Hunted Warrior Read online

  “We were on assignment,” Silence said. “The Grievance is only days away, in London.”

  “London?” Avyi edged away from the wall, her eyes still wary. “Where in London?”

  “The old Battersea Power Station.”

  Understanding spread over Avyi’s expression. “So that’s what I saw. Crumbled and abandoned. On the Thames in an industrial area. It’s perfect. You found this out with Hark and the others?”

  Silence nodded. “He and I were separated. That Indranan witch, Ulia, who works for the Asters—she played games with the minds of every rebel until our cohesion broke down. Everyone was captured but me and a man, Grandio of Indranan. He remains in hiding in London. I …” Her voice choked off. “I ran. I needed help.”

  Mal nodded. “You did the right thing, although I would’ve preferred a different way to reunite.”

  Silence glared up to where Avyi had moved within striking distance, yet closer to Mal. “The company you keep made me wary.”

  “You trusted my predictions well enough to stay in the Cages two extra years,” Avyi said harshly. “I had nothing to do with Hark’s kidnapping. Had I known how to prevent it, I would’ve got word to you.”

  “I wasn’t talking about you.” Her words were plain but as sharp as the razor edges of her shield. Mal flinched. “I was overruled when it came to seeking your predictions, because you’d been a Tigony prisoner for so long. Even Hark thought better of it. I’m sorry, Giva,” she said, pointedly using his title rather than his name. “But you hold little authority over anyone, especially the rebels. The attempts on your life made the situation worse. Someone wants you dead. None of us wants near that sort of trouble, not when freeing as many as we can from the cartels remains our focus.”

  Avyi smiled softly. “In all these years, that’s the most I’ve heard you speak.”

  Silence ducked her head, looking up through pale, pale lashes. “Blame Hark. The Dragon-damned chatterbox.”

  But her voice cracked. She closed her eyes.

  Avyi set her weapons aside and knelt, holding Silence’s shoulders, the malice of moments ago drained from her face and replaced with sympathy. “I’ve seen a future where the rebels are killed.”

  A soft hitch in Silence’s breathing was her only response to the harsh news. “And Hark?”

  “I didn’t see him.” She petted Silence’s shortly trimmed hair. “His death is not a certainty. Did you bring the Dragon idol?”

  “Yes.”

  From a leather satchel draping from her waist, Silence brought forth an obsidian idol. It was carved in the Sath’s interpretation of the Dragon. The idol was a dead ringer for the engraving on one of the arrows: wiry like a snake, with three heads, three forked tails, and six paper-thin wings in pairs along its back, sticking up like a butterfly.

  “Where did you find that?” he asked.

  “Half in Hong Kong,” Silence said softly. “Hark had it. The Pet—Avyi?—said he would have it. The other half was buried in the Asters’ underground complex. By joining both pieces, I was able to use it to unlock the collars that keep Cage warriors’ powers in check. When the collars are activated, they’re no better than trained animals. I should know. There’s nothing like feeling that part of you stolen away.”

  Mal was stunned that the idol, so delicate, could survive the journey its pieces had taken through time and across the world, but then he remembered the bow. Although ancient and buried in a crypt for countless centuries, its string remained intact.

  “You were going to return this to the Sath Leadership and clear your name of having stolen it,” Avyi said.

  “We thought better of it.” Silence offered a rueful smile. “Hark thought better of it, after the Leadership tried to have us killed. A story for another time. Likely, he’ll be glad to tell it.” Almost cradling the idol, she looked up through her lashes. “Please, help me find him.” She paused and cleared her throat. “Avyi.”

  CHAPTER

  EIGHTEEN

  As with Cadmin’s bow, Avyi didn’t want to touch the idol. She’d predicted the locations of its pieces, but she’d never seen it united, and she’d certainly never held it. The Sath considered it sacred. It felt sacred, emanating a strange vibe that resonated at the base of her brain. To touch this would change her life.

  She reached out to accept it, but thought better. After donning her cargos and sitting cross-legged on the floor, she looked up to where Mal still sat on the edge of the bed. The sheets were a jumbled mess.

