Hunted Warrior (19 page)

Avyi clung to the nearest waist-high railing—the one that marked the extent of the crypt's public accessibility—and held tight. Human beings astounded her, but this behavior was what had always made her fear them.
Panic
. Irrational fear that overrode calm common sense. If the tourists and docents kept their heads, they could walk slowly up the crypt's stairs and out to safety. That never happened. They were no better in such moments than a school of fish darting away from a shark.

“Which way?”

She opened her eyes and swallowed. Mal stood before her, his eyes no longer unnatural beacons of blue, but shaded black by the eerie red emergency lights. His hair beamed with orange highlights.

She couldn't move.

Understanding softened the urgency etched on his features. The lines of tension around his eyes smoothed to nothing.

He leaned down and kissed her.

Just a kiss. Barely a meeting of mouths.

But it jarred Avyi out of her haze. She licked her lower lip, catching the taste of him. “Was that some aspect of your Tigony ritual I missed?”

“In part wanting to kiss you.” He grabbed her upper arm. “In part waking you the hell up. C'mon, before we miss our chance.”

“I should be the one dragging you along.”

“Who's in charge here?”

“Good question, Giva.”

“We'll get along much better if you just listen for once.”

“Back at you.” She urged him from a recess between a damp wall and a crevice that was barred by a metal gate, exasperated but reluctant to awaken his ire. He was tagging along for the wrong reasons, but at least he was with her.

Avyi nimbly scampered over the metal gate. Mal mimicked her actions, with more power and equal grace, joining her beyond the barrier. He stowed the backpack in a shadowed crevice, then set about rolling up his shirtsleeves. She remembered how he'd done the same in their ferry berth and felt a jolt of anticipation. Adrenaline was pumping, her imagination was in overdrive, and he was a Dragon-damned handsome man.

This wasn't the time. She was too near her goal.

Avyi stepped to within inches of his body. “Whatever happens . . . thank you for being here.” She paused. “We make a good team. Except when you tried to obliterate me.”

He grinned. “Something like that.”

Heat traded between them. Her skin had pulled in on itself, dry, shrinking, needing wet kisses to ease an ache as old as time. Mal's stare had that effect on her. She needed to turn away, toward the opening of the deepest portion of the crypt, to remind herself why she was there. He was that distracting.

“No wonder these areas were barred to tourists,” she said tightly.

“Not exactly on the guided tour.” Mal pushed a thick curtain of moss away from where it dangled in its ancient home. The ceiling was sloped here, and the walls tighter, like a hand closing around them. The air was chilly and damp. “Could be anything down here.”

“Just the dead.”

“That's little comfort.”

“At least they won't try to kill you.”

“Good point.” His smile was fast and delicious. “Now, off you go.”

“How gallant.”

“If you're going to be on your hands and knees, then I insist you go first. I'll enjoy the view much better.”

She felt that Dragon-damned blush creeping up on her again. “If only the Council knew you as I've come to.”

“I prefer being alone with you, although the location leaves much to be desired.”

“But you forget.” She slid a hand down his arm and clasped his hand, gave it a nervous squeeze. “We'll need to regroup here when it's time to leave. I'll enjoy the return view.”

CHAPTER

M
al had no time to appreciate the way Avyi's cargo pants clung to her ass as she crawled ahead of him. A wasted opportunity. He was too focused on the slick surface and its sloping dip into the earth, like a child's shallow slide. Securing his handholds and the grip of his hiking boots required all his concentration. Darkness overwhelmed them quickly. The red cast of the emergency lights at the opening of the tunnel was too faint to illuminate detail.

He stopped, straightened a little, and rubbed his palms on his jeans. Denim was useful for static electricity. The sparks he cast lasted a few moments until he needed to take a break and start again. The space smelled faintly of sulfur. He didn't risk using a stronger flash of energy, for fear of setting off an unknown underground element.

“Just think,” he said, watching the shadowed waffle pattern on the soles of Avyi's boots. “Upstairs are hundreds of tourists being ushered into the sunshine. They're startled. They're upset because they paid for exhibit tickets and don't know if they'll get back in before dinner. I envy them.”

Avyi threw a mildly disgusted look over her shoulder. “You're nearly whining. Unflattering, Giva.”

“You're leading this expedition. My job is to make a little heat and remind you of how insane you are.”

“I said one day I'll be right. You'll see. Today. Tomorrow. Your future will catch up with us.” She paused. “And you'll hate me for it.”

Mal fought to ignore the shiver that climbed his spine. Their connection was too tenuous to trust. “I don't know about that,” he said, trying to maintain their uneasy peace. “You've only promised me one thing so far, and it's far from disagreeable.”

“It will be if you don't shut up. I'm not doing this all by sight.” She found a rock and tossed it out ahead of where she crawled on all fours. “A wall. Close. More light, please.”

“Since you asked nicely.”

He set off a charge of light and maintained it at a low glow just above their heads.

She reached the end of the crypt's descending slope and sat cross-legged with her back to the far wall. Mal joined her, hip to hip. Their clothes, streaked with earth, did nothing to detract from her radiance beneath his conjured light. She glowed with a luminance that nearly matched that fire. Memories of the night before might haunt him for the rest of his life. At the moment, however, they were as raw and fresh as if he'd just been so hard, so deep in her softness.

