They shared their first genuine smile.
“I look forward to it,” Blaer returned.
28
Adric knew, even as he fought admitting it. He’d have taken a blade to the heart rather than believe Luc would betray him like this.
But the wolf fada knew the location of Adric’s den, even if the look-away spell prevented him from finding the entrance. If Luc had been outside when Rosana emerged…
Adric was moving before he realized it. He dropped from the tree, shifting in mid-air to land directly in front of Luc.
The wolf fada was much larger than an ordinary lupine. His head reached Adric’s chest, and his canines were a good two inches long. But Adric was the dominant and they both knew it.
He grabbed Luc by the scruff of the neck, shook him. “What the fuck have you done?”
Orange tinged with gold glittered over the wolf’s coat, and then Luc stood before Adric. He was thinner, all bone and sinew, his eyes burning holes in his craggy face.
His chin jutted out. “I gave that do Rio female to Blaer.”
“Rosana?” Adric gaped at him. Even in the face of the evidence, he’d hoped it wasn’t true. That Luc would have an explanation.
A black fury filled his head. His heart exploded into frenzied beats.
The cat clawed to be free. Stole the mate.
Blood.
Kill.
Adric’s hands shot out, wrapped around Luc’s throat. “You thrice-damned bastard.”
Luc stared back proudly, not even trying to fight. “Did it…for you,” he gasped out. “Lady B…ordered me to…capture you. When I saw Rosana…took her instead.”
“For me?” Blood pounded in Adric’s temples. He gave Luc a hard shake. “You traded an innocent female for me. What kind of a goddamned excuse for a man are you?”
Luc’s eyes flared. “A man…under a geas.”
He didn’t add that he’d accepted the geas to save Marjani. He didn’t have to.
Adric forced his fingers to unpeel from Luc’s neck. Killing the other man might satisfy his blood lust, but it wouldn’t help Rosana, and the wolf had intel that he needed. With a frustrated growl, he shoved Luc away from him.
The wolf stumbled back a few feet before catching himself. He brought a hand to his throat and eyed Adric, breath sawing in and out.
“Where is she?” Adric rapped out.
“Inside.” Luc jerked his head in the direction of New Moon. “Lady B took her to the prince. An offering. She’s trying to buy her way into the court.”
Adric’s lip curled. “I don’t fucking believe it. You gave Rosana to that fae bitch after what she did to Jani. To you.”
Blaer had caged not only Marjani, but Luc. And then she’d enslaved him.
“I did it for the clan, too,” the wolf retorted. “If the fae get hold of you, the clan would never recover. We—they need you.”
Adric’s fingers flexed. Gods, he wanted to wrap them around Luc’s throat again.
“Fuck what the clan needs. There are some lines you don’t cross. Ever.”
Luc’s gaze slid from his, but he didn’t apologize. He clearly believed he’d done the right thing.
Adric shook his head in disgust. He’d known Luc since they were both cubs, but now he wondered if he’d ever truly known the other man at all.
Inside, his cat crouched, a concentrated ball of rage. Aching to sink its teeth into Luc’s throat, to drench the earth with his blood.
Easy. We need to find out what he knows.
“Why?” he ground out. “Why would the prince want Rosana?”
“He’s a fae.” The wolf shrugged a shoulder. “Since when do they need a reason to be S.O.B.s?”
It wasn’t a lie, but Adric recognized evasion when he heard it. He scraped a hand over his spiky hair. Luc wasn’t telling him everything, but maybe he couldn’t.
“You say Lady B wants to join the New Moon court?”
A shrug. “She can’t return to Iceland—the ice fae king banished her from his court for a fae year-and-a-day.”
Adric nodded. “Jani told me.”
“The night fae are her mother’s people, but they don’t want her, either. They pawned her off on the ice fae when she was still a kid.”
“Figures.” Adric snorted. The night fae would devour their own young if they didn’t need them to pass on their precious bloodlines. “But that doesn’t explain why the prince would want Rosana. Me, I can understand. Take me, and Jani will come running.”
