Chapter 4

Damien leapt out of the demolished room the same way he had entered, through the enormous hole he had made when he had rammed his body into it a moment ago.

Syreena was more than just dead weight in his arms. The insanely clever Ruth had bespelled the petite, light-figured woman he held with a weighting hex, making it seemingly impossible for anyone to lift her or take her away. It was like trying to fly with a full-grown bull elephant on his chest.

Still, he propelled them out of the prison and up toward the stars crowding the black sky. It was taxing, especially after the magical abuse he had just withstood not a minute beforehand.

On the plus side, Ruth could not fly, so her teleportation powers were useless. She could teleport into the night sky right in front of him if she wanted to, but she would promptly plummet to the ground and very likely die a moment afterward.

Ruth had to resort to other means. Damien could already feel her trying to pull his destination from his mind. If she won the image, she could use it to beat him there and would be lying in wait for him.

This was why he had purposely acted on the moment and had made no plans as to what actions he would have to take to thwart her. What he did not know for himself, she could not successfully take from him.

Magic-users could levitate, so he was not entirely safe in the air, either. He could sense and smell them leaping up after him. They were fresh, uninjured, and unburdened, so they would catch up to him very quickly.

This, however, was where he could shoot two birds with a single bullet. He hesitated in his fast upward flight, glancing down at his targets. He cast out a blanket of insurmountable dread and fear. He threw terror down at them as if it were a nuclear pulse.

The mayhem that followed their shattered concentration was instantaneous. In addition, even as bodies began to plummet back to the earth, he felt Ruth’s drag on his mind faltering. She was trying to hold on to him and negate the effects his powerful hypnotic suggestion on her minions at the same time.

As formidable as she was, she would still fail.

The full power of Damien’s mental ability flared into dominance, shutting the floundering intruder out with a painful backlash much like getting one’s fingers trapped in the heavy closing of a car door.

He did not stick around to hear the echo of Ruth’s scream of pain and outrage.

The effect of the weighting hex decreased the farther they got from the casting source. It took only ten minutes of fiercely fast flight before Syreena seemed to weigh little more than a feather in his arms, in spite of the fact that she was cold and dead limp.

She seemed so fragile, he thought as he took a moment to glance at her pallid, bloodstained features. It was not a term he would have ever thought to use when describing her until just that very moment. The sparkle of her vitality, he realized, had added an astounding potency to her presence. Now, as she lay limp and lifeless, he was overcome with the irrational fear that he might somehow break her to pieces just with the force of his necessary hold.

From the powerful aroma of blood lifting off her, he could tell she had been brutalized in ways in addition to the obvious, ways he could not immediately spy. It enraged him, the feeling intensifying as the call of the scent of it still managed to ferret out a hunger from within him. Nightwalker blood was full of the mysticism and power they all manipulated. To the Vampire, the bouquet of it was like the smell of an imminent gourmet meal cooking on the stove of a starving man.

Damien had never before had cause to be ashamed of that instinct, not in all of his long life, but he felt that burning and censuring emotion now. The last thing that he should be thinking of was what a delicacy she could be to his palate. A deadly delicacy, but a unique confection just the same. Unfortunately, he was overwhelmed by the pervading scent of her, made a little dizzy by it, and began shivering like a junkie being taunted with heroin while he was in withdrawal.

He had not hunted before escorting Jasmine to the Library that evening. They had arrived in the Russian province the night before, and out of respect for Siena’s territory, had put off the need to seek prey until they had the opportunity to ask her official permission to hunt in her province. She would not deny them, of course, because they never harmed those they borrowed life from, but it was a political courtesy. Had it been a Lycanthrope staying in his territories, he would have expected as much and been insulted by less. Not that it was a matter that would lead to war or even an altercation; it was simply a demanded courtesy of their cultures.

So now, his hunger and draining energy was the price to be paid for his civilized behavior. This was what made him vulnerable to the lure of the blood spoor that was spread over them both, more so than he normally would have been. The exotic nature of that spoor made the blade cut all the sharper and deeper.

It also told him that she was bleeding profusely. As strong as they were, even Nightwalkers could not heal fast enough to replenish blood supply at the rate the Lycanthrope was clearly losing it. He needed to find a way to provide aid for her. He had to find a safe haven, and he had to do it fast.

