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~ TARKYN ~

Tarkyn found a clearing a few minutes later. It took only a glance at the sergeant—who whistled and made a hand gesture—for the guards to spread out and leave him to himself. Oh, they would hover at the points of the compass, watching. They would follow their orders. But they wouldn’t interfere. And that was what was important.

Body humming with tension, mind spinning, rage roiling in his chest, Tarkyn walked slowly to the middle of the small clearing, hands fisted tightly at his sides.

He didn’t have a blindfold, so he closed his eyes. He didn’t have a scarf to block his ears, so he took a moment to breathe and tune his senses to nothing but his own heartbeat… and the power and might of the Creator watching.

And then he began to move.

He hadn’t been allowed a weapon, so he imagined it between his palms, the weight of the wooden handle smoothed by years of use, and the weight of the death that balanced on its blade, so benign when left alone, but shining and predatory in his hands.

He breathed deeply, feeling the swell of his chest, then positioned the imaginary spear with unflinching strength.

.....

Dead grass and twigs snapped under his feet as he took one step outward to plant his feet, balancing his weight, but he ignored the distraction as he raised his chin and brought the spear upright to the guard position and breathed deeply five times before widening his stance and beginning the familiar forms.

The ritual traditions were clear.

When Tarkyn had entered the Hallowed Grounds all those days ago, he had brought his plea to the feet of God, and he sacrificed himself for the answer.

And the Creator had answered. He had answered in the form of a soft-yet-strong she-wolf. A delight. A weapon. And a joy to him.

He had answered with the warmth of her body and smile, with the sharp intellect of her mind, and with the heart she was named for—so open and ready, brimming with love and acceptance.

The Creator had answered better than Tarkyn could even have hoped.

And now he threatened her?

Tarkyn growled.

He had entered the ritual in submission and surrender—willing to give himself, his well being, his life into the hands of the Creator that had held her away from him for all those years. Decades. He had accepted that. Submitted to his fate.

But now…

Now he would fight.

“No blindfold,” he muttered through his teeth, “because I was blind, but now I see,” he panted as he stepped to the right and swung the spear as if clearing a path through enemies. “My ears unblocked because I am no longer deaf—I hear the song of her soul,” he grunted, thrusting, then twisting it as if an enemy died under the blade of it. “Every ounce of breath and sweat because my efforts cannot be for naught.”

He turned, swinging the spear back up to the defensive position, then thrust again, “I was nothing…” then turning his head as if to hear something behind him, yanked the butt of the spear sharply back as if to catch an ambusher. “But now I am male. I am lover. I am mate.

“I came willing to bleed myself dry and you showed me the other half of my soul… and you would hold her so lightly? Ask me to hold her so lightly?” he seethed.

Tarkyn was the greatest living warrior in a people of warriors. The Captain of the Queen’s guard. Accomplished, strong and fit even among the Anima people. But he was still mortal. And for the first time in his life, he didn’t give a flying shit about what he could or couldn’t accomplish—except where it might affect her.

“You asked me to humble myself, and I did,” he hissed as he drew himself upright again. “Was it a joke? A trick? Were you taunting me?”

The wood was quiet and green around him, but as he completed the forms again and again, asking the question over and over, it began to fade.

To Tarkyn’s eyes, he had returned to the Hallowed Grounds.

To the feet of the Creator.

And to the discipline of the Ritual.

He had come to plead for his mate.

No, to demand her life, her safety—and their bond.

And as he did, his mind turned back to those days in which he’d sought her, when, as the ritual continued with no answer, he’d been plagued.

Perhaps his solitude was the Creator’s plan? Perhaps the Creator had always intended for him to spend this life alone?

Despair, thick and choking had crawled into his throat at the thought.

Now he wanted to spew it back out.

He had been faithful! He had given himself endlessly, asking nothing in return until this. And now… now he was given days?

His teeth gritted with rage as he thrust and turned, swung and thrust again, seeing not enemies before him, but promises. Convictions.

Hope.

He had done everything asked of him. Everything! Why would the Creator give him his mate only to deny him time with her?

Why should Tarkyn risk being deprived of that comfort in his aged years when he had been so faithful?

Why should he continue to risk himself, life and limb—why should he place himself and his mate in the hands of his enemies, when all the Creator did was continue to hold them both in peril?

Why should he defend his people and his Queen at risk of the heart that held his soul?

A tidal wave of rage, injustice, frustration, and fear tore through him and Tarkyn snarled, throwing himself into the forms again and again, roaring his rage.

“Why? Why would you threaten her this way? Why would you give her to me then hold this sword against her throat?! ANSWER ME YOU MOTHERFU—”

The root of a tree caught his heel and he tumbled—the warrior sent reeling to land on his ass in the dirt.

Hard.