Dance of the Gods

by Nora Roberts

  “Yeah. It works for her, for her family.”

  “You’re her family.”

  “And she always made me feel that way. But it’s not the way I was trained. Maybe that’s why it’s never worked as well for me. I…there was someone once, and I loved him. We made some promises to each other, but we couldn’t keep them. He couldn’t be with me. I couldn’t make it work, because what I am didn’t just shock and frighten him. It disgusted him.”

  “Then he wasn’t the man for you, or, in my thinking, any kind of a man at all.”

  “He was just normal, Larkin. A normal, average guy, and I thought I wanted—thought I could have that. Normal, average.”

  She was made for better, he thought. She was made for more.

  “You could say Jeremy—that was his name—taught me I couldn’t have that. It’s not that I don’t have a life outside of what my father calls ‘the mission.’ I have some civilian friends. I like to shop, eat pizza, watch TV. But it’s always in there, the knowing what comes out after sundown. You can’t shake it. We’re not like other people.”

  She looked up. “Sun’s getting low. Better go in, set up for a training session.” She gave him a quiet look. “Playtime’s over.”

  It wasn’t a hardship, Larkin thought, to sit and have a beautiful woman tend to you—especially when the woman smelled lovely and had hands like an angel.

  “How’s this?” Glenna gently kneaded his shoulder, down the arm and back again.

  “It’s good. It’s fine. You can stop anytime in the next hour or two.”

  She chuckled, but worked her way across his back to his other shoulder. “You took some hard knocks, pal. But you’re coming right along. It wouldn’t hurt for you to skip training tonight.”

  “I think it’s best I keep up with it. Time’s short enough.”

  “A few days, and we leave.” She looked over his head, out the window as she continued to work his back and shoulders. “Strange how quickly this has become home. I still miss New York, but it’s not home anymore.”

  “But you’ll go back from time to time.”

  “Oh yeah, I’ll need my fix. You can take the girl out of the city, but…” She walked around him, played her fingers over the bruising on the side of his ribs. And made him jolt.

  “Sorry. I’m a bit ticklish.”

  “Suck it in and think of Geall. I’ll be quick.”

  It was torture really, fearing at any minute he might giggle like a girl. “You’ll like Geall. At the castle, there are fine gardens, and herbs—oh Jesus, you’re killing me. And the river, where it runs behind the castle is nearly wide as a lake. The fish all but jump out into your hands, and…Thank God, is that all of it?”

  “You’ll do. Put your shirt on.”

  He rolled his shoulders first, circled his head on his neck. “It’s better. Thanks for that, Glenna.”

  “All in a day’s work.” She walked to the sink to wash balm from her hands. “Larkin, Hoyt and Cian have been talking.”

  “That’s good, seeing as they’re brothers.” He got up, pulled on his shirt. “But you’re not meaning light family conversations.”

  “No. Logistics, strategies. Hoyt’s good with logistics—he doesn’t miss details, but Cian’s better with strategy, I suppose. Anyway.” She turned, drying her hands on a towel. “I asked that they not discuss all this over dinner, so we could just have a meal. A normal…well, as normal as you can have with weapons everywhere.”

  “And a fine meal it was. I saw you and Hoyt earlier, kissing in the herb garden.”

  “Oh.”

  “And that was normal. The walk I took with Blair, or Moira cuddled up with a book somewhere. We need all that, so you shouldn’t worry I’m offended that I haven’t been part of a discussion on logistics and strategy.”

  “You make it easy. Thanks. The thing is, we’re working out not only how to get weapons and the supplies we’ll need from here to the Dance, but from here to Geall, and from the Dance in Geall to wherever we’re going once we’re there.”

  “The castle would be the place for it.”

  “The castle.” Glenna gave a quiet laugh. “Off to the castle. The transportation might be a bit tricky, and we’d need you and Moira to help with that. Meanwhile, only you and Moira know your way around once we’re there. How are you at drawing maps?”

  “This would be the whole of Geall.” In the library, Larkin drew it out. “This being the shape of it as I’ve seen on the maps at home. A sort of ragged fan, with these dips being inlets and bays and harbors. And here would be the Dance.”

  “In the west,” Hoyt murmured, “as it is here.”

