by Cat Marsters
“They’re real enough. Their reaction certainly is.”
She couldn’t argue with that. Her nipples were hard, her breath was coming faster, and her breasts were rising and falling in a way that seemed to absolutely fascinate Bael.
“Hey,” he said breathlessly, “are you wearing anything under that skirt?”
“I—” Kett began, but his fingers brushed her stomach, making her shiver. She found herself whispering, “Why don’t you find out?”
He looked up, grinning, and started gathering folds of embellished fabric.
“Just don’t tear anything,” Kett said. “I need this costume.”
“I won’t even take it off,” Bael promised, and disappointment swept through Kett.
Disappointment that fled when he dropped to his knees, stuck his head under her skirt and licked up the inside of her thigh, past the leather straps holding a knife to her thigh.
“No underwear,” he said, his breath hot against her pussy lips.
“I hadn’t gotten around to it,” Kett breathed, trying to keep steady on her feet.
She needn’t have bothered. Bael wrapped his arms around her legs, holding her steady, and buried his face between her thighs. His tongue burrowed between her folds, seeking out all the places she was most sensitive and licking them relentlessly until she came with a gasp, shuddering and nearly falling.
It was all over in a few minutes, Bael’s tongue so expert that she didn’t need any more. He rose to his feet, leaned her back against the heavy pole supporting the tent and kissed her.
He still had her skirts bunched up around her thighs. His hand slipped between and caressed her wet folds.
“Yes,” Kett murmured, her eyes closed, floating on a sea of bliss, and she heard a rustle of clothing before Bael’s thick cock was pressing at her entrance. “Yes,” she said again, opening her eyes, and he pushed inside.
“I love you,” he told her as he began to thrust. “I love fucking you. I love you.”
When they went outside, Lya and Dark kept their eyes averted, both of them hiding smiles.
Striker leered. “Made the tent shake,” he said.
“I know,” Kett replied smugly. She slipped her arm around Bael’s neck, kissed him softly and sighed. “Time to get to work.”
* * * * *
The Maharaja’s palace looked like a child’s drawing of a castle onto which someone had dumped a lot of cake decorations. Every wall, turret and curved roof glistened with colored tiles, jewels and gaudy adornments. In the shimmering heat and ever-present clouds of dust and sand, it looked like a mirage. Or perhaps a hallucination caused by eating moldy dodo meat.
“Tasteful,” Kett murmured, shielding her eyes against the gaudiness.
“Even Nuala’s not that bad,” Lya agreed.
Bael snorted. He was in Var’s body, a magnificent black stallion, his muscles bunching between Kett’s thighs as she rode him. Beside her sat Lya on a borrowed munta and Dark on Colonel Darson’s mount. Striker was nowhere to be seen—which in no way meant he wasn’t around.
Dark’s regal bearing, his kelfish slave and youthful courtesan were enough to convince the guards of the Maharaja’s palace that they should be admitted.
Inside, Var was taken to the stables, making Kett’s stomach constrict even though she knew he’d be fine, and the rest of the party was led through a series of small courtyards and piazzas, green with plants and trees, but never quite escaping the ever-present sand blowing on the breeze. Fountains tinkled. Somewhere, someone played music.
Eventually they were taken to a grand, high-ceilinged room where kelfs operated ceiling fans and a man lounged on a throne, watching a girl play the sitar terribly badly. He was the Maharaja, and she his beloved only daughter.
Kett winced. She didn’t want to kill the daughter. Hell, she didn’t really want to kill the Maharaja, but justice was justice, and he’d broken the terms of their friendship by betraying her to a man who wanted to kill her.
“Your Serene Highness, may I present the High Lord Talvéan,” Lya said, her eyes cast deferentially low.
“Hukm, Maharaja,” Dark said in perfect Pradeshi, with a regal nod. “It’s good of you to receive me.”
They exchanged pleasantries while Kett took note of as many details about the room as she could. The dozen or so kelfs. The tall doors, guarded not by kelfs but by men with curved swords. The high windows, letting in shafts of light in which dust motes danced. The handmaidens swarming around the princess.
