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Aktor stepped forward, holding the blade loosely, his smile full of arrogance. “If you don’t want to see your new friend gutted and skinned, Girl, come with us.” Stabbing his spear into the ground, he held out his hand. “One choice is all that stands in the way of him living or dying.”
“She’s not going anywhere with you,” the stranger growled, tucking me tighter against him, his palm hot and slick, his fingers tight around mine.
My heart raced too fast, too fierce.
“What do you want, Aktor?” I asked with every shred of bravery I had left. “Why can’t you let us pass? What have I done to upset you?”
Kivva chuckled but didn’t answer, his gaze on Aktor.
Aktor dropped his eyes to my bare chest. “I see how our Fire Reader watches you. I see him sharing his lupic with you.” He cocked his head. “I merely want to know why. You’re alive because of us. Yet the more time the Spirit Master spends with you, the more I hear whispers from my father and mother that you’re different. I am firstborn; it is my duty to keep my people safe.” He ran his thumb down the blade’s edge. “And if they say you’re different, it’s up to me to see why. To see if you’re a threat to my beloved family.”
“You’re not going to touch her,” the stranger snapped, his voice thick with protection.
“Ah, see...that’s where you’re wrong,” Kivva said with ice on his tongue. “We had planned on waiting to the Aium festival—the night where chaos rules the clan, and no one would notice the little adoptive girl missing for an hour or so.” He glowered at me. “But that was before Solin decided to share a trance with you. Before he chose you over us and forced our hand far sooner.”
Fighting to release my fingers from the stranger’s, needing to be free in case the two men struck suddenly, I said, “I didn’t ask Solin to put himself at risk. I’m afraid too. I don’t want—”
“It doesn’t matter what you want,” Aktor murmured, stepping closer. “What I want is to know what makes you so special, and that starts with you spreading those pretty legs.”
I gasped.
A growl reverberated in the stranger’s chest, quaking through the darkness. “Touch her, and it’s you who dies tonight.”
Kivva drifted to Aktor’s side, double fisting his staff, ready to strike. “Think you can kill both of us when you can barely stand?”
“I’ve survived worse things.”
Kivva chuckled. “You won’t survive us.” Looking at Aktor, he said, “You’re my next ruler...remember what I said.” He lowered his chin. “You have her first. I’ll deal with him.” Dropping into a fighting stance, he narrowed his eyes at the stranger.
“Wait!” I shouted, my mouth dry and nerves high. “Stop. This isn’t the Nhil way. Your father would never—”
“My father is too trusting of foreigners.” Aktor slashed his stone dagger through the sky.
It happened too fast.
Too sudden.
One moment, Aktor and Kivva stood beneath the moonlight, and the next, they were there.
Right in front of us.
Their staff and blade singing through the air.
Kivva swung his staff at the stranger’s head while Aktor grabbed me with his free hand.
The shock of his touch and the suddenness of their attack rendered me useless.
Aktor tore me away from the stranger’s hand, throwing me to the side while the stranger ducked Kivva’s swinging staff and stumbled. Planting one hand into the dirt, he tripped from imbalance and ill health before another growl rumbled in his chest. A growl that grew in volume and vibration until the very grass around us shivered.
His smoky eyes flashed silver as he launched upward, diving directly for Kivva. The two men went plummeting to the earth, pale skin and earthen, feverish flesh twining with brutish brawn as they kicked, struck, and snarled.
I fought to help. To somehow help the stranger before the last shred of his energy faded, but Aktor kept his hand lashed tightly around my bicep, dragging me away from the fight.
I scratched at him. “Let me go!”
He grunted as I punched him in the chest, yanking at his hold, sending blazing agony through my shoulder as I twisted and parried.
But he didn’t let go. His hold didn’t loosen at all.
With gritted teeth, he snapped, “The more you fight, the more this will hurt.” He kept dragging me deeper into the tall grass, away from the whipping, snapping stalks as Kivva and the stranger rolled and attacked.
Furious tears wetted my eyes, but I refused to let them fall. Refused to cry when all of this was so wrong.
“Your father will punish you for this,” I panted, fighting to free myself from his iron grip. “He would never permit you to hurt anyone.”
“But that’s where you’re wrong,” Aktor said blackly, dragging me farther away from the grunts and groans of the two men at war. “He’s our chief. He’s killed many mortals who came into our clan, disguised as friends, only to prove unworthy of our hospitality.” His teeth flashed as he jerked me into him, pressing the sharp stone blade to my throat. “I’m merely doing my duty by finding out exactly who you are.”
