Page 60 of The Prisoner's Gambit
“I’m okay.”
“And your schedule?”
“Totally changed. There are only a few spots near where you work that we go to now. Mostly we’re across town.”
“Are you being mistreated?” he asked, a protective anger flaring in his eyes.
“No. At least, not physically. It’s just the lady I work for is kind of a bitch, is all.”
The tension drained from his clenched jaw. Bodok let out a relieved chuckle and bent down to retrieve her parcels, carefully stacking them before handing them back to her, his hands lingering on her arms once she had a good hold on them. “Then you had best get back. You do not wish to draw further ire.”
“Oh, it is far too late for that,” averyangry voice coolly hissed.
She felt her stomach sink.
Oh, shit.
Bodok’s gaze shifted and Maureen turned to see the scarily calm woman staring icy daggers at her. Mistress Tormik was not happy. Not by a long shot. She stood still a long moment, the crowd sensing her rage and coming nowhere near her, parting like a river around an immobile rock.
The only people who were actually moving in her direction, Maureen realized, was a group of Mondarian guards. And by the look of the hurry they were in, something bad was afoot. This was not good. Not good at all.
“That one,” Tormik growled, pointing at Bodok with disdain.
The guards moved at once, two of them grabbing him by the arms while the others surrounded him. Mistress Tormik strode to him like a lion showing off its kill. She pulled his shirt open, his damaged runes exposed for all to see.
His Infala, incomplete and scarred, caught her eye. “Damaged, I see. Unable to fully bond. How interesting.” She ran a cold finger over it with a curious look on her face then turned away. Without another word the guards hauled him off, leaving Maureen reeling at his abrupt departure.
Her Infala was churning in her skin, the pigment active and fired up having been in such close proximity. Whatever doubts she’d had about what she’d been told about some tattoo ink bonding her to a mate were gone. It was now clear to her what they were talking about. The draw was visceral. She needed him. To be near him. To be in his arms.
And now he was being led away, and from the malicious look in Mistress Tormik’s eyes, Maureen had to wonder once more if she would ever see him again.
CHAPTERTWENTY-FOUR
Bodok walked in a daze as the Mondarians hustled him away from the marketplace. The crowd parted hastily, making their passage smooth and quick. The guards had been informed this troublesome prisoner might be difficult. As it turned out, he was nothing of the sort.
“What, were they kidding?” the guard firmly holding Bodok’s right arm wondered with a laugh. “He’s a big one, sure, but this one ain’t got no fight in him.”
“Shut it, Gozazz. We just do as we’re ordered,” the man on Bodok’s left replied.
“And we are. Doesn’t mean I can’t wonder.”
“He’s right,” their commanding officer said. “Just do what you’re told, keep your mouth shut, and we’ll all be just fine.”
“Yeah,” the other guard agreed. “Don’t you know that was Vice Quaestor Tormik’s wife back there? Not a lady whose bad side you want to be on.”
“I know,” Gozazz grumbled. “I was just making conversation is all.”
“Well, don’t. We’ve almost got the troublemaker back to his camp. Those fellas can deal with him however they see fit. Me, I don’t want anything to do with this mess. Nothing good ever comes from getting mixed up with the elites.”
Oblivious to the conversation taking place, Bodok simply trudged along where he was guided, his mind racing as he focused on the impossible taking place within his body.
How can this be?he marveled.It should not be possible, yet I feel it. My Infala.
Something had triggered the pigment long dormant within his flesh, cut off from his other runes by the Raxxians’ brutal treatment aboard their ship. The natural flow and connection of his tattoos had been disrupted some time ago, and yet, impossibly, the most vital of them all was twitching to life in his chest. It was more than just a slight tingle of life. There was no mistaking it.
His Infala was rousing from its long slumber. It was healing, dormant no more. And, unlikely as it was, it was reacting to its counterpart, his mate having been found after so long. Impossibly, it seemed that person was the human woman he had been so drawn to.
She was only just marked by the Skrizzit, her pigment brand new in her body. For that reason her own Infala was but a shadow of what it was supposed to evolve into. Normally, it would take a long time for the rune to shift and grow to full potency, and even then it could take a lifetime before it recognized its bonded mate, evolving into a new rune shared only by the destined pair.
