by Brenna Lyons
Talon set his jaw. “Only a fool or a better trained Warrior. Or maybe all it takes is a trainee and a little girl who have nothing left to lose. Hope you never meet an elder, Bryant. Your brother will cease to impress very quickly.”
Kord caught his younger grandson’s eyes and glared at him. “Well, Bryant. I can see we have been remiss in your education. We considered letting Jayde, elder killer instruct you in what to truly fear, but she graciously allowed that your problem was a failure in Maher training that thankfully has been rectified since you trained. You will face all the older Warriors of Maher except Adam. After we’ve finished with you, you’ll face Curtis. You have wronged him as surely as you wronged Erin by refusing them both aid.
“Adam, you know your fate already. I can’t stand in Talon’s way on this. I wouldn’t even if I could. Your offense was directly to his house. It was the choice of König and of you to allow you to face Hunter rather than the Lord and Lady König.” He noted Adam’s grimace and guessed that he knew he wasn’t getting off easy in the deal, now.
“I had considered giving what was left of you to Curtis, but I don’t imagine there will be much left of you, and your brother has already proven he can blindside you. I think you require extra training for that. Erin is an elder hunter. Her getting the drop on you is understandable, but Blutjagd or no, you should have seen Curtis coming.”
“Yes, Grandfather,” he breathed in a tense voice. Adam had never cared for correction.
“Good. Eat up. You’ll need your strength. Bryant, you face us day after tomorrow. Adam, you are at Hunter’s leisure.”
Bryant looked at him in confusion. “Why the delay on me?”
“I want Hunter well enough to see how Maher will deal with you, so he will see the least I expect him to deal your brother.”
* * * *
April 19, 2021
Hunter was glad to see the stitches go, though the intense itching of his rapidly healing body was threatening to drive him insane. Despite lingering pain that he was taking Tylox for, he managed to pull on a pair of jeans and join the others for dinner. He gave up on the idea of a shirt because of the agony of trying to drag one on, but the thought of his adversary staring at his wounds and getting more nervous cinched it for him. Hunter pulled on his boots and headed for the stairs gingerly, feeling every step as if glass was being driven through his healing tissues.
Kord smiled widely as he entered the large dining room. “It’s good to see you up, Hunter. Take a seat and eat with us.”
He nodded and crossed to a chair next to Erin, controlling his urge to wince as he moved. Hunter tugged at the black eyelet bandana and smiled at her as he sank into his chair. “Looks good. Matches that Warrior’s shirt nicely. Is that one of mine?” he teased.
“Maybe.” Her smile was crooked and strained because of the bruise on her face. “You’re not wearing it.”
Hunter laughed lightly at that observation. “Just clean and return it when you’re done.”
“I always do.” Erin stabbed a forkful of spinach from her plate. “Red meat, spinach, rolls, OJ, and milk, healing food. Eat it,” she ordered.
“You too.” He raised an eyebrow, until she stuffed the vegetable into her mouth and started chewing. Hunter smiled indulgently as he watched her taking in the healing foods. Gods knew she needed it more than he did. His curse would take care of his healing, even if he neglected himself. Her body wouldn’t.
His smile disappeared and he glared at Adam, issuing a silent warning. The other man nodded his acknowledgement and looked to Erin sadly. The interaction wasn’t lost on Erin, and she started pushing her food around her plate.
“Eat, squirt,” Hunter commanded her.
She stabbed a mouthful of meat and started working at it.
“That’s better,” he decided.
Jayde shook her head in wonder. “You two haven’t gotten along this well in years,” she noted.
Hunter nodded as he swallowed a mouthful of milk. “Leave it to an elder to remind you what’s important in life.”
“So, do you think you’ll be up to a walk down to the training area tomorrow?” Kord asked.
“Certainly. Another night’s rest and good food like this, and I can pull that off.”
“Good. Then, Bryant will face his punishment tomorrow.”
