Queen Takes Queen

by Joely Sue Burkhart

  But all of those considerations paled in comparison to the very real threat of what would happen to my queen, and me, if Keisha Skye managed to get a hook in Shara.

  “How does she know where we are?” Shara asked, turning from her conversation with Gina to look at me.

  I hadn’t thought she was listening through the bonds, not while planning the trip with her consiliarius. “Kendall wasn’t our only sib in Skye court. Any of them could pinpoint our location, though we fed from Kendall the most.”

  “So she’s going to try to break through the nest from below,” she mused, staring off into space. “Could one of her shifters fly over at the same time, like Nevarre?”

  “No, not to my knowledge. But I’ve never heard of anyone penetrating a nest through the ground, either.”

  :If Nevarre wasn’t your Blood, he probably couldn’t fly high enough to penetrate the nest,: Mehen added, still in his human shape. Now that our queen had taken him as Blood, he couldn’t shift into his dragon form unless she explicitly allowed it. :Your blood creates a magical wall that extends above and below, though the ground is harder for your blood to penetrate. Most winged creatures couldn’t get over it, but my beast could.:

  “What kind of shifters would come up through the ground?”

  “None that I can think of,” I replied. “Especially in her court. She has mostly cats and wolves in her Blood.”

  “You haven’t talked about her court much.”

  She’d said much the same thing a few moments earlier, but more than curiosity rang in her words. She needed information and if we were under a real and present danger…

  Rock hardened beneath my skin, turning my face to granite. “Because I would rather forget.”

  She could have sank into my bond and dragged the past out of me. She could have viewed my memories like a movie. But my queen only threaded her fingers through mine and hugged my arm to her. “If no shifter can get up through the ground, what could she send against us? What powers does she have?”

  “The bird pecked at something on the ground, so Nevarre is guessing some kind of bug.” My voice rumbled with rock troll bass, but hopefully she thought it was anger from the threat, not because my heart ached with gratitude. I knew she needed information, desperately, but she wouldn’t drag it out of me all at once. Though maybe the rip-off-the-bandage approach would be best in this case. “I wasn’t high enough in her court to know her powers, and what she displayed…”

  She kissed my shoulder. Only then did I realize how tense I’d become. I made my muscles relax so I wasn’t a granite boulder against her.

  “There’s only two things to know about Keisha Skye.” Daire stepped into the room, his usually easygoing personality a vicious snarl, his warcat pacing back and forth in his bond. “She wants a child to replace the one she lost, and she enjoys breaking alphas.”

  4

  Shara

  I’d known Rik and Daire had left Skye’s court in search of a lost queen, and that Skye had expected them to reel me in for her to expand her power base. But I hadn’t realized that Rik had actually been afraid of her.

  My big, bad alpha Blood. Afraid.

  That told me all I needed to know about Keisha Skye. Flames licked through my veins, stoking my rage. No one would ever hurt or scare or threaten any of my Blood ever again. So help me goddess.

  “You should be out searching the nest,” Rik said to Daire, but without the ring of an order behind it.

  Daire gave a little toss of his head that sent the tawny fall of his hair rippling down his back. Now well past his shoulders, his hair made me want to wrap my fists in it and haul him close.

  Padding over to me, barefoot and shirtless but with jeans on, he dropped to a crouch so he could drape himself in my lap, pushing his head under Rik’s arm that I’d hugged to me.

  “There’s nothing to find yet,” he replied. “Nevarre is still scouting from the air and his bird vision is way better than any of ours.”

  I combed my fingers through his hair, listening to his purr. Waiting. When they were ready, one of them would tell me what Keisha Skye had done that left them both so scared.

  “I can confirm some of the basic facts,” Gina said slowly, as if hesitant to speak. “Keisha Skye did have a child almost one hundred years ago. It was a big deal at the time, enough that my grandmother made a note of it in her personal records. Breeding queens are rare in this day and age, but queens able to successfully conceive and deliver a child are even rarer. No queen in several centuries had managed to have a child and she was rightfully lauded for it. Other queens were quick to ask her what she’d done to conceive, but she was very closed mouthed about it. Grandma said that could only mean one thing.” She dropped her voice even more and whispered, “dark magic.”

