Inheritance

Part 2. Chapter 37: For the Price of Gold

Instead, she felt nothing but sickness inside.

She realized that she still felt very tired.

She curled up on her side and went back to sleep.

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"Get up." Kline nudged her with the tip of his boot.

Pollyanna groaned and rolled over.

"Get up!" Kline said furiously.

He seized her arm and hauled her to her feet.

"You're a woman now. You can't spend your time pouting like a child! You could catch a cold sitting out in the rain like this!" Kline dug his fingers into her arm so roughly that she was sure it would bruise. There was a time she would have whimpered at that.

Now, she yanked her arm away. "Don't touch me."

"What did you say?" Kline demanded.

He drew himself to his full height.

She smirked as she realized for the first time since they had been married that he was only barely taller than her.

"Is this funny to you?" Kline rose his hand.

Pollyanna knitted her brows. "What will you do to me? Will you hit me? Call me names? Rape me? Kill me? You've done all of these things but the last; there are no other ways you can hurt me. So why don't you kill me? Throw me off the mountain, cut my throat... I'm sure the guards will come looking for me. So do it; I'll die happy knowing that you would be thrown in the dungeon."

Kline slammed his knuckles into her stomach.

Her knees buckled. She cradled her stomach. Weakly, she climbed to her feet unsteadily in a moment.

"I could divorce you." Kline whispered threateningly. "No more good meals. No more fancy clothes. No more... Soft sighs."

Kline murmured as he pulled her up against him.

"You have my mother for that." Pollyanna spat as she shoved him away. "I don't care whether you divorce me. I only married you to support my mother."

Pollyanna paused—her eyes flicking from the ground and then back to Kline's face. "Why would you do this? It's not enough that you have to own and rape me, but you have to have my mother, too? Does this make you feel powerful? Were you a tiny noble? Did the other nobles laugh at you and your comparative lack of wealth? Is that what this is about?"

Kline was stunned at her sudden boldness.

His look of shock turned into a dark rage. "I won't divorce you; I'll lock you in the manor and use you only what you were meant to be used for."

Angry tears cascaded down Pollyanna's cheeks in response.

"You'll go to the underworld and you'll be torn apart by thousands of monsters for this." Pollyanna replied.

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Kline was dragging Pollyanna along by the arm toward the town when they reached the bottom of the mountain.

Pollyanna had very few options.

She could try to fight him now and perhaps get away, but to what end? She had no where to go but to the nearest convent.

Similarly, she could attempt to show the guards in the town her bruises so she could get a lawful divorce, but she wasn't sure the bruises she just got would show up just yet. She wasn't even sure the guards would take her side.

For both of these options, her mother would likely end up on the street, which brought Pollyanna to tears.

She impulsively decided to take her chances here and now.

She elbowed Kline in the side and sprinted south where the convent lay.

She gasped and panted as she ran.

She looked back and saw that Kline was not pursuing her.

He merely stood still with an oddly restrained expression on his face.

Her heart was beating with joy as she put more and more inches between herself and Kline. I'm free... I'm free!

She didn't care about having to live the rest of her life in a convent; all she cared about was being free.

Until she remembered Rory.

When she remembered Rory, she sobbed horribly.

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An hour or so passed.

Pollyanna's legs were getting tired as she walked through a land so silent that she thought she might be the only one upon it.

Even the chilly breeze had died down. The only sounds left were her heavy breathing and the sound of gravel flying beneath her feet.

Nothing but dirt and an open road was stretched ahead of her as far as the eye could see.

She had been running as often as she could to put as much distance between her and the town, but she had slowed down to a crawl. Her legs ached.

She was horribly thirsty and hungry.

Thundering in the distance abruptly filled her ears.

Her eyes widened. There was no storm in the sky.

She looked behind her.

She saw the distant silhouettes of horses charging toward her.

She pushed herself to running despite the fact that her legs were aching.

Her vision was wobbly as she ran.

Frightened tears relentlessly fell from her red eyes--obscuring her vision.

The thundering was fast approaching.

In front of her, she saw no convent; she saw no buildings or people at all. It was just her and the fast-approaching horsemen behind her. She was still far away from it.

The gap between the horsemen and their quarry was fast closing.

A cloud of dust flew under the horses' hooves as they began encircling Pollyanna to block her escape.

Pollyanna stopped running and fell to her knees as a horse ran in her way and whinnied.

She recognized the town guards atop the horses; more than that, she recognized Kline riding on the back of one of the horses.

One of the knights dismounted, holding a piece of rolled up parchment in hand.

He unrolled it in front of Pollyanna and asked, "is this your wedding contract?"

"Yes, but—" Pollyanna began, about to show them her bruises.

"Then you are this man's wife. He could punish you for this, you know." The guard chided her.

"Please listen!" Pollyanna begged. "This man has been abusing me! In the eyes of Renthas, that makes the marriage null and void! It's enough to warrant a divorce!"

The knight raised an eyebrow. "Show me your bruises, girl."

Pollyanna showed the knight her arm where Kline had grabbed her roughly, and then lifted her blouse to show the knight an ugly green bruise beginning to form on her stomach.

"I see nothing." The knight said stoically.

"What? But—"

"Come with me, girl." The knight grabbed her by the arm and lifted her up onto the horse.

The world swam in Pollyanna's eyes.

Everything looked ugly.

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"I learned later that they had taken a bribe from Kline, because why wouldn't they?" Pollyanna snorted. "The things people are willing to sell for a few gold pieces..."

Eory listened silently.

Yharos is ugly. Yharos should burn. Taylor thought his ugliest thoughts for him.