Forest of Demons (22 page)

“He tastes of him.
You
reek of him. It sickens me. His heart is as black as my prison but he will quell my hunger.”

Earl appeared before him suspended in the air spinning slowly, his eyes completely white as if he were regarding the inside of his own skull.

Aryan raised his axe menacingly. “Who are you? Show yourself!”

A low rumble of laughter echoed around him.

“I do not take commands from his insects.”

“Give me back my brother!” Aryan stood, legs parted, eyes full of fire.

“Wait, what is this . . . I see. Maybe we can come to an arrangement.”

Before he could question the voice he felt it inside his head, wriggling around, poking and prodding and . . . tasting. Aryan gagged.

“Yesss . . .”

Aryan gasped as something hit him in the chest with immense force. His eyes snapped open, and Fen slapped him hard across the face.

“What the Frack, Fen?” Bojan elbowed him aside. “Chief? Chief? You all right?”

Aryan stared up at the sky through the trees. He was lying on his back. “Earl? Where’s Earl?”

Bojan shook his head, his lips pressed together grimly.

Aryan pushed himself to his feet, exhaling shakily when his eyes fell on what remained of his warrior brother.

“We need to go. Now.” Cadoc grabbed his arm and began to propel him out of the forest.

“Where did it go?” Aryan demanded.

Cadoc shook his head. “Who knows, it just . . . poof. It was gone.”

Aryan shook him off. “We have to take him back.”

“He’s dead!” Fen said wringing his hands. “And if we don’t get out of here then we will be too.”

Aryan resisted the urge to strike him for his cowardice. “We are not leaving without his body. That’s an order!” Aryan didn’t pull rank often, and it stunned his remaining warriors into action.

Together they gathered what remained of Earl, a wet mess of skin and bone barely recognizable as the warrior he had been, and made their way back to the sledges.

In sombre silence they began their journey home. Two sledges piled with wood, and one carrying a fallen warrior.

“What was it? You charged in, then you were gone, and then it was gone, and you were there, alive but unconscious and Earl . . . poor Earl was dead.” Bojan clutched his mug of brew so tightly his knuckles turned pale.

Aryan stared into the flames of their camp fire. “I don’t know, but it spoke to me.”

“What did it say?”

“Nothing that made sense, but I felt it, inside my head, it was ancient . . . angry . . . desolate.”

“We have to report this as soon as we return,” Cadoc said.

Aryan snorted in disgust. “We reported the ice wraiths. Look what was done about that?”

“I see your point,” Bojan said.

Fen looked at him, and then at Bojan in confusion. “What? What was done?”

“Nothing, you idiot! Nothing was done!” Cadoc said.

Fen stared at him in surprise. Cadoc rarely lost his temper, and he never spoke to anyone in such a derogatory manner.

Cadoc ducked his head. “I’m sorry.”

“No, I understand. This is . . . it’s too much.”

They lapsed into silence, into their own thoughts.

Two more days until they reached the City. What would he say to Hera? To Victor? Earl had been his man, and he’d died on his watch. He couldn’t help wondering if there were more he could have done. The creature had mentioned a bargain, but nothing further had been said. If only he had been given more time, maybe he could have saved Earl.

Cadoc nudged him. “Get some sleep, Chief. I’ll take first watch.”

Aryan stared up at the bright sky. No matter how often he was forced to sleep outside, he would never get used to the sun being awake when he did so. Nodding tiredly, he rolled himself up in his furs and closed his eyes.

Despite his exhaustion, or maybe because of it, sleep was a long time coming.

“I’m beginning to tire of these tales, Aryan. Your man is dead. I would think you had better things to do than to weave an inflated tale as to how it occurred. Do you think it will give his family peace to hear these horrific things?” Marduk asked.

Aryan ground his teeth to stop himself from spewing forth the venom sitting on the tip of his tongue. Hera’s wails of anguish were still resonating in his head, and he wished he could have shared them with Marduk.

It was Cadoc who spoke. Level-headed, reasonable Cadoc.

“If you please, Enforcer, we simply wish you to know what we saw, what happened. What you do with this knowledge is up to you.”

His calm, unflappable tone rankled Marduk more than if he had spoken out of turn.

Aryan bit back a smile of satisfaction.

