Under Twilight: an Urban Fantasy Novel (Fearless Destiny Book 3) Read online

  All eyes were on Baal now, and then they were running over Brett’s hooded form.

  “Who is this?” Salt and Pepper asked.

  “This is the Fearless officer who went into Twilight for us.”

  “Our emissary?”

  “Indeed.”

  “When did he return? Why were we not informed he was back?”

  “There were complications,” Baal said. “He was held prisoner and experimented on.”

  The room was suddenly deathly silent until the jowl guy broke it with an incredulous bark of laughter. “Very funny Parsons.”

  Baal arched a brow. “Minchin, I’m sure you know me well enough to know I do not make jokes.”

  Minchin swallowed. “Experimented on, you say?”

  “Allow me to fill you in.” Baal spoke and they listened. He told them of the serum, The Hunt, and the modified denizens. He laid out Orin’s plan as plainly as he could, and when he was done there were pale faces all around.

  But then the man with the salt and pepper hair snorted. “This is preposterous. Twilight has been nothing but gracious to us since our treaty was signed.” He peered at Brett. “It’s obvious some offence was caused. Maybe if we’d sent an emissary trained in the art of politics as I’d suggested in the first place …”

  The annoyance tipped into fury and Brett yanked back his hood and leapt forward, slamming his hands on the desk. Someone screamed and the eyes on the man before him grew wide as saucers. The smell of urine filled the air and a stab of satisfaction pierced Brett’s heart.

  “You think this was done because I caused offence?” Brett’s tone was a snarl. “The only offence I caused was refusing to sign a treaty that would have delivered us into their hands.”

  “The document was spelled,” Baal added. “A clause we were unable to see. It allowed the emissary full power to sign the treaty—a treaty that would have handed Lindrealm to the Twilight king.”

  “This is what he wants to do to us.” Brett pulled off his hoody to reveal his diamond skin meshed with human flesh. “He wants to turn us into soldiers for his army and march us across Evernight and into the fifth dimension.”

  Those disgusted expressions were almost too much, but this wasn’t about his pride. This was about the greater good, and so he stood still and allowed them to view their fill.

  “I was lucky I escaped before the process was complete. I maintained control of my mind, but if he’d finished I’d have been his puppet to control.”

  The room broke into murmurs.

  “They are going to come,” Baal said. “The Hunt will storm our lands and they will take our able-bodied men and women and turn them into soldiers for Twilight’s army. If we have any hope of stopping them, we need to act now.”

  “Salt the land around the gates. Salt as much as we can to deter The Hunt,” Brett said.

  “Salt?” the younger government official asked.

  “Yes. It will keep The Hunt at bay.”

  “What about these modified denizens?”

  Brett shook his head. “Mobilise all Fearless and put them on standby. If the enhanced denizens attack, we need to be ready enforce.”

  “Every Fearless counts,” Baal said. “The attack could come at any time. We need to be ready yesterday.”

  They broke into urgent conversation and Baal handed Brett his hoody. They’d made their point, it was now up to the government to take a stand.

  5

  Djinn wine did not agree with me. Or maybe it agreed with me too much. How could I have forgotten what it did to me? How it set my body on fire in desperate need to be touched. And Baal was in Lindrealm, too far away to do much of anything. Gah! Sleep, I needed to shut down. The bed seemed empty without Baal’s warm hard body to fill it. To fill me. Stop it.

  A gentle breeze laced with Baal’s scent drifted in off the balcony. Liquorice aroma, heavy and thick, wafted in from the blooms that climbed the wall outside my chambers. Deadly flowers Irina had warned me about. Deadly polyanders.

  She’d also said that Baal didn’t smell of them, but she was wrong. Or was she? Maybe she couldn’t smell him like I could? Yep, that sounded so weird. But then what was going on? Why was this scent in my head every time I was around him? Had it always been there?

