"Anne Bishop - [Dark Jewels 01] - Daughter of the Blood" - читать интересную книгу автора (Bishop Anne - [Dark Jewels 1] - Daughter of the Blood (v1) [htm])

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First published by Roc, an imprint of New American Library, a division of Penguin Putnam Inc.

First Printing, March 1998 10    9    8   7    6    5

Copyright © Anne Bishop, 1998 All rights reserved.

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for

Blair Boone

and Charles de Lint

acknowledgments

Every creative endeavor is a journey of many, especially the creative endeavor we call Life. My thanks to the friends and neighbors who make that endeavor a joyous one, and to the members of Spin-a-Story Tellers for the stories shared in performance and around the table. A special thanks to Kathy and Blair Boone, Nadine and Mike Fallacaro, Pat and Bill Feidner, Neil Schmitz, Grace Tongue, Ellen Datlow, Charles de Lint, Nancy Kress, Pat York, Laura Anne Oilman, Jennifer Jackson—and you who have picked up this book to share in the wonder of Story.

jewels

White

Yellow

Tiger Eye

Rose

Summer-sky

Purple Dusk

Opal"

Green

Sapphire

Red

Gray

Ebon-gray Black

"Opal is the dividing line between lighter and darker Jewels because it can be either.

When making the Offering to the Darkness, a person can descend a maximum of three ranks from his/her Birthright Jewel.

Example: Birthright White could descend to Rose.

blood hierarchy/castes

Males

landen—non-Blood of any race

Blood male—a general term for all males of the Blood; also refers to any Blood male who doesn't wear Jewels

Warlord—a Jeweled male equal in status to a witch

Prince—a Jeweled male equal in status to a Priestess or a Healer

Warlord Prince—a dangerous, extremely aggressive Jeweled male; in status, slightly lower than a Queen

Females

landen—non-Blood of any race

Blood female—a general term for all females of the Blood; mostly refers to any Blood female who doesn't wear Jewels

witch—a Blood female who wears Jewels but isn't one of the other hierarchical levels; also refers to any Jeweled female

Healer—a witch who heals physical wounds and illnesses; equal in status to a Priestess and a Prince

Priestess—a witch who cares for altars, Sanctuaries and Dark Altars; witnesses handfasts and marriages; performs offerings; equal in status to a Healer and a Prince

Black Widow—a witch who heals the mind; weaves the tangled webs of dreams and visions; is trained in illusions and poisons

Queen—a witch who rules the Blood; is considered to be the land's heart and the Blood's moral center; as such, she is the focal point of their society

prologue

Terreille

I am Tersa the Weaver, Tersa the Liar, Tersa the Fool. When the Blood-Jeweled Lords and Ladies hold a banquet, I'm the entertainment that comes after the musicians have played and the lithesome girls and boys have danced and the Lords have drunk too much wine and demand to have their fortunes told. "Tell us a story, Weaver," they yell as their hands pass over the serving girls' rumps and their Ladies eye the young men and decide who will have the painful pleasure of serving in the bed that night.

I was one of them once, Blood as they are Blood.

No, that's not true. I wasn't Blood as they are Blood. That's why I was broken on a Warlord's spear and became shattered glass that only reflects what might have been.

It's hard to break a Blood-Jeweled male, but a witch's life hangs by the hymenal thread, and what happens on her Virgin Night determines whether she is whole to practice the Craft or becomes a broken vessel, forever aching for the part of her that's lost. Oh, some magic always remains, enough for day-to-day living and parlor tricks, but not the Craft, not the lifeblood of our kind.

But the Craft can be reclaimed—if one is willing to pay the price.

When I was younger, I fought against that final slide into the Twisted Kingdom. Better to be broken and sane than broken and mad. Better to see the world and know a tree for a tree, a flower for a flower rather than to look through gauze at gray and ghostly shapes and see clearly only the shards of one's self.

So I thought then.

As I shuffle to the low stool, I struggle to stay at the edge of the Twisted Kingdom and see the physical world clearly one last time. I carefully place the wooden frame that holds my tangled web, the web of dreams and visions, on the small table near the stool.

The Lords and Ladies expect me to tell their fortunes, and I always have, not by magic but by keeping my eyes and ears open and then telling them what they want to hear.

Simple. No magic to it.

But not tonight.

For days now I have heard a strange kind of thunder, a distant calling. Last night I surrendered to madness in order to reclaim my Craft as a Black Widow, a witch of the Hourglass covens. Last night I wove a tangled web to see the dreams and visions.

Tonight there will be no fortunes. I have the strength to say this only once. I must be sure that those who must hear it are in the room before I speak.

I wait. They don't notice. Glasses are filled and refilled as I fight to stay on the edge of the Twisted Kingdom.

Ah, there he is. Daemon Sadi, from the Territory called Hayll. He's beautiful, bitter, cruel. He has a seducer's smile and a body women want to touch and be caressed by, but he's filled with a cold, unquenchable rage. When the Ladies talk about his bedroom skills, the words they whisper are "excruciating pleasure." I don't doubt he's enough of a sadist to mix pain and pleasure in equal portions, but he's always been kind to me, and it's a small bone of hope that I throw out to him tonight. Still, it's more than anyone else has given him.

The Lords and Ladies grow restless. I usually don't take this long to begin my pronouncements. Agitation and annoyance build, but I wait. After tonight, it will make no difference.

There's the other one, in the opposite corner of the room. Lucivar Yaslana, the Eyrien half-breed from the Territory called Askavi.

Hayll has no love for Askavi, nor Askavi for Hayll, but Daemon and Lucivar are drawn to one another without understanding why, so wound into each other's lives they cannot separate. Uneasy friends, they have fought legendary battles, have destroyed so many courts the Blood are afraid to have them together for any length of time.

I raise my hands, let them fall into my lap. Daemon watches me. Nothing about him has changed, but I know he's waiting, listening. And because he's listening, Lucivar listens too.

"She is coming."

At first they don't realize I've spoken. Then the angry murmurs begin when the words are understood.

"Stupid bitch," someone yells. "Tell me who I'll love tonight."

"What does it matter?" I answer. "She is coming. The Realm of Terreille will be torn apart by its own foolish greed. Those who survive will serve, but few will survive."

I'm slipping further from the edge. Tears of frustration spill down my cheeks. Not yet. Sweet Darkness, not yet. I must say this.

Daemon kneels beside me, his hands covering mine. I speak to him, only to him, and through him, to Lucivar.

"The Blood in Terreille whore the old ways and make a mockery of everything we are." I wave my hand to indicate the ones who now rule. "They twist things to suit themselves. They dress up and pretend. They wear Blood Jewels but don't understand what it means to be Blood. They talk of honoring the Darkness, but it's a lie. They honor nothing but their own ambition's. The Blood were created to be the caretakers of the Realms. That's why we were given our power. That's why we come from, yet are apart from, the people in every Territory. The perversion of what we are can't go on. The day is coming when the debt will be called in, and the Blood will have to answer for what they've become."

"They're the Blood who rule, Tersa," Daemon says sadly. "Who is left to call in this debt? Bastard slaves like me?"

I'm slipping fast. My nails dig into his hands, drawing blood, but he doesn't pull away. I lower my voice. He strains to hear me. "The Darkness has had a Prince for a long, long time. Now the Queen is coming. It may take decades, even centuries, but she is coming." I point with my chin at the Lords and Ladies sitting at the tables. "They will be dust by then, but you and the Eyrien will be here to serve."

Frustration fills his golden eyes. "What Queen? Who is coming?"

"The living myth," I whisper. "Dreams made flesh."

His shock is replaced instantly by a fierce hunger. "You're sure?"

The room is a swirling mist. He's the only thing still in sharp focus. He's the only thing I need. "I saw her in the tangled web, Daemon. I saw her."

I'm too tired to hang on to the real world, but I stubbornly cling to his hands to tell him one last thing. "The Eyrien, Daemon."

He glances at Lucivar. "What about him?"

"He's your brother. You are your father's sons."

I can't hold on anymore and plunge into the madness that's called the Twisted Kingdom. I fall and fall among the shards of myself. The world spins and shatters. In its fragments, I see my once-Sisters pouring around the tables, frightened and intent, and Daemon's hand casually reaching out, as if by accident, destroying the fragile spidersilk of my tangled web.

It's impossible to reconstruct a tangled web. Terreille's Black Widows may spend year upon frightened year trying, but in the end it will be in vain. It will not be the same web, and they will not see what I saw.

In the gray world above, I hear myself howling with laughter. Far below me, in the psychic abyss that is part of the Darkness, I hear another howling, one full of joy and pain, rage and celebration.

Not just another witch coming, my foolish Sisters, but Witch.

PART 1

chapter one

1 / Terreille

Lucivar Yaslana, the Eyrien half-breed, watched the guards drag the sobbing man to the boat. He felt no sympathy for the condemned man who had led the aborted slave revolt. In the Territory called Pruul, sympathy was a luxury no slave could afford.

He had refused to participate in the revolt. The ringleaders were good men, but they didn't have the strength, the backbone, or the balls to do what was needed. They didn't enjoy seeing blood run.

He had not participated. Zuultah, the Queen of Pruul, had punished him anyway.

The heavy shackles around his neck and wrists had already rubbed his skin raw, and his back was a throbbing ache from the lash. He spread his dark, membranous wings, trying to ease the ache in his back.

A guard immediately prodded him with a club, then retreated, skittish, at his soft hiss of anger.

Unlike the other slaves who couldn't contain their misery or fear, there was no expression in Lucivar's gold eyes, no psychic scent of emotions for the guards to play with as they put the sobbing man into the old, one-man boat. No longer seaworthy, the boat showed gaping holes in its rotten wood, holes that only added to its value now.

The condemned man was small and half-starved. It still took six guards to put him into the boat. Five guards held the man's head, arms, and legs. The last guard smeared bacon grease on the man's genitals before sliding a wooden cover into place. It fit snugly over the boat, with holes cut out for the head and hands. Once the man's hands were tied to iron rings on the outside of the boat, the cover

was locked into place so that no one but the guards could remove it.

One guard studied the imprisoned man and shook his head in mock dismay. Turning to the others, he said, "He should have a last meal before being put to sea."

The guards laughed. The man cried for help.

One by one, the guards carefully shoved food into the man's mouth before herding the other slaves to the stables where they were quartered.

"You'll be entertained tonight, boys," a guard yelled, laughing. "Remember it the next time you decide to leave Lady Zuultah's service."

Lucivar looked over his shoulder, then looked away.

Drawn by the smell of food, the rats slipped into the gaping holes in the boat.

The man in the boat screamed.

Clouds scudded across the moon, gray shrouds hiding its light. The man in the boat didn't move. His knees were open sores, bloody from kicking the top of the boat in his effort to keep the rats away. His vocal cords were destroyed from screaming.

Lucivar knelt behind the boat, moving carefully to muffle the sound of the chains.

"I didn't tell them, Yasi," the man said hoarsely. "They tried to make me tell, but I didn't. I had that much honor left."

Lucivar held a cup to the man's lips. "Drink this," he said, his voice a deep murmur, a part of the night.

"No," the man moaned. "No." He began to cry, a harsh, guttural sound pulled from his ruined throat.

"Hush, now. Hush. It will help." Supporting the man's head, Lucivar eased the cup between the swollen lips. After two swallows, Lucivar put the cup aside and stroked the man's head with gentle fingertips. "It will help," he crooned.

"I'm a Warlord of the Blood." When Lucivar offered the cup again, the man took another sip. As his voice got stronger, the words began to slur. "You're a Warlord Prince. Why do they do this to us, Yasi?"

"Because they have no honor. Because they don't remember what it means to be Blood. The High Priestess of

Hayll's influence is a plague that has been spreading across the Realm for centuries, slowly consuming every Territory it touches."

"Maybe the landens are right, then. Maybe the Blood are evil."

Lucivar continued stroking the man's forehead and temples. "No. We are what we are. Nothing more, nothing less. There is good and evil among every kind of people. It's the evil among us who rule now."

