Warden (Elemental Paladins Book 1) (23 page)

“Don’t even!” Diana rumbled, sounding as equally as furious as Cali. “She has been here for over two weeks. There is no excuse good enough as to why a warden would be so low on energy that she is experiencing seizures. Wardens only do that when they are empty and practically dead!”

“She wouldn’t let us!” Lark shouted.

“And we didn’t know she was having seizures.” Beyden said pitifully looking like he had been whipped.

“I don’t want to hear it. She is a Warden and you are all paladins. Regardless of your histories your duty is first and foremost to see to the health of wardens. You should have forced the issue, found a way to get her to accept and understand. The lack is with you, not with Max.” Diana reprimanded and Max fell in love with her in that moment. Not only was the dark haired beauty glorious in her indignation, she was also defending Max of her own free will, expecting nothing in return. The others had all been nice to her, but their allegiance was clearly with Ryker. Diana was acting in the best interest of Max alone.

“I accept. Tell me what I have to do.” She stated simply. Max ignored all the shocked gasps around her and focused on Diana’s smile.

“Look at my aura. See all the colours? Now concentrate on them, on pulling them towards you. The energy contorts to your will, see it, hear it, touch it.” Max listened to the melody of Diana’s voice and followed her instructions. She was surprised when the colours shimmering around Diana seemed to dance and flirt with her as they moved gracefully towards her. It was almost too easy.

“Gold.” She said, probably making no sense to anyone, “Pretty.”

Diana smiled, “I’m glad you think so. Now feel the gold as it goes into your body. Just let it in. That’s it.” Diana praised.

She had been worried it would feel hollow and cold like when the chades tried to drain her but it was nothing like that. It was warm and peace-filled and felt as natural as breathing. How had she gone her whole life without this? She felt freaking amazing!

“How do you feel?” Cali asked as she offered her hand.

Max accepted and smiled in thanks as she let herself get pulled to her feet. She stretched her back, shook out her limbs and cracked her neck. She felt like she could run a marathon! She didn’t remember feeling this good – ever!

“I feel gooood.
Real gooood
.” She figured her smile was probably a little evil but shit, she felt like she could jump buildings with a single bound! She placed her hand on Diana’s arm and bowed her head in thanks. “Thank you for your service.” Diana acknowledged her silently with a dip of her head.

“Max …”

Max finally raised her eyes and met those of the other paladins. They all felt guilty and sad and pissed off but the emotion that had Max dialling back her snark was hope. They were feeling hopeful. Of what Max had no clue and at the moment she didn’t particularly care. She really did just want to get the hell out of there. “I’ll get my things and I would really appreciate it if I could get that lift into town I was promised nearly three weeks ago.”

“Max, please wait.” Axel stepped forward.

“No more platitudes guys. I’m not your Warden. You are not my paladins. I’m a piss-poor excuse for a warden anyway. I’m going to leave so I don’t fuck up your lives any more than they already are.”

“Five minutes.”

Despite herself, Max paused at the two roughly muttered words.
Be strong Max. He’s an arsehole playing at a good guy. Not a good guy playing an arsehole.
She really couldn’t survive another rejection from Ryker and his motley crew. And with all this lovely go-juice flowing in her veins, she was fairly tempted to smite his rock solid butt!

“Five minutes.” He repeated.

TWENTY-FIVE

Max hadn’t spoken a word but she had turned and walked out of the kitchen and straight down to the beach. She knew he followed because she could sense his presence as well as the air he displaced as he moved. She could also feel the way the sand shifted and absorbed his weight and hear how his pulse thundered in his carotid artery. Diana’s gold energy sure was some potent shit! Max felt like a hyperactive chipmunk, she wanted to run and leap and dance and … well, screw Ryker’s brains out. She figured that would be an efficient way of relieving herself of some of the excess energy. But unless the man was here to grovel at her feet and beg for mercy, then she would have to find another outlet.

“Are you going to ask me to stay?” She asked bluntly.

Ryker grimaced, stretching his scar. She still had no idea how he had received the terrible injury. But that grimace said it all. Not interested in anything else he had to say she turned and headed back the way she had come.

