They burst through the back door like a pack of rabid wolves. One, two, three, four, five…six. Six teeth-baring, growling, snarling, people-eating beasts.
“Oh shit!” Taken by surprise, Sophie dropped the steak at her feet and stared, gape mouthed, stunned into a state similar to that of a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car.
Teeth flashed in the moonlight. The dogs formed a line and crept closer. She had no doubt they’d be on top of her in about a second flat. She could see their muscles rippling under their fur as they readied to pounce like wild dogs on injured prey.
It was too late. She couldn’t run. She knew she couldn’t fight them all off. She was a goner.
“Ric,” she whispered. Her voice shook. “I love you.” Then, as the pack lunged forward, she turned and sprinted for the shed.
She got the door open, but before she could close herself inside, the first animal caught her ankle in his jaws.
The pain stole her breath away. It razored up her leg, charged along her spine, then exploded in her head. Out of instinct, she started kicking her free foot at the biting animal. But a second one caught that ankle and down she went, on her butt.
Within a heartbeat, there were mouths everywhere. Teeth. Pain. The terrifying sounds of clothes ripping, teeth chomping, and dogs growling. Her own screams.
She smelled the sickly sweet scent of blood. The pungent, sulfurous odor of their breath. Wet animal and earth.
Her vision was blurred by her movement, arms flailing, thrashing in a frantic, fruitless effort to find relief from the pain.
She could feel her strength waning. Her limbs were getting heavy and it was getting harder and harder to lift them. Her will to fight was fading as she began to accept her fate. She was dog food.
“Please, just let it be fast. Let one of them bite me in the neck or something, end it quickly.” She stilled, then realized the beasts had stopped biting.
She forced her heavy eyelids up and gasped. The dogs were gone.
There were now six enormous, naked men standing in a circle around her, looking down. They were all dark haired and gorgeous. Perfect bodies. Perfect faces. Perfect…other parts. Outside of the fact that their eyes glowed red, it was like being stared at by the Chippendales.
Hell spawn or angels?
As she mulled that question over, one of the Chippendales reached down and raked a fingernail over her partially exposed nipple, igniting an unwelcome chain reaction in her body. A great ball of fire burst inside her belly. White-hot need blazed a path down to her sex, where it churned round and round, like thunderclouds over the ocean. Storms were brewing. She dragged in a deep breath and tried to will away the lust threatening to carry her away like a tsunami.
She felt like she was outside of herself, like her body was no longer connected to her mind. She knew she loved Ric, knew these oversexed boy toys were not appealing to her. Yet wanting crashed through her body, carried on the waves of pleasure the strange man’s touches stirred.
“This way,” the one who had touched her said. He reached a hand down to help her stand. She accepted his help, but the instant she was upright, black and white flashes cut through her vision. Tired. So tired.
She felt the ground smack her in the face.
Her final thought before she let go was of Ric and Dao. She’d let them both down. “I’m…sorry.”
The dark and quiet was welcome relief from her fear, confusion, pain…and lust.
Stripped of his clothes, as well as his lifeline to Sophie, the two-way radio, and tied spread-eagle in the center of a circle painted on the basement’s concrete floor, Ric glared up at his brother. His brother! The one person on the planet whom he’d ever trusted. What the fuck?
Barrett was standing next to the Guardian, looking smug.
Speaking of smug, on the dragon’s other side stood none other than Margaret Mandel. She looked very pleased as she rubbed her hands together. “Look who we have here. My sweet little Wissenschaft, Ric Vogel. So nice to see you again,” she purred.
Ric didn’t respond. Instead he looked at the Guardian. “And here I thought you would be my biggest problem.”
The Guardian smiled. “From the look of things, I’d say I’m the least of your problems.”
Margaret clicked her tongue and shook her head. “You know, you had a choice. I offered the option of becoming my lover but you turned that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity down. Now I’m forced to use you for a much less pleasing purpose—at least from your point of view. A shame, since your body is absolutely exquisite. I would’ve worshipped it daily.” She crouched down, spreading her knees to reveal a pair of black lace panties under her short skirt, and gave him a long, hot sweeping gaze.
Rage piggybacked on confusion charged through his veins, heating them. He trembled with the need to grab hold of the lamia’s neck and snap it in two. Her gaze found his face, snared his. Knowing what she’d do, he fought to break his free. It was too dangerous. He would lose the battle if she tried to charm him.
