Chapter 26 #2
He hooks a leg around mine and uses my own forward motion against me. I land hard on my side, roll, but he drives down after me this time. I flip onto my stomach as his palms slap the floor.
“I’m not little.”
Viper I can handle. I’ll gladly poison him.
I’m up in the next beat and anticipating the way he rises with me, reaching out like he’s going to brush a finger to my split lip. Trembling, I hold steady.
His brown eyes lock with mine. “Maybe I need to call you Havoc instead. Or Fury. You are so full of anger you practically pulse with it.”
I swallow the insult I want so desperately to throw. I grab him around the midsection this time with the full weight of my body. The force drives him backwards and somewhere across the dining room, an onlooker screeches in shock.
He knocks against the long dining table and candelabras and reset silverware clank obnoxiously together. I catch a flash of his grin, then—
Kieran loops an arm around my head and traps me in a headlock. I buck wildly, cursing him, but he tightens his arm, the crook of his elbow on my neck. My arms slap wildly for purchase.
One of them lands at the center of his stomach and the other on the table edge and I push. My head doesn’t pop free.
I only choke myself in the process.
I’m losing. It irks me more than it ordinarily would because Kieran isn’t fighting back. Not like the jerks I’ve kicked in my youth where we’re both struggling for dominance, prepared to do what it takes to best each other.
Kieran is defending himself and it’s pissing me off.
“This would be a more effective attempt if I weren’t in my leathers.
” He practically purrs it in my ear. “You fight with skill and ferocity, Fury. I like it. I think you have the makings of a fine soldier if you receive the proper training. Right now, you are no better than a child throwing a tantrum.”
He’s not supposed to like anything about me.
“I could make this easier for you.” He adjusts his hold. “Remove these barriers between us. But something tells me you’d find that infinitely more dangerous than what we’re doing now.”
“Put her in her place, Kieran!” someone cheers.
I scream and struggle against his hold, clawing my nails against him when his arm tightens. He’s got the height and the weight to really do some damage but he’s not. He’s not stepping over the line to take me down.
Instead, he’s some kind of benevolent lord, and I’m supposed to be grateful for his mercy. My chest tightens and I barely breathe, dragging air into my nose.
“You’re only hurting yourself. You’re not a bear with a leg caught in a trap. There’s no reason for you to gnaw off your own leg,” he adds.
Under different circumstances, he’d be correct. Normally I’d never let myself be put in this position. Now there’s no way out of it. If he squeezes any tighter, I’ll pass out. The redness across my vision recedes, replaced by stars.
Kieran is an experienced fighter. I saw his deadly effectiveness on the field. His hits are powerful and purposeful. It’s a lethal combination and sets him miles apart from the others at the academy.
He has experience.
“Just do it!” I yell. “Just kill me, then.”
My words cut off on a choke, and my throat closes. “Be done with it.”
Kieran drops the headlock. “There’s no honor in this type of concession. You’re not out of choices, Morgan.”
I rear up, stumbling and off balance, coughing until my eyes blur with tears. If he expects me to yield—
“This is what you want, isn’t it?” He grabs one of the daggers and flips it up into the air before catching it deftly.
A practiced maneuver.
He pinches the blade, holding the handle out for me to take. “Come on, then. Don’t give up.”
My throat clears. I sniff and swipe at my eyes. When I’ve recovered enough, I saunter up to him and ignore the knife to punch him in the throat, the same tactic I’d used on Evie. His gaze goes watery as he chokes.
Fury isn’t so bad.
I’ve been called worse in the past.
I’ve worked out and prepared to the best of my abilities. But it’s still a little surprising when Kieran recovers much quicker than Evie did, than I did, and charges me. I spin away sluggishly and he flips the dagger again, swiping it across my arm.
My skin splits easily and blood pours from the wound.
“You underestimate how interested I am in seeing what you can do with your skills,” he grunts.
