Page 30 of Humans Don’t Have Horns (A Crown of Blood and Magic #1)

Chapter Eighteen

Daton

The boulder I lean on is the only coolness I can find in the heat of the swamp. My tent is on the edge of the camp, like most of those with no young children to care for. I’ve always liked it that way, to be able to get some quiet and solitude away from the constant fuss of the camp.

As I sit sprawled on the ground, I try to clear my head of all thoughts of Lian.

But those futile attempts only make me want to rip someone’s head off.

I can’t escape the image of her beautiful face full of disappointment and contempt.

She’s never looked at me like that, not even in the beginning when she believed me to be the monster all Shavirs have come to know.

And the worst thing is knowing she’s right to scorn me.

I don’t deserve the way she looked at me before. I never did.

The problem is I’ve never wanted anything as badly as I want her.

I’ve tried to fight it. Stars know how I tried.

So many times, I begged the Goddess to give me the strength to resist these desires.

I didn’t want to feel this way for her. At first because of what she was – a Shavir – but then because it scared me.

It’d been a hundred years since I felt this kind of fear. Since I’ve felt so raw and wretched.

When I saw Lian for the first time, I was so mad at the sight of her.

At my reaction to her. I had no business looking like that at a heretic.

Especially not this heretic. But she was so beautiful and fierce.

Her white eyes should have been cold as ice.

They weren’t. Many times since that moment, I tried to decide if they were actually white or silver.

In every light, they looked different. In every different mood she was in, they changed.

And even then, at first glance, they beckoned like moonlight at midnight, luring like the purest of magic.

So I hated her even more. Because there is nothing alluring about the Shavirs.

Even with the Nimatek, fierceness radiated from her.

I knew the rules of Aldon. She was given a knife to kill herself, not to defend herself from me.

Yet she was defiant. She clung to life even through the haze of the Nimatek.

And she looked at me, held my eyes. When was the last time a heretic dared to hold my stare?

None since the Oblivion. She looked into my eyes and saw right through me, and it put me to shame.

Before I married Baghiva, in the village we grew up in, the Aldonian girls would flirt.

They were different then. They would tease and smile coyly before the True Religion bullshit.

They would steal forbidden kisses in the barn at night.

Because even then, an Aldonian girl had no business wanting someone like me.

But they wanted. After what they did to Baghiva, I couldn’t stand the sight of them.

Those pretty girls did nothing to help us.

They submitted to the True Religion and never again held my stare. I hated them. All of them.

So I treated Lian more roughly than I should have.

I ignored her pain and didn’t have the decency to stop and let her relieve herself.

I ignored her pleas for death and focused my mind on killing her after Minera gave me the order.

But fucking Minera had different ideas. Bless the Goddess.

I shiver at the thought of what would have happened if she’d told me to kill Lian.

Because I would have. I would have looked at those beautiful eyes and killed her.

That’s how fucked up I am. Sometimes I think I am the monster they say I am.

But Lian is different, not because of the wolves or any of that.

I had never met anyone like her. She saved me.

She treated me with Renyan healing and shared its secrets with me.

The Renyans had never done anything like that.

Before the Oblivion, the only way to receive healing from them was gold.

An amount of gold very few Mongans possessed.

After the Oblivion, no Mongan was stupid enough to reach for a Renyan healer.

For us, there was only death at their hands.

It was only the Shavir they would heal. But Lian didn’t care for their rules, or their greed.

I’d never met a Shavir like her, and I would never have believed someone like her could even exist in our hate-driven Amada.

She asked to learn our language, to really understand. How could I not fall in love with her? Every inhibition crumbled. Every reason evaporated.

But I should have never touched her, or kissed her.

And I would never have dared. Even though she is so beautiful it hurts.

The Shavirs are obsessed with colors. But being obsessed with colors is a privilege someone with horns doesn’t have.

Maybe that is why, when I saw her hair sparkle like the freshest snow, instead of being frightened by the uniqueness, I was lured by the beauty.

It also doesn’t help that the rest of her features are just as compelling.

Fuck, she couldn’t be more tempting if she tried.

And then she kissed me, and I was gone. Those impossibly soft rosy lips, her scent like fresh snow.

I lost myself and freaked her out with my hunger for her.

I did finally manage to pull myself together but I felt like maiming myself for making her cry like that.

While it was physically painful having her so close and holding back, it was also the most whole I had felt since I could remember. And making her smile, making her purr at my touch. Fuck, what I wouldn’t give for a bucket full of ice water right now.

But then, like a fucking idiot, I followed her into that water. Leaving my weapons on the bank. When had I ever been so careless, so stupid? But she looked at me over her shoulder, and I knew she wanted me to follow, and I couldn’t think. Like a fucking teenager.

I will kill for her. I will die for her.

But I just can’t bear watching her suffer and do nothing.

Can’t take having all these fucking feelings and being useless, not being able to protect her.

What a fucking loser. The Emancipator, my ass.

What good does it do if I lie there like some useless piece of shit when that monster touches her?

Says those foul words to my woman? She’s not your woman. Never was, never will be.

And I just walked out on her. I left her there, bleeding, teeth broken, after her first kill.

I just walked away. I knew she’d be fine.

She’s the one who talked to the wolves, the demichads, and then the vultures.

She was the stronger one between us. I would happily raze the world for her.

But I knew then that I was no use to her.

I just couldn’t watch it all over again and not be able to do anything.

Every sound Baghiva made that day, the smell of her blood, their semen.

