Her Warriors (4 page)

And here came the first few newcomers. Geir
could hardly suppress his tiger’s desire to pace. She would be here
soon. As would the other tiger. Geir wasn’t sure how he felt about
Beau’s presence. He knew the other tiger had the potential to be a
rival for Jacki’s attention, but while one part of him resented the
idea, the tiger inside him looked forward to being around another
of his kind again.

He had been training
pantera noir
for
many years now. He liked the queen, and the various family lines
that bred black panthers of different species—mostly leopard and
puma. But there was something about being near other tigers. This
house, for example, had been built by tigers and made comfortable
specifically for tigers. The very wood was permeated with tiger
scent and it made Geir feel welcome on an unconscious level.

Geir walked out the front door, wiping his
hands on a rag as he went. He wanted to greet the new arrivals, but
he didn’t really have time to clean up. He’d been working on a few
repairs around the house and was wearing serviceable work
clothes—jeans and a T-shirt. Not his best, but it would be okay, he
hoped. He wasn’t sure what he should do to greet Jacki Kinkaid, but
suspected that if he tried to dress up—or do anything too far out
of the ordinary for him—he would only end up looking like a
fool.

The van pulled up by the front door and Geir
helped Jacki hop down from the front seat. He must have paused a
little too long, feeling shaken by her presence. She smelled so
damn good, it scrambled his senses for a moment. Luckily, she came
to his rescue.

“It’s good to see you again, Master Geir.”
Jacki’s soft voice floated up to him and shook him out of his
frozen state. He let go of her hand and stepped aside so she could
move away from the van. “Thank you for putting us up while my
brother and Beau get back on their feet.”

“I’m happy to have you here,” Geir said,
going with her to open the back doors and help her brother get out
of the van.

He looked worse than Geir had expected. Weak
as a kitten and pale, as if he was very ill. Geir’s brow furrowed.
He had seen something like it before, and knew the other man’s
continued weakness wasn’t a good sign.

Beau came around from the other side of the
van and stood next to Geir as the two selkie siblings headed toward
the front door. Geir sensed the other tiger’s presence, but it was
a welcome feeling, not the combative response he’d half-expected
from his inner beast. As the brother and sister moved slowly into
the house, Geir stopped Beau with a restraining hand on his
arm.

“How long has he been like this?” Geir asked
urgently.

“Since the battle. He hasn’t rallied and
frankly, I’m worried, but his sister is still in denial.”

“The heart sees what it wants to see,” Geir
reflected, then turned to face Beau. “It’s good to have you here,
brother. Whatever else may happen, I am glad of your presence. I’ve
been too long away from other tigers.”

Beau seemed surprised, but Geir didn’t give
him a chance to respond. His guests were waiting for him to direct
them and the selkie male would need to find his rest sooner rather
than later, if Geir was any judge. He vowed to do all he could to
help Tom. Geir would consult with every last healer he knew,
including the snowcat elders in Tibet, if it would help the other
man.

For Tom was Jacki’s brother, and Geir didn’t
want to see her grieve for her brother. If there was anything Geir
could do, he would do it. Sadly, he feared it wouldn’t be enough to
save Jacki’s brother.

Geir entered the front hall, glad to see
that he hadn’t kept Jacki and Tom waiting too long. They were
admiring the front foyer which, while not exactly grand in the
traditional sense, was large, welcoming and homey. Geir liked the
feel of the place and he could tell from their expressions that the
selkie siblings did too.

“This place is beautiful,” Jacki said,
confirming Geir’s hunch.

“It’s big,” Geir agreed. “A tiger couple
built it and lived here, raising their many cubs, which makes it
ideal for our purposes at the moment. There are several bedrooms on
the first floor. Let me show you the options.” Geir led the way
down the hall, moving slowly in consideration of Tom’s
injuries.

“I’ve moved in to the room at the far end of
the hall for the time being,” Geir told them as they walked along.
“The upstairs still needs a little work. The house was in very good
repair, but I decided to do a little upgrading while everything was
empty and easy to work around.”