"And where are the good among us?" the man asked sleepily.

Lucivar kissed the top of the man's head. "They've been destroyed or enslaved." He offered the cup. "Finish it, little Brother, and it will be finished."

After the man took the last swallow, Lucivar used Craft to vanish the cup.

The man in the boat laughed. "I feel very brave, Yasi."

"You are very brave."

"The rats . . . My balls are gone."

"I know."

"I cried, Yasi. Before all of them, I cried."

"It doesn't matter."

"I'm a Warlord. I shouldn't have cried."

"You didn't tell. You had courage when you needed it."

"Zuultah killed the others anyway."

"She'll pay for it, little Brother. Someday she and the others like her will pay for it all." Lucivar gently massaged the man's neck.

"Yasi, I—"

The movement was sudden, the sound sharp.

Lucivar carefully let the lolling head fall backward and slowly rose to his feet. He could have told them the plan wouldn't work, that the Ring of Obedience could be fine-tuned sufficiently to alert its owner to an inner drawing of strength and purpose. He could have told them the malignant tendrils that kept them enslaved had spread too far, and it would take a sweeter savagery than a man was capable of to free them. He could have told them there were crueler weapons than the Ring to keep a man obedient, that their concern for each other would destroy them, that the only way to escape, for even a little while, was to care for no one, to be alone.

He could have told them.

And yet, when they had approached him, timidly, cautiously, eager to ask a man who had broken free again and again over the centuries but was still enslaved, all he had said was, "Sacrifice everything." They had gone away, disappointed, unable to understand he had meant what he'd said. Sacrifice everything. And there was one thing he couldn't—wouldn't—sacrifice.

How many times after he'd surrendered and been tethered again by that cruel ring of gold around his organ had Daemon found him and pinned him against a wall, snarling with rage, calling him a fool and a coward to give in?

Liar. Silky, court-trained liar.

Once, Dorothea SaDiablo had searched desperately for Daemon Sadi after he'd vanished from a court without a trace. It had taken a hundred years to find him, and two thousand Warlords had died trying to recapture him. He could have used that small, savage Territory he had held and conquered half the Realm of Terreille, could have become a tangible threat to Hayll's encroachment and absorption of every people it touched. Instead, he had read a letter Dorothea sent through a messenger. Read it and surrendered.

The letter had simply said: "Surrender by the new moon. Every day you are gone thereafter, I will take a piece of your brother's body in payment for your arrogance."

Lucivar shook himself, trying to dislodge the unwelcome thoughts. In some ways, memories were worse than the lash, for they led to thoughts of Askavi, with its mountains rising to cut the sky and its valleys filled with towns, farms, and forests. Not that Askavi was that fertile anymore, having been raped for too many centuries by those who took but never gave anything back. Still, it was home, and centuries of enslaved exile had left him aching for the smell of clean mountain air, the taste of a sweet, cold stream, the silence of the woods, and, most of all, the mountains where the Eyrien race soared.

But he was in Pruul, that hot, scrubby desert wasteland, serving that bitch Zuultah because he couldn't hide his disgust for Prythian, Askavi's High Priestess, couldn't leash his temper enough to serve witches he despised.

Among the Blood, males were meant to serve, not to rule. He had never challenged that, despite the number of witches he'd killed over the centuries. He had killed them because it was an insult to serve them, because he was an Eyrien Warlord Prince who wore Ebon-gray Jewels and refused to believe that serving and groveling meant the same thing. Because he was a half-breed bastard, he had no hope of attaining a position of authority within a court, despite the rank of his Jewels. Because he was a trained Eyrien warrior and had a temper that was explosive even for a Warlord Prince, he had even less hope of being allowed to live outside the social chains of a court.

And he was caught, as all Blood males were caught. There was something bred into them that made them crave service, that compelled them to bond in some way with a Blood-Jeweled female.

Lucivar twitched his shoulder and sucked air through his teeth as a lash wound reopened. When he gingerly touched the wound, his hand came away wet with fresh blood.

He bared his teeth in a bitter smile. What was that old saying? A wish, offered with blood, is a prayer to the Darkness.

He closed his eyes, raised his hand toward the night sky, and turned inward, descending into the psychic abyss to the depth of his Ebon-gray Jewels so that this wish would remain private, so that no one in Zuultah's court could hear the sending of this thought.

Just once, I'd like to serve a Queen I could respect, someone I could truly believe in. A strong Queen who wouldn't fear my strength. A Queen I could also call a friend.

Dryly amused by his own foolishness, Lucivar wiped his hand on his baggy cotton pants and sighed. It was a shame that the pronouncement Tersa had made seven hundred years ago had been nothing more than a mad delusion. For a while, it had given him hope. It had taken him a long time to realize that hope was a bitter thing.

"Hello?"

Lucivar looked toward the stables where the slaves were quartered. The guards would make their nightly check soon. He'd take another minute to savor the night air, even if it smelled hot and dusty, before returning to the filthy cell with its bed of dirty, bug-infested straw, before returning to the stink of fear, unwashed bodies, and human waste.

"Hello?"

Lucivar turned in a slow circle, his physical senses alert, his mind probing for the source of that thought. Psychic ! communication  could  be  broadcast  to  everyone  in  an area—like shouting in a crowded room—or narrowed to a single Jewel rank or gender, or narrowed even further to a single mind. That thought seemed aimed directly at him.

There was nothing out there except the expected. Whatever it was, it was gone.

Lucivar shook his head. He was getting as skittish as the landens, the non-Blood of each race, with their superstitions about evil stalking in the night.

"Hello?"

Lucivar spun around, his dark wings flaring for balance as he set his feet in a fighting stance.

He felt like a fool when he saw the girl staring at him, wide-eyed.

She was a scrawny little thing, about seven years old. Calling her plain would have been kind. But, even in the moonlight, she had the most extraordinary eyes. They reminded him of a twilight sky or a deep mountain lake. Her clothes were of good quality, certainly better than a beggar child would wear. Her gold hair was done up in sausage curls that indicated care even if they looked ridiculous around her pointed little face.

"What are you doing here?" he asked roughly.

She laced her fingers and hunched her shoulders. "I-I heard you. Y-you wanted a friend."

"You heard me?" Lucivar stared at her. How in the name of Hell had she heard him? True, he had sent that wish out, but on an Ebon-gray thread. He was the only Ebon-gray in the Realm of Terreille. The only Jewel darker than his was the Black, and the only person who wore that was Daemon Sadi. Unless . . .

No. She couldn't be.

At that moment, the girl's eyes flicked from him to the dead man in the boat, then back to him.

"I have to go," she whispered, backing away from him.

"No, you don't." He came toward her, soft-footed, a hunter stalking his prey.

She bolted.

He caught her within seconds, heedless of the noise the chains made. Looping a chain over her, he wrapped an arm around her waist and lifted her off her feet, grunting when her heel banged his knee. He ignored her attempts to scratch, and her kicks, while bruising, weren't the same kind of deterrent one good kick in the right place would have been. When she started shrieking, he clamped a hand over her mouth.

She promptly sank her teeth into his finger.

Lucivar bit back a howl and swore under his breath. He dropped to his knees, pulling her with him. "Hush," he whispered fiercely. "Do you want to bring the guards down on us?" She probably did, and he expected her to struggle even harder, knowing there was help nearby.

Instead, she froze.

Lucivar laid his cheek against her head and sucked air. "You're a spitting little cat," he said quietly, fighting to keep the laughter out of his voice.

"Why did you kill him?"

Did he imagine it, or did her voice change? She still sounded like a young girl, but thunder, caverns, and midnight skies were in that voice. "He was suffering."

"Couldn't you take him to a Healer?"

"Healers don't bother with slaves," he snapped. "Besides, the rats didn't leave enough of him to heal." He pulled her tighter against his chest, hoping physical warmth would make her stop shuddering. She looked so pale against his light-brown skin, and he knew it wasn't simply because she was fair-skinned. "I'm sorry. That was cruel."

When she started struggling against his hold, he raised his arms so that she could slip under the chain between his wrists. She scrambled out of reach, spun around, and dropped to her knees.

They studied each other.

"What's your name?" she finally asked.

"I'm called Yasi." He laughed when she wrinkled her nose. "Don't blame me. I didn't choose it."

"It's a silly word for someone like you. What's your real name?"

Lucivar hesitated. Eyriens were one of the long-lived races. He'd had 1,700 years to gain a reputation for being vicious and violent. If she'd heard any of the stories about him . . .

He took a deep breath and released it slowly. "Lucivar Yaslana."

No reaction except a shy smile of approval.

"What's your name, Cat?"

"Jaenelle."

He grinned. "Nice name, but I think Cat suits you just as well."

She snarled.

"See?" He hesitated, but he had to ask. Zuultah's guessing he'd killed that slave and knowing for sure would make a difference when he was stretched between the whipping posts. "Is your family visiting Lady Zuultah?"

Jaenelle frowned. "Who?"

Really, she did look like a kitten trying to figure out how to pounce on a large, hoppy bug. "Zuultah. The Queen of Pruul."

"What's Pruul?"

"This is Pruul." Lucivar waved a hand to indicate the land around them and then swore in Eyrien when the chains rattled. He swallowed the last curse when he noticed the intense, interested look on her face. "Since you're not from Pruul and your family isn't visiting, where are you from?" When she hesitated, he tipped his head toward the boat. "I can keep a secret."

"I'm from Chaillot."

"Chai—" Lucivar bit back another curse. "Do you understand Eyrien?"

"No." Jaenelle grinned at him. "But now I know some Eyrien words."

Should he laugh or strangle her? "How did you get here?"

She fluffed her hair and frowned at the rocky ground between them. Finally she shrugged. "Same way I get to other places."

"You ride the Winds?" he yelped.

She raised a finger to test the air.

"Not breezes or puffs of air." Lucivar ground his teeth. "The Winds. The Webs. The psychic roads in the Darkness."

Jaenelle perked up. "Is that what they are?"

He managed to stop in mid-curse.

Jaenelle leaned forward. "Are you always this prickly?"

"Most people think I'm a prick, yes."

"What's that mean?"

"Never mind." He chose a sharp stone and drew a circle on the ground between them. "This is the Realm of Terreille." He placed a round stone in the circle. "This is the Black Mountain, Ebon Askavi, where the Winds meet." He drew straight lines from the round stone to the circumference of the circle. "These are tether lines." He drew smaller circles within the circle. "These are radial lines. The Winds are like a spider web. You can travel on the tether or the radial lines, changing direction where they intersect. There's a Web for each rank of the Blood Jewels. The darker the Web, the more tether and radial lines there are and the faster the Wind is. You can ride a Web that's your rank or lighter. You can't ride a Web darker than your Jewel rank unless you're traveling inside a Coach being driven by someone strong enough to ride that Web or you're being shielded by someone who can ride that Web. If you try, you probably won't survive. Understand?"

Jaenelle chewed on her lower lip and pointed to a space between the strands. "What if I want to go there?"

Lucivar shook his head. "You'd have to drop from the Web back into the Realm at the nearest point and travel some other way."

"That's not how I got here," she protested.

Lucivar shuddered. There wasn't a strand of any Web around Zuultah's compound. Her court was deliberately in one of those blank spaces. The only way to get here directly from the Winds was by leaving the Web and gliding blind through the Darkness, which, even for the strongest and the best, was a chancy thing to do. Unless . . .

"Come here, Cat," he said gently. When she dropped in front of him, he rested his hands on her thin shoulders. "Do you often go wandering?"

Jaenelle nodded slowly. "People call me. Like you did."

Like he did. Mother Night! "Cat, listen to me. Children are vulnerable to many dangers."

There was a strange expression in her eyes. "Yes, I know."

"Sometimes an enemy can wear the mask of a friend until it's too late to escape."

"Yes," she whispered.

Lucivar shook her gently, forcing her to look at him. "Terreille is a dangerous place for little cats. Please, go home and don't go wandering anymore. Don't . . . don't answer the people who call you."

"But then I won't see you anymore."

