Death Blow Read Online Free PDF Page B

fought each other for the cave’s entrance.
    Konáll sliced through the rest of the ropes and threw them off. He grabbed the three daggers and raced to Nyssa.
    “Look to me.” He cleaved the ropes trussing her arms, then her feet, and met her gaze. Pointing at the arrow rock, he snapped, “Go there. Stay until Mús and I have all in hand.”
    She clamped the torn tunic together with one hand and used the other to lever herself to a squat. “Worry not of me, Viking. Go help Mús.”
    Standing with knees bent, he brandished his knives and spread his legs to block her movements as she crawled into the shadows.
    The battle had moved outside. The lion’s roars echoed off the cliff face and the beast decimated man after man with powerful swipes of his great paws.
    Twixt the snarling enraged animal, Konáll’s war bellows, and the tortured shrieks of the wounded, the pounding rain seemed a mere whisper. The moment Nyssa hugged her arms and ducked behind the rock, Konáll galloped into the storm. Few men were left standing, all either injured or dying or racing into the woods. The berserker in him reared.
    Through a scarlet haze he slashed and severed all who stood their ground and halted only when he heard the cat’s howl of pain. Konáll swung around to glimpse the beast crumpling to the muddy ground, a sword buried hilt deep in its side.
    “Nay. Nay.” Nyssa, half-naked, bounded to the fallen animal and flung her arms around its neck. “Do not leave me. Nay.”
    He could not tell her tears from the hammering rain, but the sob in her voice could not be mistaken. After checking the immediate area and reassuring himself all threat had either vanished or been vanquished, he hurried to Nyssa and grasped her arm. He shook her. “Woman! Cease your infernal tears. Want you your pet to live we needs get him inside so you can tend to him.”
    She nodded, and her glazed eyes focused. “Aye. Inside. Help me.”
    To his astonishment, she discarded the remnants of her tunic, eased the cloth under the cat’s shoulders, knotted the ends, slung the cloth over one shoulder, and heaved.
    “Yield to me, woman.” He grabbed the sling from her. “Light the fire. He is soaked and will take a chill.”
    For a moment she looked about to argue, eyes narrowed, hands fisted, but then dropped her gaze to the filthy handle of the sword embedded in the cat’s side and bounded into the cave.
    Konáll dragged Mús near to the pit she’d dug earlier.
    The blaze had already caught, and low flames welled a cloud of charcoal smoke to the roof of the cavern.
    He shifted the beast to the back of the fire, away from the entrance, and let the cloth drop to the ground. “I needs—”
    “I know, Viking. I am too well accustomed to battles. See to what you must, but secure me a weapon afore you depart.” She did not look at him but bundled the tunic into a roll and eased it under Mús’s head.
    Konáll could bring himself to consider Mús a man, not with the great cat lying wounded with a sword buried to the hilt in his mane. He had learned a long time ago not to care too deeply for the warriors he served with or the stallions that carried him in battle. Death was too frequent and the loss too painful, and the business of a conqueror was of more import. That Nyssa’s brother would survive such a blow was doubtful, but she had proved her healing abilities with Konáll’s injury.
    Konáll retrieved a sword and several knives from the fallen Picts and gave them to Nyssa. She did not notice when he left, too absorbed in heating and pulverizing a handful of the moss scraped from the cave’s walls.
     
    * * *
     
    “Wake, curse you. Wake.” Nyssa smoothed the cowlick on the top of Mús’s head, the one stubborn trait that resisted his transformation from man to mountain lion. “I cannot heal you in cat form. Pray thee awake.”
    Tears blurred her vision. She could not fail Ciárrán, not after all he had done for her. A cold, wet nose grazed her