Damon. What had become of him? Was he here with her, bound as she was, but still unconscious? She couldn’t believe it had happened so quickly. She could only pray to Danu that he was still alive and try like hell to get out of here. Wherever here was.

  “I know you’re awake, Meru. Don’t be a coward.” His voice harsher now that he hadn’t immediately gotten his way, Thorne slapped her across the face.

  Her eyes came open with a snap as she turned her head toward him, the angry handprint on her cheek no match for the ire in her eyes.

  “Let me out of these cuffs, Allen. Then we’ll see who the coward is.” Thorne laughed in delight and clapped his hands mockingly.

  “So brave.” He sneered condescendingly. “Or do you think someone will save you before I take you at your word?”

  She turned away from him without answering to study her prison. It was a giant bedroom of some sort, but it looked strange, as if the rules of gravity didn’t apply.

  Pictures moved, chairs floated and even the bed seemed to alter its shape and size as she watched. And Damon was nowhere to be found.

  The décor, an odd mixture of gaudy depravity and overindulgence, nearly made her queasy. Garish blood red fabric draped everything and oddly shaped mirrors hung on every available wall, giving the room the dizzying disturbed feel of a fun house at a carnival.

  “Is this where you live? No wonder you never invited me over. Did you decorate in early narcissist or late seventies gigolo? I must say it’s very you.” She knew she shouldn’t antagonize him, that she should be lulling him into a false sense of security and finding out where they’d taken Damon. But she couldn’t seem to stop the angry vitriol that was coming out of her mouth. Her family put in danger, The Willow’s Knot destroyed, their future uncertain…it was enough to make her snap.

  Thorne’s creepy eyes narrowed, his scales seeming to stand on end in annoyance.

  “I’d expected weeping and pleading. Three months I spent with a pathetic chit who showed no fire, no spark. The closest you came to passion was when you were discussing your beloved theories.”

  He gripped her chin, forcing her to face him. “I feel a little cheated, my love. Robbed somehow for the time I had to spend wooing you, placating you, with nothing to show for it. And now I can sense that Lycan on you. Months of effort and you let that hot-blooded, uncivilized mutt rut on you like a bitch in heat. That doesn’t exactly endear you to me, so you should be careful what you say, darling. Your fate is, after all, in my hands.”

  She laughed harshly. “Better a wolf than a cold-blooded reptile. You were a smooth operator, Allen, but a lousy boyfriend, a terrible kisser and a bad student. I’m actually relieved it was all an act. There is simply no way that you’re the mastermind behind this little coup.”

  Thorne had raised his hand to strike her once more, looking angrier than she could recall seeing him, when a voice off to the side made him pause.

  “I told you that you could play with her later, Thorny.” The soft, sweet, singsong voice sent a chill through her trapped limbs. She strained her neck to look around Allen, seeking out the owner. What she saw confounded her.

  The most beautiful woman she had ever set eyes on, apart from Danu, walked slowly toward her. Her body was grace in motion. Willowy and slender as a reed, she glided and swayed toward Meru as if she were underwater, every movement entrancing.

  Her skin was the same shimmering olive as Damon’s, as Myrddin’s. Her hair dangled down her back in a thousand tiny, ebony braids, each one twined with thin strands of gold.

  And around her head, the same nimbus of light that crowned Myrddin’s like a halo. Must be an Archon thing, Meru decided with a nervous shiver.

  The woman’s dress was Grecian-style, the material the same blood-red velvet that covered the room. It was her face, however, that really drew and held Meru’s attention.

  It was the face of an innocent goddess, of an entrancing, sensual, utterly fragile female. The personification of forbidden temptation. Only her wide, slanted eyes, clouded silver and glowing with psychotic excitement, kept Meru’s guard up against her.

  Thorne bowed toward the woman, sliding one last, leering grin toward Meru as he went to stand by the curtain that hid the entranceway.

  As the woman stood before her, Meru felt her wolf’s torc warm around her neck. She’d almost forgotten it was there. A sudden, familiar breeze that smelled of spring and sweet lavender surrounded her for a heartbeat…and she knew.