Their eyes met. They both knew the prince would do just about anything to get his hands on Marjani.
“But Rosana?” Adric shook his head. “He must know it will bring Rock Run down on him. They’re a powerful clan, and everyone knows the sun fae queen has a soft spot for Rosana.”
Luc gave a noncommittal grunt. He seemed distracted. A drop of sweat trickled down his face. At his sides, his fingers twitched.
Suddenly, he lunged. Adric flung himself to the side, but Luc’s fingers closed on his quartz.
Adric jerked. It was like Luc had plunged his hand into his chest and wrapped his fingers around his beating heart. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, his whole being consumed with a deep, visceral agony.
He shoved at Luc, but the other man held on grimly.
“Sorry.” His old friend’s face was a stony mask. “She gave me a direct order. I can’t disobey.” He gave the quartz a hard squeeze.
Adric bit down on a scream as more pain jolted through him. His eyes locked on Luc’s own quartz, just inches from his face.
He scrabbled for it, missed. Tried again.
Claws slid out on Luc’s free hand. He slashed at Adric’s forearm, ripping him to the bone, but Adric was in too much pain to register it.
There.
His fingers closed on Luc’s quartz. He glared into the wolf’s eyes, using all the dominance at his command. Praying it would be enough to overcome the geas, at least temporarily.
“Release my quartz. Now.”
Luc shuddered. Sweat poured down his face. But he gripped the pendant even tighter.
Pain lashed at Adric like a fiery whip. Scorching through his veins in an unending shriek of agony.
His body jerked, but he kept up the pressure. “Let. It. Go.”
Luc’s gaze slid sideways—and then he released the pendant and stumbled back.
The absence of pain was stunning. Adric sucked in a breath. Another breath, and then he realized he’d let go of Luc’s quartz.
Fortunately, the other man was in no shape to fight. He bent forward, hands on his thighs, chest heaving.
Adric didn’t wait for him to recover. Jerking his dagger from its sheath, he slammed Luc to the forest floor. Straddling his abdomen, he touched the sharp iron edge to the soft place beneath the jaw where Luc’s right carotid pulsed.
“Don’t move. Don’t even breathe. Understand?”
Luc hissed as the poisonous metal seared his skin. He stilled, resignation sketched on his face.
“Speak.” Adric pressed the sharp edge a little deeper. “Tell me you understand. You won’t move until I say so.”
“Yes.” Luc swallowed. “My lord.”
Adric sheathed the dagger and dragged off his quartz, dangling it from his fingers. Blood ran down his arm. He ignored it to swing the stone back and forth on its leather cord. Deep within, a fiery bronze mixed with blue flared to life.
“Look at my quartz.”
“No.” Luc squeezed his eyes shut.
Adric growled. “Look at it, you son of a bitch. Now.”
Luc shook his head, but Adric was still his alpha, even if he was technically no longer a member of the clan. His wolf wouldn’t let him fight too hard, especially now, when Adric’s command didn’t interfere with Blaer’s geas.
He opened his eyes. They were dull gold. Flat, hopeless.
Adric gave a hard swallow. For a few desolate seconds, he was back in the abandoned den where his uncle had imprisoned Luc for twelve
long months.
By then, Adric and Marjani were on the run from their uncle. Leron Savonett had tortured and starved Luc for months, but he’d never given up their hidey-holes. Adric knew he’d have died rather than betray them.
When Adric and Marjani had finally tracked Luc down, they found him manacled to the wall with an iron cuff around one wrist. The constant exposure to iron had weakened him, making it impossible for him to heal. He lay curled up on the stone floor, his body a rack of bones on which to hang his skin. Open sores on his manacled wrist. His back bloody from a recent beating.
The eyes Luc had lifted to Adric and Marjani had held that same bleak hopelessness. Even as a teenager, the wolf fada had rarely smiled.
But at the sight of them, a corner of his mouth had lifted. “About time you showed up.”
“Don’t do this,” Luc rasped now. “Just kill me.”
Adric’s throat worked. “I can’t,” he whispered.
Back and forth.
