Cursed by Fire (30 page)

But that was not the feeling he was focusing on. She could tell by the possessiveness of his grasp. He went to jerk her up against his body, but she tensed away from him just as he remembered he was covered in blood and
could easily transfer it to her dress. It would announce to the world that she had been in his arms.

“Damn it to the eight hells!” he swore viciously. She knew he did not use a curse like that lightly, considering he had been in the eight hells. His frustration must be incredible, she thought, and something about that understanding pleased her no end.

But he did not let her go. Instead he transferred his hands to her head and dragged her mouth up to his. His chiseled lips covered hers with outright demand and a hot brand of desire. He wanted to own her. To own all the rights to her and damn everyone else. He wanted to be able to prove to everyone that she was his and he deserved her.

But how had he come to this? he wondered as he devoured her mouth, stroked his tongue against hers, swallowed the erotic flavor of her. This was supposed to have been a simple business arrangement. He was supposed to be focused on a single goal. How had he become enmeshed in a desire for a woman who did not deserve to be burdened with a cursed man? She had enough men in her life who were like a curse to her.

And yet he could not stop kissing her. He conveyed that to her with silent intensity. He wanted her to feel the power she had over him. She deserved to feel powerful … if in only this one thing.

Dethan kissed Selinda until she could not breathe. The feel of his tongue in her mouth was so sultry, as if he wished he were using it like this somewhere else on her body. The thought made her knees weaken, and her spine simply melted. But she could not let herself fall against him.

Realizing how close she was to doing so, Dethan stepped back from her, disengaging their mouths in the slowest of disconnections possible. He did not want to go and she did not want him to go.

“Tonight, you will come to me,” he said urgently.

“Yes,” she promised him.

“Good,” he said, taking her by her shoulders and turning her away from him. “Now go. Go before I forget myself and endanger you.”

Slowly she walked out of his grasp, toward the door. Once there, she hesitated, looking back at him.

“Tonight I want to make love with you,” she said. She didn’t know where the bold words had come from, but with him they seemed to come so easy.

“That is good because I plan on doing that very thing as soon as I am able.”

“Good,” she said, raising her chin. “As long as we understand each other.”

“Perfectly,” he assured her.

She smiled and left him.

Dethan felt the strength ebb out of him the minute she left, as if she had taken it with her. And perhaps she had. He felt stronger when he was with her somehow. It was purely perception, he knew, but he felt it just the same.

His hand went to his side and he felt the bandages already saturated with fresh blood. He lay back in the bed, thinking it was probably best to give his body an hour to heal. It would take longer than that to heal with any perfection, but it should be enough to get him back on his feet.

He had to fight the Redoe and win. He had to do it because so much was at stake.

And in his heart he knew that winning the city in Weysa’s name was no longer the top priority it should be. Which was very dangerous, he warned himself. He was there by the grace of the goddess and could easily be returned to the hells if he displeased her in any way.

But there had to be a way to achieve both goals. To
win the city and to have Selinda as his own. There had to be a way and he had to find it and keep her safe in the doing of it. It was like balancing on the point of a sword. One wrong move and all his plans could be completely run through.

And Selinda as well in the process.

Dethan got up and was moving around again after only a short time. Keeping still had never sat well with him. The worst of the bleeding was done with, so he changed his bandages once more himself before heading downstairs. It had been much easier when Selinda had been there to wind the fabric around him, and far more pleasant.

He put thoughts of her aside as best he could. It seemed she had taken up permanent residence there, in his head. He went to the city guard barracks, which were also acting as a temporary headquarters for the army. That would have to change, and it was on his immediate list of things to accomplish. When he arrived, Kyran was there with a phalanx of men. His new commanders. He had gotten to know a few of them, but the rest Kyran had picked out over the past day. He had been forced to trust Kyran in this since he had no idea what he was dealing with. But he would. The mettle of these men would become apparent very quickly and he would know whether or not they were suited to battle as well as to leadership.

“General Dethan,” Kyran said upon seeing him, his entire face lighting up as though with utter excitement.
“I think I have found the site we need for raising the barracks. It serves twofold,” Kyran said, drawing a plan of the city and showing it to Dethan. “It’s just on the fringes of the fairgrounds. There’s wide-open space to be had and it’s close to the center of the city, putting us between the wall and the fortress.”

“A good choice,” Dethan agreed. “You said twofold?”

“Yes. There’s a line of vacant buildings just here”—he pointed them out—“that can act as headquarters.”

“Good. We need a place secluded from this one to plan.” Dethan looked at the fringes of the gathering, where guards were trying to hear what they were saying, some of them trying to glean that information for Grannish. He had no doubt that the jenden would pay well for such information. “What about training grounds?”

“Well, the fairgrounds themselves. They remain empty except during the winter festival and the summer fair. It’s a waste of space otherwise. Surely we can use it at all other times and then just make way for the festival and the fair when the time comes.”

“Perfect. Absolutely perfect. Well done, Kyran.” Dethan clapped the man on the back. “You see? I was right in drafting you. You know far more about the comings and goings of this city than I do. But I promise you I am learning fast.”

He had no choice but to learn fast. He needed a foothold here if he was going to make any progress. And he needed to win the hearts of his men if he was going to succeed in this endeavor.

He must succeed. Selinda’s very life and future depended on it and he would not let her down. He would just need to be clever about it. Cleverer than the jenden of Hexis.

“We will rout the Redoe once and for all,” he spoke up loudly. The men reacted with approval. “We will
teach them they cannot take your farmlands any longer.” The approving sounds turned into heavy grunts of agreement. “We will show them the strong arm of Hexis and they will never come to our doorstep again!”

