Her Grace Camila stood guard, a job far below what should befall a crown princess. She leaned against the wall as if exhausted, her shoulders sagging and dark circles like bruises under her eyes.
“Your Grace,” I said, giving her a slight bow. “Are you unwell?”
“Of course I’m not unwell,” she snapped. “I’m just tired of waiting out here for that filthy panther to show up.”
I kept my expression neutral as I took a drag of my cigarette, daring her to chastise me. “Yes, Your Grace.”
Her face was haggard, but her eyes were shrewd as she gave me a long, calculating look, the one that made my skin cold and my balls try to crawl up inside my body.
“Break down the door.”
I crushed out my cigarette. “Your Grace?”
“He’s in there,” she hissed, jabbing an accusatory finger at me. “I know he’s in there. She’s hiding him from me because she doesn’t want me to know she has the amulets. She thinks I’m stupid. But I know he’s there.”
“What will you do to him, Your Grace?”
“Break down the door,” she ordered, pointing to her sister’s sleeping quarters.
“This is the shah’s home,” I pointed out. “Not ours.”
“You think I’m stupid, too, don’t you?” Princess Camila hissed, her eyes flashing with gold—a threat ocelots used to intimidate each other the way wolves might bare their teeth.
For a second, I did the thing I’d begun doing since we landed. I considered whether what I was doing upheld the vows I’d taken to the ocelot throne. Was obeying Her Majesty in opposition to that?
Princess Camila stomped her foot. “Break down the door,” she commanded again. I wasn’t the only one changing on this trip. I wasn’t the only one slipping from the rigid ocelot ways. I was genuinely worried for Princess Camila, for the decisions she was making, the impression she was making on the other Feline Nations.
But it wasn’t my place to worry about those things. My place was to serve, to protect, to mindlessly obey. The rest was the job of Her Grace. The problem was that it seemed Her Grace had forgotten that.
Still, it wasn’t my place to remind her. I had tried to do so gently a few times, and she’d threatened to send me home and order my execution, or to leave me in the Lion Kingdom, or to take it out on her sister. Princess Camila was shrewd and observant as well as smart. She knew how to threaten me, how to gain my compliance when she could no longer rely on me for dutiful obedience.
Now, she turned and called down the hall. Moments later, Tadeu appeared as if he’d been waiting. Was he guarding her now that she didn’t trust me?
Before he reached us, I gathered all my strength, the fury that had awakened as I sat at that table with Princess Camila’s claw piercing through my palm like a gentle reminder of the true violence of which she was capable. She might as well have tied a noose around my neck and used it as a leash to lead me around. Her subtle threats were worse than brutality. I could take a beating. The thing she was doing to my head, that was harder to endure.
Stepping forward, I crouched for leverage and slammed my shoulder into the door. It flew inwards with a crash. Inside the room, Princess Itzel screamed and leapt from the bed as if she’d been waiting for an attack all this time. She probably had. She wasn’t stupid, either.
Around her, three men had been sleeping, all of them in the big bed together, like a family. My chest tightened, and I stood frozen as Her Majesty stormed past me into the room.
“I knew it,” she shrieked, pointing a finger at Shadow as he slid out of bed as if made of liquid. He was naked and already halfway shifted by the time I stepped through the doorway, blocking Princess Itzel from Tadeu’s path.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Itzel demanded. She stared at her sister with wild eyes, her hair a sexy, tangled mane. Thank the stars she was wearing something, though the oversized T-shirt she’d chosen barely covered the apex of her thighs. Below its hem, the expanse of her plump, golden thighs beckoned.
“Give me the amulets,” Princess Camila ordered, holding out a hand to Shadow. “Or my guards dispose of you right now.”
Princess Itzel’s eyes flew wide, and I saw the anguish there at the thought of losing her lover. I shouldn’t care. I should be able to kill any man in the world without blinking. I’d done it so many times before. But the idea of putting that anguish in the princess’s eyes, of making it permanent, made my blood turn to ice crystals that tore at my veins.
