by Brenna Lyons
The glow sank into her skin, and Erin dropped her chin to her chest. Her hands clenched around the stone, now dull and lifeless, and it disintegrated into dust and sifted through her fingers to the floor.
She raised her eyes to her husband and brother, and Curt drew in his breath sharply. Her eyes glowed the same icy blue as the glow that surrounded the stone moments – minutes — hours before.
“Everything’s fine,” she soothed him. “The stone is at peace. The elders are destroyed. They can never be freed again. When it’s over, it’s over for good this time. Zel, the end of an era and death personified, has come. When the last beast dies, there will never be another Cursed Warrior or beast.”
Gruber barreled at her in a rage, screaming his frustration. Erin held up her hand, and the beast found himself held a little more than two yards from her, beating at an invisible wall.
“Do you know why the sacred weapons kill?” she asked sadly. “Why you can’t use your powers when one is planted in you?”
Gruber hissed and beat at the wall harder, declining to answer her and desperate to get to her. His mutterings gave an indication of a portion of his frustration. He couldn’t dematerialize. He was well and truly trapped where she wanted him.
“It’s not the metal we use. It’s a simple iron tainted with carbon. The difference is in the blade. Every blade is touched by the stone’s glow after it’s shaped, forged in the blue fire.”
Erin scooped a training blade off of the floor awkwardly and ran her palm over the flat of the blade. It glowed with the stone’s fire just as she had. She set it on the pedestal reverently.
“The blade does damage, but it’s the stone’s power that kills and that renders the powers stolen from it originally useless. That’s why another blade will bleed you to ground when your heart is taken, but a sacred weapon kills.”
“The stone is dead,” Gruber growled. “The Warriors are powerless to stop us now.”
Erin opened her hand, palm up, and a ball of blue energy crackled in the center. “The fire is what kills. The power lives on.” She blew across her palm, a sensuous move, and the ball shot toward the beast, passing easily through the barrier and burning a hole where his heart once was.
Gruber looked at the hole in shock, a move Curt had seen many beasts make after their heart was taken. He crumpled to the floor, reaching his hand to her in an unspoken question.
“I free you,” Erin whispered.
Her head snapped around, at the rising sound of battle in the hall. She raised both hands and threw her head back. A shock wave of blue light exploded out from her position. Curt flinched as it passed by him, but it merely tingled a warm trail over his skin that was entirely too enjoyable for something he would assume was deadly. Erin sank to her knees with her hands over the swell of their children and dropped her chin to her chest, panting in exhaustion, sweat coating her body.
In the hall, Jayde screamed in shock. A riot of other voices tumbled over each other. Curt heard them dimly, some clearer than others.
“What the hell was that?” Terrin demanded.
“Who cares?” Adam decided. “They’re dead. Are you complaining?”
“No way,” Joel asserted.
“Did you feel that?” Talon asked. “It was like a warm wave.”
“Not to them,” Jayde answered.
Hunter pulled Curt back to his feet as the confused shouting disintegrated and footsteps thundered toward the room. Jayde gasped at the scene inside and bolted to Sarah and Mikel.
Curt ignored her chattering and the questions thrown at them about Mikel’s condition. He wrestled himself free of Hunter’s grip and started for Erin. His brother-in-law sighed and let him go, though he watched the exchange warily as he headed for his own family.
Curt shook in fear as he made his way to her. He had to make sure Erin was still herself. If Erin were a beast, he would have no choice but to kill her. Curt knew that just as he knew that if he lost her, his next blow would be to follow her.
Erin raised her face to him as he knelt beside her. Her eyes had returned to their normal color. For that, he was grateful.
She shook, and her face was pale. “Say something,” she breathed. “Please, Curt.”
He ran a hand along her cheek and sighed as she brushed her face into it to kiss his palm. “What did you do?” he asked quietly.
“The stone asked me to carry its power. It needed to rest. It was tired of wars.” She looked at him hopelessly.
“You’re not…”
“I’m not a beast. They can’t rise again. They’re dust, just as they should have been centuries ago.”
