She didn’t bother with a slap or a kick to his shin or a good stomp on his foot. She drove her fist into his stomach, a swift, sharp blow for which he wished he’d been more ready. “Son of a—” He bent over himself, a hand pressing beneath his ribs.
Mariska blinked, more surprised, if possible, than he was. “Ruger! I didn’t mean— Dammit! What did you do that for?”
“For that,” he said, a little wheeze behind his voice as he straightened. “The dread working. To get you back to yourself.”
“I’m
right here.
I—” She stopped, considering—looking around as if this little patch of forest now appeared entirely different to her. “Oh,” she said, wincing. “I’m
sorry.
”
He shook his head. “We’ve done enough
sorries,
” he said. “Are you good now?”
“I can still feel it,” she told him, and annoyance crept into her voice—at Forakkes, at herself, at the situation. “But it doesn’t have a grip on me anymore.” Her expression hardened. “That bastard.”
He grinned at her, not feeling much like a healer at all. “Time to let him know how we feel about it.”
She tipped her head at him, wary in an entirely different way. Strands of her braid had come loose again, curving around her face in a perfection of disarray; in spite of the pallor behind her color and the faint wrinkle of her brow he’d come to recognize as a sign that her head ached, she looked herself—alert and ready to go. She asked, “What are you thinking?”
Mine.
The internal response came unbidden—the most honest, most personal answer to her question.
You are mine.
He swallowed it back. “I’m thinking we should just knock on the door.”
She looked around the area in the most meaningful way—trees and bush and rugged ground, rocks sporadically scraping to the surface, and all under a bright blue sky with only a hint of building cloud. “Door,” she said flatly.
“Cameras,” he said, feeling almost cheerful about it. “You can bet they’re here. Somewhere. Got wards up?”
Weariness briefly haunted her eyes; she shook it off. “Give me a minute. I never was much good at knitting.”
Shields came easy to many—but they required a constant energy drain, and for some, constant attention. Wards came in knots and lines of energy, a woven pattern of protection that, once placed, held until dismissed. But not everyone could set them, and fewer yet could set them well.
Ruger took her hand, and said, “Me, neither. But we need to be ready. We’re right
here.
If we make him impatient enough, he’ll send out his posse.”
“You hope,” she said darkly, but closed her eyes and bit her lip, her hand twitching in his in an unconscious echo of the ward she wove.
Ruger watched her—the sweep of black lashes against her cheek, the furrow of concentration in her brow, the faint flare of nostril in her straight, long nose. He watched her too long, in a moment not made for such indulgences, until he finally forced himself to look away and inward, pulling energy together for his own wards.
* * *
Ciobaka lifted his lips in a squint-eyed grin as Tarras approached Ehwoord’s work area and hesitated beside his little jail. Small cages lined the back of the table; the middle cage held a small, flailing creature that had once been a giant tiger salamander and now wasn’t anything much at all.
Ciobaka lifted one paw to show Tarras, flexing his thumb-claw to display the newly sharp, poisoned nail at the end. “Hurt ’oo.”
Tarras spared him a scathing glance. “You stupid creature,” he said, his voice low. “Don’t you see what he’s doing? Don’t you know that you’ll be next?”
Ciobaka’s paw fell limp, dangling on the upraised leg so that now he only looked the supplicant. “Naht!”
“Yes,” Tarras said. “You’re no different than the rest of us. We’re all expendable. And you’re nothing but his biggest experiment, saved for last.”
“Naht.”
“Are you interrupting for a reason?” Ehwoord didn’t lift his head from his gruesome work, a clinking shuffle of amulets punctuating his words.
Tarras sent Ciobaka a warning glare. “Someone’s made it in past the dispersal workings,” he said. “I thought you’d want to see.”
Ehwoord sat straight up, regarding Tarras with an unpleasant expression. “You fool. Of course I want to see. Immediately!”
You’ll be next.
Maybe after Tarras?
Ciobaka looked down at his new weapon. It had hurt when Ehwoord put it there. It had hurt a lot.
But Ehwoord had fed him. Ehwoord had made him special. The new claw made him even more special...more important.
