There were no dreams, and I woke hours later with a start. Not because I’d woken naturally but because something had broken the rest. The room was pitch dark and only a faint bit of light came through the window around Balder’s head.
A creak from the doorway and I caught the scent of grease. “What do you want, Bryce?”
“Ish wants to see you.”
I frowned. “You aren’t a messenger boy.”
“I . . . something’s happened.” He trailed off and I froze.
“Are we being attacked?” It hadn’t happened often, but there was some lash-back from stealing the jewels from other supes. Occasionally they tracked us down and we had to beat them back.
“No, something with Darcy.” There was enough worry in his voice that my heart kicked up more than a few notches. I stood and headed toward the door.
Where he was fair, I was dark, my hair a tangle of curls black as the night, fading to a ruddy brown at the ends. My eyes were green, bright like the jewels we searched for, and even my skin was darker from being out in the sun so much. Bound as he was to his crappy old wheelchair, Bryce didn’t venture out much so his skin was paler than anyone else’s here.
I brushed past him and he sucked in a breath like he wanted to say something, but there was nothing for him to say, at least I didn’t think there was. I knew the truth between us and so did he. We were done. I could treat him like one of the other supes, no different. Not my brother anymore.
I was on my own, again. But maybe I’d always been on my own and just hadn’t known it. That thought slowed me, but it was not the time to be reflective on my life.
Without another word between us, I hurried away, down the hall to Ish’s quarters. The door was open and inside a fire burned hot, driving the cool air of the winter night away. Ish sat in a big chair in front of the fireplace. “Come, sit with me, Zamira. Something has happened that you need to be aware of.” She beckoned me forward with one hand, holding a thick pottery chalice in the other, bubbling with something I couldn’t place. I took a deep breath, holding the scent against the back of my tongue, finally pinpointing the spices. Aniseed was the strongest spice with a touch of nutmeg in the backdrop and beyond that, straight up vodka. A calming drink then, which did not bode well if Ish needed it.
I made my way to the fire, the animal in me almost groaning in pleasure with the heat that spilled from behind the grill if not for the worry gnawing at my insides. I sat with my back to the fire and crossed my legs. “Bryce said you needed to speak with me about Darcy. Is she back?” Hope, it was something I could hang onto for only a little longer.
“No, she is not.” She shook her head. “Her horse came back with a note attached to the saddle.”
She held a scroll out to me and I took it, fear making my mouth dry.
I unwound the paper and read the bold black ink out loud.
“Your golden cat is a lovely prize, Ish. Marsum will thank me for her. Do not bother to come for the jewel. It is mine and I will not give it up. To be crystal clear, I will slaughter all your pets if I must.”
I read the words over and over. They were not signed, but they didn’t need to be. “The Ice Witch has Darcy?”
“Yes.” Ish’s eyes were clouded.
“What about Richard and Leo?” I turned the paper over.
“Dead,” Ish said. “They slipped by the White Wolf, the White Bear, and reached the White Raven. The Raven killed them and took Darcy as a prize. A threat to make sure . . . I do not try again to regain what is mine.” There was an edge to her voice, grief and anger mixing through her words.
The world around me seemed to sway. Richard and Leo were not close to me, but they had worked with Darcy for years and she trusted them implicitly. The two men had a relationship she and I had both wished we could have with the mate of our choice. And just like that, they were gone, dead. Wiped out.
It had been years since we’d lost anyone on a hunt for a jewel. Years, and the shock was making me slow. I knew the importance of the jewels. I was the only one who truly understood why we were doing this and why the cost in lives was worth it, even if it hurt.
But Darcy, she could still be saved before she was sent to Marsum.
“Then we have to get her back.” I handed the scroll back to Ish. “That’s all there is to it.”
Ish’s eyes were hard to read as she spoke. “You wounded Steve badly, and while I do not blame you for your anger, it will make regaining the jewel difficult. I would send him to the Ice Witch to gain the jewel with his mate. I need you here to guard us on the off chance the witch sends any repercussions.”
The words were like a gong inside my head, a big, angry fucking gong that resonated to the center of my bones. His mate? He’d claimed Kiara as his mate? They’d been together less than a year, and claiming a mate took longer than that. Not to mention the women I knew he’d been with while he was with Kiara.
Ish continued. “When he comes back with the jewel, I’ve told him he will have leadership here. He is the last alpha male capable, and it is time he took that responsibility.”
I struggled to pin down the anger, hurt, and confusion, to not let it all come roaring out my mouth. No such luck. I shot to my feet, vibrating. “He cannot lead here. He’ll fucking enslave the rest of the supes. He’ll do exactly as he always has, lie and manipulate and break what little peace we have in this place!”
Ish frowned. “You think I would allow him to do that?”
“I think he would try and spin it so you believed him, just like he tried to make you believe I was dead.” I began to pace. “He’s a manipulator, he always has been.”
“That is your broken heart talking,” Ish said softly. “He was not always—”
“He was!” I yelled at her, ignoring the way her eyes narrowed. “I was just too young and stupid to see it. He likes his women young for that reason, because he can control them easier. It wasn’t until I started questioning him that he wanted her. Only when I no longer let him make me his doormat, his yes woman, that things changed between us.”