He hesitated, wanting so much to believe her unconditionally. Still, no one could touch the stone.
Erin sighed, grabbing a sacred weapon from the floor and wiping it carefully on her maternity jeans before slicing her palm with it. “Wanna make a blood oath on it?” she joked weakly as her blood welled up red in her hand.
Curt took the blade from her hand and pulled her to his chest, afraid to let her go. “I thought I’d lost you,” he breathed into her hair.
Erin pushed back and ran her uninjured hand over his cheek. She sealed her mouth to his urgently, drawing him into a mindless, searing kiss. She pulled back again, her breathing ragged. “What do you think? Am I still me?” she asked seriously.
Curt chuckled as he drew her to her feet. “It’s a safe bet, but I’m testing that theory when we get relocated,” he warned.
“Gladly.” Her smile was warm and playful despite her pallor.
He wrapped his arm around Erin’s shoulder and led her to the group of people crowded around Mikel and Sarah.
“Don’t tell me what I saw,” Sarah objected hotly.
Adam shook his head. “I don’t know what really happened, but there is no way a human four-year-old, even one König born, took out an elder that easily and neatly.”
Erin pushed into the circle with Curt snuggled to her back. “Like an untrained twelve-year-old little girl König born couldn’t drive one to ground?” she asked pointedly. “If it makes you feel better, I drove Lorian into Mikel’s blade. The kill was his own and beautifully done, my little Jee, elder killer.”
Mikel beamed and tipped his head in a bow. “You deserve a special title, Aunt Erin. What do you call someone elders run from in fear when she pursues unarmed?”
She smiled and shrugged. “Scary?” she suggested.
“The smack down queen of the Warriors,” Curt amended in a teasing tone.
Mikel giggled. “Zel, the wonder babe?” he offered, covering his mouth with his little hand.
“Wonder babe?” Sarah thundered. “Who taught you that one?” She snapped a seething look at her husband.
“Not me,” Hunter denied.
“I bet! We’ll discuss that one,” she warned.
“Where’s the stone?” Joel asked abruptly, breaking the mood. “And what’s with the weapon?” His hand reached toward the pedestal.
“No,” Erin thundered, whirling out of Curt’s arms and reaching out for the blade before the older Warrior could connect with it. She nestled it to her chest. “This one is mine.”
“It’s just a training blade,” he argued.
Sarah snorted. “Trust me, Joel. You do not want that blade,” she assured him.
“Where’s the stone?” he demanded again.
Sarah sighed. “Oh, show them already and stop this damned internal argument about it.”
Erin nodded and placed the weapon in her hand back on the pedestal. She put her hand out to Curt. “Give me the other one. I might as well have a matched set.”
He nodded and placed it in her hand, kissing her cheek and backing away. “Be careful,” he requested.
Erin smiled grimly. “Piece of cake,” she assured him. She closed her eyes, balancing the weapon on its hilt in the center of her palm.
Curt held his breath as the other Warriors crowded in around him.
“What is she doing?” Talon asked.
“You wouldn’t believe him if he told you,” Hunter commented. “Just watch.”
“She’s too tired for this,” Curt breathed. “She should have waited.”
“She’s fine,” Sarah assured him.
Erin’s eyes opened, glowing their blue fire, and William backed off in shock, coming up against Patrick as he tried to flee. The glow started as a spot on her hand and moved up the weapon, bathing its length in crackling power. She closed her eyes as the light faded, sucking in a deep breath.
When her eyes opened again, their normal color had returned. Without a word, Erin flipped the blade and buried it in Gruber’s body. The blue fire seemed to engulf the entire beast at once, charring him instantly to something resembling dying embers.
Erin crossed to him and wrenched the blade free, nodding as the dark form collapsed into dust. She returned to the pedestal, wiped the dust of the beast onto her jeans and placed the blade carefully crossed over the other.
She curled into Curt’s waiting arm and faced the silent Warriors. “Questions?” she asked lightly.
“Who was that?” Joel questioned, pointing at the pile of ashes next to the pedestal.
