Page 20 of Lera of Lunos
Throwing myself out of the way, I pull out my knife, holding it between myself and the predator. My eyes sting, my throat choking on terror.Mistake. It was a mistake beyond reckoning to hesitate. The weapon in my hand trembles but stays.
Tye’s tiger drops onto his elbows, his tail high in the air. His green eyes flash with need and pleasure. The predator likes the game. He knows exactly how he wants it to end. And with the next heartbeat, he pounces.
I feel the knife slide into muscle before the tiger’s great force rips it from my hand. I fall flat on my back, the tiger’s wide paws pinning me to the ground, his breath hot on my neck.
“No!” I scream with all the breath I have left. “No. Tye, stop! STOP.”
The flash of light is so bright, it hurts my eyes. The weight atop me disappears at once, Tye’s fae form rolling off me, his beautiful face a deadly shade of white. A patch of blood mats the hair just above his pointed ear, a larger patch soaking the breast of his green shirt, where the knife must have struck. Haunted green eyes find mine as he backs away, step by step, until he strikes the cave wall.
Relief washes over me so hard it leaves me dizzy.
“Tye,” I gasp, pushing myself to a sitting position. Waiting for him to come to me.
Tye slides down the stone until his knees hit dirt. Hands curling like claws, he covers his face, letting his shoulder wound drip unhindered. “I’m sorry.” His voice shakes, his fingers clutching his hair. “Stars. Stars. Stars.” The words come under Tye’s breath, each wilder and more desperate than the last. “What have I done? What have I done?”
“Tye.” I crawl to him, pushing his hands away from his face until I can see his glistening eyes. “The tiger isn’t you. I know that. It isn’t your fault that you can’t control him.”
Tye snorts bitterly. “But it is, lass.” Pulling free of my hold, he presses so hard against the wall that he looks like he’s trying to escape into the stone. “Do you think you can make it back to the others? You shouldn’t have to be around me.”
“I’ll make my own decisions.” I sigh, strength seeping from me. I reach for his blood-soaked shirt and then stop. “If I cause you pain, is there a chance your tiger will return and maul me for it?”
“No.” A whisper. The tears filling Tye’s emerald eyes overflow, sliding silently down strong cheeks. His smattering of freckles, usually hidden, stand out against his pale skin. When I wipe them with the back of my hand, the male flinches away.
“Don’t do that.” I grip his uninjured shoulder. “Don’t pull away from me. We’ve been through this with Shade’s wolf—”
“This isn’t like Shade,” Tye says darkly.
“Explain.” Ripping open his tunic, I examine the stab wound on his upper chest, right at the base of his shoulder. My own shoulder blazes in protest, but the pain feels like more of a general agony than the wrongness of true injury, thank the stars—or the tiger. The large cat meant to capture and mate, not kill.
“My tiger didn’t try to mate with you. I did.” Tye hisses in pain but holds rock-still. From the dark, slow bleeding, I think the blade missed any major arteries, though the sight of ripped-up flesh is enough to make my stomach churn. When I press a piece of wadded-up shirt against the puncture, the male’s hands tighten against the stone wall. “I wanted you so badly that my needs slipped through the wall between the tiger and me. The animal felt my desire and acted on it to please me, even though I abandoned the beast centuries ago.” Tye swallows, the effort to keep his eyes on me seeming to consume his body. Shame mars his perfect features, making tears burn in my throat. “And I had too little control over the beast to stop him.”
I try to work through Tye’s words but find only confusion. If the male truly wanted to couple with me, he wouldn’t have rejected me time and time again. My jaw tightens. Tye chose a poor time for lies just now. I pull my hands back. “You are the one who’s kept away from me.”
“You deserve better than me, lass. I’m—” Tye stiffens, going from wounded to predatory in a heartbeat’s time. “Someone is coming.” Gaze focused on the cave entrance, he shoves me behind him.
“Lera!” Shade’s voice calls a few moments before the shifter himself appears, frowning into the cave. He’s shirtless and gleaming with sweat, steam practically rising off him in the swiftly cooling air. His tan, sculpted chest rises and falls with quick breaths. “Tye? I thought I heard a scream.”
“Aye, you did.” Tye’s shoulders relax and he steps away, opening the line of sight between Shade and me. “Good thing, too. The lass is hurt.”
“I can smell that.” Shade’s nostrils flare and I shudder at the thought of everything the male might be scenting. Blood, certainly. Tye’s and mine both. Something more? Shade’s jaw tightens. “How?”
“Me.” Tye lifts his head, stepping closer to Shade. Baiting him to take a swing. To take me away.
“Stop it, Tye,” I say.
The male ignores me. Takes another step closer to the entrance—to Shade’s fists. “I hurt your mate, Shade.”
My stomach tightens.
With visible effort, Shade takes a step back, one hand gripping the top of the cave. “You hurt her, you bastard? You fix it.” The strain in the shifter’s face calls to me, but when I start toward him, he shakes his head and pushes himself farther away. “Don’t come any closer just now, cub. Please. I will...” The fingers of his free hand form a fist, which he thrusts into his pocket. “I will see you both tomorrow.”
14
Tye
Tye stood frozen as Shade plodded away, all at once loving and despising his quint brother for trusting him with Lera. Of course, Shade didn’t know the whole of what had happened, the truth that would give Tye nightmares for years to come. The worst part of it was that he remembered nothing of how it came to be. The last memory he could conjure was walking into the woods, the tiger inside him so desperate for freedom that Tye hadn’t dared say goodbye to the lass. And then...
“No. Tye, stop! STOP.”The tiger hadn’t understood the words but somehow knew they were important. Felt it. And, overpowering his own instincts, the tiger yielded to Tye’s fae form. He was a truly good tiger, a tiger who deserved a better partner than the ass he had.