“Lyric, please bring me my sewing basket.”

The small, slight-figured young woman looked up from her book of poetry to meet the large blue eyes that were the dominating feature in her companion’s delicately shaped face.

“But it is Wednesday,” Lyric said with confusion.

“Yes, Lyric, I realize that,” Windsong said with a patient smile.

“You only sew on Thursdays,” Lyric added.

“It is not a law that I do so,” the older woman teased the adolescent Mistral. “We will be having guests soon, and I will need to repair that tear in my blue dress.”

“Guests?” The young Siren actually choked on the word.

They never had guests.

They lived in a small French village—a tiny cluster of cottages, really—called Brise Lumineuse, with a total population of fifteen, not including the small children.

In all her nineteen years of life, no outsider had ever visited the little hamlet. In her ten years as Windsong’s apprentice, they had only had two recurring visitors from the fifteen others who lived at the end of the long lane that distanced Windsong’s chalet from the others. One was Thrush, Lyric’s childhood friend. The other was Harrier, a handsome and sweet Bard who was to the elder Siren what Thrush was to her.

However, Thrush was in bed with a terrible flu and Harrier was currently traveling. So neither of them would be visiting anytime soon.

“Who will be visiting?” she asked her mentor as she tried to keep her hands from shaking by pulling them beneath the table and clasping them in her lap.

She had been there long enough to know it was a waste of time to wonder how it was that Windsong came by her knowledge.

“Lyric, do not ask me questions. Just fetch the basket.”

Damien landed hard and with little grace.

He skidded to a stop on both knees, laying Syreena down on the damp ground. She was growing too cold too fast, and her breath was beginning to falter. He could not travel with her another moment without potentially killing her, and yet he was fully aware of the fact that their enemies had regrouped and were hot on his trail.

A lot of enemies.

“Syreena?”

He reached to touch her face, which was colder than even his wind-chilled hands. He did not have to touch her pulse to count it; he could do that by sheer ethereal senses alone. She was dying.

Rapidly.

He touched her scalp near her hairline, the most immediate site of free-flowing blood. Her hair had been torn away there, as if in methodical snatches. No doubt it had been a part of Ruth’s delighted torture. Knowing her victim’s weaknesses as well as she did, the former warrior had exploited them. It was clear Ruth had wanted to kill the Princess; Damien could tell that just by looking at Syreena. She had just preferred to do it slowly, with as much visible horror as possible. No doubt so she could find a perverse satisfaction or revenge, then return the corpse to the Russian territory as mutilated as possible, sending her message of vengeance loud and clear once the body was discovered.

Luckily, Ruth had not counted on someone of his strength being on her trail so quickly. That did not mean part of her plan would not succeed, he thought worriedly as he further assessed the Princess. Damien looked to his left and right, almost as if seeking help from the empty woods around him.

He truly did feel helpless. There were protocols to consider, superstitions between cultures that were hard to overcome. If he did what his instincts cried out for him to do …

Were she a Vampire, there would not be a moment’s hesitation. But she was an alien Nightwalker. A Lycanthrope. And that made all the difference in the world.

Out of all the Nightwalker species, however, Vampires and Lycanthropes were probably the closest in ability, thinking, culture, and instinct than any of the others. If there could be any acceptable meshing of what he was contemplating, it could well be one of her breed that would make it even remotely possible.

It was written in their histories exactly what was and what was not acceptable for a Vampire palate. For instance, the blood of a being who partook of black arts and magics was utter poison. It was a powerful enough venom to kill a Vampire who partook of it within hours. Within minutes if the Vampire was young or weak.

Human blood was the mainstay in dietary needs.

Despite popular mythos, a Vampire did not kill with its bite. It was physically impossible to take in more than half a human’s blood volume, and even that much was considered gluttony, so long as the Vampire was not wounded and losing blood as quickly as he was replacing it. So while weakness was inevitable, a human would recover from a state of prey quite easily. At the most, they would suffer from a mild to serious anemia.

Vampires were not stupid, however. Why harm their own supply of sustenance, when they could take from more than one vessel and have the humans barely miss a beat in their lives? That way their prey could live and provide sustenance another day.

