Brutal watched us, frowning slightly. I know he tried to eavesdrop, to hear what we said to one another. Our voices were pitched low enough that unless he had the hearing of a wolf, he heard nothing. I signaled, a slight hand movement, to let the others know to use muted hand and body movements. No sense in tipping our hand by gestures and facial expressions.
“I’ll not surrender,” I said quietly. “I must die here, today, or Kel’Halla falls into his hands. I must not be forced to marry him, for through me he’ll be King of Kel’Halla as my heir. I can’t be recaptured.”
Kel’Ratan nodded, his mustache bristling, his blue eyes bright. “By Nephrotiti, we’ll take no few of them with us!”
“What if we fight, and are taken as he threatened?” Witraz asked.
“A Kel’Hallan never surrenders,” Kel’Ratan growled. “We fight and die, or are captured and die harder. Either way, we will die, and our heart, our blood, our Kel’Halla, lives on. Our lives, our deaths, matter nothing. Only Kel’Halla matters.”
“He’ll never have Connacht,” Raine said quietly, his eyes on his sister. “Nor my sister.”
She scowled at him as though at a drooling idiot. She tossed her hair impatiently from her face, covering Tor. She opened her mouth to speak, but he continued on, inexorable, like a boulder rolling downhill.
“Connacht, while in the hands of enemies,” Raine murmured, his hand still in mine, but his icy grey eyes on his sister, “is yet free of the Khalidian yoke. I would rather she remain independent, under the banner of the barbarians, than another jewel in Brutal’s crown.”
His tone dropped, hardened. “If we must die to ensure that, we will. I’ll cut her throat first, before I will permit Brutal to have her.”
Given Arianne’s timidity, I expected her to cringe, show fear, that her own brother, her own flesh and blood, would kill her himself rather than see her alive and with Brutal. These two never entertained me with what I expected. I should have realized they both were as unpredictable as the wolves they resembled.
Arianne glared at her very dangerous brother. “That won’t be necessary,” she snapped.
“It’s very necessary, little cat,” Raine rumbled. “He’ll never touch you. By all the gods there are, he won’t.”
He glared, his eyes as icy, and predatory, as the day I met him. “Connacht, and Kel’Halla, will remain free. Whatever the cost to us.”
Dammit. This was the man I always dreamed of. Not that idiot Kael. Not Breen, whom my father chose. I craved a man of courage, of heart, of such charisma that even I, a leader in my own right, would follow into hell. Never before have I seen his like. The gods surely broke the mold when they made Raine.
“Whatever the cost,” I answered, taking his hand to my lips to kiss, as a vassal might offer her lord obeisance. I’d give him my loyalty as my king, and my love as his mate. If we can’t be together in this life, then, if the gods be kind, we’ll be together in the next.
His weird eyes warmed, his handsome face offering me that quirky smile I loved so much. His cheek flickered in a lightning wink, a flashing wink of a man who liked what he saw. Flipping my hand in his, he pressed it to his lips, not the back as a courtier, but my palm, as a lover.
One by one my warriors saluted him, clashing fists to chests, Kel’Hallan fashion. Even Tor saluted smartly. Corwyn, ever the Connachti, bowed low over his pommel and saluted Raine, liege to lord, Connachti fashion. Raine didn’t drop my hand in his, but he straightened in his saddle.
A king uncrowned, Raine nodded soberly, accepting the homage as his due.
“You know,” I said, tears standing in my eyes. “I never thanked you.”
His brow quirked in a silent question, inviting me to explain.
“Saving me from falling in a disgraced heap at Brutal’s little party.”
I grinned as he smiled. Leaning over, he kissed me, lingering, on the lips. His grey eyes a fraction from my own, he said softly. “I love you.”
He loves me! My heart soared on Bar’s immense wings. I knew it, I knew it, deep in my heart I knew he loved me. The gruff wolfish exterior fell away under three spoken words, his real feelings glowed from his strange eyes. How romantic a notion that he spoke them just before we both die in battle.
Now my tears dropped, one by one, down my cheeks. “I love you,” I whispered. “Dammit.”
