DarkWind: 2nd Book, WindDemon Trilogy (32 page)

He took his dagger from the night table and thrust it into the sheath at his thigh. He walked to the door. “I give you your freedom, Caitlin. I will not force you to remain with me.”

Caitlin’s heart did a funny little flip and tears pricked her eyes. She stared up at him, seeing the hurt on his face, but recognizing the pride, as well. She had insulted him, questioned his ability to protect her, and offended him deeply.

“Give me time, Khier.”

“Take all the time you need,” he said, pushing the button to open the door. “I’ll not ask you to make a decision, milady. If-or when-you want me, feel free to come looking.”

He left, the door shushing to behind him.

Caitlin stared at the door, willing him to come back, but when the panel remained closed, she lay down and curled into a defensive position on the bunk, her eyes filled with unshed tears.

Iyan recognized the
angry look etched on his friend’s cold face. “Trouble in paradise, Kheirshon?”

“You will leave me alone, McGregor, if you know what’s good for you.” Cree walked to the molecular duplicator and stared at the contraption. “Chalean brandy!”

The molecular duplicator whirred then fell silent.

“Chalean brandy, I said!” Cree shouted, striking the machine with his doubled fist.

“Try asking it for Terran liquor and you might get something, Kheirshon,” Iyan suggested. He held up his glass. “This is Irish whiskey and the gods-be-damned stuff ain’t half bad.” He took a sip, winced then smacked his lips. “Not bad at all.”

Cree dug his fingernails into his palms. “Irish whiskey!” he barked and the molecular duplicator obeyed. Snatching the glass from the machine, the Reaper drained the contents in one gulp then demanded another. The contents of the second glass disappeared just as quickly.

“Uh, oh.” Sinjin Wynth whistled. The Ravenwind’s navigator, now a crewmember of The Orion, pushed up from the table and left.

“You realize what you’re doing?” Iyan asked in a conversational tone.

“Leave. Me. Alone.” The Reaper drained the third glass and ordered a fourth.

“What you are drinking can make you drunk.”

“I believe that is his intent,” Dakin Hesar remarked. He, too, got up, and left McGregor alone with Cree.

Iyan leaned back in his chair and sipped his whiskey. He kept his gaze on Cree and after the Reaper’s sixth shot of the strong liquor, McGregor sighed deeply.

“If my company is boring you, by all means, leave.”

“No. I think I’ll stay and watch you make a fool of yourself.”

Cree turned to face his friend. He narrowed his eyes. “A fool of myself?”

“Aye.”

“In what way have I made a fool of myself, Captain?”

Iyan cocked one eyebrow. “You know how I feel about the woman.”

Hot amber fire glinted in the Reaper’s dark eyes. “The woman?” he echoed, dropping the two words like hot stones.

McGregor nodded and took another sip of his drink. He locked eyes with the Reaper.

“You are referring to my mate?”

Iyan remained silent.

A sly, evil grin tugged at the corners of Cree’s expressive mouth. “Answer me, McGregor. Are you referring to my mate when you say ‘the woman’?”

“You have claimed her as your mate?”

Cree dipped his head in a quick, decisive nod.

“And has the woman agreed to the arrangement?”

The Reaper’s gaze faltered, his amber eyes flickering, but he nodded again.

Iyan grinned. “Ah, she has not. Else you’d not be trying to drown your troubles in inferior Terran liquor and breaking laws you know you should not.”

“I make my own laws!” snarled the Reaper.

The whiskey settled in Cree’s belly and burned a hole there. The effects invaded his system and he felt lightheaded. He knew if he didn’t sit down, he was likely to fall down, so he stalked to Iyan’s table, grabbed a chair, straddled it, and sat.

“Having a distinctly different feeling in your gods-be-damned head, are you, Reaper?” Iyan chuckled.

“The demons roast you o’er a slow pit, McGregor! I know what I’m about.”

