“That’s all the explanation I need.”
He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her lips. “Should I leave you to bathe?” he asked softly.
“You should take me to bed.”
Nameer pulled Kyla out of the tub and wrapped her in a towel. Then he led her to the balcony.
“What--” she began, but he only opened the balcony doors and pulled her outside.
“This is a private garden,” he said. “Only accessible from certain areas of the castle. No one will be in it tonight. I knew from the minute you left that this was the room I wanted you to have.”
“It is a lovely garden,” she agreed. “But...”
He gripped her towel and tugged it down firmly. Cool air washed over her skin. “Nameer!”
“No one will see,” he reassured her. “And this was one of my fantasies.”
“How many fantasies did you have?” Kyla asked, arching a brow.
“You were gone 236 days,” he said. “At least one for each day.” He cupped her face. “I thought at times that you wouldn’t come back, but I couldn’t give up on you. I couldn’t even look at anyone else.”
Something that she hadn’t even know was tense suddenly relaxed. “Nobody? The whole time I was gone?”
He shook his head. “I will be faithful to you, Kyla. You belong to me.” He paused and took her hand, laying it on the scars above his heart. “And I belong to you as well.”
She stretched up onto her toes and pressed her lips to his. “Why don’t you show me that fantasy?”
He turned her around and bent her over the railing, kissing the nape of her neck as he pushed his pants down. She’d hardly had time to take a breath before he was buried inside her. Kyla moaned as she pushed back to take him as deep as possible.
“That’s so good,” Nameer said. “Keep moving on me.”
Kyla gripped the railing and worked her hips on him, feeling him sliding inside her. He reached forward and cupped her breasts, pinching her hardened nipples as she moved.
“Have I ever told you how beautiful you are?” he asked.
“You’re usually too busy yelling at me,” she gasped out.
He picked her up and spun her around, settling her down on the balcony railing. “I love that you yell back,” Nameer admitted, cupping the back of her neck and pulling her against his chest.
She tightened her legs around him and he carried her back into her bedroom.
“I wish I could do this all night,” he said.
She arched an eyebrow. “According to my memories, you can.”
His mouth covered hers and she wrapped her arms around him, feeling his muscles move under the scars of his back. Nameer buried his face in the side of her neck and began to move faster.
“Are you ready to come for me, Kyla?”
“More than ready.” She looked into his bright green eyes. “Desperate, my lord.”
He groaned at hearing her say that. “Then hold on tight.”
The headboard began to bang against the wall in rhythm with his thrusts and Kyla felt her orgasm build and crest along with his.
Nameer gritted his teeth, dragging out the pleasure for both of them until he couldn’t take it anymore. They came together, as true mates always did, and he gathered Kyla against his chest when she began to tremble.
“I’ll always keep you safe,” he murmured as he ran his fingers through her hair.
“I’ll keep you safe too,” she promised, tracing his scars. “Stay the night with me?”
Nameer kissed her forehead. “I don’t plan to let you go again,” he said with a grin. “I still have 235 fantasies to go.”
******
THE END
Realm Shifters: Revolutions
Book 3
Kyla has spent the past 3 months in a foreign world doing her best to retrieve the toxin that could kill not only the man she loves, but everyone in the kingdom he is sworn to protect.
She’s formed a team and she has a plan, but even she can’t see everything. There’s more going on behind the scenes than she knows, and it could cost them all their lives…
Nameer and Kyla are about to face the biggest challenge of his rule. Some people in Khaytab aren’t happy with the way things are changing.
Realm Shifters: Revolutions
Book 3
And they’ll do whatever it takes to go back to the old ways…
Kyla rested her arms on the low wall surrounding the training compound and watched silently. There weren’t a lot of women there yet, but there were more than she’d hoped for. Twenty-five women out of all of Khaytab; it was a start. Khaza taught them how to handle weaponry, and Danny taught them self-defense, deferring to Khaza when it came to shifting abilities.
Danny was working with Afani right now, showing her how to use a heavier opponents weight against him. It was smart because Afani was one of the smallest women there. Her head was barely on level with his shoulder. She was doing well though, mainly because Danny was distracted.
Kyla had followed his gaze more than once over the past few weeks and she discovered that it always landed on Lirana. Lirana who was currently proving herself hopeless with a scimitar. Kyla frowned as the other woman shook her head and lowered the weapon, looking down at the ground. Khaza put his hand on her shoulder and spoke gently to her, but she didn’t meet his eyes. Eye contact was a new luxury for most of the women here, but most of the army women were managing. Lirana still couldn’t do it though.
What could they do to let her know that the training compound, despite its swords and blows, was a safe place for her? Kyla chewed her thumbnail, thinking so deeply that she didn’t hear Nameer approach.
“What is this look on your face?” He asked, and she could hear the smile in his voice as he put his arms around her and rested his chin on her shoulder. “I cannot allow you to become angry, lest you shake my kingdom to its roots. Again.”
“I’m not angry,” she answered, leaning back against his broad chest. It was hard to be angry when he was with her. He said it was because they were bonded. She just called it love, but either way, they were meant to make each other better. “I’m just worried about Lirana.”
