My heart twanged. “My father was from America. New York.”
“Nice town that, biggish, full of people and action.”
I looked at him again. “You’ve been?”
“Few times. I think. I mean, I’m guessing because again my memories are full of holes and gaping chunks of time.” He nodded, frowning again. “But you’re avoiding my question. You’re different from the other supes, why? Why wouldn’t you want the wall to come down?”
“I’m cursed, doesn’t matter where I go. Might as well stay here.” I touched the ring around my neck, the cool of the metal a comfort. As long as I wore it, I was safe. The people around me were safe.
He laughed but I didn’t join in, and he slowly let the laughter die. “Shit, are you serious?”
I shrugged. “I was cursed by the Jinn when they killed my family.” His eyes popped wide and his mouth hung open as he stared at me. Gobsmacked. The definition in the dictionary would have that face he was making next to it. Why the hell was I telling him all this?
Because he was being nice to Batman . . . that was why, as stupid as it sounded. He had a soft touch with the horse and that meant something to me. Cruelty to animals—especially those who needed us to care for them—was not a quality I tolerated in other people. I’d seen too many people haul off and beat an animal because they’d had a shit day. People like Steve.
So, for that I cut Maks some slack, and maybe a little because he was easy on the eyes. That, and he was human so he truly didn’t understand this world, or what resided in it. I supposed some answers were in order if he were truly going to live here.
“What kind of curse? If I can ask?” he said softly, carefully, as if he knew it was a tender spot.
I shook my head. “Doesn’t matter. I have this.” I pulled the necklace out and showed him the ring that hung from it. Made of solid silver, it was crafted in the likeness of a roaring lion. When I was younger, I’d wanted to believe it was a perfect image of my dad, so I had something to remember him by. But now . . . I knew it was just a lion. Just like all the other lions out there. “Ish found me and Bryce after the attack. She took my father’s ring and blessed it to offset the curse the Jinn laid on me. Long as I have this, I’m good.”
He was quiet after that, his eyes thoughtful. Thank the goddess he was, because just those few words had stirred up memories. Memories that Ish had helped me lock away so I could go on with my life. She’d always said the past was the past and that you needed to move forward with your eyes on the goals you made. She was right about that. Memories could cut you down and eat you alive if you let them.
I knew that better than anyone.
For a week, we headed north without running into anything bigger than a few tiny supes that scattered as soon as we approached. Which was good, but also made me wonder what was going on. I knew the time of year was bad for dragon attacks, so it could’ve been as simple as that. But still, I wondered if it was something more. Our path just seemed to be miraculously clear and that made me nervous, especially as we rode through the steppes.
The steppes were known for having good horses. The tribesmen who bred them were always on the lookout for more horseflesh and often would come to bargain, beg, or steal your horse if they thought they were worth it. I’d come this far north a few times. This was where I’d found Balder and had to give up a fair amount of gold to take him home.
I patted his neck. While he was bred for speed, he was also bred from the hardy steppes ponies infused with blood of the desert breeds. Endurance, stamina, heart, speed, brains.
That made him the best horse who’d ever carried me.
Then there was Maks. He helped me make camp each night without being asked, hiking out to find water, carrying buckets back to our fire. He cooked most of the meals and made sure the horses were hobbled. All things that I’d done on my own before. I’d admit it only to myself, but it was nice to have someone around who didn’t make me do everything on my own. Not that I told him that.
Maks was making it difficult for me not to like him.
Especially when he bent at the waist to pick up wood for the fire. I grinned, thinking about that image as we began to turn northwest. The temperatures began to drop incrementally. I pulled out my thicker fur-lined cloak and pulled it on. Maks did the same, though his coat was shorter—but still lined with fur.
“You said something back there that stuck with me,” Maks said. We rode side by side now and I looked across at him. Batman had fully recovered and was bouncing along, happy to have a rider who looked after him.
“And what was that?” I asked. We’d barely spoken two words over as many days, the work to keep our camps going not needing much speaking. Pretty much “back there” could mean any number of things. I hated to admit it, but we worked well together, taking up the tasks needed to set up and take down camp. I didn’t have to tell him what to do, or even ask. He just did what needed doing. Bryce had been right about him. Maks was submissive, which meant there was no fighting, no arguing. He just did as he was told for the most part.
I might have to change my opinion of him and say he made a better traveling companion than I expected. Better than Steve, that was for damn sure.
“You said Steve didn’t need the horse, that he could catch up on his own feet. What is he exactly? And why do you need a horse then, because . . . aren’t you the same as him? Isn’t that the deal, no interspecies relations? Right?”
My eyes widened, surprise cutting through me that he didn’t know the basics about the supes he lived with, but the surprise gave way to irritation. My jaw ticked as I debated telling him all the truth and settled for just some of it. Which . . . was not really lying, right? Omitting some of the details he didn’t need to know would hurry the story along.
“First off,” I shook my head, “you’re telling me you never figured what we all are in the last six months living with all of us? Why didn’t you ask someone? Like Darcy?”
“Ish kept me separated, in case you hadn’t noticed. She was worried I might run into an . . . accident.” He rolled his shoulders and stretched his lower back. “I didn’t push it because I didn’t want to upset her. And Darcy’s and my conversations were circling other things, not what she was.”
I wasn’t surprised. Ish had a soft spot for the underdogs. Or under cats as the case was with me.
“Steve is a lion shifter,” I said. “And yes, my family is—check that, was—all lion shifters.”
“Bryce?”
I gave a quick shake of my head. “He can’t shift, not with the injuries he sustained at the Oasis.” Again, a memory bit at me and I shoved it back, the pain of it catching me off guard.
Blood all around us, the smell of my family’s blood filling my senses, blinding me.
“Shouldn’t that have healed, though? Like isn’t that the perk of being a supe, fast healing and all?” Maks kept at it, and while I understood the curiosity, I didn’t like the direction the conversation was taking. The past and the things from that time of my life I worked hard to make sure would never be recalled were not something I wanted to discuss with anyone, especially not a human.
I ran my tongue over the inside of my mouth and the tips of my canines before I answered. “Some injuries can’t be healed. Like with my kukri blades, they’re, well, I call them blessed, but they cut deepest on a supe, and the wound won’t heal like it should, disabling them. Which is why Steve will need time to heal, buying us time to get ahead of him and stay off his radar.”
“You mean it wouldn’t cut me?”
“That’s exactly what I mean. They’d be like butter knives on you. I’d have to use blunt force to make them work at all,” I said.
“And Bryce? Did he get a knife like that in the back?”
His words were a little too close to home and the memory I’d just banished. Hesitation made me stumble as I debated how much more to divulge. The minutes ticked by as I struggled and finally decided to give him some of the story. I could do this. I could give him info and not go back to that dark place.