Lucivar closed his gold eyes. A knife in the heart would hurt less. "I know. But we'll always be friends. And it's not forever. When you're grown up, I'll come find you or \ you'll come find me."

Jaenelle nibbled her lip. "How old is grown up?"

Yesterday. Tomorrow. "Let's say seventeen. It sounds like forever, I know, but it's really not that long." Even Sadi couldn't have spun a better lie than that. "Will you promise not to go wandering?"

Jaenelle sighed. "I promise not to go wandering in Terreille."

Lucivar hauled her to her feet and spun her around. "There's one thing I want to teach you before you go. This will work if a man ever tries to grab you from behind."

When they'd gone through the demonstration enough times that he was sure she knew what to do, Lucivar kissed her forehead and stepped back. "Get out of here. The guards will be making the rounds any minute now. And | remember—a Queen never breaks a promise made to a Warlord Prince."

"I'll remember." She hesitated. "Lucivar? I won't look the same when I'm grown up. How will you know me?"

Lucivar smiled. Ten years or a hundred, it would make no difference. He'd always recognize those extraordinary sapphire eyes. "I'll know. Good-bye, Cat. May the Darkness embrace you."

She smiled at him and vanished.

Lucivar stared at that empty space. Was that a foolish thing to say to her? Probably.

A gate rattling caught his attention. He swiftly rubbed out the drawing of the Winds and slipped from shadow to shadow until he reached the stables. He passed through the outside wall and had just settled into his cell when the guard opened the barred window in the door.

Zuultah was arrogant enough to believe her holding spells kept her slaves from using Craft to pass through the

cell walls. It was uncomfortable to pass through a spelled wall but not impossible for him.

Let the bitch wonder. When the guards found the slave in the boat, she'd suspect him of breaking the man's neck. She suspected him when anything went wrong in her court—with good reason.

Maybe he would offer a little resistance when the guards tried to tie him to the whipping posts. A vicious brawl would keep Zuultah distracted, and the violent emotions would cover up any lingering psychic scent from the girl.

Oh, yes, he could keep Lady Zuultah so distracted, she would never realize that Witch now walked the Realm.

2 / Terreille

Lady Maris turned her head toward the large, freestanding mirror. "You may go now."

Daemon Sadi slipped out of bed and began dressing slowly, tauntingly, fully aware that she watched him in the mirror. She always watched the mirror when he serviced her. A bit of self-voyeurism perhaps? Did she pretend the man in the mirror actually cared about her, that her climax aroused him?

Stupid bitch.

Maris stretched and sighed with pleasure. "You remind me of a wild cat, all silky skin and rippling muscles."

Daemon slipped into the white silk shirt. A savage predator? That was a fair enough description. If she ever annoyed him beyond his limited tolerance for the distaff gender, he would be happy to show her his claws. One little one in particular.

Maris sighed again. "You're so beautiful."

Yes, he was. His face was a gift of his mysterious heritage, aristocratic and too beautifully shaped to be called merely handsome. He was tall and broad-shouldered. He kept his body well toned and muscular enough to please. His voice was deep and cultured, with a husky, seductive edge to it that made women go all misty-eyed. His gold eyes and thick black hair were typical of all three of Terreille's long-lived races, but his warm, golden-brown skin

was a little lighter than the Hayllian aristos—more like the Dhemlan race.

His body was a weapon, and he kept his weapons well honed.

Daemon shrugged into his black jacket. The clothes, too, I were weapons, from the skimpy underwear to the perfectly ] tailored suits. Nectar to seduce the unwary to their doom. |

Fanning herself with her hand, Maris looked directly at him. "Even in this weather, you didn't work up a sweat."

It sounded like the complaint it was.

Daemon smiled mockingly. "Why should I?"

Maris sat up, pulling at the sheet to cover herself. "You're a cruel, unfeeling bastard."

Daemon raised one finely shaped eyebrow. "You think I'm cruel? You're quite right, of course. I'm a connoisseur of cruelty."

"And you're proud of it, aren't you?" Maris blinked back tears. Her face tightened, showing all the petulant age lines. ; "Everything they said about you is true. Even that." She waved a hand toward his groin.

"That?" he asked, knowing perfectly well what she meant. She, and every woman like her, would forgive every vicious thing he did if she could coax him into an erection.

"You're not a true man. You never were."

"Ah. In that, too, you're quite right." Daemon slipped his hands into his trouser pockets. "Personally, I've always thought it's the discomfort of the Ring of Obedience that's caused the problem." The cold, mocking smile returned. "Perhaps if you removed it . . ."

Maris became so pale he wondered if she was going to faint. He doubted Maris wanted to test his theory badly enough that she would actually remove that gold circle around his organ. Just as well. She wouldn't survive one minute after he was free.

Most of the witches he'd served hadn't survived anyway.

Daemon smiled that cold, familiar, brutal smile and settled next to her on the bed. "So you think I'm cruel." Her eyes were already glazing from the psychic seduction tendrils he was weaving around her.

"Yes," Maris whispered, watching his lips. Daemon leaned forward, amused at how quickly she opened her mouth for a kiss. Her tongue flirted hungrily with his, and when he finally raised his head, she tried to pull him down on top of her. "Do you really want to know why I don't work up a sweat?" he asked too gently. She hesitated, lust warring with curiosity. "Why?" Daemon smiled. "Because, my darling Lady Maris, your so-called intelligence bores me to tears and that body you think so fine and flaunt whenever and wherever possible isn't fit to be crowbait."

Maris's lower lip quivered. "Y-you're a sadistic brute." Daemon slipped off the bed. "How do you know?" he asked pleasantly. "The game hasn't even begun." "Get out. get out!"

He quickly left the bedroom, but waited a moment outside the door. Her wail of anguish was perfect counterpoint to his mocking laughter.

A light breeze ruffled Daemon's hair as he followed a gravel path through the back gardens. Unbuttoning his shirt, he smiled with pleasure as the breeze caressed his bare skin. He pulled a thin black cigarette from its gold case, lit it, and sighed as the smoke drifted slowly out of his mouth and nostrils, burning away Maris's stench.

The light in Maris's bedroom went out.

Stupid bitch. She didn't understand the game she played. No—she didn't understand the game he played. He was 1,700 years old and just coming into his prime. He'd worn a Ring of Obedience controlled by Dorothea SaDiablo, Hayll's High Priestess, for as long as he could remember. He had been raised in her court as her cousin's bastard son, had been educated and trained to serve Hayll's Black Widows. That is, taught enough of the Craft to serve those witch-bitches as they wanted to be served. He'd been whoring in courts long turned to dust while Maris's people were just beginning to build cities. He'd destroyed better witches than her, and he could destroy her, too. He'd brought down courts, laid waste to cities, brought about minor wars as vengeance for bedroom games.

Dorothea punished him, hurt him, sold him into service in court after court, but in the end, Maris and her kind were expendable. He was not. It had cost Dorothea and Hayll's other Black Widows dearly to create him, and whatever they had done, they couldn't do again.

Hayll's Blood was failing. In his generation, there were very few who wore the darker Jewels—not surprising since Dorothea had been so thorough about purging the stronger witches who might have challenged her rule after she became High Priestess, leaving her followers within Hayll's Hundred Families, lighter-Jeweled witches who had no social standing, and Blood females who had little power as the only ones capable of mating with a Blood male and producing healthy Blood children.

Now she needed a dark bloodline to mate with her Black Widow Sisters. So while she gladly humiliated and tortured him, she wouldn't destroy him because, if there was any possibility at all, she wanted his willing seed in her Sisters' bodies, and she would use fools like Maris to wear him down until he was ready to submit. He would never submit.

Seven hundred years ago, Tersa had told him the living myth was coming. Seven hundred years of waiting, watch- ing, searching, hoping. Seven hundred heartbreaking, exhausting years. He refused to give up, refused to wonder if she'd been mistaken, refused because his heart yearned too much for that strange, wonderful, terrifying creature called Witch.

In his soul, he knew her. In his dreams, he saw her. He | never envisioned a face. It always blurred if he tried to focus on it. But he could see her dressed in a robe made of dark, transparent spidersilk, a robe that slid from her shoulders as she moved, a robe that opened and closed as she walked, revealing bare, night-cool skin.  And there would be a scent in the room that was her, a scent he would wake to, burying his face in her pillow after she was up and attending her own concerns.

It wasn't lust—the body's fire paled in comparison to the embrace of mind to mind—although physical pleasure was part of it. He wanted to touch her, feel the texture of her skin, taste the warmth of her. He wanted to caress her until they both burned. He wanted to weave his life into hers until there was no telling where one began and the other ended. He wanted to put his arms around her, strong and protecting, and find himself protected; possess her and be possessed; dominate her and be dominated. He wanted that Other, that shadow across his life, who made him ache with every breath while he stumbled among these feeble women who meant nothing to him and never could.

Simply, he believed that he had been born to be her lover.

Daemon lit another cigarette and flexed the ring finger of his right hand. The snake tooth slid smoothly out of its channel and rested on the underside of his long, black-tinted fingernail. He smiled. Maris wondered if he had claws? Well, this little darling would impress her. Not for very long, though, since the venom in the sac beneath his fingernail was extremely potent.

He was lucky that he'd reached sexual maturity a little later than most Hayllians. The snake tooth had come along with the -rest of the physical changes, a shocking surprise, for he'd thought it was impossible for a male to be a natural Black Widow. During that time, he'd been serving in a court where it was fashionable for men to wear their nails long and tint them, so no one had thought it strange when he assumed the fashion, and no one had ever questioned why he continued to wear them that way.

Not even Dorothea. Since the witches of the Hourglass covens specialized in poisons and the darker aspects of the Craft, as well as dreams and visions, he'd always thought it strange that Dorothea had never guessed what he was. If she had, no doubt she would have tried to maim him beyond recognition. She might have succeeded before he had made the Offering to the Darkness to determine his mature strength, when he had still worn the Red Jewel that had come to him at his Birthright Ceremony. If she tried now, even with her coven backing her, it would cost her dearly. Even Ringed, a Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince would be a formidable enemy for a Red-Jeweled Priestess.

Which is why their paths seldom crossed anymore, why she kept him away from Hayll and her own court. She had one trump card to keep him submissive, and they both knew it. Without Lucivar's life in the balance, even the pain inflicted by the Ring of Obedience wouldn't hold him anymore. Lucivar . . . and the wild card that Tersa had added to the game of submission and control. The wild card Dorothea didn't know about. The wild card that would end her domination of Terreille. Once, the Blood had ruled honorably and well. The Blood villages within a District would look after, and treat fairly, the landen villages that were bound to them. The District Queens would serve in the Province Queen's court. The Province Queens, in their turn, would serve the Territory Queen, who was chosen by the majority of the darker-Jeweled Blood, both male and female, because she was the strongest and the best.

Back then, there was no need for slavery to control the strong males. They followed their hearts to the Queen who was right for them. They handed over their lives willingly. They served freely.

Back then, the Blood's complicated triangle of status hadn't leaned so heavily on social rank. Jewel rank and caste had weighed just as heavily in the balance, if not more. That meant control of their society was a fluid dance, with the lead constantly changing depending on the dancers. But in the center of that dance, always, was a Queen.

That had been the genius and the flaw in Dorothea's purges. Without any strong Queens to challenge her rise to power, she had expected the males to surrender to her, a Priestess, the same way they surrendered to a Queen. They didn't. So a different kind of purge began, and by the time it was done, Dorothea had the sharpest weapons of all— frightened males who stripped any weaker female of her power in order to feel strong and frightened females who Ringed potentially strong males before they could become a threat.

The result was a spiraling perversion of their society, with Dorothea at its center as both the instrument of destruction and the only safe haven.

And then it spread outward, into the other Territories. He had seen those other lands and people slowly crumble, crushed beneath Hayll's relentless, whispered perversion of the ways of the Blood. He had seen the strong Queens, bedded much too young, rise from their Virgin Night broken and useless.

