Stormrider (17 page)

She grit her teeth. “I want The Maven dead almost more than I wish to draw my next breath.”

Raptor smiled ruefully. “Only almost?”

Stormrider couldn’t help it, she had to return his grin, a warrior’s grin. “Only almost because if I did not draw my next breath then there would no longer be a chance for me to kill him myself.”

Raptor leaned forward slightly placing his large, supple hands on either side of Stormrider’s face. “Do nothing,” he whispered, “once the fight is over we will do much.”

Was this his way of asking her to trust him? Curse the man, couldn’t he see she already did?

That thought sent a shock wave through Stormrider’s body and lodged in her brain. Trust. She did trust him. Yet to turn over her entire defense to him . . . that she could not do.

“Do not trust him!” Song Dog exclaimed as if reading her innermost thoughts with Strongheart’s ease.

Raptor looked at the boy, a hint or a smile tugging at his lips, and wished he would shut up as a shadow fell across the doorway.
 

“The Maven wishes you to join him now,” a rich, cultured voice spoke as a dark head crowned with satin-smooth black hair was poked through the door. Eyes like black marbles rolled over the occupants in a challenge to refuse him, fixed on Raptor in command.

Raptor had no intention of refusing. He just hoped the stubborn woman would listen to him now as he had listened to her when he had been healing in her camp.

Their guide pulled back when it became apparent they would respond to his order. Raptor emerged first. Right behind him was Tanith and the young warrior. They paused outside for a moment, allowing their eyes to adjust to the much brighter light, then started toward the circle The Maven had devised for the confrontation.

They hadn’t taken ten steps when the first howl, low, mournful and carrying the promise of the wrath of the Gods of the fourteenth moon, drifted through the camp.

Chapter 14

The howl, deep-throated and filled with emotion no common wolf could project, threaded through the rarefied air of the Nashiran desert.

Strongheart.

The first howl hadn’t died completely when it was joined by a second, slightly higher, topped by a questioning note and a third, half yap, half howl, biting and bitter.

Littlefoot and One Eye.

And all three were very near.

The
Jaiqi
who led Raptor and Stormrider stopped in confusion, glancing in all directions as the three very different wolf voices blended, welling into a haunting, throbbing chorus. The wolves of Nashira were common in the hills and woodlands, but no
Jaiqi
had ever heard of any venturing out onto the desert plains abutting the mountains. And the
Jaiqi
camp was many miles from the trees and mountains.

“Wolves . . .” Raptor turned to Stormrider abruptly. His order of only moments earlier, the one demanding her to do nothing, seemed suddenly very pointless.

Round-eyed, Song Dog gaped at her, seeing her as a woman transformed into a Goddess. “Your wolves. They come for you. You knew they would come. That is why you did not fear!”

Tanith Aesir had known no such thing, Stormrider thought to herself, but she had known; Stormrider had known. Despite the dark silence of the pack-bond, she had known. Or, she corrected herself, she had been unwilling to accept anything else even as she had worked on her own plan for freedom. The bond of the pack had already changed her greatly. It was a philosophical point she would have to take up with Strongheart when they were out of this place.

“Tanith . . .” Raptor began.

“Stormrider,” she corrected him firmly, allowing a small, satisfied smile to quirk the corners of her lips as the howls rose in volume again.

Raptor’s eyes glinted in the brilliant sunlight.

He glanced around, head cocked, listening to a distant thunder rolling though no clouds appeared to compliment it.

“Stormrider,” he echoed, solemnly acknowledging the deep change within her.

“Hurry,” their escort demanded. “The Maven will want to hear what you know of this!
I
want to know what you know of this! What babble is this the boy speaks . . . your wolves?” The last was directed toward Stormrider, but already they were walking much too fast for a reply—had she cared to give one—which she did not.

They moved swiftly where The Maven had set up his make-shift arena. Kiribati sat in silent fury, waiting. The Imperitor, Jarrel, was nowhere to be seen. Stormrider couldn’t pick his face out of the crowd gathered for the entertainment, but doubted not that he would have already pinpointed her. Still, for now it was not he, but The Maven who drew her attention and held it fast.

