I wasn’t thinking about surviving, just thinking about giving the others a way to escape. Giving those I loved a chance to get away, to find a life outside of all these fights, away from the struggle to survive. That was all I could think as I raced away, drawing the creatures to me and away from Maks, Bryce, Balder, Lila and Batman.
A tear caught at the corner of my eye, blurring my vision. Something slammed into me, an armored head crashed into my right side and flung me up so high that my legs splayed out. The moment slowed as I spun high through the air. The reptilian creatures had followed me, and Maks and Bryce were harrying the rear, but for the most part they were being ignored.
If you’re going to make a go at surviving, whatever it is you plan, you must do it now.
Marsum’s words unlocked something in me, a fatality that meant there was nothing I wouldn’t do. Nothing I wouldn’t see through to have another look at one more sunrise, one more sunset, one more touch from Maks, one more laugh with my brother, one more fight of who knew Shakespeare best with Lila.
The moment picked up speed as I fell, landing on the back of one of the reptiles. I dug my flail-strengthened claws into his back, dragging them through his flesh and letting the magic of the weapon drain his energy straight into me. They came at me over and over and I bounced from one to the other, taking hits, but mostly able to dodge them as I took in their life-force. The blows I felt were glancing, and they healed quicker than ever, the power of the flail doing its job.
I was too small, too quick, and the energy I was gaining from them through the flail made me faster until the world around me was a blur.
The air around me shimmered as I bit into the scaled hand of a reptile creature. He let out a booming bellow as I crunched through flesh and tore the muscle away from the bone. I bounced away from him and landed hard, heavier than before. The air continued to shimmer around me, heating under my fur as though I were bathing in the sun and not fighting for my life.
I didn’t have time to question what was happening, though I could feel the shift sliding through my bones, could feel the power of the jungle cat sweeping over me. A power I’d felt before and it was not my own.
Ollianna . . . she could see through the eyes of her creatures and she could see they couldn’t catch me as a small house cat.
But the jungle cat I was meant to be was bigger, and while not slower, there would be more of me to grab. She’d done this before, given me a moment I thought was a gift. Now I understood it for what it was.
A tie to me, a tie to this side of me that she had her proverbial claws in.
Shit. Fuck. Bitch!
I let out a hiss and it wasn’t a house cat’s vocal cords, but the snarling growl of that jungle cat that I wanted to be so badly. She’d done it to make me fail.
Not today, lizard queen. Not today.
“Even like this, I’m going to kick your ass, Ollianna!” I roared the words as my seemingly oversized paws flew at the reptile creatures, sending them flying with the blows. I grabbed them around their legs, snapped bones with a single bite, and generally caused far more destruction now that I was bigger. Stronger.
Maks and Bryce were yelling at me to hang on. They were coming.
Claws slashed through my side even though I tried to dodge, sending a searing pain across my ribs. I drew on the energy the flail had been absorbing and the wound healed, but how long could I keep this up? There was too much of me. I couldn’t avoid the blows.
The flail will give you the energy you need to stop the reptiles, use the stones!
Sucking hard for air, I kept on fighting, barely able to think about magic, never mind actually use it as Marsum was suggesting.
Because I couldn’t use the stones. I’d left them with Balder.
Either I was an idiot, or I was a genius. Because the stones were what Ollianna wanted, what Ishtar wanted and probably what the Emperor wanted. At least if I died here, the stones wouldn’t end up in Ollianna’s hands. At least, not right away.
Time slid by, ticking along; the sun moved through the sky and I moved with it, unable to see anything but the bodies piling up around me, feel the bite wounds on my flanks that weren’t healing, the fatigue in my muscles as new, fresh reptiles came at me. Over and over.
I stumbled over a body and flung myself out of the way of long snapping jaw, the tips of the teeth catching at the skin under my neck and tearing at it. I kept rolling and realized that there was a change.
I had my back to the rocks I’d been running toward, and there were only a half-dozen lizard men left. Maks and Bryce and the two horses were behind them, and I was in front. We’d fucking done it.