She couldn’t see Albhar anywhere.
“And who is this charming young woman?” asked the Maharaja.
Kett kept her eyes averted as Dark drew her forward. In truth she wanted to laugh, because here was an immensely powerful, sexual, magnetic man with his arm around her bare waist, and his touch felt about as enjoyable as a pelvic exam.
“She is,” Dark paused for exactly the right length of time, “a very dear friend of mine.”
The Maharaja’s smile widened. “I see,” he said. “Well, you must be in need of rest and refreshment after your journey. Please, follow the kelfs to the guest quarters.”
Every inch of the palace interior was as embellished as the outside. By the time they shut the door on the giant guest suite, Kett was starting to feel dizzy from the mad, bright patterns. The suite was just as heavily decorated, with large open windows and a monkey on a perch. It screeched when it saw them, and Kett frowned at it.
“That went well,” Lya said, giving Kett a look. “‘Very dear friend’.”
“Shut up. How the hell did Chance wear this stuff all the time when she was a courtesan?” Kett asked, hitching up the low bodice of her outfit.
“She didn’t wear it for long,” Dark said, in a tone that didn’t invite discussion. “Do you think you can track this Albhar?”
“Dunno, but I can,” said Bael, materializing behind them. The monkey scampered onto his shoulder and Kett realized it was Var. “He has plenty of pet monkeys. I can find Albhar, change into something bigger and fly him out.”
“No,” Kett said. “If it was that simple, we’d have flown in and wouldn’t have had to piss about with costumes.”
“I like your costume,” he said, with a look that reminded her how much he’d liked it earlier.
Kett felt her cheeks burn but went on, “He has guards on the roof. That’s why Lya is going with you—and taking this.” She pointed down.
They all looked at the carpet.
“To roll him up in and carry him out,” Kett explained. “Can Var be a donkey?”
“I’ve repeatedly been told so,” Bael said, straight-faced.
“Funny. We’ll meet you back at the—”
The doors to the suite suddenly flew open, and all four of them whirled around.
“My dear boy!” Albhar cried. “I didn’t know you were coming.”
His eyes said otherwise. As did the contingent of armed men behind him.
“Albhar,” Bael said, smiling just as easily as his former mentor. “Good to see you. That dragon dragged me away when it took the shapeshifter.”
“Did it?” Albhar asked, without quite enough sympathy on his face. “And where is the shapeshifter now?”
Kett realized she was still wearing her disguise. “A shapeshifter!” she squeaked. “How exciting!”
Albhar cast her an irritated look. “It’s very dangerous,” he said. “It killed—”
“No one,” Bael said softly, and Albhar’s attention whipped back to him.
“Ah. I know you don’t believe me, but—”
“That’s because it’s not true,” Bael said.
“Your father believed a kelf—”
“Didn’t kill her. She died in her own stupid ritual. The same stupid ritual you’ve been researching for so many years.”
There was a dreadful silence.
“First rule of lying, Albhar. You get your story straight.”
“Bael—” Albhar began, but then stopped.
�
�No, please.” Bael glanced at Kett before turning back to the old man. “Explain.”
Albhar looked at him, and then at Kett. He raised his hands and let them drop in a gesture of failure.
“What can I say?” he asked. “I wanted the power.”
“You knew it would kill me.”
“You stupid boy,” Albhar sneered. “Did you ever believe I cared for you?”
Var suddenly leapt from Bael’s shoulder, changing fluidly in mid-flight to a tiger, heavy and lethal. His weight shoved Albhar to the ground, snarling and clawing, his huge jaws ripping at the old man’s throat.
The half-dozen armed men with Albhar all turned to shoot at Var.
Lya threw herself on the tiger’s back.
Kett ripped her skirts open and snatched her knife from its sheath, wishing to hell she’d been able to carry a bigger weapon. With her other hand she grabbed her scryer from its hiding place under the skirt’s embellished layers, and while she lunged forward to stab one of the men who was even at that moment loosing an arrow at Var, she tried to focus her mind on calling Darson.