Too late. He felt the velvet touch of her mind to his and instantly the fight left him. He felt his body reacting, warming. His mind slipping away.
He was weakening, falling under her glamour.
“No,” he heard himself mumble. He tried to fight back, to resist the lamia’s song, calling, calling to him. So sweet and tempting. She was too strong, her will, her mind, her spirit. Then she knelt next to him, pressed her warm, wet mouth over his, and kissed him.
He couldn’t stop her.
He hated the fact that he was a male at that point, hated the fact that his body had a mind of its own and didn’t give a flying fuck who or what was kissing him. His brain told his traitorous body this was wrong. The danger of falling under the lamia’s seduction aside, he loved Sophie. Loved her more than anything, more than he ever expected to. If Sophie saw this, if she knew, it would kill her. Still, his body heated. Wanting coursed through his body on slow ripples.
He bit back a growl, knowing his anger would only encourage the lamia, and instead thought of the most boring, mundane things he could think of, knowing that was the only way to best his aching, lust-filled body. Waiting at the secretary of state’s office. Or spending eons in line to collect an unemployment check. Or sitting in rush-hour traffic during the height of summer road-construction season on I-75. Oh yeah, that was a good one. He felt his expression relax into one of complete and utter boredom, despite the vigorous oral attention the lamia was currently giving his neck.
It got to her. When she tried to kiss him again but he refused, she shrieked in anger, “That human couldn’t possibly have that much of a hold on you yet!”
He tried not to smile but it was hard. Feeling a little smug, since that was the first time he’d ever won a battle with his single-minded hormones, he just looked at her with raised eyebrows.
“I know why you want the shield and spear.” Rising up to a squat, she pulled on her skirt until the hem was up around her waist. She parted her knees and fingered her panties. “Look at me. Don’t you want me? Why are you fighting this? I know what you want to do for your people.”
Black lace. Wet. Slick. His body warmed again. His brain started to melt, overheated by the unwelcome lust pulsing through his body. It was the glamour, the lamia’s most potent weapon. He turned his gaze to the ceiling.
Wood beams. Furnace ductwork. Cobwebs. Much better. At least his brain worked when he stared at those. “Yeah, so what?” he said.
“You weren’t thinking of letting that human have the spear and shield, were you.”
Was that a question or a statement? He wasn’t sure. But he decided not to respond anyway, partly because he wanted to piss the lamia off, partly because he didn’t want her knowing anything, and partly because he didn’t know the answer himself. When he’d first stumbled into Sophie at the library, he’d expected to continue his search, expected to find the relics and deliver them to the mage. Expected to receive the spell that would free his race from the damnation of a slow, painful death.
Even when he’d taken Sophie as his lover, he’d still expected to carry out his plans. He figured she’d be angry at first, hurt. But he’d help her find another way to defeat the lamia. Divorce was an option, granted almost impossible, and sometimes deadly. But it was something. It was the choice between two good deeds: the salvation of an entire race versus the salvation of a single human being.
Such a simple choice, or so he’d thought until today.
But now…now he wasn’t so sure he could go through with it. He knew Sophie would hate him for lying to her. Despise him for taking the relics for his purpose, no matter how honorable it was.
That would kill him faster than a day spent sunbathing at the equator.
He would tolerate the most horrid torture easier than he would handle seeing hatred in her eyes, turned on him. He would endure hundreds of years of agony to avoid seeing pain in her eyes, for even a minute.
He cleared his throat. “You just hope I’ll take the relics because then your sister’s safe from Sophie,” he said, turning his gaze back to Margaret.
She shrugged. “No, not really. She wouldn’t be safe for long; none of us would. Once Ysgawyn gets the relics, he would have the power to exterminate our entire race, me included.”
“You lie. He’s a sworn mage, powerless to hurt anyone with his magic.”
She shook her head and tsked through her teeth. With slow, deliberate movements she removed her skirt, her blouse, her bra. She stood proud, her brown-tipped breasts high and firm, her waist narrow, her hips full enough to be tempting. The musky-sweet scent of her arousal filled his nostrils. Smiling, her eyes glittering with passionate promise, she reached up to loosen her hair from the tight bun at the back of her head. It fell in heavy waves over her shoulders, framing her siren’s face. “Didn’t anyone tell you, you can’t believe the words of Ysgawyn? He’s no longer sworn. And he’s not above using any form of deceit to get what he wants. The spell that will bring the destruction of the lamiae will give him power beyond your wildest imaginings. Power like no mage has had in centuries.”
