Rik’s arms enfolded me, holding me close. His bond settled down to a fiery red ribbon of lava rather than the rumbling volcano. G’s stallion whickered softly in my mind. I felt a soft muzzle touch my cheek. I finally licked his wrist, unable to swallow a single drop more, though he kept his wrist pressed to my cheek.
I shivered a little, my back cold. Which reminded me that my favorite cuddly warcat was absent. Rik drew me down between him and Guillaume and pulled a blanket up over me. G wasn’t exactly a purring cuddle buddy, but he spooned tight against me, tangling his legs with mine and Rik without a care. I wasn’t sure how he’d feel about touching another man, but he didn’t seem to mind.
“Blood are Blood. Male, female, both, neither, it doesn’t matter. We’re here for you.”
“But have you fucked men and women? Do you have a preference?”
“My preference is to fuck my queen whenever and however she wants, in as many ways as she wants. If you find pleasure in Blood fucking Blood, then we’ll do that and enjoy the hell out of it too.”
“You will? Really? Or only because I ordered it?”
“Really. You forget that your blood flows in all of us now. To touch one of them is second only to touching you directly.”
“In most courts, a Blood only rarely gets to sleep with the queen,” Rik said.
“I remember you saying that. I guess I’m just trying to wrap my mind around it. For you, it’s not uncommon or even unexpected for two Blood to be away. For me… I’m hoping they’re not upset. And I miss them.”
Just saying it out loud made my throat tighten. Especially Daire, though I didn’t say anything. I wouldn’t interfere with Rik’s command or punishment.
“Daire is upset, but he should be.” Rik’s voice hardened. “Xin will be here in a few hours. If you have need of him before then, you know how to call him. And if you want Guillaume to stay, then he’ll stay.”
“Even if Xin has to sleep on top of us, we’ll figure it out,” G added with a yawn. “You’ll have more room in the nest once we move.”
My nest. My manor. Just thinking about it made me smile with wicked glee. All that space in two big beds. We’d all be able to sleep together.
All five of us. Or six. If this king, Leviathan, worked out.
22
Shara
Something woke me. Not a sound exactly. A presence, a sense of something moving. A quick bond check told me Guillaume was still here, so it hadn’t been six hours since we’d gone to bed. I thought maybe Daire was sneaking close, but when I touched his bond, I felt him in the kitchen making a sandwich. No surprise.
Xin was further away, like he was outside.
I turned my attention back to the room. It was brighter in here than it should be. I lifted my head and it took me a few moments to even make sense of what I was seeing. A window. In my room. That had no windows. Between the bed and the door. Soft, golden light spun out in rays from the window, so I wasn’t immediately alarmed. Monsters didn’t like the light. But then I saw what was crawling out of the window.
“Rik.” He stirred, made a low mumble, but didn’t wake up. Maybe I was dreaming. Because why would a skeleton climb through a window into my room?
It wore some kind of armor. Light flashed off the silver, making me wince. Suddenly the light was not so soft and pretty, but hard, sharp, and bright enough to hurt.
“G. Rik. Guys. Wake up. Tell me I’m not dreaming.”
:We’re coming.: Xin and Daire both flared brighter in my mind. I felt them racing toward me, Daire closer, coming up the stairs. But it still didn’t feel real. Until the skeleton laid its bony fingers on my ankle. That felt pretty fucking real. In fact, it hurt like a bitch.
“Rik!” I shrieked. The damned thing locked a vise around my ankle and wouldn’t let go, even when I kicked it in the head. “Rik!”
He moved slightly, as if trying to come awake, but slumped back down heavily. Drugged. Spelled. Something was keeping him from moving. I refused to consider that they might be permanently incapacitated. Or I’d just give up right now.
Magic leaped in my blood, strength and power ready to rock and roll, but I wasn’t sure what to try, especially against something that didn’t even have a body. I didn’t want to burn down the house with us in it so a fireball didn’t sound like the brightest idea. I went for Rik’s troll strength and slammed my foot into the skeleton again. Bone shattered. And it still dragged me off the bed. I hit my head on the floor so hard that it dazed me a moment. I grabbed at the leg of the bed, hooking my arm around it to hold on.
