Chapter 53 Owning You 1

Chapter 53 Owning You 1
The sun was high up in the sky and blazing down but the weather had gotten chilly. Winter was coming, they could feel that in the air.
Iris and Ryder sat on their horses and stood side to side, neither of them saying a word to the other, or planning to. They waited for Xanth and Lyra so they could be on their way towards the Eldham border where Ryder had planned to cross into Rocheveron after he must have settled the issue of land dispute, and he would settle it his own way.
Xanth approached Ryder, Lyra walked close to his side, she had her head down, not to the ground but she didn’t look up to meet Ryder’s gaze. Both her hands had been bandaged and by the pained look on her face, anyone could tell that the pain from her burned hands still stung something painful.
“Could we delay for a day or two?” Xanth asked Ryder as he walked up to him, patting his horse’s head. Ryder frowned and looked down at him.
“Why?”
“I’m afraid Lyra won’t be able to hold on to the horse’s reins with her hands and ride with us.”
“Then…” Ryder began to say but Iris interrupted him.
“Isn’t she Khione? She can heal herself. Can’t she?”
Ryder found sense in what she had said and he looked to Xanth to answer the question. “Can’t she?”
“Summoning the light energy would require her to use her hands and that might worsen her injuries. She just needs a day or two to heal slightly then maybe she can try healing herself.”
“Then she can stay back at the castle,” Iris told Xanth but kept her gaze on Lyra who didn’t bother to look at her back. “She isn’t of no use to us where we are going anyway.”
“Iris.” Ryder cautioned and she scoffed then guided her horse away from them, heading towards the castle’s gate. Ryder looked back at Xanth and then at Lyra who still didn’t meet his gaze and he frowned. “We have delayed for too long, and every time we could not go it had something to do with her. We cannot delay further.”
Xanth frowned slightly at Ryder, not exactly taken aback by his coldness but somehow, he was angry. “Ryder…”
“We won’t delay anymore because of me,” Lyra spoke up, interrupting Xanth and then she looked up at Ryder, anger evident in her gaze which lingered on him for a while before she turned away and walked to where her horse had been prepared for her. She gripped the reins and saddle and hoisted herself up onto it.
The pain shot through her palms but she held it in. She gave Ryder one last stare before she directed her horse away and past Ryder who gave an irritated smirk and just watched her.
Xanth moved to his horse and mounted it swiftly, urging it forward until he was beside Lyra. If Ryder wouldn’t care, then he would.
They rode nonstop for almost an hour before they stopped at a clearing. They were still in Kilead but had gone quite far away from the castle and were a little distant from the village. Lyra was the first to dismount from her horse, and without saying where she was going, she walked away from the group, towards the sound of running water. Her hands were sore and she could not bear the pain anymore, she would find the source of the running water and dip her hands in it to find some relief.
The source ended up being a creek, not far from where they had stopped, she walked quickly, unwrapping the now bloody bandages as she hurried to the creek’s edge, then she dropped heavily on her knees and dipped her hands into the water. The cool water washed over her hands which throbbed with pain and she shut her eyes. They were riding to Eldham and Xanth said that it would take two days to get there, she looked at her hands in the water, she could not carry on like this for another hour, not to talk of two days.
She pulled her hands out and tried once more to conjure up a ball of light energy to heal herself but the more she tried, the more pain she felt in her hands. She gave up in defeat and put her hands back into the water and cried.
Then she felt someone take her wrist and pull her hands out of the water, she opened her eyes and Ryder was beside her.