Page 29

Sasha

Sasha woke to Meadow staring down at him. She studied him with those glorious green eyes, her blonde hair curling around her shoulders. If she was worried about wearing very little clothing, she didn’t show it.

“I thought Earth plane vampires could not be awake during the daylight hours. I have read some books on the subject. Mostly by Vampire plane scholars. They enjoy studying what they like to call their less evolved cousins.”

He frowned and then smiled again because she was here and she was beautiful and he was now utterly, hopelessly addicted to her blood. Companion. She was his companion by all legal rights since he’d convinced her to drink from him as well. Ostara had explained to her host that his blood would strengthen their body. And the bond between them. “They are not wrong. While King Daniel and a class of vampires we call academics have the power to daywalk, I must use magic.”

He held up his right hand, showing off the ring. “This allows me to be in the sun, to be awake when I need to be.”

“Or I could do this.”

She placed her hand on his chest, and her eyes changed as energy pulsed through him.

Through his chest, his heart. That warm wave seemed to go straight to his cock. It filled with blood and strained against his underwear. He couldn’t help but gasp.

He’d allowed Rhys to share some energy with him when he’d known he couldn’t feed from sex energy. He’d known his wife was somewhere out there and he couldn’t force himself to betray her. Even if she hadn’t known who he was. Vampires fed from blood and sex, and he cut himself off from half his energy, so Rhys had given him just enough to survive.

This was more than survival. This was power. A tidal wave of sex energy flowing through him. Like Devinshea gave Daniel.

He wouldn’t need the ring anymore. Not as long as he had her. He could give it back to the royals and they could give it to one of their warriors. Someone who could work in the shadows and strike when no one would expect.

He groaned and tried so hard to fight back the orgasm that threatened. He had fed from Meadow the night before and given her his blood as well. She’d groaned and moaned in a way that had him panting for her. He’d felt her orgasm, but she’d been weak. She fell asleep in his arms and he carried her to bed, gently undressing her down to her light chemise. He gathered her into his arms and laid in the darkness for the longest time, simply breathing her in.

So he was horny. Super fucking horny, as his American friends would say.

And she was by all accounts a virgin.

She was smiling as she broke contact with him, her eyes back to normal. “Ossie says that should take care of you for a while. I’m afraid she might have had a relationship with a vampire in the past. She enjoyed it. She’s worried, though, because vampires can be possessive of their companions. Is that why you didn’t make love to me last night?”

He turned her way. “My darling, I didn’t make love to you because you were exhausted and running on emotion. I have to give you the choice to be with me, and that means allowing you time to make the decision.”

“So you’re not opposed to caring for both of us?”

Meadow asked the question with an air of expectancy.

Oh, he was over that. He didn’t have to think about it. Ostara had already proven herself to him. “Do you love her, Meadow?”

“Very much,”

she replied with a smile. “She came to me when I was low. I didn’t know why, couldn’t remember my dreams with the exception of how terrible they were. She saved me. There was something inside that told me I wasn’t in the right place.”

He sat up, not an easy task in the small bed. They were forced to cuddle all night and his feet hung off, and it was the best sleep he ever had. “But you were.”

“I know that now, but at the time I felt,”

she seemed to think about what word to use, “so far away. I didn’t understand it, but I was too far from you. Now I know. If I had been born near you, I would have been human.”

“If you had been born on my plane, in my timeline, you would be roughly fourteen years old,”

he pointed out, trying to ignore his insistent cock. “I would have to protect you and stay away from you for years.”

“I don’t like the sound of that,”

she replied with a frown, and her eyes were on his chest.

“You are not afraid of me?”

She shook her head. “Another good reason to have been born Fae this time around. I was raised around all manner of creature. They do not frighten me. Though now that I think about it, perhaps I need better senses when it comes to danger since I thought marrying the evil king would be a good way to save my plane.”

He had almost forgotten. “You need the marriage for your kingdom. You said something about a blight.”

“We have not had a fertility god or goddess for many, many years,”

she explained. “My people were struggling, and then Ostara was discovered. She had been trapped by men who thought to use her power. They died, but she remained in the prison. One day some curious children found the cage they held her in buried in the sand of a cave. They freed her but she was weak. She found me and I ascended. However, she was still weak. We heard word of a wizard who could funnel energy to non-corporeal beings.”

“If it’s Myrddin, he cannot. Or rather wouldn’t. He’s not known for his good deeds.”

This was what he needed so he didn’t fall on her and scare the hell out of her before she was ready. He needed to think the problems through. “You said Devinshea sought you out as his bride.”

“I believe he heard about my ascension,”

she explained. “There are several Fae planes in this timeline. I come from one that accepts both Seelie and Unseelie Fae. My plane is not directly attached to the Earth plane, as this one is. From what I understand there is one Seelie plane and one Unseelie plane both attached.”

That was how it was in his time. From what he could tell, the land remained the same. It was the people who changed given what forces sculpted them. “I know the royals traveled to several different Fae planes other than the attached ones.”

“I lived on one founded by a group of Fae who hated the wars between us and wanted to live in peace. Which we do for the most part. My mother is Unseelie and my father Seelie. So both tribes are represented by our crown. But when we lost our Green Man no one would help us. After so many years, not even the gnomes could make it work. We thought we would have to find new lands or be taken back into the sitheins here. And then Ostara brought us hope but

even inside me, she was a shadow of her former self. So we met with witches who put us together with Myrddin. He brokered the marriage between us and Devinshea, and it seemed perfect because Devinshea did not want physical relations with us. He was honest about finding his love. He wanted only her but would accept a political marriage.”

