Reckoning

by T. J. Michaels

  Reckoning

  Gathering of the Storms Book One

  Volume Two

  by

  T.J. Michaels

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Reckoning (Gathering of the Storms)

  Dedication

  Introduction

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Also by Author TJ Michaels

  About the Author

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  Reckoning (Gathering of the Storms) ©

  Copyright 2003 – 2016 by T.J. Michaels

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

  First edition published 2016 Bent West Books

  Edited by LM Editing

  Cover Art by Syneca of Original Syn

  ISBN: 9780990569923

  All books copyrighted to the author. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  Dedication

  This book is, as always, dedicated to my kids. They have been super supportive from day one. This work is of special importance because it’s the one I wrote when they were little. I set it aside to raise them and establish my career, and it sat on the shelf for a long, loooong time. Now, I share with you what was truly the beginning of my journey as a writer.

  The world created for Gathering of the Storms is rich, full of family and love, power and deceit. Magick and mayhem. So without further ado...

  Welcome to Draema!

  Introduction

  There is one truth: Once passion is awakened, it is as potent and lethal as any storm.

  ~~~~~~

  After the Breaking, many flocked from their devastated homelands to the new province of Draema to begin anew. The people who called themselves Gaian chose to walk a different path. Now, love and danger bring them together again.

  ~~~~~~

  The threat to Rhia Greysomne, First Heir of Draema, has struck time and again. Each plot, darker and more devious than the last, closer to family and loved ones.

  How did a creature only known in fairy tales come to possess the magick of the Gaian clans? And how does he keep eluding the Realmwalkers, only to strike where they least expect it?

  The Wind Storm and the Fire Storm have run out of time. Since he can’t seem to get to her, Rhia’s husband, RuArk Miwatani, Protector of the Realm, is now firmly in the cross-hairs of their unseen enemy.

  So Rhia will do what she does best—kick ass and take names, Draeman style. A reckoning is at hand...and Rhia will be the victor. Period.

  WARNING: Cunning, but gorgeous bad guys with extra-long teeth abound. Laser pistols, katanas and bows all meet in the ring, complete with hunky swagger.

  Chapter One

  RuArk lay motionless, barely breathing. Linc managed to help roll him over as Rhia pressed strong, but trembling fingers to the large vein in his neck. His heartbeat was much too faint and fever flashed out of nowhere. He was suddenly so warm, the still-falling rain should have evaporated the second it touched his body. The blood was everywhere. She reigned in panic as RuArk stirred, and a tired groan slipped from his lips. She might not be a perfect Gaian woman, but crisis? Crisis she could do.

  “Rhia...” He tried to lift his injured arm to touch her, but the weight of it seemed too much. It flopped into the mud in a puddle of red-tinged water. The ripped sleeve of his tunic fell away and she saw it—a huge gash across his left shoulder. The skin and muscle lay wide open and she could see clear down to the bone.

  Her temper flared. “How long did he fight with his shoulder hacked open? Why didn’t any of you take care of him?” she snapped at the group at large. Right now she didn’t care who answered.

  “RuArk, lay still,” Rhia barked as he tried to get up. By the third time he’d almost tossed her onto her butt, she straddled him in an effort to keep him from moving. The man might be only half conscious, but he was wholly pissed off and determined to get up off the cold wet ground.

  RuArk stumbled to his feet as she continued to cling to him. “I can take care of myself,” he hissed, throwing her own words back at her. He fell heavily against her chest, clutching the front of her soaked tunic. His lips tipped up into a half smile and Rhia wondered what the hell he found so funny while he was dying before her eyes.

  When his breathing became short and raspy, Rhia had had enough. She stood up on her tip toes, grabbed him by what was left of his tunic and whispered for his ears alone.

  “Listen up, RuArk, because this is your only warning. You’re. Going. Home. Don’t make me take advantage of the situation by having you dragged there.” She softened her demands with a gentle, “Please, don’t be boneheaded about this.”

  He looked down at her, but said nothing. They both knew she’d won this little battle and this time when he hit the ground like a fallen tree, he remained unconscious.

  Warriors gathered around the Protector of the Realm, and tried to push past Rhia to gather up RuArk’s prone body. They obviously didn’t realize who they were dealing with. The first warrior who inadvertently put his hands on her landed on his head next to RuArk. The next found himself standing on the toes of his boots. While he tried to get away from the agonizing pain shooting up his arm Rhia had twisted behind his back, her thumb worked a sensitive nerve at the base of his spine that kept him immobilized.

  “All of you step back,” she yelled, then turned to Linc, Dalmore and Osgar.

  “Linc and Dalmore, take him home as fast as you can. Osgar, send someone across the river to the Grandfather, then tell Drefan to double check the security on the gates. All of them.”

  The two men caught RuArk underneath his arms. Their muscles strained with the weight. In the end, it took four warriors to get RuArk up the hill to the villa.

