“We’ll protect you.” Skehl nodded. So naïve.
She rolled her eyes. “Skehl, your warrior thinks I’m the enemy. He’s been hunting me for weeks, and after I saved his life. No, he won’t protect me. He’ll try to capture me. But it’s I who’ve captured you two. Now come.”
Skehl, who by rights should obey her commands, refused. “No. We must finish the games. Then we return home. You will come with us.”
She frowned. “Do you not know your place?” What had the bastards done to her poor mate all those years she’d been looking for him?
“My place is here, Raia. With you both.” He motioned for her to follow him. “Come. We will introduce you to our alpha. And then we will…”
But she’d already turned away, making new plans to rescue her stubborn mate from the dictatorial ideals of the eastern barbarians. When she next had him and the stubborn Arghet under her control, she’d teach them how a family unit should work, with the female taking charge.
Raia hurried to the waterfall she’d been using to clean herself. Though the males had given her their second seed, she felt sure she could wash the scent clean. She needed to be unmarked, to keep a low profile from all those nearby. Wearing a marker from Vyctore barbarians in the midst of so many at the games would be like painting a target on her back, attracting one and all to take aim.
Yet even with the confusion that came from two mates she’d have to train, she felt true joy at finally being home. Killing the human Francesco clan of Earth had been a joy. She’d waited a long time for the opportunity to succeed. Then, using what she’d gained to follow them back to Ussed to finish them off as she had a few weeks ago?
She finally felt as if their deaths balanced the cost of her childhood. The first time she’d stepped foot on Ussed after being gone for most of her life, she’d known she’d made the right decision to avenge herself and her mate, and to root herself once more in the world that had borne her.
Her time on Ussed since “stealing” Arghet’s kill had been to learn as much as she could about the Vyctore, who had been rumored to have killed the Nasuhl trash who’d enslaved her mate and given her over to offworlders so many years ago. The decades between them had changed sweet bond-mate, as they had changed Raia as well.
Skehl was no longer the same boy he’d been so long ago. But neither was she an innocent young maid.
Arghet was a factor she hadn’t thought to consider. Yet after having him so briefly, she knew she’d keep him. Phelthar tied them all together, a unique bond melding barbarian and assassin essences as one. How would Arghet fit? How had he been able to bond with Skehl in the first place? And then to her? She hadn’t thought it possible, yet she’d felt him deep inside. Where he continued to linger.
Grumbling under her breath, she washed herself clean and still felt their presence. She sighed and reapplied her camouflage, hoping she could resist pairing with them again before she could successfully, quietly, steal her men away.
She had a feeling Talzec of the Vyctore would not approve.
