Chapter 18

18

A brief indulgence, regret for a lifetime.

~ Assai, Priestess of Luvana

“Vlerion.” Kaylina tried to pull her shirt closed as he stared at her, his eyes savage with naked lust, his muscles tense as he kept her pinned to the wall. “Thank you, but could you maybe hum a bit? You’re looking a touch?—”

With a growl, Vlerion rose to his feet, leaning in for a kiss, but he caught himself. He froze, closing his eyes, tension and great struggle twisting his face.

“Kaylina,” he rasped, his hard muscles quivering, his body coiled, as if he would spring. No, as if the beast would erupt at any second. “Stop me. I don’t want to hurt you, but I—” He threw his head back, the power radiating from him alarming. Dangerous.

Kaylina squirmed, trying to slip away. Her pants had fallen off—no, he’d taken them off—and she’d been too absorbed in her pleasure to notice. She couldn’t reach her pocket. The vial.

Vlerion stepped back, releasing her, but she feared it was only because the change was taking him. She glanced to the side, to the vines she had worried about earlier.

They remained limp. The sentinel wouldn’t help her.

As Vlerion staggered back, the rip of clothing announcing the change, she lunged for her pants and dug into the pocket. Fur sprouted from his skin as his muscles swelled, growing even larger and more powerful. His trousers split at the seams.

With shaking hands, she dug out the vial and started to uncork it, but Zhani’s warning about side effects popped into her mind. The stuff could stop his heart.

But once he turned, he would take her as the beast, and she wouldn’t be able to stop him, not this time. He hadn’t engaged in battle first and wasn’t exhausted. He was full of energy, of power. Of lust for her.

Kaylina uncorked the vial, but she couldn’t bring herself to throw it. Even as his human teeth elongated and turned to fangs, and auburn fur sprouted, changing his face from that of her trusted Vlerion to a savage beast, she stepped forward and planted her hand against his chest.

She attempted to summon power, to send soothing magic into him, to turn him back. Was that possible? So soon after changing? She didn’t know.

What if he had to find a release for his great power before the magic would fade? This time, there wasn’t a blatant enemy to send him against. She couldn’t sic the beast on another spymaster—or Jana Bloomlong.

His eyes met hers, no hint of Vlerion in their savage blue, and Kaylina forced herself to focus. If this was to work, it would take all of her concentration.

The brand on her hand warmed, and power flowed into Vlerion as a nimbus of green glowed around her again.

“Stand down, noble beast,” Kaylina whispered, then hummed his song, wishing she had a better voice for music.

Paws gripped her shoulders, and the beast pushed her against the wall. Before, she’d wanted nothing more than for Vlerion to have her against that wall, but now, fear almost made her yank her hand back, to try to escape, to run. But she sensed that would break the magical link she had. Even if it wasn’t turning him back, he showed some restraint. At the least, he hadn’t yanked off his shredded pants to?—

“Calm, please,” she whispered, keeping her hand planted.

“My mate,” he rasped, looking down.

Her shirt had fallen open again.

She shivered under the feral gaze, that lust-filled hungry gaze.

“I know you want this, my mate, but… I might not survive it. I know I promised we could be together before—” Kaylina still felt guilty that she’d lied to the beast about that, “—but the world is dangerous. Very dangerous. I need a protector, not… another danger.”

His gaze rose to her face, and she thought he was listening, that she might be getting through to him—until a paw took her breast, claws grazing her skin.

“ My mate.”

“Vlerion,” she said sternly, willing the magic in her blood to work, to give her the power to command him. She requested the sentinel to help too. As much as she hated needing its assistance, there were no other plants around that she could call upon.

The beast’s mouth lowered toward her breast as his paw trailed down her skin, erotic but terrifying.

Her hand heated, her body thrumming with power. The beast growled, drawn, aroused.

She would have to throw the vial. As she lifted her hand, intending to spatter it against his chest, she sensed movement behind her. Commanded by her power, the limp vines reenergized, their tips lifting into the air.