The skeleton jerked on my leg so hard something popped or tore, I wasn’t sure which. Pain burned up my calf and into my knee. Which pissed me off. Fuck it all to hell. If I had to burn the house down, so be it.
I willed fire to engulf the skeleton. So hot that even its armor would melt and bend. I felt the sear on my flesh. I heard an unholy screech. But it still wouldn’t let go of my ankle.
Daire’s warcat exploded through the door, casting deadly splinters of wood everywhere. He seized the skeleton’s arm in his jaws and crunched through the bone, tearing its whole arm off. The skeleton drew a gleaming gold and silver sword with its other hand and stabbed Daire in the chest. He roared, I screamed, and finally, Rik and G scrambled up, dazed, but alive, just as another skeleton crawled through the window.
My tower bedroom had felt plenty big. Until a warcat, a rock troll, and a hell horse started tearing a bunch of skeletons apart. Xin’s silver wolf crouched over the top of me, shielding me with his body. I wrapped my arms around his neck and tried to stand, so I could get out of the way, but my leg wouldn’t hold my weight. He dragged me over to the wall and pressed against me. :Can you shut the portal?:
I focused on the gleaming window. Five skeletons had crawled through. All armored and fighting with swords. They were actually very good, too. I could smell my guys’ blood. All of them but Xin. Another skeleton started through. A couple of more, and we’d be seriously outnumbered.
I tried envisioning the portal smaller, but I strained until sweat beaded on my forehead and nothing happened. It was like the harder I pushed, the firmer the window stood. From the side, it looked silvery, kind of like a flat bubble hovering in space. I crawled a few steps to the side so I could see the back better, and it definitely looked like a bubble, gleaming and slightly rounded.
Bracing myself, I tapped on my period blood. Power surged through me like a million-volt generator came on line. I pushed that energy like a lightning bolt to prick that bubble. Something exploded all right. Light blazed like we’d blown up the sun. My eyeballs burned, seared and tender. I blinked, and I was looking up at the ceiling. Xin rolled over beside me, blood leaking from his ears and eyes. He touched his muzzle to my cheek, and I could feel his pain. All of their pain. They were all down. All hurt, bleeding, damaged. I forced myself upright, slowly, holding my head. Pain splintered through my skull, whether from the explosion or when I’d hit the floor, I wasn’t sure.
Bones littered the room. It looked like a graveyard had been torn apart by an earthquake and coffins had just emptied out all over my bedroom. Rik’s rock troll pushed up to his knees, one hand braced on the floor, his head hanging low. Daire was sprawled and twisted half under the bed. He was the one I was most worried about after taking a sword in the chest. I couldn’t see G, but he was on the other side of Rik and the bed. Banged up, but okay, at least his bond felt the most solid and least pain. It’d take a hell of lot to kill the headless knight.
I crawled over to Daire and laid a hand over the gaping wound in his chest. He was still alive, but weak. The sword had punctured a lung. His breathing sounded too wet and heavy. Though he still managed to lick my cheek.
:Don’t cry, my queen. We’re all alive.:
I didn’t realize I was crying. “Can you feed? Will that help you?”
Rik pushed up, lurched a step, and finally made it to us. “Your blood will always help.”
:I can’t shift, and if
I bite her like this, it will hurt her.:
G came to me, a small knife in his hand. Silently, I offered my wrist and he made a quick cut. I let my blood drip directly onto the horrible wound in Daire’s chest, and then offered him my wrist. Rather than lick, he took my whole arm in his mouth, cradling my wrist so gently that he didn’t even break my skin, and let my blood flow down his throat.
I held my other wrist out to Rik. He hesitated a moment, bowing his head.
“We failed you, my queen. I failed you. You should feed Daire and Xin first since they were quickest to your aid.”
“You’re alpha. We need you up quicker than them. And you didn’t fail me. You kept trying to wake up, but you couldn’t. Something was keeping you from helping me.”
