Knight Awakened (Circle of Seven #1)

by Coreene Callahan

  “Here?” Both his brows rose. “At Drachaven?”

  Afina nodded.

  “Have you spoken to her before?”

  “No, but I’ve always known she exists...my mother told me so.” Even though she told herself not to, her hands tightened on his arms. She couldn’t let him go, not now, not ever. “She is real, Xavian. You did not imagine her.”

  He glanced away. His chest rose and fell. Afina breathed with him. In. Out. Mimicking his movements. The sound of the smithy’s hammer echoed, clanging as the fire crackled, interrupting the silence. Uncertainty burned in the center of her chest. She felt like the ash beneath the flame, grey and useless, without the strength to influence the blaze above.

  The logs shifted on the grate and a cracking pop burst into the chamber. Xavian stared at the embers, expression set, eyes serious.

  “As a lad I needed her.”

  His voice was low and full of gravel, but his hand returned, sliding along her thigh. His palm in the hollow, he curled his fingers around her hip, anchoring himself, pleasing her. Thank the Gods. His shields were coming back down. He was going to talk to her. Afina murmured, encouraging him to continue.

  Xavian cleared his throat. “I’d close my eyes, go to sleep, and she would...”

  “What?”

  His gaze flicked to hers then away. “Hold me. Keep me safe in my dreams, away from Halál and the horrors of the day.”

  She brushed the hair away from his forehead. “I am glad.”

  “She never comes anymore.”

  “You are a grown man now. Strong enough to protect yourself and others. And mayhap...”

  “Mayhap?”

  “She no longer visits because you no longer need her...” Afina took a deep breath, setting her courage. “Because you have left Al Pacii.”

  Xavian went rigid. His hand flexed then bit into her hip.

  She stayed perfectly still. Mentioning the group of assassins was a risk, but she needed him to know that she knew. Henrik had told her everything. She understood where Xavian had grown up; what Halál had done to him and her brother. The bastard had hurt them so badly. Xavian needed to know she would never judge him for his past. He didn’t need to hide it from her...there was no shame in what he’d been made to do. The fact he’d survived—been able to walk away with his soul intact—was a miracle.

  “Henrik,” he growled, murder in his voice.

  “Yes. I have spent a lot of time—”

  “Rahat!”

  A muscle jumped in his jaw as he rolled away from her. Afina clung to him, following the explosion. Wrapping her arms around his shoulders, she threw her leg over his thighs and straddled his hips. He sat up on the edge of the bed and, spanning her waist, prepared to toss her aside.

  She hung on, her grip desperate, her heart galloping like a runaway horse. “Don’t!”

  “Jesu, you do not know me—”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “—or what I am capable of. You shouldn’t—”

  Afina slapped her fingers over his mouth. “Be quiet...be quiet and listen.”

  His jaw tightened beneath her hand, but merciful goddess, he stayed silent.

  “I do know you...better than I know myself.” He tried to protest. She pressed against his lips. If she was going to win, she must have her say...without him interrupting. “I know you think it’s important...your past, all of the things you’ve done. But I don’t care about any of that. I want you regardless and need you more.”

  “Afina...” His hands flexed on her waist. Afina dug in, arms firm around his shoulders, knees pressed to the mattress. “I am not the man you think I am.”

  “True. You are much more.”

  “Christ, you have no idea wh—”

  “Why do you think the goddess visited you all these years?” Looking him square in the eye, she pushed him past his doubts and into the truth. “Why, Xavian?”

  He shook his head, shifting a little beneath her.

  “She was keeping you safe until you held the skills you needed...to protect me. The goddess doesn’t do random, my love. She chose you for me.”

  Xavian stared at her, open-mouthed.

  “I am sorry for what you endured with that mad man. If I could, I would take it all away, but I need you as you are. Strong, skilled, smart...sometimes brutal like you were with the slavers. Who else can protect me but you?” She kept her tone soft, but without a hint of remorse. The instant he detected pity, he’d throw her off and disappear. “I am not ordinary. Much as I wish otherwise, I have accepted it. I cannot have an ordinary mate...I need you.”

