Chapter 12

 

Lishelle had half a heartbeat to stare at the violent fireball reflected in Tynan’s wide dark eyes before they were both knocked flat.

The breath was punched from her lungs, her ears ringing dully, but he caught her, cushioning their fall. Before that heartbeat finished, he’d dragged her to her feet and they were running back toward the castle.

Her numbed mind supplied only one coherent thought as she stumbled along behind him: Her scarf had been ripped right off her head, and her hair was an absolute disaster.

For some reason, that realization reset her brain, and she threw herself into the run. She’d never been athletically inclined, but she was tall and she was going to put those long legs to good use, goddamn it. She drew even with Tynan when they hit the front steps of the ruins, and she actually passed him in a dead sprint for the front portal.

Ooh, why had she thought the word dead?

There was zero lag in her heartbeat now. Her blood was screaming through her veins, giving her a lifetime of awful cardio in minutes. Together, they swung around and shoved at the huge double doors, closing them tight. When Tynan strained to spin a gear that dropped a thick bar across the entry, she pointed mutely—ears still ringing and her tongue dry in her mouth—at the hole in the ceiling. He shrugged, held up one finger, and pulled the blaster from his thigh holster.

She cringed back. He was going to try to force the attackers to come through one opening. Where he could mow them down.

She swallowed hard. “Tynan, wait.” Her voice sounded thready and weak, even to herself. “It might be the duke or the captain and their people, come to rescue me.” She obviously hadn’t convinced them she’d gone willingly; was it because, as her ex had accused, she always held back a bit of herself, never quite convincing herself she was where she wanted to be?

But Tynan shook his head. “That was a mercenary cruiser. No ship ident, and no warning. They’re here for Blackworm. For me. And they just destroyed our only means of escape.”

Okay, turned out, her heart could only race so fast before it stopped entirely. “How did they find us?”

“Apparently whatever flair I had as a warlord atrophied in my time as a love god.” His dark eyes narrowed, sharp and glinting through his lashes, as if the plasma fire had forged his glare into obsidian. “They intercepted our last communications with the station, or they followed our wake, or our mimic shroud wasn’t configured correctly, or…” He snarled. “I larfing failed. I forgot what I was. But that stops now.” He turned those hard eyes on her and grabbed her hand. “Come with me.”

Disconcerted at his abrupt transition, she followed along behind him without question. He hauled her around the dais and then slung her toward the small hidden room behind.

“Get into the spy room,” he snapped. “There’s food and drink for several days.”

A surge of relief made her almost dizzy. “Yes. We can hide here—”

“I’ll seal you in,” he interrupted. “Whatever happens, stay quiet. They’re here for me, or who they think I am. Once they have me, they won’t care about you.”

“Wait—”

He grabbed her, the butt of the blaster pressing sharply into the small of her back as he yanked her up against his chest. He stared down at her, and she was achingly aware of every point of contact between them, even more aware of the fragility of her own body and his, for all his potent strength and godliness.

“You make me believe not what was, but what could be,” he rasped.

“Tynan,” she whispered.

His mouth crashed down on hers, all brutal finality and zero of the grace she’d known from him, as if the infinity he’d known as the God of Beloveds had shrunk to this single point of time between them.

She swayed into him, grasping at his shoulders, but he was already pulling away. Her lips stung from the pain of his kiss, and she could only loose an incoherent cry of denial when he planted his widespread hand between her breasts and shoved her back into the room. She stumbled a few steps, almost bouncing in the lighter gravity, before she caught herself, but even as she launched toward the opening, he gave her one last look and slammed the door in her face.

“Tynan!” She grabbed for the seam of the hatch. It had taken both of them to force it open yesterday. Despite the hopelessness, she clawed at the recessed handle, throwing all her weight at the closure. She had enough weight to crack the seal… Argh, but not enough to force it open! She just needed a few more pounds, a little more leverage. Her whole life had been scrabbling to make it just a little further from where she started, and yet here she was again, trapped and abandoned. Not by her own ambition or some vile abductor, but by the man she loved.