Hunter raised an eyebrow at the second of Lewis’ sons. “I wouldn’t miss it, Kord.”
Bryant stared at his plate miserably.
“Nothing to say, Bryant?”
The other man raised his eyes and flicked a glance at Erin, who was trying to ignore the exchange. “I was wrong, but I don’t think anyone would buy that I’m sorry at this point. It’ll be a hell of a show, I suppose.” Bryant shrugged.
Erin looked at him in disbelief.
“What’s wrong?” Talon asked.
“I don’t want to watch this,” she managed.
“It’s an internal matter to Maher, though you felt the fallout from it. We were invited, but you’re not required to attend.”
“Thank you. I don’t want to attend.”
“You should attend when Hunter fights Adam, though,” he cautioned.
Erin met Adam’s gaze head on and nodded. “I can do that,” she decided.
The rest of the meal passed in relative silence. When Erin finally pushed away from the table, Adam nodded to Talon and followed her from the room.
Hunter watched him warily. “What’s this?” he asked in a tense voice.
His father smiled. “Adam is trying to offer an apology — if your sister will accept it.”
“Now? Why?”
“Better now than after he takes his beating. It will sound more honest, now.”
“Even if she accepts it, I’m taking him apart,” Hunter warned. “He’s not talking his way out of this one. He was way over the line.”
“He knows that. This is between him and Erin. It has no bearing on what goes on when you heal.”
“Erin! Stop,” Adam thundered.
Hunter pushed to his feet painfully. “Unless I kill him now,” he growled.
Adam raced into the room and snatched up his weapons belt from the back of his chair. Hunter snagged him by the throat, stopping his headlong dash back to the doorway.
“Hunter, I need,” he rasped, gasping for breath.
Hunter shook him, wincing at the lance of pain in his shoulder. “What did you say to her?” he demanded.
“Nothing. I apologized,” he managed hotly through the grip Hunter had on him.
“Then, why,” he began.
“Later, Hunter. She took off, and it’s getting dark out there. Let me go after her.”
The room was suddenly in motion. Hunter’s blood ran cold, and he released Adam slowly. Too much time— He wasted too much time fighting Adam while Erin was heading away at top speed. She could be anywhere by now.
“Find her,” he whispered. “Find her or it’s your life.”
Bryant was already strapping on his belt. “Where’s Curt?” he asked in confusion.
Adam groaned. “Hopefully, bringing her back. Let’s get flashlights and radios before we go.”
* * * *
Erin startled as Adam’s hand touched her shoulder.
He pulled back with his hands up in surrender. “I won’t touch you,” he soothed her.
She took another step away, watching him warily. “What do you want?”
Adam was a big man, a good three inches taller than her father and Hunter, making him over six and a half feet, and just as broad. She had been afraid of his sheer size when she jumped at him, and it terrified her now.
As if reading her mind, he shoved his hands in his pockets and took yet another step back. “Look, I wanted to apologize.”
“Apologize?”
“I overreacted. I didn’t know.”
“Didn’t know what?”
“I heard about Lorian — all the things he did to you. Once I asked some questions, I understood.”
Erin felt her stomach turn a lazy circle. “What did you hear?” she asked just to be sure. She hadn’t stayed in the room with Curt and her family. Worse, only her father promised not to share everything. She couldn’t even be sure Adam got his information from Curt. He asked around, he said. If her parents told Kord and Lewis— Her stomach rebelled at the thought of Adam knowing all her secrets.
Adam sighed and shifted his eyes from hers. “Look, I know what he did to you. Having him touch you like that— I’m sorry. I’m sorry he hurt you, and I’m sorry I made it worse. You didn’t deserve any of it, but taking your dignity was probably even worse for you than the physical abuses. I could see that in your eyes the other day, but I didn’t understand what it was then.”
She backed away, looking at the floor through a haze of tears. This was her worst nightmare come true. Of all the people she’d rather not share this with, Adam was just about lowest on her list.
