by Riley Storm
The lines rushed forward, catching the Fae by surprise, and the shifters swept the smaller creatures aside like wheat before the scythe. They didn’t stop there. Guardsmen lunged forward and threw themselves at the fourth elephant before it could close. Men simply leapt upward and plunged their swords deep into its flesh.
Others jumped higher, using those swords as stepping stones to propel them to the top. Swords rose and fell. Axes hacked and dropped. The mighty creature shook itself violently, sending shifters sailing away, but it was too late. A tide of bears rose up and took the beast down, crushing it under sheer weight.
Nearby, Klaue reached out and snapped off the tusk that was inside of him. Clumsily, due to a lack of thumbs, the bear pulled the tusk free. The elephant clearly knew what was about to happen and tried to back away, but it was too late. Klaue slammed the tusk down on its head, driving it deep into the creature’s skull and killing it.
Khove grabbed his queen and his men darted backward out of the way of the falling beast, buying themselves a short reprieve. Nearby, the giant bear slumped down, weak from loss of blood, and started to revert to its normal size.
“This fight will unite us as one,” the Queen growled, sucking in air.
“Aye,” he said quietly. “If it doesn’t break us first.”
As if summoned by his words, a fiery thunderbolt of blue lightning struck nearby, wiping out half a dozen shifters in the blink of an eye.
Khove’s head whipped around to see Korred headed their way. In the sky behind him, he could barely make out a figure toppling from the sky, a second one plunging downward in pursuit, hair whipping behind her. Khove could only hope Amber reached her mate in time.
“It’s time to end this,” Korred said as he landed on the ground, arms spread wide, eyes fixated upon the Queen.
Khove stepped in between them, sword held at a guard position. His gray eyes burned with malice as he faced the worst Traitor High House Ursa had ever seen.
“Agreed,” he snarled, and advanced.
40
“You’re to stay here!”
She turned at the guards’ snarled warning and brought her light assault rifle to her shoulder. “Are you going to stop me?” she snarled, thumbing the selector to full auto.
The bear shifter licked his lips nervously, obviously not having expected Rachel to threaten him. “Ummm.”
“My mate is out there, and they need my help more than you do here,” she said, motioning to the medical station.
The underground garage was mostly abandoned. It was clear the fight for the House was taking place on the north lines, and the Captain had long ago taken everyone who could fight and headed that way, except for four guards he’d detailed to stay behind and protect the medics.
Four guards, and Rachel. But she was tired of that. Tired of being protected, when she was fully capable of helping.
“No? I thought not,” she said fiercely, backing away several steps before turning and running up the sloping curved ramp.
What she saw at the top was a scene enough to give her nightmares. Here and there, the human mates of many of the shifters whizzed by on ATV’s, the women hauling mangled shifters to the medical station below. Bodies of Fae and occasional shifters lay where they had fallen. Fires burned everywhere, providing the only light besides the flashes from the fight in the sky.
She swallowed in sudden fear as the realization of what awaited her truly hit home. This wasn’t just a gunfight. There was magic and more being unleashed.
That point was struck home by an explosion of golden light to the north. Rachel watched as a bear larger than a dump truck took on four oversized elephants. Her eyes kept trying to deny what she was seeing, but the shockwave of sound that battered her ears convinced her otherwise.
“Ahhh!” she screamed in pain, dropping her gun and clamping her hands over her ears until it was over.
A shape came near and she snatched up the rifle, calmly selecting a single shot and pulling the trigger twice. The satyr rocked backward, two bullet holes appearing in its skull. A second later, it collapsed and died.
Rachel pulled her lips back. The Fae weren’t human, she decided. Human laws didn’t apply to them.
Stalking forward, she prowled the shattered battlefield. Fae that had gotten in behind the lines spotted her, and they came at her in ones and twos, spotting an easy kill. Or so they thought.
