Chapter 9 #4
“Delano and I had an idea. One that could end this hunt far more quickly than a routine tracking. Since we’re all tired,” she added, “and would enjoy a bath and our beds …” Reule felt her fingers stroking him along his spine as she said bed, making sure the word received appropriate emphasis in his mind.
“I thought a faster solution would be welcome.”
Delano stepped forward and held up one of the canisters of fuel they’d found emptied near the field where the initial fire had been started.
The metal was melted and charred and bent, but there was no mistaking it.
Mystique stepped away, swiping at her already dirtied face with a small soot-covered hand.
Then she held out both hands, nearly black as they were, palms up to show him just how bare they were all of a sudden.
No gloves. Nothing to protect her from connecting to whoever had held that can before it had been maliciously emptied.
“Your telemetrics,” Rye whispered. “An excellent idea!”
“To hell it is! I don’t want her anywhere near a Jakal camp!” Reule roared. He rounded on Mystique, pointing a finger in her calm face. “And don’t you ever try playing me like that again, kébé!”
“I wasn’t playing you. I was communicating silently.” She shrugged. “I thought a subtle hint would be more acceptable than bluntly saying I wanted to help so we can finally get around to becoming lovers. Since I prefer the frank and honest approach better anyway—”
She broke off and grinned, a flash of white teeth in a soot-streaked face, when the entire Pack all but fell on the ground laughing.
Reule was just grateful he was filthy because he had a feeling he was blushing.
He’d forgotten that nothing embarrassed her and she was never afraid to be forthright in company.
Reule found himself grinning when the snickers and snorts of laughter surrounding him were lowered in an attempt at respect.
She was waiting expectantly, her big eyes blinking with a pretty moonstruck effect she was completely unaware of.
He folded his arms over his chest and, very slowly, allowed his gaze to travel from the top of her head to the tips of her toes, with some strategic and lascivious pauses along the way.
The cough-covered laughs began again, but his grin grew because he felt the quick response of her sensually attuned body leaping across the distance between them.
“Gentlemen,” he said without looking away from her. “You heard the lady. Let’s get this over with. I have some … business … awaiting my attention.” To his pleasure, Mystique laughed at his taunt. She was a treasure, and he vowed never to let himself forget that.
Delano waited until everyone, was quiet and focused completely on Mystique before handing her the canister.
Since she was unfamiliar with the terrain, Reule would read her thoughts and pick out landmarks and other notations that she resurrected.
He moved to stand behind her, holding her around the waist.
The canister wasn’t a personal item like Chayne’s chair, used with regularity so that a bond had been formed, but with focus she was still able to pinpoint the most recent owner of the object.
Reule felt her jerk in his grasp, watched her hands tighten fiercely on the container, the already fatigued metal buckling under the pressure.
She threw her head back and stared upward with blank, changing eyes.
Their color turned a muddy sort of brownish black, and Reule’s mind was suddenly filled with what she was seeing.
The moon In a different position. The Jakals were outdoors.
Or at least this one was. She drew down her head and looked around, and he saw the camp, cold and dark, large rocks, trees.
“The forest,” he murmured.
“Sánge,” she said in a guttural version of her own voice.
“Stupid Sánge. Beasts. Feel so much, spewing emotions like offal, wasting it.” Reule cringed to hear her say those things.
It was blasphemy to hear them on her lips because he knew she would never think or feel such poison.
“Sánge murderers. We will hurt Sánge prince as he hurt us. He will pay.”
Mystique jerked sharply and Reule held her close, following her eyes around the Jakal camp, counting sleeping forms, watching for a unique formation or tree.
“I will enjoy the day I can pluck the skin off the Sánge prince,” the Jakal thought, unaware of how close he actually was at that moment to the Sánge prince. “He will come and we will trap him. Trap him here. Him and his Pack.”
“By the Lord, they’re waiting for us,” Rye hissed.
“Thirty, maybe more,” Reule murmured quietly. “Camped in the open forest. I don’t see how they expect to trap us.”
He assumed the Jakal was a guard because he kept moving and looking around until finally, Reule saw a recognizable landmark. A cave. The Jakal went to enter it.
