“Grief festers if it’s ignored,” he told her gently. “Tears are good for the soul.”
She cocked her head. “When’s the last time you cried?”
“Me?” His eyes dropped and for a bare second, she would have sworn sorrow as sharp and cutting as her own flashed through his eyes. Then he smiled and shrugged, but his casual demeanor didn’t quite seem genuine. She’d accidentally touched a nerve.
Pushing down her grief to deal with later, she sat on her heels and tilted her head back to take in the towering peak above.
“I feel like we’re so far from civilization,” she said, steering the conversation onto more neutral ground. “Don’t you think Ash and Raum are overdoing the scouting and stuff? How could anyone find us here?”
“Just because we don’t know where the ley lines in these mountains are, doesn’t mean other people don’t,” he said, relaxing with the change of topic. “And other daemons aren’t the only concern. The Underworld is home to many creatures that consider human-sized prey a great meal.”
She blinked. “Oh. I hadn’t considered other predators.”
He gave her shoulder a squeeze and rose to his feet. “We should go help the others set up. The sooner we have camp ready, the sooner we can try out these hot springs.”
She stood but didn’t turn away from the water. “Is this it? Is this what our lives are now? Hiding in these mountains, soaking in hot springs while Earth burns?”
“You don’t know that anything on Earth is burning,” Lyre replied, suddenly stern. “And no, this isn’t our lives forever. Nothing is forever, Piper. Nothing is set in stone. Today, tomorrow, the next week or even the next year, we’ll help Ash and Raum create a safe home for the draconians. After that? Who knows. If you don’t like it here, you can leave. We want to protect you, but we won’t hold you prisoner.”
She faced him, letting out a long breath. “I’m sorry. I sound ungrateful, don’t I? I just feel so helpless …”
He hesitated, a veiled look crossing his eyes. “You know we can’t give it back.”
She flinched. Hazy memories of white power and explosive destruction had haunted her dreams since she’d woken in the Underworld. She didn’t know who had the Sahar—Ash, Lyre, Seiya, one of the dragonets—and they weren’t telling her. Short of an end-of-the-world emergency, they would never allow her to touch the Stone again, and she couldn’t blame them.
She’d eventually pried some details out of Lyre about what had happened. While under the Sahar’s influence, she’d killed a bunch of Gaians, all of the Ras … and she’d fought Ash and Lyre, doing her best to kill them both. Lyre, working from a distance, had escaped unscathed, but Ash hadn’t. She’d broken four of his ribs and sliced a deep gash in his abdomen. He’d lost a lot of blood in the time it took to subdue her and retreat from the Gaian facility. If Raum hadn’t joined the fight, she might have killed Ash. The thought made her sick.
She understood the danger of the Sahar, that the risk she would lose control like that again was too great, but she still felt like she’d lost her right arm. The Sahar had been her trump card, an unbeatable power she could fall back on when things got bad. Being without it made her feel pathetically weak and helpless.
Speaking of weak, the hollow ache in her head warned her she was running low on magic. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on her human form. Tingles rushed over her skin and her weariness quadrupled in an instant. She swayed before Lyre caught her arm, steadying her.
“Ugh,” she grunted, opening her eyes. “My legs feel like jelly.”
“The hot springs will help with that.”
Stretching her arms over her head, she swept her gaze over his glamoured form. “Does it bother you, staying in glamour even in your own world?”
“I’m used to it. It would be inconsiderate to drop my glamour around so many women without good reason. If it were just the guys, the effect would be diluted enough that I could get away with it.”
Out of glamour, Lyre’s real form was so striking and magnetic that he was downright hypnotizing. His aura could easily overwhelm a woman’s will and give him an unfair amount of power over her. Piper didn’t blame him for keeping that particular ability under wraps around the draconian women, half of whom were already halfway smitten with him.
Her brow wrinkled. “Did you say the effect would be diluted on the guys? I didn’t think aphrodesia affected men at all.”
