"A course with the Faolchúnna," Lauryl sneered.
"Aye, it is his family of which I speak," Sagira said. "They will welcome you with open arms and accept you with joy for you are the heart of their loved one's heart and will be for as long as he lives."
"Choud as veeyme bio," Lauryl said softly. She looked over at the old woman. "He said that to me."
"For as long as I am alive," Sagira translated though she knew her visitor understood the words.
"But how can he know that?" Lauryl protested. "We've just met!"
"He knows," Sagira said. "Just as you know, daughter of Torreya."
Lauryl buried her face in her hands. "I don't want this," she said.
"How do you know?"
She didn't, Lauryl thought but wasn't ready yet to accept what she was beginning to realize was inevitable. She sat down at the table and slumped in the chair. "What do I do, teagascóir?"
"To be with him as you would like, the obstacles must be overcome," Sagira said.
"So I need to wipe the whore off the face of the earth," Lauryl declared.
"It can not be at your hands that she meets her assigned fate," Sagira told her and when the younger woman looked up at her, she cocked one shoulder. "I don't make the rules, child."
"Then how do I get rid of her?"
"And her lover," Sagira reminded her. "He is as much a part of this as she is." She shuffled the cards over and over in her twisted, gnarled hands. "Let me think on the matter. What other concerns do you have?"
Lauryl chewed on her bottom lip. "I don't want to give up what I do."
"And you fear the Faolchúnna will require it of you?"
"I am what I am," Lauryl stated. "I am good at what I do. I provide a service. I do not want to lose that!"
"No one has said you have to," Sagira said. "I see no reason why you should not continue on as before." She put the deck on the table and cut it, picked up the card on the top of the deck and laid it down. It was the hierophant again. "Just as I knew it would be."
"You are reading the cards for me again?" Lauryl asked.
"Nay, daughter of Torreya. This time I read them for myself."
Whatever the cards revealed to the old woman, it pleased her for she was smiling broadly when she laid the last card face up on the table. She laughed--revealing a few rotten and snaggle teeth--then got to her feet. "Thank you for the gifts," she said as she went to the door and opened it. "They will be well used."
Realizing she was being dismissed, Lauryl stood and walked to the door. She bowed respectfully to the old woman. "Thank you, teagascóir."
"All will be as it is meant to be, daughter of Torreya," Sagira said. "Go raibh an Ghaoth go brách ag do chúl."
"Go raibh an Ghaoth go brách ag do chúl," Lauryl replied, wishing for the Wind be always at the old one's back.
As she rode away from the isolated cottage, Lauryl could feel the Ancient One's eyes on her back. She had never had reason to consult a soothsayer before but Sagira had not made her uneasy as she had thought one of her kind would. Instead, she felt a measure of peace as she kicked her mount into a faster pace, anxious now to return to the Faolchúnna and whatever the future held for them.
Chapter Six
Lauryl returned to Nonika in time to eat a late lunch. She checked in on the Faolchúnna, saw he was still sleeping soundly and went back downstairs. It was raining again and when she told the Captain Reese Fontenalle of the Akkadian Rangers the roads were nearly impassable in places, he informed his men they'd be staying the night again.
"Care to join us in a few hands of cards to pass the time, Milady?" the captain asked.
Already feeling bored and restless, she nodded. "I would," she agreed and sat in with him and three of his higher ranking men as the rain grew heavier and the wind picked up to skirl like a banshee through the eaves.
"Strange weather we're having," Reese observed. "How often have you heard of it raining like this in Nonika?"
"It is rather odd for a desert clime," one of his lieutenants remarked as he dealt the cards to the players.
"Will your companion be joining us?" Reese asked as he looked down at the spread of cards in his hand and rearranged them to his liking.
"He's sleeping. He had a migraine and I gave him a measure of tenerse," Lauryl replied. "He may well sleep through the night."
"Best thing for that kind of god awful ailment," Reese said. "My Lady-wife has suffered from them since she was in her teen years."