  “Draga,” he whispered, the pain in his eyes almost more than she could bear. “I am damaged goods. You do not know what you are asking.”

  “Yes, I do.” Holding his face in her palms, she leaned in to kiss him softly. He allowed the caress, but didn’t kiss her back. “You are mine as much as I am yours. We are bonded and I...I love you. I cannot survive without you now.”

  “You love me?” He whispered the words slowly, as though he spoke a foreign language, one he didn’t understand.

  She nodded. “And you love me too.”

  As she pulled away, Afina saw the truth. The love he’d tried to hide was there for her to see, but so too were regret and guilt. She murmured, the sound pleading. Xavian closed his eyes. On a rough exhale he bowed his head. Afina tilted her chin, making space as he nestled his face against the curve of her throat. She cupped his nape with one hand and stroked his spine with the other, willing him to relax, wanting him to accept.

  “Be with me, just...be with me. We will face the future together.”

  His arms slid around her, brought her closer as a shudder racked him. “I am no good for you.”

  “Not true.”

  “Jesu, I had it all planned, but I never expected...”

  Holding him tight, Afina waited.

  Finally he said, “You. I never expected you.”

  “Too bad,” she said, rocking him in her arms. “I am here to stay.”

  He huffed, the laugh half-amusement, half-despair, and Afina knew she had won. Whatever the future—however soon her enemies attacked, uncertain or not—he would stay and fight by her side.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  Shay crouched behind a large rock, close enough to see, far enough to stay out of view. Damnation, Vladimir Barbu was smart. The bastard wasn’t approaching Drachaven from the usual paths. He was making his own, cutting through heavy brush to reach the great fortress undetected. Most of his men remained five leagues away, tucked away in the forest. With only a handful of men he approached on silent feet, looking for weaknesses, weighing his options, calculating the odds.

  From his position thirty feet away, Shay watched Barbu motion to his men. He spread them out, keeping ten paces between each man. Canny. The distance kept the sound of their boots in the underbrush to a minimum. Not as quiet as his, but effective nonetheless. Christ, the bastard was dangerous. Not good for Ram. Even worse for the woman Barbu was after.

  A healer by all accounts: dark-haired, hazel-eyed.

  He’d gotten the details last night while the moon hung high and the wolves called. The great oak above Barbu’s head had provided concealment enough to get close and listen in. Belly down, flat against a thick tree limb, the rough bark had bitten through his tunic while the campfire blew smoke in his face and Barbu laid out his plans.

  The bastard had grand ambitions—the lordship of all Transylvania.

  Shay shook his head. One side of his mouth worked its way into a snarl, dragging amusement with it as he left the rock and sifted like a phantom in Barbu’s wake. Deep shadows and crooked bracken touched his tunic, rasping against leather and the steel he had sheathed inside it. The scent of fall—damp earth, decaying leaves, and wet wood—followed, greeting the morning chill. He quickened his pace, predatory awareness in every step.

  He could take Barbu now...if he wanted—gut him and be away before his men knew what hit them. Selfishness st
illed his hand. He needed a way inside Drachaven. A feat great enough to prove his loyalty to Ram. Declaring it would never be enough. Ram wasn’t stupid—canny, brutal, unforgiving? Aye, all of those, and Shay hoped trust might be counted among the qualities...for a price.

  The price was Barbu—his movements and plan given on a silver platter.

  Something had changed on Shay’s journey through the mountains. He no longer wanted to die. Surprising, really. But as he’d made his way, the stories he’d heard in the villages and marketplaces had given him hope. Drachaven had become a refuge—a safe place amid the wilds—and Ram accepted strays. He gave them a home and a second chance.

  A home.

  Shay clenched his teeth and kept his feet moving. Silent as death, thick longing welled inside him. A place to belong, to be trusted and accepted and needed in the normal way. His ribs drew in tight, restricting his lungs for a moment. Pausing in the gloom, he crouched behind a fallen tree, pressed his hand to the slick moss that covered dead bark. Black birds with red-tipped wings flew in Barbu’s wake. They called to one another, their song sharp as they flitted from branch to branch, leaving a dark trail of blurry wings overtop Barbu’s men.

