Page 4 of Great Falls Protector
Arisha swallows, her cheeks pinking as she quickly puts the note away and starts walking once more toward the library. “Your males are a lot more complicated than they seem, aren’t they?”
“If—” Someone shoves me hard from the back, and I stumble forward, managing to keep from falling on my face only by virtue of stomping into the puddle before me, the mud splattering all over my blue satin gown. Twisting around to see who hit me, I see Tye and Katita walking away toward the entrance of the arena, Tye’s laugh piercing the air between us.
My stomach twists. Grabbing a clump of mud, I launch it will all my strength, the gray-brown patty hitting the back of Tye’s head with a satisfying thump.
Tye stops. Turns. Looks down at me from his great height.
In the bright sun, the male is devastatingly beautiful, with his broad chest and sweat-matted red hair framing a square jaw. Each movement of his body sings with controlled power, the corded muscles shaping his red-and-gold exercise tunic. Beads of sweat along his temples reflect the sunlight, making his skin shimmer. Large, callused hands that I’ve felt along my body so many times before now open and close against his sides.
A smile that doesn’t touch Tye’s cold emerald eyes curves along his face, somehow making it even more breathtaking. And cruel. The glinting silver earring only adds to his aura of danger—only now, that danger is directed toward me.So this is what it feels like.“Lady Leralynn. Did I inadvertently disturb you? Inexcusable. Shall I help you to the infirmary to see if any injury might have befallen you?”
“We might need to evacuate Lera to safety,” Katita adds sweetly.
Swallowing, I conjure a smile as genuine as Tye’s own, even as my heart squeezes. “On the contrary, it is I who should be thanking you. I only put this dress on to appease Arisha, and you’ve finally given me a reason to change before dinner. Excuse me.” I start walking away, only to stop two steps later, my racing blood taking over better reason. For better or worse, I suddenly want Tye to know the plan I concocted last night over the protests of the rest of the Protector’s Guild. I like it no better than they do, but it is the only way of having one of us at the very center of the highest-value targets at all times, ready to respond if—when—the Night Guard strikes. “I almost forgot—I expect to be your teammate soon, Tye. Welcome news, I’m sure.”
“You?” Katita throws her head back with a laugh, her curtain of blonde hair gleaming in the sunlight. “On our team. I cannot imagine I heard that right.”
My gaze shifts to the princess, my heart thudding in my chest. “No, you didn’t, Your Highness. I don’t intend to be onyourteam at all.”
“There is only one team. I knew your math was bad, but surely you can count to one if you use your fingers,” the princess says haughtily, though her turquoise eyes now flicker with unease.
I smile at her. “Yes. But I’ll be competing for your swordsmanship spot on it at tomorrow’s practice. Excuse me.”
3
Tye
“She can’t just join the Prowess team less than a week ahead of the Trials.” Katita’s indignant voice whittled away at the thickness of Tye’s thoughts. They were near the cadet dorms already, though he didn’t remember walking here, his mind still riveted to Lera’s taunt.
Her on the Prowess team. Those lush curves he’d claimed and bottomless eyes he’d stared into, now just cruel reminders of her betrayal. In his face, each and every damn day.
“Right?” Katita repeated, putting emphasis into the word as she reached for Tye’s elbow. Ever since Lera had sabotaged Tye by reporting him to Shade, Katita had used it as an unveiled opportunity to get closer to him. Sidling up to him at mealtimes, partnering with him in class with a silky hand on his arm. Tye let the princess play at flirting for the simple reason that Katita’s father was the king of Ckridel and held all the strings to Tye’s future—not to mention that it made Lera furious—but he had to admit that the attention was starting to chafe.
Tye pulled back from the princess’s reach. “Of course she can,” he said over his shoulder, only barely able to hide his irritation. “She is good with a bloody blade, and it wouldn’t take long to learn a few extra rules.”
“Surely Master Han would not allow such a thing.”
“Han cares about winning, Kat. Do me a favor, and win the damn challenge round, because having to share the arena with a back-stabbing vixen is more than I can handle just now.” Without waiting for Katita’s reply, Tye slid into the dormitory and out the first window he found. After climbing swiftly to the roof, he settled onto the sun-warmed stone that had become his choice of refuge in past months.
With his back against one of the two chimney columns, he braced his elbows atop his bent knees and tried to focus on the colorful flapping standards that had transformed Great Falls Academy into a stage.Hisstage. The culmination of everything he’d worked his entire life for, reaching its final zenith. A parapet from which the woman he had stupidly fallen in love with had tried to shove him off.
Stars,Lera’s betrayal still hurt. And it was Tye’s own fault. He knew that Prowess training and women don’t mix—knew it better than anyone. And yet, despite his better sense, despite the too-vivid memory of what his last attempt at combining the two had led to, Tye had let his guard down again.
Granted, Lera offered an overwhelming temptation. Despite their short acquaintance, her musical laugh and bravery and what Tye had thought was a deeply kind heart had started to fill the void Tiga’s death left inside his soul. Leralynn’s intoxicating lilac scent brightened the world’s colors and sounds, whispering promises of great adventures—oflife—just beyond sight. Yes, it was all so very tempting that Tye had lapped it up like a dimwitted pig, not realizing the extra scraps only ensured a faster butchering.
And as it turned out, Leralynn of Osprey butchered with the best of them.
Tye’s fingers curled into a trembling fist, the morning of her betrayal unfurling bitterly in his memory. It had been well before dawn, and Tye had just slipped into the bath. Since starting to train with Han, he’d made a habit of bathing in private—his body was edging the limit of its endurance, and he knew better than to trust outsiders to understand that it had to be so, that the costs his training exacted had to be paid.
When he heard the bathhouse door whisper open, the lass’s lilac scent drifting in on warm moist air, Tye knew at once that he should leave. But he didn’t. Of all people, he was blindly certain that he could trust Lera—with his secrets, his dreams, his pain. With everything. So he’d let her see him, revealed the costs of his chiseled muscles and gravity-defying flips, of what it took to claw his way out of the nothing that he was born into.
He’d expected Lera’s understanding. Had secretly hoped that there might be a person—just one person—whom he might rest his forehead against for a few moments of reprieve. Instead, Lera turned his secret into a weapon to be used against him.
That very day, she reported Tye to the healers—not even from some misplaced concern over his well-being, but because it was a means to an end. She’d gotten it into her head that the Prowess Trials were a frivolous game and needed to end.
It was only with Han and Sage’s interference that Shade agreed to return Tye to training after ten days instead of three weeks, but even that time off had hurt Tye’s chances. No, not chances—chance. Tye had only one shot. Without this victory, he’d return to poverty by summer’s end, with nothing but the memory of Tiga’s death and his failure to keep him company.
All because he had trusted Lera. No more. There was only one reason Lera would want to get onto the Prowess team, and that was to destroy it. So Tye needed to destroy her first.