Bael let out a bellow and turned on the soldiers with a sword that had come out of nowhere. Kett slashed at the arm of the man nearest to her, making him falter in his aim. Another cut to the wrist made him drop his bow, and then she stabbed under his ribs, pushing the knife in as far as it would go.
Lya’s body covered as much of Var as it could, and her kelfish skin was impervious to the arrows raining on her from such a short distance. But she couldn’t cover all of the tiger and the soldiers were beginning to discard their bows for short swords, slashing and stabbing at Var through his thick fur.
“Kett?” shouted a voice from the scryer in her hand. She’d gotten through.
“Now,” Kett said. “Send them now!”
She yanked her knife back, shoving at the dying man with her foot and thrusting her scryer into her bodice so her hand was free to grab his sword as he fell. Whirling on the next man, she cut him across the chest. None of the men were properly armored, and the sword cut through his clothing enough to leave a line of blood. The man turned on her, but she used the momentum of her swing to whirl and slam the sword into his head.
But not before he’d yelled, “Guards! We’re under attack! Gua—”
His head split open, spraying blood, and Kett twirled to the next man.
But there were no more. The other four men lay on the floor in various states of dismemberment, Bael and Dark standing over them, breathing hard. Bael stepped forward in the sudden silence and picked up Lya, whose eyes were closed tight.
“Are you all right?” he asked, and she opened her eyes, nodding. They both looked down at Var, whose striped fur was dark with blood. Lya’s body had shielded him from a lot of blows, but not all of them.
“Is he?” asked Kett.
“He’s okay. Nothing serious.” Bael set Lya on her feet and knelt by his twin, placing his hand on the tiger’s back. “Tigers have incredibly thick fur, helps repel blades.”
“I know,” she said, and he smiled at her. She smiled back, tremendously relieved he was all right. The fight had only lasted a minute or two. How could she possibly have been worried enough to call for backup?
Var got to his feet, leaving behind the bloody, mauled mess that had once been Albhar. The tiger’s legs, belly and face were smeared with the old man’s blood, and Bael regarded it with his jaw tight.
There was silence for a long moment.
“We should go,” Dark said, and they all nodded, moving toward the huge windows and the little courtyard beyond. Kett was already working out the best escape routes in her head. Take to the skies? She and Bael could each carry a passenger, but she was fairly sure the Maharaja had snipers on his rooftop, alive to the possibility of an aerial invasion.
Maybe if she and Bael disguised themselves again, they could just walk out. No; someone would check their quarters long before they got to the outside wall. And they were all sprayed with blood.
Maybe—
“My gods!” cried someone from outside the guest quarters, and without even sharing a glance, the four of them, plus Var, broke into a run, through the windows and toward the archway at one side of the courtyard. “After them!”
“Thought that went too easy,” Bael said, his hand brushing her arm as they ran. “Are you okay?”
“Five by five.” She grinned. “Nothing like a good fight to get the blood pumping.”
“Just as long as it only pumps inside you,” he said, and they shared a smile.
They’d left the little courtyard attached to the guest quarters by the time the guards found the bodies. They ran through another little piazza, then another, each one hung with vines and trellises, the sound of heavy boots on stone echoing behind them.
“It all looks the same,” Lya cursed. “How do we get out?”
“I follow my nose,” Bael said, flashing her a grin. “This way!”
But “this way” led them into a bigger courtyard, one with many exits. Soldiers entered through three of them.
“Nice one,” Lya snapped. She ran with a sword in one three-fingered hand and a crossbow in the other, both apparently stolen from Albhar’s guards. She raised the bow as she ran and felled one soldier, but a hail of arrows were returned.
They ducked behind a fountain. “There are four of us,” Kett said.
“Five.” Bael pointed to Var, still tiger-shaped.
“Six.” With a shimmer, Dark separated into two forms. Véan, a lion eight feet from nose to tail, tossed his long, dark mane and pawed the ground, leaving behind long gouges. An undulating growl rose in his throat.