He had seen it and grieved over it, furious and frustrated that he could do so little to stop it. A bastard had no social standing. A slave had even less, no matter what caste he was born to or what Jewels he wore. So while Dorothea played out her game of power, he played out his. She destroyed the Blood who opposed her. He destroyed the Blood who followed her.

In the end, she would win. He knew that. There were very few Territories that didn't live in Hayll's shadow now. Askavi had spread its legs for Hayll centuries ago. Dhemlan was the only Territory in the eastern part of the Realm that was still fighting with its last breaths to stay free of Dorothea's influence. And there were a handful of small Territories in the far west that weren't completely ensnared yet.

In another century, two at the most, Dorothea would achieve her ambition. Hayll's shadow would cover the entire Realm and she would be the High Priestess, the absolute ruler of Terreille, which had once been called the Realm of Light.

Daemon vanished the cigarette and buttoned his shirt. He still had to attend to Marissa, Maris's daughter, before he could get some sleep.

He'd only gone a few steps when a mind brushed against his, demanding his attention. He turned away from the house and followed the mental tug. There was no mistaking that psychic sent, those tangled thoughts and disjointed images.

What was she doing here?

The tugging stopped when he reached the small woods at the far end of the gardens. "Tersa?" he called softly.

The bushes beside him rustled and a bony hand closed on his wrist. "This way," Tersa said, tugging him down a path. "The web is fragile."

"Tersa—" Daemon half-dodged a low-hanging branch that slapped him in the face and got his arm yanked for the effort. "Tersa—"

"Hush, boy," she said fiercely, dragging him along. He concentrated on dodging branches and avoiding roots that tried to trip him. Gritting his teeth, he forced himself to ignore the tattered dress that clothed her half-starved body. As a child of the Twisted Kingdom, Tersa was half wild, seeing the world as ghostly grays through the shards of what she had been. Experience had taught him that when Tersa was intent upon her visions, it was useless talking to her about mundane things like food and clothes and safe, warm beds.

They reached an opening in the woods where a flat slab of stone rested above two others. Daemon wondered if it was natural, or if Tersa had built it as a miniature altar.

The slab was empty except for a wooden frame that held a Black Widow's tangled web. Uneasy, Daemon rubbed his wrist and waited.

"Watch," Tersa commanded. She snapped the thumbnail of her left hand against the forefinger nail. The forefinger nail changed to a sharp point. She pricked the middle finger of her right hand, and let one drop of blood fall on each of the four tether lines that held the web to the frame. The blood ran down the top lines and up the bottom ones. When they met in the middle, the web's spidersilk threads glowed.

A swirling mist appeared in front of the frame and changed into a crystal chalice.

The chalice was simple. Most men would have called it plain. Daemon thought it was elegant and beautiful. But it was what the chalice held that pulled him toward the makeshift altar.

The lightning-streaked black mist in the chalice contained power that slithered along his nerves, snaked around his spine, and sought its release in the sudden fire in his loins. It was a molten force, catastrophic in intensity, savage beyond a man's comprehension . . . and he wanted it with all his being.

"Look," Tersa said, pointing to the chalice's lip.

A hairline crack ran from a chip in the chalice's lip to the base. As Daemon watched, a deeper crack appeared.

The mist swirled inside the chalice. A tendril passed through the glass at the bottom into the stem.

Too fragile, he thought as more and more cracks appeared. The chalice was too fragile to hold that kind of power.

Then he looked closer.

The cracks were starting from the outside and going in, not starting from the inside and going out. So it was threatened by something beyond itself.

He shivered as he watched more of the mist flow into the stem. It was a vision. There was nothing he could do to change a vision. But everything he was screamed at him to do something, to wrap his strength around it and cherish it, protect it, keep it safe.

Knowing it would change nothing that happened here and now, he still reached for the chalice,

It shattered before he touched it, spraying crystal shards over the makeshift altar.

Tersa held up what was left of the shattered chalice. A little of mist still swirled inside the jagged-edged bottom of the cup. Most of it was trapped inside the stem.

She looked at him sadly. "The inner web can be broken without shattering the chalice. The chalice can be shattered without breaking the inner web. They cannot reach the inner web, but the chalice . . ."

Daemon licked his lips. He couldn't stop shivering. "I know the inner web is another name for our core, the Self that can tap the power within us. But I don't know what the chalice stands for."

Her hand shook a little. "Tersa is a shattered chalice." Daemon closed his eyes. A shattered chalice. A shattered mind. She was talking about madness. "Give me your hand," Tersa said.

Too unnerved to question her, Daemon held out his left hand.

Tersa grabbed it, pulled it forward, and slashed his wrist with the chalice's jagged edge.

Daemon clamped his hand over his wrist and stared at her, stunned.

"So that you never forget this night," Tersa said, her voice trembling. "That scar will never leave you."

Daemon knotted his handkerchief around his wrist. "Why is a scar important?"

"I told you. So you won't forget." Tersa cut the strands of the tangled web with the shattered chalice. When the last thread broke, the chalice and web vanished. "I don't know if this will be or if it may be. Many strands in the web weren't visible to me. May the Darkness give you courage if you need it, when you need it." "The courage for what?" Tersa walked away.

"Tersa!"

Tersa looked back at him, said three words, and vanished.

Daemon's legs buckled. He huddled on the ground, gasping for air, shuddering from the fear that clawed at his belly.

What had the one to do with the other? Nothing. Nothing! He would be there, a protector, a shield. He would!

But where?

Daemon forced himself to breathe evenly. That was the question. Where.

Certainly not in Maris's court.

It was late morning before he returned to the house, aching and dirty. His wrist throbbed and his head pounded mercilessly. He had just reached the terrace when Maris's daughter, Marissa, flounced out of the garden room and planted herself in front of him, hands on her hips, her expression a mixture of irritation and hunger.

"You were supposed to come to my room last night and you didn't. Where have you been? You're filthy." She rolled her shoulder, looking at him from beneath her lashes. "You've been naughty. You'll have to come up to my room and explain."

Daemon pushed past her. "I'm tired. I'm going to bed."

"You'll do as I say!" Marissa thrust her hand between his legs.

Daemon's hand tightened on Marissa's wrist so fast and so hard that she was on her knees whimpering in pain before she realized what happened. He continued squeezing her wrist until the bones threatened to shatter. Daemon smiled at her then, that cold, familiar, brutal smile.

"I'm not 'naughty.' Little boys are naughty." He pushed her away from him, stepping over her where she lay sprawled on the flagstones. "And if you ever touch me like that again, I'll rip your hand off."

He walked through the corridors to his room, aware that the servants skittered away from him, that an aftertaste of violence hung in the air around him.

He didn't care. He went to his room, stripped off his clothes, laid down on his bed, and stared at the ceiling, terrified to close his eyes because every time he did he saw a shattered crystal chalice.

Three words. She has come.

3 /Hell

Once, he'd been the Seducer, the Executioner, the High Priest of the Hourglass, the Prince of the Darkness, the High Lord of Hell.

Once, he'd been Consort to Cassandra, the great Black-Jeweled, Black Widow Queen, the last Witch to walk the Realms.

Once, he'd been the only Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince in the history of the Blood, feared for his temper and the power he wielded.

Once, he'd been the only male who was a Black Widow.

Once, he'd ruled the Dhemlan Territory in the Realm of Terreille and her sister Territory in Kaeleer, the Shadow Realm. He'd been the only male ever to rule without answering to a Queen and, except for Witch, the only member of the Blood to rule Territories in two Realms.

Once, he'd been married to Hekatah, an aristo Black Widow Priestess from one of Hayll's Hundred Families.

Once, he'd raised two sons, Mephis and Peyton. He'd played games with them, told them stories, read to them, healed their skinned knees and broken hearts, taught them Craft and Blood Law, showered them with his love of the land as well as music, art, and literature, encouraged them to look with eager eyes upon all that the Realms had to offer—not to conquer but to learn. He'd taught them to dance for a social occasion and to dance for the glory of Witch. He'd taught them how to be Blood.

But that was a long, long time ago.

Saetan, the High Lord of Hell, sat quietly by the fire, a hearth rug wrapped around his legs, turning the pages of a book he had no interest in reading. He sipped a glass of yarbarah, the blood wine, taking no pleasure in its taste or warmth.

For the past decade, he'd been a quiet invalid who never left his private study deep beneath the Hall. For more than 50,000 years before that, he'd been the ruler and caretaker of the Dark Realm, the undisputed High Lord.

He no longer cared about Hell. He no longer cared about the demon-dead family and friends who were still with him, or the other demon-dead and ghostly citizens of this Realm, the Blood who were still too strong to return to the Darkness even after their bodies had died.

He was tired and old, and the loneliness he'd carried inside him all his life had become too heavy to bear. He no longer wanted to be a Guardian, one of the living dead. He no longer wanted the half-life a handful of the Blood had chosen in order to extend their lifetimes into years beyond imagining. He wanted peace, wanted to quietly fade back into the Darkness.

The only thing that kept him from actively seeking that release was his promise to Cassandra.

Saetan steepled his long, black-tinted nails and rested his golden eyes on the portrait hanging on the far wall between two bookcases.

She'd made him promise to become a Guardian so that the extended half-life would allow him to walk among the living when his daughter was born. Not the daughter of his loins, but the daughter of his soul. The daughter she'd seen in a tangled web.

He'd promised because what she'd said had made his nerves twang like tether lines in a storm, because that was her price for training him to be a Black Widow, because, even then, the Darkness sang to him in a way it didn't sing to other Blood males.

He had kept his promise. But the daughter never came.

The insistent knocking on the door of his private study finally pulled him from his thoughts.

"Come," he said, his deep voice a tired whisper, a ghost of what it once had been.

Mephis SaDiablo entered and stood beside the chair, silent.

"What do you want, Mephis?" Saetan asked his eldest son, demon-dead since that long ago war between Terreille and Kaeleer.

Mephis hesitated. "Something strange is going on."

Saetan's gaze drifted back to the fire. "Someone else can look into it, if anyone so desires. Your mother can look into it. Hekatah always wanted power without my interference."

"No," Mephis said uneasily.

Saetan studied his son's face and found that he had a hard time swallowing. "Your . . . brothers?" he finally asked, unable to hide the pain that the question caused him. He'd been a flattered fool to cast the spell that temporarily gave him back the seed of life. He couldn't regret Daemon's and Lucivar's existence, but he'd tortured himself for centuries with reports of what had been done to them.

Mephis shook his head and stared at the dark-red marble mantle. "On the cildru dyathe's island."

Saetan shuddered. He'd never feared anything in Hell, but he'd always felt an aching despair for the cildru dyathe, the demon-dead children. In Hell, the dead retained the form of their last living hour. This cold, blasted Realm had never been a kind place, but to look upon those children, to see what had been done to them by another's hand, for there to be no escape from those blatant, wounds. ... It was too much to bear. They kept to their island, unwilling to have any contact with adults. He never intruded on them, having Char, their chosen leader, come to him once in a while to bring back the books, games, and whatever else he could find that might engage their young minds and help wile away the unrelenting years.

"The cildru dyathe take care of themselves," Saetan said, fussing with the hearth rug. "You know that."

"But . . . every so often, for the past few weeks, there's another presence there. Never for very long, but I've felt it. So has Prothvar when he's flown over the island."

"Leave them alone," Saetan snapped, his temper returning some strength to his voice. "Perhaps they've found an orphaned Hound pup."

Mephis took a deep breath. "Hekatah has already had an altercation with Char over this. The children are hiding from everyone who approaches because of it. If she had any authority to—"

Before Saetan could respond to the sharp rap on the study door, it swung open. Andulvar Yaslana, once the Eyrien Warlord Prince of Askavi, strode into the room. His grandson, Prothvar, followed him, carrying a large globe covered with a black cloth.

"SaDiablo, there's something you should see," Andulvar said. "Prothvar brought this from the cildru dyathe's island."

Saetan assumed an expression of polite interest. As young men, he and Andulvar had become unlikely friends and had served together in a number of courts. Even Hekatah hadn't severed that friendship when she'd strutted around, gleefully carrying a child that wasn't his—Andulvar's child. It didn't turn him against the only man he'd ever called a friend—who could blame a man for getting tangled up in one of Hekatah's schemes?—but it had ended his stormy marriage.

