Without skipping a beat, Trick moves over to stand beside us, and drops his pants.
Same deal.
My eyes go right to his dick, analyzing the semi-curved length of him, the most intimate parts of his flesh covered in tattoos. There’s so much going on down there that he manages to pull on his new pants and cover it all up before I even get a handle on what I’m looking at. I can feel my cheeks flushed with heat, muscles down below clenching in excitement. This man is fucking gorgeous, and my eyes can’t seem to drink him in fast enough.
Blind he might be, but Trick’s head snaps up, and his mouth twists in the most wicked of smirks.
“I can smell your arousal,” he says with this little head toss that has me fuming.
What a piece of shit.
“You don’t smell anything, but the stink of this alley,” I say, kicking a rotten piece of fruit in his direction. He bats it away with the end of his staff, and then taps it on the ground a few times. “You said you found this guy, Jensen? So can we please get him and go? I have a cat to feed.”
“Oh, I found him alright,” he growls, his mood shifting in an instant. Bending down to dig in his discarded jeans, Trick pulls out a thick sheet of paper with a drawing on it. “Some idiot was reading this to his buddies or else I wouldn’t have seen it–obviously.” He adds this last part with a healthy dollop of sarcasm that I suppose is pretty reasonable for someone who went blind at age ten.
Trick thrusts the wrinkled page out toward us.
I can’t read a damn word of the language on it, but interestingly enough, a Wanted poster looks much the same here as it does back home.
A crude drawing fills the top half of the page, but even with the horrible linework of the sketch, it’s pretty obvious that the man they’re trying to capture–both in art and in shackles–is as handsome as the two on either side of me.
Jensen, huh?
And this is the third and last knight we’re looking for?
I do my best not to think about the soul mate comment.
“So we have to find this guy before the authorities do?” I hazard as Crew takes the thick sheet of paper in his hand, gritting his teeth and shaking his head. He points to a single word scribbled across the bottom in that strange symbolic language. When he starts signing for me, I get chills.
Because I’m pretty sure he just made a cage with his fingers.
“He’s in prison already,” Trick growls out, shaking his head. I know he can’t see Crew’s signing, so I’m guessing he picked that gossip up in town. “More specifically, he’s been thrown in the palace dungeon.”
Crew slams his fist into the wall on his right, crumples up the page, and then tosses it over his shoulder. I haven’t seen him get upset, even with all the crazy stuff we’ve been through in the last few days.
“What does this mean exactly?” I ask as Kumo flutters down from above and shifts into her other form. She wraps her wings around herself, like a bat burrito. It’d be almost funny if I couldn’t see the horrible expressions on the faces of the other two.
“It means we’re going to have to break him out,” Trick explains as Crew leans against the wall and sighs heavily. It seems he can make sounds that have to do with breathing–sighing, yawning, coughing–but no laughing, no humming, and of course, no talking. That would probably drive me slowly insane; I like having a voice.
Crew puts his finger up to his forehead again, imitating a horn.
“He’s talking about the kirin again,” I tell Trick as he removes his shades, showing off those strangely beautiful eyes of his. He bends down and tucks them and his other clothes into his bag before tying that strip of leather around his face again. “Our best chance is to find a guard and bribe him. You’ve got plenty of money, don’t you?”
Trick stands up and starts to put on the woven leather breastplate. He gets a little caught up in the straps, so I step forward to offer my help. I notice he shudders when my fingers brush along his back. I can’t really blame him; I can feel the energy passing between us, even with the shirt in my way.
“I will fly to the palace and see what I can’t find out,” Kumo says, unwrapping her wings and then flapping them once, hard enough to propel her out of the alley and into the air. As soon as she’s above the rooflines, she shifts back to her bat form and takes off.
“Don’t worry about her,” Trick says, as if he can sense my tension in my fingers. “We might not have cellphones here, but you’re always connected to your Sanshi. Just call her and she’ll come.”
