by Kali Argent
“We have to find the connection.” Tira nodded, suddenly more alert. “I understand.” She stared intently at the projection screen. “There’s no information on the last female. No medical reports. Nothing about a male.”
“I think we agree that just because the family didn’t know about a male doesn’t mean there wasn’t one.” Leaning back on the sofa, Elder Blue propped his feet up on the coffee table and examined his fingernails. “I swear everyone is getting laid except for me.”
Tira gaped, and Kai choked, but Ivy and Sion both threw their heads back and laughed until neither of them could breathe. Damn, Sion liked that guy.
“Let’s figure this shit out and then we’ll see what we can do about that.”
Elder Blue spared him a passing glance. “You’re not my type.”
It was Sion’s turned to choke and sputter while everyone else laughed. “Okay, can we get back on track?”
It took a few minutes for everyone to regain their composure and start digging through files again. An hour later, they still hadn’t found anything on the missing female from the Northern Isle that would indicate she’d been pregnant or even romantically involved at the time of her disappearance.
Through wide yawns, Ivy finally admitted defeat, but promised her aid again come morning. Unwilling to leave her for even a moment, Kai also bid them goodnight in favor of retiring with his mate for the evening. Sion couldn’t blame him. He’d much rather be in a warm bed with Rya than trying to figure out who had kidnapped a bunch of females and why.
Several times during the evening, Lorcan and other attendants brought water, sandwiches, pastries, and even wine. They worked through the night, searching, discussing, and generally getting nowhere. By the time the sky outside the library windows began to lighten, Sion was past frustrated and angling toward desperate.
“Okay, let’s just assume that they’re all carrying little Xenon babies. What does it mean? Why would someone be kidnapping pregnant females?”
Tira and the elder looked at each other with a combination of anxiety and disgust, but neither of them spoke.
“Do you want to share with the class?”
He could fill the library with everything he didn’t know about magic, but common sense dictated that if this had to do with the mystical and mysterious, someone was cooking up something damn nasty.
“It’s the blackest kind of magic,” Tira murmured. “It’s unthinkable.”
“Damn it, Tira, tell me.”
Elder Blue rose from his seat and shuffled over to the projection screen to point at the picture of Wyn Nightstar. “It was believed that Sentry Nightstar acted in response to a type of influential magic.”
Sion nodded. “I remember.” Kai had said that type of magic required a blood sacrifice. “You think someone is planning some kind of spell to influence...who? The remaining elders? Kai?”
“The planet.” Elder Blue’s pressed his lips together in a thin line, and he looked a little green around the edges. “A baby’s energy is pure, untainted. It would be like harnessing a lightning bolt.”
“It’s about the babies, not the females.” Sickened by the revelation, Sion couldn’t speak for a moment. “To influence the entire planet?”
“I can’t say for sure, but a Five Point Spell would be powerful enough.”
Five points. Five islands. It wasn’t hard to make the leap.
“Whoever’s doing this needs two more females, one from Sommervail and one from the Eastern Isle.” Happier than ever that he’d come to his senses and sent Rya off-planet, Sion also reasoned that if their villain didn’t have all five females, that gave him and Tira more time to find a way to stop the spell from happening.
“Yes, but we can’t be certain if that’s what this is. It could be something else entirely.” The captain spoke without conviction, and a hint of fear clouded her eyes.
In the brief time Sion had known her, he’d never once seen Tira afraid. Hell, he hadn’t thought she was capable of the emotion. Seeing it take hold of her now drove home the seriousness of the situation, and just how very screwed they were.
They were running out of time, and if they couldn’t put the pieces together soon, there wouldn’t be a planet left to save.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In the front courtyard of the citadel, Sion paced. He’d awoken to a vid message from Rya, informing him she’d be home before nightfall, and that she had news to share with him. The source of his irritation and anxiety came from the message that followed, this one from Garrik.
