Chapter 1
HELL’S TEETH
SAERIS
THE DRESS WAS made for sinning.
Black.
Strapless.
Sheer.
The slit up the side was cut so high that there was no way I could have worn underwear.
The fabric clung to my frame like a second skin, shimmering when it caught the light as if tailored from the night sky itself.
Long gloves of the same material covered my arms as if I’d dipped them past the elbows into shimmering ink.
This was nothing like any of the ensembles Everlayne had dressed me in when I’d first arrived at the Winter Palace.
This was elegant. Stunning. Painfully sexy.
I didn’t recognize the woman in the full-length mirror of my dressing room . . . and there was a reason for that. The strange creature staring back at me wasn’t a woman. Not anymore. Once she might have been, but now she was a Fae-vampire hybrid, touched by the gods.
I was the same as I had ever been, and yet I wasn’t.
Immortality might have cleaved the meat from the bones of others and made them willowy.
It had filled out the parts of me that Zilvaren had starved.
My cheekbones were rounder now, my lips fuller.
Hips, breasts, ass: I’d had all three before, but now I really had them.
As it did every time I had caught myself in the mirror over the past forty-eight hours, my attention snagged on my tips of my pointed ears, poking through the dark waves of my hair.
Reality seemed to warp and snap back into place whenever I saw them.
In the end, I was just as Fisher’s mother had drawn me.
This was real.
I was Fae.
I was a vampire.
The sound of a voice clearing at the back of the room broke the silence. “Well, I suppose if no one else is going to say it, then I will. You look downright fuckable, Saeris Fane.”
I turned, wearing a chagrined frown, already preparing for the fallout that would follow on the heels of that comment.
Three males occupied the large dressing room with me, each of them emitting so much testosterone that the air swam with it.
By the large window, the last rays of sunlight burnished Taladaius’s silver hair and limned his features in gold.
I could sense his emotions now. I was connected to him in a way that I didn’t enjoy.
Sometimes, as dusk was falling, I would feel him wake on the other side of the palace, and his sadness would steal my breath away.
My maker cringed at the male on the other side of the room, sprawled out on a chaise longue like he owned the damned place.
“Are you out of your mind?” he asked. “I don’t know a single person stupid enough to hit on a newly bonded female, let alone a God-Bound female.
But to do it right in front of her mate?
In front of him?” he added, jerking his chin toward the last male leaning against the wall by the door.
I paused before allowing myself to look at him.
Paused before I even allowed myself to think his name.
Kingfisher.
My mate.
Fisher’s dark, wavy hair tumbled into his face, flicking up around his ears.
It had somehow grown longer in the past day or two.
He felt bigger, too. Taller, broader, his presence even more imposing.
He was armed to the teeth, dressed in leather, his ever-present gorget flashing at his throat.
Tendrils of shadow and glittering black sand wound between his fingers, circling his wrists.
They twisted down his legs and spilled across the plush carpet like hunting snakes, heading for the chaise.
They had reached the chair and were weaving up its legs toward Carrion when I let out a sigh, folding my arms across my chest. “Fisher.”
His eyes came alive at the sound of my voice. “Hmm?”
“Stop.”
His nostrils flared, his jaw working. “I can’t help it if he doesn’t want to live.”
Carrion heaved himself upright, nearly spilling his drink in the process.
He was on his fourth whiskey, though he seemed none the worse for wear because of it.
It all made sense now—the number of times he’d drunk the other patrons at the House of Kala under the table.
The Fae could drink themselves into oblivion if they wanted to; they only had to will it and they were as sober as a judge in their next breath.
For as long as I’d known him, Carrion had been hiding his lineage.
The glamor Kingfisher’s father had wrought on him as a baby had held his whole life, concealing his true appearance.
In fairness, he’d always been tall. But his ears had been rounded, his features less chiseled and sharp, his frame not quite so broad.
The reality of him was taking some getting used to.
Thanks to his run-in with Malcolm in the maze, the glamor was gone now, and the male was his natural, true self at last.
