The Fire King (26 page)

Golden light flared in his eyes, and in moments all that quiet thoughtfulness was consumed by hunger. Karr bent low, grabbing Soria around the waist, pulling her off the ground until her feet dangled. He bowed his head and kissed her so hard she could not breathe. She had never been held so tightly, with such strength, but rather than feeling trapped she felt as though she fit for the first time in her life; that if humans could be puzzle pieces, then she was matched perfectly with this man.

His mouth was hot, relentless, and when his hand grazed her breast the pleasure that rocked through her was so fierce she gasped, squirming closer and forcefully rubbing against his growing hardness. Karr broke off the kiss, a low growl rumbling from his throat. His eyes were glowing, his mouth wet. He licked his lips, and she darted in for another kiss that ended with a long, slow tease of his bottom lip. He made a startled sound, his hands sliding up her back with possessive force, snaking beneath her shirt to touch bare skin.

Control,
she told herself, dazed; but she was wet and aching, and it was difficult to think when for the first time in a long while she wanted to reach inside a man’s pants and ride him full and flush. She cupped him over the outside of his clothing, her thumb sliding, stroking, savoring the feeling of his straining body. Karr hissed through gritted teeth, muscles straining in his neck.

Soria suddenly found herself sitting on the edge of the table, placed there by Karr. He leaned over, massive, a giant, his large hands braced on either side of her, and lowered his head until their brows brushed. She stayed still, trying to catch her breath, listening to her thundering heartbeat. Every part of her body was tingling, and she suffered the startling, overwhelming urge to laugh.

“Forget science,” she muttered in English. “I’m donating my body to magic.”

“What?” he breathed.

Just saw it on a T-shirt once,
she wanted to tell him, but shook her head, biting her bottom lip—which felt deliriously swollen. “I want to do more of that.”

His laugh was quiet and ragged. “I am not certain I would be able to stop.”

Soria pressed her cheek against his, closing her eyes. “I would never dream of asking you to.”

His breath caught, and she felt something unfurl inside her mind: a sweet light that was small but warm. She did not know what it meant, but moments later she sensed another tickle, and suffered a sensation of falling, down and down, into the rough edges of Karr’s mind. She saw no memories, but felt his emotions—raw, wild, aching with loneliness and desire. All of which her presence eased, like that sweet warm light.

A light he was afraid of crushing.

His fear cut her loose, and she tumbled back into herself, flinching as she suffered the same plummeting sensation as in a dream—waking just before impact. She opened her eyes and found Karr watching, his face slightly more leonine, his skin radiant with golden tones. He still looked like a man, but an extraordinary one, breathtakingly striking. Not made from any modern mold, but something far more primal and dangerous.

Soria heard a shuffling sound outside the tent. Karr straightened smoothly, moving with liquid grace, and was standing over by the stove by the time Evie poked her head in. The girl’s gaze was sharp, knowing, as she glanced between them, but her focus settled on Soria and was not entirely friendly.

“What kind of e-mail did you send?” she asked.

Soria blinked. “Just letting people know we were okay. Why?”

Evie frowned. “You better come with me.”

Dread filled her. She glanced at Karr, and found him looking troubled. His hands were curled into fists.

Outside, the night air was cool. Soria stood braced against the wind, but did not see anything out of the ordinary. Karr said, “I hear something.”

After a moment, so did she. A chop-chop sound. A helicopter.

“If you go to the other side of the camp, you can see the lights,” Evie said, beside her. “You’re not really tourists, are you.” It wasn’t a question.

Soria gave her a sharp glance. “What?”

But the young woman continued on as if she had said nothing strange. “I need to warn the others. We have to lock down the livestock, or else those choppers will frighten them into running.”

Soria grabbed her arm. “We have to go before they get here. Thank you for your help. Please, tell the others how much we appreciated it.”

Evie hesitated, and then hugged her hard—a surprising gesture that brought equally unexpected tears to Soria’s eyes. “Don’t be a stranger,” whispered the young blonde woman, who then turned quickly on her heel and began running through the camp, shouting.

