Mayte looked down at the woman curled in a fetal position, covered in mud as she’d struggled to crawl away. Whatever spell Mayte had used on her was a brutal one. The woman’s arms and legs were bent at unnatural angles. Each time she tried to flee, another bone cracked.
Our queen would do well to learn this spell. I had a feeling she’d need every trick in the bag when she went after House Skye.
She came closer, her gaze meeting mine. “Are you sure that I’ll go after Skye?”
I nodded without hesitation. “It’s what I’d do.”
“Why?”
I gave her my most dragon grin without shifting into Leviathan. “Because I’d be fucking tired of her bullshit.”
Shara gave me a slow, glorious smile that dripped with vicious anticipation. “Exactly right.”
11
Shara
Letting my gaze move over each of my impressively aroused Blood, I let out a sigh of regret. “I’d very much like to see to each of your needs, but something tells me I need answers from our unwanted guest first.”
Rik picked up the blanket I’d dropped and jerked his head slightly at Itztli, a silent command to get out of his way. They might have objected before, but this time, they let go of my hands and stepped back without argument.
Rik wrapped the slightly soggy blanket around my shoulders. I shivered at the dampness, but it was better than being completely naked. He didn’t pull me in against him or make any other possessive move. My alpha was above such displays because he was fully confident in his place.
I leaned against him and wrapped my arms around his waist anyway.
“Xin, Nevarre, Mehen, Guillaume—take the prisoner down to the room,” he ordered. “The rest of us will dress and join you momentarily.”
“I’ve got him stashed over here.” Xin turned and headed into the night. “Just outside the nest boundary. Mayte’s Blood gave me some rope to tie him up.”
As he moved away, my skin prickled like I’d stumbled into a nest of fire ants. “Stop!” I barked out, my heart racing. He stopped immediately and started to turn toward me, his mouth opening.
Instinct took over. The shrill siren in my head wasn’t something I’d ever ignore. I drew on my blood and envisioned a shield rising above us. A giant dome, like a billion-dollar football field. I pushed it out as far as I could, nearly to the nest boundary itself, straining to make it stronger. Higher. I didn’t want anyone inside this nest hurt.
Mayte’s bond swelled inside me, spilling lush green power into mine, buoying me higher. :What is it? What’s wrong?:
I couldn’t answer, other than sending her a sense of urgency. I didn’t know what was going to happen, or how, only that it would be bad.
The heart tree that I’d just grown with Itztli’s sacrifice grounded me. I reached through its roots and felt my grove at home respond. The earth energy of my ancient trees poured into me, and I let my power blaze higher. Fire whipped to the heavens. Moonlight shimmered like beautiful opals in the air.
Then Nevarre added his gift of Shadow, Morrigan’s thick blanket of darkness. Fire and moonlight, green jungle and shadow braided above us.
Automatically, my Blood started to shift. Their instinct was to protect me. Leviathan crouched, wings unfurling, ready to soar into the sky with a roar.
I screamed at them through the bond. :No, stay low! Don’t fly!:
An explosion lit up the night a few paces outside of the nest—where Xin had been leading us. A golden fireball ballooned toward the nest, solar power so hot it melted rock, disintegrating everything it touched. The ground rocked beneath us. Rik swayed and stumbled, clutching me against him. People screamed.
The golden wave of power hit the nest and cut through Mayte’s boundary like butter.
I braced for impact. Rik, my rock, shielded me with his body. Guillaume’s hell horse and Daire’s warcat pressed close to me, too, and the rest of my Blood made a defensive ring around us, just in case my shield failed.
Liquid gold slammed into my shield. Power crackled and sizzled in the air. My hair shot out like I’d stuck my finger in a light socket. My ears rang and the fine bones of my face ached like someone had slammed me with a bat. Repeatedly. My eyes streamed tears, even though I’d squeezed my eyes shut without even realizing it.
The shield sagged, bowing under the massive weight of the golden bomb. In slow motion, I tried to lift my right arm toward my mouth, fighting to get my wrist close enough to tear open again. Blood. I needed more blood.
