“Is all forgiven then, Serre?”
“We’re still family.” His little brother offered a lopsided smile that made Tallis’s heart pinch. It was like looking in a mirror and seeing a younger, less jaded version of himself. “And family is a benediction for all manner of sins. Unless you’re Indranan,” he said tightly, glancing at Kavya.
“Then it means a death sentence.” Her words should’ve been listless and resigned, but edgy violence pulsed from Kavya. She was ready. Tallis was proud, and relieved that she would have no regrets. “And I’m not dying today.”
—
So that was the color of his eyes.
Kavya knew it was an absurd realization, just as she knew she should be frozen through and through as Tallis had warned. Yet the fire in her belly kept her warm, and the sight of the North Sea crashing onto the craggy rocks of the northern Scottish coast filled her with peace. She would never know the deep secrets buried in her husband’s soul. Now, however, she knew that his eyes matched the waters of this sacred place. She’d been right. They were the color of an ocean she’d never seen. Frothy, white-topped waves reminded her of the silver flecks adorning each strand of his wind-tossed hair.
The family followed her and Tallis as they climbed the jutting shores and followed a path to the west. An hour passed. Then two. She kept her attention focused on Tallis, lest she telepathically give away her approach. Pashkah’s pet monkeys would obviously be able to sense an oncoming party of Pendray, all dressed to the hilt in armor and mean intentions, but perhaps her presence could be hidden until the last moment.
So she banked the temptation to reach out to Chandrani. To see if her friend still drew breath would be the equivalent of a scream in Pashkah’s ear.
She watched Tallis as he walked with unrelenting strides, each the same distance and intensity no matter the terrain. She had to hop and pick her way across craggy shoals just to keep up. His family was equally fleet of foot as they protected her back. This was their territory, just as the Pir Panjal had been hers.
When Tallis stopped and held up a hand, Kavya’s lungs seized. Didn’t work. For a panicked span of seconds, her mind was trapped in a vessel that wouldn’t move, couldn’t move.
Then it was gone. She was clad in either the last garment she would ever wear, or the last garment she would ever wear with family yet in the world. That responsibility and grim reality renewed her strength. She was growing more powerful with each passing moment, as if the overnight gift of Tallis’s fight and strength had seeped from his gracefully muscled body into hers.
“Beyond this rise,” he said. “It should be the boulder you saw. I need you to climb up. Stay low. Signal me if I’ve got it right.”
Kavya nodded and moved to go.
Tallis took her hand. Rather than kiss it or bid her good luck—sentimental things a husband might offer his wife—he unsheathed one of his seaxes and pressed it into her palm. They shared a tight smile. That was more fitting. Equal sentiment, but with deadly purpose.
“I’m beginning to like how you Pendray think,” she said.
The climb up the rise was arduous. She wasn’t cold, but her knees felt the sharp pinch of rock. A fingernail sheared away. Her stomach closed into a tighter ball until her guts were made of stone. She was calcifying, becoming part of that sacred place. It wouldn’t have been a bad place to spend eternity, with a view of the ocean the color of Tallis’s eyes. Only, she wanted the real thing even more. She wanted his eyes every day, gazing down on her when she awoke, burning her with their intensity when they made love. On some evening yet to be, she’d position a mirror in front of their faces when he took her from behind. She wanted to see the sharp blue glow of his eyes when he bit her nape.
A shudder worked across her shoulders. She clasped the hilt of his seax with even more assurance. Pendray territory. A Pendray weapon. A Pendray husband. She was ready to crawl out of her skin with the need to do violence.
His family. She was drawing from his family. Not their gift, as the Sath did—known derisively as Thieves, temporarily stealing the powers of other Dragon Kings. No, Pendray had unlimited stores of confidence in battle. They were disrespected as a backward clan, but they knew how to fight. Hand to hand, weapon against weapon—nothing and no one equaled them in sheer ferocity. She relished its beat in her blood.
At the top of the rise, she lay low across the ridge, belly to rock. As Tallis had described, the distant boulder was shaped like an ancient Neanderthal goddess, all rounds hips and curvy stomach and heavy, ripe breasts. Yet touches of the Dragon were everywhere, in the lick of a serpentine tongue, the potential carnage of hooked claws, and the slanted eyes that would protect or threaten, depending on who looked upon that mystical formation.
It was the rock formation from her dream.
The Mother of Clan Pendray. Their symbol of the Dragon.
Down in its shadow waited the villains she sought. The eight Guardsmen surrounded Chandrani. Pashkah paced in a wide circle around the ensemble. He’d reach the twelve-o’clock position and turn back the other way. Clockwise. Counterclockwise. She’d forgotten that particular quirk of his, a similar means of sorting thoughts and maintaining calm that Kavya used when clasping her hands. His brown hair was covered by a heavy brocade headscarf, the tail of which whipped in the salty sea wind.
He wore purple and orange and winking medallions that promised he intended her death just as much as she needed his.
Without looking away, she signaled the others to join her. Tallis was by her side in a matter of seconds. The pulse of his fury had tickled her back and arced down her thighs, even while he waited at the base of the rise. When he lay on his stomach beside her, he was like a wood stove left unattended, burning, pulsing, until it flamed with heat enough to melt the metal trying to contain the fire.
She grabbed the hair at the back of his neck. It had been shorter there when they’d first met, but weeks of travel meant she could find a passable grip. “I need you, Tallis. Tell me you’re in there.” She yanked his hair again, then shot him a wicked smile. “I’m not Pendray, so I’m not playing by all of your clan’s rules. Forget a one-way claiming. I’m biting your nape one day. This will be mine. Do you hear me?”
A growl pushed out of his throat, his chest, his soul. “You think that’ll calm my fury, goddess?” he asked, rasping, as if invisible hands pressed on his larynx.
“No, but you’re replying with more than single words. I need you, Tallis. Thinking as well as culling. You’ve seen what he can do and what pain he can inflict. Your family has no idea.” She kissed the back of his neck, before smoothing his wild hair into place. “Tell me who you are and why you’re here.”
“Protect my family, rescue Chandrani, keep my wife safe, and rid the world of a Dragon-damned piece of shit.”
“Tall order.”
“Big sword.” He matched her tight smile before adjusting his grip on the weapon that hummed with as much power as he did. His eyes glowed mean and vital. “Now let’s go.”
CHAPTER
THIRTY
Tallis’s surge down the crest toward the foot of the Mother followed a pattern woven into the fabric of his people’s memories. The high ground. Swooping in like raging locusts intent on feasting. How dare they invade our homes? Threaten our women? Disturb this sacred place?
The only way a Pendray knew how to cleanse sacred places was to wash them clean with the blood of strangers. Enemies.