  “Hold on to me?”

  Mal inhaled deeply. “After what happened last time …”

  “At least we may have another direction.”

  “You insisted it was time I make those decisions for our people.”

  “Then choose. With Hark’s life at stake. Those rebels. Everything. Do I touch this idol or not?”

  “No matter what it does to you?”

  His voice was like a last caress before parting. Then his face hardened. He was immutable and commanding, with no weapon but his expression. He arranged his legs so that he bracketed either side of her shoulders with his knees. The whole of his calves braced her body. His hands were solid and strong on her shoulders. Silence joined Avyi on the floor, also cross-legged, but without touching her. That was Mal’s responsibility. She offered the idol again. “You helped me find it,” she said. “It’s so much to ask that you help me again.”

  “The Chasm isn’t fixed.” Avyi blinked, as did Silence. Mal’s grip stiffened on her shoulders. That same old phrase. That same Dragon-damned phrase.

  “Do it,” Mal said—an undeniable command.

  Avyi blew a breath out of her nose and took the idol in hand.

  She stiffened. She saw so many images as to make Cadmin’s bow just another piece of junk. This was history and power distilled into obsidian. She gasped as more poured out of it and into her mind, threatening her consciousness. “Orla, don’t leave me.”

  She closed her eyes, but felt reinforced when Silence, the woman born Orla of Sath, twined her fingers with Avyi’s around the snakelike dragon. So many pieces. Far more than the two that had been united to form this portal to the past and future.

  With a gasp, she wrenched free of that mental hold. She found herself in Mal’s arms, stretched on the floor. Her face was damp, her whole body sticky with sweat. A chill wouldn’t let go. Her teeth rattled, and he held her even closer. Hot and cold. Near and far. The earth tilted as she tried to make sense of what had happened.

  “How long … ?”

  “About four minutes,” Mal said quietly by her ear. He kissed her temple. “Scared me.”

  “Scared myself.”

  She tried to sit up but needed help from Mal as dizziness washed over her vision in a haze of red and black.

  He rubbed her arms. “Easy now. No fast moves.”

  “Oh!” The idol was broken in two. “I— Silence, I didn’t mean to.” She looked around. “Silence?”

  The young woman was sitting on the floor in the far corner, arms hugging her shins as Avyi was prone to doing. She was pale and covered in a similar sheen of sweat. “You called me Orla.”

  The name sent fissures of fear and something akin to joy down Avyi’s spine. With caution, she met Silence’s eyes. Dark eyes. Black on black. But in her features, in her posture, Avyi saw what she couldn’t deny.

  “Orla of Sath,” Avyi said. “I’m here for you.”

  She pushed away from Mal with gathering strength and purpose.

  Although her legs were still too unsteady for walking, she crawled in a way that reminded her of how Dr. Aster had liked to see her move. Slinky and lithe like a cat. She pushed that memory aside in favor of one much more complicated and potentially beautiful.

  Because Orla met her halfway. They joined hands. Each inhaled sharply.

  “Frakohn,” Avyi said. “Our mother’s name was Frakohn.”

  “Pale like us. Thin but strong. So beautiful.”

  “I touched her stomach. I
was maybe three years old. ‘Mama, you’ll have a girl. She’ll be Sath like you. Hair like sun on the sand.’ ”

  Orla dipped her head on hitched breath. “How can you know this? You see the future.”

  “What was once will happen again.” She squeezed Orla’s hands. “Look at me. Why did I help you? I had no reason to. In fact, it was dangerous. Dr. Aster could’ve …” The tightness in her throat wouldn’t let her speak. She swallowed past the pain. “He would’ve punished me. I couldn’t find the idol, but I needed someone who could. Someone I could trust without reservation, although I didn’t know why. And why in the name of the Dragon did you trust me?”

  “That affinity. From the first. I never doubted what you told me. I would lie awake at night wondering why I still fought in the Cages, when I had the means of escaping. I couldn’t understand why I trusted the one woman I should’ve killed rather than believe. I only had your word, that I needed to be there. Why would I give that much of my life into your care? You were Aster’s Pet!”

