by Jaye Shields
“With the Dryad?”
“Yep, that’s my best friend, Tera. AKA, the one hunted by Chaos.”
“I figured the Goddess simply had an itch for creating fresh madness. Did she actually have a cause?”
“I guess she had a bone to pick with Artemis, Tera’s mom. The Goddess of Chaos ended up being more like the goddess of jealousy because she couldn’t stand the Goddess of the Hunt. Maybe I’d be a little miffed, too. After all, whenever Chaos creates war and violence, she gets hell for it. But whenever Artemis, the Goddess of the Hunt kills, she is worshipped for her abilities. And then on top of it, Artemis has the ability of creating a new life when she kills. Thank goodness, because that’s how I got my best friend.”
Tangent much? Sparrow realized that she was getting more and more buzzed by the moment. And in addition to too much talking, she had the biting urge to sing and get on top of the bar.
“Well now you have another friend. Call on me whenever you have need.” She wondered if it was the drink causing her to think of the word “need” in a highly sexual fashion. But her sensual stream of thought brought an image of Rowen into her mind.
His tall, muscular build had been cool like granite against her skin as it held her close during release. She had thought it only another erotic dream at the time, but as soon as she had realized that it was real. The band finished playing, and the siren set the mic on the bar counter before sauntering away to let a black, horned demon buy her a drink. Sparrow needed more wine. No, she needed the microphone.
“Are you ready to take leave?” Pyrrhus had stood along with her, but she only peered back at him playfully as she made her way to the mic, lying on the counter, calling to her.
“Nope. I have plans to serenade the crowd first.”
“It seems you have enjoyed the demon wine?”
“I love the demon wine.” She grabbed the microphone and made the effort to climb atop the bar. The crowd began to notice and called out, in what she could only hope was excitement. Pyrrhus was at her side in an instant, lifting her atop the bar. “Thanks. You are such a gentleman.”
She realized all eyes from the crowd were on her, including the gorgeous siren. Well, she would show that girl that humans could sing too. And not some wimpy classical stuff. Sparrow was going to introduce these demons to blues.
“It seems your serenade is eagerly awaited.” Pyrrhus smiled up at her as she stood atop the bar. He was absolutely gorgeous, but she couldn’t help the pang in her heart, the pang of disappointment that she couldn’t have Rowen in her company.
Rowen’s image triggered two thoughts: Orgasm. Mysterious heart ache.
She knew just what song she wanted to sing. “This one is dedicated to the Knight that didn’t finish the job.” A raucous of various demonic roars and high-pitched hollers echoed from the crowd. From atop the bar, she looked down to where Pyrrhus was seated. He was smiling up at her, obviously entertained.
She let her body sway to her own slinky beat of the song, and hoped the demon band would catch on. The mulled wine drying on her lips still tasted good, and she licked it slowly, savoring the taste before singing the next line. “A man is a two-faced … ”
The sound of a bass joined in, but when she looked around the crowd, she couldn’t spot the large instrument. Instead, a large Jabba-esque demon jammed in a corner, swaying to the beat as he flicked a fat finger against his throat. A deep, raspy boom escaped the demon’s large, teeth-lined mouth and rivaled the sound of any bass she had ever heard.
A thrill went through her, the very same one that shot through her like electricity every time she sang in front of a crowd. She let herself flirt with the audience, and soak up the various expressions on their faces. Tonight her crowd was a far cry from anything she would have imagined. Not even a Slipknot concert had this many weird looking people. But these weren’t people, these were demons. Well, maybe they weren’t all demons, but they were definitely out there. As they looked at her now, like she was both edible and toxic, she had never felt sexier. Well, maybe with one exception. She quickly put thoughts of Rowen out of her mind, and ran her fingers through her hair, letting her shirt ride up. The cheers she received from the crowd spurred her on, and she all but moaned the next jazzy lyrics.
The bar shook underneath her feet as Sparrow watched a large form charge toward Pyrrhus. The various demons and other beings roared with excitement, but she could only watch in shock as Rowen hit the Quetzalem like a torpedo.