“You know who it was.” G’s mouth turned down in a grim slant. “So how is she supposed to hold you accountable for not responding quicker?”
Rik grunted an acknowledgment and cradled my left wrist. He bent over my arm, but looked up at me, meeting my gaze. “I still feel like I failed you, though Guillaume’s right. We’re all lucky to be alive.”
“Who was it?” He bit into my wrist and my eyelids fluttered. Time seemed to still. Eons passed in between my heart beats. All that mattered was my blood. In them. In them all. I looked at Guillaume, a silent request. No, order. I willed him to come to me, now, and feed.
He walked around behind me and took me in his arms. I relaxed into him, letting him hold me up, as he sank his fangs into my throat.
Xin’s wolf crept closer, head down, though not because he was injured.
“Can you shift?”
:Not yet, my queen.:
“G, I need you to bite me again so Xin can feed too.”
I sensed a heaviness in his bond. Concern for my welfare, with four of them feeding at the same time. Especially after I’d just shattered whatever that portal thing was. But I tugged on his bond. Willing him to do as I asked.
He shifted me up so he could bite through the upper swell of my breast. I shuddered, so close to coming, just from the bites. From taking care of them. Healing them. G returned to his bite on my throat and Xin’s wolf licked my blood from the second bite.
Connected. All five. My blood pulsed in them, setting off a cascading power surge. I didn’t have to do anything but lie there in G’s arms and bleed. My blood knew exactly what to do. One by one, I healed them. I closed the wound in Daire’s chest. The skeleton swords had managed to gouge several deep cuts into Rik’s troll hide, and the explosion of the portal had hurt something inside him. Bruised his organs. My blood flowed over those injuries and took away his pain.
I sank into Xin, easing his wolf’s sensitive senses that had been scorched by the brilliant light. Then Guillaume. Skilled with sword and blade as a knight, he hadn’t taken any direct wounds—until I’d tossed him on his back and broken several of his ribs.
Footsteps pounded up the stairs and all four men went rigid with tension. G held knives in both hands and even Daire scrambled to a crouch, tail lashing.
A very human and suddenly very scared man stumbled to a halt at the door. “Oh shit. We heard… We saw… No alarm but…”
He looked at each of us and I finally realized who it must be. “Frank, right?”
He nodded and tried to keep his gaze locked on my face, but yeah, I’m pretty sure he thought he’d just stumbled into a crazy orgy. I was naked and bloody and stretched out between two men and two animals. “There was an explosion,” he whispered. “Thought maybe a gas line. You didn’t answer your phone.”
Dismissing the man as a threat, Rik picked me up and carried me to my bed. “And now you need to heal yourself, my queen.”
I didn’t remember what he meant, until he touched my right knee. I sucked in a hard breath and bit back a scream.
“I think it’s dislocated,” G said. “While she can heal it, it might be best to have a doctor set it for her first.”
“You did the right thing,” I said to Frank, pleased my voice didn’t quiver, though I sounded a bit breathier than normal. “Can you call Gina and ask her to come with Dr. Borcht, please? Tell them I hurt my knee and it might be dislocated.”
“Of course, ma’am.” He took a step back, eyes still frantically locked on my face. “Right away, ma’am.”
He disappeared and ran back down the stairs quicker than he’d come. I sighed. “Money says we’ll need to hire a new security firm tomorrow.”
“You never know.” Xin sat on the edge of the bed, fully human. “He seems to be more invested in you than the average human. He may very well ask you to bond him.”
“A human?”
“Not as Blood, but as… what’s the word?” He looked to G and Rik for help.
“Thrall?” I asked, but he shook his head.
“Servant, but they don’t really have servants in this day and age,” G replied. “Back in the old days, all humans working for the nest were sworn to the queen, even if they weren’t Aima. That way she knew who she could trust, and who might be a plant of another queen.”
Daire sat on the floor beside the bed. He didn’t ask, but I wanted him up with us. I didn’t ask Rik, but he felt my desire in the bond and gave a nod to Daire. He hopped up and cuddled into my side, careful not to bump my knee, which was swollen and hurting more by the moment.
