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Ivanna’s vision returned, along with her ability to think and plan. They thought she was dead, so she didn’t move as she assessed the situation. She and her team were surrounded by hundreds of enemies. The scent of blood was heavy in the air, and she knew that some of her companions were dead. She could see Krish’s broken body, and from the amount of lynx blood she could smell, Deniz hadn’t survived.
She hoped Dakota and Valter had escaped, but the chances were slim. She heard Niletean fighting, and when she regained enough health to touch the magic, she tried to change again, hoping to snatch him and get the hell out of there.
Before her body could shift, another loud crack split the air, and agony exploded in her head again.
“What the fuck?” the voice from before asked, his tone filled with wonder and curiosity. “Why isn’t she dead?”
Ivanna screamed when he fired another shot into her head. She was now blind, but agony still washed through every cell in her body. Something cold touched the side of her face.
“I don’t know how you’re still alive, little dragon, but I find you fascinating. You’ll fetch a pretty price, I imagine. Clean her up and take her to the cages.”
Someone picked Ivanna up, and everything faded to black.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
New Therian Palace, Monday, January 7, 2013
After a long but productive day, Luca was alone in his chambers. He’d called Ash and been thrilled to discover that Eiko had completed the spell to withstand the sun.
She and Dani were bonding with the panthers but would be setting off soon. She’d asked for time to forge her own path and provide evidence that every race had good and bad people. As much as it pained him, he had to let her see this through.
He thought about humanity’s ingenuity in confronting a world without magic. He recalled moving to the United States to live among humans and the first close friend he’d made at the college. Dr. Jeremy Mills had learned about Therians from his father, who’d learned about them from his father, who had helped Queen Kittania find a valuable historical artifact she’d sought in the nineteen-twenties.
For reasons neither disclosed to Luca, she’d revealed her Therian nature, and the Mills men had kept that secret, passing along the knowledge only on their deathbeds. Jeremy’s father answered the call in the fifties when Luca needed a place to go.
Though he’d known the man for most of his life and had watched Jeremy change from an exuberant child to a well-respected geologist, Luca had last seen his friend five years ago at an annual convention. The tall black man was in his sixties, with salt and pepper hair and intelligent brown eyes that seemed to see everything through the glasses he always wore.
Luca chuckled. When they’d taught at the same college in the seventies, he’d learned that Jeremy’s glasses were only required for reading. He wore them all the time because he was usually reading. The other man had often aimed an inquisitive glance at Luca over the wire rims as they ate lunch or talked in the staff room.
Calculating the time difference, it was late afternoon in America. Thinking that it would be nice to hear from his old friend, Luca dialed the number. It rang twice before he answered.
“Hello?”
“Jeremy, it’s Luca. I was sitting here reminiscing about our days at the college and thought I’d call to see how you were. It’s good to hear your voice.”
“Luca! It’s been ages. How the hell have you been?”
He was grateful that he didn’t have to explain the hidden world. Jeremy was a trusted friend, and Luca felt like an idiot for not reaching out to him sooner. “It’s been a rough few months. I found my soulmate in a human woman. Nikoli went insane and slaughtered all of my siblings except Viktorija, plus hundreds of others.
“Nadya captured me, and my mate became a vampire to free me from her clutches. I had to make a temporary truce with the vampire queen to take Nikoli down. Now, I can’t be with the woman I love because, as the king, I have to put my people first. They aren’t ready to accept her yet.”
“I… Well, you know… Damn, Luca. That’s a lot to absorb all at once. I don’t know where to start.”
“Mostly what I need is a distraction. We can talk about me later. What’s been going on in your life?”
Jeremy coughed. “Well, I’m currently writing an article about the anomalous effects after an earthquake on the ocean floor off the coast of Chile. There are all sorts of strange readings in the area. The data doesn’t make sense. I ran the tests myself, and there are no fault lines to cause a seismic event of that magnitude mentioned in the available research. That alone is curious, but the sonar data indicates a created structure down there. Hundreds of miles from the coast.”
Luca grinned. Jeremy had a tendency to go on in detail about geological matters unless he was stopped, and the man’s obvious passion was an excellent distraction from his feelings. “I’ll bet you have those glasses perched on the tip of your nose, as usual.”
“You know it.” The other man laughed. “You never know when you might find a book.”
He laughed again. “How have you been, Jeremy?”
His tone changed. “Since Lucy died, I’ve been lonely. You’ll never believe what happened.”
“I’ll bite. You met someone new?”
Jeremy laughed. “I met someone new, all right, but not the way you’re thinking. You know there could never be anyone for me after Lucy. I’m an old man, anyway.”