As with all things in nature, it was instinct for Vampires to provide and take in balance. He had always believed that this was why they were equipped with coagulant systems to keep prey from bleeding to death, not to mention the notable side benefit of an antibody transference that could cure ill humans of a majority of illnesses.

However, very little in nature was perfectly universal. There were diseases that changed and mutated so fast that many antibodies would be obsolete almost instantly. Which meant there were things that even Vampires could not cure. Then there was the matter of what was nourishment, what was benign, what was deadly, and what was a great unknown when it came to the blood supply itself.

It was widely known in the Vampire world that Lycanthropes could not benefit from the cure of Vampire antibodies. What was not as clearly known was what taking Lycanthrope blood would do to a Vampire. Nightwalkers were taboo to Vampires, like sugar to diabetics—they could eat it, perhaps even survive it, but there was no telling what they would suffer for it.

This was Damien’s dilemma of the moment.

As exhausted as he was from all he had done that night, he was not afraid to pit his power against whatever negative effects the introduction of Nightwalker blood would have on him. He had far more of a chance of surviving that than Syreena had at this moment of surviving without his aid.

The aid she needed was within his body, in the form of the injectable clotting factors that came into play after he had fed from a victim. In their mystical way, they would rush to all sites of open wounds and work their magic. He would have to take Syreena’s blood, however, in order to trigger the coagulants she so desperately needed. One could not be stimulated without the other, just as a meal stimulus or something of the like was needed to trigger the injection of insulin into the human digestive system. A human could not simply think it into happening. Neither could any Vampire trigger his own injection response.

There was then the fact that she had lost so much blood already. To take more could kill her before it cured her. And after all those considerations, there was no guarantee the clotting agents would be compatible with her chemistry. It was very likely, but not a definite.

Damien suddenly grew tired of the frustration of his indecision. He no longer had time for the luxury of it.

He slid one arm beneath her shoulders, lifting her limp torso up from the ground. He slid her forward onto his thighs, the chill of her body penetrating him quickly as he drew her tightly to his chest. Gently, with a sense of reverence he did not understand the origin of, he brushed back what remained of the gray hair on the slope of her right shoulder. His dark gaze fell onto the artery that pulsed so weakly in her throat and he closed his eyes for a moment, exhaling as he said a quick mental prayer for her benefit and safety. When he looked at her again, he allowed himself to feel his incredible hunger for the first time in hours.

And he prayed for himself.

He was not prepared for how awesome it would be. The hunger was blinding, a sensation like no other, and he swayed under the power of it. It was dark and deep, insidious as it made itself known, telling him how long the actual craving had been creeping around in his subconscious and his veins. Only then did he realize how much self-censure and control he had been using all of this time.

Fangs erupted violently in his mouth, demanding their target ferociously. Need slammed through him in waves, erotic like the night, a mystery ready to be exposed. Without any hesitation, he struck at her with the speed of a biting cobra.

A second before he made contact, Syreena’s eyes flew open. Something inside the female Nightwalker had known she was about to be attacked and had forced her into consciousness in the hopes that she could fight off any further harm. Like going into shock, it was her body’s last-ditch effort to try and save itself.

So she was conscious when the fast and pointed piercing of Damien’s canines struck her throat. However, she was too weak to do anything but gasp in surprise. Not because it hurt—the break through her skin was too quick and sharp to cause any prolonged pain. His mouth, however, was hot, like fierce fire compared to the deathly chill of her skin and body, and this was what shocked the sound out of her laboring lungs.

Syreena was aware that his strike was exactly that, a rapid piercing in and out directly over her carotid artery. She had always thought that a Vampire used the bite of his fangs like a straw or a needle, using them to suck blood directly from the main access point.

In fact, he simply used them to create the two wide initial holes he required. That had to be the case, because she felt nothing of his teeth a moment later as his lips, so warm and so damp, closed to make a perfect seal around the wound he had created. His tongue first slid over her skin, the burning velvet caress making her shudder hard in his hold. Then there was suction, increasing moment by moment with a surreal and erotic intensity.

