Chapter Twelve
Trey
W as it monumentally stupid of me to break the skin on Angelica’s shoulder with my teeth while seconds away from a rut?
Fuck yes, since I hadn’t gotten her permission.
Was it also dumb as fuck to taunt her into a mating run when I was holding back from claiming her by the very slimmest of threads?
Undoubtedly.
Was I still going through with it?
Yes.
Oh hell yes.
It was time to tell her that she was my fated one, that I loved her and always would. If she rejected the bond, then I would be forced to leave her permanently after this mission but at least I wouldn’t have to worry about my primal side coming out and causing harm like it almost had in the mines.
And I wouldn’t have to worry about losing control and almost marking her either.
The bite didn’t look quite deep enough to infect her with the claiming venom, but her euphoria after sex had me worried. That was a mating sign, but it could also just be that she was happy, as Angelica herself had said.
If she accepted me though, if she was willing to see where this went, even if she wasn’t ready for the mating claim yet, I’d at least have hope. Which was a hell of a lot more than the mixed signals and questions I had now.
The thought of what her creamy skin would look like with my distinct pattern all over her back and chest, the way it would curl around her breasts, down to her mons…
I paused outside the study and breathed. Max looked scandalized enough without me showing up to help translate with a full-on erection.
When I’d gotten the lust under control, I stepped inside to find Max pacing the room with Tessa at the printer.
“Perfect,” she said, handing me several pages. “See anything familiar?”
Max stopped pacing and I felt his eyes on me as Tessa grinned at me expectantly.
I looked down at the markings. The information under the pictures said that they were discovered during restoration of the temple at Siwa in Egypt. Someone was testing a special light used to discover old images that might’ve been covered up by other dynasties or artists. No one had expected to find much of anything, but then they did. Archive specialists were called in and took over the dig, cataloguing the symbols.
I recognized most, but some made no sense to me at all.
I started writing down the translation for the symbols I could read onto a piece of paper that Max shoved at me. There were six pages of these symbols and by the time I was done translating what I knew, I went back to see if anything else popped up.
“Well, anything?” Max asked.
“Some, yeah, but it…doesn’t make sense. I have no idea if I’m translating this correctly.”
“Give it a shot and then we can compare it to the journal.”
I nodded.
“Well, I think it’s talking about a group of Draconian priests who were looking for the sundial. When it was found at the temple of Zeus-Ammon in Siwa, the priests either purposely separated the dial from the bowl or it was an accident, that’s not clear. When this happened, though, the youngest priest was chosen to take the bowl of the sundial into a between realm. There’s a legend I learned growing up about a Draconian priest that tried to destroy the sundial and died, I was telling Angelica that people sometimes say they can hear his ghost in the ruins. So I’m guessing he didn’t die, he’s just been trapped in this realm all this time.”
“I’ve never heard of the between realm,” Tessa said.
“Kind of like a purgatory,” Max replied. “Our world is one of many realms that are layered on top of one another, like a giant sandwich. The between realm isn’t like the others though. It’s the…”
“Condiment?” she suggested.
I snorted and Max shrugged.
“Yeah, I suppose. It exists in the dimensional space between the other realms, almost like a shadow to the one someone is accessing it from. It can be used to hide powerful items, banish threats. Some people, according to legend, have even used them to travel great distances instead of using portals.” Max looked back at me and asked, “So you’re saying the bowl part of the sundial is in the between realm with this Draconian priest?”
“If I’m translating this right, yes. He was supposed to keep it until…and this is a very loose translation, until Alexander’s heir would come and split the skies to send the power back from whence it came.”
“Alexander’s heir, are you sure?” Max asked.
“As near as I can tell, but the lettering and the symbols, they’re very archaic. I only studied some of this in my youth and to be honest, I was a shit student.”
“But Alexander’s children didn’t survive,” Tessa said. “Am I remembering that correctly?”
“You are,” Max said, typing something into his tablet. “His biological children did not live long. But, if we translate it as heirs to his kingdom, and take out the biological element…we get the generals who carved up the dynasty. And the one that came the closest to getting the sundial was – ”
“Ptolemy,” I said. “Which would explain the dial part being hidden in the Ptolemaic astrolabe.”
Max nodded.
“And according to this lineage,” he handed me his tablet, “at least one of Ptolemy the First’s wives were Draconian.”
I stared at the very old, very extensive ancestral data in front of me. It was my family tree dating back to the first dynasty. There were names on here I’d never seen, parts of my genealogical history that I was, in fact, told were lost to the history.
