Blood Enchantment

by Tamara Rose Blodgett

  Pretty awkward. “And this Redemptive craziness?”

  “Stop the vehicle,” Laz says in a powerful voice.

  “What about the demonic, Praile?” Talia asks in a strained voice, her eyes bouncing between them and the road.

  “Pull. Over.”

  Tahlia's mouth becomes a slash in her pretty face as she jerks the wheel. The car slams into the soft shoulder.

  She shoves the gearshift into park and turns around, gripping the back of the driver's seat. “You will show me respect, horned one, or I will become an eagle in the time you take your next breath and pluck the beak from your face.”

  Laz leans forward, nearly nose to nose with Tahlia. “And I shall suck your soul in one gulp, bird or no.”

  They glare at each other.

  “Guys,” Tessa interrupts their combative posturing. “Totally not helping. And Praile is probably really cranked.” Definitely. “Let's get things discussed and find a safe place. And ditch this car while we're at it—kind of conspicuous.” What with the built-in AC for the lack of door.

  Laz exhales in disgust, dismissing Tahlia.

  Great. That's all I need is those two at each other's throats. Tessa wonders how she acquired a rebellious whelp Lanarre and a demonic. How does this shit keep happening to me?

  Lunatic life, that's how.

  Laz turns to face her, his intense eyes trapping her. “You are my chosen one. The prophetical Redemptive.”

  Tessa represses the urge to smile. “I think you mentioned that when we were sucking face.”

  “What!” Tahlia shrieks in surprise.

  Laz lifts his chin. “Silence, Lanarre.”

  “I will kill you,” Tahlia huffs, her iolite-colored eyes flashing.

  “Negative,” Tessa says, shooting her a “shut up” glance.

  “You will try,” Laz murmurs.

  Tessa grunts. “You're sure immature for a big bad demonic.”

  Laz leans forward, capturing her jaw in a hand that could crush her. Strength thrums through his capable fingers. “I am more evil than anything you could dream up in the vastness of your thought process.”

  Tessa's blood runs hot, surfacing over her entire body and tingling insanely where his touch lingers. She fights rubbing against him like a cat with its favorite perch. “If you're so evil,” Tessa whispers, “then why do you feel so good?”

  Laz's forehead tips to meet hers, their breath mingling.

  Holy hot tamale. Cinnamon sweet and yum. Tessa's suddenly dizzy.

  “That is the question you must answer. I know what the Redemptive means to me. I will stop at nothing to protect you. You are the most cherished discovery a high demon of mixed heritage can hope for.”

  “Wait a second.” Tessa pulls away. And like releasing yourself from warm bathwater, it’s a shock to the system, an unpleasant withdrawal.

  Oh I’m in such deep shit.

  “Are you saying—what are you?”

  Laz shakes his head. It's hard to think when his thumb is moving over the pulse in her throat like a feathery whip of fire.

  “Tessa, I don't like this,” Tahlia says, warily staring at Laz.

  “Me, either,” Tessa answers softly. But Laz did save her—them. He deserves to say his piece.

  Laz lifts a muscular shoulder, and Tessa's breath catches at the recognition of how wonderfully put together he is.

  Wait—maybe all this bullshit “pull” is nothing more than heat. How long had it been since I was in heat anyway?

  Laz jerks her out of her thoughts. “I do know that I am high demon. But the other species is anyone's guess. Demonic is always primary—as angelic is.”

  “But you're a Healer?” Tessa asks, trying to shake off the image of humping a certain red guy.

  “Yes.”

  “What species can do that?” Maybe they can employ simple deduction and figure out what brand of Heinz 57 Laz is.

  “Many. Fey, Singers, some vampire—mostly, they all can. Though pure demonic cannot.”

  “What do I have to be in order to be your Redemptive?” Tessa asks, without bothering to censor her suspicious tone, though she can't deny there's a powerful connection.

  “We would have to be of the same blood.”

  Gah. Tessa pulls a face. “Ooh. Like related?”

