“When your wolves return from rutting,” Jamiason asked, “which side will your pack serve?”
“Yours.” Thamores assured him. “And it won’t be just my pack.” He hoped he wouldn’t regret the next promise. “I’ll call a council of the benandanti.”
“Those that you can find.” Jamiason reminded him. “Any idea where they are disappearing to?”
“None.” Thamores admitted. “It’s why I’ve decided to run with werewolves instead of my own kind. Hopefully, I’ll be over looked.”
“That, my friend,” Jamiason raised his hand and clapped Thamores on the bicep, “is an unlikely supposition.”
Thamores, not comfortable with compliments when they came from other males, responded with a cold, thin lipped smile.
-25-
Loki grinned at the babe in his arms.
He was a disturbingly ugly creature. Yet, at the same time, I believe Loki viewed him as the most beautiful baby that he had ever seen.
The child’s body was covered in light grey scales. There were darker scales that spiraled from the base of his hairline—which was made out of snakes rather than actual hair—at his right temple around his left eye and mouth to curl back to the right around his neck. This spiral continued through the entire breadth of his body to end at the heel of his left foot. As for his yellow eyes, they ran vertically along his face. His nose was little more than a small bump with two vertical slits on either side.
“What is he?” Loki raised his gaze and grinned at Lucias, who lay upon the birthing bed, watching him with guarded interest. “What can he do?”
“Other than you, Nol and I,” she smiled coyly, “anyone else who looks in his eyes will see their greatest fear.” Loki’s brow furrowed. I wondered how much will it took him not to admonish her for raising her husband’s name in that particular moment. “When they do so, if they are mortal, exiled or damned, they will turn to stone. If they are immortal, and still walk in Noliminan’s light, there is a potential they shall run mad.”
“Turn to stone?” Loki frowned at her. “And their soul?”
“Trapped in the statute of their body until someone chisels out their heart.” She chuckled. She was clearly amused by her antics. Loki, clearly, was not. “Then they can re-grow themselves to the fate that they would have been given by the manner of their lives.”
“Lucias.” Loki shook his head in disdain as he returned his gaze to the child in his arms. “What thoughts possess you to come up with such a creature?”
“As he breeds with other races the blood will dilute.” She replied to this as she reached for the baby’s hand. He cooed. As he did so, one of the serpents that made up his hair curled itself around her finger and began licking the tip of it with its black, forked tongue. “He will, of course, be the most powerful of his people. Necessarily, given once his mortal veil is lifted he will become a God.”
“Who, exactly,” Loki wondered aloud, “would breed with him?”
“He can rape his women if he must.” She shrugged.
Loki’s lips pursed and his nostrils flared.
“Not my son.” He groused at her. “This child will grow up knowing the difference between right and wrong.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. It was as if she were assessing him, wondering if he were judging her for her own behavior when she took what she wanted against another soul’s will.
“He will know from the cradle that, where a woman is concerned, a soft hand will ever be offered.”
“As you say, Loki.” She placated him. “He is, after all, your son.” She looked away as she said this. Loki didn’t mark this, but I, standing at the baby’s cradle, felt a sudden chill by this sudden coyness. “He has powerful blood running through his veins. He will have the ability to seduce that which he craves.”
Loki chuckled under his breath at that and shook his head. As he did so, he raised the babe to his lips and kissed the scales where his brow should have been. When he lowered the child, he turned his gaze to Lucias again and asked, “What shall we name him?”
“Gorgon.” She grinned.
“That’s a dragon’s name.” He scoffed.
“He has dragon in him.” She replied to that. “Mostly serpent. But aren’t dragons little more than giant serpents?”
“Depends on the type.” Loki corrected her.
“Gorgon.” She insisted. “It’s decided.”
“Thank you for allowing me to have my say on the matter.”
I doubt that he was angry. Gorgon is a strong, masculine name. In fact, this is the name of the very first dragon ever hatched. He was loved by all races until he fought in Lucias’ war. Then he, like all the other Gods who stood against Noliminan, was exiled to one world or the other and never heard from again.
The child could do with far worse a legacy.
“Gorgon it is.” Loki agreed.
“There is something that I must tell you.”
Loki looked up at her with abrupt swiftness as if he didn’t like her guarded tone. “What would that be?”
“Noliminan has demanded that Gorgon replaces Michael in the Quorum.” She said this so swiftly that I was uncertain I had heard her words as they had been meant to be said. “We’re to have Countenance come and see to his aging. My condition was that you and I raise him to manhood so we can influence him.”
“You agreed to this madness?” The anger within him was uncontainable. Had he not been holding the child in his hand, he would have exploded with it. As it was, he tempered himself long enough to stride across the room and set the babe in his cradle. When he no longer held Gorgon he rounded on her. “You agreed to gift my son to that monster?”
“He’s not a monster.” Lucias snapped, her eyes glowing with her displeasure that he would disparage her husband’s name. “I did it for Michael. We get him in exchange.”
“In exchange?” Loki ignored the fact that she had defended Noliminan. After everything that the King of Lords had done to him, personally, I suspect that was an extremely difficult thing for him to manage. “My son for Raziel’s?” His teeth clamped shut as he began violently shaking his head. “No. I will not gift him to that carvetek mouk.”