“Winter safe place here,” Mystique rasped, “after Sánge king is dead. Food is plenty. Cave is warm.”
“That’s no guard,” Delano murmured, “that’s a leader making plans.”
“Sacks of supplies line the walls,” Reule said, his confusion evident. “This is different. I’ve never seen Jakals travel with so much weight before. The cave is lined almost …”
And that was when Reule noted the red stamp on the sacking nearest the Jakal as he passed it. It was the merchant stamp of the City of Jeth.
“By the Lord,” Rye whispered as he realized what it meant. “The grain convoy. Amando.”
Reule reached around and jerked the can from Mystique’s hands, turning on his men furiously.
“I want to know what the hell is going on here!” he roared.
“This is the second time a member of my Pack has been threatened by these bastards! Defender! Blade!” He turned to Rye and Saber, his multicolored eyes snapping into the yellow glow of threat. “You sent outriders with Amando?”
“Of course we did! It was a large shipment. We know full well the Pripans would rather take it than trade for it if it was not protected properly.”
“I sent a good twenty guards with Amando to drive and manage the convoy,” Saber said stiffly. “With the merchants and their apprentices, that made a good fifty Sánge for four wagonloads.”
“Five,” Rye corrected him softly.
“So you’re telling me we lost a shipment that well guarded to a band of thirty Jakals? I don’t believe it. I won’t believe it,” Reule spat.
Mystique said gently, “There is a trap, Reule. One that Jakal is so confident in, I can still feel it. There is something we don’t know.”
“That isn’t the worst of it,” Darcio noted in a low voice that shook with repressed outrage. “The worst of it is there were no Sánge prisoners in that cave or the campsite.”
Mystique couldn’t deny the observation. She’d never once felt the Jakal think about Sánge prisoners.
Then again, she hadn’t figured out the trap that was set for the Sánge either.
When she had channeled Chayne, she’d known his deepest thoughts.
Why hadn’t she learned of the trap or what had happened to the other Sánge? To Amando?
“Don’t worry,” Rye said as he reached out to touch her arm in a comforting gesture, “Amando is tougher than he looks. Like Chayne, he’d be more valuable to them kept alive. It’s only been a day.”
“Which means they’re close by,” Darcio noted.
“And I think I know where,” Reule said. “That cave has to be deep to store that much grain. This was very well planned.”
“We’re tired from fighting the fire,” Mystique said.
“That was the purpose in setting it, I think. To wear out the Pack. They know how strong you are. They also know you’ll come after them yourselves.
So they weaken you first, then lie in wait with a trick that they no doubt tested out on the convoy first. Yes. This is very well planned, Reule.”
She reached back to touch him and he slid his arms tightly around her in a hug of comfort. She took it gratefully, closing her eyes as she used his warmth to shed the chill of being in the mind of their enemy.
“You have to let me channel him again,” she said softly. “I can find out more …”
“No. You’re exhausted, kébé.”
“So are you all,” she countered, her tone gentle rather than confrontational.
“There’s a time constraint,” Rye said abruptly, his eyes snapping up to Reule’s with understanding dawning over his handsome features. “That’s why they set the fire. They needed our attention and they needed it quickly. Why? What advantage grows weaker with time?”
“Strength? Perhaps Amando’s?”
“Right,” the Prime Blade mused as he looked at her in surprise. “If they’re using him as bait. They know Pack will sense one another. If he’s dying, they need to rush us.”
“Listen, kébé, it’s time you went back to the city.”
“No. You need me with you if Amando is injured. Or anyone else, for that matter. Don’t argue, just agree,” she pleaded as she turned in his grasp to face him. “You have no time or men to spare to go with me. Besides, you may need my telemetric abilities. There’s still an unseen snare.”
“Send her back, Reule. She’ll just distract you,” Darcio thought to him.
“Darcio’s right,” Delano agreed.
“I think she could be useful,” Rye countered. “And she’s right. We have no time or resources to send her home. You’ll be worrying about her whether she’s there or not. Better to have her in sight.”
“kébé, keep near me. Ride close to Fit. We’d better go before it gets any later and any colder.”