Hood's Obsession: Kingdom Series, Book 9

by Marie Hall

  “Knight? What?” She shook her head.

  “Shh.” He placed a finger over his lips and then pointed straight ahead.

  Shaking the marbles loose, she blinked through her blurred vision and noted that they seemed to be locked inside of a hollowed-out corner of mountain. The moment she noticed that she also noticed she was sitting in water and not only were her ankles chained together, but she was bound around her middle with a fibrous section of rope.

  “What?” She jerked with a sudden jolt of adrenaline brought on by a sharp burst of fear.

  Wolves did not like to be tied up.

  Breath coming in rapid-fire punches, she twirled on her butt as the enormity of their situation became obvious to her. She was sitting inside a large, black cast-iron pot. Beside her, Giles sat in his own pot.

  “Great wolf!” she cried. “We need to get out, we can’t—”

  “Shh.” He hissed again louder, and this time his brows dropped and his head swiveled toward the door where a long slice of shadow inched beneath it. “They’ve posted guards,” he began in a whisper. “I heard them say they would not begin supper until the meat had awoken.”

  “Meat?” she squeaked, swallowing down the bile that had risen at the mere mention of them being meat. “Shift, Giles, get us out of here.”

  He glowered. “I cannot.” His chin jerked toward a fat black beeswax candle cushioned between sections of chiseled rock. Its black flame flickered macabrely across the shiny surface of the silver veined stone walls.

  “The candle is blocking you?” Lilith tried so hard to keep the tone of her voice down. Now that Giles had warned her she could indeed hear the murmurings of dwarves just outside the door.

  Their voices held a gruff, rumbly tone to them, which clearly came from mining in the dark bowels of the earth and constantly inhaling dusty fumes.

  Lilith gripped the edge of her pot, fingers curling around the lip of it as she tried in vain to not think about the fact that all they needed to do was light a fire and she’d be wolf stew.

  “My necklace,” she gasped, realizing there could be no better time to use fairy magic than right now. But when she patted her neck it was gone, in its place a little brown sachet tied with a string of leather.

  He shook his head, “I already looked. They stripped our possessions while we’d been out.”

  Gripping the sachet, she attempted to open it to see what was inside. It was squishy and full of something, but she had no clue what. There were no visible openings, so she lifted it to her nose and sniffed.

  There was a pleasant but slightly earthy smell inside. She’d never smelled the scent before. A hideous thought came to her then. “Is this a pouch of cooking herbs?”

  His eyes were hollow. The red in them almost a dull, lackluster yellow. She did not like that look, she would not accept that look.

  “Stop it,” she snapped at him and dropped the sachet. “You will not get sad about this.”

  “It’s my fault, Lilith. I should have guarded you better. I should have been more alert.”

  She waved her hand. “No, you couldn’t have known. I have better hearing than you and I did not hear them. I heard you in the bushes, though.” She arched a brow at him, completely disgusted with herself. She’d been all too aware of Giles’s hot gaze on her while she’d bathed, and maybe it had been her focus on him that had prevented her from hearing the sneaky bastards coming up, but she didn’t quite believe so.

  Stone dwarves were said to possess almost preternatural powers when in the vicinity of their particular cave system.

  “Think.” She looked at him. “Can’t you get out of the ropes? Maybe you can’t shift, but—”

  He slapped his hand across the water. She noticed that, unlike her, his wrists were bound.

  The room was very dark, but thanks to the flickering of the candle she was able to see faint scratch marks across her wrists.

  “I couldn’t undo mine. They seem to spelled. But I was able to get yours off. I had hoped that with your hands free you could undo yourself at the very least and slip away.”

  Even in the face of death he still continued to try and save her.

  Nodding, knowing if she did manage to undo her knots she wouldn’t leave him. She went to work on the rope around her waist. Though it was lax enough to let her move, it still gripped tight enough to her that she knew they had no intention of her slipping free so easily.

  Her human fingers were clumsy on the sodden fiber ropes. “Ugh,” she growled. “I can’t even find where the knot begins.”