  For vampires that reveled in blood, I was almost afraid to ask what would make Gina whisper. “What’s that?”

  “Dark magic requires the death of something to raise the power.”

  “An unwilling sacrifice,” Rik whispered, though with his rock troll’s graveled rumble.

  “She prefers women,” Daire said. “Always has. But a queen needs a male alpha to sire a child. The more powerful the alpha, the better. So she always has plenty of alphas in her stable, so to speak, and she… uh… tests them.”

  “She tortures them,” Rik growled so deep and low that my cup rattled on the table.

  “Deep down, she hates men, I think,” Daire said softly, rubbing his head on Rik’s arm to soothe him. “She takes pleasure in hurting them under the guise of testing to find the best alpha to sire a child. When she finally did conceive, she coincidentally killed the alpha in the process.”

  My mouth fell open. “She killed him?”

  “So they say.”

  “But she lost this child? How?”

  “She had a daughter, yes,” Gina answered. “Tanza, I believe, though I’d have to check our records to be sure. The whispers started right away though that the child wasn’t… right.”

  “She was gone before Rik and I came to court, and Skye cast a geas to keep anyone in her court from talking about her.” Daire said. “But they still whispered about her in hushed, general references. I don’t know how many of the stories were true, but if even half of the nightmares they told us actually happened, then I can only say it’s a blessing the child died.”

  “Grandma wrote that the child was possessed,” Gina admitted, still whispering, as if we were all afraid that Keisha would somehow sense that we were talking about her. “That she carried a demon in her. The queen went a little mad when she lost her child. To my knowledge, no one outside of Skye’s court knows exactly how she died, either.”

  “She went a lot fucking mad,” Daire corrected. “She’s still unstable, to be honest, but supposedly better now than she was even fifty years ago. Though she’s still obsessed with conceiving another child.”

  “No one sane would torture people like she does.” Rik’s voice still rumbled, his muscles rock against me. “She’s the one who carries a demon.”

  “She only tortures alphas,” Daire’s voice broke and he turned his face deeper against Rik. “I lived in dread that one day he’d get called up to join her Blood. She burned through the alphas much too quickly.”

  Rik dropped his other hand on Daire’s head and leaned into me harder. “There were plenty of alphas in their prime ahead of me, but I was relieved when she finally allowed us to leave.”

  I closed my eyes a moment, fighting to regain my composure. My eyes were hot and burning, but I wouldn’t cry. Not now. Maybe later, when it was just me and him and I could hold him tightly against me, I’d cry at how close I’d come to losing him before he could have ever found me. “How did you end up in Skye’s court in the first place?”

  “My parents served as sibs in Jarnsaxa’s court. She had a long-standing relationship with House Skye to exchange young Aima to keep the blood fresh in both courts. No one outside of Keisha’s court knew exactly how bad it was
, especially for alphas, and when I did realize how dangerous it was for me, it was too late. It would have shamed both my parents and my mother’s queen if I broke their agreement, and so I endured to the best of my ability.”

  “That’s what we do,” Daire said softly. “If you don’t have a queen of your own, you endure, and hope for the best court possible. I guess we were lucky not to go to Marne Ceresa’s court.”

  Rik grunted softly. “I don’t know anything about how she runs her Blood but surely it wouldn’t have been as bad as Skye’s.”

  I could feel dark spots in Rik’s bond that echoed with pain and fear. Memories of things he’d seen, that he tried to shield me from. He didn’t want me to know exactly how terrible it’d been for them both, but him in particular.

  Part of me wanted to know, so that I’d be sure and not do anything like it.

  He turned to me so fast that I flinched back a little at his intensity before I could catch myself. “You’d never do anything like it. I have no doubt of that at all. If you want to see the torture she inflicted on her Blood, my mind is open to you. It always is. But I’d rather you not see and fear the same way as we do.”

