Regret (Lady of Toryn Trilogy) (5 page)

Drake glanced down at their
joined hands, looking strangely unsure of himself. “I wouldn’t have risked it
if it weren’t absolutely necessary,” he said.

“But you
did it!
” she exclaimed, too much in awe to consider thanking him.
“How did you do it? I wasn’t even going to risk it, I mean, if a broken bone
had been anywhere near my heart, I can’t even imagine-“

“You may not agree with my
methods,” he admitted. “It wasn’t only the
heal
magic.”

“Well, whatever it was-” she
started to say, and stopped, realizing suddenly that he was still holding her
hand.

There was a pause as they both stared
at their clasped fingers, Drake’s bandaged hand rough against her palm.

After a moment, she gingerly
extracted her hand from his, and rubbed her chest, fingers tingling as she
tried very hard not to focus on the fact that Drake had been holding her hand
of his own accord.

She never thought she’d be so
grateful to
not
be in pain. Breaking
her ribs had been the single most agonizing experience of her life, and now- thanks
to Drake- she didn’t have to suffer through the excruciating healing process.
“What else did you use?”

Drake crouched by her for a
moment longer, then stood and walked to a pair of horses tethered to a tree, both
of which were already in full tack, waiting placidly.

Ashlyn slowly climbed to her
feet, expecting the usual pain that came with bumps and bruises, and was surprised
when she could feel none. It occurred to her then that she was still wearing
the dead soldier’s gi. “Where are we?” she asked, looking around. They were
still surrounded by trees, so they hadn’t left the forest, but otherwise there
was no way for her to tell their location. “Did Skye…?”

“He led them off,” Drake
answered. “Most of them.”

She knew what he wasn’t saying. Ashlyn
walked to the horse, leaves crunching beneath her bare feet. So they’d been
attacked, and she had been unconscious through the whole thing.

Some leader.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t any help,”
she muttered, reaching up to grasp the reins.

He reached up, hand covering
hers, and Ashlyn’s heart leaped into her throat, her pulse accelerating as she
fought to tamp down her own stupidity. Hormones, that’s all it was. Just
hormones.

She lifted her chin, eyes meeting
Drake’s determinedly. He’d broken her heart once already this week. She would
not give him that power over her a second time.

His gaze was fierce and liquid,
scarlet depths shifting as he searched her face. Whatever he saw, he gave no
indication of his response, and instead nodded to the pack that was neatly tied
behind the horse’s saddle. “Clothing,” he said.

Ashlyn pulled her hand from under
his and quickly turned to the pack. It was a bundle of clothes and flat-soled
boots that were exactly like the ones she’d destroyed while shifting- these had
presumably been taken from another ninja. Well, that made sense. Drake couldn’t
have anticipated her nakedness when he’d set out from Toryn. She was glad he’d
managed to get another horse, too. Riding double with him had definitely been
much too close for comfort.

She deftly untied the knots that
held the clothes in place, noting with some delight that her shuriken and sword
were secured underneath. She pulled the clothes down, clutching them to her
chest. “Turn around,” she said to Drake, and he obediently walked around to the
other side of the horse, facing the opposite direction as she untied the belt
of her bloody tunic.

Ashlyn paused as she unfolded the
pants, eyebrows knitting. Her right arm felt…strong. She held it straight out,
examining it for any changes. It was the arm that had been shredded by wolves
seven months ago in Landi, and she’d spent countless hours since the attack
training herself to use her left arm instead. But now her right arm felt as
strong as it had before the attack.

“What did you use besides
heal?”
she asked Drake, hopping on one
foot to pull on her pants.

“What do you mean?”

“You said it wasn’t only the
heal
magic that fixed me. What else did
you use? Something stronger?” As she tied on her new tunic, wrapping it tightly
around her slim torso and securing it with a green leather belt, it occurred to
her that Drake might have some stories of his own to tell, new magic that he’d
discovered in the three years since she’d last seen him. Restlyn had mentioned
that he owned a weapons shop, but hadn’t disclosed much else about the
enigmatic vampire.