Saetan looked at each man in turn and saw the same uneasiness in three pairs of gold eyes. Mephis was a Gray-Jeweled Warlord Prince and almost unshakable. Prothvar was a Red-Jeweled Eyrien Warlord, a warrior bred and trained. Andulvar was an Eyrien Warlord Prince who wore the Ebon-gray, the second darkest Jewel. They were all strong men who didn't frighten easily—but now they were frightened.

Saetan leaned forward, their fear pricking the bubble of indifference he'd sealed himself in a decade ago. His body was weak and he needed a cane to walk, but his mind was still sharp, the Black Jewels still vibrant, his skill in the Craft still honed.

Suddenly, he knew he would need all that strength and skill to deal with whatever was happening on the cildru dyathe's island.

Andulvar pulled the cloth off the globe. Saetan just stared, his face full of wonder and disbelief.

A butterfly. No, not just a butterfly. This was a huge fantasy creature that gently beat its wings within the confines of the globe. But it was the colors that stunned Saetan. Hell was a Realm of forever-twilight, a Realm that muted colors until there was almost no color at all. There was nothing muted about the creature in the globe. Its body was pumpkin orange, its wings an unlikely blend of sky blue, sun yellow, and spring-grass green. As he stared, the butterfly lost its shape, and the colors bled together like a chalk painting in the rain.

Someone on the cildru dyathe's island had created that glorious piece of magic, had been able to hold the colors of the living Realms in a place that bleached away the vitality, the vibrancy of life.

"Prothvar threw a shielded globe around this one," Andulvar said.

"They dissolve almost immediately," Prothvar said apologetically, pulling his dark, membranous wings tight to his body.

Saetan straightened in his chair. "Bring Char to me, Lord Yaslana." His voice was soft thunder, caressing, commanding.

"He won't come willingly," Prothvar said.

Saetan stared at the demon-dead Warlord. "Bring Char to me."

"Yes, High Lord."

The High Lord of Hell sat quietly by the fire, his slender fingers loosely steepled, the long nails a glistening black. The Black-Jeweled ring on his right hand glittered with an inner fire.

The boy sat opposite him, staring at the floor, trying hard not to be frightened.

Saetan watched him through half-closed eyes. For a thousand years now, Char had been the leader of the cildru dyathe. He'd been twelve, maybe thirteen, when someone had staked him and set him on fire. The will to survive had been stronger than the body, and he'd tumbled through one of the Gates to end up in the Dark Realm. His body was so burned it was impossible to tell what race he had come from. Yet this young demon boy had gathered the other maimed children and created a haven for them, the cildru dyathe's, island.

He would have been a good Warlord if he'd been allowed to come of age, Saetan thought idly.

Andulvar, Mephis, and Prothvar stood behind Char's chair in a half circle, effectively cutting off any means of escape.

"Who makes the butterflies, Char?" Saetan asked too quietly.

There were winds that came down from the north screaming over miles of ice, picking up moisture as they tore over the cooling sea until, when they finally touched a man, the cold, knife-sharp damp seeped into his bones and chilled him in places the hottest fire couldn't warm. Saetan, when he was this calm, this still, was like those winds.

"Who makes the butterflies?" he asked again.

Char stared at the floor, his hands clenched, his face twisted with the emotions raging within him. "She's ours." The words burst from him. "She belongs to us."

Saetan sat very still, cold with the fury rising in him. Until he had an answer, he had no time for gentleness.

Char stared back, frightened but willing to fight.

All of Hell's citizens knew the subtle nuances of death, that there was dead and there was dead. All of Hell's citizens knew the one person capable of obliterating them with a thought was their High Lord. Still, Char openly challenged him, and waited.

Suddenly, something else was in the room. A soft touch. A question running on a psychic thread. Char hung his head, defeated. "She wants to meet you."

"Then bring her here, Char."

Char squared his shoulders. "Tomorrow. I'll bring her tomorrow."

Saetan studied the trembling pride in the boy's eyes. "Very well, Warlord, you may escort her here . . . tomorrow."

4 / Hell

Saetan stood at the reading lectern, the candle-lights spilling a soft glow around him as he leafed through an old Craft text. He didn't turn at the quiet knock on his study door. A swift psychic probe told him who was there.

"Come." He continued to leaf through the book, trying to rein in his temper before dealing with that impudent little demon. Finally, he closed the book and turned.

Char stood near the doorway, his shoulders proudly pulled back.

"Language is a curious thing, Warlord," Saetan said with deceptive mildness. "When you said 'tomorrow,' I didn't expect five days to pass."

Fear crept into Char's eyes. His shoulders wilted. He turned toward the doorway, and a strange blend of tenderness, irritation, and resignation swept over his face.

The girl slipped through the doorway, her attention immediately caught by the stark Dujae painting, Descent into Hell, hanging over the fireplace. Her summer-sky blue eyes flitted over the large blackwood desk, politely skipped over him, lit up when she saw the floor-to-ceiling bookcases that covered most of one wall, and lingered on Cassandra's portrait.

Saetan gripped his silver-headed cane, fighting to keep his balance while impressions crashed over him like heavy surf. He'd expected a gifted cildru dyathe. This girl was alive! Because of the skill needed to make those butterflies, he'd expected her to be closer to adolescence. She couldn't be more than seven years old. He'd expected intelligence. The expression in her eyes was sweet and disappointingly dull-witted. And what was a living child doing in Hell?

Then she turned and looked at him. As he watched the summer-sky blue eyes change to sapphire, the surf swept him away.

Ancient eyes. Maelstrom eyes. Haunted, knowing, seeing eyes.

An icy finger whispered down his spine at the same moment he was filled with an intense, unsettling hunger. Instinct told him what she was. It took a little longer for him to find the courage to accept it.

Not the daughter of his loins, but the daughter of his soul. Not just a gifted witch, but Witch.

She lowered her eyes and fluffed her sausage-curled golden hair, apparently no longer sure of her welcome.

He stomped down the desire to brush out those ridiculous curls.

"Are you the Priest?" she asked shyly, lacing her fingers. "The High Priest of the Hourglass?"

One black eyebrow lifted slightly, and a faint, dry smile touched his lips. "No one's called me that in a long time, but, yes, I'm the Priest. I am Saetan Daemon SaDiablo, the High Lord of Hell."

"Saetan," she said, as if trying out the name. "Saetan." It was a warm caress, a sensuous, lovely caress. "It suits you."

Saetan bit back a laugh. There had been many reactions to his name in the past, but never this. No, never this. "And you are?" "Jaenelle."

He waited for the rest, but she offered no family name. As the silence lengthened, a sudden wariness tinged the room, as if she expected some kind of trap. With a smile and a dismissive shrug to indicate it was of no importance, Saetan gestured toward the chairs by the fire. "Will you sit and talk with me, witch-child? My leg can't tolerate standing for very long."

Jaenelle went to the chair nearest the door, with Char in close, possessive attendance.

Saetan's gold eyes flashed with annoyance. Hell's fire! He'd forgotten about the boy. "Thank you, Warlord. You may go."

Char sputtered a protest. Before Saetan could respond, Jaenelle touched Char's arm. No words were spoken, and he couldn't feel a psychic thread. Whatever passed between the two children was very subtle, and there was no question who ruled. Char bowed politely and left the study, closing the door behind him.

As soon as they were settled by the fire, Jaenelle pinned Saetan to his chair with those intense sapphire eyes. "Can you teach me Craft? Cassandra said you might jf I asked." Saetan's world was destroyed and rebuilt in the space of a heartbeat. He allowed nothing to show on his face. There would be time for that later. "Teach you Craft? I don't see why not. Where is Cassandra staying now? We've lost touch over the years."

"At her Altar. In Terreille." "I see. Come here, witch-child." Jaenelle rose obediently and stood by his chair. Saetan raised one hand, fingers curled inward, and gently stroked her cheek. Anger instantly skimmed her eyes, and there was a sudden pulse in the Black, within him. He held her eyes, letting his fingers travel slowly along her jaw and brush against her lips, all the way around and back. He didn't try to hide his curiosity, interest, or the tenderness he felt for most females.

When he was done, he steepled his fingers and waited. A moment later, the pulse was gone, and his thoughts were his own again. Just as well, because he couldn't stop wondering why being touched made her so angry. "I'll make you two promises," he said. "I want one in return."

Jaenelle eyed him warily. "What promise?"

"I promise, by the Jewels that I wear and all that I am, that I'll teach you whatever you ask to the best of my ability. And I promise I'll never lie to you."

Jaenelle thought this over. "What do I have to promise?"

"That you'll keep me informed of any Craft lessons you learn from others. Craft requires dedication to learn it well and discipline to handle the responsibilities that come with that kind of power. I want the assurance that anything you learn has been taught correctly. Do you understand, witch-child?"

"Then you'll teach me?"

"Everything I know." Saetan let her think this over. "Agreed?"

"Yes."

"Very well. Give me your hands." He took the small, fair hands in his light-brown ones. "I'm going to touch your mind." The anger again. "I won't hurt you, witch-child."

Saetan carefully reached with his mind until he stood before her inner barriers. They were the shields that protected the Blood from their own kind. Like rings within rings, the more barriers that were passed, the more personal the mental link. The first barrier protected everyday thoughts. The last barrier protected the core of the Self, the essence of a being, the inner web.

Saetan waited. As much as he wanted answers, he wouldn't open her by force. Too much now depended on trust.

The barriers opened, and he went in.

He didn't rummage through her thoughts or descend deeper than was necessary, despite his curiosity. That would have been a shocking betrayal of the Blood's code of honor. And there was a strange, deep blankness to her mind that troubled him, a soft neutrality that he was sure hid something very different. He quickly found what he was looking for—the psychic thread that would vibrate in sympathy with a plucked, same-rank thread and would tell him what Jewels she wore, or would wear after her Birthright Ceremony. He began with the White, the lightest rank, and worked his way down, listening for the answering hum.

Hell's fire! Nothing. He hadn't expected anything until he'd reached the Red, but he'd expected a response at that depth. She had to wear Birthright Red in order to wear the Black after she made the Offering to the Darkness. Witch always wore the Black.

Without thinking, Saetan plucked the Black thread.

The hum came from below him.

Saetan released her hands, amazed that his own weren't shaking. He swallowed to get his heart out of his throat. "Have you had the Birthright Ceremony yet?"

Jaenelle drooped.

He gently lifted her chin. "Witch-child?"

Misery filled her sapphire eyes. A tear rolled down her cheek. "I f-failed the t-test. Does that mean I have to give the Jewels back?"

"Failed the— What Jewels?"

Jaenelle slipped her hand into the folds of her blue dress and pulled out a velvet bag. She upended it on the low table beside his chair with a proud but watery smile.

Saetan closed his eyes, leaned his head against the back of the chair, and sincerely hoped the room would stop spinning. He didn't need to look at them to know what they were: twelve uncut Jewels. White, Yellow, Tiger Eye, Summer-sky, Purple Dusk, Blood Opal, Green, Sapphire, Red, Gray, and Ebon-gray.

No one knew where the Jewels had come from. If one was destined to wear a Jewel, it simply appeared on the Altar after the Birthright Ceremony or the Offering to the Darkness. Even when he was young, receiving an uncut Jewel—a Jewel that had never been worn by another of the Blood—was rare. His Birthright Red Jewel had been uncut. When he'd been gifted with the Black, it, too, had been uncut. But to receive an entire set of uncut Jewels . . . Saetan leaned over and tapped the Yellow Jewel with the tip of his nail. It flared, the fire in the center warning him off. He frowned, puzzled. The Jewel already identified itself as female, as being bonded to a witch and not a Blood male, but there was the faintest hint of maleness in it too. Jaenelle wiped the tears from her cheeks and sniffed.