“The body of the stone and the spirits of the elders.” She shrugged.
“What happens if we touch those blades?” Terrin asked. “Will we end up like Mr. Crispy over there?”
“No, but did you get a good look at Mr. Crispy’s deep-fried hands? You wouldn’t like the experience. It would take a while to heal.”
Curt furrowed his brow. “What about the children? I don’t know a child that doesn’t play with his parents’ blades.”
Erin sighed. “Hunter, try to hold Mikel’s weapon,” she ordered.
Her brother nodded uncertainly and took the blade from his son’s out-stretched hand. He dropped it immediately, shaking his hand, and Mikel retrieved it with a shake of his head and a big grin.
“What did you do to it?” Hunter demanded.
“I charged my amulet, not the blade itself. Come here, Mikel.”
She started to hoist him, but Curt took over. “Let me.” He gave her the fierce look he reserved for times when he felt she was doing too much, and she nodded her agreement and backed off slightly as he lifted the child.
“Is this safe?” Sarah asked nervously.
Erin looked at her in disbelief. “This is Mikel! My own impetuous nature aside, Sarah—”
“I know. I apologize. It’s just—”
“He’s your son. You’re allowed to worry, but I would never allow him to be hurt. I know his limitations. You saw that tonight.”
She smiled warmly. “Your turn soon enough.” Sarah sobered and seemed to grow agitated. “If what Lorian said is true... How do you feel?”
“I think he was bluffing. If I’m having babies before the sun rises, I better be going into labor PDQ or not at all.”
Curt startled and ran a hand over his children. “Labor?” he asked in a strangled voice. It was too early for that. If Erin was in labor, there was no time to waste with all this silly questioning and demonstrations.
Erin shook her head wearily. “Not a pain,” she assured him. “He was trying to shake me. It was sweet revenge to see him running scared.”
“The look on his face when the stone took his powers away was pure poetry,” Sarah added gleefully.
She nodded. “Back to this. Mikel, touch the blade for me.”
The child’s fingers caressed the metal, trusting that he would be safe. He giggled. “It tickles. It’s warm.”
Erin grinned. “I think your Daddy would have a vastly different experience with it.”
“How does it work?” Jayde asked.
“The stone was sentient. We always knew that. It liked puzzles. We said it amused itself— Actually, it was trying to get through one damned plan without someone on one side or the other screwing it up!
“We never chanced anyone touching the stone, because we mistakenly believed that no one could touch the stone without dire consequences. True innocents could always touch it. The stone’s power possesses something of that intelligence. The children are safe. The adults know better — or will after trying it once.”
For a long moment, no one spoke. Finally, Joel cleared his throat and asked the question no one else thought to dare. “What exactly are you now?”
“I am a vessel. I hold and harness the stone’s power. As its servant, I could do no less. As Zel, it was what I was born to do. Everything from my ten-megaton Blutjagd to my telepathic link with Sarah has been training specific to becoming the vessel the stone needed.”
Curt nodded. “The elders were destroyed with the stone,” he explained. “When the last turned dies, we’re free. All of us. Forever. There will be no more Cursed Warriors.”
“When you die?” Talon asked her.
“If the beasts are all dead, the fire dies with me. If not...” Erin ran a hand over her pregnant belly slowly. “Katie will become the vessel.”
Curt sent Mikel back to his mother and ran his hands over her with a broad smile. “You’re giving me a girl,” he breathed. “That shy little thing has been hiding all this time, after all.”
Erin nodded happily. “And a boy,” she reminded him. “Corwyn and Katie König-Maher — if that’s acceptable to you.”
He nodded without taking his hands off of his children. Her grandfather and his mother commemorated? It was a beautiful thing. “Oh, it is,” he decided. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
* * * *
December 25, 2029
Curt lay in the bed, staring at the ceiling of the room Adam sent them to while the others burned the bodies and moved possessions from the training house. In a room down the hall, Sarah and Mikel slept as Erin slept beside him. All of them were doubtless exhausted from the events of the evening.
