CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Luscia
An arrow soared past Luscia’s shoulder, nearly enlisting a collection of blonde hairs in its lethal pursuit.
She twisted in the saddle to see that the target was an average-sized buck grazing among the farthest trees in the distance. Assessing the trajectory of Zaethan Kasim’s arrow and the angle at which it sailed, Luscia abandoned her long-awaited discourse with a certain Orynthian prince and kicked the mare into a run.
The savage whooping and howling of Kasim and his warriors died when they realized she’d dashed to greet their conquest, though she hardly cared. A Darakaian wouldn’t see what she did and, likely, wouldn’t be too concerned if he could. Once in the animal’s vicinity, Luscia slowed her horse, but did not wait for the mare to halt. Seamlessly, she slid from the saddle and sprinted the rest of the way on foot.
Lying on the forest floor, the buck struggled to breathe. It was as she’d anticipated. Kasim’s aim had been too low to strike the skull and yet too high to plunge the heart or liver. She dropped to the earth and cradled the deer’s head in her lap, soothing him with Boreali hymns. With one hand she stroked the frightened animal, while the other reached beneath her surcoat and gripped her consort dagger, Ferocity.
“Tadöm, Ana’Brödre. Tredae’Aurynth,” she whispered tenderly in the buck’s ear. Her mother’s blade caressed the hairs of his neck and ended his suffering.
Warm blood oozed from his throat and soaked her outer gear. Gently, she moved the head off her thighs, careful to avoid his antlers, as the band of Southern hunters rushed toward the macabre scene on horseback. Never before had Luscia seen anyone ride as the Darakaians did. Bows drawn, they stood in the saddle as their stallions galloped underneath, like a tidal wave of menacing, monochromatic towers charging in unison.
“Get away from my kill!” the al’haidren to Darakai barked as he leapt from his stunning, if erratic, Andwele stallion. “Tell me what you did! Did you curse it? Or is bathing in its blood just another filthy y’siti custom?”
Luscia studied Kasim’s bright eyes. A genuine accusation of sorcery boiled behind them. Ire settled in her belly at his routine use of the derogatory term. His lip curled into a fleeting snarl, twisting his usually appealing features. A slim yet powerfully built woman came to stand at his side, though she lingered a foot behind. By her tattooed cheek, shaved head and the whittled bone sheathing both ears, Luscia quickly recognized her as the female who’d guarded Dmitri’s apartment the night she arrived in Bastiion. The confidence the woman projected suggested she was either Kasim’s mate or held a high ranking within his pryde.
“I saved him from the misery of a poor shot,” Luscia squarely replied as she wiped Ferocity clean with the edge of her surcoat. She pushed a few stray hairs out of her face, untroubled by the trace of crimson her fingers left along her jaw.
“This is a hunt! Your kind have no authority here. How dare you mark and claim what is mine!” Kasim pointed to the carcass and back at Luscia.
Luscia’s eyes charted the jerky motion of his hand. A series of newly healed hatch marks decorated his knuckles.
Violent, this one, she considered.
“This is a life, Lord Darakai. One given for your enjoyment,” she added when he started up again, refusing to be bated by his outbursts. “Make use of it all. Don’t you dare waste him.”
Luscia strode back to her mare, feeling no obligation to continue the exchange. She’d come on this excursion for one purpose, and it was not to be disrespected by the al’haidren to Darakai. She heard him shout his displeasure from where they huddled over the dead buck, but Luscia ignored his remarks. If one indulged the tantrums of a child, one encouraged them—a principle she likewise applied to Zaethan Kasim.
By the time she resettled in her saddle, Marek’s scarlet head had emerged through the foliage as he led Dmitri to find the rest of the group. Aksel trotted between their mounts, the white fur of his muzzle bloodstained by a recent meal. Eager to roam freely, the restless lycran had disappeared an hour earlier. Luscia knew he’d find her once finished. She whistled for him to come near, as the presence of her northern predator wouldn’t help to calm the already edgy band of Darakaians.
