Page 27 of Bounty Hunter

She steps away, shooting me a dirty look. “Keep your distance.” She goes back to studying the map after she decides she’s a decent distance from me and frowns. “I’m in charge, and we’ll be visiting the fae first.” She gives me a pointed look, then looks at the map again. “We are much, much further than we were in Kivan. The river did a number on our travel days.”

There’s nothing to say to that. It’s frustrating, but the river was the only option to escape the goblins, so I can’t regret it. I fiddle with the strap of one of my scabbards while she continues to look over the map. I’m about to begin breathing exercises to extend my patience.

Finally, she seems to make a decision and folds up the map decisively. I have zero confidence that she has chosen the best route. So, naturally, I begin tosuggest one.

“It would be fastest if we?—”

“I don’t need your opinion.” She throws her pack over her shoulders and starts walking.

My instinctive response, drilled into me for over twenty years, is to reprimand her for her disrespect, like she’s one of my soldiers, but she’s not. I hold my tongue, barely. The problem is, if she doesn’t accept my help, it’s very likely that I’m going to end up forever cuffed to this stubborn woman.

It’s been almost an entire day since we left the riverside. We made camp a few miles from the river and attempted to get a few hours of sleep, then continued our journey early this morning. Before long, we found the deep black canyons that this desert is known for. Maze-like, tiny paths wind through its narrow crevices. Some of them are wide enough to travel side-by-side, but most aren’t, and some I even have to turn sideways to get through. Others are pitch black, enclosed, tube-like tunnels we’re forced to scramble through. A claustrophobic’s nightmare. Even with the suns high in the sky, the canyons are so deep and narrow that the light that reaches the bottom where we travel is dim and dusty. Occasional winds kick up the loose sand beneath our feet and send it flying around and over us, so much so that my clothing and skin feel gritty. I keep my mouth pressed shut. Don’t need sand there as well.

She glances every so often at me, cool gray eyes full of distrust and hate. I keep my face wiped of all expression. I don’t want her to know how irritated I am. According to the document she showed me, I have been classified as a Class A criminal. I don’t want to be proud of that, but it does help ease the sting of being cuffed by an obviously inexperienced hunter. I try notto show that I care too much about the cuff, but whenever I catch a glimpse of it on my wrist, I have to tamp down a frown. It’s a literal, portable prison. My magic is stopped like water behind a solid dam. I force the pressure of my magic against the cuff, testing and attempting to pull and manipulate it, but it doesn’t work. I’m basically an Absent. I hope my skill and strength with weapons and fighting are enough to fend off anything we come up against during this journey, but my hope is lacking. I’ve relied on my magic heavily these last few years to win the bigger gloam battles. Without my magic, if I can’t protect her, and she dies, this cuff is stuck forever and my kingdom is doomed. And to top it all off, the small woman walking ahead of me is infuriating. Nothing like a charmed cuff and an arrest to thank someone for rescuing you, and an attitude much larger than her small frame to top it all off. It doesn’t help that I feel like an idiot for dropping my guard after I rescued her. I’d made an easy catch.

“How long have you been a hunter?”

“I started working with hunters five years ago,” she says evasively.

So, not even a hunter. The shame surrounding my arrest deepens, and I want to punch the nearest canyon wall, but I’d probably end up with busted knuckles for the duration of this eternal journey, and I no longer have Darvy as a healer. The vulnerability is real, and I don’t like it.

“If not a hunter, what faction are you?”

“Why do you care?” She raises a brow with another heavy dose of attitude for such an innocent-looking woman.

“Just wondering who arrested me.”

“You don’t need to know anything about me.”

“So we just walk in silence, and I trust that you are who you say you are and that you know where you’re going?”

“That would be preferable.” She smiles sweetly, but there’s venom in her words. The sandy winds have pulled strands of her dark brown hair from her braid, and they float around her face in a wispy dance. At first glance in that tavern, I thought she was too skinny, boyish even, in her oversized clothing. But right now, with her hair messy and loose, her gray eyes framed by dark lashes, and the lightest sign of freckles across her nose, I could never mistake her for a boy. Up close, she’s all fragile beauty.