"The lighter Jewels are for practice and everyday stuff until I'm ready to set these." She upended another velvet bag. The room spun in every direction. Saetan's nails pierced the leather arms of his chair.

Hell's fire, Mother Night, and may the Darkness be merciful!

Thirteen uncut Black Jewels, Jewels that already glittered with the inner fire of a psychic bond. Having a child bond with one Black Jewel without having her mind pulled into its depths was disturbing enough, but the inner strength required to bond and hold thirteen of them . . . Fear skittered up his spine, raced through his veins.

Too much power. Too much. Even the Blood weren't meant to wield this much power. Even Witch had never controlled this much power.

This one did. This young Queen. This daughter of his soul.

With effort, Saetan steadied his breathing. He could accept her. He could love her. Or he could fear her. The decision was his, and whatever he decided here, now, he would have to live with.

The Black Jewels glowed. The Black Jewel in his ring glowed in answer. His blood throbbed in his veins, making his head ache. The power in those Jewels pulled at him, demanding recognition.

And he discovered the decision was an easy one after all—he had actually made it a long, long time ago.

"Where did you get these, witch-child?" he asked hoarsely.

Jaenelle hunched her shoulders. "From Lorn."

"L-Lorn?" Lorn? That was a name from the Blood's most ancient legends. Lorn was the last Prince of the Dragons, the founding race who had created the Blood. "How . . . where did you meet Lorn?"

Jaenelle withdrew further into herself.

Saetan stifled the urge to shake the answer out of her and let out a theatrical sigh. "A secret between friends, yes?"

Jaenelle nodded.

He sighed again. "In that case, pretend I never asked." He gently rapped her nose with his finger. "But that means you can't go telling him our secrets."

Jaenelle looked at him, wide-eyed. "Do we have any?"

"Not yet," he grumped, "but I'll make one up just so we do."

She let out a silvery, velvet-coated laugh, an extraordinary sound that hinted at the voice she'd have in a few years. Rather like her face, which was too exotic and awkward for her now, but, sweet Darkness, when she grew into that face!

"All right, witch-child, down to business. Put those away. You won't need them for this."

"Business?" she asked, scooping up the Jewels and tucking the bags into the folds of her dress.

"Your first lesson in basic Craft,"

Jaenelle drooped and perked up at the same time.

Saetan twitched a finger. A rectangular paperweight rose off the blackwood desk and glided through the air until it settled on the low table. The paperweight was a polished stone taken from the same quarry as the stones he'd used to build the Hall in this Realm.

Saetan positioned Jaenelle in front of the table. "I want you to point one finger at the paperweight. . . like this . . . and move it as far across the table as you can."

Jaenelle hesitated, licked her lips, and pointed her finger.

Saetan felt the surge of raw power through his Black Jewel.

The paperweight didn't move.

"Try again, witch-child. In the other direction."

Again there was that surge, but the paperweight didn't

move.

Saetan rubbed his chin, confused. This was simple Craft, something she shouldn't have any trouble with whatsoever.

Jaenelle wilted. "I try," she said in a broken voice. "I try and try, but I never get it right."

Saetan hugged her, feeling a bittersweet ache in his heart when her arms wrapped around his neck. "Never mind, witch-child. It takes time to learn Craft,"

"Why can't I do it? All my friends can do it."

Reluctant to let her go, Saetan forced himself to hold her at arm's length. "Perhaps we should start with something personal. That's usually easier. Is there anything you have trouble with?"

Jaenelle fluffed her hair and frowned. "I always have trouble finding my shoes."

"Good enough." Saetan reached for his cane. "Put one shoe in front of the desk and then stand over there."

He limped to the far side of the room and stood with his back to Cassandra's portrait, grimly amused at giving his new Queen her first Craft lesson under the watchful but unknowing eyes of his last Queen.

When Jaenelle joined him, he said, "A lot of Craftwork requires translating physical action into mental action. I want you to imagine—by the way, how is your imagination?" Saetan faltered. Why did she look so bruised? He'd only meant to tease a little since he'd already seen that butterfly. "I want you to imagine picking up the shoe and bringing it over here. Reach forward, grasp, and bring it in."

Jaenelle stretched her arm as far as it would go, clenched her hand, and yanked.

Everything happened at once.

The leather chairs by the fire zipped toward him. He countered Craft with Craft and had a moment to feel shocked when nothing happened before one of the chairs knocked him off his feet. He fell into the other one and had just enough time to curl into a ball before the chair behind the blackwood desk slammed into the back of the chair he was in and came down on top of it, caging him. He heard leather-bound books whiz around the room like crazed birds before hitting the floor with a thump. His shoes pattered frantically, trying to escape his feet. And over all of it was Jaenelle wailing, "Stop stop stop!"

Seconds later, there was silence.

Jaenelle peered into the space between the chair arms. "Saetan?" she said in a small, quivery voice. "Saetan, are you all right?"

Using Craft, Saetan sent the top chair back to the black-wood desk. "I'm fine, witch-child." He stuffed his feet into his shoes and gingerly stood up. "That's the most excitement I've had in centuries."

"Really?"

He straightened his black tunic-jacket and smoothed back his hair. "Yes, really." And Guardian or not, a man his age shouldn't have his heart gallop around his rib cage like this.

Saetan looked around the study and stifled a groan. The book that had been on the lectern hung in the air, upside down. The rest of the books formed drifts on the study floor. In fact, the only leather object that hadn't answered that summons was Jaenelle's shoe. "I'm sorry, Saetan."

Saetan clenched his teeth. "It takes time, witch-child." He sank into the chair. So much raw power but still so vulnerable until she learned how to use it. A thought shivered across his mind. "Does anyone else know about the Jewels Lorn gave you?"

"No." Her voice was a midnight whisper. Fear and pain filled her sapphire eyes, and something else, too, that was stronger than those surface feelings. Something that chilled him to the core.

But he was chilled even more by the fear and pain in her eyes.

Even a strong child, a powerful child, would be dependent on the adults around her. If her strength could unnerve him, how would her people, her family, react if they ever discovered what was contained inside that small husk? Would they accept the child who already was the strongest Queen in the history of the Blood, or would they fear the power? And if they feared the power, would they try to cut her off from it by breaking her?

A Virgin Night performed with malevolent skill could strip her of her power while leaving the rest intact. But, since her inner web was so deep in the abyss, she might be able to withdraw far enough to withstand the physical violation—unless the male was able to descend deep enough into the abyss to threaten her even there.

Was there a male strong enough, dark enough, vicious enough?

There was . . . one.

Saetan closed his eyes. He could send for Marjong, let the Executioner do what was needed. No, not yet. Not to that one. Not until there was a reason. "Saetan?"

He reluctantly opened his eyes and watched, at first stupidly and then with a growing sense of shock, as she pushed up her sleeve and offered her wrist to him.

"There's no need for a blood price," he snapped. She didn't drop her wrist. "It will make you better."

Those ancient eyes seared him, stripped him of his flesh until he shivered, naked before her. He tried to refuse, but the words wouldn't come. He could smell the fresh blood in her, the life force pumping through her veins in counter-rhythm to his own pounding heart.

"Not that way," he said huskily, drawing her to him. "Not with me." With a lover's gentleness, he unbuttoned her dress and nicked the silky skin of her throat with his nail. The blood flowed, hot and sweet. He closed his mouth over the wound.

Her power rose beneath him, a slow, black tidal wave skillfully controlled, a tidal wave that washed over him, cleansed him, healed him even as his mind shuddered to find itself engulfed by a mind so powerful and yet so gentle. He counted her heartbeats. When he reached five, he raised his head. She didn't look shocked or frightened, the usual emotions the living felt when required to give blood directly from the vein.

She brushed a trembling finger against his lips. "If you had more, would it make you completely well?"

Saetan called in a bowl of warm water and washed the blood off her throat with a square of clean linen. He wasn't about to explain to a child what those two mouthfuls of blood were already doing to him. He ignored the question, hoping she wouldn't press for an answer, and concentrated on the Craft needed to heal the wound.

"Would it?" she asked as soon as he vanished the linen and bowl.

Saetan hesitated. He'd given his word he wouldn't lie. "It would be better for the healing to take place a little at a time." That, at least, was true enough. "Another lesson tomorrow?"

Jaenelle quickly looked away.

Saetan tensed. Had she been frightened by what he'd done?

"I ... I already promised Morghann I'd see her tomorrow and Gabrielle the day after that."

Relief made him giddy. "In three days, then?"

She studied his face. "You don't mind? You're not angry?"

Yes, he minded, but that was a Warlord Prince's instinctive possessiveness talking. Besides, he had a lot to do before he saw her next. "I don't think your friends would care much for your new mentor if he took up all your time, do you?"

She grinned. "Probably not." The grin vanished. The bruised look was back in her eyes. "I have to go."

Yes, he had a great deal to do before he saw her next.

She opened the door and stopped. "Do you believe in unicorns?"

Saetan smiled. "I knew them once, a long time ago."

The smile she gave him before disappearing down the corridor lit the room, lit the darkest corners of his heart.

"Hell's fire! What happened, SaDiablo?"

Saetan waggled Jaenelle's abandoned shoe at Andulvar and smiled dryly. "A Craft lesson."

"What?"

"I met the butterfly maker."

Andulvar stared at the mess. "She did this? Why?"

"It wasn't intentional, just uncontrolled. She isn't cildru dyathe either. She's a living child, a Queen, and she's Witch."

Andulvar's jaw dropped. "Witch? Like Cassandra was Witch?"

Saetan choked back a snarl. "Not like Cassandra but, yes, Witch."

"Hell's fire! Witch." Andulvar shook his head and smiled.

Saetan stared at the shoe. "Andulvar, my friend, I hope you've still got all that brass under your belt that you used to brag about because we're in deep trouble."

"Why?" Andulvar asked suspiciously.

"Because you're going to help me train a seven-year-old Witch who's got the raw power right now to turn us both into dust and yet"—he dropped the shoe onto the chair— "is abysmal at basic Craft."

Mephis knocked briskly and entered the study, tripping on a pile of books. "A demon just told me the strangest thing."

Saetan adjusted the folds of his cape and reached for his cane. "Be brief, Mephis. I'm going to an appointment that's long overdue."

"He said he saw the Hall shift a couple of inches. The whole thing. And a moment later, it shifted back." Saetan stood very still. "Did anyone else see this?" "I don't think so, but—"

"Then tell him to hold his tongue if he doesn't want to lose it."

Saetan swept past Mephis, leaving the study that had been his home for the past decade, leaving his worried demon-dead son behind.

chapter Two

1 / Terreille

In the autumn twilight, Saetan studied the Sanctuary, a forgotten place of crumbling stone, alive with small vermin and memories. Yet within this broken .place was a Dark Altar, one of the thirteen Gates that linked the Realms of Terreille, Kaeleer, and Hell.

Cassandra's Altar.

Cloaked in a sight shield and a Black psychic shield, Saetan limped through the barren outer rooms, skirting pools of water left by an afternoon storm. A mouse, searching for food among the fallen stones, never sensed his presence as he passed by. The Witch living in this labyrinth of rooms wouldn't sense him either. Even though they both wore the Black Jewels, his strength was just a little darker, just a little deeper than hers.

Saetan paused at a bedroom door. The covers on the bed looked fairly new. So did the heavy curtains pulled across the window. She would need those when she rested during the daylight hours.

At the beginning of the half-life, Guardians' bodies retained most of the abilities of the living. They ate food like the living, drank blood like the demon-dead, and could walk in the daylight, though they preferred the twilight and the night. As centuries passed, the need for sustenance diminished until only yarbarah, the blood wine, was required. Preference for darkness became necessity as daylight produced strength-draining, physical pain.

He found her in the kitchen, humming off-key as she took a wineglass out of the cupboard. Her shapeless, mud-colored gown was streaked with dirt. Her long braided hair, faded now to a dusty red, was veiled with cobwebs. When she turned toward the door, still unaware of his presence, the firelight smoothed most of the lines from her face, lines he knew were there because they, were in the portrait that hung in his private study, the portrait he knew so well. She had aged since the death that wasn't a death.

