Her Reaper's Arms (19 page)

Perhaps it was because English had come down with rabies and was a danger to

everyone and everything around him, or it might have had something to do with the

carnage the
balgair
had left behind in his rundown shack.

“By the gods!” Reece had exclaimed as he took in the slaughtered nuns dangling

from the walls. “This is bad. This is really bad!”

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

But it had been the Reaper who had destroyed the evidence of English’s perfidy

and for that Penthe bore him a begrudging amount of respect. Had she not been

engaged in the third day of mourning for Asteria, she would have come out from the

place she’d been hiding to attack the Reaper, but the dictates of her religion had

prohibited her the use of her weapons during the
Pentheo
, the triad of mourning days.

Antimache and Myrine had gone on with the three
balgairs
to Lawler while Penthe

had stayed behind to bury her dead and say the prayers for Artesia’s soul. Her only

regret was that in her grief at losing her lover, she had failed to bury Artesia’s Dóigra

with her in the grave.

She hadn’t been there when the
balgairs
had bought it at Coure’s hands, or when

Antimache and Myrine had taken the captured breeding stock up into the
Ostria
. If she

had, she would be flying free among the shades as were the captain and lieutenant—or

roasting alongside them in the Abyss.

She supposed she had Coure to thank for not having met her fate in the barn.

A deep frown shifted over Penthe’s face. She tested what she was feeling at that

moment as one would a decayed tooth—pushing at it, probing the sensation—and

realized she no longer bore any ill will toward the Reaper for the destruction of the

ship. He had not caused it. The Triune Goddess had and why?

“Because they tried to snatch Her precious Reaper,” Penthe reasoned.

Okay, she thought as she mulled that one over. She didn’t fault the Reaper for the

destruction of the ship so she couldn’t blame him for the possibility of remaining on this

stupid world. Neither was his fault. But there was still the matter of avenging her

ancestor’s vendetta against Coure. But then, she realized, there was a problem with that

as well.

“The man was a priest,” Artesia had commented. “He had taken a vow your greatgreat-grandmere bid him break. Was there honor in that?”

Her lover’s question had precipitated a violent argument that had lasted for days

with Artesia reminding her that Coure had not been a male captured during a skirmish

or even during a raid. He had been assigned as a priest to Rathlin and had not even

been on Amazeen soil when Kennocha Tramont had him imprisoned for denying her.

“Think on what you have agreed to do, Penthesilea,” Artesia had declared. “You

are taking up a vengeance no other warrioress has agreed to in all the years since your

great-great-grandmere declared the
Edikeõ
, the Vengeance, because they knew there

was no honor in it. Why would you? And why now?”

Penthe had her reasons and it was not so much that she had wanted to perform the

Antapodidõmi
, the Pay Back, by taking on the mantle of a Blackwind but that she wanted

to leave Amazeen, to soar past the anomaly of the Carbondale Gate—that section they

called The Sinisters—and journey into the vast unknown of the megaverse in search

of…

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Her Reaper’s Arms

“Adventure,” Penthe whispered, disgusted with herself. She sat up and ran a

distracted hand through her thick brown hair. “Adventure and glory at bringing home

a Reaper.”

But would her sisters be happy that she had taken on something none of them had

been willing to do? Or that she had brought home to them a Reaper who—by rights—

had done them no harm whatsoever? It was not as though he were their enemy, had

caused them the first trickle of trouble. He had not. As far as the elders knew, the only

bad thing Bevyn Coure had ever done was steal an apple from one of his instructors

because the boy had not eaten in seven days.

Penthe turned her head and looked at the apple cores she had casually tossed into

the corner of the loft. Had she not stolen to fill her belly? Was that not her only crime so

far on this gods’ forsaken, backward world? She had not gathered up the breeding stock

nor locked the women in the church nor the older men and young boys in the jail. That

had been carried out by Antimache and her lieutenant and the
balgairs
.