“My darling, then what did he get from the marriage?”

Marta had been somewhat na?ve. She believed the best in all people.

“Apparently he got to try to peel Ostara off me and eat her soul.”

She laughed. “Sorry. Ostara is calling me a silly girl for believing that. She says you cannot eat a soul, as your friend Shy could attest. Though she does appreciate that is a question we should have asked. We were na?ve.”

“Shy? What does she have to do with it?”

“Nothing to do with it, but your friend should be able to put the pieces together. Ostara believes she now knows what the wizard is trying to do,”

Meadow explains. “She didn’t understand why he has spells and charms to draw in deceased souls. She felt them, knew what they were, but it didn’t really register. She’s so much stronger now, and that means her memories are stronger as well. The magic from last night truly revitalized both of us.”

“He’s trying to draw in souls? To what purpose?”

His body was humming with energy.

“I don’t know, but perhaps Shy would since she is made of the energy that turns the wheel.”

He’d heard the phrase before but he didn’t understand. “I’m confused by that. I’ve known Shahidi for several years. She’s never shown powers beyond being able to talk to the dead. It’s been very useful. She’s trained hard, and she’s good at hand-to-hand combat and several weapons, but I don’t understand what you mean by turning the wheel.”

“The wheel is life,”

she explained. “Think of it like a year. You are born in the spring. You live in the summer. You die at the end of the fall and rest during winter. You make your choices during that sleeping time. It’s different for all people. Sometimes that winter is the blink of an eye because the soul knows what it wants. Sometimes the soul lingers. It watches and learns. The soul makes a choice to move forward, to stay somewhat where they are, to change forms entirely. I made that choice, Sasha. It’s why I trust what is between us. Whatever I saw when I passed into this turning, I knew being born Fae would lead me here.”

He reached for her hand, bringing it to his lips. “And I am so grateful for your choice, my love. But how would Shy turn the wheel?”

She stopped for a moment, obviously listening to the voice inside her head. “Ossie says she’s made of an ancient magic. She looks human but she is not. She says it’s been at least two thousand years since she felt the presence of that magic on any plane. You see while there are many different versions of human and Fae and other creatures, there are those whose souls are completely unique.”

This he had figured out. “Gods like Bris. Goddesses like Ostara.”

She nodded. “Yes. And, if I’m correct, beings like the wizard Myrddin. The simple fact that he can cross timelines without using the stones proves this. Shy did not need the stones. When you are ready to go home, she can get you there.”

If she was right, then he could get them all out now. But he had to be certain. “Because of this magic she has?”

“She doesn’t have the magic. She is the magic.”

Meadow frowned, an expression that did not mar her beauty in the least. “She does not know, does she? She believes she is human, which is why I sensed the small distance between her and the Green Man. She worried she would not be enough for him, but the real question is the opposite.”

“Shy has always worried her magic is too dark for Rhys, though for a long time she had a passenger. A bit like Ostara, though Harry didn’t have the same power. He lived in her soul space and he was Rhys’s grandfather.”

Meadow smiled. “Soul space. A pretty name for it and a bit true. Ossie is wondering how the magic found its way to become somewhat human. Arawn destroyed it when it became clear he would have to retreat with the Fae. It was too dangerous to keep in Annwn. He had certain symbols—you might call them objects of power. The Golden Torc, the Cloak of Invisibility, and the Cauldron of Rebirth. The cloak was given to a group of powerful beings who were creating a race of kings.”

Huh. Now he knew where Daniel had gotten it. Or rather Myrddin, since he’d been the one to give it to the king. When Daniel had gone missing, Albert had brought the cloak with the kids, and it had proven invaluable over the years. “I don’t see what this has to do with Shy.”

“You will. Patience, my love. He still has the torc. He wears it while in Annwn. But the cauldron was the most important object in all of the Fae world at the time. Though you should understand he ruled over humans, too. It was only when they pushed aside the old ways that the gods left the plane.”

“I don’t know much about Welsh folklore. What did the cauldron do?”

Sasha asked.

“What didn’t it do? It could feed armies. It could bring the dead back to life. What it mostly did was keep the wheel turning. It was life and death and regeneration. The cauldron could kill or give life or stop life altogether.”

“Yes, I can see where that would be very dangerous.”

“So dangerous if it found its way into the wrong hands,”

Meadow agreed. “So Arawn was forced to hide it. He couldn’t destroy it entirely, but he could use his magic to get it down to the tiniest piece of the original cauldron. A bit of light and magic and he stood on Snowdonia and flung it out across land and sea and air. He made sure it was so far away no one in its new land would recognize it.”

A chill prickled along his spine. “Magic like that, it grows. It changes if allowed to.”

She nodded solemnly. “Yes, and in this case, it likely morphed into something like the building blocks of a human, waiting for the right ingredients to become magical again.”

His stomach threatened to turn. “You are telling me Shy has the power of the Cauldron of Regeneration in her genes?”

“No. I am telling you that Shy is the cauldron reborn, and I worry Myrddin will use her if he can. Ossie believes the wizard is planning to use the souls he’s trapped in the mountain to some terrible purpose. If he filters them through the right spell, he could gain incredible energy.”

“Enough to, say, close the gates between planes?”

She nodded.

Sasha stood. The reunion would have to wait. “We need to stop them from leaving. They could be walking into a trap.”

He raced to get dressed and hoped they would make it in time.