Heart of the Gods

by Valerie Douglas

  It was not an idle threat.

  Each word made her mouth go dry as horror shivered through her at the thought, at the picture he painted with those words.

  The Djinn had no reason to love her. Their vengeance would be terrible.

  She took a breath, her eyes on Kamenwati’s eyes in Zimmer’s face.

  Ky went still, his jaw nearly shattering it was clenched so hard at the thought of Zimmer touching her, using her.

  Why was she taunting him?

  Behind Ky a soft voice said, “Don’t look now, boss, but Raissa’s swords just appeared behind you.”

  Ryan.

  In disbelief, Ky dropped his hands lower and encountered the nearly razor-sharp edge of one and a sharp sting as he cut a finger on it.

  Quickly, he glanced at the guards, even John, but they were intent on the scene in front of them.

  As Raissa had so obviously intended, goading Zimmer as she had.

  Now Ky understood.

  A look to the others was all it took. With small movements, they moved closer to cover him and the swords. They braced themselves for the inevitable repercussions if they came and watched the guards carefully. Tareq steadied the hilt of Raissa’s left hand sword with the hands they’d bound in front of him so that the sharp edge was up. Ky sawed the edge of his bonds across the sharp edge.

  Zimmer thrust Raissa away from him so she stumbled backward, falling onto her back to stare up at him as he stalked toward her once more.

  “I will ask only one thing of them,” he said, “that they leave you alive when they are done so I can sacrifice you to Set. After her rescue and resurrection of Osiris, he has no love for Isis. Even weakened as you are, Isis’s priestess’s dying a long, slow death at his hands will bring both him and me a great deal of power.”

  Even knowing the plans she’d set in motion, the thought made her heart sink.

  If they failed, she knew what her fate would be. And resigned herself to it.

  His smile went colder.

  “But first,” he said, “it would appear that you need to be reminded of your place…slave.”

  The word, and the way he said it, sent another chill through her. It didn’t bode well.

  Gesturing to the guards, he summoned two of them.

  “Take her and hold her, bind her hands in front of her…”

  Raissa watched him warily.

  From her years as his slave she had an inkling of what he intended.

  Her throat tightened further.

  It would hardly be the first time. She had and could endure as she had then.

  Another gesture, a conjuration and the whip was in his hands. She knew the thin braided leather strips well from old. Her breath caught and her mouth grew taut as she braced herself for what would follow.

  “Fight this,” Zimmer said, “and one of them will die.”

  There was no need, as terrible as it would be, what was coming would meet her needs. All attention would be on her and Kamenwati. It was worth the pain.

  Shaking out the braided length of the leather, he untangled it so the little iron beads at the ends of each strand flicked across the sand. He wanted her to see it, to anticipate what was coming.

  Raissa tightened her jaw. She’d hoped the last time would truly be the last. This would hurt a great deal, cost her a lot of blood she couldn’t spare, but it would end, she knew. Somehow she would get through it.

  “What is the penalty?” he asked her, for the benefit of the other prisoners, “for an escaped slave?”

  Technically, Raissa hadn’t escaped, Isis had taken her into her service. It had been her saving grace. That scarcely mattered to Kamenwati.

  Her voice was quiet when she answered. “Twenty lashes.”

  Ky stiffened, beside him Tareq went still, horrified.

  Surely Zimmer wasn’t serious… Twenty lashes…with a cat o’ nine tail?

  Forcing himself to concentrate, Ky worked the heavy rope over Raissa’s sword. He couldn’t help her if he wasn’t free. At least they’d used rope, plentiful at a dig, and not metal or plastic handcuffs. The first would have been much more difficult, the second would have cost him some blood.

  Two of the men hauled Raissa to the center of the circle of tents and forced her to kneel.

  One of them grabbed the back of the thin t-shirt and ripped it open to expose her back.

  Coiling up her hair in one hand, he tossed it over her shoulder so it would be out of the way.