  A wash of calm swept over Avyi. Her sweat cooled, and her shivering stopped—like a fever breaking. “But I was your sister first.”

  Mal stood and began to pace. “What is going on?”

  “We’re half sisters,” Orla said, her voice filled with awe and acceptance. “You were sent away.”

  “And I was crying as Father took me out of the city, knowing we’d never be back. That I’d never see your face.”

  Orla’s smile was crooked but welcome after the overwhelming confusion and deep emotion. “You ever get a prediction so wrong?”

  “Not that I know of,” she said harshly. “But in light of what I’ve been seeing lately, I dearly hope for more mistakes.”

  Crouching beside them, Mal was wearing his customary frown—the one for when he was deep in thought. “What was her name? Frakohn? She was the youngest daughter of the Sath ruling family. This would’ve been about forty years ago? I heard the gossip after …” He dipped his eyes, then cracked a thumb knuckle. “After I came down from the mountain. She married a Garnis and was already known for her eccentricities. Then she caused even more scandal. Another man? Something like that. Everyone disappeared. Secreted away as the Sath do.” He glanced at Orla. “No offense.”

  “None taken, Giva.”

  “So my Garnis father took me away,” Avyi said. “What about Mother and your father … ?”

  “My father was Sath. I was always told they went down in the Cages. The assumption was debts. Maybe it was to hide her family’s disgrace. Then I was placed with my Sath guardians. Everything hushed up.” She nodded to Mal. “As you said.”

  “And I was placed with mine, to be raised by my father’s clan.”

  Mal rested his broad palm on Avyi’s knee. “What do you remember of him?”

  A shudder overwhelmed Avyi’s body until both Mal and Orla needed to hold her steady. “All I hear are raised voices,” she whispered. “What if— Oh, Dragon be. No. What if the family that raised me was my real family? Those Garnis were my father’s people? What if they punished him and scorned me? Then they sold me to Dr. Aster.”

  Mal wrapped her in his arms, his body enveloping her as she curled against his chest. “Does it matter now, Avyi? We have so much to do. That idol held pieces of your past. The past for both of you. But it won’t help us with Hark or Cadmin—”

  “Or you,” she said vehemently. “Someone tried to kill you. We’ve known from the start that they won’t stop with a failed attempt.”

  Orla was so quiet, so still, that Avyi pulled away from her lover to look at her sister. They had been drawn together their entire lives, until they sat together on the floor of a bed-and-breakfast in Florence.

  Avyi reached out for Orla’s hand, and then they were embracing with a strength born of decades of separation and pain. “Every unborn child whose future I predicted,” Avyi said, “gave me the feeling that I’d done so before. Not in the labs but somewhere long ago, so distant. I think I was remembering how I’d first foreseen your birth.”

  Orla took her face in hand. “Is your gift so strong? To have known at such a young age?”

  “I don’t know. I hate that I don’t know. But Mal’s right. We need a plan for the future. This,” she said, hugging her sister around the waist, “will be waiting for us after we’ve protected those we love, when we fulfill what the Dragon has been planning for us both since our earliest moments.”

  “You’ll help me rescue Hark?”

  “That shouldn’t sound like a question, because there is no question about it.”

  “What if Hark … ?”

  “Orla, you have to trust me again. I would tell you if I knew. I would do you that mercy, even if it felt like a cruelty.”

  And I would fight fate no matter what.

  She had accused Mal of being resigned to his role as Giva, never giving of himself as much as he could. Had she been doing the same? Was it possible … just possible … that she could change her visions? She had been trapped for so long with Dr. Aster that seeing the outcome of a pregnancy had been her only guidepost—the signs of any future. What if life with him had taught her not to hope for anything better? Had she ever truly rebelled against the future?

  More resolved than ever, she embraced Orla again. Avyi drew strength from the rightness of fitting two pieces back together. “But how did you know your name, before this? Avyi. Did you remember it from so long ago?”