They stopped at the first door and Geir
reached around to open it. “This is typical of the rooms on this
floor, and most have their own attached bath.” He went inside and
opened the inner door that led to the gleaming white bathroom, so
they could see it.

“We’ve got a winner,” Tom said in a voice
filled with relief. “If nobody minds, I’ll just park myself here
for now. You guys go on ahead. I’ll just rest for a bit.”

Jacki was at Tom’s side, helping him to the
freshly made bed. She drew back the covers as her brother kicked
off his shoes and sat wearily on the side of the bed. She helped
him settle, and tucked him in with obvious love and care. Geir felt
a pang in the region of his heart even as his spine tingled with
alarm. Something was very wrong with Tom. Geir very much feared
they were going to lose him.

Geir didn’t care to think what that would do
to Jacki. It would be awful for her. Geir didn’t want to see her in
any kind of pain—especially not the pain of losing a brother. Geir
had been there, done that, and wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
Especially not a woman as special as Jacki Kinkaid.

Tom insisted he would be fine and that he
just wanted to rest for a bit. Eventually, Jacki was convinced to
go find her own room. She joined Geir and Beau in the hallway.
There was no question but that she would take the room right next
to her brother’s. It also just happened to be the room next to
Geir’s.

Beau settled on the room across the hall
from Jacki’s and dropped his gear before rejoining them. Jacki had
asked to see where the kitchen was. She also wanted a tour of the
rest of the house. Beau joined them.

Geir enjoyed showing his guests
around—particularly Jacki, of course—but he found rather
surprisingly, that he enjoyed Beau’s observations about each new
defensive position and chamber in the building. The house had been
built with defense in mind and Geir was pleased that Beau caught on
to that fact rather easily. It wouldn’t be obvious to most, but
Beau seemed to see beyond the walls and into the function of the
design.

After the tour, Jacki and Beau each headed
to their rooms to unpack and get comfortable. Eventually, they all
ended up back in the kitchen and Geir realized it was almost lunch
time. Jacki offered to make tea while Geir got to work on the meal
he had planned once he’d heard he was going to have guests. It was
kind of sad how much thought he had put into this meal and all the
other preparations he’d made for their arrival. Geir didn’t like
being solitary, though that had been his path more often than not.
With Jacki here, he had a chance to discover if maybe—just maybe—he
would no longer have to walk his path alone.

If she turned out to be his mate, as he very
much suspected she was, he would count himself the luckiest bastard
to ever roam the earth. But he had to get close enough to her
first, to find out if what he suspected was true. He had to kiss
her, but it wasn’t in Geir’s nature to accost a lady on short
acquaintance. He would have to find a way to work up to it slowly,
in the natural course of things.

Somehow.

“There’s a small farm on the other side of
the valley that supplies meat for us. They were given startup
capital by the tigers who lived here before and have a top notch
organic operation. The steaks are some of the best I’ve ever
eaten,” Geir promised as he grilled the aforementioned steaks on
the state of the art kitchen grill.

The big kitchen gleamed with stainless
steel, professional-quality equipment. Everything was built on the
large side, and built to last. Geir liked it and was pleased to see
that his guests appreciated it too.

“Anything to drink other than tea?” Beau
asked.

“In the fridge,” Geir answered, still
working at the grill. “Help yourself.”

Beau reached into the gleaming metal
refrigerator and took out a bottle of beer, automatically getting
one for Geir, which was nice of him. Beau popped the tops off and
handed the cold bottle to Geir as he came over to admire the grill
and the bounty upon it.

“This is quite a place,” Beau observed.
“Thanks for putting us up.”

“You are more than welcome here,” Geir said,
being sure to include Jacki by meeting her gaze briefly. “It’s a
big place for a bachelor, though I suspect it’ll fill up fast once
the rest of the Nyx’s people get here. They intend this compound to
function as a garrison and first line of defense, which is similar
to how the tigers used it.”

“How many can you fit in the house?” Jacki
asked, looking around again as if to try to calculate how many
people would fit into the rooms he had showed her.