“Still. There are hundreds of them. Within a minute or two there could be thousands. And they’re good. Have any of you ever faced troops in battle?”
“Yes,” said Dark, his face grim.
“Yes,” said Lya.
“No,” sighed Bael, “but I’ve been in a hell of a lot of bar fights.”
Kett passed her hands over her face in despair. Six against even one hundred was terrible odds. Six against several hundred, maybe even a thousand, was such terrible odds she couldn’t believe any of them were contemplating it.
“Where the fuck is Striker?” she asked, looking around as if he might reveal himself, a shape silhouetted in the ever-present dust clouds.
“Not here,” Bael said. “Not since we entered the palace.”
“Great,” Kett said, and hauled out her scryer. But Striker didn’t answer.
“He’s probably busy roasting babies or something,” Lya said.
The sun beat down on them. Sand drummed up by the marching soldiers filling the courtyard clogged the air.
Kett started looking around for cover. “Okay, we need to hide. Barricade ourselves somewhere until the battalion shows up.”
“Will they?” Lya asked. “Show up?”
“They’d bloody better,” Kett growled, pointing toward the nearest part of the building. “In there. Get as deep into the palace as we can. Find somewhere defensible. Everyone ready?”
“No,” said Bael. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her, hard. “Now I am.”
“You’re a lunatic,” she told him.
“So are you.”
He grinned, and then so did she, and they both took off running.
* * * * *
By chance they ended up in the throne room, its high doors slammed shut and barricaded with furniture. It had been empty but for the Maharaja and one pretty concubine, who both fell silent when Var and Véan bounded into the room.
“Are there any other entrances?” Kett demanded, and the terrified, gibbering man pointed to a small door no doubt used by the servants. She smashed a table with the hilt of her sword and used one of the legs to barricade the door.
Outside, someone yelled a command, and a hail of arrows came in through the high windows. Annoyed, Kett manifested a pair of wings, grabbed the Maharaja and flew up there.
The big courtyard
was full of soldiers. Rank upon rank of them filled the space, crammed into every corner, jammed up against the walls. Weaponry glinted in the sunlight.
The silence was intense.
Kett held the Maharaja in front of her, leaning away from his wriggling body and kicking legs. “Shoot again and you might hit him,” she shouted.
“Kill them!” he squealed to his soldiers. “Kill them all!”
“If we die, you die,” she told him, and dropped him the ten or so feet to the tiled floor of the throne room. He landed with a crack and howl, at which the concubine let out a cry.
Kett landed by the fallen ruler and aimed her stolen sword at him.
She let her disguise slide away.
“You were the one who handed me over to Albhar, weren’t you?” she asked. “You told him where I lived.”
“I’m sorry!” he cried, sobbing like a child.
“Yeah, me too. I should do to you what Var did to him.”
The Maharaja looked up, fear and tears staining his face. Kett gestured to Var, who padded over and rested one bloody paw on the Maharaja’s chest.
The Maharaja fainted. The concubine whimpered.
“I’m not going to kill him,” Kett said in disgust.
“You’re not?” asked Bael, looking disappointed.
“No. I just want to do this.” She kicked the man over onto his stomach and slashed the back of his thigh, hamstringing him.
“Poetic,” said Bael.
“I thought so.”
Something heavy hit the main doors, its thud reverberating throughout the throne room. Dust shimmered from the rafters.
“How long, do you think?” Dark asked.
The ram hit again. Thud.
“Long enough for the army to get here?” Bael ventured.
Thud. The furniture piled up in front of the doors started to wobble.
“Better be,” Kett said. She picked up the fallen ruler and placed him on the floor by his own throne, where the concubine cowered. “Make yourself useful.”
Thud.
“Are we going to die?” the girl whimpered.
“Yes,” Kett said, and the girl burst into tears.
“I didn’t say today,” Kett sighed. “Stop his bleeding, will you? Use that sari, girl, there’re acres of it. Stop being so stupid.”
