Chapter 5 #2
Leaning nearly all of his weight against the sturdy door, Reule shuddered in response.
There were few things more stimulating than a confident woman who knew what she wanted.
She was like a bolt of lightning out of a clear sky.
Unexpected, shocking, and able to make him sizzle from head to toe in a single strike.
Damn. It was as if his little foundling had been conjured just for the torture of his senses. Senses that were reacting wildly to her. Reule glanced down the front of his body at the positive proof of his reaction, which was fiercely testing the seams wrought by his tailor.
This was wrong, he thought with an internal groan. It had to be wrong. His Packmates were the ones who loved to sniff around women, flirting and bedding whoever suited their ravenous appetites.
Not he. He was in control of his needs and his desires at all times.
And yet, this painful state of body, this low, taunting pulse, seemed to fiercely whisper his need for the outlander woman.
A woman who might not even know what she was getting herself into.
A woman who had been in his existence for all of a few days!
Curses spewed through Reule’s mind as he finally pushed away from the door.
Once he was in motion, his stride began to eat up yards of wood, stone, and carpeted floors, the step of his boots striking out a tattoo he found satisfying to his temperament.
He at last began to master his body as he distanced himself from the too-near temptation of a compact beauty with hair of deep, breathtaking crimson.
Darcio was sitting before the fireplace in the Pack’s common room, located just outside the dining hall.
He was in his favorite chair, relaxed into a slump with his booted ankles crossed and propped on the large ottoman in front of him.
His slim fingers were threaded together and both hands rested palms down over his flat stomach.
His eyes were closed beneath the spiky fall of his straw-gold hair, which gleamed and caught the colors of the flames.
Finally he opened an eye and, tilting his head so the fall of his hair shifted out of his line of sight, he narrowed eyes the color of a coming storm on his Pack-mate, who had moved soundlessly up beside him.
“Something I can do for you, Rye?”
“I’m worried about this girl.”
Darcio smiled. He could always count on Rye to get straight to his point.
In the position of Prime Blade, Rye was captain of the Jeth armies as well as heir to Reule’s throne should he die without issue.
Their Prime’s family had been destroyed in the persecutions and the aftermath of the wanderings before they’d finally found a home in the Jeth Valley.
With no blood heirs, Prime Reule had long ago selected Rye from his Pack to succeed him.
It was a well-deserved honor. Rye was the second strongest pathic in the city of Jeth, as well as having a head for matters of state and the even temper Reule himself strove for, even if their Prime didn’t always succeed at it.
“Why would a half-starved and wholly abused girl disturb you, Rye?”
“Because she’s just too damn convenient,” he muttered, throwing himself into a nearby chair when it looked as though he wasn’t going to be able to stir Darcio from his relaxation. “And I’m not the only one who thinks so. Delano is—”
“Delano is Prime Assassin, it’s his job to suspect everything that breathes of foul play.”
“Well, I’d never discount his opinion,” Rye said with a dark scowl lining his already dark features. Rye’s sky-blue eyes fixed on Darcio. “Did you see how Reule reacted today when Para came running into the courtyard? Did you feel it?”
“Of course I did. I’m neither blind nor as ’pathically challenged as some think I am,” Darcio scoffed.
“That isn’t what I meant to imply and you know it,” Rye snapped. He caught his own tone and exhaled his frustration with Darcio, running both hands through his mane of black hair as he leaned back in his chair. “Why are you being purposely obtuse?”
“Because I don’t see anything to worry about.
Yes, Reule reacted strongly. I would have, too, after the way Para came running up on us.
Reule sees things that we don’t, and that’s a fact.
He feels things that we don’t. I wouldn’t presume to question so simple an incident as him running off to help someone in trouble. ”
Rye snorted. “I hardly call a nightmare being in trouble.”
Darcio studied Rye through lowered lashes.
He knew Rye well, and he could safely assume that this wasn’t necessarily the Blade’s own opinion he was hearing.
Rye wasn’t the sort to be easily swayed, unless it was by Reule’s desire.
Or unless someone was trying to convince him that Reule was in danger.
Delano and Saber, Assassin and Defender respectively, were the only ones capable of doing so.
“This is more than Delano’s usual paranoia, isn’t it?