  Laz grins suddenly, and the light expression is so different than his typical somberness that Tessa automatically laughs. “No, we are not of close blood—like blood.”

  “I am pure Were,” Tessa says matter-of-factly. That solves that.

  Laz shakes his head, his irises back to the soft pale hue Tessa connects with everything being okay. “No supernatural is pure. Anciently, we were one species.” He knits his hands to illustrate his point. “Excepting the angelic and demonic, all the other supernaturals were as one. Then inexplicably, there was a fracture, and the species became separate. Now we have what we have.”

  “In your theory—”

  “Fact.”

  Tessa groans. “Anyway, if it were true, how do we figure out what I am.”

  “That Were knows what you are, and he wants you.”

  “Tramack wants me because he's psycho.” Tessa rolls her eyes heavenward.

  Tahlia snickers.

  Laz shoots her a long-suffering look. His attention shifts back to Tessa. “He wants you because he somehow senses your specialness.”

  Two decades of chasing her does seem excessive. All those sleepless nights of wondering why he couldn't just find a passive little woman and have a litter of little Tramack’s didn't escape her thought process.

  “So what is our mutual blood?”

  “Does it matter?” Laz asks.

  At the end of the day, probably not.

  “What do you get out of her being your Redemptive?” Tahlia asks suspiciously.

  What if I don't want to be a Redemptive?

  Laz says, “That's simple—I don't go back to Hades. Ever. I am free.”

  Ah.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Drek

  “I smell her everywhere,” Drek comments, lifting his palm off the forest floor. He brushes his hands off on the athletic pants so typical of what his kind wear during wolfen form.

  Even though shifting is simple for a Lanarre werewolf, there is nothing simple about maintaining the form. All forms require excessive energy without the full moon. For the common among his kind, a full change is only possible at the moon's zenith.

  Bowen tips his head in the direction that they both scent the escaped Tahlia. Drek shouldn't allow hope of finding her. Scent-tracking doesn't mean anything except that she was alive when she moved through this area. By some miracle, Tahlia survived a massacre by an unhinged Alpha Were.

  It's up to Drek to recover Tahlia and protect her from any future challenges.

  “Drek,” Bowen calls in a low voice.

  “Wait—” Drek's brows come together. His ears are sensitive, and elongated in his wolfen form. They fold forward slightly, and he stills.

  Far off to the east, noises of conflict reach him—a particular kind of conflict. Violence.

  He lifts his nose to the sky. The moon rolls over the horizon as though called by him. It is waxing to full.

  He notices Bowen is studying him, reading the subtle tells of his face. “Drek, the moon's call is weak.”

  His eyes move to Bowen's, spinning silver in his head. “Do not tell me what call I can or cannot answer. I am a Lanarre prince.”

  “Fine—fuck it. It'll hurt like a bitch.”

  “It will. But I can find Tahlia faster if I become my beast.”

  “That means I have to shift.”

  “Do not.”

  “Right—and be known as the shittiest guard that ever howled? I'm royal enough, Drek. I've got some of that righteous blueblood of the Lanarre, too.”

  Drek looks away, throwing his shoulders back.

  His fur ripples as he seizes the barest voice of the moon's call. It's a whisper.

  But Drek is La
narre, and that is enough.

  His skull splits first. He can't fight the pain of a shift this far from the moon's siren, and his body slumps, knees hitting the soft undergrowth of pine needles, moss, and leaves.

  Vaguely, he senses Bowen's shift to his right. The other Were’s change will hurt even more, for he does not possess enough of the royal blood to shift without a high degree of pain.

  Saliva strings dangle from his mouth as a double row of canines sprout like knives inside his mouth. Drek's shriek of agony is a garbled wail. He falls to his side, his chest heaving. He whimpers as brutally sharp, short talons erupt from his legs.

  Dew claws for vertical climbing, absent in mundane Lycan, push through the back of his legs. Powerful, with their own specially designed talons, they hurt like wisdom teeth breaking through in a human mouth.

  Drek doesn't feel wise; he aches to his very molecules.

