Dragon's Ground (The Desert Cursed Series Book 2)

by Shannon Mayer

  Animals hated them.

  I frowned, wondering why I hadn’t thought of that before.

  “I think there is something ahead.” Lila was above me, using her height advantage to get a lay of the land. “Maybe your eyes are better than mine, though. I could be seeing things.”

  I nodded and tied Batman’s reins to my saddle before I took my feet out of the stirrups. The cold had seeped into my bones and made me stiff, like a two-hundred-year-old woman, and I grimaced while I worked to get the blood flowing again. With a groan, I pushed my feet up onto the saddle, then carefully stood, balancing on Balder’s back.

  That bit of extra height made the difference. Ahead of us on the flat plain, I could see a small group of figures moving about. Maybe three miles away. I dropped to the saddle and turned the horses north.

  “We need to keep a low profile until tonight,” I said. “There’s no way we can go in the light of day to check on him.”

  “They’ll move today, and if they go, we’ll never be able to keep up,” Lila said.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. Jinn like the heat and the sun. They’re probably hunkering down against the weather,” I said. Though I was not altogether sure, it seemed a high probability.

  I swallowed hard because a sudden swell of nausea flowed up and through me. Jinn. . . I did not want them knowing I was alive, or that any of my pride had survived. We’d lasted this long because they hadn’t known. I frowned. Then again, Maks had said he’d been sent to kill Steve and Bryce. Someone had to have blabbed about where we were.

  I sighed. Another mystery for another day. “There’s a stand of boulders over there. We’ll duck behind them for the day.” Because while Jinn could be lazy, they were not stupid.

  They’d notice us if we just stood there out in the open of the plain watching them.

  We hurried to get to the boulders, which also stood out in the middle of the plain in a circle, but they were more cover than we had on our own. I should have thought about just what they were, and why they were there, but I didn’t. I only thought about getting out of sight of the Jinn.

  The horses picked up a quick trot, and though Batman stared back toward Maks and the Jinn encampment, he kept up with only a slight limp. I’d have to look at his legs and feet and see what ailed him. I hoped it would only be fatigue.

  “We’ll get you back to him, one way or another,” I said as we rounded the first tall standing stone. I stared up at the gigantic black boulder, the grooves drawn into it anything but natural.

  “Lila,” I said. “This might have been a bad idea.”

  “Why?” She was just ahead of me, her wings cutting through the air.

  “These are standing stones.” I expected her to understand, to get exactly what I was saying. Standing stones were known to appear on this side of the wall and they were usually connected to a supernatural of great power.

  As in the Emperor himself.

  But they had not been seen in my lifetime, though my father had taught me about them.

  I swallowed hard, halted the horses and asked them to back up. Lila swept out from between the stones and the sense of foreboding that crawled over my skin eased off.

  “The Emperor is. . . he must be waking.” I breathed the words and a low rumble of thunder seemed to laugh at me and my fear.

  Lila squeaked and shot to my shoulder, burying herself inside my cloak. “Sweet goddess, we were right in there. Why didn’t he steal our lives?”

  Apparently, she had heard the legends and rumors too. The stones were a place of sacrifice for the Emperor’s acolytes. They’d used the stones to hand over the lives of their enemies. At least, that was how the story went.

  I turned the horses so we rode around the outside edge of the stones until we were behind them. They still blocked us from the Jinn’s sight, but they would give us no shelter from the cutting rain. Which was fine. We’d all survived worse.

  To be fair, though, that was probably one of the most horrendous days of my life in terms of sheer discomfort and length of each minute. The rain slashed through every layer I had. I might as well have been naked. There were moments I considered shifting and standing under Balder as Lila was so smartly doing, but I needed to hold myself ready for a shift later.

  The hours passed slowly, and the horses huddled together, but even they didn’t get too close to the black standing stones behind us. I kept turning around to make sure they were still there. Or more accurately that they hadn’t drawn any closer. There were stories about the stones appearing, but like with dragons healing those in need, I’d thought they were just stories with no basis.