  Christ, what he wouldn’t give...a home among his own kind.

  He pushed away from the log. The woman was the key. From what little he knew, Ram valued her. Gossip was scarce—mayhap even wrong—but little was better than naught. Barbu wanted her. Ram protected her. And Shay would bide his time, prepared to give aid however his former comrade needed it. ’Twas the only way to win Ram’s trust. The only way through the gates to Drachaven and into the fold.

  She felt so damn good in his arms. But then, that was no surprise. From the moment he spied Afina in the market of Severin, Xavian had wanted her this way—warm and sweet, tangled up with him amid quilts and soft sheets.

  Propped on his elbow, one thigh between her own, he adjusted the covers around them. She hummed, the sound soft with contentment as she sank deep into slumber. He studied her face, watched her chest rise and fall, the rhythm even, her trust absolute.

  Xavian stewed about that for a moment.

  He didn’t deserve her trust. Didn’t deserve to be sated from her loving much less hold her while she slept. But in the middle of his bed, with the afternoon waning and Afina in his arms, he couldn’t help but be thankful. Before her, he hadn’t known life could be so sweet.

  “Draga.” Xavian murmured the endearment, heard the reverence in his tone as his hand ghosted over her: tracing, worshiping, committing her to memory. He needed to remember her like this...always. “I love you.”

  The words came out low, a thick tangle on his tongue. Afina’s eyelashes flickered, and he froze, one hand on the curve of her hip, breath gone still in his throat. Please, not yet. He needed her to sleep awhile longer. Wasn’t ready to face her yet. Uncertainty was still using him for target practice, leaving holes the size of arrowheads in his confidence.

  He exhaled as she settled and said the words again, tasting fear in each syllable. Were they true? Did he love her? Afina believed he did. Had told him what he felt was more than passion. On some level, he knew she spoke true. Aye, there was lust aplenty and yet...

  Was that something more love?

  Having never loved someone, Xavian couldn’t be sure. All he knew was that what he felt grew deeper with each passing moment. Christ, he could hardly contain it.

  Dipping his head, he kissed the curve of her shoulder, brushing his mouth over her birthmark. The moon-star glowed faintly, a soft shimmer against her pale skin.

  The touch of the goddess...the one who’d visited in his dreams.

  Xavian frowned. He’d been so young, only seven, barely a month in Halál’s camp when the dreams started. He suppressed a shudder, recalling that brutal time, those first days, how frightened he’d been. Closing his eyes, he pushed that memory away and reached for another. Red-haired, green-eyed, she rose in his mind’s eye. The irony wasn’t lost on him. He couldn’t remember his mother’s face but he remembered hers.

  He should feel guilty about that...or sad. All he could manage was regret. And a keen sense of foreboding. The warning stirred inside him, an echo he’d not felt before. ’Twas telling him to get all in order, to stock Drachaven, arm his men, and prepare for war. The reaction smacked of paranoia, but he couldn’t deny the urgency.

  He’d ignored it at first, dismissing the itching claw as naught more than his response to Afina. But the sensation plaguing him now was different; completely unlike the gentle current he drew from the lass in his arms. More aggressive, it streamed from another source, something outside Drachaven. Something dark and unnatural.

  “Warrior.” The whispered greeting drifted across the chamber.

  Xavian went stone still. Logs shifted in the hearth. The cracking pop echoed, almost in warning as a potent wave bubbled into the chamber. Magic. He recognized the smell. ’Twas a thousand times stronger than Afina’s, but the resonance was the same.

  The goddess had arrived.

  Long-standing habit made him reach beneath his pillow. He never met anyone new without a weapon in his hand.

  As his fingers closed around the hilt of his favorite dagger, he glanced over his shoulder toward the hearth. Bare feet planted on the cowhide rug in front of the fire, she regarded him with cool, green eyes. White gown knotted over one shoulder, she wore majesty like a cloak, her power on display, magic the jewel in her crown. An intimidating picture. Xavian wasn’t impressed, although his heart reacted, slamming against the wall of his chest.

