THORN QUEEN

Volusian was my minion, for lack of a better word. He was a damned soul, cursed to wander without rest for all eternity after committing atrocious acts in life. I’d fought and bound him to me, forcing him to serve me. Volusian wasn’t very happy about this and frequently liked to remind me of how he would destroy me if he ever broke free of my control. After hearing stuff like that over and over, it almost took on a familiar feel, kind of like how a pop song heard often enough will work its way into your heart. While Otherworldly spirits often had insubstantial forms in the human world, the shape Volusian had now looked exactly the same as it would if I summoned him back home: a short, imp-like creature with black skin, pointed ears, and red eyes.

“My mistress calls,” he said in a flat voice. “And I answer. Regretfully.”

“Oh, Volusian,” I said cheerfully. “Always a joy to have you around. You’re such a ray of sunshine on a dreary day.”

Volusian merely stared.

I turned to the others, hoping I sounded queenly and authoritative. “Alright. Let’s go kick some outlaws out of town.”

I still wasn’t used to having an entourage of guards. So much of my life had been solitary, so much of it spent fighting on my own…well, I didn’t really know what to do with so many people at my back. As we headed toward our destination, I found it was a lot easier to deal with the guards if I just focused on Kiyo and pretended we were alone.

“I can’t believe you gave Shaya a place mat and now expect her to revolutionize this place’s total infrastructure,” he noted.

“What else am I supposed to do?” I asked. “You were just complaining about me getting too involved in this place. Handing off a place mat is about as uninvolved as I can get-unless you’re saying I should take a more active role now?”

“No,” he answered swiftly, face darkening a little. “Believe me, if there were an easy way for you to give up this place, I’d make you do it.”

I cut him a glance. “You’d make me, huh?”

“Encourage,” he amended. “Unfortunately, it’s a moot point. The only way to lose a kingdom is if your power drops or…well, if you’re killed.”

“I’m sure Volusian would love to help with that.”

My minion walked near me, needing no horse to move swiftly. Upon hearing his name, he said, “I would perform the deed with great relish and much suffering on your part, mistress.”

“You can’t put a price on that kind of loyalty,” I told Kiyo solemnly. “No crown even required.”

Kiyo grunted noncommittally. There was a lot of tension between him and Dorian, but the one thing they both agreed on was that Volusian was trouble. Both had encouraged me to get rid of him. I didn’t have the power to completely banish him to the Underworld, but it probably could be managed with another magic user. Still, dangerous or no, I continued to retain the spirit’s services.

“Are you going to stick around when we’re done here?” I asked. That was my subtle way of asking if Kiyo was going to see Maiwe

His dark eyes were on the road ahead, thoughtful. “No. I was hoping to go back to Tucson and see if I could get this hot chick I know to go out with me. I hear she’s in demand, though. She keeps putting me off each time I try to plan something romantic.”

“Yeah, well, maybe if you come up with a good itinerary, you could lure her out.”

“I was thinking di

I made a face. “If that’s the case, maybe you’d better brace yourself for rejection.”

“Red Pepper Bistro?”

“Okay. Now you’re in the zone.”

“Followed by a long massage in the sauna.”

“That’s pretty good too.”

“And then indecent things in the sauna.”

“I hope you mean you’ll be doing the indecent things-because I more than did my share last night.”

Kiyo glanced over at me with a mischievous grin. “Who says I’m talking about you?”

I would have swatted him if he’d been in reach. Instead, I gri

Rurik trotted up beside me and interrupted my pornographic thoughts. “We need to go on foot now. We’re getting close.”

We stopped on the edge of a “forest” comprised of saguaro cactuses and scraggly trees. They spread on ahead of us, up toward some sharp rises in the land that turned into sandy red cliffs studded with rocks. While tethering the horses, Kiyo decided he’d go ahead and scout in fox form.

“If you can’t change back, that’s going to seriously interfere with our date,” I told him.

He ran a hand along my bare arm, making every part of me tingle. “Nah, nothing’s interfering with that. I’ll go in small fox form-they’ll never see me.”

He slowly shape-shifted, his large, muscled frame growing smaller, then elongating into a red fox about as big as a medium-sized dog. He brushed against my leg and then disappeared into the vegetation ahead. I watched him go. Some part of me would always worry about those I loved, but overall, I had confidence in Kiyo when it came to dangerous situations.

The rest of us milled about in the midday heat, passing water around. About twenty minutes later, Kiyo returned. With each approaching step, he transformed from a cuddly furry critter into the man I loved. Not that I didn’t love him as a fox too.

“They’re over there, just like we thought,” Kiyo said. There was kind of a lope as he walked, a leftover from the fox form. It was both cute and sexy at the same time. “Looks like they’re camped out and resting for the day.”

“Any lookouts?” asked Rurik.

Kiyo gri

I rolled my eyes. “Did you see any girls?”

His smile faded. “No. Just the bandits. They’ve got a few less people than we do.”

“Well, that’s good,” I said, frowning. No girls. What did that mean? Had the couple in the village been wrong? Maybe their daughter really had run off with her boyfriend. Still, if this group was harassing people, getting rid of them would certainly be a good deed.

Kiyo and Rurik plotted strategy on how to sneak up on the camp, and our group set off, pla

Based on an earlier discussion, I’d thought our whole group would just swoop down at once. Instead, one of my guards suddenly stepped out and shouted, “Surrender in the name of the queen!”

Oh God, I thought. He did not just say that.

There was no time to ponder it further as my party charged forward. “Remember,” I hissed to Volusian. “Subdue. Don’t kill.”

He didn’t look happy about this. Of course, he never looked happy. The rest of my guards had orders to avoid killing if they could but not to hesitate if it was their life or a bandit’s. I wanted prisoners we could question later and didn’t really like the idea of furthering my tyra

As I’d expected, the bandits fought back. No surrender here. They had conventional gentry weapons, as well as some weak fighting magic. It became clear early on that taking prisoners was a little harder than killing. Killing was fast. Taking someone down and tying them up was a little more complicated. It exposed you to attacks from others. Nonetheless, I saw my guards handily bind two of the bandits right away. A couple other bandits got killed shortly thereafter, but they’d had knives at my men’s throats and left us no alternative. Kiyo and I were working together to tie a flailing man up when I suddenly felt a surge of magic in the air.

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