He watched Marduk work to hide his annoyance, then place his hands flat on his desk in a gesture Aryan had come to recognize as preparation for delivering his closing argument.

“I will take your report into consideration when dispatching further Hands to the forest, although I maintain that you were mistaken in what you saw. Now, you will need an additional member to replace the one you have lost. I will allocate you a replacement immediately. You may leave.”

Cadoc’s hands curled into fists, his jaw clenched. He nodded curtly. They spun on their heels in unison. Cadoc opened the door, and Aryan strode out and down the steps into the foyer.

He paced for a moment, hands on hips, breath coming short and heavy.

“Let it go, Chief,” Cadoc said.

“I know, I know.” Aryan ran a hand over his face. “I need to go back to Earl’s. Hera has no family; Earl’s parents met the eternal flame last year, and he had no siblings.”

“She has us. We are her family.”

Aryan nodded. “Yes. We are.”

Victor let them into the house. Hera was asleep, drained by sorrow. Mia was in the family room simmering something on the stove that smelled delicious.

She offered him her cheek, and he kissed it chastely.

They sat around the table in silence until a knock at the door broke it.

“I’ll get it,” Mia said.

She returned a moment later trailed by Bojan, Fen, and Valasea. Aryan’s heart began to race as it always did in
her
presence. He quickly averted his gaze, tracing patterns on the wooden table with his finger. His heart rate slowly returned to normal.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Valasea asked Mia.

“No, I think I have everything cooking nicely. Would you like some tea?”

“Oh that would be lovely.”

He listened to them conversing, so civilized. If Mia knew . . . if she knew. He looked up to find Bojan glaring at him again.

Frack! The man was unrelenting in his disapproval. Why didn’t he just come out and confront him about it? Aryan pushed back his chair.

“I need some air. I’ll be back.” He left quickly before anyone could challenge him, or offer him company.

Outside he leaned against the stone wall and waited. He didn’t need to wait long.

“Chief.” Bojan joined him.

“Just say it.”

“Say what?”

“Crud Bojan, I’m not blind. Just say what it is you want to say, and let’s move on.”

Bojan hung his head, his shoulders rising and falling. When he spoke his voice was low, soft, but in no way judgemental.

“I understand chief, I do, but you need to stop. You can stop, and everything can go back to the way it was. If you don’t . . . if you don’t, it won’t end well. Fen’s an idiot, but he’s not stupid. Crud, I’m not explaining myself too well, am I?”

Aryan didn’t respond, because to do so would be to incriminate himself. He’d given Bojan the opportunity to vent and he had. Bojan hadn’t said anything that Aryan hadn’t thought already, but what his warrior brother didn’t understand was that words and thoughts paled in the face of Valasea’s beauty. All that mattered was action, his hands on her, and hers on him.

“Chief? Aryan? Are you listening to me?”

“I heard you.” He pushed off the wall. “I’ll see you inside.”

“You’re playing with fire, you can’t just—”

Aryan shut the door, cutting off his words.

Valasea was seated in his spot when he returned. She pinned him with her sunshine eyes, a tiny smile playing on her lips. He looked away.

“Aryan love, could you taste this?” Mia beckoned him from the stove.

He joined her, opening his mouth to taste the sauce on her spoon. He licked his lips, nodding in approval.

Mia cupped his cheek, running her thumb fondly over his jaw.

Valasea was watching. He could feel her eyes burning holes into the back of his head. He pulled away from Mia, pretending not to see the hurt that played across her face.

He rejoined the group at the table.

“Where is Victor?”

“Checking on Hera,” Cadoc said.

The door opened, and Victor appeared, shaking his head. “She’s still sleeping. I’m not sure when she’ll wake up.”

“That’s fine,” Cadoc said. “Let her sleep. I should get back to Alma. The baby has been keeping her up, and she’s exhausted. I’ll be back later.”

Fen rose with him. “We should be going too. I’ll come round later with Cadoc when Hera’s awake.”

“But shouldn’t we be here when she wakes?” Valasea asked.

Fen turned on her, his eyes flashing. “She barely knows you. I’m sure you won’t be missed.”

