The Legends of Regia Box Set: The Complete Series. Books 1-7
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Forbidden Forest
Copyright © 2012 by Tenaya Jayne
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced without the written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, names, incidents, organizations, and dialogue are the products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.
ISBN-13: 978-0-9882757-1-3
ISBN-10: 0988275716
Edited by Finish The Story
Second edition proofread by T.K.
Cover art by Erika Doucesse
Cold Fire Publishing LLC
Dedicated in loving memory of
Robert and Opal.
I miss you.
Contents
Forbidden Forest
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
The End
Forest Fire
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Epilogue
The End
Verdant
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
The End
Dark Soul
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
The End
Burning Bridges
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Chapter Twenty Two
Chapter Twenty Three
Chapter Twenty Four
Epilogue
The End
Blood Lock
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
The End
Lightning Flower
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-five
Epilogue
The End
Acknowledgments
Prologue
Austin, Texas
Where shall you go, daughter of Austin? It’s Friday night and you’re ready to hit the clubs in your new mile high shoes and push up bra. You walk down the sidewalk as though it were the runway, with your girlfriends in tow behind you. Where shall it be? Will you stick with the familiar on 6th St.? Or will you saunter over to Red River? You feel your power over the opposite sex as they ogle you as you pass. Maybe you’ll meet Mr. Right tonight or a suitable Mr. Right now. You set your sights on some familiar stomping ground, thinking it’s as good as any, but wait. . . What’s this? You and your girls feel the pull of the doors to your left. You look up at the sign hanging low over your head: The Portal. You can feel the beat of the music in the sidewalk under your feet. The vibrations going up the heels of your stilettos are pleasantly buzzing your feet.
The cool air welcomes you in out of the humid summer night. You feel it instantly, some sense of otherworldliness. The place is packed, and the energy of the people dancing is palpable and intoxicating. The spinner, positioned royally above the crowd, breaks your heart with his unnatural amount of masculine beauty. Why have you never heard of this place? Your girlfriends flow onto the dance floor, but you hesitate. Wanting to get the full picture, you back up slowly until your back hits the wall.
There is nothing out of place, nothing to cause you alarm, but you have an unspoken innate knowledge of the strangeness of this place. This club has secrets. You think you are alone in the shadows, pressed up against the wall, when you turn your head to the side. A woman is standing very close to you, looking at you, silently. Your eyes widen, and your mouth gapes as you stare rudely back at her.
Never in your life, not in a movie, or a doctored picture have you seen eyes like hers. Layer upon layer of shades of green, laced with minute veins of gold, and fanned with lashes of deepest ebony. Her eyes seem too big to be real. You’d deal with the devil for a pair of your own. You can’t even register anything else about her appearance except you know that she is exquisitely beautiful. Now the power you felt earlier drains away. You feel plain next to her.
“Go on,” her voice is both gentle and seductive.
You look back at the dance floor and feel an overwhelming pull to join the crowd, but not before you look once again into those eyes. Turning back to the woman, you find she has gone, as quickly and silently as though she vanished into thin air . . . maybe she did.
Chapter 1
Forest pressed her back against the cool concrete wall, wanting to remain aloof from the entity of the crowd. She chose her position in the shadows, out of the paths of the roving, multi-colored spotlights. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the feeling of the undulating human pheromones flying around on the air. At the beginning of every shift, she allowed herself a few minutes of this alien/human experience, though she didn't fully comprehend the combination of dancing, drinking, and ear-breaking sound waves. They loved it, however, and never seemed to deviate from the recipe.
These were the people she was sworn to protect. She had developed a light affection for the human race and considered them a benign, if not slightly silly, bunch of creatures. Her religious passion for her job was rooted in hatred of that which harmed the humans, not a superhero tendency to protect the weak.
Forest opened her eyes and focused all her senses to sniff out the illegal suckers that tried to sneak through the portal. She was in the zone tonight, and not for the first time did she feel that hers was the best job in existence. It was a shame she couldn’t legally kill suckers in her native world.
Over the next two hours, Forest didn’t move from the wall. She monitored the light traffic through the portal: two shifters and one elf, each of which nodded to her respectfully as they passed. Yawn. The shifters left the club to enjoy the delights of Austin’s nightlife elsewhere.
The elf would have been breaking Regia’s law had he left the club, but he dutifully seated himself at the bar and ordered a fuzzy navel. He wore a plaid, porkpie hat, pulled down over the tops of his pointed ears. Forest didn’t know him personally, but she had seen him in here before. The bartender surveyed him with narrowed eyes as the elf nervously tugged his hat down further and ordered a few more girly cocktails.
Intent on making sure that not one sucker was able to sneak past her, Forest was blindsided by the drunk bubba who had been trying to catch her eye for the last twenty minutes. He had finally decided to stagger over to hit on her.
“Hey babe, you’re too beautiful to look so lonely. How’s ‘bout I buy you a drink?”
“How’s ‘bout I call you a cab instead?” Forest mimicked his drawl.
“Only if you share it with me, Darlin.” He leaned in closer, and Forest’s throat began to sting from the noxious fume of booze mixed with his natural musk.
“While I appreciate the offer, Jethro, it seems only right to inform you that I’m not actually attractive at all. If you leaned in a little closer, you’d see that you’ve fallen victim to the effect of beer goggles. A hag like me can’t take advantage of a stud like you.”
As he leaned in, Forest instantly enlarged her nose, pockmarked her skin, evaporated her front teeth, and added a large black mole with a long hair sprouting from it for good measure.
“You’re no hag, baby! You’re the sexiest little thing in…I…uh…" He stumbled backward. “Good grief! Sorry, sorry…” he stammered, retreating. “I’ve gotta quit drinking,” he mumbled as he turned away.