"My sister has them, too," the lieutenant put in. "But I've heard they are much worse in men."
"I've heard that, as well," the Sergeant Major agreed with a nod though he was frowning fiercely at his cards.
"I pity your companion, then," Reese told Lauryl. He nudged her with his knee and when she moved her leg out of his reach, he sighed.
Lauryl glanced toward the door leading from the common room. Two men were standing just inside the doorway, their rain slickers dripping water on the parquet flooring.
"We are looking for the innkeeper," the taller of the two men stated.
"He's not in here," Reese said. "You might try the kitchen."
The man nodded and he and his companion exited the room.
"Hope they're not looking for rooms," the Sergeant Major said as he laid down a card.
Lauryl's attention was on the doorway still. The two men had had a look about them that had sent warning signals through her brain. Their eyes had been hard and cold and completely devoid of emotion. Each had a shoulder scabbard holding large blades and each carried crossbows along with their saddlebags and bedrolls. They were bounty hunters or she'd eat her leather jerkin.
And there was no doubt in her mind that they had been sent to get.
"You in or out, Milady?" Reese inquired.
Lauryl tossed her cards in. "Lady Luck isn't with me this afternoon," she said though she'd had one helluva good hand. She pushed her chair back.
"It's just the first hand," the captain complained. "Your luck is bound to get better."
"Or it could get much worse," Lauryl mumbled. She nodded to the men and left.
The two strangers were speaking to the innkeeper in low tones when she came out of the common room and all three sets of eyes shifted toward her--one set looking very nervous while the other two were flinty and full of suspicion. She pretended not to notice and climbed the stairs, the center of her back feeling as though it were being scraped raw with a dull blade. She knew the men had been told about the presence of the Faolchúnna and it would be but a matter of minutes before the bounty hunters came upstairs to investigate.
Hurrying into the room where Prince Glade slept on--oblivious to the potential danger lurking below stairs--Lauryl drew her blade and positioned herself behind the door, leaving the portal unlocked and slightly ajar in invitation. Before too many seconds had passed, she heard the stealthy approach of boots on the stairs and grinned nastily.
Glade's eyes opened and he stared up at the shadows lacing the ceiling. Something had awakened him but he couldn't put a finger on it. He was about to sit up when his room door began to ease open. Warning bells went off in his head and he moved, rolling to the far side of the bed even as a war cry echoed through the room. From the floor, all he could see were three sets of booted feet scraping across the floor in a macabre dance. The clang of metal striking metal and fierce grunts punctuated by hisses and growls made his blood run cold for he had no weapon and no way to protect himself from the attack being carried out right in front of him. It wasn't until he heard Lauryl curse soundly that he realized--weapon or not--he had to lend her his aid.
But that help wasn't needed for the moment he pushed up from the floor he saw her slide her blade into the belly of one man, withdraw it and with a backward swing, take the head off the second. He stood pressed against the wall, staring with disbelief as she reached for the sheet on the bed to wipe the blood from her sword.
"Mother of the gods," he breathed, eyes wide and lips
parted.
"It's what I do," she said in a matter of fact tone and walked over to kick the skewered man in the hip. "Who sent you, as if I didn't know?"
The man was dying and knew it as he tried to hold his innards inside his belly. "Princess Rolanda," he whispered.
"To bring me back," Glade said with disgust.
"To kill you," the man replied and took his final breath.
Glade blinked. "To kill me?" he repeated, incredulous.
The sound of running footsteps up the stairs told them they were about to have company as the captain of the Akkadian Rangers and the men with whom he'd been playing cards came rushing into the room.
"What happened?" Reese said, taking in the two dead men.
"They were here to kill His Grace," Lauryl said, "and I prevented them from doing so."
Reese swung his attention from the dead bodies to Glade. "His Grace?" he questioned.
"I am Prince Glade, son of King Barren Aeolian, Laird of the Faolchúnna," Glade replied.