The beast noticed and sprang back, landing in a crouch to face the threat. The vines flowed past her and toward him. He leaped back again, glancing over his shoulder. More vines sprouted from the mortar in the walls to either side of him.

“Don’t hurt him,” Kaylina ordered. “Just…”

What? Restrain him? Yes, that was what she needed until the beast magic wore off. He would hate it, but there wouldn’t be side effects.

As the vines stretched for him, obeying her unspoken thoughts, the beast leaped back again. He wanted to run from the threat, she thought, but he gazed at her, disappointment mingling with his lust. He wanted her almost as much as his instincts demanded that he survive.

A vine whipped toward his arm. He caught it in the air, ripping it from the wall, and his powerful muscles surged as he tore it in half. He bit another off as it flicked near his head.

Snarling, he had to back farther as more vines reached for him. Too many for him to deal with. He shot her one last anguished look—as if he believed his mate had betrayed him—before turning and running.

Though she felt awful for having him attacked when he’d proven her protector again and again, that didn’t keep her from ordering the plant to capture him. If she let him escape the castle, and, enraged that he hadn’t been able to claim his mate, he attacked others, it would be her fault. What if he hurt Frayvar?

That thought propelled her to yank on her pants and run after the beast. All Frayvar would have to do was hear something, open his door, and lean out at the wrong time.

Kaylina ran down the hallway, buttoning her shirt as she went.

When she turned into the wider hallway, the beast was already gone, though broken vines dangled from several spots in the wall. At least Frayvar’s bedroom door was closed. Later, she would be embarrassed that she’d probably made enough noise before Vlerion had turned that her brother had heard. For now, that didn’t matter.

A furious roar echoed from the floor below. The beast.

Kaylina ran down the stairs, glancing left and right at the bottom—afraid he crouched in the shadows and would spring at her. But more broken vines dangled from the walls, promising the sentinel was still protecting her. It had tried to capture him, as she’d asked.

Thank you, she told it before running outside.

Beyond the courtyard, it wouldn’t be able to protect her, but she had to catch the beast before he went… where would he go? This time, she hadn’t ordered him after anyone.

The queen had irritated Vlerion with her proposal, but Kaylina doubted the beast would care about that—or even remember. The queen hadn’t threatened Kaylina. Even Jana, with her blackmail, had only wanted Kaylina to leave this part of the kingdom.

When she reached the back gate, it was closed. One of the taybarri came over. In the dark, she couldn’t tell if it was Crenoch or Levitke, but a tail swished as a large furry head looked toward her—no, toward her pockets.

“Nothing good in there now. Did Vlerion come this way?”

The whuff sounded confused.

“Did he come outside at all? He… wouldn’t have been himself.”

No , Levitke spoke into her mind and looked toward Crenoch as he also ambled to the gate. We heard a roar.

“But you didn’t see him?” Kaylina looked toward the front gate, thinking he might have run that way, but the taybarri would have noticed. “Okay, wait here, please.”

Kaylina ran back into the castle, turning into the kitchen. The pantry door was open, and, yes, the movable flagstone that led to the root cellar and eventually the catacombs had been shoved aside. In the confined space, she noticed the beast’s animal scent.

She ran and grabbed her sword and a lantern, planning to follow him, but she paused. If the beast had gone into the catacombs instead of the city, there was less chance that he would encounter people—less chance that he would hurt anyone. If he did run into people, they’d likely be up to no good, right?

Grittor’s face popped into her mind, and she grimaced. As she well knew, the Virts used the catacombs. But what were the odds that they were down there tonight?

“More likely, the beast will run around until the magic of the curse wears off,” Kaylina reasoned. Tomorrow, he would wake as Vlerion and return.

She bit her lip, hoping she was right. Even though she shouldn’t blame herself for this— Vlerion had been the one who’d wanted to reward her—she shouldn’t have let him leave the castle. She should have tried harder to stop him. She should have thrown the vial.

Kaylina slumped against the pantry shelves. Yes, that was exactly what she should have done. If it had worked, he would have changed back into a man right there. Now…

Distant screams came from the catacombs.

