Chapter 28
Hercules
My head hurts. My head never hurts. I blink as I wake, my vision blurry as my eyes adjust to the dim light.
A tendril of panic creeps through me when I realize that I don’t know where I am. I swallow down the unease before it forms fully.
It doesn’t matter where I am. What matters is who will pay for this.
Closing my eyes again, the blackness easier to deal with, I try to think.
I was in the taverna with the pretty redhead. I told her I would spend an hour alone with her if she would show me where she thought the lion’s lair was, and she agreed, enthusiastically.
It’s hard for an unmarried couple to be alone on Cancer, so she told me to meet her near one of the larger estates near the forest edge, and then she slipped away. I waited long enough to finish my wine and went after her.
I will what happened next to present itself. My head throbs again and I suppress a groan. All I can remember is a peacock’s face as I lay on the ground.
I take a long breath and open my eyes again. They clear quicker this time. I’m in a very large, very comfortable bed.
The bed is in the center of a stone room with no windows, lit by candles on shelves all around the edge of the circular space.
It’s clearly set up for romance, and I relax.
It’s obvious that I’m in a room used for secret trysts, so it’s highly likely I’m where I was supposed to meet Gata.
I still can’t understand how I got here, though.
“Gata!” I call loudly.
“You’re awake!”
I hear her before I see her, and twist to look back at an archway to the left of the bedhead. My eyes widen momentarily when I see her, and I let out a long breath.
She’s completely naked as she steps through the doorway toward me. Her red hair falls about her freckled shoulders, and she’s beaming at me. “I was worried about you,” she says, reaching me.
“You were?” I mutter, my gaze fixed on her body.
“When that awful man attacked you, I didn’t know what to do. I’m just glad you were already so close to my home.”
“Attacked me?” I say, my eyes snapping to hers. “Who attacked me?” I sit up straighter and notice absently that I have no clothes on under the sheets either.
“A man, shouting about you not winning the Trials.” She shrugs. “But you’re here now.”
I frown and move my hand to my head. “How did I end up unconscious?” I ask, feeling for a wound. It takes a lot to knock me out. In fact, I’ve only ever known one man to do it. Suspicion and anger surge inside me.
“That doesn’t matter now,” says Gata, climbing onto the bed and kneeling in front of me. She takes my other hand, guiding it over her taut stomach.
I’m distracted by the feel of her soft skin for only a few seconds. My being rendered unconscious by an unknown assailant is more than I can bear. I pull my hand away from her.
“I must know who did this.”
“No, what you must do is touch me, Hercules.” She takes both my hands and presses them to her breasts. Her nipples harden under my palms, and she tips her head back. “Oh, how I’ve longed for a man’s touch,” she breathes.
Something is wrong, but my hands are moving over her skin, my fingers pressing into her firm flesh. Her legs part, and she grips my wrists, moving my hands lower.
“Wait.” I stop, resisting her tugs.
“I don’t want to wait. I’ve waited long enough.”
“Who attacked me?”
“Why does it matter? We’re here, alone, now.”
“It matters because no man may render me unconscious and not pay the price,” I growl.
“Is that more important than me right now?” She lets go of my wrist and moves her own hands between her legs. With a long stroke, she purrs.
My cock stiffens, but I can’t be distracted by this.
I drop my hands from her body. “Yes. I must find him, immediately.”
She throws her hands in the air and gives a shout of annoyance. “You would rather assert your manly pride than fuck me?”
I blink at her, the shift in tone catching me by surprise.
“Gods, I did it! I drugged your wine, you imbecile!”
I stare at her.
“You may be a pretty man, but there’s not a lot going on up there, is there?” She taps the side of her head mockingly.
My shock finally gives way to anger, and my hands clench into fists. The muscles in my legs and shoulders tighten as I prepare myself for violence. Excitement begins to rush through me.
“Who are you?” I ask quietly.
She steps back from the bed and raises her eyebrows at me. “Surely you’ve guessed by now,” she says. As she speaks, her red hair grows around her, both in length and volume.
I growl and spring to a crouch in the huge bed.
“It’s a shame I’m going to have to kill you so soon. You’re the nicest-looking man I’ve had here in years. I really did want to fuck you first.” She smiles, and it’s no longer the giddy beam that the young Gata was giving me before. It’s a cruel smile, under hungry, narrowed eyes.
Adrenaline courses through me, and my muscles twitch as I maintain my rigid crouch on the soft mattress. I need to be ready for anything.
Her red mane has grown down over her shoulders and around her neck and stopped changing, but now her chest is morphing, along with her arms. I watch, transfixed, as the beautiful girl’s body distorts and transforms, finally followed by her face.
Her petite, freckled nose lengthens, and her eyes widen and spread.
Her mouth merges with the growing snout, and sharp white teeth flash as she flexes her morphing jaw.
As her front legs thud onto the floor, she shakes her head, the fiery mane now framing the head of the most magnificent lion I’ve ever seen.
She must be five feet tall at the shoulder, her head probably level with my own if I were standing, and she paws the stone ground with claws almost the size of my hands.
I look into her golden eyes, and though the color has changed, I recognize the girl I was with in their flashing excitement.
She roars, an earth-shaking sound that sends shivers through my taut body, and I smile.
“You’re still beautiful,” I tell her. She drops into a tight crouch. “And this is going to be my greatest victory yet.”
She pounces at the same time that I leap from the bed.