  No … Not the first time we’d met in the garden in Evernight. I hadn’t picked up on it then, no, the first time had been when I’d discovered Erebus’s betrayal, when Baal had alerted me to it, just before Erebus and I had …

  It was something to ask him about surely. But right now, thank goodness, the wine was wearing off. The fire had melted to a slow burn, turning my limbs liquid and my eyelids heavy. As I hovered in the place between wakefulness and slumber, a phantom weight settled behind me, the mattress dipped, and heat pressed against my bare back. Fingers, calloused and thick, ran down my spine, eliciting a moan and a steady throb at the apex of my thighs.

  This wasn’t happening, it wasn’t real, and yet it was. The connection forged when I’d taken the flame glowed softly between us. The wine had opened the door between us and Erebus was here, not in the flesh but in my mind, his spirit touching mine, the act somehow too intimate.

  “Stop.” My voice was a trembling whisper.

  His breath was a hot caress on the nape of my neck. His hand slipped over my waist and up to cup my breast, aching and tight. My body yearned for him. No. Not him, it cried out to be loved. Baal. I needed Baal. His hand froze, as if sensing my thoughts.

  “No.” I kicked the door between us closed and collapsed onto my back.

  Dammit. No more fucking wine for me.

  Grabbing a pillow I shoved it over my head and squeezed my eyes closed. Sleep.

  Now.

  The sandman obliged, tugging me under. But there was no relief for me there either, as I slipped into someone else’s skin.

  “Touch me. You know you want to.”

  “Dante … please,” Erebus’s tone was pained.

  A sultry laugh. “Please, please, please. What are you afraid of?”

  “You know we can’t.”

  A husky sigh, and then the sound of buckles being undone followed by the kiss of air on my skin. “You’d turn this down?”

  “Damn you woman.”

  Hands on my breasts, rough and demanding. A mattress at my back, fingers inside my slick heat. Stroking, stoking, fuck, yes. But more, I needed more.

  “Erebus, just fuck me already.”

  His cock pushing into me inch by inch, filling me, taking me.

  “The thrill of the hunt. The pleasure of the flesh.”

  “Dante, I …”

  “Don’t, don’t say it. Just show me.”

  Erebus began to move, and the world shattered.

  I sat up, gasping, my body throbbing in the after effects of the most powerful orgasm. Oh shit, I was wet and, shit, wow. What the heck had just happened?

  The sound of wings beating the air and a soft thud on the balcony had me scrabbling for my robe.

  Fargol was back.

  Wrapped in the soft material of my dressing gown, I padded toward the archway.

  Irina peered in. “you’re awake.”

  “Um, yeah. Couldn’t sleep.” Liar liar, vagina on fire.

  She held up a leather bag. “I have the solution.”

  The lingering dregs of the dream dissipated. “Tell me what it does.”

  Irina parked her butt on the edge of my bed. “We should probably get Erebus in too. I can go through it once and we can formulate a plan of action.”

  Fargol sat back on his haunches in the arch.

  Get Erebus? Like into my bedroom after that … whatever had just happened? “Sure. I’ll go find him.” After I put some clothes on.

  Erebus answered his door, fully dressed and alert.

  “You knew I was coming?”

  His lips twitched.

  Oh shit. Double entendre.

  I turned on my heel and strode off toward my chambers. “Irina is waiting.”

&nb
sp; It had been a dream brought on by what Davin had told me about Erebus and Dante’s relationship. Yeah, this was all Dante’s fault, and I bet Erebus had sensed … stuff, from the bond we shared. This was so fucked up. Right now, the bond came in useful. With the hoard still active and the gate still needing protecting, I could channel power to Erebus and give him a boost if he needed, or summon him to me if I was in trouble. Yeah. We needed it right now, but once this was all over, that bond had to go.

  Irina greeted us with a smile and a tray of tea. When had she had time to make tea? Fargol sat on the floor by the bed, a dainty cup clutched between forefinger and thumb—he looked ridiculous. A snort of laughter exploded from my lips.

  Irina rolled her lips between her teeth, her eyes twinkling with mirth.

  Fargol sipped his tea, completely oblivious that he was the object of our amusement. Man I loved that gargoyle.

  We sat on huge cushions around the low table Irina had prepared, and she poured more tea. “Father was pretty excited about this project. He already had some equations and formulas he’d been playing with for another project which hadn’t gone so well, but when I told him what we needed he had an epiphany.”