  Even in the wavering torchlight, the old scars on her back were clearly visible. Long white marks across her back and shoulders.

  Ky winced to see them. It wasn’t the first time she’d faced the lash. Somehow it hadn’t occurred to him that she might have. Yet it was a common punishment in that time.

  With a smile and a sigh, Zimmer walked to her, stroked a hand over her, his thick fleshy fingers lingering on the scars there, tracing them.

  Her hair swung to hide her face and for that Raissa was grateful. Just his touch made Raissa flinch.

  Zimmer sighed, his breath trembling with anticipation.

  “I remember well.” he said, fondly and with some satisfaction. “You needed to be educated often.”

  The whip snaked across her back, curled around her ribs, the pain bright, searing…nearly blinding…all the breath went out of her at the intensity of it. Fighting for breath against the agony, her back automatically arched away from the source of the torment.

  “You do remember?”

  He was waiting for her answer.

  “Yes.” Her voice was thin, a little more that a gasp as she sucked air in once again.

  With a sudden sharp flick of his wrist he sent the whip snaking across her back once again.

  “Master,” he snapped.

  It was as if fire licked across her skin, sharp, savage, the pain so intense it took the breath from her again. She couldn’t have cried out if she wanted but she locked her jaw against it. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. And she wouldn’t call him Master. She wouldn’t give him that. Besides, she couldn’t breathe. Her body quivered at the violation, the assault on it.

  Agony was apparent in every line, every muscle sharply defined as they locked in response to the pain that came with each crack of the whip.

  In the face of that Ky forced himself to concentrate.

  Raissa.

  Twenty lashes.

  Blood trickled down her hands from her wrists. Streaks of it ran down her back, her ribs.

  Her face was in profile, her beautiful blue eyes closed as she flinched away from the pain.

  All Ky could do was watch the scene in front of him, his jaw tight as he worked the rope across the edge of her blade, a part of him responding to each crack and flick of the whip as it stroked across Raissa’s skin. He saw her knees give a little.

  The next bite of the whip sent a rush of weakness through her. Raissa’s knees tried to buckle. It was only with effort that she kept them beneath her. She was getting weaker, quickly, as the blood flowed. Worse, though, she was getting hungry. Her stomach quivered, cramped. It had been too long since she’d fed and the blood loss only made it worse.

  “I will break you,” Zimmer promised softly, “before we reach the Tomb. Bow to me now, give up and the pain will stop.”

  Magic licked out around her, drew off her pain, drew it in and fed on it. She shuddered at the violation.

  “No.”

  He sent the whip snapping across her back. It flicked across two previous stripes, a new layer of pain on top of what had come before. It was so sharp, so intense, her lungs locked.

  Zimmer leaned close, his voice low and suggestive. “Are you hungry…?”

  Just the suggestion set it raging. Her need had claws and they raked her. She fought to pull it back, to regain control. Her stomach cramped as another wave of weakness washed through her. She felt her teeth shift, extend. They pressed against her lower lip sharply. She bit down, the pain a distraction. Her teeth retracted.
r />   The whip burned across her shoulders and her knees finally gave out as pain exploded through her. She fell, braced herself on her hands as the shackles dug in. Darkness closed around the edges of her vision.

  She fought it as she’d fought the rest.

  Ky felt the rope that bound his wrists give to the sharpness of Raissa’s blade even as she sagged, her body trembling violently.

  Carelessly, Zimmer tossed the whip to one of his men. The leather was darkened with her blood, it glistened wetly in the flickering torchlight.

  “All of you,” he said, to his guards. “Stay clear. Don’t get close to her, don’t touch her for any reason.”

  Knowing she was still semi-conscious by the flutter of her eyelids, he bent down, leaned in close to her ear. “Soon you will be very, very hungry, won’t you? Nearly ravenous…”

  Already Raissa could feel it tearing at her, fighting to be released.