  Lastly, his ears and eyes explode like spoiled fruit. Drek lies in the soupy gore of his own change, blind and momentarily deaf, while his vision comes to him in shades of gray. Stages of clarity gradually form into a crystal-clear acuity of a full shift.

  Drek lies still. The seconds pile up to minutes. The noise of animals breathing reach his acute hearing.

  The smell of a bird shitting a mile from his position causes his nose to stir. He lifts his muzzle off the richly scented, lichen-laden forest carpet and staggers to his feet.

  With a mighty shake of his body, his fur fluffs out, shaking away the miserable remnants of his wolfen form.

  Drek raises his snout, testing the air and sighting Bowen.

  He is sleeping in the muck of his change.

  Drek grins with the mouth of his wolf. He looks to the moon, somewhere between three quarters to full, and howls a singing praise of thanks.

  One must always thank the source of one's power.

  Especially a Lanarre.

  *

  Drek had to wait for Bowen to come to himself, then suffer through his complaint of the wretchedness of changing that far from the moon's fullness. Drek reminded him that they were lucky they had the ability.

  He gave Drek a sour look.

  When that bit was finally accomplished, they trotted to where the scent of Tahlia burnt his nostrils. There is no scent beyond him while he is a werewolf.

  “A terrible wonder” some Lanarre call the absurdly refined olfactory senses of the royal Lycans.

  Drek's extreme case of nose makes him a supreme tracker. Many of the Lanarre believe his skills are wasted because he is a prince, and as such, nothing is required of him but the making of new little princes.

  Drek considers that role to be extremely tiresome.

  Yet, he has told no one, though he believes Bowen suspects how much he would like to change the archaic laws that have been in place for over a thousand years.

  New challenges hasten the need for responses that are different than the canned protocol that has become ineffective—such as the arranged match between he and Tahlia, a young woman he has never met.

  It is his secret, and his alone. But he has no wish to mate someone with whom he has no kinship. She is his chosen—but not his beloved. He would free her from this obligation if he could, and he often wonders if she feels similarly.

  He endeavored to speak with her, ascertain her thoughts. That was before.

  Before the merciless killing of her guardians. Before her survival became paramount.

  No. He will find Tahlia and secure her safety. Then, and only then, will he see to her assimilation into the Lanarre.

  Of course, that presumption is met with a dozen thoughts of what that could mean to her.

  Tahlia might become an outcast if the others believe he rejected her because of some perceived imperfection.

  Drek is sure that she is perfect. Lanarre royalty have been deliberately bred to personify the perfect physical characteristics of the Lycan.

  He's also sure that she is barely out of whelphood and not perfect for him. Tahlia is a good choice as a mate because she is of pure royal blood, as pure as his own.

  And she is a wereshifter—a rare trait. That very thing undoubtedly saved her from the murderous, crazed Alpha whose scent he now owns.

  The royal families of all the Lanarre families have been aligned for hundreds of years. It's time to change that and give males and females of royal blood a chance to choose whomever they want.

  “Are you going to be okay?” Bowen growls. Though his vocals are a series of yips and soft barks to those who are not Were, for Drek, it is as refined as his human speech.

  Drek is able to hear Bowen's sarcasm a mile away, and he glares at his trusted guard. His return barks are also soft, nearly inaudible.

  “I'm in my head, Bowen.”

  “I see that.”

  Drek would love to seek his council. If there were retribution for his beliefs, which are not in keeping with Lanarre law, it is better that Bowen doesn't know them. Drek can admit that Bowen is more friend than guard. So he will shoulder the burden alone.

  Drek could have sent an entire contingent to track Tahlia when she did not arrive at the preordained time. But what kind of prince would I be if I’m unwilling to not find my own chosen? Drek has always felt strongly that his role as prince requires him to lead by example. Strong leadership through acts are more powerful than words. Every time.

  He will retrieve the sacred chosen—his chosen—and work out his internal struggles from there. Her safety is paramount.