Luc might hate Adric for hypnotizing him, but at least he’d be alive.
“Damn you to Hades.” The wolf’s gaze locked on the quartz swaying, pendulum-like, above his nose.
Adric pumped energy into the crystals. Inside, the flames flared brighter until they were reflected in Luc’s pupils, eerie blue flames in the glistening black circles.
“You’ll take me to Lady B.”
“Yes,” Luc said in a flat voice.
“Can you get me through New Moon’s wards?” He’d planned to use his Gift of hypnotism to trick a guard into sneaking him inside, but entering with Luc was even better. The wards would open for Luc, and Adric could slip inside with him.
“Yes.”
“I want your promise on your honor as a wolf.”
“Yes. On my honor as a wolf, I will get you through the wards.”
Gotcha. Adric’s mouth curved in a feral smile. “Where are your clothes?”
“There.” Luc’s arm swung up, pointed into the trees.
“Take me to them.”
Luc immediately started to his feet. Adric had to scramble out of his way.
The wolf fada walked in the direction he’d pointed, halting in front of an oak tree, where his clothes were bundled into a leather jacket and wedged into a crook of the tree. He stood at attention, awaiting instructions.
Adric was surprised at how easy Luc was to control; it was as if he’d surrendered completely to Adric’s will. But then, he was Luc’s alpha, whether or not he’d been expelled from the clan. When a man like Luc gave you his loyalty, he’d walk through hell or high water for you.
“Give me the clothes,” he told Luc, “and then shift to your wolf.”
While the other man obeyed, Adric used his quartz to heal the slashes on his arm. After they’d scabbed over, he dropped the leather cord over his head and took the clothes from Luc.
They were a little big, but they’d do. He tucked the sheathed dagger beneath the T-shirt and laced on the lug-sole boots. If a fada came across their tracks, they’d see Luc’s prints, not his. Lastly, he put on the black hoodie, pulling up the hood to hide his distinctive hair. The leather jacket he returned to the crook of the oak. It would only be in the way if he had to shift—or fight.
Weak as he was, Luc took a long time to shift. Too long.
Adric stood helplessly by as his old friend wavered between man and wolf, sparkles flickering anemically over his skin. If Luc couldn’t complete the shift, he’d die, his body a grotesque mass of incompatible organs.
He growled. “Focus, damn you. You can do this.”
A weak glimmer of orange, and at last Luc’s huge brown wolf appeared. He was too thin in this form as well, his fur dull, patchy. At this rate, he’d never survive his decade with Blaer.
“Fuck, I’m sorry.” He touched Luc’s head. “When this is over, I promise I’ll do what I can. There’s got to be a way to break the damn geas.”
The wolf’s breath sighed out. Then he gave Adric’s hand a firm nip. The message was clear: Stay out of this.
Adric scowled down at him. “I’m the alpha, remember?”
Luc growled lowly.
It was Adric’s turn to sigh. “At least let me give you a shot of healing energy.”
At Luc’s nod of assent, he ran his quartz over the wolf’s body. He was still thin—there wasn’t much Adric could do about that, but his fur grew shinier, the patches closing over until he had a thick coat again.
Luc nuzzled his chest in gratitude.
Adric grimaced. “Don’t thank me yet.”
He lifted his quartz, dangling it in front of the wolf’s face.
He paused, sorting his thoughts. He had to get the command just right. Once they were inside, and especially if Blaer caught sight of them, he had to make sure the compulsion to obey him, Adric, was stronger than the power her geas exerted on Luc.
When he was ready, he infused his voice with dominance. “Take me to Rosana do Rio. Now. No detours, except whatever’s necessary to keep the night fae from detecting me. Understood?”
The wolf whined…and then turned and trotted out of the trees. Adric dropped his quartz back over his head, tucking it into the T-shirt along with the dagger, and strode after him.
Luc didn’t take the shimmering fae path, confirming Adric’s suspicion it was booby-trapped, or maybe even an illusion. Instead, he veered right.
They circled the compound, Luc padding stiffly beside him, his will under Adric’s command. Adric swallowed something acrid. He’d promised himself he’d never compel any of his lieutenants or close friends.
