Bloodlust (14 page)

"You have more experience with the bow," he protested too late as she darted out of the crevice.

The twin dragon heads let out a massive roar, and a rush of fire belched out from their bellies. Ivy leapt into the air, impossibly high, but not quite high enough. The soles of her leather shoes caught on fire. She kicked them off, and they tumbled down the small bridge, falling like burning stars.

Belatedly, Lukor realized he clenched the silverbow so tightly he risked bending it. Although he knew he could flee now — that Ivy would be trapped here without his aid, would never find Kennan without his help — he couldn't leave, and not solely because she had the shield in her possession again.

Before the arrow he sent spiraled into the dragon's side, the dragon released another blast of fiery air. This ball Ivy did not attempt to leap over. Instead, she brought up the shield. Crazy fool.

Without a reasonable thought coursing through his mind, Lukor dashed off toward her. At the last second, she ducked, the ball flying above her head. How she remained unharmed, the shield scarcely singed as it spared her back from the blast, Lukor did not know, but relief flowed through him.

Until a fireball was launched in his direction.

And another in hers.

An object whirled toward him. The shield. Lukor plucked it out of the air and held it up. Ivy raced to him and jumped, her feet scarcely touching the shield before she leapt again. Twirling through the air, she hacked and slashed with her blade and chopped off one of the heads.

The dragon roared and tumbled to the bottom of the cavern.

Unfortunately, so did Ivy. She screamed as she fell, and it took Lukor a moment to realize she was shouting at him. Something about the shield.

Instinctively, he threw it toward her. The shield spun around, the spike in the center unwavering, and she managed to land on top of it. Still spinning, although much slower now, the shield carried her to another bridge. Within a minute, she climbed back to his level and stood by his side, and they ran, hand in hand, to the proper bridge. Soon, they were deep within the passageways once more.

Abruptly, Ivy halted and pulled back on his hand. "We're on the other side of the mountain."

"Yes."

"You can't tell me there isn't another entrance."

"There isn't."

"I don't believe you." Her eyes darkened ever so slightly as she tapped her fingers on her crossed arms.

Lukor grinned. "Aye, I do know of one other entrance. However, that one is guarded by a hive of destroyer dreads."

Ivy shuddered. Destroyer dreads had four segmented body parts. Their teeth were poisonous. Their long antennas caused paralysis to those they brushed against, and their wings sped them from victim to victim. That wasn't even mentioning their tail ends, with spikes that burrowed the dreads into their victim's skin, worming toward one's heart.

"Perhaps, before this is all over, you will learn to trust me." He leaned against the polished stone, his gaze falling on the shield in her possession.

"Aye, if you deserve it." She waltzed down the path.

Her armored bodice had a few scratches in it now, the skirt hanging in tattered strips, clinging to her long legs. Still, she had a picturesque backside.

Ivy turned her head to the side. "Are you going to stand there and stare at me or are you going to earn my shield?"

"I never knew..."

"Knew what?"

He approached her, their bodies separated by an inch. "Come along." With a nod, he walked on.

"Lukor..."

The gentle touch of her hand on his arm stilled him once more.

"Thank you," she said, her voice a strange mixture of gentleness and gruff, as if she could not believe her own words despite their ring of truth.

"You are foolhardy and reckless and are going to get yourself killed."

Her soft laughter echoed throughout the passageway. "Thank you again."

"Only a barbarian would take that as a compliment."

"If you don't start leading, I'm going to find myself a meal. I'm hungry for some more pig meat."

"You try my patience." He growled, the sound rumbling from the back of his throat.

"And you mine."

Lukor stalked off but could not bring himself to walk swiftly. He was stalling.

Because he knew that she would soon be leaving him. But why should that matter to him? She meant nothing to him. A key to ensuring the ends to her miserable race.

Yet twice she had been enthralled, in the throes of Bloodlust, in his presence, and twice he had endured.

It would be unwise to attempt surviving a third round. Better to help her and flee, set off a chain of events that would ensure the goliaths would join the trolls. His goal 'twas all he needed to concentrate on. That and nothing else.

When Lukor increased his pace, Ivy easily kept up with him.
Probably wants to hurry and get his shield.

The notion that she would soon be parting from his company, and lack her shield, did not sit well with her. Barbadia was a good distance away. With no one to converse with, the journey would be long and lonely. Strange. Being by herself was something she often experienced back home, but now, she enjoyed having someone to spar with, even if most of the time 'twas only verbally.

With barbarians, she constantly had to hold her tongue. Arguments of any kind could result in bloodshed and even death. 'Twas the biggest factor contributing to her not standing up to her father more.

Her father. Did he know she still lived? Did he care? Perhaps in the days she had been gone, he'd married again and was striving to conceive another heir.

Ivy almost wished this was the case. Ruling the barbarians was something she always knew she would have to do, although she did not necessarily want to.

"What think you?" Lukor asked.

"Always have to fill the silence, don't you?" She relished how her biting tone resonated in the crammed quarters. "My thoughts are my own."

"For you to share if you so choose," he pointed out.

