The Royal Hunter

by Donna Kauffman

  “He’s a healer? Then why can’t he save your ruler, your … whatever?”

  “Queen. Catriona Dalwyn. She inherited the throne three years ago when King Cynan, her father, was assassinated. She’s fought a hard battle to keep her kingdom from chaos. Now she’s fighting a battle for her life. If she loses this one, the kingdom will fall apart.”

  That stopped Talia. Just the way he said it. Not with reverence, but simply as fact. Perhaps it was the lack of reverence that caught her. He didn’t sound like a fanatic. He sounded like a man frustrated with his role in this crazy mission. Which brought up another question.

  “You’re Australian, right?”

  Now it was his turn to look wary. “I was born there.”

  “How did you end up a British subject?”

  “I am no one’s subject.”

  Talia wholly understood that feeling and wasn’t at all keen that she shared something in common with the man. “Then what is in this for you?”

  He didn’t answer her. Instead, he said, “Baleweg is not a healer. You’re the last in that line.”

  “How can he help me learn, then?”

  “I don’t know!” Archer exploded in frustration. “He can get inside your mind, help you discover the hidden talents you possess. Whatever.”

  “But—”

  “You have doubts, I understand that. I know this sounds ludicrous. I didn’t believe in time travel, either. Believe me, it’s not an everyday occurrence in my time. In fact, until a few days ago, I didn’t know it existed. But I trusted Baleweg to get me here and he did. He’ll get you there and back. It’s not so hard.” When she continued to stare at him, he slapped at his thighs. “Why would I make something like this up?”

  “I have no idea. I don’t know you.”

  “If you’re concerned about the travel itself, I can assure you that it is quite simple. Baleweg does all the work.”

  “What if I refuse to go? What happens then?”

  He held her gaze for some time before finally saying, “I can’t force you. However,” he added quickly, “I’d like you to think long and hard about what is being asked of you. In the context of the rest of your life, the output for you is small. And yet the rewards for an entire kingdom of people will be immense.”

  He made it sound like a quick jaunt. Save the world and be home by dinner. “What about the risks? You have no idea what might be required of me.” She couldn’t believe she was even having this conversation.

  “The risks exist whether you return or not. That much must be obvious to you.”

  Right at that moment, nothing was obvious to her, except this was too much to contemplate. “There is suffering all over the world. Always has been, always will be. I can’t take the weight of the world—present or future—on my shoulders. No one person could. Why is it so hard to comprehend that I might not be willing to put myself up to that task?”

  “Because no one is asking you to save the world.”

  “Sounds like it to me.”

  “You say there will always be suffering in the world. You would be right. That does not change. However, for all the suffering in the world, many could be called upon to champion the cause of those other victims. In the case of the queen, there is only you.”

  “No one else can help her?”

  “All who could have helped have tried, and failed.”

  “I find it odd that you keep going on about how your beloved queen is in mortal danger, yet you don’t seem to care overmuch for her.”

  That took him aback. “How would you know what I feel?” His gaze narrowed. “I thought you said your empathy dealt only with animals.”

  She couldn’t get used to the way he talked so easily about her gift. It unnerved her. “Just answer my question.”

  “I am here at the queen’s request.”

  “So this is what, a favor? A good deed? I asked you before what was in it for you and you didn’t answer. I want an answer.”

  He looked her dead in the eye. “A pile of money.”

  She swallowed. So, there was what amounted to a bounty on her head. And she was looking at what was probably the future’s best bounty hunter. Lovely, just lovely. “So you’re basically kidnapping me. And I’m supposed to go along with this willingly, to boot.”

  “I am not a kidnapper.” He seemed honestly affronted by the notion. “I’m a businessman. Of sorts.”

  “You’re a mercenary, you mean. A professional bully. Of sorts.”

  He shrugged off the sarcasm, but there was an air of supreme confidence about him now. Okay, a bigger air than usual. “I don’t bully. But I do have special skills of my own. Available for a price.”

