“Don’t forget, you’re the one who wanted this,” he said.
I sat on the other side of the couch. It was the only spot to sit. It wasn’t only excruciatingly uncomfortable, it was other things as well. It was making those other feelings burn up too. The ones I resented most. The weird stuff that made me want to crawl all over him and lick his skin and bite his lower lip.
Burn had known what was going to happen. He’d known it and wanted it. I was beginning to realize he was trying to make us get stuck together. Why? So Ryker could have all my magic, probably. I’d forgotten one of the most important things: Burn was Ryker’s crew, his family. His loyalty was to Ryker, and I’d been foolish to think that all motives didn’t somehow lead to Ryker’s benefit. If I lived through this, Ryker was no longer number one on my kill list. It was Burn. I was going to flay him alive, that sneaky bastard.
I dropped my head back on the couch, my skin feeling like it had a blowtorch aimed at every piece of me. Standing didn’t help; sitting didn’t help. Curling into a ball didn’t help. “Why is it this bad? Is this normal?”
He ran a hand over his head, looking like he was going to scalp himself. “No. This was why I didn’t want to do it.” His voice was clipped. The fact that he looked and sounded as miserable as I was made the situation a smidge more tolerable.
“Why is it so bad?” I pulled my legs up to my chest, dropping my head on my knees, trying to find a position that didn’t make it feel like my guts were being scrambled.
I glanced between us at the empty spot. If the magic was making us miserable right now, maybe all we had to do was make the magic happy?
“Have you ever heard the term Full Blood?” he asked.
“No. What is that?” I shifted, inching over toward him. Did I feel better? Maybe.
“That’s not really surprising. You lived in the Ruined City, which doesn’t have a reputation of educated people. Plus, it’s not a common term.”
I ignored the commentary on my previous neighbors and got to the only question I cared about. “What does it mean?”
“Wyrd Bloods are rare. Having very potent magic is even rarer. Then there’s Full Blood. It’s used to describe a Wyrd Blood who has so much magic that it’s nearly bursting from their veins. They’re Full-Blooded, or Full Blood. That’s why this is so bad. We’re both Full Blood.”
“Did you know I was Full Blood?”
“You never know for sure until something like this proves it, but I suspected.”
I tilted my legs in his direction, then shifted until I was halfway through the space in between us. The agony eased slightly more.
Is this what you want? If that’s it, you can have it, I silently said to the gods of magic. Gods that I’d refused to believe existed but was now talking to. Amazing what a little desperation could do for your faith.
Ryker bent forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “One thing is for sure: your magic does not like to be contained.”
“Tell me about it. I don’t know how you can reel yours in and shape it. Mine feels like a wild animal that doesn’t come on command. Occasionally it’ll happen to do what I want, but it’s more luck than anything else.” I inched over a little farther, finding every move made it a bit more bearable.
“How many have you killed?”
I shot him a look that was only a warmup for the words getting loaded and ready to fly. When he turned to look at me, I pulled them back. His expression was soft, his eyes not the usual cold burn. That was when I knew for certain it had happened to him. He was commiserating, not accusing.
I pulled a knee up to give me something to hug, only a few inches separating us at this point. “More than I’d like to remember. I didn’t realize what I was doing at first. Didn’t know it was me, that I was the reason they died. By the time I figured out that I needed to avoid others when I got that feeling, I had a trail of blood that felt a mile wide.”
He nodded. “You come to terms with it after a while.”
“No one told you either?” I asked, remembering his theory about Wyrd Blood being stronger when it didn’t show in a bloodline for a long time. Some reason, even with the stories I’d heard of the Cursed King, I’d imagined him always being in complete control of everything around him.
“It happened before my markings showed. I’d killed more than I could count before they did.”
I could hear a branch creak outside, it was so quiet. Another few very long seconds passed before I looked at him. His expression had chilled again, back to something I was much more familiar with and a lot less happy to see.
We’d gotten somewhere, to a different place than what we normally had for a moment, and now it was gone and all I wanted to do was chase after it, wrangle it to the ground and hold on.
There might’ve been some of that desperation leaking through into my next words, or I could’ve been using that as an excuse to tell him what I was about to say. Either way, it was coming out. I couldn’t seem to hold anything back at the moment. My magic, emotions, or words.
“Whenever anyone found out that I was caught by the slavers and heard I’d escaped, it always made them think I was so tough, especially because of how young I was. The less I wanted to talk about it, the more they built it up in their heads.
“In truth, my escape was a complete accident. There was a Wyrd Blood in the slaver crew. Everyone called him Ice because he could freeze anything he touched. His markings were on his hands, low-level stuff, and he couldn’t do much permanent damage.
“The main slave master told him to steer clear of me, but the guy never listened. Every night, he’d come by to visit.”
“You mean torment.”
My gaze jerked back to him. I guessed it had been pretty obvious. I gave a slight nod but that was all. Sharing didn’t mean every tiny detail had to be dragged out.
He leaned back, resting his arm along the back of the couch behind me. I didn’t complain.
