Chapter 31
SHARA
After breakfast, I left Regina in good hands with Gina, who promised to help her gather the rest of her things from the hotel and even her apartment in College Station, Texas.
I didn’t want a stranger in the main house, especially a human we didn’t know much about yet, so Gina recommended we give our new guest the gardener’s cottage.
I didn’t even know we had a gardener’s cottage, but Gina assured me it’d been renovated around the same time as her house at the gate.
Leonie, Vivian, and Itztli departed through the tree to see what information had survived the Dauphine’s hostile takeover of House Delafosse.
And I retreated to bed. I could barely keep my eyes open. I felt a little achy too, a telltale sign of my impending menstrual cycle. Rik tucked up against my back, and Xin joined us.
Yawning, I tipped my head to the side, offering him my throat. “You can feed again if you want.”
He pressed a lingering kiss to my throat but didn’t bite me. “I’m perfectly fine, my queen. You need your rest.”
“Only if you sleep too.”
A quick smile of amusement flashed and then disappeared, a rare grin from my silent silver wolf. “I will try if you insist.”
I tangled my hands in his hair. “I do. Sleep with me.”
As soon as I closed my eyes, I slipped into deep, restful slumber. Hours passed while I slept unaware.
Until I began dreaming.
I walked along a sandy beach, but I didn’t recognize the location.
As his silver wolf, Xin padded along beside me, my fingers in his ruff rather than his hair.
The sand glittered like black glass beneath steady waves rolling in from the ocean.
Rocky columns rose like grasping giant fingers from the dark water.
Thick fluffy snow began to fall, and the wind rose, howling louder and louder, almost like an animal whining in pain.
Snow blanketed everything, burying the black sand beneath drifts.
I couldn’t see the rocky fingers any longer.
Just blowing, endless white. Snow crunched under my feet, and I had to lean into the wind to keep my balance.
:Where is this place?: I asked Xin.
:I don’t know, my queen.:
The cold usually didn’t bother me, but the temperature burned like freezing fire deep into my bones.
My foot caught on something in the snow.
A lump. I squatted down and brushed the snow away to reveal a man’s still face.
I didn’t recognize him. In fact, he looked rather nondescript, like any human on the street.
His skin was as cold as the snow and ice around us but soft beneath my fingertips, so he wasn’t frozen solid.
He just lay on this frozen beach. Waiting. Sleeping? I wasn’t even sure.
I brushed more snow away, checking for wounds, injuries, or blood. He wore modern clothes—dark jeans and a simple gray hoodie. Nothing remarkable. No jewelry. Something told he probably didn’t carry a wallet, either. He wanted to be nondescript.
Pressing my hand over his chest, I closed my eyes, waiting to see if his heart beat. Allowing my mind to sink into him, I didn’t feel a spark or any flare of recognition in my magic. I didn’t think he was meant to be one of my Blood.
Out loud, I whispered, “Are you hurt? Do you need help?”
His heart thumped. Just once. Telling me that he was at least alive—
Fingers clamped around my wrist. My eyes flew open just as Xin lunged for the man’s throat.
I caught a glimpse of brilliant green eyes and then he was gone.
No blood from Xin’s teeth. But I could still feel the hard grip of his fingers on my wrist, and there was a vague body-shaped indentation in the snow.
:I got a taste of him,: Xin said. :I’ll find him again if he dares come near you.:
:I don’t think he was here for me. What did he taste like?:
Xin thought for a moment. :Pastries. Sweet, buttery, crumbly, with a bit of something jammy but tart inside. Like raspberries. But he tasted smoky too, as if the pastries were warmed over a campfire.:
So we had to be on the lookout for a man who tasted like raspberry pastries and smoke. Piece of cake. Er, pastry. Great.
I started to rise to my feet, but the world shifted around us, making me sway and stumble. White blowing snow swirled harder, streaming my hair into a black whirlwind around my face. Tangling my arms, pinned by my own hair.
My anxiety skyrocketed for a brief but painful moment. Then I felt Xin’s cold, wet nose on my hand. I clutched his fur, calming my breathing. The wind died, and my hair started to fall back behind my shoulders, slipping away from my face and arms.
We still stood on a beach, but this one was night and day different.
A narrow band of light-colored sand mixed with pebbles lined the ocean, dotted with larger rocks.
Brilliant green grass and wildflowers grew around the boulders.
Jagged mountains rose overhead against a brilliant blue sky.
