She’d seen Quinn only in rare situations since that initial brief affair, and every time they’d been adversaries. There was no way he’d help her locate the Alterants, especially Evalle, whom Quinn watched over like a younger sister.
Kizira shook her head. “That Belador will not help me capture the female Alterant Evalle.”
“He will once I tell you how to persuade him.”
“What if I can’t persuade him?” She wouldn’t put Quinn at risk, no matter what. But if she didn’t play this out with Cathbad he’d know he could use Quinn against her.
“Then you risk Flaevynn learnin’ the truth behind this man.”
She stared silently. He could not knoweverything.
He nodded and answered, “Oh, but I do know everything. I know you care for him, which is why you will do as I compel you if you wish him to live.”
Welcome to life as the lowest pawn in a deadly game.
EIGHT
Evalle stumbled forward, tripping over a bulging root covered in ferns. Her vision cleared from teleporting. But not the urge to upchuck the pizza she’d eaten.
She held her forehead for a few seconds until the nausea passed, then she turned slowly to assess her surroundings.
It looked like she’d been dropped in a jungle that smelled of damp earth and decaying vegetation constantly composting. Water drizzled over her face and streaked her sunglasses.
If not for her unusual optics, she’d have been blind in this almost-total darkness. That meant her twenty-minute visit to the Nether Realm hadn’t lasted five hours in the mortal world this time, or she’d have been facing sunshine.
But how long would a day or “more than a day” in the Nether Realm translate into human time?
Or had Loki meant one day in the human world?
Who knew, but she had to get back to Atlanta—with three escaped Alterants in tow—and help stop an Alterant massacre.
At least she could offer the three Alterants she took back a chance at real freedom.
She used a finger to squeegee water off her forehead.
Warm water soaked her shirt. Glancing up, she couldn’t even make out cloud cover through the thick canopy of hardwood trees and tropical palms. Hidden somewhere up there were critters that chirped, screeched and chattered.
So this was where Tristan lived,ifshe’d landed in his spellbound prison. When she’d first met him in Atlanta, he’d said his cage was in a South American jungle, but not the specific location.
And that had been when they’d been on speaking terms, before she’d used the Ngak Stone to return him to captivity.
A tingling warmed the skin on her chest. She looked down.
The amulet still dangled from her neck.
Thank the goddess she hadn’t lost it. She always worried about losing some part of her clothing or her sunglasses in transit, but she instinctively put a hand on her glasses to hold them when she teleported. If the leather thong holding the amulet had come loose while teleporting, would the necklace have landed at her feet or ended up in another part of the world?
She didn’t know. Now the thing was heating up even more.
Just like it had before she’d been ambushed in Atlanta.
The jungle stilled. Not a chirp to be heard.
She didn’t have to be hit over the head to figure out this silver disk was acting like some kind of warning device, but why? Nicole’s spell on the amulet was long gone. Opening her senses wider, Evalle tried to determine if the danger approaching was of this world or preternatural.
No energy touched hers.
That ruled out preternatural.