I should have seen this coming from the very first night I worked in the palace, when the preteen princess got into the king’s liquor and drank herself numb from the pain of her mother’s death. When I found her passed out on the kitchen floor and carried her to bed, because I would want someone to do the same for my sister now that she no longer had someone to look after her. I could look after this girl. I could follow her when my night shift ended on too many nights. I could make sure she made it home every time.
And when my sister died a few years later, I was meant to care for nothing but the king. That was the purpose of her death, and I’d thought it wasn’t for nothing. But it was. Because I hadn’t lost all attachments. I’d simply transferred them.
Shadow dropped his front paws to the ground, fully shifted in a second’s time.
“Kill him,” Princess Camila ordered, aiming a finger at the threat.
“No,” Princess Itzel yelled, jumping in front of a panther, as if her human body could shield him. Tadeu jostled me aside, shoving past and lunging at Shadow while still in human form. Camila turned to me, eyes flashing murderously as she screamed at me to shift. I barely heard her. My eyes were riveted on the scene behind her back. Tadeu was wrestling with the panther while Prince Kwame had thrown on a set of clothes and snatched up a backpack.
Lord Balam grabbed Itzel, kissed her hard on the mouth, and shoved a velvet pouch into her hands. I knew what it was. I’d seen it in Princess Camila’s bag. It was the thing she was after, the thing she would kill for. One of the things.
I could have leapt past Princess Camila, ripped it out of their hands. Joined the brawl. Shifted first, ripped out a throat. I could have pulled out the dart gun I’d procured from the driver who’d brought us from the plane to the castle, knocked out the thieving princess, and been the hero.
Lord Balam pulled his jaguar skin around his shoulders, and I knew it was time to fight.
“Come,” Prince Kwame said gently, taking the princess’s elbow. Our eyes met, and I knew with complete certainty that I was on the wrong side of this fight. I had sworn to fight and die for the throne, though, so that’s what I would do.
Princess Itzel had her calling. She had her True Mates to fight by her side, to love and protect her with their lives. I had no place in her rebel crew. My place was to die at her sister’s side.
So, I dropped and shifted into fighting form. When I looked up, Prince Kwame and Princess Itzel were gone.
The familiar determination hardened the steel of my heart back to the way it should be, cooling it from the molten form it took when Princess Itzel looked at me to the impenetrable resolve of a proper ocelot guard. I leapt at Lord Balam, sinking my teeth into his shoulder. He struck at me, and I jumped back. Tadeu’s enormous tiger form had emerged, and he threw Shadow across the room and leapt at Lord Balam. I dove after Shadow, who came up hissing and snarling.
I fought for the future queen and for the honor I would never forsake. Even knowing we were the enemy, we were the evildoers, didn’t erase the oath I’d taken. I hadn’t vowed to do what my conscience told me was right. I had vowed to serve another’s vision of what was right. I was bound to that oath until the moment of my death. That was my life sentence. Princess Itzel wasn’t my forever. This was my forever.
She was my never.
Eighteen
Itzel
Princess, Ocelot Nation
“We should go back,” I hissed to Kwame as we ran through the tiled courtyard after climbing out the window. “S
he thinks Shadow has the amulets. She ordered them to kill him. What if he’s dead?”
“He’s not dead,” Kwame said, his cool hand tightening around mine. “Come, we must hurry.”
“How do you know?” I asked, digging my heels in and yanking at his hand.
Kwame turned to face me, resting his hands on my shoulders and squeezing. “Itzel, this is the plan. He would give his life for you just like any one of us would. There is no greater honor than to die for your mate. Come. We must stick to the plan.”
“The plan wasn’t for someone to die,” I said, but I let him pull me on, through the entrance to the palace and back out toward the helicopter pad.
Sir Kenosi’s pilot came running from the other direction, gave a quick salute, and hopped in. He’d been told to be ready when we decided to go, and a rush of relief and gratitude swelled inside me when the chopper started up. The pilot had come through for us even when his employer had left this world, but I had no doubt it was because of his loyalty to Sir Kenosi that he was so willing and ready to help.
