Hunted Warrior

by Lindsey Piper

  The Tigony had bested rival Dragon Kings by coming into a position of dynastic power when Pythagoras decoded the universe based on mathematics, when Gutenberg invented the printing press, when Fleming discovered penicillin. They had a reputation for preferring talk to action, which was ironic considering the bellicose nature of the Greco-Roman traditions: the velvet fist.

  But they were just as wrong about the visage of the Great Dragon as every other clan.

  What was once will happen again.

  Her eyes grew heavy. She hadn’t been so close to a man since her imprisonment with Dr. Aster. This was so different as to be one of those distant stars.

  “They wanted you dead.” She inhaled deeply. The blood he’d shed was the most prominent odor, but she would’ve needed to be born without a nose to miss his underlying masculine scent. Malnefoley. He wasn’t clean and coated in fragrance—Dr. Aster’s preference. No, this was the life-affirming musk of a man who had fought and conquered, the hallmark of warriors from the beginning of time. “Unfortunately, you killed them.”

  “Sorry.” She could hear his smile—cruel and funny at the same time. The funny was new.

  “But not all was lost. The head of the biggest man gave me a clue.”

  “The head? I thought you were performing funeral rites.”

  “I was searching what was left in their synapses. All I saw was the great dome atop the cathedral in Florence.”

  “Italy?”

  “Don’t be dense,” she said. “That’s not why you get to wear the fancy robes. Yes, Italy.

  “It matches what I’ve seen before, a man beneath the dome of the Florence Cathedral. I didn’t know it was you when I first glimpsed that image. That Pendray made it clear. Now I think the bow is there, and possibly more people associated with the plot against you.” She inhaled and let the air out slowly. “That’s how I see it.”

  “And that makes perfect sense to you.” His mocking tone irritated her, as if she were a cat with its fur being petted backward.

  “Yes. So you have two choices. Take me back to Greece, where I’m useless and you’ll learn nothing about another assassination attempt until they come for you, or travel with me to Florence and find answers.”

  “What about variables?”

  “They’ve narrowed. But I don’t want to miss another surprise attack.”

  “Being wrong again frustrates the hell out of you, doesn’t it?” The note of sympathy in his voice was new. From the Giva, she didn’t know how to interpret it.

  “Being wrong makes for a poor soothsayer.”

  “Another joke?”

  “I’m trying.”

  “Why?

  Avyi hesitated. “Because you like them.”

  In the darkness, Malnefoley closed his hand over hers and gave it a squeeze. Maybe it was the struggle of the day and the weight of her responsibilities, but tears pricked behind her eyes. She hadn’t been touched with such kind regard in … No, her memory wasn’t that good. She couldn’t remember a time. Their kiss had been combustion. This was comfort.

  She accepted his strange attempt at comfort with a twitch of her fingers around his. It was lovely. But the last thing she needed was the impulse to please another man and seek his approval. Cadmin needed her, wherever she was and whatever she would do. That was what had pulled the woman named the Pet to Crete, digging among rocks and shale to find a quiver of arrows. Her mission remained clear, no matter that she was inexorably linked to the Honorable Giva who held her hand.

  CHAPTER

  FIVE

  Mal awakened with a headache, a feeling of suffocation, and the Pet—no, Avyi—curled away from him. She was practically fetal, in a tight ball. She defended herself even in sleep.

  He blinked against the rays of eastern sun beginning to creep over his face, Helios making his arc across the sky.

  The old myths were called myths for a reason. Dragon damn, Mal had to believe in coincidences. Otherwise the last twenty-four hours would mean something greater than merely finding Avyi, finding those arrows, and finding his shoulder nearly hacked off.

  They could’ve journeyed beyond the rock outcrop shielded by scrubby juniper bushes, but it had seemed like a welcoming inn. Avyi hadn’t consulted him; she had simply made a pronouncement. He couldn’t remember a time when decisions weren’t made without contentious arguments where he eventually put his foot down, like a parent settling a score between squabbling children.