The warcat locked my wrist in his mouth, pressing hard enough to break the skin. With more blood, my power shored up the shield. I didn’t try to fight the golden wave, for fear it would only gain strength from me. Panting with effort, I concentrated on holding the shield firm and allowed the solar power to flow over it. Feet planted wide, head back, I strained to hold back the blazing might of the sun god.
Finally, the golden blaze dissipated into the night.
Rivulets of sweat tracked down my face and chest. My knees trembled. I ached deep inside. Stress fractures, maybe, as if I’d fallen off a horse onto the rockiest ground imaginable. I forced my eyes open and lifted my head to look around.
The heart tree still stood, though the very highest branches were a little scorched, and a few smaller limbs littered the ground. Mayte blew a kiss to me and then turned to round up her people and see if anyone was hurt. Groups started moving around, checking on the houses and outbuildings, but everything seemed okay.
“Amazing,” Rik whispered, shaking his head. “You’re incredible, my queen. To hold off an attack like that… What made you suspect anything amiss with the prisoner? Xin, did you feel anything off with him?”
Xin sat back on his haunches but kept his head low. :Not at all. Forgive me, alpha, my queen. I sensed nothing in his scent that led me to believe he was a ticking time bomb. If I’d brought him into the nest…:
Yeah, that would have been bad, to say the least. If I hadn’t been able to react quickly enough, we could have had several casualties. Exactly as Ra intended.
“Did he say anything to you while you were guarding him? Was he some kind of Blood to Ra? Do the gods even have Blood like that?”
:He remained a black dog until Mehen killed the eagle, then he shifted. He told me if I didn’t release him, he’d take me and everyone with me to hell.:
“Hell? That’s the word he used?” My words slurred, and I had to concentrate to make the words string together. “That seems like a weird thing for the sun god’s minion to say.”
Rik swept me up in his arms and started for the house. “You need to feed long and hard, my queen.”
“Rest,” I mumbled, fighting to keep my eyes open. “Home.”
Either he was extremely fast, or I passed out momentarily, but the next thing I knew, he was settling me into bed and kissing my forehead. “Tomorrow. I can’t wait to get you home and rested up.”
I made a low hum of agreement. I didn’t have the energy to say the words, but I made sure he knew what I was thinking.
Hot flesh pressed against me. Skin and blood and sweat. Too many dicks to count.
He huffed out a laugh and drew me closer. “As you wish, my queen.”
12
Shara
In the dream, I stood on top of a pyramid, but it wasn’t Isis pyramid that I’d seen the first night when Rik and Daire had found me. This pyramid was made of large blocks of weathered gray stone. Instead of sand dunes stretching into the distance, I saw the lush green jungle that I smelled when I tasted Mayte’s blood. The rooftop was flat, with a low wall of carved stones along the edges. Sinuous feathered serpents with gaping jaws raced along the top of the stones.
Great Feathered Serpent, like my Blood, Tlacel.
“Are you well pleased with my gift to you, Daughter of Isis?”
I turned toward the voice, musical, lovely, and echoing with power, just as Isis’ did.
This goddess sat on a carved jade throne that rose above her in the
shape of two large serpents, facing each other with mouths gaped, fangs bared. Her hands rested on two massive jaguars, one black and one gold. They panted softly with their distinctive grunting growl, their eyes shining eerily in the night.
Her face was painted blue, her dark hair long and thick, curling over her bare chest. Her breasts were heavy, her stomach soft and rounded, and even from several feet away, I could see the stretch marks. She was the embodiment of Mother Earth, and she’d nurtured many.
She wore a thick white sash around her waist with one long end that hung down in the front to cover her genitals. Something moved in the thick shadows that hung around her. The dry rustle and strong musky scent told me what wound around her ankles and knees.
Snakes.
The same ghostly shape I’d seen hanging over Mayte tonight. I clasped my hands together and bowed at the waist, but kept my gaze locked on hers. I don’t know why. It just felt right. I wasn’t terrified, like I’d been when I first met Isis. Reverent, absolutely. Grateful for all They had given me. But not scared.