“It hasn’t been five minutes.” He yelled after her.

She dropped her head to her chest and spun back around. “You have three minutes left.”

He nodded and ran his hands through his unkempt hair in clear agitation. “It’s not that I don’t want you to stay Max. It’s just …” He trailed off.

“You don’t want another flawed reject around.” Max filled in the blanks. “I get it, don’t worry.”

“That isn’t it.”

“Yes it is. I’ve heard a lot about you over the past few weeks. You were one of the most respected paladins in history, born from a long line of honourable men and women, bound to serve and protect some of the most significant humans in the history of the world. Then suddenly, you became nothing – worse than nothing – you lost your honour within a society based on it. You lost your purpose so you hid yourself away in this beautiful secluded home to lick your wounds. You gave up and surrounded yourself with people who were as equally flawed as you so you could never be hurt or disappointed again. You take the snide comments and ignore the whispers behind your back because you think you deserve it. You don’t have enough guts to take on the responsibility of a warden again because you’re too afraid of what might happen if you fail.”

“Afraid? You think I’m afraid?” He stalked forward so he was nose to nose with her. “I’m not afraid, Max. I am bone-deep, piss my pants, makes me want to vomit, terrified!” His chest was rising and falling in rapid succession and Max could feel the fear pumping from him in waves. Despite herself she felt herself soften towards him as he continued;

“I failed! Don’t you get it Max? I failed them all! My Warden, my knights … nature itself! I was their Captain, their leader and they trusted me to protect them. They’re all dead Max. Every last one of them.”

Max nodded her head, really beginning to understand him now, “And you’re still alive.”

He barked out a harsh laugh, “Yes. And I’m still alive.”

Unable to help herself, Max placed her hand over his trembling arm. She didn’t think he was even aware that he was shaking. But he was – shaking and trembling and pale beyond belief. “You have survivor’s guilt.” And likely a very healthy dose of PTSD, Max added silently.

“Survivor’s guilt? Those two little words can’t even come close to describing how I feel.”

His body was turned to hers now, their fronts almost touching and she raised both arms to wrap around his neck, rubbing her thumbs back and forth just under his hair line. “Why don’t you tell me then?” She held her breath, awaiting his response. This moment was it. The last chance either one of them were going to get.

****

Ryker stared into the abyss of Max’s exotic eyes and felt himself falling even further under her spell. She was truly amazing, offering him comfort and an outlet for his steel-trapped emotions even after all the horrible things he had said and done since meeting her. And not ensuring to her health? Not forcing the vitality issue? Diana was right; he should be whipped. The feeling of her hands on his skin and the warm pressure of her body along his invited comfort, invited peace, and offered a safe haven for his thoughts and feelings. He wanted to bask in her forever. Dare he reveal his past to this incredible woman? A woman who had been born with great gifts and a higher purpose. A woman who had been alone her entire life with the hounds of hell snapping at her heels and yet still managed to be warm and giving and loving. A woman who experienced untold pain on a daily basis if this most recent episode was anything to go by. For the first time in decades Ryker felt thoroughly ashamed of himself. He had been feeling so sorry for himself for so long he had become blinded to the suffering of others. He had been assuaging his guilt by offering shelter to the others and offering his skills at the training lodge, contenting himself that his paladin status wasn’t going to waste, that he was contributing to their society. In actual fact, he had been hiding out and Max was absolutely right; he had been surrounding himself with people he thought were just as damaged as he was. The joke was on him though, given that Darius, Axel, Beyden, Lark, Cali and Diana were some of the best people he had ever known. They were knights through and through and he was proud to be associated with them.

“Ryker?”

He glanced down to find Max’s beseeching eyes once again studying his face. She was so beautiful. He had been around a lot of beautiful people in his time – Max was correct in thinking the paladins were blessed with good genes. But none other could compare to the tiny woman in front of him. Her hair was gleaming in the sunlight, throwing off rich flames of red and gold as it curled enticingly around her shoulders and breasts. Her face was flawlessly smooth, a rich cream canvas that was spread over rounded cheekbones before coming to a softly curved chin. She wasn’t smiling but he could picture the one dimple on the left side of her face just above those plump, Cupid’s bow lips of hers. They were naturally red and revealed even white teeth whenever she smiled – which was often. She had no hard angles on her anywhere, unlike many of the women warriors he had bedded over the years. Instead, she was soft and curvy from the top of her remarkable breasts to those flared hips of hers, ending in those smooth calves. That’s not to say she didn’t have her fair share of hard-won muscle. He felt the strength and resilience in her body each time they touched. He nearly groaned as his mind decided to give him a live action replay of their one time sleeping together. Now really wasn’t the time.