“How did you get this?” I asked.
“The Archive has a complete genealogy of every royal line of every Supernatural race. If we are to believe this line, you are the last of Alexander’s heirs. Or, Ptolemy, if you want to get technical. But the prophesy would likely apply to you.”
“We don’t know that,” I said, my stomach twisting.
“This here,” Max pointed at a page in the journal, “read it.”
I took the journal from him, trying very hard not to let my hands shake.
“According to this, the sundial has to be reassembled to be properly destroyed. Which means we need the dial part, which is currently in Viktor’s hands. It also says…” I read it twice and my shoulders deflated. “Only Alexander’s heir may enter the realm where the bowl resides.”
“And that would be you.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, not at all happy with this turn of events because something told me it wasn’t going to end there.
“So,” I continued, “I have to reassemble the sun dial to destroy it.”
“Yeah, but outside the between realm,” Max clarified, “Not only would it be dangerous to expel that much magic in the between realm, but there’s several mentions of an altar made of red stone that’s connected with Alexander. That’s where it has to happen and it has to be under this conjunction of stars.”
He flipped to another page in the journal and I chuckled.
“Angelica was right, these aren’t coordinates. They’re star charts, and these symbols here indicate that it’s going to power the spell to destroy the sundial.”
Max nodded thoughtfully, running his fingers down his beard.
“A celestial conjunction would create a lot of power but there’s still something missing. Usually there’s also a sacrifice of some kind.”
I swallowed at that and tried to change the subject, not quite ready to go down that road because I had a suspicion what that sacrifice might be.
“But what about this altar,” Tessa asked. “It’s been how long since it was there? And the temple of Zeus-Ammon in Siwa is a ruin.”
“Check the reports about the restoration, they must have a reference to the altar, it’s too big to simply have disappeared,” Max suggested.
“First things first,” I said, “we need to figure out how to get our hands on the dial. Otherwise this whole thing is useless.”
“When Alexis is trying to draw out a perp,” Max offered, “she’ll tease some bait in front of them. Lead them to where she wants them by dangling what they want where she wants them to be.”
“So if we want the dial, we just have to let Viktor know where we’re going. It’s a risk, but it could work. Still, all of this,” I said, gesturing to the journal and print outs, “doesn’t answer why they separated it and hid the two pieces. Why not destroy it then? I was always told it was a single priest. But according to this, there was a cadre of them, pretty powerful ones too, if they were able to open a doorway and keep someone alive in there this long.”
“Could’ve been a mistake,” Tessa suggested. “Or they didn’t have time to destroy it and this was the only option.”
“Whatever the reason,” Max said, “we have to do everything we can to find out how to destroy it now.”
I stared down at the symbols indicating Alexander’s heir, and my gut knotted.
Would I be the sacrifice?
“I’ll have River look at the incantation and tell us if it’s for opening the door to the between realm or destroying the artifact,” Max said, taking the journal and handing me a half dozen other papers with pictures and notes on them. “I found these when cross referencing the symbols in the incantation. See if you recognize any of them and maybe between you and River, you can get a complete picture of the ritual to destroy it, or whatever this is.”
“Got it.”
“We also need to figure out when these stars move into this configuration. If they even still exist at all, considering how old this is.”
“I’ll look into that,” Tessa piped up.
I nodded, half listening as my mind spiraled. There was nothing in here that indicated danger to me beyond what was normal when dealing with spells and Artifacts.
It will be fine…the Fates wouldn’t be so cruel.
I shook the morbid worries off and settled in to work.
We worked through dinner, so Angelica came in with some plates of food. Max and I briefed her on what we’d discovered and she listened with that all-business frown that I’d seen her use at so many meetings at the Archive. It may have looked like she was simply taking the information in, but I knew better. Her mind was working through the questions, the possibilities, as she also attempted to construct a plan.
“Do we know when the stars will align like they’re described in the writings?” Angelica asked.
I was about to say that we hadn’t discovered that yet when Tessa gave a yelp of victory.
“We do now! Three days from now. Even with the time difference, if you leave tomorrow afternoon and then charter a smaller plane to Siwa, you should arrive in time.”
She handed me a paper with the star conjunctions on them and my eyebrows rose at how thorough she’d been. Tessa had accounted for everything, down to the placement of the temple as it was now, in comparison to sea level, versus where it was when the symbols were written on the walls.
“You found the doorway too?” I asked.