The Darktime isn’t over. The prince will destroy your clan from the inside out.
Was this how it started? With Adric himself?
As they passed through two longleaf pines, a small circle shimmered into being, widening into a wolf-sized portal. Luc stepped through it, Adric glued to his side.
His spine tingled. He pulled back his shoulders, his stance tough, as if he were a fada bodyguard. Someone who belonged. Meanwhile, his gaze roamed the compound, his body poised for anything.
A second ticked past, then another and another. From a nearby oak, a raven studied Adric with beady brown eyes. Finally, the portal behind them contracted shut.
He was in.
He blew out a breath, took a cautious step forward. It was darker in here—too dark—the weak sunlight barely penetrating the forest canopy. Something rustled behind him. He spun around, but nothing was there. Then it was in front of him, although he still couldn’t see anything.
Until he realized the shadows themselves had come alive.
They blotted out the sky, slithered over the vine-covered buildings, morphed into nightmarish creatures that grew larger until they loomed over him and Luc before dissolving, only to reappear somewhere else. The worst were the faces, their eyes wide, their mouths stretched into predatory howls—or worse, smiles.
It was the Darktime amped up ten times over.
Breathe. Stay calm. Think of something good, something that makes you happy. Making love to Rosana, or playing soccer with the cubs.
Then it got worse. Magic shivered over Adric’s skin…black, cold magic.
His nape tightened. Memories pricked his skin like sharp, painful darts.
Luc hadn’t been the only one tortured to feed the night fae’s craving for negative emotions. After he and Marjani had sprung Luc, Leron had finally captured them. They’d been lucky, though. His uncle had only let the beatings and torture go on for a few days, because he still had a use for them.
Marjani, he hadn’t touched at all. No, she’d been chained to the wall, forced to watch as Adric took the beatings for them both.
When he’d deemed them sufficiently broken, he’d had them brought to him. Adric had been told he was leaving the country to fight as a mercenary for the fae, and Marjani had been ordered to whore herself to Jumar.
It was Leron Savonett’s final mistake.
Adric’s knees locked. Caught in the dark memories, he c
ouldn’t make himself continue moving forward.
Beside him, Luc seemed unaffected, probably because unlike Adric, he had permission to be here. He continued forward alone until he realized Adric was no longer following. Turning his head, he yipped a question.
“Right behind you.” Adric steeled himself to walk into the nightmarish shadows. For Rosana, he’d enter Hades itself.
Luc sniffed the air and then aimed for Langdon’s lair.
The shadows sucked at Adric, but the darkness lessened. His whole body slumped in relief.
Time to hide.
Adric removed Luc’s boots and hid them under a bush. Then he touched his quartz, drawing energy from the tiny crystals to cloak himself. But he’d have to be careful—the energy drain was tremendous. He had fifteen minutes, maybe less, before the crystals ran out of power.
Luc swung his head from side to side, nostrils flared, clearly wondering where Adric had gone. Then he must’ve picked up Adric’s scent because he gave a wolfy shrug and turned down a path of smooth white pebbles.
This time, when the darkness sucked at him, Adric twisted his fingers through Luc’s ruff, and as he’d hoped, whatever protected the wolf spread to him as well. Together, they followed the path through the trees and around the still black pond.
The entrance to Langdon’s lair was down a short flight of granite steps. Ivy spilled down either side of the tall door, a dark, polished wood with a triple moon carved into the top.
He stilled, inhaled. Lady Blaer had come this way.
And even though he couldn’t scent Rosana, she was also nearby. He knew it with the same certainty that he knew the location of each of his clan members at any given moment.
“You go first,” he told Luc in an undertone. “Distract the prince so I can get Rosana out. And Luc? If someone asks, you’ll say you never saw me. That’s an order.”
The wolf’s head swung up and down.
Adric tried the door handle. He wasn’t surprised when it moved—Langdon had little to fear in his own compound. But as the door swung open on silent hinges, uneasiness crept up his spine.
This had been too damn easy.
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