“We’ll ride into Lackshir. It’s a few hours’ detour, but the merchant markets will be an easy place to gather information. For now, we stay together.”
“Are we leaving now?” I ask.
“No, we’ll eat. Killian will be back with meat soon. You can sleep here tonight, then we’ll ride out in the morning. Roarke’s leg needs more time to heal,” Pax says, motioning for me to follow him back toward the cave.
Sleep is an ongoing issue; they need so little of it, and I keep getting these interrupted naps followed by unconscious slumbers at really odd times of the day. What I wouldn’t give for just one night where I fall asleep at sunset and wake up, uninterrupted, at sunrise. No injuries, no Saber magic involved, and no alcoholic tranquilization.
So I don’t argue about the plan and follow them like a good little shadow.
As I walk, I do a reshuffle of my list of questions. Finding out why white-haired Silvari Masters drowned me as a baby and why the Elorsins’ mother sent her boys to Lord Martin’s estate are still at the top of the list. Working out why Killian ripped the top line off the prophecy is reaching for a top spot, though, followed by discovering Pax’s dark past. The most important one should be discover an exit out of these boys’ lives before I get myself killed – or get them killed, but it’s not.
I might have entertained for an instant that I might be someone important, that I might be able to make a difference and help bring down Lithael, but I fear Pax is right. If I have any part in the future of this realm, it will be to die.
And sitting right up on the top of my list is stopping a BeastSeed before he gets close to any of my men ever again.
No freaking idea how a soot-servant is supposed to be any help with that.
We cook small game, a rabbit and three bush chickens, in the low coals of a fire, then move into the cave with its superior defensive advantage.
Shadow curls up on the old blankets and rags in the corner, not taking notice of the state of them. She pulls our cloaks over her shoulders – the things are long enough to be full length blankets on her.
They’re thick Silvari wool. Cool in summer, warm in winter, waterproof.
The girl needs her own cloak.
And her own bed.
I scrunch my nose at the scent of a killer, not even realizing I’ve stopped midstride.
A bed is a bed.
Pax lets out a small snarl, pacing two steps forward then turning to walk one step back. There’s no pressing business to do with me knocking her out or a note from our dead mother. Nothing to pull his attention.
And it’s clear in the way his jaw is clenched, his lips pressed thin, his hand bouncing as if trying to tap out a tune on his leg – as if itching to move closer, pick her up, and carry her away with him. That scent is really screwing with him.
Roarke and Seth glance between the girl and me – the two of them fanning out in the room, collecting various foods and a few weapons, before moving toward the cave’s entrance. A few more glances back. A twitch of Roarke’s nose.
The scent is digging at all of our nerves.
It bugged me when we first got here. Seth even stopped breathing through his nose while she slept off the nicks from my blade. But we all had other things on our minds: Roarke was bleeding, Seth was bruised, and Pax still wanted to hit me.
Things that have passed.
Pax sets his gaze on me, and I nod.
It’ll actually be amusing to watch her wake up with his wolf in close proximity. I picture screaming.
He strips off his gear, folding it into his bag before his wolf takes over. The beast pads over and makes himself comfortable at Shade’s back. His head nudges into her hair, huffing deeply.
She sighs, her body responding to his presence.
I wait a moment longer to see if she’ll stir. But she doesn’t.
As the scent of evil is overridden, and the imminent dangers are all behind us, we all take a deep breath of relief.
“Triple in a row, my roll,” Seth says, pulling three dice from his pocket and letting them drop one at a time onto the red dirt of the cave floor.
I grunt, sitting to form the last corner of their triangle. Kicking his ass at dice sounds rather relaxing.
52.5 miles from Potion Master Eydis
I sleep like a rock. Like a warm, cozy, safe rock.
And I have no idea if that’s how rocks normally feel, but my sleep-lulled brain likes to think I’m right.
Always right.
I’m so good at chuckin’ sleeping I can do it with my eyes closed.
I yawn. Stretch. Roll slowly onto my back, then yawn again.
The sun’s up, a funnel of light falling blindingly onto my face, but there’s still a pink hue to it – so I’m going to guess it’s early. Five-thirty or six kind of early. Jake’s milking the cows. Cook’s pulling out the early rolls for the servant’s breakfast. Someone let me sleep in, so it’s probably my birthday.
Must be spring then. Nineteen. Crap, that came quick. I’ll be twenty soon. I was born at a young age, and so far this is the oldest I’ve been.
And I need to get my ass moving, or it’s going to be the last birthday I see. I’ve a list of chores a mile long, and the first on the list is crawling into Lord Martin’s bedchamber to stoke the small fire in the corner. Crawling. The man likes to sleep in – but he’s also particular that only the female servants are allowed to attend him.
And I’m particular that if the choice is between me and fifteen-year-old Beth or sixteen-year-old Lucy – then it will be me.
Because if Martin wakes early, he’s on you like a snake on a mouse. He’s never managed to pin me, or lock me in, which has little to do with my own skill and a lot to do with his old age and complete lack of fitness.
Okay, maybe a little to do with my ability to climb out a window and up onto the roof.
But I’m so damned comfortable.
