My power blossomed outwards, sensing all the bright, faerie souls that surrounded us. And part of me thought it was only fair that they suffer for this kind of sick entertainment. I felt that uncontrollable wild glee fill me as I stretched out, my power sweeping across the sky.
“You see, I had no intention of letting you die,” Pan whispered to me, grabbing my arm tight. “Though I can see you’re perfectly capable of defending yourself. Now, pull your power back.”
For a second I wanted to blast him, all of them, and I felt that familiar wash of rage at any attempt to put a leash on my freedom. Pan squeezed harder, putting his own push of power behind it, and reluctantly my power died down. “Well next time, you stay the hell out of my body,” I hissed.
Pan smiled and stepped in closer to me. I became very aware of his earthy masculine smell and the sheen of sweat over his muscles. “You may change your mind about that one day.”
“Not likely,” I said into his twinkling eyes. “So, what’s the plan now that you’ve played your little game?”
He smiled. “Even my so-called games are part of the plan.” He turned from me and faced a side of the stadium that held clusters of private balconies, as opposed to the open seating on the other three sides. “Since my champion has defeated the reigning champion,” he called for everyone to hear, “I invoke the right of victor’s challenge.”
A resounding gasp of surprise mixed with delight rang from the crowd. Apparently this was an infrequent treat. After a few moments of heavy silence, a figure walked to the edge of one of the balconies. I recognized him immediately. Taryn Blackflame.
“Our friend Taryn was the master of Jintara, who you have defeated,” Pan said softly to me. “And since I am the—” he paused as I turned to glare at him, “Let’s just say ‘manager’ of you, I am entitled to challenge Taryn to a fight.”
“What are your terms?” Taryn called to Pan.
“I am here for the three that you abducted—the human, the were, and the witch.”
“I have other plans for them,” Taryn said with a smile. He waved his hand, and the recesses of his balcony became illuminated. Standing there, bound with chains, were Quinn, Riley and the HR. “They are to fight in the stadium.” The audience cheered in approval.
“Am I to understand that you are refusing the right of victor’s challenge?” Pan called, pleasantly enough.
“I will battle you Pan, but my new toys are not available as the spoils.”
“Well in that case, I withdraw my victor’s challenge.” I stared at Pan as he gave a little bow to Taryn. His green eyes sparked. “If you won’t offer them as prizes in a fair fight, I suppose I’ll just have to take them.”
As the words fell from his mouth, Taryn’s face twisted in rage, the crowd began to yell in a mixture of excitement and disapproval, and the earth rolled beneath our feet. Sand flew up into the air as something sharp penetrated the floor of the arena. As it rose further up, I could see a point of stone, granite or something similar. It pushed further and further, a small mountain forcing its way out of the ground.
I saw Taryn gesture to several faeries I assumed were his guards. He was going to move his prisoners. I dashed forward and sprang up to the balcony, knocking a surprised Taryn out of my way. A rush of wings at my back told me Eli had joined the fight. I threw a bolt of power at the chains holding Quinn and Riley while Eli snapped the HR’s with his bare hands. At that moment I heard a gasp from the audience and turned to see what was transpiring in the arena.
The mountain now shimmered and moved, elongating in some places and shortening in others. After a moment during which my eyes struggled to see what shape it was taking, I saw what definitely looked like a head. And from that head came a deafening roar. The form rippled, and two huge wings stretched out. The gray stone glowed orange for a moment as if turning to molten metal, and then cooled back down to a glistening gray. A tail whipped around, bashing in one of the columns of the arena.
Holy shit. Pan had created a dragon.
The dragon roared again and beat its new wings, rising into the air. Pan climbed gracefully onto its back as it lifted off. It flew toward our balcony, hovering in the air before us. Taryn screamed at his guards, but they cowered back against the walls. I didn’t waste any more time. I grabbed Quinn’s wrist and dragged her forward as Eli lifted the HR and flew toward the dragon. I wasn’t worried about Riley making the leap with his werewolf agility. As we approached the edge of the balcony, I grabbed Quinn’s waist and we leapt onto the dragon’s back.
