“There is, actually,” Gen offered, her smile bright and helpful. “Jak hasn’t eaten since midday yesterday, and that was road rations, and Zeph hasn’t eaten much either, what with all that’s happened. Both of you should eat a hearty meal before you go, to give you the best chance. I’ll need at least an hour to cook. Two would be better for a substantial meal.”
“I’ll help,” Lena offered.
Jak smiled thinly. “There you go. Let’s get your bags. We’ll do some knifework while Gen and Lena cook.”
“I’ll help with the blade practice,” Astar offered, taking a step toward them.
“No, you won’t,” Zeph declared, hauling him back and fluttering her lashes. “You’re going to give me a proper goodbye. Just think—we might never see each other again.”
“Zephyr,” Astar protested, stricken. “Don’t say things like that.”
Behind Astar’s back, Zeph gave Stella a satisfied simper, perfectly aware that Stella would’ve been grateful for someone else to ease this humming tension between her and Jak. She’d never seen Jak like this. Where had the happy-go-lucky friend of her youth gone, and where had this simmeringly dangerous—and sexually fierce—man come from? Worse, now that she’d been so thoroughly a part of him, they’d be able to physically touch without it hurting her.
The revelation came with a rush of joy underscored with stark fear.
She had no reason to hold him off.
She had no excuse to hold him off.
And her future still hadn’t changed.
“Your daggers, Stella,” Jak reminded her, as if there were some possible way for her to have forgotten already. “Your bags are where?”
“In my room,” she huffed in resignation. “I’ll go get them.”
“I’ll come with you.”
“I can meet you back down here,” she said. The idea of being alone with Jak in her room gave her stomach an unfamiliar flutter.
“We might as well practice in there,” he replied. “As good a place as any.”
“It’s small,” she pointed out dubiously.
“I’m sure, but what you need to learn is close infighting. How to deal with an attack that has made it through the rest of us. A confined space is actually better.” He returned her gaze evenly, a glint of challenge in his dark eyes.
“Come on, then,” she sighed. “If you insist.”
~ 13 ~
He did insist. In fact, he’d been moments from falling to his knees and begging her to become a bird and fly far, far away from this wretched hellhole. That she’d agreed that the intelligence from the alter-realm was seeking her specifically had rimed his heart with a fear he’d never felt for his own hide. He needed to protect her with a primitive urgency that defied logic.
He didn’t care how much it pissed her off: She was going to learn to wield those blades or… He didn’t know what, but something. He wasn’t afraid of going to the alter-realm, but he was gut-wateringly terrified of coming back to find her gone. Or worse.
In a rare temper, Stella flung open the door of a room on the second level. An unmade bed took up most of the small space, her minimal baggage on a low table nearby. With her back firmly to him, she rummaged in her bags, searching for her blades. Jak leaned against the wall, arms folded, watching her, keeping his body loose and relaxed—but fighting his own mounting temper as she took forever to find the fucking things.
At last—minutes later, during which a toddler could’ve skinned and gutted her—she exclaimed in relief and turned to show him the daggers. Her triumphant smile faded at whatever she saw in his face. Probably good that his expression got the point across, as the next step would be throttling her.
“Put them on,” he instructed softly, not trusting himself not to shout at her again.
She sighed in exasperation. “Is it really necessary to—”
“Yes,” he bit out. “See how the pretty daggers sit in sheaths on that lovely belt? You buckle the belt around your gorgeous hips, and then you wear them. All. The. Time.”
Her eyes darkened, thunderclouds gathering. “There is no need to be sarcastic with me.”
“Isn’t there? Then, pray tell, what will get through your thick skull?”
The sense of a pending storm thickened. “Don’t you speak to me that way, Jakral Konyngrr.”
He rolled his eyes, making his disdain clear. “I’ll speak to you any way I like. Not as if you can do anything about it.”
Lightning flashed in her eyes. “You forget that I have offensive magics. Powerful ones.”
“Useless ones,” he sneered, goading her further.
“How dare you!” Her streaming dark hair stirred as if in an unseen wind.
Though the hairs stood up on the back of his neck, he didn’t move, considered yawning in her face, but even he didn’t have the balls to push her that far. Instead he lifted a shoulder and let it fall. “I dare because I’m a better fighter than you are. Not because you’re female, but because you’re defenseless. That’s why you need protecting. So, quit whining about everyone being overprotective and accept that you need a big strong man to—”
With an incoherent screech, she dropped the knife belt and hurled a ball of blue lightning at him. As it flew toward him, he pulled a dagger, threw it, and ducked. The lightning grazed his shoulder with a light tingle—he hadn’t even needed to evade that tickle—and his blade shaved off a long lock of Stella’s hair before thudding into the wall behind her.
Stella gaped at him. Without speaking, she dropped her gaze to the severed lock of hair lying like a snake at her feet. “I…” She lifted her eyes to his, shock clear in them. “You… you threw a knife at me.”
“You threw lightning at me,” he pointed out.
“Because you provoked me!”
“Yes, I did. Worked pretty well, except that was the most pitiful lightning I’ve ever seen. If that’s the best you can do, then—”
“It isn’t,” she snapped.
“Why not?” When she didn’t reply, he pushed away from the wall. “Because you pulled your punch.”
Unhappily, she watched him pick up the lock of hair. Coiling it into a tight circle, he stuck it in his pocket. A nice keepsake. “All the magic in the world does you no good if you won’t use it,” he said.
“I can use it.”
“I know you can. I also know you won’t.”
Pressing her lips together in something just shy of a mulish pout, she glared at him. “Are you saying you wish I had hurt you?”
He tugged the shortened lock of hair. “I can take it.”
She didn’t smile. “You’re not immortal, Jak.”
“And yet I survived a brush with death, thanks to you.” He grinned jauntily at her, unbothered that she didn’t return it. “Let’s try that again, but this time, try harder.”
“But I don’t want to hurt you!”
He blew out an impatient breath. “If something is trying to kill you, then it’s your enemy and deserves to be hurt.”