The soldier scratched his bristled chin. “Problem is, you warmed up me and my men good, too. And we’re thinking it won’t be long until you’re screaming and squirming on our pricks, and liking it just as much.”
She stared at him in disbelief before glancing at the others. They didn’t look as eager to fuck as they did entertained. They would enjoy her encounter with this brute no matter the outcome. “Do you not know what I’ll do to you?”
“We’ve heard what you did to the citadel guards.” He tilted his big head to the left and eyed her wrists. “Don’t know how you’ll manage that now.”
Easily. “I warn you, soldier. You’ll lose any hand that touches me.”
Behind him, Selaq came into the common room, carrying Mala’s flagon of ale. Her eyes widened in alarm. “You soused lout, Delan! Get away from her before she takes your fool head!”
Her warning only made him more determined. His lewd sneer turned ugly. “We’ll see.”
He reached for Mala’s loincloth. By Vela, she would not even give him a chance to touch her.
Gripping the leash, she hauled herself up and snapped her booted foot into his balls. He folded over, retching. Swiftly she spun toward the table. Kavik had shoved her sword farther down its length than she could reach, but one of her knives lay close enough. She trapped the hilt between her feet and flipped upward, bringing the blade to her hands. Before her legs swung back to the ground, she’d sliced through the leash.
With an enraged roar, Delan came at her like a charging ox. The idiot. Her hands were still bound but she held a leash and a blade.
Choosing her weapon, she whipped the length of leather around his throat, leapt up onto the table and vaulted past him, yanking the leash. His feet kept going; his upper body didn’t. His legs flew out from beneath him and he landed hard on his back, choking and ripping at the leather circling his neck. Mala jumped heavily onto his chest and stomped his cock again. It wasn’t so hard now.
She glanced up. Kavik hadn’t run off to a den; he’d apparently only been donning his clothes and gathering his belongings. Arms crossed over his now-armored chest, he stood at the nearest table, watching without expression. Selaq waited behind him, her mouth agape.
Good. Mala had worked up a thirst even before this scut had attempted to touch her.
“The ale?” she asked, and gratefully took the flagon the innkeeper brought to her. Beneath her feet, a purple-faced Delan tried to heave her away. She ground the toe of her boot into his throat and didn’t step off until his eyes rolled back and his struggles ceased. Not dead. Just beaten soundly.
As if suddenly uneasy, the other soldiers looked away from her and quietly resumed their drinking. Since they weren’t going to display the same stupidity or avenge their comrade, Mala approached Kavik and held out her bound hands.
“Are you still showing me what it means to be tamed? We’ll need a new leash.”
“No.” He unfastened the collar from her wrists with a few sharp pulls. “I’ll return for you here when the moon is full.”
“I’m supposed to wait?”
“You will.”
The warrior hadn’t tugged her leash that well. But she said nothing and watched him go. There was still much to learn about Kavik the Beast; it could not all be done now. He had more to learn about her, too—such as how patient and stubborn she could be.
He would soon find out.
CHAPTER 5
The woman in red followed Kavik across the moors. Riding her stallion and leading three other horses, she’d appeared behind him as the midday sun slipped behind gray clouds. As the rolling hills flattened into a dank marsh, she dismounted and trailed him on foot. When evening fell, she stopped to tend to the animals and to lay out a camp. By night, she was only a small flickering fire in the distance. Though hungry and tired, he continued on until the shadows of the Weeping Forest swallowed his trail.
By midmorning she was behind him again.
And no longer at a distance. If she had been, the thick forest would have concealed her presence. Yet she followed close enough that he could hear the clomp of the horses’ hooves over the noise of the rain and the dripping leaves. Her voice floated among the occasional nicker and whinny—and at times her laugh. That night she didn’t stop to camp before he did, and set up hers so near that the glow of her fire was indistinguishable from his. Over the flames he roasted the red-crowned hopper taken with his bow in the morning. The wingless bird’s meat was tough and stringy, and he watched her skin a fat opossum while he ate. She glanced over at him once, holding up half the animal—offering it. Kavik shook his head and made his bed on the wet ground.
Though Kavik would have liked to smash the other man’s teeth for it, the measle Delan had spoken truth. It hadn’t mattered that Mala had been the one bound by the collar and leash; Kavik had been the one being tamed from the moment he’d tasted her—and by the time she’d screamed his name, he’d forgotten his rage. Instead he could only reverently kiss her sleek thigh. He’d have done anything for her, this woman he’d loved even before knowing her name. Who’d been drenched in her need even before he’d touched her.
He’d been led so easily. He’d gone exactly where she’d wanted him to go.
Never again.
But Kavik couldn’t summon more rage. Instead he went to bed with a heavy ache in his chest, and it still remained when he woke. He’d known an ache like this before, following his father’s death. Now Mala stalked his path and heralded his own.
Vela had been clever. She’d sent the one person in the world Kavik couldn’t fight. But he could stand firm. And he would have to until Mala abandoned this quest. He might lose everything. He might die. But he wouldn’t face the end tamed and on his knees.
In the morning she came to him, leading a sturdy black gelding. Her eyes were still heavy with sleep and her dark hair newly braided. The rain dripping from the trees overhead beaded on the shoulders of her red cloak before soaking in.
“This mount is yours, if you wish,” she said. “He’s sound and even-tempered.”
And of a similar build to his gray horse, as if she’d noted the size of his saddle and chosen a horse it would fit. With a nod, Kavik asked her, “Do you still want to hunt the demon tusker?”
Her lips parted and she stared at him for a long moment—she hadn’t likely expected any answer. But he couldn’t stand firm while running away.
“I do,” she finally said.
He took the gelding’s reins. “Then we will go.”
THE density of the trees prevented Mala from riding alongside Kavik, so she continued following him to the forest’s edge. Though the rain had ceased, the leaves still dripped, and she studied him from beneath her shadowed hood. He’d hardened himself again. Not with icy rage, this time. Instead he seemed filled with iron determination.
She preferred his anger. Fire could be doused. Ice could melt. But iron wasn’t so easy to bend.
Mala knew it well. Her own will and stubbornness was crafted from iron just as strong. So they would be as two hammers, striking away at each other. Neither one would break.
But if Mala’s task were simple, the reward would not be so great.