A sharp sound marked the first time Mal had heard Avyi laugh. She covered her mouth, but the sound kept coming. It reverberated off the walls, as the echo cackled along with her. She glanced at his jeans where his erection was coming to life. “You're looking at me like that
now
? Really?”

It was either grin or take offense. “I am.”

“
Lonayíp
ass.”

“You're stunning. And I'm arrogant.”

She smiled, as if laughter still fizzed in her blood. Laughter at his expense. He didn't care. “Arrogance has its benefits. We're in a crypt because of mine.”

Mal increased the burst of light above them in a lasting arc. “Where do we start?”

“Anywhere.”

Together they searched on all fours within the antechamber, which was no taller than Avyi and not much bigger in diameter than a couch. Mal touched rock and dirt, feeling and digging until his fingers cramped. Avyi's breathing echoed in the small space, its pace exceeding that of their exertion. She sounded as if she were becoming ever more frantic.

“What if it's not here?” she rasped.

“Keep looking.”

Mal frowned at himself, wondering why he was encouraging her to keep going. He didn't believe. But why were his hands dusted in dirt and his heart beating in anticipation?

Upstairs, the sirens went silent. They looked at each other. “I wish that had lasted longer,” he said, dimming the glow over their heads. Then . . . “Here. Avyi, here.”

In the near darkness, he pulled her fingers toward the curve of the wall to the left of where they'd entered the hollowed chamber.

Avyi knee-crawled forward. A hollow in the rock revealed a long strip of color that gleamed in the half-light. It was as if strands of gold had been inlaid between jewels, but the jewels were plain striations of earth. “It's beautiful.”

“I'll be Dragon-damned.” Mal pinched the back of his neck, struggling with his disbelief. “How did no one find it? It's
right here
.”

She shivered. “What was once will happen again. Sitting here, I can see the past because it's a prediction of the future.”

“A cycle?”

“Our clans have changed dynasties. There are patterns. Revolt. Reform. Corruption. Excess. Overthrow. It happens among the humans, too. Why think our cycles are any different?”

Mal tugged the rock away from the sliver of gold. Within moments, he'd uncovered the entire shaft, as if it had been waiting for his hands. “Surely . . . there won't be a bowstring.”

Yet he was only muttering to himself. A part of him deeper than logic and older than his years—older, perhaps, than his clan—knew to shut the hell up. Because there most certainly was a bowstring.

He carefully set the ancient weapon on the ground, as if cautiously releasing a snake. He couldn't shake the eeriness. “You win,” he said grimly.

“You think I like it?” She pushed away from the wall and knelt beside him. “
Do you?
”
she whispered fiercely. “I have seen two glimpses of my future.
Two
. You'd think I could get a better perspective on my own life-yet-lived. Now that I'm here, I need to touch that bow. I must learn what it will tell me. Because, Mal, we've made it this far. Step after step. I don't . . .”

She shook her head again.

Mal caught her face between surprisingly steady hands. This was absurd, but it hit a true, undeniable place in his gut. “You don't want to see what comes next?”

“I don't.” Her vehemence was a surprise, as were the tears in her eyes. Mal caught her as she sagged against his chest and buried her face against his throat. “Stepping stones,” she whispered. “Crests of waves. Think of whatever metaphor you want, but space exists between all of them.” She turned a panicked gaze toward the glittering bow. “Traveling by helicopter. The ferry ride and making love. All of that was the space between finding the arrows and me touching . . . that.”

“What will it tell you? The next cresting wave?”

“Otherwise,
you
win. I'm a charlatan, or insane, or worth treating with suspicion.”

“I could think that no matter what you say.”

“I wish you wouldn't,” she said quietly.

Holding her upper arms, Mal took a deep breath. He could believe her, or he could crawl out and do this another way. He was tempted to turn away from the gift he still couldn't process. Only, what he'd witnessed so far was becoming impossible to ignore.

He picked up the golden weapon in all its gleaming perfection and held out his hands.

*  *  *

Avyi couldn't do it. She'd seen this moment more and more clearly since they'd arrived in Florence. Every mile, then every seemingly ordinary step forward . . . she was nearing the last few seconds of innocence before she would know why Cadmin would need this bow.

Perhaps she would learn even more.

Perhaps she really was crazy, slowly driven mad after so long in Dr. Aster's captivity.

It would be a painful thing to come to that realization in front of Malnefoley. She very much wanted to be right, just so he'd look at her with surprise and admiration, not with so much suspicion.

His expression was etched with unexpected sympathy. His brows tucked together, laid over by streaks of straight blond hair that gleamed as golden as the bow he held. “Do you see the light above our heads?”

She matched his frown, then nodded.

“I spent four years on the top of what the humans describe as Mount Olympus. I stayed there until my gift had manifested. But more than that,” he said, with such gravity that Avyi shivered, “I stayed until I could claim absolute control over every aspect of my powers, from a small glow to illuminate an underground crypt—”