Ric closed his eyes against the distraction of her standing nude before him and tried to concentrate on what she’d said. Ysgawyn casting a spell to destroy all the lamiae? Impossible! Or was it? He’d seemed mighty eager to get his hands on those relics. If they didn’t serve him in some manner, what could he possibly want with them? “Who am I to believe—”
“Believe Margaret, Ric,” Barrett interrupted. “She speaks the truth.”
Ric opened his eyes to glare at his brother. The brother who stood by the lamia’s side. The brother who seemed to have led him into this trap. “You want me to believe her?” He squinted at the lamia, who had taken a step behind Barrett, the coward. “I’m having a hard time trusting you after this. You lied to me, pretended to be here to help me. Then led me straight into the lamia’s trap. And now you have the balls to tell me to believe her? How could I possibly do that? You know what she is. What she and her clan have done to humans. To our people. How could you stomach standing by her side watching this?”
“Yes, I know what she is. But I couldn’t let you go through with it,” Barrett explained. “I couldn’t let you give Ysgawyn the shield and spear. It’s against the law of the Immortals.”
“You prize the law over the blood we share? We’re brothers. Remember? Or has the lamia already worked her glamour on you too? Are you under her spell?”
“No.” Barrett shook his head. “I have all my mental capacities intact—”
“That’s up for debate.”
“Shut up, you bastard, and listen for once.” Barrett was gritting his teeth. His face practically glowed it was so red. “You want to know how much you mean to me? I prize your pathetic ass over the law. Your life over my own, even. My freedom. My career. My future.” He held out his wrist, showing the mark of the Bond. A deep purple stain forming a full circle around his wrist.
Ric didn’t often have to inhale, being a vampire. But at that moment, his lungs burned for air. He sucked in the deepest breath he’d taken in centuries, then fought against the metal cuffs securing his wrists and ankles to the ground. “What. Have. You. Done!”
“I went to the Judicial. Signed a promissory note. My life for yours. I had to. What you were about to do would’ve cost you your life if you’d succeeded—what you would’ve done if I hadn’t let Margaret stop you. Lamia or not, she’s spared you the mistake of an eternity. Please, don’t be a fool! Don’t go through with it. We both have too much to lose if you do. We all do.”
“Went to the Judicial? Why would you do that?” Ric wanted to roar out his rage, shout long and loud until the walls around him tumbled to the ground. His brother had taken The Bond to protect him? For what? Barrett had promised to give up everything, had volunteered to pay the price for his transgressions. Would never again be able to make a decision freely if Ric went through with his plans. Why had Barrett done such a thing? No part of Ric’s plan was illegal. “I didn’t ask you to. I would never ask you to.”
“What choice did I have? After I found out what you were doing, that you’d made a pact with Ysgawyn—”
“To save our people!” Ric hollered. “To spare them the agony of the Second Death. Why should that be against the law? We’ve sought other ways, spent eons searching for a medical cure, but there is none. Magic is the only answer. And if turning to magic is illegal, then the law has bound us, kept our people from the cure they deserve.”
“It’s not the magic that the law forbids. It’s the end results that would bring judgment to you. Your plan to save our people will ultimately cost the lives of a whole race of Immortals,” Barrett explained in a cool voice. “And so many more if that mage is able to complete the spell harnessing the power of the Fury. Forget about the mage for a minute and the disaster he could bring to the Immortals and the humans both. You can’t save one race by destroying another.”
“But why would I be held responsible for another man’s actions? I didn’t know what he was going to do with the relics. He didn’t tell me. I only knew the price for the spell I needed was the shield and spear. I thought no mage could use them—”
“It doesn’t matter. Whether you knew or not, the guilt would be yours.” Barrett knelt next to Ric and looked at him with pleading eyes. He unfastened each of Ric’s wrists, then ankles. “Please. Complete the spell with Margaret. The relics must be destroyed to bring our people and the lamiae back to harmony, and keep Ysgawyn from completing his spell. It’s the only way.” He took Margaret’s hand and pulled until she was on her knees next to Ric.
Hundreds of years of searching had led to this moment, to a decision so difficult and complex. How could he possibly sort through it all in the space of a heartbeat? Ric knew the agony of watching his brother sentenced to death by the Supreme Immortal Council would likely destroy him. He’d probably not survive to see the freeing of his people from the bonds of the Second Death.
