Drake Chronicles: 02 Blood Feud (20 page)

“Just sit back into it, as if you were sitting in a chair.”

“Okay.” I touched her cheek, or tried to. Our auras touched, sparked. “You don’t smile enough.”

“Flirt with me later, Logan.” She shoved me and I tumbled, fal ing backward and landing in my body. My arms and legs twitched, as if electricity coursed through me. I felt heavy and weird and tingled al over. Charlemagne nosed me roughly, leaving a wet cold smear on my neck. I sat up, grimacing. “Not the kiss I was hoping for, dog,” I told him. He nudged me again and I froze. I’d heard it too that time. Footsteps, bodies moving with vampire speed between the trees.

Toward us.

Isabeau was lying too stil , she wasn’t back in her body yet.

Before they could spil into the clearing, I leaped into the air and landed in a crouch at her feet, stake in my hand.

Charlemagne stood by her head.

He relaxed when the Hound warriors surrounded us.

I didn’t.

Magda stepped forward, her face unreadable.

“Logan Drake, come with us.”

“Like hel .”

Isabeau stil wasn’t moving and I had to warn my parents, had to make sure Solange was safe.

“This is not a request.” There were dogs at her feet, ears pricked, teeth bared.

I snarled. “Look, you’re at the bottom of my list of priorities I snarled. “Look, you’re at the bottom of my list of priorities right now, Magda. Take a freaking number.”

“You have been summoned by Kala.”

“She can wait too.”

Isabeau jerked once and then sat up abruptly. She blinked dazedly.

“Magda? What’s going on?”

Magda tossed her long curls back over her shoulder. “He’s been summoned for the rites.”

“What?” Isabeau leaped to her feet, nearly knocking me onto my face. “No!”

I rose slowly. “What are you talking about?”

“It’s not like that,” Isabeau said pleadingly at the warriors.

“Kala read the bones again,” one of them said. “He has to prove himself worthy of you, of the Hounds. He has to be strong enough to be one of us.”

“You never told me,” Magda added, sounding hurt.

Isabeau winced. “I know. But it doesn’t mean he’s the one.

And anyway, we don’t have time for this.”

“You can’t be handfasted without the rites,” another warrior insisted. “He has to be initiated if he’d going to be your consort.

”

“Consort?” I echoed. I stared at her. “Consort? Seriously?

That’s what they meant?”

She blushed lightly. “One of our traditions,” she said softly.

She weaved on her feet, fatigue making dark bruises under her green eyes. “Kala predicted that I would promise myself to a vampire of the royal courts. To a Drake.”

“And here I thought you didn’t like me.”

“It’s not like that.” She pushed her hair out of her face. “We have to warn the others,” she said. “Kala’s orders.” My fangs were out, my fists clenched. “Let me at least cal my parents to warn them.”

Isabeau looked crestfal en. “Phones won’t work here, not after al the magic that’s been done. It’s why phones don’t work in the caves either.”

“Then send someone to somewhere where they do work,” I ground out. I reached for her hands, remembered the thin girl stealing coins and eating stale crusts of bread, the woman I’d kissed just this morning as the sun rose like a candle set too close to lace curtains. “If I do this,” I asked huskily, “I’m proving myself to you?”

She nodded almost shyly. “Yes, but—”

I cut her off, turning to the band of armed warriors.

“Let’s go.”

CHAPTER 18

LOGAN

The march back to the caves was formal and irritating. At least Magda wasn’t smirking at me anymore. Isabeau was bewildered and embarrassed. I probably should have been more concerned about my own welfare, but I was kind of glad to have a chance to prove myself to her. Even if it was the worst possible timing. And I’d been tested before, by Madame Veronique, who might prefer embroidery to warfare but was stil remarkably intimidating.

Possibly I was underestimating this test.

Most of the torches had been doused inside the caverns; only a few candles were left burning along the edge of the milky lake.

