Sharing a Pavilion With You
Chapter 152: Finding the Princess

Chapter 152: Finding the Princess

Mei Renlong galloped his horse down the main road heading east. He had picked up another two soldiers, so there were four men on his heels, struggling to keep up with his wild pace.

Though it was the main road to the eastern kingdoms, it was not wide, and it was filled with twists and turns as it followed mountains and gullies of the northern region through dense bamboo forest.

The ground was still wet with sleet and melting snow, spraying the men from head to toe with specks of mud, as they pushed their horses to the limit.

First was concerned he might miss a clue among the sporadic hoofprints coming from the opposite direction, but he didn’t dare slow down, thinking to himself that every minute now could be critical.

He was becoming more and more convinced that Sofya was in danger...

His heart thrummed with urgency and fear, though he didn’t dare acknowledge the sentiments that might be driving him to such heights of panic, behaviour which was completely out of character for the cool man who prided himself on always keeping his emotions in check.

They had been riding at this frenzied pace for at least an hour, when the soldiers started to drop further behind him.

"Sir, Sir!" yelled one. "Sir, our horses are not as strong as yours. They need to rest! Sir?"

Mei Renlong pulled on his warhorse’s reins and turned the horse to face the men, waiting for them to catch up to him.

He looked at their mounts. They were lathered and labouring for breath.

"Alright," he said shortly. "We’ll trot for a while and let the horses catch their breath."

"They need water, Sir," ventured the same man.

"Just hold on for another half hour," he replied tersely, turning his horse and trotting off down the road. "We’ll find somewhere for them to drink then."

He needed to get as far as he possibly could before they stopped for a break. It didn’t bear thinking about if something happened to her while they were resting the horses.

At least at this pace he could carefully check the road without fear of missing something critical, he thought as he hunted for clues.

"What are we looking for Sir?" asked a soldier, seeing the way the Chief Strategist was studying the road. "Maybe we can help?"

"Two young women travelling alone towards our camp," he replied, without elaborating any further.

The soldiers looked at one another, eyebrows raised. What on earth would two young women who their Chief Strategist knew, be doing out here alone?

It wouldn’t do to share the princess’s identity with these men just yet, Mei Renlong decided; in case something bad had happened to her which they might need to keep hidden to preserve her reputation.

His heart gave a clench of pain at the awful thought.

They hadn’t been trotting for long when in the distance a faint scream could be heard.

Mei Renlong’s head jerked up from its downward position where he had been glued to the road. He looked wildly left and right, hunting for the direction the sound had come from.

"It was up ahead, Sir!" yelled a soldier.

"Yaah!" Mei Renlong spurred his horse into a gallop, careening up the steep hill, the men close behind him.

Another scream rang out. High pitched... female... This time much closer.

Mei Renlong turned his horse three hundred and sixty degrees, hunting for a critical clue that would show him where they had left the road.

There it was! A patch of disturbed snow and mud alongside the tight curve of the road.

He kicked his horse back into a gallop, following the hoofprints of what looked to be at least seven or eight horses.

He emerged into a small clearing in the bamboo.

What happened next was a confused blur.

As he looked across the clearing, he saw two groups of men holding two people down.

"Help! Help! Somebody help me!" screamed one of the people being pinned to the ground. They were thrashing and fighting.

Sofya! her despairing voice struck him like a whip.

She was dressed as a man, but she was unmistakeably a woman.

Fighting her captors like a wildcat, but still not managing to escape. Her long hair was messy and loose, but he would have recognised her beautiful face anywhere.

One of the men gave an ugly laugh.

"I told you they was women," he cackled, "and this one’s a real beauty".

"Cut her clothes off," called another of the men who held one of her arms.

"Don’t even think about it!" Sofya screamed. "I’ll kill you all if you touch me," her voice turned imperious and cold, commanding...

"You don’t think she’s someone important do you?" asked the third man, uncertainty creeping into his voice at her tone, which identified her as from the upper classes.

"Who cares. Dead noble girls don’t tell tales."

An arrow emerged through the man’s stomach, and he looked down at it in disbelief before dropping to his knees with a groan.

An arrow struck the throat of the man next to him. His hands gripped the shaft, and an awful gurgling sound rang out across the clearing before he fell forward from his knees onto Sofya.

The girl didn’t waste her chance, scrambling out from under the man’s body, as the remaining three men shouted, running for cover or for their weapons.

They were all shot as they ran, until seconds later, none of them were left alive.

Mei Renlong leapt from his horse and ran across the clearing to Sofya who was weeping as she crawled away from the dead bodies.

He scooped the girl up in his arms, while his soldiers ran over to her maid, who now stood, trembling with fear in the aftermath of the attack, and looking about the clearing for her Young Miss.

She tried to run to her, but her legs gave way, and she collapsed.

Sofya was covered in blood from the man whose corpse had fallen on her.

She looked up and saw that the man who carried her appeared to be Mei Renlong.

The girl opened her eyes wide and shut them, before opening them again to check if he was real. He remained there, hovering inches above her. A shaky hand reached out to touch his face, checking if the apparition might fade into nothingness.

As soon as her delicate fingers had grazed his cheek, her eyes rolled upwards, and her lashes fluttered for a minute, before she fainted.