He didn’t have time for this.
After removing his suit coat, he wadded it into a ball. The expensive fabric served as protection as he vaulted one of the jagged half walls. Navigating one at a time, he hoisted himself up using the coat as padding for his hands. The ancient, crumbling rock was flaked and chipped like shale honed to razors.
He topped the last wall. A jerk behind his knees sent him sprawling onto the unforgiving ground. The Pet. She’d been pressed flat against the wall, waiting for him.
His head connected with a boulder the size of a large melon.
“Bathatéi,” he shouted, using the worst curse in the shared language of the Dragon Kings.
The descending sun stole his vision. He jerked his head to the side by instinct alone. Metal scraped against rock. Sparks shot against his cheek. Those sparks might not have been visible to the naked eye, but he absorbed their minute flashes of power. He snatched them out of the air and armored his skin with the living equivalent of an electrical fence.
The Pet landed another blow, in the form of brass knuckles against his breastbone. Thudding pain shot out from the center of his chest, while she screamed. Electricity arced from the knuckles to his chest and back again. She landed on her ass, her elfin features enraged. Telltale quivers made her muscles jump and twitch. But she didn’t give up. She landed two more hits, one against his temple, and as he rolled—again by instinct—one to the base of his spine.
Part of him conceded that the strike was perfect. Part of him was too enraged to care.
She landed atop his chest, squatting. Her boots were heavy. They fortified her slight weight. Beneath his dress shirt, Mal’s skin was stretched by the industrial treads of their soles.
The Pet grabbed a fistful of hair and yanked his head off the ground. “You’re bleeding.”
“That would be your fault.”
“The rock’s fault. I take credit for making you fall.” She shoved his head back down, then smeared her palm across his shirt. He caught the distinctly coppery smell of blood.
He was more surprised that her touch seemed designed to enflame and entice, as much as serve a practical purpose. Just how much had Dr. Aster, that psychotic fifty-something sadist, taught her in all means of combat?
Anger wasn’t a strong enough word for the flames gathering in his hands. His palms felt as if beetles and maggots wiggled across his skin. The only way to banish it was to let the electricity build and burn—then unleash it.
He whirled away. She didn’t lose her balance but had to jump to the side. She was petite and agile. The way she’d recovered from his initial blast was impressive. Both stood in loose fighting stances. Only now, she held a switchblade.
“You don’t experience pain,” he said, squaring off against her.
“I experience pain. You’d rather think that I don’t.”
He called on deep muscle memory to fight her hand-to-hand. Another concentrated, precise strike took time to build, but his was already prepped and ready to burst. He had always been more powerful than most of his clansmen—so quick to gather more and more energy into his personal arsenal. At that moment he could’ve blown up a mountain, but he didn’t want to lobotomize her. Martial training was the only alternative.
He swept his leg to try and catch behind her calves, but she jumped straight up, then landed with the ease of a cat. She twirled to one side and stabbed him twice in the shoulder. The sharp spike of her assault made him grunt. Her control of the blade was faster than he would’ve thought possible. Was she of Clan Garnis? So scattered as to be nicknamed the Lost, the Garnis possessed amazing senses and reflexes, but her features were more delicate than those hearty nomads.
He had yet to determine the Pet’s clan, or even her gift from the Dragon.
Still more mysteries he intended to solve.
Mal caught her trailing wrist. He yanked her against his body, spun, and used that momentum to slam her against one of the half walls. She caught her balance by gripping the razor-sharp shale. Her shriek was as wild as it was anguished. She dropped the switchblade. Mal tried to pin her, but the attempt wasn’t fast enough. When was the last time he’d used his body to fight? His muscles were unfamiliar weapons, but they were weapons he relished rediscovering.
She launched off the wall, which added power to her punch. Brass knuckles connected with his jaw.
He reeled. His lip was split. More sparks crackled where her metal met his skin. She squealed as the electricity spiked up her arm. They circled one another like two starving wolves whose only option was cannibalism.
“I’m walking away now,” she said simply.
“I can’t let you do that.”
“Then we keep fighting until one of us is a cripple. How long until you lose your temper and do too much damage? I’ll be useless to you.”
Mal breathed heavily through his nose. He would’ve rather dangled over a volcano than have his options so limited.
“Do you want to be caught?” he asked. “You could’ve bribed any bus driver and boat captain who helped you escape the mainland.”
“I have nothing to use as a bribe.”
“Women always do.”
Her eyes became slits, her expression murderous. “Not an option.”
“Why are you here?”
“I’m looking for something.”
“For what?”
“I don’t know.”
“Nothing good will come from testing me,” he said. “Because you’re right. I might lose my temper. I might destroy the only link I have to the Aster cartel and the answer to Dragon King conception. Not that it’ll matter to you by then.”
“A tempest in a suit. Does the Council know who sits at the head of their table?”
“No.” He stepped forward. “Do you think I need you in particular? You’re convenient. You’re valuable. Yet other Dragon Kings are connected with the cartels. I’ll find them, one by one, just like I found you, until I get the answers our people need.”