  Avyi was definitely no child. She had such a strong mind of her own that he could barely reconcile her with the subservient Pet of the Asters’ infamy. He’d only seen her once before the liberation that had freed his cousin and other Aster warriors from the Cages—and patients from the labs. The Pet had been dressed in skintight black latex, collared with leather and spikes, and led around by Aster by the will of his voice alone. Sometimes she’d squatted by the man’s feet, holding his thigh, looking out from behind well-tailored slacks with those unreadable eyes, as if hiding … as if waiting …

  Avyi, by contrast, was so changed as to be an entirely different woman.

  Now, his body was tense. His mouth was parched. He tried to shift without waking her. A lance of fire shot from his shoulder to his forearm and back up again. But the effect was not so crippling as it had been. The Dragon’s brilliant gift of quick physical recovery from injury was much appreciated. He could feel his left extremities, the subtle warmth of the sunrise, and how the rocks jabbed into his back in several places. He hadn’t cared the night before, when the pain had burned to a crescendo.

  As he sat up, dizziness smoked the vision at the corners of his eyes, replacing bright sun and bleached plains with a cloying gray mist.

  After he took a deep drink of the water from Avyi’s hidden supplies, he stilled and looked at the sun. He was unwilling but unable to deny that he was wavering. In no way did he believe her predictions, but there was a certain logic to being unpredictable. For the moment, at least, he had no doubt that she would stay with him willingly. If going to Florence turned out to be a wild-goose chase, he could always take her back to the Tigony stronghold.

  And then there was his intention to pick up where their kiss left off. She excited him as few women ever had, which meant desire propelled his decision as strongly as any twist of logic. It wasn’t responsible, and it wasn’t something he needed to do, but he was actively pursuing a woman for the sole purpose of seeking pleasure.

  He itched where she had used her belt to secure the makeshift bandages. The blood had dried. He was in desperate need of a bath—and a shirt. The sunshine on his chest and stomach made him potently aware of his bare vulnerability … and his awareness of Avyi lying so close. What would she do if he touched her? Jump out of her skin?

  He wondered if there would ever come a time when she didn’t flinch from touches she didn’t initiate. Maybe she was too damaged for that to ever come to pass.

  He reached up to peel back the maddening bandages but found his hands stilled in mid-motion.

  “No.”

  She had turned and sat up without his notice. Was she made of smoke? Of liquid? No sound and no form. Except he’d felt her slight weight across his stomach when she’d straddled him. Her fingers had guided his into place. Her forehead had pressed against his, grounding him when pain and, yes, panic had threatened to warp his mastery over his gift. She’d helped him maintain control when that was something he took pride in keeping very much within his own grasp. He didn’t know if he should be thankful for her assistance, or resentful that he’d needed it at all.

  Both.

  He remembered all of that like he remembered the rebellious tumble of her hair and her challenging defiance and the kiss that had changed the entire timbre of their time together. She spoke to him without words on such a deep, primal level.

  “Not yet,” she said. The pressure of her hand against his, where he held the belt buckle, brooked no argument. He frowned. She needed to use more force this time. The long, slender mus
cles of her forearms strained to keep him from his task. “I’ll check, but we’ll need to replace the same bandage and find new ones if the bleeding starts again.”

  “Out of bandages?” He eyed her with a mix of surprise and amusement. “I already sacrificed my shirt. Turnabout’s fair play.”

  “I’m not stripping,” she said bluntly.

  “You had no problem stripping me.”

  “Next time, if you’d rather bleed like a butchered animal, I’ll refrain from touching your precious clothing.”

  “So you foresee a next time?” Mal tried, but he couldn’t help but smile. She was probably going to hit him—and part of him relished the chance to tussle with this frustrating woman. That didn’t matter. He simply could not believe her talk about futures and prophecies.

  “If you mock me again, I’ll inflict the wound myself.”

  “I have a Dragon-forged sword.”