He took a deep breath and bent down to rest his forehead against hers, “Are you sure you really want to know?”

Her answering smile made his pathetic heart skip a beat, “I’m sure.”

Without thinking and doing what felt entirely natural, he placed a soft peck on her red lips and took her hand, “Let’s sit down.”

****

He started by telling her what it was like growing up in a loving home with one parent who loved him unconditionally and showered him with affection. His father had been an amazing man, a paladin of great honour descended from one of the highest ranking paladin casts in history. His domain had also been life and he was bound to one of the wardens on the International Council. When Ryker had been born, his father’s warden had coincidently also been pregnant. She had then taken a secondment so to speak for the next twenty years in order to raise her own son. He had never met his mother, she was a warden and was apparently horrified when she had given birth to a healthy paladin son instead of a warden like herself. She had dumped Ryker on his father’s doorstep and they had never seen her again.

Given he was now two hundred and five years old, he had grown up in the time before the Great Massacre. Back then in England, wardens were a lot more active in their roles and the role of paladins was a more extensive one than merely playing battery charger and bodyguard. Orders truly were like families, living and working together to ensure their domains were upheld, giving and taking vitality in equal measures. Ryker and Flint had practically been raised together and were like brothers. So when Ryker’s father had been killed alongside his warden, Flame, when he was thirty-five, it was the most natural thing in the world to bind himself to her son. Flint had become his liege and Ryker had spent the next one hundred and thirty years of his life guarding an amazing man and heading up the Order of Ember, alongside five other paladins.

The Order had made their way to Australia at the request of the International Domain Council just one year before the bloodbath. Chades had always been a part of their society and were a constant threat to wardens but their numbers had been steadily increasing, their attacks becoming more vicious and no one had known why. Their numbers seemed to be highest in the southern continent and they were congregating along the coast line here. His first year here had been a blur of fighting and hunting and fruitless investigations. Nobody could figure out where the chades were coming from or how they were gaining their strength. But more and more wardens were converting or being drained. Then one day fifty years ago, when hundreds of wardens and paladins from all over the world had gathered to discuss the crisis, the chades attacked
en masse
.

The foul creatures had pounced like starving, rabid dogs, ripping and shredding everything in their paths with poison-tipped claws. The world had narrowed into one black storm, as the writhing mass of dark shapes cut through seasoned warriors as if they were nothing. Wardens had been sucked dry, their vitality drained in a heartbeat into the empty voids of what used to be human mouths before they had become abominations. The earth had groaned, the wind had cried, water had bubbled and fire had roared as the elements tried to answer the warden's call for aid.

During the pandemonium, he and his Order had fought back to back, always keeping Flint between them, but the noble idiot just had to play the hero and move from their protective circle. He was struck down in an instant. His Order had broken formation in pain and vengeance and began striking out at anything that moved. Ryker had watched in horror as one by one his paladins fell under the weight of the chades. Ryker took a nasty slice to his face and had believed it was enough to kill him at the time. It was certainly what he wanted given that Flint had died in his arms, blood foaming through his lips and eyes glazed with agony.

He had become a whirlwind of violence, unleashing his fury onto the chades, as one by one, they began to fall in turn. He didn’t even realise when the massacre ended, but the silence had finally drawn his attention. When he tore his eyes from his fallen family and looked around, he thought his heart would stop on the spot. There was no way the wretched muscle could continue to beat when confronted with such gore. Hundreds of his brethren lay dead on the ground, stares fixed forever in sightless horror. The wizened husks of hundreds of wardens littered the blood soaked ground. And yet, there Ryker was, the sole beating heart in a field of silence.