“This was home to a rather large family of
tiger shifters, but you might’ve noticed some of the outbuildings
as you drove up. A couple of those structures can function as
barracks and there are cabins all around the property, and all
around the mountain, in fact. The idea would be to have everyone
train here in the dojo—the big barn you probably saw as you drove
up—and live in various locations around the perimeter of the
mountain, similar to the way the tigers ran it. We’re moving a few
things around, of course,” Geir added. “We need to make this place
our own and not rely completely on all the work done by the
tigre d’or
. It’ll be good for the Nyx’s Clan to have
permanent homes near her, for those that choose to move here.”

“Clan Kinkaid is a little different from
most others since we’ve got two major groups of shifters under our
banner, though there are way more lions than there are selkies,”
Jacki observed. “Still, the
pantera noir
is something else
altogether, since black cats can come from a variety of
species.”

“And the Nyx has been on the run almost all
her life,” Beau put in. “No roots. It’s hard to run a Clan when you
don’t have a base of operations anywhere.”

Geir was pleased they both seemed to realize
the challenges Ria would face in uniting her scattered people.

“That’s all going to change now,” Geir said,
as if making a promise to himself. “She’s going to make her stand
here and her Royal Guard will follow her anywhere. They will form
the nucleus of the Clan, as they have for many years.”

“How did you come to be the Master of the
pantera noir
Royal Guard?” Jacki asked. Geir’s tiger
strutted around inside his brain, pleased that its potential mate
was curious about his background.

“I was born in Iceland, as you can probably
tell from the accent I have never quite managed to lose.” Geir
paused to smile. His story wasn’t exactly a cheery one, and he
wasn’t sure he’d be able to tell all of it. It wasn’t really a
secret—just something he preferred not to discuss most of the time.
But if he was going to tell anyone, it would be Jacki. And he
realized he didn’t really mind Beau hearing it either. Beau was a
brother, of sorts. A lone tiger who had chosen a solitary path. If
anyone would understand Geir’s choices, Beau probably would.

“A lot of tigers live there,” Beau added,
nodding. “Not my people, but some of our relatives, I think. Did
you leave when King Frederick went into exile?”

“Yes,” Geir confirmed. “Right around that
time.”

Chapter
Three

Geir couldn’t quite bring himself to explain
exactly why he had left Iceland. He let them think it was because
of the king’s exile—and it was connected in a way—but Geir’s true
reason for leaving was much more personal and too painful to poke
at right now. It was enough he was telling them anything about that
time. He rarely spoke of it. This new openness would take some
getting used to.

Baby steps. That’s what he needed here.
Small disclosures over time, so the pain wouldn’t be so raw. It was
his chosen strategy, and he was going to stick to it for now.

“I was young, though,” Geir continued. “I
went to my aunt, who had married into the
pantera noir
. The
former Master saw to my training and sent me abroad when I needed
to learn certain skills he could not teach me. Eventually, I ended
up in the snowcat enclave in Tibet. That’s where I first heard
about Jake, the Nyx’s new mate. He’s something of a legend there.
He may be only human, but he earned the respect of the snowcat
elders, which is a rare feat. Jake is a force to be reckoned with,
no doubt about it. He will be good for Ria. For too long has she
been alone with her burden. It’s good that they found each
other.”

Now, how had he gotten onto that subject?
Mating wasn’t something Geir ever really talked about, but he
guessed maybe his inner tiger was pushing the thought into his
brain. The cat wanted to find out if Jacki was the woman for them.
It thought she was already, but it needed confirmation. And his
human side definitely needed that confirmation before he could
commit his emotions any further.

“They’re a really good couple,” Jacki agreed
with a wistful sort of look on her face that Geir understood all
too well.

“So how did you get from Tibet back to the
Nyx? I’ve heard that few who train with the snowcats find their way
back home. Although…I guess Iceland is your home,” Beau observed, a
question in his tone.

“No, my home is with the Nyx now. I’m sworn
to her service and more than that, I fit in here. I know I’m
needed. If the day ever comes when I’m not, or I fail to serve her
to the best of my ability, I’ll leave. For now though, I choose to
stay with her.”