Page 92 of A Touch of Savagery

“Once you get the key, you’ll kill him anyway. You’re a bunch of whores and liars.”

“You haven’t got much of a choice, do you?” Lightning crackled around Captain Kalani’s hands as she marched forward. The man slowly stood. “Get back on your knees. You and your brother won’t survive this if you don’t cooperate.”

The man looked to his left and back at his supposed brother. He must have picked himself since he bolted to the port side to return to his ship. The women yelled and stampeded after him.

“Fuck,” hissed the one holding Aspen. “They’ll get him anyway, but still. I guess he only cares for himself.”

She suddenly let out a muffled shriek, and the dagger dragged across the side of Aspen’s neck. He screamed through the gag, thinking his last moments were done since the other Captain hadn’t cared enough to bargain for his “brother.”

Blood dribbled from the cut, but it wasn’t deep enough, and something thumped behind him. He turned just in time to see fire flash, but the woman let out an agonized scream as the man who had her smashed her wrist into the wall. She dropped the flaming dagger, and he started wrestling her into the room Aspen had been held captive in.

Perhaps he’d slipped off in the earlier festivities, and nobody had noticed while they serviced other males to distract them. It had been easy to come up from behind. Aspen scooted back on his ass to reach the dagger. The blade burned his fingers, and he fumbled for the handle instead. The woman’s scream in the cabin pierced his brain as the two fought.

“You fucking bitches with your tricks,” snarled the man.

Even if they’d treated Aspen as something to use, he didn’t care. Nobody deserved to be held down and forced like that.

The dagger slipped and burned him again as he struggled to cut the rope. Once it loosened, and his hands were free, he firmly grasped the blade by the handle as he scrambled to his knees and channeled his own fire. It cooled the remnants from the woman’s magic. At the next scream, something snapped in his brain.

He barely registered anything but the man trying to pin the woman to the floor, and he lunged to stab him in the back. The sailor shouted, and Aspen stabbed him again before yanking him off of the woman. The sailor said something. Maybe he begged for mercy. Maybe he cursed Aspen. It didn't matter.

He heard none of it as he fell on the man and thrust the flaming dagger into his soft throat. Once, twice, three times. Blood hit his face, and he still didn’t stop. He drove it into the bastard’s chest and stomach. Burns blossomed. Blood coated the blade, spilled on the floor, and stained his yellow shirt as he kept stabbing.

He’d fucking kill everyone that ever touched him or another person in that way. Aspen withdrew the red-coated weapon as he stood to grab the man’s arm.

Flames crackled somewhere to his right when he managed to heave the limp man out onto the deck. Let his comrades find him dead if any were alive. Aspen cut at the man’s trousers, heedless of the bloodied lines that blossomed on his skin. More red spurted when he used the dagger again.

He realized he was standing on the deck in a yellow shirt that barely covered his crotch as real blood mixed with the fake bruises and red streaks. Captain Kalani, still covered in gold swirls that had been smeared, stared at him as he held the man’s severed cock and balls in one hand and the gorey weapon in the other.

“Aspen, put the dagger down,” she said with a warning note. “And the-the-”

He breathed heavily and vaguely noticed the other woman coming back with the last remaining male. They’d bound him with rope, and huge burns marred his skin along with bloody cuts. The woman from the room was led out by another.

He needed the other men. He’d drive his dagger in them too and cut off what they’d used to hurt him and others over and over. They’d bleed and pay for it with their screams. Anyone that touched Oriel or Roth would follow the same path. They’d beg, and he wouldn’t care, just like the men in the Hall hadn’t cared even when he’d been bleeding on the floor.

But they weren’t here.

Captain Kalani said something as he dropped the bloody penis and testicles on the deck. The dagger followed with a clang, and he stumbled toward the dark hall as his strength left him. If they wanted to chain him back up or toss him overboard, so be it. At least he’d killed one bastard and wiped the filthy smear from this realm.

It was a relief to curl up on the floor in the room and let the darkness take him.

Chapter Twenty-One

Oriel was beyond tired even though the trip hadn’t been that hard. Sailors had taken care of the ships and guided the fleet down the Path which had swiftly carried them along. It was the largest and fastest river in the realm. Still, three weeks was a long time, and he knew Roth was tired too.

It was worth it to look into Kalen’s icy blue eyes and hear his words.

“We always pay our debts. We’ll aid you.”

Some of the tension left Oriel’s body. In general, the Valentines weren’t known to go back on their word, but they could have said no and hemmed and hawed about entering a war that didn’t truly involve them.

King Kalen and King Rhys had agreed. They sat on the other side of the desk from Oriel and Roth. Their men were camped outside of a lord’s home. Kalen and his once-human husband had met them at the port city where they’d planned to disembark to make the trip overland. Oriel didn't think they'd be there, but both Kings had seemed eager to meet him.

The lord was letting them use his own home, and he sat off to the side of the desk.

“We’ve already been getting the men and supplies ready,” said Rhys.

“You have?”

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