LITMIR.BIZ

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      “What did you do to me?” she growled.

      With her suddenly smaller form pressed into his, the growl reverberated through him, a sensual rumble. She was wedged so close, her knees tightly framed his hips. He’d had phae lovers, once upon a time, but the wild heat of this wereling scorched those memories to ash even as other parts of him surged in silent answer.

      “I haven’t done anything to you,” he said. Yet was implied. His free hand slipped down to settle on her haunch.

      She reared back, sweeping his hands aside. If she’d still had claws, he would have had his last wish and filled the geas with his blood.

      Instead, he only winced at the bruising blow and pushed to his feet, facing off with her across the bare white corridor where the shallow pool was rapidly drying.

      She cast one searching glance around her. “I slipped into the lake and then...” Her gaze arrowed back to him. “This is the phae court.”

      He nodded once. Holding one hand open in front of him, he knelt to retrieve his dropped items. The wereling watched suspiciously as he tucked away the knife and gloves. In his mind, he imagined her long tail lashing.

      He kept his voice steady and soothing. “How did you breach the phaedrealii?”

      “I have no idea.” Her tone was anything but soothed. “How did you spark the verita luna?”

      “I didn’t.”

      “You did.” She paced, her long legs eating up the width of the corridor, each bare footfall in the pool slapping her ire. The remaining water didn’t even cover her toes. She spun on her heel to face him. “Do it again. Change me.”

      A note of desperation made his eyebrows rise. “That’s your trick, not mine.”

      She snarled, and he glimpsed the beast inside her. “I want out.”

      For a moment, he thought the beast itself spoke to him. “I can’t let you go.” When she took a threatening step toward him, he lifted one finger and added, “Not until I find how you got in.”

      “I told you. I fell into the lake. I swallowed some water and then I was here.”

      “You swallowed more than water,” he noted with a deliberate sniff. “Overindulgence in spirits is a time-honored way into the phaedrealii.” She sputtered, but he asked over her indignation, “Where is this lake?”

      Her jaw worked a moment before she answered, “Mad Dog Valley. In Oregon.”

      Ah, now he recognized the scent on her. A pair of wolflings from the small mountain stronghold had recently driven off the Queen’s hunters. Raze had sealed that gateway behind the disgraced phae, as he’d sealed all other routes.

      And yet this tigress had come to him along that path.

      Apparently, his geasa weren’t complete. Just as well he hadn’t yet killed himself.

      What had he missed? He studied the tense wereling in front of him, which was no hardship. Lean muscles rolled easily under her skin, and she seemed oblivious to her nakedness. He didn’t have that calmness, and the rough abrasion of the robe only made him more aware of the difference.

      But her stripped splendor and the scent of night clinging to her hair wasn’t what he needed. He needed answers.

      “I am Raze,” he said. “Prince of the phae and vizier to the Queen. What shall I call you?”

      She barred her teeth in an insincere smile. “A taxi?”

      He tilted his head. “This is a joke from the sunlit realm, I think.” He’d had little to do with the world since the Iron Wars.

      Her smile upended. “Not joking. I want out. But first I want to know how you forced the verita luna on me. Tell me.”

      Despite the demand in her words, the furious gold had faded from her eyes, leaving a darker amber flecked with green. Raze relaxed a bit since she seemed less likely to rip him apart.

      “This court is a place of enchantment,” he reminded her. “Perhaps the magic here inspired you.”

      “The Second Truth isn’t a two-penny magic charm I rub between my fingers,” she snapped. “It’s what I am.”

      He hummed in the back of his throat and traced his gaze over her nude silhouette. “Your wild side is quite charming, although I admit, I find this shape even more so.”

      A rosy flush brightened her cheeks, and she angled one arm across her body. The move only served to plump the curves she sought to hide. Beads of water glistened on the upper swell of her breasts and across her flared hips. He was a beast himself to tease her, but he had not been named the Ruiner for his kindnesses.

      “No wonder Mom said to stay away from phae,” she muttered.

      “Your name,” he reminded her. “Your name in exchange for my cloak.”

      When she narrowed her eyes, a glint of gold shone beneath her dark lashes, but she said grudgingly, “Yelena,” and held out her hand. “Morozova, of the Amur tribe.”

      He shrugged out of the gray cloak, keeping the loose trousers and sleeveless tunic for himself. But instead of passing over the robe, he took her hand—though he should not have done so without his gloves—and raised it to his lips. “Yelena,” he breathed across her skin before his mouth grazed the soft ridges of her knuckles.

      From the way she clenched her fist, he guessed the courtly gesture had expired sometime since he last walked the sunlit realm. A pity, for the touch told him much. Under the pads of his fingers, he felt calluses with a reserved strength behind them. This was no pampered house cat.

      Also, the simple touch was a pleasure.

      She, however, did not seem particularly pleased as she plucked the cloak from his slackened grip and slid it over her shoulders, wrapping it tightly around her waist. Scaled for his breadth, the folds went nearly twice around her until she secured the belt. The gray cloth looked rough and dowdy against her creamy skin. With a whisper of magic, he could match the cloak to the amber glow of her eyes, reweave it as a silken gown to skim her curves....

      With a ruthlessness to befit his name, he crushed the fantasy. He wore the crude homespun because every twitch of his power sustained the geasa. He needed all his magic to find the flaw in the wards.

      And she was the key.

      “There was a phae portal in that lake,” he confirmed. “But it should have been closed. I am uncertain how you got through. Or how to send you back. What were you doing when it opened?”

      “Nothing.” She wrinkled her nose. If she’d had whiskers, they would have twitched. “I was looking at the moon, and it turned red.”

      Bloodied water. Raze glanced at the cell door. The slow weep from the iron had halted, and the metal seemed to quiver with silent intensity. The silence of attentive listening.

      “Come.” He reached for her arm, but she avoided his touch, as lithe as a tabby arching away from an unwanted petting. “If you want out, I need to be in the center of my power.”

      She stared at him through narrowed eyes. “Do I have another option?”

      Inclining his head, he considered briefly. “No.”

      She swept one hand ahead of her. “Then after you.”

      He stepped ahead of her, making his way down the corridor.

      Leading had never been his intent. Despite the legacy that made him a prince, in the desperate days of the Iron Wars he had become a soldier. He’d served as vizier only because so few survived, but now, with the barrier between the phaedrealii and the sunlit realm fading, he knew he had to finish what they’d been so loathe to do: seal the court forever.

      If he didn’t, no one—not the phae, not the werelings, not the humans—would escape

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