Damien felt the violent tremor of her body. He was hugging her tightly to his chest, breast to breast, so the vibration of it made him quake in time with the aggressive shudder. He was dimly aware of her consciousness as her blood burst into his mouth. The heat of it intensely defied the chill of her body. That was his final coherent thought as the first taste of her flowed over his tongue. When the hot liquid slid down his throat, she burned him like a potent whiskey.

It could only be described as ambrosia. He had tasted the blood of human women thousands upon thousands of times, and always the pheromone content of it went straight to his head, filling him with a sense of sensuality and pleasure that was very akin to sexual desire. Syreena’s blood was like nothing he could have ever hoped to encounter, even in his enormous lifetime. She was full of power, the layers in the bouquet of it like strong barbiturates that numbed in everincreasing intensity. Unlike those drugs, however, he soared into an astounding high, rather than a relaxing, coma-like state.

He fell off his knees, sitting down hard in the wet grass and leaves, dragging her with him every inch of the way. He tried to think, tried to remember everything that was so crucial for him to keep aware of, but all he knew was her blood, the feel of her body, and the long, low groan she was releasing against his neck. Her hands slid up his back, her long fingers finding the path of his spine, following it up to his shoulders where they spread like wings to hold him.

“Damien …”

The rasp of his name on her lips sang through him like a high note. His body reacted with ultimate need and lightningsharp arousal.

This was no pheromone-induced shadow of excitement, either. There was no mistaking the difference. His body burned, hardened with a violence of need that made him groan low in his throat. It was an oppressive weight, strangled by his clothing and his conscience. He should not be feeling this. Not when so much was at stake.

He could not have helped it, even if he had truly wanted to. And he could not make himself honestly want to. She was a sensualist’s perfect fantasy. As she sustained him, bled into his body, he felt his senses expanding to accommodate the overriding sensations and pleasures she was providing. Her scent, her luscious flavor, and the slow, slinky writhing of her body against his. His hands clenched into tight fists, balling up the fabric of her simple cashmere dress.

Leave her! Leave her now! his conscience screamed, completely in contrast to everything he actually wanted. What he wanted. Wanted. Craved. Syreena.

That was the moment her grasping hands went limp and fell away from his body. The hastening feeling of loss sent a note of warning and clarity into the haze of satiation and pleasure he was drowning in. Damien’s eyes flew open as reality set in with its cold, demanding way. He suddenly recalled his purpose and that the life he held in his arms was in terrible threat.

The last thing Syreena felt before she drifted away into welcoming blackness was the second piercing of his teeth, followed quickly by a vicious burning sensation that began to spread across her neck and into her body.

Damien fell onto his back, gasping for air he did not even need, her slight weight falling over the top of his body. Freezing cold and moisture soaked into his clothing, but he was completely unaware of it. He could not move, could not think. He was nothing but a rush of feelings and sensations that the exterior conditions of the world simply could not touch.

He had succumbed to the immeasurable high of her inside him. Muscles and circulatory pathways contracted, shuddering and quivering in pleasure and the feelings of being beyond alive, beyond his own spiritual ties to that planet and that point in time. All he could do was stare up at the trees thrusting up all around him in an intensely distorted threedimensional perspective. The stars in the dark night sky were spinning around the heavens, a blur of bright white light on a velvet black background. They streaked tails of light, as if his eyes were the lens of a camera left with an open aperture as the world turned on its axis.

He closed his eyes, feeling a little nauseated by it, trying to tell himself that it was just a mild hallucination.

What he could not so easily think away was the heavy ache of his aroused body. He felt as if molten steel had been poured into him, hardening him into an inviolable state. It was somehow sacrosanct, and his power was pure nothingness in the face of it.

He was dimly aware of her breath in the cradle of his neck. It meant she had survived him, and he was grateful for that. As they lay together in the night, she began to warm up against him.

‘‘‘Hours to go before I sleep,’’’ he murmured to the forest, the quote coming to his mind as reminder that he could not afford to waste any more time in this way that exposed them both to incredible danger.

But he could not make himself move. It was as if he had been given a paralytic drug. It kept him from moving, yet still allowed him to feel.

And that was when the paincame.

