by Alisa Woods
Their hands were on her, lifting her up from the ground. Her toes dragged in the gravel as they carried her away from the cars and toward the forest. It was only a dozen feet away, and it beckoned, dark and cool. The fire in Arabella’s brain longed for it. But a part of her knew that this was a bad, bad thing. If they could hide her, buying time until that black dragon in the sky could reach her, Arabella wouldn’t survive two seconds beyond that.
And neither would her baby.
Somewhere from the depths of her being, she gathered up the strength to fight—she had to slow them down, do anything she could to stop them.
She dug her feet into the dirt. She squirmed in the hold of their clumsy hands. Her body was so slick with sweat, she was like a greased eel. She wormed one arm free, then redoubled her efforts with the other one. One man swore and grabbed at her harder. Another dug fingers even deeper into her arm. Just as they got a grip on her again, the air cracked all around them.
A fiery blur of white fell from heaven and landed with a ground-shaking thud in front of them. Arabella’s vision was blurred with pain and heat. Sweat was dripping into her eyes and making her squint. It took her a second, but when she blinked them clear, could see who it was…
Erelah.
With a raised blade and a look of righteous fury and power, the angeling’s scream shook the air and made the arms holding Arabella tremble. Erelah surged forward and sank her blade into the demon on her left. He jerked away from Arabella and fell to the ground. In a blur, Erelah swiped the blade in an arc, up then down, plunging into the demon to her right. His body dragged Arabella down, its grip still hard even as the man’s head lolled back… but Erelah caught her in an angelic hug that vibrated with power and set her free.
“I have you, princess of the House of Smoke!” Erelah cried triumphantly.
Arabella slumped in her arms. “Too hot,” she gasped.
Erelah’s eyes went wide, staring at her in horror and confusion.
Rachel appeared at Arabella’s side, grabbing hold of her other arm. “She’s burning up!” she yelled. “You have to help her!”
Erelah released her, and Rachel struggled to hold her up.
“I don’t… I know not how…” Erelah shrank a little and looked terribly uncertain. Then her gaze was caught by the other demon thugs who were fleeing. “Her death is upon you!” she shouted, raising her blade and going after them. Arabella heard their screams as the angeling caught them, but that didn’t matter. None of that would save her and the baby.
Rachel couldn’t hold her up when her legs buckled. Arabella sank to the ground as another wave of pain started deep in her belly. Rachel cradled her in her arms and started petting her again with cool hands.
Arabella leaned into them and managed to gasp out the words that needed to be said. “The baby. You have to save the baby, Rach.”
“No! I’m saving you!” But there was terror in her eyes. And they both knew there was nothing she could do.
Then a flap of wings beat the air, and Arabella felt it wash over her. Terror clawed at her heart as she blinked away the sweat and the sun. Was Tytus here already? But there was a blue dragon landing instead, sending up a puff of dirt next to Rachel and transforming into a man.
Cinaed dropped to his knees, one arm around Rachel and the other on Arabella’s belly. “My lady!” he cried. “The baby? Are you well?”
“She’s burning up!” Rachel sobbed. “Cinaed, do something!”
He leaned back and waved his hands, conjuring a tub filled with ice water next to her. Then he scooped up Arabella, wrenching her away from Rachel’s grasp, and hurried her into the water. It was a welcome splash of coolness, but the fire had been raging too long and too deep. Steam rose off Arabella’s body and drenched the air above them.
“No, no, no!” Rachel was crying, tears running down her face.
Cinaed knelt by the edge of the tub, splashing water over her belly. “Hold fast, my lady! The prince is coming.”
Lucian. He’s alive. But the pain was climbing up her back again, and Arabella couldn’t speak. Moaning turned to keening and then to screaming. She curled up over her belly with the strength of it, rocking and splashing the water in the tub.
Cinaed’s face held panic. Rachel was sobbing. Erelah arrived at the side of the tub looking thoroughly terrified at the sight of Arabella thrashing in the water.
