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“I didn’t think of you either until we reunited in the Yukon in this time. It was as if you never existed. As for Tristan, I thought we left him and Morgan behind in the past. I hope they fared well.”
“Actually,” Annie said, “Tristan, if we’re thinking of the same person, is well and alive in New York City!”
They all turned to gape at her.
Hurriedly, she went on, “I don’t know him well; Benji knows him better. But I’ve run into him a time or two at the Pure Ones’ base, the Shield, when I visited. Hemustbe the same person you’re looking for. I seem to recall that he used to be a medieval knight in his past life.”
“Past life…” Arthur murmured, mind boggled.
“He was a human reborn as a Pure One when he died a heroic death,” Annie explained. “I don’t know all the specifics, but I do know that he is Mated to another Pure One named Ayelet, and they have a beautiful daughter named Isolde.”
We shall take you to him, then,Sai said.
As he spoke, the river churned around them, spinning into a liquid portal right before their eyes.
And when Sai and Rui sailed through in their dragon forms, all of them arrived on the other side in human form, dressed appropriately for the time and place, in the middle of Manhattan with the first rays of dawn glinting off the towering skyscrapers that surrounded them on all sides.
“This is it,” Annie said, looking up.
Way up.
“This building contains the Shield. If your portal took us here, Sai, it must mean that Tristan is currently in town.”
She turned to Arthur, quirking her lips.
“Ready to see your old friend?”
This was unbelievably surreal, Arthur thought. The universe—Fate—worked in mysterious ways. He wouldn’t question it. He’d simply take it by the horns.
“Ready,” he confirmed.
He was more than ready to go after what was his.
~ * ~* ~ *~ * ~* ~ *~ * ~
Annie wished Ben was here with her so she wouldn’t have to spring a surprise visit on the Pure Ones—she wasn’t exactlyBFFs with them, given that her adopted father Eli was Ramses’, the King of the Dark Ones and the mortal frenemy of the Pure Ones, reluctant general.
Honestly, she didn’t know what role, exactly, Eli played in Ramses’ Chosen guard. He wasn’t officially one of them, but Ramses trusted him implicitly, and the other warriors of the Dark King’s inner circle deferred to Eli’s command.
The point was, even though Annie herself was best friends with Ben, who was in turn, the Pure Ones’ favorite human, she didn’t necessarily have these immortals on speed dial.
She didn’t know the Pure Queen, Sophia’s, inner circle very well, though she knew enough. As she led her group into the secret entrance of the skyscraper from its bowels, since the main entrance above ground was locked due to the early hour, she hoped they would be well received.
It helped that not a single one amongst them was a “vampire” (though Eli would glare at her for making such a reference, even in her head). Just because Dark Ones had fangs, got sleepy in daytime, and drank blood to absorb power didn’t mean they were “vampires” the way modern humans portrayed them.
The truce between the Pure and Dark Ones was tenuous at best, and not all factions of the expansive Dark empire fell in line behind Ramses’ edicts on peaceful coexistence.
In fact, only Jade Cicada, who ruled the second largest hive after Ramses, shared his views on peace and equality, whereas eons ago, Pure Ones were enslaved by Dark Ones, along with all of the other immortals, and supplied their most coveted food—Pure blood. Given Jade was Mated to the Pure Ones’ Consul, Seth Tremaine, it made sense she was more positively inclined toward his Kind.
A little-known fact was that Jade was once a Pure One herself. But by all appearances, she clearly enjoyed her Dark incarnation infinitely more.
Ramses himself shared a similar bond, Mated to the Pure Ones’ Seer and Scribe, Eveline Marceau. Eveline, Grace, Ava, and Annie’s adopted mother, Clara, were very close. As such, Annie heard a lot about the Pure Ones second hand from Eveline, as well as from Ben.
“So, uh, I think there’s a hidden button we’re supposed to push,” Annie said as they all squeezed into one of the limited access elevators below ground.
“You don’t recall where it is located?” Rui asked. “There are only steel walls. I see no buttons.”
“Well…I don’t exactly come here very often,” Annie winced. “And I always come with Ben.”
