Blood Warrior

CHAPTER TEN

Tallis grabbed Kavya’s arm, which was honed of slender, resilient muscles beneath the sleeves of her sari. “Especially now, you can’t consider this. A Mask is one thing. Lobotomizing a fellow Dragon King is repulsive.”

With a sour mouth and rebellious amber eyes, she looked him up and down. “Better to kill them outright, Heretic? Your sins precede you.”

“Sins that haven’t been of my making.”

“Bathatéi.”

The worst curse a Dragon King could spit sounded particularly vicious when coming from a soul as placid as Kavya. Part of him was glad she possessed that much fire. They would both need it.

The Chasm isn’t fixed.

He banked a shudder. He hadn’t been reminded of that warning in months. Only his dream of the Sun had brought it back to mind. At least that much of her prophecy rang true, although he couldn’t begin to know why.

“You can curse all you like, goddess,” he said. “It won’t change what you’re contemplating. It’s sick.”

Nakul pinned him with eyes made watery and colorless by age. “Determine your own fate, Heretic. You’re able-bodied enough to make that possible. I want the privilege of determining mine.”

“Why not leave the mountain? The Punjabi plains are within reach. Instead you want to stay where the elements will maul your body? It’s wasteful.”

“Determine your own fate,” Nakul said again. “Let this woman determine hers and me, mine.”

“Tallis, tell me what you’d do in my situation. Risk death by Pashkah—”

“Or risk insanity.” He smacked a fist against his palm, then turned sharply to jab an angry finger at her face. “You have more choices than that. Tell me you didn’t have to fight your way free as a kid.”

Kavya bowed her head as if it were an unbearable weight. “I did,” she whispered. “You’d have me go back there?”

“At least then you had some control. There’s no control in giving yourself over to this man. He’s begging you for death, and you’d let him apply another Mask?”

Tilting her head, she assessed him so intently that he suppressed the need to look away. The Sun could be persuasive. She had that much in common with the beautiful demon in his head. He hadn’t realized how many variations persuasion could take. He’d only been privy to what appealed to his sense of chivalry, reverence, and quite frankly, his lust.

“Why does it matter to you?” she asked.

Tallis flared his nostrils on a long, tense inhale. “I want Pashkah to give me answers. Worm, remember? Bait. He won’t find you if you’re some other person.”

She’d be another person.

That thought ricocheted through his insides like a bullet, hitting vital places along the way: his accelerating heart, his struggling lungs, his closed fists that wanted to open and take hold of her—or remain fists and pummel anyone who tried to do her harm.

“Great.” She shook her head with sharp movements. “The only time you defend me with words rather than weapons and bare teeth, and it’s to use me as a means of getting back at Pashkah. When was the last time you did anything because it felt right?”

“When was the last time you did what you wanted? You’ve been guided by your cult’s needs for so long.”

She turned away from him and settled more firmly into her seat. “I’ll do it,” she said to Nakul. “I’ll release your mind from this world. All I need is another Mask.”

As Tallis watched, he pondered something despicable. What would be the harm in letting her wear another Mask? Her madness would mean a permanent split among the Indranan. She’d never be able to affect a new peace. The dreams would end. The prophecy would be undone.

Then what?

He’d have left Kavya to an abyss—the same abyss he was trying to escape.

A surge of primal instinct said his future was bound with this woman. This was Kavya. She was still his prize, and his baser nature still wanted her. He was beginning to agree with the animal in his soul.

—

Kavya yelped when two strong arms grabbed her out of the chair. Tallis’s force and the rotting wood combined to splinter the chair into shards.

“What are you doing?”

“The old man said as much. This is me determining my fate. It involves you. I could apologize for that, but I won’t. I’m being selfish.”

She struggled against the hard, muscled forearm that wedged between her diaphragm and lowest ribs. “What are you talking about, being selfish?”

His mouth nuzzled the shell of her ear. “Remember what the animal wants.”

A shiver of dread and, Dragon help her, unchecked desire was absorbed by his firm hold. “Are you about to go berserker?”

“No. I’m as clearheaded now as I’ve ever been.”

He pulled her into the sunlight. The heels of her slippers shredded against the wood floor of the makeshift porch. Kavya used her nails to flay small strips of skin from the backs of his hands, but nothing stopped the frightening, arousing power of his demand.

Arousing.

No, no, no.

She twisted her torso and kicked her feet. “You want Pashkah to kill me, don’t you? Or maybe you don’t care. I really am some dangling piece of meat. A worm. You wanted revenge when you thought I’d infested your dreams. Turns out it wasn’t me. Instead you’ll settle your grudge on the woman who’s the best fit.”

“You weren’t listening.” He dragged her down the alley and pushed her against the wall of a weatherworn trailer. “I may be a Pendray dressed up in an English accent with too much knowledge of the world, but I am able to multitask. That means wanting you, no matter how else I’m occupied.”