The Akkadian's face hardened. "Faolchúnna," he repeated then gave Lauryl a quick glance. "And what are you to His Grace?"
Lauryl almost grinned at the angry emphasis Reese put on the title. "I am his bodyguard," she said. "Lauryl Coedil of Bandar."
A gasp went through the men who had accompanied Reese up the stairs and the word Hell Hag whispered through them. They took an involuntary step back although they'd been socializing with the woman.
"You're a mercenary," Reese accused, his eyes boring into hers.
"I am what I am," she stated and refused to look away from his probing glower.
"Who would want the Prince dead?" the captain queried.
It was Glade who answered, drawing the heated eyes of the Akkadian his way. "My Lady-wife," he answered.
Reese held Glade's unblinking look for a long moment then turned to his Master Sergeant. "Get some men up here to remove these miscreants from the lady's room."
"Thank you, Captain," Lauryl said and smiled warmly at him.
His back rigid, the Akkadian gave a curt nod and spun around to stride quickly from the room, his men close on his heels.
"I guess he won't want to play with me any more now that he knows what I am," Lauryl said with a sigh.
"Anymore than Rolanda wants to play with me," Glade stated.
"I'd say she just upped the ante," Lauryl said. "I think she's tired of fucking with you, Wolfboy."
"The coldhearted bitch wants me dead!" Glade spat as he stared at the dead man. "What the hell did I do to deserve that?"
"You didn't give her what she wants and she's gonna keep trying until she breathes her last," Lauryl suggested.
"Bitch," he called her again and ran a hand through his hair. "I wish I could ring her lying, cheating neck!"
"Aye, well since you can't do that without dire consequences and there is no divorce among your kind, your only hope is if she trips down the stairs and breaks that lying, cheating neck of hers," Lauryl said.
"Even wishing for it is forbidden," he said on a long, disgusted release of breath.
"It isn't for me," she said.
"Were you to kill her, I'd pay the price for it," he said, shaking his head in misery.
"How do you figure that, Wolfboy?" she demanded. "You haven't bartered with me to kill the bitch."
"Nay, but I know you desire to, have given you reason to, and that's just as bad in the eyes of my Tribunal."
"Well, hell," Lauryl grumbled. "What do we do, then?"
"There's nothing to be done," he replied. He looked down at the two men she'd slain then up at her. "You killed for me."
"To protect you, aye," she said. "That was part of the job your brothers hired me to do."
"I owe my life to you," he said softly.
"You owe me nothing," she said with a toss of her hand. "Your family is paying me quite well, believe me."
"Nevertheless, my life is yours," he said.
"I don't want it," she stated. "I have a hard enough time handling my own."
Four soldiers took that moment to come to the door to retrieve the dead men. They wouldn't look at Lauryl and that told her they knew now what she was. One part of her was amused by their reaction to her while another part was annoyed. It was always the same when men found out she was a Daughter of the Night.
"Your kind is feared," Glade told her, reading her mind.
"No more so than your kind are," she reminded him.
"I suppose not," he agreed.
"The two of us together are no doubt a royal nightmare to the men in this inn," she said with a snort.
"So how shall we pass the time?" he asked. "It's too early for supper or bed. I don't need another bath but if you do, I can go down and order it."
"I told them to have one prepared for me after supper," she said. "It relaxes me and helps me to sleep."
"A pair of strong arms and a warm body will do the same," he teased.
"A good fuck would put me right out," she countered and delighted in watching the color rise in his lean cheeks. "I guess that's out though, eh?"
"Aye," he said, looking away. "It is."
"Then I guess we'll have to do what the Akkadians are doing," she said and went over to her saddlebags to fetch the deck of cards she kept there.
