Her Reaper's Arms, Charlotte Boyett-Compo [world best books to read .TXT] 📗

the far end of the

street. He did not have the heart to tell them he knew their loved ones were dead. He

just turned away, heading back to his horse.

“Milord?”

Surprised one of them would dare speak to him, he turned to find a middle-aged

woman stepping away from the little clump of women. Her lips were trembling, her

hand out to stay his departure.

“Aye, wench?” he asked.

“The young men?” she pressed, and tears entered her eyes. “My sons?”

The truth must have been stamped on his face for he watched the woman lower her

head into her hands, heard her first faint sob as her shoulders bowed beneath the

weight of her sorrow.

“It…” he began, and was keenly aware of every eye on him. “It was quick,” he

finished. “They did not suffer.”

“The explosion?” another asked.

Bevyn nodded and winced as the wailing began. He watched women fall to their

knees with their grief. There was nothing he could do for them and as their older

menfolk and young sons began running toward them, he headed for his mount tied up

on the hill.

As he reached Préachán and untied the steed’s reins, he felt eyes on him again.

Malevolent eyes. Angry eyes. Eyes that meant him harm. Though he scanned the

immediate area, he saw nothing, detected nothing, but nevertheless he knew something

was there.

That something had a name.

It was a Blackwind, a warrior woman trained for tracking and exacting revenge on

Reapers.

76

Her Reaper’s Arms

Chapter Six

Penthesilea Aracnea squatted by the creek and scooped water into her strong,

capable hands. She drank her fill then wiped her forearm over her lips, studying her

surroundings for the marauding goddess from whom Penthe had managed to barely

escape. Beside her, the glass head of her Dóigra caught an errant beam of sunlight and

the grass around the star-shaped bulb shriveled, burnt to ash in seconds.

No one fucks with my Reaper! she had heard the fire-haired termagant bluster before

destroying the LRC that had brought them to Terra.

“Aye, but that particular Reaper belonged to the Aracnea clan before You ever laid

Your hands to him,” Penthe hissed.

Having sworn vengeance for her Amazeen ancestor Kennocha Tramont, the

Blackwind sat down on the creek bank and stared into the sparkling water. It had taken

her thirty years to find Bevyn Coure and now that she had, she intended to see he was

returned to Críonna and the fate reserved for him. How she would do that now that her

transportation had been destroyed was a major problem.

“Greedy bitch,” Penthe growled, thinking of the captain of the Ostria. Had it not

been for greed, things would not have gotten so out of hand. But the Amazeen captain

had taken a look at the fine, strapping lads of Lawler and had decided they would make

good breeding stock on Amazeen. Despite Penthe’s objections, Captain Antimache had

ordered the young ones taken.

“There are hundreds of such prime specimens of maleness scattered across Terra,”

Antimache had argued. “We can take them easily and come back for more!”

“You won’t be coming back from the arms of the Gatherer,” Penthe said with an

ugly snort. “Nor will those prime specimens of maleness.”

Angry that her transportation home had been demolished and with no guarantee

another LRC would be forthcoming, Penthe kicked at the sand beneath her bootheel.

Her anger was such that she felt the blood pounding in her temples. She had not only

the covetous Antimache to thank for her situation but the bastard Reaper as well.

Thinking of Bevyn Coure, Penthe stretched out on her back, her knees drawn up as

she glared at the lacy leaves canopied over her head. For days she’d been tracking the

Reaper—keeping close watch on him, waiting for just the right moment to throw a net

around his handsome head and draw him up. Had Antimache not overruled her, Coure

might well be on the LRC at that very moment, though Penthe had not counted on the

interference of the Triune Goddess in the matter.

“But you should have,” she chastised herself. “You should have known She’d not

give him up easily.”

77

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

Realizing she might well be stuck on this backward world for the remainder of her

days, Penthe cursed fluently and sat up, slapping her wrists atop her drawn-up knees

and glaring across the bucolic creek. Her vow to bring Coure back for punishment

might never be fulfilled, but she would take pleasure in hunting him, causing him as

much irritation and grief as she could.

“I want him hurt,” Kennocha had said on her deathbed. “I want him completely

destroyed.”

Penthe had read the bitter memories boiling inside her great-great-grandmother’s

head as the old woman lay there wheezing for breath. She had seen the handsome

young priest as the flames had swept upward to devour him. She had witnessed the

unbelievable rescue that had plucked Bevyn Coure from his just reward and had

commiserated with Great-Great-Grandmere Kennocha that justice had not been served

that day. Truth be told though, she couldn’t have cared less about the alleged injustices

Coure had supposedly perpetrated against her kinswoman. She wondered at

Kennocha’s state of mind as the old woman continued to rail so vehemently against the

priest.

“Pain of the highest order,” Kennocha had decreed. “Give him pain he will feel

throughout eternity!”

Such things came when a woman allowed herself to become obsessed with a male,

Penthe scoffed, knowing that would never happen to her. She herself had no use for

what she considered the weaker sex. Men were born to be used until they were used up

and then discarded for a newer, better model. They were not meant to be kept and

cosseted as the priest had been at Rathlin. Nothing good ever came from sheltering the

dirty little beasts from life’s travails. To her way of thinking, Great-Great-Grandmere

Kennocha had gotten what was due her but family obligations were more important

than personal feelings, and she would do what was needed to avenge her great-greatgrandmere.

Not to mention, Penthe thought as she got to her feet, she had her own personal

bone to pick now with Bevyn Coure. Because of him, she was trapped, whether

permanently or temporarily, on Terra and he would be made to pay for his part in the

problem. Dusting off the seat of her jumpsuit, she bent over to retrieve