Everything seemed to glow, as if the light itself had a magical quality.
More steep mountains carved a jagged dark line rising in the distance in both directions, split by glittering water.
Islands, maybe? In the distance, even more white-capped mountains lined the horizon.
The glowing light intensified, drawing my gaze out over the rolling ocean waves.
Golden and red flames rippled across the sky, brighter than the sun.
Too bright for me to see much of the shape inside the flames, but it had four legs.
Dark fur covered the legs, but the rest of the creature looked like sunfires.
The fiery shape dipped lower, making the ocean simmer and sizzle with its heat.
A towering wave began to crest higher, faster, trying to catch the shimmering flames.
Another wave swept out from the shore. Crashing together, the waves engulfed the sunfire flames in salty water.
As we’d seen in Minnesota when the sunfires attacked Helayna’s cabin, I feared the water wouldn’t have any lasting effect.
Hissing and popping, steam wavered in the air. I could smell the salt with a hint of singed fur and smoke. Uneasy waves tossed and whirled, the natural currents disrupted. The ocean boiled, still steaming, until the fiery shape exploded free of the waves.
As soon as it reached the beach, flames erupted into the sky. Roaring fire and rippling flames mixed with a howling bellow that made my scalp prickle. My ears rang with the booming roar. Such rage. Hatred. Fury. All consuming, volatile emotions.
Dread pounded through me. This creature brought death. Destruction. For everyone.
And it wouldn’t rest until the entire world burned, devoured in the same flames.
XIN
Gripping my ruff, Shara pulled us both up out of the dream. Our eyes opened together, our faces inches apart. Her scent wafted over me. Intoxicating magic, precious herbs burning on a brazier, flowers and sand and…
Blood. My nostrils flared. Not just any blood, either.
My mouth watered but I kept my face smooth and relaxed.
“Could you tell who was inside the flames?”
I hesitated before shaking my head. “Not through scent or sight directly. I suspect it was a wolf, though no natural wolf carries that kind of rage unless it’s rabid.”
She blew out a soft sigh, her breath tickling my cheek. “So we’re watching for a man who’s pretending to be dead, who tastes like one of Winston’s best pastries, and a rabid wolf covered in sunfires.”
One corner of my lips quirked. “Exactly so, my queen.”
She nodded, her brow furrowed. “Which means it has something to do with Karmen, and we both know a wolf king who fits the unstable bill. Though I don’t know that he’s so far gone as the creature we saw.”
“I see the creature in your bond,” Rik said. “Could it be something she’s creating to send against you?”
Shara’s eyes unfocused as she replayed the vision through her mind. “No, at least I don’t think so. If anything, I think it’s meant as a warning for her. Not me.”
Rik tightened his arm around her, tucking her deeper into his embrace. Rubbing his face against her hair, he worked his nose deeper. Finding the delicate skin behind her ear. He inhaled loudly, as if he couldn’t suck in enough air. His long exhale rumbled deep like distant thunder.
“Oh,” she whispered, her eyelids fluttering shut. “Did my period start?”
“Mm-hm,” he replied.
I barely breathed, afraid to inhale too much of the lush scent. One drop of her blood beading on her skin made all of us go rock hard in an instant. Her mind-blowing breeding scent was enough to make any and all of us behave like crazed addicts desperate for a hit.
Plus, I didn’t want to embarrass her or make her feel self-conscious. She’d been raised as a human. At first, she hadn’t even known how rare and special it was for a queen to breed at all, let alone so regularly.
“I remember when you first came to Kansas City.” Cupping my cheek, she opened her eyes. As deep and dark as the universe itself, her eyes gleamed with a sprinkling of bright stars. “I was bleeding then too.”
Involuntarily, I took a deep breath. Nostrils flaring wide. Taking in every cell and molecule of air I could load into my system. For all time.
Overload. Every drop of her blood I already carried seemed to catch flame, just like the fiery creature running across the ocean waves. Only I ran to her. Always.
Leaning closer, she brushed her lips in a teasing light kiss that made me tremble with the effort of restraining myself.
She huffed out a low, soft laugh. “I almost sent you away because I couldn’t feel you.
Now…” She slipped her tongue into my mouth to touch the tip of one of my fangs.
“I can’t imagine not feeling you with me, every moment of every single day.
I hated every moment you were gone on the hunt, even though I could still feel you in my mind.
It wasn’t enough. I want to feel you, Xin.
I want to know you more. Every single day. ”