  Erebus drained his cup. “What did he create for us?”

  Irina set the leather pouch she’d shown me earlier on the table and undid the tie. She carefully extracted a vial.

  “It’s an invisibility potion,” she grinned. “And it works!”

  “You tried it?”

  “No, father did. He was invisible for almost two hours. And Agares tested it too, albeit reluctantly.”

  Baal had tasked his general with watching over Caldwell, Irina’s father. We couldn’t risk him being taken by Orin again. “How is Agares?”

  Irina winced. “I think his guard duty is wearing thin. He is eager to be by Baal’s side, or here with us at court.”

  “I’ll speak to Baal when he gets back. Maybe we can move your father here too?”

  He face lit up. “That would be wonderful. Thank you. But there is more,” she glanced at Fargol.

  Fargol frowned. “Fargol stay with Kenna.”

  I looked from the mage to the gargoyle. “What’s going on?”

  Irina sat forward. “Father is extremely close to finalising the anti-serum, and we were discussing methods of deployment.”

  “Okay?”

  “Father believes he can create bombs that turn into a fine mist upon impact. He suggested we launch them aerially.”

  “That’s an awesome idea.”

  Fargol made a harrumphing sound.

  “You want gargoyles to do it,” Erebus said.

  “Fargol stay with Kenna,” Fargol said firmly.

  It was a great plan. If we could get enough gargoyles to carry and launch the bombs, when the denizens did attack we could wipe them out in one fell swoop.

  “Fargol?”

  He shook his head. “Please do not ask Fargol to leave Kenna.”

  I sighed. “I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. Who knows how much time we have before Orin makes his move. We need to be prepared. Can you rally the gargoyles?”

  Fargol put down his teacup. “Gargoyles stubborn. It take time to convince them.”

  Back at the fortress Fargol had needed to feel useful, was that just because he’d been serving the building or was that a gargoyle thing in general? Only one way to find out. “Tell them their queen requests their aid. It would be most helpful”

  His eyes lit. “The queen requests aid.”

  “That’s right.”

  He grinned, showcasing his terrifying teeth. “And if say no, Fargol crush.”

  “Um, maybe just ask again, nicely?”

  He considered this and then shook his huge head. “No. Crushing work much better.”

  Must be a gargoyle thing. “Fine. You do what you have to and recruit me some gargoyles. I’m counting on you Fargol.”

  He strode out onto the balcony and stretched his mighty wings. “Fargol not leave Kenna for long.” And then he was launching himself into the air.

  One part of the bigger plan was in motion. Now to focus on the immediate mission. “Okay Irina, tell me more about this invisibility potion. Do we drink the whole thing?”

  She shook her head. “Oh no. Just one drop will render us invisible for an hour. There should be enough here for the dark djinn we’re rescuing to use too, if need be. It should help us smuggle them out of the palace.”

  Yes, this could work. The Twilighters couldn’t catch what they couldn’t see. It gave us a distinct advantage.

  “Thank you Irina. This is fantastic.”

  She beamed.

  “We will have to work fast,” Erebus said. “And we have only your friend’s oral account of the location.”

  “Brett was pretty precise, and I had him draw me a map.” I retrieved the map from my jewellery box and handed it to Erebus.

  He studied it for a long moment. “This is surprisingly detailed.”

  “Yeah, Brett has exceptional observation skills.”

  Erebus laid the map on the table and traced the weave of the river with his finger. “We can enter Twilight through the Black Forest here, cross the river here, and access the palace catacombs here. From there, as long as we don’t draw attention to ourselves, we should be able to break into the chamber my people are being held in from below, and liberate them.”

  Irina reached into her pocket and pulled out a dagger. It glinted dully in the lamplight. “Iron,” she said. “You said the djinn were being held in slumber by some kind of vine? I did some research, and there is only one vine that can do that. It’s called the obsidian narcos, and it can be poisoned with iron.”

  So we had all we needed. We had the potion, the dagger, and a map. “We leave at dusk.” I stood and brushed down my slacks. “Get some rest everyone. We’re going to need our strength.”

  6

  “You’re going to do what?” Davin stared at me in horror.