  Outside the voices grew and one of them rumbled loud enough for them to hear, “I do believe the meat has woken. Send for Heapy.”

  Giles’s gaze snapped back to hers and in them she read his fear. Though if she knew him, she sensed that fear was not for himself.

  “Maybe if you shift, Lilith, use your claws. You have to get away from here.”

  And go where? It was on the tip of her tongue to argue it, but she did want out of her bonds if for no other reason than to blow out that infernal candle and help him to shift to shadow.

  If she’d been thinking straight from the beginning she would have known to do that first. Rolling her eyes at her stupidity, she quieted her mind and called to her light and then paused when she sensed its absence punch through her like a fist. Black ice skated down her spine.

  “My wolf,” she whimpered. “They’ve done something to my wolf.”

  Squeezing her eyes shut, she called the light again. And still nothing, just a vast emptiness that made hot tears gather at the corners of her eyes. She wasn’t sure how, or what they’d done, but just as with Giles they’d prevented her from calling their means of salvation.

  Reluctant to give up—even though she heard several pairs of shuffling feet just outside the door—she attacked the rope around her again.

  Slicing her fingers open on the coarse material, she wouldn’t stop. Even as the door handle began to jangle and the cackling laughter of devilish glee slipped through the room.

  Lilith would not have stopped trying at it if it hadn’t been for Giles’s soft voice.

  “I’m so sorry, Lilith.”

  Swiping at her tears, she shook her head. She wasn’t sure for what, or if she were trying to convey a meaning to him by it, but it was all she could do for a minute. Just shake her head sadly.

  Their pots were close enough that if she leaned over she’d get to within an inch of his beloved face. Moving as close as she could, she leaned into him.

  “Knight?”

  “Yes?”

  They were in dire straits, and the odds were very good that they would not walk away from this alive, but even in the darkness a wolf could sometimes find humor. “Orcs, yes. Centaurs called Chest, yes. But flesh-eating dwarves…bluidy hell, knight, we have the worst luck.”

  She said it with a lilt in her voice and tears gathering in her eyes. It was so unfair that things should end this way, and yet if there was one good thing that could come from this it was that she refused to ignore her feelings for him any longer.

  “Lilith?” He lifted up both hands and gently traced one finger down her cheek, causing her lashes to flutter at the sensual touch.

  “Aye?” She clutched at his fingers, pinning them to her cheek desperate he never stop touching her.

  “Can I kiss you?”

  Smile going wide and her heart trapped in her throat, she nodded forcefully. His kiss lacked the passionate intensity it had had the other night, but it was full of so much more. Of unspoken promises and vows. In this kiss she finally tasted Giles’s truth, and the words that had refused to pass his lips now came pouring forth.

  He loved her.

  She felt the sentiment flutter through every square inch of her body as he pulled away.

  “That kiss was—”

  “I love—” Giles began to say.

  Her eyes widened. “Kiss!”

  The doorknob rotated slowly, the door creaked open with a groan.
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br />   “What?” he asked, jerking his head toward the door as a gathering of dwarves bearing unlit torches piled through.

  “Kiss. Giles. Kiss!”

  She knew he didn’t have a clue what she was getting at, but the rush of jubilation had tied her tongue completely. Smiling stupidly at the miniature men stamping through, she whispered two words.

  “Ying. Lor.”

  Giles wanted to crow the moment Lilith had murmured the dragon warrior’s name. The rock foundation shook, and the fifteen or so dwarves already inside threw out their arms for balance, gazing around with terror-filled eyes as a giant fissure tore through the stone.

  There was nothing more deadly to a stone dwarf than a cave collapse.

  The power of the earthquake didn’t last long though. As quickly as it had come, it was gone.

  Hoping that maybe the shifting ground beneath had snapped some of the chains holding him in place, he was disappointed to learn that besides a little water sloshing over the rim’s edge, nothing more had happened. The candle hadn’t even blown out.

