Page 56 of Great Falls Cadet
“Yes.” Shoving past the princess, Tye started toward the stables.
“Stop.” The amusement in Katita’s voice was gone now. Stepping in front of Tye, she pressed her hand into the middle of his chest. “Leralynn must have interfered. Let the royals handle it as they see fit.”
“Are you insane?” Tye fought the urge to grab and snap that slim wrist. His mind raced, his gaze darting between the princess and the stable. “Come with me and put a stop to whatever is happening, Katita.”
“No.” She closed the distance, her movement for once void of sensuality. “Leralynn interfered withroyals,Tyelor. After today, I imagine she won’t repeat the mistake.” Her voice lowered, the soft threat raking like nails on slate. “Don’t make the same mistake she just did.”
Tye burstinto the stables in time to hear a high-pitched male wail. This came from a doubled-over Lord Nolan, who, judging by his popping eyes and straining vocal cords, wouldn’t be siring any children in the near future. Or ever.
Just beyond the downed Nolan, Lera had control of Puckler’s back, her arm wrapped around the cadet’s thick neck. Unable to reach the ground, Lera hung on to the choke while Puckler flung her about like an angry bear. Puckler’s twin, Rik, circled the pair in search of an opening that his own twin wasn’t giving him. Granted, given Puckler’s increasingly darkening face due to lack of air, the mindless thrashing was understandable.
Stars.Lera was half the size of any one of them, and holding her own better than any Academy guardsman could have.
For a heartbeat, Tye’s swell of pride for the fierce little tsunami made him hesitate to interfere. Then Puckler twisted around.
Welts and bruises flashed through the rips of Lera’s tattered magenta dress, bits of manure covering her vibrant hair and flushed skin. Another bruise ran along her mouth, her lips swollen and bloody. She’d not been winning; she’d been surviving. And she was hurt.
Tye was already moving from across the stable when Rik finally managed to grab Lera’s hair and haul her off Puckler. In the same motion, Rik slammed her chest-first into the wall so hard that the boards rattled. Without missing a beat, Puckler grabbed Lera’s free arm with one hand, the other rubbing his reddened neck. With Puckler and Rik now pinning Lera to the wall, Lord Nolan snatched a thick leather girth from a hook.
Leralynn froze, the scent of her sudden terror filling the air—and kindling an explosion of primal violence inside Tye.
Tye’s vision darkened. He was still a pace away when Nolan swung—just as Puckler realized they were no longer alone and shouted a warning.
Tye discerned neither Puckler’s words nor his twin’s answer. Tye heard nothing but the pounding of his own heart as he grabbed Nolan’s thick blond hair and shoved the bastard headfirst into the horses’ drinking trough. And then Tye held him there, beneath the water, while the tall lord thrashed uselessly. In outrage. In fear. In desperation for air that Tye was never going to let him have.
The twins’ eyes widened, the righteous excitement in their faces fading to disbelief.
Puckler shouted something. Lifted his hands. Stepped away from Lera.
Tye didn’t know what Puckler said. Didn’t hear. Didn’t care. Not with Lera’s frightened scent still spinning his head, the sight of the marvelous, ethereal creature who’d faced down three of the Academy’s largest royals being made vulnerable.
Beneath Tye’s grip, Nolan kicked wildly. Seeing his cousin’s jerking spasms, Puckler swung a hammer-sized fist toward Tye’s jaw.
Jerking Lord Nolan’s head from the trough, Tye used the lord’s face to intercept Pucker’s blow. The crush of bone and spray of blood chilled the stable’s air to ice. For a moment, no one moved, Nolan holding together his broken nose while Puckler stared at his own bloody fist.
Tye, his hand now free to curl into a fist, twisted about the battle scene, ready to finish the males. To rip their throats out with his teeth.
“Walk away.” Lera’s quiet voice skittered across the stable. Not aimed at Tye, he realized through his haze of protective instincts, but at the royals. “Move slowly. No running. No sudden moves.”
The royal cousins glanced at each other once before obeying, and it was all Tye could do to keep himself from pouncing on the pathetic figures and clawing them to shreds. His chest heaved. Yes. He longed to hunt them down. To kill them. To protect Leralynn from anyone who dared harm her.
12
Lera
Choking down the pain and fear still filling my lungs, I wait until the doors close behind the escaping cadets before stepping toward Tye. The male’s chest heaves, fiery hair damp with sweat, his green eyes still flashing with a primal fury. The fury is as much Tye’s as that of the tiger he doesn’t know he shifts into—the tiger he only started connecting with earlier this year.
“Tye?” I say softly.
The male finds my gaze, his own still unfocused. Still primal and savage and as dark as the blood that gushed from Nolan’s broken nose. Unlike Tye, whose veil-covered mind remembers nothing of me, the tiger must still feel the mating bond pulling at his soul. Just as Shade’s wolf does.
My breath hitches. Unlike Shade’s wolf, Tye’s tiger form recalls nothing of his fae partner even in Lunos. With the mortal lands further choking the magic, if Tye ever shifts, the resulting predator would think nothing of ripping half the Academy to bits and eating them raw. I can’t let that happen.
“Tye? I-I’m all right.” I swallow, forcing a smile into my lie. Leaning against the wall for support, I try to ignore the throbbing as welts and cuts check in from all over my flesh. “I’m all right. It’s over.”
Tye shakes his head, his mane of red hair swooshing about him. When he steps toward me, his glazed eyes slowly regain their reason. Distantly, I notice that, unlike me, he’s not dressed for dinner—he looks to have come straight from training, in a cut-off gray uniform tunic and black pants.
I hold very still. Doing nothing that might further wake the predator.