Adam took a step closer. “You’re safe now, Erin. I know you don’t believe me, but I’ll make sure he never touches you again — in any way. I promise even the emotional scars will heal in time.”
Erin had heard enough. She launched out the door and into the woods, feeling the tears coursing down her face. She ignored Adam, when he ordered her to stop. He was the last person she wanted to set eyes on.
By the time she reached the lake, her leg muscles burned and her lungs hurt. Erin launched in without removing her shoes and socks, letting the cold water wash over her. The shock to her system helped clear her mind.
Why the hell would they tell Adam that? She supposed Kord might not know how much it upset her, but how could it not upset her?
Erin groaned and dunked her head again, trying to stay warm. The water was cold, but she could deal with that. The cold wind blowing over her skin when she rose above the waterline was almost more than she could bear.
She startled at a noise from the shoreline. Panting and shaking in exhaustion, Curt stood with his hands on his hips, watching her.
“What do you want?” she asked miserably. And, why couldn’t anyone just leave her alone?
“Come on out and talk, Erin,” he invited.
“No. I can’t trust any of you.” And, I’d freeze my ass off if I came out, she added silently.
“You can trust me. You know you can trust me.”
Erin shook her head stubbornly. She thought about sending him away, but Curt would either ignore her or go back for her parents, and that was not an option for her.
“If you don’t come out, I’ll have to come in after you and drag you out,” he reasoned in a voice that brooked no other options.
“You wouldn’t dare,” she growled, her anger at that idea almost overwhelming the rest put together.
Curt sighed and dragged off his boots and socks, while she watched with wide eyes. He waded in after her, before she could stop him.
He grimaced, shooting her a look of pure pain. “Damn, this is cold! Sure you won’t come out?”
Erin closed her eyes in resignation. Curt would just keep coming until he was as soaked as she was, and it would be her fault. “You’re really going to drag me in, aren’t you?”
“You’d rather be a Popsicle?”
“Not particularly,” she admitted. More important, she’d rather he wasn’t a Popsicle because of her. He would drag her out even if it meant coming away as wet as she was. Curt would see that as his duty.
“Then, come out and talk to me.”
She nodded and swam back. “All right. Since you’re so determined.”
He held his ground, until she passed him on her way to the shore. Erin curled into a ball with her back to a boulder, shivering, trying to make as little of her body accessible to the cold wind off the higher peaks as she could.
Curt sank down next to her and wrapped an arm around Erin for warmth. “So, what stupid thing did Conan say this time?” he asked quietly.
“Nothing,” she stormed. She was wrong, she decided. Erin wanted to discuss this with Curt even less than she wanted to discuss it with Adam.
“Bullshit! You take off like a bat out of hell and come throw yourself in a frigid lake when it’s fifty degrees outside without even removing your shoes. What set you off?”
Erin shook her head miserably. “I really don’t want to discuss this, Curt.”
“Just tell me what he said. I know you don’t have any reason to save Adam’s life. Well, neither do I, but Hunter will kill him if you don’t come up with something that isn’t entirely Adam’s fault.”
“He just— Dammit! Can’t everyone just drop it?”
“What is it?” Curt asked in frustration. “I can’t help if you don’t tell me.”
“You can’t help anyway. Not unless you can erase Adam’s memory.”
He furrowed his brow. “I don’t get it.”
“Adam knows something I’d rather he didn’t. Whether he got it from you or my father or Kord— I don’t care really, but he has no right knowing it. I wouldn’t have told him.”
“Told him what?”
“Lorian used some sort of coercion on me, like a directed daydream but very real. Hunter pulled me out. I couldn’t fight him. That beast would have won if it weren’t for Hunter.”
“What’s so bad about that?”
Erin felt her cheeks burn. She didn’t question why the thought of telling him hurt so badly. A cursory examination told her that Curt was her friend, and losing his respect would kill her. She couldn’t seem to stop the tears when they started.
