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For Tish, who will read this and know instantly why. Thank you so much for being my friend and a well-needed voice of reason. To Sheri, Kim Burdette, and Kim Turner for all the decades you've been my touchstones. To LaShon and Leisha for too many reasons to name. To Laura, Kerrie, Paco, Parker, Jacs, Alethea, Leanna, and Carl for coming to my aid when I needed you! I love you guys so much and am forever in your debt! And as always for my boys, who are ever my heartstones. I love you all!
I loved you at your most wicked.
--Rev. Oscar C. Allred
Acknowledgments
To Adam Ezra for allowing me to use the words from his song "Home Again Soon" off the View from the Root album. If you ever get a chance, make sure to check out his music. It's been my pleasure and honor to know him for years and to have featured his music in the Nick and Dark-Hunter videos, and at book signings. He is a great musician and a wonderful man!
PROLOGUE
In the year of Our Lord 417
May the fifth
Glastonbury Tor
Betrayal.
Cold and brutal, it always took the shape and form of the closest friend and ally. And stung so deep to the soul that it left you bleeding and weak, wondering if you'd ever find your way to trust again.
Left you adrift in misery and heartache. Unable to breathe for the pain of it.
Worse than that, the treacherous bastard always came when least expected. And at the worst fucking time.
Given the brutal circumstances of his birth, Falcyn Drago had never considered himself immune from its fetid claws. Far from it. Indeed, he'd been nursed on its most foul and bitter taste. He'd learned to anticipate it from everyone around him, at all times. And sadly, no one had ever disappointed him by being above it.
Never once.
Rather, they seemed to glory in stabbing him through his wounded heart as ruthlessly and viciously as possible.
And none more so than his own brother, who now stood before him in all of Max's sanctimonious and smug glory. Something that would have been galling had his brother been in his real and true dragon's body, but like this, in the guise of a man, the betrayal burned twice as deep.
And hurt all the more.
"Damn you, Maxis! Was it not enough you left Hadyn alone to die amongst the humans? Now you take my son, too!"
Maxis's hazel green eyes flared to gold, then to red as his anger ignited. "That's not fair! I did everything I could to save our brother. How dare you throw that in my face! I'd have given my life for his!"
"Bullshit! I should have strangled you the moment you crawled from your egg!"
Grabbing him by the throat, Max shoved him back against the wall of the stone room where Falcyn had thought to meet his son, but now instead found himself barred forever from the realm his child called home.
Because of Max! The flesh of his flesh.
His worst nightmare.
Max's eyes showed the depths of his own despair. "I wish you had, brother. I wish you had."
His brother's agony scorched Falcyn, but not as much as his own misery that ate him whole and left him bereft of anything save utter despair. Damn him for caring about Max's feelings when it was obvious that his brother didn't give one shit for his. Tears blinded him. "Maddor was all I had in this world. How could you!"
A tic started in Max's jaw as he stepped away. "I had no choice. Dammit, Falcyn! Be reasonable. The Adoni plan to use you as a tool. Nothing more. They bred a hybrid child with you, without your knowledge or consent, and you're fine with this?"
"Igraine was to be my wife!"
"Igraine is a faithless whore. An Adoni sorceress who has killed two husbands before you ... think you that she'd spare you her treachery?"
"As you have?"
Max drew back as if he'd hit him, but he must have rethought that stupidity. Because they both knew that Max would never survive a real fight with Falcyn. "If she truly loved you, brother, my spell on your child wouldn't have mattered to her, would it?"
Nay, it wouldn't. The truth was an even more bitter pill to swallow.
And for that, he hated Max most of all. Because now he knew for an indisputable fact that he was every bit as unlovable as his dearest mother had proclaimed him to be upon his arrival into this hateful existence.
Max drew a ragged breath. "We were cursed from our births, and well you know it. The gods spurned us and our mothers abandoned us. The only hope your son has is that if he is more man than drake, he won't come under their fire ... or notice. Or control."
"That wasn't for you to decide!"
"And you should have never allowed yourself to be used by the Adoni. You know the laws of magick the same as I. For this ... some debt will be collected."
Falcyn winced at another truth he didn't want to face. "I was to protect him from it. Now..." He gestured at the veil that separated this world from the one where Igraine had taken their child to raise him out of his reach and care. There was nothing he could do for his son. So long as Maddor lived in his mother's fey realm, Falcyn couldn't get to him. Not even his powers were that great. "Never, ever speak to me again, Maxis. I'm done with you."
Returning to his dragon's body, he spread his wings, intending to fly.
"Careful of your ultimatums, brother. Like magick, they come with a terrible bite."
Falcyn shot a burst of flame toward him. "And so do I, Max! So do I!"
1
"Remi! You can't kill Daimons at the front door!" Dev Peltier shot across the main bar floor of Sanctuary at a dead run, with his wolfwere brother-in-law Fang Kattalakis hot on his heels.
"Sure I can," his identical brother snarled in his earpiece. "Watch me!"