She loved him.

The truth expanded through her in ravaging waves like a supernova consuming everything in its orbit. Someone smarter—someone like she’d once been—would run and hide from such devastation. But…what was fear, what was uncertainty in the face of this power? She couldn’t protect herself from this, and…

She didn’t even want to save herself.

Shoving away from the door, she raced to the spy holes in the wall that observed the dais. Tynan stood in the center of his throne room, staring up at the broken ceiling, his legs braced wide and the blaster extended at his side. Sunlight streaming in a bright column through the shattered window, bright motes dancing in the humid air, left him standing in a pool of stark shadow. He looked like the warlord he was.

And he looked very alone.

Every muscle in her body contracted with dread and betrayal. She’d told him her secret shame, that she hadn’t fought her way out, and now he’d locked her in. Damn him! She slammed her hands against the wall on either side of the spy hole, as if she could strike a blow against him, against an unfair universe that didn’t believe in the power of love.

She swung her face away from the sight of him ready to fight for her, die for her.

And found herself staring at the tokens they’d brought into their little hideaway. Plenty of people had believed in love…

She raced to the goodies. Could she make a molotov cocktail out of the bottle of ghost-mead and…uh, something from the energy source in the solar lanterns? Was that even possible? Damn it, why had she read so much about philosophy and not enough about anarchy?

She tossed through the offerings—alien cheese and crackers, vacuum-sealed pastries from who knew how long ago, probably as yummy as Twinkies but not super useful unless she could gain enough weight immediately to pry open the door with brute strength, a small unlabeled box…

Bobbling it in her hand, she wondered what it could be. A tiny bomb? That would be good.

She popped the lid.

And stared down at a beautiful ring. The fiery yellow gemstone in the middle was cut into a diamond shape, throwing sparks across her hand even in the low light. Scarlet striations threaded through the stone like veins of blood.

Useless. Why had he even brought this back here from all the gifts on the dais?

Tynan was going to sacrifice himself and she’d never have the chance to tell him that she loved him. Growling in frustration, she shoved the ring on her finger as she spun around to survey the room again. If only the jungle had grown this far, a tree branch would’ve been more helpful than all these riches… Her gaze fell on the inflatable mattress where they’d spent the night. Why hadn’t she said anything when they’d been wrapped in each other’s arms?

She narrowed her eyes.

Racing to the mattress, she whispered nonsense to whatever gods might hear her. She poked at the controller on the side of the sleeping pad, and it sucked itself back into a shape almost as small as the ring box. If this worked…

She dropped to her knees beside the gap in the doorway. Wedging the deflated mattress into the narrow opening, she triggered the device.

The mattress squealed as it jammed up against the stuck door and almost popped out of the opening. Gritting her teeth, she shoved herself against the inflating pad and the doorway, holding it in place and pushing so hard something crackled warningly in her shoulders. Whatever. She ignored the pain, groaning with effort. But her inadvertent noises were lost in a louder clang from the great hall.

Oh God, was she too late? Were the mercenaries breaking through? Was Tynan facing them alone?

Was she brazening her way out of here only to be caught for no reason?

A part of her—a big part, she was humiliated to discover—wanted to stop struggling, just pull that limp mattress over her head and stay hidden, as he’d commanded her. After all, hiding had kept her from being thrown into a black hole. But…

Fuuuuck that. She wasn’t going to hide again, and she didn’t even care if love didn’t always win the day. It mattered that she believed, just like all the anonymous yearning souls who had brought their offerings to the throne of a long-gone god.

More than believe, she’d fight for it.

This time, she threw everything she had at the stubborn barricade.

With the extra oomph of the rapidly expanding cushion, she shoved the door wider, not quite all the way, but enough to slither through.

The throne room was just beyond the wall, with Tynan and the invading mercenaries.

Terror sleeted through her, and for a moment, she sagged against the portal she’d just forced open. Was she really going to do this? What made her think she would be even as useful to Tynan as an inflatable mattress?

She turned and ran back into the room.

