Protector: A Young Adult / New Adult Fantasy Novel

by Joanne Wadsworth

  “Yet there will always be Peacian deaths at the hands of Dralion’s warriors,” Silas pointed out.

  “Not that high. We need to be given a fighting chance to defend ourselves. You and I both know how fast and precise their attacks are.”

  I touched a hand to my chest. Of course I didn’t agree with the loss of lives, would never condone an innocent man or woman’s killing, but this war wasn’t my doing, and it would never end with the capture of one man. Not when that man was my father. I couldn’t lose him, not now I’d finally found him.

  Silas sighed. “What about you? This isn’t like you to use an innocent to gain the outcome you want. There must be a way to make this right.”

  Davio scrubbed both hands over his face. “There is no other way.” He shot to his feet and stormed to his desk. “Faith will not leave Dralion now, not if she hopes to protect Alexo and herself.” He picked up a framed photograph from his desk and stared at it. “She is the one I want, and I can’t have her.”

  Silas crossed the room and squeezed Davio’s shoulder. “So how are we better off? She’ll be on her guard, as will Alexo. This argument and the loss of your mate will have all been for nothing.”

  The photograph in Davio’s hands was the one I kept on my bedside stand, the one of Silvie and me as we’d celebrated my last birthday at Pier’s Restaurant. He must have snuck back and pinched it.

  Davio set the frame back on his desk. “She will have alerted him. She left before I could prevent her, and before I was supposed to have taken her to the holding cell. I should have done as Carlisio bid and made it quick, only I wanted more time with her. This is my fault she escaped.”

  Tears slipping free, I closed my eyes. I missed him, no matter what he’d done. I rubbed my temple, the familiar ache of being denied our connection rolling through me. Three days was all I’d ever lasted in being kept from forming the merge of the mind with him. I doubted I could go much longer than that and be able to sustain the pain. Already it had begun to build.

  “Faith.” Mum peered around my bedroom door.

  “Come in.”

  She smiled, all blushy and pink and glowing, which had me recalling exactly what she’d been up to earlier that day. “You and Dad are together again, huh?” I rolled my shoulders.

  “How did you”—she coughed, clearing her throat—“ah, no, please don’t tell me how you know that. The things you and Alexo can do are almost criminal.”

  “Trust me, I wish I didn’t know.” I patted the bed beside me. “Sit. We need to talk.”

  “About?”

  “My mind-merge.”

  She eased in beside me, tilting her head. “Go for it.”

  “Dad first said my mind-merge was an extension of my forethought, that I’d activated it because of my warring blood with Davio. What I do is merge my mind with his and with touch, skin-to-skin, I no longer experience pain. Yet if Dad had this ability to bed down in your mind, warring blood or not, he would discover there is no choice—he would have to mind-merge with you.” I looked into her eyes intently. “I can go a few days without the merge, but when I’m not with Davio, my mind cries out for his. He’s not affected at all like I am, but then he can’t mind-merge. I’m the one who has the skill—not him. So, I’m certain this is a separate ability. Entirely.”

  “Which means?”

  I sighed, finally giving into the knowledge which resonated deep in my heart and soul. “I can’t go more than three days without him. I need to reconnect to his mind to restore the balance of the merge. I don’t know if anyone else has this skill. Everyone’s presumed it’s part of my forethought, and we all know how rare that skill is. Maybe this mind-merge skill is a rare one too.”

  “I see.”

  I shook my head. “No, you don’t see. A Magioling’s strength skills are passed down through their DNA. I didn’t receive this skill of mind-merge from my father or from the Wincrest family line. I had to have received this skill from you, from your family line. You are thirty-six and you could pass for my sister. You are an orphan with no known family. You are also mated to Alexo Wincrest when there has never been any other mating between an Earthling and one of theirs before. Now there is Davio and me. There are too many variables. You can’t be of Earth. Don’t you see it?”

  “Faith, no. I don’t have any strength skills.” She twisted her fingers together.

