The Adversary

by Thea Harrison

  Dragos leaped down from the edge of the sarcophagus. “I slipped out of his illusions. He set a trap, I set a trap. Once I got a firm grasp on his presence, I started to… burn him with dragonfire.”

  Morgan’s brows quirked together as he listened. The sorcerer looked fascinated but still mystified. “This was a fight while you were both disembodied?”

  “Correct.”

  “While I’m not sure I understand your method, I’m glad it worked.”

  Pia was no sorcerer, but she thought she had a grasp on what Dragos meant. When the dragon breathed fire, it was not just a physical flame but one filled with Power. She remembered looking into his eyes when he was possessed and knowing that it was not Dragos looking out at her. The fire in his spirit had been missing, those hot gold eyes dimmed.

  “So he’s dead now,” Rune pressed. “Right?”

  Dragos glanced back at the shattered mummy. “He was already dead. His—presence, soul, whatever you want to call it—couldn’t handle the dragonfire, so he fled. From that point, it was a fairly quick matter of convincing Aryal, Grym, and Quentin that I was really me again, so they set me free.”

  Khalil turned to face Grace. The Djinn said, “Confirm, please.”

  Grace blinked. “I don’t know what you want me to confirm.”

  “Is he in the spirit realm now?”

  “I don’t know his name,” Grace said. “And since he’s been so dangerous, I wouldn’t feel comfortable trying to call him anyway. In any case, even if I do, he doesn’t have to come if he doesn’t want to.” She glanced at Dragos. “And since Dragos is able to injure him, I’m pretty sure he won’t want to.”

  Graydon pinched his nose. “So we don’t have any concrete proof that the bastard is really gone.”

  “Nope.” Dragos put extra force on the percussion of the P.

  Pia’s stomach sank. No, no, no. This, she did not want to hear.

  “Postulation,” Morgan said. He began to stroll in a circle around the group.

  The sorcerer looked as calm as ever, intrigued and engaged. He was a towering maestro in his sphere, and for a distant moment Pia imagined how compelling a thing it would be to have his passion entirely focused on one, entirely engaged. Sidonie was a lucky woman.

  She said telepathically to Eva, While I am completely and happily immersed in loving Dragos, my ovaries just made a little mouse squeak too.

  Eva’s gaze flashed to hers.

  I might be mated, but I’m not dead, Pia added. She brought one shoulder up in a subtle, droll lift, and the surprise in Eva’s expression turned to quick laughter.

  “You have Number Four, who did a complex and specific thing,” said Morgan. “A very targeted thing that was drastically, violently outside his norm. He knew to come down here. He knew to damage what he had damaged. He knew to take what he had taken. How could he have possibly known any of that?”

  “There’s only one answer.” Dragos crossed his arms. “He was told.”

  “Right,” Morgan replied. “He had to have been informed. And who was the only person who could have known all of that?”

  “Me,” Dragos growled. “Or who he thought was me.”

  Morgan slanted an eyebrow at Dragos. “Also correct. Bayne was bothered by Number Four’s actions and motives, but they become more transparent if you consider that Dragos—or so Number Four thought—might have given him a clear set of instructions to follow. If Number Four was a good Wyr soldier, he would be highly motivated to follow orders from the Lord of his demesne. While I’m morally concerned by someone so casually killing his coworkers and comrades on someone else’s orders, it’s the only scenario that fits.”

  Grim comprehension dawned on Rune, Carling, and Graydon’s expressions, while Bel simply looked appalled.

  Goose bumps rose on the bare skin of Pia’s arms. She rubbed herself briskly. “But when would he have done it, and why? He was busy getting ready for the beach party, and then we trapped him.”

  Graydon said to her, “Dragos collapsed, and when he came to, you said you knew immediately that it wasn’t him. The moment you got to the surface, we started laying plans. What if we weren’t the only ones to do so?”

  “Consider this,” Morgan said to the group. “Our god-king lay here dead but not gone for countless years. Dragos and Pia must have been his first opportunity at freedom in millennia, so he leaped at it. I will tell you this much for free, my new, very charming friends—if I found myself needing to possess Dragos, I would be extremely uneasy about it.”