"If." As he stood still, she had no choice but to stand beside him. How infuriating that he wished to hinder her yet again.

The goliath stroked his chin. Little moss grew here, and he looked more tanned than green. If she squinted a little, he could almost pass for an exceedingly tall barbarian or a monsterly giant-sized human.

"I know you hate the trolls," he said.

"Aye."

"The elves?"

"Indifferent." She glanced behind them. "Have no quarrels with dragons either, so long as they don't want to char me to a crisp. Humans are a wasted race."

"Why do you think that?"

"They constantly bicker and fight. I don't know how the race lasted this long. All they do is fight and go to war, whether with themselves or other nations."

He raised his eyebrows.

Her cheeks grew warm. "Aye, the same could be said of the barbarians. And the trolls. And the goliaths."

Lukor chuckled. "You have a fire within you."

"And you douse it," she retorted, crossing her arms. "Are you done questioning me?"

He ducked his head and stalked off.

Had she offended him in some manner? Good. Perhaps it was best to put some distance between them.

After rounding two more corners and walking an incline, Lukor motioned for her to stay back before disappearing into a small room. Not waiting a moment, Ivy followed him.

A man sat in a stone chair, a stone table attached to the floor in front of him. All kinds of plants grew in the room, some dying, some glowing, a few purple, one blossomed large nut-looking objects within its petals. His bald head shone, glistening with sweat. He whispered to the flower in his hand.

Lukor grunted.

The man whipped his head up, his brown eyes narrowing before a smile crossed his features. His human features. The Rocks of Breakingham was located on the fringe of the human domain, but considering the stone mountain had been the home of the dwarves for centuries, Ivy had been expecting a dwarf.

She raised her eyebrows at Lukor.

The goliath tapped the center of his forehead. "Kennan."

The human resumed his whispers to the plant.

"Kennan, this is—"

"Don't talk. My plants do not like any voices but my own."

This daft man was to be her interpreter? How long had he been cooped up in this room, away from contact with his people, let alone other species?

She withdrew her sword, but before she could threaten either his plants or himself or Lukor, the human said without bothering to look up, "Princess Ivy of the Barbarians, I suggest you return your sword to its sheath."

Only allowing herself to be a trifle bit alarmed, she did as he bade. Something told her to keep her lips together, and she somehow refrained from tapping her feet.

Kennan whispered again to the plant in his hand before tucking it in between two bushes. With a deliberate slowness, he touched every petal, going around the circular room. Once that was accomplished, he eyed Ivy.

She handed him the messages.

"Ah, the trolls." He spoke almost too loudly. "These messages are encoded in the old troll tongue. I had thought they no longer used it. Evidently, I thought wrong."

Ivy chewed on the tip of her tongue. He sounded intelligent, but with his rambling, she feared he would never get on with it.

His skin glowed against a nearby orange vine-like plant, giving the paleness a yellowish hue. "This one..." He lifted the message she'd obtained from her father's vulture. "The trolls plan to destroy your kingdom, lay siege to the barbarian fortress, and starve out the remaining barbarians until none survive."

Ivy inhaled sharply but did not feel too discouraged. An attack in that manner would never succeed. The barbarians would be able to dismantle the trolls before they would be able to see the fortress’s stone walls. How cunning and ruthless her father was to have trained one of the troll's vultures to deliver him their messages. And how lucky their race was that she had intercepted this message, for surely her father would have declared war on the trolls the moment he read it. Could her father have decoded the message? It would not surprise her if he could. Just how many secrets was he keeping from her?

"And this one." He held it up to the light and appeared to be reading and rereading it. Ivy's knees grew weak. She wanted to shake him until words poured out. When she was ready to act, he finally said, "This message is an appeal to the dwarves for aid."

The dwarves, with their pickaxes, made Lukor's skill with his double axe look infantile. From two hundred feet away, they could throw their axe and hit the center of a target — or their enemies' chest — every time without fail.

"And the elves and humans."

The elves would most likely ignore such a request. The humans would first have to reunite and end their own civil war. A possibility.

"And the goliaths."

Ivy's gaze lifted from the stone floor to Lukor. A flicker of emotion that looked suspiciously like joy flashed in his eyes before his face settled into a mask.

She swallowed hard. If the trolls and the goliaths were to unite against the barbarians, their sheer number would certainly succeed, even without aid from the humans or elves or dwarves.

Those barbarian children would never grow up. Never have the chance to keep their compassion into adulthood. Would never have children of their own.

Her throat burned as she cleared it. "What of the last one?" The one from the troll's pouch.

The human scanned it and tossed it aside. "Looks like a report on how close the writer could get to the barbarian fortress."

She scowled. The idea that a troll had even laid eyes on her fortress was almost enough to send her spiraling into Bloodlust. After a moment, she recovered her emotions and coolly asked, "What payment do you wish for your services?"

Kennan stared at Lukor. The goliath tilted his head toward the door. Not relishing the idea of being ignorant of their conversation, Ivy stood outside the opening, but she could not discern their hushed tones into words.

Lukor glowered at her when he left the room, his teeth glittering. "My shield?"