Damien cried out when it burst through him with sudden brutality. He could not help it. The wrenching sound echoed into the night, bouncing off the trees, a long, deep-timbreed roar of agony. He suddenly felt as if his veins and arteries were being stripped from his body, tearing clean through muscle, sinew, and skin. He convulsed beneath the charge, so hard that he heard a bone somewhere in his body snap in his sub-vocal hearing. He was aware, somehow, that he was being brutalized on an atomic level. With the altering of his body came the altering of his mind. He imagined, for a single, horrifying moment, that his chest was exploding, making way for the leaping escape of the dolphin that had somehow become trapped within. As the beast writhed into the air, it changed form into a falcon. From a falcon, it burst into the shape of a dove.

The soft little mourning dove floated on delicate wings to land beside his head. He blinked his eyes, and the next moment he was looking at small, bare feet.

Numbly, he followed the line of ankle and calf until he was looking up at the entire figure of a beautiful young woman he could swear he had seen once before.

Windsong knelt beside the Vampire Prince quickly, touching his skin to test the warmth of his body. It was the only way to tell if a Vampire was alive or not, provided they were not beheaded or burnt to ash. Those deaths were pretty much self-identifying.

Even in the darkness she could make out the blood still on his lips. Considering the matching wounds on the Lycanthrope’s throat, Windsong was easily able to add up the evidence before her, immediately understanding what Damien had done and why he had been forced into such a terrible decision. The sacrifice he had made to save the vulnerable Lycanthrope Princess touched the sensitive Mistral far too deeply, and she had to blink back the sudden moisture in her eyes.

The flutter of bird’s wings drew her attention up to the small lark lighting on the ground beside her. With a ruffle of feathers, the bird began to transform. In a minute’s time, it became the petite form of Windsong’s apprentice.

“Lyric, we must fashion litters and take them home as soon as possible. They need healing and protection.”

“How can we protect ones such as these?” Lyric questioned nervously, even as she knelt to help Windsong turn the Lycanthrope Princess off the Vampire Prince, laying her out next to him.

“Just as we protect ourselves, dearest. With our voices and our wisdom and our hearts. Hurry now, there is no time to waste.”

“Are they close to death?”

“I am not sure. However, I am positive they are being pursued. Move quickly, child.”

Lyric did not ask another question. She hurried off to gather some strong branches together. She would not go far, Windsong knew, because she would be too afraid to. That was for the best, the Mistral thought, because for the next few moments she would not be able to keep any of her attention on her young charge.

Instead, she sat down on the chill forest debris, folding her legs beneath herself gracefully, her knees close to the side-by-side heads of the unconscious outsiders.

Windsong closed her eyes and took two long, deep breaths. Then, softly, she began to sing. The song was one of protection, and it was a powerful one. It would buffer the three of them from detection and harm once it had spread about them in a circle of comfort. That widening circle was only a matter of Windsong’s exquisite voice warming up and expanding in exponential force. It only took a moment for the forest to begin to ring with the echoes of the notes, sung over scales that were sometimes perceptible only to animal ears. The eddy of the painfully sweet music drifted out, bewitching and confusing the senses of anything within its circumference, or anything trying to enter it.

“Syreena,” Siena hissed softly.

She let the bloodied snow fall through her fingers, turning sharply to face the female Vampire.

“You believe Damien has tracked after her?”

“Since it is unlikely he would attack her, that is the only logical alternative,” Jasmine responded matter-of-factly. “His scent leads to this place, then disappears just as your sister’s does. Unless you think they are holding a caucus or trysting while your sister is wounded …”

“Syreena does not tryst ,” the Lycanthrope Queen snapped at the smaller female. “Why do I think you are seeing this as some sort of amusement?”

“Siena …” Elijah warned gently.

“Very likely because my species is easily taken in by a good intrigue. Lucky you, for that is no doubt why Damien followed the Princess.”

Elijah reached out to grab his wife’s arm when she lurched toward the Vampire female with a snarl rumbling out of her chest. “Siena! I am sure Jasmine means no insult and is only relating fact,” he interjected quickly and soothingly.

“Of course,” Jasmine said.

“Can you track them?” Siena asked her husband, ignoring the Vampire and grasping at the sleeve of his shirt.