“Yep,” she bounced on her toes in delight, “it should be at this part of the temple, which is going to be tricky because there’s a restoration project going on at the moment and this spot is part of that, but I also believe that this is where the red granite altar will be as well. The conjunctions are all aligned exactly at ten sixteen at night, and if you stand here…well, I don’t know what you do, but this is directly under the planet at the center of all these conjunctions.”
“Damn, Tessa,” Max said with a low whistle, “you want a job with my research team?”
“I have a job, thank you, and to be honest, if I had to do this level of research every day, I’d stab myself with a knitting needle.”
“Alright then,” Angelica said, giving me an excited grin, “I’ll have the jet ready by noon and arrange for transportation and hotels in Siwa. All under my name of course so Viktor can see it and come running.”
When Max had told her that part of the plan, her eyes had lit up with glee at the thought of double crossing Viktor. Her devious side, the one that had a dark edge no one would expect, was one of many of my favorite things about her.
“You think he’s gotten the safe open yet and figured out you double crossed him?” Max asked.
“Maybe. Those spells are tricky. It’s more likely he messed up one of them and the safe melted. Either way, he’s going to be looking for a lot more than just the bowl to the sundial. He’ll want revenge too. We have to be careful.”
I nodded.
“So then maybe we should wait to draw him out? Not lay the trail of bread crumbs quite so thick?”
“We don’t have a lot of time,” she said, “I want to make sure he’s there. Of course, Dahlia almost killed us in those mines. He’s packing a pretty big punch between her and the weather Witches…we need reinforcements.”
“I happen to know three pretty powerful Celestials who would like a little payback,” Max said with a dark glint in his eyes.
Angelica’s eyes widened and she froze, staring at him in complete shock.
“You-you’d do that? Come with us?”
“Mom, you’ve backed us up for a long time. It’s our turn now.”
She swallowed convulsively and I glimpsed tears in her eyes before she turned away. When she looked at Max again, Angelica was barely holding on to her emotions.
“Thank you,” she smiled, her voice shaky. “That means more than you know.”
Max shrugged awkwardly and that was the end of it.
“We shouldn’t let them know you’re coming though,” Tessa said, fidgeting with a pen. “If we hold back the Celestials until you’re ready to spring the trap, he won’t be prepared, we’d have the upper hand.”
I arched an eyebrow, and Angelica grinned at her.
“You’re good at this,” I said.
Tessa shrugged.
“I’ve strategized to take down evil before.”
Max snorted.
“Alright, how far behind us should everyone be?” I asked.
“Can you time it for an hour before the conjunction?” Angelica asked. “I want him thinking he’s won, with his guard down.”
“That’s risky. What’s to stop him from killing you before help arrives?” I asked.
“If I know Viktor, he won’t miss an opportunity to monologue and force me to witness his great victory. And even if you’re not necessary to opening that doorway, we can convince him that you are. It will keep us alive long enough for everyone to show up.”
There were too many assumptions going into this part of the plan, and it made my hackles raise, especially since it would put my mate in the line of danger. But try as I might, I couldn’t think of any alternatives. I rubbed the back of my neck; hours of research and translating hadn’t helped me shake the feeling that we were all missing a big, obvious piece of this puzzle. And I was afraid that by the time it became evident, we’d be too far down the road to do anything but let it happen.
By the time we’d translated and organized the notes from the journal and the archeological evidence that Max found, it was past midnight. My nerves had heightened into a jittery energy that I needed to burn or I’d never sleep. I glanced at Angelica where she was lacing up a pair of sneakers and grinned.
Chasing her through the open desert around that cabin was just the thing to take my mind off all of this.
And if the worst happened, at least I’d know what it was like to run her down and rut her until she screamed.
Max and Tessa said their goodnights and left us alone in the room. Angelica was trying to act nonchalant, but I could practically feel her vibrating with excitement.
She wanted this as much as I did, but she didn’t know why. I glimpsed just the edge of the bite I’d given her and a jolt of surprise hit me.
There was a tiny, nearly unnoticeable spark of light, there and gone so fast that I wondered if I’d imagined it.
I shook my head. I hadn’t bitten her that hard; she’d be feeling it a hell of a lot more if I had.
But that mark still drew me. It was from me, on her, and I couldn’t help pulling the collar of her shirt aside and running the tip of my finger along it. Angelica shivered but didn’t turn around, stubbornly denying my effect on her as always.
And I fucking loved it.