  “Lila,” I needed to break the silence, “you know about the stones?”

  “You mean how the emperor uses them to gain his strength back so he can rule us all again?”

  I nodded. “Something like that.”

  “You mean like how they suck the life and soul right out of you?”

  “That too.” I breathed the words and peered down at Lila who was peering up at me from under Balder’s belly.

  “What are you thinking?” She flicked her wings several times, flinging water droplets every which way.

  “That the stones are waiting for something powerful to come along, and neither you nor I are that.” I smiled, though I knew there was a sour twist to it. “Score one for the weaklings.”

  Lila laughed, but there was a bitterness to it that I did not miss. “Yeah, score one for us.”

  After that, we fell into silence again for hours more, and finally the sun began to drop. I slid from Balder’s saddle and ground tied him. “I’m going to shift, Lila. Can you climb high enough that they won’t notice you, but you can still see in the dark what is going on below?”

  She bobbed her head. “Yes, I think so. What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to see if Maks needs rescuing,” I said. “If he does, I’ll do what I can. If he doesn’t, then we book it out of here as fast as we can.”

  She gave a single flick of her tail and shot into the sky, startling the horses after so many hours of inactivity. For just a moment, I wished I was with Marcel and Kiara in that mud hut with the roaring fire. But then, I’d be back with Marcel and Kiara and the mud hut, and have no way of slipping away from them.

  I sighed and let my body slide from two feet to four, barely blinking, and it was done. Faster and faster, I was getting better at the shift after so many years of ignoring that side of me. I should have been using the gifts I had instead of ignoring them all these years. I startled, my tail twitching. That was the first time I’d ever considered the shifting ability I did have to be a gift.

  I jogged around the standing stones, giving them a wide berth. Just in case the Emperor changed his mind and decided any power was worth a grab.

  A shudder slid through me.

  The sun was ahead of me and I watched as it dipped below the horizon; the clouds blocking the light worked in our favor. And miracle of miracles, the rain eased off to a light mist that was damn near heavenly after the pounding rain we’d sat through for the day. But it could mean that the Jinn might be ready to leave.

  I ran toward where I’d last seen the encampment. When I was a mile away, I heard them, their voices carrying across the flat ground.

  The laughter, the raucous talk, the clink of plates and such. I slowed, dropping my body so I was less noticeable. The whoosh of leathery wings high above me made my ears twitch. Lila had my back, there was that, and it gave me a boost of courage.

  Still, if I’d been in my human form, I’d have been sweating. As it was, my tongue hung out and I couldn’t help myself. I was panting like crazy as the fear cut through me. Jinn were not to be trifled with, they were not to be engaged, they were to be feared.

  They killed lions, cutting them down with no thought.

  A hundred feet away, I crouched beside a series of crappy little scrub brushes. The darkness was my friend, especially with my black fur. Even if the Jinn were looking my way, they wo
uld not see me.

  I crept forward, flat on my belly now, my eyes narrowed so their gleam didn’t catch in the firelight. The camp was not new by the looks of the shit everywhere. I mean that in a most literal sense. There was horse shit everywhere.

  It looked like the Jinn had set up camp before the rain had come and just hunkered down. I swiveled my ears toward them. Their conversation froze me.

  “How much longer, Orlow?”

  “Tomorrow, we move tomorrow. We’ll see if we can pick up one of the lion shifters Maks told us about. Didn’t he say there was a female?”

  Laughter followed, and my blood seemed to freeze. Maks had given us up after all. I turned to leave, and actually took a few steps before their words stopped me.

  “Not much of him left. Why don’t we just kill him? Tell Marsum that he fought us too hard and we had to. Bastard did put up a good fight, and we have the scars to prove it.”

  If I thought my blood had run cold before, the ice now in my veins made the previous chill feel like a blisteringly hot summer’s day. I made myself creep closer again, my eyes searching the ground around the camp. Lila had said Maks was pinned to the ground, face in the mud.

