A Promise of Fire

by Amanda Bouchet

  I squeeze her hand. “You would have found a way.”

  She turns back to me, her face etched with worry. “Even I can’t bring back the dead.”

  “Then it’s a good thing I’m not dead.” My attempt at a joke is shaky, and no one laughs.

  “Tell me truthfully, Cat. Are you happy here?” It’s not a simple question, but there’s a simple answer.

  “Yes.” My eyes find Griffin’s. My voice softens. My whole body does.

  “I see.” Selena’s lips purse. “Aetos and Desma will be disappointed. Vasili, too. Everyone misses you, especially Cerberus.”

  I grin. Cerberus couldn’t care less. “I’ll visit soon.”

  “When you’re stronger,” Selena says briskly, her expression smoothing into its usual cool lines.

  “I miss you,” I tell her. “I miss everyone.”

  “And we miss you.” She leans close and whispers the ancient word for family in my ear. Its power electrifies me like a lightning bolt, and magic whooshes through my veins. I gape at Selena as my body settles. She’s hiding more power than I ever imagined.

  “Real family works both ways,” she says with an enigmatic smile. Then her eyes narrow on my willowy frame. “What happened to your curves? You look like you did when I found you.”

  Funny. I thought I’d found her. “They’ll be back. I’ll be struggling with certain pants again soon enough. Some people are just made that way, and spice cakes don’t help.”

  She sits back, straightening her rumpled clothing. “Do you want me to stay?”

  I shrug. “Yes. But you have a circus to run, and I’ll just be sleeping for days.”

  “Sleeping and eating,” Selena says firmly, bending down to kiss my forehead. She smells like blossoms and budding leaves, and I wonder if this is what it feels like to have a mother who loves you.

  “How’s Hades?” I ask before she goes.

  She gives me a significant look. “Virile. As always.”

  I smile. I get it now. “Give Cerberus a pat.”

  She arches one sculpted eyebrow. No one pats Cerberus. Selena and I are the only ones who even go near him. He terrifies everyone else.

  She squeezes my fingers before rising. “Cerberus didn’t guard the circus until you came. He hasn’t been around since you left.”

  It takes a moment for her words to sink in. Hades may be her lover, but Cerberus is my watchdog. My eyes blur, and my nose stings, and I’m not really sure why. I press my lips together, holding a flood of emotion at bay.

  Selena leaves with Carver after delivering a series of grisly threats to Griffin. I don’t hear everything, but I hear enough to know he’d better not let anything happen to me.

  Taking a slow breath, I turn to the man I love. He’s been standing off to one side, hovering, protective and extremely male. “She won’t carry through.”

  He looks dubious. Selena must have been pretty convincing. “You mean she won’t personally rip my beating heart from my chest and string my innards from one end of the Underworld to the other?”

  I make a face.

  “Or lop off my head and give it to Cerberus for a chew toy?”

  I mash my lips together to keep from smiling. “That would be a terrible waste of a handsome head.”

  “Or have a Cyclops pummel me with its meaty fists until my bones are splinters and my organs ooze out?”

  I grimace. “Ack!”

  Griffin grunts. “More like ouch.”

  I laugh, clutching my aching middle, and in that moment, I don’t care that Griffin has all but vowed to uncover everything I can’t bear to confide in him, that he wants to take over the realms, that Andromeda is coming for me, that I have thunder and lightning in my veins, or that I am destined to end the world as we know it. But when my smile dies, I close my eyes for the briefest of seconds and see war and crumbling kingdoms and me in the middle of it all, and I can’t help wondering how fleeting my happiness will be, and how many people will suffer along with me.

  I open my eyes and meet Griffin’s steady gaze. “I love you, and I’m so glad you love me, too.”

  His eyes widen at my admission. He stops mid-breath, his whole body going utterly still. “Live together, or die trying?” he asks, his voice a deep rasp.

  I nod. “Us. Together. Forever.” I speak instinctively, trustingly, and this time magic whips through me, acknowledging the unbreakable promise even as fate whispers in my ear that my forever might not last long.

  I hold out my hand. “Make love to me.”

  His gray eyes ignite. “Are you sure?”