Shortly after arriving on X21, Rya had fallen ill. So ill, in fact, she’d fainted in the sanctuary. She’d been transported to the med-bay and treated for dehydration and low blood sugar. Garrik assured him she was well enough to travel, but he’d thought Sion should know.
The message had greatly improved his opinion of the captain, but he’d been worried and restless since he’d received it. He should have been there. Not that he would have been able to stop it from happening, but because Rya had needed him.
The sun had begun its descent toward the horizon, the last vestiges of light glimmering across the surface of the vast ocean. Tira had promised to contact him the moment Rya’s cruiser entered Xenthian airspace, but he’d been waiting for hours.
“I take it from your brooding expression that Vasera Clearwater is delayed.”
Sion spun around, his upper lip curled over his teeth, but relaxed when he saw the male striding toward him. “Elder Meadowlark.” He didn’t like the elder, but that alone didn’t warrant hostility. “What brings you here?”
“Other than the exploration journeys of our leaders, this is the first time one of our people has left the planet in longer than anyone can truly remember.” He tucked his long, black robe around him more securely. “I’m eager to hear the Vasera’s report.”
“I thought you didn’t want anyone leaving Xenthian.”
“I don’t,” the elder responded bluntly. His shoulders slumped, and he exhaled wearily. “I don’t like any of this. We shielded our planet to keep us safe. I know what you think of me, but I’ve only ever wanted what is best for my people.”
“There have been three murders and three kidnappings in the past weeks,” Sion challenged. “That doesn’t seem very safe to me.”
“No, I suppose it doesn’t.” The elder’s silvery hair fanned behind him in the breeze, and in the dying light of dusk, he suddenly looked every bit his immense age. “I didn’t ask to be an elder. I never wanted the responsibility, but I was chosen, and I’ve done my best.”
Sion had never heard Elder Meadowlark speak with anything but contempt and prejudice, and he didn’t buy the “poor me” act for a second. “Then maybe it’s time to let someone else try.”
“Maybe you’re right.” Tilting his head toward sky, the elder pointed at a flickering light. “There’s your mate. I’ll leave you to your reunion.” He turned back toward the citadel, but paused to look over his shoulder. “Please let the Vasera know that I’d like to speak with her before she returns to her island.”
“I’ll tell her.”
The elder already forgotten, Sion watched the red, flashing light until he could make out the sleek lines of the cruiser. He willed the ship to move faster, but it did him little good, so he continued his pacing, the need to have Rya in his arms growing by the second.
Since no one had been allowed to leave or enter the planet for so long, Xenthian didn’t have docking bays. Instead, the Astoria landed in an open, grassy field just beyond the courtyard, her engine purring and whining before eventually falling silent.
The castle doors opened from behind him, and Tira marched toward the gates, Kai and Ivy following close behind. Sion paid no attention to them. When both exit doors opened, Sion jogged across the shorn grass and up the ramp, almost barreling over a human female with wide, startled blue eyes.
“Holy nova,” she breathed. “You scared the hell out of me.”
He sidestepped around the female
without a word and stomped onto the ship, following the scent of sunshine until it led him to his mate. The sight of her standing in the small galley filled him with so many emotions, he couldn’t settle on just one.
“Sion!” Jumping into his arms, Rya laughed when he lifted her off her feet and spun her in a tight circle. “I missed you.”
Stars, she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. He’d missed her as well, but until that moment, he hadn’t known how much. The dull ache in his chest eased, but he hadn’t recognized the presence of the pain until it had faded. With Rya in his arms, he took his first real breath in two days, and he promised himself he’d never let her go again.
Still smiling, Rya leaned in to brush their lips together. “Well, say something.”
His throat constricted, and his heart beat too fast. His brain misfired, and when he spoke, he could only communicate in short, primitive sentences.
“Need you. Now.”
Rya had so many things to tell him. She wanted to share about her meeting with the Krytos, seeing a bar for the first time, and trying the strange D’Aire ahava wine. Though it would likely cause an argument, she knew she needed to tell him about her fainting spell, and her consequent visit to the med-bay.