  But there was no movement, not even the exhalation of breath that should have given a body away. I tipped my head sideways to give my nose better access to the scents. The Jinn came through loud and clear, the smell of desert and death. A faint whiff of a man I knew, of the smell of someone I cared for, was there too.

  Barely.

  Maks was on the far side, of course. I worked my way slowly around the camp, moving only when I thought the Jinn were preoccupied with each other. Their conversation flowed over me as they discussed killing Maks.

  “He was never really one of us, so what loss is it?”

  “Marsum wants to make an example of him. Show what happens to traitors. Besides, he’ll power the Emperor.”

  “Hmm. Marsum will be pissed if we don’t come back with a lion too. The female, the one that’s pregnant. We need her. That will soften the blow of losing Maks. A two for one deal.” Laughter followed that last bit.

  Oh, fuck, they were talking about Kiara now. Gods and goddess of the desert, none of this was going to help me get to my brother any sooner. How the hell did they even know about her though?

  Bryce would understand why I had to go back for Kiara first before going to him. Protect the children first, and Kiara carried the first child in twenty years.

  The strongest lions of the Bright Pride stood between danger and the member that could not protect themselves. That was our creed, our family, and I would not fail it.

  So I thought.

  I got all the way around the camp and the Jinn had settled in to play cards of some sort, betting on them and throwing things into the fire as they lost. I split my attention between them and the man who was on his belly at my feet. He had his face turned to the side, but even so, the mud had climbed over everything but one nostril. The air fluttered in and out slowly against the mud as if he were peacefully sleeping.

  Or out cold.

  I could smell the blood on him, the injuries that weren’t healing.

  I wanted to rip his bonds from him but knew our survival depended on doing this right, and that meant doing it quietly with all the stealth I had. I slowed my breathing and went to his left wrist. I cut through the rope tying him down with my claws, the strength in them buoyed by my weapons. I quickly went to his other wrist and legs. One eye on the Jinn, one eye on what I was doing.

  Maks didn’t move an inch. I needed him to shift into his caracal form so we could run, so we could get away. I nudged his head with my nose.

  A burble of air bubbled out of the mud and his face sunk under the thick sticky mass. I grabbed his hair with my mouth and yanked his head up. It was then I realized he was bound by the neck too.

  You’re lucky I don’t hate you, toad, I thought as I stuck my face under the mud, my mouth searching for the rope that held him down.

  The mud was foul, tasting like horse piss and vomit making me gag, but I worked my way through it until I found the rope on his neck. A single bite and I was through it.

  But none of that mattered as a hand settled onto the scruff of my neck and yanked me upward.

  I was spun around to face the one thing I feared above all others.

  A Jinn.

  He held me tightly by the scruff of my neck, immobilizing me. I stared at him and a hiss slid out of me. He frowned. “What the fuck is this, a cat?”

  I hissed again because I realized he didn’t know me. He didn’t know what I was, and that was about the only thing that was saving my furry ass. I stopped myself from shifting and just twisted around, hissing and spitting as any normal, ordinary run-of-the-mill house cat would.

  Goddess save me. I was in deep shit.

  “Put it down, Bart,” one of the others said. “They are all hair, not worth eating at all, and that one is fucking scrawny. Couldn’t be more than five pounds!”

  The Jinn threw me down and I scrambled backward, out of the firelight while my heart pounded out of control. Part of me said I should have fought, should have tried to kill him while I was so close, but the truth of it was, I wasn’t strong enough. I couldn’t have killed him. Jinn made the Ice Witch’s pets look like stuffed animals.

  I scuttled to the edges of the flickering firelight but. . . Maks was still face down in the mud. Fuuuuuk. I let out a tiny snarl of frustration that made the Jinn laugh, but then they all turned their backs on me.

  I scooted forward the second time and grabbed at Maks’s hair with my teeth, yanking his head up.

  He wasn’t breathing.