  “Not all Magiolings do.” I laid my hand over hers. “Please, you have to know something which could help me. This is so important. Already my head aches, and I can’t go to him.”

  Her brow creased. “You fast-heal. Why can’t you go to him?”

  “My fast-healing skill doesn’t aid me in this.”

  It had not relieved the symptoms for me on the mountaintop when I’d needed it so desperately. Only reconnecting to Davio’s mind had completed the healing.

  I heaved a sigh. “I can’t go to him now, not after he’s chosen to use me as leverage to capture Dad.” Mum’s eyes widened, her hands shaking under mine. “It just happened today, Mum. I’m sorry to have to tell you like this.”

  “Sol,” she stated. “You know my maiden name is Sol, and that I was just a baby, around three days old, when I was orphaned. What I haven’t told you is that the nuns who ran the home said my mother’s name was Katerin and that she came alone. My mother left me there.” The truth came tumbling out, and she grimaced. “It hurts to know she never returned. She promised the nuns she would, but she never did. Because of that there was no option for adoption.”

  “Katerin Sol,” I repeated.

  “The nuns named me after my mother. They weren’t sure what else to do.”

  I repeated the name again, that of my grandmother’s name. “It’s a start. Is there anything else?”

  In his dark leathers, Dad entered the room, a glow to his cheeks similar to my mother’s. “I’ve been watching your conversation. My apologies. It’s a bad habit.” He clenched his jaw. “In the future, everything you two discuss of this kind of importance, you will discuss with me present. We are a family.”

  I pressed my fingers to my temples. “We have a name. Katerin Sol. Now where do you suggest we go from there?”

  He planted his feet wide. “We start by backdating Kate’s age. Thirty-six years ago, Dralion’s dome had been intact for four years. If Katerin Sol was from Dralion, she would’ve been a female warrior for that’s the only way she could’ve gotten out.”

  I bounded to my feet. “Are you saying that’s a possibility?”

  He pressed a finger to his chin. “No, there have been no Sols as warriors until two years past when Maslin Sol joined the ranks, and he is the first from within his family line.” He looked at me. “The skill of mind-merge has never been recorded in our land, which is why I believed it must be an extension to my forethought.”

  “What do you think now?”

  “I agree with your assessment. It’s a separate skill and quite possibly rare. We need to seek more information.”

  Mum rose and crossed to Dad’s side. “How do we do that? What of Katerin Sol?”

  He took her hands. “It is far more likely she came from Peacio where there are no restrictions on their people’s travels.” Glancing at me, he said, “Which means you’ll need to have Loveria search his history books. We have to be certain. He must hold the information we’re after.”

  “I’ll contact Belle now.”

  “Before you do, understand that I would never fall for any of the Loveria family’s tactics. It hasn’t happened in the past, and it won’t in the future. If you were locked up, I would find a way to get you out without being captured. I have forethought for a reason.” He wrapped an arm around Mum’s waist. “We’ll leave you alone to make that call.” They flashed away.

  In the silence, I paced, shaking out my hands as I crossed from one side of my room to the other. This upcoming conversation wouldn’t be easy.

  Taking a deep, steadying breath, I opened the link.

  “Belle, ca
n we talk? I need you to be the go-between again between Davio and I since I don’t have a—”

  “Of course. No telepathic link yet. Silvie told me why you left. If it helps, I don’t agree with what’s gone down. It’s not right that he’s using you in this way, to capture your father.”

  “Yeah, but I have another problem. A big problem.” I opened my forethought and she shimmered into view. She sat in the rec room thumbing through a leather tome. “Could you call Davio to you? I need to see for myself what he says.”

  I didn’t have to wait long.

  “He’s here.”

  And he was. He’d ’ported to the rec room, bringing Silas with him.

  I rubbed my forehead, outlining every detail as it had gone down with my mother and father. I studied Davio’s reaction during the telling.

  He stormed to the windows, his fists clenching and unclenching. “Faith is lying,” he bit out. “This must be a trick. Sol is a common family name, as is the given name of Katerin. With our form of record-keeping it would be impossible for us to locate a woman who’s not been seen for thirty-six years.”