  A hard smile notched the corners of Dragos’s mouth. “You couldn’t do it. Not if I saw you coming.”

  “I could if you didn’t see me coming,” Morgan told him. “Because that’s what happened, isn’t it? He’s a proficient, skilled magic user. He caught you by surprise and that was his window in. But if that were me, I would be very uneasy for a lot of reasons—your age, strength of will, nature, intelligence, and knowledge of magic. If you were a castle and I had captured you, you would be very difficult territory to keep. And I would know that, because I know magic very well, just like our god-king does. So, I would not assume that I could keep the valuable real estate I had just captured. And I would be laying plans for my fallback position just in case I had to give ground.”

  “Fuck, fuck me, fuck,” Graydon muttered. “And just as we’ve been learning about him, he’s been learning about us.”

  “Pia described a scene where a figure wielded an object of Power in a battle with otherworldly creatures. That scepter, wand, sword—whatever it is—must be the focal point of our god-king’s magic,” Morgan said. “The more he worked with it, the more Powerful it would have become. He must have also made it into a soul repository.”

  “I’ve heard of those,” Carling murmured. “I’ve even read some of the spells, but I’ve never fashioned one.”

  “Me neither,” Morgan told her. “Mostly because they’re not a healthy thing to do. If and when I die, I want my soul released into the universe to move on to whatever comes after death. Maybe that’s reincarnation, or heaven or hell, or maybe it’s nothing.”

  Grace smiled. “It’s not nothing, I promise.”

  He bowed to her. “Whatever it may be, I know for sure that I don’t want to be trapped in a receptacle for eternity.”

  Pia had started to feel more and more ill as the discussion progressed. She bent at the waist, propped her hands on her knees, and groaned, “And Liam went after Number Four—and Bayne went after him.”

  “I’ve heard enough.” Dragos strode over to the where the rope still dangled from where Graydon had dropped it earlier. He looked over his shoulder at Pia. “Are you coming?”

  She leaped at him. “Hell yeah.”

  Dragos was too big in his Wyr form to shapeshift and fly out without causing major damage to the sinkhole. He urged Pia to climb on and ride piggyback. Once she had a secure hold, he swarmed up the rope. As a werewolf, Morgan had no wings for flight, so he followed suit, and Eva did as well. The others mounted Rune and Graydon in their gryphon forms and flew out.

  “We need to organize a search party,” Dragos told the others.

  Even as he spoke, there was a rush of wings. Not otherworldly wings in some half-sensed dimension, but real wings that beat hot, dusty air into their faces. Squinting, Pia looked up in time to see Bayne and Liam hovering overhead.

  Bayne landed with precision nearby. Liam’s dragon form was so much bigger, he swung into the cleared area on the other side of the sinkhole and shapeshifted back into his human form, then jogged around to them.

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Pia whispered to any god who might be listening.

  “You’re free,” Liam said to Dragos.

  “I am indeed. It’s good to have you back.” Dragos hugged him.

  Then Liam turned to Pia. She threw her arms around him. “I’ve been so worried, and I’m so glad to see you. What happened to Number Four?”

  Liam shook his head. Bayne said, “We d
idn’t get him. When I caught up with Liam, he was flying along the coastline. The bastard’s Wyr, so he knows how to disguise his scent when he needs to.” He said to Pia, “I know waiting to hear can be hard, so we came back to update you. This is not a quick or easy hunt.”

  Dragos said, “Aryal, Quentin, and Grym went back to the house to clean up and wait.”

  “I’ll get them,” Graydon offered.

  Liam looked at Pia. “I’m hungry.”

  “Okay, honey,” she said. “Go back to the house and get something to eat. There’s tons of food. I can’t leave your dad.”

  Liam nodded. He stroked Pia’s hair, lingering to finger the ends, and then he strode away.

  Chapter Seven

  When Graydon started to follow, Dragos told him, “On second thought, let’s all go back and convene there. I want to rinse the mummy dust off and change into fresh clothes.”

