Page 90 of Bound

If Power Ranger’s radio had trouble with reception down here, maybe she did not know about Trystan’s capture yet. If she did, would that make a difference? Jayd was disturbingly aware of everything the Pura stood to gain with her in their hold, whether her last name became Carris or not.

The woman seemed to process those details in the same five seconds that Jayd did. ’Twas either that, or she decided to nod knowingly for the twisted fun of it. She added a long sigh while slipping her hand away from her neck. Only then did Jayd notice that there were only three fingers extending from that hand, with long-healed burn tissue where her pinky and ring finger should be protruding. The mottled skin extended up the back of her hand and then disappeared beneath the cuff of her leather jerkin.

“So, you’re on your toes. That’s good. Damn good. And yeah, you have a right to the freak fit about this.” She tapped her forefinger at the tattoo with a swift move that could have been part of a rap video routine. “Felt the same way when those bastards forced it on me three years ago.”

Jayd bugged her gaze. “When…they…”

“Drugged me, strapped me down, and then marked me with this tattoo,” came the unnervingly calm reply. “And yeah, you heard me a hundred percent correctly.”

The woman canted her head, which made a long black braid fall over her shoulder. There were colored ribbons twined with her strands—the red and purple favored by the Pura. But were those also not by the woman’s choice? This was beyond baffling. Jayd’s eyes told her one thing, but her gut clenched with a hideously different truth.

“Boopsy. Highness. I wish I could stand here and be all fair Verona with more of the pertinent back story, but we don’t have that luxury right now. You either believe I’m on your side and have been waiting three damn years for the chance to do so, or you don’t. What’s it going to be?”

So much for wishing her gaze was going to get back to normal.

“Th-Three years?” Jayd blurted, ashamed to be searching—and perhaps wishing—for any glitch in the woman’s composure.

Instead, she got two more layers of unnerving revelation.

“You think the Pura Dumplin’ Gang simply spun up this caper in a few days?” the stranger charged. “Uh-uh. This has been in the works since Rune Kavill started rolling their action.”

“Kavill,” Jayd spat. “Disgusting prispoul.”

“Word, girl. But regrettably, a lot of prispouls are brilliant fuckers too. Kavill wrangled those kittens enough to orchestrate the bigger stunts like kidnapping Princess Brooke and bombing the Grand Bridge. He was also the mastermind behind the effort that nearly doubled their legion in a year.”

Jayd grimaced. “Which still baffles my brothers and the high council. A recruitment like that is absolutely—”

“Impossible?”

“In a word?” She tried to laugh, but it emerged as a bitter huff. “Yes.”

The woman gave up a matching sound, though her sour edge was dusted with something more. Raw virulence. “Because it wasn’t just a recruitment.”

Just six bleak words, in the woman’s dark tone, were the only switches needed to blare Jayd’s mind with comprehension. “It was…an impressment?”

Sharper shards of violet gleamed in Power Ranger’s eyes. “Guess that’s the nice way of putting it.”

Jayd frowned. “What is the not-so-nice way?”

“In my case?” She rubbed her three fingers over her tattoo again. “Being locked in an induced coma and then woken up and told I’d been kept alive only as a bribery tool against my mother.” She blinked a few times, revealing glistening drops along her lush black lashes. “The mother, mind you, who I thought had been dead for years.”

“Wh-What?” Shock turned Jayd’s rasp into a stammer. She and Maimanne had definitely had rough patches over the years, including most of the last ten days, but imagining that she had been lied to about the woman being alive at all…

Pain gouged her heart and contorted her face. “Why would anyone do that? And would your maimanne let them?”

“Because she was told I was dead too.”

“By the blessed Creator.” Jayd wrapped her arms around the thousand emotions stabbing her stomach. “Why?”

The woman’s face gained some new creases, though they were vastly different than the tension lines of before. For the first time, Jayd detected some true conflict from the decisive warrioress.

“We have to get going, okay?” she decreed. “Come on.” She yanked on Jayd’s elbow, hauling her toward the tunnel that extended off the other side of the weapons room. “We should’ve been on the move already.”

“Get going where?” Jayd made the demand despite her compliance with the stranger’s new guidance. “And why? You know that Carris has been apprehended now, yes? My brother Samsyn and his team—”

“Have done nothing to change anything,” the woman cut in. “You know that already, yes?”

Jayd forced down a heavy breath as they entered a second chamber. Its linear footprint nearly matched the weapons room but was outfitted with basic armoires along the sides. At one point in time, the pieces were likely a sturdy storage solution for the soldiers who deployed from here. Tonight, Jayd was stunned that their footfalls were not causing the wardrobes to crumple apart.