  “I want you. In me. Around me. Always.”

  He’s by my side in an instant, achingly fierce, terrifyingly gentle, afraid that I might break. With each caress, each softly spoken endearment or sensual drag of his lips over my skin, Griffin heals me in a way no magic ever could. And when he rises above me, filling me completely, he’s a rock and a wall—my shelter, my home. He wraps his arms tightly around me, thrusting slowly to drive my pleasure to new heights. He kisses my shoulder when I shudder beneath him and then joins me in completion, offering me his strength as his head drops to my neck and his powerful body quakes and trembles. When he shifts to the side, he cups my jaw and feathers his lips over mine, murmuring words of adoration and praise that sweep aside my fear of the confrontation between us I know is yet to come.

  I kiss him back and touch every part of him that I can reach. And when he makes love to me again, I don’t cry at his tenderness even though I feel like I might, and I don’t tell him that if I were going to break, it would have happened a long time ago.

  The series continues in Book 2 of The Kingmaker Chronicles, Breath of Fire!

  Click here to order

  For more info and updates about The Kingmaker Chronicles go to:

  https://kingmakerchronicles.com/

  HERE’S A SNEAK PEEK AT BOOK TWO IN AMANDA BOUCHET’S RIVETING KINGMAKER CHRONICLES TRILOGY

  BREATH OF FIRE

  Dawn breaks over the Ice Plains, turning the icicles lining the mouth of the cave into fiery daggers. Around us, a landscape of white, gray, and glacial blue slowly emerges from the night like a cautious beast leaving the shadows—still, monumental, treacherous. In the silence of daybreak, Griffin takes steel to flint, lights one of our two torches, and then hands it to Kato.

  I peer to my right. The glacial tunnel leading into the labyrinth is as dark as a Cyclops’s heart. Griffin hands me the second, unlit torch, and I slip it into a loosened dagger loop in my belt.

  In turn, I hand Griffin Ariadne’s Thread. He holds the silvery ball of twine while Carver ties the loose end around my wrist, tugging hard on the knot to make sure it’s secure.

  Griffin rechecks it, twice, his expression grim. “Remember what the wizard said.”

  “Only Kato and I go in. Beware Atalanta’s bow. Find the lyre before the three-headed beast. Heed the Goddess’s needs.”

  His eyes bore into mine, dark and troubled. “I don’t like being separated.”

  My chest contracts painfully as I lean into him. “I know.”

  “Don’t you dare cut this thread.” Griffin’s arms clamp around me, hard as rocks. “If you do, I swear to the Gods I’ll come in there, find you, and give you a spanking you’ll never forget.”

  A shaky laugh explodes from my lungs. “I find that a lot more tempting than I probably should.”

  Griffin squeezes me. “Come back to me. Don’t do anything foolish.”

  Me? “I’m never foolish.”

  He grips me until my bones creak.

  “I’ll be careful,” I promise.

  Griffin eases his hold, pressing his lips to the top of my head and inhaling deeply. When he lets me go and offers his hand to Kato, the other man shakes it, absorbing Griffin’s long, hard look with a solemn nod. The silent communication has
“protect her with your life and then some” written all over it. A few weeks ago, I would have dismissed it as a lot of overprotective male posturing. Now, I only wish I could convince them that dying for me is not an option.

  As Kato and I enter the labyrinth, I have to convince myself to put one foot in front of the other. About thirty feet in, just before the tunnel curves to the right, I stop and look back even though every instinct tells me not to.

  My heart seizes, tumbling painfully at the sight of Griffin. Ariadne’s Thread trails from his tightly fisted hand. His big frame is taut and still with the kind of coiled tension that hovers on the brink of explosion, as if he’s barely restraining himself from coming in after me.

  Our eyes collide across the frost-blanketed entrance of the cave. “I swear I’ll cut this thread, drop it, and leave it behind me if any one of you steps past this point in the tunnel before we’re back.” The vow jolts through me, sealing itself in my skin, my blood, and my bones.

  Griffin’s face twists. He curses violently.