“I had no choice.” She leaned forward. “We can raise him. Noliminan has no use for him until he’s an adult.” Then, almost as if this were an afterthought, “And then we get Michael.”
“I don’t want Michael!” Loki roared at her. “I want my own son!”
“I had no choice!” She snapped at him. “Do you think I would have agreed if I had?”
He chose not to respond to that question.
“Michael is in trouble now.” She explained. “Today. We can interfere where Gorgon is concerned when you sit upon my throne.”
“If I sit upon your throne!” He cried. “Breeding a Quorum isn’t an assurance that I will be accepted as a King!”
“People love you, Loki!” She countered. “Everyone loves you. No one will challenge your claim!”
“Raziel will.” He reminded her. “As will your husband.”
She rolled her eyes and looked away. “I think of you as my husband as well.”
“Do you?” He seethed. “Because it seems to me that, if that were the case, this would have been a conversation rather than an order. Am I still nothing more to you than your servant? To bide your desires in your time? Is this what you are telling me?”
“You know that isn’t the case.” She frowned at him. “Loki, we can save Gorgon later. We need to save Michael now!”
“We need to save Metatron now!” He flared. “Or Azrael! Or Zadkiel! Or even Camael, for that matter!” He was infuriated with her for the first time since he had met her. “Michael is exiled, yes. And in a bad situation to be certain! But I’ve taken care of him and given him my protection already! If you had to trade my son for any one of your other children, Michael was not the one who needed your immediate aide!”
“He was the only one that Noliminan would trade for.” She sighed.
“Loki—this can be corrected once you are on my throne! You have to trust me.”
“Isn’t that all that I have ever done?” He seethed as he turned away from her and pulled his babe into his arms. “Trust you?”
He clearly needed to get as far from her as he could in that moment lest he do or say something he regretted. Though, he wasn’t about to leave his newborn child in her care given she had already traded him as a pawn.
Though I suspected he would come to understand, in his own time, he couldn’t bear to look on her traitorous face for a moment longer in that particular moment.
-26-
“Thank you.” Iladrul smiled at Sezja. As he did so, she flicked her eyes to her father.
He gave her an encouraging nod. Seeing this, she forced her own smile.
“You’re welcome, my Prince.”
Iladrul started. His eyes, which had, moments ago, been hopeful, were now sparkling with pleasure. His lips, which had worn a smile, now split into a toothy grin. Seeing him so, Sezja was helpless but to finally see the draw that Osete felt for the young prince.
“Will there be anything else?” She asked.
“Not tonight.” He smiled gently at her. “Unless you’d be interested in joining Osete and I at the kings’ board.”
Her brow furrowed slightly. “I’m not expert at the game.”
“Osete is.” His smile grew. “You can play as a team.”
Her eyes darted to her father. He was leaning slightly forward, biting his lips to suppress a smile. He gave her another encouraging nod.
Knowing that her father wanted this pairing, she forced herself to grant Prince Iladrul another smile. “Very well, my Prince. As long as the game is played fair.”
“Swear.” He raised his hand, kissed the tips of his fingers and held them toward her. It was a childish elfin gesture, given when a promise was made between friends, but it made her smile grow true.
“I’ll have Osete set up the board.” She said, before turning away from him and walking swiftly out of the tent.
As they ever were, her four brothers stood in a pack, waiting for her. Seeing them, she felt at peace. “Osete!”
He looked toward her, wearing a weary smile. She knew that he was jealous of the attention that Prince Iladrul gave her.
“He wants you to step up his kings’ board.” She told her brother. “You and I are to play as a team against him.”
“Sezja . . .” Macentyx began.
“It’s what Father wants.” She sighed.
“Father isn’t the one who’ll be pinned to the table.” Haidar spat. “Don’t put yourself in that situation!”
“I won’t let him rape her.” Osete snapped at his brothers. “Anyway, he wouldn’t. He’s not like that.”
“What do you know about what he’s like?” Haidar asked. “He’s clearly not interested in you.”
Osete flinched as if he’d been slapped.
“It’s my decision. And you all know that I can hold my own.” She reached for her hip and patted the dagger she kept there. Her brothers, all of them but for Osete, who stood glowering at his boots, grinned. “I’ll be safe enough.”
“Still,” Haidar mumbled, “we’ll be standing outside the tent. You need only call my name and I’ll be on him in a flash.”
“He won’t hurt her!” Osete snapped before spinning on his heel and storming away.
Sezja turned to Haidar and glared, “When are you going to learn not to berate his love interests?”
“Iladrul shouldn’t be his love interest.” Haidar seethed. “It’s unnatural and it’s disgusting.”
“He doesn’t know any better.” Macentyx shook his head. “Give it a rest, Haidar. He’s only falling back on a life’s worth of training.”
“That isn’t what this is about.” Javelin, who rarely ever commented on this particular subject, interjected with a soft tone. “He really does prefer . . . that. And, as his brothers,” he smiled apologetically at Sezja, “and sister,” she smiled in response, “instead of judging him, we need to see him through this. He truly seems to love Prince Iladrul and Prince Iladrul is never going to love him in return.”