  Talia wasn’t used to people jerking her chain, not in her quiet, safe little existence. But her chain had been jerked now and she found it impossible to remain passive. Maybe she was too far down the Yellow Brick Road now to have any perspective left. Whatever the cause, she found herself running her gaze over him, documenting his serviceable clothing, his body’s latent powerful stance, the calculating look that met hers when she came back to his eyes. “Yes, I can imagine you do.”

  His eyes widened a bit and for the first time a tiny spark of awareness shot into their dark depths. Sexual awareness. Whoa, she thought, backpedaling quickly. We won’t be going there again. His mercenary skills apparently extended beyond kidnapping for his queen to … other things. Things she had little experience with and no business fooling around with. Not with him anyway.

  She glanced away and caught her reflection in the pond. Baggy overalls, a T-shirt that was almost as old as she was, and Beatrice’s fishing bonnet. Oh, yeah, she was just a seduction waiting to happen. She smiled wryly.

  “I’m glad I amuse you,” he said shortly. The spark—if it ever really existed—had died, replaced by the cool competence and impatience that were more typical of him.

  She didn’t tell him she was amused at herself, not him. She liked him better when he was on the defensive. He was still cocky and arrogant as hell, but he seemed more human somehow.

  “You said there would always be risks, whether I went with you or not. What did you mean? Does it have something to do with Jimmy?”

  “There are those who would like nothing better than for Wales to—”

  She lifted her hand. “Hold up. Wales?”

  “Of course. One of Britain’s three kingdoms.”

  “Countries, you mean. Wales, Scotland, and England. But they are united under one monarchy.”

  He stared at her for a long moment, then said, “That changes.”

  “Oh.” Talia wanted to ask him more, and at the same time she didn’t want to hear another damn thing. Right now she had goose bumps on her goose bumps. He was pretty damn good at this “I’m from the future” thing and she wasn’t liking it.

  “Lord Chamberlain, our High Parliamentarian, would like nothing better than for Llanfair to lose its ruler and heir to the throne in one tragic death.”

  She stilled. Llanfair? In her mother’s fairy tales King Cynan’s castle was set in the magical land of Llanfair. She’d thought it had been all make-believe. She desperately wanted to keep believing that. Then something else he’d said struck her. “Ruler and heir?”

  “Queen Catriona is pregnant with a son. The heir to the throne.”

  Chapter 4

  Pregnant. Talia’s stomach tightened. She wanted to believe this was indeed some sort of elaborate fairy tale, a bizarre dream that she might still wake up from. But the idea that there was an unborn child at the center of it all made everything that much harder.

  Archer didn’t let up. “If she dies, and the heir with her, it will make those difficulties she inherited from her father look like a simple ripple of disturbance.”

  “Does she have enemies?” Why was she talking about this person as if she really existed? Only, technically she didn’t actually exist. Not yet. Not for some unnamed number of years in the future. Talia’s head began to throb.

  “
On the surface, things seem in line, but there is an undercurrent of corruption that I know to be fact. Chamberlain has organized his opposition well. They are simply waiting for word of her death to overthrow what would remain of the monarchy.”

  “And you know all this firsthand? High-level access for a businessman, wouldn’t you say?”

  He didn’t so much as twitch a muscle. “There are all sorts of commodities one can broker in. Information being one of them.” He held her gaze. “Baleweg, it appears, isn’t the only one who has mastered time travel. Chamberlain had Dideon sent here to stop you from returning.”

  This was the part that Talia had the hardest time explaining away. Archer and Baleweg could be two flakes or con artists who happened to know her mother and somehow knew about her make-believe tales. However, Jimmy’s threat and assault, and the fact that he knew Archer … that one was a bit harder. Too many people seemed to know all about this. And believe it. “How did you recognize Jimmy?”

  “Dideon. His name is Dideon. I knew he worked for Chamberlain. Or he did.”

  Talia’s eyes widened. “What does that mean?”

