The Cage King (6 page)

“What’s wrong?” And only with Esh’s words did it register her feet had stopped and her body was stationary, while people flowed around them.

As attention was the last thing she needed, she got her feet moving again. “Sorry. I was taking it in.”

His face creased lightly in disbelief, but he didn’t call her on it, and they continued forward as they were directed.

The set-up was impressive, especially when you added in most if not all of it had been built without magical help. In rather hilly land, a large tract of forest had been cleared to build a little town. The structures on the edges were shoddily built, their quick construction evident with a glance, but the further in you got the nicer, bigger, brighter everything became.

Esh must have seen something in her face give away her thoughts, because he said, “Outside houses are for staff, the rank-and-file security.”

“Where will the fighters be housed?”

“Close to the middle. Easier for the guards to keep an eye on us.”

As if his words conjured them, the guards became more noticeable. The prevailing theme was big and mean-looking, and armed with bladed weapons. No bows or staffs – no, all of them had knives and swords in easy reach.

They traveled through the town, the buildings in the middle looking less like barracks and more like condos. From here the houses built up into the hills were noticeable, and Esh said, “The guests. The ones who are watching the fights.”

“Beylor?”

“My guess? His house is whichever one looks like the most money went into it.”

That would be the one right in the middle, and it was a monstrous celebration of excess without thought to good taste. Somewhere in there, her mother’s ring was waiting, and a sharp pain lanced through her chest, for a moment the loss of something so precious to someone like
that
unbearable.

On the opposite end of town from where they entered was a huge building, built abutting the forest. The closest she could compare it to was a coliseum, except this had a roof. “The fights will be held here?” she asked.

Esh nodded, nothing much more to be added to that observation.

“Fighters.”
This voice had no magical enhancement, instead relying on an antiquated speaker system. It took moments to locate the source, a man who was standing on a scaffold on the outside of the coliseum. His long, pointed nose and lack of a chin had Nalah thinking cheese and mouse traps. “Fighters! Welcome to the Underground Tour. Congratulations. Only the finest are offered a spot here. You are all to be commended to have made it this far. I am Beylor.”

A natural public speaker he wasn’t. His voice wasn’t squeaky – surprise, that – but he did have the faintest lisp that made any authority he tried to project into his voice a lost cause. Still, the large amount of jewelry, the finery of his clothes, and the fact that he was surrounded by scary looking goons made sure everyone gave him their attention.

“There will be three days of fighting. At the end of the first day, we will have our final sixteen. At the end of the second, eight fighters will be left standing. And on the third day, the King of the Tour shall be crowned.”

The crowd responded to this, loud cheers following suit. Beylor held his hands up for quiet. “You are allowed no weapons, but apart from that, there are no rules. You will fight until one of you can fight no more, and the one left standing is the winner. Are you
ready
?”

More catcalls, more yelling with now the stomping of feet added. “Between the fights you are welcome to whatever you wish, wherever you wish to go, with again only one rule – there will be no fighting outside of the Tour. Is that understood?”

All around them the guards raised the various weapons, and the cheering was more subdued from minutes ago. Beylor retreated back into the building, and women came forward to start leading the fighters to their rooms.

Well, that and to get harassed. Several fighters were brushing against the women, speaking to them. Nalah couldn’t hear the words, but the pinched look on the women’s faces said everything. She crowded closer to Esh. Esh, who had noticed as well and was taking it in without a sound, only wrapped his arm around her shoulder and waited until a woman came forward for them.

They were shown to their apartment, located in the smallest of the cluster of buildings that seemed to be the fighters housing. The rooms were well appointed and spacious and a far cry from what she had been expecting. Nalah started searching room to room, holding her finger to her mouth when he would have said something. Shrugging, he lay on the bed, hands beneath his head as he watched her work.

Finally she nodded, and he spoke. “What was that?”

“Remember I said most people put seven different security spells on a building but wouldn’t bolt their door? Well, this was the opposite. There’s no magic here, so I was looking for old-fashioned methods to listen or spy on us.”

“Any?”

“None, which is kind of shocking. Paranoia is Beylor’s defining characteristic. I can’t understand why he wouldn’t be keeping an eye on the fighters. I put up some countermeasures in case he gets the idea in the future, but right now, zilch.”

“I’m not surprised. There are several other ways Beylor keeps an eye on us, and someone finding a bug in their room wouldn’t be good for his business. That’s a line most of us wouldn’t accept being crossed, especially for those who bring their women. Speaking of,” he added, patting the bed beside him.

He was intent on her, focused on her in a way he was nowhere else, not even within the ring. His words from that night pounded in her brain, the beat upping her heart rate and bringing warmth to her skin. She couldn’t let him get the upper hand, not so quickly, but inside her still lived the ten-year-old who looked up to him like he was a rock star and the seventeen-year-old who loved him as only a teenager was capable of, and they were both demanding she snuggle with him on that bed.

Straightening her spine, she did the only thing that came to mind – stall and hope it worked. “I’d like to get cleaned up, look around a bit, check out the fighters.”

“Later,” Esh said, and his face was settling into lines that promised a battle should she fight him on this.

So much for that plan. Nalah took off her shoes, debating a moment. If she tried to stay on the opposite side of the bed he’d come after her. There was nothing to do except cuddle into him, so she did, positioning herself so her face lay on his shoulder and her arm rested over his upper waist.