  I reached up and stroked the hard marble planes of his face until his fierceness eased. “I’ll take your word for it. I don’t want to see, unless it’s something I need to know to beat her.”

  “You’ve already beaten her.”

  “Actually, yes, you have,” Gina said, her voice trembling with worry. It made me turn away from Rik to see her face. Her eyes were big, dark, shimmering with fear. “You’re able to breed. That means you’re able to conceive. From everything I’ve read about her in Grandma’s notes, Keisha Skye will hate you for that reason alone. It’ll make a political fight personal for her. In fact, her obsession is probably eating her alive already, wondering how on earth Selena could have conceived you with a human. It wouldn’t surprise me if she’s kidnapping human men off the street now to try and conceive another child.”

  “Would it be better or worse if she knew the truth?”

  The truth was so much more difficult to believe, even as outlandish as the thought that I might have been half human. The people who’d raised me until their deaths weren’t actually my parents. Selena was my aunt, and Alan had no blood relation to me at all.

  My mother and Selena were both Aima, a powerful line of vampires descended from the ancient gods and goddesses. My family in particular descended from Isis.

  My father…

  A long forgotten god. Typhon, the father of monsters like Cerebus. And me. Though I didn’t have three heads, I could transform into both a cobra and a wyvern so far.

  “Honestly, I don’t think it’ll matter much,” Gina replied. “You can breed, so you’re a threat to her personally. The other queens will definitely be more wary if they know you’re not half human, but for Skye, it won’t matter.”

  “Let’s handle this one problem at a time, then. Keisha Skye is my problem right now. She’s planning an attack on the nest, something that no one’s heard of before other than Mayte Zaniyah, since she sent the warning. What goddess is House Skye descend from?”

  “She’s several generations removed from Scathach, the legendary warrior maiden associated with the Isle of Skye,” Rik replied. “Though she isn’t known for being a warrior like her ancestor. The only power I’ve ever heard associated with her is controlling the weather, especially storms.”

  I frowned. “Then what power does she have that might affect or come from the ground?”

  “None that I’m aware of. I’ve never seen her display her power, though, and since we weren’t Blood, we didn’t feel her directly.”

  Gina typed on her laptop a few moments and then said, “According to Grandma Paula’s notes, the hurricane in 1938 marks the death of Tanza. Over six hundred people died.”

  I didn’t try to think of a solution exactly. I just let ideas well up in my head. Options. Possibilities. Until something crystallized.

  I stood and immediately everyone stood with me. “Go ahead and get the trip set up as we planned.”

  Gina nodded, but her brow was creased with worry.

  “Thank you, Winston. That was a delightful breakfast, er… very late brunch.”

  He inclined his head. “You’re most welcome, Your Majesty.”

  “Shara, please. I don’t want there to be formality in my house. As far as I’m concerned, you’re all family.”

  He blinked and pulled out a monogrammed handkerchief to dab at his eyes. “It’s an honor to serve, Shara.”

  I gave him a quick hug and then Gina. “What are you going to do?”

  “I’m going to protect my nest the best way I know how.” I smiled and her eyes flared, one brow arching with curiosity. “I’m going to bleed.”

  5

  Shara

  I didn’t think we’d been in the house too long, but it was already dusk outside. Snow still covered the ground, but tracks marred the white surface. It made me smile to see wolf tracks beside hoof and paw prints.

  Rik gave a jerk of his head at Daire. “Go on patrol. I have a feeling she’ll attack after dark.”

  Daire stepped in close to me first, giving me a quick but deep, full body hug. He didn’t just use his arms, but managed to drape his whole body on me, even though he was nearly a foot taller than me. “When you’re ready, I’d love for you to try and burn her out of me.”

  In Kansas City, I’d had the idea that I could try and burn their previous blood bonds out of them, so that Keisha Skye wouldn’t have any hold on them any longer. No one had been able to break a bond like that before, at least not that we knew of.