But so had he.

He dropped the sight shield and psychic shield.

The wineglass shattered on the floor.

"Practicing hearth-Craft, Cassandra?" he asked mildly, struggling to tamp down an overwhelming sense of betrayal.

She backed away from him. "I should have realized she'd tell you."

"Yes, you should have. You also should have known I'd come." He tossed his cape over a wooden chair, grimly amused at the way her emerald eyes widened when she noticed how heavily he leaned on the cane. "I'm old, Lady. Quite harmless."

"You were never harmless," she said tartly.

"True, but you never minded that when you had a use for me." He looked away when she didn't answer. "Did you hate me so much?"

Cassandra reached toward him. "I never hated you, Saetan. I—"

—was afraid of you.

The words hung between them, unspoken.

Cassandra vanished the broken wineglass. "Would you like some wine? There's no yarbarah, but I've got some decent red."

Saetan settled into a chair beside the pine table. "Why aren't you drinking yarbarah?"

Cassandra brought a bottle and two wineglasses to the table. "It's hard to come by here."

"I'll send some to you."

They drank the first glass of wine in silence.

"Why?" he finally asked.

Cassandra toyed with her wineglass. "Black-Jeweled Queens are few and far between. There was no one to help me when I became Witch, no one to talk to, no one to help me prepare for the drastic changes in my life after I made the Offering." She laughed without humor. "I had no idea what being Witch would mean. I didn't want the next one to go through the same thing."

"You could have told me you intended to become a Guardian instead of faking the final death."

"And have you stay around as the loyal, faithful Consort to a Queen who no longer needed one?"

Saetan refilled the glasses. "I could have been a friend. Or you could have dismissed me from your court if that's what you wanted."

"Dismiss you? You? You were ... are ... Saetan, the Prince of the Darkness, High Lord of Hell. No one dismisses you. Not even Witch."

Saetan stared at her. "Damn you," he said bitterly.

Cassandra wearily brushed a stray hair from her face. "It's done, Saetan. It was lifetimes ago. There's the child to think about now."

Saetan watched the fire burning in the hearth. She was entitled to her own life, and certainly wasn't responsible for his, but she didn't understand—or didn't want to understand—what that friendship might have meant to him. Even if he'd never seen her again, knowing she still existed would have eased some of the emptiness. Would he have married Hekatah if he hadn't been so desperately lonely?

Cassandra laced her fingers around her glass. "You've seen her?"

Saetan thought of his study and snorted.  "Yes, I've

seen her."

I'm sure of it."

"She's going to be Witch. I'm sure of it." "Going to be?" Saetan's golden eyes narrowed. "What do you mean, 'going to be'? Are we talking about the same child? Jaenelle?"

"Of course we're talking about Jaenelle," she snapped.

"She isn't 'going to be' Witch, Cassandra. She already is Witch."

Cassandra shook her head vigorously. "Not possible. Witch always wear the Black Jewels."

"So does the daughter of my soul," Saetan replied too quietly.

It took her a moment to understand him. When she did she lifted the wineglass with shaking hands and drained it "H-how do you . . ."

"She showed me the Jewels she was gifted with. A full uncut set of the 'lighter' Jewels—and that was the first time I'd ever heard anyone refer to the Ebon-gray as a lighter Jewel—and thirteen uncut Blacks."

Cassandra's face turned gray. Saetan gently chafed her ice-cold hands, concerned by the shock in her eyes. She was the one who'd first seen the child in her tangled web. She was the one who'd told him about it. Had she only seen Witch but not understood what was coming?

Saetan put a warming spell on his cape and wrapped it around her, then warmed another glass of wine over a little tongue of witchfire. When her teeth stopped chattering, he returned to his own chair.

Her emerald eyes asked the question she couldn't put into words.

"Lorn," he said quietly. "She got the Jewels from Lorn." Cassandra shuddered. "Mother Night." She shook her head. "It's not supposed to be like this, Saetan. How will we control her?"

His hand jerked as he refilled his glass. Wine splashed on the table. "We don't control her. We don't even try." Cassandra smacked her palm on the table. "She's a child! Too young to understand that much power and not emotionally ready to accept the responsibilities that come with it. At her age, she's too open to influence."

He almost asked her whose influence she feared, but Hekatah's face popped into his mind. Pretty, charming, scheming, vicious Hekatah, who had married him because she'd thought he would make her the High Priestess of Terreille at least or, possibly, the dominant female influence in all three Realms. When he'd refused to bend to her wishes, she'd tried on her own and had caused the war between Terreille and Kaeleer, a war that had left Terreille devastated for centuries and had been the reason why many of Kaeleer's races had closed their lands to outsiders and were never seen or heard from again.

If Hekatah got her claws into Jaenelle and molded the girl into her own greedy, ambitious image . . .

"You have to control her, Saetan," Cassandra said, watching him.

Saetan shook his head. "Even if I were willing, I don't think I could. There's a soft fog around her, a sweet, cold, black mist. I'm not sure, even young as she is, that I'd like I black to find out what lies beneath it without her invitation." Annoyed by the way Cassandra kept glaring at him, Saetan looked around the kitchen and noticed a primitive drawing tacked on the wall. "Where did you get that?"

"What? Oh, Jaenelle dropped it off a few days ago and asked me to keep it. Seems she was playing at a friend's house and didn't want to take the picture home." Cassandra tucked stray hairs back into her braid. "Saetan, you said there's a soft fog around her. There's a mist around Beldon Mor, too."

Saetan frowned at her. What did he care about some city's weather? That picture held an answer if he could just figure it out.

"A psychic mist," Cassandra said, rapping her knuckles on the table, "that keeps demons and Guardians out."

Saetan snapped to attention. "Where's Beldon Mor?"

"On Chaillot. That's an island just west of here. You can see it from the hill behind the Sanctuary. Beldon Mor is the capital. I think Jaenelle lives there. I tried to find a way into—"

Now she had his full attention. "Are you mad?" He combed his fingers through his thick black hair. "If she went to that much effort to retain her privacy, why are you trying to invade it?"

"Because of what she is," Cassandra said through clenched teeth. "I thought that would be obvious."

"Don't invade her privacy, Cassandra. Don't give her a reason to distrust you. And the reason for that should be obvious, too."

Minutes passed in tense silence.

Saetan's attention drifted back to the picture. A creative use of vivid colors, even if he couldn't quite figure out what it was supposed to be. How could a child capable of creating butterflies, moving a structure the size of the Hall, and constructing a psychic shield that only kept specific kinds of beings out be so hopeless at basic Craft?

"It's clumsy," Saetan whispered as his eyes widened.

Cassandra looked up wearily. "She's a child, Saetan. You can't expect her to have the training or the motor control—"

She squeaked when he grabbed her arm. "But that's just it! For Jaenelle, doing things that require tremendous expenditures of psychic energy is like giving her a large piece of paper and color-sticks she can wrap her fist around. Small things, the basic things we usually start with because they don't require a lot of strength, are like asking her to use a single-haired brush. She doesn't have the physical or mental control yet to do them." He sprawled in the chair, exultant.

"Wonderful," Cassandra said sarcastically. "So she can't move furniture around a room, but she can destroy an entire continent."

"She'll never do that. It's not in her temperament."

"How can you be sure? How will you control her?"

They were back to that.

He took his cape back and settled it over his shoulders. "I'm not going to control her, Cassandra. She's Witch. No male has the right to control Witch."

Cassandra studied him. "Then what are you going to do?"

Saetan picked up his cane. "Love her. That will have to be enough."

"And if it's not?"

"It will have to be." He paused at the kitchen door. "May I see you from time to time?"

Her smile didn't quite reach her eyes. "Friends do."

He left the Sanctuary feeling exhilarated and bruised. He'd loved Cassandra dearly once, but he had no right to ask anything of her except what Protocol dictated a Warlord Prince could ask of a Queen.

Besides, Cassandra was his past. Jaenelle, may the Darkness help him, was his future.

2 / Hell

Dropping from the Black Wind, Saetan appeared in an outer courtyard that held one of the Keep's official landing webs, which was etched in the stone with a clear Jewel at its center. The clear Jewels acted as beacons for those who rode the Winds—a kind of welcoming candle in the window—and every landing web had a piece of one. It was the only use that had ever been found for them. Leaning heavily on his cane, Saetan limped across the empty courtyard to the huge, open-metal doors embedded into the mountain itself, rang the bell, and waited to enter the Keep, the Black Mountain, Ebon Askavi, where the Winds meet. It was the repository for the Blood's history as well as a sanctuary for the darkest-Jeweled Blood. It was also the private lair of Witch.

The doors opened silently. Geoffrey, the Keep's historian/librarian, waited for him on the other side. "High Lord." Geoffrey bowed slightly in greeting.

Saetan returned the bow. "Geoffrey."

"It's been a while since you've visited the Keep. Your absence has been noted."

Saetan snorted softly, his lips curving into a faint, dry smile. "In other words, I haven't been useful lately."

"In other words," Geoffrey agreed, smiling. As he walked beside Saetan, his black eyes glanced once at the cane. "So you're here."

"I need your help." Saetan looked at the Guardian's pale face, a stark, unsettling white when combined with the black eyes, feathery black eyebrows, black hair with a pronounced widow's peak, the black tunic and trousers, and the most sensuous blood-red lips Saetan had ever seen on anyone, man or woman. Geoffrey was the last of his race, a race gone to dust so long ago that no one remembered who they were. He was ancient when Saetan first came to the Keep as Cassandra's Consort. Then, as now, he was the Keep's historian and librarian. "I need to look up some of the ancient legends."

"Lorn, for example?"

Saetan jerked to a stop.

Geoffrey turned, his black eyes carefully neutral.

"You've seen her," Saetan said, a hint of jealousy in his voice.

"We've seen her."

"Draca, too?" Saetan's chest tightened at the thought of Jaenelle confronting the Keep's Seneschal. Draca had been caretaker and overseer of Ebon Askavi long, long before Geoffrey had ever come. She still served the Keep itself, looking after the comfort of the scholars who came to study, of the Queens who needed a dark place to rest. She was reserved to the point of coldness, using it as a defense against those who shuddered to look upon a human figure with unmistakably reptilian ancestry. Coldness as a defense for the heart was something Saetan understood all too well.

"They're great friends," Geoffrey said as they walked through the twisting corridors. "Draca's given her a guest room until the Queen's apartment is finished." He opened the library door. "Saetan, you are going to train her, aren't you?"

Hearing something odd in Geoffrey's voice, Saetan turned with much of his old grace. "Do you object?" He immediately choked back the snarl in his voice when he saw the uneasiness in Geoffrey's eyes.

"No," Geoffrey whispered, "I don't object. I'm ... relieved." He pointed to the books neatly stacked at one end of the Blackwood table. "I pulled those out anticipating your visit, but there are some other volumes, some very ancient texts, that I'll pull out for you next time. I think you'll need them."

Saetan settled into a leather chair beside the large black-wood table and gratefully accepted the glass of yarbarah Geoffrey offered. His leg ached. He wasn't up to this much walking.

He pulled the top book off the stack and opened it at the first marker. Lorn. "You did anticipate."

Geoffrey sat at the other end of the table, checking other books. "Some. Certainly not all." They exchanged a look. "Anything else I can check for you?"

Saetan quickly swallowed the yarbarah. "Yes. I need information about two witches named Morghann and Gabrielle." He started reading the entry about Lorn.

"If they wear Jewels, they'll be in the Keep's registry."

"It's a safe bet you'll find them in the darker ranks," Saetan said, not looking up,

Geoffrey pushed his chair back. "What Territories?"

"Hmm? I've no idea. Jaenelle's from Chaillot, so start with Territories around there where those names are common."

"Saetan," Geoffrey said with annoyed humor, "sometimes you're as useful as a bucket with a hole in the bottom. Can you give me a little more of a starting point?"

Pulled away from his third attempt to read the same paragraph, Saetan snapped, "Between the ages of six and eight. Now will you let me read?"