  “Goddess,” he murmured, his tone polite, his posture aggressive. ’Twas the best he could manage. Until he knew her purpose, he refused to give way. She was in his home—one he’d fought hard to secure—and goddess or nay, he held sway here. “Welcome to Drachaven.”

  “Best you can do?” She raised a brow.

  He shrugged. “Depends.”

  “On what?”

  “Your purpose.”

  Her lips curved as she glanced away to take in his chamber. Xavian kept his focus on her. He didn’t need to follow her gaze to know she saw a sparse chamber: stone walls, simple hearth, timber-beamed ceiling, a few stools, one chair, and a scallop-edged wardrobe. The only extravagance in the room was his bed. Her amused expression transformed into a true smile when she swept the bedposts, examining each one in turn. Xavian clenched his teeth, tamping down a sudden surge of embarrassment. He never should have carved the posts in her image. He’d done it on a whim, as tribute to his boyhood savior.

  “Don’t let it go to your head.” He nodded toward the bedposts and shifted onto his other hip, careful to shield Afina. He didn’t want his back to the goddess or Afina out in the open.

  “As compliments go, it is a beautiful one.” Stepping off the rug and onto flagstone, she approached the bed. Xavian tightened his grip on the knife, prepared to defend the only way he knew how...with brute force. The goddess stopped at the end of the bed, even with the footboard and the first post. Her mouth curved as she raised her hand and traced the sheaf of barley the carving of fall held with a fingertip. “You have astonishing skill with a blade, assassin.”

  The double meaning wasn’t lost on Xavian. Aye, his skill was legendary, but the one she spoke of had naught to do with wood and everything to do with human flesh. A lump, heavy as a lodestone, settled in his belly as the goddess moved on to examine winter. He shifted again, the balls of his feet sinking into the mattress as he rolled into a crouch.

  What the hell did the goddess want? Why approach him now...when Afina was asleep?

  The answer to his question came with dizzying speed. This visit was for him. Whatever the goddess hoped to accomplish she didn’t want Afina to overhear. Or mayhap she’d come to take her away...for the training the goddess had promised Afina at the burn. Aye, he knew of it. Had listened to Afina as she told him of their conversation.

  But that wasn’t going to happen.

  Afina belonged with him. She need
ed him to ease her, to drain the excess magic in her blood. Without him, she would suffer and so would he. Not physically, but in every other way. No matter how much his independent nature wanted to deny it, he knew he couldn’t live without her now.

  “Why are you here, Goddess?” His voice sounded harsh, even to his own ears, but he couldn’t help it. Suspicion made him tense, ready to use the knife in his hand.

  Still at the foot of his bed, she ignored his question and said, “No need for a weapon, Xavian.”

  “There is always need.”

  “Not this time,” she said, bare toes visible from beneath the hem of her gown.

  Leaving off her examination of winter, she pivoted and, as though out for an afternoon stroll, returned to the fire. The rug rippled under her feet, and she raised her hand. Xavian tensed as the armchair next to the hearth shot out from the wall. Wooden legs bumping across the flagstone floor, it came to a stop a hair’s breadth from the goddess’s outstretched hand. Grasping the wide chair back, she turned the seat to face him and sat, lowering herself onto the cushion with a grace that complemented her beauty.

  “Though I am glad you have taken to your duty.”

  His gaze swung from the chair’s usual spot to the woman now sitting in it. Jesu, why was he so surprised? Afina could blast a full-grown dragon, for Christ’s sake. One puny chair was hardly a match for the goddess. “Duty?”

  “You protect her well.” Bending her knees, the goddess settled into the chair, curled like a cat in its favorite spot. “I am grateful...though you will have to learn to share her.”

  His eyes narrowed. “Share how?”

  “Territorial males.” Waving a hand in the air, she rolled her eyes. “Bane of my existence.”

  Xavian stayed silent. The insult he could handle. What he couldn’t take was the idea of losing Afina. What was the goddess playing at?

  Careful to protect his position, he moved to the edge of the bed. Afina grumbled as he withdrew, protesting the loss of warmth. His gaze pinned to the goddess, he murmured to soothe her and pulled at the quilt, drawing it over her sleeping form. She sighed and, turning, curled onto her side, nestling into the spot still warm from his body.