“He’d been warned to stay away, so he started visiting after everyone went to sleep. The place they kept me, though, in order to get close, he had to unlock the door and come in. One night, he dropped dead. I didn’t think. I only reacted. I climbed over his body and ran.”
Ryker didn’t need to know the joy it brought me. There hadn’t been a hair of sadness when I saw Ice drop to the ground suddenly. I hadn’t called for help or done anything but watch him for a few seconds, smiling.
“I lucked out because the guards on duty that night had been drinking. I wasn’t some fearless kid. It was fear that made me run, fear of what would come next.”
Ryker wasn’t judging. He was listening. That was when I realized why I was really telling him everything. He never judged. He might criticize and tell me to do something better, but he wasn’t going to turn away from me. If I did something he didn’t like, he tried to bully me into being better, but there wasn’t a part of me that believed he’d ever walk away from me—at least until he got the stones.
When did I start caring if people left me? Had I always been like this? Had it happened after Fetch and Tiger left and then Sinsy’s death? Had it been losing Marra that had made me this pathetic creature?
Ryker shifted, and I realized his side was right against mine. This time, he’d closed the distance.
“I might know how to make this go quicker.” His voice was gravelly. Our eyes met, and I knew exactly what he was thinking.
I turned into him—the slightest move, but the loudest yes I could’ve yelled. That was all he needed.
He gripped my hips and swung me around, until I was facing him, straddling his lap.
I swallowed as I settled into him, our hips—and other parts—pressed firmly together. The oppressive heat pushing in seemed to relinquish its hold almost completely, shifting into a feeling I’d chase.
“Do you feel that?” he asked.
I nodded, pretty sure he was talking about the relief we were getting and not his swollen cock pressing against me.
“I
think we should try some more,” I said, wetting my lips because it was hot in our little bubble. I was doing this for us as a team, to accomplish our mission. That was it. It wasn’t because it felt good or I’d wondered about it for weeks.
His arm wrapped around my hips as the other looped up around my shoulder, pressing me into him as he ground against me.
If I pressed downward, it was only to help the cause. It wasn’t to increase the delicious feeling growing lower.
“It’s definitely working,” he said.
I arched into him, as he shifted his hips up. My head dropped back and his lips found my neck, lighting my skin on fire before trailing their way upward, tasting me as he trailed a path toward my ear.
Moans broke from my lips as I dug my hands into his hair, then his shoulders, gripping the fabric of his shirt.
He flipped us, and I found myself on my back, his upper body hovering over mine as his hips settled between my legs.
My legs were wrapped around his hips when the door swung open.
Burn turned around immediately. “Sorry! Didn’t see anything,” he yelled, walking out.
“Burn, it’s fine. Stop.” Ryker jerked up.
I pulled myself into the opposite corner of the couch. Ryker didn’t look as startled as I was, but then again, he’d had a lot of sexual encounters in his life. A spontaneous dry-humping session was probably nothing to him.
Ryker sat forward but didn’t stand right away. I did, and immediately realized the magical ward that had enclosed us was gone.
I walked forward, testing it, then looked back to Ryker. “It’s gone.”
Ryker finally stood and walked over to Burn, who had been hovering right inside the door, not saying anything.
“It broke the ward, but I can still feel her magic. Do you feel her?” Ryker asked him.
Burn looked my way, and I let my eyes skim his but had trouble keeping them there.
Burn walked in, getting closer, although he appeared to want to run back out. He looked around as if my magic were something you could see, before he said, “It feels better. She’s usually all over the place.”
I took a deep breath and realized he was right. I could feel my magic more condensed around me. I gave it a mental stretch and could feel it inflate and deflate around me, but it was calm somehow.
No one was speaking to me as I sorted out this new feeling, walking from place to place, as if that might change it. I took advantage of the moments to gather up all the other things I was feeling. What had just happened between me and Ryker? Had that all been for the cause? Had it been the magic goading us on or the drink that had set everything free?
It hadn’t felt like that, but he wasn’t exactly showing me any signs it meant more. Although Burn was standing here talking to him. What was he supposed to do?
“Is Sneak next door?” Ryker asked.
“Yeah, I’ll grab him,” Burn said, giving me an awkward wave as he walked out.
Ryker closed the door behind him. “You need to tell Knife you can’t merge magic with him. Don’t string him along and let him think you’re going to Dorley with him if Cacoy doesn’t work out.”
Ryker wanted me. Against my better judgment, I felt like I was floating. It didn’t matter that he’d turned me down before. It just wasn’t meant to happen then. We weren’t meant to have a one-night stand. We were meant for something longer and more lasting.
I nodded, crossed an arm over my chest, and put a fist over my mouth so I could hide the smile that wanted to creep up. Just because I felt goofy and lightheaded didn’t mean I was an idiot. We’d need to date for a while to see if we were really meant to be together.
Maybe we’d go find some more stones, have some adventures, and then he’d fall in love with me.
He turned, walking toward the door and opening it back up, as if he were wondering what was taking Sneak so long.