His mouth melted to mine. My heart beat faster. I was going to die in the next few moments. Die with my sword in my hand, keeping safe my people and my homeland. Dying with the man I loved beside me. I’d stand proud before Nephrotiti’s throne, hand in hand with Raine, souls joined, mated, until the world was broken and made again.
I cared little that Brutal watched us kiss. He’ll never, ever, have what Raine and I now shared. Simple, true love. His soul will sicken and die, craving the very thing he sought for and died for.
I breathed in Raine’s most precious breath—
“You make me so sick I think I’m going to vomit.”
For a moment my mind turned the voice into Brutal’s harsh, nasal tone. Confused, my mind discovered it didn’t come from away and above us. It came from within our group and was Arianne’s.
Startled, Raine took his mouth from mine, his eyes from me. I turned my head, gawping at an Arianne I failed to recognize.
She sat the grey mare like one born to a saddle, her huge glorious, grey-blue eyes sparking anger. Her fair lips firm, her chin high, she reminded me of a Kel’Hallan warrior from old, a feral woman, tough, fearless. I found a woman who rode to her death with defiance in her song.
Proudly erect, her spine ramrod straight, her midnight hair fell to the mare’s dusty flanks, Arianne glared. Not at Brutal and his troops, I found. Her full and complete anger lay with us: Raine and me.
No trace of the timid slave, one who feared to eat her meals and hid behind her hair at the slightest raised voice remained. That person had vanished from those sparking, blue-grey depths. A princess shone from those eyes, one bred to war and steel. The cold etched in them might have come from Raine himself.
“What the hell?” Raine asked, clearly confused.
Her eyes might have drilled holes in him had he been a lesser man.
“You’re ridiculous,” she snapped. “You both are behaving stupidly.”
“Um,” Raine began diffidently, gesturing to the Federate troops around us, above us. “They aren’t here to invite us to a party. We’re all going to die here.”
“No one is going to die,” she growled. Growled?
Kel’Ratan edged away from her, his fingers making the sign against strong enchantment. My boys, eyeing her askance, reined their stallions to the flanks, making certain her anger fell anywhere but on them.
“What do you mean?” Raine asked, baffled.
“You are so dense,” she flared. “Listen to what’s inside you. None of us will die today. They will, but not us. You are acting like lovesick fools.”
“Just how are we going to walk away from hundreds upon hundreds of Brutal’s soldiers?” Kel’Ratan asked, his eyes bulging.
She flipped a dismissive hand. “Oh, ye of little faith.”
I exchanged an incredulous glance with Raine, with Kel’Ratan, with Witraz.
Raine shrugged. My vow to smack him should he ever shrug again entered my head then vanished when chaos erupted from the hills. From all around us came the sounds of the thudding of hundreds of hooves, the shrill whinnying of horses, shouted orders, curses, cries of panic. I wheeled Mikk toward the sounds.
I looked first to Brutal.
His commanders, aided by Tenzin and his kitty, hurried him, hustled him, back toward his horse, to safety. He didn’t try to stop them, but stared, aghast, as his neat plan unraveled like a cheap sweater. Loyal to the core, they pushed him from the outcropping toward the saddled and waiting horses. The white and gold Sins lowered their spears, standing in a bristling protective ring around him, backing away from the threat. Whatever that threat was, they’d die before i
t found their royal master.
“Now that’s a sight you don’t see every day,” Witraz commented, his tone conversational.
Wolves poured in a furry grey, silver and brown wave from under the forest trees, attacking the eastern company’s rear. As Witraz had described them, they were huge, bigger than yearling bulls, some as big as small horses. Grey, brown, black, silver, even a few white wolves in the mix galloped downhill. He’d said there were maybe sixty wolves tagging behind us. Somehow that number had quadrulpled. More wolves than I could count without demanding they stop and standstill for the next half hour galloped down from the hills.
Spreading wide in all directions, they snapped and snarled at the cavalry horses. While the Khalidians trained their horses to withstand an enemy charge, they never trained them to withstand the attack of slavering wolves. The wolf, the predator that preyed on horses.
It didn’t take much work on the wolves’ part to start a panic among the mounted troops. Fright spread from horse to horse in a tidal wave of terror. The flight or fight instinct had taken over in almost all the horses, and their riders were, for the most part, ignored.