Her rifle barked again and again. Holes opened in foreheads, chests, and occasionally a stomach when she missed. Rachel’s hair flashed as she whipped around and unloaded the rest of the magazine into a charging centaur, the uranium dust spilling from the bullets upon impact, eating away its entire torso until it fell apart in two pieces at her feet.
“Anyone else?!” she snarled, tossing the empty assault rifle over her shoulder and pulling two pistols from her belt.
More Fae, alerted by her voice, moved to block her as she headed for the northern lines, where she knew she would find Khove. They came at her screaming wildly, eerie high-pitched noises that sent shivers down her spine.
Rachel’s arms came up.
Fae went down.
She fired until the pistols were dry, then shoved them home in their holsters and grabbed a second pair lower on her legs. Spare magazines criss-crossed her chest, but there was no time to spare for reloading. Not yet.
More creatures went down and she twisted in a circle, guns blazing. Nothing was going to stop her from reaching the northern lines and Khove. Not until she could find the big dumb bastard to kiss him and tell him she loved him.
Blue light blazed down from the heavens in front of her. Rachel was close enough to the lines now to see the shifters it hit disappear, burned black and then incinerated. A solitary figure shot from the sky and landed on one knee before rising and gesturing to the crowd.
The Fae broke and ran at this, leaving her momentarily alone until something came plummeting from the sky. Rachel dropped to one knee and spun, both pistols coming up to eye level, but she held her fire.
Two figures impacted upon the snowy ground, sending up a spray of snow.
She watched as a woman with golden-blonde hair that fell past the middle of her back got up and began half-carrying, half-dragging a man with horrific burns to most of his body toward the medical station.
“Dammit!” the woman screamed, tears running down her face. “You can’t die on me yet, Kasperi. You are not leaving me to raise our child on its own. So you hold on. That’s an order!”
Rachel almost went to help, but two others appeared from nowhere and scooped the mangled burns victim up onto an ATV and they rushed off below the Manor. She watched them go in silence before continuing toward the heaviest of the fighting at a jog. Time was running out, she could feel it.
Although she couldn’t make out details at this distance, it was obvious who the person facing the shifters was. Korred had won the magic duel. Now he was trying to end the fight. Rachel’s legs pumped as she ran over the slow rolling hills that surrounded Ursidae Manor, desperate to close ground in time.
“No,” she whispered as a figure advanced against Korred, sword held high. “Khove, you idiot. What are you doing?!”
She dipped into a low spot and her view of the fight was lost for several precious seconds. By the time she crested the next hill, it was already over. Khove and one other figure were wrapped up in a red glow, while a dozen other shifters lay scattered about on the ground nearby.
A booming laugh reached out over the distance. Rachel was almost there.
“Put him down!” she screamed, but over the roar of the ongoing fighting on all sides of the individual fight, nobody heard her coming. “Let him go!”
Korred gestured with his hand and the Queen screamed in agony. He lifted his fist into the sky and the Queen rose from the ground. Then the evil mage dropped his hand and she slammed hard into the ground, another shriek reaching Rachel’s ears.
Rachel watched in horror as Korred then turned his attention to Khove. He closed his
hands into a fist and Khove bellowed in pain. Rachel screamed in impotent fury. She was too far. The distance was too great. Korred would see her coming and Khove would die before she could tell him what he meant to her.
That was unacceptable.
Dropping the pistols into the snow, she pulled the assault rifle from her back and rammed home her spare magazine, trying to stop her arms from shaking. It was time for Rachel to make a decision. She was too far away to stop Korred by normal means.
Khove roared again in pain, and Rachel cringed at the agony the man she cared for was in. There was a way to stop it. She could put an end to it. If any of the nearby shifters tried what she was about to do, Korred would see it coming. But Rachel was far enough away, and at an angle, that she could do it.
She could make the shot.
Bringing the rifle up to her shoulder, she leaned down the stock, closing one eye. It was either Khove, or Korred. This wasn’t cold-blooded murder. It was saving her partner.