Ashlyn paused, realizing he still
hadn’t answered, and walked around the horse, boots dangling from one hand.
“Drake?” she said, cocking her head. “You didn’t just fix my ribs. You fixed my
arm, too. How?”

He was staring at the ground, jaw
clenched, perfectly still and silent. After a long moment, he looked up, and his
eyes were still molten. His gaze dropped to her mouth, his lips parting, and
then he looked away, and Ashlyn frowned in spite of herself.

She almost hesitated, having seen
some of his moodier moments back when Lord Angelo was still alive. But she’d
never before caved to his darkness, and she wasn’t about to now. Instead, she
flopped down gracelessly on the ground in front of him, pulling one boot over
her foot. “What’s the matter, Lockhart? Did you give me the vampire kiss of
life or something? You don’t have to feel embarrassed about it. Vargo and I
have already had some hot and heavy make-out sessions that were
epic
, I am telling you,
epic
. It takes more than a single smooch
from a vampire to freak me out. Just consider me all grown up now.”
And totally over you and your meaningful
angsty silences,
she thought but did not say. She pulled on her second boot
and stood, brushing leaves off her pants.

He didn’t meet her eyes this
time, but held out one hand, the hand without his glove. Ashlyn looked down at
it, not comprehending. His hand was heavily bandaged, old blood seeped through
to stain the gauze covering his palm.

“Vampires heal fast, right?” she
said.

“Vampire blood has healing
properties,” he answered quietly.

“Vampire…blood,” she repeated.

Oh.

“Oh,” she said, and frowned. “You
gave me your blood? Like a transfusion?”

“Like a…drink,” he corrected her.

His obvious reluctance was
aggravating. “Oh, Drake, is that what you’re beating yourself up over?” she
said incredulously. “You used vampire blood to help heal my bones? I thought it
was something serious, like a new magic or whatever. Geez. Freak me out, why
don’t you.”

“Vampire blood can be used to
overcome its drinker’s free will,” he said, and his words were clipped, like
she’d somehow managed to offend him.

“Do I look like I’m in any danger
of losing my free will?” Ashlyn replied, perhaps a little too snidely,
spreading her arms out and turning for inspection. “Seriously, Drake. Thank you
for your concern, but believe me, losing my free will is the last thing I’m
worried about right now. I’d probably be more concerned about becoming a
vampire, but that takes a lot more than just one drink, right?”

“Yes,” he said. “The conversion
to vampirism takes weeks, even months, and requires several instances of
blood-drinking.”

To cover up the way her stomach
twisted at his response, Ashlyn stomped around and pulled herself up onto the
horse, fuming silently for several long moments before she looked down at him
again. “Are you coming? We need to find Skye.”

He paused for a moment, looking
as though there was something more he wanted to say, but eventually he shook
his head and swung up onto his own horse.

They rode in silence for quite
some time, with Ashlyn seething quietly. Drinking blood was gross enough in
itself, but it had been a necessary thing, given the situation. Yet somehow
he’d made her feel dirty with his reluctance to admit to the act- almost like
she wasn’t worth the effort. Knowing Drake and his ever-changing moods, she
wasn’t sure whether to be offended or just chalk it up to his usual lack of
manners.

“Where do you think we’ll find
Skye?” she asked finally.

“He was leading them west,” Drake
said. “If his plan succeeded, then he should have been able to drive them back
again and escape into the forest.”

“Using the
earth
stane,” Ashlyn said, nodding as she remembered Skye’s uncanny
skill with combat magic. During their battle with the general of the DEMON
Army, Skye had save her from falling to her death by using
earth
. If anyone were able to escape the
shift
army using magic, it would have been Skye.

“He planned to circle back and
head east to meet us, once he was certain he’d not been followed,” Drake
continued.

