Stormrider (4 page)

He was a well-put-together youth, straight as a tree trunk drawn steadily from Nashira’s rich soil like a slim and supple sapling. His eyes were dark fire, wide-set and intelligent. His body was sleek, dark-skinned and clad in almost nothing at all. A softly tanned rectangle of animal hide draped across his loins and a trapping of fine, brilliantly colored needlework swagged across his chest. He wore nothing else despite the early hour and the crisp bite of the morning air. He raised a hand toward her, but not in aggression. It was neutral, offering no greeting or threat.

Tanith’s hair prickled and tightened against her scalp. She never knew exactly what to expect from one of The People (her people)—especially the males. Most recently they had contented themselves with merely watching, but they were unpredictable, and now simply was not the time to be dealing with their prickliness. Not with her totally untutored patient staring so intently at her. Was there question in those fox-eyes? Or was it her own wishful thinking that he’d somehow sense the situation?

Unblinkingly, he watched her. Raptor Simic was an astute man. He wondered about many things looking across at her like this from his position flat on his belly, his back stiff as old leather, his muscles thrumming their discomfort. Mostly he wondered not
who
she was, for he’d seen pictures of her back on Antaris, but what strange fate had brought him down on this continent, exactly
where
she was. Because there was no doubt in his nimble mind that she was Tanith Aesir, Janissary, trained Custodian/Protector of the laws and people of Antaris, she had been sent to Nashira before him. Sent when the Council had been adamant about achieving its goal of recovery, but just as adamant as to how it was accomplished. These days all bets were off. A bounty hunter, willing to use any method, and adept at it, much more suited their desperation.

He probably
should
wonder why she wasn’t dead. Such a detail could be important to his own survival. Instead, he decided to wonder why she had come to his aid, being alive after all and what she was doing with those beasts—yes, a flick of his eye clarified matters, assuring him they were all still near. Worse, they appeared to be in a defensive stance, fanned out around the woman where she hitched herself up on one elbow, still half buried in bed furs, gazing steadily past him at someone or something behind him. She appeared little pleased with what she saw. The wolves, spread out stiff-limbed around her, allowed teeth to show.

A threat? A danger? It occurred to him that it might be a good idea to see if he would be able to move in case there was danger approaching. In case she needed help. Raptor made it a point always to pay his debts one way or another, sooner or later, and the one he owed her was great. He twitched a couple of muscles, found that everything right down to his bones ached, itched and burned, watched the glacial expression on Tanith’s face, then decided he did not care to know the answer right now. When it came, if it came (whatever
it
was) would be time enough to find out if he could rise to the occasion. He would hate to jump the gun now. Besides, adrenaline could add a boost at the right moment. Better it should be a surprise. He continued to watch her.
 

Tanith displayed neither aggression nor passivity. She simply returned the gaze of the strapping, dark-haired male at the edge of the trees knowing Strongheart directed the defense.

In response to the silver wolf’s directives, One Eye and Littlefoot moved slightly to either side, heads lowered and bristling. Legs braced, teeth gleaming, they stood firm and gave warning. Low, menacing growls passed from one to another.
 

She sensed their movements more than saw them, in tune with the pack, feeling their tension. Tanith vibrated to the commands crackling in silence as Strongheart directed, implanted strategy for defense, and if necessary, for an attack. Their camp would not be an easy one to threaten. The man of The People would find no easy slave or wife for capture here.

But he was probably just looking, observing her. Tanith knew they took endless delight in discussing her oddities among themselves. Still, if she was not ever-vigilant she would be vulnerable. She wished she hadn’t been so stupid as to leave her weapons up in the cave. She continued to meet the young man’s gaze on an equal level until he turned and melted into the trees with one last awed glance at Strongheart, One Eye and Littlefoot.

Immediately the wolves relaxed. So did Tanith. At least she relaxed with the wolves, more of a body language than true ease. No, she was still decidedly
uneasy
with this stranger laying so near, staring, and waiting. He was no threat to her, at least not in the sense of having to protect herself against some sort of attack. He was too weak, but there was something . . .
 

She narrowed her green eyes, disliking being put in the position to speak first. It felt, unreasonably, like a defensive posture. They would have to find a way to establish the rules between them early.

Raptor watched her rise slightly and saw the immediate lines of tension fade from her face, quite a beautiful face, much like the pictures he had seen before coming. He again unveiled his disarming smile, easier now, smoother.

Tanith was not charmed; she was irritated.

“You are not of The People. What are you doing here?” Bluntness was her favorite opening technique She briskly looked him over.

“Broad question,” Raptor returned. “Here where? Here with you?Here on this planet? Or here, at a specific place on this planet where you obviously don’t believe I should be?”

Strongheart moved in close to peer into the intruder’s face. The wolf’s gaze was steady, appraising.
He has a facile tongue, perhaps he is a clever man.

“He is pond slime.” Tanith gave her knee-jerk response out loud.

Raptor had the good grace to appear affronted despite his urge to laugh. He had no idea where the remark had originated, but he had no doubt it referred to himself. And who was she talking to, the wolf?

Littlefoot edged nearer, sat down beside Tanith and yawned widely giving full display to her gleaming white teeth. The she-wolf radiated support, but formed no direct thoughts. The wolfling’s equivalent of no comment.

Tanith tossed aside the heavy furs of her bedding, then began to shed her outer leathers. “I have no time for this.” She did not bother with silken tone, just directed her blunt words at Raptor. “Who are you and what do you want?”