Kala already looked better, sitting on a worn stone, her amulets and bone beads clacking together when she shifted. Warriors lined the wal s with their dogs. I could only see the glint of their eyes. The ground was swept clean of pebbles and broken chunks of stalactites but sprinkled with what looked like salt and dried herbs.

“Logan Drake, do you come to the rites wil ingly?” Kala asked me, her voice echoing in a way that wasn’t entirely a result of the caves.

I stripped off my jacket and my shirt. “These things aren’t cheap,” I muttered, folding them on a ledge. Someone sneered.

I could just imagine what they must think of me in my pirate-style frock coat and steel-toe boots. It was easy to assume a guy who was comfortable wearing lace cuffs might not know a sword from a toothpick. I was used to it. And I knew how to use it to my advantage.

Isabeau swal owed, sent me a look I couldn’t quite decipher.

She opened her mouth with a warning but the man next to her clapped his hand over her mouth. I scowled.

“You know the rules,” Kala told her sharply. “The bones and the dreams are not to be ignored.”

“I’l be fine,” I assured her. I raised an eyebrow at the Hounds stil muscling her into silence. “Get off her.” I couldn’t believe she was al owing it. These traditions must run deeper than I’d thought. “Now.”

He smirked and let his hand drop but didn’t move away from her. Charlemagne didn’t look as if he felt the need to bite the man’s face off so I supposed I shouldn’t either. It probably didn’t bode wel that a dog had better self-control when it came to Isabeau than I did.

Kala shook a seed rattle hung with dog teeth. The sound was like rain on a tin rooftop. Six other Hounds lifted their own rattles and joined the prayer. Kala was chanting in a language that sounded like Sanskrit accented with guttural Viking-esque sounds. If I closed my eyes I could have been in some beautiful desert temple … or about to be ripped apart by a Viking Beserker in bear armor.

Beserker in bear armor.

The song ended, the rattles trailing off into silence.

“Begin,” Kala barked.

I tensed, half expecting vampires to rush at me howling.

Nothing happened. There was the cold silence of the caves, the steady drip of water into the lake, the shifting of dogs. The unremarkable quiet moment was nearly worse than an out-and-out attack. That at least I had some vague idea how to handle.

This was unnerving.

It was meant to be.

I lifted my chin arrogantly, standing with loose knees, ready to spring. I could take what they threw at me. And hel if I’d let them see me squirm and sweat.

And then I heard it.

The growl was low enough that I nearly felt it rumble in the ground under my feet.

The dog was that big.

He had the heavy bulk of Ox-Eye, with a generous dash of Doberman and Rottweiler. Drool plopped into the dust as his lips lifted off teeth that would have done a
Hel-Blar
proud. It was al muscle, not an ounce of soft puppy fat anywhere. And he was trained to fight and kil , with a leather col ar armed with spikes to protect him from his prey. I’d heard they’d used dogs like this in the gladiator rings in ancient Rome and to hunt boar in the Middle Ages.

Knowing that hardly gave me an advantage though; just a shot of adrenaline in my veins.

I should have known they’d use dogs. And if I hurt it, even to save my own skin, they’d likely kil me for it anyway. The other dogs ringed around us in the dark growled in response.

Trial or trick?

Too late to regret my rash decision now.

I knew better than to back away or make eye contact. And I didn’t have a handy drugged slab of steak with which to distract it. Just my own pitiful self.

This whole tribal negotiation thing just sucked.

Not to mention crushing on a girl who came from a tribe of bloodthirsty lunatics.

The dog paced toward me, head lowered threateningly, stalking me.

I wasn’t going down like a damned gazel e. That would hardly prove my worth to Isabeau.

Very possibly this was the night my white-knight complex, as Solange put it, would get me kil ed. Someone had better write a poem about it. It was only fair.

I held my ground. There was nowhere for me to go at any rate, I was surrounded by warriors and their dogs. The light glimmered off the silver buttons of my coat on the ledge. If I was very lucky, I might be able to flip up and land on the narrow stone outcrop and climb out of reach. I looked back at the slavering war dog and bent my knees further, waiting.

