“I know the layout of the Jinn’s Dominion,” I said as I scrambled over a pile of rocks. “Our father drilled it into us, so if we were ever taken, we’d be able to find a way out.” Of course, now that I’d learned that Marsum had wanted to take me to raise me as his own, it made sense why we’d been taught the layout.
The training, the understanding of how the Jinn’s lands were set up, none of it had been for Bryce to rescue people once he became alpha. We’d never gone in after someone if they’d been taken, never.
The training had been so I’d be able to escape if I were taken.
“Sweet baby desert god, this is a fucking mess. My whole life is nothing but lies.” I grimaced.
Lila grunted. “You and me both.”
She had a point.
There was a brush of air to my left and I turned to see Bryce walking beside me. He was indistinct, but he was there. I shook a fist at him.
“You got something you want to tell me?” I barked. “Like how much Dad knew about Marsum wanting to take me as some sort of freaky-assed adopted child?”
Bryce’s image wavered, and he turned his head to me, his eyes more golden than I’d ever seen, his voice deeper, resonating in his belly. “He didn’t want you as a child, Zamira. He wanted you as a mate.”
It took a moment for the words to sink in. When they did, my stomach rolled hard over itself as if it would scramble to get away from me. I pushed a hand into my belly as if I could hold it together. “What?”
His image wobbled and for a space of a heartbeat, I thought he was someone else, an old man in sand-colored clothes, but no, it was just Bryce. “Do not go to him. He will not kill you. He will bind you to him forever.”
I couldn’t help the way I sucked air as if I’d been running, but I forced myself to talk through the panic. “Not possible. He could have taken me when I was a child!”
Bryce shrugged. “Except he swore he would not. Maggi didn’t show you that part. That he swore he would not take you until you were older. That was the deal he made—your mother’s life for a semblance of a life for yourself.”
I stared hard at him. “Why are you telling me this now? Why did you not say something before?”
I blinked and Bryce was gone. “Damn it! You could be a little more helpful than that!”
I could have sworn I heard a heavy sigh, but it could have been the way the wind whipped through the rush grass too. And then his final warning. “Do not go to the Jinn’s Dominion, Zamira. Not if you wish to remain free.”
Lila landed on Balder’s saddle. “Who were you talking to?”
I struggled to swallow, my mouth suddenly dry. I grabbed a water flask and spun the top off, then sucked down several long gulps before I answered her.
“Bryce. He just showed up.” I screwed the lid back on the flask and tucked it into my saddlebags. “He confirmed what Maggi said about Marsum.” I filled her in quickly on the exchange.
She was quiet for a beat and then the questions spilled out of her. “What are we going to do? What about the others? What about Maks? We can’t leave them there.”
I shook my head. “We aren’t going to leave them there. Lila, my skills lie in sneaking in and stealing what I want and sneaking back out. This is the same as any jewel heist, only the jewels are our pride.” I looked at her. “We aren’t turning back.”
She grinned. “Good.”
We were quiet a few minutes before we hit something that made us both stop in our tracks. Paw prints in the loose soil, easily the size of both my hands side by side.
“That’s the hyenas?” she gasped.
“Yeah.” I bent and touched one, seeing how degraded the edges were. “Yesterday. We’re behind the full pack too.” I looked up at her. “This is good unless they turn back.”
“Let’s go to the water,” she said. “They are following Maks, staying west. If they turn back they might pass right by us.”
I nodded, mounted, and turned Balder east, going straight across. When the waves came into view, I saw a few sirens swimming, waving at us. I waved back. They were ineffective on me and Lila, and Balder was gelded so we would be fine.
Along the edge of the water, we traveled in relative ease for the next few days. There were no witches, no Jinn, no dragons, no werehyenas.
No Maks.
No Bryce.
No Shem.
More than once I found myself thinking about the three of them, and how they’d turned things around on me in different ways. How each of them had impacted my life and in some cases turned it on its head.
I shouldn’t have missed Shem at all, but I found myself wishing he’d been able to stay closer, that he’d been able to give me a little more insight into what I was supposed to be doing. Because while I was the alpha of my pride, and I felt that truth all the way to my bones, there were pieces of my life I didn’t understand. Bits that didn’t quite fit. And I suspected my crazy uncle had more information than he let on. A thought formed . . . the dream walking the Ice Witch had done, what if I could do that and reach Shem? “Hey, Lila.”
“Yup?” She looked at me from where she coasted on an updraft, rolling to her back as if in water and not air.
I opened my mouth to tell her what I was thinking about trying and then shut it again. That was ridiculous. I was no mage. “Nothing.”
She squinted one eye at me but didn’t press. I probably couldn’t even do it without the Ice Witch helping me. My hand went to the pouch where I kept the clear diamond . . . and I wondered if maybe there was something else I could do to try to reach Shem.
To ask him the questions I had. But each night I lay down, I told myself I would do it the next day.
By day four on our own, we’d settled into an easy pattern that consisted of food, movement, and trying to stump one another with obscure Shakespeare quotes. That easy rhythm was the only reason I have to explain why we didn’t notice the trap until it was too late.
Way too late.
Chapter Fourteen
To be fair, the trap that we sprung wasn’t meant for us specifically; at least, I don’t think it was, despite who set it. We settled down for the night, later than usual, meaning I didn’t check out the area very well. My bad.
I stripped Balder of his tack and set up a small fire. Lila brought back two birds for our dinner and I gutted and cleaned them with speed.
“What do you think Maks is doing?” she asked me softly as I worked. “Do you think he’s okay?”
I shrugged as I pulled the last of the feathers out of the birds. “No idea. He’s more likely only a day ahead of us now. Batman could not keep up that breakneck pace for long. He’ll reach the edge of the Jinn’s Dominion in a week, the werehyenas right behind him, and I imagine he’ll be just fine.”
“Really? After the Jinn left him to die in the mud?” Lila waddled close to the fire, her belly full of the bird innards. She ran her tongue around the edge of her mouth.
I ran a spit through the two birds and set them over the flames to cook. “Lila, I don’t know. I don’t know how I’m supposed to save him when even the Ice Witch says I can’t. She’s powerful. I’m not, remember? And what if what he said was the truth? What if he was fooling us all along? We don’t know, and maybe we never really knew him.” Maybe I never really knew him.
Ahh, that bit hurt the most because I’d yet again let my squishy weak heart follow its own path right into Maks’s arms. A path that my head had told me was dangerous and stupid, and I’d followed it even after I learned he was a Jinn. Shit, I would have been better to let Steve keep cheating on me and stayed married to that dumb ass.
“No, I don’t think that’s true,” Lila said softly. “I think you’re afraid to embrace what you really are. I think . . . you aren’t all shifter. That’s what Maggi said. Or was that Merlin? Ishtar, maybe?”
I hunched my back a little. “I know that’s what you think. But that doesn’t mean it’s right.”
“What do you feel? Do you think it’s possible, though? ’Cause, let’s be honest, if you have any sort of hidden powers, now would be the time for them to come to light.” Lila moved so she was close to the fire and staring up at me with those big eyes of hers. The weather here was slowly warming and the fire was almost too hot on some nights. And yes, I was avoiding her question by thinking about the weather and the fire in front of me.