The pain peaked and subsided again. Arabella sagged back in the tub. Only Cinaed’s quick hand kept her head from going under. Arabella weakly pawed the air and the side of the tub, searching for Erelah’s hand. When she found it, she grabbed hold of it with all the strength she had left, which was practically nothing, and urged the angeling closer.
Erelah bent down, her eyes wide, to hear Arabella’s whispered plea. “Use your blade,” she gasped. “Take the baby.”
Erelah leaned back, eyes lit with horror. “I cannot… no!”
“Please. Save my baby.” But that was all she could say, the last of her strength sapping out of her. Darkness started to crowd in on her vision. Arabella closed her eyes and leaned back to get as much of her body in the water as possible. She focused in on the baby deep inside. Past the raging fire. Past the waves of pain that were wracking her. Down to the baby who was churning and churning inside her, fighting for his life. Daddy’s coming, she thought. Just hold on. Just hold on…
She believed it with all her heart—Lucian would come for her.
But she didn’t know if it would be soon enough.
Erelah’s warrior-angel cry reached Lucian’s ears just as he closed in on Tytus from above.
Lucian was diving snout first, wings swept back so he could rocket down, but just as he reached Tytus’s leathery black wings, the bastard barrel rolled—and clutched in his talons was a gun. Three short pops blew darts into Lucian’s chest just as he smacked into Tytus, now flying upside down. The impact knocked them both out of the sky and into the canopy below. As they crashed and tumbled through the leaves, Lucian felt the triple dose of poison leech through his system, carried even faster by his rapid-beating heart, hyped on adrenaline and anger and fear. He smacked into the ground with such force that he bounced, and that was the only thing that allowed him to get his legs under him before he landed again. Tytus was a short ways off, crashing and rolling through the underbrush. Lucian staggered after him, marshaling all of his fae magic to combat the poison—now that he knew what it was, it was easier to fight, but it still felt like a lead weight dragging behind him. Tytus glanced back and saw Lucian slicing small trees out of his way with his talons and stumbling after, so he leaped into the air, whirled on black wings, and pivoted to rake Lucian with a blast of dragonfire. Lucian drew his wings over his face, but the fire still scorched him as he lifted off the ground. With no room to maneuver in the dense spacing of trees, Lucian tipped sideways and drove between the narrow columns toward Tytus, reaching him before Tytus could get off another fireball. Lucian sank his talons into the black scales of his chest, and even with Lucian’s strength sapped by the poison, he was able to throw Tytus to the ground.
The trees above cracked and snapped as the other dragons—Leksander and Leonidas and the remaining dragons of his House—dove into the forest.
But Tytus was his to kill.
Lucian had him pinned to the forest floor, his talons sunk deep into Tytus’s chest. Blood surged out of his gaping and panting mouth. “You are weak,” he gurgled. “My demons will kill her before you can—” Lucian cut off his vile words with a squeeze that made Tytus scream. Then Lucian wrenched one blood-covered set of talons out of Tytus’s chest and swiped it across his neck, severing his head and sending it rolling into the ferns.
Lucian’s breath heaved, the poison making him weaker by the second, and he had to struggle to pull his other hand from Tytus’s now dead body. Lucian stood over the black dragon, wavering and dizzy, as Leonidas and Leksander both dropped through the last branches to the ground by Lucian’s side.
He turned to them, and Leon
idas reached forward steady him, his talons gently gripping Lucian’s shoulder to keep him upright. Runes rustled down Leonidas’s arm, and Lucian could feel the magic flooding into him, the healing spell chasing after the dark tendrils of poison.
Leonidas shifted human and plucked the three darts from Lucian’s chest, throwing them to the ground by Tytus’s body. Lucian returned to human form as well.
“My brother,” he gasped, his chest a tight squeeze from the poison. “You don’t have the energy to save me.”
“Shut up,” Leonidas said. He kept pumping healing energy into Lucian.
Leksander joined them on the other side, in human form as well, and did the same. Between his two brothers and their powerful magic, the poison began to quickly recede.
Lucian shook his head and shoved their hands away. “Arabella,” he wheezed, his lungs still tight. Then he leaped into the air and fought his way through the branches to lift above the forest canopy. He reached out with his weakened fae senses—they couldn’t go far, but less than a mile away, he sensed Arabella.