  “Aye, and a bit inland. Though if it’s a clear day you can see the coast, and out to sea. There’s a forest, as there is here, but it spreads just a bit more to the north. The Dance is on a rise, and the Well of the Gods here. And here, ah, about here, would be the castle.”

  He marked it, drawing a kind of rook and flag. “It’s a good hour’s ride, if you’re going easy, along this road. There’d be forks here, and again here. To this way, you’d go into the village—Geall City. And this way down to Dragon’s Lair, and onto Knockarague. My mother’s people came from there, and there are plenty who would come to fight.”

  “And the battleground?” Hoyt asked him.

  “Here, near the center of Geall. These, the mountains, in a kind of half ring running north, curving east, and down to the south. The valley is here. It’s wide, and it’s rough land, pocked with caves, layered with rock. It’s called Ciunas. Silence, as a man could wander there, lost, for hours. And no one would hear. In all of Geall, to my knowing, it’s the only place nothing lives but the grass and the rocks.”

  “No point in having an apocalypse in a meadow,” Cian commented. “Five days’ march, isn’t that what Moira said?”

  “Hard march, yes.”

  “Tricky for me, even if I managed to get that far.”

  “There are places along the way. Shelters, cabins, caves, cottages. We’ll see you don’t go up like a torch.”

  “You’re a comfort to me, Larkin.”

  “A man does what he can. There are settlements closer to the valley,” he continued, sketching them in. “Men can be called on there as well. But I think there needs to be some fortification done. The enemy would find those locations handy for their own shelter and preparations.”

  “Boy’s got a brain,” Cian commented. “She’d attack these.” Cian tapped his finger on the map. “Decimate the population, turn those she felt would serve her best, use the rest for food supply. Those would be her first strike.”

  “Then those will be our first defense.” Hoyt nodded.

  “You’d be wasting valuable time and effort.”

  “We can’t leave people undefended,” Hoyt began.

  “Get them out. Leave her without the food source or fresh recruits, at least in that area. I’d say burn the settlement to the ground, but I’d be wasting my time and effort.”

  “But you’d be right.” Blair stepped into the room. “Leave her with no shelter, no supplies, nothing but ash. It’s the cleanest, quickest and most efficient method.”

  “You’re talking of people’s homes.” Larkin shook his head at her. “Of people’s homes and lives and livelihoods.”

  “Which they won’t have when she’s done in any case. But they won’t do it,” she said to Cian. “And if they did, or tried, people would rebel, and we’d be fighting two fronts. So clear out the population, move the old, the weak, those who can’t or won’t fight to the castle or other fortifications.”

  “But you agree with him,” Larkin insisted. “On the surface of it. Burn it down, the homes, the farms, the shops.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “There are other ways.” Hoyt held up a hand. “Glenna and I haven’t been able to do a spell to repel the vampires from around this house because of Cian. But we could try one to protect these areas, to keep them out of the homes there. Their wizard may be able
to break through that, but it would take time—and have his focus and energies tied up.”

  “That could work.” But she exchanged a look with Cian, understood he was thinking the same as she. So they wouldn’t burn the settlements. Lilith would.

  “So, this is Geall.” She leaned over the map. “And this is the place. Landlocked, slapped up against the mountains. Lots of caves, lots of hiding places, and desolate for all that. A goat would have a hard time beating a retreat out of there.”

  “We won’t be running,” Larkin said tightly.

  “I was thinking of them. Without other shelter during the day, they’ll use the caves. That gives us the high ground, but gives them ambush advantage. It’ll be night, another advantage for them. We’ll use fire, big advantage us. But before we get there, I’ve got some ideas about some surprises along the way. Now we don’t know where she’s going to come out, but we have to figure the odds are it’s within this area.”

  Blair placed a hand on the map. “Battleground, shelter, castle. She’s not going to nip behind a rock during the day—not her style, so she’s got it worked that she comes in at night and moves with some speed to shelter. Most likely, she’ll send an advance to these settlements, get it all taken care of for her arrival. So we need to know the quickest routes from these points to these.”

  They worked, debated, discussed. She could tell Larkin had backed off from her, stepped away on some basic level. She told herself it couldn’t be helped. Told herself she wouldn’t be hurt.