The music played on, becoming a soundtrack to the grunts, groans and breaking furniture from the brawl taking place below the counter. A crowd had gathered around the knight and the Quetzalem, and there was little room for her to jump down and stop the twosome. Without a black eye anyway.
The surreal development unfolding before Sparrow was just too much. A giggle escaped her, drowned out by the excitement of the fight. Rowen had no right to attack Pyrrhus, but at the same time, the Quetzalem was holding his own, even landing a few hard punches himself. The heat of the battle left their heavily muscled skin glistening with beads of sweat.
Testosterone has never looked so good.
Rowen’s body nearly covered Pyrrhus’ as the dragon demon was crushed to the ground, but Pyrrhus head-butted the knight. Rowen stumbled backward into a thick wall of spectators pushing him forward. But he needed no encouragement, and Sparrow watched as Rowen charged Pyrrhus once more.
The Quetzalem smiled and parted his lips to throw a small flame in Rowen’s direction. Quick on his feet, Rowen ducked and threw a punch at the dragon demon’s midsection, letting a spectator get fried behind him.
Pyrrhus rebounded quickly from the force of the blow. Sparrow watched the hard scales on the back of his blue skin project outward. Pyrrhus immediately lashed out with his arm, using the scales to cut into Rowen like tiny blades.
Sparrow sucked in a breath. Okay, things are getting out of hand.
Rowen swerved, but Pyrrhus’s arm still nicked his face. Tracks of blood leaked down Rowen’s cheek, but he didn’t seem fazed. Instead, Sparrow watched him sweep out with a leg and bring Pyrrhus to the floor.
Finally, Sparrow spotted an opening, and scrambled down from the bar top. Pushing away the looming audience, she jumped on Rowen’s back.
Please don’t let him toss me across the room. Just in case, Sparrow wrapped her legs around Rowen’s thick, muscular torso. Immediately, he ceased his attack on Pyrrhus.
Rowen turned his back on the Quetzalem, as if looking at Pyrrhus without throwing a punch was too much to handle. Just as Sparrow was about to be released from her piggy-back hold, she heard Pyrrhus began to exhale flames in her direction, too worked up to notice Sparrow was now in the middle of the fray.
Just as she untwined from Rowen, his thick ropes of muscle wrapped her tightly within his arms. Rowen turned, folding her into his body so he would take the impact of the flames.
Scorching heat melted around her, and Rowen’s body became heated granite against her skin.
When the flames subdued, Rowen released her. She stepped back and took in two very different men. Rowen stood with fury in his glittery aqua-gaze, his body still throwing off heat from the flames. Pyrrhus stood just behind him, realizing that he had almost mistakenly hit Sparrow, and his golden gaze was full of shock and worry.
“I’m okay,” she tried to console the Quetzalem, but Sparrow couldn’t take her eyes off Rowen. He smelled like brimstone, and his handsome image was framed with thick smoke rising off his skin. He looked pretty okay considering … considering that for a minute, she forgot he’d broken her heart. “You give new meaning to the word ‘hot.’”
Rowen turned back toward Pyrrhus and roared, “You almost charred my woman!”
“Your woman?” Sparrow and Pyrrhus both responded in union, equally surprised.
She watched Rowen turn back toward
her, slowly, as if trying to contain himself, and regain his usually calm façade.
“Come, Sparrow.” He grasped her hand, and for a moment, she was stunned enough to follow. “I know not why you have traveled here, but,” Rowen’s voice became a whisper, “this Quetzalem is dangerous company to keep. Especially in this realm. Why do you think he’s wearing a cloak?”
“It’s cold outside,” she retorted.
“His veins are filled with liquid brimstone.”
“Excuse me? You’re just jealous.”
Rowen continued to pull her toward the exit, away from Pyrrhus. “You’re associating with a highly wanted man, wanted in several realms. You could be mistaken for a mercenary as well.”
“Mercenary?” Sparrow looked back at Pyrrhus.
“Oh, did he leave that out?”