She tsked as if patronizing a child. “I’m sure altruism propels you.”
“What do you mean?”
Standing to her full height for the first time, which wasn’t very tall at all, she smirked. She packed so much disdain in the single lift of a midnight brow. “Our people? No. In your heart, Honorable Giva, you only want to win. At any price.”
CHAPTER
TWO
Now I’m done with you,” she said simply. “I have work to do.”
The Pet once again turned from the Giva, although she would’ve been amused at finding a way to push him to lose control. Amusement was out of the question—and in this case, deadly. Her head throbbed and her fingers burned, as if the brass knuckles were fused to her skin. His electrical strikes still snaked under her skin, and the adrenaline of their fight was wearing off. What remained was a numb lack of coordination following his lightning strike. Her limbs felt leaden, her stomach a rage of nausea and pain. But she had to continue.
Forget the Giva.
Cadmin needed her.
“Why are you here?” he asked again.
She wouldn’t have replied had his voice been wrathful, wheedling, or derisive. No, for the first time the Honorable Giva—such a cumbersome title to carry, like lead across one’s back—sounded curious.
“To find something.”
“Back to games?” He stood with the wide stance of a man used to commanding armies, not leading Council meetings. “You’re all half answers and deception, keeping secrets someone would have to beat out of you.”
“Someone?” She gestured to the empty vastness of that deserted plain. The labyrinth was its only feature. “Or you? Either stop me or help me.”
“Help you?”
His indignation was nearly comical. The Pet wasn’t used to smiling, but a fist made of fear in her chest loosened. Just a little. She wasn’t sure she wanted it to; she held on to her fear because it kept her safe. No one could hurt her if she assumed that everything could cause suff
ering.
“Yes,” she said, kicking aside a long, thin shaving of rock. “I’ll know it when I see it.”
She heard his strides over the rubble as if he were walking with his fancy dress shoes through the marble-tiled foyer of a magnificent palace, not the tumbledown remains of old ambitions. “Then how am I supposed to help you find it? Read your mind?”
“You’re not Indranan.”
Malnefoley grabbed her arm and spun her to a stop.
“More fighting?” she asked. “I’m game.”
“Look at me.”
Her head snapped up as if she wore a collar that had been jerked by a leash. She’d known that feeling for too many years, publicly paraded as Dr. Aster’s literal pet. She’d borne the humiliation by turning off a great many parts of her mind.
Only the children mattered.
And the riddle of the Chasm.
Although energy still pulsed from his skin like the hot waves of a mirage, he was merely frowning. Confused, maybe. Frustrated, definitely. But he was no longer angry. She was instantly on guard, waiting for the trick. There was always a trick.
“No more fighting.” He glanced down to where blood still seeped from the knife strikes she’d landed. “And I’d rather have you talking than drooling.”
“That pesky temper.”
“Shut up.”
“Touchy.”
He pursed his lips around what might have been another raging curse. “You argue like a child and reduce me to your level.”
“You behave like a bully and reduce me to yours.”
Both of his hands clamped her upper arms. “Explain yourself, you servile thing. Why did you escape, only to stand here where anyone could see? Where I could see?”
A thing.
She’d never been anything else. No wonder some youthful, desperate part of her had interpreted his manipulation as flattery.
But she was free now. She would find Cadmin. I knew your mother … I knew you …
“What gift do you believe I possess, Giva?”
His frown was back. The jewel-like richness of his eyes wasn’t a single shade but a thousand shades from aquamarine to midnight. His jaw was broad. The hollows beneath sharp cheekbones were like the plains that surrounded them—impressive and austere. Only where his mouth parted, with hardly more than a glimmer of white teeth showing between sensual lips, did he reveal any potential for softness. Yet those sensual lips spoke the words of the enemy.
“You’ve said you have the ability to see the future.” He smirked. “So have others.”
“You doubt it.”
“I do.” Despite the assurance of Mal’s declaration, she never flinched, never looked away. Her eyes were almost too large for her face, giving her a childlike impression of false youth. Brows that could only be described as dynamic were her most expressive features. Subtle movements from those elegant slashes of black revealed more than she probably would’ve liked. With her small mouth and a heart-shaped face that was widest across distinctive cheekbones, she looked nothing like any Dragon King he’d ever seen. “No clan boasts such power, not even those that focus on the mind rather than the body—the Indranan with their telepathy, or the Sath, who steal other Dragon Kings’ abilities.”
“I was a foundling. Occupy yourself here by pondering my unknown genealogy. I have work to do.”
“Something you saw about the future?” His words were drenched in snide disbelief.
“Yes.”
No one had ever believed her abilities except for the occasional Sath, who temporarily acquired her gift to see would-be, could-be moments. The woman known as Silence had been one such individual. That singular warrior had come away from their few brief encounters—down in the Asters’ Cages—with no doubts.
