Authors: Charlotte Boyett-Compo
“I’d prefer you butt-naked but such would be a distraction,” he said, once more intercepting her thoughts.
“Mick would probably like me like that,” she teased, and laughed at her husband’s low growl. Her friendship with the town barber in Haines City was a tad too close for her husband’s comfort.
Cynyr was preparing their vac-syringes of tenerse and as he loaded his frowned.
“What’s the matter?” Aingeal asked.
“My back isn’t paining me,” he said. “The queen is lying still for once.”
“She’d better,” Aingeal quipped. She turned her back to her husband and swept her long hair aside for him to administer the drug to her.
A sharp, biting pain drove straight through the Reaper’s back and he nearly dropped his vac-syringe. Striving not to let his wife see his agony, he stepped up 12
Reaper’s Revenge
behind her with hands trembling from the brutal pain chewing through him and stuck the needle into Aingeal’s neck. He bent down to kiss the spot where a single drop of blood had appeared.
“I guess I’m getting used to it,” Aingeal said. “That didn’t hurt nearly as bad as it usually does.”
Unaware her husband was being tortured by his parasite, Aingeal picked up the other vac-syringe and turned to give him his shot. She felt terrible when she watched his face pinch from the discomfort racing through his veins.
“Do you give yourself more tenerse than me,
mo shearc
?” she asked.
“Aye,” he said, reaching up to rub at the agony spreading down his neck and shoulder. “It’s given according to your weight.” He forced a smile to his lips. “You weigh less than the down from a fledgling bird.”
She snorted. “You’ll change that in the months to come,” she said, “when I’m waddling around like a fat pig.”
Cynyr put out his hand and laid his palm over her flat belly. He couldn’t seem to stop doing that. It was there his child was growing and he loved touching his lady so she could feel how proud and delighted he was with her pregnancy. She covered his hand with hers and when he lowered his mouth to hers, welcomed his kiss. The knock hit the door only once but Harold’s imperious voice sound like a barrage against the panel. “Breakfast is upon the table!” he barked, each word spat out like a cannon shot.
Shaking his head, Cynyr ground his teeth. He was going to have a talk with Warrington—who had informed him the High Council had assigned him to be the Crees’ servant in Haines City.
Opening the door for his lady, Cynyr put his hand to the center of her back and ushered her from their sleeping quarters. Harold was stomping down the corridor ahead of them, not bothering to look around to see if they were following.
“Have you ever noticed how he walks?” Aingeal whispered.
“Not until today,” Cynyr replied, and was amused as he watched Harold’s ass swaying to and fro like that of a woman.
Having positioned himself behind Aingeal’s chair, Harold was waiting impatiently for his charges to gain the table. His pencil-thin mustache twitched, his very thin lips pursed as they approached.
“I am told we will be arriving in Haines City around noontime,” Harold informed them as Aingeal took her chair and he pushed it up to the table for her. Snapping her napkin, he laid it in her lap and walked around to take up Cynyr’s to do the same.
“Thank you, Harry,” Cynyr said, knowing how much the nickname annoyed the fussy little man. He could hear Harold’s teeth grinding.
13
Charlotte Boyett-Compo
Before each of their plates was a large goblet of chilled Sustenance. The dark red liquid in the goblets stood out against the pristine white of the starched tablecloth with its white china dishes.
“Will there be anything else?” Harold inquired with a sniff. His beady eyes were surveying the bowls of bacon, fluffy scrambled eggs, crisply fried potato chunks, buttered toast and—much to his disgust—the mound of grits that had been spooned onto the lady’s plate.
“Everything looks delicious as usual, Harold,” Aingeal assured him. A faint smile tugged at the little man’s face and he bowed, thanking her for her compliment. With that done, he turned toward the kitchen at the front of the railcar. Taking up the Sustenance first, husband and wife downed the liquid that allowed them to exist peacefully with the parasites nestled within their bodies.
“How do you think the town took to Arawn and Bevyn?” Aingeal asked as she ladled scrambled eggs onto her husband’s plate.
Cynyr shrugged. The two highest-ranking Reapers had volunteered to go on ahead of Cynyr and his lady to protect the town from the threat of Silus Gibbs and the Jakotai brave who were looking for the Crees.
“I expect Moira put them to work chopping wood for her,” Cynyr replied.
“Nothing intimidates that lady.”