“Ana’Sere,” Marek murmured through tight lips, though he was still yards away. “Did anyone touch you?”
She knew he really asked if the al’haidren to Darakai had overstepped his bounds again. Ever since Kasim’s intrusion in her common room, the Boreali captaen remained watchful for any excuse to retaliate. Even though the prince had ordered his hound out of her apartment shortly after, her men would not forget Kasim’s impudence so easily. In Boreal, protocol required she be spoken to with dignity and respect. It was understandable that anything less would enrage the men who’d sworn to protect her until their final breath.
Niit, Luscia mouthed to the captaen.
When he tilted his head in question, perplexed by her earlier departure, she jerked her chin toward the deer carcass being tied onto the back of a Darakaian’s horse and the wound she’d made along its neck. Turning back to Marek, she watched him close his eyes and smile. He understood. As his lips stirred, she knew the captaen offered thanks to the High One for the animal’s sacrifice as well.
Unaware of their silent dialogue, Dmitri urged his horse forward until parallel with Luscia. His was a beautiful steed, she had to admit. During their travel to the southeastern border of the outer proper, the prince had shared how his mare was twin to the headstrong stallion ridden by his oldest friend. Even beyond their dispositions, his Harmonia appeared to be the exact inverse of her sibling. Where Hellion’s black hide shone beneath his cotton white mane, her grey body gleamed under a mane that spilt across her neck like ink on a page.
“Ah, Zaeth! Good aim, my friend!” Dmitri cupped his hands and called to the other al’haidren, then turned to address Luscia. “You took off so fast, I’d hardly enough time to realize what happened! Your man Bailefore insisted we’d find you all by following your wolx here.”
“To Aksel, I am pack.” Luscia shrugged. “He could pick up my scent a mile away, even in a snowstorm. When he was no longer a pup, we tried to introduce him to another lycran pack, but to no avail. The brute kept returning home to me.”
“It’s amazing, is it not? If not for the diluted war-taint in his veins, this fox-wolf hybrid could not exist,” Dmitri said admiringly. “How’d you come to find him in the first place? My maps suggest a fair distance between Clan Roüwen and the Orallach Mountains.”
Luscia grinned at the prince’s earnest attempt to study every aspect of his realm, even the most remote corners.
“When I was fifteen, my father journeyed to Clan Ciann to convene with their elders. On his journey back, he heard the cries of a lycran pup, either lost or abandoned. Winter was in the wind, and he couldn’t bring himself to leave it out there alone.” She chuckled, reminiscing on her father’s sentimentality. “The mighty Clann Darragh carried Aksel inside his bear-pelt coat the entire trek home.”
Bearing the name of Boreal’s second hero, Aksel had undoubtedly fulfilled his calling. Meaning Champion of Peace, he was gifted to her more out of necessity than affection. Orien Darragh had sensed that, like the frightened, traumatized pup in hand, adolescent Luscia might find peace in the lycran’s companionship. That perhaps Aksel’s deep, untroubled breaths could lull her to sleep and help her heal the wounds beneath those marring her neck, after the initial months of turmoil three years ago.
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Most nights, Luscia still needed him.
“When you meet those who offer such unwavering loyalty, it is difficult to leave them.” Dmitri sighed, his melancholy dragging Luscia’s mind back to the present.
She paused. Her hand rose to lift her collar out of habit, where it shielded the ugly evidence of those memories. Quickly, she dropped it to pick up the reins instead. Luscia directed the mare to follow Kasim’s men, who led them out of the wood back into the plains. Time was dwindling, and despite Alora’s warning to avoid the topic, Luscia was determined to take advantage of the prince’s cheery frame of mind. Soundless to most, she instructed Marek to fall back and allow them privacy.
“Your Highness—”
“Dmitri.”