While all that was going on, she’d been lying in wait for the Reaper, ready to stun

him with the Dóigra and carry him aboard the
Ostria
. She’d taken no part in the deaths

of the Terran men.

Turning over, she crawled on her belly and carefully lifted her head to look out the

loft. The sun was lower in the heavens but it was broiling hot outside. She saw the men

toiling with the building, hammers busily rising and falling, saws rasping back and

forth, tin panels being carried up to the rafters where the Reaper sat straddling a

support, a clutch of nails between his lips.

By the gods, the man was prime as he sat there, his bare chest gleaming with sweat.

He’d discarded his hat for a bandana that covered his thick dark hair and was tied at

the nape of his neck. His muscles flexed and pulled as he hammered the tin into place.

Though his fingers were sheathed in thick black gloves so he could handle those hot

panels, Penthe could almost feel the strength in his hands, could see it bunching in his

shoulders as his hammer rose and fell.

And then he was looking straight at her, their eyes locked.

“Oh shit,” Penthe said, going completely still.

He had felt her presence and now he knew where she was. She stared at him unable

to move as he poised there with his hammer at his shoulder, looking her way.

Peripherally she saw other heads turn to see what had grabbed his attention and one

man pointed to the loft.

Eyes were shielded as they turned her way. Everyone there was aware of her now.

Though she could dematerialize into vapor as all Blackwinds could, where would she

go?

Then Coure did something completely unexpected. He turned his eyes from her

and drove the hammer hard against the nail.

“Come down, milady,” the Reaper called out to her, “and join us.”

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

For a long while Penthe lay there with her hands clutched into the hay, looking out

the loft window, watching the townsfolk looking up at her, no one speaking, no one

stirring save the Reaper who had moved to another section of the tin panel and was

busily hammering away as though he had all the time in the world. His woman had

stood up and was staring at Penthe with concern.

Her brows drawn together, the Blackwind considered dematerializing but her belly

was rumbling and her thirst was such that her mouth was as dry as the dust flitting

down from the stable’s rafters. She licked her dry lips then sighed.

“Come down,”
she heard him whisper into her mind
. “I mean you no harm
.”

“What if I mean
you
harm, Reaper?”
she sent back to him, and was stunned when he

laughed.

“I think I can handle you, wench,”
he chuckled.

Penthe smiled even though she sent him a mental snort. Getting up, dusting the hay

shards from her jumpsuit, she slid down the loft’s ladder—boots to either side of the

ladder’s uprights—not caring if she made any noise now. She strutted out of the stable,

ignoring the stunned looks of the men and the uneasy looks of the women.

Lea was staring at the tall—she had to be at least seven feet—female with broad

shoulders and short brown hair who came striding purposefully from the stable. The

woman’s long legs and wide upper body were encased in a type of one-piece garment

that fit her like a glove. When she cast an insulting look over Lea before heading

straight for Bevyn, that look made the hair stir on Lea’s arms for the woman had a tribal

tattoo that covered the whole of her right cheek.

Bevyn stopped hammering and sat there on the rafter with his wrist resting on his

knee, his leg drawn up to ease the ache in his ass caused by the hard lumber upon

which he’d been perched for over an hour. He stared down at the woman who came to

stand directly beneath him with her hands on her hips. The dark green eyes looking

back at him were filled with a vibrant emotion he could not ignore.

“I am Commander Penthesilea Aracnea,” the woman stated. “I am the descendant

of…”

“Kennocha Tramont,” the Reaper interrupted.

“I came to take you back to Críonna,” Penthe told him.

“You’ll play hell doing it,” Lea snapped.

Penthe flicked an amused look over the Terran woman and then returned her

attention to the Reaper.

“I know little of Blackwinds,” Bevyn said. “What is it they call what you have

sworn to do?”

“
Antapodidõmi
,” Penthe replied.

“Which means?” he probed.

