by Lisa Daniels
“And just what are you going to be doing in Sumaria?” Draven crossed his arms across his chest.
“Trying to break this thing and save someone from a similar fate.”
“Or die trying?”
“Okay, fine. But it is only a little bit of a suicidal tendency.” The assassin held his fingers up and they appeared to be pressed together from where Dulce stood. Draven laughed a little. A smile flickered across the assassin’s face before he opened the door.
The door was nearly closed when it was thrown open. Draven and Dulce were looking at each other when it happened, and his mouth was open as he was about to talk. “Actually, I want you to wait. Give it one week, then go.”
“Why one week?” Draven frowned.
“Well, knowing that you are now active, I don’t expect it will take you that long to locate and draw out the poison. If she doesn’t have any external influence when you go in,” the assassin looked at her and gave a little laugh before running his hand over his mouth. He coughed before continuing, “That will remove the other requirements. Waiting a week will be alright knowing that she cannot be controlled. Just don’t wait any longer than that. One week.” His sapphire eyes flashed as he looked at Draven.
He gave a little nod. “Take care.”
The assassin gave a little wave, then disappeared.
“He was even cagier than you.”
Draven turned to look at her, “Where do you think I learned it from?”
“So neither of you will tell me who he is.”
Draven eyed her, “He is exactly who you think he is.”
“I don’t exactly know a lot of assassins.”
“You don’t need to know many.”
“Well, he definitely wasn’t Ignacio—Oh, my gods, we should have told him to pass word on to Ignacio.”
“I can take you to the rookery and you can write Ignacio yourself.”
Dulce nodded, “Okay, but still, the only other assassin that I’ve ever heard of—”
“Yes.”
Dulce knitted her brows, “Yes what?”
“Do I really need to say it?” Draven gave her a look.
“You can’t expect me to know the person who mentored you. I wasn’t there. Besides Ignacio, the only other assassin that I’ve heard of is Caspian.”
“Yes.”
“What do you mean yes?” Dulce folded her arms across her chest.
“If you couldn’t recognize him based on his reputation, then you have made him very happy.”
“Why are you changing the subject?”
Draven let out a deep breath before licking his lips and saying, “Yes, that was Caspian.” There was almost a pained look on his face as he said it.
Dulce’s mouth dropped open. “But he didn't seem like a cold heartless killer. He was really charming and—”
“Please don’t let him hear you say that because I will never hear the end of it if he does.” Draven’s eyes went to the door almost as if he expected Caspian to reappear.
“I quite liked him.” Dulce smiled and shrugged when Draven gave her a look.
“Yes, he is actually very personable, charming, and a right bastard when he wants to be. His reputation just makes it easy for him to do his job, and when your job is analyzing and killing, you don’t want it to be long and drawn out.”
“You don’t think he enjoys killing?” Dulce tilted her head to the side.
“Why would he? Most assassins can’t stand killing, but it is better than the alternative.”
“What alternative?”
“Letting terrible people live and kill the innocent and decent.”
“That’s very sad.”
Draven gave her a strange look, “You think they should enjoy killing?”
Dulce shook her head, “Absolutely not. But they should enjoy what they do. Cat shifters don’t naturally have short lives, and living for so long loathing what you do is tragic.”
Draven looked at her, then a smile spread across his face. “I have never known anyone who was so kind to assassins. Most people dismiss them.”
“Is that why you don’t tell people about your training? Or your mentor?”
“It certainly isn’t out of shame. I am far more capable than my brethren because of Caspian.”
“I can certainly believe that. If only you had taken in a little bit of his charm…” She squealed as Draven crossed the distance between them and lifted her off her feet. She laughed as he headed down the hall. “I thought you were hungry.”
Draven stopped and looked at her. “I suppose we have already missed one meal.”
Chapter 10
Betting on an Uncertain Future
Dulce insisted on helping him make the meal, and it took them considerably less time together than it had typically taken Draven on his own. When the meal was ready, the couple sat at the table in the kitchen. They were relatively quiet as they focused on eating, their thoughts following different paths. Draven finished long before Dulce did. As soon as she put her fork down, he slipped a hand over hers. “Would you like to go for a walk?”
Dulce looked at him. Part of her wanted to return to the bedroom—after all, they had been in the middle of something when Caspian had appeared—but something in his tone made her curious about what he wanted to say. Smiling at him, she nodded. He helped her out of her seat and held her hand out the door and as they walked along the beach.
“We have one week to prepare, and we are going to need most of it. Of course, I will need to send a message to Haiden, who is going to be upset about the change. It might be better to see if Legend is available.”
Dulce’s face lit up, “I haven’t see Legend in years. How is he?”
Draven turned toward her. “He’s been tracking down seers who were trafficked in Sumaria. Many of them ended up in the hands of the Unwashed, but not all of them. Occasionally he contacts Anders too, but they don’t have a very good relationship.”