Forest chuckled to herself once he absorbed back into the crowd. Being a shape shifter sometimes had unusual perks. Once her nose was clear of his funk, she refocused her senses on her job and reconstructed her face.
The club’s activity peaked at 1:30 AM. People filtered in and out. The music grew a little louder, the humans a little drunker, the smell a little fouler, and Forest grew a little bored. The night seemed to be shaping up into a frustrating nothingness. She sighed, feeling the weight of her favorite .45 Magnum against her back. She was itching to get her gun off. She hadn’t killed a sucker all month; it was messing up her average.
The worst blackguard on both sides of the portal, sauntered into the compass of Forest’s senses. Her nostrils flared and her spine stiffened.
Leith.
The fight or flight instinct kicked in. Pulse, adrenaline, breathing, and sweat all accelerated through her body. Her mind banished all reason as her body began to quiver with the possibility of taking him down. Leith. Reason might have been useful to Forest at this moment, but this was the fight she was constitutionally incapable of backing down from.
Her hands began to tingle at the thought of pointing her weapon at him, pulling the trigger, and blasting a hole through his black heart. Her lips curved into a full-on Cheshire cat smile as she envisioned standing victorious over his dead body.
It had to be a coincidence. Leith wouldn’t come through her portal unless he was looking for her specifically. That thought made her grind her teeth together. He hadn’t sought her out in a long time. No, it had to be coincidence. He didn’t know her schedule, and the last time she had seen him, he didn’t even know the location of her post. Not that he couldn’t find that out if he wanted to go digging.
She stood motionless in the shadows, watching him move through the dancing crowd toward the exit. She admired that he didn’t slink or attempt conceal himself. Leith merely walked through the crowd as though he owned the world.
She checked herself. Bastard. She hated his arrogance, always had.
Oh, if only this could be the night she triumphed over him. If only she could confront him with her sword and not a gun.
Leith had the sense to go out the back door, which led into the alley. The second the door shut behind him, Forest bolted from the wall, swiftly snaking through the crowd. The alley was long and extremely dark. As soon as she stepped outside and the door closed at her back, she used her elfish power and disappeared. Leith turned around abruptly. His ice-colored eyes looked right through her. He pulled in a deep breath through his nose, but the dumpster next to her masked her scent. His pale eyes darted back and forth, and he sniffed the air a second time before turning back to the looming street ahead. Forest followed a few paces behind. Leith’s attire suggested that he was trying to look like a 1960’s greaser. Maybe his only reference to a human male was James Dean.
People and cars passed on the street ahead, under the weak protection of the street lamps. Protocol dictated that she make her presence known, state the law he was breaking, give him a chance to return through the portal with a mark on his record, or kill him if he resisted or ran. But this was Leith. If it was anyone but him, she would do what she was supposed to do.
Ten more yards, and he would reach the street. Although invisible, she was right on his heels and the stinky dumpster was now far behind.
Leith stopped and turned, an expression caught between a smile and a sneer on his face. He breathed deeply once more. A feral sound resonated from his chest. She didn’t move.
“Show yourself!” he commanded.
Forest’s solid form flashed against her will for a split second before disappearing again. Their eyes had locked. Leith lunged. Forest ducked too late. He scooped her off her feet and pinned her between his chest and the alley’s brick wall. She sighed and dropped the now pointless invisib
ility.
“Forest,” he growled. “I thought that was your scent. I don’t know if this is good or bad luck.”
She gave him a malevolent glare. “Bad.”
“Ha! I’m sure you think so, given the position of disadvantage you’re in.” Hungry heat flashed into his eyes, and he looked at her neck.
“Don’t even think about it!”
“Oh, but I do.” His voice turned to silk. “I think about it all the time. That’s how I know this must be good luck. I was thinking about it just today.”
Forest shivered with repulsion.
Leith noticed. "See now,” he whispered intimately. “See how you respond to me? You’ve missed me.”
He pressed his lips into the curve of her neck where the worst of her scars were. She felt bile rise in her throat. “Let go of me!” she growled.
He laughed, his breath falling across her skin. “In this relationship, I’m the one who commands. You’re the one who obeys.”
Forest squirmed, trying to reach her .45. He was so much taller than she was; her feet were hanging a good six inches off the ground. Leith pulled his face back from her neck to look in her eyes, and a mixture of emotions crossed his face. She had seen him look at her like that many times. Desire and hatred, envy and fear. She understood it.
“You’re packing, aren’t you?”
“I’m on duty,” she said. “Of course I’m packing.”
Leith tightened his grip on her. “Why don’t you just give in to me? Why do you insist on trying to kill me when you know you can’t?”
“I like to test my boundaries. I know I don’t need to remind you how close I came to killing you, not all that long ago.” When he grimaced, she smiled. “It must have left one hell of a scar. Can I see it?”
Leith bared his teeth. His glassy eyes were murderous. He pushed his forehead against hers until the back of her head pressed roughly to the wall. She knew he wanted to see her fear. Instead, Forest closed her eyes and let her body go limp.
After a second, Leith relaxed a fraction and pulled back from her face, only to move his mouth to her ear. “I’ll let you see it, Forest,” he breathed. “I know you really want to. I’ll forget about the Vampire RPG I was going to crash, and you can call your boss and head home early with me.”
Forest opened her eyes and smiled thinly at him. “Sure. Why not?”
Heat flashed in his eyes again, and he backed up and dropped her to her feet. Throughout all these years, she was still amazed at his stupidity. As soon as her arms were loose, she pulled her gun on him.