  Silas joined him at the windows. “I agree. This sounds too convenient.”

  “What it is,” Davio continued in a snarl, “is Wincrest’s strategy to circumvent what we’ve done. His wife is of Earth and Faith is a Halfling. All along Wincrest has said he won’t allow any warrior spies to know of his daughter’s connection to me.” He crossed his arms. “This battle is between him and us, and I’m certain he’ll turn up here to halt what we’ve done—the spreading of the truth, that I’m mated to a Halfling. I don’t see he’ll have any other choice if he wants to keep Faith safe.”

  Great. It appeared Davio didn’t believe me.

  “Belle, what of my ability to mind-merge? Has anyone ever heard of what I can do?”

  “No. If this has nothing to do with your forethought as you’ve said, then you’re the first I’ve heard of, but let me check.”

  She asked Davio my question, and he snapped his answer. “If I’d known about it, I would have said so before now. It’s damn convenient Wincrest says it has nothing to do with forethought or his family’s line of skills.”

  I sat in silence. How could Davio ignore the facts? When I found my voice, I murmured, “Belle, I’m starting to believe this skill isn’t known because it’s a lost one. A skill that is so rare it no longer exists.”

  “Explain why you believe that.” She repeated what I’d said to Davio.

  Once she had, I laid down and rested my head on my pillow, the canopy sweeping overhead. “I mean a deadly one. There is no one known who seems to have held this ability. I can’t forget that time on the mountain. I had no use of my limbs and was barely with it. I also can’t imagine trying to survive past that point, if Davio hadn’t turned up.”

  She was quiet.

  “And then there’s my mother. She told me she was left with the nuns when she was three days old.”

  She repeated every word to Davio, and he ground his heel into the floor. “I don’t believe this. Now she thinks to hold her safety over my head? No. This ruse will not work against me. Belle, can you feel her pain through your link?”

  She shook her head. “There’s no pain, just a slight headache and I’m not surprised by that.”

  Davio gritted his teeth. “Then to believe her words, I demand she come here and see me. The only way to tell she speaks the truth is to see her eye to eye.”

  And I couldn’t do that, not until he’d promised to revoke all he’d done, as well as to take back his decision to imprison me.

  “No. I won’t come. I’ll never allow him to hold me captive, either by his decision to use me as a pawn, or to lock me up within a steel cell.”

  Belle told him.

  “Then it’s a lie,” he gritted out.

  I groaned. We were getting nowhere.

  “Belle, perhaps if you could try and research the matter for me, I’d appreciate it.”

  “And what will you do?”

  “Stay put.”

  “For how long?”

  I looked at my mate where he stood. I wanted to go to him and ease his pain, yet instead, I took a deep breath and held firm. “On the mountain, I couldn’t have helped myself. I needed you and Davio then, as I need you both now.”

  Belle repeated my words, and Davio plowed a fist into the wall. “Damn it, she is a Wincrest through and through. She plays with my emotions. There is no skill on this planet which ultimately kills. If there had been, we’d have heard about it before now.” He stormed from the room.

  “Let him go,” I told her. “But contact me if you have any information.”

  There was nothing more to be done for now.

  Chapter 16

  I pushed back the sweaty strands of my hair stuck to my forehead. Dad pushed me in the empty arena, distracting me from my pain. His blade cut across mine and made me groan at the impact.

  “Dad,” I whimpered as I tried to hold my stance. “You have to give me a break. This session is killing me. You know I’m hitting the three-day mark away from Davio.” My training clothes were saturated, my feet so wet I slipped within my own socks.

  He twirled around and came at me from the behind, his white shirt billowing. “Another two minutes. You can’t arrive there too soon.”

  “I won’t arrive there at all, at this rate, and why are you working me so brutally hard?”

  Now in front. “You need to perfect this move. Every second counts.” He sidestepped and crossed his blade in a beautiful line, bringing it right up under my nose.