“The plan was for us to get to the mountains, and for them to stop your sister,” Kwame said, lifting me into the helicopter. “Of course there are small hiccups, but we stay the course. Right?”
He searched my face, letting it sink in that this was my decision. I could go back now, give the amulets to Camila, and be done. I could let her pay for the snow leopard amulet however Gao Jetsun wanted to make her. But something had changed in me the night Tadeu had told me the truth. Camila had known all along that he was alive. She had taken him to see me while I tried to fuck away my grief over losing him with a complete stranger. She had set it all up so he would hate me, so he would never come back and so that I never knew he could.
She was the one who had separated us. I was pretty fucking sure she was the one who had ordered his execution, not Father. Sure, my relationship with Tadeu pissed off the king, but nothing had happened to make him suddenly want to execute him. Camila couldn’t have known how it would all play out, but she must have seen him as a threat. He was a distraction, someone I loved that didn’t benefit her. She knew I wanted to marry him, elevate him in status. She knew I wanted to give my virginity to him. And she’d known that I would be much more malleable if I didn’t have my heart in two places.
Fury rolled through me, and I squeezed Kwame’s hands before turning to close the helicopter door. “Let’s go.”
*
After all the close calls and big scenes we’d had trying to leave the last few territories, I kept looking out the window, expecting to see Camila, Gabor, and Tadeu charging for the helicopter, determined to stop us. Only when we were high above the Tiger Palace did I finally relax back into the soft, leather seat. Kwame slid an arm around my shoulders and squeezed me to him.
“You’re safe,” he said, kissing my forehead. “We’re going to go find Gao Jetsun, get the last amulet, and then we will make you a queen.”
“A queen of what?” I asked, drawing back to look at him.
“When we marry, you will be the Lion Queen, of course.”
“I’m going to find a way to bring Sir Kenosi back,” I said. “Then I won’t be a shifter.”
“I don’t care,” Kwame said. “You will be my queen either way.”
“Would your people allow that?”
Kwame smiled, revealing the slight gap between his white teeth. “Of course,” he said. “My people are mostly human. Only when people from the royal families die do they become lion shifters.”
“Right,” I said, nodding. “Like that lion that lay beside me when I was in the grass. Was that you?”
“Yes,” he said. “Before, I was a lion while in our world, and a man when in the spirit world. Now that you brought me back, I have changed. I am a ghost in both worlds, but I can be both lion and human in our world. This is very special, Itzel. Most lion shifters cannot be both in this world. I hope you know how grateful I am for what you did for me.”
“Good,” I said. “I gave up my mother for that.”
“I’m so thankful,” Kwame said, cupping my cheek in one hand and leaning in to kiss me gently. “I know it is not an equal sacrifice, but I will give up my throne if you wish to become the ocelot queen.”
“You can do that?”
“Of course,” he said. “I am the eldest child. I inherit the lion throne. But if you need to fix your country, I will leave the throne to my sister. She prepared for that job for years after I was killed. She is quite capable.”
“Don’t you want to be king?”
“I want you,” he said. “I am doing the right thing for my mate. Nothing could make me happier, except to know that I am leaving my people in good hands as well as serving you.”
“How did I get so lucky?” I asked, leaning in to press my lips to his.
“Maybe you were due some luck,” he said, taking my hand and lacing his fingers through mine.
“Let’s hope it holds while we get the last amulet,” I said as the helicopter began to descend. The pilot was dropping us off in the mountains, as close to one of the monasteries as we could get. Since the monasteries were mostly human, with maybe a snow leopard or two in each if we were lucky, it might take a while to find my half-brother. Most of the monasteries probably had no shifters at all. The upside was that we only had to contend with my pheromones attracting one or two snow leopards at once. We could fight them off if needed until we found Gao Jetsun.
We were pretty sure he lived somewhere around there. Luring him out would be the hard part this time. Well, that and not getting assaulted by another feline shifter on the mountain in the process. Then, all I had to do was convince Gao Jetsun that I was worthy of the amulet.
Easy enough.
Oh, and I’d also probably need to convince him that it wasn’t my fault—or my mom’s—that his father had been killed. Even though, really, it kinda was our fault. My mother had the affair. My father had killed him because of the affair. I was a result of the affair.
