Fantasyland 02 The Golden Dynasty (13 page)

Unlike when Lahn and I arrived, the minute
Dortak hauled his woman into the tent, eyes went to him and the
vibe changed. There was still cheering, stamping and the fighters
didn’t miss an opportunity at landing a blow, but a lethal
undercurrent slithered low through the tent and it did not feel
good.

When I saw her, without thought, my hand
moved swiftly, searching until it found Lahn’s and I curled mine
into his. He didn’t give me a reassuring squeeze. He moved my hand
to his thigh and curved my fingers around the firm muscle then his
hand left mine.

Okay, I didn’t know how to read that. Maybe
he just wasn’t the kind of guy who held hands during knockdown,
drag out warrior fights. But I was guessing it was an indication
that I was his kickass rahna Dahksahna and I needed to suck it up.
This was their world and I was in it.

And suddenly, that sucked.

The night had been kind of fun, I knew I was
more than slightly tipsy on the spirit Lahn kept giving me and I
was feeling loose and truly happy for the first time since I got to
this world (again, I was more than slightly tipsy… but still).

Now, the night was not fun and as hard as I
tried, I could not take my eyes off Dortak and his bride.

Something there had to give. She was clearly
miserable and he was clearly mistreating her. It wasn’t only the
bruises; it was the defeated look on her face.

I was going to have to have a word with my
husband. The problem was, he understood, at my count, two of my
words and I didn’t understand much more of his.

I laid my cheek against my hand on his thigh
and stared without interest at the fighters. But my gaze kept
drifting back to Dortak and I caught it when one warrior leaned
over to Dortak, jerked his head at me, telling him something while
smiling, something Dortak didn’t think was worthy of a smile if the
ferocious frown he aimed my way was anything to go by. Therefore, I
knew my cheering and drinking had been recounted and Dortak would
not have been amongst those shouting my title in approval.

I pulled in a steadying breath to stop
myself from having a visible reaction to the hate coming my way and
my eyes went back to the fighters.

Minutes later, I heard a cry from his
direction and it wasn’t from a warrior. My eyes moved there and my
torso shot straight.

Dortak had his hand in his wife’s hair, he
was yanking her head this way and that at the same time pulling his
sex out of his hides.

No, he wasn’t going to…

He pushed her face into his lap, forcing
himself into her mouth.

I surged to my feet and took a flying step
forward but two iron arms clamped around me, one at my belly, one
at my chest and Lahn’s mouth came to my ear. He spoke quietly, even
gently but I didn’t hear a word he said (regardless of the fact I
probably wouldn’t understand them) as I stared in shock and tried
to get venom to spew out of my eyes and fly with precision at
Dortak who held my angry stare and used his meaty fist in his
wife’s hair to force her mouth back and forth on his shaft.

“Stop him,” I whispered as Lahn pulled me
back then sat, not pushing me to the ground but settling me in his
lap. “Stop him,” I repeated louder and he turned me in his arms and
shoved my face in his neck so I could no longer see. “Kay me
ahnoo!” I snapped into his neck.

“Rayloo, kah fauna,” Lahn murmured and kept
my face in his neck with his hand cupped on my head and my body in
his lap with his strong arm clamped around it.

I lifted a hand and curled it around the
other side of his neck. “Kay me ahnoo,” I told him and his arm gave
me a squeeze. “Kay me ahnoo,” I repeated on a whisper but he didn’t
do anything except for the fact that he didn’t let me go.

I knew it was over when his hand loosened on
my head and dropped down to become an arm wrapped around my
body.

He still didn’t let me go and he didn’t
shove me off his lap and force me between his legs. He just kept me
where I was, holding me in his lap. I carefully took my face out of
his neck and looked at his profile. He was silently watching the
fighters. Then I chanced a look at Dortak. His bride was still
between his legs, body facing the fighters but her head was bent,
her cheeks flaming and her eyes were directed to the
ground.

I turned back and shoved my face in Lahn’s
neck.

I felt his chest expand with a big breath
that he let out very slowly.

I didn’t want to be there anymore and I
curled into him and tried to shut everything out, hoping it would
be over soon.