Holy hand grenades, we’d done it.
My body trembled, and my lungs heaved for air as I panted hard, parched and exhausted in a way I’d never been, not in all the battles I’d faced. “Come on then, fuckers.” I growled the words. “Let’s finish this.”
The lizard men looked to one another, dropped to the ground and . . . they shrunk. They reduced to the size of desert lizards and scooted away, heading south. All around us, the bodies of the reptile creatures we’d been fighting did the same, their large bodies turning into the creatures they’d been pulled from. Hundreds of tiny little desert lizards, dead.
My legs were shaking so badly, I could barely stand. I gave up and let myself fall flat on my belly, legs splayed out. If something came at us now, we were done. There was no fight left in me.
Which is why the sound of horse hooves coming from the east barely drew my head off the dusty ground. I blew out a breath, recognizing the horses before I saw the two people on them.
They slowed as they approached, blond hair glistening in the midday sun. Midday, maybe later.
We’d been fighting for hours and now motherfucking, sheep-fucking Steve and Darcy showed up.
How was I not surprised?
8
Maks and Bryce moved as a unit, flanking one another as they intercepted Steve and Darcy riding into what should have looked like a massacre of ridiculous proportions. A bunch of tiny lizards blanketed the desert, I mean, how hard could it be to kill tiny lizards, right?
Steve’s eyes swept the scene, and he looked at me. “Who is that?”
Oh, this was going to be rich. One of the things Steve had always enjoyed pointing out when we were together was that I was lucky to be with such a big strong lion, seeing as my own form was so useless.
How’s this for useless, shithead?
I forced myself to my feet, stretching out and lashing my tail, feeling every inch the jungle cat. But even as I did, the magic Ollianna had put on me, stripping me of whatever curse I still had, faded. My body shimmered around me and my body slipped back to the six-pound house cat.
“It’s me, asshole.” I didn’t want to shift back to two legs this exhausted, but I couldn’t stand the condescension in his eyes. Even now, a small part of me wanted to shrink away from that look. A small part of me still hurt when those around me thought less of me.
I opened the doorway in my mind between four and two legs, and took a horrible, gut-wrenching step through. There was a moment where I thought maybe I wouldn’t be able to do it, where every muscle in me seemed to get stuck.
That could not happen. I was not getting stuck between an animal and a human shape. I’d heard rumors of that happening, we all had. Of those who weren’t strong enough getting jammed in between, part animal, part human, and stuck there the rest of their miserable lives.
Nope, not today.
With the last of my energy, drawing all I had from the flail and my own reserves, I pushed through.
A step stumbling forward, and Maks was there, catching me. I leaned into him, using the moment to whisper a warning. “He still belongs to Ish.”
Maks nodded and helped me stand.
“How sweet. You like fucking the Jinn now?” Steve shook his head. “Talk about lowering your standards. Then again, it’s not like you were going to get another shot at me.” Steve
’s golden eyes glittered and danced, and it was in that moment I realized something.
He wanted me.
Maybe not because I was the best in bed, or because I was the most beautiful, but because I defied him. He wanted to win, and with me, he’d lost.
Bryce cut between us, a bigger lion than Steve ever was, blood coating a good part of his head. Darcy’s eyes went straight to him, and I could all but see her calculating which male lion was stronger. I grabbed my brother by the tail, tugging him back. “Wait. Before we kill them, I want to know why they’re here.”
Bryce shot me a look over his shoulder, and gave me a nod, not unlike Maks. They were letting me speak, letting me be the alpha of our pride.
I drew a breath and let go of Maks to stand on my own two feet, even if it was hard to stay upright. I looked from Steve to Darcy and back again. “What do you want? Or maybe I should ask you what the bitch you work for wants?”
Darcy startled and then relaxed. I wanted to roll my eyes but managed to keep from doing so. I didn’t really want to antagonize them. They were fresh. We were not. The fight would be brutal, and I didn’t want to chance that they would hurt us worse than we already were.