“Thank you, Mother of the Gods, for my twins.”
She smiled and gestured for me to come closer. “They’ve already proven themselves loyal to you, but they offer much more. They’re as close to my sons, Xolotl and Quetzalcoatl, as you are to Isis.”
“Why give them to me, rather than giving twin gods to your daughter? She needs protection for Xochitl.”
“Mayte’s a healer. While this world needs healers more than ever, you are the warrior we have selected to end the sun’s tyranny. Your twins burn for war and destruction and death.”
One of the snakes stretched upward, winding around her knee. It was small and rather cute, a brilliant crimson color without the deadly king coral stripes, scales glowing like fiery rubies. It seemed offended at my thoughts and hissed at me, its tongue flicking out like it could taste me.
My cobra queen stirred, her scales slithering inside me, making me shiver. I wouldn’t be surprised if my eyes were slitted now.
“So many gifts,” Coatlicue whispered as she stroked her index finger down the small snake’s head. “Such cost.”
I swallowed, pushing the cobra back down inside of me. “I’ll pay that cost to keep my Blood and Mayte’s family safe.”
Coatlicue let out a low, sighing breath that sounded like a mournful wind. “So many lost. Queens wiped out before they could come into power. Entire Houses devastated. We call for blood, daughter. We call for an end to our queens living in fear, on the run, or trapped in their nests. We want our daughters to have many children as in days of old. A time when children ran the nests, learned our ways, and lived with love anywhere they chose.”
The lost little girl inside me nodded, aching for the childhood she’d never had. A chance to grow up in a nest, knowing full well what she was, without guilt or shame or regret. With a loving mother, who hadn’t been banished from living Aima memory in order to give birth to me.
“I have a powerful gift to offer you, but beware. I am Mother, which means I give birth, yes, but I’m also a destroyer. I am the womb and the grave. I defend my children vehemently, but I punish them even more harshly if they abandon my ways. Huitzilophochtli…” Her voice broke and tears of blood dripped down her cheeks. “He was my son. Ra’s influence contaminated him, twisting and ultimately consuming him, as he consumed many sun gods before him, until only he remains. My son is no more.”
She leaned forward, pinning me with Her gaze. My nape prickled, and my nerves quivered with sensation, as if an invisible breath swept over me.
“The Great One made you the queen of resurrection. I would make you a divine queen of death, the sole carrier of a grave so great that not even a god could withstand your power. In exchange, I ask for only one thing. That you kill Ra, and release Huitzilophochtli’s soul so he may return to me in Aztlan.”
I didn’t answer right away. She didn’t offer these gifts lightly. I’d be a fool to rush in without thought. A divine queen of death. That sounded… terrifying.
I would much rather be a queen of love and sex, pleasure and laughter, hope and lightness. Not grief and death. As Itztli had told me, it would suck to be a grim reaper of death, only so people appreciated my passing with relief that they were still alive.
I didn’t want to be the kind of queen who sacrificed a Blood on an altar and cut his heart out of his chest, something I had already done before Her gift. How much worse would this gift of the grave make me? I’d already killed with my gifts. I certainly hadn’t been sorry that I’d destroyed Greyson, the master thrall who’d killed my mother, nor his minions. I would have killed the golden eagle myself today if I could have caught it before Mehen snagged it in his jaws.
I would have interrogated the dog we’d captured after the attack. And yes, if I’d had to cut off a few body parts to get him to talk about Ra’s plans for Xochitl, or me, I would have. Gleefully.
I was already a fledgling monster, and I hadn’t even had the awful pleasure of dealing with Keisha Skye yet, let alone Marne Ceresa.
“You may indeed find it necessary to kill other queens,” Coatlicue said softly. “But that is not why I give you this power. You would find it easy enough to kill another queen without my grave. But not a god, and certainly not Ra himself. He absorbed all the other sun gods before and after him, taking their power for himself, and using the lifeblood of countless queens to fuel his obsession. He would enslave all women, but especially our queens. His purpose is why there are so few Aima queens still living. All queens are under constant attack. You may find it best serves your needs to ally yourself with them, rather than kill them.”