The Giva would need to be maneuvered differently. She didn’t want to fight him again, because losing was a definite possibility. He might not liquefy her brain, but he could take her back to Greece. She’d lose the chance to help Cadmin, however the Dragon intended. Needing time to recover more fully from his lightning strike, she worked to appeal to his ego and occupy his mind. He was brilliant; she knew that much. No one had ever disputed his intelligence, which made throwing around the insult “Usurper” all the more believable. Had he been a simpleton, he wouldn’t be accused of every plot devised in the last twenty years. Had he been any less arrogant, he wouldn’t have fought to keep his title.
“Imagine this,” she said. “An ancient endeavor, human or Dragon King, was built here. The sun is not blunted. Monsoon rains fall without impediment.” She nodded to the east. “The slope of the plain invites the wind to gather along that rise, then hurls it with more force. So why here? Why build something so complex where it was destined to be sanded away?”
“All old buildings crumble. Half walls and curious humans aren’t anything new.”
“We’re near no city. No village.”
For the first time since his antagonistic arrival, the Giva seemed to focus his thoughts on something other than melting or recapturing her. He cut an elegant figure at a distance, but he was imposing at such close range. She stood no taller than his collarbones. His pristine white dress shirt had been ripped open so that two buttons were missing. Blood stained the shirtsleeve covering the arm she’d stabbed. The fine cloth was dyeing crimson. He was dusty and sweaty, as she was. A powdered grit had settled into the fine lines at the corners of his eyes and on either side of his slender nose. No matter the grime, he maintained the air of an angel who wouldn’t deign to set foot on the ground. That would be too humble for a soul such as he.
She knew better. The Giva was the highest of their kind, but he was earthy and sordid as well. He didn’t get his hands dirty while standing on high. But Malnefoley of Tigony could bleed and sweat with everyone else.
Now his mind was at work. While the Giva scanned the plain and seemed to process her questions, her observations, the Pet stared at the notch at the base of his throat where tan skin pulsed with life. His veins told tales of exertion and adrenaline levels as elevated as hers. A rivulet of sweat trickled down the side of his Adam’s apple and settled in that notch, leaving a damp streak in its path. She wanted another to appear so she could watch its progress.
Enticing. That was the word. He was enticing.
“It was a prison.”
The Pet nodded. “Good. The Minotaur. That sort.”
“Minotaur? The Minotaur?”
“What other?”
“You’re talking about a half-bull man who ate the human flesh of prisoners cast into his labyrinth.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know why I wasted so much time wondering if you have useful information about the cartels or the doctor’s experiments.” He straightened his cuffs and stared down at her. That shifting blue gaze must’ve intimidated hundreds, maybe thousands of people since he was chosen as Giva. The Pet only returned his stare, waiting for him to make his point, waiting for another chance to watch the trickles of sweat on his neck. “I might as well be talking to a chimpanzee who’s spent the last few years being used for drug-test protocols.”
“Am I a chimpanzee?”
He blinked and jerked his chin minutely to the side, as if he were the one waiting for a trick or a trap. “No.”
“Then you only speak in insulting metaphor. I speak about the old ways.”
He gave in to what must’ve been a painful injury by squeezing his hand over the meat of his shoulder where she’d stabbed deep. It would take at least a day before it healed. “The old ways? By telling tales about the Minotaur?”
“All the myths are true.”
“You’re joking.”
“You’ll know when I joke.”
“How so?”
“I’ll be as surprised as you.” She sidestepped him and found her switchblade among the rocks. The steel was streaked with blood. She returned to the Giva. “Hold out your arm.”
“You are mad.”
“Hold out your arm.�
�
“What do you promise in return?”
The Pet looked down at his patent leather shoes, which must’ve been shiny when he’d arrived in Crete. Now they were as chalk-dusted as the rest of him. He had caught his slacks on the rocks. The fabric was ripped along his thigh. Was he bleeding there, too? She didn’t care about the injuries. He would heal. Quickly. But if they were together when night fell, the blood could attract whatever predators hunted these plains.
In return …
A promise in return …
“I’ll tell you about Cadmin. Why I’m here.”
“Will you apologize for stabbing me?”
“Only if you apologize for striking me with lightning.”
Malnefoley twisted his lips, appearing rueful. “No.”
Apparently an apology was more difficult than extending his arm toward a woman holding a knife, which he did with guarded strength. He was revealing more and more about himself—those things she doubted few ever examined too closely. The Pet looked at the expanse of white that hugged his strong forearms. A scant brush of blond hair edged out from his cuff and topped the back of his hand, which was curled into a fist crackling with electricity. He was ready to strike.
She lay the blade flat across his arm. He didn’t flinch.
With two swift strokes, she left streaks of brick red on the shirtsleeve. “All clean,” she said, pocketing her switchblade.
She most certainly had his attention, which was more alluring than she was ready to admit. His expression was pure confusion. But she knew that with this man, confusion could quickly whirl into devastating anger. She saw it when she closed her eyes and caught glimpses of their shared future—the sensual future she’d seen since first meeting him amid the remnants of the Asters’ ruined Canadian laboratory. She wanted to find that razor’s edge and dance along it, daring him, daring herself.
Hunted Warrior Page 2