“Shit.”

Someone was down there. And the beast had found him. Or… them? More screams sounded.

Altered orchards, there might be bodies everywhere in the morning. Just as that awful article was printed, condemning Vlerion as the beast.

Kaylina swore again as she wrestled with indecision. If she went down there, she wouldn’t have the sentinel to back her up. If the beast killed whatever victims he’d found, then turned on her, she might not be able to stop him again.

No, she still had the vial. She touched her pocket to reassure herself. And if she didn’t go, there was a chance his magic would wear off while there were still threats, and that would leave him unconscious and vulnerable.

She set her jaw and descended into the catacombs. If the beast needed help, after she’d driven him away, she had to be there for him.

Kaylina walked quietly from the root cellar and into the catacombs, the passageways utterly dark aside from the wan light of her single lantern. The stone Kar’ruk statues looked no less ominous than the first time she’d come down here, and knowing they would hiss vapor at passersby didn’t keep her from flinching when it caressed her cheeks.

She held her breath and hurried past the area. It crossed her mind that when the real Kar’ruk had invaded the city and been in the catacombs, they might have refilled the reservoirs of poison that the statues spat.

“Probably not,” she whispered. If they had, the poison would have stopped the beast.

The screams ended before Kaylina reached their source. Cautious, she approached the underground lake where the fur shark had once attacked her.

A hint of yellow light shone on the water ahead, and her passageway ended at its rock ledge of a shore. The surface lay still, the faint trickle from the flow entering at one end not enough to disturb it.

Before leaning out of the passageway to look around, Kaylina paused and listened, straining her ears for the sounds of breathing, of anything. The trickle of water was all she heard.

She risked peering around, then froze, horror filling her at the sight of mangled bodies on the dock near the end of the lake. Numerous mangled bodies.

Men in green uniforms that she didn’t recognize lay among blankets and packs, swords fallen from their hands, blood spattering the area. They looked like they’d been caught by surprise while camped for the night. All save a guard who was dead on the walkway close to Kaylina—he might have been awake and tried to defend the camp, but the beast had been too strong. Claws had slashed through the man’s throat, leaving no doubt about who had been responsible.

She counted ten bodies before realizing that even more floated in the water near boats tied to the dock. And there were more near the start of the river that exited the lake, the dead lying half off the walkway that followed the wall.

Her gaze traveled back to the dock, and she counted the boats. Six of them, each large enough to accommodate a dozen men.

Had there been even more here? Men who’d managed to flee the beast while the others fought? Fought and died.

Kaylina shook her head in horror, hardly believing that what had started as an enjoyable night with Vlerion had turned into this.

But who were these people? The Virts didn’t wear uniforms. And these weren’t the colors of the Castle or Kingdom Guard.

Kaylina slumped against the stone wall. She couldn’t bring herself to step over the dead body on the walkway to investigate. None of the men were moving, so she was fairly certain they were past help. She had to tell…

Who?

Vlerion was who she would usually go to.

Captain Targon was the logical choice, but she winced at the thought of explaining how the beast had come to be roused. Targon would guess the reason even if she didn’t say, and he would be snarky and judgmental.

Maybe she would deserve it, but that didn’t keep her from shying away from the notion. Maybe she could tell Sergeant Zhani. Zhani had enough rank that she could gather men, lead a team down here to investigate, and report to Targon.

Eventually, Targon would learn what happened, but Kaylina wouldn’t have to be there for it.

“I wouldn’t have to report it at all,” she mused, wishing that didn’t sound like cowardice.

It was tempting though. Days might pass before someone stumbled upon the bodies. The rangers patrolled down here from time to time, but she didn’t think it was that frequent.

“No, I have to report it.” As a ranger in training, it was her duty.

Besides, these people in their unfamiliar uniforms might represent a threat to Port Jirador or even all of Zaldor. What if this was part of an invasion force? The kingdom had enough trouble this week already.

“I hope you’re okay, Vlerion,” Kaylina said before heading back. “Wherever you are.”