The strong, vibrant scent of her was weak… and fading. And the baby—
He pumped his wings and gave everything he had to speed across the canopy toward her.
We are with you, my brother, he heard in his mind. It was Leksander, crashing up through the canopy close behind him.
I sense the baby… Leonidas’s thoughts were in a panic. Lucian, hurry.
Emotion surged up to choke Lucian, but he focused in like a laser on Arabella’s scent. There was nothing but her now—her and the baby—and in a handful of seconds that seemed to stretch forever, he finally saw her through a small opening the tree line. She was lying in a tub of water between the road and the forest. He rocketed down in dragon form and landed, shifting to human as soon as his feet touched the ground. He hit it running and was by her side in an instant.
Erelah moved to make room for him. Lucian dropped to his knees next to the tub. Cinaed was holding her just barely above the water. Rachel huddled by the side, crying. Lucian could feel the heat coming off Arabella even before he touched her. Her eyes were closed, and she was mumbling something, delirious. Her skin was like fire when he touched her cheek and slipped his other hand to her belly where his son was writhing in torment. His runes rushed to his hands, and he began flooding her with the healing magic she needed.
He just didn’t know if it would be enough.
His touch seemed to rouse her—her eyes popped open, and those beautiful green jewels stared up at him. She blinked, rapidly, and her eyes seem to be looking past him into some infinite distance.
“I’m here, my love,” he whispered. He leaned forward, dipping his head down and brushing his cheek against hers. “I’m here,” he whispered in her ear.
She responded to that, turning her face to press against his. “The baby,” she gasped. “Save our baby, Lucian.”
He drew back, tears threatening his eyes. “I’m saving you both.”
Lucian heard his brothers land behind him, felt the beat of their wings folding as they shifted back to human. A fraction of a moment later, they arrived at his side, both plunging their hands into the icy water Cinaed had conjured to keep Arabella cool and finding a place on Arabella’s hands or arms or legs in which to infuse her with their magic. Even weakened by poison—between the three of them, they were saturated with it—Lucian could feel the power of the three of them joining to carry her through.
He still didn’t know if it would be enough.
Then Arabella cried out and lurched up out of the water, curling over her belly and keening a low moan that grew and grew in volume until she was screaming. Lucian fought to bring her back into the water, but she was curled up tight.
“My love,” he said, a cry in his voice, “breathe through it. You have to stay in the water. The heat…” Then he couldn’t talk anymore, not over her cries of pain.
There were slicing through him like razor-sharp talons.
Rachel reached out both hands to Arabella’s shoulders and gently urged Arabella to lay back in the water. “Ari, honey, you’ve got to stay in the water. Please stay in the water.”
Leonidas’s face was still ashen, but he leaned forward until he was close to Arabella’s ear and whispered, “We’re going to save your baby, princess of the House of Smoke,” he said with a rough voice. “But you have to lie back, no matter the pain. Do you understand?” Leonidas’s hands trembled a little as they held her arm and gently urged her back.
Slowly, slowly, the keening sound coming out of her mouth diminished, and she eased back into the water.
Lucian shook with relief and the emotional overload that gripped him.
Arabella panted, her breath heaving in and out. Her beautiful face twisted with a pain that Lucian almost couldn’t look upon. Between gasps, she called to him. “Lucian.”
He bent back down to her. “I’m here.”
“I told…” More panting. “The baby.” She swallowed and seemed to deliberately deepen her breaths. “I told him… you would come.”
Holy mother of magic, he prayed, please don’t let me lose her. Please.
“Of course, I came,” Lucian whispered. “You are everything to me.”
Arabella nodded, jerkily, splashing the water around her face and up onto her cheek. She was nearly submerged. “We have to make it.” Her voice was so soft, it was like she was talking to herself. Or to the baby. “For Daddy.”
Lucian couldn’t breathe. She was holding his entire life in those words.
Then Arabella gritted her teeth and breathed through them in short bursts—in and out, in and out—and a scream welled up from so deep inside her that it sounded like it was turning her inside out. She writhed in the water, clenching and bearing down. She flailed her hand at Rachel, grabbing hold of her shirt, fisting it, and dragging her closer. “The baby… is coming…” Arabella gasped out.