She laughed softly and sat back in Her throne, still petting the snake that slithered up Her thigh. “Though, I admit I would likely kill them, too, and be done with their convoluted plots.”
I stepped closer, eyeing the jaguars on either side of Her. They started purring, so I knelt at Her feet between them. They both rubbed their heads against my shoulders, and the black one lay its head in my lap, playfully rolling over and begging me to scratch its stomach. “What’s the cost for this power?”
“A life for a life.” She reached out to cup my cheek, Her eyes glimmering with regret. “It cannot be your own life, either. I know your heart, child. You would willingly die to save another, but it cannot be paid by you. You won’t have the choice of who pays the cost. If you call upon my grave to kill, it will claim another one you love at great cost to you.”
My throat swelled shut with tears, shredded with agony at the thought. Who would die? One of my Blood? My heart bled at the thought. Gina? Winston? Mayte? “I can’t bear it.”
“You must, if you accept this gift. But I will tell you truly that if you do not kill Ra, then he will kill many more. You will lose loved ones. You will die in great pain, and everyone you love will suffer. The only difference is that you will not have the responsibility of knowing that someone died because of your power.”
“If they die, can I resurrect them?”
She shook her head solemnly. “My grave is beyond even the Great One’s resurrection. It must be so to ensure Ra’s death.”
Tears trickled down my face, and I bit my tongue and lips, shredding my own flesh with my fangs. “Can you tell me who you’ll take?”
Silently, She shook Her head again.
The cost. So steep.
If I lost Rik…
Goddess. I couldn’t breathe at the thought.
Daire. Guillaume. My grumpy dragon. My silent, ghostly wolf. My poor, tortured dog.
I choked on sobs, splattering Her with my blood.
She shivered, Her eyes flaring with hunger. “Decide, child, so I may send you back unscathed. You’ve aroused my hunger, which is never wise.”
Decide reverberated in my head.
If I said no, then many people would die, probably myself included. If I said yes, only one person was sure to die, but I’d have to live with the knowledge that they’d died because of me for the re
st of my very long Aima life.
If I didn’t use Her gift, Ra would have more time to hurt and kill people. Maybe the very same people I loved. Maybe he’d attack Zaniyah again, and I wouldn’t be here to pull Xochitl back from the cenote. Maybe he’d get to Winston, mostly alone at my nest while I was away on Isador business, like this trip.
My loved ones could die in countless different ways, indirectly by my hand because of my indecision.
Or one loved one, indirectly by my hand, but wholly my responsibility to bear.
My chest ached like Itztli had shoved his fist into my ribcage and yanked out my heart this time, but I nodded. I had to protect as many as possible. Save as many as I could.
I thought She would give me blood like Isis had done, but instead, She seized the snake curling up Her thigh in Her fist and yanked it free. By the grimace on Her face and the fresh blood trickling from Her lips, it hurt Her to do so.
The snake hissed and writhed in Her grip. It struck Her forearm, leaving bloody holes in Her flesh, but She didn’t release its coils. She moved Her hand closer to me, and the snake turned its head to glare at me.
I tipped up my chin and willed my tears to dry. I was the last queen of Isis. My mother and father had both died so that I might live. They had paid the ultimate cost to create me.
I would not flinch from my duty.
Even if it bared fangs and hissed with fury to be torn from the Mother of the Gods.
The ruby snake lunged at my face, and this time, She let it go. It sank fangs into my cheek, its small body winding around my neck. It hurt, but nothing like how badly my heart already ached. Shaking, I waited while the snake bit me a few more times, and then grudgingly settled around my throat like a collar, its head over my right breast.
Coatlicue leaned forward and enfolded me in Her arms. “There, my child. It’s done.”
But it wasn’t over. It would never be over. Dread would hang over my heart until I knew which one of my loved ones would die.
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