Blood Feast: A Fantasy Romance

An Old Nemesis

Are you all right?Lio asked Cassia in the sudden silence.

A heartbeat. I don’t know.

He felt it in her blood. Death. He would never forget what it was like to experience that for the first time as a Hesperine.

Hold on, my Grace. We fall apart together, remember?

I refuse to fall apart while you’re still in danger. Let me help you remember the route through the passages.

With her ever-present in his mind, he navigated the ivy-covered corridors, his spell light illuminating the way for the mortals. Along the twists and turns, her tension only grew. A burning thirst eclipsed the chill of death in her aura.

Lio’s fangs dropped. You need me.

I can hold out. You must get everyone to safety.

Lio cursed the miles between them. He forged ahead, but with the villagers and their animals, they proceeded at a crawl. Cassia’s pulse seemed to fill the passageways, her Craving needling deeper into Lio’s own veins.

When he found the way out at last, it was through a portal into the great hall of Castra Patria. The exhausted villagers stumbled onto the dais behind the Hesperines and their queen.

The ceremonial chamber of the Lords of Tenebra was now crowded with bedrolls and worried mortals. Mages moved among Solia’s subjects with food and bandages, while warriors stood around a table cluttered with maps. At Solia’s appearance out of the wall, everyone leapt into action to assist her with the latest evacuees.

Gray-haired Lord Hadrian came to Solia’s side. “Your Majesty, you went yourself, without your guards?”

“I was away from my people for fifteen years,” she told him. “I won’t spend this war out of sight inside the defenses.”

“My Queen,” her most loyal general growled, “will you not spend this war where I can make sure you survive it?”

“I do my best not to make your duties more difficult. Within reason.”

“And I do my best not to hinder you, Your Majesty. Under protest.”

“Your dissent is noted, my lord.” Her eyes crinkled with affection. “I did have Hesperines with me.”

“We’ll always return her to you without a scratch, Lord Hadrian,” Mak said, levitating a startled but grateful elder down off the dais.

“Stewards.” The mortal warrior greeted them with a long-suffering sigh, but a chord of respect hummed between him and Lio’s Trial brothers. “Take some steel with you next time, along with your”—he waved his hand in the air—“shadows and moondrizzle.”

“Also noted,” Lyros said with friendly salute, directing more of the villagers to descend.

Lio tossed their belongings down to them. “Alas, they only had a diplomat for reinforcements, but I assure you I brought my best moondrizzle tonight.”

“Ambassador,” Lord Hadrian said. “Well, this is a surprise. To the enemy as well, I take it.”

“We have him to thank for our safe return,” said Solia.

“And for Princess Cassia’s life, I understand.” Lord Hadrian’s hard gaze rested on Lio.

He knew his Grace would always be Princess Cassia in Lord Hadrian’s heart. “My lord, Orthros has bestowed on her all the power and honor she deserves. You have my vow that she will want for nothing—for as long as we both shall live.”

Lord Hadrian clasped Lio’s arm and pulled him near. “Well done,” he murmured gruffly, before turning away to issue more orders.

Lio let out a breath. “I did not expect that.”

“There is room in his definition of honor for resorting to Hesperine moondrizzle to keep Cassia and me safe.” Solia gave Lio’s arm a squeeze before joining her men at the table.

Lio looked around the chaotic great hall. How many souls in this room would they lose before the war was through? How many would they lose tonight?

He saw no sign of Rudhira and his group of villagers.

Stay until you know he’s safe, Cassia insisted.

Can you manage?

He is in greater danger than I am right now.

Craving fever is no small matter, my Grace.

I can manage, she said again.

“Rudhira should be here by now,” Lio said.

“I know.” Mak’s aura throbbed with worry. “But we have our orders, and it will not help him if we disobey.”

“We’re needed on the walls,” Lyros told Lio. “We’re going to reinforce the Charge’s warders.”

Lio nodded. “You two go. I’m heading back into the tunnels.”