  What was between them was illusion anyway. Something framed in fantasy, as transient as innocence. The passion was fine, it helped fill voids—temporarily. She knew very well that passion flickered out and died when things got tough. However cold the comfort, she held it to her. Kept it close when she went to her room alone.

  Moira bided her time. All through training she could see there was something wrong between Blair and Larkin. They barely spoke, and if they did it was like strangers. When most of the night was gone, she caught him by the arm before he could leave the training room.

  “Come on with me, would you? There’s something I want to show you.”

  “What?”

  “In my room. It’ll take a minute. We’ll be home in a few days,” she said before he could object. “I wonder if all this will seem like a dream.”

  “A nightmare.”

  “Not all of it.” Recognizing his poor mood, she bumped him affectionately with her hip. “You know not all of it. Time’s moving so fast now. For a while, it seemed we’d been here forever. Now it’s flying, and it’s like we only arrived.”

  “I’ll feel better when I get there. When I know where I am, what I’m about.”

  Oh yes, she thought, something was wrong. She opened the door to her room, and didn’t speak again until they were both inside, and the door shut.

  “What’s gone wrong between you and Blair?”

  “I don’t know what you’d be talking about. What did you want to show me?”

  “Not a thing.”

  “You said—”

  “Well, I lied, didn’t I? I’ve seen the two of you together for a while now, and just today out walking, hand-in-hand—and a look in your eye that I’m not mistaking.”

  “And what of it?”

  “Tonight, the air frosted between you every time one of you opened your mouth to the other. You quarreled?”

  “No.”

  She pursed her lips. “Maybe you need to quarrel.”

  “Don’t be foolish, Moira.”

  “What’s foolish about it? She made you happy. She brought something into you I’ve never seen, and it seemed to me you were bringing the same to her.”

  He toyed with some of the pretty stones she’d taken from the stream and put on the bureau. “I think you’re wrong. I think I was wrong.”

  “Why is that?”

  “She said today I didn’t really know her. I didn’t believe her, but now…Now I wonder if she didn’t have the right of it.”

  “Maybe she does, maybe she doesn’t, but it’s no question to me she’s done or said something to upset you. Are you just going to leave it to lie there? Why don’t you kick it to pieces, or at least kick it back at her?”

  “I don’t—”

  “And don’t make excuses to me,” she snapped, impatient. “Whatever it is can’t be bigger than what we’re facing. Anything else is petty now. Anything else, I swear, can be fixed. So, go and fix it.”

  “Why is it up to me to fix things?”

  “You might as well because you’ll just be sulking and brooding instead of sleeping until you do. And before you get to the sulking and brooding, I’ll be badgering you about it until your head’s aching.”

  “All right, all right. You’re a true pain in the arse, Moira.”

  “I know.” She touched his cheek. “It’s because I love you. Go on now.”

  “I’m going, aren’t I?”

  He used his irritation with Moira to carry him out of the room and down to Blair’s. He knocked, but didn’t wait for an invitation. He opened the door, saw her sitting at the desk at the little computer thing.

  He shut the door firm behind him.

  “I’ll have a word with you.”

  Chapter 10

  She knew that tone—when I want to have a word with you really meant I want to have a fight with you. And that was fine, that was great. She was in the perfect mood for a quick, nasty brawl.

  But that didn’t mean she’d make it easy for him.

  She kept her seat. “Obviously, you’ve missed the fact I’m busy.”

  “Obviously, you’ve missed the fact I don’t give a bleeding damn.”

  “My room,” she said coolly, “my choice.”

  “Toss me out then, why don’t you?”

  She swiveled toward him, stretched out her legs casually in what she knew was an insulting gesture. “Think I couldn’t?”

  “I think you’d have considerable trouble with it right at the moment.”

  “From the look of you, you came looking for trouble. Fine.” She crossed her feet at the ankles—just a little more insulting body language, she thought. Idly, she picked up a bottle of water to gesture with. “Have your word, then get out.”

  “From the sound of you, cara, you’ve been expecting trouble.”

  “I know you’ve got a problem with me. You made that clear enough. So spit it out, Larkin. We haven’t got time, and I haven’t got the patience for petty grievances.”