Pan waved cheerfully to Taryn as the dragon beat its wings and launched into the sky. It made a dramatic loop over the stadium, lighting up the sky with a spout of flame before rising up into the clouds. The last thing I heard was the awed gasp of the crowd before the wind filled my ears. Okay, so I was in Faerie, with the god of nature, I had fought and beat a faerie in a gladiatorial battle, and now I was riding on a dragon created from a mini mountain. If it weren’t for the fact that we now had Quinn, Riley and the HR, I might think some of the faeries in Gemstone had slipped us some drugs.
A range of mountains appeared in the distance, and the dragon headed toward their ragged purple peaks. Within a few minutes we had landed on a snowy ledge. We all hopped off. “Thank you, friend,” Pan said to the dragon. It responded with a plume of flame as it took off into the sky.
“What now?” Eli asked.
“Now, we just open a door back to Earth.” Pan ignored our puzzled expressions and lifted his walking staff into the air. With the head of the staff, he drew a rectangle in the space before him. Glowing lines appeared along the edges. He pushed his palm forward, and the rectangle fell, revealing a city street at night. “Ladies first,” he said with a bow.
I followed Quinn through the door onto the street, stepping over the strange rectangle of Faerie sky that Pan had cut out. Comfort enveloped me as I stepped into the cool darkness of the night. We were on Broad Street, the Space Needle hovering just a few blocks away. Quinn wrapped me in a tight hug.
“You rescued us. I can’t believe it.”
“Well, I wouldn’t be a very good friend if I let the faeries keep you as pets, now would I?” I shifted uncomfortably in her grasp.
“Just shut up and let us say thank you,” Riley said, adding himself to the group hug.
“Are you guys okay?” I croaked from under all the hugging.
“We’re fine,” Riley answered.
“They didn’t make you fight in the arena or anything?”
“No,” Quinn said. “We’re okay, really. They grabbed us on the way to Noir, and after the video, they took us straight to the gladiator arena and threw us in a cell. We were scheduled to do some battles, but then you showed up and saved the day in classic Zyan Star fashion.”
“I must express my thanks as well,” the HR said when I’d finally managed to untangle myself from Riley and Quinn. “You’ve proven yourself to be the right person for the job. And, a good friend, if I may call you that.”
“You may,” I said, feeling a strange warmth in my cheeks. “And I must thank you, Pan, for leading us into Faerie and back out again in one piece.”
Pan nodded, his silken red hair shifting in a night breeze. “You allowed me a chance to get revenge on Taryn Blackflame. An altogether entertaining adventure.” He leaned on his staff, looking back and forth between me and Eli. “I say farewell for now. But I will call upon you, Eli, for my favor at some point in the future. And you, Zyan, I will call upon as well, though your debt is fulfilled. Hopefully we can entertain each other further.”
His expression left nothing to the imagination there, and I definitely felt myself blushing this time, mostly because the HR stood right next to me. Pan sauntered down the street, spinning his walking stick in his hands, and then vanished in a burst of moss green sparks.
“I’m going to get the HR back to headquarters,” Eli said to us. Then he smiled down at his boss. “I’m sure there are a few people who want to see you.�
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“Thank you again, Zyan.” The HR met my warm brown eyes with his dark ones.
“Of course,” I responded.
Eli looked at me. “I’ll call you later.” His purple gaze shifted around. “Try and uh—get some rest or whatever.” And he and the HR vanished.
Quinn shot me a puzzled look. “Why was Eli acting so awkward all the sudden?”
I shrugged and started walking down the street. “Bed sounds beautiful right about now.”
“Wait—something happened, didn’t it?” Riley’s voice, his footsteps right behind me.
“Uh, yeah. We just had to follow Pan, the God of nature, who is questionably sane, into Faerie. And then that whole gladiator thing…”
“You’re dodging the question.”
I rolled my eyes. “No, I was simply answering it. Plenty of things happened, and yes, one of those things might have been a kiss, but only—”
“Whoa! What?” Quinn shrieked.
