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But it had also sounded like he&039;d been cut off
Darting to her feet, Lucia ran her arht pricked the canopy above, casting strange shadows froazed up, far off in the distance, and saw movement Yes, up on the levee, perhaps a mile away
Wait At first, Lucia didn&039;t believe what she was seeing Tears ht was so distant But her est snake she had ever ireen coils wrapped around MacRieve, its face bobbing mere inches from his own
On its meaty body, black spots looked melted on, like scorched wax dripped over daubs of yellow Boned ridges flared from its nose, past its slitted eyes, back over its skull
Anaconda
Panic jolted through her MacRieve was in the grip of one of those things It&039;d pinned his ar the life from him Every time he exhaled
No way for Lucia to climb the rocky rise to the levee in ti
Without thought, she dove for her bow and quiver Nocking two arrows, she aimed - a mile away, into the breeze, have to pierce its eyes or it won&039;t e
If sheaway any hope he had of fighting
She sed, pulled the string, and tried to slow her heart Concentrate But this is MacRieve! She blinked through tears
I&039;m so in love with hiods, he wasn&039;t conscious Release the string, release it!
When the snake began distending its lower jaw - to s its prey whole - her fingers relaxed; the bowstring sang She exhaled in a rush, going ith fear -
The snake reared up, two arrows jutting froround
Lucia had nailed it
Disbelief No time to succumb to her shock With a cry, she sprinted for MacRieve, cli up the terrain As she ran, she inwardly chanted, Ho? How did I do that?
Once she reached hi with panic for MacRieve, she dropped her bow, trying to lift the snake away, but she couldn&039;t budge it Tractor trailers with Regin were one thing - lifting a snake&039;s dead weight by herself was another
"MacRieve, wake up!" she cried Nothing Peeling off her backpack, she rushed to a young tree, then kicked it at the base, snapping it to the ground Returning to the snake with it, she jabbed the wood in between its hefty coils, using it as a lever
She gritted her teeth with effort, hanging bodily froain, she jabbed and levered Finally, she heaved the last coil aith a thunk
After dragging MacRieve far away fro his head in her lap He was unconscious, rattling his breaths, a fine bloodyfrom his lips with each exhalation
"Please, wake up!" His torso was mottled with blood under his skin Internal injuries She lifted one of his eyelids His eye was filled with burst vessels, as red as a vampire&039;s
But her Scot was an ienerate She gingerly eased out fro a pillow of leaves for hi more coazing around warily She was on edge Yes, she had her bow to protect theradually fading?
"I&039;ve got to know," sheout her sat-phone Surprised it was still working, she dialed N&iuht away "Lucia! How&039;s your vacay?"
"Eventful Nïx, you kno you told me I&039;d have to restrain myself? I didn&039;t MacRieve and I - "
"You tagged him? You marked his teeth with your neck?"
"Uh, yeah But here&039;s the thing I think I can still shoot"
N&iu for co, she said, "Lucia the Archer, you are the best You are unmatched in skill, peerless in all of the world - "
"Nïx! I had sex Skathi vowed she&039;d revoke my powers"
The soothsayer made a diso"
"What are you talking about?"
"Didn&039;t I tell you? Yes, it seems Skathi wasn&039;t on board with your od killer"
"You mean I&039;ve had no ability this entire time?"
"No ht For the last teeks, I&039;ve made incredible shots Now I can still shoot as well as I ever could"
"Well, naturally" Nïx sounded puzzled "You practiced for over a millennium"
"Practice wouldn&039;t make me peerless in all the world! Look how hard Tera the Fey trains, and I still outshoot her"
"Maybe you got the talent genetically? Your mom could&039;ve been Robina Hood for all we know, you impish wittle mutt"
"Robina Hood?"
"Or it could be - hey, here&039;s an idea - the fact that your other two parents are gods Hello? You&039;re a Valkyrie, the daughter of Freya and W��den The last I checked, we don&039;t suck at anything"
"This ability is allBut it is now The pain Skathi &039;gifted&039; you with toyou all of her tricks"
Just as everyone had always assumed "I can&039;t believe this Are you sure?"
"Skathi didn&039;t teach you to track or give you that ability, yet you&039;re an expert at that as well"
I am I learned to be "And Skathi couldn&039;t have told me this would happen?" Lucia felt as if she&039;d been slapped
"Oh, she didn&039;t knohat an apt pupil you&039;d be Had no idea you could grow to be as good as she is"
"No idea?" Yes, slapped - bitchslapped by the goddess of the hunt "Then she believed I was going on a quest with no defense?"