Valasea flinched, her eyes misting. She glanced in Aryan’s direction as if imploring him to intervene. Aryan averted his gaze. There was nothing he could do. She belonged to Fen.

“Come on. Get up!” Fen reached for her arm, but she dodged him and stood, her head held high. Without another look in his direction, she strode out of the room.

Fen stood by the table for a moment, his chest heaving.

“Fen?” Cadoc reached for him.

Fen pulled his arm away. “I’m fine. We’ll be fine. I’ll talk to her, I promise.”

Aryan watched him leave, and after a few minutes Cadoc followed. He was alone with Mia and Victor.

“What was that all about?” Victor asked.

“Nothing you need to worry about.” Aryan said.

Victor snorted. “Typical. They tell you that you’re a man, but they treat you like a child.”

Mia placed a bowl of stew and a plate of bread before him, and then took the seat beside him. “Victor, I suspect this has more to do with the fact that what happens between life-mates is no one’s business but their own.”

Victor tore a hunk of bread and dipped it in the stew but didn’t bring it to his mouth. He kept his eyes fixed on his bowl. “Is what happened to my da my business? I
am
a man now, and I want to know what killed my da. I have a right to know. I know Ama asked you not to tell me, but I have a right to know.”

Aryan glanced at Mia, who gnawed on her lip a moment before nodding.

Aryan sighed. “You have a right to know, but your ama is trying to protect you.”

“But—”

Aryan held up his hand. “But I will tell you, because yes, you are now a man. It is your duty to protect your ama now, so you must be strong.”

Victor put down the hunk of bread.

Aryan licked his lips and began to speak.

Aryan had seen Victor become a man before his eyes. As he had relayed the events leading to Earl’s death, the boy’s spine had straightened, his jaw broadened, and his whole demeanor had shifted from uncertain to sure. Afterward, when all had been said, and Hera still slept, Victor had urged them home, assuring them that he would fetch them if needed.

As they washed and undressed for bed, Aryan became aware of a strange tension between him and Mia. She had been more subdued than usual on their journey back, and now as she combed her long locks, her movements were jerky, almost angry. He was weary, but to ignore this was to allow it to fester, and so he did what a good life-mate would do.

“Mia? Are you all right?”

She paused in her combing, raising her face to his. “How well do you know her?”

Frack! “Who?”

Mia held his gaze. “Valasea.”

She was staring at him, studying his face. He had done nothing wrong . . . he had to believe it or she would see. “About as well as you would suspect. I’ve met her once before, briefly. Fen speaks of her often though. The man is truly in love.” He forced a chuckle.

Mia dropped his gaze. “Oh.”

He wanted to leave it at that, but knew that an innocent male would not. An innocent male would question his life-mate, ask her for the reason behind her question, so, he played the innocent.

“Why do you ask?”

Mia shook her head. “It’s nothing. It’s silly.”

He cupped her shoulder. “Tell me.”

“I saw the way she was looking at you. I saw the way you looked at her, and then at the stove you pulled away from me as if ashamed of my touch.” Her lips trembled.

Crud, the woman was more perceptive than he had given her credit for. He would need to be more careful in the future. He slid his hand up her neck to caress her cheek, and she leaned into him closing her eyes.

“Mia, you have nothing to fear. I pulled away because it felt wrong to feel contentment at your touch in such terrible circumstances.”

“I’m sorry. It’s been a long day. I shouldn’t have doubted you.”

The crisis seemed to have been averted, but Aryan realized he would need to show Mia more affection in the future. Maybe a child would put her mind elsewhere.

He slipped into bed behind her, pulling her against him. He closed his eyes and summoned Valasea’s face.

Mia gasped, but didn’t protest as he pushed her forward and slid into her from behind. He fucked her with intent. A child, he would give her a child, and all would be resolved.

Later that night he found himself at the baths. It had become their secret meeting place. They met frequently late at night, snatching moments here and there. He needed to see her, to touch her. A week was too long not to have tasted her. Time ticked by, and he was about to give up hope when her scent reached him. She appeared a moment later, but where he expected to see smiles he saw only tears.

“Valasea? What happened?”

She rushed into his arms, burying her face in his chest.

“Valasea?”

“Fen.” Her voice was muffled by his furs. “Fen was furious with me. He suspects, I swear he suspects something.”