“Ishtar,” Steve said, and then curled his lips. Oh, good, whatever he’d been sent to do or say was not something he wanted. Which meant he probably wasn’t here to kill us. Interesting.
“Did you escape her?” Maks asked. “Is that why you’re here?”
Darcy shook her head. “No, she sent us. To help you.”
My eyebrows could not have shot higher into my hairline if I’d painted them there. “What?”
I had to have heard wrong. There was no way Ishtar would have sent them to help us. Spy on us, hurt us, harry us the way that Ollianna was, but help us, never.
Darcy gave a delicate shrug. “She did not tell us why, only that we were to ride here as fast as we could and help you against a great battle you were facing from some other witch . . . Olivier or something like that.”
I frowned, calculating the distance between the Stockyards and where we were. Four hours at a hard ride at best. “When did you leave?”
Steve smiled. “Midnight.”
Nearly twelve hours before. I snorted. “We don’t need your kind of help, so, off you fuck, and tell Ishtar to do the same.”
I went to Balder and ran my hands over his face, neck and body, checking him for wounds. I found a number of scrapes and cuts, then checked Lila again and found her curled tightly around the bag of stones. I pulled them from her tiny grasp and attached them to my own belt. “Maks, you want to check Batman?”
“Already on it. I’ve got the hacka paste if you want some.”
“Bryce, let me put some on you too,” I said as my brother shifted back to two legs. Buck naked and covered in wounds. Again, nothing was major. Because the creatures hadn’t been after him. Ollianna thought she could just overwhelm us with numbers, kill me and be done with it.
Joke was on that dumb-as-a-rock toad.
The thing with Steve was he hated to be ignored, and Maks and Bryce, goddess love them, followed my lead. A glutton for being the center of attention, it wouldn’t take long for Steve to . . .
“Don’t you fucking ignore me!” he roared. “I’m here to protect your useless ass, for reasons I don’t understand. She should let you die as far as I’m concerned!”
I kept my back to him, treating my horse’s wounds, and then Bryce’s after he’d slipped on some pants. “Steve, you can go right back to Ishtar and tell her I said she can fuck off too. I don’t want you here. No one wants you here.”
I smoothed Balder’s mane to one side, loosened his girth and started walking him away from the scene of all the little lizards. My stomach rumbled and I made a quick, brutal decision and scooped up a half-dozen of the small reptiles. They were good eating, and I was starving.
I wasn’t sure when we’d get a chance to hunt, or even stop, and we needed to take advantage of the unintentional bounty. I motioned for Bryce and Maks to do the same.
“We can’t go back,” Darcy said. “We were sent to protect you, all the way to the Emperor. If we return, she’ll kill us.”
I snorted. “Sounds like a great person to follow if you ask me. Really, a brilliant move on your part to throw your lot in with her.”
“We had no choice,” Darcy said, softening. Another time I would have believed her voice, the tone in it. I spun and pointed one of the flopping dead lizards at her.
“There is always a choice, Darcy. Just like you had a choice.” I gave her a wink as if it were a big secret between us that she’d slept with Steve the first time in an effort to steal him from me. I mean, what’s a little husband fucking between friends, right?
Gods, I’d been a fool to believe her then.
I looked at Steve. “You know what, she told me that you made her fuck you the first time. That she had no choice. And I believed her. So if she can make me believe her lies, Steve, you’d best watch yourself. Because she’s eyeing up Bryce like he’s the next hot meal on the plate.”
Chew on that, you snaggy shithole of a friend.
Bryce jerked like I’d slapped him on the ass; Darcy paled, her jaw ticked, and for the first time, I think I saw a bit of the real her. Angry, jealous, and willing to do anything to claw her way up the ranks. Including pretending to be the friend of the girl who was married to the strongest lion of the pride.
I kept on walking, Balder next to me, Maks and Bryce beside me in a matter of seconds. Steve and Darcy were behind us as if they weren’t sure if they should follow or not. I didn’t give a shit either way. Bryce had the slightest limp to his stride. He pulled on a shirt as we walked. “That was . . . unreal back there.”
