The Amazon's Curse by Gena Showalter Page A

the entire point of mating season.
    â€œExcellent,” Kreja said with a grin.
    Zane snarled.
    That delighted the women around him, edging them to a new level of eagerness.
    Nola fought a wave of anger, of helplessness. She should not have feared Zane. She should have enjoyed him while she’d had the chance. His was the first touch in the entire span of her life that had not filled her with disgust. There had been something almost…reverent in his every gentle caress. If she’d welcomed him, he might have helped purge the demons of her past. He might have saved her from herself.
    Now, she would never know.
    â€œFight for me if you wish,” he said through sharp, gritted teeth, “but know that I will slay the winner with my bare hands.”
    He was not a man given to boasting, Nola knew.
    â€œSo vengeful,” someone twittered happily.
    â€œSo mine,” another snapped.
    â€œIt is I who will win his seed,” still another growled. “I who will give birth to his offspring.”
    â€œNo one will bear my child,” he roared.
    He is not meant to be a slave, Nola longed to shout. He was too proud, too defiant. Traits she also possessed. Which was why she had finally risen up and slain her own mother. Which in turn was why she sometimes cried herself to sleep, wishing she could claw the images from her mind.
    Scowling, Nola strode forward and reached out, hoping that, for once, her fingers would do more than ghost through as she tried to shove the Amazons aside. As always, her hand slipped through their bodies as if she were nothing more substantial than mist.
    A cry of frustration escaped her.
    Still, no one paid her any heed.
    â€œThose of you who desire the vampire will now enter the arena.” Kreja’s hard voice silenced their arguments. Together they did as commanded, bypassing Nola, even stepping through her.
    â€œDamn you!” she shouted. “Hear me!”
    Of course, they did not.
    Shoulders slumping, she closed the distance between herself and Zane and sank beside him. Like the others, he did not act as if he noticed. But she could almost—almost—feel his warmth, and goose bumps broke out over her skin.
    â€œLily,” Kreja called with a wave of her hand.
    Lily, the child-princess who would one day rule this clan, stood up from her throne atop the dais and walked to her mother’s side, her little body draped in velvet robes rather than the leather straps and skirts worn by the warrioresses.
    She had changed much in the past few months. No longer was this queen-in-training giddy and innocent. Once having run from camp to prove herself worthy of her people—thereby inadvertently beginning a war between the Amazons and the dragons, a war she’d thought had caused the deaths of Nola and another Amazon—she was now solemn, determined to become a worthy leader. She’d even relinquished her right to claim Brand the dragon shifter, another of the gods’ exiles, as her personal servant, and had offered him up to her people. He now sat among the other slaves.
    â€œYou will not fight to the death,” Lily proclaimed in her soft voice. “But you will continue to engage each other until only one of you is left standing. It is she who will earn the right to bed the vampire.”
    After Nola’s own experience with the gods’ cruel contest, she had no desire to watch another. For Zane, however, she would watch. And she would wish.
    There was only a slight pause before Kreja said, “You may begin.”
    Immediately the women leapt into action. Metal clanged against metal, grunts abounded, and sand was flung in every direction. Bodies were collapsing, cries of pain echoing, as one pink-haired female savagely worked her way through the masses.
    Soon, she was the only one standing.
    Nola wanted to vomit.
    â€œAnd so we have a winner.” Kreja motioned to Zane with a wave of her hand. “Claim your prize, beloved.