by JL Madore
Kotah nods. “I know exactly how that feels.”
“Out of all of us, you would know best, My King.”
Kotah arches a brow and chuffs.
Creed gets served by Jaxx and leaves Doc chatting with Brant to join us. He’s standing tall and lifts his chin, but he reeks of embarrassment and shame. “I must apologize,” he says, swallowing. “For Rhylan and… what happened. Keyla’s been gracious about it but—”
Kotah squeezes Creed’s shoulder. “All I care about is that you treat my sister well and she’s happy. What happens behind closed doors—even if others happen to witness it—won’t sway our opinion of you.”
Calli snorts, joining us with a plate of finger foods. “If it makes you feel better, our quint had a similarly embarrassing event in our early days.”
Kotah chuckles. “Which one?”
I grin at Creed. “There are too many to count.”
“True story,” Calli says. “I was referring to our first naked nacho night.”
Hawk and Lukas come in the door in time to hear her and Hawk rolls his eyes. “Oh, fuck. Why would you bring that up?”
“Bring what up?” Brant asks, loping over. “Come on. Share with the rest of the class.”
Calli grins. “If I’m not mistaken, Prince Creed is embarrassed—”
“—mortified,” Creed corrects.
“—mortified,” Calli says, “about the public display of private affairs. I think we should tell him about our first naked nacho night and ease his misery.”
“Then I’ll need a drink.” Hawk heads toward the bar. “And before the night devolves into whatever drunk debacle we have in store, yes, Lukas masked Creed’s scent off Rhylan and yes, he can do the same for Creed.”
Jaxx lifts a bottle at the bar. “The Phoenix Quint, putting out one fire at a time. Well done, Lukas.”
Everyone offers Lukas a round of thanks.
“And what have we discovered about the blood witch?” Creed asks.
Lukas fields that one himself. “I brought a team of FCO enforcers through the rift and have the building under surveillance. It might take a day or two, but we’ll know more then.”
“What about your beacon buzz?” Doc asks. “Is that telling us anything we need to know?”
Creed checks with me and I shake my head. “It’s there but not going haywire. For now, it seems like we’re on standby.”
“Then back to naked nachos,” Calli says.
Since no one jumps into it, I begin the tale. “So, Kotah and his mates had just arrived at the palace. My father’s health was failing, and Mother was appalled Kotah mated a commoner who didn’t know what it meant to be a wildling or a royal.”
“That’s me,” Calli says, waving a skewer of meat. “I tried to make a good impression, but the Prima wasn’t impressed. In fact, she hated me.”
Jaxx chuckles. “Sorry, kitten, I’m not sure you can use a past tense on that.”
Calli chuckles. “You’re probably right. She still hates me.”
“Her loss,” Hawk says, returning with a tumbler of whiskey in hand. “At that time, I was in another part of town at a fae conference. It was before I consummated our mating and I was not only the odd man out, but Brant also didn’t trust me and convinced Jaxx that for the sake of the realm, they should start snooping into my life to expose me as a corrupt traitor.”
Brant’s chuckling now. “So, Jaxx and I thought while Hawk was gone, a drunken night of debauchery was in order.”
“That part of the evening was going very well,” Kotah adds, smiling. “We’d been drinking all night, playing various adult games Jaxx came up with, leaving us less than presentable.”
I laugh picturing it all unfolding. “But earlier that day, Kotah had asked me to soften up our mother and bring her around. Not knowing what they were up to, I convinced her to give Kotah and his mates another chance and get to know them.”
“And around that time,” Hawk says. “I found out about Brant and Jaxx thinking the worst of me, so I flew back to the palace in a rage. I stormed into the suite and fists started flying.”
Kotah rolls his eyes. “So, there we are, Brant naked and spraying Hawk’s blood across the décor, Jaxx—”
“—also naked,” Calli adds.
Jaxx snorts. “Now, now. My male bits were covered by a lovely little apron.”