Rachel breathed in, and out, steadying herself.
Inhale.
Exhale.
The crosshairs landed on Korred, and she suppressed a shudder at the maniacal gleam in his eyes. There was no time to spare, but if she rushed it, then she would miss her opportunity.
Both Khove and the Queen screamed in pain as Korred toyed with them, the evil mage content in his belief that he’d won.
Inhale.
Exhale.
There it was. The shot. It would be the first time she’d ever taken a life. Her job was about saving them. About protecting people, not killing them.
And by doing this, I’ll save two lives worth saving.
Rachel stroked the trigger.
***
Dropping the rifle, she charged forward.
All around her, shifters did the same, swarming over the remaining Fae, even as many of them simply fell over or collapsed into piles of purple dust.
Rachel didn’t care, nor did she notice. Her eyes were fixed on one person, and one person only. Sliding to a halt over his prone form, she fell to her knees at Khove’s side, cradling his head in her lap.
“Khove!” she shouted. “Khove, you idiot. You wake up this second or I swear to God that I will follow you into the afterlife and torment you for eternity. I did not fight my way across this battlefield for you to die, dammit. Now wake up!”
The huge shifter groaned and then stirred. “I’m not sleeping,” he muttered. “I’m just resting with my eyes closed.”
Rachel sob-laughed. “You’re okay.”
“I think. Hurt. But okay. Queen…” He stiffened and tried to rise, but she put a hand on his chest and forced him back down.
“Easy,” she said. “Easy. Kaelyn is fine. Rough shape, like you, but she’s awake and talking to Knox, if I remember him correctly.”
Khove sighed in relief and sagged back down. “What are you doing out here?” he asked. “What happened?”
She smiled and kissed his forehead. “Someone tried to take my man from me. I had to come show them how bad of an idea that was.”
Khove started smiling. “Badass.”
Rachel nodded. “Don’t you forget it. I’ll do the same thing to you if you don’t behave.”
Khove’s eye’s went wide, then closed again as she leaned down to kiss him.
Only then did she weep for everyone who hadn’t made it, the stress finally too much.
41
“You should be in bed back in the infirmary,” she growled as Khove limped toward the shower, his body covered in bruises. “Your leg is barely healed enough to walk on, even for you.”
“I need to be clean,” he muttered. “Not dirty.”
Rachel started to protest, but Khove turned to look over his shoulders, his eyes flat and dull. “Many of my friends are dead. There are others hurt far worse than I am. I will not waste the nurse’s time staying back in medical.”
“Okay,” she said quietly, pulling off her shirt.
“What are you doing?”
Rachel snorted. So typical. “I’m going to wash you,” she informed him, undoing her pants while she followed him into the shower. “You have one arm in a sling, and the other has three fingers barely healing. Not to mention cracked ribs, a leg that you can barely put weight on. Shall I go on? If you can’t handle your mate helping to clean you, then you can take it up with her other side.”
Khove blinked. “No, I think I’m good.”
She grinned savagely. “Smart answer. Now move it, mister.”
Helping him into the shower, she turned on the water, trying not to grimace as the water turned an ugly reddish color. Most of the purple liquid the faeries used as blood had dried and caked off, but enough of Khove’s own blood remained, and it, along with dirt and grime now sluiced off into a disgusting pool that was slowly swept down the drain.
“You don’t have to do this,” Khove said as she lathered up a loofah and slowly began to rub it across his shoulders.
“I’m aware of that. I’m choosing to do it, because I want to, Khove. Because I care for you.”
He stiffened, and she poked him gently in a place free from bruising. “Relax. That’s an order.”
“Sorry,” he said, the words muffled by the shower. “I guess I’m just not quite used to someone caring this much for me.”
She smiled unseen behind his back. “That’s your own fault, for being such a good person that it comes easily to me.”
“You have my apologies for that. I’ll turn into the asshole you expected,” he chuckled.
