That must be how Mother feels—free.
Panotii keeps dancing, and I stroke his sleek, chestnut neck, trying to soothe him. “Panotii wants to run, too.”
“You’ll burn yourselves out.” Griffin’s silver-hued eyes hold a hint of warning. “And you’ll burn us out chasing you. We have a long way to go.”
I make a sour face. “Did I ever tell you I detest the voice of reason?”
“Did I ever tell you you’re adorable when you’re riled up?”
I scowl. “I’m never adorable.”
“You’re right,” he says mock-seriously. “You’re very scary. Especially with that curl bouncing over your cheek.”
I shove the stupid curl behind my ear. My wavy hair is turning even more unruly with the approach of the rainy season. It’s overcast for the first time in weeks, and I can smell the moisture in the air, somehow both sultry and refreshing, as if a cloud were about to burst over the scorched land, but the Gods aren’t quite ready to stick a dagger in it yet. My hair doesn’t know the difference. Anything too short to stay firmly in my braid is now springing out with gusto and frizzing all around my head.
Out of habit, I check my knives. My old set hangs from multiple belt loops. My new set is secured to flat leather straps circling my thighs. My sword is on my back in a sling Griffin had fashioned for me along with the thick boar’s-hide armor that hugs my upper body from shoulders to waist in a sleeveless, close-fitting shell. A direct hit will pierce the leather, but it’ll provide protection from slices or glancing blows, as will the new vambraces on my forearms.
I told Griffin I’d be too hot and confined, which I am, but he insisted in that steady, intractable voice of his that if I want to ride with warriors, I’d better have the equipment.
He knows I’ve been fighting without any of this since before I could walk, but I humored him because I love him. Apparently, that’s how couples work. Compromise. Gah! Now there’s so much metal and leather weighing me down that I almost couldn’t get on my horse.
That curl bounces back out, and Griffin leans over, tucking it behind my ear again. “Terrifying,” he murmurs, and something in his voice makes me shiver like he just trailed a warm, rough fingertip down my spine.
“In a Fisan fishing village, they call me Talia the Terrible.”
One midnight eyebrow creeps up. “Do tell.”
I settle deeper into my saddle when Panotii swings his back end around again, his hooves banging out an impatient rhythm on the marble of the courtyard. “It was that exceptionally cold winter about ten years back when the Ice Plains swept down into the realms and frosted over land that usually never sees even the barest dusting of snow. The northern forests hung with icicles, and terrifying creatures followed the freeze down into the realms, extending their usual playground by miles. People were scared, cold, and hungry—totally unprepared for that kind of severe weather.
“In this village on the coast, a giant, crazed octopus came down from the magic-filled waters of the north. Its appetite was huge, and it began devouring all their fish and ripping apart the boats that dared to cross into its new territory. The entire village was slowly starving to death. Hands and bellies empty. Hopeless eyes. Wailing babies. I heard about their plight, traveled there, and caught the gigantic tentacled monster—at great personal risk to myself, as you can imagine—and tore it limb from limb with my bare hands. Pluck.” I mime yanking a leg off and tossing it over my shoulder. “Pluck.” I toss the next one over the other shoulder and watch the imaginary limb splat in the imaginary dirt. “When I got to the eighth and final leg, the creature looked at me with doleful eyes and said, ‘You are truly terrible,’ and then it died in a pathetic, gelatinous heap.”
Griffin explodes with laughter, the sudden sound making even Brown Horse’s ears twitch. It rolls from him in great, deep waves, and I can’t help laughing, too, even though my ridiculous grin destroys Talia the Terrible on the spot. It’s the first time in days he’s looked happy like this. The broad smile, the way his eyes crinkle at the corners, bringing out the silver lining around his irises—it’s a different kind of pleasure from the intensity of lovemaking, or the times when it’s just the two of us, wrapped in each other’s arms. I like seeing him simply enjoy himself. I love being the reason for it.