Again, I could do nothing. Nothing but sob, retch, and collapse into the despair of the hunted souls trapped in that abomination they forged and called the Kozari lassos.

It all closed in on me. I had always known the Goddess was vindictive. But this. To relive this.

The truth is there is no excuse. She needed me, and I bailed like a fucking coward. And she is so angry with me, so hurt by me. Even so, she came. She said she didn’t come for me, but still she’s here, in the middle of this cursed camp. With my kin. She’s so close.

I hear someone approach, and I recognize Bahar’s footsteps. I look up to see him grin at me, a bottle of bree in each hand. I could almost kiss him for it.

“I bear a peace offering,” he says as he sits beside me, his thigh against mine, his hand on my shoulder.

Personal space was never his thing. “I missed you, brother,” he says and presses his brow to mine.

I missed him too, but if I admit it out loud, he’ll never shut up about it, so I take the bree in response.

I drink the hard liquor from the bottle like it’s water on a hot day.

Stars, that shit is gross. But it does the job.

One bottle, and I’ll be wasted. One bottle, and Lian’s face will disappear.

“Easy there,” Bahar says at my drinking speed and pulls the bottle from my hand. “Am I forgiven?” he asks, his voice all of a sudden solemn.

“Nothing to forgive you for. You did what the law demanded of you.” I take back the bottle while he’s midsip .

“Actually, the law required me to bring you back to trial, as Minera kept shouting at me in any chance she got,” he says dryly.

When I say nothing, he keeps going. Between the two of us, he was always the outgoing, chatty one.

“But that was the least of my hardship. Because I took your weapons, Niska nearly bit my head off. Literally, Daton. She nearly bit my head off. And Emek—” He trembles.

“I slept out of my own tent for three weeks. Three weeks!” he exclaims.

I can’t help but laugh at the sorry bastard, managing to enrage the three women no one dares to mess with all at once.

“So, come to think of it, you should have bought me the bree. Yeah, especially now that I saw that pretty little heretic of yours—”

“Don’t fucking talk about her,” I growl at him, my upper lip curling to reveal my teeth. Yours . He said yours . But she’s not mine. Never was. Never will be. I’m Amada’s greatest fucking idiot.

Bahar frowns at me. “Brother, you can’t—”

“Are you fucking kidding me? Are you two brutes drunk?” Emek cries, her hands on her hips.

“Getting there,” I say, raising the bottle in salute.

“Why, I swear, it is no other than the most beautiful oracle who ever walked the land!” Bahar exclaims, but Emek only gives him a death glare.

“Leave us. I need to speak to Daton.”

“Where should I leave to, oh my beautiful, sensual oracle?” he asks her in what might sound tempting in his head but not to anyone else. He could never handle the bree. I try to be a good friend and not jeer. Fuck it. It’s too hard.

Emek sighs. “Why, Daton? Why make him drunk?”

“He’s the one who brought the bree,” I say between laughs. Then take another swig.

Bahar stands up. “Can I go to the tent tonight?”

But Emek only gives him a dry look.

“I’ll do that thing you like. The one where I—”

“Fine,” she grunts to shut him up. He actually made her blush. “ Wait for me in the tent,” she says and lets him kiss her before he leaves.

“Traitor,” I call after him for leaving me alone to handle her, but he only grins widely at me.

“Kicking your mate out of your tent for three weeks. I’m almost touched that you cared so much,” I tell Emek, handing her the bree.

She gives me a hard, humorless look and takes a sip. “For a man who just escaped a death sentence and got his old job back, you look quite testy.”

“I didn’t want that job back.” But she knows that already.

“Not with the farming nonsense again.” She rolls her eyes. Lian didn’t think it was nonsense. I sigh at that. I fucked up so immensely.

“What happened between you and her?” Emek asks in a more tender voice.

“None of your fucking business,” I answer.

“It is my business. She’s important,” she says in a flat tone.

“If she’s so fucking important, why didn’t you stop Minera?” I grimace at her. She should have. She shouldn’t have left it to the warlord to have ethical objections. There’s a reason we have two separate leaders.

“I didn’t think the people were ready then to turn on Minera.” Then she adds pensively, “And truthfully, I didn’t want to believe she is the savior.”

I straighten at that. “Savior? What the fuck are you talking about?”

She sighs before she says, “Thirty years ago, at a self-transcendence ritual, I had a vision. To make a long story short, I’ve been searching for a white-haired Mongan baby since then.

I didn’t realize the savior wasn’t Mongan.

And I most certainly didn’t expect the savior to be a pampered, spoiled princess. ”

“She’s not spoiled,” I deflect in a reflex. Well, that’s bullshit. She is indeed spoiled.

“She spat out our food,” Emek protests because in our culture, to spit out your host’s food is enough of a reason for him to kill you.

“Our food tastes like shit.” I cringe at how defensive I sound. But it’s true. It took me years to stop vomiting from the roram and the bree.

“Because we live in the swamps where nothing grows. Because of her people. Because of her father.” Emek glowers.

“She’s not responsible for her father’s actions. She’s been subject to his bullshit as much as we have. The man wants to burn her to death, for fuck’s sake.”

She eyes me, then with one of those looks I see far too much, she says, “You have feelings for her.” And I swear it’s commiseration in her eyes.

“It doesn’t matter. She hates me, and rightly so.” Then I change the subject before she can answer me. “You need to tell her of your vision.”

“She’s a heretic,” Emek protests.

“No,” I say. “She’s a Shavir. There is a difference.” And if I can see the difference for the first time in a hundred years, then maybe she really is a savior.