  Tears burned her eyes but she wouldn’t give in to them, or him. She strangled the hunger back, throttled it.

  “Bind her hands behind her again. Let me know when she begins to stir, to awaken, to struggle. We’ll see how her companions like her come morning.”

  Horror swept through her.

  No.

  Hunger raged inside her.

  It hadn’t happened yet, she reminded herself. She still had her will. The weeks that had passed since she returned to the world had taught her some self-control. She could hold it.

  She would hold it, if it came to that. She had to.

  Laughing, Zimmer walked away, signaled to John and his lieutenant to follow him.

  Zimmer knew he dared not leave John there or take the chance that the glamour he’d cast would weaken with either distance or time. He might still need the man or the knowledge he had.

  It was astonishing how easily the man had been suborned but then Zimmer’s own capitulation had been almost too easy as well. The people of this time were astonishingly weak of will, easily turned.

  The last strands of the rope around Ky’s wrists parted almost too suddenly, too easily. He shook his hands to get the circulation back as he pulled the ends free, watching the guards in case the movement caught their attention.

  Tareq worked to free himself as Ryan waited his turn.

  The guards nearest them watched Raissa, sprawled limply on the ground wearing only the remains of the thin t-shirt and not the captives behind them. Across the way, one of the other guards turned to say something to another, distracted, his eyes also turned away from those across from him.

  However professional these men might be, this was soft duty to them. They expected no resistance from a bunch of academics, archaeologists.

  That’s what they saw.

  They were relaxed, hardly on guard at all.

  None of them were aware of Ky’s training. His skills.

  Ky smiled, bitterly, wolfishly.

  He’d never wanted to use those skills in this way again, but he would for Raissa, for Tareq, his old friend, for Ryan and Komi, even for John.

  He couldn’t wait any longer, couldn’t risk one of the guards seeing Raissa’s swords, seeing them free themselves.

  The brief distraction across the way was all he needed.

  In an instant Ky rose softly and silently behind the guard closest to the shadows, his eyes on the others as he caught the man around the throat in a sleeper hold to pull his quarry quickly and silently back into the darkness. With a quick snap of his hands, the man dropped, his neck broken.

  Quickly and silently, Ky searched the dead man in the shielding darkness, slinging the man’s holster over his shoulder, borrowing his belt and the knife in the sheath with it. Guns were noisy, knives, used right, were silent.

  Ky faded into darkness, silence, his hands and the knife weapons enough.

  Slipping behind the tents, he caught one of the guards as the man went to relieve himself. It would be a moment or two before the others realized he wouldn’t return. There wasn’t much time before they did, before they realized they were growing smaller in number. Ky could already see one of the guards looking around for the other man who had been guarding the prisoners. He was frowning, perhaps just realizing they were one short.

  Ky caught Tareq’s eyes, glanced at the guard.

  His old friend and mentor had also seen combat.

  Tareq nodded, rose silently to his feet behind the searching guard.

  A quick blow, another, sharp, to the throat, and the man fell. Tareq drew him quickly into the shadows and went in search of another quarry.

  It would only take one outcry to ruin everything.

  A thrown pebble drew the next guard’s attention and Ky silenced him as well.

  Suddenly the light dawned as one of the remaining guards realized his companions hadn’t returned. He started to open his mouth. Ky threw the knife. The blade buried itself in the man’s throat, rendering him silent even Ky took down the man closest to him and Tareq tossed the remains of the rope still tied around his wrists over the last guard’s head, drawing it tight as the man bucked, fought, his feet kicking uselessly in the sand and slowly went still.

  Ky gathered up some of the guns, slung them over his shoulders. They would need them.

  Chapter Twenty Four

  It all happened so quickly, so silently, Raissa barely had time to realize it was over. She shook her head to clear it, startled to find Ky there unlocking the manacles. Her hunger raged within her, the darkness of it hazed her vision as need cramped her stomach and the pain in her back became excruciating. All of it shredded her will, her control.