Iyan’s grin widened. “No, Khier, you do not. What you are is a man starting the kind of trouble I would not have in a million years!” He finished off his drink.

“You’ve got nothing between your legs to start trouble with!” The instant Cree said it, he regretted it. He pounded the table with his fist and groaned. “Merciful Alel, I didn’t mean to say that!” He stood, wavering at the liquor rushed to his head.

McGregorclenched his jaw, a muscle working as he stared at Cree. Iyan squared his shoulders. “Will you be needing me for anything else this evening, Commander?”

“Iyan,” Cree held out his hand, but Iyan stepped back.

“We’ve both said enough. Good evening, Commander.” He pivoted on his right foot and marched from the room.

Cree groaned again, shaking his head in frustration at his stupid remark. He put his hands on his hips, lowered his head and cursed between tightly clenched teeth. He drew in a long breath then exhaled. For a long while he stood there, staring helplessly at the floor.

“You owe him an apology, Khiershon.”

The Reaper raised his head and saw Caitlin standing in the doorway. “Aye. I do.”

“I’d wait until morning,” she suggested. She came toward him, wrapping her arms around her as walked. “Give him time to get over the hurt.”

Cree flinched as though she’d struck him. “I did not mean to say what I said.”

She glanced at the glass on the table. “You let whiskey speak for you.”

He ran a hand through his dark curls. “Aye, and I’ll pay for that, too,” he said, feeling the nausea tight in his throat. He sat down, vertigo making him more ill. “There are reasons Reapers don’t drink.” He put his arms on the table and lowered his head to his crossed wrists.

“I thought about what you said,” she told him.

The whiskey had reached his parasite and the beast was rebelling against the intoxicating effect. Cree was uncomfortable, the Revenant worm shifting angrily along his right kidney. The last thing he wanted or needed at that moment was to carry on an argument with Caitlin.

“Lady, I am in no condition to discuss anything coherently with you.”

“Then listen.”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to do that, either.”

Caitlin craned her neck and looked at his sweaty face. She gasped, her eyes widening “Are you going into Transition?”

“No,” he said in a reasonable voice. “I am drunk off that inferior liquor of yours.”

Caitlin straightened. “It’s not
my
liquor. I don’t drink.”

“I wish to the gods I hadn’t, either!” he moaned. He shot his arms out to grab the edges of the table to keep from spinning off into space. With his left cheek plastered tightly to the tabletop, he squeezed his eyes shut. “Merciful Alel, what was in that poison?”

“How many did you have?”

“I didn’t count.”

She pursed her lips. “Apparently more than you should have. You can’t stay here all night.”

“Watch me.” His hands clutched the table so tightly his knuckles bled of their natural coloring.

“You’ll feel worse if you do,” she warned. “We need to get you to bed.”

He opened one eye and looked at her. “Lady, if I could walk, it would be one of the Fourteen Miracles of Alel.”

She smiled at his woebegone expression. “You make it hard to stay mad at you, Reaper.”

Cree managed to lift his head. He blinked away the vertigo and tried to concentrate on her face. “You are going to stay with me?” he asked, his heart in his soulful gaze.

“Aye. But the first havoc you wreck on my civilization, I’ll leave your ass so fast...” She got no further for the Reaper’s eyes rolled up and his head crashed to the table with a loud thunk that made her wince with the force.

“Reapers are not allowed to drink,” Iyan said as he sauntered into the room.

Caitlin turned. “I can see the reasoning behind that restriction.”

Iyan grunted. “Too bad Khier didn’t.” He squinted at her. “What did you do to him to make him do such a stupid thing?”

“You can ask him when he comes to. Can you help me get him to bed?”

McGregor clenched his jaw as he strode to the table, hefted Cree over his shoulder, adjusted the Reaper’s weight. “Show me where you want me to put his stubborn ass.”

Caitlin smiled at her nemesis. “I think he’d be a happier camper if he woke beside me come morning, don’t you, Captain?”