As if to emphasize his point, Dunshi appears on one of Trick’s shoulders, staring down at me with solid purple eyes. He sniffs the air and then swishes his fluffy tail against his master’s neck.
“We should seek the kirin,” he says, but Trick just clamps a hand over his head and squeezes until the spirit disappears in a puff of smoke.
“No kirin. First off, Jensen hates them. Second, their prices are too high. And third, if we even inadvertently lead the Royal Guard to where they’re hiding, we’re all screwed. They already have one kirin under their belt, you want to give them a good two dozen more?”
“How do you know they have a kirin?” I ask, not entirely following along with the conversation.
Trick grins at me, spins his staff in a circle, and slams the base into the ground near our feet.
“Because Jensen is a kirin,” he says, before turning and heading for the wall at the end of the alley. Crew straps his pack and sword back on then reaches down for my hand. This time, I don’t struggle with the decision; I just let him take it.
A kirin, huh?
So basically, my third knight is a unicorn/deer monster trapped in a supernatural prison?
Well, that doesn’t sound very good, now does it?
Drawing in a deep breath, I follow after the two men and let them help me over the wall.
If we find this Jensen guy, and kill the spider bitch, there’s a chance I can go home. And despite all this tension with the boys, all the magic and the intrigue, that’s still something I want.
Isn’t it?
10
The palace is even more impressive up close, towering over the nearby houses like a skyscraper. It really is that tall, defying my perceptions that this place is like … feudal Japan or ancient China. The building rises in fits and spurts, a tower here, a bridge there, a wooden walkway dripping with flowers. There’s no rhyme or reason to it, but the beauty in the architecture is undeniable.
Crew and I are standing in the shadows near a bakery, eating small sugary rice bowls topped with fruit. The sign for our meal is two fingers tapped against the opposite palm, nail side down. But since Trick is off looking for a guard to bribe, I don’t know how to say the actual word aloud. Crew tried to write it down for me, but I’m not entirely sure how to pronounce ichigofandai in any proper way.
“This is amazing,” I whisper, closing my eyes and sipping the sweetness of the rice milk at the bottom of my bowl. I couldn’t properly identify what fruit exactly was in my dessert, but it was all amazing. I’ve never been much of a sweets person, but if this was a regular option back in Eugene, I’d probably be a good twenty pounds heavier.
Kumo swoops down and lands on my shoulder, giving me a small start. It’ll take me a while to get used to having a constant companion. I’m more accustomed to being alone.
“The palace has many guards,” she says in that lilting voice of hers. “Too many for me to get close. And each of them has a Sanshi on air patrol.” She looks up and I follow her gaze, but I can’t see anything beyond a cluster of fluffy white clouds around the tallest tower. “I cannot get close enough to see anything beyond a crowd gathered outside the back gate.”
Crew listens intently, his own Sanshi clinging to his claymore and watching me with dilated pupils. Maoshi can’t talk now, but next time I figure out how to channel energy into giving Crew a voice, I’m going to see if he can. I’ve always wondered what sorts of conversations a cat might carry on.
<
br /> Speaking of cats … I miss mine terribly. I just hope Mahou is okay. I know a lot of people wouldn’t give two shits about a little five-pound rescue cat, but I have a tendency to side with the unwanted and the abused. I’ve been both; I get how painful it is to be tossed aside like trash. Even a cat deserves dignity and respect.
“We’ll have to wait for Trick then?” I ask, leaning back against the wall. Crew reaches out to take the wooden bowl and spoon from me, returning both to the vendor before rejoining me. It feels risky to be this close to the castle after our bloody run-in with the guards, but Crew seems relaxed, so I try to take my cues from him.
He looks at the little bat on my shoulder for a moment, and then signs something nice and slow, giving me a moment to take it all in. When he’s done, he pulls out his journal and scribbles down the words in English.
Can you feel him nearby? If you close your eyes and focus, like you did with Kumorishi, then we might be able to get a better read on where, exactly, they’re keeping him.
