Sweep of the Blade (Innkeeper Chronicles #4) - Ilona Andrews Page 0,94

but she answered anyway. “We almost died today. I can’t wait any longer. I don’t want to be careful, I don’t want to think about the consequences or things going wrong. I just want you. I want you more than anything.”

“You have me.”

“Always?”

“Always,” he promised.

Maud stretched, sliding her foot along the heated length of Arland’s leg. He pulled her tighter to his body. Her head rested on his chest.

“What were they? The creatures.”

“The closest thing to Mukama in my generation. On the vampire home world, there were predatory apes, like us, but not quite us. A distant relative, less intelligent, more feral, more vicious.”

“Primitive?”

“Yes. The Mukona, the creatures that attacked us, are the Mukama’s primeval cousins. They are to the Mukama what feral apes are to us. An earlier evolutionary branch that didn’t grow. Daesyn is the birth place of the Mukama, after all. The Mukona possess rudimentary intelligence, more of a predatory cunning, really, and inhabit caves deep below the planet’s surface. When we took over the planet, we had hunted them to extinction, or so we thought. Apparently we were mistaken.”

“There were three of them,” Maud said. “A mated pair and an offspring?”

“I don’t know. Possibly. I’d never seen one before today. I’d heard stories.” He made a low growl. “Once this damn wedding is over, we’ll have to send survey drones into the caverns. Find out how many of them there are, and if any are left, we’ll have to take measures to preserve them.”

She raised her head and looked at him.

He smiled at her. “Today we are legends. We killed a Mukona, the next thing to the Mukama, the ancient enemy, the devourers of children, the cosmic butchers who almost exterminated us. Once the word gets out, every House will be beating on our door for a chance to hunt one. They really are magnificent beasts. We have to protect their future and manage their numbers. I have no idea what brought them to the surface for this hunt, but whatever it was ensured its place in history. Oh well, at least something good will come out of this wedding.”

“It was Helen,” Maud said.

He frowned.

“When I was a little girl, a Mukama came to stay at our inn.”

Arland jerked upright in the bed. “A living Mukama?”

“Well yes, it wasn’t a dead one that somebody brought with them. No, he was very much alive and wanted a room. They are out there somewhere, Arland. Think about it. They were an interstellar civilization with an armada of ships. You didn’t really think you got them all, did you?”

“Yes, I kind of did. What happened?”

Maud sighed. “I was very young, so I only remember bits and pieces. My brother told me most of it. He is older than me by three years and he saw the whole thing. He had nightmares for years after. The inn had lain dormant for a long time and my parents had just recently become its innkeepers. They were not in a position to turn down guests, and when the Mukama came, he was brimming with magic. The inn desperately needed sustenance and giving him a room would go a long way to restore the inn’s strength.”

“I understand,” he said. “That’s why your sister agreed to host our peace summit after everyone else turned us down.”

Maud nodded. “My parents offered him quarters with a separate exit, completely away from all the other guests, on the condition that he refrain from harming anyone. Supposedly, I had walked into the garden at this point. I was maybe five. I should remember it, but I don’t. All I recall is a monster chasing me through the garden. And then there were teeth. Really scary teeth.”

She slid deeper under the blanket. Arland lowered himself back down next to her and wrapped his arm around her waist.

“I was running for my life and then my father stepped onto the path in front of me. His robe was black, and his eyes and his broom were glowing with blue light. I ran behind him and kept running, and then there was this awful roar. My parents had restrained the Mukama. It had taken all of their combined power and everything the inn had. When my father demanded to know why he shouldn’t just kill the Mukama now, the creature told him that it couldn’t help itself. That I was full of magic and he would do anything to devour me. He offered them a fortune. He told them they could