  “You’re Nimue.”

  Nimue frowned petulantly. “And you’re too smart for your own good.” She glanced toward Thorne before smirking over to where Meru hung from the wall.

  “Well, except in matters of the heart. First you fell for my sneaky little Sauros and then you give yourself to that cursed Fianna, that devil’s spawn of Lycaon.” Her eyes softened as if lost in thought. “But then, we women are always victims of our tender hearts.”

  Meru tried to stop her voice from shaking as she asked the question that had been screaming through her mind since she’d regained consciousness. “Where is Damon?”

  Nimue giggled and clapped her hands together like a little child. “Oh Thorny, look how she trembles! The worry and terror in her voice when she mentions his name. She must really love him. Unrequited love.” She sighed. “How incredibly sad.”

  She flinched and Nimue saw the sign of weakness, thrusting the dagger in. “You didn’t really think he loved you, did you? A Lycan mates with the woman he loves, bites her and shares himself completely. It’s obvious he slept with you. But it would take a lot more woman than we both know you are to satisfy a powerful being like that.”

  Meru tried to ignore her words, but insecurity rose to the surface. Damon had held himself back from biting her on several occasions. She thought it was because he didn’t want to hurt her but, what if there was another reason?

  What if he simply didn’t want to be stuck with her as his mate? Just because she was in love with him didn’t mean he returned her feelings. Unfortunately, that possibility didn’t lessen them either.

  “What have you done with him?” Her voice was firm, despite the heart that felt like it was breaking inside her.

  Nimue placed a slender palm to her chest in innocence. “I haven’t done anything to him. I was a little disturbed when my,” she glared pointedly at Thorne, “servants couldn’t get him away from you.” She shrugged, smiling as she continued. “Luckily, I had already seen that problem coming and made an alliance that I knew would benefit my plans.”

  “What alliance?”

  Nimue spun before one of the wall-to-wall mirrors, watching her dress swirl around her legs, her braids fly through the air as she danced. “The smartest one yet. It would be very hard, even for me, to get that particular goody-two-shoes out of the way. He’s too well connected. So I simply asked myself how one would go about killing a Lycan. And the answer appeared as if someone had whispered in my ear.”

  She turned toward the white-faced Meru and grinned in mischievous insanity.

  “If you want to kill one Lycan…you simply need another one. Or two.

  * * * * *

  Damon was in agony. His blood was burning like acid beneath his flesh from whatever they’d injected him with. Body racked with unimaginable pain. He was on his knees on a floor of hard, damp concrete. A heavy metal slab across his shoulders, his wrists chained tightly to the ends.

  He couldn’t move. The chains must have been forged from Hephaestus silver, an Archon metal. Myrddin had once told him that it was the only thing in any dimension that could hold a Lycan.

  His sense of smell, however, was still working fine. He knew Theron and Kyros were nearby, gloating quietly in the shadows of what looked like an old warehouse.

  He had no idea where he was, how they’d gotten a hold of these chains or the transport devices. His only conclusion was that they had been procured from the same mysterious source that had aided the Sauros. And the transport devices explained how he hadn’t caught their scent at the museum until they were upon him. But what had they given him?

  He inwardly railed at himself. How could he have been caught so off guard? And what of Meru? What had happened to his mate? Had the other Fianna taken her to safety? Was she even now returned to Myrddin’s fortress of a house, wondering where he was? He prayed with all that he was that that was the case. He needed to get back to her to see for himself that she was safe. It was time to end this.

  “Honorable as ever, my brothers? Still needing the help of others to best the bastard slave, I see.”

  He heard the roar of rage before he saw Theron, partially changed and barreling toward him. Kyros dragged behind as he attempted to hold him back.

  “Patience, brother! We’ll get no satisfaction from granting him such an easy death.” The words of Kyros seemed to calm the furious Theron, stopping his clawed hand before he could strike.

  His fangs retracting as he continued to stare, unblinking, at Damon, Theron grimaced. “I suppose you’re right, Kyros. Though I find myself eager to bathe in the blood of this murderer, vengeance will be all the sweeter for his suffering.”