The entire room erupted in cheers. The men at the table banged their fists upon it.

“Come, Kyran,” Dethan said, drawing the man close and speaking softly in his ear. “I need you to take me to the best black market runner you have in this city.”

Kyran nodded. “That would be One-Eyed Jyo. He’s not likely to speak with you … even if you could catch him. He’s sort of the king of the lower swells—the poorest part of the city. He runs the black market and looks after the place with a gang of thugs. He strong-arms protection money out of the merchants in the bartering square, our commerce district. Of course in the end he’s protecting them from himself.”

“And the city guard does nothing?” Dethan asked with a frown. Then he rethought the query. “Let me guess. The jenden gets a cut of One-Eyed Jyo’s profits, so the guard is instructed to leave him be.”

“Aye, something like that. The jenden is the richest man in the city for a reason. Some say he’s even richer than the grand.”

“Very well. Take me to this man.”

“He won’t talk to you,” Kyran insisted.

“That may be, but Tonkin said you wouldn’t talk to me either,” Dethan said, giving the man a grin.

That made Kyran chuckle. “True. You do have a way with words. And you get the men on your side. I’ll take you to the lower swells. We’ll see how close we can get to Jyo.”

“Those are lookouts,” Kyran said, pointing out the group of men sitting in a circle around a table, upon
which sat a game that two of the men were heavily engaged in.

“We’ll start there, then.”

Dethan walked up to the men directly.

“I want to see One-Eyed Jyo,” he said flatly. The men looked at him in surprise and then as if he’d gone mad.

“Lolly and I want to see the grand of Hexis, but neither of us is likely to get what we want.”

“I can take you to the grand. Can you say the same?”

“Oya, Lolly, get your mind around this one,” the man said to his gaming companion with a coarse laugh. “He’s going to take me to see the grand.”

“Get on with you,” Lolly warned, getting to his feet. He moved aside his vest, just enough to flash the dagger at his side. A clear warning.

“You’re going to take me to see Jyo,” Dethan said quietly, “or I’m going to kill all but one of you and then let that one lead me to Jyo. The first way you all get to live. The second way … well … Who would like to volunteer for being the survivor?”

The men shifted nervously, laughing to try to cover up their sudden uncertainty. They didn’t quite know what to make of Dethan or his threats. They were used to being the ones who did the threatening. They each sized Dethan up, trying to figure out if he could make good on his threats. In the end, they decided there was strength in numbers and gained courage from the idea.

“Get him, Lolly!” the first man ordered. The other men moved too. The whole lot of them—six in total—swarmed around Dethan and Kyran.

Dethan had learned his lesson from the assassin. He had since armed himself and would wear his weapons from that day forward. He had the daggers he had taken off the assassin and his god-made sword, which luckily he had retrieved his first day in the fortress. He knew if he pulled out the sword he could cleave through these
men in a matter of seconds, but he chose the more up-close-and-personal daggers. They would, he thought, make far more of the impression he was looking for. He pulled one dagger and in an instant had jumped on one of the men, the weapon flashing in and out of his chest between heartbeats. The man dropped like a stone, shock clearly written on his face. But Dethan took no note of it. He was moving to his next target, grabbing him by the hair and slicing the man’s neck open on the right side. Flesh parted and blood spurted forth.

He took a moment to check on Kyran. After all, he had yet to see the man in any kind of action. But he saw Kyran move like lightning as he elbowed one man in the face hard enough to smash his nose, an immediate spray of blood jetting forward as the man cried out and fell back. Then Kyran pulled his weapon—a short axe that had been tethered to his belt with a quick-release knot. In a mighty feat of strength and with a roar of power, Kyran planted the axe blade deep in the forehead of the next man.

Dethan took his third with just as much ease as the first in spite of his enormous build. The failing of men that big was that they thought their size made them strong enough to do anything, defeat anyone. Dethan kicked the man in the gut, making him double over, then cracked him in the jaw with the hilt of the dagger. The man hit the ground like a huge stone, and that was when Dethan made his killing blow, a dagger right through the man’s spine at the back of his neck. When Dethan looked up, there was only one man standing. The man whom he had spoken with initially. His eyes were wide with shock and fear and he was literally shaking in his boots. Kyran jumped on the man, grabbing him by his hair and holding the wicked-sharp blade of his axe to his throat.

“It looks like you’re the winner,” Kyran ground out.
Then to Dethan he said, “Are you sure we can’t kill him? He probably doesn’t even know where Jyo is.”

“No! I-I do! I know exactly where he is!” the man insisted in a panic. “I can take you to him right away!”

“Now see, why couldn’t you have done that in the first place?” Dethan asked mildly. “It would have saved so many lives.”

“I’m sorry. We’re under orders not to let anyone get close to Jyo. I-I had no choice!”

“There’s always a choice,” Kyran said darkly.

“W-who are you guys?” the man asked shakily.

“That’s not important to
you
. The only thing important to you right now is taking us to Jyo and then figuring out a reason why we shouldn’t kill you afterward,” Kyran said.

“Now, Kyran. That’s not very friendly,” Dethan scolded with a tight-lipped smile. “After all, we’re all going to be friends here.” Dethan leaned close to the other man’s face. “Take us to Jyo, and if you value your intact throat, I wouldn’t try to lead us into any traps.”

Five minutes later, after being led through a maze of structures standing in six-inch-deep mud, they found themselves at the door of a dark building.

“They’re with me,” the man, who they had discovered was named Harro, said to the guard at the door. The guard narrowed eyes on the group, maybe sensing something wasn’t quite right.