Reese Fontanelle was a very angry man as he stood at the bar in the common room of the inn and nursed his liquor. He felt he'd been made a fool of and that did not set well with the Akkadian. Though he had been married for nigh on twenty years, he had never been faithful to his wife and never had any intention of being so. He took his comfort where and when he found it. His objective was to spend the night between the delectable thighs of the woman named Lauryl but now that would not happen. It wasn't just that she was a Hell Hag. He'd had one or two of those in his day for variety sake. What kept him from trying with the bitch again was the claim he'd seen stamped in the eye of the Faolchúnna and he knew--without having to be told--the wolf had taken the Hell Hag's blood. The woman was now spoiled for any man who might want to lay with her or her with him.
"Now I know why she pulled away from me when we went outside," he muttered before downing the last of his whiskey and banging the glass on the bar for a refill. He wondered if she was aware that she'd never be able to tolerate any man's touch beyond the Faolchúnna's.
"I've heard tell of Prince Glade," Master Sergeant Myles Daimone told his commanding officer. "He's the third eldest of the Aeolian princes and quite the swordsman, I hear. His twin is the one they call Slade, the Blade."
Reese's eyes narrowed. "Is that the one?" he inquired, staring at his reflection in the long mirror that hung over the back bar.
"That's the one," Daimone replied.
"I wonder why his wife wants him dead," Reese asked.
"I heard tell he's been missing for a month or two," Daimone said. "Mayhap his Lady-wife was holding him prisoner."
"But why?" Reese wanted to know. "For what purpose?"
Daimone shrugged. "Don't know, Cap'n, but I could find out if'n you are of a mind to know the particulars."
"I am," Reese said. He took a sip of his fresh drink then ran the tip of his tongue over his upper lip. "Aye, I would very much like to know why she wants the bastard dead."
As the storm continued, the dark gray of the day turning to satiny black, Lauryl and Glade played hand after hand of anemoi--a three card draw--and skeiron, a complex game that went on for hours at a time, both playing so well neither got the upper hand. By the time the innkeeper came up to announce dinner, both were tired of playing cards and ready to relax over a leisurely meal. But once down in the common room where the Akkadians had not ceased holding court during the dreary day, it was soon apparent that Lauryl was no longer welcome among them. The room grew silent as soon as she and the Faolchúnna appeared and it was an uneasy quiet that set everyone's nerves on edge.
"We should have had the food served in our room," Lauryl said softly as she cut into the thick steak that had been
placed before her.
"Why?" Glade inquired. He was accustomed to just the reaction they were getting and knew she was, too. "It's their problem, not ours."
Lauryl nodded as she forked a juicy piece of meat into her mouth but made no reply.
Half an hour later, the two of them climbed the stairs to their room and Lauryl retrieved the clean clothes the innkeeper's wife had laundered for her, happy to give back to the woman's son the clothing she'd bought from him earlier that day.
"Two baths in one day has to be a record for these people," Glade told her as she started out of the room. "I meant to ask--what did you do today to need a second bath?"
"While you were sleeping, I rode out to see a Daughter of the Night who lives nearby," she replied. "Being out in rainy weather like this makes me feel soiled, my skin clammy."
"Aye, I know what you mean," he said. He gave her a quick look. "How was Keyrragh?"
"She was eating when last I saw her," she replied. "I told the stableman to see to her well if he valued his life."
Glade grinned brutally. "He'd better heed your words," he agreed.
"I'll be back soon," she said and started to close the door behind her.
"I'll be here waiting with those strong arms and warm body," he quipped.
Lauryl snorted but as she skipped down the stairs, she was smiling to herself. She was looking forward to lying in those arms, against that muscular body even if nothing could or would come of it this night.
Glade stretched out on the bed with his hands beneath his head, knees bent. The headache was finally gone and the nausea had left him. He had eaten a good supper although he would have preferred more Sustenance to the food he'd consumed. The pitcher the lad had brought to him before Lauryl had left that afternoon had to be poured out, its contents clotted before he got to it. It would be morning now before he could go to the butcher for more. Sometimes he hated what he was, how he had to survive, and never more so than when he was with someone not of his kind.
WindBorn Page 9