The Maven grinned at Stormrider while the distant thunder began to coalesce into something else. Something more solid than moving air. He took no notice of it.

Stormrider grinned back and The Maven’s mocking smile dimmed.

“Maven,” their dark-haired escort vied for the powerful
Jaiqi’s
attention. “The wolves, the howls, the woman knows something . . . I do not . . .”

The Maven waved a dismissing hand. “The wolves are only animals. They are no threat to us.” He was abrupt, uninterested, seeing only the insolent smile of the woman slave. A smile he was determined to see wilt and die.

“Kiribati is ready,” The Maven announced to Raptor. “No doubt so are you.” It wasn’t a question or an idle remark. It was a command. “Gentlemen,” the words were more a curse than a polite address as he gestured to the crude circle drawn in the sand surrounded by noisy, eager
Jaiqi
, “the arena is yours.” Soft words. Steel-wrapped invitation.

Raptor stepped confidently into the circle mainly because there was little else he could do. But he was far from ready with those eerie howls weaving their presence on the soft desert wind. Rising and falling in a language he didn’t understand.

His plans were being demolished. The mournful wolf-music on the wind told him as much. If Raptor was any judge of the big silver wolf Stormrider called Strongheart, his blood debt would not be canceled this day.

The Dinh Dinh, Kiribati, was given a jocular shove into the circle by some helpful
Jaiqi
onlooker and he faced Raptor with a sneering snarl, apparently not in the least interested in the haunting, ululating cries of the wolves. He didn’t know Nashira and had only the
Jaiqi
to provide example. They weren’t interested.

No weapons were supplied, but Kiribati had come equipped. He crouched, palmed a gleaming utility knife from his shiny left boot beckoning Raptor to come to him. Expecting it. Nearly demanding it.

And Raptor decided he’d oblige soon enough. But, for now, he was going to enjoy the game. Or, more to the point, he wanted the
Jaiqi
to enjoy the game to distraction. Whatever was being initiated by the wolves, whatever happened, he hoped only that it would allow for his leaving the
Jaiqi
camp with hide intact and Stormrider in tow.

Raptor’s wide, mobile mouth curved upward at the corners into a taunting smile. He didn’t crouch. He just stood there, waiting, hands relaxed at his sides, balanced delicately on the balls of his feet. The soft kiss of the dry wind riffled through the waves of Raptor’s tawny hair, for long seconds the only movement within the circle aside from the Dinh Dinh’s pacing.

Kiribati fumed and sweated, nervously transferring the knife from hand to hand, watching Raptor with an intensity the bounty hunter appeared to find boring.

“Hela take you! Fight!” Kiribati demanded in a rasping voice, he being apparently devoid of The Maven’s humor. “We’re here because that’s what you wanted! Come here and die for your cursed bounty hunter’s ego!”

Raptor gave it a few moments more.

The Dinh Dinh moved closer, then further, enticing, feinting. Raptor watched the movement of his opponent’s muscles, the set of his legs, the shifty, uncertain movements of his pit black eyes. He swayed slightly in response to Kiribati’s movements, picking up the other’s rhythms. Had the man no sense? Any master taught his students the movements of the body gave everything away. The Dinh Dinh was making it far too easy.

The
Jaiqi
surrounding the circle were be coming restless, eager for entertainment promised by The Maven . An uneasy silence descended among them, muffling chatter, even as the low, throaty howls rose, separated into individual cries, then blended again. And the strange new thunder of the land kept tap-tapping at the soles of their feet. Their attention was turning from the circle and Raptor knew the game was ended. Swift and deadly, he struck.

Without appearing to have flexed a muscle, Raptor was across the circle. One hand snapped around the Dinh Dinh’s wrist above the knife. The other moved swiftly to block Kiribati’s retaliatory blow. He swung his leg to take Kiribati’s feet from beneath him and dump him backward into the sand.