Her eyebrows rose slowly. “You think he controlled you?”
“He tried to.” I shrugged, not wanting to say the truth. I’d let my love for him blind me to what he really was. “Look, enough of that, it’s the past. I’m going after Darcy. And when I get back, I’ll damn well fight him for leadership if I have to.”
“No.” That one word stopped me mid-stride. Did she mean no to the fight, or to me going? “When Steve is healed, he will go for the jewel with Kiara. You will go to Dragon’s Ground to see if you can find a way in prepping us for the next jewel.”
I closed my eyes, my heart breaking on what was left of my belief in Ish. I thought she would understand. I thought she of all people would grasp the importance of not leaving anyone behind. “You would leave Darcy to the Ice Witch? You would leave her to be sent to Marsum?”
“Steve will save her, Zamira.” Ish’s words were soft, but not particularly soothing. “You are not strong enough to see the final three jewels back to me on your own, or even with Steve. The final three jewels are held by guardians of the wall and they are . . . they are not a rush of giants or a coven of witches. They need a true lion of power to take them down. I’m sorry. But it is the truth.”
Her words could not have cut any deeper than if she’d used a knife on me. I forced myself to stand still and straight, to not slump under the shame that had just been heaped onto me. “Not strong enough.” I repeated the words.
“It is the truth, Zamira.” Ish reached for me and I pulled back. “You know it is the truth and the sooner you accept it, the sooner you can move on with your life. You are living as though you can truly stand next to those in your pride, shoulder to shoulder, and you cannot. You are not that cat. You will never be.”
I swallowed hard, turned and strode away from her. Away from a truth that while it might be my reality, was fucking hard to hear from the mouth of my surrogate mother. To hear that she thought so
little of me, thought me incapable of . . . anything.
My whole life I’d fought one thing: being weaker than the others. All I could do to counteract that weakness was by training, learning weaponry, gaining skills that helped me be the fighter and thief I was. But there was something else I struggled with almost as much as being weak. I’d screwed up who to trust enough times now that I didn’t see the point in trusting anyone. Even Ish—the woman who was my mother in everything but blood. She didn’t trust me to complete what I set out to do. She didn’t trust me, and obviously, I couldn’t trust her to know me well enough that she would allow me a measure of understanding.
The halls seemed to close in around me and I struggled to walk straight. I finally stopped and leaned against the rough brick and mortar to catch my breath that came in gulps, as if I’d been running flat out for miles and miles. But I couldn’t slow the pounding of my heart or the racing of my thoughts as my world imploded. My ears twitched with the squeak of a wheel and I turned my head. “What do you want, Bryce?” The words were hollow, dead of emotion. It was time I felt nothing, it was time to shut this shit down. If I didn’t feel anything, then I couldn’t be hurt anymore. If I expected nothing from those around me, there would be no disappointment.
“Tell me you’re going after her,” he said with more pain in his voice than I’d heard in years. “I may never be able to love her the way she deserves, but I don’t think I can go on without her being in my life. Steve won’t save her; we both know it. No matter what was between them—”
“Don’t.” I cut him off. “Don’t go there.”
My throat tightened, making it tough to speak. At least Bryce loved Darcy. It took me a moment to pull my shit together, to push the past down so I didn’t vomit it right out my mouth. “I’m not leaving her out there on her own.”
He closed his eyes and then took a big breath, expanding his broad chest. “Then you’re going to need help and I know who can go with you and not be missed, at least not right away. Darcy was flirting with the human before she left.”
“Maks?” I stared hard at him and shook my head. “No, she didn’t like Maks. She would have told me something like that.” It was bad enough who she did like, and it wasn’t my brother. Maks, while pleasing to the eye, was human. I was sure Darcy wouldn’t take him into her bed. My gut twisted. Then again, Darcy had taken someone to her bed that I would’ve never thought she would.
Bryce nodded. “She did. I’m sure of it. I saw them talking several times out my window. And the feeling was mutual. You were too busy hating Steve to see she was falling for him.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant Darcy was falling for Maks or Steve. No, that wasn’t true. I knew he meant Maks, but I’d never told him the other secret Darcy had. It was her secret to tell, or not tell after all, not mine.
“He’s human; what can he possibly do to help?” I lowered my voice, not because Maks might hear me slag him, but Ish might hear us talking and she’d try to stop me. Because I’d already decided I was going after Darcy. No matter what happened, she was my friend and I wasn’t leaving her in the icy cold north.
I wasn’t sure anymore if she would do the same for me, not after our fight. But I wouldn’t let that stop me. She’d saved my life years ago, and this was my chance to return the favor, to show her I could forgive her.
“Maks is cannon fodder.” Bryce shook his head. “Shitty as that sounds. And he does have some skills, and you can boss him around easier than Steve. He can help, I think. He’s survived on this side of the wall where other humans haven’t lasted a week. You could use that kind of luck on your side.”
I pushed off the wall and made a motion with my hand, an offer to push his wheelchair. He shook his head. The fight we’d had earlier was gone under the bonds of our broken family. That’s the way it went some days. Screaming and yelling and hating, then banding together to save one of our own, burying the feelings so they didn’t get in the way of what needed to be done.
