by Alyssa Day
The taller man, older, with leathery skin and a hawk-like nose, nodded. “We’re good. We were sure with dark coming on that the vamps would start showing up, but we ain’t seen hide nor hair of ’em. The boys are patrolling all the way around the hospital for the shifters, too.”
Alexios nodded. “We won’t go far.”
He herded Grace down the sidewalk and away from the lights and sounds of the ER. She walked with a jerking, halting gait, like a marionette dancing on the strings of a drunken puppet master. When they reached a low stone wall, partially hidden by some bushes, he guided her to it. Then he sat next to her, his arms around her, and held her while she wept.
The sound of her sobbing—muffled because she tried to hide it from him—and the feel of her warmth as her body trembled in his arms overwhelmed the careful, rock-solid defenses Alexios had carefully constructed over the past several years. He inhaled deeply, trying for control, but failing miserably when the scent of sunshine and flowers from her hair shuddered through his senses.
She was tough, a warrior woman. She never showed weakness to anyone—ever. And yet here she was, crying in his arms. Needing him to comfort her. The fierce drive to protect and cherish surged through him, and a tsunami of unexpected and unwanted emotion crashed through the barriers around his heart like a tidal wave through a fragile coral reef.
She turned her tear-drenched face up to his when his body shuddered against hers. “Alexios?”
There was only one choice he could make. Only one recourse open to him. He needed to taste her lips more than he had ever needed food or water or even air to breathe.
He kissed her.
He kissed her, and she gasped a little against his mouth, but then she was kissing him back. She was kissing him back. She twined her arms around his neck and pulled him closer to her and opened her mouth to his invasion, welcoming and enticing him.
Seducing him with her lips and warmth.
He groaned, or perhaps she did, but either way the sound was swallowed up in the heat between them, and he was tilting her head better to devour her, and kissing her and wanting her and needing her . . .
The red flashing light of an emergency vehicle splashed on the side of the building, at the farthest edge of his peripheral vision. A vision but not a vision. A memory but not a memory.
Flames.
The fires. The pain.
The torture.
He wrenched his mouth from Grace’s and stared at the flashing light. Heart pumping. Muscles clenching.
Retreat! Escape! Kill them! Escape! Escape!
“Alexios?” She struggled in his arms, and he yanked her even closer, maddened that she would try to escape him.
“Alexios,” she said, stronger now. “You’re hurting me.”
Somehow the words sank in past the memories. Past the waking nightmare.
There was no choice. There was only despair, and the death of hope, and an eternity of loneliness stretched out in front of him. They’d twisted him, and now he was broken. Wrong.
Alexios took the only honorable option available to him.
He left her there, bewildered and alone. Walked, then ran, then flew as mist through the air, desperate to escape. He never stopped, not even once, until he’d traveled all the way back to Atlantis. His throat burned with unspoken words; his eyes burned with unshed tears.
He ran, and he made yet another promise: he’d never allow himself to touch Grace again.
GLOSSARY OF TERMS
Aknasha —empath; one who can feel the emotions of others and, usually, send her own emotions into the minds and hearts of others, as well. There have been no aknasha’an in the recorded history of Atlantis for more than ten thousand years.
Atlanteans —a race separate from humans, descended directly from a mating between Poseidon and one of the Nereids, whose name is lost in time. Atlanteans inherited some of the gifts of their ancestors: the ability to control all elements except fire—especially water; the ability to transform to mist and travel in that manner; and superhuman strength and agility. Ancient scrolls hint at other powers, as well, but these are either lost to the passage of time or dormant in present-day Atlanteans.
Atlantis —the Seven Isles of Atlantis were driven beneath the sea during a mighty cataclysm of earthquakes and volcanic activity that shifted the tectonic plates of the Earth more than eleven thousand years ago. The ruling prince of the largest isle, also called Atlantis, ascends to serve as high king to all seven isles, though each are ruled by the lords of the individual isle’s ruling house.
Blood pride —a master vampire’s created vampires.
Landwalkers —Atlantean term for humans.
Miertus —Atlantean slang for excrement.
The Seven —the elite guard of the high prince or king of Atlantis. Many of the rulers of the other six isles have formed their own guard of seven in imitation of this tradition.
Shape-shifters —a species who started off as humans, but were cursed to transform into animals each full moon. Many shape-shifters can control the change during other times of the month, but newly initiated shape-shifters cannot. Shape-shifters have superhuman strength and speed and can live for more than three hundred years, if not injured or killed. They have a longstanding blood feud against the vampires, but old alliances and enemies are shifting.
Thought-mining —the Atlantean ability, long lost, to sift through another’s mind and memories to gather information.
Vampires —an ancient race descended from the incestuous mating of the god Chaos and his daughter, Anubisa, goddess of the night. They are voracious for political intrigue and the amassing of power and are extremely long-lived. Vampires have the ability to dematerialize and teleport themselves long distances, but not over large bodies of water.
Warriors of Poseidon —warriors sworn to the service of Poseidon and the protection of humanity. They all bear Poseidon’s mark on their bodies.