Ashlyn remembered the
reveal
stane then, and turned to untie
her shuriken from the back of the saddle. “Hang on just a sec,” she said, and
flipped the shuriken over, taking a moment to admire the familiar gleam of
reveal
within its slots. With everything
that was new and frightening, it was comforting to see that some things were
still the same. After a moment, she pulled the
heal
stane out of her armlet and swapped it with the
fire
stane from the weapon. She’d had
too many close calls, and she didn’t want to keep relying on
shift
to save her every time she lost
her shuriken.

Focusing on
reveal,
she silently willed it to lead her to Skye. The glittering
trail of orange fireflies materialized in front of her, causing her horse to
toss its head in surprise at its sudden appearance.

“
Reveal,”
Ashlyn said when Drake gave her a questioning glance.
“I…um…borrowed it?”

“Borrowed,” he said, and there
was a hint of a smile around his lips.

“Yeah. Well…” She urged her horse
on, following the glittering path, which was significantly less sparkly in the
late afternoon sun that streamed through the branches overhead than it had been
in the darkness of night.

Drake’s horse matched pace with
hers as they wove their way through the trees, each watching vigilantly for any
sign of Toryn ninjas.

“It was just you and Skye?”
Ashlyn asked suddenly, remembering the note she’d left behind the night before.

Drake glanced over at her, clearly
understanding what she was asking and seeming to consider his response. “Vargo
stayed in the city,” he said at length. “The Spartans are assisting Restlyn in
assuming temporary leadership of Toryn.”

Leave it to Drake to know exactly
what she was thinking. Ashlyn knew she shouldn’t say anything more about it,
but her curiosity got the best of her. “Was Vargo…mad?” she asked, dreading the
response, but taking a perverse kind of pleasure in asking Drake for details.

Drake made a noise in his throat,
almost like a growl. “No one in FLD approved of your actions, Ashlyn.”

Her eyes narrowed. She didn’t
want to hear lectures from him. “I knew you and Skye would come after me. Well…Skye,
anyway.”

He was silent for a moment, and
then said, “Only you would question my allegiance in circumstances such as
this.”

“Only you would tell me you don’t
feel
anything after spouting off
about rainbows and destiny,” she retorted, glad for a lead-in to the inevitable
argument. “Do you make a habit of seducing people with pretty words and then rejecting
them, or is it just me?”

He looked affronted. “I
healed your wounds
.”

“Oh yes, that makes it all
better. Ease my suffering by letting me drink your blood. Newsflash, Lockhart,
that only works on fixing broken bones, not broken hearts.”

“Did it mean nothing to you?” he
snapped, wheeling his horse about and facing her. “A bond exists between us now
that cannot be severed. This is not something to be taken lightly.”

“No, and nothing involving you
ever is, is it?” she burst out. “That’s why we’re so
horribly different,
and that’s why it was dumb of me
to even
wonder
if you could feel something for an immature brat
like me! It’s never that simple with
you, you can’t just let go and let things
be.
I’ll tell you what, Drake, I
wish
I’d
lost my free will, because at least then I wouldn’t have to feel responsible
for my stupid decisions and my stupid
emotions!”

They stared at each other for
what seemed like an eternity, but was probably just a few moments, her dark
eyes boring into his red ones, the tension between them a tangible thing. Eventually
Ashlyn turned away, and began to follow the path again. She urged her horse
into a slow lope, letting the wind sting her eyes and whip any semblance of
tears away.

As they rode and the minutes
ticked by, Ashlyn’s anger began to ebb, and very soon she was feeling quite
foolish over her outburst. She had left Toryn in the middle of the night, and
rather than chastising her for her stupidity, Drake had come after her. He’d
not only rescued her, he had also healed her, an act of magic that took far
more skill and concentration than she herself possessed. It seemed awfully
petty to beat him up over his lack of romantic interest in her.