  His face an unreadable mask, Damon looked upon the duo that had made the years of his youth so hellish. Time had not been kind to them.

  Regardless of the Lycan healing abilities and infinite lifespan, their faces were haggard and gaunt, their bodies riddled with scars. For a Lycan, those could only have been caused by Archon Magick. What had those two gotten themselves into?

  How had they survived all these years? It was obvious that they hadn’t changed much, despite appearances. Their expressions were still too smugly superior, their eyes still as drenched in malice. It was a miracle someone hadn’t killed them long ago.

  “Whose panting lapdog have you become, Theron, to have gotten your hands on Hephaestus silver?” Damon wanted to rile him, wanted to force his hand. He wanted to distract his half brother while he rid himself of his shackles.

  He owed Myrddin yet another debt, he smiled inwardly, recalling that when the old man had told him of his only weakness, he’d also showed him how to overcome it. He would bet his brothers knew nothing of any Magicks beyond their Lycan abilities. He would use their ignorance to his advantage.

  Though Theron tensed, his voice was still calm as he responded. “We have friends just as powerful as yours, little bastard. More powerful. And we all agree on one thing. Every one of us wants to see you dead. You and your little whore.”

  Damon growled, unable to help himself, and Theron knew he’d hit his mark. “That Sauros Thorne mentioned something about a little payback before he flashed in to grab her. Something about her not being able to hold out for long, isn’t that right, Kyros?”

  Kyros chuckled, “That’s what he said, brother.”

  Two shocked cries resounded through the dank prison as Damon, free of his chains and enraged, threw the large metal bar toward them as he rose to tower angrily above them.

  The pain in his body pushed aside, Damon’s anger gave him strength as he allowed his Lycan gifts to come to the fore. His body expanded, ripping through his grime-covered clothing. Thick claws burst forth from his hands, gleaming sharply in the dim light.

  He smiled through the sting of his fangs bursting past his gums as he stalked closer to his cowering brothers. Kyros looked at him, his eyes crazed with fear as he shouted, “You killed our father! Our King! You don’t deserve to live, don’t deserve to be Lycan!”

  Damon suddenly felt a little sorry for the pathetic man. “He killed my mother. An innocent babe. Thousands of men, women and children in his pointless quest for power. But you’re right, none of us deserved to be cursed. No one deserved to be punished but our father, the King.”

  A growling snarl behind him was all the warning he got before he rolled, diving out of the way as Theron took a swipe at his head, claws extended. He’d somehow snuck around him and fully changed while Damon was distracted by Kyros.

  He backed up, circling warily as he watched Kyros morph to match his brother, two fully shifted Lycans attempting to trap him between. They were an image out of his long faded nightmares, the beasts he had run so long and far from, as he had from the one within himself.

  Covered in a fur lighter than his own, matted and unhealthy, they still looked deadly. Their faces had formed into elongated muzzles, eyes inhumanly bright. They stood on two legs, giant drooling beasts still easily recognizable to Damon.

  Theron dove for him, his full Lycan strength sending Damon crashing to the floor beneath him. He flipped Theron over onto his back and hopped up before leaning into a strong legged back kick, knocking the charging Kyros in the jaw with a well placed boot.

  Kyros released an animal scream, catching Damon’s thigh with his dirt-encrusted claws while falling backward from the blow. Theron, scenting the blood in the air, jumped up and ran once more toward a whirling Damon.

  They circled around him, fangs bared, dagger-tipped paws extended toward him warily. Damon allowed them closer, smiling with dark intent. “I haven’t got time to play this childhood game with you, Theron. Tell me where they’ve taken my mate.”

  Theron spoke in the garbled, rumbling tone of the full Lycan, his sneer apparent even around the fangs. “Somewhere you’ll never find her, you bastard son of a slave whore. Somewhere to die.”

  Sensing Kyros behind him, he allowed himself to be nearly sandwiched between the two brothers before he spoke again. “You’re a weakling and a coward, Theron. You don’t have the strength to kill me as you think I deserve. To kill me as I killed our father. As I’d kill him again.”