Karr’s hand clasped Soria’s shoulder. “What is that sound?”

“Trouble,” she said, craning her neck to look up at him. “Or help. But either way, I do not want to find out here, with these people around.”

It was too late. Somewhere close, a woman cried out. It was a muffled sound, choked off at the end, distinctly startled and afraid.

Soria flinched. Karr took off running. She tried to follow, but he moved like a ghost, hardly seeming to touch the ground as he flowed through the air. Golden light flickered over his skin, scales flowing like pearls. And then the light went out and he vanished in the darkness.

Soria staggered to a stop, her eyes unable to adjust. Except for bare glimmers from the pale
gers,
she felt blind. She heard goats bleating on her left, and Evie’s voice ahead, on her right, movement inside the tents—but all those were safe sounds, and she had the sudden chilling sense that she was not alone with anyone, or anything, that was safe.

She took several tentative steps, mouth shut tight, willing her eyes to adjust to nothing but starlight. There had been campfires earlier—she had burned that damned bloodstained sheet in one of them, much to the consternation of all who watched—but she saw no hint of flames now. Everything had been stamped out.

Air whispered across the back of her neck, replaced by something cold and hard. Soria resisted the urge to clutch her chest, and took a deep breath. “Who sent you?”

The gun barrel pressed harder—and then she sensed rather than saw a ghost fly out of the darkness. She heard a whuffing sound behind her, and the gun disappeared.

She heard a loud crack, like that of a breaking bone, and she turned and found Karr—naked again—towering over the crumpled body of a man.
Dead,
she thought, and felt no twinge of remorse.

He reached for her hand, but just before his fingers closed around her wrist, Soria heard a popping sound. Karr staggered sideways, grunting. More pops filled the air, small impacts thudding against him. He dragged Soria into his arms, and began running. She yelped as something hard and painful hit her back. A rubber bullet.

For a moment, all she could hear was the harsh rasp of Karr’s breathing; and then shouts trickled through, and screams. Dogs started barking, drowning out the frightened wails of children.

A loud whistle cut through it all. Karr went down. Soria flew out of his arms, rolling over rocks and grass. It seemed to take forever to stop, and another eternity to move again. After an intense, dazed struggle, all she managed to do was prop herself up on her hand and knees, ready to vomit.

She crawled to Karr, who was struggling with the tangled netting wrapped around his legs. His claws were out, but that seemed to be doing him little good.
Metal wire,
Soria thought. Almost thin as thread, cutting into his skin.

He saw her coming, and snarled. “Soria,
go.
Run.”

She ignored him, just kept struggling to reach his side. She got to Karr just as men came racing from the shadows, and threw herself over his body—thinking, maybe, that might protect him. He tried to push her away, but she wrapped her arm around his neck with suffocating strength.

“Soria,” he rasped.

“Shut up,” she muttered. “All we have here is each other, remember?”

His gaze blazed golden hot, and in one quick move he rolled over, pinning her to the ground, shielding her with his massive frame. He stared at the men surrounding them, and a snarl tore free of his throat—which was shimmering, shifting, fur chasing scales over his skin as his muscles contorted. Fangs appeared inside his mouth.

It was hard to breathe with him on top of her. Soria craned her neck, trying to see what was going on, and saw two bare feet step close. A moment later those feet were joined by a hand, knees, and a familiar sharp face, eye patch neatly in place. Serena peered at them, crouched low, dressed in a seamless black body suit. She held a cattle prod.

“Still alive. And looking cozy,” she remarked.

“Fuck you,” Soria replied. “He’s not what you think.”

“You don’t know what I think,” Serena said, and stood. “Get them in the helicopter.”

Karr could not fight them. He tried, but the leopardess stabbed him in the back with a long rod, sending a paralyzing jolt through his body. He collapsed, twitching, choking on his own spit and fury as his hands were bound behind his back with the same thin metal wire that had become tangled around his legs.

Soria was dragged away from him. The men were rough with her. Karr could see little of their expressions, but their scents were acrid, angry. One of them—bald, pale, and hard-jawed—grabbed her braids and yanked back her head so far and with such strength that Karr thought her neck would break. Soria’s breath rattled, but she reached up, clawing at his eyes. He raised his fist—

The leopardess barked out a single word.

