Capturing my wrists, the captain hauled me to a stand then spun me to face him, inspecting my claws with raised brow. “An interesting modification. And certainly effective,” he added, holding his savaged forearms aloft.
Blood trailed toward his elbow, soaking the fabric of his black dress-shirt.
“She’s got a wicked right cross, too,” Marco said, thumbing the imprint of the terrycloth and three bumps where my knuckles had landed. “Fucksakes, that was close. Basically ran straight into the general’s arms.”
“Yes. And let’s get out of here before he returns,” the captain said. “Take Alicia to my residence and get her settled in. I’ll—”
Alicia came to the edge of the bathing pool, fingers pressed to her lips. “Sir. I—if I may. I’d… I’d like to help.”
“Thank you, Alicia, but that won’t be necess—”
“I know what she is,” the scientist blurted, clenching her fists. Playing her part beautifully—of a traitor.
The captain stilled, fingers tight on my wrists.
“Jasper may be a damned, superstitious fool not t’see it, butI’mnot stupid, sir. I was schooled in the Temple before the fall and I know a little of the Blood. The teeth. The claws. The fact that an Elite warrior went to such great lengths to claim a wee forest demon,andmade a spectacle o’punishin’ a slaver the way you did?” Alicia swallowed, green eyes flicking to me for an instant, before dropping to the floor. “I’ll admit I wasna fully conscious at the time”—she touched her bruised and swollen nose—“but I saw somethin’ that needs explainin’. Something she did, out there at the edge of the wood. You almost had the slavers beat, didn’t you, lass? If it hadna been for me, distractin’ you, then…” Tears dusted her scowl, topping off a flawless performance—and one that distanced her from the rebels beneath the mountain, me, and all her powerful, deadly knowledge about Glaith technology.
Hertechnology.
“Clever and beautiful?” Marco said, looking Alicia up and down. “The perfect woman.”
Marco didn’t know the truth of his words.
But the captain was not so easily won. “There are some who would kill to keep that information secret, Alicia. In this very room.”
She swallowed. “And I’m bettin’ you’re aware a woman likeherwill need more’n the attention of men. ’Specially now. Transitioning from what she was, to…” Alicia shrugged, trailing off. Avoiding my eye, the coward.
Long seconds passed with nothing said. With his hands on my skin and his eyes on Alicia. Warm water swirling around our hips, soaking through our clothes as he deliberated her fate.
“Not a word,” the captain murmured at length, meeting—and holding—Alicia’s gaze. “Keep this to yourself, and you’ll be rewarded with your freedom as soon as I can manage it. You have my Blood-oath.”
“Consider my lips sealed, sir,” she whispered.
A bargain struck, and me, with no part in it.
“Traitor,” I hissed glaring at her, and brought my knee up, aiming for the captain’s groin.
He blocked me easily. “I had half a mind to give you a reprieve from the Eidolon, but because youinsiston acting like a wild thing, you’ll wear these manacles until I can make it official.” He rummaged about in his pocket for a moment, then looped the leather bands containing the Raith around my wrists once more, catching me when I sagged against his chest. “There,” he murmured, petting my sopping hair for a moment, pinning me with inky eyes. “That’s better, isn’t it, pet?”
In response, I flashed my teeth, unable to do much else but fret over three little words.Make it official…
His gaze stuck at my mouth, glimmering with something indecipherable before he stooped, setting his shoulder against my belly. Compressing my ribs, he hefted me from the water. “Let’s go.”
Chapter 14
The journey to the captain’s residence was at once short, and an experiment in ceaseless agony. Every step bounced my injuries against his shoulder, keeping me just lucid enough to dread whatever was to come next. Whatever wouldmake it official.
Would it matter? With the Raith sipping at what remained of my ki, would there be anything for the captain to torture when we got to where we were going, or would he find he’d captured nothing more than a frozen, empty shell?
I missed the moment when the captain entered his home—the Raith was chewing holes in my time-line. I couldn’t recallhowwe came to be sitting in a tiled bathroom, my head resting on his shoulder as he fiddled with something behind me. And neither could I decipher anything beyond the low rumble of his voice as he murmured to the others, working as he talked.
My mother’s pendant was pressed between us, mocking me as it bruised my collarbone. Filled to bursting with years of rare and dangerous ki, yet utterly beyond my reach.
“Ready?” Marco asked, his voice distorted and far away.
“Yes,” the captain said, gathering me against him, dragging my wrists above my head and fastening them to a bar fixed to the ceiling.
Body stretched taut, I cried out, eyes squeezed shut against the pain. “Mmph. D-Don’t,” I groaned, sagging in my new bonds, unable to fight any longer.
