Road Warriors (Motorcycle Club Romance Collection) (Bad Boy Collections Book 4)

by Faye, Amy

  The knife went through the chicken's gut easily, as well. She kept it sharp as a razor. First because it made the whole process easier, and second because if it were any challenge she wouldn't be able to bring herself to do it.

  The guts spilled out, and she could hear voices crying out their displeasure, far below. She was floating, now, miles above. This was why she was here, but it was never something that she was good at. That was why divination required all of her attention. She was so much better at the herbs and poultices than this.

  There was blood all over the ground. A symbol, or just a reality of what she had done? No. It was a sign, she decided. There had been a good chance she missed all the major arteries, leading to a slow bleed. This was more than that. The Old Gods communicated how they would.

  She took another deep breath of fumes as the first screams started to rise outside. It broke her concentration, but she had always known that they were going to be here within the hour. It had been a mad flight just to make it into town undetected.

  She tried to imagine that the blood only represented the villagers outside, but Deirdre had a sick feeling that there would be much more than just that.

  She looked at the pile of guts and tried to read them. Watched her body lean over them for a better look, but her mind already had the best angle. It was too interpretative for her, too difficult to say what was real and what was not. She went by feeling. Her teacher had granted she was right more than she was not.

  A powerful man, she saw. Five men in total. Another, weak. A third, seeking approval. Fourth, a madman. And a… priest? The word didn't seem to fit, but it was close. She would know them, she would be involved in this. She looked at a loop that seemed to circle back on itself. What on earth could it mean? She felt nothing from it. As if it weren't there, or as if it didn't matter, and yet so prominent…

  She shook her head and reached aside to grab the bundle of herbs, planning to wave it beneath her nose. She needed to see clearer. This had been about trying to find a way to stop them, to staunch the blood. It was never that simple.

  She took a deep breath of the powerful herbs and tried to clear her thoughts. A sound brought her attention away.

  The weak man. She noticed, as her eyes darted to the door. There was so much blood, but none on him. Was that the answer…?

  The door, thick and oaken, split with a crack. The noise went through the whole room, sending a shiver down Deirdre's spine. What was waiting for her? What was going to happen when she found out?

  When he stepped through, Deirdre was surprised. In the haze of the herb-induced trance, she felt as if she had expected him. As if she'd known from the beginning that he would come here, and he would find her. What had been the purpose of all the secrecy?

  She could see her body fall back to the ground, then watched herself surge back forward as the trance faded and her consciousness merged back with her body.

  "Don't hurt them!" She had the knife in her hand, but she realized as she moved that it would have been pointless to try. A long shaft stuck through his side, The sharp half of a spear all the way through his body. What she would do with her pig-sticker that some poor man hadn't already tried to do before her?

  What could she do in the face of someone so powerful? She shuddered with the realization that there wasn't a whole lot. She was very much at his mercy.

  The look on his face wasn't the one she had expected. She expected cruelty or love of slaughter, but she found neither as she looked at him. Nor, she thought, did she see any signs of anger, nor fear, nor pain. He looked relieved. When his hand grabbed her around her arm, she tried to fight for a moment.

  He didn't stop to wait for her, just threw her across his shoulders like she'd been waiting for him to do it. The sharpened spike that stuck through him sat dangerously near her head as she dangled.

  From over the Viking's shoulder she saw a man coming, someone she had seen once. She never knew his name, and as he started to shout "put her down," she wanted to thank him. And she wanted to tell him not to bother. The big man who carried her turned, and when he turned back away a moment later there was a dead man in the mud.

  Gunnar didn't love seeing the boy die. But he couldn't afford to stop now. It was too important that he have this woman. He had felt it, that there would be the woman who would save him in the raid today. He wondered every time, if he would find her this time. But as if he were possessed by the spirits of battle he had seemed to know just where to go to find his prize.

  There was no time now to let a boy who had only just gotten his first taste of battle take what was his. Gunnar's sword called out, but it was not the time yet. There was more to be done. Eirik called out as he saw the man, and saw the woman over his shoulder.

  "Ho," Gunnar called back. "Where are the others?"

  "They've each gone their own way," he confessed. "I think that Ulf and Leif have a bet going to see who can find more valuables. I think they'll find that they have a great deal of disagreement about what is valuable, and I think you should make sure that they don't cause too much trouble with it."

  "That's good advice," Gunnar agreed. "Will you not go to glory, as well?"

  "No," he answered. "It's not time yet. This wet… Odin weeps. No, I'll not go into battle until it's time."

  Even still, Eirik turned the haft of his ax in his hand, as if the weapon itched for battle. There would be time for that, Gunnar agreed. Time later, once he had secured the small woman who could wield magics. He could see it when he looked at her, something unusual in her face. There were children in the room he'd found her in, and women as well, packed in like they'd bought a boat too small.

  He felt a tugging doubt that the building would escape unscathed. English boys, no doubt they would come after the party if they could, but it would be years before that happened. Gunnar and his men would have moved on by then. Back to Denmark.

  "Eirik," Gunnar asked distractedly as the pair of them stalked through now-empty streets, the smoke of burning buildings filling the air. "What say the Gods on the killing of children?"

