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They both sensed the attack before the movement. The thing sprang out from behind the rocks, fangs bared. Cian merely pivoted, led with his shoulder and sent it tumbling down to the road. For the second, he used the stake he’d hitched in his belt.
Then he straightened, turned to the third, who appeared more cautious than his fellows.
“Tell your mistress Cian McKenna wants to speak with her.”
Vicious teeth gleamed in the moonlight. “We’ll drink your blood tonight.”
“Or you’ll die hungry, and by Lilith’s hands because you failed to deliver a message.”
The thing melted away, and down.
“There may be more waiting above,” Hoyt commented.
“Unlikely. She’d be expecting us to charge the caves, not head to high ground for a hostage negotiation. She’ll be intrigued, and she’ll come.”
So they climbed, then walked the slope to higher ground, and the point where Hoyt had once faced Lilith, and the thing she’d made of his brother.
“She’ll appreciate the irony of the spot.”
“It feels as it did.” Hoyt tucked his cross out of sight under his shirt. “The air. The night. This was my place once, where I could stand and call power with a thought.”
“You’d best hope you still can.” Cian drew his knife. “Get on your knees.” He flicked the point at Hoyt’s throat, watched the dribble of blood from the thin slice. “Now.”
“So, it comes to choices.”
“It always comes to choices. You would have killed me here, if you could.”
“I would have saved you here, if I could.”
“Well, you did neither, did you?” He slid the knife from Hoyt’s sheath, made a V with the blades to hold at his brother’s throat. “Kneel.”
With the cold edge of the blades on his flesh, Hoyt got to his knees.
“Well, what a handsome sight.”
Lilith stepped into the moonlight. She wore emerald green robes with her hair long and loose to spill over her shoulders like sunbeams.
“Lilith. It’s been a very long time.”
“Too long.” The silk rustled as she moved. “Did you come all this way to bring me a gift?”
“A trade,” Cian corrected. “Call your dogs off,” he said quietly. “Or I kill him, then them. And you have nothing.”
“So forceful.” She gestured with her hand toward the vampires creeping in at the sides. “You’ve seasoned. You were hardly more than a pretty puppy when I gave you the gift. Now look at you, a sleek wolf. I like it.”
“And still your dog,” Hoyt spat out.
“Ah, the mighty sorcerer brought low. I like that, too. You marked me.” She opened her robes to show Hoyt the pentagram branded over her heart. “It gave me pain for more than a decade. And the scar never fades. I owe you for that. Tell me, Cian, how did you manage to bring him here?”
“He thinks I’m his brother. It makes it easy.”
“She took your life. She’s lies and death.”
Over Hoyt’s head, Cian smiled. “That’s what I love about her. I’ll give you this one for the human you took. He’s useful to me, and loyal. I want him back.”
“But he’s so much bigger than this one. So much more to feast on.”
“He has no power. He’s an ordinary mortal. I give you a sorcerer.”