This became impossible when I heard
taunting, loud words hurled in what seemed to be our direction. I
lifted my face out of Lahn’s neck, turned my head and saw Dortak
standing before us, jeering at Lahn, spittle coming out of his
mouth, his face red and his fist beating his chest. My eyes darted
to his wife who was where he left her on the ground but now curled
into herself, arms tight around her legs, eyes peeking from behind
her knees.

Lahn said something calmly and I looked up
at him to see he looked as calm as his voice then swiftly I looked
to Dortak who had not taken to Lahn’s calm very well. He was red in
the face and the veins in his neck were standing out as he
continued to shout.

What was going on?

Lahn asked him a question to which Dortak
spat out a, “Meena!”

Lahn nodded. Then he stood, me in his arms,
he set my ass on the bench, his eyes coasted across mine then he
straightened and turned.

The instant he did the warriors all rose
from their seats, arms up, shouts deafening and they were saying
only one word.

“
Dax!
”

Oh fuck.

Was Lahn going to fight this guy?

Dortak immediately swung a punch, connecting
with Lahn’s jaw.

I rose to my feet.

Lahn took two steps back, pointed at me, his
finger moved to the bench and he clipped out, “Lutoo! Boh!”

Dortak closed in and connected again, this
time with Lahn’s ribs.

I sat, not wanting to divert his attention
again but I sat on the edge of the bench and how I stayed on the
bench I had no clue since I was shaking like a leaf.

Dortak connected, again, again, again, a
quick succession of blows that Lahn didn’t appear even to try to
deflect.

Then another one to the face so brutal
Lahn’s torso swung around and down, his hand going to the blood
that was now dripping from his mouth. Dortak charged to attack but
Lahn lifted an elbow, connecting with Dortak’s nose not only with
the strength of his arm but Dortak’s momentum. Dortak stumbled back
and Lahn went in, palm to throat. He lifted Dortak clean off his
feet and slammed him flat on his back on the stone, the crack of
his skull hitting the stone sounding with a sickening thud that
made my stomach to turn.

The warriors went wild.

Lahn had gone down on a knee to take Dortak
to his back and he swiftly moved one leg to put his knee to
Dortak’s arm in order to incapacitate it, the other calf he shoved
in Dortak’s neck as he twisted the rest of his body to Dortak’s
legs. He caught a flailing ankle, yanked the man’s hides back and
then he pulled a small knife out of a sheath.

All cheering silenced instantly and I rose
again to my feet, the fingers of both hands coming to my mouth.

None of the other fighters had weapons. They
used their fists, their feet, their wits… not steel.

Lahn removed his legs from Dortak but
swiftly turned and kept him down, one hand wrapped around his
throat, the other hand holding the knifepoint aimed a half an inch
from his eye.

Then he growled something in his face.

Dortak’s only response was to choke. Lahn
was strangling him. Dortak’s face was turning purple and veins were
popping out along his temple.

Lahn repeated what he’d growled earlier.

Dortak kept gasping for breath, his hands
pushing ineffectually at Lahn’s arm, his legs kicking out.

Lahn repeated what he’d growled.

Dortak made gurgling noises.

Then, quick as a flash, the knife moved and
blood covered Dortak’s face as he howled.

I gasped, stepped back and hit bench so
stopped.

Lahn pushed off him and up to his feet,
tossing the knife down so it landed on Dortak’s chest, bounced off
and clattered to the stone ground.

Lahn stared down at him then spit in his
direction, the spittle landing on Dortak’s shoulder.

Then he turned and started to me.

I watched him move, my body shaking then I
saw Dortak get up, still choking and my body froze as I saw Lahn
had carved a deep, gaping, curving gash from temple over cheekbone
partially through his lip and across his jaw.

“Lahn,” I whispered and Dortak bent,
snatched the knife off the ground, straightened and I shouted,
“Lahn!”