Men cried out in fear and panic as their horses reared, fighting bit and spur, deadly fangs snapping at their flanks. Dozens ignored both and fled blindly. Many horses succeeded in dumping their riders and decamping, while others tried to fight back, to kick the nimble wolves. The wolves seemed to know exactly how to frighten the horses without actually harming them. Loud snarls, flattened ears, swift lunges at throats or hindquarters, sharp nips to flanks or shoulders that cut but did no lasting harm did far more to create absolute chaos than actually killing.
I suspect that’s exactly what the wolves intended. How in Nephrotiti’s name they knew that, I dared not guess. Horses shed their human burdens as quickly as possible and disappeared over the hills. No wolf chased them. Those soldiers left behind faced their snarling enemies on foot, with nothing but the weapons they had in their hands when their horses politely asked them to get off.
“Unbelievable,” Kel’Ratan murmured.
I noticed a strange pattern. The men that fell from their mounts were left alone, provided they rose and took to their heels. If they froze in paralytic shock, not moving, the wolves ignored them. A very few who stood, jaws agape, hands held high in surrender, watched as the massive beasts passed them by and left them unmolested. Those that remained mounted, but allowed their horses to run most probably survived to fight another day.
For the only humans the wolves killed were those that offered them battle.
Some foolish soldiers tried to fight, horseless, aiming their bows, or crossbows, or swinging their swords at a passing wolf. Those soldiers found themselves brought down, hamstrung from behind by sharp fangs, throats ripped out, dying a bloody, agonized death. Arrows and crossbow bolts whizzed past, the nimble and quick wolves galloping too fast to make an accurate target. Those stupid shooters died under bloody fangs for their efforts.
Still, a few more talented royals mastered their panicked mounts and spurred them to the attack. Wolves, those successful hunters, went for the vulnerable hamstrings of the horses. I inwardly winced every time a horse fell, kicking, whinnying in panic, when its legs could no longer hold it upright and moving.
Brutal’s finest tumbled from their saddles when their mounts collapsed under them, swords in their hands. Quick to rise, they fought to slay any wolf that came within range. As they dared to offer battle, the wolves lunged in. Wolves dodged sword blades to kill efficiently and seemingly without effort. Brutal’s soldiers went down under the hard-muscled weight of wolves that weighed more than they did. They, too, screamed out in terror and fear before sharp white fangs ripped their throats. Blood soaked into the ground, splashed on tree trunks, coated the long grass.
I noticed the wolves didn’t waste precious seconds to kill the helpless horses already brought down. Those stricken animals struggled to rise, panicked, trying to get hind legs to work that could serve them no longer.
Raine’s hand tightened around mine. I glanced up, meeting grey eyes wide with fear and horror. Horror he felt not at the bloodshed on the hillside above. He felt only terror of the wolf within. He feared the wolf that craved to run with his brothers and slay his enemies and protect those he loved. He feared the lust to open the throats of the men who dared harm his mate, his sister, and his friends.
He feared himself.
Don’t be afraid, I tried to say, but couldn’t. There was too much to be afraid of.
Running rampant, the wolves killed at will. Their fangs slashed exposed throats of the men who sought to kill them. Then, without pausing to worry the dying man, leaped to bring yet another down. All around, men bled to death from mauled throats, or crawled helplessly, trying to cover their necks. The wolves ignored those men who, down and groveling, offered little or no fight. They spared all who posed no threat to them. Or to us, standing in the small valley, captive, unable to either join the fight, or run from it.
I forced my eyes from the slaughter and looked up. Brutal, his Sins, his Tongu friends, his commanders, still stood at the highest point watching the very strange battle weave below them. Obviously, Brutal’s commanders wanted him to run, to escape, before the wolf army found time to gallop uphill and gnaw on his royal throat. Their distant voices, their frenzied gestures, informed me of how they urged Brutal to come with them, to run to safety. He did not, but stood, staring downhill, his jaw agape, as mere wolves sliced his royal soldiers into purple and gold ribbons.
Throwing my head wildly around, my hair flying, I looked for my boys taken captive by Brutal. From below, Alun waved his hands, shouting something I couldn’t hear. How did he get free? How did his hands get untied? No troops held him hostage any longer.