  Fighting the burning rawness inside of me, I say, “You can take shelter in the cave’s entrance, but if you come after us, I’ll be physically compelled to cut the rope and not pick it up again.” The magical chain reaction will hit me no matter where I am, not leaving me any choice.

  “I release you from your vow,” Griffin says.

  “It’s not a vow to you, it’s a vow to myself. You can’t release me.”

  “Cat. Be reasonable. What if—”

  “Just wait for us,” I call. “We’ll be back.”

  My pulse thuds wildly as I back away under Griffin’s livid stare. A muscle jerks in his cheek, ticking hard enough to send a ripple through his beard. His eyes blaze, and my heart wrenches as I turn away.

  “Cat!” he roars.

  I turn the corner without looking back. My eyes burn, and every shallow, quick breath shudders in my throat.

  Kato waits until the light from the cave’s entrance fades entirely before asking gruffly, “Are you all right?”

  I sniff and press my chilled fingertips to my stinging eyes, stemming the hot prickle of tears. “No.”

  He doesn’t try to talk to me again, which is for the best.

  With only the light of the torch and the dim glow from our cloaks, we wind our way deeper into the labyrinth, ducking pointy icicles and slipping on mirror-smooth patches of ice. When the tunnel splits into three branches, we peer into the darkness. Which reveals nothing. Because it’s dark.

  “What do you think?” I ask, my voice rough from disuse and swallowing tears.

  Kato lowers the torch, scanning the tunnel floor for footprints or signs of passage. There are none. The ice is even and unmarked underfoot, and so cold that the chill is already seeping through my thick-soled boots.

  He shrugs. “Straight?”

  After that, there are so many offshoots that we simply take turns deciding which way to go. Twice, we stumble back onto Ariadne’s Thread and know we’ve gone in circles. We’re debating whether or not to backtrack while picking up the thread when a dim light beckons us from a distant tunnel on the right.

  Curious, cautious, we follow the light and find a cavern, bright and high-ceilinged—if you can call the enormous sheet of ice filtering in the sunlight from outside a ceiling. Far above our heads on the frozen roof, zigzagging patterns of windblown snow splash swirling shadows across the cavern floor.

  Kato looks up, frowning. “How thick do you think that ice is?”

  I scrunch my nose. “Thick enough?”

  Voices carry differently in the cavern, amplified by the smooth walls and towering ceiling. When we’re not speaking, it’s quiet enough that I fancy I can hear my own heartbeat echoing back to me from off the sheets of ice.

  It’s quiet enough that there’s no mistaking the distinctive twang of a bowstring when it vibrates in my ears.

  * * *

  We both duck on instinct, and the arrow slams into the milky-white stalagmite behind us, embedding itself deep in to the mineral deposit.

  Kato reaches for me, but another twang sends us diving in opposite directions. I scramble toward another stalagmite, slipping on the ice and skidding beyond my mark. The bowstring hums again, and my right foot gets punched out from under me.

  I hit the ground hard on my side and slide. Grunting, I flip onto my stomach and then scrabble back over the ice until I crash into the back side of the mineral tower. Another arrow clatters across the ice just as I snatch in my trailing foot.

  “Cat!” Kato is ten feet away, behind a stalagmite that’s not even as wide as his shoulders. “You’re hit!”

  A colorfully fletched arrow sticks out from the heel of my boot. “It’s in the sole.” I yank it out and drop it next to me. “I’m fine.”

  “Not for long,” a singsongy voice croons from a gallery of caves high up along the opposite wall of the cavern. “You’re oh-so-wrong.”

  I take a quick look out from behind my shield, trying to discern the archer’s form. “Atalanta, I presume?”

  There’s a pause. “She knows my name. That’s not part of the game.”

  Twang. Crack!

  She aimed high. I look up and see a huge, lethally sharp icicle speeding toward my head.

  I jump out of the way, forced to forsake my shelter. Another arrow flies before I can take cover again and slams into my shoulder.

  I gasp, staggering back. Then Kato has me. He shoves us both into the debris of the shattered icicle behind my stalagmite an instant before another arrow skids over the ice where I just stood.

  Fuming, I grab the shaft and yank the arrow from my shoulder. Kato looks horrified.