  Eirik was a thin man, with long limbs, but he was every bit as fierce as any of them. Gunnar did not watch him as he turned, instead shifting the girl to his other shoulder to balance the burden. But the fire in his face was one that he recognized as soon as he had seen it.

  "They bear no love for it—and for that matter, neither do I. Do you know of children here?"

  He didn't like the fact that he had to nod his head. Yes, he did. Better that their parents had shouted at them to run and hide in the hills. It made the whole thing more palatable when he only had to face men with blades in their hands.

  Even still, it would have been worse to lie. Eirik wasted no time. "Where are they? Take me, now. We need to find them, and we need to ensure that nobody sullies himself there, is that understood?"

  "They were hidden away, but I found them. With this," he said, pointing with his eyes towards the woman in his arms, who still struggled fruitlessly. "While we walk—can you help me with this? It stings badly, and I'd have it gone."

  He turned, the point of the shaft stuck through him swinging through the air. "I don't know. Having it gone could bleed badly."

  "I'm sorry?"

  "I was saying," the tall, slender man said, a little louder, "that it would kill most men to have this through them, never mind to remove it."

  "I am not most men."

  "No, I suppose you are not, Gunnar. I suppose you are not."

  A woman ran past them, nearly falling when she saw the two men. Their weapons never rose, just watching her pass by. There would be time later, if the need arose.

  The largest building in the square was obvious before they were close, and it was more obvious still that Gunnar had been there. The door was covered in score-marks, a hole large enough to put the large man's shoulder through. And it hung loosely on the frame.

  The rain and muck made it nice to get inside, but both knew that their fight was not insi
de. They would have to go back out, once they were sure.

  A young man was there, one that Gunnar recognized but couldn't name. A last-minute addition to the party. He had put his sword back into its sheath, and the knife that each of them carried at his hip had come out. It took the both of them only a moment to realize what he intended to do with it.

  Gunnar rolled the girl off his shoulder, slowing her descent with his arm even as he pulled up his sword. Eirik was quicker, his ax already swirling.

  "Put that away, boy," he called out.

  He was still too young to know what he was doing in the raids, but he wasn't too young to kill. There was no glory to be had killing children.

  "They're all right here," he said. Gunnar noted the woman at his feet, no older than seventeen. He would have split the boy's head if not for the fact that Eirik's ax came down hard through his shoulder, splitting down straight through the boy's middle. He fell away, and Eirik put a foot on his body, pushing down to pull the ax free.

  Then he entered the hidden room, half of a door hanging loosely across the entrance. A vicious growl came out, like a bear's, and a moment later a dozen screaming children ran out as fast as their small legs would carry them. Gunnar chased after them.

  They were running as fast as their legs could carry them, but he could have caught them easily with his long, powerful strides. As they made the edge of the village, and towards the green hills, he slowed and stopped. He checked the edge of the houses to make sure that nobody would come after them. Then he turned back. He hoped she hadn't run. It would only make it worse.

  Two

  Deirdre was worried about what was going to happen next. She was surprised at the lanky man's calm demeanor after the man who grabbed her ran off. Who was he? Was he one of the men in her vision? Was he the weak one? She wondered. He had split the raider boy practically in half.

  It was only after a moment that she noticed Alice in a pile on the floor. She hadn't been in the room before. Deirdre had hoped that she would keep her distance. If she'd just stayed away—

  There's no reason to assume she would have been alright. Deirdre tried to to remind herself of that. The only person in the village who'd spent more than a moment talking to her lay dead on the floor in front of her.

  She'd seen the big man chasing the little ones out of the room, screaming like a madman. Practically frothing at the mouth, she thought. She could still hear the screams of battle, of fear. All the death around her. She shivered.

  The time seemed to pass strangely. When she wanted to think, it was going too quickly. Yet, now that she wanted nothing more than for it to be over, it seemed to last forever.

  When the raid was over, she at least had her own two feet on the ground, and had all her limbs. That was more than many could say. The dead littered the ground, and the few who had been spared were barely able to walk. She wasn't surprised to find that they had more captured when they walked her and the others back to a makeshift camp.

  The big men were perhaps thirty or forty, and they moved with the easy grace of men who knew how to use their bodies. The one who had been speared through walked in the front, not looking at her. She wondered if she could have run, but two men flanked the group of captured. They would have chased her down before she made the treeline.

  Deirdre let out a soft breath and waited. It was all she could do. Only, they didn't bring her to the post where the others were tied up. She came to it, saw them looping rope thongs around the pole and then tying up the rest, but she was taken past. She didn't fight.

  There was a larger tent, toward the outside of the camp. Strange. It seemed important, yet it wasn't near the center. When she went inside, part of the question was answered. Her hands, to her great surprise, were freed. She could already begin to guess where this was going.

  She'd dropped her knife in town, and now she wanted it more than anything. She wasn't about to let some Viking barbarian have his way with her. She'd kill him before she let that happen. She'd kill herself.

  There was a roll intended for a bed, and what might have passed for a table. She had to remind herself that they were carrying all of this, and that sometimes comfort would be sacrificed for portability, because the tent, though large, was practically empty.