“Pay Back.”

“Pay Back for what?” Lea demanded.

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Her Reaper’s Arms

“Her ancestor believes I wronged her,” Bevyn said. He stood and walked the rafter

like an acrobat, easily and without a moment’s wobble. He climbed down the ladder

and turned to the other workers. “That’s it for today, men. I’m tuckered out.”

“Wronged her how, milord?” Lea asked.

Everyone else was standing about as though they had been turned into statues. It

was so quiet the proverbial pin could have been heard dropping.

“She wanted me and I refused her,” he answered.

“I imagine many women wanted you,” the Blackwind said softly.

“What is Kennocha to you?” he asked Penthe.

“She
was
my great-great-grandmere,” Penthe replied.

“Ah, so the beastess is no more,” Bevyn said, folding his arms over his chest. He

was less than three feet away from the Amazeen Blackwind, his gaze steady on hers.

“She was laid to rest thirty years ago,” Penthe declared. “It has taken me this long

to find you.”

Bevyn tilted his head to one side. “You can not be much older than that, wench.

What are you? Thirty-four? Thirty-five?”

Penthe raised her chin. “Forty-four, but I thank you for the compliment, Reaper,”

she said with pride.

“You wear your years well, milady,” he said. “So at the tender age of fourteen you

declared yourself my enemy and began to seek me out.”

“I would not say I declared you an enemy, Reaper, as it were. I simply wanted the

pleasure of catching you and bringing you back. You must admit you would be quite

the trophy.” Observing his raised eyebrow, she shrugged. “Perhaps I was a bit hasty in

seeking you out, milord,” she replied, the closest she would ever come in her lifetime to

asking anyone’s apology.

They stared at one another for a long, long time without either blinking then the

Reaper slowly smiled.

“Are you hungry?” he asked, unfolding his arms and walking past her, turning his

back to her, though the men tensed and the women gasped, for the strange woman was

holding a lethal-looking weapon in her hand as though it were a lance.

“I am starved, warrior,” Penthe admitted.

“Then you’ll be glad to know my lady is an excellent cook,” Bevyn said.

Lea’s eyes were narrowed as the tall woman fell into step beside the Reaper.

“I could eat a horse,” Penthe noted, “although yours I would gladly fight you to

possess.”

“Préachán is a stalwart steed,” the Reaper said. “And one for whom I would battle.”

“Would you consider it?” Penthe asked. “Fighting me for the mount?”

Bevyn shook his head. “No.”

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

Penthe shrugged. “Too bad,” she said. “It might have been fun to have you

stretched out beneath me.”

Lea stiffened and opened her mouth to comment, but her Reaper reached out to

thread his fingers through hers, drawing her to him. “I love you,” he said so quietly

only Lea heard him.

Penthe ignored the Terran woman whose hand was clasped in the Reaper’s. She

walked with him to the blanket, and when he dropped down, pulling his woman with

him, she scowled. She looked pointedly at the basket from which the woman had fed

Bevyn Coure earlier.

“Tell me what it is you expect to happen here, milady,” Bevyn requested of Penthe

as the Blackwind hunkered down on the blanket, the Dóigra clutched tightly in her

hand.

“Unless my people come for me, I am trapped on this world,” Penthe replied. “A

warrioress among women scared of their own shadows.” She raked Lea with an

insulting glance.

“Let’s you and me get something straight,” Lea said, her hand tensing in Bevyn’s.

“Touch my man at your peril. I might not have your strength, I might not be a

warrioress, but your back won’t always be turned away from me and I can be a spiteful

bitch when I want to be.”

Penthe’s green eyes flared. “Are you challenging me?” she hissed.

“No, she is not. She is simply warning you as I will warn you,” Bevyn said. “If you

touch one hair on her pretty little head, you’ll have me on you in a way I promise you

won’t like, wench.”

Penthe swept him a heated look. Up close the man was by far the most handsome