Luscia smiled wryly at his insistent tone. “Dmitri…you must expect I wish to discuss the shocking information uncovered yesterday morning. Boreal was already abreast of the deaths in the northern port towns, but not of the cases your al’haidrens to Bastiion and Darakai seem so familiar with.” She risked a glance in his direction and found him nodding in agreement. “I’d like to request permission for our najjan to investigate these crimes. As the emerging pattern pertains to my House, Boreal should be involved. We deserve the opportunity to seek justice for our own cross-castes. However, they’ll need full disclosure—if you’ll permit them access through the Unitarian plains to seek it.”
“I agree, Luscia, but my hands are tied,” he said regretfully, fidgeting with the reins in his hands. “My father entrusted the matter to Commander Kasim. Even as crown prince, I hold little influence in military matters.”
“With all due respect, my kinsmen are being hunted, Your Highness. Hunted within this very Proper,” Luscia countered, searching his hazel eyes. “Are you unwilling to even try petitioning your father on Boreal’s behalf?”
“With all due respect, Lady Boreal, those cross-castes are breakaways. Per the Ethnicam’s Accords, they are no longer considered citizens of the House of Boreal.” The prince’s voice steadied and adopted a new, authoritative tone. “I might concur with your sentiments, but the fact remains that these deaths do fall under Unitarian jurisdiction and therefore must be investigated by the military and the prydes. If time does not favor their efforts, then I may eventually have reason to contest. Unfortunately, for now, both you and I are confined by the same Accords in this matter.”
“If you wait to confront the king, more will be sentenced to death by the delay,” she sternly warned, though mindful with whom she spoke. “Darakaians do not care for the Boreali, Your Highness. What is a Boreali cross-caste to them?”
“A cross-caste who is not permitted to reside within your own borders. So, what is a Boreali cross-caste to you, Lady Boreal?” He candidly shifted in his saddle to face her, waiting for an answer.
Yet it was an answer she could not provide him.
Luscia could not allude to what was at stake. Regardless of the crown that would one day grace his head, a higher allegiance required Luscia to tread cautiously. Upon her Ascension, she, too, became oath-sworn to protect the light sheltered within Aksel’s Keep. However much she wished to, Luscia could not speak to Dmitri Korbin Thoarne of the Dönumn Lux, the Gift of Light sheltered in the mysterious basin of Aksel’s Keep. Not yet.
“The Boreali way of life can be…difficult for some cross-castes to embrace, as I’m sure you’ve heard.” She severed eye contact and gazed forward, not liking the direction their conversation had taken. “Our breakaways choose to leave because they do not wish to carry our burden or follow our creed. But this does not mean our House has broken from them. These deaths are a horrific, legitimate assault against Boreali blood, and there’s no amount of litigation that can diminish that fact.”
“My father trusts the House of Darakai to resolve it, and I must follow suit. The cross-castes belong to Bastiion,” Dmitri promptly surmised, closing their debate. “I’d appreciate your support in this, Luscia. As al’haidren to Boreal, your example will set the tone for how your people are to respond to these attacks.”
Luscia’s lips parted in shock. It seemed the prince of Orynthia was just like any other Unitarian politician, gathering allegiance with the promise of betterment, but too content to actually challenge anything. She had been foolish to buy into his flowery speeches and late-night conferences. And not only had she fallen victim to Dmitri’s moving words, like a naive little girl, but Luscia had also failed Boreal in her first cause for diplomacy.
Anger simmered beneath her alabaster skin. It melded with the sweat coursing down her back, a gift from the unforgiving sun.
They rode in uneasy silence over the next hour or so, while Luscia reevaluated her argument and the conclusion Dmitri had ultimately offered in exchange. She was furious with them both—the prince for proving to be the embodiment of Bastiion, and herself for not seeing it sooner. Had Alora also suffered such constricting disappointment for the last twenty-five years?
Luscia pressed her mare to keep up with the Darakaians, who beat the trail ahead with fervor. A lagoon of tall grasses danced for miles around their party, a peaceful contradiction to the fanatical rush of riders before her.
She shared their urgency. For once they’d returned to Bastiion’s inner proper, Luscia intended to have a long overdue conversation with her captaen.