He snorted, but didn’t say anything, instead tightening his arm so she was comfortably crushed to him.

His fingers moved in lazy circles over her upper arms, sensitizing every square inch of skin and leading her mind to latch on one question –
Where will he touch next?

And the small disappointment when it became obvious the answer was nowhere else, that he was content holding her in his arms and stroking the skin of her arm? It was because there were better things she should be doing right this moment.

Yeah, right,
said the seventeen-year-old. Not wanting to examine her thoughts or motives all that closely, she closed her eyes and let her mind drift.

The first time she was in his arms in a romantic sense was right after their first kiss. It was her first kiss ever, though Esh couldn’t claim the same – not that she ever pressed him on that.

The kiss was so soft. Of all the words that described Esh,
soft
never once entered her mind before that night, but that was the only word that fit. His lip was split, but he didn’t hesitate to press them to hers when she lifted her face, the faintest aftertaste of blood lingering. His fight swollen hands roamed feather-light over her skin of her shoulders and arms, going only a moment to the stretch of skin over her tummy her too-short shirt revealed, before tugging the material down and returning to the neutral areas.

He laid her on top of him that night, not making any allowances for the various bruises the fight left, but he pushed her no further – soft kisses and soft strokes were all that were given that night, until she fell asleep in his arms.

“Why do you want to check out the other fighters?

“Hmm?” It took a moment to be brought out of her hazy lassitude. “Oh, I want to see if any of them are innate.”

“Innate?” he asked, voice curious but still calm.

“Yeah, I should be able to feel if any of them have powers by magical means.” She glanced up to see him studying her, his face calm confusion.

“Didn’t we just go over how this place isn’t magical?”

She straightened, sat up on the bed to look down at him. “Magic is…weird.” Wow, that was a lame way to start. He smiled but didn’t say anything. “I know, I know, really helpful. I’m trying to think how to explain.”

“Start by speaking. I’ll ask questions along the way.”

And there was Esh, pragmatic and straight ahead. “There is no one way magic behaves. There is no one truth. It makes dealing with magic difficult.” He still looked confused. Taking a deep breath, she tried again. “All right, say someone casts a spell to light a fire. The magic is in the spell. The fire, though, the fire isn’t magic, even though it started that way. Right now we’re in an area that doesn’t allow magic, so if someone cast a spell to light a fire, it wouldn’t work. But if someone cast a spell to light a fire outside of this dampening area, and then brought the torch with the fire here, the fire wouldn’t extinguish the moment they crossed into the zone. But even though the fire isn’t magic, if I looked at it, I’d be able to tell the fire was started by a spell instead of a match. It would still carry its beginnings.”

Esh face was open, questioning. “So what do you mean
innate
?”

“When we call someone innate, it’s because they have powers that are magic, but are not subject to the same rules as straight magic. Their powers can’t be dispelled – at least, usually they can’t – and they could still use them even in a magically dead area.”

“Such as?”

“Such as a werewolf’s ability to shift. It doesn’t matter if that ability came into being because of magic or not, it’s now part of them. Same as a gargoyle’s ability to fly, or a shadow stealer’s ability to blend into shadow, or in theory a dragon’s ability to breathe fire.”

“Too bad there are no dragons to ask if that’s true.” Long experience told her the lines between his brows and the thin lips meant he was rolling her info in his mind, absorbing this new knowledge.

“Innate type magic is more intricate and harder to place. It can get lost in noise pretty easily.” At that, sledgehammer to her face couldn’t have surprised her more, and the
ohh
fell from her lips without conscious thought.

That’s what she’d been feeling from Esh, this itch that overcame her. It was light and, added to the storm of other feelings being around Esh engendered, near impossible to suss out.

Innate.
There was something in him innate – buried, buried deep, so deep he probably didn’t know of its existence. The part of him responsible for his eyes, maybe his superior strength and fighting as well.

“What?” he asked.

She shook her head, continued on. Not until she thought this through would she mention it to him. “I want to make sure I at least try to see if any of the fighters have that advantage. I don’t want you caught off guard.”

“You mean like this?” he asked, and rolled her onto her back, trapping her beneath him.

‡

T
hose gorgeous dark-brown
eyes of hers were wide with surprise as he rolled her under him. No reason why they should be. He told her this was where she was going to be for the duration of the Tour.

“Esh,” she started, and in response he pushed his hips against her pelvis, rubbing hard against her.

Her mouth parted. A long, deep breath met the movement while her eyes went half-lidded. Her hands went to his shoulders, her fingers half digging into the muscle, her arms both pulling him closer and pushing him away.

His Nalah was conflicted? Well, he was going to put an end to that real quick. By the end of the Tour she was going to be back in his bed and standing by his side, where she belonged now, and where she’d belonged these last five years before she’d run away.

To the Guild. Of all fucking people, she had gotten involved with the Guild. He growled, the need to mark her as his and not theirs growing in him, and he lowered his mouth to her throat.

She panted and moaned as his lips and teeth ravaged the sensitive skin below her ear, the sounds tightening his belly and ratcheting up his arousal. He wanted her to make those sounds all night, he wanted her hoarse tomorrow and embarrassed because everyone would give her a knowing look each time she spoke. He sucked the dark skin into his mouth, wishing the small bruise would show.

How had he lived without this these last years? She even smelled the same, summer nights on the beach. He told her that after their first kiss, and she laughed, saying they’d never been near the ocean in their lives.