  There was no more choice, I had to shift. I didn’t let myself think about it, but instead let the shift take me. I lay on my belly, breathing hard as I grabbed Maks by the shoulders and yanked him partway out of the mud.

  I didn’t look at him but kept my eyes on the Jinn. They were totally ignoring this side of the camp. I pulled Maks a little farther, the wet ground making little sound under his sliding body.

  When we were ten feet away, I twisted around, flipped him onto his back and turned his head sideways, sliding my fingers into his mouth and clearing it of mud. I tried not to think about anything but getting him breathing.

  I put my mouth to his and blew into him. Filling his chest with my air. I paused and listened to his heart.

  Nothing. Again, I pushed air into him, again I listened. I used my elbow and drove it once into his chest, then breathed into his mouth again. Not exactly what I’d call expert CPR, but it was the best I could do. If he didn’t start breathing soon, I would have to leave him here.

  Panic like I’d never known caught hold of me with that thought. Of Maks dying.

  Breathe, damn you, breathe! Inside my head I screamed at him, demanded that he take a breath. I chose not to notice how wet my face was. It had to be raining again.

  I put my ear to his chest just as he took a slow, labored breath. I spun around so my face was by his and my body in line with his so I could watch the camp.

  “Do not move,” I whispered as quietly as I could into his ear. “Breathe, catch your wind. Then we shift and run.”

  I had my cheek pressed to his, and he lifted a hand to touch my face but said nothing. His breathing came stronger with each lift of his chest. At least he was going to bounce back fast.

  That was the only good thing about him being a Jinn: they healed like a speed demon.

  The seconds ticked by as I lay on my belly in the mud with Maks with his hand on my face and my cheek pressed to his. A weird sense of calm flowed over my body and through my limbs.

  This was what he did to me. Good or bad, my heart had decided that Maks was good for me. Fucking traitorous chest drum.

  The calm fled as the Jinn began to move around, restless. As if they knew something was up but couldn’t quite pin it down. They didn’t look toward where Maks had been pinned. Likely they wouldn’t have cared if he’d died in the mu
d right there.

  How the fuck was I getting us out of this mess? Maks’s hand pressed a little harder, then slid through my hair, trailing a tingle of energy everywhere he touched until he left off and reached for the flail’s handle.

  I put my hand over his, stopping him. That was not a good idea. If he started a fight we couldn’t win, we’d both die. I couldn’t fight one Jinn, never mind four, even with Maks at my side. They were not gorcs, and I knew my limits.

  Apparently Maks did not know his.

  I leaned closer to see those blue eyes of his were open and snapping with an anger I’d never seen in him. Rage was a good, dangerous look on him that sent my blood pounding into overdrive.

  Don’t judge me. I have a thing for men who can take charge, and Maks was that with a soft heart that gave me the best of both worlds.

  But did I trust him enough to take the flail? The weapon was beyond destructive, and though he’d used it once before, something in me told me not to let him take it. I pushed his hand away and the anger etched deeper onto his face.

  So be it. He could be angry with me all he wanted, but we needed to get out of here as fast as we could. I shifted into my cat form, which did two things. It hid me from the Jinn, and it hid the flail from Maks.

  He rolled to his belly and shifted to his other form of a desert caracal. Sandy brown with black tips on his ears and points, he wasn’t that much bigger than me, really.

  We just needed to creep away.

  Except we were too late.

  “Maks, you fucking shit, get back here!” The Jinn, Bart, I think, screamed his name.

  We bolted, but Maks was slow and I couldn’t leave him behind. Well, this was going to hell in a handbasket in a fucking hurry.

  The Jinn raced after us, screaming a war cry that set my hair standing on end. A war cry I heard in my nightmares reliving the Oasis.

  I pushed Maks ahead of me, guarding our rear. Which was something of a laugh, considering. We needed speed because Jinn were faster than a horse when they wanted to be.

  “Lila, get him out of here!” I yelled. There was a snap of wings and then a whoosh to my side right before Lila scooped Maks in his caracal form right off the ground.