I walked beside him, heading to my room. “I don’t want his help. I’ll be faster on my own.”
Humans were so many things and none of them good in my opinion. Useless, prideful, stupid. I mean, I got what Bryce was thinking. It would be no big loss for Maks to die. Not really. And if he managed to help me a little along the way, I could understand what my brother was thinking. The problem was I knew I could move faster on my own. Never mind the whole issue of whether or not I could trust Maks—the short answer was I couldn’t. No human could be trusted. No matter how pretty his blue eyes were.
“I’ve already told him he’s going with you,” Bryce said. “You aren’t the big cat you were meant to be, Zam. You’re quick, and smart, and mean as they come when you really put up a fight, but you need some muscle behind you in case things get tough. Maks can be that muscle. And you need someone to help push you into decisions you’d rather not make. You won’t do that on your own.”
His words stopped me. Complimentary and not, all at once. “Bryce—”
“No. For once let me lead our family as I was meant to. I’m giving you a direct command.” Something in his voice deepened and I felt his power as an alpha all the way to my bones. My leader was speaking and the cat in me bowed under his demand, making me inwardly snarl at the submissiveness in me. “Get Darcy, bring her home. Take Maks and try not to get killed.”
I nodded, bending to his will. And even though it was what I wanted to do—get Darcy home—I hated that my inner self was still the doormat cat I loathed. “What about the jewel?”
“Ish wants it, so Steve and Kiara can get it,” Bryce said. “Two teams, two goals.” I noted that he used the word want. He was wrong about that—Ish needed the jewel. Her secrets burned in me, and for a brief second, I thought about telling him the truth. About telling him what I knew. But I couldn’t trust him with it. I knew that.
I put a hand on his shoulder and tightened my fingers as I struggled to let him direct me. It was his rightful place in our family, but things hadn’t quite worked out that way. My cat wanted to bow to him, and at the same time, swat his cheek for trying to boss me. I finally lowered my chin to my chest, submitting fully. A sigh slid past my lips.
“Tell Maks to meet me at the stable. I leave tonight, in an hour.”
Bryce nodded. “Take that flail with you. Father told me about it, said it was a powerful weapon.”
“What do you mean?” I touched the handle of the flail hanging on my side. Not a good place if I were going into battle, but that hadn’t been the plan when I wore it into Ish’s anteroom. It had been for show alone.
“There are legends around it, if it’s the flail I think it is.” Bryce reached out and grabbed one of the spikes, pulling the whole weapon up so he could see the designs on the haft. “But it isn’t good. If that really is the weapon Marsum created, then it’s powerful, yes. But the stories Father told me say it’s dangerous to the user too.”
For a moment, I stared at him, sure that I’d heard him wrong. I had to have heard him wrong. “Marsum. Did you say Marsum’s flail?”
Marsum was the Jinn who’d destroyed our family, killed our father and maimed Bryce. No small thing in my world, and to have a weapon he created . . . I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.
Bryce nodded. “I did. Our great-grandfather stole the weapon from the Jinn, and then it went missing on his next raid. Take it with you, but be careful. I don’t know what it can do, but . . .”
I didn’t know if I should snatch my hand away from the wooden handle or hang on tighter. “There were enough ‘buts’ in that little story to make a gay man giddy. You aren’t leaving me with a lot of confidence in taking it at all.”
He shrugged. “I only mention anything because of the seal of the lion on it.” He ran his finger over the lion’s head on the handle. “This is Grandfather’s crest. The rest is just what I remember Father telling me and he wasn’t sure on anything either. Bring her home, Zam.” He raised his eyes to mine and again I found myself
backing down, bowing my head to him. He turned his wheelchair and left me standing there. No goodbye, no come home, not even a be careful. Just bring Darcy home.
My heart ticked with discomfort, that once again, I was passed over for someone else. Despite our strained relationship, he was my brother. He should have cared for me a little. Then again, if he knew the truth of his injury, I wouldn’t blame him for hating me.
I watched him roll down the hall, then opened my door and stepped over the threshold. His words worried me and I considered doing the opposite of his advice and leaving the flail behind. I knew my two kukri blades, the shotgun, and the other weapons I carried well. What did I need with some magic shit that could end up doing something weird to me?
I rubbed the heels of my hands over my eyes, indecision wracking me. Damn it. I needed to choose and choose quickly if I was going to get ahead of Maks. I paced the room for a good five minutes as I fought to figure out what would be best. Take it, don’t take it.
It finally came down to one thing. Bryce was still my alpha and he said I needed the weapon, so for now, I’d take it. If things got ugly, I’d just drop it where I stood.
Right.
“I’m coming for you, Darcy.” I grabbed my bedroll and saddlebags that would hold most of my gear behind my saddle. I stuffed them with what I would need for the colder country I was headed toward. Fur-lined clothing, gloves, a fire starter, dried food, more of the oat and fat balls for Balder, thicker blankets for me, collapsible buckets for melting snow into water. The bedroll was twice the size it normally was and my saddlebags bulged.
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