  Lunis met them on the front porch with a wicked black fireplace poker in his hand. One look at RuArk and the poker was forgotten, left to clatter loudly on the stone at his feet as he ran ahead to prepare their bed and get extra linens. Rhia still shouted orders.

  “Lunis, after you help us get him upstairs, send a runner to the Society of Physicians and the Gaian Healers. Have them set up a triage area. Use the security force’s barracks for the more serious cases. Then find Brita and have her bring her medicines. Sharyn, too. Tell those women to get their asses up here immediately.”

  RuArk lapsed in and out of c
onsciousness as his body continued to burn at an alarming rate. Rhia grew more and more nervous as he approached delirium. There was no reason he should have a fever this fast.

  But then, this whole business was strange. No Draeman colony, nor any of the colony’s townships had been attacked since the wars and reconstruction after the Breaking. Who were those men who’d dared attack her home? And how had they gotten into the township? There hadn’t been anyone in front of or behind her when Drefan waved her through the inner wall’s gates. What the hell was going on?

  Lunis put down a plastic-like material on one side of the bed and placed clean sheets over it. The warriors settled RuArk on top of it, removed his boots and leggings, and then filed out of the bedroom solemnly. Linc stayed behind.

  Rhia threw a towel over RuArk’s groin while Linc removed his underclothes. An already serious expression hardened as he helped remove RuArk’s ruined leather tunic.

  The wound was horrendous. The only thing holding RuArk’s shoulder to his body was the bone itself. The slash was deep, but thankfully the cut was clean. So why did it look like this? The bleeding had slowed, but a strange yellow fluid mixed with the blood seeped out of the gaping flesh, bubbling as it came up out of the wound.

  The skin around the cut was a sickly gray that faded to a putrid-looking raw pink. She’d been in endless blade fights and countless skirmishes, but she’d never seen anything like this. Rhia stopped breathing.

  His skin was scalding to the touch. She sponged the wound as best she could and then covered him with light linens. Then for the first time in her life, she prayed.

  “His fever is raging, Linc. Please go see what’s keeping Brita and Sharyn.” He didn’t move right away, only stood watching her with a stoic expression. Hell, she didn’t have time for this. “What, Linc?” she barked as she brushed a stray lock of hair back from RuArk’s forehead.

  “I respect your strength and courage, fighting alongside us as you did, but if he leaves this realm, I will never forgive you.”

  Her fingers stilled at the coldness in the First Commander’s voice.

  “What does this have to do with me?”

  “The Wind Storm refused to have his wound seen to because he was more concerned for your whereabouts and safety than his own life. He continued to fight until he saw you were safe. If you had been where you were supposed to have been, he would have been under the care of the healers long ago, and much more assured of life than he is at this moment.”

  Linc left the room without another word, and quietly snapped the door closed behind him. What else was there to say? After all, he was right. The battle may not have been her fault, but RuArk’s current state of health certainly was. There was no arguing that he would be in much better shape if he’d been treated earlier. Now there was absolutely nothing she could do except comfort him with cool towels and wait for Brita and Sharyn to arrive.

  * * * * *

  The two women had taken two steps through the main door into RuArk and Rhia’s apartment and were no further than the living room when Rhia appeared at the threshold of the bedroom, blade at the ready. The bastards who’d attacked had gotten past the gates once and she wasn’t taking any chances. Relieved to see her friends, Rhia dropped her blade with a muffled thud on the thick carpet and blurted out her concerns.

  “Brita, what do I do? What do you want me to do? Linc and I removed his wet clothing and covered him lightly, but his fever is so high. The wound looks horrible. How can I help?”

  “You can help by leaving us to our tasks,” replied Sharyn, already marching into the bedroom toward RuArk’s too-still body.

  “Are you crazy! I’m not going anywhere,” Rhia growled.

  “Rhia, nobody said you have to leave, but we can’t tend him if you’re damn-near on top of him,” Brita said as she joined Sharyn at the side of the bed. She nudged Rhia aside to get a good look at RuArk’s large flushed body. She pulled a digital steth out of her bag and placed it on his chest.

  “His fever is high, but his heartbeat is strong, though a bit erratic. His lungs don’t sound clear. Strange, since the wound is on his shoulder. I’ll give him some meds to stave off infection. When he awakes tomorrow, his fever should have come down significantly.” Brita dropped the steth back in her bag, then snatched two small packets of crushed brown something-or-other from an inner compartment.

  Thank god Brita knew about medicines. It was times like this Rhia wished she’d paid more attention to the woman’s instruction when she was growing up, rather than chasing young boys with wooden swords.

  Sharyn changed places with Brita, closed her eyes and let her hands move about RuArk’s temples. Rhia pulled in a swift breath as goose bumps jumped across her skin. A familiar tingling sensation tickled the base of her skull. She knew Sharyn was using her Gift on RuArk.

  “What are you doing to him, Sharyn?”