He was looking outside as he said, “It’s obvious we’re stuck with each other, so the sooner he knows, the better.”
And then gravity hit. My head cleared and my feet smashed back onto the ground. “Stuck?”
He shut the door again, as if he’d decided we were going to need a little more privacy. “You know this is going to happen. The magic is making it unavoidable. You’re a realist, Bugs. Surely you see that.”
“I see a lot of things, and we’re not stuck. I’m not stuck with anyone.” He wasn’t saying he loved me, or even liked me. He was saying he was “stuck,” like stuck in the mud, or stuck in between a rock and a hard place. There was nothing good about being stuck with somebody.
Damn, I was an idiot. That swig of stuff that unleashed my magic must’ve done some other crazy things to me, because thinking I wanted to be with this man was insanity. I didn’t need anyone anyway. I had Ruck: he was my crew, my family. Ryker could go to hell.
“If we merge magic, I won’t use yours unless you tell me it’s okay, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he said, staring at me as if I were a book in a foreign language.
“No, that’s not a concern, because we won’t be merging, even if Cacoy is a total bust.”
“What is wrong with you? Why are you acting so erratic?”
We were standing on opposite sides of the room, and it might as well be opposite sides of the world, when Sneak opened the door and walked in.
I didn’t say anything else as I walked out.
I walked away from Ryker’s cursing silently. That potion had done something crazy to me, or I never would’ve messed around with him. I should’ve sat there in pain. There was one thing I wasn’t ever going to be, and it was someone’s albatross.
I stopped and pounded on the door in front of me, belatedly thinking of the time. What if he was sleeping? I’d killed his man and now I was waking him up too?
Knife swung open the door, shirtless and, I had to admit, pretty damn sexy. None of that meant he wouldn’t kill me after he found out, but I wasn’t going to let Ryker tell him first. He’d really think I was his dead weight.
I launched into an apology before he could whip out the razors.
“Hey, I wanted to tell you what happened earlier today before—”
“I heard. We’re good.” He stepped back and waved a hand inside. “Want a glass of wine? I was just having one.”
That was it? Did nobody care that I’d killed another Wyrd Blood?
I’d done enough drinking for the day, but how did you turn someone down when they’d waved off an unintentional murder? There had to be some sort of obligation there.
“Sure.” I stepped inside. The place was comfortable enough, with a large bed and a couch and table set up in the corner, but probably not what he was used to. I’d seen his Dorley castle from afar. This was a mouse hole in comparison. I made my way to the couch, having no other place to go.
He was still standing right inside the door. He raised his finger as if to point at something but paused. “Your magic? It’s not…”
“Yeah, it’s fixed.” It was hard to believe myself, because all in all, I didn’t feel that much different.
“How did that happen so quickly?”
“I don’t know. Something clicked, I guess.” I was short, hoping he’d take the hint. The last thing I wanted to discuss was how that had gone down. “So you’re really not upset about the guy?” I asked, more prepared to talk about death than what had happened with Ryker.
He shut the door and walked to the couch. “I only brought him with me because I was hoping he’d like it and stay here. Seemed a good way to get rid of him.”
Thinking about some of the other people he’d brought with him, there were definitely similarities. How many people did he want to dump? I was going to have to talk to Ryker tomorrow, even if it killed me to do so. We weren’t getting stuck with all of Knife’s cast-offs.
Knife picked up the bottle from the table, topped off the half-empty glass, and handed it to me. “Sorry. I don’t have a spare. It’s pretty basic here.”
&nb
sp; I took a sip, and he took a swig from the bottle. We sat there for a few minutes in silence, which Knife seemed to be very comfortable with. He stared at me most of that time, while I tried to come up with small talk and wondered how long I had to sit and play civilized because I’d killed someone. Ryker never made me sit and act normal.
“You’re very attractive. Even if you didn’t have magic, I’d still be interested,” Knife said, still staring. He reached forward and started twirling a piece of my hair. Ryker would’ve grabbed a hank of it and pulled me to him.
“Thank you.” I needed to get control of this conversation before things went south. “So you and Ryker have been—friends for a long time?” Amazing what you could do when really pushed.
He smiled and laughed softly. “I guess you can call us that. I know, it’s curious. It’s a relationship born of convenience, but there’s been a certain bond that’s been built over the years. He doesn’t want what I have, and I don’t want what he has, or I haven’t in the past.” The look he shot me made it obvious what he was referring to. “It works. I wouldn’t trust him with my belongings, but I trust him with my life. We know we’re better off in an alliance.”
I took a small sip of wine, wondering how much longer I’d have to sit there. Was ten minutes enough when you killed someone, or was fifteen the minimum? I should’ve waited until tomorrow, when he was busy doing something. But no, I had to come now and get it over with. I took another sip of wine.
“Have you given any more thought to merging magic with me?”
“Yes, and I still can’t answer.” I put the glass down on the table, having had about enough of this shiny, pretty show. “Can we cut the bull for a second? Is this is about getting my magic, getting in my pants, or aggravating Ryker?”
Full Blood (Wyrd Blood Book 2) Page 16