The way he looked at her, as if no one else in the universe existed, stiledl all of her whirling thoughts. His hard, chiseled muscles flexed when his arms tightened around her, and a low rumble somewhere between a purr and a growl vibrated his chest. She loved the sounds he made, loved the feel of his body pressed against hers.
Her brother loved her, and Fawkes cared about her. The people of her island respected her. No one had ever needed her, though, not until Sion. It was a heady feeling, and a big responsibility, being the center of someone’s universe. She would know, because she needed him as much as he needed her.
“Hold tight,” she whispered, dragging her lips down the rim of his ear.
The confined quarters of the cruiser vanished, throwing them into darkness for half a heartbeat. Opening her eyes, she looked around them and laughed. “I don’t know how this happened.”
Since she didn’t yet have a guest room in the citadel, she’d had only a vague destination in mind. Instead of a bedroom, however, she’d dropped them in the middle of the training center.
Sion grunted, and before she could rectify her mistake, he lowered her into the sand that comprised the floor of the sparing pit, and covered her from hips to sternum.
For now, they were alone in the cavernous room, but that could change at any moment. “What if someone sees us?”
When Sion slid a hand up her thigh, pushing her tunic over her hip, and slanted their mouths together in a hard, demanding kiss, thoughts of propriety vanished. Tangling her hands in his hair, she arched against him, her body trembling with desire. She needed to feel him, flesh against flesh, to touch his warm, bronzed skin, and map the contours of his muscles as they flexed beneath her fingers.
Too impatient to wait any longer, she removed their clothing with a few mumbled words, and moaned as his warmth surrounded her. They hadn’t been apart for long, but she’d missed him, missed the closeness they shared when their bodies were joined.
Growling, Sion nipped at her bottom lip while his hands explored in teasingly light touches. “You’re so soft,” he mumbled, his lips skimming down her sternum and over her breasts. “Stars, I could touch you forever.”
His mouth closed around one erect nipple, and he sucked the bud between his teeth, tugging at it until she bowed up with a strangled cry. Her breasts tingled, currents of energy rippled down her spine, and the smoldering embers of longing erupted into an erotic firestorm.
There was a time for romance, for slow and sensual. This wasn’t one of those times.
Reaching between them, she fisted his hard, throbbing length, loving the sounds he made as he grinded into her hand. Her pussy slicked with desire, her entire being aching to be filled as she guided him to her entrance.
His big frame shook, his muscles tense with restraint, and the vein in his neck bulged when he slid into her, inch by torturous inch. The stretch was delicious, the pressure welcomed, but Rya didn’t want his restraint. She wanted the primal part of him he rarely unleashed, the part that wasn’t gentle or controlled.
Angling her hips, she thrust up from the ground, taking him into her completely with one, swift plunge. The growl that rumbled up from his chest produced a rush of wetness between her thighs, and she grabbed his face in both hands, pulling him into a hard, desperate kiss.
Encased in her velvety heat, Sion couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. The slide of her tongue against his, the sting when she caught his lower lip between her teeth, and the feel of her supple body beneath him battered at his self-control. She was so delicate, so fragile, and in his new, bigger body, he feared hurting her, even unintentionally.
“I’m not so breakable, my darling.”
She arched her hips, taking him deeper, and his brain malfunctioned. His hips moved without his permission, his body overruling his mind. Driven by need, unable to deny himself any longer, he thrust hard, burying himself in her depths. Her inner walls gripped him, pulsing in rhythmic waves, and he couldn’t fight it any longer.
Relinquishing his control, he pushed hard and fast, plunging into her with abandon. Rya cried out, chanting his name, her voice ringing throughout the training hall as she moved with him, meeting him thrust for thrust. Soon, her body tensed, her center clutched him like a vise, and she scored her fingernails across his back as she rode the waves of her climax.