Kotah laughs. “Yes, they were. Until he got back fisted and was sprawled out cold over the arm of a sofa with his apron flipped up around his hips. Calli was heaving her guts out over the kitchen sink, in her lacy underthings, and Keyla picked that moment to escort our mother into the suite to show her who we really are.”
Calli laughs. “Which, who are we kidding, kinda is who we really are.”
“Yeah, baby,” Jaxx says holding up his drink.
“My point is,” I say, taking Creed’s hand in mine. “Whether it’s crazy antics or mortifyingly embarrassing moments or ridiculously inappropriate comments, there’s nothing we can’t handle in this patchwork family.”
“No judgment,” Kotah says. “You are part of this family now. You can’t shock us and nothing that happened with Rhylan will change the fact that you belong here with Keyla.”
“And in a way, it’s kinda proof that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be,” Jaxx says, tipping back his glass. “And what man hasn’t gotten a hand job in front of a room full of people?”
Doc and Lukas raise their hands.
Brant laughs. “Aw, that’s too bad, boys. Don’t be sad. You’re both young and reasonably good-looking. There’s still hope for you.”
Creed
Keyla and Doc’s family is the strangest kind of wonderful. They are inappropriate and funny and genuinely enjoy one another. After an hour of eating and talking about their realm and our plans, I finally let the fiasco with Rhylan go and enjoy myself.
“No, that’s bullshit,” Brant says, laughing a while later. “If jaguars took over the world, they’d have us all sunning ourselves and swimming.”
“Or in your case sinking,” Hawk says.
Brant lifts his glass to toast his mate. “No. If it came down to living like one species, everyone should live like bears. Eat when you want. Sleep when you want. And most importantly, kill people in the woods when you want.”
Calli laughs. “I think we’ve killed more than our fair share of people in the woods.”
Brant grins. “See. We’re well on the way. You’d all be great bears.”
Kotah and Jaxx come back from the kitchen with two trays of chicken nachos. Both of them are wearing guilty expressions and I wonder what we missed. The wildings seem to understand immediately.
It’s only me, Calli, and Lukas that seem to be on the outside of the joke.
“Seriously?” Doc says, rolling his eyes. “We’re out here starving and the two of you are sexing it up in the kitchen?”
Calli gives the nachos a sideways glance. “Where were these during the sexing.”
Jaxx laughs. “Still in the oven. Trust me, there’s no cross-pollination of anything funky.”
Calli laughs and helps herself.
“You’re taking their word for it?” Hawk asks arching a brow.
Calli nods. “I’m preggers and hungry. Besides, no trust, no us.”
A frisson of energy runs the length of my spine.
I swallow my drink and turn. “Where did you hear that saying?”
Calli looks over at me, chewing a chip. “Pardon?”
“No trust, no us. Is that a Human Realm saying?”
“Not really. My bestie, Riley said it all the time. She’s the only one I ever heard say it, why?”
“And Riley is…”
“That’s the girl I told you about,” Keyla says. “The one we think was from this realm who guided Calli through life to get her ready to become the guardian. We think she was one of your travelers.”
Jaxx sets the tray down on the stone coffee table and straightens. “Finding Riley and discoverin
g what happened to her is one of our primary reasons for being here. Whoever she was, we all owe her a debt.”
The hazy numbness of alcohol has taken hold, but I fight off the mind fuzz and try to make sense of that. “What made you think she is a traveler?”
“Because after she was physically killed in our realm, she kept talking to me,” Calli says. “At first, I thought it was a grieving thing and I was manifesting or projecting or something but as time passed, she knew too much about my mating and opening the rift.”
Keyla adjusts on the sofa beside me and reaches for some food. “Jaxx’s mom researched which of the fae species in this realm might be able to not only observe but inhabit a person in our realm, but we didn’t get far.”
Jaxx nods. “Our records are out of date on what the species on this side of the rift can do.”
“And how long did you know Riley?” I ask.