I stretch again, reaching to flick the blanket off of me.
My fingers brush dirt, and my mind tumbles over the new information.
The apple cellar is stone.
Where the fuck am I?
A silhouette moves through the sunlight, and I throw myself to my feet, my heart racing as I stagger, trip, land on my ass, then try to shuffle backward until I realize I’m pressed against a wall.
In a cave.
Looking at Roarke.
Now that I’m not directly in the sunlight, I can see his long hair is out, he’s wearing a fresh black cotton shirt, and he’s frowning.
I take a deep breath, my eyes drifting shut as the fear ebbs away. Leaving me shaking instead.
Footsteps approach.
Just Roarke, I tell myself.
I’m in a stupid cave, somewhere inside the stupid Enchanted Forest, and I’m feeling really chuckin’ stupid. Just took all my darts and threw the lot at the board and watched them all miss – that’s how stupid I feel.
Roarke stops, and I open my eyes to see him crouched down just out of arm’s reach. His brow furrowed, his lips pressed thin.
“I have my power clamped down,” he says slowly, his gaze scanning over my face as if looking for even the slightest reaction.
“Why?” I ask. Actually, I gasp.
My heart is still struggling back into a normal rhythm, and I have no idea what the guy’s talking about.
“I shouldn’t have scared you like that,” he says.
“Why would having your power locked down affect what I’m afraid of?”
“Because you’re scared of me. Of what I can do. And you should be.”
I shake my head very slowly, closing my eyes again as I will myself to calm the bralls down. Why are my fingers still trembling?
“I’m not scared of you,” I whisper, not even bothering to open my eyes. “I thought you were someone else.”
He moves, his knee whispering against the dirt, his fingers coming to brush against my cheek.
“Who?” he asks softly.
I shake my hea
d. “Not you.”
When I open my eyes, my gaze is immediately drawn into his. Into a depth of sadness that I wasn’t expecting to see.
“Not you,” I repeat.
He drops his hand from my cheek.
“Do you know what I am, Kitten?” he asks, his tone low and even – but somehow still hinting at pain and fear.
“An asshole,” I mutter, almost mumble, my throat left dry as the fear settles. “But you’re my –” I swallow the last word down.
Yep, that was going to come out wrong.
The corner of his mouth pulls into a smile, just a little.
“Mortals have stories about sirens, beings who crave lust and desire to survive. I don’t get a choice in what I crave. There’s no line between what I am doing and what my power is doing – they innately work as one unless I have the presence of mind to lock it down. It’s a short-lived solution.”
He stops, leaving something unsaid.
I take a guess at it. “Because you need your power to survive.”
He runs his finger through the sand, drawing a spiral, stalling.
I don’t mind. Swallowing a few times to wet my throat and hoping he’ll start talking again before my nightmare jumps to the next visual. Because I hadn’t stopped before to wonder which of the other girls would be stoking Lord Martin’s fire in the mornings now that I’m not there. And whether they can run and hide as well as I could.
Or how his hands on their flesh would feel.
“I don’t want you to look at me like that,” he says, grabbing my focus just in time. “I don’t want that fear you had just now to be because of me.”
He grips my elbow and pulls me to my feet before I can object.
“Pax is coming,” he says, but I’m stuck on the thing he said before that.
“You know when you found me under your bed and thought I’d be fun to play with?” I ask.
He nods.
“Why didn’t it bother you then?”
He runs a hand through his long hair, pushing it back from his face before letting it settle into a mess around his shoulders.
“Because I didn’t care about you then.”
It sounds like he’s going to leave it there, so I raise an eyebrow.
“And?” I press.
“I was probably going to humiliate you – I admit that was a dick of an idea. It would have pissed Pax off if you’d walked out of my room naked – but he deserved it because he brought you back in the first place, and we had more important shit to be doing than drawing that kind of attention among the dignitaries at the White Castle. But making you walk naked out of our suite was all that was going to happen.”
“All,” I blurt out. “Then what? Was I going to walk naked through the whole damned castle until I found some more clothes?”
He gives me a sheepish look. “Hadn’t thought about that.”
“I might have been afraid of you then, but I’m not now,” I say, almost expecting him to see it as a challenge.
But he’s not Seth.
He turns slightly, looking toward the cave’s entrance, as Pax walks in.
Pax, also dressed in fresh clothes and with the look of someone who’s just had a shower, steps inside, then stops.
“What?” he asks Roarke.
It’s like I’m not even here.
“Something scared her,” Roarke says.
“And it’s none of your business,” I growl, pushing past Roarke and storming toward the crate of chocolate bars.
Because chocolate for breakfast just screams of the perfect solution to this nonsense.
“Roarke?” Pax presses, still not talking to me.
“Not Roarke,” I grumble, pushing the lid off the crate.
“Apparently,” Roarke says.
I don’t bother to turn around, but by the gentle footsteps retreating, I’m guessing he’s left. I grab a chocolate bar in my left hand, not wanting to find out how easily my right is going to start throbbing today, and turn sharply.
Yes – Roarke is gone.
And yep – I feel like crap.
“Tell him I’m not afraid of him,” I tell Pax.
There’s a worried little crease in Pax’s brow.