The bite of pain pushed him over the edge, throwing him headlong into a blinding orgasm that robbed his breath. Growling and groaning, he pumped through his release, wringing the last drops of pleasure as he spilled himself into her clenching depths.
“Missed you,” he mumbled long moments later as he stretched out beside her in the purple sand.
“I can tell.” Moving closer so that her breasts pressed against his chest, she arched her neck for a long, slow kiss. “Mm, I needed that.”
“How are you feeling? I didn’t hurt you?”
Sighing wistfully, Rya rolled onto her back and stretched. “I feel like I’m starving. I wonder if they have any pastries in the kitchens. Ooh, especially the ones with cream. I like the cream ones.”
Laughing, Sion forced himself up from the ground, then reach down to pull Rya to her feet also. “Well, we can’t go strolling through the castle like this.” He did his best to brush the sand away from her skin with his hands. “Where are our clothes, princess?”
“On the bench by the door.”
Lost in the feel of her luscious body beneath his fingertips, he didn’t notice the charge in the air, the subtle shift in energy until it was too late. Two sentries materialized in front of them, grabbed Rya, and disappeared from the training center before the growl even made it to his lips.
Blind, savage fury consumed him. His skin burned, his head pounded, and every cell in his body called out for blood. He’d find her, whatever it took, and when he did, those responsible for taking her would pay dearly.
Grabbing his pants from the bench, he jerked them on quickly, and ran out of the training center. He screamed Tira’s name as he sprinted through the corridors, not caring who he woke in his frantic search.
Instead of Tira, he found Kai, also half-dressed and looking just as murderous.
“They took her,” they shouted at each other in unison.
“I’ll kill them.” Kai’s eyes darkened dangerously, and the markings on his skin shined so brightly, they made his whole body glow. “They took Ivy right out of our bed.” His chest heaved, and his nostrils flared with each breath. “This is my planet, and these are my people, but I swear to the ancestors, I will burn it to the fucking ground to find her.”
“I’ll light the match.” Wrath and vengeance wouldn’t find their mates, though. “Come on. We need to find Tira.”
“I’m here.”
The captai
n’s appearance in the hallway didn’t even faze Sion. “Ivy and Rya are gone. Sentries took them, and I want them found. I want everyone looking for them. Now.”
“I’ll do everything I can, but it’s not that simple. There are places on the planet that are warded. We’d never find them unless we already knew where to look.”
In that moment, Tira Meadowlark wasn’t the Captain of the Guard, a female he respected. She wasn’t his friend or his ally. She was simply an obstacle standing between him and finding his mate.
“Fuck you.” Shoving past her, he stomped toward he library. If no one would help him, he’d find Rya on his own.
Halfway down the corridor, Kai fell into step beside him. “We’ll find them.” The muscles in his jaw ticked, and his eyes narrowed. “We have to find them.”
In the library, Sion opened the projection screen on the far wall and pulled up the map that showed the location where the bodies of the two females and Sentry Allbright had been found. He’d already been over the map a hundred times, and he’d found no discernable pattern, but he had to start somewhere.
“They have all five,” he muttered. His pulse raced, and his hands trembled as he traced the lines on the map. “Five. Five.” With a swipe of his hand, he flipped the screen to the display of the missing women. “They had four. Why kill Glenda Rivers? Why take Rya instead?”
If the theory held, and pregnant females were needed for the ritual, that meant...
Sion’s legs buckled, dropping him to his knees, and his chest constricted so tightly he thought it would crush his heart. For a moment, he allowed himself to be swallowed by the fear and grief, to let his mind wander down that dark, tragic road. When he surfaced, his rage no longer burned out of control, but instead, had been replaced by a cold, calculating determination.
Steadily, he stood and scrolled back to the map on the screen. “Tira?”
“Yes?” She paused her pacing near the doorway and looked at him.
“Get Elder Blue here. I don’t care what you have to tell him.”
Tira vanished, then almost instantly, she reappeared with Elder Blue, one hand grasping the male’s shoulder, and the other wrapped securely around his elbow.