Pyrrhus pushed through the thick crowd to catch up to them. “She was busy. Busy describing to me the many nights she and I spent together in her dreams.”
Sparrow looked at Pyrrhus, who was obviously still furious about being attacked. He was baiting Rowen, and from the look on the knight’s face, it was working.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Rowen glared at the blue-skinned Quetzalem. Pyrrhus had been a respected ally during the fight on Alcatraz. The demon had been in the right place at the right time when the Knights had realized they would battle in the human realm. But Rowen knew that this dragon demon was wanted in five realms, and had even been imprisoned just days before they fought together in Alcatraz.
Unfortunately, the realm they were in currently, Canicus, was a sanctuary. Rowen could arrest no one in this place, but he could throttle the Quetzalem with his bare hands.
Pyrrhus smiled at Rowen as if he knew what he was thinking. Rowen lunged at him once more and heard Sparrow scream.
“Stop, you guys!”
Rowen briefly wondered who Sparrow was more worried about: the lover from her dreams, or her real-life lover who could possibly get burned to a crisp in this fight. The skin on his back still bubbled from the earlier encounter with the Quetzalem’s potent flame.
The head keeper of the establishment barked to Rowen in a foreign tongue.
Rowen continued to trade punches with Pyrrhus as they both wrestled each other to the ground. “We’ve been warned to take it outside,” he growled at his opponent before the Quetzalem knocked the air out of his stomach. Rowen threw a fist of granite right back, hitting the demon in the trachea.
Pyrrhus choked but managed a reply. “Fine with me, knight.”
“What the hell. You listen to Jabba the Hut here, but not me?” Sparrow pushed Rowen as he stood, the feel of her hands on his chest propelling warmth through his body.
Rowen took her hand within his own. “Come, Sparrow, we’re leaving this place.” As he began to pull her toward the exit, the crowd jeered. One particularly slimy demon muttered something vile about Sparrow in a distant tongue. Just as Rowen released Sparrow’s hand to punch the beast, Pyrrhus beat him to it. The demon fell to the ground. “You speak Gilhabay?” Rowen questioned Pyrrhus as he continued to pull Sparrow toward the exit, surprised the demon spoke such a foreign dialect.
Pyrrhus only nodded in response, his golden eyes locked in response.
“What the hell are you guys talking about? If you’re gonna hit each other with death threats at least do it in English,” Sparrow inserted herself into the conversation. As a Knight, Rowen automatically spoke whichever language the other guy chose and often forgot which dialect he was speaking. “Forgive me. Pyrrhus and I were just in agreement that you receive far too much ill attention here.”
“I said nothing of the sort,” the Quetzalem contradicted.
Okay, Rowen was going to sort this man out once and for all. As they arrived just outside the establishment, Sparrow jerked her hand free. The action stung him, but Rowen couldn’t blame her. “So Rowen,” her eyes flashed like angry comets descending toward devastation, “you’re a love ’em and leave ’em guy, and a liar.”
The words hurt more than any blow he’d traded with the Quetzalem. He had lied to Sparrow. Many times.
Above all else, he’d lied to her about his feelings. He loved her, and she’d never know.
Rowen grasped for her hand once more to lead her out of the small middle-of-nowhere village and back toward the portal.
“Leave me alone, Rowen. I need to find my mom.” The sound of her voice, both angry and near tears, hit him hard.
I should tell her.
“I don’t like to see ladies held against their will, knight.” The Quetzalem’s glare held obvious concern for Sparrow. “If you don’t unhand her, then we will finish what we began inside.”
Gritting his teeth, Rowen bit back an ungentlemanly response. He resented that the Quetzalem thought his intention was to hurt Sparrow.
They reached the prairie just as Pyrrhus tensed his muscles to get the drop on Rowan, no doubt with a sucker punch to the kidney. .
Rowen released Sparrow from his hold. “Sparrow, I’ve known all along where your mother is.”
“What?”
He weighed his words before he spoke them. Sparrow’s skin was pale against the moonlight and her eyes glazed over at the betrayal. Pyrrhus was silent as he stood behind her. As if he were her fucking support system and Rowen was the bad guy.
