Darkness Possessed (Order of the Blade) (21 page)

She froze, shocked by the realization that she was pinned beneath him, completely trapped, horrified that she had been so caught up in her plants that she hadn't even noticed it happening.

But before she could become afraid, a deep, powerful burning desire swept over her, a need for this man that was so intense that nothing else mattered. Her fingers involuntarily dug into his shoulders, and her legs tightened around him, and she realized that he hadn't pinned her to the ground against her will. She'd dragged him down with her, and the only thing that had kept their clothes on was his sheer strength of willpower. He could have violated her in a thousand ways, and she would have let him, but he hadn't.

And that fact made her entire body clench with longing and need so stark and raw she felt like her soul would break if she didn't have him.

Zach suddenly went still, as if he'd sensed the change in her.

Slowly, he raised his head to look at her. The lust burning in his eyes made her suck in her breath, and her heart began to race. After years of being terrified of being touched or kissed by a man, suddenly all she wanted was for Zach to kiss her. Not just a kiss. The kind of kiss meant to sear her soul and rip away all the damage that she'd carried for so long.

Her fingers began to tremble, but she didn't let go of his shoulders. She simply met his intense gaze. "Kiss me, Zach," she whispered, her voice trembling. "Kiss me now."

Eric liked her.

He sat on a patch of dirt, watching Jordyn as she strolled around the perimeter of Rohan's camp. She was edgy and tense, and had opted for takeout with her stew instead of sitting around the campfire trading stories. She'd finished her dinner on her second circuit, and he'd accepted the bowl from her as she'd passed him by.

The others were all watching her as well, and he knew they were not used to having a woman in the camp. Rohan and his team were uncivilized, raw, and stayed as far away from women as they could, except for the occasional foray into a town for a night to relieve the typical Calydon lust. Having Jordyn strolling around their camp as if she owned it was interfering with their solitary maleness.

Eric, however, was thoroughly enjoying watching her take inventory of the camp. He respected Rohan's crew, but enduring the hard, deprived life wasn't his style. He was damned happy to have a woman around, even one who gave him a lot of shit. In fact, he kind of liked that aspect of her.

Jordyn suddenly stopped at the far end of camp, near the black pit that hid Thano and the other rogue warrior. "What's in here?"

Again, silence. Every question she'd asked had been ignored by Rohan and the crew. "Jesus, guys. Be a little more rude," Eric said aloud. "You did invite her."

Again, no reply.

Bunch of chumps. Nothing much about this crew bothered Eric, but their absolute silence around Jordyn was beginning to grate on him, though he had to admit the others were probably asphyxiating under their hoods, which they usually wore only in battle to hide their true identity. Having Jordyn among them meant they couldn't drop the secret identity thing, which he found sort of amusing. Who the hell cared who they really were? "It's where Rohan keeps the rogues that are waiting to be saved," he offered. "He has them tied up and—"

"Enough!" Rohan was suddenly on his feet. "She doesn't need to know."

"Rogues?" Jordyn suddenly looked wary. "Why aren't they dead?"

"Because they're good warriors," Rohan snapped. "I don't kill rogues unless I have to. That's not my mission."

"No?" She turned back to face him. "What is your mission? Aren't you Order?"

Eric raised his brows. "How the hell did you know that?" Even he hadn't realized they were Order of the Blade until six months into his time with them. All the warriors were Order of the Blade, but they weren't like any of the Order he'd heard about over the years. Not once had they gone after a rogue Calydon, like the traditional Order was supposed to do.

No, they went after other shit. Darker shit. Monsters.

"Because I was the
sheva
of one of the most powerful Calydons in history," she said simply. "I paid attention." She studied Rohan, and then looked around at the others. "What is your deal? Seriously? There's so much melodrama here, I could choke on it, but you guys aren't doing anything but sitting around. I thought Calydons were action guys, not the kind who dwell in introspective silence."

Eric grinned at the rise in tension as she challenged them. "They're afraid of the fire god," he offered.

"I'm not afraid," Rohan snapped, apparently unwilling to hold his silence in the face of an accusation of fear. "I'm a smart warrior, and—"

"Are you?" Eric stood up. "You sent Zach off by himself. Did it ever occur to you that maybe he could use some backup? He sets the fires, and you do other shit?"