  She heard the flap of the tent open, heard heavy footsteps coming up behind her. Deirdre tensed, ready to fight at any moment, but then he passed by her. The big man who had carried her out. Who had chased away the children. He was caked in blood, blood that she didn't want to think about.

  Had he caught them? He had a blade in a sheath that he laid against the wooden crate against the tent wall, leaned a wooden shield against the other side, and turned. She wanted to run, wanted to escape, but something rooted her to the spot.

  Every instinct in her body screamed out to fight that instinct, to run away. As he turned to face her, she finally found the strength to turn and start to run. With a long, loping step he caught her around the shoulder with one powerful arm, turned her round, and sent her tumbling to the bed.

  She didn't like the way that he looked at her. He wanted something from her, and she didn't have to wonder what it was. Men like that only wanted one thing from women like her, she knew. That was the way of the world. She wasn't going to let him have it.

  A knife handle stuck out of his heavy leather belt, tantalizing. He caught her looking. She reached up to take it, but he was faster. The big man put a knee on her chest and kept her pressed to the ground with all his weight. Still, she could reach it. He slapped her hand away, the weight on her chest taking her breath. With it, her fight.

  "Let me be!" She shouted the words, knowing that he spoke a strange language she didn't recognize. He shook his head.

  "I need you."

  "I'll kill you," she answered. She readied herself to grab at the knife again.

  "You can't," he said. She reached for the knife again, and again he slapped her hand away.

  Then, as if he were reconsidering, he pulled his weight back off of her. She gasped for breath. She definitely didn't like the way he looked at her. Then he pulled the knife free from its sheath. Deirdre felt strangely numb about it. What was the point of killing her now, if not before?

  No, he wasn't going to. As he flipped the knife around and handed it to her, she frowned. There was a plan at work, surely. He'd stop her somehow. He stood and reached down a hand to help her up off the ground. She took it, but instead of standing she used it to pull herself into a lunge forward, pulling him in towards her.

  When she stepped back, his knife was buried inches-deep in his stomach.

  And then he did something that surprised her. He laughed. She gripped the knife again, twisting the blade, and he groaned out in pain. The laughter continued. She pulled hard, trying to carve a large hole in him.

  He pushed her back off him, onto her back. The knife came free of his stomach easily, leaving a red mess on the white shirt he'd worn, beside the red bloody hole left by the spear that had gone through and through.

  She couldn't have missed his guts, unless it was some sort of trick. It was absolutely impossible, absolutely. He would be dead, whether it took a day or a week, it was as sure as anything. So why did she feel so sure that he hadn't been the least bit effected?

  The wound in his gut had bled badly—for a moment. Then, like most, it had closed up, and now, after a long day's march he wasn't sure that he felt it at all.

  If he twisted hard, he could feel some tightness, he thought. But it could have been his imagination. He imagined himself to feel pain from most of his wounds, but few of them even left a scar for more than a week or so.

  Gunnar sucked in a breath through his teeth, replaying the night before in his mind. What had he wanted when he had her taken to his tent?

  He'd wanted what he had always wanted. He wanted to have the damn 'blessing' lifted. He wanted to live like his brothers, to take scars, like a warrior.

  Yet, there had been a thousand other things in mind wh
en he'd seen her there. He'd wanted—Gods above, he'd wanted something very different from her expertise as a witching woman. The way that her dress, torn from the morning before, had let just enough of her spill out when she was pushed onto her back. He blinked the memory away.

  The primal feeling he'd gotten when he put his weight down on her, knowing that he could have taken whatever he wanted. The thought set him on edge. What he wanted had nothing to do with a woman's body. He was leader on this raid, and he wouldn't let anything distract him.

  That he would never join his brothers in Valhalla, that concerned him. Concerned him enough that he had to see it rectified before another failed expedition sent him home alone, carrying only the memories of his comrades.

  He refocused his sights on the horizon. There it was, another village. They were only a few miles out, now. Best to make camp here, where they wouldn't risk being seen. He stopped abruptly, letting the men behind him stop in their own time. Valdemar walked past, brushing shoulders with Gunnar.

  It was probably intended as a slight, he thought. But better to ignore it than to let him see any chink in the armor. Valdemar had always been a gifted fighter, that much was without a doubt.

  But he was too aggressive. He couldn't make the right decisions under pressure. He was clever enough, true, but he always raised the stakes too high. Gunnar smiled. He sounded as if he were describing himself. Dangerously similar. And if they were dangerously similar, Gunnar knew what would come next.

  Did he want to stop it?

  Gunnar let out a long breath. "We'll make camp here for the night. Get to making your tents, get a fire going."

  He looked back at the men, at the group of prisoners. He did a quick head count, saw that two had found their ways to freedom. No matter, so long as the witch was with them.

  In the distance, over the rolling hills he could still see a thick chimney of smoke from the town they'd left earlier that day. He smiled mirthlessly. The Gods would be pleased with them tonight, to be certain. It had been a narrow thing, with the boy acting as mad as he had. But between Eirik and him…