulped it back.
    Now, the man—the obvious leader—said, “I see two options: believe you, or kill you. Either way, though, you can’t expect that I’ll just let you walk away.”
    “And why not?” Lense thrust out her chin. “Did I come looking for you? No. Your people came after me.”
    Mara cut in. “Saad, this is a waste of time. Her family’s got money; they’ve got to be rich. She’s just too well-fed to be from one of the other Outlier tribes.” Mara tossed Lense a narrow-eyed, suspicious look. “All you have to do is look at her to know that she’s got connections. There’s not a scratch on her, no visible prosthetics. I’ll bet that if we strip her down, she won’t have any scars either. No organ transplants, nothing.”
    “So you’re talking ransom,” Saad said slowly. His eyes were that shade of brown that’s almost black, and now they clicked over Lense, clearly taking inventory. “Maybe. But look at her skin, Mara. See how pale she is? And that blood.” He pointed at the scratches on Lense’s arms and her crusted knees. “It’s too red. Maybe she’s a mutant that got cast out of the city.”
    “Or maybe