Dreading the scene of his shapeshifting lookalike ripping the heart out of a demon on the busy streets of New Orleans underneath a closed-circuit police camera, Dev considered teleporting to stop the coming disaster, but that would only worsen this fiasco.
And guarantee them both some special quality time in a high-security government lab someplace where they'd never be seen or heard from again.
He and Fang barely reached the open front door in time to grab the tall, muscled mountain that sometimes passed as a human being before Remi ate the petite blonde standing nonchalantly under the outside streetlight.
And that bastard fought them with everything he had as they pulled him back from his would-be victim. A victim who didn't appear the least bit concerned that she'd narrowly escaped certain death at the hands of a savage bear-human-beast.
Remi even bit Dev in the shoulder as he struggled against them.
"Dammit!" Dev snarled. "You better have had your rabies shot, boy!"
Growling in that unique way that only a shapeshifting bear could, Remi continued to try and throw them off so that he could reach the woman, who still hadn't moved.
In fact, the Daimon yawned. Then checked her watch and manicure as if the entire event left her bored out of her mind. "Can I go in now? You two have him leashed, right?"
Fang's jaw d
ropped at her nonchalant tone. "You know, Medea, given what happened the last time a bunch of you showed up here, you've got a lot of nerve."
"'Course I do. It's what makes me the bad guy. And I'm told my half brother's upstairs, playing poker with your little brother. So if you don't mind..." She headed inside as if she didn't have a bar full of shapeshifters who'd love to make her their late-night snack.
Remi continued to curse them both. "They killed Maman and Papa! How could you let her waltz into our bar like that?"
Dev kept his brother in place with his forearm across Remi's throat. "Because if you harm one hair on her head, we'll lose our sanctuary license again. Think of your nieces and nephews and the danger you'd be putting them in!"
The last time they'd lost their license, Sanctuary had been razed and they'd lost their parents and several good friends.
Remi's gaze fell to Fang, and Dev knew that had finally reached through his brother's temporary insanity and need for blood vengeance. Their sister--Fang's wife--had just given birth to a son and daughter. And Dev's own wife was pregnant after having given up her immortality so that they could start a family of their own. Last thing any of them wanted was to risk enemies crashing the gate and burning Sanctuary to the ground.
Again.
Above all, they had to maintain their limani standing so that no shapeshifter or demon could war here. They'd all lost too much during the last battle that had shattered their family. Now, they had even more to lose.
Finally, the fire went out in Remi's eyes as he stopped struggling against them.
"We good?"
Remi nodded.
Releasing him, Dev stepped back to eye Fang. "So what idiot put hothead on the door tonight?"
Fang cast him a disgruntled glare. "I be said idiot. Thank you very much. Thought he was you. Could one of your bastards cut your hair so that I can tell you apart?"
Dev rolled his eyes. Then pointed to the double bow-and-arrow tattoo on his biceps. "I do have one mark that distinguishes me from the other idiots I'm blood related to, you know?"
Fang scoffed while Remi started for the door.
"Hey, hey!" Dev caught his arm. "What'cha thinking, punkin?"
"That Maman should have eaten you when you were whelped. Or at least before you were weaned."
Dev snorted. "You can't go in there and start a fight with her. Need I remind you there's a shit-ton of human tourists in that bar and Max is a bit preoccupied tonight with his dragonswan. That boy ain't been up for air in days, so we can't count on him to help us out with mind-wiping the humans in the event they see something they shouldn't."
Remi's nose twitched in that way that said he was hell-bent for blood. "Can't his brother mind-wipe them, then?"
Good question. Falcyn might have the same powers as Max. Then again, he might not. Even if he did, there was no guarantee he'd use them, as helping others wasn't exactly the surly dragon's priority. "No idea. You want to ask Falcyn?" That shapeshifting bastard was the only creature alive with a worse attitude than Remi.
Unless you counted the former Dark-Hunter Zarek. Though to be honest, Dev would run Falcyn up against Z any day. Thrice on Sundays.
Proof to the point? Remi backed down immediately at the thought of speaking to Falcyn, and that was something his brother never did.
"I'm going to go watch her," Remi grumbled before he headed inside.
Dev growled low in the back of his throat as he met Fang's irritated smirk. "I know. Dev, go watch your brother."
"And find me someone else to guard the door."
"Where's your ear p..." Dev's voice trailed off as he remembered that one of Aimee's favorite things was to nibble Fang's ears in the back room when no one else was around. Disgusted with the thought of his baby sister touching anything male in a sexual way, he grimaced. "Never mind. I'll grab Cherif. You can't miss him. He's the one who looks like me, but isn't."
"That could also be Quinn."
"Don't remind me." It was hell to be one of four identical quads. Only Aimee and the Dark-Hunter Acheron had ever been able to tell them apart.
And Dev's wife, Sam. She'd never once confused him with his brothers, which was one of many reasons he loved her.
"Double time, Bear!" Fang snapped. "Don't need your brother starting some shit while we've got humans around to witness it!"
Letting out a bear growl in his throat, Dev went to find Remi before the bear really did eat the Daimon, and start another war they didn't need to fight.