  “No,” Avyi said with a shake of her head. She glanced toward where Mal had stood, gathering their weapons and possessions. “I was still the Pet. He named me.”

  Orla tilted her head in that way Avyi remembered from the days when Silence was her only name—a woman who never spoke. “What does it mean?”

  “In the Tigony language, it means dawn. East.” Despite his slight smile, he appeared haunted and struggling, as unnerved by all of this as she and Orla. But he was stronger now than she’d ever seen. Certainty looked so very right on the man intended to lead them all. Her heart swelled until she couldn’t breathe for pride. “It also means new beginnings.”

  Tears filled Avyi’s eyes. He said he might tell her one day. He didn’t say that it would hit straight to the heart of her, fulfilling every wish she could have for the name she would bear with pride and love for the rest of her life.

  “I thought it was meant for Avyi alone,” he said. “Now it’s for all of us.”

  CHAPTER

  NINETEEN

  Mal was tired of being on the back foot. Really tired of it. He had a lover, his lover had a sister, and that sister’s bonded mate was going to be killed. Or was he? Avyi didn’t know for sure, which meant Mal erred on the side of being able to do something for Hark. It was time to stop reading runes. It was time for action.

  He called the only person on the Council he could trust, his adoptive grandmother, Hobik. Within twenty-four hours, she’d procured fake papers for Avyi and plane tickets to London. She’d also arranged for a collection of weapons to be packaged as antiques, including the Dragon-forged sword, to be held in the belly of the passenger jet. Mal didn’t ask for particulars. He didn’t want to know how the cagey old woman had managed.

  She was the only person yet living who knew the truth about Mal’s behavior at Bakkhos. That she accepted his failings while lauding the changes he’d made to Tigony culture—for the better—was the reassurance he needed. She didn’t think he was a saint. But she’d always believed what he was only now taking into his own skin, and breathing with his own lungs. His temper had fueled the destruction of Bakkhos, but countless others would’ve been destroyed had he refrained. The Tigony would still be hiding and perpetuating the last terrible secret of their clan.

  He and Avyi disembarked from the plane, with Orla following close behind. Security at Heathrow was its usual mess. Three large planes had landed in close succession, from Mexico, India, and the United States. Avyi was bouncing on her heels while they waited to pass through customs, while Orla had pulled deepl
y within herself. Silence. He’d only ever met her in passing, there at the liberation of the labs, but the name suited her uncommonly well.

  Hark could be anywhere, but the Townsend cartel was the obvious place to start. They controlled the Cage warriors of Europe and North Africa, with the Kawashimas claiming domain over East Asia. The Asters practically owned the western hemisphere and any place where a slight toehold meant an avenue toward more power. They needed to be destroyed.

  Mal had stood by for too long, working through the politics of the Council, relying on the idea that a solution would produce itself without effort beyond arguing with the other clans’ representatives. In truth, he’d been the same spoiled brat as always, and the same fool who’d fallen into an ancient trap. He blamed the world—but mostly himself—for the tragedy that followed.

  He glanced down at Avyi. She was the change he’d needed.

  Perspective. Vision.

  He didn’t just mean the ability to predict the future. Her strange optimism and childlike faith were the flip side of his jaded apathy. Together they made for an interesting team.

  Interesting.

  The word was so insipid as to be insulting. He wanted her. More and more. That their stolen night in the bed-and-breakfast hadn’t been the vision she’d pictured for their future actually lifted his spirits. It meant they would be together again. No telling when. How far into the future? How long would they know one another before the future spread out before them, undefined?

  What would they do then?

  Mal cleared his throat. The security officials checked their passports, including Avyi’s doctored papers. Everything in order. Even their weapons, crated and safely delivered, were stacked among the oversize luggage. He glanced around the baggage claim, where several hundred human beings hurried on their way.

  None of them had any idea of the cataclysmic events happening all around them. There was nothing they could do, nothing they would know to do. The cultures established by the Five Clans would continue as if their originators had never existed. What would the world look like without the influence of the Dragon Kings? What would the world become without them?