“Can’t I just smoke another one of those cigarettes and make a portal into the castle?” I ask aloud. Crew shakes his head, signs his response, and then writes it down. Seems he’s determined to teach me his language. Thing is, I don’t see myself sticking around long enough to get a good grip on it. Still, I pay attention to the movement of his hands, and then read the written words that go along with it.
The palace is heavily warded; sadly, this is as close as we’re going to get.
“What happens if we can’t get Jensen out? What if they execute him or something?” Crew just looks down at me with an expression in his rose-red eyes that says I don’t want to know the answer to that question. Trick said that if I died, he died. Is the opposite of that true as well?
If Jensen dies, Crew writes as I watch, then we’ll have to wait for him to be reborn, find him, and then raise him until he’s old enough to help us out. It’d mean years of running and hiding, of fighting impossible battles. We really don’t want that.
He pauses again and then adds, like getting to a boss battle in an RPG with one of your party members already dead. He taps the page, smiles, and then shrugs. But hey, I can understand that analogy.
The rest of it … rebirth, years of running, impossible battles. I don’t like any of that. Not even sure if I believe it all. I mean, Crew’s implying reincarnation is indeed the final answer. As fascinating as that is, I’m not taking anyone else’s word on what happens in the afterlife.
“So you want me to see if I can feel him,” I repeat, listening to all of that wild magic swirl inside of me like a hurricane. It wants to get out and do something, almost desperately so. My fingers and toes twitch at the thought of releasing this power into the world. Last time, it took a kiss from Trick’s hot mouth to wake me up. What am I supposed to do this time?
Closing my eyes, I lean back against the warm stone wall and breathe in the sweet scent of sugar and fruit, the savory smell of fresh-cooked rice. I can hear Crew’s even breathing on my left, Kumo’s weight on my right shoulder. Like I did before, I focus on the magic inside of me, imagining it like that wild snowstorm in Crew’s world.
What if I make a snowball? I think, trying to take the metaphor a step further. Because, really, how else does one deal with magic? I run my metaphysical fingers through the icy wind and gather some of that power to me, drawing it into my hand and squeezing it tight.
I let the rest of the magic go, sending it swirling through the air around me. Right away, I feel a hit from Kumo, like the warm caress of a friend pushing back against the storm. A second later, my power hits Crew, this brick wall of magic and energy that’s familiar and foreign all at once. It tries to slide inside of him, take him over, but I don’t let it.
Is that how I give him a voice? I wonder, but I get the sense that if I divert my energy into Crew now, I won’t have any left to look for Jensen. As if it’s enraged by the thought of being separated from Crew, the power rushes angrily outward and into the city, snagging on Trick as he makes his way back toward us through the crowds. The same thing happens: the magic tries to enter him, and I put the brakes on, hard and fast. The wind of my power continues on past him, even angrier than it was before, fanning out like the creeping fingers of some supernatural plague.
It extends so far that I start to feel weak, like my energy is too spread out, like the molecules of my body might shatter and leave me a puddle of blood and bones on the stone walkway.
But this time, when my magic senses another presence, one that’s more similar to Crew and Trick than Kumo, I lift up my snowball and chuck it as hard as I can.
It’s a direct fucking hit.
Sound explodes in my ears, the cacophony of a crowd, of jeering and shouting and wicked triumph. I can feel my body being dragged along the stone, my knees buckling, blood running down the side of my neck, dripping from my heaving flanks.
Flanks?
As soon as I realize I’m not in my body, but someone else’s, I almost lose the connection. But it seems Jensen–because who else could this be?–has also just spotted me.
What are you doing here? a voice whispers in my mind, sharp and angry. This is the last place you should be! Energy catches between the two of us, swirling sharp and angry inside the massive, muscular form I’m now inhabiting alongside this other voice. Our eyes lift up and catch on a woman in thick flowing robes, her long, dark hair trailing down her back to pool on the ground near her feet. She’s in shackles, the metal chains on her wrists hooked to the belt of a man in similar robes, his a blazing amber-gold with the shapes of shimmering dragons.