“I can.” Siena was forced to look at the outsider because of her husband’s negating thoughts in her head. He could not follow Damien. His skills were not equal to the superb abilities of the Prince. “I can follow Damien anywhere he wants me to,” Jasmine continued easily. “I assure you, he has not covered his tracks behind him. He wants anyone who notices this scene to follow him and perhaps lend him aid. Your Consort and I can fly after him. You, however, cannot. You will have to remain behind.”

Elijah felt his mate’s frustration soaring through her with white-hot intensity. She did not like this stranger telling her what she could and could not do. Even if she was right, the Queen resented her for reminding her of it. Siena’s animal form was a cougar, a land-bound creature that could not cross bodies of water without the aid of other means, mystical or technological. For instance, Elijah could take her with him.

“No,” he murmured softly into her hair near her ear, reaching to cradle her shoulders in his palms. “Stay here. In case Damien returns with Syreena. At least then you can inform us of it and we can return to you more quickly.” He touched her chin gently, turning her eyes up into his own. “We will bring her back to you, kitten, if it can be done.”

“I know,” she said, the catch in her voice tight and painful. She blinked the emotion in her eyes away, turning from them both in order to hide it. Jasmine knew it was purely for her benefit. The Demon warrior was well aware of everything his mate felt, sometimes even before she was. It was the nature of the way they were joined. Even a Vampire knew this.

Jasmine spread her slim arms to her sides, fingers and palms turned up to the sky as she lifted from the ground and into the night. The cold wind rippled through her loose shirt and hair as she hovered just above the couple’s golden heads. She turned her eyes upward, her face away, so Elijah and his bride could say a brief good-bye without her obvious witness.

A moment later, the Demon was soaring up to her level, his stark green eyes penetrating the darkness as he looked at her.

“Lead,” he commanded her.

“Be patient. This will be slow going, warrior,” she warned him. “The trail is already several hours cold.”

“I understand that,” he said, glancing down at his wife in spite of himself. His worry for her was clear.

It was enough to touch even the jaded Vampire.

Damien’s eyes flew open, the pupils contracting sharply in the bright light surrounding him. He shied for one breathless moment, alarmed that he had woken up in sunlight.

After a moment of adjustment, he realized there were soft hands on his back urging him to lie back into the warmth and comfort of the bed he had been resting in. He jerked around to see who was touching him, an instinctive show of fangs and a snarl behind his lips.

The young girl he sprang at yelped in terror, jumping out of her chair and knocking it over as she stumbled back out of his reach.

“Easy, Lyric,” a soft, sweet voice soothed the girl as hands reached to steady her. “He will not hurt you. Will you, Damien?”

Damien hesitated when he heard his name, turning to focus on the new target. He realized immediately that he recognized her. “Windsong?”

“Yes, Damien.”

He remained frozen in place for two beats as his mind tried to reconcile all the information it was receiving at once. It was difficult to do, not only because of his shocky state, but because Windsong’s voice was a natural hypnotic. The dazing lure of a Siren’s voice was half pure beauty and talent; the other half was a trick of the mind. A Vampire of his skill and age was immune to the mind manipulation, but there would always be an effect of a Mistral’s voice that he could not overcome. Not so long as the Mistral’s intentions were well meant.

“Sorry,” he murmured to the girl he had frightened before lying back with a sigh of immeasurable relief.

Safety. At last.

He remembered it had been intentional, setting down in the woodlands near Brise Lumineuse . He had intended to seek shelter there if and only if he had to. Apparently, Windsong had known he had become unable to reach her himself.

Windsong somehow always knew those sorts of things.

“My apologies, Lyric,” he said again, this time far more sincerely. He glanced at Windsong and then turned studying eyes on the compact little dark-haired girl. “Your apprentice this century, I take it?”

“Yes,” Windsong said. “How are you feeling?”

“Tired,” he responded automatically. Then he realized that was very much the truth of it. He could not remember the last time he had actually felt weariness like this. This was not the weakness that came from too long a time between feedings, something he experienced with much more frequency, if frequency was the appropriate term. This was a tiring like … well, like it had been when he had once depended on circulation, oxygen, and a beating heart to power himself.