“She is not fighting well?” He watched her intently for a moment. “I’m not sure she should have a blade.”
“Well...no,” Kyla admitted. “But that’s not really what I was worried about. Now that you mention it, I don’t think that the scimitar is her thing.”
Kyla and Nameer both caught their breath as Lirana came within inches of taking off her own foot. Danny strode across the grass and plucked the blade from her hand. Kyla was too far away to hear what he said, but he handed the woman a sheaf of throwing knives and pointed her to a corner of the compound before going back to Afani. Lirana looked down at the smaller blades and sighed, walking dejectedly over to the target in the corner.
“I am concerned too,” Nameer said, getting back to the reason he’d gone to find his mate. “About tonight. Are you sure that you won’t have me join you?”
Kyla turned in his arms, putting her back to the wall and her arms around his neck. “We’ve been through this, Nameer.”
“Yes, but women are capricious and capable of change,” he said, his tone teasing even though his eyes were worried.
Kyla laughed. “That’s me, so changeable.”
He dipped his head and kissed her, exploiting her weakness for him until she couldn’t hold back a slight moan. His hands slid down her back until he could rock her forward against him.
“Let me go with you.”
“No.” When he sighed and pulled back, she tightened her grip. “You’re susceptible to the poison, I’m not. It’d be different if there was a reliable antidote, but there’s just not.”
Khaytab was alarmingly behind the times when it came to technology. She didn’t mind missing her favorite television shows, but she would have killed for a medical lab of some sort. Nameer had created a team of the better doctors to try to analyze the poison, but since m
ost of it came from a world they weren’t familiar with, they weren’t having much luck.
She and Danny had even talked about the possibility of bringing his brother Steve to Khaytab. They’d decided against it because, as Danny pointed out, “What could he do? Bang rocks together and grind herbs? He might have more knowledge, but he can’t bring his lab with him.”
“Kyla,” Nameer began.
She leaned her forehead on his chest, breathing in his comforting scent. “Please don’t ask, Nameer. I couldn’t lose you like that.” She kept remembering how Steve had described it. “Like strychnine, but slower.” To have to see Nameer in that kind of pain? No way in hell.
He sighed heavily, his hand resting gently on the top of her head. “All right, my love.”
She looked up at him and managed a smile. He tried for one too, but his typically bright green eyes were dark with worry.
“It does not feel right to let you go without me,” he said heavily. “You are mine to protect.”
She traced his jaw with her fingertips. “I know. But you’re mine to protect too.”
******
Kyla looked around at her team. There were ten of them, counting her. Their aim was stealth and retrieval, not a fight. And all of the men were former or current guards, they were all muscular and well trained and they all shifted into massive tigers. She had taken Nameer’s advice in how she treated them and she felt like they all finally respected her.
“All right,” she said, holding herself as tall as possible and speaking loudly to get their attention. She held up one of the poison vials that Danny had managed to take. “This is what we’re looking for and we know that it is extremely dangerous. If the bottles are broken or leaking, do not touch them. Come and find me. It’s not a reflection on you, or your abilities, it’s just my natural immunity to the poison.”
The men nodded, listening intently. Tayas gave her a short smile.
“Why so worried, Captain?”
Kyla couldn’t figure it out, honestly. They’d trained for nearly three months, their spies had come through with some great information, and they’d planned their approach impeccably. And yet she had a bad feeling about it all. There was no way to go back now though.
“I’m not worried,” she lied robustly. “We’re ready to go.”
Tayas fell into step beside her as they moved out. Kyla glanced over at him. She’d wondered about him when he’d first presented himself to be part of the retrieval team. He was arrogant. He had too much swagger. He questioned everything she planned. He’d turned out to be one of her best soldiers.
“Now that the rest of them aren’t listening,” he said in an undertone. “Why don’t you tell me what the problem is?”
She gave a short laugh. “I can’t. I don’t know. There’s a storm coming. Maybe that’s the problem.” There was a heavy feeling in the air and more than a hint of danger in the strong winds that were beginning to blow around them.
Tayas rested his hand on her shoulder for a moment, a gesture of camaraderie that never would have happened when he’d first strolled into her training compound.
“We’re ready for this, Captain. It will go well, rain or no rain.”
They soon managed to get to the Seeban storage facility. The rotation of the guards was just taking place as the first rumbles of thunder sounded above them. Kyla motioned for half the team to move forward. The other half would stand guard and let them know if any of the Seeban army approached.
They had about a minute and a half when the side entrance was unwatched. Tayas shifted smoothly into his tiger form and Kyla jumped up onto his back and through the window. She unlocked the side door and they were in.
And they were staring at shelf after shelf of poison. More than she’d ever even imagined. Enough to take more than just Khaytab, surely.
“We might be making more than one trip,” Tayas said ruefully.
Kyla swallowed hard. “How could they have done this?” Seeba was a little more advanced than Khaytab, but they didn’t have assembly lines or manufacturing plants.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” she said. “There’s no way we’re prepared to deal with this. If we take any of it, they’ll know and move the stash.”