  “I’ll be fine. I just need you to keep things ticking while I’m gone.” I adjusted my jacket, the softest black leather. It fit like a glove and was super easy to move in. The royal tailor had even made me soft leather slacks that weren’t too tight on my legs to allow for my prosthetic. The man was a genius, and he worked insanely fast.

  “Kenna! You’re a monarch. You can’t just go swanning off into danger. You have people to do that for you.”

  “What kind of monarch would I be if I sat back and let others do all the dirty work? I need to lead by example.”

  Davin moved around to block my view of the mirror. “Do you think that Ibris ever set foot on the battlefield?”

  I blinked up at him. “What? I thought he was brave and fearless and stuff.”

  Davin’s beautiful lips curled in a smile. “No doubt that he was, but he was also the jewel of the realm, and thus was protected. Until death slipped into his home and took him unawares of course. It was the kind of death he could not fight.”

  “Yes, the poison, the poison that incapacitated him and my family.”

  Davin inclined his head, and a strand of hair laced with gold and green slipped over his shoulder. I resisted the urge to tuck it behind his ear. He was undeniably beautiful.

  “Ibris was an emblem,” Davin said. “A powerful figurehead for the realm. But the warriors that kept it safe were a different matter entirely. A monarch protects its people through alliances and political endeavours, and if matters progress to war then he sends an army.”

  He was right of course, but I wasn’t the kind of monarch to sit around drinking tea, twiddling my thumbs and spewing pretty words to make my public love me. I was a woman of action, a woman who led by example. “This isn’t war, it’s a rescue mission, and to be honest, even if it was a war I’d be on the front lines. Because by staying behind all I’d be doing is sending the message that their lives are worth less than mine.”

  Why was he looking at me with that odd expression on his face?

  “Um, are y
ou okay?”

  He nodded. “I will stay behind and watch over the realm for you as you wish. I must make preparations for the coronation.” He leaned in and pressed a kiss on my forehead, sudden and firm, then turned on his heel and strode from the room.

  My skin tingled where his lips had made contact. What the heck had that been for? But Fargol was landing on my balcony.

  It was time to go.

  ***

  “Maybe we should take a carriage?” The huge primal Evernight beast snorted at me—a cross between a horse and a lion, it was jet black, had a tail tipped with spikes, and an armoured head plate. I’d ridden on one once, when we’d galloped through the Evernight to save a settlement from the shadow people. It had been like riding the scariest rollercoaster, except the rollercoaster was alive and could eat you if it wanted.

  We were behind the stables, unseen and unheard. The staff had been summoned to an impromptu evening meeting by Davin. He’d spin them a lie about my being away in Lindrealm for diplomatic talks. Enough time for Irina, Fargol, Erebus, and I to exit the palace grounds undetected. An almost full moon hung heavy in the air providing enough light for us see what the heck we were doing.

  Irina strapped her pack onto its back—most likely weapons. My everlight sword was tucked in its sheath at my side, although I wasn’t sure how effective it would be against Twilighters.

  Irina patted one of the ebony beasts. “Beautiful. It’s been a long while since I had the pleasure of riding one of these.”

  Erebus smiled, his eyes lighting up with genuine delight. “You’ve ridden a leoequise before?”

  Irina launched herself up onto the beast’s back, her golden braid flicked up behind her, and her tawny eyes glinted in the gloom from her cobalt blue face. “Once or twice.” She dropped him a wink. “Question is: can you keep up?”

  Erebus let out a burst of surprised laughter and something ugly and unexpected twisted inside me. But then Erebus’s hands were closing around my waist, and I was momentarily airborne as he lifted me up onto the fearsome beast. I’d barely taken a breath before he was settling in behind me—too close, too intimate. His large hands gripped the reins and the memory of our last ride surged up to grasp my mind. I’d wanted to touch him back then, and be touched by him. My heart had beat faster in his presence, and there’d been urgency to each breath. But he’d crushed those feelings with his manipulations. Exhaling away the recollection, I flexed my thighs to grip the beasts hide and then we were in motion. Irina took the lead, her beast moving so fast it looked like she was in flight. Erebus let out a whoop and cracked the reins, urging our mount to go faster.