  Just as Damon knew he would, Theron responded with a ferocious howl of pain and rage. He charged toward Damon, his arm plowing forward, his hand an open claw to tear out his heart.

  Fast as lightning, Damon leapt high in the air, flipping out of the way in time to hear the cry of pain that came from Kyros. He turned to see the two brothers, whose only loyalty had ever been to the other, staring into each other’s eyes in stunned horror. Theron’s fur-covered arm had been launched into Kyros’ chest nearly elbow deep, his hand clutching the torn, but still beating heart. Though a Lycan couldn’t be killed unless his heart was crushed and his head ripped completely off, Kyros was no doubt wishing he could die to stop the pain.

  “I will kill him for you, brother.” He heard Theron whisper before ripping his arm out of a squealing Kyros and launching himself at Damon with impossible speed. His eyes were red with bloodlust, his fangs dripping in his gaping jaw.

  Damon felt the blood flooding down his leg, his body still weakened by whatever poison they had injected him with. He wasn’t able to sidestep swiftly enough to avoid the move from Theron as he landed, pinning him to the ground with his angry weight.

  He bucked off the larger Lycan but he knew his only hope of winning at this point was to fully change. Though he still hesitated, it was the only way. In that form, just as in his human one, he would be bigger and stronger than the crazed Theron. Before he had a chance, however, Theron’s revenge was interrupted.

  “Well, this is a surprise. Damon Arkadios, you are just too stubborn for your own good.” Theron was tossed by some invisible force and thrown back to land beside his mewling brother.

  Damon rolled up as quickly as he could, turning his head to catch the gaze of the smiling stranger.

  A tall, well-muscled man who looked to be in his early thirties, with long, golden-brown hair that swung freely to his waist and a jagged silver scar across his left cheek. His arms were casually crossed as he shook his head chidingly. By his scent alone, Damon could tell he was Archon. But who?

  “You could have ended this fight an hour ago if you’d fully shifted.”

  Damon raised his brow at the lecturing tone. “And you are…?”

  The man threw back his head, his hair flying as he laughed aloud. He held his hands out at his sides, drawing Damon’s attention to the strange, almost iridescent material of his dark outfit; the mandarin collar and loophole buttons on top reminding Damon of Raj’s usual style of dress.

  “Don’t you recognize me?” He looked over at the two huddled masses in the corner, his eyes glinting with sudden menace. “Don’t any of you recognize me?”

  Seeing the confusion on Damon’s face, he relented. “I’ve been watching you for so long that I forgot I was only a babe when last we met.” Eyes, shining golden like his father’s, twinkled. “I am Nyctimus, son of Zeus.”

  Damon stood, stunned, as he heard his brothers whimpering in renewed terror. Their bruised and battered bodies were human once more, attempting to crawl from the room. Nyctimus ignored them, focusing on Damon.

  “Being half Archon is an amazing thing. They’re fairly advanced. All that’s left of my…cutting experience is this.” He pointed to the single scar on his otherwise whole and perfect frame.

  “You saved me, Damon. When you warned my father what Lycaon had planned.” Theron’s head looked up sharply as the man continued.

  “And for your boon, what did he do? Went off half-cocked, putting the entire town under his bloody ridiculous curse, you included.” Nyctimus sounded disgusted with his father’s actions.

  “Since it couldn’t be undone, I watched and waited for a chance to repay you. And today is the day.” His golden eyes gleamed as he rubbed his hands together in anticipation. “Now let’s finish these two and take you to your woman.”

  Damon jerked his head up at these words. “You know where Meru is?” The other man nodded.

  Damon looked over at Theron and Kyros. Saw through eyes that had seen countless ages come and go. Saw them for the pitiful creatures they had, after all, always been.

  “Leave them. Take me to my mate.”

  Nyctimus looked at the man he had secretly considered his brother, in wonder. Born a slave, tortured without end and then given immortality under a demonic curse, Damon had cause to be bitter and vengeful.

 

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