Frantic, I gazed upward, uphill, seeking Yuri and Yuras. I found them still mounted. Their horses, while snorting and spooking, white rimming their eyes, still maintained enough sense to not throw the young brothers. Their hands still tied behind their backs, Yuri and Yuras broke free of the bloody chaos and galloped downhill, guiding their chestnut stallions with their knees. Down, toward me and safety. No trooper tried to stop them.
Breathing a quick gust of relief, I shifted my gaze to the left.
Tenzin pointed grimly. A dozen grizzled hounds leaped downhill into the battle.
My throat caught. Had the wolves met their match?
“Don’t be silly,” Arianne said confidentially. “A mutt is never a match for a wolf.”
Twenty, more, wolves raced uphill to meet them. Each wolf outweighed a Tongu hound by triple. As though enjoying the challenge, the wolves singled out a grey and brown grizzled hound, one on one. Fifteen huge wolves rose against fifteen huge hounds. The others stood scattered amidst the combatants, keeping a wary eye on Brutal’s people. Keeping things fair, I thought with a half-hysterical giggle.
If I had to gauge the match, I was forced to admit the hounds had ferocity on their side. Their courage, their willingness to kill or die, might yet give them the edge. Yet, the wolves had the quick reflexes of natural killers. No hound that sought a vulnerable wolf throat or belly achieved its goal. Hound fangs snapped shut on air. Hound jaws closed on emptiness. Hounds wheeled to fight what threatened their hindquarters but found nothing to fight.
Wolves, trained from infancy to battle for survival, leaped nimbly in to cut a dog’s hind tendon before it could turn. On three legs, a hound, like a horse, stood no chance. A wolf that outweighed the crippled dog by two hundred pounds or more had little to fear from its enemy’s teeth. Each vulnerable hound died under the superior weight and savagery of the wolves.
One by one, the Tongu mongrels died, lying in the grass, throats or bellies opened to the sun, their blood soaking into the ground. Not a single wolf lay still and silent above us.
Tenzin watched it all, his skin pale and shining with sweat.
Interesting, I thought. He never sent his precious puss into the fight. His black panther, his Sh
irel, remained at his side throughout the battle. Perhaps she was too valuable to waste in a fight he couldn’t win.
The Tongu assassins were another matter entirely. Ignoring those wolves who galloped back downhill to rejoin the forces of their brothers, they walked, stiff-legged, to the bodies of their hounds. Standing amid the corpses of men and struggling, crippled horses, they knelt beside the torn bodies of their hounds. Obviously, their body language told me of their grief. How could such evil, cold-hearted assassins find love in their hearts? Love, even for the dogs who served them?
Yuri and Yuras galloped into our midst, slowing their mounts with their weight in their saddles. Sliding to a stop, they exposed their still tied hands, inviting release. Left and Right seized knives and cut their hands loose. Yuri yanked his gag down to hang around his neck.
“I’m sorry, Your Highness,” he gasped. “They were on us before we even saw them.”
“No worries,” I said, vying for a bright tone. “It’s all good.”
Regrouping, the two hundred plus wolves found no one to fight. A swift glance to my left told me those cavalrymen atop the western hills sat their horses, not yet willing to commit to the battle. I didn’t turn my head to seek the Khalidian soldiers to our rear. Several wolves stared upward and past us, yet stood quiet, alert but unalarmed. Ah, so Brutal’s men were not so willing to enter a battle they obviously had no hope of winning.
A group of perhaps thirty wolves dispatched from the larger pack and galloped uphill. They loped toward Brutal and his commanders and his Sins, tongues lolling from parted jaws. In anticipation, I suspected. I swept my hair from my eyes to see better.
Brutal’s protective Sins reacted first. Closest to the oncoming wolves and on foot, they surged backward, yelling, urging their royal master to run, to ride hard and fast. Spears lowered, they backed slowly toward the cluster of Khalidian commanders, Tenzin and Brutal. Sangar and another of his rank helped Brutal onto his flashy black stallion, two troopers riding to either side of him. I watched him fling a panicked glance over his shoulder before he set his spurs to the stallion’s silky black hide.The others mounted up and with their bodies, and those of their horses, between the wolves and their High King, acted as a buffer.
Catch a Wolf Page 29