” Darcio guessed. “Saber must be in a twist as well to compel you to seek me out.” The Prime Shadow tried not to smile at the flash of surprise and sheepishness that struck the heir’s features.
“So, one very small girl has an entire Pack of brutes shaking with fear and worry?”
“Darc!” Rye protested loudly, sitting up straight in his affront.
Darcio sat up as well, letting go of his teasing as he gave Rye a soothing smile.
“There are some mysteries about this girl, it’s true.
And there is definitely something attaching our Prime to her that even he can’t seem to figure out.
” Rye’s brows shot up at that. “However, it’s purely an emotional reaction.
Reule is sensitive, despite his hard exterior, and we all know this. ”
“Not that we’d bring it up to his face too often,” Rye joked.
“Not that we would. But even I have felt the sorrow and pain this female carries with her like a heavy cloak. Reule can’t abide suffering. And I assure you, this woman has suffered.”
“So you believe Reule is fixated on her out of compassion?”
“Fixated?” Darcio laughed. “He’s spent time with her twice since she got here, and you call this a fixation?”
Rye hesitated. It wasn’t like the heir to do that, so Darcio was extremely curious as he waited for him to gather his thoughts.
“You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed he’s in heat for her,” he said at last, opting for his usual bluntness.
Darcio had more than noticed. He’d experienced it pretty much firsthand when he’d relived the petite woman’s body memory. The Shadow dismissed telling Rye about that, figuring it wasn’t his place to share any information Reule had privately requested him to seek out.
“Rye,” he said at last with a little sigh, “she’s an out-lander, not a criminal.
I thought you above all would be more tolerant of that.
You usually follow Reule’s example in these things.
If anyone has cause to be prejudiced against non-Sánge, it would be Reule.
The persecution of this tribe could have scarred him in that way.
Instead, it marked him the opposite. It made him despise intolerance and strive to set an example of acceptance.
You’d best be careful around him if her outlander status is all that compels you to be suspicious of her.
If you hadn’t noticed, Reule has taken a bit of a shine to her. ”
“Oh, very funny,” Rye said, not sounding at all amused. “You’re telling me you aren’t at all worried that our Prime is forming an attachment to an outlander woman whom we know nothing about?”
“We know more than you think,” Darcio hinted cryptically, “and no, I’m not worried. Reule isn’t the sort to lose his head or his heart easily. And even if he did, Rye, I’m not entirely certain it would be any of our business.”
“Everything is Pack business,” Rye contradicted.
“Oh? Does that mean I can demand details about that pretty Janna you’ve been sniffing after all month?
” Rye flushed a deep red at the mention of his rather serious flirtation with a young lady of the court.
“After all, you are heir. If you’re seeking to attach yourself to a woman who might one day be our Prima, perhaps we ought to be more involved in this. ”
“All right! Do you have to be such a cocky shit all the time?” Rye demanded. “You’re right, as usual, and Delano, Saber, and I are assholes. Satisfied?”
“Immensely.” Darcio chuckled. “But I’d never say you’re entirely wrong, Rye.
We all have cause to keep our attention on our Prime.
Love and duty demand that we do. I just want you to measure your reaction.
I think we’re all on edge after this incident with the Jakals.
We’re all worried for Chayne …” Darcio trailed off and frowned as they both looked up to the ceiling above and to the left, to the place where they could feel agony, waking nightmare memories and the knowledge of impending horror.
“I stopped asking the apothecary if there was any change,” Rye said gruffly. “Every report was worse than the last. Have you heard anything?”
“His fever is life-threatening. The infections are rampant. There are definite signs of putrefaction and nothing the physic can do about it.”
“So you’re saying it’s hopeless,” Rye snapped off. Darcio knew the anger wasn’t directed at him, so he took no offense.
“The apothecary wants to amputate.”
“His legs?” Rye was aghast.
“And his arms,” Darcio added quietly.
“Lord and Lady damn me,” Rye hissed. “Better to put a dagger in his heart! Better he hadn’t survived at all! What man could live like that?” Rye was so upset that he surged out of his seat and began to pace furiously back and forth before the fire. “Chayne would rather die.”
“So would we all,” Darcio agreed gravely. “Chayne will refuse. If he can’t, Reule will refuse on his behalf. The odds of his surviving so radical a surgery—”
“At the hands of that quack,” Rye interjected.