I pull myself from whatever mesmerizing trick she’s playing. Defiance rises in my chest. I am the High King. I have an entire army at my command. I have a high kingdom and four low kingdoms of people to care for, who depend on me, and an important mission to complete to keep them safe. But right now, I’m labeled a prisoner and criminal and am under complete control by a wannabe bounty hunter. I can tell her I’m a king—I have my seal and my mark—but will she even know what it is? Do I risk more by revealing my identity to someone I don’t trust while I have no magic and no backup or keep my mouth shut?

I’ll have to make the journey back either way, and I decide it’s best to keep my anonymity. Seven days. Give or take a few. I’ve done worse for that length of time. Like the time when I assisted my soldiers with a rescue in the mountains, and we were stranded for a week in a shard beast and scorpion-infested cave in blizzard conditions. Strange mix, that. An awful battle ensued as we fought for shelter. I can still feel the depth of the cold in my soul. Or the time we hauled a large convoy of weapons through dead, gloam-filled forest in a sand storm so thick I couldn’t see my hand in front of my face. Didn’t like breathing dirt much.

I eye the small woman ahead of me, practically drowning inthe men’s clothing she wears. Her braid continues to be pulled from its twists by the gusts of wind. She seems harmless enough. I can do this for seven days. It will undoubtedly be easier than many of the missions I’ve commanded.

In the silence between us, I spend the hours watching for dark creatures hiding in the crevices and shadowed canyon walls and wonderingwhowould set a bounty on me and how this happened. Those who know me know I am king, and those who don’t know me have no reason to do so. Most would recognize me on the spot, and since Vera doesn’t know who I am, I have to believe the glamour is still working. So, at least there’s that. I know without a doubt that Jethonan didn’t betray me. One of the servants maybe? They’ve all worked for me for years, so it doesn’t make sense that all of a sudden one would develop a grudge.

I continue to think on it, picturing the servants that frequent my rooms and office as our current, narrow crevice path opens into a wide open space. The ground is covered in weeds and plants with sharp, poky leaves. Three other paths lead out at the other side, two narrow crevices such as this one, the other a cave-like entrance. Vera stops suddenly, jarring me from my thoughts. I freeze and listen, instinctively attempting to pull magic, but it doesn’t come. My hearing and vision, my strength, all stay the same. They aren’t what they should be, and I clench my jaw in frustration.

“There’s a gloam creature nearby,” she whispers.

Another thing I should be able to sense with my magic.

I pull my sword, crafted and enchanted by a renowned weapons master, from its scabbard at my side. I may not be able to power it with magic like I did to beat the shard beast, but its enchantments will still help defeat most gloam creatures. Evena magic cuff won’t stop the enchantments crafted into my weapon. I grin at the thought.

“What direction?” I ask, my voice low.

“Coming down the path to the right, I think.”

I watch closely, scanning the tall canyon walls and down each of the other paths as well. But instead of a creature bounding out and attacking violently, a dark, thick mist begins to fill in the space around us, and the canyon becomes heavy with an ominous silence. I know exactly what it is and immediately try to slow and limit my breaths, knowing that if the mist thickens enough and I stand in it for too long, it will eventually kill me. Vera, as well.

“A murk. Try not to breathe it in.”

The woman seems inexperienced, but I hope she knows what a murk is. Gloam creatures with no definitive form, who use hallucinogenic mist as their offensive weapon to confuse, paralyze, and kill their prey. An enchanted weapon will kill them, but finding them in their half-solid state in time is the problem. That, and protecting the wannabe bounty hunter that I can no longer see. I turn, scanning, listening. My magic strains against the cuff, and I clench my jaw at the vulnerability and weakness I feel with the lack of it. The space that had once been wide open and full of weeds is now pitch black.

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