My chest heaves. “You want me to prove it to you? Haven’t I done enough?”
“I’d love nothing more than to watch you.”
I shake off the pain from the cut. It’s only a few inches long and it will heal on its own without the need for stitches. One foot in front of the other is my motto, isn’t it? I circle Kieran.
He’s smiling at me and waiting for me to charge him again because that’s what he expects me to do. He wants me to give fully into the frustration and the rage and make a mistake so he can lord it over me.
I might be mad but there’s no reason to be a complete idiot. I’ve already made too many mistakes on that count.
He holds the blade between us in a striking position, both of us poised. My brain has somehow managed to demand my muscles be patient, to watch him for his patterns and weaknesses instead of charging.
“Do you want to go to the mines, Morgan? Because I’m pretty sure that’s where you’re headed, after what you did to Evie.” He arches the knife down.
I dodge out of the way before he nicks me again.
“I was already going there,” I tell him through gritted teeth. “I had until the end of the week, and they were shipping me off.”
I kick out at his wrist but Kieran retreats before I make contact. My kick is sloppy. I’d do better with a weapon. Or sleep. I need approximately three days of absolute oblivion to make up for today’s fight and the repercussions of the adrenaline rush.
Kieran’s stare goes hawkish. “Oh really?”
I shrug, disguising the seething boil in my veins. “I’m not made to fit in. Definitely not here.”
The prickle of eyes on my scalp reminds me of the audience but there’s Kieran, smiling, lifting a brow, and my blasted heart stutters again.
He shamelessly drops his arms to his side. “I thought you’d want to stay.”
I scoff. “There’s no more choice. I’m out. Milkin isn’t about to change her mind.”
Not after she caught me.
My life is forfeit. There are no more options left. I didn’t even get around to killing Evie for what she said.
“I can—”
I step up to Kieran, a sadistic need to cause pain rising. Damn him. Curse him and everyone like him. I kick out again in the same pattern.
“You’d have better luck if you tried something else,” he explains as he pivots. “As it is, I know your moves.”
“You’re a fast learner, then.”
“And you’re tired and sloppy.”
He slaps my leg away. I’ve got to get the dagger from him. I glance at the blade as we circle each other but Kieran is loose, only moving because he has to.
“You don’t have to go to the mines.” He leans closer. “If you let me help you, really help you, then I’ll see what I can do to keep you from the pits.”
His whispers caress my skin despite the feet separating us. I feel it inside of me, the whirl of my hair, along the line of my neck.
I shiver. Scorch him.
He knows how to get to me. He’s learning those tricks, too. Rather than shuttering up and showing him nothing, he’s seeing between the lines. He’s reading into things he has no business reading.
It’s like he and I are fellow travelers on the same road, Kieran with the uncanny knack to ferret out my secrets and me struggling against his obvious interest.
“A trick. A dirty scorched lie.” I spit at him.
I’d rather die than let him help me because then, I’ll owe him… the thought of owing Kieran is humiliating. I’ll do this my way.
“Not a lie,” he mocks. “An offer. I’m willing to help you.”
I scoff and ask, “For a price?”
“There’s a price to everything in this life so why would this be any different?” He twirls the blade again. “I’m still willing if you are.”
“You hate me.”
He wouldn’t have brought me here if he didn’t.
“Hard to hate a blade. If you cut true when I need you, hatred is irrelevant.”
The pressure in my chest increases. I swing for him, and he kicks out with the dagger, sending me back a step. I ignore the tip of the blade, ignore the curve of his lips, and punch for his ear. The blade is only one of my problems when Kieran puts me straight on my backside.
Pain from my tailbone splinters up to my head. My next inhale brings dust and loss into my lungs but no lifegiving air. He covers me with his body, one hand pushing down on my chest with enough pressure on my throat to let me know he controls my air.
I’m out of time, I’m out of options.
Kieran is the judge handing down his decision and I don’t have to read minds to know exactly what comes next.