It would have worked. It
should
have worked, but Kiribati flipped not away from him as Raptor intended, but instead plunged into the bounty hunter’s attack, reeling off-balance against Raptor. Both went down. Fine, choking dust billowed up around them filling nostrils and burning eyes as they rolled and slid across the undulating surface of the sand. Sand hot as a griddle and scouring as sandpaper ripped at their flesh like cats’ claws.

Stormrider watched for the first few moments in silence. Raptor’s evaluation of his opponent appeared accurate and his tactics flawless. She probably would have employed similar logic herself, she admitted to herself somewhat grudgingly. Baiting the Dinh Dinh was the best offensive move. The bounty hunter read his opponent well.

When at last they engaged the dust made it nearly impossible to see anything, but by that time Stormrider had plenty of other things on her mind.

The wolves. All three of them were very near. Strongheart. One Eye. Littlefoot. They occupied her awareness as nothing, no one else could.

Stormrider attempted to plunge into the pack-bond time and again, but found nothing but blackness, emptiness. Like there was a wall of muslin between them preventing the joining of the bond. Resilient, but there nonetheless. Unyielding. With a mental strength she hadn’t known she possessed, she punched and pushed, but with no result. She had to tell them! Had to let them know there was more at stake in the camp of the
Jaiqi
than securing her own release! She wouldn’t leave the captives of Grey Wanderer’s band here. She couldn’t abandon them to Hela’s pits of slavery and wouldn’t forsake them to the mercies of the Queen of the dead and damned.

And still the howls rose and fell. Communicating.

Directing. Questioning. Group chorus preceding attack. Haunting sounds reached for Stormrider, touched her, and a deep and growing need welled up suddenly within her. A wild need to respond coursed through her veins. Her body, her being, thrilled with the desire to touch them as they touched her, without the pack-bond. She glanced toward the battle between bounty hunter and Dinh Dinh.
 

Raptor and Kiribati grappled in the sand.

The
Jaiqi
watched. Superior egos and supreme confidence forbade concern over such a trifling thing as a few wolf howls, no matter how misplaced.

Stormrider threw back her head and gave a long ululating cry which translated quite simply into an answering howl. But it was more than a howl, more than a sound. Full and textured, it came not only from her throat, but from her soul. The eerie sound of it surprisingly, to Stormrider at least, caught and mingled with those of her pack, hanging in the air like due warning before a coming storm. And underlying the howls, the earth still thundered. Rolling, strengthening, it filled every corner of silence with its growing demand.

Strongheart’s howl changed. Rich and throaty. Acknowledging her, promising her . . . what? Stormrider could not hear Strongheart’s thoughts, know his plans, or even sense his intent. But the howls spoke to her little by little, as a language barely beginning to be deciphered. The thunder belonged to Strongheart, and the wolves were very near.

The sound of Stormrider’s rising cry sent a chill up Raptor’s spine and jarred his focus; the woman, in truth sounded like one of her wolves. But he dodged the Dinh Dinh once more as they squared off, both diving for the knife glinting silver in its bed of sand.

Raptor reached it first, Kiribati all over him like a many-legged sea creature defying description. The bounty hunter had raised a sweat of his own and was working at freeing himself from the Dinh Dinh’s sticky grasp when he flipped over onto his back, dragging Kiribati with him. The move tore Kiribati’s concentration for a moment and gave Raptor the edge he needed to secure his hold on the knife, plucking it clear of the sand. Momentum kept the roll going until Kiribati was pinned beneath him.

Long of arm, the Dinh Dinh slammed the heel of his hand into the soft underside of Raptor’s chin catapulting him backward to sprawl again in the warm softness of the sand. Kiribati lunged for him once more. No one paid attention to the slaves.

Beyond the tight perimeters of the fight, the recently captured slaves were stirring. Confused by the growing din around them, appalled by what appeared to be Stormrider’s demented display, afraid of the wolfsong, they rose one by one or in pairs, watching, risking the pain of punishment. Unconsciously, Stormrider raised her arms as she had seen Shamans of The People do many times before, invoking the full powers of the Goddess. She knew the pulsing life of Nashira as her howl spiraled out to mingle with that of the other wolves.