When he doesn’t say anything, just walks closer, I add, “He didn’t do anything. I just had a bad dream.”
“He’s affecting your dreams?” Pax demands.
“No,” I cry – pointing at him with my block of chocolate. “No. The dream had nothing to do with him. I did have a life before you threw me over the back of your horse and dragged me into this mess.”
He grabs the chocolate bar, stopping me from pointing with it. Apparently pointing with chocolate also pisses him off.
I don’t let go, though. This sugary goodness is mine.
Okay, so there is a whole box of bars behind me, but that doesn’t mean Pax can just take this one off me.
“I trust him. If you say his power isn’t affecting you, then I believe you,” he says, his soft voice contrasting the death grip he has on my chocolate. “What was in your dream?”
“Who,” I say, giving the bar a yank but failing to get it free.
“Who was in your dream?”
“It wasn’t really a dream. More like a split second where I forgot that I was no longer in an apple cellar.”
Pax scans over me. His gaze is so intense that I freeze, and goosebumps rush over my skin. Finally, his eyes settle on my left wrist. On the thin piece of blue cloth tied over an old scar.
I let go of the chocolate bar and try to retreat, but he has my arm in his grip before I have even begun to move. The bar falls to the ground with a soft thud, but that’s still louder than I dare to breathe.
“Killian says no,” I mutter out.
He nods, like he’s listening, but still tugs me closer. Twists me, then slams my back hard against his chest. With one arm wrapped around my waist, he has me pinned. I want to fight, even squirm a little, but within a beat my body has stilled and submitted.
I have no chuckin’ idea what’s made him snap or what’s going to happen next.
“Pax,” I say, tentatively. “Remember what I said about castration. I will use a chocolate bar as a blunt instrument if I have to.”
He huffs into my hair, and his fingers splayed across my stomach relax just a little.
“Show me,” he says.
“Tell me why you’re holding me like this first.”
“Show me,” he presses, the words pulling at my mind, daring me to argue so his power can rip into me and snap my thoughts into submission.
I close my eyes against the pressure – but my mouth is functioning fine.
“Answer me,” I growl back at him. “Why does the mark of someone held captive make you turn into a wild animal?”
Slowly, like he’s fighting against himself, he extends his arm underneath mine. His hand lets go of my wrist, inches from the blue cloth. My arm rests on his, my elbow in the crook of his, my hand open and his unfurling.
I’ve spent a lot of time looking at this guy. At his eyes, his expressions, his ass.
But not his hands – or his wrists. They all wear a lot of long-sleeved shirts, except when they’re wandering back from the showers, which is also one of the times where my attention is on other body parts.
His fingers are calloused, the nails chipped short from hard training, but his hands are freshly-washed, and every scar is clearly visible. Small, like they’ve had a few hundred years to heal, but white against the natural light tan of his skin. Slithered lines in distinct patterns.
Chains. Cuffs. Manacles. Canes and lashings.
I want to turn my hand, wrap my fingers around his wrist, and smooth away the pain that still seeps from him. But I can’t move.
“You have a past too,” I say.
He nods, and I can feel the movement against my hair.
“Do you have bad dreams? Moments when you wake and think you’re somewhere else?” I ask.
“Not anymore,” he say
s, moving his arm so he can cup my wrist, his thumb hooking underneath the blue cloth.
“Is this going to make things worse?” I ask.
He nods. “What’s mine needs protecting.”
“You can’t protect me from memories.”
“That doesn’t make sense, Pup. Of course I can.”
“If seeing these little scars is going to trigger you into a rage, then my wrist is staying covered,” I say, but the minute the words have left my mouth, his fingers have turned half-wolf.
Long claws extend, and with the brush of his thumb, he cuts through the cloth.
I groan, and wait for him to get over his ‘me Alpha, you obey’ shit. His hand turns human again – human is good. Human is safe from a rogue BeastSeed.
“These,” he says, brushing the cloth aside to join the chocolate on the floor, “are not little scars.”
He takes long, measured breaths. The kind that sound like he’s controlling something, but I feel like he’s losing that battle. He’s right – against the thin lines that mark his skin, my rough, jagged reminder of days left in chains are not little.
But compared to the mess the Manor Lord has made of my back, my wrist looks almost pleasant.
“I told you the wolf has much simpler logic,” he says. His muscles begin to shift, subtly moving against my back. Sometimes man – sometimes trying to be wolf.
I nod, but he’s already started talking again. “The wolf doesn’t know forgiveness. He remembers.”
Pax’s fingers on my stomach flex again, the tips of claws pressing against my skin with the barest sting of something that could cut – but isn’t. Not yet.
He leans lower, his lips brushing against the exposed skin along my neck and down toward my shoulder.
“He wants to know if you’re all right,” Pax says.
As he speaks, the sharp tips of his teeth nick at my flesh.
I nod furiously, my body so full of a rush of fire and flames that my words have been burnt to ash. The air escaping my lungs is rough, pulsing, struggling. I suck in a fresh breath and run my tongue over my lips before trying to speak.
“I feel like maybe we shouldn’t be this close right now,” I manage to say.
Shadows and Shade Box Set Page 51