Still, there was Sophie. And her friend. Maybe he couldn’t save a race but he could save a single human being. But were there unknown risks involved in that quest too? He had no idea what was involved in the freeing spell. Would that cause more innocent deaths? Would his brother still be forced to pay with his life? Ric’s gaze zigzagged between Barrett and Margaret. Was one human life worth the risk?
Barrett stood and took several steps back until he was out of the circle. Margaret pressed gently on Ric’s shoulders until he was sitting up on his bent elbows. She traced a circle on his chest and chanted the first lines of the spell. “No,” Ric interrupted before she’d completed the first verse. A flare of guilt and anger shot through his spirit as scalding fury pulsed through his veins. He pushed on Margaret’s shoulder. Forced her away from him. “I can’t. Sophie…”
“She has made her own choice. There is nothing you can do for her now.” Barrett motioned toward the wall behind him. The Guardian blew a stream of air at the wall and a tiny pinpoint of light glowed in the center, then spread out until the entire wall looked like it was consumed by fire. The flame flared for several seconds, then dimmed, leaving a transparent circle in the center.
“Sophie?” Ric said on a gasp. “Sophie!”
She didn’t hear him but he could see her. As clear as if she were right next to him. She was lying on a bed. Her glossy hair was fanned out about her head. Her spine was arched, her breasts pushed high into the air. His mouth watered. His body ached to feel her beneath him.
Why couldn’t he be there with her right now? All their worries gone. Their loved ones safe. Why couldn’t those be her fingers stroking his stomach, making the muscles tighten?
Sophie’s face turned to the side facing him. She stared blindly for a moment, obviously unable to see him. Then she blinked her eyes and shuttered them closed. Peace touched each of her features. Her lovely lips pursed, the corners lifted into a shadow of a smile.
He remembered seeing her react that way to his touches, his kisses. Only this time it was another man whispering in her ear, gliding his hands up her cotton-sheathed thighs.
Julian stood beside her running his hand up her leg. Her stomach. Her breast. He knelt on the bed and lowered his head to kiss her.
For a moment, Ric simply shook his head in disbelief. “It’s a trick. Sophie would never—”
“It’s no trick.” Barrett motioned toward the Ancient One. “You see? They’re performing the binding ritual.”
Ric looked again, saw the shimmering, translucent rope in Julian’s fist. “No.” For the third time in the past hour, white-hot rage blasted through his body. Why would Sophie bind herself to another Immortal? It made no sense. Surely she wasn’t doing it just to get the spear and shield? She wouldn’t do something so foolish. So dangerous.
“She’s not binding herself. She’s binding you,” Barrett said.
Ric shook his head. “No!” He couldn’t believe that. Wouldn’t believe it. Sophie wouldn’t bind him for eternity just to be able to destroy one lamia. She loved him. She trusted him to help her. He knew it; he’d felt her love and faith, had heard her thoughts whispering through his soul like a soft breeze through a forest.
They’d tricked her somehow. That had to be it. But goddess help him, if it wasn’t a trick, he needed to stop her before she completed the ritual.
“The human is no longer your concern,” Margaret said, sounding impatient. “She has chosen another path. You never completed the Joining with her.” She traced a long, slick path up his stomach with her tongue. “It’s time. We need to complete the abolition spell. We must destroy the spear and shield. Now.”
“This is what you’ve wanted all along, isn’t it,” he growled, glaring at her with such hatred his mouth burned with acid. “That’s why you told us about the Guardian. You wanted us to find the relics, to get this far so you would be able to convince Barrett that the shield and spear had to be destroyed. That way none of your people will ever again face the threat of death.”
“Perhaps.” She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. What’s done is done. It’s no longer safe with the Guardian. If you give the spear and shield to Ysgawyn, your brother will pay the price with his death. And untold millions will pay when the mage summons the Fury. You can forget about helping Sophie’s friend too. You don’t know the price to be paid for using the relics to destroy my sister. Do you really wish to risk your brother’s life? Or Sophie’s?”
“You must complete the spell,” Barrett echoed.
Margaret smiled triumphantly. “You have no other choice.”
This time Ric didn’t hold back. He roared, releasing the frustration, anger, and powerlessness boiling and churning inside like hot magma deep in the belly of the earth.