Page 36 of Bound (Gladiators of the Gryn #3)
RYCH
This was a mistake. I haven’t nested for my Chrissie properly. I haven’t claimed her. She is mine, but with other Gryn around, it sets every feather on edge.
“A mate!” Klynn exclaims. “This vrexer found a mate!”
Both of them take a pace back from me.
“Vrex!” Maxym shuffles his primaries. “ a mated male. Who’d have thought it?”
As much as I hate it, I drop my wing to reveal Chrissie.
“This is Chrissie.” I look down at her, and she smiles up at me. “Chrissie, this is Maxym and Klynn. Maxym is the big vrexer, and Klynn is the one with an unhealthy attachment to all things sharp.”
“Hi,” Chrissie says with a little wave.
“Bold,” Klynn says.
“As I would expect any mate of ’s to be.” Maxym’s brows draw down. “But if you are mated and free, why the vrex are you in Tatatunga? If it was me, I’d be far from here.”
“My mate is being hunted by a Loxzian. Her employer seems to have vrexed off the wrong people.”
“Her employer?”
Klynn has returned to his seat and is downing a tankard of mead-ale.
“I sing for Fenek. He’s on the council,” Chrissie says.
Maxym gestures to their table, and I sit, pulling her onto my lap. She only squeaks slightly but doesn’t protest.
“What is ‘sing’?” Klynn asks, slamming one of his blades into the tabletop where it vibrates.
Chrissie pulls in a breath and then sings out one of the tunes I heard when we were leaving Fenek’s dwelling for the last time. Klynn’s jaw goes slack as he stares and stares at her, until Maxym hits him in the side of his head.
Which is good, because I was about to rip it off.
In the face of the violence, Chrissie stops and glares at all three of us.
“I sing. It’s all I can do.”
“It’s beaut…” Klynn’s mouth flaps before he remembers he’s supposed to be a bad vrexer. “Interesting.”
“Why aren’t you in the undercroft bothering the pikrats?” I snarl at him.
“The dome wanted us out today. We’ve both got passes.”
I frown. “Why?”
“I get a pass occasionally,” Klynn growls. “Not that unusual.”
“I mean why both of you? Why would the procurator want both of you out?”
Maxym raises his eyes to mine. “There’s a new sponsor in the dome. A Loxzian.”
“Vrex!” I growl.
“Vrex indeed.” Maxym intones.
“This can’t be a coincidence,” Chrissie says. “But what does it mean? How is Fenek tied up in all of this. How am I? And who wants me dead?”
“How do you know they want you dead?” Klynn asks, having produced another dagger which he’s using to pick his claws.
Chrissie looks at me. “I don’t, I suppose.”
“Because if I wanted you dead, you would already be dead,” he says.
I release a snarl like I’ve never made before. “You would have to come through me.”
Klynn laughs, a harsh, mirthless sound. I feel Chrissie tense on my lap.
“I mean, gladiator , if someone is trying to kill your mate, they’re not doing a good job, and that’s because they’d have to go through you. Yet they haven’t.”
“As much as I do not want to say it, Klynn is right,” Maxym rasps. “The Loxzian are good assassins, even if they’re terrible fighters.”
“So, if they don’t want me dead, what do they want?” Chrissie’s voice is a mere whisper.
I feel my lips lifting and my fangs showing at the others, for making my mate feel fear. She should never be afraid again.
“Vrex!” I slap my hand to my forehead, “Szar!”
“Vrex it all, ,” Maxym growls. “Were you giving your mate a tour of all the gak-holes on Trefa?”
“Red!” Chrissie sits up in my lap, her delicious bottom squirming over my cocks. “She said the Loxzian wanted me in good health…not dead.”
Klynn lifts a lip. He prefers death. I growl at him, and he goes back to messing with his weapons.
“We’ll go back to the dome,” Maxym says as he rises. “Get some more information about the supposed new sponsor, whose coincidental appearance can only be because they’ve realized there’s a Gryn involved.” He glares at Klynn who huffs, downs his second tankard and gets to his feet. “Can you stay here for the time being?”
I settle farther into the chair and pull Chrissie closer.
“We’ll stay here until nightfall,” I reply. “Then we’ll have to find somewhere else.”