“Need back up?” Marco asked, dark eyes slanted in such a way that all but begged the captain to decline his offer. “I’m not entirely comfortable leaving you alone with your little terror.”
“Anything that makes you uncomfortable is worth doing,” I said through a mouthful.
The captain rolled his eyes. “We won’t be long.”
Chapter 4
With anyone else, a stroll on a night such as this might have been enjoyable.
A warm evening breeze caressed my cheeks, dispelling the heat and the lingering fog clouding my thoughts. Mixed with the scent of a cooling city, the mouth-watering aroma of baking bread wafting through an open window, and the night itself, I almost forgot where I was.
And with whom.
I scowled at the glitterbugs lighting our path. Hating them for daring to twinkle in the dusk as we brushed by, for lending a romantic air to an evening that didn’t come close to deserving it.
Aching with the weight of fresh memory, for I was unable to touch their tiny minds as they flickered about. Couldn’t sense their ki, but was forced instead to scan the gnarled shrubs and elegant statues with my eyes alone.
Like a mundane fool.
Nothing.
Not so much as a hint of the Caledonians and slaves I knew were there. Just beyond my limited scope.
There was nothing but Asher, and his accursed bond.
Goddess, how? How was I supposed to live like this? Cut off? Ki-blind and at the mercy ofhischarity. Dependant on his infernal protection, whether I could stomach admitting it aloud or not. And the general… How was I to fight for the fallen? For the vengeance they were owed?
The streets were damp with dew, air heavy with a chill in the shadow of the setting sun. Struggling to keep up with his long-legged stride was costing me what little energy I had left, burning through the ki the captain had used to revive me on the battlefield. But he did not slow, for the bathhouse loomed before us, the sweeping, blocky pillars a testament to the Eloran architecture from which they’d been stolen. A representation of everything I’d lost, of everything the Caledonians had stolen and remade.
Cheeks warming with exertion, I gasped, tripping over my feet and muddy hem, forced to seize his elbow or fall. “Wait,” I whispered, sweat beading upon my brow. “I… I can’t… I need a moment.”
Watching me with face void of expression, obsidian eyes gleaming in the dusk, he paused.
I swallowed the flapping wings at the back of my throat, eyes falling to the cobbled streets.
A rough palm settled on the back of my neck, making me flinch, coiled even as he worked a thumb into the corded tension at the base of my skull.
Shoulders hunched, my gaze flicked to his, confused—until he tugged the pendant free and his eyes lost their sharp edge. Sharing it, he allowed ki to pulse through me, demanding calm at every beat of my frantic heart.
“Better?”
Filling my lungs to capacity, I nodded, once, chasing it. Drifting closer to his heat, both inside and out. Goddess, if I could just—
He tucked the pendant beneath his shirt, cutting me off once more.
I stumbled forward, keening low at the back of my throat.
Something wicked flicked through the bond. Something akin to triumph. “Come along,” he drawled, hand dropping from nape to lower back, nudging me through the heavy oaken door.
“Parasitic bastard.”
Grinning, he mounted the steps, one hand hot on my skin, the other tight on the railing. “Got any more stunts for me today, Miss Tannovic?”
I tossed my filthy caramel hair over my shoulder. And though my eyes flicked around the darkened bathhouse and I picked at the scabs ringing my left wrist, I said, “I haven’t a clue what you mean,” and ignored his stupid little hum of amusement.
Steam clung to the tiles beyond the landing, chasing off the evening chill and inviting the memories of the last time I’d been in this very spot. When my ki was still my own.
Was it possible that only two days had passed? Or were there more than that lost to unconsciousness?