  But when he glanced at Lilith she no longer looked like a frightened little cub, she was smiling gleefully at the stumpy men, as though she knew a secret none of the rest of them did.

  Taking his cue off her, he forced his mind to relax. A warrior was only as strong as his mind, for a second he’d allowed the panic to take him, believing he’d failed not only Erualis and Rumpel, but also the shifter who was coming to mean more to him than any vow of fealty he’d ever sworn.

  This would not be the way things ended for them. It wouldn’t. He’d be patient, and wait for the moment freedom revealed itself.

  “This meat has brought us much trouble,” a dwarf who stood in the center of the semi-circle of grizzled men said. “Shy, why haven’t they been cooked yet?”

  The leader didn’t simply look as though he hated the thought of bathing—as he was coated in years’ worth of grime and dust—but he was also missing an eye. The skin around the empty socket looked melted down, as though someone had stuck a torch to it. Perhaps another victim of the cooking pot that’d managed to escape?

  Giles could only hope.

  A little man hidden behind the shoulders of another much broader dwarf stepped out and hung his blond head bashfully, rubbing his hands together. The length of his hair fell nearly to his knees, shielding him from view as though he stood behind a curtain.

  “Sorry, Heapy. Sorry.” His head bopped up and down. “But Vet said the meat would be too soft and bland unless pumped full of adrenaline to make it stringy and game it up.” His voice was a meek whisper of sound.

  “Aye, just so!” Another dwarf came forward; this one was wearing tiny little spectacles across his bulbous nose. He scratched at his matted red hair and without missing a beat, stared at his finger, then sucked it into his mouth. “Meat must be tenderized.”

  Giles scrunched his nose. “I am the royal valet of Rumpelstiltskin. This female,” he pointed to Lilith, “is under his protection as well. Release us at once.”

  Rumpel had done much business with the dwarves in the past, and just as his master loved his deals, the dwarves loved making money. Of which Rumpel had a limitless amount.

  “We know who you are,” the one called Heapy snarled, then, grabbing his stomach, he hollered, “Well, what say you men—should we release the meat?”

  “No!” The voices thundered, causing pebbles to crumble off of the ceiling and rain down on their heads.

  Even the bashful Shy was pumping his fist in unison with his brothers’ chants.

  The flame of the black candle flickered.

  “Oh, I really think you might want to rethink that, dwarves,” the sultry strains of Karis’s voice suddenly echoed through the room.

  As one the dwarves twirled on their heels, roaring at the lone female holding the tip of her sword at the center of Heapy’s chest.

  Shy lifted his hands, looking as though he meant to tackle Karis to the ground.

  The petite brunette laughed. “Oh, dwarf, I promise you don’t want to go there.”

  And then Rayale’s pipes began to play. The beautiful dark-skinned pied piper stepped out from the shadows and bowed toward Giles and Lilith even as she continued to play her song.

  The music seemed only to be attuned to the dwarves and no one else, because only they stood still and silent. Their eyes were wide in fury, though, as the final member of the deadly three stepped into the room.

  Ying plopped her hands onto her hips, her golden bow gleamed like fire as she gazed around. “Well,” she looked at them, “are you gonna get out or stay and get cooked? The girls and I were just about to get our mani-pedis done.”

  “The flame, if you could.” Giles jerked his chin in the direction of the candle.

  Lifting a brow, Ying glanced over her shoulder. “Ah, demon, you’ve shown us your weakness. How wonderful.” And then, with a smirk that revealed just a hint of fang, she turned on her heel and blew out the flame.

  Sighing with relief the instant he felt his body become his own again, Giles shifted to shadow, easily slipping free of the bonds and turned toward Lilith. “Lilith,” he said in a ghostly whisper, “can you ssshift yet?”

  She shook her head. “No.” She sounded positively grumpy about it.

  “Then may I asssist you?” He held out his hand.

  “Absolutely.” Her smile was broad.

  No one else in the room could have understood the gift she’d just given him by accepting his help. It was the first time she’d ever allowed it, tamping down his triumph of the moment, he inclined his head in thanks.

