by K. F. Breene
He smiled so big it took up his whole face. His dimples were deeper than she had ever seen them. Too bad she was about to bloody that handsome face.
“I have a good block,” he said, pacing across the clearing like a jungle cat.
“I have a great attack.”
“Well, then…”
“Tobias, does that change the odds?” Shanti called.
“Yes, s’am. You are the underdog right now, but using the ol’ noggin will definitely change things.”
“Did you bet for me or against?”
“I appreciate you saving my life ‘n all, but he’s bigger, stronger, and faster. I’m against. Although, now I’m not sure. Even match with the noggin, maybe.”
“Noggin is head, then?” Shanti asked a still smiling Cayan.
He nodded and feinted at her. She didn’t bother to react. Instead, she opened and released her power, flexed, spread it out, then condensed it down. She took hold of his mind and found his block.
“Ready, then?” she asked.
He must have known what she found because he smiled bigger. “I’ve learned a thing or two.”
“I don’t care, I’m getting bored. Let’s do this.”
She barely had time to react, he came at her so fast. Giant spans of arms and legs speeding toward her body with incredible strength behind them. She didn’t want to take a solid hit from him and she couldn’t block without risking damage. For him it meant deflecting and returning the attack when he compensated.
His arm arched toward her face. She stepped into him instead of ducking away, caught his thick arm with her raised elbow to stop it and then hammered her fists into the valleys of his muscle. His breath went out in a whoosh but he was moving again, grabbing for her body to fling her over his shoulder in a throw. She swiveled and kicked up, connecting with the side of his face. He took the blow and turned, leg out, sweeping her leg out from under her. She turned it into a roll, dodged a kick, and came up on the other side of him.
That was when he started the mental warfare. He advanced on her, a solid Push from his mind jarring her bones and sparking her power. Power turned to heat within her body. She almost stopped where she was, but if she did she would have been flat on her back from his fist in the next second. Instead, she backed up and half ran to the edge of the clearing, her back to Tobias.
“Running away?” Cayan asked with hungry eyes. Power made his irises glow. The answering power within her nearly roared in response.
“Are you sure you want to play with this much power?” she asked, trying to hide her shaky voice. “Can you control it?”
“Can you?”
“Yes?”
He laughed. “Bring it on little girl. I’m not afraid of you.”
“Yeah, but I am a little afraid of me,” she muttered, gingerly walking back toward him.
She faced him like she would’ve faced any of her opponents so long ago when she was on the sparring pad. She took in a deep breath and drew in her power, wearing it about her person like a cloak. His eyes glowed in response, feeling it calling him, reaching out to her in return. She wanted to join it and play. It felt exciting. Invigorating. Extremely dangerous. Just like him.
“You better have your shield on as tight as you can make it, or else this might hurt a little.” She grinned wickedly.
She attacked, her power unleashing like a splinter, hurled into the center of his forehead as she advanced with hands moving constantly. Kick, punch, wipe away his answering punch, poke to the neck, elbow to the face, then back out, rolling under a kick and turning back with a slap of power. He couldn’t keep up physically, not with her mental bombardment. He was taking punch after kick, staggering, grunting, and straightening for more.
She couldn’t get through his muscle, couldn’t do any real damage. He was fast enough to move that little bit to where she was less effective and block her mental prowess. After about ten minutes he stopped with a hand up. She backed off.
He was breathing heavy and his eyes were contemplative. “You win round one.”
“That’s it?” she asked, working her shoulder. “We can use weapons if you want. No more mental stuff.”
“No, I’m not done. I need to regroup. You’ve done this before. I haven’t.”
“You’re bigger and stronger. Tobias says that gives you an edge.”
“Tobias doesn’t know how lethal a woman’s mind can be when she’s pissed off.”
“Yes I do,” Tobias called from amid the crowd. “But Captain, you are now the underdog. You aren’t making us men folk look all that great right now.”
Cayan nodded. “Again.”
Shanti went at him again, whirling, attacking his mind and body. When she got within his reach she bombarded him with punches, hitting the same places as before, trying to work the bruises through the layers of muscle. As she worked, evading his grabs and answering attacks, a feeling started working up from her inner thighs. It wasn’t unpleasant—in fact…it was only pleasant.
Finishing her punches and ducking out, it felt like a giant, wet, slightly coarse tongue licked between her legs. When it got to the top of her slit it went in lazy circles, and tingles spiraled up her body. Shanti froze, unable to tear her mind away from the sensation. An instant later she was airborne, landing ten feet away flat on her back. Where she stayed for a second, shivering.
“Remind me to apologize to Sanders. Then say you’re welcome,” she said to the air. Cayan started laughing.
“What happened?” Tobias called out.
“The Captain seems to know his way around the female anatomy, and is coloring outside the lines,” Shanti explained, getting up slowly.
“I win round two,” Cayan said with a delighted smile.
“You were paying attention that day…” Shanti said, circling him.
“Not really. But I’m a man. I have an active imagination. It seems visualization is the key.”
“Atta boy, Captain. Way to pull ahead by thinking with your dick,” Tobias called, taking another bet.
“Language,” Cayan said firmly.