  “Sounds good,” Graydon said.

  Pia glanced at the sky that was lightening with predawn. The interloper had gorged on plenty of food at the beach party, so Dragos’s body had been fueled recently, but she never did have that smoothie Liam was going to make.

  It had been almost twenty-four hours since she’d been able to choke down any sustenance, and not only had she expended a lot of energy, she had also been pumping breast milk for Niall.

  She was starting to feel hollow and lightheaded. As much as she wanted the interloper destroyed for good, part of her was relieved at Dragos’s decision. She just needed a few fucking minutes before the next thing happened.

  They followed Liam back, and the house very quickly became overcrowded with everyone present at the same time. A few people spilled onto the deck outside the master suite, which made Pia give Dragos a wry scowl, and he returned. It was good to have such a tight-knit community, but it also meant they weren’t going to get any alone time soon.

  We need that bigger place, he told her telepathically. Like right now.

  I know. She stroked the long, powerful line of his back. We need a place so big everybody can have their own space in it, and then they won’t even notice when we leave and get our own real place.

  Both hunger and laughter glimmered in his darkened gaze. I don’t want to take too long before resuming the hunt, or I’d pull you into the bathroom and to hell with everybody else.

  Hold that thought for now. We’ll pick it again soon. Pushing his arms away so he didn’t forget and touch her with the mummy cooties on his hands, she stood on tiptoe and kissed him quickly.

  Growling under his breath, he deepened the kiss before pulling back. Frustration hardened his features.

  By that point, she was so hungry she was starting to feel faint. “I have to eat.”

  “Go,” he said immediately. “I’ll be there in five.”

  She made her way to the kitchen, where Liam stood at the counter, wolfing down beef sandwiches. Aryal, Quentin, and Grym were there as well, drinking beer and polishing off a huge platter of wings and chicken legs.

  Quentin left the food to give her a hug, and she leaned into him gratefully. “The things you and I have seen since getting entangled with this group,” she whispered.

  His chest moved in a quiet laugh. “Yeah, the things we’ve seen. Glad you’re okay.”

  “Thank you.” She kissed his cheek then stood back and said to all of them. “Thank you for everything.”

  Aryal nodded, and Grym tilted his beer bottle at her. They would never talk about what they had done, she knew. What happened in the sentinel club stayed in the sentinel club. But that was okay by her. She didn’t need the details of what they did to Dragos in that beach tent.

  Grabbing juice from the refrigerator, she drank it thirstily straight from the pitcher and as the sugar hit her system, she started to feel better almost at once. Then she gathered up vegan dishes indiscriminately—a platter of snickerdoodle cookies, a bowl of pasta, and another bowl of salad—and set them on the counter.

  “Now that Dragos isn’t possessed any longer, we should think about going back to New York,” Grym said. “As fun as a bug hunt sounds, they don’t need us for that.”

  “I kind of want to stay,” Aryal replied. The harpy sucked the meat off a chicken wing. “I like bug hunts. I just have so much to do with that harbor investigation.”

  Grym muttered, “I have so many reports on my desk, they’ve acquired intelligence, formed their own civilization, and are in the process of having babies. In fact, their babies are having babies.” He smiled at Pia. “Speaking of which, I’m sorry we missed seeing your little nutcase. You must be looking forward to getting him back home.”

  “Can’t come soon enough for me,” she said around a mouthful of cookie. Ah, carbohydrates. “Just as soon as we’ve hunted down that bug and know that it’s safe again. All the parents here must be anxious to get their children back from hiding.”

  “Where are the children again?” Liam asked casually.

  Grym shrugged. “Not our department.”

  Pia frowned down at her half-eaten cookie, then looked at Liam. Was it okay that he asked that? How could it be okay that he asked that? They had just talked about it, when he had found her in the forest clearing. Liam had agreed with the decision to keep the children’s whereabouts a secret.

  Dread can come in many ways. Sometimes it hit like a lightning bolt. At other times, it took over the body like a slow, creeping rot.