Sezja sighed. Javelin was right. Prince Iladrul clearly had no bending toward other males. Not that she had seen, by any road.
“I’ll see to Osete.” She told her brothers. She turned away from them and waved over her back. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Call our names!” Haidar cried after her.
Raising her hand and waving it at him again, she followed after the brother who needed her.
-27-
Aiken started as Loki stormed into the apartment and toward the library. Rarely, in all of the years that he had been Loki’s friend, had he seen the God as angry as he seemed to be in that moment. Concerned, he rose to his feet and followed Loki, not bothering to knock given Loki hadn’t shut the door.
“I am little more than a stallion she means to stud.” He stormed at Ishitar, who was sitting by the fire reading. Ishitar looked up at him with an expression of guarded curiosity. “She gave my son to your father in exchange for Michael to serve on my Quorum!”
“For Michael?” Ishitar blinked.
He lowered the book and put it on the empty chair at his side.
“How many times has Metatron come to her and begged her succor?” Loki seethed. “But, yes. She chose Michael to trade.”
“What an odd move to have made.” Ishitar’s tone was thick with his discontentment. “He needs him. He can’t win a war without Michael.”
“This isn’t a war.” Loki growled. “It’s a Gods be damned game of kings’ castles!”
“And you are little more than a pawn.” Aiken braved. “The nymph set on the Oakland hillock for the purpose of taking out the Lady Regent and her followers.”
Loki rounded on him, glaring. He said nothing, however. There was nothing for him to say. Aiken had the right of things and all three of them knew it.
Instead, he turned to Ishitar. “I’m to give up my first rightful heir; my first child born out of a lover’s embrace.” He shook his head. “I can’t bear it.”
“You won’t have to give him up.” Ishitar muttered, his lips thinning. “We can fight for him later.”
“Your Gods be damned mother’s words!” Loki seethed.
“She was wrong.” Ishitar agreed. “But you know as well as I that once barter is sealed only a God of equal power to the God of greater strength can break the vow.” His light brown eyes danced over Loki’s face with curious interest. “Are you powerful enough to face my father? Or to force the breaking of this vow against Lucias’ wishes? Because if you are I will support you in doing so.”
Loki’s expression danced through many shifts as he contemplated this question. They rode the waves from certainty to defeat. Finally, he rolled his eyes closed and shook his head. “I want to. But no. I will lose any fight I raise with your father.”
“You’re certain?” Ishitar asked. His tone was guarded, yet, he wore a smile. A small, curious smile that Aiken didn’t understand.
Or trust, for that matter.
“I’m . . . certain.” Loki nodded. “I want to defy him. But something in my heart is telling me that to do so will create more consequences than have already been wrought.” He sighed and shook his head in exasperation. “I can’t beat him.”
“Then you have your answer.” Ishitar replied, still wearing that contemplative smile.
What in the name of the Sixty Realms has you so Gods be damned pleased?
“We let my father take the child.” His eyes flicked to Aiken before directing them back to Loki. Aiken cared even less for the acute curiosity that he saw in the youngling’s light brown eyes as they landed upon him than he had for the contemplative smile directed at Loki. “For now. We move Michael into your care. Once there, Lucias can raise him to be the God over the race of dragon men.”
Loki, clearly frustrated, let out a harsh breath through his teeth.
&nb
sp; “And,” Ishitar continued as if Loki had made no reaction, “when you are ready to face my father, we force the issue of the boy and bring him back to your side of the thrones.”
“Madness.” Aiken spat.
Loki, shaking his head, agreed to what he interpreted Aiken’s outburst to mean. Aiken opted not to correct his friend’s misconception.
“I’ll never be ready to face your father.”
“Perhaps.” Prince Ishitar agreed with a disinterested shrug as he reached for the book he had discarded. “But, then again, perhaps not.”
-28-
“What can I tell you about what happened next?” I ask Charlie. “But to say that Ishitar made another Gods be damned pie.”
“Another pie?” Charlie asks.
I turn toward him. His tone brokers my attention.
“Azrael.” His brow is furrowed and his lips are drawn. “I have to ask you. Given your love for this child, were you not afraid that Noliminan is going to find out that Ishitar has been raiding his tree?”
“I am concerned.” I tell him. “As I’ve told you before.”
“Then why do you let him keep making these pies?”
I consider my answer for a long moment.
“Because I have come to understand a fundamental truth regarding this situation.”
“Which is?”
“That I have no power to sway him.”
He considers me for a long moment, wanting to press me further but uncertain that this is a wise course to take.
I am not surprised when he nods, raises his hand and twirls his finger impatiently to entice me to go on.
-29-
Iykva stormed down the aisle of tents, his eyes flicking to each pair of elves in turn.
What was wrong with these damn creatures? They had been on the trail to the Northern Sea for many moons now. Why had they not yet allowed nature to take its Gods be damned course?
He felt his lips thin as his eyes darted to Thamores. He had just told Iykva that he intended not to march with the vampires this night as, come tomorrow, the golden moon would be fat. He feared that his wolves would destroy the elves that Iykva meant for them to guard and protect.
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