Chandrani’s shout manifested as adrenaline-fueled fear at the front of Kavya’s skull. It was all the warning she offered. Kavya twisted, slipped, slid—onto her knees, rolling away from Tallis.

Chandrani’s saber sliced across his shoulder. Only the thick padding of his leather coat kept his skin free of the blade’s cut. He spun and shrugged from beneath his pack. The seaxes became an extension of his limbs. He didn’t hesitate. Saber and seax clashed in a shriek of steel against steel. Chandrani ducked, parried, attacked anew.

“Respect Kavya’s wishes or this fight will continue.”

Sweat lined Tallis’s hairline and the back of his neck. His frown never eased. Although he held two weapons with the elegance of a man long trained in their use, he didn’t have Chandrani’s loyal determination, nor the ability to shoot spikes of pain down her spine, as she was doing to him. He hissed with each one. Her momentum edged them toward the outskirts of the small town. People had emerged from their trailers and shacks to watch.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Tallis called. “Not the way I could. You’ve seen it.”

“You’ll never get the chance.” Chandrani’s face was a picture of concentration. She was a warrior to the core. Wielding her saber and forcing telepathic jabs into her opponent’s brain was difficult to coordinate, but she did so with great skill. “The old man begs for a lobotomy. I’ll give you one whether you want it or not.”

“Didn’t you hear me? Do you want to be torn apart?”

Again he appeared on the verge of something other. The light in his eyes winked out. His features slackened, as if easing toward sleep. Kavya had seen that look when her brother’s blood had streaked Tallis’s mouth. How intent was he on keeping her from wearing another Mask? Would logic even matter if he skidded past a berserker’s invisible threshold? It would be like talking a wolf back from his latest kill.

“Stop!”

She couldn’t let them hurt each other. Chandrani, for all her determination and loyalty, would not survive this confrontation. Soon Tallis would slip beneath her ability to hurt him with telepathy. The animal was immune. Chandrani wasn’t immune to the fury Tallis could bring to bear.

Chandrani, he’s already proven that he can hurt you. And he did worse damage to Pashkah, of all people.

He’s bastard Pendray scum.

I know. Kavya blinked as Chandrani’s attack lessened by slow degrees. I won’t let him ruin our plans. Please. Too many have been lost. To lose you would break my heart.

Chandrani jumped back and lifted her saber. “I yield, you Reaper shit!”

Tallis seemed to flip a switch. The light in his eyes returned. He sheathed his seax. “You’re done being an idiot?”

“Not if you keep insulting me.”

“That’s all I’ve got,” he said, picking up the other seax and slipping it into the second scabbard. “Because you fight damn well. I’d never even try if we were human.”

Chandrani frowned and studied him. “Some new trick?”

With a tight smile, Tallis shook his head. “We Pendray aren’t up for tricks, remember? You gave me one helluva headache back in the valley.”

“And you the same to me.” She assessed them both. “Will you let Kavya do as she wishes?”

“Wishes and dreams and useless optimism,” he sneered. “You’re quite the pair. Even when faced with Pashkah’s rage, you’d climb back into the hills and start again.” What began as a glance toward Kavya intensified into a full-out stare. “If you wanted to settle down with a quiet pod, I’d encourage you to walk back into that shack and accept a new Mask. They’d never know you were the Sun. You’d never remember that you weren’t Kavya. And I’d take my fight to Pashkah, Dragon damn the consequences.”

Kavya swallowed past the dry lump in her throat. “I wouldn’t stop.”

“Then you need every bit of the brains you have left.” He stalked toward her. Rather than touch her with what so plainly remained of his ferocity, he swept tangles of hair back from her face. The light in his eyes was magnetic now—that undeniable ocean blue. “Don’t do it, Kavya.”

He held her face and rubbed a thumb across her lower lip.

“Don’t do it,” he said again.

Had he repeated it as a command, she might have kept up her resistance. Instead it sounded like an entreaty. He wasn’t begging, but it felt rather close.

Remember what the animal wants.

She saw it across every blindingly handsome feature. He was waiting as if his next breath depended on her reply. When had she been on the receiving end of such a plea? This man truly didn’t know her decision. She couldn’t read his mind, and he sure as hell couldn’t read hers. She’d never been at such a loss.

“We’ll find another way,” she said softly.

A soft exhalation rolled down his torso. “Then we need to go.”

“Not yet.” Kavya faced Nakul’s shack.

“What are you doing?”

“Honoring a vow.”

“You didn’t get the Mask. You don’t have to do that now.”

“I’m an idealist, but I know that my battle against Pashkah will not end peacefully. Nakul’s battle is at an end. He wants to surrender. Unless you have a Dragon-forged sword hidden under that coat, I’ll help him.”