"Zach?" Jordyn walked toward them, clearly pleased she was finally getting some response from Rohan. "Who's Zach?"

"The poor bastard Rohan sent off to try to get the staff from the fire god to save his team. He's holding the guy's best friend hostage until he gets back."

Blue lightening crackled from Rohan's fingers. "I liked you better when you weren't being an ass," he snapped.

Eric blinked, surprised by the normalcy of Rohan's sentence. The warrior was usually formal and proper, never hinting at his emotions, but that one line had been spoken like a man who was alive and cared. Around them, he felt the other warriors shift, as if they, too, were surprised by this change in Rohan.

Jordyn strode across the clearing and stood in front of Rohan. "You sent another man off to save yours? What kind of leader does that? You hide behind a cloak and—"

"Enough!" Rohan snapped, spinning toward her.

"Hey." Eric leapt between Jordyn and Rohan, holding up his hands. "Let's everyone chill. There's no need to kill anyone here." His fingers hummed with magic, and he let it roll through him, willing to intervene if necessary. He doubted he could kill Rohan, but he could do enough harm to let him and Jordyn get away. The damage, however, would be unpredictable, and he had learned to save his strongest magic for a last, very last, resort.

Rohan spun away and stalked across the clearing, standing with his back toward them.

Silence fell over the campsite, and Jordyn looked at Eric with a small shrug. "Sorry," she said. "It just makes me mad when I see people who have the ability to help, but won't do it. I feel like everyone who is in a position to help someone else has an obligation to do so."

Ah...he was beginning to understand. "Which is why you are here to help Rhiannon?"

She nodded. "Her soul mate is a bad man," she said. "A woman bound to a jerk is in a very rough spot. No matter how awful a man is, it's hard to sever the ties with him once an emotional bond is created. I know that, and her ex is..." She grimaced. "Bad news. I need to help her." She sighed, glancing back at Rohan. "It's so sad when someone as powerful as he is refuses to use that power to help."

"I do help." Rohan didn't turn around. "I do what I can, but I'm bound by limitations."

Eric raised his brows at the unusual confession from the stoic leader. "What limitations?"

Rohan didn't answer. Of course he didn't. Jordyn's influence could go only so far to make the man human. But just as Eric was turning away, Rohan whispered softly, so softly that he could barely hear the words.
"They have her
." Rohan's lament was like a whisper on the breeze, so faint it drifted away before the words had even taken shape.

Eric stopped, uncertain that he'd heard right. "Who has her? And who is the woman being held?"

Rohan's shoulders shuddered, and then he turned back to face them, his face still shrouded behind the cloak. "I do what I can," he said quietly. "I do
all
that I can."

Then he turned and strode past them, into the darkness that held the two rogues.

Silence fell upon the campfire, with Rohan's team sitting in silence. Eric looked at the warriors. "Does anyone know what he's talking about? Or
who
he's talking about?"

For a moment, no one spoke, and then Ethan pulled back his hood, not bothering to hide his silver hand from Jordyn. His ragged blond hair tumbled down around his shoulders, and he fastened his blue gaze on her. His jaw was heavy with whiskers, and the fluorescent lime-green of his tee shirt was barely visible above the neckline of his cloak. "You were really Walter's
sheva
?"

Jordyn nodded, not commenting on the sudden revelation of his face. Eric was a little surprised, however. He wondered what it was about Jordyn that Ethan had decided to trust. He wasn't sure he liked it, to be honest. There didn't need to be any bonding between Jordyn and other men. Seriously. There really didn't.

"You killed him?" Ethan asked.

She nodded again, but Eric saw her shoulders stiffen, belying her casual stance. He thought of what she'd said about Rhiannon, how difficult it was for a woman to break free of a man she was bound to. He wondered what she had endured with Walter.

"Was it hell when he died?" Ethan asked.

She bit her lip, and Eric walked over to her and set his hand on her shoulder. "Of course it was," he said softly, sparing her the need to respond to Ethan's question. "She killed her soul mate. What do you think that was like?" Everyone at that fire knew of the
sheva
destiny, that she would kill herself after she killed her rogue mate, because the anguish of his death was too powerful for her to survive.