Rachel leaned in close, resting her head very gently on one shoulder. “You had better not. I like you just the way you are, and I would very much like to keep it that way.”
He turned to face her, and she once again winced at the damage Korred had wrought on her mate’s body. Bruises and swelling covered much of him. It had been a close call. If she’d not taken the shot, or if Rachel had hesitated much longer, the wicked spell that he’d been caught in would have squeezed the life from him.
“What?” Khove asked.
“Just your injuries,” she said, spreading her fingers wide on his chest, the lightest of touches. “It hurts me to see you this way.”
“I’ll heal,” Khove said. “A couple of days and I’ll be good as new. No babying me, I promise.”
She nodded, reaching down for his free hand, the one not in a sling, and bringing it up, forcing him to rest it against the back of her head.
“I wish I could have you promise me you’ll never put yourself in danger like that again, but that’s never going to happen, is it?”
Shaking his head, Khove stroked the nape of her neck with two fingers. “No, it won’t. My job is to protect my Queen. Ideally, it won’t put us in such danger, but such is the nature of life among shifters, my darling Rachel. Sometimes, it cannot be avoided.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I just don’t like it.”
Khove clutched her tight. “Do you think I like knowing that you put yourself in danger every day?” he countered.
Rachel frowned into his chest. That particular train of thought hadn’t occurred to her.
“I guess,” she said, admitting the truth of it. “But you had better come back to me, or I will cross over and find you.”
“Duly noted. Consider the same threat applied to you.”
Giggling, she kissed his chest tenderly and resumed washing. “I wouldn’t dream of it otherwise.”
Khove fell silent, letting her scrub him down as hard as she dared.
“Why did you come looking for me on the battlefield?”
The sudden question caught her by surprise while she was crouched down washing his legs, being extra careful with the recently broken one.
“Umm,” was all she could muster, standing up to let him turn and rinse the suds away while she organized her thoughts.
“Just um?” he asked, completing his circle.
Closing her eyes, she recalled the urgent need that had driven her fro
m the safety of the garage out into the hell-ravaged battle zone. It had spurred her onward as Fae closed in on all sides. It had allowed her to make a decision that would otherwise have left her wracked in grief. So why was she having such a hard time saying it?
“Rach?”
She wiped water from her eyes and stepped back. “Why do you think?” she said, abandoning any attempt at sappiness. It simply wasn’t her style. “I love you, you big dope. Completely, utterly, and honestly, totally unbelievably. I’ve known you a week, and yet I couldn’t imagine my life without you in it. For the rest of it. How is that possible?”
Khove stood stock still, not responding until she was finished. “I love you too.”
Blinking, she couldn’t help but smile. “I give you a paragraph, and I get a sentence?” she teased.
The big man leaned in and kissed her. “Give me a few days and I’ll give you a ring.”
Rachel gasped, first in surprise at not only his words, but the gravity and understanding with which he spoke them. Then a moment later while kissing, she let out a smaller, less surprised gasp when she felt something stir between them.
“You’re hurt, mister. Can you spare the blood flow?” she asked, looking down, bottom lip curling between her teeth.
“Come here and I’ll show you,” Khove growled.
42
“Well, partner, I think you did it,” he said as they entered the sallyport at the station.
Rachel shook her head. “You mean we did it.”
Khove shrugged. “Close enough.”
“No,” she said fiercely. “No, it’s not. We did this, Khove. Together, you and I, we’re a team. Partners.”
“What kind of dysfunctional relationship is this?”
Khove turned and pushed his hand through the metal grate and snatched up the person in the back seat by the collar. “Did you have something to say?” he asked happily, withdrawing his hand until the prisoner’s face was smushed against the grate.
“No. No! I’m sorry.”
Khove casually tossed him back against the seat.
“Not again,” she moaned, looking at the hole in the grate. “That’s the second time this month. The Sheriff is not going to be impressed, Khove. You’ve got to stop doing that.”