  “I am listening to his body. We must determine where to begin the healing before Brita gives him the fever medicine. The wound in his shoulder is... wrong. The yellow substance oozing from it is almost alive with a vile taint. I can sense it. I am afraid it will take both of us to heal him.”

  “Both of us?” Rhia shrieked. “What the hell am I supposed to do? You know I can’t control my Gift yet. In fact, we don’t even know what my Gift is.”

  “Come here, Rhia.”

  She hesitated, unsure and afraid for the first time in ages. “Sharyn, if I screw up, I’ll be responsible for RuArk’s death.”

  “Come here. Now.”

  Even in her concern, Rhia couldn’t keep her brows from flying upward. Sharyn hadn’t raised her voice, but her tone dropped into a deep octave that took the option of refusal off the table. Rhia moved next to her friend and prepared for who-knew-what.

  “You do not have to know how to use your Gift to help him, Rhia. Just open yourself to me. My skill and knowledge of my Gift of Healing will join with your innate power, and magnify it.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then we wait. The rest will depend on his strength and will. If he were a weaker man, there would be no hope for him, regardless of our Gifts.”

  “Please, just tell me what to do. He’s starting to wheeze. Hurry up!” She was beside herself with worry and didn’t realize she was practically strangling the other woman until Sharyn looked calmly down at the hands clutching the collar of her tunic. Blushing, Rhia quickly removed her fingers and let her arms fall to her sides.

  “Just relax, Rhia and follow my lead. Reach for your Source and allow the Gift to come to the surface on its own. If you open to it, it will come. Once you feel it, let me take control from there.”

  The two women knelt on the top step of the huge platform bed next to RuArk’s body, and placed their hands on his chest and belly with their fingers touching.

  Rhia closed her eyes and opened herself to her Source. She sensed rather than saw a faint light flare to life, then grow brighter as she made contact with her Source. She felt Sharyn gently take control of it, taking Rhia along for the ride. She felt everything Sharyn felt, saw what Sharyn saw.

  They could see the wound now from inside RuArk’s body. Sharyn probed down through the layers of skin, the fibrous bands of muscle, the veins and blood vessels, everything. Then she zoomed in on the source of RuArk’s distress.

  Poison. Blood poison. Rhia had no idea how she knew, but the knowledge was there none the less. She also instinctively knew it would take an amazing amount of strength to neutralize and remove the taint and heal RuArk’s torn and shredded muscles, nerves and tissue.

  Sharyn spoke into Rhia’s mind. “Rhia, we will remove the poison first, then heal the severed nerves. That is all we can do.”

  “But where will the blood poison go?”

  “We can expose it to the light, pure Source energy.” At her obvious confusion, Rhia felt Sharyn struggle for a Draeman equivalent of what they were about to do. “Think of it as a laser of sorts. It will dissolve it... unmake it, in a manner of speakin
g.”

  “Okay, I think I get it. Can we heal him and seal him up completely?”

  “No. It’s going to take all our strength just to remove the poison, and we’re going to be close to completely drained by the time we are done. If our strength fades while we are still linked to RuArk, we can become infected, lose him and kill ourselves as well. We will do what we can, then Brita can mend the torn tissue. Are you ready?”

  “Yes. Do it.”

  The next instant, Rhia felt a tremendous surge of energy rush toward and then through her. It reached into RuArk, who jerked and bucked as they worked. Thankfully, Linc had returned in the middle of the healing session and between the three of them, they managed to keep contact with RuArk’s body and each other.

  When they were done, they released their Source with an inaudible whoosh. Rhia promptly collapsed into the nearest cocoon-like comfy chair and willed the bright spots and sparkles behind her eyelids to go away. Linc helped Sharyn up from the spot on the floor she’d crumpled onto.

  Lunis entered with a tray of tea and broth. “Ladies, you should eat something to regain your strength.” He sat the food down on the small table between them, but Rhia wasn’t sure she could move enough to eat anything just now.

  “Linc, help me,” Brita called from across the room. “I need to get this down his throat.”

  “What is it?” Linc asked quietly.

  “Clear broth with paracetinil for the pyrexia...”

  “Py-what?” Linc asked.

  “Pyrexia. The clinical name for fever. And meds for the pain and swelling.” Brita mixed a pungent-smelling concoction from a number vials on the table, then moved swiftly toward RuArk.

  Linc held up the head of a semi-conscious RuArk as Brita slowly spooned the liquid into his mouth and massaged his throat to make sure it went down. After she’d done this several times, Rhia watched her prepare a packet of flexible, clear surgi-thread.

  Though the blood vessels and nerves had been healed by Sharyn, the layers and layers of muscle and skin, Brita mended by hand with the smallest of stitches. Rhia was thankful that her lifemate felt no pain and that the surgi-thread would dissolve on its own. When Brita was done, RuArk had nine-inches of red, angry skin that oozed just the slightest bit of blood.