  I slammed my blade down, cutting him off in the nick of time. “Hey, okay, that’s enough,” I muttered. “I happen to need my nose.” Why did he keep changing positions? One moment he was in front, the next behind, to the side—it was endless.

  Mum called out from the sidelines, her arms crossed and pressed to the top of the safety railing. “Alexo, her nose is bleeding, and she’s so flushed.”

  I wiped my nose, the back of my hand now coated in blood. I’d never had nosebleeds before. I dropped my sword because I hurt. Everywhere. “Okay, so what exactly was your forewarning all about? You never did elaborate.”

  He took my elbow as I stumbled to the side of the outdoor arena. “I can’t elaborate, not when I have no wish to alter my forewarning’s course. You’ve practiced these battle moves, and now the field of play is far more even.”

  Huh, and Davio thought my father wasn’t fair. He was too damn fair. “My time’s almost up. I can’t do anymore.”

  “I know.” He cupped my cheek. “You can go to him now. The time is right. Loveria will be in the training hall where he works out with Silas. Here, take this.” He lifted a very new and gleaming sword from a bag lying on the bench, and passed it to me with a smile. “It’s yours. I had it crafted for you by our sword smithy. Consider it a belated eighteenth birthday gift.”

  So gorgeous. The most beautiful blade. I held it up, balancing it horizontally across the tips of my two index fingers. Perfect. I flipped the blade and the fine hilt slid snugly into my palm. “Thank you.” I glanced at Mum, who nibbled on her lower lip.

  “Hey.” I hugged her. “I’ll be back.”

  “You better be. I didn’t spend the last eighteen years watching you grow for no reason.”

  “Agreed.” I ’ported to my room, splashed water on my face and changed into a figure hugging black cat-suit. I belted my sword at my side and it blended with ease into the brassy strip that ran down the side of the clingy suit.

  Stretching, I ran my shaky hands over both legs.

  I was going in to fight, and I wouldn’t be backing down.

  With another two painkillers popped into my mouth, I gulped water. I’d taken meds this morning, primarily out of habit, and particularly since my fast-healing didn’t work at all on this pain. I’m not sure the meds helped, but they certainly couldn’t have hurt.

  I opened my link with Belle and fanned my face. “Do you have anythin
g yet?”

  “No, still nothing. It is as Davio said. There’s no record of a skill like yours.”

  The failure in her tone increased my pain. “Hey, you tried, and I’m most grateful you did.”

  “I won’t stop looking, but you need to return. Please, Davio is in the training hall, going at it with Silas again.”

  I flashed straight there. My father had said the time was right, and no more would I delay.

  “I’m here.”

  “I’m coming,” she rushed out.

  I turned about within the training hall. Davio puffed as he stared out the large bank of windows in form-fitting black jeans and a black t-shirt, the grassy meadow and rolling hills spread out into the distance. Silas stood beside him, heaving deep breaths as well from their workout.

  I closed my eyes, each breath becoming more difficult to draw in. Right now, I had to maintain my focus, because for certain I needed to withhold the mind-merge, no matter what. It would be my only leverage, provided he could see the pain I was in.

  Opening my eyes, I set my gaze on him. “Davio.”

  He spun around, his hand on his sword hilt belted at his side. “You’re back.” Dark shadows under his eyes showed he’d had very little sleep of late, and with them being so deep and dark, I wanted to cry.

  Silas gripped his shoulder. “She’s here. It’s not your imagination.”

  Davio’s gaze traveled over me. “Your skin is flushed, but apart from that you look fine.”

  “I’m a Wincrest. We try not to show our pain.” Fighting words as the pressure of the merge I withheld magnified and pressed out within my skull. He stepped forward, breaching the five feet mark, and it all went to custard. I grabbed my head. “No. Don’t come any closer.”

  I had to ensure my safety and my father’s first. There would be no mind-merge.

  I stumbled back, trying to gather more distance between us, only he flashed in behind me and I thumped into his chest.

  Gripping my shoulders, he turned me around, his lips flattened into a tight line. “Your heartbeat is racing out of control because you’re not mind-merged with me. Do it. Now.”