“Almost twelve years,” Calli says. “She found me when I first ran away and was living on the streets. She took care of me. She taught me how to fight and kept me out of trouble and, in the end, she was the catalyst to bring me and the guys together. We figure she was part of the program Laryssa mentioned for keeping tabs on us but was working for the good guys.”
I scrub a hand over my face my heart racing. “The traveler program allows certain fae species to observe events in the other realm, but they wouldn’t be able to manifest there and stay for over a decade. That’s a different skill altogether.”
“Different how?” Hawk asks.
I hold up my finger to the avian and ignore the question for the moment. I need to keep my train of thought on the tracks. “You said this Riley girl continued to speak to you after her human host was killed.”
Calli nods. “What does that mean to you?”
“A lot.” I get up and jog toward the door. When I step out into the hall, I’m relieved it’s Rhylan guarding the door and not Vik. The guy frowns but I don’t have time for another round of oops I’m a hot-headed dragon.
“When Honor was caught and recaptured, where was she found? Did you track her activity? Do you know what she did during her time while she was free?”
He glances down the hall before throwing me a glare. “Are you trying to get me killed?”
“No. You’re doing a fine job of that on your own.”
The two of us standoff until I step back and sweep my hand into the suite. “Come inside.”
“Pass. The last time I was in there with you people my life was ruined.”
“That was your doing, not theirs. Now, inside. Please, this is important.”
Rhy straightens and curses, giving in. Inside the door, he stops dead and stands at attention. “Fine. I’m inside. What do you want?”
“I want you to answer my questions. Where was Honor when you recaptured her and what had she been doing during her escape from Laryssa?”
“Why do you need to know?”
I shove him and slam him against the back of the door. “Stop being such a stubborn prick and answer the fucking question. When my sister was recaptured, where did they find her? StoneHaven? She was in StoneHaven, wasn’t she?”
“What if she was?”
I grip his shirt with both hands and lean in until we’re nose to nose. “Drop the asshole act for once in your fucking life. I told you, this is important.”
His lip curls up in a snarl. “Not an act.”
I clench my hand into a fist and am swinging back when Kotah catches my wrist and a warm rush of calming energy washes over me. It stops the drunken swirl in my head and helps a lot.
“Patience might be a more productive approach,” Kotah says. “Perhaps if you tell us what you’re working out, we can help.”
I draw a deep breath and exhale. Releasing my fist, I hold up my hands to Rhy and step back. “Your assumption about a traveler possessing your friend Riley is flawed. It doesn’t work that way. Travelers are observers only. The most they can do is take a snapshot of what’s happening there and bring that back.”
Hawk lifts his chin. “If not a traveler then who or what do you think Riley is?”
“The only species of fae from this realm that could possess a being from your realm would be a mind fae who weilds that particular gift. More importantly, only one specific member of my species would have the power behind her to embed herself and withstand the strains of spanning time as you’ve described.”
”All right,” Hawk says. “we’re all ears. Who are we talking about?”
I peg Rhylan with a look and see the light go off in his mind as he catches up. “Honor.”
I nod and meet the confused gazes of the group. “My sister, Honor. I’m pretty sure in the year she escaped Laryssa’s captivity, she went to StoneHaven and transferred her consciousness to your realm.”
“Slecking hell,” Rhylan says, raking his fingers over his forehead and exposing his dazzled expression. “She prepared Calli for her life as the phoenix and initiated the prophecy.”
“It’s the only thing that makes sense.”
“Laryssa was always bragging about what she was up to with Sebastian so she went back, found Calli, and made sure it didn’t end her way.”
“How?” Calli says. “I don’t understand. How could she spend twelve years with me in one year of escape? That makes no sense.”
“When you look at time through a linear lens, no,” I say. “But Honor and I are more than mind fae, we’re guardians. We carry the blooded magic of the ancient crown guardians—the Amberloq warriors.”
Keyla steps in to join us by the door. “That was the magic you used to break the hold on the searing to get us back to our human forms?”
“That’s right. I lost the ability to access the magic of the Amberloq when the blood witch cursed me. The soul-searing shook that loose somehow.”
