Gideon's Promise (Sons of Judgment Book 2) (60 page)

Her heart was screaming in her ears even as she shoved him away. “Where is she?”

“We’re going to find out,” he promised her. “Everyone’s downstairs right now with the—”

That was all she needed to hear.

Throwing back the covers, she catapulted herself out of bed. The darkness spun as her knees revolted beneath her. The corner of the mattress barely caught her.

“Valkyrie!”

“Don’t touch me!” she screamed when his hand closed around her elbow.

Uncaring that she was clad in nothing but her bra and panties, she charged out of the bedroom. The corridor tilted and bounced beneath her feet, but she stumbled her way to the stairs, only partially aware, partially caring that Gideon was right behind her.

She heard the voices first. They seemed to echo endlessly off the kitchen walls. It was impossible to tell how many there were, and she didn’t care.

She missed the swinging doors when she threw her hands up to slam them open. The momentum sent her crashing into them with her shoulder and nearly hitting the floor on the other side. She was saved solely by Gideon’s arms. Wrenching free of him, she faced the room, the small crowd of people and finally settled on the one tied to a chair.

“Where is she?” Her snarl came out more animal than human.

“Valkyrie...” Magnus moved into her path when she charged.

Valkyrie didn’t stop. She didn’t slow down. She swung blindly and yet with deadly accuracy and plowed Magnus in the jaw with enough force to send him crashing into a table. No one else tried to stop her and she was on him, on the bastard responsible for the pain washing over her in tidal waves.

“Where’s my baby?” Her hands closed around his collar and she hoisted him up to her as far as his binds would allow. “Where’s my baby?” she screamed.

The world went red when her suffering brought a cruel smirk to his face. Raw fury pulled back her arm and the sickening crack of her backhand sang up her arm with a satisfying crunch. Blood burst from the gash splitting open his lip.

“Where is she?” The same fist drew back and slammed into his face full blow, shattering nasal bone and spraying them both in blood. “Where is she?”

The room spun and for one horrific moment, she thought she was fainting again. But the floor was vanishing beneath her feet and she was going up, not down. Hard hands clamped about her middle and she was hoisted against a strong chest like a small child. She was being drawn away, away from getting her vengeance.

Unhinged, she screamed and thrashed, kicking and punching at the air. But the person holding her never relented. The hold only tightened until she couldn’t breathe.  Her anger dissolved into gut wrenching wails of agony that seemed to crash through the entire room and resonate through her skull. Her knees deserted her and she sank to the ground. The hands grabbed her. They lifted her just as the darkness took her over.

Chapter Thirty-Four

Valkyrie gave herself a night. One night to huddle in the dark corner of her locked bedroom and let herself grieve. She refused to allow herself more than that. She refused to wallow in her misery when her anger was so much more productive. Her mind was raw with grief and all the things she should have done different. Guilt was a solid force of pain tattooed into her every heartbeat. Every part of her wanted to die and she couldn’t bring herself to do it, not when the person responsible was just downstairs, laughing at her.

With the approach of dawn, she showered and dressed in her boots, leather pants, and black halter. She drew on her coat and strapped her sword to her hip, followed by both daggers inside her boots. Her father may have been many things, but he had been right about one thing: Harvesters were not weak. She would find what happened to her baby and then she would kill whoever was responsible for taking her away.

“Valkyrie?” Kyaerin spotted her in the doorway of the parlor first.

The surprise on the woman’s face, the surprise on all their faces, made her think that maybe her rebound wasn’t a common thing. Maybe they had thought she would grieve for longer.

“Where is he?”

“Kyrie.” Gideon rose from the sofa, hands up as though afraid she might lunge at him. “You should eat—”

“Where. Is. He?” She stressed each word through gritted teeth.

“I will take you to him.” Serinda climbed carefully to her feet, her armor glinting off the early morning light rising against the windows. The sight of her sister momentarily made Valkyrie forget the others in the room. “But first you must listen.”

Valkyrie stared at her, not sure what to make of her presence, or the presence of the other two warriors sitting mutely on the sofa in the place Reggie and Magnus usually sat.

“What are you doing here?” Her fingers unconsciously tightened around the hilt of her sword. “If you think I will return with you now after everything that has happened—”

Serinda shook her head. “That is not why we are here. If you will allow us to explain, I will tell you.”