Iyan scowled. “Come morning, we will be near the Serenian outpost at Corinth and you will not be so smug in your position with this Reaper, woman.”

It was Caitlin’s turn to frown. “And why is that, Captain McGregor?”

A nasty grin pulled at the corners of Iyan’s mouth. “You’ll meet Princess Raphaella and I would venture to say she’ll have something to say about where Khiershon Cree spends his nights.”

The woman the Reaper had claimed as his mate answered McGregor’s evil smirk with one of her own. “What she says and what is done are two separate things, Captain.” She arched one thick brow. “Amazeen or not, no woman takes what belongs to me.”

Iyan blinked. “What belongs to you.”

“Aye, Captain.  Khiershon Cree belongs to me.”

She turned her back on the Serenian warrior and proceeded him from the room. Iyan stood with his shoulder aching from the Reaper’s dead weight bearing down on it and grimaced.

But the smile that tugged at his lips was not so much vindictive as confused.

“By the gods,
I hurt,” whispered Khiershon.

“Drink it all,” Caitlin commanded, holding the seltzer to his lips.

The bubbling liquid turned his stomach but the Reaper managed to down the vile contents. Wiping a trembling hand across his lips he gagged, burped, then lay back down to curl into a tight fetal position on Caitlin’s bunk, dragging the covers over his head.

“What you really need is a bit of the hair of the dog that bit you.” Realizing he wouldn’t know what that phrase meant, she added, “Another shot or two of whiskey will help you recover.”

“No!” He groaned. “Never again!”

“That’s good to know.”

“Why?”

“My father, God be good to him, each of my nine uncles, and all five of my brothers are a bit too fond of the drink. I fully intend to make sure my husband is not.”

He pulled the cover from one bloodshot eye. “Husband?” he croaked. “As in Joining?”

She nodded. “As in marriage, aye.”

He held his breath. “You would legally join with me, Lady? Become my sanctioned mate?”

Her heart in her gaze, she reached out to smooth his tousled hair. “I would if I were asked in the proper manner.”

He lowered the covers. “What is the proper manner on your world, Caitlin?”

“When you’re better, you can research the answer, Reaper. For now, you need to rest.” She started to turn away, but he caught her hand.

“Tell me.”

Caitlin sat down beside him. “Every good Catholic lass has a vision in her head of the perfect proposal,” she said. “Our knight in shining armor will first go to our fathers to ask for our hand in marriage and-”

“I cannot do that.”

“No, you can’t.”

“What else?” he asked.

“Once he receives our father’s blessing, he will then come to his lady and, on bended knee, ask her earnestly for her hand.”

Cree’s thick brows slanted together. “I must get on my knees to you, Lady?”

“On one knee.

“To abase myself.”

“To show your respect. And the devotion you are willing to extend.”

He thought about that for a moment then nodded. “Go on.”

“That’s all there is to it. You ask; I accept; and we are betrothed. If Captain Wellmeyer would agree to marry us...”

“Any captain of any ship can perform the Joining.”

“Aye, but...” she hedged, knowing where this was going.

“Iyan is my friend. If I ask, he will read the words.” He pushed up on the bunk, wincing at the pain in his head. “I assume you have words from your world?”

She looked down at her hands. “We do, but I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“You do not believe Joining with me is a good idea?” he asked, hurt turning his mouth hard.

She would not look at him. “I would be honored to be your wife, Khiershon, but I don’t think McGregor is the right man to perform the ceremony.”

“Why not?” came the steely demand.

She shrugged.

“Why not?” he repeated.

She lifted her head. “Iyan McGregor hates me, Khiershon. The last thing he will want to do is unite the two of us.”

He looked into her eyes and saw the hurt there. He probed her thoughts and was surprised to find she had no animosity toward Iyan, only exasperation at the man’s pigheadedness. Having intimate knowledge of just how stubborn Iyan could be, Cree could find no fault in his lady’s assessment of the man’s nature.