“Sorry, sir.”
“Way to give her a taste of her own medicine!” Sanders yelled from off field somewhere.
Shanti continued to circle, a firm hand on his mind. She kneaded his head, pushing at his block, poking it, trying to move it to the side, feathering it. Then, with one swift spike of power, she struck at it, focusing all on one tiny point as she moved in, hands and feet moving. The power speared him, his shield unable to handle such a concentrated attack as her kick landed on his solar plexus.
He wasn’t used to two tiers of fighting, not yet, so he wasn’t organized enough to choose which to block. He took the hit in both places, staggering back, bent, unable to counter. Shanti merely watched, not pursuing, as he dropped down to one knee.
“Ouch,” he said, running a hand over his head.
She reached out immediately, brushing away the hurt with a soft caress, lessoning the residual pain. He looked up with that blue gaze and lingered in her eyes. In her mind.
“Want to just stick to physical sparring for a while?” she asked by way of apology.
“Can you hit harder than that? Can you make it more potent?”
“Yes.”
“Do it.”
“No.”
He climbed to his feet. “I want to see it happen. I want to know what it feels like.”
“I know you can hit really hard. I don’t ask you to prove it.”
“That’s because you already know how to hit.”
Shanti put her fists on her hips. “You know how to do what I just did; all you have to do is apply more power. And then it hurts more.”
“An ape knows that much.” It sounded like Sanders.
Cayan ignored him. “Show me.”
“No.”
“Would it kill me?”
She stared at him. He stared back. The field was dead quiet. “If you were unprepared, like you just were, and didn’t fight back,
then yes, it would kill you.”
“And the lady just took the lead,” Tobias muttered off to the side.
Cayan let a hard breath tumble out of his mouth. “Then, for now, let’s just spar. I will need to practice before you do any real harm.”
“So the girl wins mentally, but we still have the physical battle. At your leisure, my lord,” Tobias mediated.
Cayan was no longer in a laughing mood. She’d shaken him. He had just learned how ill trained he really was. The next time he showed up to spar, she had a feeling she would be back-pedaling before she could fight him off.
The purely physical sparring lasted for the next hour. They were well matched, but Tobias had been right; Cayan was bigger and stronger, although not faster. At least not enough for it to count. His reach was what killed her. She had to duck in and out of his long arms, and a few times she got tangled inside. On those instances he grabbed her, gave whatever part of her body he had hold of a quick, though playful fondle, always laughing, then threw her across the field.
The first time it happened, the guys watching had sucked in a breath. Cayan had given her butt a hard pinch and a sound slap. They didn’t realize the extent of what she had done to him and to Sanders—she knew that she had started it, and also deserved it. Still, a swift though light kick to his balls had been justified. The guys had sucked in another breath at that one.
The last time, when Shanti was starting to get tired and sloppy, she had tripped over Cayan’s big boot and went head first into his chest. Before she could get her hands in gear to punch him in the gut, he had her face tilted and found her lips with his own. Startled, she froze, suffering his tongue to drift along her bottom lip, tasting her, daring her to open her mouth and taste him in return. Instead, she punched him in the balls as hard as she could, sending him back down to one knee.
In the quiet that followed he had smiled hugely and announced that it had been worth it. All the men cheered. Then all the men felt what it was like to have their brains lightly squeezed. It cut short the celebration, but not Cayan’s triumphant smile.
To Cayan, women were a game, and while it was funny, and to some extent also fun, she wasn’t in the mood to play for long. Not when he had denied her Jerrol. It was all a one-sided joke, in which he was in control, and she did not plan to forget it.
At the end Tobias ruled that the Captain had won the sparring and everyone collected their winnings. It was the first time Shanti had gotten nods and pats on the back. She was still the scary foreign woman, but she was less mysterious. Not that it really mattered to her, but she’d play along if it helped them sleep at night.
“Can I speak with you?” Cayan asked when the groups of men broke up.
She shrugged, finding a fire at the edge of the group and sitting down. The guy who had been there, a squeaky-voiced kid who was good with a bow and had just made it past Cadet, made himself scarce in a hurry.
“I know you have mostly healed,” Cayan started, sitting next to her. “I know that you don’t plan to come back with us. But I wondered…can you forestall your trip until after winter?”
She shook her head while he continued. “Winter gets very cold here. It has been known to snow. You don’t have provisions for that. You are newly healed after the last injury, and you were just newly healed before that. Another couple months won’t matter—no one can travel far in the winter. We are not in danger until then. In that time, you can represent your people as we draw others to our side.”
“I am in danger all the time, Cayan. I am forever in danger. If one of your people was to sell me out, or someone caught wind of me, the Graygual would not wait until the snows melt. They would come immediately to claim me.”
“But now my people know your value. And they know that I am like you. They cannot sell you out without also exploiting me.”
“Your army might adhere to that, but your citizens will not. They won’t understand me, or your Gift.”
“A couple months. The word cannot get out before then. We don’t trade in the winter, no one visits—it is like the world halts for the cold. In that time you can train me. You can work with your Honor Guard and the other young members of the army. You would have a home, a warm place to celebrate your holidays, a time to rest and rejuvenate.”