“And I can’t help it if you aren’t falling over yourself to compliment your girlfriend,” Carrion countered, raising his glass at Kingfisher.
Oh, gods. This was going to be bad.
The threads of shadow and sand became ropes.
They darted up the chaise longue, lashing around Carrion’s wrists and throat, slamming him back down onto the crushed velvet cushion behind him.
His whiskey went flying. Fisher did nothing to save the glass as it hit the carpet, bounced, and went tumbling across the floor, spilling its contents everywhere as it rolled.
Not content to assault Carrion with only his magic, Fisher had his fists ready and was moving with purpose across the dressing room with murder in his beautiful green eyes.
My chest squeezed. “Fisher!”
Mercifully, Taladaius stepped in, blocking my mate’s path before he reached the smuggler.
They were of a height, the two males. Just as broad.
Just as fearsome. They were similar in many ways.
But where my mate was all darkness and quiet brooding, Taladaius was light, his mood often easier than it had any reason to be.
There were counterweights, perhaps. Different sides to the same coin? But also different currencies.
Vampire.
Fae.
Maker.
Mate.
The vampire placed a hand on Kingfisher’s shoulder, shooting him a tight smile.
“I may be considered enlightened among my kind, Fisher. But the others who have gathered here tonight . . .” He paused, hiking up an eyebrow for effect.
“Are not. Spill living blood, even here in Saeris’s chamber, and you’re asking for a world of hurt.
Guaranteeing your safety here is difficult enough as it is. ”
Fisher’s expression was blank. He didn’t seem remotely concerned by Taladaius’s warning.
Slowly, he glanced down at Taladaius’s hand resting on his shoulder, as if the point where the two made contact was about to burst into flames.
“You aren’t guaranteeing anything,” he said in a low voice.
“I’m not here by anyone’s good graces. I’m here because my mate is here.
Where she goes, I go. And if any more of your brethren feel like taking a swing at me, then believe me, I’m all for it.
I’ve waited an age to find myself in the same room as these supercilious pricks. ”
Taladaius clenched his jaw, exhaling deeply before he spoke again. “You know what those supercilious pricks can scent even more than blood?”
Kingfisher smacked Taladaius’s hand away, snarling under his breath. “I’m not afraid, Tal.”
“Fear will be your undoing out there,” the vampire gritted out. “If you’re worried about her, even for a second, they will know, and they’ll leap at the opportunity to tear you down because of it. Weaken her claim. Cast her out—”
“Uhhh?” A gurgle came from the chaise behind them, where Fisher’s shadows were still strangling Carrion. “Help?”
“Gods and martyrs, can you stop posturing, all of you! Fisher, let Carrion go. Taladaius . . .” I blew out an exasperated breath. “How much time do we have before we need to go out there?”
Straightening the beautifully tailored black jacket he was wearing, Taladaius composed himself, but his glittering eyes remained fixed on my mate. “The sun’s set. They’re already gathered. If we don’t go soon, they’ll say you’ve abandoned your claim.”
“They’d do that?”
“They’re bureaucrats,” he replied.
At last, Kingfisher released Carrion from his magic’s hold. “They’re monsters,” he countered.
“They are,” Taladaius agreed. “Which is why we have so many rules, and why we stick to them so fiercely. Our court would be carnage without them. Tradition must be honored. The laws of the five must be obeyed. Even by queens,” he stressed.
“Only once she has that circlet on her head will she be in a position to effect change. Change that will benefit all of Yvelia.”
And there it was. The crux of all of this.
Back in that maze, I hadn’t killed Malcolm for his crown.
I’d done it to save myself. For vengeance.
For my mate. I hadn’t asked to become queen of this hateful court.
If it were up to me, we’d already be back at Cahlish, celebrating the fact that the king of the vampires was dead.
But then where would we be? With another vampire lord rising to power, leaving Yvelia potentially worse off than it already was.
In the past forty-eight hours, I’d had a crash course in vampire court politics. And unlike when I’d found myself being lectured back in the library at the Winter Palace, this time I had paid attention.