Yeah, I was definitely going to need some luck.
When we landed, I gave instructions to the pilot, a cheetah who was loyal to Sir Kenosi and now apparently to me. He left to bring my mates to a base camp that wasn’t too close to me but wasn’t in another country altogether. Once he left us, it was just me and Kwame on the mountain.
I looked around at the alien world, the furthest thing from the warm, sub-tropical Ocelot Nation as I could imagine. The air around us felt thin and dry, nearly glittering with ice crystals. The mountainsides were steep and smooth, with snow still on top and extending down the sides. Small patches of tan, dry grass peeked out from the sandstone that surrounded us as we started up the side. Brown boulders with white and red lichen made for handholds, but also made good hiding places for anyone out to ambush us.
Which was no one, I reminded myself. There was no one here to attack us, no one who wanted to. When the magic kicked in, though…
“We will set up camp for the night,” Kwame said, scrambling up the mountain in front of me despite wearing the heavier of our packs. “Let’s find a good spot. In the morning, you should open the tiger amulet, and we can start searching.”
Everything about this place reminded me that we were in a foreign land, about to navigate something even further from my past experiences than the other kingdoms. How the fuck was I going to convince a monk that I was worthy of a sacred mating amulet? My brother was some sort of celibate holy man, while I was… Weak.
I felt weak compared to that. I wasn’t even sure I had moral convictions. My bargains for the amulets had been entirely sexual, not cerebral or philosophical, and definitely not spiritual. Aside from the Lion Amulet, I’d traded all of them for sex. I’d never really had to convince someone I was worthy, and I wasn’t sure that I could. I didn’t know if I was worthy of something sacred.
I’d fucked a stranger to forget a lover. I’d ripped his clothes off and thrown myself at him. I’d drugged a man and driven him to insanity, and wh
en he’d come for me, I’d been scared, but I’d gone willingly. And if I was brutally honest with myself, some dark part of me had awakened that night, a part of me that liked being handcuffed to that bed and fucked so wildly that his mattress was shredded in the morning.
At Sir Kenosi’s, I’d fought him at first, but by the end, I was lying face down in half eaten food, begging helplessly for him to degrade me if it meant I’d get his beautiful cock. And while I hadn’t enjoyed Tadeu’s treatment of me, I hadn’t asked him to stop. I hadn’t begged the shah for mercy. I had been willing to be violated roughly, publicly, even violently. Maybe a part of me had believed I deserved it after what I’d done to Camila. The least I could do was take the wrath of my lover for her.
Only Kwame had made me sacrifice more than my body for him. He’d fucked me, too, but he said it was only to gain the mark, so he’d know for sure I was his mate. Gao Jetsun wouldn’t want even that much. If I could lure him out, he might still prove the hardest to convince. After all I’d done to get the others, was I still worthy of something precious? Or was I ruined and dirty, a wrecked and worthless whore like Camila said?
I had to admit, now that I was here, that Camila might have been the better choice to convince my brother to turn over the snow leopard amulet. She was still pure, undamaged by what she’d gone through to get the amulets. And what did I mean to do with the amulets when I had them all? I’d been blinded by my anger at Camila, unwilling to turn them over. But I couldn’t even touch the ocelot amulet. It too was cursed, so that only an ocelot could place it into the puzzle with the others. If anyone else touched it, we’d die. Which meant I was going to have to give it back to her or get her blessing, and even I wasn’t blind enough to think she’d give me that.
And in truth, I had no right to the amulets or the throne. Camila was a worthy contender, not just for the amulets but for the throne. Was I really ready to fight her for that, though I had no claim and hadn’t really earned it? Not the way she had. She was right. She’d studied and trained for it since the day she was born while I made a game of escaping the boring tutors and playing with other human children in the streets. She was a shifter who knew shifter politics while I only knew my own passions and fancies. Camila wanted the throne so much she’d do anything to get there.
Hunted Princess: A Paranormal Dark Romance (Feline Royals Book 3) Page 13