by Amy Sumida
“I have no idea.” Daxon let go of my hands and stood up. “Neither visions nor Anu are within my area of expertise. You'd do better asking Killian. He was chosen by Anu, wasn't he?”
“Yeah. But first... oh, crap. I forgot that I have to scry them from separate rooms before I bring them together or the crystal will get confused.”
“I'll scry Tiernan,” Daxon offered as he scooped up my scry phone and headed out of the office.
“Thanks.” I waited till he was in the hall before I directed the crystal ball with, “King Raza Tnyn of Unseelie.”
The crystal filled with gray mist but then colors began to fill the nebulous shadows. The colors condensed into the shape of a smiling Dragon-Djinn.
“I didn't expect to hear from you so soon, mo shíorghrá,” Raza said.
“I have something I need to talk to you about.”
“Here he is,” Daxon declared as he came back into the room.
He leaned the scry phone against the crystal ball. Tiernan stared out at me from the slice of crystal.
“Here who is?” Raza asked, his grin shifting into a scowl.
“Tiernan's on my scry phone,” I explained. “I wanted to talk to you two together.”
“Is this about shortening the visits?” Tiernan asked.
“No, but I do have good news on that front. All of us are in agreement. After Daxon's visit, we'll start the three-day rotation.”
Raza and Tiernan made satisfied sounds.
Then I said, “Anu appeared to me today.”
Their pleasure vanished.
“What did you just say?” Tiernan asked in a deadly tone.
“Anu appeared to me and asked for my help.”
“No!” Raza roared. “You are done with that. You're a mother now, Seren! You are not going off to fight in some human war!”
Daxon, leaning against the door frame with his arms crossed, smirked at me.
“I did mention that to him,” I said dryly.
“And what did he say?” Tiernan demanded.
“That he needed my help saving his children, and that I was his child too, not just Danu's. He said the Fairies of Earth are in danger as well.”
They went quiet.
“I agreed to help.”
Raza roared again, this time without words.
“Without talking to us?” Tiernan asked me in shock. “How could you do that?”
“It wasn't as if I could get back to him,” I huffed. “I had to make a decision on the spot.”
“What exactly does he want you to do?” Raza growled.
“I don't know yet. He says I'll know when I need to.”
“Fucking Anu and his fucking vagueness,” Raza hissed. “At least Danu was always straight with you—with all of us. Her brother is an ass.”
“He's not an ass. Look, I'm sorry that I agreed without speaking with you, but... I... I just...”
“No,” Raza whispered in horror.
“You want this,” Tiernan said what Raza wouldn't. “You want to be an extinguisher again.”
“No,” I protested.
They started to relax.
“Not exactly.”
Raza started cursing in the Fey language so fast and so gutturally that I couldn't understand what he was saying.
“I don't want to be an extinguisher again. I never stopped being one, Raza,” I snarled.
The Dragon King quieted and leveled a grim stare on me. “You may still be an extinguisher in your heart, but you're no longer on duty, as it were. I would prefer for it to stay that way, my Queen.”
“I know, and your preference is important to me, Dragon,” I said gently. “But I've already given my word and, as you've guessed, I'm eager to fulfill it.”
“It's done, Raza,” Tiernan said before the Unseelie King could go ballistic. And by ballistic, I mean dragon.
“Not quite, Tiernan,” Raza growled as he leaned forward. “If you're going back on the job, mo shíorghrá, I'm going with you.”
“Raza, you can't just leave Unseelie—”
“In the hands of my heir?” He cut me off. “Yes, I can. I can also leave our daughter with him. Rayetayah has proven his competence in both tasks.”
“Don't do that.” I sighed. “If you're coming to Earth, I'd prefer Shahzy be with her siblings in Twilight. I'm going to ask Kill and my dad to watch Caelum anyway.”
“You don't think Killian will want to be with you too?” Tiernan countered. “Because I want to, Seren.”
“You too? Tiernan, I don't even know what's—”
“I'm coming to Earth,” Tiernan declared with finality. “I'm a hunter; I served in the Wild Hunt for longer than you've been alive. And I'm still a member of your Star's Guard, in case you've forgotten. I will assign a regent to watch over Seelie while I'm gone.”
“Sweet Danu,” I whispered. “With the two of you and your Royal Guards, we'll need a fleet of vans and planes to transport us around the world. And what if I need to twilight somewhere, huh? I'd have to leave you behind.”
Twilight is the term Killian coined for traveling the Between. It's a little silly but since no one had come up with a better word for it yet, we'd all adopted it.
“We will figure it out,” Raza declared. “Contact the Snake and your father, then scry us back.”
“Raza, I—”
He wiped a hand over his ball and his image faded while I was still protesting.
“Fucking dragon!” I hissed.
“I agree with the fucking dragon,” Tiernan declared before he ended his connection as well.
