vengeance on fiction, I beg of you. For I shall be forced to kill you—and if I do not, my twin will hunt you down with the Brotherhood and make you pray for your own demise.”
Xcor searched into himself and saw something he despised, but could not ignore: He had no memory of the bitch who had born him, but he knew too well the story of how she had cast him out from the birthing room because of his ugliness.
He had wanted to be claimed. And the Bloodletter had done that—the physical disfigurement had never mattered to that male. He had cared only about the things Xcor had had in abundance: speed, endurance, agility, power . . . and deadly focus.
Xcor had always assumed he’d gotten that from his father’s side.
“He named me,” he heard himself say. “My mother refused to. But the Bloodletter . . . named me.”
“I am so very sorry.”
And the strangest thing? He believed her. Once ready to fight to the death, she now appeared to be saddened.
Xcor paced off from her and walked around.
If he was not the son of the Bloodletter, who was he? And would he still lead his males? Would they follow him into battle e’er again?
“I look into the future and see . . . nothing,” he muttered.
“I know how that feels as well.”
He stopped and faced the female. She had linked her arms loosely over her breasts and was not looking at him, but at the wall across the way from her. In her features he saw the same voided emptiness he had within his own chest.
Pulling his shoulders up, he addressed her. “I have no issue to settle against you. Your actions directed unto my”—pause—“the Bloodletter . . . were taken for your own valid reasons.”
In fact, they had been driven by the same blood loyalty and vengeance that had animated his search for her.
As a warrior would, she bowed at the waist, accepting his reversal and the clearing of the air between them. “I am free to go?”
“Yes—but ’tis daylight.” When she looked around at the bunks and cots as if imagining the males who had wanted her, he interjected, “No ill shall befall you herein. I am the leader and I . . .” Well, he had been the leader. “We shall pass the day upstairs for your privacy. Food and drink are upon the table o’er there.”
Xcor made the concessions for modesty and provision not because of the bullshit propriety issues that revolved around a Chosen. But this female was . . . something he respected: If anyone was likely to understand the importance of revenge against an insult upon your family, it was him. And the Bloodletter had done permanent damage to her brother.
“Upon nightfall,” he said, “we shall take you out from here blindfolded, as you cannot know where we tarry thus. But you shall be released unharmed.”
Turning his back on her, he went over to the only bunk that did not have an upper layer. Feeling like a fool, he nonetheless straightened the rough blanket. There was no pillow, so he bent down and picked up a stack of his laundered shirts.
“This is where I sleep—you may use this for your rest. And lest you feel worried for your safety or virtue, there is a gun under each side upon the floor. But worry not. You shall find yourself arriving unto the sunset in safety.”
He did not take a formal vow upon his honor, for verily, he had none. And he did not look back as he took to the stairs.
“What is your name?” she said.
“You do not know that already, Chosen?”
“I know not everything.”
“Aye.” He put his hand on the rough banister. “Neither do I. Good day, Chosen.”
As he mounted the stairs, he felt as though he had aged centuries since he had carried the unanimated, warm body of that female underground.
Opening the stout wooden door, he had no idea what he would be walking into. Following his announcement of his status, his males could well caucus and decide to shun him—
There they all were, in a semicircle, Throe and Zypher bookending the group. Their weapons were in their hands, and their faces were death-knell grim . . . and they were waiting for him to say something.
He closed the door and leaned back against it. He was no coward to run from them or what had happened down below, and he saw no benefit to padding what had been revealed with careful words or pauses.
“The female spoke the truth. I am not a blooded relation of the one who I thought was my sire. So what say you all.”
They didn’t utter a word. Didn’t look at each other. And there was no hesitation.
As one, they fell down upon their knees, sinking to the floorboards, and bowing their heads. Throe spoke up.
“We are e’er yours to command.”
Upon the response, Xcor cleared his throat. And did it again. And one more time. In the Old Language, he pronounced,
Throe’s eyes lifted. “It has not been the memory of your father that we have served all these years.”
There was a great whoop of agreement—which was better than any vow that could have been spoken in flowery language. And then daggers were buried in the wooden floorboards at his feet, the hilts clasped in the fists of soldiers who were, and remained, his to send forth.
And he would have left things there, but his long-term plans demanded a revelation and a further confirmation.
“I have a larger purpose than fighting parallel to the Brotherhood,” he said in a quiet tone, so that the female on the lower level could hear naught. “My ambitions are a death sentence if discovered by others. Do you understand what I’m saying.”
“The king,” someone whispered.
“Aye.” Xcor looked into each of their eyes. “The king.”
None of them glanced away or got up. They were a solid unit of muscle and strength and lethal determination.
“If that changes anything for any of you,” he demanded, “you shall tell me now and you shall leave at nightfall, ne’er to return without penalty of death.”
Throe broke ranks by dropping his head. But that was as far as it went. He did not get up and walk away, and no one else did either.
“Good,” Xcor said.
“What of the female,” Zypher said with a dark smile.
Xcorshook his head. “Absolutely not. She deserves no punishment.”
The male’s brows popped. “Fine. I can make it good for her, instead.”
Oh, for chrissakes, he was just too much like the damned
“What the hell?” Zypher got to his feet and the rest followed. “If you say she is off-limits, I shall leave her alone, as will the others. Why—”
“Because that is what I decree.”
To buttress the point, Xcor sat down at the foot of the door, putting his back in place against the panels. He trusted his soldiers with his life in the field, but that was a beautiful, powerful female down there, and they were rutting, horny sonsabitches, the lot of them.
They would have to get through him to get to her.
After all, he was a bastard, but he was not completely codeless, and she deserved protection she likely did not need for the good deed she had done him.
Killing the Bloodletter?