“Why? Why did you keep it from me?” A tear slid down her cheek.
“I’m sorry, Sparrow. It was commanded of me. But she is safe, I promise you. I would never let any harm come to your family. She’ll return soon.”
“That’s why you were outside my house!” she screamed at him now, no longer trying to hide her tears. “You were spying on us so someone could steal away my mom.”
“Sparrow — ”
“I can’t believe I actually thought you might have wanted to see me … that you missed me.” She dragged a palm across her cheek and he watched in agony as disgust rippled across her expression. “These tears aren’t because I’m sad, okay? They’re because I’m stupid. Stupid to have thought that you might actually have changed your mind about wanting to be with me.”
She turned toward Pyrrhus to leave, but Rowen couldn’t let her go like this. Not again.
“Sparrow,” he grabbed her arm with more force than he meant to. She looked back at him with dangers shooting from her sapphire gaze.
“Sparrow, I lo — ”
No, he couldn’t tell her like this when she was upset. She wouldn’t believe him. He watched her turn away to leave. He should tell her now; it could be his only chance. And she was immortal, safe from the soothsayer’s vision.
“I love you, Sparrow.” The words he had kept inside for so long escaped in a desperate whoosh of air.
She turned back and looked him in the eye, tears streaking down her cheeks. She laughed and choked out a sob. “God, I can’t believe you.” Pain dripped from her words and took the strength from his knees. She didn’t believe him, or if she did, she thought it was too late.
“Stay away from me, Rowen.” Her lip trembled through the solemn words. Rowen released his grip on her to reach out and cup her cheek. When he did, Sparrow slapped him across the face. “Don’t touch me.”
Her fingers went to work prying the sapphire Ring of Immortality off her finger. She threw it at him. “This is how much I don’t want immortality, and how much I don’t want to be a part of your world.”
With that, she stepped backward once more, and when she did, Pyrrhus unleashed flames in his direction so Rowen could not follow. Preparing to sprint through the flames, Rowen watched Sparrow become a flash of light, only to appear in the sky as an owl. Pyrrhus took to the sky as well, letting his wings escape out of his back.
He watched as his world shattered into a million pieces at the sight of Sparrow and Pyrrhus becoming smaller an
d smaller.
In the distance, a dark cluster of movement on the ground caught his eye. No, no, no. His heart clenched and he began running forward, but knew he could do nothing from so far.
“Sparrow!” He roared into the night as he watched the ground forces launch a net into the air toward Pyrrhus.
Dragon hunters.
He watched the tiny owl, just a spec in the distance, disappear with the Quetzalem into the net as it was pulled tight.
Rowen would never be able to catch up to the caravan on foot. They’d be hauling their prisoners to a fortress to be kept as slaves. Likely they would use Pyrrhus as a blood slave. But Sparrow …
He had to get to her.
Arriving back in town, he stole the first horse he saw and galloped in the direction of Sparrow’s captors.
There was no time to call for help from the Knights in the Portal Realm. He just prayed to the Gods that his horse would carry him fast enough to reach Sparrow before anyone laid a hand on her.
And if anyone touched her, it would mean their death.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Pain exploded before Sparrow fell from the sky. “Sparrow!” Pyrrhus tried to move within the tight binding as they fell through the air, tried to protect her from the impact of the fall.
He had successfully managed to gather her into his arms somewhat, but the impact with the ground still hurt like hell, and the shock caused Sparrow to flicker back and forth between forms.
“Sparrow! Don’t let them see you as a woman,” her companion hissed.
She couldn’t see beyond his wing caught in the net, but the ground shook from galloping horses. Concentrating as hard as she could through the discomfort, she remained an owl.
“Sparrow, they’ll be here any minute. This net is specially crafted to protect against dragon scales, so I can’t free us. But you must try to get loose. These are not just dragon hunters. What Rowen told you was true. But I’m even more sought-after than he thinks. I’m the last remaining king of my kind. This land is mine, and these hunters hope to extinguish the hope for my enslaved people. If they see you in human form, they will question you.”