  “It means he’s no longer a threat to you.”

  “You—” She couldn’t say it. All of a sudden this was no longer a joke or an elaborate charade. The man was a mercenary, after all. No matter what title he gave it. Didn’t mercenaries kill people? “Is he …?”

  “Gone.”

  Talia swallowed hard. So that was the business he’d been taking care of. A shudder crawled down her spine.

  “But trust me,” Archer said, “there will be others. Better for you to come with us. We can get you to the queen, put you under her direct protection.”

  “Wait a minute. If Jimmy wanted me dead, why am I still alive? He certainly had ample opportunity.” She thought of the long hours they’d spent alone in the kennels when she’d first trained him and shuddered again.

  “We questioned him on that. Apparently, Dideon was originally sent here to observe you, find out if there was a way to subvert your powers, use them for their good against the queen. He was as much your warden as your hangman.”

  Talia was trying to sort it all out in her mind, but it was such an impossible thing to truly comprehend. One indisputable fact was that Jimmy had threatened her. “So if they send someone else, can you recognize him?”

  “I know most of the players, but I don’t intend to stick around here and find them all out. It is best if we move quickly. The faster we get you back, the faster this will come to an end, and you can return to your life here, safe and sound.”

  He was wrong. Safe was no longer an option. Her life was suddenly filled with insanity that she was supposed to accept. And she simply couldn’t stand there one second longer. She’d hit maximum stress level. Without another word, she turned and began marching back to the house.

  Archer immediately caught up to her and grabbed her arm. “We don’t have time for this.”

  Talia yanked her arm free and poked a finger at his chest. “Correction, you don’t have time for this. I, on the other hand, have as much time as I want. So why don’t you just let me go and return to wherever you slithered out from.”

  His eyes widened with real surprise. “Slithered?”

  “Isn’t that what kidnapping mercenary snakes do? Slither?”

  His jaw clenched. “I’m not a mercenary or a kidnapper. And I’m not a snake.”

  She almost laughed. “That offends you? Tough guy like yourself? I imagine you’ve been called much worse.”

  It didn’t help matters that this close up, she noticed he had a tiny cleft in his chin. And that when he got angry, his accent was stronger, flatter. No, she shouldn’t be noticing stuff like that. She had an escape to make.

  “Oh, I’ve been called many things, sweetheart. But snake? Slithered?” He shook his head. “I really must be losing my touch.”

  Now she cocked a hand on her hip. “You have a touch?”

  His eyebrows lifted.

  Talia caught herself wanting to smile. Adrenaline was pumping through her, along with something else that she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She wasn’t actually enjoying this little heated interchange. Was she? It was just some sort of weird stress transfer that suddenly had her hyperaware of him. “Did you really think you’d just pop into my life, drop this amazing little fairy tale of yours in my lap, and expect me to go dancing off behind you, all because you twinkled those eyes and showed off that little cleft in your chin?”

  Oops. She’d been doing fine up to that last part. What had been the vaguest suspicion of a smile became a blinding grin. As it turned out, the man had touch. In spades.

  “You noticed the cleft, huh?” Gone completely was the impatient, frustrated mercenary. In the short time she’d known him, she’d never have guessed him capable of anything resembling charm. She immediately decided he was safer when he was cold and mercenarylike.

  “Okay,” she managed, her throat tight and strangely achy. “So you might have a little … touch.”

  His smile widened. It exposed the fact that he had the smallest dimple on the right side of his mouth. Good God, the man was actually sexy when he grinned like that.

  “Sweetheart, you don’t know the half of it.” He reached up a hand and took the hat off her head. “This is sort of a mood killer, though.”

  “I save homeless animals for a living,” she managed, finding her own edge. “One generally doesn’t dress in sequins and pearls in my occupation.” She should be moving away from him.

  “I’m not much into sequins and pearls, either,” he said.