He’d been in this house many times. It was the manor house of his home range, after all, but he’d never slept in this room before. This was the lord’s suite. Though it was Adam’s place now, Curt had no doubts that whatever range they roamed would extend this same courtesy to them — and to Katie and her mate after them. Zel, the stone vessels, were the new true elite, with good reason.
Erin’s explanations had gone on for another half an hour. As stunned as Curt had been to see her kill the turneds, he wished he had been there to see Lorian backing down as she stalked him, bare-handed and unprotected, his fondest wish become his worst nightmare intent on his destruction.
Finally, Erin had seemed to sway on her feet, drained. Curt had demanded arrangements for her to rest immediately. He’d swept her into his arms even as he faced down the other Warriors with a fierce look unlike any they had seen from him in the past, amazed that Erin still seemed an insignificant weight while carrying both of his children.
Adam hadn’t batted an eye. He’d simply directed them away to the manor house with a promise that Bryant would be along to guard their backs shortly. He’d ordered Sarah along — with Mikel sleeping on her shoulder, his prized blade still clasped in his hand.
Erin had slept against his shoulder for most of the drive, and Curt would have been content to simply settle his wife in bed, but she had other ideas.
Her arms wrapped around his neck and drew his face down to seal her mouth to his. For a few glorious moments, Curt lost himself in that kiss. Erin. She was his Erin. Whatever surprises the stone had in store for them, she was still Erin.
He groaned and eased her away. “You need to sleep,” he decided. “The babies—”
Erin silenced him with another kiss, a playful one, the one she used when she was about to do something that was mind-numbing to him in bed. “The babies are fine.” She kissed him slower and deeper, dragging his shirt up his chest. “I want you, Curt. You said you’d test to see if I was still me.” She tossed his shirt away and started unbuttoning his jeans. “I need you.”
Curt undressed her, kissing and caressing as he went, heedless of whatever objections he had been express
ing moments earlier. Erin. He had almost lost her. He suddenly realized that he needed this as much as she did. He needed to lose himself in her and prove to himself that they were both alive.
All alive. He kissed the swell of her belly and ran his tongue over the squirming baby assaulting the heat of his touch. Which one was it? Was it his son or his shy daughter who would undoubtedly have a ten-megaton Blutjagd and a fiery temper just like her mother?
Erin groaned and curled her hands in his hair, cradling his head to her for his intimate exploration. Curt moved lower, lifting her hips to drink in her sweet musk as he tasted her readiness for him and found her beyond simply ready. She cried out under his ministrations, begging him to take her.
Curt turned her in his hands so that she settled on her hands and knees. “I can’t wait,” he breathed in apology, though he knew she didn’t want slow and easy either. He eased into her, feeling the hot, slick tightness enveloping him, surrounding him in pure bliss. He sank to his heels with his hands locked on her hips, pulling Erin into his lap so that she settled over him with her head nestled into his shoulder.
He moved slowly, savoring her internal muscles gripping his pulsing length as he played follow the leader with a baby through her stomach. Their passion skyrocketed, and Curt found himself thrusting into her, hopelessly lost in the sensation. He nuzzled and nipped at her shoulder, neck and up to her jaw. Erin reached a hand back around his head and turned her face to kiss him with a fierce need.
Time seemed to stand still as he tensed inside her, filling Erin with his seed. His senses faded out momentarily, and the sensation of her orgasm pulling at him as her muscles contracted blocked out all else.
Sated, Curt cradled her to him and pulled Erin to the bed, spooned protectively in his arms and still locked deep inside her. He trailed his lips over her neck and shoulder lazily. “You’re still you,” he promised.
“Is that good or bad?” Erin asked, already half asleep.
“Good for us. Bad for beasts.”
Erin had fallen into a fitful sleep in his arms. It was the unsettled nature of her rest that kept Curt awake and watchful. He smiled at the knowledge that he was being so protective of a woman with the power to slay almost a hundred high-levels in a single shot, but he was printed to her, and that was not a rational state.