AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Lokene grabbed my neck with his free hand, holding just beneath my jaw. Tilting my chin back, he straightened my neck so his blood ran smoothly down to my stomach.
Dropping the barrier that had blocked them from my mind, I let Lokene and Bion back into my mind. I’d failed them all. I looked into his eyes, having much to say but knowing there wasn’t enough time left to say it. Tears burned my eyes, trickling down my cheeks.
“Stop. Stop that right now.” Lokene’s voice shook. “You are not a failure. I’ve never seen anything like what I witnessed today. Soyale, you took down six Ancients as though they were nothing more than puny humans. No one has ever done that. If we’d just trusted you last night, we would have been here to—”
To do what?My words were a gentle caress in his mind.You cannot raise a hand against your people. This is the way it had to be.
“No, it doesn’t have to be this way! Drink, Soyale! Drink every last drop if you need it,” Lokene begged.
Already sweat dotted his brow, and his pupils were so wide his irises were barely visible. My venom was affecting him, and it terrified me more than my impending death.
“I don’t care what happens to me,” Lokene whispered, a single tear dripping down his cheek. “If you die, then I die with you.”
The rush of his blood slowed, although thanks to my venom, his heart was pounding harder. I could not risk taking any more, even though I could still feel my blood leaking out of the open wound in my stomach.
Jerking my jaw from his grip, I clamped my mouth shut, refusing to allow him to give me more blood.
“Stop this and drink!” he cried, trying to open my mouth, but I refused.
Bion spoke up for the first time. “Lokene? Can we get her to Earth? Maybe if she gets blood from the rest of her mates?”
“She wouldn’t survive blinking between worlds,” Lokene said in a choked whisper. “Please Soyale, take my blood. All of it.” His eyes begged me to take more of his blood, but I would not allow him to die with me.
I love you, mate.
“Don’t you dare, Zosime! You’re a warrior, and this is just one more battle you have to fight!” Lokene yelled in desperation. “Don’t you dare leave me!”
I wanted to fight, but I was so tired. My nerves had finally fried from the overload of pain, and now I felt warm nothingness. It was odd, but the sweet fragrant scent of honeysuckle tickled my nose. I’d always loved that scent.
“So that’s it. You’re tired, so you’re giving up?” Bion’s cold words shocked me.
If I could have chuckled, I would have. I was dying, and he was mad?
“Yeah. You bet I’m mad. I watched how you handled those arrogant jerks on Earth and here on Iolatara. Then I watched you systematically take down one Ancient after another, and not just any Ancients. Oh no, these were ‘boss level’ Ancients.” Bion’s face was turning red as he laid out his grievances.
It was a weird way to send someone into the afterlife, but Ancients had proven to be a strange species.
“Leave her alone! If the Ancients hadn’t pulled her into this mess, she might have had a chance at a normal life,” Lokene growled, and the muscles of his thighs flexed beneath my body. The warmth of his skin had me nodding away.
Tired. So very tired.
“Zosime wasn’t born to be normal, and we both know it. She was a warrior among warriors. Atlantis’ adored champion. She’s done the impossible over and over. Yet now she is tired and, rather than fighting, she decides to give up.” Bion’s chest heaved with anger as he spoke, and it was a stark contrast to his eyes, which were filled with pain that I didn’t understand. “Some warrior.”
How dare he talk to me that way? I’d given my life, more than once, to serve Atlantis and the Ancients. But instead of sweet goodbyes, I had to listen to Bion ridicule me? If I could move without worrying that my insides would fall out, he’d be sorry.
“Lily was quite taken with your Storm,” Bion added, and my scales flickered a pale turquoise as my temper flared.
My siren shoved forward in my mind, and taking advantage of my being too weak to control the siren’s nature, she took full control. My form rippled, legs disappearing as my tail formed.
The rush of magik left me feeling woozy, but the siren wasn’t anywhere close to being finished. If we were dying, she was going to go out with a bang.
I just didn’t realize she planned to be so very literal about it.
Shifting forms caused the nerve endings in my body to flare to life again in a blaze of fiery, explosive pain. That agony, combined with the adrenaline from the fight and my anger at Bion’s taunting comments was just too much. I screamed as excruciating pain flooded me.
I’d been getting better control of my emotions and learning how to blend in with modern humans, but that didn’t change the fact that in my soul was the wildness of the earth, the raw power of violent storms, and the all-consuming hunger of the sea. There was no reigning in the feral monster inside me… the siren who was currently in control.
My pupils narrowed to thin slits, and I smirked at the apprehension flitting across Bion’s features. He’d insulted the beauty, and now he’d deal with the beast.