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“Might I ask where we’re running off to, Ana’Sere?” Marek questioned between strides, evidently concerned by Luscia’s impatience as she advanced down the corridor.
“Niit!” She whipped around and shushed him. “Not here, Captaen!”
Aware she resembled the very Northern zealot Alora had cautioned Luscia against becoming, she hauled the confused captaen along in search of a secluded space, sheer frustration propelling her forward. She recalled a private alcove somewhere along these halls. Luscia had attended Bastiion’s trivial functions, stood poised in the face of their mockery, but the time for passivity was over. Her need could not wait.
“Bolaeva, Ana’Sere. Please, if you would just explain your distress, then I could—”
Hurriedly, Luscia turned at the next bend, but ran into a chest of maroon damask. The impeccable fabric reeked of ladies’ perfume.
“Well, what a treat,” came an inviting tenor. “And here I thought we wouldn’t see each other today. You were in quite a rush to find me, Crumpet—in need of a more experienced escort, are you?” Ira Hastings suggestively arched a tidy brow at her.
Shtàka, Luscia cursed silently and frowned, realizing she had begun to adopt Unitarian slang. She had also assumed she’d escaped his company when the al’haidren to Bastiion declined to join Dmitri’s hunt that morning, and she didn’t have time for this nonsense.
She looked from Ira, who reclined against the stone wall, to the young courtier beside him, pouting with both hands on her remarkably slender hips.
“Ira, how rude you are!” the courtier scolded, swatting his arm.
“Forgive my manners, Lady Crumpet.” He winked at Luscia. “Allow me to introduce my insufferable sibling, Flourette Hastings. There—satisfied, you festering measle?”
“Hardly.” Flourette rolled her rust-colored eyes and reached for Luscia’s clenched fists. “Ignore Ira, he’s such a twiddleton. But you and I, our acquaintance is so belated! His Highness personally asked me to take you under my wing and share how we do things here in Bastiion.”
“Did he, now?” Luscia felt her nostrils flare.
“Oh, I don’t mind coaching you in a few areas,” the girl assured as she openly studied the hair drooping from Luscia’s braids, blanching slightly when she noticed the blood in it. “Ahem. Besides, friends share many effects with each other…”
Flourette’s eyes jumped to the najjani captaen, appraising his form. A coquettish grin appeared, and she batted her lashes excessively. Suddenly enraged, Luscia wrenched her hands out of Flourette’s and gripped Marek’s forearm. A menacing sound rattled from the back of her throat as she stepped around the Hastings siblings, jerking the captaen with her.
Behind her, Luscia heard Flourette gasp. “Ira! Did she just growl at me?”
“Yes. Yes, I think she did,” Ira answered approvingly.
After another series of rapid turns, Luscia spotted the alcove to the left. Detecting no further pests in the corridor, she reeled Marek into the shadows, eager to move into action.
“By Aurynth, Ana’Sere!”
Luscia advanced, pinning Marek against the stone. “The luxiron— where is it?”
“You saw.” His lips flattened. “It was confiscated.”
“Marek…” Luscia whispered, shaking her head. She propped her leg on the molding, pressing against his own. Her fingers dropped to hike back the fabric of her surcoat where it split along her thigh. “You and I both know that was not all we carried with us into Bastiion.”
Much like their luxsmiths, Boreali woodcrafters were just as skillful in their expertise, proven by the trunks that Bastiion’s own sentry had delivered to her apartments. Namely, the secret compartments built into ever single one of them. Flashing the hilt of Ferocity, she continued, “I’ve learned there are training spaces on the floor above. I think it’s time we christened one.”
Luscia saw the muscles of his jaw flex as he peered down at her, registering their rare proximity. She heard his breathing shift to a measured tempo. With each inhale, the plaited leather across his chest brushed her breasts before retreating with the next exhale.
“Wem.” Marek swallowed and dropped his eyes to where they touched. “I will gather the men and meet you in thirty minutes.” Swiftly, his gaze darted back to meet hers. “What calls to you?”
Luscia smiled with all her teeth. “Bring me the wraiths.”
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