  She stared at the long, graceful form of her handsome son, while nausea churned and blood pounded in her veins. This horrible suspicion… this had to be a PTSD reaction, right? Bayne said that he found Liam flying along the coastline. She had seen Liam’s dragon form for herself when he landed at the construction site.

  The thief of everything wasn’t Wyr. He had never accessed Dragos’s Wyr capabilities. But like Graydon said, just as they had been learning about him, he had been learning about them.

  And that thief might not be Wyr, but Liam’s body was.

  Heart pounding, she abandoned her food and walked over to lean against the counter beside Liam. “Mm,” she said, smiling. “Your sandwich smells good. Can I have a bite?”

  He offered it to her.

  The beef sandwich.

  She met his blue, watchful gaze.

  He was very quick, she had to give him that. He must have seen the comprehension in her face and realized he had made a misstep. Even as she shrank away and opened her mouth to scream, he snatched her hard against his side, pulling her off her feet.

  Tangling his fingers in the hair at the back of her head, he snarled at the others, “Stay back, or I’ll snap her neck.”

  The sentinels had begun to lunge at him. They stopped.

  “This is why I hate surprises and don’t want Christmas presents!” the harpy roared.

  Quentin’s gaze met Pia’s. His eyes were filled with shock and rage. “But he flew.”

  “I know.” She broke into wild struggles, but the interloper had Liam’s strength and speed. He yanked her head back cruelly, and she choked and went still.

  The house went by in a chaotic blur. It was a short trip from the kitchen to the living room. With her head forced back so far, she could hardly see anything, just snatches at the corners of her eyes.

  Exclamations, chairs scraping across wood. Someone—Graydon, she thought—grabbed at Liam’s shoulder, but the interloper spun away, slammed back into a wall, pushed off it to charge through the front door, splintering it into pieces.

  The impact knocked the breath out of her. Struggling to get air into abused lungs, she tried to wedge one arm between them while she grabbed the wrist of the hand tangled in her hair.

  He hissed in her ear, “I swear to all the gods, I will rend you limb from limb in front of your mate if you don’t hold still. Just think how happy that would make me. You’ve been nothing but trouble since we met, you traitorous bitch.”

  He could do it. He was strong enough he could tear her apart with his bare hands.

  Dragos shot ou
t of the house, barefoot and shirtless and dressed in jeans, moving his tremendous body with deadly, powerful speed. She would have called him an unstoppable juggernaut—she had, many times before—but when he laid eyes on them, he jerked to a halt.

  The others poured out behind him. She caught a glimpse of Bayne’s horror-stricken expression. “Oh my fucking God. But he was in dragon form. He flew.”

  Then the interloper in Liam’s body whirled to face the house, and Dragos, Bayne, and the others disappeared from Pia’s line of sight. As the interloper backed up, he began to laugh. “This body is amazing. Just like yours was, Dragos. Unbelievably strong. The smells, the sights—the sounds.” He shook Pia like a rag doll. She felt a rib snap and cried out sharply before she could stop herself. “Tell them to stop trying to surround me.”

  “Stop,” Dragos said.

  Silence fell over the clearing.

  “He’s every bit as strong as you are, your son,” the interloper said. “But he doesn’t yet have your expertise with magic. He doesn’t yet know that struggling against the sleep spell makes it stronger. Now, kneel.”

  The silence grew deadlier, heavily weighted with the promise of violence and death. Pia didn’t have to see Dragos to know that he went down on one knee immediately.

  “Very good,” said the interloper. “The rest of you do the same—excellent. I am your sovereign now. Say it, all of you.”

  The words echoed through the clearing. Pia heard the lie ringing through their many voices. Everyone who had been present in the house said it….

  Except Morgan and Sidonie. They had also been in the house, hanging out with the others in the living room. If they had been present in the clearing, she had no doubt they would have spoken the words along with the others.

  Where had they gone? She couldn’t look around to doublecheck her theory, but despite everything she smiled.

  “Those shackles you used to chain me,” the interloper said. “I want them. Get them now.”

  “We don’t have them any longer,” Aryal said, and Pia heard the lie in that as well. “Since we didn’t need them, we sent them back to New York.”