“Why not?”
“Too similar, I think. They both try to do things their own way, and that doesn't work well when you work with someone.”
“And you want to work with Legend instead of Haiden?”
“I am firmly of the opinion that champions need to have downtime, just like the assassins do. You know what I mean because Ishtar treated you the same way.”
“No rest for the wicked,” Dulce’s tone reflected a little of the bitterness she felt toward the nation, but it didn’t permeate her thoughts the way it had before she met Draven.
“Exactly,” he looked at her out of the corner of his eye, a slight smile on his lips. “Haiden has not had a break in the last three years.”
“What if we have him come and manipulate him into taking a break?”
Draven stopped and looked at her, “We wouldn’t have a backup then.”
“We could tell him that we need him here by tomorrow, then he would be forced to have downtime.”
“Tomorrow.” Draven did not look happy.
Dulce thought about what she had said. “Could he stay with one of the families down the beach?”
His eyes shifted toward her, and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, “I think we can work something out.”
“What do we need to do?” Dulce watched as he thought about how to phrase his response. “Don’t forget, you said you would be honest. No need to change what you are going to say just to suit me.”
His smile was beautiful as he looked at her. “I am not trying to spare your feelings, I am trying to think of a way to phrase it that will make sense without being terrifying.”
“How bad can it be? Caspian thinks that we can do it alone.”
“Caspian likes to think that I am on the same level as him, so you can’t believe his assessment.”
“At least he thinks well of you. That has to mean something coming from someone with a world-renowned reputation.”
“I think you mean for someone who is infamous around the world.”
“Hey, that is your men
tor you are talking about.”
“Yeah, so you know that what I am saying is absolutely true.”
Dulce laughed, “You have changed a bit since I arrived. You used to be so tight-lipped, almost standoffish.”
“Was I really?” His look showed his concern.
Bumping into his shoulder with hers, Dulce giggled, “No. You were always polite, just unemotional.”
“It was to protect myself.”
“From me?”
“Yes. It was obvious that you weren’t completely under their control, but that didn’t mean that I would be able to remove the poison before it killed you. I didn’t want to be emotionally attached any more than I was. It would have been impossible not to blame myself if you died.”
“And here you have been reprimanding everyone you meet about blaming themselves.”
He shrugged, “It’s a bit different when you are facing enemies head-on and facing the results of their work in the confines of your home. It would be much harder to believe that it wasn’t my fault if you died under my hands—there would be good odds that your death would have been directly from something I did.”
“Why not bring in a magic user to fix me? Maybe you could have gotten one of my friends out of prison and—”
Draven shook his head sadly, “I can assure you, they are all under complete control. As soon as any of them emerge on the street, the assassins will kill them.”
Dulce put a hand to her mouth, “But, I know them, I care about them.”
“They are already dead. Being up and moving does not mean that they are the women you knew.”
“Stella has been sending me—”
“Contaminated powder. That was how the Unwashed have been able to ensure you continued the downward spiral following…”
“It’s okay, you can say since Darinon died.”
Draven stopped, forcing her to stop. “It wasn’t just Darinon you lost. I know how hard it was for you because Caspian told me about how much you worried while you were delirious. He even tried to convince me to come care for you, but I was busy with something else at the time. Not that I would have been much help.”
“Caspian was worried about me?”
“Very much so. He has never failed a mission, and he had promised Darinon that you would live. Normally he would have been the one running in, but Darinon charged ahead before Caspian had a chance.”
“For someone who wants people to believe he is uncaring, that would have made him incredibly brave. Caspian the martyr.” Dulce smiled at the idea.
Draven was shaking his head, “No, that was the problem. If Caspian had gone in before you arrived, Darinon wouldn’t have died. He knew about the nest, but had postponed, hoping that you two would make it through first. By the time he realized that some of the Unwashed had acted on the other side, it was too late. He blamed himself because he felt he should have taken care of it already.”
“But that would have put us at risk earlier?”
“Yes. It could have gotten both of you killed. There is no way to know what would have happened, only what did. Like you, he chose to beat himself up over it. He didn’t even need the poisoning for it to become something of an obsession.”
“But no one else even knows he was there, did they? I was told that I was found at the door of a merchant who had connections to the champions. No mention of anyone else.”
“He didn’t exactly advertise. Who would have believed him if he did? But you said it yourself that someone pulled you out of there when Darinon charged ahead. Did you remember who it was?”
“No, I was too upset that Darinon wasn’t leaving. After watching him run away, the only thing that struck me was the sapphire color of the trees when I fell to the ground.”
“It was winter.”
Dulce blinked. “It was.” A smile spread across her face. “His eyes really are lovely.”
Draven’s mouth drew up into a line.
Dulce laughed, “His eyes are like the cold persona he tries to present to the world. I am more fond of yours, though. They are the fire that you constantly try to hide from the world.”