"What a whore!" N&iuht you should offer yourself up to Cruach to appease him, rather than uncover the dieumort"
Appease Cruach Despite the fact that Skathi had witnessed how Lucia had suffered at his hands "I&039; to kill her"
"Now, Lucia, you can&039;t go offing gods willy-nilly Unless you find sorettably each one only has a single shot before the power is extinguished"
"Skathi had to knoould never abuse the weapon, would never harm anyone but Cruach with it"
"Yes, but to find the dieumort, you have to open a tomb, and there&039;s an evil deep inside it"
Exactly what Damiãno had said "I think I&039;ve already found the to so powerful that if loosed, it would change the world forever Even the gods fear its awakening"
"What evil being?"
"The Gilded One," N&iuet the dieu the evil?"
"There&039;re house rules at the tomb door You break them, and you&039;ll have to leave the party"
"Damn it, what do you mean? This is no time to withhold Wait! You couldn&039;t have told ravation spiking "You advised !"
"I&039;d totally forgotten about this until I found a Post-it note to myself stuck to the underside of Annika&039;s bed"
"What were you doing under her - Never mind, I don&039;t want to know" Yet her irritation with Nïx soon dwindled when Lucia comprehended all that had happened
Lucia was no longer a Skathian, a slave to the goddess&039;s whier a victi, how utterly e
Broke that bitch!
Lucia sed as a sudden thought struck her She could even have children
She cast a s her! Had made up his mind
One of these days, Lucia
When Garreth coughed, waking, Lucia was right beside hi down, her eyes swollen from tears "Nice nap?" she asked
"What what happened?" His body was a
"Big snake got peckish?"
"You killed it?" When she nodded, he frowned, recalling"You told me you couldn&039;t shoot anymore"
"I believed that But clearly I was mistaken"
"Aye, clearly You must&039;ve shot it fro as pain radiated through every inch of hioddamned ribs were cracked
"Is the pain bad?" she asked
"What do you bluidy think?"
Her eyes narrowed "I think that&039;ll teach you to leaveback"
Her expression unreadable, she asked, "For me?" Before he could answer, she added, "Probably to convinceback for you! Though you dinna deserve me to, stubborn Valkyrie"
She didn&039;t deny that "Why? I thought you were done"
"I&039;ll never be done!" he snapped, wincing again as his ribs screamed in protest "You&039;re my woman, Lousha Damn you, I&039;ll never want another!"
At that, she leaned down and pressed a tender kiss to his forehead "Good"
"What?" Was this an olive branch - froht she couldn&039;t confuse him more, she put theht you hated me"
"I hated the consequences of e&039;d done - or at least what I&039;d thought they were I took out all er and fear on you I&039;m sorry"
"Ah, bluidy hell, lass" Never would he have thought an apology frohter "For what it&039;s worth, I am sorry to have lost the cuff I bollixed that up"
She stroked his hair fro to be different, MacRieve With me If you want them to be Once we save the world, that is"
He could tell things were already different Garreth had claimed her, yet she could still shoot - and she looked more at peace than he&039;d ever seen her "What happened to you while I was out?"
"I have no more ties to Skathi None Any talent I possess is my own"
"Will you finally confide in me, then?"
"I can&039;t Not yet I&039; you for time" At his scowl, she said, "Look, I wasn&039;t ready for two things: sex and sharing secrets Noe both kno the first of those turned out Can&039;t you accept one out of two for now?"
He scowled deeper "Sex or secrets?"
Lucia jutted her chin "If that&039;s how you want to look at it"
She&039;d played the sex card - as in the proht before And o&039; course, he&039;d do just about anything for that "You keep your secrets for now As for the other, I have been getting ain as soon as I&039;m able"
Chapter 42
"So we&039;re no&039; to wake a big evil," MacRieve said as they gradually h she could tell he was still in a great deal of pain, he&039;d insisted that they gear up and set out by noon
On the way down, she&039;d filled hi N&iu she hadn&039;t said For instance, though the soothsayer had never actually confirrown convinced that the dieumort was there It had to be in the to about - the one that had hieroglyphs of gold
"Who do you think Dauardian of this place, then who hired him?"
"Doona know Maybe he&039;s a descendant of the people who lived here"
"Do you really think he hacked up those passengers?" She kept recalling the look on his face when MacRieve had accused him Had there been a brief flicker of surprise?