Everything else receded: Isabeau’s careful y blank expression, the tel tale way she clutched her hands together, the flickering light, the thunder of the waterfal . It was just me and the dog and the uneven stone.

I had one chance.

I had one chance.

I careful y made eye contact and bared my fangs.

He didn’t waste a single moment on barking or growling. His legs bunched up and he lunged at me, al teeth and wild eyes.

His col ar gleamed viciously. I bent, pushed off, and flung myself into a backflip that would have done any acrobat proud. I sailed graceful y through the air, nearly grinning.

The landing, however, wiped my smirk right off. The steel toe of my boot jammed into the wal . There wasn’t enough room for my entire foot, and not enough of a handhold to keep me comfortably upright. The stone crumbled under my heel as I teetered, cursing. I slipped, dropped to the ground. The jagged rock tore at my arms, drawing thick rivulets of blood. I nearly lost a tooth bashing the side of my face.

No one was looking at me anyway.

There was a snap of teeth on air and another growl.

Charlemagne sailed out of his position at Isabeau’s feet and landed between me and the war dog. He landed with more power and grace than I’d shown. He snapped his teeth, growling. The war dog paused, lowered his ears, and promptly sat down, whining.

My mouth dropped open.

Kala inclined her head. “Very good,” she said.

I wiped blood and grime off my hands. “What the hel just happened?”

“You passed the first trial,” she said as if I was slow, as if this sort of thing was perfectly normal. “And, much more impressively, one of our own dogs claimed you as his own. That does not often happen.”

I blinked sweat out of my eyes. Charlemagne’s tongue lol ed happily out of his mouth.

Kala sprinkled a handful of dried herbs and what looked like chalk into a smal fire burning at the limestone bank of the white lake. “Ground-up bones of some of our most sacred dogs,” she explained. She pointed to the hundreds of grottolike shrines that had been dug into the rock. They each held a candle or clay urns. “We keep them al close by, along with the ashes of our Mothers.” I assumed “Mother” was another term for “shamanka.” And the smoke from the fire fil ed my nostrils and I stopped caring about semantics and powdered bones. The Hounds seemed to fade slightly into the background and Isabeau might as wel have had a spotlight on her. She glowed like pearls and stars and moonlight. She was even more beautiful than usual, her long straight hair gleaming, her stance graceful, nearly coquettish. She wore a slinky dress of clinging satin in a deep burgundy, slit up one leg practical y to her hip. Her slender leg emerged as she took a step forward. My mouth went dry. She wasn’t wearing any jewelry, only those faded scars.

And she was smiling at me.

“Logan,” she said softly, her green eyes glowing with amusement and heat as she approached me.

“Isabeau,” I croaked. My voice cracked in a way it hadn’t done since I was thirteen years old. I felt about as suave as I had then. The fire crackled beside us, sending out curtains of scented smoke that lingered in the air between us and the others. We might have been entirely alone in the caves, in the others. We might have been entirely alone in the caves, in the whole world even.

She stopped when she was close enough to lick me without leaning forward.

Which she did.

She kissed me so thoroughly the war dog could have snuck up behind me and chomped on my leg and I wouldn’t have noticed. She tasted sweet, like mul ed wine and spices. Her tongue touched mine and I pul ed her so close against my chest there was no room between us even for the bil owing smoke.

She nipped at me playful y and then she was soft and pliant in my arms, clinging to me and sighing my name.

It took a moment for coherent thought to hit me.

Isabeau would never sigh and cling like that, never run her hand under my shirt, along the waistline of my trousers with her entire tribe watching.

Not Isabeau.

It stil required a supreme application of wil to enable me to pul away. She was barely an inch from me, our noses practical y touched. She licked her lower lip. I lost my train of thought.
Shit, man up, Drake
, I told myself.

She nuzzled my ear until shivers touched my spine.

“Logan, let’s leave this place,” she murmured. “Leave the Hounds and the Drakes and al of the politics. It could be just you and me. Alone.”