*
Medea screwed her face up at all the humans in the dark, noisy bar as they swayed to the music of the house band of shapeshifters they'd ironically named The Howlers. Gah, how she hated them all. Though to be honest, it would be quite a feast for her should she choose to indulge, not that she needed their blood to feed--unlike the others of her kind.
For her, it was just fun payback....
More tempted than she ought to be, she forced herself to ignore all the throats that would be so easy to rip open and searched for her half brother's familiar face. Though she and Urian were technically enemies who fought on opposite sides of this war, he was still one of the few people she considered her friend.
Right now, she had dire news he needed to hear.
"Hey, baby! You looking for me?"
Medea curled her lip at the cheesy come-on line. Worse? The filthy human stank of cheap alcohol and some cologne he must have bought off a clearance drugstore aisle. "Out of my way."
"Ah, now, why you want to do me like that, baby? Be nice and stay for a bit." He put a rough grip on her arm to hold her by his side.
Laughing, she bit her lip seductively. "Sugar, you have no idea what I really want to do with you...."
His eyebrows shot north. "Oh yeah?"
"Ummm-hmmm." She stepped into his arms as she dreamed of gutting him on the floor.
An instant later, he was snatched back and shaken like a dog would do to its favorite toy. "Take a hike."
The human started to attack, until he caught sight of the man who'd grabbed him. That took every bit of bluster out of him, and he quickly dashed away.
Not that Medea blamed him. This Were-Hunter was huge, even by their inhuman standards. Tall. Well muscled. His caramel skin would make any woman's mouth water. And to her instant horror, she wasn't immune to his charms.
In fact, she was strangely breathless as her gaze went to a pair of silvery blue eyes that practically glowed. Between that and his black hair, she'd almost think him a Dream-Hunter. Indeed, his powers were strong enough to be godlike.
The air around her was rife with them. It crackled in a way that was reminiscent of Acheron Parthenopaeus--an Atlantean god who pretended to be a Dark-Hunter for reasons only he knew. More than that, she couldn't even tell what breed this particular Were-Hunter belonged to. Bear, wolf, bird, lion, leopard, panther, tiger, dragon, jaguar, cheetah, or jackal. He was that powerful.
"What are you?"
Falcyn felt an odd half smile curve his lips. A rare, rare thing for him. But then it'd been a long time since he'd seen a morsel as tasty as this one. Her white-blond hair was an unusual shade, but natural. And it contrasted sharply with her black eyes.
And she wasn't just a Daimon. There was something a lot stronger inside her. Something he could taste and smell. The scent of it was like honey to his tongue.
"Hungry," he whispered.
She actually rolled her eyes and stepped around him.
A sound rumbled out of him that was even more rare than his smile. So rare, in fact, that it took him a few seconds to realize it was a laugh.
No one had ever been so dismissive of him. Mostly because he ate those idiots and picked his teeth with their bones. And before he even realized what he was doing, he was after her.
She paused in the crowd to turn around and glare at him. "Oh, I see. You're a dog. Well, Fido, I'm sure there are some nice little humans over at the bar who'd like to take you home and pet you. I'm not one of them. So go on, boy." She c
licked her tongue like a human would do their pet or a stray they were trying to get rid of. "Go on! Shoo!"
As she started to leave, Falcyn licked his lips. "So you're the queen bitch of the Daimons. They told me you were something else. But how many of them know you have demon blood inside you?"
She quirked a brow at his question, then gave him an insidious smile that made his cock jerk. "Before or after I kill them?" Her gaze narrowed as she swept a gimlet stare over him that said she was sizing him up for battle. "And you're wrong about my title. The queen would be my mother."
"Then what would that make you?"
"Daddy's most precious little girl."
He belly-laughed. Something that made every Were-Hunter near them step back and gape.
That finally took some of the bluster out of her, as she caught sight of their uncharacteristic reservation.
And fear. Especially since they never feared anything.
Except him. Yeah, he was that dangerous.
"Who are you?" she asked with a note of reservation in her voice.
"Wrong question."
"How so?"
"It's not so much who am I ... as what am I."
Medea felt a tremor of fear finally roll down her spine. "You're not one of them, are you?" The Were-Hunters had been created aeons ago by the king of Arcadia in a desperate attempt to save the lives of his sons from a curse placed upon their mother's race by the Greek god Apollo--Medea's own grandfather. Seeking to elongate the lives of his sons, the king had bargained with a Sumerian god to magically splice their DNA with animals.
It'd worked, and the Sumerian god and Arcadian king had created two races of shapeshifters. Those who held human hearts, called Arcadians--human in their base forms, they could take animal form--and the Katagaria, who had animal hearts and were able to shift into humans.
The "man" in front of her shook his head slowly to indicate that he fell into neither group. As he said, he was something else entirely.
Yet he bore the scent of a Katagari warrior. An animal at heart and in base form. She knew the raw, preternatural musk that permeated their breed. It was unlike anything else in the world. And though tinged with something else, it was unmistakable.
This wasn't a man she was dealing with, but a creature of immense power.
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