She would make me earn her, make me break through those walls with quiet moments like earlier and hours of animal passion. I would give her anything, whatever she wanted. I was addicted to her, every shift of her voice, the different notes of her laughter, the soft heaven of her body. The smell of her cum, the taste of it. The way she sighed into my mouth when I hit just the right spot.
There was nothing about her that didn’t obsess me. And tonight, I’d have her sweat and the beat of her heart as she attempted to outrun me.
I growled, low and rumbling in my chest, and drew my finger up the back of her neck before seizing her there. I leaned in, lips grazing the pink shell of her ear.
“Are you ready to be run down and fucked by a Dragon?”
She licked her lips, breath catching and Fates help me! I pushed my hips against her so she could feel what the promise of her evasion and submission was doing to me.
“Are you going to be able to fly with that thing at full mast? Quite indecent if you ask me.”
I chuckled.
“Don’t you worry, you’re the only one who will be seeing it.”
I guided her out, my hand on the back of her neck as we walked through the dark house. Outside, the night air was just cool enough to feel like heaven against my heated scales. The sky had few clouds, and there was a heavy moisture in the air leftover from earlier. Under our feet, the ground had yet to absorb all of the rainfall. It would be a muddy chase, and I couldn’t wait.
I picked her up, bridal style, and she gave a gasp of shock as we shot into the sky.
“If we were near Avalon, I would do this over several days. You’d be left in the forest with what you needed to survive, and I’d hunt you through the trees. Chase you to the clearing and herd you to where I wanted you. It would be during the day, so the golden sun would shine on you and there would be nothing to hide you from me as I slowly shredded your clothes every time I came near. Until the final leg of our chase, where you would be naked as I tackled you to the soft earth and slipped between your thighs. I’d rut you for hours, bathe you in the sacred crystal pools, hunt meat for you and fuck you more. I’d fill you until you were delirious with pleasure.”
Her fingers dug hard into my shoulders where she held on, and her heart was thudding as her breath fanned in hot gasps across my face. I didn’t look at her, but I let a trace of my primal nature through my voice and eyes. She could see the change, I knew from the hint of fear under the musk of her arousal.
And damn it, she’d been right. I was horribly fucking indecent with my cock half extruded, simply from her reaction.
“So then…what will this be like?” she breathed.
“Shorter, in the moonlight. I will drop you within sight of the cabin, but far enough away to make this… interesting .”
She chuckled a nervous laugh.
“If you get to the cabin first, then you win the chase. But if I catch you,” I huffed out a dark laugh that made her quiver, “then I’ll fuck you wherever I like so that your screams echo through the desert.”
“Is this…I mean, most of the time I’ve heard that primal hunts result in a mating claim, is that what this would be?”
“No,” my voice was harsh, tortured. “Not unless you want me to.”
I held my breath as I hovered in the air, desperate for her answer. Could she hear the hope in my voice? The need for her?
“I don’t…I mean, I just don’t…”
“It’s alright. It was unfair of me to say that. We haven’t really talked about…If you want to turn back—”
“No, not unless you do. Or if you need to because you won’t be able to hold back.”
“I can.”
I’ve been doing it for four years now, what’s one more night?
Maybe it was something in the way I said it, or how this conversation fell out, but she frowned up at me, as if something had just become clear to her.
But I wasn’t ready for that conversation yet. I’d had a plan, a way to reveal who she was to me so that I had the best chance of wooing her.
So I looked away from her questioning eyes and flew down into the soft, red earth. We were a good distance from the cabin, but within sight. I’d confirmed with Alexis and River that it was empty earlier, and that the porchlight had a timer to click on after dark. It was the only light shining for miles; even car headlights didn’t reach this far since the road was a great distance. So no matter where I chased her, she’d be able to see the light.
When I set her on her feet, I gave her a wicked grin and was about to take off when she grabbed my hand.
“Wait, you said that I’d be naked at the end, right?”
“Yes.”
I watched in awe as she lobed a playful smile at me and began to strip out of her clothes. She placed them on a nearby rock and faced me, completely bare in the moonlight. Goose flesh broke out over her body but in true Angelica fashion, my mate acted like it didn’t bother her at all.
“Alright then,” she said brightly, “let’s start.”
The little vixen was making it very hard to fly off and she knew it.
Stick to the plan. Chase, fuck, woo Then tell her the truth…oh Fates, look at that ass!
I grit my teeth on a low, crazed snarl and jumped into the air, my blood running hot.
She didn’t stand a chance.