“But only because Pan made us. Twisted little faerie fuck….”
“Wait, how did he ‘make’ you?” Riley smirked, doubt written on his face.
“It went something like ‘I’ve never seen a soul sucker and an angel kiss, entertain me or die’. He had quite a few faerie thugs to back up his threat.” They both kept silent for a moment, contemplating my words. “Anyways, I don’t know why he’s being all awkward, because it didn’t mean anything.”
“So, how was it?” Quinn asked, a gleam in her eye.
I groaned. “Don’t know, Quinn, I was kind of hoping we wouldn’t die, and worrying about your dumb asses, and trying not to drink Eli’s life force, which smells pretty amazing.”
“You’re such a liar.” Riley shot me a knowing look and strode on ahead.
“Think what you want,” I hissed, but they both laughed.
We arrived back home a few minutes later. Quinn and Riley went to their respective rooms. I sunk down onto the sofa. It’d been a really interesting last couple of days.
Someone knocked on the door, making every muscle in my body tighten. With a groan, I got up and walked across the room. I looked through the peephole, saw a familiar Irish shapeshifter, and swung the door open.
“Donovan, what are you—”
By way of greeting, he crushed me against him, his face in my hair. “Oh, thank God!”
“You’re crushing me!” I croaked. Not that I couldn’t get out of his hold, but I didn’t want to hurt the poor man.
He released his hold, a little, and stared at me as if trying to determine if I were a mirage. “I thought you were dead! I saw the news, and I knew you went down to Faerie, because you’re Zyan Star, and of course you went to Faerie, and—” And then his lips were on mine, not gently.
Donovan had always been an amazing kisser. Sweet and fierce, sensual and hungry, all at once. Our relationship years before had been extremely… passionate. We didn’t do a whole lot other than hunt things and spend time in the bedroom. Bedroom being a fairly loose term, as we often didn’t quite make it to a bedroom. But in all that time, never had he kissed me like this, like he was going to devour me, like I was the only thing in all the realms that he wanted. Needed.
And a small voice in my head felt inclined to remind me that I’d just been kissing someone else not a handful of hours before, but that small voice faded as I wrapped my legs around Donovan’s waist and dug my fingers into his strong shoulders. He carried me to my room and we fell on the bed in a tangle of limbs. My body was so hot I felt like I was going nuclear. I pulled off my shirt, ripping it in the process, and leaned forward to help him with his. Donovan stilled, placing a hand on each side of my face, and kissed my forehead.
“I can’t live without you, Zy,” he murmured.
“Can you say that again once your pants are off?”
He caught me in an intense gaze. “I’m serious.”
WTF was happening? “Um…”
“It’s not just about sex,” he said. “And I’m going to prove it.”
I looked down at a certain part of his anatomy that was straining up through his jeans. “Your body is majorly disproving it. Whatever “it” is.”
“You. Me. Us. I’m not trying to get you back for a cheap fling. For a purely physical relationship. We had that before. It didn’t work. I’m different now.” He held my gaze, his brow furrowed earnestly. “I love you, Zyan Star. I’m just going to say it, because it’s how I feel, and I want you to know.”
Well, fuuuucckkk. That was unexpected.
“And you don’t have to say it back now, because I know you’re not going to, and I don’t care.”
I took a deep breath and tried to speak. Failed. Tried again. “I—I’m at a loss for words.”
He smiled and stroked my hair. “I know. Just be here.”
We laid there in silence for several minutes. I was already grateful that I had survived my trip to Faerie, but Donovan’s reaction made me feel even more lucky. Wasn’t sure I was ready for our relationship to get serious, and I certainly wasn’t ready for the dropping of the L-bomb, but still. I was here, and unharmed. Things could be way worse.
“I suppose what happened tonight is my bad karma for the other evening, when you made me dinner,” I said after a while.
“Yes. I suppose that’s true.” Donovan chuckled. “I may have enjoyed it. Just a little.”
“Hey!”