The bald man shot the shifter a cold and deadly look, still ready to punch Soria.
“I lost friends because of them,”
he growled.

“Your friends were stupid and careless,”
Serena replied.
“If you continue showing the same traits, I’ll kill you myself—and then pay the rest of your men triple for the privilege.”

Hate filled his eyes, but the bald man let Soria go. She staggered, and the leopardess caught her arm. Soria did not fight her, but looked down at Karr with unflinching determination. Serena yanked her away.

Karr tried to watch, but the bald man and several others hooked a thick rope to the bindings around his legs and began dragging him across the grass. Metal wire cut into his flesh, as did rocks. The pain burned through him, but he clamped his mouth shut and did not make a sound.

The men kept watching him, smiling grimly whenever they thought he would break. Frowning when he did not.

Easy enough. All he could think of was Soria and the look in that man’s eyes, the thick strength of his raised fist.

Dead,
Karr thought, staring at the back of that pale, hairless head.
You are dead. Even if Soria is your ally.

Although maybe she was not an ally anymore, he realized, watching as she was unceremoniously shoved into a dark hole cut into the side of a remarkably odd object: sleek and rounded on one end, sharp on the other; black as night, with long dark blades sprouting from its roof. Karr felt a quick stab of uneasiness when he saw the thing: too strange, its purpose was not easily divined.

He was tossed in after her. Behind him, he heard continuing sounds of disturbance in the nomad encampment. It wasn’t violence, exactly, but there were shouts of anger, fear, and confusion.

Soria reached for him, sliding her arm around his chest. Her touch was warm and solid, and unexpectedly soothing. This was not the first time he had ever been bound and captive, but he had always been alone in such moments. No kind touches. No compassion. It made a difference … and he wished that were not so. It meant weakness. It meant he had something to lose.

Soria glared at the leopardess.
“They’re good people. If you hurt them—”

“These men are not interested in terrorizing goats and their keepers,”
replied the shape-shifter, sitting down on a small leather bench.
“Just the job. You. Him.”

Soria glanced at the dark-clothed men climbing in after them.
Mercenaries,
Karr thought, following her gaze. He could see it in their eyes, which were hard, steady, accustomed to death. A regular soldier might be all those things, but men who fought and killed for money were a different breed entirely.

The bald man climbed in, staring. The area they filled was crowded. Men squeezed together on low benches. Soria tore her gaze away, and looked again at Serena.

“These are the same kind of men who came for us back at the beginning,”
she pointed out.
“You sent them. You double-crossed your own people.”

“No,”
Serena replied, her golden eye glittering.
“But circumstances have changed. I was forced to make a choice.”

Karr nudged Soria with his shoulder. “She has allied herself with the dragon,” he guessed.

Serena gave him a sharp look.
“What did he say?”

Soria hesitated. Karr understood why: reveal too much, and the leopardess would guess that he comprehended her language. Better to maintain that secret for as long as possible.

You trust Soria to protect you,
he realized then, with some shock.
You trust her to lie to her own people for you.

It was a revelation. For all the connection he felt toward her, all those deep feelings he could not name but that twisted him like a knotty riddle, this was something he had not considered. But considering it now made him feel like a blind man able to see—not the world, but inside himself. He trusted her. Apparently, he trusted her with his life.

“He wants to know why you’re doing this,”
Soria said, confirming his feelings with a lie.
“And I want to know how Long Nu got you under her thumb.”

Serena’s face hardened, and she snapped her fingers at someone behind Karr. He heard a loud, screeching whine that made him wince, followed by a deafening roar and an unholy wind that felt like the spine of a storm. He tried to move closer to Soria, and the leopardess slammed her foot down on his shoulder. Claws poked from her toes, digging into his flesh.

Everything lurched. Karr glanced over his shoulder and watched in amazement as they floated off the ground. He tried to see more, but a wall slid between him and the night, cutting off the roaring wind.