  She shook her head. “Don’t make empty threats, Giva. It’s unbefitting. You can’t kill me and you know it. In fact, you’re so curious, against your will, even, that you didn’t bring reinforcements. You probably don’t have any in waiting. Are you so arrogant, or are you so determined to find me compelling?”

  “I only want what you know, including what you knew about those Pendray assassins.”

  “Which could be discussed right here, right now.” She crossed her arms over breasts outlined by her thin, dusty purple shirt. One sleeve was torn off. One forefinger with a ragged nail tapped her annoyance. She was beginning to lose some of her icy, unreadable quality. “There’s no need to take me back to some Tigony prison.”

  “It wasn’t a prison.”

  “So I was free to go whenever I wanted?”

  Mal grimaced in silent reply.

  She leaned near, almost nose to nose, which meant she was once again closer to him than people ever dared. The title he wore was as much armor and barbed defenses as it was an honor.

  He looked right down that filmy purple top and raised an eyebrow. “The last time you wanted to argue, you were straddling me. Let’s pick up from there.”

  “Do you hear me, Giva? I need you because time is weaving us together. I won’t bother telling you any more than that, because you won’t listen. You know I’ve suffered worse than you could ever inflict. You won’t get answers that way. As for your stronghold, I was free to go whenever I wanted. I proved that. The same held true with Aster. I am no one’s prisoner and no one’s pet.”

  Slowly, drawn to her softness, drawn to her, he lifted his good arm and brushed his thumb across a streak of chalky mica on her cheek. “That’s right,” he whispered. “You’re Avyi.”

  She pulled back as if his touch were a brand rather than skin on skin. Within seconds, she had pushed away from him, shouldered the quiver and her pack of supplies, and stood facing the east. “It’s a long walk to the village. We’re vulnerable out in the open.”

  “That’s the plan, foreseer of great and terrible things?”

  She scowled. “You tell me, Giva. Do you remember the choices?”

  “Florence … or dragging your skinny ass back to Greece.”

  For a moment, she appeared genuinely confused. “My … ?”

  “Your skinny ass and your crazy hair and your unnerving cat’s eyes. All of you. Back to Greece.”

  “We’ve already taken that option off the table.”

  He liked seeing her so ruffled. “Have we?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know, the Aegean is beautiful this time of year.”

  “I remember thinking the same thing as I left it.”

  “You are my responsibility, whether you’re a threat or an asset. That,” he said, nodding to the quiver, “was a coincidence or a trick.”

  “You saw me find the arrows.”

  “I didn’t see when you might have planted them.”

  She muttered something under her breath in a language he didn’t understand. Garnis? If that was even her clan. All he had were stories. Why would she suddenly tell the truth, when months of captivity had yielded nothing?

  “And predicting the future based on a dead man’s final, what, thoughts? I can’t believe that either. For all I know …” His skin, baking under the rising sun as they began walking, suddenly went cold. Grabbing her entire delicate jaw in one palm, he forced her to look at him. She didn’t meet his eyes. “For all I know, you knew about those Pendray.”

  “I saved your life.”

  “I have you and three dead Pendray. That’s where this begins and ends.”

  She swept a boot heel behind his left knee and yanked, catching just the right spot. Mal sprawled onto the ground. He grabbed her around the waist and pulled her down with him. The quiver slipped from its place at her back.

  He rolled. He was on top of her. They both stilled.

  Mal’s shoulder hurt, but he wasn’t blind or dead or an idiot. He was stretched atop a confounding woman who looked up at him with eyes that were so perfectly gold and green, so wide, so chillingly distant. He got the impression that he could’ve taken her apart, limb by limb, and the same distance would’ve remained in her eyes.

  Only a moment ago, she’d been teasing him. That was gone. Unfortunately, so was what should’ve been gratitude for what she had done to heal him. She could’ve left, letting him bleed, taking the quiver and sword without a backward glance. He should’ve been grateful, but more disturbingly, he wanted that brief moment when she’d opened up enough to try making a joke or two. He got the impression that was a rare effort.