Tarras moved briskly to the computer desk at the end of the worktable and tapped out a quick combination of keystrokes, swiveling the large monitor so Ehwoord could see it.
A lone man, standing among the trees. Shirtless, bigger than any of Ehwoord’s pack, at ease with himself in the forest. Just standing.
Ehwoord cursed. “I warned you not to take them for granted! Where is Yovan?”
“Gearing up,” Tarras said. “There’s only one of him. Assuming he’s Sentinel, he still won’t be hard to take out.”
“No!” Ehwoord snapped. “He is most certainly Sentinel, and I want him alive! He can take Ciobaka’s cage. I must have him, do you hear me? Failure is not an option!”
His cage!
Ciobaka whined under his breath.
“Nahhht.”
Tarras’ mouth turned into a grim little line. He understood, all right. His hand dipped into one of the many pockets of the blotchy green pants he wore. “We may need to damage him.”
“That is of no consequence, as long as he lives.” Ehwoord swept the dead salamander from the table and into the trash and his notes on the creature along with it; he swept his amulets aside and yanked open a drawer, plucking out a series of amulet blanks and a few select, primed amulets; he seemed to have already forgotten Tarras’ presence.
Tarras strode for the exit, turning beside Ciobaka’s cage—well within reach of that new claw. “We’ll turn all our resources on him,” he said, glancing oddly at Ciobaka, his words distinctly formed. Ciobaka gave him lips and teeth in return. “I’m afraid it will result in some temporary confusion here below.”
Ehwoord graced him with disdainful frown. “I may have overestimated you, Tarras. At times you seem quite simple.
Go get that man!
”
Tarras turned on his heel. On his way past Ciobaka’s cage, his hand flicked out.
A metal key landed silently in the bedding.
Chapter 19
M
ariska shifted on her perch of an arching pine bough, staying close to the trunk so the resulting tremble of the branch wouldn’t give her away.
::This is a bad, bad idea,:: she sent to Ruger, letting her scowl color her thoughts and pretty certain that her worry leaked through, as well.
And there he stood, out in the open—out where they were so certain Forakkes would have surveillance in place. Just because after an hour of lurking less obviously—as if they didn’t know they were so close—Mariska had run off into the woods to retch off the growing effects of the amulet working in her system.
“We can’t wait,” Ruger had said. “It could be days before they come back out. We don’t have the time.
Ian
doesn’t have the time, or Sandy.”
“Maybe Jet—” Mariska had started, but it wasn’t an argument she pursued. He was right. Maybe Jet would come to check on them; maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe Maks would wonder; maybe he wouldn’t. But by then it would be far too late for all of them.
It would clearly be too late for Mariska. And it would leave Ruger out here on his own.
And so he stood out there, exposed, tall and relaxed and shirtless. Easygoing and primal at the same time.
Bait.
Mariska suddenly thought it was such a very, very bad idea.
They appeared without warning—two men toting guns, one with a rifle also slung over his shoulder. Gangsters at heart—just as they’d always been, all the way back to the start of it all, when the Roman-born son had persecuted his druidic brother. Mariska gave them a mental sneer.
::Steady,:: Ruger said. ::I see them.::
::I’m not sure where they came out.:: She let her frustration slip through that, too.
::They obscured it. It doesn’t matter. I’ll see it when I get close enough.::
::I don’t
want
you to get close enough!::
::I know,:: he said, and that was all.
Dammit.
The Core minions stopped not far from Ruger—definitely out of reach, watching him with overalert wariness.
When Ruger spoke, he did it without moving—without threatening any further. “Take it easy—we’re not at war here. At least, that’s what your Septs Prince says.”
From their expressions, they knew as well as Ruger and Mariska that their international prince was growing short in temper when it came to the trouble the Southwest regional
drozhars
had generated these past several years. But they were well-trained minions, decked out in matching black shirts and camo pants, similar features and black hair pulled back into tight ponytails—and similar implacable expressions. The tallest of them said only, “Come with us.”
Ruger didn’t move; he didn’t show any signs of concern. “Of course, you’re all officially disavowed now, but I’m sure you’ll be welcomed back if Forakkes gets his big working finished and tested out.”
