9. Hector

CHAPTER NINE

HECTOR

A t first, no one seemed to know quite what they were looking at. Sure, a number of warriors had watched me and Orestes train as they'd eaten supper, but one by one, they turned away from us, until Orestes's spear arm went slack, and he too turned to stare at the coastline.

We were between the rest of the clan's warriors and the water, on the wide open grassland where we stood no danger of hurting anyone as I struggled to find the proper form with such a long weapon.

The spear left me feeling exposed, despite theoretically being able to keep my enemies at a distance. When I fought Orestes, it felt like I had no firm defenses. What I'd earned in proximity, I gave up in control.

"Shit," Orestes hissed as he watched the men crunch over the rocks at the waterline.

"What?" I stepped closer to him. I didn't recognize the banner these men flew, but Orestes's expression had gone hard.

"They never use the sea."

"What?"

Already, he was stepping forward, lifting his weapon. Most of the men below abandoned their boat to the one poor sod trying to drag it up the shore with a thick rope, and when they turned to Orestes, they grinned at each other and shouted in a tongue I didn't know.

"The southerners," Orestes growled out, only seconds before the strangers started running for him.

The men saw Orestes and rushed him. It was like he was a cake in the summer heat, left out for the flies to swarm around. And I couldn't understand why they only fixated on him.

Yes, he was large, arguably more likely to kill a man than I was, given that I'd never done it before and he was, well, enormous and trained and formidable. Still, it was absurd of them all to rush him, like they were racing to see who could take him down first and didn't give a damn for the rest of us, no matter how well armed and formidable we were. Or at least the Crane warriors were.

I might not know how to wield a spear properly, but I still had a sword on my hip, and I was far from completely useless with it. Moreover, the southerners seemed to favor swords themselves, and that put us evenly balanced.

The southerner nearest me was struggling to get past his comrades into striking distance of Orestes, who held them off with strong, sweeping blows, leveraging the sharp edge of his spear to slice through any who dared get too close. The nearest southerner, instead of turning to the next target, surged forward when he saw an opening.

I grabbed him by his shoulder and jerked him around. With a roar, he spun my way, his sword arm stretched long.

I was barely able to jump back, and even then—I felt the tip of his blade dance across my skin. It tore more at the cloth of my shirt than at my body, as harmless as a paper cut at first. Then the stinging pain spread.

His arm swung wide, his balance undone by the unexpected attack, and I lunged forward. There was no need to make a dramatic gesture, just sink my blade in and?—

It slid in so smoothly, like cutting a well-cooked potato. The blade was sharp. But then, a bone. The impact jarred up my arm, and I twisted my sword and slashed it out to the side.

The man screamed in fear and pain. He dropped to his knees, suddenly paler than he'd been, clutching his open stomach. And I?—

I'd killed him. He breathed still, but even then, he was swaying, trying to hold in his punctured organs, his split skin. He fell to the side, gasping for air, blood bubbling past his lips.

I stared.

I'd never?—

Gods, I felt sick.

As a nearby southerner realized that they had more to deal with than just one rather oversized Nemedan, he rounded on me, fingers flexing around the hilt of his blade.

I glanced at my own, at the blood on gleaming metal, and I wasn't sure that I could do it again. My heart pounded, my stomach rolled?—

And the next second, the rest of the Crane crashed past me with a roar.

It was all of them, moving together as if they shared one mind. Their spears lashed out, and the southerners broke.

Me? All I could do was stagger back, get out of the way. Orestes's laugh rolled through me as he tossed one of the southerners aside.

My breath caught, the metallic tang of blood rose from the back of my throat as if I'd swallowed it. I?—

I stood there, dazed, lost, until Killian's pale, furious face took up my field of vision.

"What the hell were you thinking?" He jerked the cut on my shirt open to inspect my skin, gauge the seriousness of the damage. Only once he'd seen with his own eyes that it was hardly more than a scratch did he straighten and meet my gaze.

"You do not," he growled, "rush into a fight without thought."

"They were all going at Orestes. I was nearest to hand."

Killian scoffed. "Orestes knows what he's doing. We know what we're doing."

The tilt of my lips turned sharp and bitter. Clearly, the only one there who had no idea what they were doing was me. I was the next best thing to useless.

And still, I did not think I had done wrong. I might've been an ignorant, useless fool, but I'd still tried to do right in the moment.

"Are you asking me to standby and allow a friend to get attacked?" I arched a brow, and Killian's jaw flexed, his fury spiking.

He couldn't ask me that. If he was the man I thought, he wouldn't dare—particularly not in front of his people.

Nemeda might be a strange place to me, its ways anathema to the values held in Urial, but I'd learned enough. They worked together, in balance, serving and served by each other.

Killian's eyes narrowed. He shoved forward, closer, and I inhaled in time with his step, stubbornly planting my feet to the spot.

His arm lashed out and he gripped me by the back of my neck. His fingers dug in hard. "Half an inch closer, and that man could've gutted you," he hissed, his silvery eyes flashing bright.

His other hand slipped beneath my shirt, past the bloodstained score in the fabric to belabor his point by pressing against my torn skin. I gasped, but it was more than just the sting of his touch against the cut. I was caught in his arms, in his gaze, in his anger, and my thoughts went fuzzy. Blood rushed to my head, down to my groin, and everything went blank around us.

There was just him, me, the sting of a cut and the rough feel of his calluses against my skin and—and this moment with his concern and fury glowing in his eyes. Truth told, I didn't care if he was angry with me. That was better than holding himself apart, better than being alone in a strange land.

"Yes," I whispered. Suddenly, my mouth was dry. My lips were too. I smoothed the tip of my tongue between them and swallowed, trapped in his furious glare. "I'm not ignorant of the risks in coming here, Killian."

For a breath, we were trapped like that, so close. I didn't quite dare grasp the front of his shirt and hold him there, haul him in like I wanted to. But I'd kissed him once and been rebuffed and—and now his people were there, eyes on us, and I couldn't?—

With a growl, Killian released me all at once. His fingers flashed red with a smear of my blood as he jerked away. I stumbled back into balance as he stalked off, fuming.