Lio plunged back through the wall. He sent his thelemancy deep into the tunnels, and strange impressions echoed back to him. Magic played by different rules here. The Lustra’s rules.

But he managed to catch a hint of auras. Cursing the inability to step in here, he set off at a run.

He quickly came upon a group of eight humans. The villagers Rudhira had escorted out of Mederi were bedraggled but alive. His sudden arrival startled them, but then they breathed sighs of relief.

“Can you show us the way out?” the village miller pleaded.

Lio nodded. “Where is the Hesperine who stepped you out of the village?”

The man pointed back the way they had come. “He had to stay behind with the wounded one.”

Lio’s heart jolted.

Who is it?came Cassia’s swift response.

I don’t know.

Drawing blood from his hand again, Lio grasped his pendant and sent a spell light floating through the tunnels toward the portal. “Follow my light. It will take you to safety in the fortress.”

The grateful villagers set off, and Lio raced deeper into the passages. Amid the bizarre magic that breathed around him, he caught a whisper, a certainty. The Lustra itself seemed to guide him.

He found Rudhira in the glow of another portal. The prince crouched over a fallen Hesperine. Lio showed Cassia the image before him.

Not Kalos! she cried.

Lio knelt by their unconscious friend. “What happened?”

“Someone put a magefire arrow in my best scout’s chest,” Rudhira growled. “And as soon as I heal the wound, I’ll go find that archer and put Thorn in him.”

Lio knew from his own experience with a magefire wound how much pain was burning through Kalos’s veins as they spoke. “Will he make it?”

Rudhira’s healing magic saturated Kalos’s aura. “Yes. My spell is working faster than I could have hoped. I believe it’s the strong Lustra magic here.”

He’s going to be all right,Lio relayed to Cassia, thanks to the passages. The Lustra is helping Rudhira heal him.

Her fear eased. He’s not the only Hesperine Lustra mage any longer. I hope this proves to him that I have his back.

“How did you two get into the passages?” Lio asked. “No one could enter without Cassia escorting them until tonight, when we discovered I can now open them.”

Rudhira raised his brows at Lio. “When the war mages intercepted our step, they pulled you and me out at different locations. I had just taken care of the one near me when Kalos found me. He said that glowing portals have appeared all over the countryside surrounding Castra Patria, and Hesperine blood will open and close them. When he led us to the entrance, I could sense your magic.”

Astonished, Lio reached for Cassia’s presence again. I think we managed to open the passages for Kalos. Even the entire Charge.

The Lustra has accepted not just my Grace, but all Hesperines?

At least in this network of tunnels. Orthros’s Silvicultrix has given us quite a gift.

It’s your Gift to me that did it. This wasn’t possible before I was a Hesperine.

“The archers ambushed us as we were heading inside,” Rudhira said. “Kalos sent everyone else down first. The arrow caught him when he was sealing the portal behind us.”

Kalos groaned and stirred.

“Lie still,” Rudhira urged him.

He’s awake, Lio reassured Cassia.

Tell him not to scare us like that.

Lio passed her words on to Kalos, who grinned faintly. “Tell her these tunnels saved my hide tonight.”

“Yes, they did.” Rudhira sat back from his patient at last.

“My Prince,” Lio said, “tonight you’ve seen what Cassia and I can do.”

Rudhira let out a heavy sigh. “I want you two safe at home. But I think the Goddess has other ideas.”

“Let us use our power against Kallikrates.”

At last, Rudhira nodded. “When Hespera creates new defenders for us, I will not dishonor her gift. I will inform Argyros and Lyta of my decision, and we will tell you when and where you, Cassia, Mak, and Lyros should report for duty.”

“We’ll be ready.” Somehow.

Her newborn Craving was like a knife in his chest every time he drew breath.

“Now go,” Rudhira said. “Dawn is coming, and you can’t afford for the sun to catch you here.”

He was right. Cassia couldn’t withstand it if the Dawn Slumber trapped Lio in Tenebra.