“Even the great Zyan Star gets turned down once in a while,” he said with a laugh.
I smacked him in the face with my pillow. “Smart ass.”
“I don’t get it,” I said, a few hours later, after getting some much-needed sleep. We were all sitting out in the living room. “I expected some sort of massive attack or societal breakdown while we were gone. Why else kidnap you guys and the HR?”
“I’m sure they didn’t expect you to get out alive,” Donovan commented.
“We were gone, what, about eight hours?” Quinn said.
Riley piped in. “What was about eight hours in Faerie was over two days here. The time passes differently.”
“Which makes my case even more—that’s plenty of time for an invasion to begin,” I said.
There was a knock at the door. Good grief. Couldn’t anybody ever call ahead of time? I walked over and glanced through the peephole. Eli. I opened the door.
“Has it started?” I asked by way of greeting.
“Yes.” His eyes were bright, like he’d had too much caffeine or something. “There’s a major breach in West Seattle. It looks like whatever plan Lucifer has in mind has been sprung. You ready?”
“Oh, sure, why not. The end of the world! Mind if I get some shoes on?” Without waiting for a response, I sauntered back into the apartment.
Eli followed me in, greeting the other three.
“No rest for the wicked,” I sighed. “You guys ready to stop this breach?”
“Let’s do this,” Riley said with a fist pump.
Quinn nodded in agreement and Donovan said, “Let me call my crew,” and opened up his phone.
“I’ll take Zyan and Riley through first, then you guys?” Eli asked.
We stepped up next to Eli, and reappeared a moment later in the midst of Armageddon. Eli disappeared again and thirty seconds later was back with Donovan and Quinn.
There had to be at least fifty demons, ranging from eighth level on up to twelfth. The NHTF and angel warriors outnumbered them slightly, but for demons of this level, it would take three or four warriors for each. I saw Commander Hunter leading a team against one of the twelfth level demons, and Eli immediately darted off to assist her. As he approached, she yelled and waved him off. “Don’t come any closer!”
He paused for just a moment, and then an explosion blasted him backwards. “Marissa!”
The smoke cleared and Hunter came running toward us with her team. “I’m fine. It’s you I was worried about. We’re using a special bomb on the demons. It’s deadly for supes.”
“Including angels?” El
i asked, looking astonished.
“Yes, including angels,” she responded, looking uncomfortable.
Quinn, Riley and D didn’t look too happy about it either, but I said, “Groovy. If they kill these fuckers, I’m down with it.”
“What’s the blast radius?” Eli asked, all logical and stuff.
“Twenty feet or so. So just make sure you’re clear before they go off.”
“Alright, load me up,” I said impatiently.
Hunter tossed me two small silver orbs. “Be careful.”
“I’ll try.” I shot off in the direction of a cluster of demons that seemed to be pummeling some of the NHTF agents pretty hard. I heard Donovan and Riley shift shape and tear after me. Coming in at a hard run, I whipped past the agents and pulled my blade. I went in a circle around the demons, weaving in and out in a blur, slicing at their legs. On my second rotation, I jumped straight up into the air, pressing the red button on the bomb and tossing it down between them. “Duck and cover!” I yelled, tucking into a tight ball and spinning out into the night. One second, two seconds, three—the night lit up with a white flash and a satisfying boom. I landed and watched the astonished expressions on all the agents’ faces as the demons dissolved before their eyes. Good ol’ government. Always coming up with new things to play with.
Turning, I saw Eli and Commander Hunter fighting back to back against two tenth level demons, Hunter with some sort of automatic weapon that launched blasts of white light instead of bullets. I was mentally planning the next good place to plant my second bomb when something smashed into the back of my head and sent me flying. I flew about thirty feet, landing hard with my cheek against the pavement. Rolling over, I got to my feet just as the twelfth level demon blasted another spell at me.
I rubbed the back of my throbbing head. As a wave of anger washed over me, I saw my demon mark begin to glow. Which made me more mad, which made it glow even brighter.
“It looks like you have a problem with your temper,” the demon said with a throaty laugh.
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