“And your sister, Honor?” Calli says. “How would she know to find me and prepare me?”
“The Amberloq guard the timeline. Even though this is our present, for us in the future, this is our past.”
Jaxx chuckles. “Am I the only one who wishes we had this conversation before two hours of drinking?”
Brant snorts. “I think I’m getting it. So, your Amber-time-fae-warrior-people from the future knew Calli would rise as the phoenix, but maybe she wasn’t ready or tough enough or something, so they have your sister slip back a decade and start training her.”
I place a hand on the small of Keyla’s back and make our way back toward the sofas. “Exactly. In the royal lineage of our family, the firstborn is a son and the secondborn a daughter. The son is the guardian of the quadrant and the daughter is the guardian of the crown.”
“In essence,” Rhylan says, “she’s the queen of the special forces destined to protect the crown.”
“And I take it, your aunt is dead?” Lukas asks. “If Honor has come into her powers and was able to travel back to connect with Calli, she would have to have not only the information about what needed to happen but also the ability to ensure it did.”
I look to Rhylan. “At the time of the raid, Valorus escaped with the help of her warriors. It took almost a year for Laryssa to find her and eliminate her.”
“And that’s right about the time Honor escaped,” Doc says. “So they killed Creed’s aunt and activated the transfer of power.”
Rhylan nods. “Laryssa was unaware of how the Thornebane lineage works. She bound Honor’s access to her mind fae powers the same way she did with you but when Valorus was killed, the surge of power disrupted the witch’s spell.”
I swallow, taking that all in.
Keyla squeezes my hand. “I’m sorry about your aunt. Were you close?”
I meet the sympathetic gazes of the group and shake my head. “No. I barely knew her. My father and she had a falling out when Honor and I were kids. I hadn’t seen her since then.”
Hawk stands and starts to pace the room. “Aunt Valorus is killed. Honor comes into her powers. The Amberloq inform her of the coming pro
phecy. The disruption of the witch’s hold on her allows her to escape and she goes to StoneHaven. Once there, she projects herself into Calli’s life and sets this entire adventure in motion.”
I nod. “It’s the only answer. There’s no other way this could’ve worked out.”
Lukas sets his glass down and whistles. “That explains how the Pixie Queen and Rowan knew to redirect the river in Pennsylvania too. We never could figure out how they did that a decade before we needed to safeguard a site for the portal gate.”
Hawk nods. “Honor must’ve communicated it to them somehow and they started to divert the flow to shift the perception of where the sealed rift was located.”
Calli shifts to the front of her seat and frowns. “Then the only question is where’s Honor and how do we get her back?”
CHAPTER TEN
Rhylan
I’m torn. I see the Wolf King and Creed talking about Honor and making plans for the future and I know deep in the twist of my bowels they are a better choice for this realm’s leadership, but to support them means to go against my brother, my mother, and our standing as one of the ancient dragon families.
The Silverwing name is in tatters since our father’s challenge of Shadowcaster. It wouldn’t survive defection to overthrow the crown.
I’m bound to Laryssa by duty.
I’m bound to Creed by desire.
I tip back the third bottle of ale I’ve opened in the last twenty minutes and let the oaky stout soothe some of my jagged edges.
“Why do you look like someone kicked you in the gem pouch?” Vikarus asks, walking through the open door to my suite. With the door to the corridor propped open, I can sit at my kitchen table and have a clear sightline of the door to the private suite of the royal heirs.
“Because I genuinely think we’re on the losing side and I can’t figure out how to stay on top of things and still keep ourselves and our name in good standing.”
Vik opens my small countertop refrigerator and helps himself, pulling out a carton of raw meat. After ripping open the package of shaved venison, he sniffs it and decides it passes the test. “The reason you can’t figure out how to flip allegiance and stay in good standing is because there isn’t a way. We were given a task, first by Shadowcaster, and then by the queen of our realm. It’s as simple as that.”