“Fucking Legolas!”
Daxon laughed his ass off.
Chapter Fourteen
After Daxon stopped laughing—which took awhile, by the way—I was going to scry Killian but he scried me first. Daxon's lingering grin vanished when his crystal ball chimed. I lifted a brow at him before I swept my hand across the smooth surface. Killian's face came into focus.
“Hey, I was just about to scry you,” I said.
“Really? Why?”
“I had a visit from Anu. He asked for my help.”
“Your help with what?” Killian, unlike the others, didn't sound upset. But then, Killian's part human and respects Anu.
“He didn't specify, said I'd know when it happened.”
Killian chuckled. “That sounds like him.”
“Right?” I asked with a measure of relief.
It was nice to have someone who understood me, and Killian had always been the best at that. Probably because, out of all of my husbands, he was the most like me.
“So, you're back on the divine payroll, eh?” Killian asked with a wry smile. “You're not going to come after my job are you, Twilight?”
“No, babe, that's all yours,” I promised. “Frankly, I don't want to deal with the politics. I get enough of that as Queen of Seelie and Unseelie.”
“No shit.” He laughed. Then he blinked and sobered. “This is interesting timing.”
“You mean because of Rowan's vision?” I glanced at Daxon.
“That and then there's the reason I was calling you.”
“Dear Danu, spit it out already,” Daxon groaned.
Killian cocked his head as if he were trying to see Dax, which was impossible since crystal balls have a limited, fish-eye view. “Hey, Daxon. How's it hanging, Blue Balls? I mean, King Blue Balls.”
Daxon rolled his eyes and stepped into Killian's view. “It's my hair that's blue, not my balls—although, that's partially thanks to our wife—and they're hanging just fine.”
Killian chuckled. “Good for you.”
“Kill, why did you scry me?” I asked pointedly.
“I'm being called in on a case. I was scrying to let you know that I'd spoken to Dad and he's good with watching Rowan.”
Killian's father had died awhile back and my father had warmly welcomed Kill into the family, giving him the approval to call him dad. None of my other husbands had asked for such familiarity nor did I think t
hey wanted it. Not that they don't like Keir, it's just a Fey thing. But my father had fallen in love with a human and had tried to embrace human traditions for her and now, for me. So, he was good with the familiarity.
“I'm going to ask him if he'll be willing to watch all of them.”
“All four of the kids?” Killian asked in surprise. “Why?”
“Because the others are insisting on joining me wherever this Anu business leads.” I grimaced.
Killian roared with laughter.
“It's not funny, Kill.” I glared at him.
“Hell, yeah, it is,” Killian protested. “How hard has it been for you to get all of us together? We manage it maybe three or four times a year. Go figure that all it would take is you going back to work.”
“I love that you're good with it,” I said softly.
Daxon cleared his throat.
I glanced over at Daxon, “Sorry, but it's the truth. He understands me.”
“I understand you and I'm good with you doing this,” Daxon insisted. “I'm just not good with you doing it alone.” Then he frowned. “Hold on, you said that you had a mission, Killian. That means you won't be joining us so why'd you say we'd all be together?”
Killian smirked at Daxon, then looked at me. “I have a feeling that this mission and Seren's are one and the same.”
“Tell me about it,” I urged.
“I'm going to India,” Killian said.
“Twilight country,” I murmured.
Even though the Earth isn't under Fey control, Fairies can be territorial about it. The regions that align with a kingdom are considered to be that kingdom's domain. So, India, which aligns with Twilight, is considered to be Twilight stomping grounds.
“Yep. There's a group of Naga mystics, or whatever they call themselves, living there,” Kill went on. “They're the guardians of this stone called the Cintamani. Some people call it the Oriental Philosopher's Stone. It's a Fey relic.”
Something shivered inside me and an image blossomed in my mind—that of a giant, glowing pearl. “It's not a stone, it's a pearl,” I whispered.
“Fuck, is it?” Killian asked, his expression going grave.
“They didn't tell you that?” I countered.
“No, they just said it was a relic that grants wishes.”
“Wishes.” I blinked as something clicked in my head. “This is it; this is what Anu needs me to do. I have to go with you to India.”
“I figured,” Killian said softly. “But I didn't think it would be related to Rowan's vision.”
“Then it's good that all of us will be together,” Daxon declared. “Whatever's coming for you, you won't be facing it alone, Killian.”
“Thanks, Dax,” Killian said sincerely. “I appreciate it. But I'm not worried, not about myself anyway. It's just that if all of these things are related—Anu's appearance, Rowan's vision, and this... pearly stone—then this mission is bound to be momentous.”
“You never did finish telling us what the mission is,” Daxon reminded him.
“Oh.” Killian blinked. “The Cintamani has been stolen.”