Dortak charged and Lahn turned like I hadn’t
shouted his name to indicate imminent danger but like I’d suggested
he might want to look over his shoulder and observe the flight of a
pretty butterfly. Then his arm came up, he caught Dortak’s wrist
that was connected to the hand that was carrying the knife, used it
to swing him around and caught him around the throat with his other
forearm. Lahn then twisted Dortak to facing this bride and he used
the knife still in Dortak’s hand to slash another curving, deep
gash down the length of Dortak’s chest, down, down nearly to his
groin and then he moved Dortak’s hand and sunk the blade in
Dortak’s side.

Dortak grunted in pain and my knees
buckled.

Then Lahn pulled out the knife, let Dortak
go, he dropped to his knees, hands to his wound and Lahn wiped
Dortak’s blood off the knife against his hides. Then he tossed the
knife well away.

Then he turned and stalked to me.

I tried to step back but nearly stumbled
over the bench as he came at me and I tried to come to terms with
the violent justice I just witnessed my husband dish out. Perhaps
it was justified but it still freaked me out.

His long legs had him to me in seconds, he
grasped my bicep, turned his back to me, swung me up, my legs
automatically curled around his hips as he wrapped my arm around
his neck and then he stalked out of the tent.

Welp. Guess that meant the games were
over.

Yikes!

* * * * *

“Hold still,” I snapped at Lahn, who was
sitting on one of the chairs in our tent and he kept jerking his
head out of the way when I tried dabbing his cut lip with the wet,
soapy rag I’d managed to explain to Teetru I needed.

My eyes moved from his annoyed ones and I
tried to dab at the blood again.

He jerked his head away.

“Lahn!” I hissed. “Hold still!”

He didn’t hold still. He tore the rag from
my hand, tossed it on the table and came out of the chair with his
shoulder in my belly.

I let out a gust of air as I went up then I
went down as he threw me on the bed then I let out another gust of
air when he landed on top of me.

“Lahn, we need to clean your cut lip.” On a
wheeze I told him something he wouldn’t understand and clearly had
no intention of sitting around and allowing me to do. It was a
miracle I got him to sit in the first place. It only happened five
minutes ago and I still didn’t know how I managed it.

His hand went between us and he yanked one
panel of my sarong aside.

I knew where this was going.

“Lahn –”

“Rayloo,” he growled.

“Lahn! Your lip!”

That bloody lip (and his not bloody one,
they luckily came in pairs) came to mine. “Rayloo, Circe.”

I glared into his eyes as his hand glided up
the skin of my side.

Shit, that felt nice.

“
All right,
rayloo
. I’ll
rayloo
, whatever
the hell that means,” I grumbled, his eyes went soft and his hand
went away from my side.

It came up to my face where the pad of his
thumb put pressure on my chin and his fingers put pressure on my
lips.

“Rayloo,” he said quietly.

Ah.
Rayloo.

His hand left my mouth.

“Quiet,” I whispered.

“Quiet,” he repeated.

“Rayloo,” I tried it out and he shook his
head like he didn’t know what to do with me (as, perhaps, he would
considering he’d told me to be quiet and I kept talking) but
affirmed, “Rayloo.”

“Okay,” I said softly.

His hand slid down my arm, took mine in his
and then it pulled mine between his legs and moved it down inside
his hides. Then his fingers curled mine around his hard cock.

Wow. Nice.

I bit my lip and squirmed under him.

He shook his head like he didn’t know what
to do with me again, his hand left mine around his cock and his
went into my panties.

Okay, I was wrong; he knew what to do with
me.

So I shut up and let him do it.

New Warriors

I felt the thump of something heavy and soft
and my eyes opened.

The minute they did, I saw a furry paw and
then felt the gentle thump of it against my cheek.

“Loolah,” Ghost mewed, I smiled at my baby,
captured her in my arms and gave her a snuggle.

She squirmed free and then bounced and
rolled around the bed, a bit on the mattress, mostly on me.

I looked to the other side of the bed.

Lahn was gone.

This was the first time I’d woken up in this
world without him.

No, strike that. This was the first
time
he
had not
woken
me.

And, again, I had woken up in this
world.

I rolled to my back, pulled the covers up to
my chest and stared at the ceiling as Ghost jumped around, clawing
and playing and anytime I could get my hands on her, I scratched or
stroked but she was not having that and kept bouncing around.