She grabbed the open bottle of ghost-mead and the closed one that weighed heavily in her hand. Maybe a quick nip off the open bottle…?

Whirling, she sprinted out the door as if it might slam shut. And she still wasn’t sure which side she should be on.

Except she knew, she had to be at Tynan’s side.

The thudding she’d heard was louder, and as she skidded into the great hall, she sneezed at the hail of debris falling from the ceiling. Apparently one hole in the roof wasn’t enough for the invaders—or maybe they suspected Tynan was gunning for them—and they were going to bash in the whole thing.

And the front doors too, for good measure. The huge double panels vibrated with blows from outside, the heavy geared bar bowing from the pressure.

When she appeared with her sneezy self, Tynan whirled, the blaster raised.

She held out her hands. “Don’t shoot me!” The booze bottles felt ridiculously heavy.

He scowled fiercely. “I knew I should’ve stunned you.”

She glowered back. “You better not.”

“Lishelle, you have to go.” Despair sharpened his tone. “There’s at least a dozen mercs from what I can guess, and they’ll hurt you to hurt me since I can’t pay them off with love baubles.”

“We’re getting out of here together,” she said. “This castle is huge. You must have a secret tunnel to escape or something.” When he hesitated, the blaster wavering, she hurried to his side. “We’re not going to make our last stand until it’s really the last. We fight to the end.”

For a seemingly timeless instance, he stared down into her eyes.

Then he grabbed her wrist and started running.

The abrupt reversal rocked her head back on her shoulders and left her stumbling, but she kept ahold of her bottles as she righted herself and kept pace.

“Where are we going?”

“The escape tunnel.”

She couldn’t hold back a choked laugh. “You actually have one?”

“Doesn’t every castle?” He led them past the dais and deeper into the hall where the passageway shrank to less imposing measurements. The pounding behind them dimmed.

Her brief amusement faded even quicker. He’d taken that suicidal stance when there was an escape? “If there’s a tunnel, why didn’t we—?”

“What you said,” he interrupted, “about deserving happiness.” He yanked her around a corner where a steep ramp angled sharply upward against the inner wall of an open courtyard. “If you think being afraid of a black hole means you weren’t deserving, then me sacrificing all those girls means I should be shot.”

“That wasn’t you,” she protested. “That was Blackworm.”

“I mean the maidens who offered me their love in these very ruins.” His breath caught, and she didn’t think it was because of the hard climb that was taking them higher through the castle. “The goddesses judged me and found me wanting. They left me wanting, forever.”

Behind them, a massive crash echoed through the castle corridors. Lishelle gasped—was that the taste of plasma-scorched stone on the back of her tongue? They came to a split in the ramp, each arm going higher yet, and Tynan paused.

He pulled her into his arms.

“Uh, is this the time?” Despite her waspish tone, she snuggled into him.

“I’m waiting for the mercs to catch up.” He gave a quick glance toward the courtyard below.

“Then why—?”

He laid one fingertip over her lips. “Lishelle,” he murmured. “The goddesses cursed me to bless the love of others and never feel its joys myself. But they never expected a beautiful alien to save me.”

She gazed up at him, forgetting the mercenaries probably swarming the great hall right this second. “An alien?”

“You,” he clarified.

“Me?”

His smile was radiant. “Brash, mouthy, delightful as any sin that would tempt a god to fall. I don’t deserve you, Lady Lishelle, but I want you anyway.”

He bent her back over his arm. Even with doom so close on their heels, his kiss became everything to her: hot and needy and sweetly chaste all at once. She caught her breath, not quite a sob, and tried to hold him, though her hands were full of ghost-mead. She’d always had trouble holding on because of old ghosts, but she was done with that now, she swore to herself.

When he finally lifted his head, he took one of the bottles from her and tossed it over the side of the ramp to the landing below. They were high enough that the chiming crash took a moment.

He aimed the blaster downward and with a single shot ignited the puddle.

She flinched. “They’re going to see that.”

“That’s the idea.”

“We have an idea?”

“It’s not a great one, but yes.”

Shouts echoed from the corridor they’d recently exited.