  “Is it petty to talk so callously of destroying people’s homes, their life’s work, everything they’ve built and sweated for?”

  “It’s a legitimate, and proven, strategy in wartime.”

  “I’d expect to hear that from Cian. He is what he is, and can’t help it. But not from you, Blair. And it wasn’t just the strategy, but the way it was spoken, and how you talked of those who would defend those homes—rebel as you put it—as a nuisance.”

  “They would be, creating a liability we couldn’t afford.”

  “But otherwise, you could afford to burn them out.”

  She knew, too well, the look and sound of angry revulsion on a man. All she could do was harden herself against it. “Better to lose brick and wood than flesh and blood.”

  “A home’s more than brick and wood.”

  “I wouldn’t know, I never had one. But that’s not the point. In any case, it’s moot. It’s not being done. So if that’s it—”

  “What do you mean you never had a home?”

  “We’ll say I never developed an emotional attachment to the roof over my head. But if I had, I’d rather see it go than me, or anyone I cared about.” The muscles in the back of her neck had tightened like wire, shooting a headache straight up into her skull. “And this is a ridiculous discussion because we’re not burning down anything.”

  “No, because we’re not the monsters here.”

  She lost her color at that. He could see it just sink out of her face. “Meaning you
’re not, Hoyt’s not, but Cian and I are another matter. Fine. It’s not the first time I’ve been compared to a vampire.”

  “That’s not what I’m doing.”

  “You expect it from him, but not from me,” she repeated. “Well, expect it. No, strike that, don’t expect anything. Now, get out.”

  “I’m not finished.”

  “I am.” She rose, started for the door. When he stepped in front of her, took her arm, she yanked free. “Move, or I make you move.”

  “Is that your solution? Threaten, push, shove?”

  “Not always.”

  She hit him. Her fist came up, connected, before the thought of doing it clicked in her brain. It knocked him down, and left her stunned, shocked and shamed. Losing control with another person, physically harming another person, was simply not allowed.

  “I’m not going to apologize because you asked for it. But that was crossing the line. The fact that I did means I’m already over the line, and this conversation has got to be over. Here, get up.”

  She offered a hand.

  She didn’t see it coming, another mistake, the yank on her hand, the sweep of his leg knocking her feet out from under her. When she hit the floor, he rolled on top of her before she countered.

  She had an instant to think he’d been training very well.

  “Is that how you win arguments?” he demanded. “A fist to the face?”

  “I was done arguing. That was punctuation. You’re going to want to get off me, Larkin, and fast. I’ve got a slippery hold right now.”

  “Bugger that.”

  “Bugger you.” She flipped him off, then sprang to a crouch to block anything he might throw at her. “I won’t be played like this. It’s all so easy when it’s walks in the sunshine, and talking about picnics, but when things get hard, when I have to be hard, then you’re revolted. I’m a fucking monster.”

  “I never called you that, and I’m not revolted. I’m sodding mad is what I am.” He dived at her, and they hit the floor again, rolled. Their bodies rammed into a table, tipping it over so the blown glass bowl on it shattered.

  “If you’d stop trying to bruise and bloody me for five bloody seconds we could finish this.”

  “If I wanted you bloody, you’d be pumping from an artery. I don’t need you passing judgment on me, or giving me the big chill because I’ve shocked your sensibilities. I don’t need this bullshit from you or—”

  “What you need is to shut the hell up.”

  He crushed his mouth to hers in an angry, frustrated kiss even as her elbow found its way into his gut. He had to lift his head to wheeze back in the air she stole.

  “Don’t tell me to shut up.” She grabbed his hair with both hands, yanked his mouth back down to hers.

  Just as angry, just as frustrated. Just as needy. The hell with it, she thought. The hell with right and wrong, with sense, with safety. Screw control.

  There were times you just took, and let yourself be taken.

  Didn’t mean anything, she told herself as she dragged at his shirt. It was only flesh, it was only heat. She wanted to weep and rage as much as she wanted to consume.

  She shoved him over, straddled him as she pulled her shirt over her head. But he reared up, clamping his arms around her as his mouth found her breast. So she held on, letting her head fall back, letting him plunder.