“We’re not asking again,” the man said, and shifted the rifle across his back.
“You never asked in the first place. You
told.
” Ruger’s congeniality shifted, making way for a hint of the bear—an imperceptible shift in bearing as his voice hardened and his expression hardened, and Mariska felt her bear rise right along with his. “So now I’m telling
you.
This is your chance to get out of this mess. Go turn yourselves in to the new
drozhar,
and see if he lets you live. Because Forakkes is going down, and if you stay with him, you’ll go down, too.”
One of the men lifted his gun—or started to. He’d made his biggest mistake coming out here with the weapon still down at his side. Because for all his size, Ruger carried little bulk—and he was faster than either of them. Stronger than either of them. Buoyed by the bear, tempered by the human—the best of the best, working in concert.
When Ruger straightened, he pulled his strength in, calling on the bear. He said, so softly that Mariska wouldn’t have heard it but for their connection, “Leave the gun out of this.”
At the man’s hesitation, Ruger added, “This isn’t about whether I go back into the bunker with you. It’s about whether you leave this place in one piece, or whether you never leave this place at all.”
Neither man moved. Not for a long, long moment. Then the taller of them took a step back, not raising his hands so much as spreading them from his sides with open fingers, the gun barely held to his palm with his thumb.
Mariska sent Ruger her skepticism. ::Don’t trust—::
::No,:: he agreed, and then jerked slightly, his expression grim with alarm. ::Mariska!::
It was the only warning she got, and she understood it well enough. The man’s very acquiescence had been a signal to someone within, someone with an attack amulet to spare. Mariska threw energy to her shields, tightening her grip on the branch beside her, bracing herself—
Not enough.
Even as Ruger faltered in the clearing, it hit her—a working of cruel, sweeping pain and sucking darkness. It slammed through her shields; it tangled in the wards. They shuddered, warping; Mariska gasped, suddenly bereft of air. The world swooped around her and she closed her eyes and
clung
—to the tree, to consciousness, to herself.
And it lasted forever...
With a final reverberation of agonized, whiplashing energy, the wards snapped. Mariska moaned, her face pressed against rough bark, her hair catching in it.
But the working ebbed away, and she was still there. It faded into nothing more than a lingering stench. She scrabbled for her defenses, eyes squeezed shut against tears and unable to suppress a small sob of effort.
No more wards, no more shields...
She had no defense against the next working. And Ruger was still out there—
Ruger!
She forced her eyes open, hastily scrubbing them against her forearm—not daring to release her grip on the tree. He’d been stronger than she from the start, better protected than she. Surely he—
Yes.
She found him there, still standing. He’d staggered but not gone down, and the overconfident Core minions hadn’t yet realized he wasn’t going to. They stood waiting—one smirking, one grim—and only belatedly responded when he lifted his head, baring his teeth in a ferocity they should never have roused.
They scrambled back, guns rising, and Ruger moved on them—slapping aside one weapon with preternatural quickness, whirling to ram his elbow into the man’s chest. The minion dropped in his tracks, astonishment etched on his features.
The second man pulled off a shot before his weapon even came to aim; dirt puffed up from the ground and Ruger was on him, ripping the rifle sling off his shoulder and coming around to meet him with the butt of it. A blow to the arm cracked audible bone; a reversed follow-up to the side of the man’s head and he went down hard.
Silence.
Ruger stood on braced legs, for that instant still in the fight. Then he straightened and stood quiescent, his gaze aimed at the place where the men had first become evident—the doorway still masked, but clearly not far.
Mariska couldn’t see his face from this angle; she didn’t have to. She saw the message clearly enough—the direct challenge in the set of his shoulders, the threat in the power of his stance.
Then he turned and walked away—heading not for Mariska, but lateral to her position, not giving her away. ::Two down,:: he told her, his background thoughts full of intent. ::We’ll come back after dark and circle in the other way if the others don’t come out for us. If not, we’ll go looking for those air vents.::
She didn’t respond at first, too full of dismay—too full of her own truth. By evening, she’d be no good to him. The hit she’d taken had undone his painstaking trickle of healing, and there was little he could do to stop the effect of the working now.