Seeing no other choice, Valkyrie moved deeper into the room and stopped when she was just behind Kyaerin, putting a sofa, three people, and a coffee table between herself and her sisters. And her mate. But she didn’t dare glance his way. His hurt thrummed through her and she knew she would break if she met his eyes.

“Speak.”

Serinda remained standing. “Your child is not gone,” she said. “It has been taken, but is still alive.”

“Where?” Even to her own ears, the single word rang with the pain and desperation clashing inside her. “Where is she?”

Serinda put up a hand. “We do not know, but!” she said quickly when Valkyrie opened her mouth. “We are working on him.”

“Him?” The hand she had no memory of grabbing the back of the sofa tightened. “Who is he?”

“Devlin.” Kyaerin’s voice was barely audible. Valkyrie would never have heard it if she hadn’t been standing just over the woman’s shoulder.

“Who’s Devlin?”

Kyaerin rose and moved away from the group. Her hand shook as she raised it to her mouth.

“I ... I thought he was dead,” she choked. “I had no idea...”

“Grá mo chroí.”
Liam started for his wife, but she shook him away.

“He was my friend,” Kyaerin explained. “I loved him once.”

“Your ...
friend
, did this?” Valkyrie tried and failed to contain the anger in her voice.

Kyaerin raised her head. Her blue eyes glittered with unshed tears.

“He wouldn’t ... I...” Her small, pale hands wrung together like frail little birds. “I don’t know why he’s doing this. I don’t ... I don’t understand.”

“Talk to him!” Valkyrie shouted.

“I have tried!” Kyaerin cried back. “He’s changed. He’s not the Devlin I knew.”

“Then I will talk to him,” Valkyrie stated. “I will make him tell me—”

“It is not that simple.” Serinda reached into the leather pouch hanging at her waist and gingerly removed a small sliver of wood from inside. She held it up. “This is the arrow head we pulled from your back.” She dropped it back into the pouch and fastened the top. “It has been dipped in siren’s blood.”

“It is also what was used to kill Reginald,” Liam chimed in. “I knew I recognized the smell. It has been eons since that type of poison has been used.”

Now Valkyrie wished she’d taken a seat whilst she’d had the chance.

“Why?” she asked, suddenly feeling exhausted. “Why is he doing this?”

“He will not say,” Serinda replied. “But we are working to extract the name of his partner—”

“Partner?” Valkyrie looked from her sister to the other two warriors she didn’t recognize. “What partner?”

“When we arrived, there was another with him,” Serinda began. “He got away, but we captured Devlin. Your ... mate...” She gestured to Gideon. “Gave you the antidote.”

“The potion Reginald gave me,” Gideon murmured.

Valkyrie looked at him for the first time. She took in the dark circles under his eyes, the pallor in his cheeks, and the slump in his shoulders with an immense sense of longing; all she wanted to do was run to him and have him fold her against his chest. But she couldn’t. Not yet.

“There couldn’t have been enough for both of us,” she said.

“His arrows were not poisoned,” Serinda answered for him. “Only yours.”

“So, he wanted me dead,” she mumbled. “Why? I don’t know him.”

“That is what we are going to find out,” Serinda said. “Crizen is with him now.”

If there was one Harvester Valkyrie never wanted to get on the wrong side of, it was Crizen. The seven foot tall warrior was the one her father called upon when he needed a prisoner to talk. She never failed.

“But why were you there, Serinda?” she wondered.

“Father’s orders,” Serinda said evenly. “He wants your surrender, willingly, or we will do so with force.” Her cool, blue eyes never left Valkyrie’s, not even when Gideon stiffened right beside her. “This is the only warning he will give.”

“Then why didn’t you let me die?”

Something like the hint of a grin lightened her sister’s eyes. “I considered it. It would have certainly made my task simpler.” Serinda lowered her gaze. “Father might have wanted you alive to receive your punishment.” She lifted her attention back up to Valkyrie’s face. “Letting you die might have meant the pits for me.”