“Octopuses live in warm water, Madam Terrible. And is tentacled even a word?” Griffin asks, still chuckling.
“Of course it is. It rhymes with manacled.” I give him a significant look, my mind jumping straight to his big hand gripping my wrists, but my face heats to the point of burning, which ruins the effect.
Fabulous. Catalia Fisa, master of seduction.
Griffin’s glittering gray eyes smolder with interest, though. He looks ready to drag me off my horse and forget about leaving for a few hours.
Maybe I am a master of seduction!
With a low sound that makes my whole body hum, he leans down and brushes his lips over mine. When that’s not enough, because it’s never enough, he clasps the back of my neck and presses his mouth down harder. Our kiss starts to move in a rhythm. His fingers tighten on my nape. I breathe him in and savor his taste, and when he pulls back, I tingle from head to toe.
“You are terrible when you need to be. And terribly selfless.” Griffin drags his thumb across my lower lip. “Even in that ridiculous story you made up, you were defending people, putting others before yourself. You like to pretend otherwise, but don’t you see? You’re the shield, and I’m the sword. Together, we’ll forge a new world.”
My heart hangs suspended for a moment and then beats again hard. Fear mingles with…anticipation? “Who said I made it up?”
Griffin grins and kisses me again. Our teeth click softly when I grin back. Then our lips cling until I lower my head.
Do we make a whole? Or do we cancel each other out? What if he’s the shield, and I’m the sword? What if I break him, and everything else?
A dull clomping in my ears tells me the others are finally mounted and ready. I look over my shoulder and see the guys moving in our direction.
Carver draws alongside us. Kato and Flynn take up the rear. On Griffin’s signal, the gate rises. The rest of the royal family calls out and waves to us again. I briefly wave back but don’t linger over another good-bye. The first one was hard enough. I don’t turn again as the spiked portcullis finishes its slow crawl up into the high rectangle of the castle’s main gate, although I think I’m the only one. I don’t know why it’s not universally acknowledged that looking back is a terrible idea. It only makes going forward that much harder.
“Now that we’re done with the kissing,” Carver mutters, “we can finally leave.”
I flush and adjust my seat, picking up the reins I’d apparently dropped. Griffin gives his younger brother a withering look and then presses his heels to Brown Horse’s sides, setting the big animal into motion.
Panotii follows without any direction from me. “I didn’t realize we were kissing,” I tease Carver, trying to take everyone’s mind off the people and place we’re leaving behind.
Carver grunts. “Gods forbid.”
I arch an eyebrow. He’s usually such a flirt, although I’ve never seen him look seriously at any woman, and certainly not at me. “I’m pretty sure I should be offended, although I’m telling myself you’re just doing your best to avoid Griffin’s rampant jealousy.”
Now Griffin grunts.
“I love kissing women,” Kato offers. “I’ll kiss hundreds of them.” He sweeps his hand toward the tiled rooftops of Sinta City. “The whole city.”
“That sounds unhygienic,” Carver says without humor.
Kato winks at me. “And fun.”
I roll my eyes.
Kato tips his blond head toward Carver and tells me in a low voice, “He’s just frustrated because he’s not using his sword.”
I choke a little. Is
that a metaphor again?
“We all know I’m the best swordsman around,” Carver comments dryly.
I doubt that. My money is on Griffin—unless this really isn’t a metaphor again. In actual swordplay, Carver just can’t be beat.
“It’s not only about the sword. It’s about knowing how to use it,” Flynn remarks sagely.
“And where to stick it,” Kato adds, miming a slow, low stab.
Carver finally cracks a smile. He turns and leers at me, but it’s not as authentic as usual. “Show me your sword, Cat, and I’ll show you mine.”
Griffin’s eyes glint dangerously, which goes a long way toward restoring Carver’s usual good humor.
“You need the practice, Cat. We should cross swords,” Carver says.
I ignore him.
“Work on our parries and thrusts.”