Aingeal grinned around a mouthful of her precious grits. “I’m glad you are going to ease her pain,
mo shearc
. She deserves to live her last years in comfort.”
“I would have started on that before we left, but there just didn’t seem to be time,”
he said. He’d regretted having left Haines City without taking away the elderly woman’s pain.
As she was buttering her toast, Aingeal stopped and looked up at her husband.
“Why are their tattoos different from yours?” she asked.
Cynyr’s left eyebrow crooked up. “You were looking so closely at them you saw that, wench?” He wasn’t so sure he liked his woman staring at the other Reapers’ faces.
“I noticed it right off but I guess it didn’t hit me until now. Do they belong to Morrigunia too?”
“Every Reaper I’m familiar with does,” Cynyr said. He hated to think of the Triune Goddess of Life, Death and War who had turned him from a dying man into a bloodthirsty beast. “I’ve seen tats on the rogues too, but they’re usually elsewhere on their bodies, like their backs.”
“And she gave each of you a different tattoo.”
“No, the tattoo is different for each clan, not each man. Arawn’s is a heron because he is a Gehdrin. There are seven symbols of the Reapers. There is the heron, blackbird, hawk, crow, owl, seagull and raven. Each has meaning for Morrigunia.”
“The Cree clan is the raven,” she said, looking at the dark blue tattoo fanning out from the corner of her husband’s right eye.
14
Reaper’s Revenge
“Aye.” Cynyr answered. “The bird symbols are related to knowledge, bloodshed and skill.” He glanced at her. “That pretty much tells you what Reapers are, doesn’t it?”
“What do the other symbols mean?”
“I don’t know, wench,” Cynyr confessed. “The raven is a symbol for healing but—”
“The heron symbolizes vigilance and Lord Arawn most definitely is a cautious man who carefully watches over his men,” Harold said as he came up to the table. “The blackbird is enchantment, a strong mage, and Lord Owen Tohre is a very adept magician. The crow symbolizes wisdom although that is Lord Bevyn Coure’s clan and I hardly think he qualifies as being a wise man. Hawk is for observing and that holds Lord Glyn Kullen in good stead for he is most definitely a keen observer. The Owl symbolizes patience yet Lord Phelan Kiel has the least patience of any Reaper I know. Lord Iden Belial’s tattoo, however, is the seagull and that symbolizes great versatility. He is good at everything he attempts.”
“You know quite a lot about Reapers, Harold,” Aingeal said. Harold sniffed. “I make it my business to know all I can about my charges, Lady Aingeal,” he stated. He looked down disdainfully at her plate. “Up to and including their strange predilections for foul food.”
She smiled at him and Cynyr was surprised when the snotty man returned her smile with a lopsided one of his own.
Aingeal put her elbow on the table and braced her chin in her hand. “If I were to get a tattoo—”
“Which you won’t,” Cynyr interrupted.
She ignored her husband’s remark. “What tattoo should I get, Harold?”
The little man cast a sidelong glance at Cynyr. “Well, Lady Aingeal, you are now a member of the Cree clan so it would be a slightly altered version of the raven tattoo, however—” he lifted his chin “—I would think the telling symbol for you would be the swan for it signifies grace and sincerity, both attributes you possess in quantity.”
“Are you flirting with my woman, Harry?” Cynyr inquired in a conversational tone.
Harold stiffened. “Most assuredly not, Lord Cynyr!” he responded, his beady eyes flashing. “I know my place!” With that said he spun on his heel and stormed off toward the rear of the railcar. The sound of him making the Crees’ bed was interspersed with loud wheezing noises coming from the short man’s nose.
“Stop baiting him, Reaper,” Aingeal chastised.
“But he’s so baitable,” Cynyr said innocently.
Turning away from her husband’s smug look, Aingeal watched the scenery passing by the train window. “Do you think,” she asked, “Otaktay is out there somewhere?”
Cynyr reached across the table and took her hand, pulling it down from her chin.
“Wench, you have nothing to worry about where the Jakotai is concerned. I will never allow him to hurt you.”
15
Charlotte Boyett-Compo
She turned worried eyes to her mate. “You will have to kill him,
mo shearc
. There isn’t any other way he’ll ever leave me be.”
“I thought I had killed him,” Cynyr said, wondering who the Jakotai brave was he had shot between the eyes. “I’ve no compunction about dispatching him,
mo chroi
.”