Curt pulled her to his chest and held her. “Tell me, Erin. I can’t help if you won’t talk to me.”
She shook her head into his shoulder.
“Please. Nothing can be that bad. There is nothing you cannot tell me.”
Erin ached to believe him. She needed to believe him, so she launched out the words before she could talk herself out of it. “He was seducing me — more or less. It was so real. It hurts to think about,” she whispered.
“It was brutal,” he guessed.
“No. He was tender, too tender. He’d never really be like that.” She sighed.
“Is that it?” he asked in surprise.
“Don’t you get it? I was enjoying it. Until Hunter broke me free—” She shuddered. “He could have— Well, Lorian could have done just about anything, and I wouldn’t have had the common sense to stop him.”
“No! It was a coercion. It was — like a rape in some ways. The emotional part was just part of the package for Lorian. You weren’t enjoying it. He added that.”
“How can you be sure? I can’t,” Erin admitted, feeling ashamed at the truth of it.
“When you first laid eyes on Lorian, what was your first impression of him?”
“He frightened me, and it wasn’t just being trapped with a sword to my throat. His looks frightened me. I can’t explain it,” she moaned.
“Were his fangs extended? Was he bloody? Was he grimacing? What frightened you?”
“No, he — he looked like a Warrior. That’s dumb. Of course, he looked like a Warrior. All the elders were originally Warriors. He was handsome, smiling.” Erin shivered. “But, there was something frightening in that just the same.”
“Would you have kissed him? Let him touch you and have sex with you?”
“No,” she responded in horror.
“After Hunter freed you, did you still want him? Did you want Lorian’s hands and his lips on you? Did you want him to take you?”
“No!” Erin tried to push away, but Curt cradled her closer to his chest and started to rock her. “The thought makes me sick, Curt,” she whispered into his chest.
“Then, he added your enjoyment to his coercion,” he concluded gently, running his fingers over her cheek to punctuate the words. “Never doubt that. You didn’t want him before, and you didn’t want him after. The rest was nothing but a trick.”
Erin pushed away slowly and met his eyes in the dim light around them. Curt was being honest. There was on
ly concern written in the depths of his dark eyes. She hugged him tightly, needing to know he was really still there for her. “Thank you, Curt,” she breathed, when he didn’t pull away from her.
“Anytime. Now, I need to get you back before we both freeze. It’s getting dark.”
She snapped her head up. A nameless panic settled in her chest. No, not nameless. Lorian. “What have I done?” After dark, Erin was a sitting duck. They were five minutes from the house at a dead run, and it was too dark to travel that way now.
“Hand me my boots. It will be okay,” he soothed her. “We’re close enough.”
* * * *
Hunter looked at his mother angrily from his perch on the wide staircase. “For the last time, I’m not going back up until Erin is back.”
Being unable to join in the search was maddening. The Mahers had left the entire König household behind with the excuse that they didn’t know the terrain, but Hunter suspected that his parents were left to keep him from following them out.
So far, the men had split up to head for all the lower grounds: the rock face that fell away from the house, the meadow where the training area was, and the thick stand of trees due west. They doubted Erin would head uphill if she was running, and those places held more danger for her. If she headed up, Erin would eventually have to cross water to go further. In the cold evening air, they assumed she wouldn’t try to cross water for fear of hypothermia.
His head snapped up as the door opened.
Erin slipped in followed closely by Curt. She was drenched head to toe and dripping large droplets of water on the front hall floor. Curt was solidly wet to his thighs — except for his boots, which were simply splattered — and had wet imprints on his lap and chest that seemed to indicate he had either grabbed or hugged Erin to himself. Both were shivering and pale.
Hunter calmed himself to wait for the explanation. Talon trusted the boy, and nothing Hunter had seen so far belied that initial sense of duty and friendship the young man had for Erin.
“What the hell happened?” Talon demanded, less patient for an answer.
“She decided to soak her head,” Curt chattered, wrapping his arms around his ribs.