Jessica Andersen - Nightkeepers

He scowled. ‘‘I’m only eight years older than you, for gods’ sake.’’

Damned if he wasn’t right, she realized as she did the math. He’d been married and a father at the time of the massacre, but he’d started young. ‘‘What do you want?’’ she persisted, knowing there had to be something.

He shoved a glass of juice across the nightstand in her direction, nearly dumping it on her. ‘‘Drink your OJ. You’ll need the energy.’’

‘‘For what, exactly?’’

‘‘I want you to go back into the barrier.’’

‘‘Wait.’’ She held up both hands, sloshing the OJ. ‘‘Whoa. I thought the point was to keep me away from the nahwal . Now you want me to go back in?’’

‘‘I’ll go with you.’’ He paused. ‘‘We need more information. ’’

Her skin chilled. ‘‘You can’t use the three-question spell until the actual equinox.’’

‘‘I know. That’s why I need you. The nahwal has marked you. It will come if you call, answer if you ask.’’

‘‘Maybe.’’ She paused. It didn’t take a flying leap of intuition to guess where this was going, what he wanted her to do. ‘‘But you need to get something through your thick skull right now. I don’t want to lead the Nightkeepers. I don’t even want to be here. Maybe instead of charging into the barrier, you should be asking yourself why you’re having so much trouble accepting Strike as leader.’’

‘‘Because he hasn’t accepted it himself,’’ said the older Nightkeeper—though he was right, damn it, that he wasn’t that much older than her.

Before, she’d been a teenager and he an adult. Now they were both adults, which gave her the guts to say, ‘‘You don’t have the right to make that call. The kingship passes from father to son unless the line is broken. It hasn’t been broken. Strike is our father’s son. He is king, whether he likes it or not.’’

‘‘He doesn’t want it.’’

‘‘Neither do I.’’ She leveled a finger at him. ‘‘So why put me in the same position and think anything’s going to be different?’’

‘‘Because you’re different.’’

‘‘That’s right. He stayed in the program. I didn’t.’’ Anna gave up all pretense at resting and sat up, pulling the bedclothes up around her in a protective tepee, even though she was wearing light cotton pj’s beneath. ‘‘Don’t depend on me. I’m not the one you want.’’

When he didn’t say a damn thing, she froze. ‘‘That’s it, isn’t it? You want an alliance. Me running the show, with you as my mate. Me for the bloodline, you for the leadership.’’

Shock and betrayal tangled with something darker, more tempting. It might even work, she had to admit inwardly. Jox and the winikin would never support Red-Boar in a bid for power, but they might support her, support the bloodline.

He met her stare for stare. ‘‘You had feelings for me once.’’

She snorted. ‘‘I was sixteen. You were the only guy I knew who was taller than me. Besides, you were mourning Cassie and the boys. That made you safe.’’

Pain flickered across his normally impassive features. After a moment, he said, ‘‘Do you know how long it’s been since I heard that name? Since anyone mentioned them aloud?’’

‘‘This won’t bring them back. Going against succession won’t fix anything.’’

‘‘If your father had listened to Gray-Smoke and Two-Hawk . . .’’ He trailed off after naming the king’s closest advisers, who had normally taken opposite sides in any debate, but had been united in begging him to ignore the visions and wait for the end-time before leading the Nightkeepers to battle.

‘‘That doesn’t mean Strike is wrong now,’’ she said, but wasn’t entirely sure she believed it herself.

His look said he’d caught the hesitation. ‘‘Two jaguar rulers. Two sets of visions that go against tradition, against the prophecies and the writs. How can you not see the parallels?’’

‘‘I see them.’’ She frowned, wanting to support her brother’s born role but not willing to blindly follow tenets she’d learned as a child and walked away from as an adult. ‘‘I’m just not convinced history is always destined to repeat itself.’’

‘‘ ‘What has happened before will happen again,’ ’’ he quoted.

She waved him off. ‘‘Too easy. The world isn’t built on aphorisms and it doesn’t march to the beat of thousand-year -old prophecies. Think about it . . . Godkeeper issue aside, who would you rather have leading the charge, you and me or the rightful king and his mate?’’

‘‘His human mate, you mean?’’

‘‘She’s it for him,’’ Anna said softly. ‘‘Don’t you remember what that felt like?’’ The words brought a faint pang, because she’d found it with Dick, though she couldn’t say for sure they had it anymore.

‘‘Fine. Great.’’ Red-Boar turned his scarred palms to the sky. ‘‘Which just puts us in an even crappier position, because when it comes down to it, he’s going to choose the woman over the gods. We need to stop him from doing something really stupid.’’

‘‘Or you could trust him to make the right decision.’’

‘‘Look where trusting your father got me.’’

And she really couldn’t argue that. He and so many others had trusted Scarred-Jaguar to know what was right, and they’d died for it. Red-Boar might have survived the battle, but everything important that was inside him had been killed that night.

‘‘I won’t lead,’’ she said finally. ‘‘I’m sorry.’’

He sat for a moment in silence, then nodded and stood. ‘‘I’ll let you rest.’’

She waited until he reached the door before she said softly, ‘‘Hey.’’

‘‘Yeah?’’ He looked back, his expression inscrutable.

‘‘Don’t do anything stupid.’’

‘‘Define ‘stupid.’ ’’

The trace of arrogance in his voice reminded her of the brash young warrior all the girls had sighed over, even after he’d married and become a father. More, she remembered how that had changed him, made him a man, even in her childhood perception. ‘‘Before you do anything, ask yourself whether you’ll be proud to own your actions in front of Cassie and the boys when you finally reach the sky.’’

Her only answer was the slam of the door at his back.

Leah slept poorly and woke the morning of the equinox feeling strung-out and twitchy.

It wasn’t just her conversation with Jox that had her on edge, though it hadn’t exactly been fun to have her lover’s defacto father tell her to do the world a favor and kill herself. There was something in the air, itching beneath her skin and making her jumpy. Restless.

Twelve hours and counting.

She opened her eyes to find Strike awake, propped up on one elbow, staring at her as though he was trying to memorize her and commit every last moment they were together to long-term storage in his brain. Or maybe that was what she was feeling.

‘‘We should talk,’’ she said, her voice raspy with morning huskiness.

‘‘Let’s not.’’ He leaned into her and covered her mouth with his, and though she knew it was a stall, she also knew it might be one of the last times they were together.

Opening her mouth to his kiss, she buried her fingers in his thick hair, hooked a leg over his hip, and offered herself to the moment, to the man she wished she could claim as her own. They strained together, touching, tasting, and the heat built as it always did when they were together. Only this time there was an edge of desperation— theirs, the god’s, she didn’t know. But she knew the end was near; she tasted it in the bold possessiveness of Strike’s kiss and felt it in herself—a sense of needing to take a piece of him with her.