Tynan glanced back at her. “There are too many of them for me, warlord or no, to shoot down. But we can’t expect to just outrun them either. They’ll be able to track us from their cruiser, and we have no way off-planet with our shuttle destroyed.”

She swallowed hard, his detached assessment so at odds with his impassioned kiss. “We can’t give up.” That much she knew.

“Not this time,” he agreed. “But we need to scatter them, distract them, give the ones left on the cruiser something to do besides hunt us.”

She grimaced. “Seems a shame to set fire to that much ghost-mead on their ship.”

He cupped her cheek. “I like the way you think. But instead of fire, we’ll use what the storm last night gave us: water.”

Glancing nervously down at the courtyard where the alcohol-fueled flames were already dying out—why did she keep thinking about dying?—she fisted her hand in the front of his tunic. “You want to pray for rain?”

“It rained already. All that water is stored in the cisterns on the peak above us. I’m going to lure them into the ducts and you are going to flush.”

She blinked. “That is a shitty idea.”

He snickered, then sobered when he noticed she wasn’t laughing too. “What it lacks in elegance, it more than compensates for in irony, don’t you think?”

“I think you’re crazy!” She didn’t bother not shouting since his whole stupid idea was the bad guys chasing him.

“You’re the one who believes I’m the God of Beloveds,” he reminded her. “What does that make you?”

While she was grinding her teeth, she almost took a stunner blast to the back.

“Blackworm!” The scream of fury from below was more personal than any unpaid mercenary.

“It’s Radek,” she gasped as the rest of the mercenaries boiled out of the corridor into the courtyard.

“Larf it,” Tynan snarled. “He’s not going to be bought off with trinkets or anything else that doesn’t include Blackworm’s head.”

He grabbed the second bottle of liquor from her and tossed it out over the courtyard. One shot from his blaster nailed it in mid-air, raining fire down on the mercenaries who ducked and scattered. Her universal translator struggled to decipher the dozen profanities aimed up at them.

Not to mention the barrage of yellow stun-setting energy also aimed up at them, brighter than suns. They raced onward, taking the left-hand ramp, dodging the plasma until Tynan yanked her through a narrow doorway in the wall, out of range.

For the moment.

The doorway took them to an outer ledge along the castle wall. She gasped and shrank back at the breath-stealing sight of the sheer, seemingly bottomless dive off the side of the cliff.

He’d called the castle his mountain stronghold, but having only seen the sheltering jungle arms at the front, she hadn’t realized the ruins were set right up against the edge of a gorge. Too steep to support any plantings except the most tenacious of vines, the chasm plunged into deep shadow. From somewhere far below, a low roar drifted up along with a cool breath of air. A river, she guessed, swollen from the storm.

They were standing in the archway of something like the ancient aqueducts on Earth. Though only a section was visible from where they stood, she could imagine smaller pipes feeding the castle proper. But the main duct was large enough to stand upright. She clutched at his arm. “This is too dangerous.”

His dark eyes bored into her. “You said you believed in me.”

“I do.” She couldn’t keep the despairing truth from her voice.

And they couldn’t go back. The rumble of booted feet slamming up the ramp was louder than her frantic heartbeat.

She kissed him, hard and fast. “Show me how to flush the bastards.”

He pointed. “The control center is that way, through that third arch. You’ll see the diagram that shows where you open and close the sluices to direct the flow. Send everything from the cistern through the main channel. That’s where I’ll be leading them.”

“I do think tanks, not septic tanks!”

His lips twitched. “You’ll do whatever you must. That’s one of the things I love about you.”

“How will you get out?” The sound of boots, of the water, of her pulse slushing in her ears made her quaver.

“This was my home, and I know the tunnels. I’ll let myself out through one of the side channels.” He slapped the blaster into her hand. “Now go.”

Without waiting for her reply, as if he had no doubt she could do this, he wheeled and raced back the way they’d come, to lead Radek and the mercs into the trap. Biting back a cry of anguish, she ran for the controls.

He said he loved her.

And she hadn’t told him she loved him.