  She fought it as desperately as she’d fought Kamenwati.

  Ky was so close, though. The scent of him filled her nostrils and her stomach clenched against it. Her esurience grew. She felt her teeth extending again to press sharply against her lip.

  She looked up at Ky. Her vision was hazed, reddish.

  His jaw was tight, his dark eyes grim as he fought the manacles that bound her.

  Her vision faded in and out. Hunger burned through her.

  It pained her but she had to say it.

  “Don’t,” she said, quietly, urgently, her voice unsteady, barely above a whisper and harsh even to her own ears. “Ky, stop. Don’t take them off. It would be better if you left me here. Zimmer was right.”

  Ky looked at her, at her pale face, at the fear and despair in her blue eyes but he didn’t stop. The iron fell away.

  Her wrists were chafed, bleeding from the harsh edges of the iron. The sight made him wince as fury rushed through him. His anger burned hotly.

  Raissa could smell him, almost taste him. Ky. That scent filled her. Her hunger raged. She bit it back as lightheadedness and thirst nearly overwhelmed her fragile control.

  Nearly frantically, she choked back the hunger his closeness sent raging through her as she said, desperately, “Ky, I don’t know if I can control it much longer.”

  Ky looked into her eyes, into the nearly feral gleam of them. The lambent blue of them was nearly overwhelmed by a deep red glow. He could feel the heat of her body radiate against him. Unconsciously her body swayed lithely toward him, the movement sensual, so sexual he couldn’t help responding.

  Catching her jaw tightly in his hands he shook her head a little and watched her lovely blue eyes focus on him.

  “I love you. I’m not leaving you,” he said, sharply, fiercely, “So, control it.”

  In shock and surprise, he saw her eyes widen as his words penetrated and then she blinked. Ky could almost see the focus come back into those brilliant blue eyes as hers met his. He watched as she struggled, fought for control, for clarity and sanity.

  Her eyes fixed on his, locked on them, and cleared.

  Startled, for a moment Raissa could only stare at him in disbelief before she raised a tremulous hand to touch his cheek, to trace the line of his beard unsteadily, a thousand emotions racing through her, not the least of them love.

  She couldn’t fight him. Somehow, she
would have to find a way to fight her thirst, her craving.

  Ky touched her split and swollen lip as he slid an arm around her and another flicker of pain and anger went through him at the sight of it. His jaw tightened even as his thumb traced it. She shuddered as his arm contacted the slashes across her back. It was wet, sticky against his arm. It had to burn painfully but there was nothing he could do. They had to get out of there, and quickly.

  His touch reached her, reached past the pain, the hunger… With an effort he could see, she forced herself to hold on.

  “I’ve found the jeeps,” Tareq said, quietly. He had Raissa’s swords in his hand. “They appear untouched.”

  It brought Ky back to himself. He nodded.

  At least there was that. It appeared John hadn’t sabotaged them, but then it had been unlikely. Those Jeeps were John’s babies, he wouldn’t have tampered with them either willingly or under duress.

  “With luck, the distance will keep the sound of them starting from alerting Zimmer and the others too soon,” Ky said, “but even so…We have to risk it. The darkness will help.”

  He thanked God or the Gods for the thin silvery light of the moon.

  Wasn’t Isis a moon Goddess?

  “Take Komi and Ryan with you. If they do give chase, they’ll be more likely to go after Raissa and me than you. Use the fort as a reference, head directly west south west from this corner as we originally planned. We have to stay out of their hands, and find and reach the Tomb before they do.”

  Tareq nodded.

  “Ryan, get the trunk,” Ky called softly.

  He’d leave nothing for Zimmer.

  The grad student nodded, hurrying away.

  For a moment Ky worried about the other archaeologists, but there was nothing he could do for them, except perhaps draw Zimmer off. It would have been different if he’d had either of his old teams with him, or a healthy Raissa and Tareq, then he might have attempted a rescue. As it was, he didn’t dare.