Chapter Fifteen
“Caelum and I had better get our week with you when this is all over,” Daxon declared as he watched me pack our son's bags.
My father had eagerly agreed to babysit all of his grandchildren even though I couldn't tell him how long he'd be watching them. I wasn't surprised; I would have leapt at the chance too. The kids together can be a handful but they tend to cancel each other out; their personalities compliment each other so well.
My husbands, children, and I were meeting at Castle Twilight for two reasons. The first, of course, was to drop off the children. The second was to travel to the other side of the kingdom—which meant the other side of the planet—via a rath and use another rath there to travel to a mountain in India. Most times, traveling was easier in the Human Realm. Humans have things like cars and planes and trains instead of horse-drawn (or Puka-drawn) carriages. My father has a team at his company, Gentry Technologies, developing a magic-powered vehicle but until then, we're stuck in the middle ages as far as transportation is concerned. Why? Fuel emissions. No one wants that crap in Fairy.
But despite HR's advanced vehicles, Fairy has raths that bridge enormous distances in seconds and many of them are planetary—they take you around the planet—as opposed to a realm rath that forms a bridge between realms. In this case, we could take a planetary rath from one side of Twilight to the other, then a realm rath to India. The Twilight Kingdom is the center slice of the planet so it's like a ring; we'd be going from the front of the ring to the back before leaping off the planet altogether. This would be much faster than going the human way, even when you take into consideration the amount of time we'll have to spend in carriages to get to both raths.
Since Castle Twilight is in an area aligned with California on Earth and the opposite side of the Kingdom is aligned with India, traveling the planetary rath will be like shooting straight through the planet to go from San Francisco to Delhi in five seconds. But that wasn't the only reason we chose to travel this way. The Naga sanctuary we were headed to was located in the Himalayas, a place where cars, planes, and trains can't reach.
The sanctuary was on the Trishul massif—a range of mountains formed by three peaks in Uttarakhand, India. Composed of Trishul peaks I, II, and III, they're collectively called the Trishul and are named after the Trishula—the trident of Shiva. Trishul I, the highest peak and the one with the Naga sanctuary, could only be reached via a long trek that starts in the town of Almora and goes through hill stations and other towns before reaching a lake called Roopkund that lies at the base of Trishul I. But that, of course, was if you traveled by human means. Our way bypassed all of those towns and hill stations and took us directly to Roopkund.
“Of course, you will,” I assured Daxon, then stopped packing and frowned. I'd hit something hard in Cael's suitcase—something I hadn't packed. I pulled it out and my heart melted. It was a framed photograph of him and me that Daxon had taken. In it, Cael was only two and I was holding him above me, his body extended up and his head down with our laughing faces close together. Caelum usually kept the photo on his bedside table. I looked over and, sure enough, there was an empty spot where it should have been. “You adorable child.”
“What?” Daxon scowled.
I lifted the picture frame and showed him. “Cael slipped this into his suitcase.”
Daxon's face softened. “He misses you when you're gone.” His jaw clenched before he added, “We both do.”
“Dax,” I whispered as I laid the picture back in Cael's suitcase. “I miss you guys too. That's why we're changing the schedule.”
He cleared his throat and grumbled, “You've just got here and now we're leaving.” His striking features shifted into petulance. “We haven't even had sex yet.”
I chuckled under my breath. “Ah, so that's your problem.”
“Yes, Seren, that's my problem,” Daxon huffed. “I've been without my wife for nearly a month and now, she's packing to head to a fucking Naga cave in India.”
I closed the lid of Caelum's glossy suitcase and turned around to face Daxon fully. The look in my eyes was enough to shut him up. I pointedly strode past him, into the hallway and then toward our bedroom. Daxon rushed up behind me and swept me into his arms. I laughed as he ran the rest of the way. He set me down to lock the door, and I began to undress.
“You think I can wait for you to get undressed?” Daxon scoffed as he picked me up again. “I need to be inside you now!”
Dax set me down near the foot of the bed, then spun me around to face it. I bent over without his urging, already knowing what he needed. I pulled my panties down as he drew my skirt up. Daxon groaned, low and deep in his throat, before sliding his hands up, over my ass. His touch trailed inward, then pushed my thighs wider apart.
“Spread your ass for me,” he growled over the sound of him undoing his belt and then lowering his zippe
r.
I leaned forward and reached back to grab my cheeks for him. Dax was a bit of a freak in the bedroom and he had an influence on me. When I'd first started dating Tiernan, I always wanted to be in control, even in the bedroom; I prided myself on being a strong woman. But Tiernan had shown me that giving up control didn't mean giving up who I was. He'd laid the groundwork, as it were, for Daxon. But Tiernan's idea of taking control and Daxon's were a bit different. Where Tiernan wanted to be on top and maybe tie me up once in awhile, Daxon wanted full domination.