They turned and headed for the door. They were only a few steps away when they heard shouting. The rest of her team. Tayas boosted Kyla over the wall and then he and the other men followed. A full regiment of Seeban soldiers waited there.
The five men she’d left to act as guard were on the ground. Each of their throats had been cut.
“You think we didn’t know about this?”
Kyla, her heart pounding in fury and fear, turned to face the speaker. He was clearly the leader. His armor shone in the flashes of lightning that forked through the sky.
“We’ve been tracking your spies for months,” he informed her.
“Then why didn’t you kill them?” Kyla asked tightly.
He smiled. “Because I wanted to know what you were up too. An attack or a cowardly theft?”
“Cowardly?” Tayas asked, his voice dipping to a growl. “When we fight, we fight with our skill. We don’t have to rely on poison to subjugate our betters!”
“Shall we kill him, Sahir?” one of the Seeban soldiers demanded, stepping closer to Tayas.
Tayas met him with a snarl, his muscles bunching and tensing. Kyla put her hand on his back.
Sahir’s smile twisted. “It’s time you recognized that turning into a filthy animal doesn’t make you better than us.”
Rain began to pour down, thick as a waterfall.
“Kill the woman!” Sahir shouted as he threw a vial of poison. It broke on Tayas’s chest. Other Seeban soldiers pulled out their own vials, and did the same.
No one expected what happened next.
The poison combined with the water and rose in huge clouds of green fog. It burned Kyla’s eyes, but she saw Tayas fall, one hand over his chest where the vial had hit. Blood seeped from between his fingers. Kyla dodged one of the Seeban’s attempts to grab her, tripped him and kicked him in the head. He fell limp beside one of her dead soldiers. Shouts of pain and the injured roars of the tiger shifters filled her ears.
Suddenly another Seeban soldier fell to his knees, gagging and choking.
“Commander?” he gasped out.
His fellows began to fall. Kyla scrambled back. Sahir was retreating too. Leaving his soldiers to the mist. His face looked panicked. Seeban’s had lost their ability to shift long ago, but apparently there was enough of their ancestors in their DNA for the poison to affect them too.
She didn’t have time to take pleasure in it. Her men were dying and there was nothing she could do. Kyla dropped to her knees beside Tayas.
He raised his hand, gripping her wrist. His teeth were clenched with pain and his massive body was shuddering.
“Run, Captain,” he grated. “Don’t...” A groan interrupted him and he closed his eyes tight. When they opened again, they were the eyes of an injured animal. His voice was barely human. “Don’t let this be for nothing.”
“I can get you back,” she said frantically. “Something...we can do something for the pain!”
“Go!” he snarled. “Changing...might...hurt you.”
Claws raked down her arm. His golden eyes seemed to go blind to who she was. Kyla did the only thing she could do.
She fled back to Khaytab.
******
Kyla looked up, letting the rain wash the tears off of her cheeks. She’d managed to hold it together long enough to inform Nameer and the rest of the task force, but as she’d tried to get ready for bed, panic and guilt had overwhelmed her. The storm was holding steady, but the balcony had been the only place she felt like she could breathe.
She gripped the stone railing of the balcony, scraping her fingers as she did so. Rain burned in the wounds. It was nothing compared to what her men had gone through. A sob ripped free of her painfully tight throat and she went to her knees. How coul
d this have happened? They had trusted her!
Kyla wasn’t sure how long she crouched there, letting the rain pelt her back and soak through her clothes. She didn’t pull away when Nameer knelt beside her and put his hand on the nape of her neck, but she didn’t go into his arms either.
“I led them to their deaths,” she said, her voice so low that it was almost covered by the thunder.
“Is that what you think?” he asked. “My love, they chose to follow you.”
“How do I know that?” she asked frantically. “How do I know that they weren’t just doing what they felt like they had to do?”
“Have I ever told you about my father?”
“What?” She squinted up at him. He looked strangely calm.
“My father. The king before me.”
“No,” she admitted.
“His name was Fanrith,” Nameer said, leaning back against the balcony rail and pulling Kyla against him, his arm around her shoulders. For all of his apparent ease, it might have been a bright summer day, rather than a raging storm. “Fanrith the Unwavering.”
“Are you a the?” she asked, momentarily distracted.
“What?”
“Nameer the...”
“Oh. No. I have not yet earned my title. I have been king too short a time.” He sighed. “With this unrest, I wonder what they will choose to call me.” When Kyla ducked her head, he went on. “As I was saying, his rule was long and largely uneventful. But he used to tell me stories from our history. Once, long ago, there was a king called Trushir the Victorious. He lived in a time of war.”
“And I guess he was good at it,” Kyla murmured.
“That’s what I thought,” Nameer replied. “But my father said he was only victorious on the backs of his soldiers. He conscripted them into service whether they wanted to fight or not. He forced whole families to give their lives for small causes in his search for power. Our troubles with Seeba began then, as well as our troubles with many other surrounding lands. For decades the cities were damp with blood. Finally, my ancestors overthrew him. Part of our promise was that no man would fight a battle that he did not choose.”
Realm Shifters Page 8