“So which one of you is going to tell me who attacked us with skeletons while we wait on Dr. Borcht?”
23
Rik
I hurt all over and not because of any physical injuries.
I’d failed her. I’d failed to protect my queen when she’d needed me.
Sure, some magical shit had to be going down to keep me from responding to her, but I wouldn’t soon forget the horrible feeling of hearing her scream my name and being unable to move. Without Daire, she would have been dragged through that portal.
We never would have seen her again. I had no illusions what would have happened to her on the other side. Our bonds would have been severed. The thought made me want to smash this whole house down and kill everyone who tried to stop me.
Guillaume and Xin looked at each other like they were silently daring each other to be the one to tell her. As the oldest Blood, they’d seen the most shit. And while I’d been fully prepared to deal with court politics and queen wars, I’d never in a million years expected we’d be facing off against a god.
“He has many names,” Guillaume finally said. “Out of all the old gods, he’s found a way to still be meaningful in the world today. He’s not worshiped, exactly, but he’s conflated with other religions, feeding off them, confusing people, turning good intentions wrong. All the ancient mythologies featured a father god, usually a god of the sun, or god of light. That’s who we’re dealing with.”
“The Egyptians knew him as Ra, or Amun-Ra, or even Aten,” Xin said. “The Greeks usually called him Apollo. He influenced both, though not as directly as the Egyptian mythologies. Perhaps that’s why he was so quick to strike at you, my queen. He’s closer to Isis than the other queens’ goddesses.”
Shara frowned. “Nobody worships Ra today, do they? Light is supposed to be good. That’s why I wasn’t afraid at first. The monsters don’t like light, and the golden light shining through the window was so beautiful. How could something that beautiful send skeletons that tried to kill us all? What the hell were those things, anyway?”
“Soldiers of Light, the best warriors from all the ages who died in service to him. Samurai, Pharaoh’s personal guards, even a few Templar knights I’m sure.” Xin paused when Guillaume grunted with disgust, but he nodded. “The sun is good, yes? We must have the sun to survive. But the sun can also cause cancer. It can burn your skin, cause sun poisoning, heat exhaustion, and extreme dehydration. You can die from sun exposure, even though we need the sun to survive. Light is wonderful, until it’s focused into a laser that sears your eyes or cuts through a foot of metal like butter.”
Guillaume laid his hand on her left thigh, his touch
gentle. “In the world today, any time you see something good twisted to hurt another, it’s his influence. Supposedly good men who excuse killing people who are different from him. Gunmen killing people in church or at a concert at random. Men spewing obscenities to women on the street. Tyrannical purity, racial injustices, fanatical extremists. He revels in patriarchy, misogyny, racism, and hatred.”
She shivered and we all drew closer, pressing against her, shielding her. “Why would he come after me?”
I pressed my lips to her forehead. “Can you think of anything a patriarchal god would despise more than a woman reveling in blood and sex and her own growing magic?”
“Then why not all the Aima queens?”
“I’m sure he’s spun out his fanatical plots against them as well, but I have a feeling you will be his focus.”
She pressed tighter to my side and I wanted to die at the thought of losing her. Of failing her again. We had to find a way to counteract whatever spell he’d sent ahead of that portal. “My mother said I was controlled chaos. If Ra is order to an extreme… then I suppose it makes sense that he’d hate the chaos I bring.”
“And that’s probably why you must find Leviathan,” Guillaume said. “Remember those old myths? They feature the father god defeating the mighty serpent and either killing him or chaining him in the depths of hell or the ocean, far from mankind. Or in this case, far from you. That’s probably another reason he targeted you now, before you could find the king and free him.”
I felt her fear trembling in the bond. Her core was shaken. All the political plots and queen games suddenly paled in comparison to an epic battle of light versus dark proportions. “If you’d all been in here sleeping with me…”
Rage crawled through me, lowering my voice to furious bass. “You’d be dead. Gone. Lost forever.”
Queen Takes King Page 14