  “I don’t want to hurt you like that.”

  “Hurt me. I don’t care. I hate being a liability, a weakness.”

  I wrapped my hands in his hair and tugged his head back. He started purring, so I tightened my grip, pulling his hair back to bare the long, sexy line of his throat. “You’re never a liability or weakness. In fact, I fully intend to use your bond with Skye court to betray them.”

  “How? When?”

  I smiled and kissed his throat, giving him only a faint prick of my fangs. Then I released him. “You’ll see. Don’t worry about her bond.”

  He pouted, but I felt a push in their bond. Rik, exerting his alpha will. Daire shifted immediately, though he bumped his head into my stomach for some scratches behind his ear.

  Rik let out a rumbling growl.

  Daire twitched his tail, smacking Rik’s legs, but obediently headed out into the darkening night.

  “So what’s this plan of yours to use our Skye bonds?”

  My fangs descended, making me shiver. My stomach knotted. Hunger rose. Need burned. Rik rumbled deep and low, his arm sliding around my waist, and yeah, I wanted his blood. But not yet.

  I dragged my fangs across my wrist.

  Power bubbled up inside me like a pure mountain spring. My senses sharpened. I could feel my other five Blood. Their heartbeats. Each feather in Nevarre’s wings. The thud of Guillaume’s hooves pounding the ground. The whisper of Xin’s fur as he ghosted across the snow.

  “You don’t have to add blood to the circle.” Rik’s voice rumbled deep and low in my belly, stoking my desire.

  “I know,” I whispered, holding my wrist out so blood dripped down my skin and onto the ground.

  The first plop of blood on the ground sent a ring of power rippling out like a wave. Primed by my blood circle’s sacrifice, the great Earth Mother, Gaia, answered eagerly. The earth absorbed my blood like a starving creature. Frost melted in the heat of my blood. Life sparked in the dirt. A tiny seed sprouted, a faint green leaf unfurling in the snow.

  Regret tightened my throat. I didn’t want the tiny sprout to die. I hadn’t meant to make something start growing in the dead of winter.

  The sprout had other ideas, though. It grew quickly for a few moments, green leaves up to my knees. But then it stopped, tender leaves wilting a bit. The whole young stem leaned
toward me, leaves straining to stand against the snow and cold.

  I held my wrist back out over the young plant and allowed blood to splatter on the leaves. Immediately, the plant started growing again until its tender stem was replaced by a woody stalk taller than me. Leaves and branches stretched up to the sky, but more importantly, the roots sank deep into the ground, spreading like a sensitive network.

  My blood pulsed in the tree, deep into the ground. Pumping energy through the soil and rock, the roots cast out a steady radar bleep, searching for anything out of place.

  “Wow,” Rik said, his voice soft with reverence. “How did you know to do that?”

  “I didn’t, not exactly. But I felt how much She loved my blood when we set the nest, and I figured that was a way to start.”

  The lattice of roots stretched a good thirty feet down and out in a wide circle, but nowhere near the entire nest. Trailing blood, I started walking, listening and feeling for another seed to spark. “What kind of tree is that?”

  “Looks like an oak.”

  I glanced back, amazed. The tender green leaves had transformed into gnarled thick branches running low the ground. The tree looked like it’d been here for a couple of hundred years.

  I felt a spark in the snow and paused, watching as another sprout broke through the snow, stretching up toward my blood. This one was some kind of evergreen. In a few minutes, a mighty pine stretched into the sky, interlacing its roots with the oak. I sighed, looking at how much ground I needed to cover. It was going to take a hell of a lot of blood.

  Rik drew me into his arms. “Then you should definitely feed on me while you grow the next tree.”

  “I don’t want you weakened if we’re going to have to protect the nest.”

  He snorted and walked with his arm around me, waiting until I found the next seed that sprouted beneath the snow. “Feeding you makes me stronger, not weaker. And I want my queen well-fed and pumped with alpha power before Skye attempts to spoil your nest.”