“Oh, she’s always been a bitch. She just hid it well.” I waved him off.
“No, not them.” He glanced back, and I did the same. The pair of them were following. “You fighting, Zam. I’ve never seen anything like it. It was like you were a whirlwind. They couldn’t catch you.” He slung an arm across my shoulders and pulled me into the one-armed hug that he was so good at. “Remind me not to fight you. Ever.”
I looked up at him. “I was a six-pound house cat for half of it.”
“I know. And that was the most terrifying part.” He wasn’t laughing at me, not in the least. “You moved like you were riding lightning and everywhere you touched they went down. They didn’t want to fight you. They started balking partway through, holding back, which gave you more time. We were killing them from the back and they barely looked at us. It wasn’t until you turned into the jungle cat that they got bold again.”
Maks grunted. “That didn’t slow you down much, though I suspect that was the goal. You hit as hard, as fast. Your brother is right. You were amazing to watch. I don’t think Ollianna knew what she was going up against.”
Bryce chuckled. “I felt rather useless myself.”
“Never,” I leaned into him, holding him tightly, “I was fighting for you and Maks. For Balder and Lila.” I wasn’t sure how to feel about what they were saying. I’d just been fighting. Doing what I’d been doing my whole life. “However, I do need to rest. And eat.”
We were between the large rocks, now, weaving our way through. I knew the area better than most, being so close to the Stockyards as it was. “There’s a good spot with a small spring where we can take a break for the rest of the day.”
Steve brushed past us. “I’ll lead.”
Darcy followed him, her back stiff.
“You want to argue with them?” Maks asked. I shook my head.
“Not today.” I paused and went to the saddlebags, pulling Lila out. I cradled her to my chest. “I don’t want them to know she can shift size. But that means I need to find a way to wake her now.”
Maks put his palm over her. “What if you go to sleep, go into the dreamscape and find her that way?”
I blinked up at him. “See, that’s why I love you. You’re a smart guy.”
“I thought it was my good looks and charming magic.” He laughed at me and Bryce mumbled something that sounded like gross, get a room.
With Lila’s small, warm body close to me, and a plan to wake her in hand, anxiety that had been holding onto me slid away and I nearly went to my knees. Maks caught me with one arm around the waist. “Bryce, you want to get a bedroll ready for her.”
“On it.”
The two of them worked around me and the exhaustion took me, step by step. I barely made it to the blankets that Bryce laid out near the spring.
“What the hell? It’s not nap time,” Steve snapped. “We want to get going, get this show on the road and get you out of our hair.”
Bryce let out a low rumbling growl and that was about the last of what I heard. Personally, I was fine with Bryce laying Steve low, but then Darcy would want Bryce. And there was no way in hell she was getting her claws into my brother.
No, he was far too good for her.
Sleep washed over me in a wave, but I fought the darkness that would be restful and forced myself into the dreamscape that the Emperor had built long before I’d been born. He’d done it so he could keep a hand on the world, watch what was happening and prepare for his eventual return. That had been his plan.
All along, I’d been trying to stop him, and now here I was, riding straight to him with a weapon that could release him from his prison.
The dreamscape mimicked the real world and I found myself lying on a bedroll next to the spring as it burbled and gurgled, Lila still tucked tightly in my arms.
“Lila, wake up.” I gave her a little shake and she shivered in my arms, the most movement she’d made since she’d drank down the țuică. What had Trick said to her that sent her back to the camp so fast, and to drink down all that liquor?
What if it was a combination of heartache and alcohol keeping her under?
Seriously, I was going to kill that dragon the next time I saw him.
“No,” she mumbled.
I looked around us, trying to think of something that would bring her around, but I doubted a bottle of țuică was a good idea after that last one. “I stumped Maks with a quote from Will.”
Emperor’s Throne: Desert Cursed Series, Book 6 Page 7