His lips curved, a wicked twinkle in his amber eyes. “Well, it doesn’t work as fast or as well, but with a bit of time and effort, I can catch anyone.” He smirked at her obvious doubt. “Ash didn’t believe me either. I proved it to him.”
Her eyes went so wide they probably doubled in size. “You—you what?”
“He said there was no way I could make my aphrodesia work on him,” Lyre said casually, lifting his hands in a shrug-like gesture. “I took it as a challenge.”
“Lyre!” Hot embarrassment rose in her cheeks. “Stop messing with me!”
“I’m not,” he said, his amusement vanishing. “He didn’t think it was possible, so I made sure he understood the danger.” His gaze intensified. “Never assume you’re immune to anything, and you’ll be a lot safer.”
She nodded slowly. Daemon magic was complex, especially their inherent caste abilities. She would do well to remember not to underestimate it. Puffing out her cheeks, she glanced at Lyre and wondered if she dared request the details about the lesson he’d taught Ash on incubus aphrodesia.
Seeing the silent laughter sparking in his eyes as he waited for her to ask, she decided she didn’t dare.
Chapter Three
Piper stood on the path, listening to the low chatter of voices and the splash of the small waterfall just out of sight. She had a blanket wrapped around her body, and under it, she wore nothing but her bra and underwear.
She’d drifted off while the others were cleaning up after their meager dinner of dried rations and soup, and by the time she’d woken, everyone had been almost ready to leave for the hot springs. She’d scrambled to get ready but they had already left the camp, calling for her to hurry up.
Biting her lip, she listened to them talk and a wave of loneliness washed over her. No one had intended to exclude her; they’d been telling her to get moving. It wasn’t their fault she’d fallen asleep, and it was silly to feel hurt that no one had waited for her. She wasn’t a child who needed her hand held.
She straightened her shoulders and forced herself into motion. As she rounded the bend, the springs came into view, the waxing crescent of Periskios reflecting on the rippling surface of the water. Clouds had drifted in, muting the light of the suns.
The draconian women were scattered throughout the water, submerged up to their shoulders. Since she’d seen them leaving, she knew they all wore modest undergarments—fitted little shorts and tight chest wraps. The women had donated a set to her so she could rotate out her regular undergarments for washing, but today, she was wearing her original bra and underwear, and both were a good bit more revealing than their clothes.
As she approached the pool, she realized most of her self-consciousness was unwarranted—Ash, Lyre, Raum, Kiev, and Sivan were nowhere in sight.
“Sleeping beauty awakes!” Coby called teasingly, waving at Piper to hurry. “Get your skinny butt in here before the rest of us get too waterlogged.”
Piper dropped her blanket on a rock at the edge of the pool. The air had a cold bite to it, raising gooseflesh over her skin, but in the next moment, she was splashing into the pool. Warm water rushed over her, instantly blissful.
She moaned in appreciation. “Oh, this is soooo good.”
Coby grinned. “Pretty damn wonderful, isn’t it?” She fluttered her fingers on the surface, sending droplets flying. “The pool gets hotter the closer you move to the waterfall, if this isn’t enough for you.”
“Hmm, hotter might be better,” she said thoughtfully, crouching until she was submerged up to her neck. “Where are—”<
br />
A few feet away, Yana flapped her small wings, splashing water everywhere with a peal of laughter. Piper shielded her eyes with one hand as Ivria plucked her out, lifting her over to the shallower spot. As the woman turned, a large puckered scar just below her shoulder blade was cast into sharp relief. Ivria sank back into the water and smiled apologetically at Piper.
“Sorry, what were you saying?”
“Huh? Oh, I was just asking where the guys are.”
Coby pointed to a plume of steam beyond the little waterfall, higher up the slope. “That spring over there. Shona decided the risk of adolescent hormones was too great for co-ed bathing.”
Piper flicked a glance at Jezel and Raisa, the former sitting in silence while the latter splashed around like a kid at the swimming pool. Probably a good idea. She was a little relieved herself, because she probably would have had trouble keeping her eyes off Ash.