“I’m Raptor Simic, if that answers your gently phrased question, and I want what the Dinh Dinh I killed was seeking, and you are undoubtedly
still
seeking.” He finished off his short speech with a grunt of effort and managed to push himself into a half-sitting, half-reclining position, sweat breaking out across his forehead in great beads. Everything was stiff and painful, and worse, he felt weak as limp grass, his limbs trembling visibly with his efforts despite his best attempts to conceal it.

He eyed her carefully. What in the name of the Dinh Dinh’s perdition had happened when he had finally collapsed? He had vague memories of a momentary consciousness before blackout and this woman, though not tiny, taking the bear down from behind with a knife and the wolf . . . what . . . ? Raptor threw an appraising glance in the huge silver wolf’s direction. Then he glanced around for the other two. There had been no mention of the wolves in the reports he had been given prior to his departure. He trembled, sat up straighter and shivered, drawing the heavy furs across his shoulders, instantly regretting it as pain whipped through his body in a blinding flash that sent glowing black dots dancing before his eyes nearly blocking out his image of her.

Tanith gave him close regard. She knew that name, Raptor Simic. It rang bells of recognition, yet she could not place the name with a biography. She could not put her finger on where she had known it. Annoying, but it would come to her in time.

She felt an unwanted empathy for his weakness. She would care little for being in his position; no, she would be stunned to find herself in his position. The memory of weakness and helplessness ripped through her. And the memories brought something close to physical pain. Her work as a Janissary was not without its risks, but it was her life prior to that—her childhood capture by the slave traders—which had brought the pain of memory. She would not care to repeat the experience on any level. Her lost youth was enough. Becoming a Janissary had been her defense. But her past was not at issue here. She gave him a level-eyed stare.

“The Dinh Dinh, being dead, is no longer seeking anything. I know, I buried him. He matters little to me at this point. What matters is you, and the question in my mind as to why you are evading my questions. What is it exactly that you seek and you believe me to be seeking as well?”

He laughed softly and shook his head, taking exquisite care to move the rest of his body as little as possible. “It is not a matter of belief. I know you are seeking the amulet just as I am; just as many others are now. And I, like you, have been sent here by the High Council, The Circle of Nine of Antaris.”

Tanith blinked a couple of times, rapidly, the only indication of her agitation. If he had indeed been sent to Nashira by the circle of Nine, elite of The High Council, then he knew
everything
. Her mission would have been recorded as having failed and he would have been told everything; about the mission; about her. Her life would be in-side-out. It was a well known and accepted policy. It was done to help one succeed where another had failed. He would know all about her life down to the last detail. All about her birth in Nashira, her background, everything that had happened to her before and after she had been adopted by her parents on Antaris. He would know every detail concerning her mission; everything she had known when she had started out from Antaris. He would know her as no other human being had ever known her—save her instructors, and they had been bound by a vow of silence and confidentiality.

Just one look at Raptor Simic told her he would be bound by nothing. A man with no honor, no sense of decency and he would know of her childhood here among The People; of her kidnapping by the slave traders and her position as the Maven’s personal possession.

She had been a child then and the Maven had left her alone, treating her as only a servant, for a little while. A while which had proved to be too little. This man, this Raptor, would know— She cut her own thoughts off abruptly. She would not think of that, not now.

For the first time, Tanith cursed the policy which had long ago been instituted to help in the completing of a mission should one Janissary fail. She was protective of her past. All that information was to be passed to another only if she was dead. And she
wasn’t
dead—except to the Circle of Nine! She refocused her attention outward, toward Raptor.

The slow grin spreading across his face as full realization dawned upon her did nothing to bolster her painstakingly constructed confidence. Her past haunted her, its power disturbed her, and now she was face to face with it—in the body of one Raptor Simic.

“You are not a Janissary,” Tanith said slowly, not caring for the bemused look the injured man cast her as she spoke. “By what authority did the Circle of Nine send you here?”

“What authority do they need other than their command?”

“Stop playing word games with me!” Tanith snapped. “I know the High Council.” Her appraising gaze did not waiver and she felt herself coloring from the tips of her toes to the roots of her hair in a flowing wave as he returned her brazen stare.

He was moving his body now, in slow, sinuous curves, obviously testing each and every muscle, one at a time, his soft regard never leaving her as he discovered his limits. “I operate under one of the oldest auspices of the world. I am a bounty hunter.” Gently spoken but with no apology.

Anger. Shock. Disbelief. All of them surged through Tanith. Then more anger. “A
what?!
”

He shrugged; too sharp a movement; winced. “A bounty hunter. And I’m not here to apologize if that offends you,” he assured her with cool, steely delivery.

“They sent a
bounty hunter
?” That was where she’d read that name! He had a reputation, and what a reputation it was. He was known to be the most dangerous, the most accomplished of his kind.

Tanith incredulously spoke to the air surrounding her, certainly not to him, her tone questioning, filled with disbelief; or at least the lack of desire to believe. “The Circle of Nine sent a bounty hunter?”

What in the Blue Moon was she dealing with here? The High Council, Circle of Nine, had sent this . . . man to finish what she had begun. To return the Amulet of Suonetar to its origins. To place it about the neck of the rightful Imperitor, he who was above even the Circle of Nine’s High Cudan, highest governing body of the Council of the Servitors?

Tanith gave a small shudder at what this man would have to know; about her, about the council, about some of the innermost workings of Antaris. Bounty hunter or no, he would not be sent out with such an important directive unarmed. He would have the weapon of knowledge and undoubtedly any other weapon he was about to scrounge before coming here.

“Others know about the Amulet and its theft. The High Council believes you have failed. They hold you in high regard, but unfortunately, they consider you dead. Even did a very touching formal memorial service to honor your bravery. I’m sure it will be with immense relief that they will hear of your life-force continuing.”