Like all Vampires, however, he had ceased to need those support systems around his one hundredth year. Now any use they got was purely habitual, like blinking or breathing. It was this lack of expected function that had started the myth that Vampires were the walking dead. In truth, it was merely that, as they matured, their bodies learned a new way to conserve nutrition while at the same time magnifying the energy it produced. It was an evolutionary efficiency and it was why they had become so prevalent as a species. Their brains functioned at higher levels, allowing for higher sensory abilities, the power to influence the minds of others, and the capacity to levitate and fly by the sheer command of thought. Not to mention the quick healing that all Nightwalkers enjoyed the benefit of in one form or another.

Apparently he had survived his deadly experiment with the ingestion of Lycanthrope blood, his remarkable ability to heal himself of almost any damage being his true saving grace.

However, he would not be repeating the act anytime soon.

He could still remember the pain and knew it would haunt him for quite some time. Like a child, he did not need to touch the flame twice to learn his lesson.

He felt leaden and heavy, but there was no hunger that needed attending, so he knew that was not the reason why. His body was nowhere near finished coping with whatever damage had been done. It made him feel helpless and he hated that. What he would not give for a good Body Demon medic in that moment.

“Syreena?”

“She is resting,” Windsong assured him, resting a hand on his arm to keep him lying in the bed when his instinct was to get up and see for himself. He would be responsible if anything happened to the Lycanthrope Princess, and he would rather lose his head to a dull blade than see that happen.

The passion of the thought surprised him for a moment, so much so that he actually laughed aloud. It was out of place to the two women near his bed as well. He could tell because they exchanged curious glances. “Will she live?”

“Thanks to you,” Windsong said, letting him know she was aware of what he had done to attempt to save her.

“Thanks to luck,” he corrected her with a long, heartfelt sigh. “A lot of luck.”

“Then we shall have to give thanks for your luck in our prayers before we sleep this morning,” Windsong said.

“How long until dawn?” he asked. Normally, his body clock warned him when it was close to dawn, but he was not surprised to realize he was a bit dulled to some of his usual internal sensitivities.

“It is past dawn,” the little apprentice said, her surprise that he did not know that all too evident in her sweet little voice.

“Thank you, sweetling,” he said, his eyes drifting closed for a long minute. He did not see her blush at the intimacy of the endearment. “Right now, I think I would be mid-suntan before I realized that.”

Lyric burst out in a surprised laugh, covering her mouth in shock at herself as she drew his attention back to her. He gave her a charismatic grin as he casually tucked one hand beneath his dark head.

“So you are studying to be a healer?” he asked. “You will be learning from the best. The woman you saved today would not have lived into adulthood if not for Windsong.”

Lyric’s eyes widened at that piece of information. “We mostly do herbal medicines together. Windsong will not take me to more serious cases.”

“Because you are a long way off from learning those skills. One day at a time,” the elder Siren lectured firmly, her large blue eyes sparing a knowing twinkle for Damien alone. “Is it not amazing how eager the young are to get themselves into hot water?”

Damien laughed and nodded. He had known far more than enough precocious Vampires with that very same trait. Jasmine had been one of them.

“Now, Lyric, resume your seat and your mending song,” Windsong instructed her pupil, using her hands to guide the awestruck girl into her chair. “Lyric has an exceptional voice, Damien. I expect she will help you to sleep in no time.”

“I do not doubt it in the least,” Damien said.

He relaxed as much as he could in the bed, closing his eyes and trying to ignore the residual echoes of extraordinary pain that still lived in his memory and the nerves of his body.

As promised, Lyric began to sing to him. After a few unsure quavers, she fell into the familiarity of the mending song she had practiced over and over and over again; always waiting and hoping for the time she would first use it. She was amazed and honored that her first serious patient was the very powerful Prince of the Vampires. She could hardly wait to tell Thrush about the wild experience of the entire night. He would never believe her! She hardly believed it herself.

Lyric’s voice flowed over Damien like a breeze that first rushed, and then lingered. The song itself was filled with soothing imagery, of fields and fresh air and moonlight that shone down on the wings of the moths flitting by. He allowed himself the luxury of being cocooned by this special form of magic. So long as Windsong was there, they would remain safe.

Damien drifted into a contented sleep with that thought.