The woman, I feel like I should recognize, but it’s clear that the man in the gold is the one in charge. He lifts his hand and gestures for us–for Jensen–to be dragged forward. The kirin does his best to stand, but his legs won’t work, and he ends up falling to his side, panting and kicking wildly as he bleeds across the stone.
Why are you fucking here?! the voice shouts at me again, his own power pushing up hard against mine, trying to shove me out. But I can hear things right now that I recognize: the chanting of creepers. There are demons fucking everywhere. I can’t see them, but I can hear words whispered on the wind, words full of powers that bind and choke and conquer. If you die, we all die. I’m not ready to give up yet.
Jensen pushes against me with another surge of energy, forcing me out of his body so that for a split-second, my spirit lingers in the air in front of him like a ghost.
I find myself looking down at a massive, muscular beast, far more intimidating than the one in Crew’s book. Like a Clydesdale mixed with a stag, the horned creature gazes up at me with burning silver eyes, its pale blue mane tangled around its face and matted with the rust-red smears of drying blood. Its fur is the color of a frozen lake under a blue-blue sky, a pale color that seems to shine with its own inner light.
Pretty sure it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.
It looks at me with a mixture of longing and hatred that I feel reflected back a hundred times over. Without a doubt in my mind, I know that this is the last knight, my Voice, even if I’m not entirely sure what that all means. I’m no goddess, but in that moment, looking into the kirin’s eyes, I know he’s supposed to be mine. They all are, all three of them.
The man behind me in the gold robes says something in that staccato language, prompting several dozen guards to move forward with ropes in hand. They toss them over Jensen as he struggles and screams, thrashing his muscular neck and biting the arm of the nearest guard. The man lets out a screech of his own as blood spurts in crimson arcs, staining the creature’s fur with red.
But he’s too injured, and there are too many soldiers, too many ropes. Before I can even think to come up with a way to stop them–because this magic has to be good for something–I feel a hand gripping my arm, my real arm and not the incorporeal thing that I am right now.
“We have to go; the Royal Guard’s got our scent.” It’s Trick, speaking to
my flesh and blood body. I ignore him, even as I feel him shake me, desperately trying to wake me up. After a moment, I get the sensation of being lifted and tossed over a muscular shoulder. Trick’s picked me up and started running like hell.
That can’t be good.
And yet I can’t seem to tear myself away from the kirin, even though I know I should, even though I can tell he’s desperate for me to get the fuck out of here.
With another scream of rage from the beast’s move, he collapses under the weight of the ropes and a heavy net with stones tied to the edges, his side lifting with panting breaths. Behind me, I can feel eyes boring into me. It should be impossible, considering that I’m not even really here, but when I look, I see the woman in the robes staring straight at me, a look of terror and concern etched into every feature of her beautiful face.
I don’t have time for her though, because one of the men is approaching with a silver knife, as ethereally beautiful as the creature lying helpless on the ground in front of it. It, too, seems to glow with its own inner light, casting strange shadows on the white stone walkway. The man in the gold robes gives another command, and a sharp nod, encouraging the guard with the knife to step forward.
As I watch in horror, he places the edge of the blade at the base of the kirin’s skull and starts to saw his way through the horn. Blood and energy spurt from the wound, making me scream. I can feel the sound escaping the throat of my real body as Trick stumbles, slides to a stop, and finds himself surrounded by soldiers.
Danger on both fronts.
Crew unsheathes his sword as Kumo shifts forms, carefully taking me from Trick, so that he can wield his staff.
All of that, however, seems so far away from here, like watching a movie. This is my real self, and that, that’s just an illusion.
With one last cry, the kirin lunges forward, his horn glowing with silver moonlight, and plunges it through my incorporeal body.
Realms and Rebels: A Paranormal and Fantasy Reverse Harem Collection Page 10
