Page 16 of Bought to Break

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He grabbed her chin suddenly, the abruptness of the action startling her. His eyes were dark with an emotion she didn’t really understand, a violent possessiveness that scared as well as soothed. ‘But you aren’t theirs. You belong to us. From now on, anyone else who touches you dies.’

‘You’d really kill someone for that? For me?’ She wasn’t sure she liked that. No one deserved to die over her.Well – maybe Ather.She tried to be good, but she wasn’t a priest of the Mount.

‘All three of us would.’

But Kane hadn’t even met her yet. She didn’t understand the Brothers’ world. She wondered if Viktor was getting tired of all her questions. She had so many, but now there were some that burned brighter than all the rest – what was Kane like? She got the impression that he was their leader, if the three Brothers could claim to have one. Would he want her as Viktor and Sorin did? How would that work and how long for?

Having three deadly mercenaries protecting her in her old life would have been laughable, but this was a new world, much more dangerous than the one she had left behind, she was starting to realise. Perhaps having real protection was a good thing. At least until she was able to flee. She thought back to the three men who had attacked her this evening and shuddered.

‘Viktor?’

‘Yes?’ he answered her as he hefted the bags off his horse – the job she had started doing before those men had appeared with their vile threats and chased her into the ruins.

‘When Uth was speaking to you, he said he could smell me. How?’

Viktor’s hands stopped what they were doing. ‘I hoped you hadn’t noticed,’ he muttered.

He finished unbuckling a strap and turned to her, catching Sorin’s eye as he did so.

She frowned at him. ‘Stop exchanging looks with each other and tell me.’

Viktor gave her an apologetic glance and led her to where Sorin now had a merry fire crackling away. He sat, pulling her down to sit next to him on the soft moss.

‘What is it?’ Sorin asked. He turned the meat that was now cooking on the fire, and Lana’s mouth began to water. Viktor was silent for so long that she thought perhaps that was the end of their conversation for the night, but then he replied.

‘She’s asking about Uth.’

Sorin grimaced and glanced at her from the other side of the flames. ‘Ah. You caught what he said, did you? Should have known you would.’ He shrugged. ‘She’s going to find out eventually. Might as well tell her now.’

Viktor nodded solemnly. ‘Very well, but, Lana, you mustn’t speak of it. It’s only rumoured outside the Brothers and the Army wants to keep it that way.’

What did that mean? ‘I won’t tell, I promise. But I don’t understand.’

‘Brothers usually come in threes.’ He looked around as if he was afraid someone was listening and lowered his voice an octave. ‘Sometimes you get a Brother in a unit who’s different.’

‘Sometimes two,’ Sorin piped up as he worried the meat with a stick.

Viktor rolled his eyes. ‘It’s rare. Most of the time there’s just one in a unit and he has a … well, a sort of gift.’

A gift.‘What kind of gift?’

Viktor leant forward and turned the meat on the fire himself. Sorin let out an audible sound of outrage and slapped his hand with the cooking stick. Viktor ignored him and answered her. ‘It varies.’

‘Some have travelled from Dark Realms to join us,’ Sorin interjected. ‘Sometimes they’re from our world but they’re … different.’

Viktor gave Sorin a look that made him go silent before continuing. ‘He means some aren’t fully human. They have heightened senses or superior strength, transform into creatures. That sort of thing.’

Lana sat dumbly, staring from one man to the other, their impossible words going around and around in her head.Heightened senses?Creatures?When she finally spoke, all she could do was parrot Viktor’s words. Her voice had risen to almost a screech. ‘Transform into creatures?’

‘Yes. Some. Uth is sometimes a bit more … wolfy.’

Lana couldn’t help it. She jumped to her feet, her mouth hanging open. ‘That man who had a knife to my throat – who told me he was going to cut me into pieces after he and his friends defiled me – turns into awolf?’

‘A scraggly, mangy one,’ Sorin cut in again. ‘He’s not very impressive. I once knew a Brother who could turn himself into a great, Dark Realm beast.’ He gestured to his horse. ‘Bigger than my steed, he was. Now that was something to see. Uth – well, the beast is like the man – uninteresting. But he does have a keen sense of smell.’

Men who could turn into beasts? Monsters roaming the lands?As much as Lana’s interest was peaked, there was just too much to unpack in one night. She continued on their current vein. ‘So Uth could smell that you hadn’t …claimedme?’ Lana asked.

Viktor patted the ground where she’d leapt from and she sat down again. ‘Don’t worry, Lana. If he ever meets you in the future, there will be no confusion,’ he murmured into her ear, and she felt her face grow hot as Sorin snickered from the other side of the flames.