She rolled her shoulders, feeling the pull of stiff muscles. “I’m going to try the hotter end.”
“Me too,” Coby said. “My lower back is killing me. I can’t wait until this baby pops.”
“Have fun,” Ivria said, leaning back against a rock. “I promise to fish you out if you faint.”
Coby waded toward the other end of the pool. Piper followed, waving to Seiya, who was chatting with Shona and Denna in a deep spot. The water grew steadily hotter as she and Coby neared the short waterfall. Mahala sat alone in a little nook of rock, her eyes closed as steam rose all around her.
“Holy shit, this is hot,” Coby announced, plunking down beside Mahala. She leaned back until the water was level with her collarbones.
Mahala opened her eyes, watching Piper sink down as well. Piper resisted the urge to fidget. She hadn’t spoken much with Mahala since joining up with the draconians. She wasn’t talkative like Coby, and Piper couldn’t help but feel a bit intimidated. It didn’t help that Mahala was absolutely stunning, with long raven hair and lovely, delicate features.
The hot spring and soft sounds of splashing water and conversation soothed her tension and she relaxed back against the rocky edge of the pool. Somewhere in the distance, the eagle-like calls of hunting birds echoed through the mountains, fierce and lonely.
“This is glorious,” Coby said, her eyes closed. “If only our permanent basecamp could have something like this. I could get used to a daily soak.”
Piper trailed her fingers back and forth in the ripples as the heat soaked into her tired muscles. “How will that work? How long will you live in a camp?”
“It won’t be forever,” Coby said. “Just until we find something better.”
“We don’t want a semi-permanent home here,” Mahala said, her low voice smooth and almost sensual. “We want a permanent one. It’s simply a matter of finding the best location where we will have sturdy shelter, fresh water, edible vegetation, and decent hunting.”
“Not a demanding list of requirements at all,” Piper said with a smile. “So you’ll eventually build your own little … village?”
“Yes. It won’t be a glamorous life, but …” She gave a small shrug. “It’s infinitely better than what we came from. These mountains are our home, even if we’ve never been here before.”
“There’s also the chance we might join a community instead of start one,” Coby said. “For as long as I can remember, there have been rumors about draconians living in secret here.”
Piper sucked in a breath. Draconians here? Ones who’d never been enslaved by Samael?
“Rumors mean little,” Mahala replied, her tone growing stern. “If there were draconians here, Samael would have hunted them down by now. We must not raise the children’s hopes.”
Coby grimaced. “You’re right. It’s just, you know, Kirya had to have come from somewhere, right?”
Mahala pressed her lips into a thin, unhappy line.
“Who?” Piper asked hesitantly.
“Ash and Seiya’s mother,” Coby answered. “She was ‘wild-caught,’ as the reapers used to call it. Samael’s hunters brought her in when she was a youth. They’d killed her father and older brothers, and her mother died in the fighting, so it was just her.”
“She was very special to many of us,” Mahala said. “She was old enough to know of the traditional values of our people and shared them with us before she died. Even though she was with us for only ten or eleven seasons, she made a great difference.”
Piper pressed her hands together under the water. “How did she die?”
Rage flashed over Mahala’s face, unexpectedly aging her. “Priel killed her.”
“Who?”
Mahala’s eyes focused. “Sorry, a male draconian.” Seeing Piper’s shock, she smiled grimly. “Samael is a master at breaking the spirit and twisting the mind. He needs the males to be obedient, either because they care about us too much to disobey, or because they come to enjoy what they do. Priel enjoyed it.”
“Did Samael tell him to kill Kirya?”
“No. Priel decided he wanted her. She fought back, and he killed her. Samael might very well have executed him for killing an important female—a new bloodline—but Raum and Ash got to him first.”
“But … but Ash would have been only …”
“A child. Still a child.”
She’d wondered before how young Ash had been when he’d first killed, but she never would have guessed he had still been a child. She almost asked how old exactly but decided she didn’t want to know.
Giving her head a little shake, she looked between Mahala and Coby. “So both Ash’s parents were captured by Hades as adults or near adults?”
