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“I see,” she murmured. Her appetite gone, she pushed back her stool and stood. “Thank you, Daig. I’m going to hit the road. I know I’m getting closer. I just hope I can catch up before they move on again.”
“Try following the river,” Marik suggested as he joined his companion behind the bar, wiping his hands on a woven cloth. “I think they were planning on spending some time along the bend where there are a few towns and villages scattered nearby.
“River?” she echoed and both males laughed.
“You think this place is called Riverside for nothing? The river runs through the woods behind the outpost. Keep going down the right and take the first immediate left, that will take you toward the bend. The bend is a cove on the coast. Two of the towns are on opposite sides of the bend, and the third is a village on an island. We usually don’t get the carnival through here, but they’ve been known to spend the winter along the bend from what I understand.”
Daig’s eyes suddenly widened, and Marik murmured a soft excuse before disappearing into the back room as a deep, growly voice rumbled from behind her.
“Dark places, each of them. You will not be venturing near any of those cursed places.”
She stiffened, an instinctive fear shooting through her. She thought she gained a handle on her fear, but it seemed that she had just been foolish herself. It was one thing when she was dealing with something that she somewhat expected and could see so that she could steel herself against, and another when she was taken by surprise.
She spun around to find herself facing the bulk of a large, masculine body. Her nostrils flared, and a rich, earthy musk with a hint of spice filled her nose. Her first impression was that her assailant was huge. Her heart pumped in terror as she took in the broad expanse of muscle, defined beneath a plain woven tunic. Her gaze immediately dropped down to powerful thighs encased in leather. Her gaze skipped over the bulge of his sex, snapping away from it nervously, but she trembled at the sight of lethally clawed hands held loose at his sides.
They flexed slowly, as if he knew that she couldn’t seem to tear her gaze away from them, drawing her attention to a brace loaded with long, sharp needles around her forearm that moved as the muscles flexed.
That small movement, however, made her eyes fly up to a broad face with dramatically sharp angles and long pointed ears that swept back from the sides of his head, partially concealed within the length of dark hair arranged in several small braids at the front. Such features could have been at home among any of the mother humanoid monsters and fae, but the shape and proportion of the ears, the horned crest of his brow, the black furred tail, and the green complexion were all troll. As was the handle of a massive weapon visible over his shoulder.
Black eyes narrowed down at her as a dark, hot flame sparked within their depth and a faint smile curled his hard mouth. Warmth curled in her belly, and she nearly choked at the sensation flooding through her body. It warred with the fear that still pumped through her at being so close to a monstrous male who stood a littletooclose and towered over her.
“You,” she whispered.
A covetous look filled his face as he raised one of his giant hands and grabbed her, yanking her forward against his massive body. She squeaked in terror but blinked when she heard a purr vibrating through his body as if he were a giant cat.
“At last,” he rasped as his body curled, and she felt his nose lower against her head and nuzzle her hair. His purr kicked up happily and sank into her. “Mine.”
“W… w-wait, what?” she stuttered and then shrieked when she was suddenly plucked off her feet and into the air.
“That troll you were looking for—looks like he found you,” Marik said, creeping warily back into the room.
So it seemed. And he was armed to the teeth by all appearances. She was pretty sure more than one dagger that he wore strapped to his huge frame was digging into her body as he hugged her to him. To her horror, the tension slowly bled out of her as he continued to purr in a deep, happy rumble. The “mine” part worried her, but the fact that he was tenderly and carefully holding her was slowly working past her fear.
And he did come from the carnival. He could be her way in.
MaryAnne didn’t know whether to be relieved that she was a step closer to finding the carnival or terrified for what all this could suddenly mean for her.
ChapterFourteen
Raskyuil growled and he drank in his female’s scent. He had left the carnival in the dead of night, unable to resist the compulsion that had seized him as he made his way back. All his reasons to avoid the female evaporated when he caught a faint trace of her scent on the evening breeze. After so many days and nights suffering from separation from her and his rut drawing closer, there was no longer room for uncertainty.
With the fever raging in his blood, he had threatened one of the fairy men to bring him back down the river. He’d been forced to leave his motorcycle behind, and Elwyn would probably be out for blood once word got back to him of his methods, but it was worth it now that he had a hold of her.
Breathing in her sweet scent and feeling the fever cooling to a warm, persistent throb, beating in time with his pulse as his cock awoke fully and stiffened, made it all worthwhile. He didn’t even care that Cathol, that meddling overseer, was stalking up behind him. He knew that no one at the outpost would be happy to see him return, least of all Cathol.
“Marik said you returned,” the overseer growled, and Raskyuil’s lips peeled back in a silent snarl as he felt his female startle in his arms, the traces of fear in her scent intensifying.
He hated that it was there at all, though he understood. He was a strange male, and she didn’t know him yet. Even drawn all this way because of the Ha’shena, she was still only human and ignorant of how intensely a fae male reacted to his mate—and other strange males who foolishly came too close with the fever upon him. That Cathol’s presence made her even more afraid sent fury knifing through him, his tail lashing angrily behind him.
He lifted his head slowly and glanced over at the troll, but the male raised his hands and gave him a faint smile as his eyes darted to what little he could see of the female.
“Peace, Raskyuil. I’m not here to challenge you. Nor do I have any intention of either harming her or taking her from you. My mate would murder me if I did,” he added with a rumble of amusement. “Actually, I’ve been waiting for you.”
“Waiting?” Raskyuil rumbled suspiciously. “Why?”
He hadn’t even known that he was coming until he was unable to ignore the Ha’shena any longer.
The overseer shrugged. “I knew you would show up when I caught word that there was a human female searching for the carnival and mentioning a forest troll who traveled with it. There couldn’t be two of you bastards traveling with it, so I asked Marik to alert me upon your arrival to make sure that things proceed in the safest way possible. I don’t need a male with the fever tearing apart my outpost.”
