Warrior Rising (Goddess Summoning #6)(92)

“Well, that’s obvious.” She lifted her chin, pretending with every skill she’d learned in her clinical experience to be calm and unaffected by him. “Achilles—” she began, but he cut her off.

“No! Achilles is no more!”

As he lunged toward her, Kat stumbled back, her composure crumbling. “Achilles!” she cried. “You have to come back to me!”

She saw recognition flicker through his eyes, cooling the scarlet and causing the monster to pause awkwardly. “Yes! Achilles!” Kat smiled, dizzy with relief, but before she could say more or move toward him, her arm was being yanked roughly back and up, and she was pulled out of the clearing and off her feet.

“Ah, gods, we thought you were dead!” said the handsome, kind-eyed man who had lifted her onto the back of a quivering black stallion and into his arms. “Polyxena! Sister!”

Kat looked into Hector’s eyes as the berserker roared his challenge and charged.

* * *

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Keeping one arm around her, Hector kneed the stallion so that it sprang to the side, narrowly avoiding Achilles’ charge. With a fluid motion, the big horse spun while Hector grabbed a spear from the saddle quiver and hurled it at Achilles. Kat screamed, but with the berserker’s inhuman reflexes Achilles knocked the spear aside as if it had only been a toothpick.

“Hector! No!” Thinking frantically she pulled on the stranger’s arm. “Leave him. Let’s get back inside the city walls.”

Hector glanced down at her, trying to maneuver the stallion to avoid Achilles’ next rush.

“You cannot have her!” the creature snarled.

“By the gods! It is you he’s after.” His arm squeezed her protectively.

“Get me out of here Hector!” Kat yelled above the noise of battle.

“Trojans! To me! Protect your Princess!”

For a second Kat thought it would work and they would leave Achilles to roar impotently at the walls of Troy, giving her time to figure out what the hell to do next. Hector had begun backing the stallion from the clearing and a line of Trojan warriors was rushing to meet them. Then the creature that had been her lover gave a terrifying cry and hurled himself at Hector’s stallion. As Achilles flew past them his bloody sword tore down the horse’s flank. The stallion screamed, stumbled and lost his rear footing on the slick, bloody clay. Kat automatically threw herself forward, clutching the stallion’s wide neck. She felt Hector’s grip on her release at the same instant Achilles snagged his shoulder, ripping him from the saddle.

Then everything happened with blinding swiftness.

Hector regained his footing. He ran to the stallion, pulling his sword and shield free. His eyes met Kat’s. She saw his love for Polyxena there, and knew that he would do anything to keep his sister safe.

“Get inside the walls. I’ll hold him off for as long as I can.” Hector raised his hand and brought it down on the horse’s rump, sending him galloping across Trojan lines.

Achilles followed the horse, roaring with fury. Hector ran, jumped and put himself directly in the berserker’s path, cutting him off from Katrina. The Trojan warriors encircled Kat and the wounded stallion, but she had an excellent view of the battlefield as they fought off the Myrmidons, now rallied by Odysseus, and began moving her toward the city gates. Her eyes were locked on Achilles and Hector, and she watched everything as if in slow motion. Hector fought bravely, but he wasn’t battling a human. The creature was utterly uncontrollable, but Hector stood his ground, until Achilles sliced through the muscles of his thighs, and even then the brave man fought from his knees, keeping the monster engaged as the massive gates groaned open enough for Kat, the stallion and Hector’s guard to slip within. As they closed Kat heard a wail of despair begin from atop the Trojan walls and she knew that Hector, Prince of Troy, was dead.

The soldiers took her directly to the king. Priam’s arms enfolded Kat, and she wept with him while he held her.

“A miracle from the gods… a miracle from the gods…” he kept repeating over and over. Finally he steadied himself and called for wine for both of them. Only then did Kat get a good look at him, and her heart squeezed. He was an older, shorter version of Hector—a handsome man with kind brown eyes and thick silver and black hair. With a little jolt Kat realized that his eyes weren’t familiar just because Hector had had them. They were familiar because since she’d been transported to the ancient world and plunked into this body, those same expressive brown eyes had been looking out from her face, too.

Priam collapsed into a high-backed wooden chair exquisitely carved with plunging stallions. His hands shook as he drank deeply of the offered wine. Feeling lightheaded, Kat sipped her own wine, and then handed the goblet back to a servant who had been crying silently but openly. She heard a choked noise, and more arms were suddenly around her. An older, elegant woman who was too thin and a delicate, beautiful twenty something cried while they embraced her. Overwhelmed, Kat could only stand there and wish this had all been different—that she’d managed to make things right.

“It is true. Hector is dead. Achilles has killed him.”

Kat looked up with the women who had been holding her to see who had spoken. A slender man stood in the arched door to the spacious chamber. He was probably not much older than Polyxena, and he, too, had kind, expressive eyes. A blond woman stood behind him in the shadow of the doorway, her beauty undiminished by the tears that washed her cheeks. She stared with adoration at the young man who had just spoken. Kat thought she’d never seen anyone so gorgeous—she easily rivaled even Venus’s beauty. Paris and Helen—it has to be.