Her husband’s handsome face was set with determination. At that moment, she loved him more than ever. Until she had ventured upon his campsite many weeks before, she had never had a man look out for her. Not even her father had been particularly protective. After all, he had handed her over to the likes of Donal Greeley and that had proven to be a bad mistake.
“Not all men are like your first husband,” Cynyr said, picking up on her memories.
“I know,” she said.
Harold came stomping by to inform them he had tidied their sleeping quarters. He gave Aingeal a gentle look then glanced back at her husband with something akin to aversion.
“I don’t think Harry likes me,” the Reaper said loud enough for the little man to hear.
“Harold,” the fussy man stressed, turning around to spear Cynyr with an arch look.
“It is Harold, my Lord Cynyr, not Harry!” He shuddered delicately. “That is such a common name.”
“I’m sure Lord Cynyr will try to remember, Harold,” Aingeal said in a sweet voice. Harold sniffed and continued on his way.
“I believe that man has a serious sinus problem,” Cynyr commented. 16
Reaper’s Revenge
Chapter Two
Arawn pitched a twenty-dollar gold piece into the pot. “I’ll see your bet, Brady, and raise you ten.”
“Too rich for me,” Brett Samuels said. “I fold.”
“Me too,” Brett’s brother-in-law Verlin Walker agreed.
Bevyn Coire looked down at his cards. His hand wasn’t that great so he too folded. Mick Brady didn’t bat an eye. He slid a silver onto the pile of coins. “Gotcha covered,
mo
tiarna
. Let’s see what you got.”
The Prime Reaper fanned his cards out on the green baize tabletop. Four aces lay side by side along with the ten of spades. Arawn leaned back, satisfied he’d won. Mick laid his cards down and the men at the table as well as those standing close by gasped. The barber had a straight flush with a jack of diamonds as the highest card.
“Son of a bitch,” Bevyn said with a whistle. Arawn never lost at poker. He was one of the luckiest men Bevyn had ever seen play the game.
The Prime Reaper reached up to scratch at his tattoo. “Not my morning, gents,” he stated, watching Brady rake in the pot.
“That’s what comes of ye lollygagging around the saloon instead of doing me chores like ye promised, Arawn Gehdrin,” Moira McDermott snapped as she came through the batwing doors of the saloon. Her hunched back was painful to watch but the glint in her eye was unnerving. “Losing serves ye right.”
The men all jumped up as the little old lady came up to the table. Each of them had a guilty look on his face. She pointed a finger at Bevyn. “And ye don’t do nothin’ but encourage him either, Bevyn Coure!” She narrowed her rheumy eyes. “What became of that wheelbarrow ye was putting a new wheel on?”
Bevyn glanced at Arawn but the Prime Reaper was standing with his head down, face flaming. “I’m on my way right now, Miss Moira,” Bevyn said.
“The train will be in here in less than an hour and all ye menfolk just sitting around playing silly games,” Moira berated them. “Shame on the lot of ye! Don’t ye have nothin’ better to do with your time?”
Men scattered under her glowering gaze until only Arawn and Mick were left at the table. Even the saloonkeeper John Denning had disappeared.
“I don’t have any customers until noontime, Miss Moira,” Mick defended himself.
“Can’t get ye shop spanking clean instead of doing the demon’s work by encouraging the likes of this young fool?” she asked, turning her narrowed gaze on the Prime Reaper.
17
Charlotte Boyett-Compo
“Yes, ma’am,” Mick agreed. “I can do that.” He cast Arawn a parting look and hurried out the door.
“You’d make a damned good drill sergeant, Moira McDermott,” Arawn told her.
“What ye need is a woman to whip ye ass in line, Arawn Gehdrin,” Moira replied.
“Wouldn’t hurt ye none to be paying attention to that little filly of the Brewers.”
Arawn winced. The young woman in question had been tagging along behind him for days and was beginning to show up even in his dreams—a very strange occurrence, indeed, for Reapers did not sleep well and dreams of anything save violence was rare. At first he’d simply ignored her—thinking if he glared at her sharply enough she’d turn tail and run. That hadn’t happened. If anything Danielle Brewer was around far too often for his peace of mind. He was surprised she wasn’t stuck at the hip to the old woman standing there giving him the evil eye.
“Aren’t you the least bit afraid of me?” Arawn asked Moira.
“And why should I be?” she countered, putting her frail hands on her hips and straightening her bent posture as best she could. She cocked her head to look up at his six-feet-plus height. “You’re nothing but an overgrown boy.”