“You wish me to stay for you, then, is that it? To train you and your army? For your benefit?”
Cayan hesitated, his gaze boring into hers. “Yes. For me. For my benefit and your own.”
“What makes you different from the Being Supreme?” Shanti asked quietly.
Cayan’s blank mask melted in anger. “For one, my goal is not to rape and breed you. And two, I have wanted you within my walls from the beginning. My reasons constantly change, I will grant you that, but they have always been in your best interest.”
Shanti shook her head. “I’m not in the game of trusting strangers, Cayan, especially not those who are interested in their own gain. I need to continue on my way. We need to part.”
“But what of my Gift? Our mating Gifts?”
“I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers.”
“You don’t have any answers.”
“Fine, I don’t have any answers. It doesn’t change my duty.”
“I had planned to go with you,” Cayan said so quietly she almost didn’t hear him. “I wanted a couple months to prime Sterling and Daniels to handle the city while we were gone. I wanted to use the winter to get my allies lined up. Then I planned to go with you. I think we need to stick together, or else why are there two of us? Why did my mother’s long lineage of daughters suddenly end in a son?”
“Fate again, is it? Fate doesn’t exist, Cayan. I do not play the dutiful soldier well. If I had any family left alive to swear to that fact, they would tell you many a story. I travel best alone. It was how it was meant to be. I can reconnect with you if I can make it back.”
“That’s the point everyone understands but you, Shanti. You won’t make it back. Half of you wants to die in the next few months. More than half, now, I think. I think you’re eager for it. You can’t handle the burden anymore. What else is it but Fate? You, near death, were saved by the city that held the one person with your mating Gift. That’s more than coincidence. When you were ready to die, why did you suddenly find someone who wanted to help? Who wanted to keep you alive. Who watches over you, religiously, because you seem to look for battles that will end badly, or use you until you won’t get back up. Tell me that.”
“Unlucky, maybe. You don’t need me, Cayan. Actually, it sounds like you’d find much more peace without me. As you did before me. You can learn your Gift now that you understand the nature of it. You have what you need.”
“No, I don’t.” Eyes on fire, he grabbed her, capturing her face in his hands. He kissed her hard, his lips glued to hers, his mouth opening and willing her to do the same.
She resisted, pushing at him slightly, not understanding why her body was tingling, why his hands and mouth seared her face, why the smell and feel of spices overwhelmed her until she was leaning in helplessly, rubbing her hands up his chest and twining them around his neck. Or why she finally opened her mouth to his probing tongue.
He filled it in a rush, tilting his head for more contact, stroking her tongue with his, licking her lips and backing off to nibble. When he lifted his head, his eyes were smoldering, soft but aflame, his eyes glowing slightly, his mind wrapped within hers.
He was bloody attractive. All the girls thought so. He got whatever and whomever he wanted, even within his modest society. She was alone, and lonely, and grieving. He knew she needed intimacy—it was why she wanted Jerrol—and knew that capturing a girl’s heart was a way to override her logic. If he got her to believe in his love, she would fall in line. He was a master and she was a sucker.
She closed her mind and pushed. His eyes went wide before his face dropped into a scowl. “You keep running.”
“That is my duty. But let me guess; now you are going to t
hrow in something about how Romie would disapprove of me leaving like this. Or how I couldn’t be the woman he fell in love with, what with my lack of foresight. Or how my parents would be ashamed of me. Or how my grandfather would be disappointed. Or how Rohnan, my Chance, saved the cause, and now I am just waiting for it to finally kill me and succumb to failure? You tried lust, and now you will try guilt, right? If so, don’t bother.”
He shook his head. “I was going to say you are as afraid of succeeding as you are of loving, whether it be family, friends, or anything else. And then I was going to wish you goodnight. You have noticed, I’m sure, that you have no guards. I have left you to the edges of the encampment to give you space. You could have left at any time. Still can. I do not hold you here under lock and key, nor was I doing it in the city after you proved I could trust you. I urge you to think on what I have said. I know you were trained to be a leader, and those that relied on you trusted you a great deal. Since I know something of leadership, I can say that the woman in front of me is not thinking with her experience, but instead, with her fear.”
With that, Master All-Knowing got up and walked toward the center of the encampment, leaving Shanti to feel hollow and alone. Leaving to her to think on her options. To mull over what he had said. It would be really irritating if he was right.
Chapter 50
Marc was in a panic. She was gone. She wasn’t there anywhere. He had searched every tent, every shrub, accounted for every man…she was gone. She had left in the night sometime when everyone was sleeping. Leilius might have a lot of talent for sneaking around unnoticed, but she had trained him. If she had wanted to get out soundless, undetected, she would have had no problem.
Without thinking, half in disbelief, he sprinted up to the Captain. “She’s gone! Sir, she’s gone. She left us. Sir.”
The Captain looked at him out of the corner of his eye. “I know, Cadet. She left last night. We leave for home today. Without her. She made her decision and we will respect it.”
“But sir—“
Sanders walked up briskly, his body looking like it ached, but the man ignoring it. “I just overheard. Should I go after her?”