  “Yeah, can we get on with this already?” Karis asked. “This wee little bastard here is eyeing me like I’m a slice of filet mignon and I really think it’s time to go.”

  Grasping hold of Lilith’s hand, he transferred his shadow ability to her and pulled her free of the binds. The moment she was out he released her hand and she was whole once more.

  Shivering, she rubbed her arms up and down. “Thank…thank you,” she clacked through her teeth.

  Becoming human again he gathered her into his arms and held her tight. So grateful to have her with him and safe once more.

  “All righty, then.” Ying smiled and bowed at the gathered dwarves. “Come after us and I’ll kill you all. So let’s just forget this little tete a tete shall we?”

  Yanking on Giles’s collar, Ying jerked her head in the direction of the door, where Rayale was already backpedaling away though still playing her pan flute.

  “Let’s go,” she singsonged.

  Lacing his fingers with Lilith’s they turned and followed the xiather.

  “Karis!” Ying snapped.

  Turning up her nose, Karis lifted the hilt end of her sword and snapped it down on the thick head of Heapy, who crumbled in a pile at her feet.

  Giles could not imagine what had possessed her to do such a thing, harming the ruler of the dwarves could incite their fury even further.

  “What?” She shrugged. “He was freaking me out. Now let’s go.”

  The moment they turned from the room whatever spell Rayale had cast with her music dissipated and the grunts and groans of angry dwarves rang out like a disturbed hornet’s nest after them.

  “Quick. Quick. Quick.” Ying cried, racing with sure-footed steps up the steep embankment of a smoothed-out dirt path. “We gotta get to the top.”

  No sooner had she spoken the words than she was pulling her bow off and with a speed born of dragon blood she snapped one flaming arrow after another into the hearts of dwarfs chasing after them.

  Karis took to the lead in front of them, slashing and dashing her way through. Rayale was well in front of all of them, she was playing, but her power to drive off attackers seemed only to last within a certain range of sound and she seemed to be in charge of keeping the path to topside as relatively clear as possible.

  “It would help if I could shift,” Lilith panted.

  She was clinging to his fing
ers, running as fast as she could to stay by his side, but she definitely seemed slower. The dwarves had done something to her.

  Giles could practically feel the stench of dwarf breath on the back of his neck. Short they might be, but they could run.

  “Can I shift us again? They can’t take us in shadow.”

  Shifting for someone not of demone blood could be painful and could even cause lasting harm to the person’s psyche, but they had no choice. She was lagging behind and the women weren’t slowing their pace one bit.

  “Yes,” she said without hesitation.

  Praying that there would be no more black candles along the way, Giles shifted the both of them. Lilith’s soul pulsed around his with a frenetic, almost angry beat.

  She was terrified and clinging to him.

  Wrapping himself around her as best as he could, trying his hardest to shield her from the chaotic roll and movement of this style of travel, he caught up to Rayale in the blink of an eye and could finally see the faint edges of moonlight crest a few dozen feet away.

  Almost there, he whispered to her mind and felt the gentle nudge of her nod.

  In five more seconds they were there. Rayale finally took the pipe from her mouth and, gasping, said, “Go out. I’ll guard the entrance until we’re all out.”

  Nodding, he zipped outside and the second the cool night air brushed through him he shifted, placing Lilith on her feet.

  Her eyes were wide and dazed and she was wobbling so hard he had to grab her around her waist. “Little wolf, are you okay?” He brushed his fingers through her hair.

  Swallowing air, she buried her face in his neck and nodded. “Just…just give me a second.”

  He patted her back and watched as Ying finally slipped through the entrance. The heavy pounding of thousands of approaching feet thundered through the opening. Stepping back, the women linked hands as though they meant to make a final stand.

  “They need help, Lilith,” he said, disentangling her arms from his neck so that he could go and fight beside them. There was no way they’d be able to best the thousands within, but if they could just give Lilith enough of a head start, then that was all he could hope for.