  Bowen yips, and Drek turns toward where his large snout points.

  Drek knows he cannot truly frown in this form, but he does frown.

  They've come to an open glade. A large late-nineteenth-century manse rises from a knoll like a jewel of architecture. To the northerly position sits a huge red barn, though Drek doubts livestock have graced the inside of the structure in a long time, if ever. It does not scent of animals in the last fifty years.

  In human form, Drek would have laughed at the expression Bowen's wolf gives. But humor is in short supply. Bowen swings his massive face toward the structures and gives a soft yip. His eyes rotate so quickly, they're spinning coins of molten silver. His coat is gray, like Drek's, but Drek retains the inky tips of royalty.

  The two move cautiously closer.

  They've entered a loud ruckus—the same one he'd heard some miles back, before they changed. Drek scents Bowen's intent, and with a snuffle of acquiescence, they trot with well-trained unity, seamlessly parting and running in mirrored semi-circles around where a horned one lies writhing in the dirt.

  Another is beside him.

  An Alpha.

  Drek scents deeply of him, smelling many things, but not the scent he most wishes for. It's both a disappointment and a relief. It would not end well for this Alpha if he had smelled of Tahlia.

  The fragrance that rises most quickly is the foreign Alpha's injury, but underneath that, the certain stirrings of insanity lurk like rancid liquid from garbage gone bad.

  Bowen gives Drek uneasy eyes from across the yard, where he is positioned in the shadow of the barn. Insanity is a real problem with older Alpha's. There is usually a catalyst for the origin, but once it begins, it can spiral into true lunacy.

  Their spinning orbs regard each other.

  What has happened here? They seem to silently ask each other.

  The demonic holds his cock in an attempt to stem the flow of inky blood that pours forth.

  Drek's tongue hangs from his mouth. The injury is fitting for one of that kind. His keen eyes shift to the Were on the ground, intestines littering the sparse gravel driveway.

  Deep grooves speak of a large vehicle leaving in haste—recently, by the scent.

  The smell of injury, death, and fear permeate the area. And Tahlia's scent is mingled throughout.

  Someone will answer for this.

  Drek lowers his head, growling softly. The demonic and Were raise their heads, spotting him. They do not see Bowen.

  Drek leaps
, closing the distance.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Julia

  Julia believes that fear about her first time—anxiety over the unknown—would otherwise have been present.

  But with Scott, it's not.

  The soul-meld is a drug. Feelings of ease coat her body in languid calmness, and Julia submits to the ocean of instinct that permeates every cell of her body.

  Scott lies beside her, trailing his fingers lightly over the slope of her naked side. His fingertips hesitate where her waist narrows to a valley, then he moves on, his fingers barely skating the hill of her hip.

  His fingers spread on the bone, warming her to the core.

  “Do you feel forced?” Scott asks softly, his normal intensity dialed down.

  “No,” she replies quietly, looking away. Her hair sweeps forward, partially blocking her view.

  Scott tucks the wayward strands behind her ear, tilting her face to his with a finger. “Don't, Julia.”

  Her eyes move back to his. She studies the deep-chocolate irises. Steady, commanding, they are filled with desire.

  “Don't what?” she whispers, but she knows. She can feel it through their connection, grown taunt with the coming event—the solidification of what they were always meant to be.

  “Think,” he whispers and softly kisses the tip of her nose.

  A sigh slides out of Julia, loosening that last bit of tension. “I haven't—God, I sound so stupid.”

  Scott presses his finger to her lips. “I know. It's what all the damn fuss has been about. The virginity thing.”

  Julia nods, her cheeks burning. “I've been really intimate before.”

  Scott's dark brows lock together.

  Julia smooths them with a finger. “I'm sure there's been other women for you Scott, so get over yourself.”

  His smile is tight. “Now that I have you, there certainly wouldn't have been. I'm not a monk. But for you, I will be everything you need.”

  Julia holds her lip between her teeth as his words reverberate to her toes. So many emotions riot inside her: inadequacy, guilt, and excitement.