“Holy shit!” Rachel looked down at Arabella’s belly. “Lucian, her clothes!”
What the hell?
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, Lucian!” Rachel cried. “Do your magic thing and get rid of her clothes!”
He just blinked for a moment and then realized… the baby was coming.
Lucian hastily lifted a hand and flicked away Arabella’s clothes, replacing them with a gown that would give his mate some privacy from the three men hovering over her, keeping her alive during the birth of his son.
“Rachel… can you…” Lucian nodded helplessly at his mate, his hands busy with pumping healing magic in her.
“Oh God!” The woman looked completely startled and terrified, but she jumped to her feet and ran around the back of Cinaed to the end of the tub. Once there, she thrust her hands into the water and underneath Arabella’s gown.
Arabella lurched up out of the water, screaming, only, this time, he could see the writhing of her belly as his son moved, preparing for his arrival.
“Oh my God! Oh my God! I see his head!” Rachel yelled.
Lucian turned away from the panic on her face and focused on Arabella’s. Her eyes were squeezed tight, her teeth were clenched hard, and she was pushing, pushing, pushing… Lucian flushed every bit of magic he had left through his hands and into her, giving her every bit of borrowed strength he could.
“It’s happening! He’s coming!” Rachel’s voice hiked up hysterically.
Arabella groaned and pushed, and in a moment of undefined quiet, only the sloshing of water and scrambling for movement… his son was born. He knew it by the gasping look of relief on Arabella’s beautiful face. He couldn’t tear his eyes from her shining green eyes, not until he heard…
The baby’s cry.
His head whipped to the sound of its own volition. Rachel’s eyes were wide as saucers, but she was cradling his newborn son in the water, holding his head above it and letting his little body—an impossibly tiny body—float next to his mother’s legs. His son’s hands were fisted up tight to his chin, legs tucked against his small bell
y, but his eyes were wide and wondering. Green eyes. Just like his mother. And the small cry that had announced his entrance into the world had subsided into a tiny pout that worked soundlessly.
Lucian was the same—his mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out.
“Let me see him,” Arabella said, her words half sob.
Lucian was whipped out of his shock. “Arabella, my love.” He stared in wonder as she sat up in the bath. “Are you…”
His brothers had already released her. They were grinning like fools next to the bath, just like Cinaed, all as wordless as he, but they couldn’t possibly have half his joy.
“I’m fine,” Arabella said, still breathless. She was radiant.
His hands held her up, touching her skin in wonder—the fire was gone from her body.
She nodded to affirm it again. “I’m okay, Lucian.” She held her hands out to Rachel. “I want my son.”
Rachel looked uncertain how to move the baby from the water to his mother’s waiting arms. Cinaed leaned down and gently supported the baby with her. A look passed between them, and Cinaed’s wide grin seemed to leap across the air and infect Rachel. By the time the two of them brought the baby to Arabella’s arms for her to cradle against her drenched gown, Rachel and Cinaed were side by side, leaning into each other. Once they gave the baby over, Cinaed’s arm slipped around Rachel’s shoulders, and he held her tight to his side.
Lucian’s brothers each clapped a hand to one of his shoulders. Leonidas still looked gray, but his smile was nearly breaking his face. Leksander had tears in his eyes that he seemed determined not to let fall. By his side, Erelah leaned back, looking on with the same wonder that was bursting from Lucian’s heart.
But his tears were burned off by a fiery joy that radiated inside him like the sun. He reached a tremulous hand to his son’s head. Arabella was already snuggling him to her chest like a pro.
“You did it.” He breathed out the words, amazed. This woman… how had he managed to keep this amazing woman?
“We did it.” She beamed up at him. Those green eyes… just like their son. The precious new life that fixed everything—Lucian could feel the holes in his heart healing, the poison banishing, the fear, anxiety, and sheer terror at the thought of losing them both evaporating into mist. The blessing of his son’s birth renewed Lucian’s life in an intensely magical way.