“They are like yours, just without the gentleness to tone them down.”
“So what do we need to do?”
“There is an Unwashed heart on the border of Ishtar and Belson.”
“Why there?”
Draven shrugged, “That is something we will need to try to determine.”
“So what do we do? Just spy on them and find out what is going on?”
Draven shook his head, “We have to destroy the heart. That is what I have been doing. But there is hope that you will be able to help us see how to do it without killing the magic users who are in the heart.”
“What do you mean? Why would we kill magic users?”
“The heart is made of trapped magic users, and it is used to control others within the control range. I’m not very good at describing it, and that’s why I’ve been trying to think through it. Basically, I destroy everyone who has been added to it because once a magic user is added, their abilities are absorbed, powering the monstrosity.”
“How can we stop something like that with just three people?”
Draven bit his lip before responding, “I have destroyed several on my own. The third person was to monitor you for signs that you are being controlled. With the poison still in your body, we were concerned that it could be used to turn you against us.”
“I should not be going.”
“I am not going to force you to go, but I do believe that a week will be enough time to remove the poison from your system. Especially, as someone pointed out, when taking our potential activity levels into account.”
Dulce gave him an odd look.
Draven tried to keep talking, “You know that champions don’t have any magical abilities, but the more familiar we are with our companion, the easier it is to detect anomalies. Only champions can sense that, and the druids have been very desirous of pairing me and Maverick with a couple of their most powerful members to ensure they are not compromised.”
The look on Dulce’s face said exactly how she felt about that. Draven laughed, and she was momentarily entranced by the sweet sound, so unlike his usual stern demeanor. “You don’t need to worry about it now. They would never force something on jaguars because we are endangered. They know how important it is that we breed, and—”
Dulce was shaking her head. “I can’t—you guys are not animals. You don’t breed.”
Placing a hand on her shoulder, Draven calmed her down with just that simple touch. “I know, I am explaining it from their perspective.”
“But they are right. You should be—”
“I should be with the person who helps me in a way that no one has been able to before you. I want to see what happens with you because I have never been interested like this in anyone. It is…” his voice trailed off.
“Exhilarating and terrifying?” Dulce gave him a shy smile. He nodded. Noticing that he did not bring up love, she decided that he was probably right. She had professed her love once before and learned that she had been wrong. “I feel the same way,” she murmured.
Draven took a step toward her, his hand moving gently to her cheek. Dulce closed her eyes and felt the warmth on her skin. “Are you trying to find the poison?”
He moved closer, his lips brushing her cheek. “I already found it. I just need to find a way to draw it out without it causing you any further damage.” His mouth moved down to her neck, then Dulce felt her feet lifted off the ground.
Suddenly, there was a loud burst of sound, and the couple looked up the beach toward children running toward them.
“Oh no, they are not taking you away from me today. Or any time over the next week. We have work to do.”
“Why did you send me to play with them anyway?”
“To remind you of what you would miss if you continued with your downward spiral. Having been secluded for too long, your entire personality h
ad shifted. I am not exactly trained in helping lift someone’s spirits, but children do it naturally. It made it a little easier to draw out some of the memories from a less negatively tainted perspective.”
“All of those memories were negative.”
He looked at her and shook his head as the children reached them. Turning to face them, Draven said, “Sorry kids, she has been injured and will not be able to play for a while. I will make sure to let you know when she is healed.”
There was a loud collective groan. “Why did she get hurt?” the eldest child asked.
“Because she wanted to help everyone and ended up getting hurt herself.”
“So she’s a hero?”
Draven looked at her, “She most certainly is. Please make sure to remind her of that often.”
There was a chorus of agreement before they ran off down the beach toward a small tidal pool.
“How are you feeling?” Draven’s eyes moved over her.
“A bit overwhelmed, a little scared, and incredibly curious.”
“Not quite what I was hoping for, but we can focus on that if you would like,” his voice was a little down as he carried her to the house.
She rested her head on his shoulder, then turned ever so slightly and started kissing his neck.
“Oh,” Draven no longer sounded disappointed. “Are you sure you are alright?”
“As I recall, we were still just getting started when we were interrupted by a famous assassin.”
“I think you mean infamous,” Draven laughed. “You make it sound like it was a harrowing experience where we barely escaped death.”
“From the look in your eye when you realized who it was, I thought there might be some blood spilled.”
Draven laughed, then pulled her into a kiss as soon as the door closed behind them. Her clothes were completely shredded before they reached the bedroom. “No more interruptions,” he murmured as he placed her on the bed.
Just like before, he did not wait to penetrate her, and again, her body responded immediately. Panting after her body finally relaxed, she mentioned that they didn’t have to start so aggressively. Draven nuzzled her neck, “I will need some of the gentler stuff in about 12 hours. I want to prove that you haven’t made a mistake.”