I ignore him some more.
“There’s really only one good way to jab.”
I mash my lips together to keep from smiling.
“But there are a lot of ways to perform without actually getting poked.”
I burst out laughing. “Good Gods! Are you trying to get yourself killed before we’re even five minutes out of the castle?”
Carver grins, his lean face lighting up. He seems to set his unusual moodiness aside for good. Griffin takes the whole thing surprisingly well, and I’m so happy to be away from the confines of the castle that I’ll gladly participate in a lewd conversation.
Actually, I’d do that anyway.
Open farmland greets us as we exit the city, ripe crops lending a sweetness to the air that mixes appealingly with the sharper aromas of sun-baked wild thyme and the huge, rambling rosemary bushes lining the road. Olive groves glint in the distance, silvery-green leaves fluttering on the warm breeze. A slender ribbon of water snakes through the squat, solid trunks like a sparkling thread, reflecting the midmorning sun that’s already done away with the earlier cloudiness.
I inhale deeply, breathing in the freedom of the road. I can’t quite come to terms with living behind stone walls again, with guards, and gates, and people who look to me to make decisions for them.
I wasn’t at all hungry at breakfast. My stomach actually cramped at the thought of food, but I’m ravenous now, so I pull an orange from my saddlebag and drop the reins to peel and eat it. Panotii will keep going in a straight line without my largely token involvement in the steering process.
We settle into a familiar rhythm as the day goes on. Kato and Flynn talk from time to time, Carver hums softly, and Griffin and I ride side by side, our mounts keeping stride with one another. We’re rarely more than a few feet apart, almost like we’re still attached by the magic rope Griffin used when he abducted me.
I glance at Griffin only to find him already watching me. Maybe we are still attached, but the rope has turned intangible, and the magic runs deeper now.
He doesn’t turn away. The intensity in his gray gaze makes my cheeks heat, and his low chuckle conveys pure masculine satisfaction that he can still make me blush with only a lingering look.
We reach Ios at sunset. After a quiet meal, Griffin and I take full advantage of having a bed and a closed door because who knows when we’ll have that kind of privacy again. From now on, we’ll be sticking to the woods and forgoing inns.
In the morning, we visit the healing center site where Eneas and Calla are. The two healers were recently promoted for keeping me alive—Eneas to the head of Ios’s new healing center, and Calla to his personal apprentice—although I’m not sure gaining a dusty construction site and a group of petulant healers is any great gift. Griffin instructs Eneas to hire Hoi Polloi medics if Ios’s healers still haven’t agreed to take their shifts by the time the building is in working condition.
I smile to myself, just imagining the fits of apoplexy when Magoi realize they’re being replaced by Hoi Polloi. Good Hoi Polloi medics have decent skills. Magoi healers can cure just about anything, but if they’re too pompous and prejudiced to treat nine-tenths of the people who need attention, they deserve a far worse fate than just getting bumped out of their traditional role.
Times are changing. I have a feeling they’ll come around. Eventually. And if they don’t, I’ll come back here and make them.
CHAPTER 8
Shifting in his saddle, Griffin dips his head toward mine. “Something is following us.”
My eyes widen, meeting his. At the sudden tension coursing through my body, Panotii’s ears twitch.
Griffin puts his hand on my shoulder to keep me from turning around. “Three wolf-like creatures. Enormous. They’ve been there on and off all day.”
“Their eyes glow,” Flynn adds softly. He’s on my left. Griffin is on my right. They box me in, squashing my legs.
“Am I the only one who didn’t know about this?” I ask from between gritted teeth.
Griffin doesn’t answer, which is answer enough.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
He doesn’t look over at me again. His sharp eyes scan the forest ahead and to the sides. “I didn’t want to worry you before I was sure.”
I guess he’s sure now. Fabulous.