  His voice was all deep and Down Under velvety. Russell Crowe and Mel Gibson eat your hearts out, she thought. Talia found herself sinking into the depths of his gleaming eyes. There was almost no distinction between pupil and iris. It was as if she could fall into their inky depths and never hit bottom. When he lifted a hand to push a wayward strand of hair off her face, she almost shuddered in anticipation of what his tough, hard hands would feel like on her skin.

  But she never found out. Instead she all but jumped out of that skin at a sudden clearing of a throat behind her. It was only Archer’s quick reflexes that kept her from falling ass-backward into the pond.

  She wished he’d let her fall in. At least then she could disappear beneath the murky depths rather than face his knowing look. Or the considering expression on Baleweg’s face when she turned to find the old man standing behind her.

  Archer shifted his attention to Baleweg. No doubt the old man had seen the two of them standing close like that. Lost my touch, eh mate? Not bloody likely.

  “I trust you have convinced Miss Trahaern to begin her studies?” Baleweg said mildly.

  “I was getting to that.”

  “Studies?” Talia asked.

  “We must begin your instruction, to help you bring forth your natural talents. So that you may return with us and help our queen.”

  Archer stepped between them. “Wait a minute. What you mean is that she’ll return with us, and then she’ll begin whatever lessons she needs. I’m sure the queen can help you both with all that.”

  Baleweg shook his head. “She cannot return until she is ready. The queen’s health is dwindling, yes, but she’s not at death’s door quite yet. Talia is of no use to her as she is now. Once we take her to Llanfair, things will move swiftly. Forces there will be ready to pounce upon her return. Even the queen would be hard-pressed to protect her in her current state. She must be able to act immediately. Everyone knows trust is a rapidly dwindling commodity at court these days.”

  “She’s not exactly safe here, either,” Archer argued.

  “We have a more controlled position here,” Baleweg responded. “We have only to weed out those few who have found their way here. It is easier for me to detect disturbances in the time continuum here than at home.” His focus seemed to drift. “It is … quieter here. I have never felt such clarity.” He didn’t sound entirely comfortable with that, but
his blue eyes sharpened once more as he looked back to Archer. “Your extensive knowledge of those likely to be involved should help us maintain security.”

  “Let me get this straight. You want me to play castle guard while you two play school?” Archer shook his head. “The deal was I find her, I convince her to come back. Something, I might remind you, I was about a second or two away from accomplishing before you so rudely interrupted.”

  Talia lifted an eyebrow. “Awfully sure of yourself, aren’t you?”

  Archer’s mouth actually twitched. She surprised him. For all that she looked as if she’d break in a good stiff wind, she was a pretty tough sort. Her luminous eyes and elegantly shaped lips, framed between high cheekbones and a pair of delicate eyebrows, served to give her an ethereal, almost fragile air. Until she opened her mouth.

  If Archer hadn’t been so annoyed with the way this mission was going, he might have admired her adaptability. Lord knew, she was going to need that and a whole lot more before this was over. So, apparently, was he. “I think we should return and let the queen deal with this situation. I didn’t hire on as baby-sitter.”

  Talia’s mouth dropped open. Baleweg shook his head. “I do not have the energy to move us about through time on a whim. Taking our leave in such a rapid manner the other day has taxed me to a great degree. If I am to move all three of us forward, then I must conserve my strength.”

  Archer narrowed his gaze in doubt. Baleweg had seemed tired, but not overly taxed. “So which is the real concern? Your supposed fatigue or Talia’s safety?”

  “Both. But her safety is my foremost concern. I will be ready when she is.”

  Archer held his gaze, but Baleweg merely looked at him with such serenity that Archer knew there would be no point arguing with him. Archer sighed and looked out over the pond. His gaze narrowed further at the big white duck floating placidly amid the water lilies. Oh, great, that was all he needed.

  “You two can argue all you want,” Talia said, jerking his attention back to the matter at hand, “but you seem to have forgotten one key element in all your Machiavellian plans. My cooperation.” She shot Archer a look. “Which you have not come close to securing.”