  “It hit a buckle. The armor blocked it.” Mostly. Under the tough leather, warm liquid dampens my tunic, making the material cling to the side of my breast.

  His eyes close briefly in relief. Then, setting me behind him, he calls, “We’re here on a mission from the Gods. We don’t want any trouble.”

  Atalanta laughs. It’s a light, airy sound, like wind through trees. Preternaturally fast, she flits from cave to cave along the far wall. “So handsome. I think I’ll hold you for ransom.”

  “What?” I say through gritted teeth.

  Kato looks at me. The wariness in his cobalt eyes doesn’t color his arch tone. “Now she can rhyme.”

  My jaw drops. “I can rhyme!”

  “Live among bears, get covered in hairs!” Atalanta sings.

  I roll my injured shoulder, testing it. It stings, but that’s all. “She makes no sense. She’s trying to kill us. We have to get past her.”

  Drawing a Kobaloi knife, I rub my thumb over the sinew while I watch the way the archer’s silhouette moves. When I think I’ve nailed down the pattern, I throw the blade into an empty gallery, counting on her to flit through it at the same moment. She does, but she catches the knife, stopping it right in front of her armored chest before twirling back into the shadows.

  I blink. Titos and now this? Those Kobaloi knives were the worst purchase of my life!

  Atalanta pops into the next cave, flips my knife in her hand, and then throws it back. The blade sticks in a mini stalagmite an inch from my foot. I jerk back, thumping mad.

  “It’s not with a knife that you’ll take my life.”

  I pry my knife free and then sheathe the blade again.

  Twang. Crack!

  Kato yanks me against him and spins to the side as another icicle falls from the roof and smashes down next to us. Shattered ice blasts our legs and scatters in a chiming wave.

  “Nock an arrow, hit the marrow,” Atalanta chants, letting another bolt fly.

  Too late, I realize Kato isn’t entirely behind the stalagmite anymore. He slaps his hand over his neck, right at the base of his skull.

  Fury gathers inside me like a storm as he moves us both closer to t
he mineral deposit again. I reach for his wrist. “Let me see.”

  He lowers his red-stained fingers, and I rise to my toes, using the arm he still has around me for balance.

  “It’s just a scratch.” But mini Titos’s forked tongue is lapping up the blood.

  I pat Kato’s chest in what I hope is a reassuring way, trying to keep my eyes a normal size and my voice steady. “You’re fine.” Animated tattoos and vampiric snakes are not something he needs to worry about right now.

  I pull my tunic from my pants, rip off the relatively clean hem, and then wrap the strip around Kato’s neck, securing the ends with a knot. “There. Good as new.”

  He gives me a tight smile. “This stalagmite isn’t big enough for the two of us. I’ll go back to mine.”

  “Don’t.” I grab his arm. “She’s too good. She’ll pin you in seconds.”

  He hesitates and then gets behind me, pushing me right up against the frosty surface. Stuck, I can’t even give Atalanta the evil eye anymore.

  “I can’t breathe,” I eventually protest.

  “Good. Then you can’t move.”

  “And that’s ever-so helpful in a fight!”

  “Atalanta!” Kato calls, not moving an inch. “Zeus and Athena sent us. We’re meant to bring a treasure to the Ipotane Alpha.”

  I roll my eyes. “Fantastic. Just tell her we’re here to steal her treasure.”

  “It might not be hers.”

  “She might be guarding it,” I argue.

  I feel him shrug behind me. “Or she could say she was expecting us.”

  “Expecting to kill us,” I mutter.

  Kato inhales sharply, moving enough for me to lean over and see what he sees. Atalanta has stepped out onto a ledge. Framed against the gallery of caves above, she’s magnificent. Wild and dark. Silky hair falls to her knees, spilling over her arms, hands, and lowered bow. Diaphanous skirts cover her long, shapely legs only to mid-thigh, and gleaming, golden upper-body armor illuminates the smooth, pale skin of her neck and face. Dark brows wing across her forehead, arching delicately. Her full mouth looks like it’s been stained by kalaberries, offering an exotic splash of color against her flawless, almost translucent complexion. She’s as cold and perfect as the ice crystals adorning the cavern.