We’re deep in the vast, uninhabited woods of northern Tarva. Lichen and moss crawl over boulders and fallen logs, cushioning the forest in deep greens, russets, and orange. Long, ghostly tendrils of mist slide like exploring fingers around towering tree trunks and loop over gnarled branches, cooling and dampening the air. The dense canopy is so thick and thriving it shades everything and swallows all sound.
A moment ago, I was soaking up the freshness, glad for the shadows and feeling my magic spark. Now I shiver. I’m not cold, although the air is cooler here, this far to the north. It’s the sudden sense of foreboding that feels like ice melting down the back of my neck.
Griffin’s heavy hand is still on my shoulder. “What do you think they are?”
“How am I supposed to know? You won’t let me turn around and look.”
Griffin gives my shoulder a warning squeeze before removing his hand. “Right now, they’re not far behind, and a little to the left.”
I draw two knives, leaving Panotii to steer himself. “My left now? Or my left when I turn around?”
“Your left now.”
“So my right.”
Griffin shoots me a sidelong glance. “This isn’t funny, Cat.”
“It never is.” We’re close enough to the Ice Plains now that magical creatures might wander down from the north, looking for food—or fun. Neither option is good for us.
I turn around, focusing on Kato first. He looks shaggy, disreputable, and incredibly handsome. His bright cobalt eyes stand out like jewels in his tanned face. “You’re looking rather uncivilized. Did you lose your razor somewhere?” I let my eyes slide to the right and search for movement amid the trees.
Kato scrubs his hand over the thick coating of whiskers on his jaw. Then his arm drops, and his long fingers curl around the handle of the mace lying in his lap. “The beard keeps my face warm. Interesting development with your hair, by the way,” he comments back, giving me a reason to stay turned around. “You can borrow my comb.”
“Thanks, but I’d probably break it.” There’s a springy, dark frame all around my face. The dry season is officially over. “It’s my Medusa look, minus the snakes.”
Quietly scoffing, Kato lifts his weapon to rest it against his shoulder. “I doubt you’ll be turning men to stone anytime soon.”
“Good to know,” I murmur distractedly, catching a flash of gray fur, a distended, barrel-like body, and four thick legs.
Carver rolls his shoulders, warming them up. Flynn draws his ax and the short sword he’s taken to carrying as the creature melts back into the woods.
“Thoughts?” Griffin asks.
A pair of blazing eyes materializes from the shadows. Then
another. And another.
Bollocks! They know I’ve seen them. They aren’t trying to be discreet anymore.
They approach, and their new proximity brings a prickle of power to my searching senses. The sinister vibrations of magic weaving through the forest along with them sweep over me like a harsh, dry wind. I tense. The power emanating from the creatures is the kind of stuff I wouldn’t touch in a million years, a darkness so deep and hungry that no one who gets sucked into it ever crawls back out again.
Suppressing a shudder, I turn back around, but not before something instinctive within me pulses, probing deeper into the dark magic. A yawning pit of immorality overlaps the creatures’ own disturbing presence. The familiar essence haunted my childhood and makes my blood run cold now.
Mother’s here.
A hard knot forms beneath my ribs, and suddenly I can’t breathe. My eyes find Griffin’s. She’ll rip apart everyone I love—and laugh while she’s doing it.
Griffin’s eyes widen. I must look as terrified as I feel.
Pressure builds behind my forehead, and then a low, eerie ripple of a voice invades my mind. “Coming home, Talia?”
Gasping, I slam down my mental shields so hard and fast that my head goes numb, and I see spots. I hope Mother’s brain rings for an hour.
“Talk to me, Cat.” Griffin’s concerned voice seems to come to me from miles, and seasons, and lifetimes away. “What just happened?”
“Alpha Fisa.” I blink, trying to clear my head. “Andromeda is driving the creatures.” I tighten my grip around my knives because I don’t want Griffin to see my hands shake. How can Mother possibly drive three creatures at once and have enough power left over to get into my head?
Griffin eases Brown Horse even closer to Panotii, and the two horses move like they’re one.
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