Mahala nodded. “I was a young child when Kirya was brought in, but I still remember the commotion. His father was …” She smiled faintly. “He was chaos incarnate.”
Seiya had told Piper the story of Ash’s father. A Hades force returning from a battle had stumbled across a small settlement of draconians. Ash’s father had single-handedly held off the entire army while his kin escaped. He’d been captured alive—most definitely not his intent—and had made Samael’s life hell for a short time before he was executed. Before his death, he’d been forced, through a combination of drugs and magic, to impregnate Ash’s mother. His last words had been to tell Kirya what Ash’s full name was to be: Ashtaroth.
“We’re all tied together by blood—siblings, half-siblings, aunts, cousins,” Coby said, “but Ash’s only relation is Seiya. Even Seiya has a couple relatives; she’s cousins with Sivan and Jezel on her father’s side.”
Piper glanced toward Seiya, only semi visible through the steam. “She is?”
“Jezel is my niece,” Mahala said. “And she’s Raisa’s half-sister and Kiev’s cousin on her mother’s side, and Sivan’s half-sister and Seiya’s cousin on her father’s side. You can see how interwoven our bloodlines are. We truly are one big family—except for Ash.”
Piper resisted the urge to massage her temples, her head spinning with the complexity of their family tree. “Did it bother you that he only wanted to save Seiya?”
“Not me,” Mahala said. “I was envious of his freedom to make the attempt. I understood that he kept his distance from us not to be cruel, but to protect us. When he escaped, Samael didn’t punish us. He knew he couldn’t use us to draw Ash back. I was happy for him. He, more than any of us, needed to be free.”
Piper tilted her head. “What do you mean?”
“He couldn’t be cowed. Samael knew that too. Ash would either break completely or die, but he would never truly become an obedient slave.”
“Like Raum?” she asked hesitantly.
“Raum …” Mahala trailed off, her eyes distant.
“Raum was lost for a long time,” Coby said slowly. “He was already sliding, and then Samael killed his first child … the poor girl was still a baby. After that, Raum was just this … empty, obedient shadow. He wasn’t vicious like some of the others, but he did whatever Samael ordered, even if that meant beating one of us.”
&nbs
p; “I’m not entirely sure when he began to change,” Mahala murmured. “It was very subtle and he was careful to hide it so Samael wouldn’t notice. About two years ago, he came to Denna, Shona, and I to tell us we needed to start carefully preparing the others for the day when we would escape—or die trying.”
Piper exhaled, her head swimming and emotions churning. “He’s lost a child and had another already, even though he’s still so young?”
Coby snorted. “He’s not that young. He’s, what?” She looked at Mahala. “Only a few seasons younger than Shona, right?”
“Yes, older than me but younger than Shona.”
Piper looked between them. “How old is that, exactly? He looks, like, twenty-four or twenty-five to me.”
“Twenty-four Earth years, right?” Coby said, wagging her finger.
Piper blinked.
“What makes you think your years are the same as ours?” she asked with a chuckle.
“We don’t track age aside from a few milestones,” Mahala explained. “Different daemon castes age at different rates so it would be foolish to compare the number of seasons we’ve each been alive.”
“Wait … So you don’t know how old you are?”
“I know my age relative to the others. Raum is a few seasons older than me and Ash is a few seasons younger.” She shrugged. “What else do I need to know? Why do I need to assign a value to it?”
“But …” She shook her head. Her age had been an important part of her identity growing up. The idea that daemons didn’t know or care about their ages was bizarre. “But Ash told me he first tried to escape Asphodel when he was fifteen and Seiya was thirteen.”
The two women exchanged looks.
Coby lifted one shoulder in a little shrug. “He must have picked an equivalent human age for simplicity. He might keep track of passing Earth years—he’s spent enough time there—but I seriously doubt he actually knows exactly how old he is in human terms.”
Piper frowned. So Ash had lied to her? Or had he just gone with a number he thought was about right to keep things simple? That conversation had happened when they’d only known each other for a handful of days.