They held gazes and for the first time ever, Valkyrie saw something in the other woman’s eyes. She saw the sister who would let no one train Valkyrie, but her. She saw the sister who would sneak Valkyrie an extra bread roll in the pit when no one was watching. She saw the sister who let her escape, time and time again, when they both knew Serinda was faster and stronger. It had never occurred to her until that moment that maybe, just maybe, her sister loved her.

“Take me to him,” Valkyrie said. “I want to talk to him.”

No one stopped her when she started for the door. Serinda followed after telling the other warriors to stay behind.

“Thank you,” Valkyrie murmured as they walked shoulder to shoulder down the hall.

“I have done nothing.”

“You saved my life, and Gideon’s.”

Serinda shook her head. “I did nothing for him. When we arrived, he was crawling up the hill with three arrows in his body. He was determined to get to you. He even tried to fight us until I managed to convince him that we were not the ones who harmed you.” She paused, filling the silence with the scuffle of their feet and the faint clink of her armor. “He cares for you.”

“He loves me,” Valkyrie murmured.

“You are angry with him.” Oddly enough, it wasn’t a question.

Valkyrie shook her head. “I am angry with myself. I let my guard down. I let myself believe I could be like other women who fall in love, have a family, and are happy.” A tear slipped through her defenses and slid down her cheek. “And I was happy, Serinda. I was so happy. But father was right, I’m a warrior. We don’t get that luxury.”

Serinda said nothing for several paces. They descended the stairs and reached the hall leading to the kitchen.

“Father is a wise man,” she murmured at last. “He is made wiser by the love he has shown his wife and children.”

At the stockroom doors, Valkyrie paused. Serinda’s words replayed through her mind, but no matter how she turned them, they made no sense.

“Father has never loved us, or Mother.”

Serinda said nothing. She gave Valkyrie a single fleeting glance before moving through the tower of boxes towards the trap door cut into the floor.

The row of stairs led into a dark, dank chamber illuminated by a single bulb. The room was barely large enough for the bed stuffed against one wall. Devlin wasn’t on it. He was still strapped to the chair half in and half out of the room. His face was a maze of gashes and bruises. Blood soaked what was left of his shredded clothes. His dark hair was matted to his skull. One eye was completely swollen shut. The other rolled wildly in its socket. Crizen stood over him, a bloody dagger gripped in one meaty fist. She looked up when they approached.

“Anything?” Serinda asked.

Crizen wiped the blade off on Devlin’s shoulder. “He wishes for an audience.”

Serinda narrowed her eyes. “It had better be to confess the location of the child. I will not tolerate anything less.”

With that, she spun on her heels and stalked back up the steps, probably to get the others. Crizen moved to the bed and began arranging and organizing her neat row of tools, which consisted mainly of sharp instruments. Valkyrie stayed three feet from the man who had torn her family in two and studied him.

Not so smug now,
she wanted to tell him.

“Where’s my baby?”

His head lulled on his shoulders, as though the weight of it was just too much. His good eye squinted up at her. Something like a chuckle rattled in his chest.

“Little Harvester,” he rasped. Blood and drool spilled down his chin in slimy ropes. “Are you still looking for your lost little sheep?”

“Where is she?” Valkyrie demanded.

“Your husband was in here only hours earlier,” he continued, as though she hadn’t spoken. “He did this to me. Though, I bet that makes you happy, bedding a monster capable of such violence.”

“The only monster I see is you,” she retorted with far too much calm. “You attack an unarmed woman and rip the baby out of her. Why?”

He snickered. “Maybe it wasn’t me. Maybe you lost it because you don’t deserve to be a mother. Or maybe you were never pregnant. Maybe it was just gas.”

Valkyrie ignored him.

“Who was your partner? I know you gave my baby to him. Tell me his name and I will—”

“You will what?” he challenged. “Let me go?”

Never
! She wanted to spit.

“I’ll give you a quick and painless death, which is more than you deserve.”

“How about you come sit on my cock instead and let me give you a new baby, a better one?”

Valkyrie stared at the man, feeling extraordinarily calm despite how hard he was trying to enrage her.

“I have a better idea.” She pulled out her dagger. “How about we play a game? I’ll ask you a question and every time you answer truthfully, I won’t cut off a finger. If you lie to me, we will start on your toes. Then, when you have no more fingers, or toes, I will start on the parts that hang between your legs.”