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

the window behind which she knew the

Reaper would be.

She sniffed the air and the odor of spent sex came to her from the open window and

her lips twisted. Kennocha was no doubt rolling over in her grave knowing the priest

had freely given a woman what her ancestor had demanded of him so long ago.

“No longer pure, are you, Reaper?” Penthe snarled, her fingernails digging into her

palms. “You’ve taken a mate.”

Thoughts of the pale woman she had seen walking beside Coure earlier that day

flitted over Penthe’s mind. She wasn’t much, the Blackwind surmised. Short, her

muscles flaccid, her abilities worthless—the human female was useless in Penthe’s

mind. She would be no match at all for Penthe’s superior warrioress’ skills should it

come to hand-to-hand combat.

Not that the human female would fight for the Reaper. To even contemplate such a

thing was ridiculous and Penthe grimaced. A frail being like the one called Lea would

not pose a challenge and was to be left alone. It would be punishment enough for the

inadequate being to lose the Reaper to Penthe’s Dóigra. The ineffectual creature was to

be pitied not harmed. She was—when all was said and done—a female and deserving

of some manner of protection, the Blackwind reasoned. It was not her fault she had

succumbed to the dangerous black arts of the Reaper.

Glancing around her, Penthe decided to bed down in the stables with the mounts.

She needed shelter and had no compunction about sharing space with her equine

brethren. Stealthily, she made her way to the livery and slipped quickly inside, having

no trouble finding the Reaper’s mount among those stabled. She entered Préachán’s

stall and ran an expert hand over the black horse’s withers.

“You are a worthy steed,” she said, hugging the great head to her breast. “I shall

claim you when I have taken the Reaper’s head.”

* * * * *

After using a washrag to bathe his dirty feet, Bevyn waved away his pants and

climbed back into bed with his woman.

“All settled for the night?” she asked him.

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Charlotte Boyett-Compo

“I would have felt terrible if I had left him tied to Cornelia’s fence,” Bevyn said of

his horse. “I gave him some hay and a bucket of water.” He chuckled. “If I know

Préachán, he’ll have overturned the bucket by now.”

“What does his name mean?” she asked, snuggling up to her Reaper.

“It is an old Chalean word meaning ‘crow’,” he replied, and reached up to touch the

tattoo on the side of his face. “It is also the name of my clan tat.”

“Milord?” she asked softly. “Why is it you have the Coure marking? Did you learn

who your father was?”

She didn’t think he was going to answer her. His arm had tightened around her and

she could hear him grinding his teeth. She decided if he did not wish to tell her, she

would not ask again for obviously it was something that disturbed him.

“It was Morrigunia who told me who my father was,” he said at last, and his body

was as stiff as a board beside her. “It was She who had both tattoos put on me. Had it

not been by Her hand, neither would have stayed upon my flesh, for anything that was

not there before I Transitioned would heal.”

“Will you tell me of your father?” she asked.

Again he was silent for a long time. “I never met him so I only have second-hand

information,” he said at last. “He was dead long before I was born. I was told he died in

battle but Morrigunia did not believe him worthy of resurrecting.”

He pushed himself up in the bed, leaning back against the headboard, pulling her

up to sit beside him. She saw him look down at her and through the faint glow of the

moonlight shimmering through the window, his face was expressionless.

“I will tell you this but once and then we will never speak of it again,” he stated.

“All right,” she said, holding his dark gaze for a moment before he turned his head

and appeared to be staring across the silent room.

“There are twelve primary clans that are dear to the goddess’s heart,” he said.

“Clans She reckons worthy of Her protection and help. She safeguards those clans,

makes sure they survive from one generation to the next, one world to the next. They

are not all in one universe but spread out in what She calls the megaverse. She calls

them WindWorlds. From those twelve clans, She chooses those She will make Reapers

and those whom She will make Shadowlords. Some clans have both Reapers and

Shadowlords and some have only one or the other.

“Ben-Alkazar, Belvoir and Tarnes are always Shadowlords while Gehdrin, Kiel,

Cree, Tohre, Kullen, Belial and Coure are always Reapers. The Jaborn and Sorn clans

can have both. There are other clans She has given Reaper powers but they are not as

important to Her as what She calls the Dháréag, the Twelve.”

“Dháréag,” Lea repeated.

“It is not spoken of, wench,” he warned her. “That is to be kept between us.”

She nodded. “I understand, milord.”

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“I don’t know how my fellow Reapers met their fate, if they knew they were of the

Dháréag before or after their Transitions by having the tribal tat placed on their faces.

For all I know, I may be the only one who was marked during my rebirth. What I know

of the man who sired me was that he was a prick of the highest order and I was a

product of rape.” He rubbed his fingers over his right eye. “When I asked the goddess

why my mother did not attempt to expel me from her womb, She said She would not

have permitted that to happen. She said She knew I was the one She would want from

the moment of my conception and that She had kept me safe.”

“So it was not truly by chance the priests came by where you had been abandoned,”

Lea said.

“I guess not,” he said, not having thought of that.

“Were they good to you, milord?” she asked.

“The priests?” He shook his head. “No, wench, they were not. The Brotherhood of

the Domination is not known for being good to its members. Pain