  With his elbow bracketing her face, he stared into those mesmerizing eyes. “You are a fraud. You come from some family of frauds.”

  She struggled and cursed, fighting until a sharp blow to his temple made him grunt.

  “You’re not getting away that easily,” he growled.

  “I only struck your temple. I could use my knuckles against your shoulder.” She sneered. “That would take the fight out of you Dragon-damned quick.”

  “And you accused me of making threats I can’t go through with.” She didn’t retaliate. She simply licked her lower lip. Mal couldn’t have looked away had his life depended on it. Instead, he decided on a different tactic—one that needed to happen if he were to retain his sanity. “Kiss me, Avyi.”

  Mal ignored the lingering pain in his shoulder in order to grasp both of her hands. He pinned them above her head and took the kiss he wanted. It was heated and heady once again, but with a different flavor. They were celebrating; they were at war. She was driving him mad with frustration and indecision that felt like weakness. He wouldn’t stand for it.

  Avyi growled and fought his hold, but she didn’t squirm away from his questing mouth. He needed her taste. With lips and tongue, he forced his way in. But that was all he needed to force. She met his tongue with every heavy pulse of blood in his veins as their duel was dictated by body and breath. Somewhere in the haze of that passion, Mal felt her hands relax. He dared release her. She gratified him by wrapping slender, deceptively strong arms around his neck, pulling him closer.

  He was taken by surprise at how swiftly he was hard and aching. In less than a day, this maddening woman had proven that he could be stripped of the fundamentals of his character. He was a man who held on to control. Now his control was slipping. He thrust his hips, rocking their bodies together on the rough ground. They were even rougher. Take and take, with so little give.

  He molded his palm over her breast. Such softness to be found there. Such temptation.

  Avyi twisted at the waist and slipped from beneath him. He had been looking down at her pale, elfin face. Now he was staring at pearl-white shale. His hands were empty. His lips were slack, then tightened with anger.

  “You don’t touch me,” she said bluntly, edging away from him. “You don’t.”

  He stood to his full height, propelled by his flush of enraged frustration. “Then what the Dragon damn was that?”

  “A mistake. I’ve made many since meetin
g you.”

  Without wasted motion, she hefted the Dragon-forged sword and held it in what looked to be a practiced two-handed grip. She turned her back. On him. The Honorable Giva. He had nearly given up trying to remember a time when anyone had treated him with such disregard. Nearly.

  He ducked under her weak side—the left, where her elbow wasn’t raised to the same ready angle. Two seconds and two swift moves later, he held the sword. They were face to face, body to body, breathing hard. He loomed a full head taller. He would only have to tip his chin toward his chest in order to kiss her crown. He realized that her view was very different. She would be staring at the hollow between his collarbones. She could lean forward a few scant inches and kiss his bare skin.

  He tipped her chin up to meet his gaze. His eyes were filled with challenge.

  “Have you made your choice, Giva?”

  Hefting the sword, stifling every emotion but self-preservation—in all forms—he was the one to turn his back. “We should move.”

  *

  The sudden coldness of the Giva’s mood was no surprise to Avyi. How often had her wishes been met with disdain, anger, or even cruelty? Coldness was practically a relief, for its change of pace. She couldn’t explain why she had acted as she had, either in kissing him or in ending the kiss. Too much. That’s all she knew. Too much. Now he was walking, but his posture and expression were as hard as marble.

  So often, she had been offered trust, friendship, or affection, only to have them jerked away for reasons beyond her comprehension. She was idiot enough to keep trying. Like a woman encased in ice, knowing the thaw would bring the paralyzing sting of pins and needles under her skin, she stepped without fail toward a source of potential warmth. Only, that warmth was always fire. Burning. Forcing her to shy away again.

  While Malnefoley had slept, she’d resisted the impulse to curl up against his body rather than away from it. He was tempting. How much nicer would it have been to spend the night wrapped in his sure embrace than held by the chilly earth? How much more dangerous?