"You? Nay, you canna. The Skathians were from ages ago."
"I'm over a thousand years old," she said. "Skathi is the one who gave me my bow." And my abilities. She can take them away as well. She longs to. "I'm chaste in her name."
Oh, bluidy hell, no. "You canna be serious."
"I am. I made vows, MacRieve. My reasons are my own, but I will never take a man into my body. It's a religion to me."
Suspicions arose. Was she lying? "I never heard this about you."
She glanced away, and her hair fell over the side of her face. "Besides you, only Regin and Nïx know."
"Why would you do this? A life without sex?" His tone was astonished - he could barely comprehend such a lack.
"Again, my reasons are my own. But it is done."
"And can easily be undone."
"MacRieve!"
"Never take a man into you? You're... a virgin?" Garreth had suspected so, and didn't know how he felt about that. Once he introduced her to sex, would Lucia be tempted to sow her oats with other males? His claws dug into his palms at the thought.
"I wasn't born into that order," she said, with a shadow of some unrecognizable emotion in her eyes.
Cryptic words? So she wasn't untouched. Now he had to wonder how many lovers she'd had. "When did you join?"
"What does that matter?" she cried.
"There are no ways around this vow of yours?"
"Skathians are chaste. Period. We're expected to be pure."
"Do you believe that rot? That you have to be chaste or virgin to be pure?" he demanded. "Or that it's preferred anyway? Does that mean all mothers are impure?"
"Of course not. But I believe in believing in something, a higher purpose. This is mine." When he was still shaking his head, she asked, "MacRieve, what do you hold most sacred in the world?"
You. "My clan."
"Imagine if I forced you to forsake it for eternity. You'd grow to hate me. The same applies here." She met his eyes. "I will hate you forever if I lose this part of me."
This was the reason she'd run? His hackles rose again. The Instinct was sharp. - She means what she says. Coax what you can't take. -
But anger surged inside him. He'd never doubted that she wanted him back, and so for months, he'd wrestled with confusion, grasping for answers. The mystery had eaten at him, the bewilderment...
In China, she'd gazed at him with longing - right before she'd loosed a flaming arrow to blow him up.
She had wanted him, but instead of welcoming him to her bed, she'd honored this Skathi. Lucia had denied them to keep her ridiculous, useless vow of chastity. Which was nearly sacrilegious in itself to a Lykae - their kind revered all things physical, like sex.
A year of his life... wasted. He shot to his feet and paced. "This was why you ran? Over some purposeless vows to a second-rate goddess?"
She gasped. "I left because I have things to do around the Accession."
"What things?"
"Private things!"
"So many bluidy secrets. Has anyone ever told you that you're a high-maintenance mate? By the gods you're a complicated woman! The first night I saw you I wished for a female who would give me a challenge. Now I wish I could take it back." After digging his sat-phone from his bag, he stormed for the door, snatching up the bowcase on the way out.
Out on the deck, the rain was a cool mist. Garreth raised his face to it, struggling for calm. Once he'd gotten the worst of his ire under control, he called his brother. "Lachlain, I have her."
"That's excellent! Are you being patient with her?"
Hesitation, then he admitted, "Nay, no' exactly, but I'm trying to be."
"Watch yourself, brother. I will never forgive myself for the things I did to Emma." Lachlain's voice was rough with regret. "Doona make the same mistake. And no' like Bowen either. Learn from our misjudgment."
Their first cousin Bowen had treated his mate, Mariketa the Awaited, even worse than Lachlain had Emma. Before Bowen had accepted that Mariketa was his, he'd almost killed her.
"Is the Valkyrie bristling that you've caught her?"
"Oh, aye," Garreth said, relating all that Lucia had just told him, from the apocalypse to the vows, finishing with, "I want to throttle her."
"You're no' really letting her go with you to stop this apocalypse?"
"Bluidy hell, no. Just letting her think that until I can get more information out of her."
"Good then," Lachlain said. "For now, you can start fresh with the Valkyrie. You have the opportunity to no' f**k up with her. Find the patience."
Patience? Before Garreth could correct him, Lachlain said, "Take the edge off by yourself if you have to." He added in a mutter, "Gods know I did."
Garreth heard Emma sleepily say, "Lachlain, come back to bed. It's late." Two in the afternoon in Scotland was late for a vampire.
"I'll be there in a second, love."
Garreth felt a moment of envy, then grew shamed. After Lachlain's torture and imprisonment at the hands of the Horde, he above all men deserved the solace his pale-haired bride had been giving him over the last year. "Go to your queen, brother."
"Call me tomorrow," Lachlain said. "We have much more to discuss. Remember - she'll come around if you treat her well and respect her beliefs."
Her beliefs. Little hypocrite. Garreth loathed vows like hers, thought them ridiculous. Lykae revered food, touch, sex. She didn't eat, wouldn't have sex, but by the gods, he'd set to touching her. Tonight. Aye, he would -
"Remember, Garreth, you only get one female. Ever."
After he hung up with Garreth, Lachlain returned to bed, quietly easing in beside Emma.
But she was still awake. "Was that Garreth?"
"Aye." He pulled her into his arms, inhaling her sweet scent. "He's found the Archer."
"How's she taking it?" She briefly peeked up, reading his expression. "That good, huh?"
"It's hard when one's mate is other. Think of what we went through. And Bowen and Mariketa?"
Bowen had probably had it hardest of any of them. He'd believed his mate was dead, had mourned her loss for well over a century. Then, just this year, he'd met Mariketa the Awaited, a witch. When he'd begun to fall hopelessly for her, he'd hated himself for his unfaithfulness, hated her for tempting him, accusing her of casting a spell over him. Bowen had found out nearly too late that things... weren't always as they seemed with Mariketa.