Ethan nodded quietly, and his shoulders relaxed, as if he'd decided that he could trust Jordyn. "Back when I first joined the team, Rohan used to talk at night in his sleep," he said. "He spoke of a woman. He never said her name, but he called to her. It's like he's searching for her, and can't ever find her." He looked at Jordyn. "I've been with Rohan for over two hundred years, and you're the first one who has ever gotten to him. What is it about you?"

As he spoke, Eric saw the others take down their hoods. Zane Hart with his shaved head and row of black diamond earrings in his left ear. Maddox Crowley with his gray-flecked crew cut and matching goatee. James Wolfe with his pale blue eyes that seemed to drill straight into the heart of anyone he looked at. Ethan Lagat, with his silver hand that could do shit Eric still didn't believe was possible. And lastly, slowly, as if not convinced that Jordyn was worthy, Axel Knight eased back his cowl, revealing the white blond hair, pale flesh, and stark complexion of a man without a soul.

Eric was shocked at the sight of all of them exposing themselves to someone outside the team for the first time since he'd met them. He glanced at Jordyn, stunned by the response she was evoking in this stoic, hardened team of loners who had never acknowledged even the slightest bond between them.

She looked around at them, her face softening in the flickering firelight as she took the time to really look at each man, honoring him with her attention. Eric watched each warrior sit taller, as if emboldened by her attention. Was it Jordyn herself affecting them like that, or the fact she was the
sheva
of a warrior they had all heard so many heralded stories about?

Personally, with his limited knowledge of Calydon lore, Eric had never heard of her ex, which meant that his own fascination with her was entirely Jordyn herself...which stumped him. Women didn't impress him. Women didn't interest him. At least, not the way Jordyn did.

"I think," she said softly, as if she'd spent hours contemplating Ethan's question about why Rohan was reacting to her, "that I am the first person he has met who isn't afraid of him. I see him as a man, not as a warrior, and that's different for him." She looked at all of them. "I see all of you the same way."

As she said it, Eric realized that she was right. She didn't look at Rohan like he was some god. She gave him attitude. She stood up to him. But at the same time, she was so compassionate about Rhiannon that her softness made him want to be a better man, for her. Soft and tough. A dynamite combination.

She walked over to the fire and knelt next to the flames, finally stopping her restless pacing. "I was the soul mate of a warrior so powerful he could have destroyed the earth if he'd chosen, and yet, beneath that visage was simply a man. A man who loved me." She held her palms out to the fire, as if absorbing the heat into her body. "After that, every Calydon I met was simply a man." She smiled. "Most of them are complete jerks, I'll be honest. Very few warriors have retained enough humanity to make them admirable, but even those...they are simply men."

Her words fell over the campfire, settling into the grooves of the silence, filling the gaps with something real. Something humane. Something laced with the faintest hint of irreverence surrounding the legend of their kind.

"You're right, you know," Eric said, breaking the silence. "Most Calydons are shits." He grinned as the other warriors glared at him. "But not these guys," he added, after a deliberate pause. "These guys got it going on." He meant it too. He'd never seen a crew so brave and willing to sacrifice for what was right. In the year he'd been with this team, four Calydons had already died fighting the monsters they hunted, and yet the remaining ones never faltered in their commitments. "You can trust them."

Jordyn smiled at him, her face softening. "You're going to miss them, aren't you?"

He cleared his throat. "Shit, no. I got more important stuff to do than mourn for guy time." He winked at her with just enough lustful deliberation to make heat rise to her cheeks. "You know. Got stuff to do."

"Shut up," she said, but her voice was tinged with laughter.

He grinned just as Ethan cleared his throat. Eric and Jordyn looked over at him. The warrior was hunched forward, his muscular arms braced on his thighs, his cloak shoved up around his hips to reveal well-worn jeans and heavy black boots. He stared into the fire, a dark look on his face that made him look more like a venomous raptor than the good guy Eric had just claimed he was. After a moment, Ethan looked up, his gaze going slowly and defiantly around the circle, daring anyone to interrupt what he had to say. "Gloria."