Geoffrey replied in a language Saetan didn't understand, but translation wasn't required. "I'll have to check the registry at Terreille's Keep, so this may take a while even if any of your information is remotely accurate. Help yourself to more yarbarah."

The hours melted away. Saetan read the last entry Geoffrey had marked, carefully closed the book, and rubbed his eyes. When he finally looked up, he found Geoffrey studying him. A strange look was in the librarian's black eyes. Two registers lay on the table.

Saetan rested his steepled fingers on his chin. "So?"

"You got the names and the age range right," Geoffrey said softly.

That icy finger whispered down Saetan's spine. "Meaning?"

Geoffrey slowly, almost reluctantly, opened the first book at the page marker. "Morghann. A Queen who wears Birthright Purple Dusk. Almost seven years old. Lives in the village of Maghre on the Isle of Scelt in the Realm of Kaeleer."

"Kaeleer!" Saetan tried to jump up. His leg buckled immediately. "How in the name of Hell did she get into the Shadow Realm?"

"Probably the same way she got into the Dark Realm." Geoffrey opened the second register and hesitated. "Saetan, you will train her well, won't you?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Gabrielle. A queen who wears birthright opal. Seven years old. Strong possibility she's a natural Black Widow. Lives in the Realm of Kaeleer in the Territory of the Dea al Mon."

Saetan pillowed his head in his arms and moaned. The Children of the Wood. She'd seen the Children of the Wood, the fiercest, most private race ever spawned in Kaeleer. "It's not possible," he said, bracing his arms on the table. "You've made a mistake."

"I've made no mistake, Saetan."

"She lives in Terreille, not Kaeleer. You've made a mistake."

"I've made no mistake."

Ice whispered down his spine, freezing nerves, turning into a cold dagger in his belly. "It's not possible," Saetan said, spacing out the words. "The Dea al Mon have never allowed anyone into their Territory."

"It appears they've made an exception."

Saetan shook his head. "It's not possible."

"Neither is finding Lorn," Geoffrey replied sharply. "Neither is walking with impunity through the length and breadth of Hell. Yes, we know about that. The last time she visited here, Char came with her."

"The little bastard," Saetan muttered.

"You asked me to find Morghann and Gabrielle. I found them. Now what are you going to do?"

Saetan stared at the high ceiling. "What would you have me do, Geoffrey? Shall we take her away from her home? Confine her in the Keep until she comes of age?" He let out a strained laugh. "As if we could. The only way to confine her would be to convince her she couldn't get out, to brutalize her instincts until she wasn't sure of anything anymore. Do you want to be the bastard responsible for that emotional butchering? Because I won't do it. By the Darkness, Geoffrey, the living myth has come, and this is the price required to have her walk among us."

Geoffrey carefully closed the registers. "You're right, of course, but ... is there nothing you can do?"

Saetan closed his eyes. "I will teach her. I will serve her. I will love her. That will have to be enough."

3 / Terreille

Surreal swung through the front door of Deje's Red Moon house in Beldon Mor, flashed a smile at the brawny red-coated doorman, and continued through the plant-strewn, marble-floored entryway until she reached the reception desk. Once there, she smacked the little brass bell on the desk enough times to annoy the most docile temper.

A door marked "Private" snapped open, and a voluptuous middle-aged woman hurried out. When she saw Surreal, her scowl vanished and her eyes widened with delighted surprise.

"So, you've come again at last." Deje reached under the desk, pulled out a thick stack of small papers, and waved them at Surreal. "Requests. All willing to pay your asking price—and everyone knows what a thief you are—and all wanting a full night."

Without taking them, Surreal riffled the stack with her fingertip. "If I accommodated them all, I could end up being here for months."

Deje tilted her head. "Would that be so bad?"

Surreal grinned, but there was something sharp and predatory in her gold-green eyes. "I'd never get my asking price if my"—she twiddled her fingers at the papers—"friends thought I'd always be around. That would cut into your profit margin, too."

"Too true," Deje said, laughing.

"Besides," Surreal continued, hooking her black hair behind her delicately pointed ears, "I'll only be here for a few weeks, and I'm not looking for a heavy schedule. I'll work enough days to pay for room and board and spend the rest of the time sightseeing."

"How many ceilings do you want to see? That's all you'll look at in this business."

"Why, Deje!" Surreal fanned herself. "That's not at all true. Sometimes I get to see the patterns in the silk sheets."

"You could always take up horseback riding." Deje stuffed the papers under the desk. "I hear there are some pretty trails just outside the city proper."

"No thanks. When the work's done, I'm not interested in mounting anything else. You want me to start tonight?"

Deje patted her dark, richly dressed hair. "I'm sure there's someone who made a reservation tonight who'll rise to the occasion."

They grinned at each other.

Deje called in a slim leather folder and removed a piece of expensive parchment. "Hmm. A full house. And there's always one or two who'll show up sure that they're too important to need a reservation."

Surreal propped her elbows on the desk, her face in her hands. "You've got an excellent chef. Maybe they're just here for dinner."

Deje smiled wickedly. "I try to accommodate all kinds of hunger."

"And if the special's taken, the main entrees are still delicious."

Deje laughed, her shaking bosom threatening to shimmy out of her low-cut gown. "Well put. Here." She pointed to a name on the list. "I remember you saying you don't mind him. He'll probably be half-starved, but he appreciates appetizers as well as the main course."

Surreal nodded. "Yes, he'll do nicely. One of the garden rooms?"

"Of course. I've done a little redecorating since you were last here. I think you'll like it. You have a true appreciation for such things." Deje reached into one of the little cubbyholes in the wall behind the desk and pulled out a key. "This one will suit."

Surreal palmed the key. "Dinner in the room, I think. Is there a menu there? Good. I'll order ahead."

"How do you remember all their likes and dislikes, particularly from so many places, so many different customs?"

Surreal looked mockingly offended. "Deje. You used to play the rooms before you got ambitious. You know perfectly well that's what little black books are for."

Deje shooed Surreal from the desk. "Away with you. I have work to do, and so do you."

Surreal walked down the wide corridor, her sharp eyes taking in the rooms on either side. It was true. Deje was ambitious. Starting out with a packet of gifts from satisfied clients, she had bought a mansion and converted it into the best Red Moon house in the district. And unlike the other houses, at Deje's a man could find more than just a warm body in a bed. There was a small private dining room that served excellent food all night; a reception room, where those with an artistic temperament made a habit of gathering to debate each other while they ate the tidbits and drank good wine; a billiards room, where the politically ambitious met to plan their next move; a library filled with good books and thick leather chairs; private rooms, where a man could get away from his everyday life and be catered to, receiving nothing more than a good dinner, an expert massage, and peace; and, finally, the rooms and the women who would satisfy the carnal appetites.

Surreal found her room, locked the door, and took a long look around, nodding in approval. Soft, thick rugs; white walls with tasteful watercolor paintings; dark furniture; an oversized, gauze-enveloped poster bed; music spheres and the ornate brass stand to hold them; sliding glass doors that led out into a walled private garden with a small fountain and petite willow trees as well as a variety of night-blooming flowers; and a bathroom with a shower and a large walk-up sunken tub that was positioned in front of the glass window overlooking the garden.

"Very good, Deje," Surreal said quietly. "Very, very good."

She quickly settled into the room, calling in her work clothes and carefully hanging them in the wardrobe. She never carried much, just enough variety to satisfy the different appetites in whatever Territory she was in. Most of her things were scattered in a dozen hideaways throughout Terreille.

Surreal suppressed a shudder. It was better not to think of those hideaways. Certainly better not to wonder about him.

Opening the glass doors so she could listen to the fountain, Surreal settled into a chair, her legs tucked beneath her. Two black leather books appeared, floating before her. She took one, leafed through to the last written page, called in a pen, and made a notation.

That contract was finished. It hadn't taken the fool as long to die as she would have liked, but the pain had been exquisite. And the money had been very, very good.

She vanished the book and opened the other one, checked the entry she needed, wrote out her menu, and with a flick of her wrist sent it to the kitchen. Vanishing the second book, she got up and stretched. Another flick of her wrist and there was the familiar weight of the knife's handle, its stiletto blade a shining comfort. Turning her wrist the other way, she vanished the knife and smacked her hands together. One was all she'd need tonight. He never gave her any trouble. Besides—she smiled at the memory—she was the one who had taught him, how long ago? Twelve, fourteen years?

She took a quick shower, dressed her long black hair so it could be easily unpinned, made up her face, and slipped into a sheer gold-green dress that hid as much as it revealed. Finally, clenching her teeth against the inevitable, she walked over to the freestanding mirror and looked at the face, at the body, she had hated all her life.

It was a finely sculpted face with high cheekbones, a thin nose, and slightly oversized gold-green eyes that saw everything and revealed nothing. Her slender, well-shaped body looked deceptively delicate but had strong muscles that she had hardened over the years to ensure she was always in peak condition for her chosen profession. But it was the sun-kissed, light-brown skin that made her snarl. Hayllian skin. Her father's skin. She could easily pass for Hayllian if she wore her hair down and wore tinted glasses to hide the color of her eyes. The eyes would mark her as a half-breed. The ears with the tips curving to a delicate point. . . those were Titian's ears.

Titian, who came from no race Surreal had met in all her travels through Terreille. Titian, who had been broken on Kartane SaDiablo's spear. Titian, who had escaped and whored for her keep so Kartane couldn't find her and destroy the child she carried. Titian, who was found one day with her throat slit and was buried in an unmarked grave.

All the assassinations, all those men going to their planned deaths, were dress rehearsals for patricide. Someday she would find Kartane in the right place at the right time, and she would pay him back for Titian.

Surreal turned away from the mirror and forced the memories aside. When she heard the quiet knock on the door, she positioned herself in the center of the room so her guest would see her when he first walked in. And she would see him and plan the evening accordingly.

Using Craft, she opened the door before he turned the handle, and let the seduction tendrils flow from her like some exotic perfume. She opened her arms and smiled as the door locked behind him.

He came at her in a rush, need flowing out of him, the Gray Jewel around his neck blazing with his fire. She put her hands on his chest, stopping him and caressing him with one smooth stroke. Breathing hard, he clenched and unclenched his hands, but he didn't touch her.

Satisfied, Surreal glided to the small dining table near the glass doors and sent a thought to the kitchen. A moment later, two chilled glasses and a bottle of wine appeared. She poured the wine, gave him a glass, and raised hers in a salute. "Philip."

"Surreal." His voice was husky, aching.

She sipped her wine. "Doesn't the wine please you?"

Philip consumed half the glass in a swallow.

Surreal hid her smile. Who did he really hunger for that he couldn't have? Who did he pretend she was when he closed the curtains and turned off all the lights so he could satisfy his lust while clinging to his illusions?

She kept the meal to a leisurely pace, letting him consume her with his eyes as he drank the wine and ate the delicacies. As he always did, he talked to her in a meandering, obscure fashion, telling her more than he realized or intended.

Philip Alexander. Gray-Jeweled Prince. A handsome man with sandy hair and honest, troubled gray eyes. Half brother to Robert Benedict, a premiere political player since he had tied himself to Hayll, to ... Kartane. Robert only wore the Yellow, and barely that, but he was the legitimate son, entitled to his father's estate and wealth. Philip, a couple of years younger and never formally acknowledged, was raised as his brother's accessory. Tired of playing the grateful bastard, he broke with his family and became an escort/consort for Alexandra Angelline, the Queen of Chaillot.

Subtle cultural poisoning over a couple of generations had allowed Chaillot's Blood males to twist matriarchal rule into something unnatural and wrest control of the Territory from the Queens, so Alexandra was nothing more than a figurehead, but she was still the Queen of Chaillot and wore an Opal Jewel. A little strange, too. Well, unusual. It was rumored that she still had dealings with the Hourglass covens even though Black Widows had been outlawed by the Blood males in power. She had one daughter, Leland, who was Robert Benedict's wife.

And they all lived together at the Angelline estate in Beldon Mor.

She played dinner as long as she could before beginning to play the bed. A Gray-Jeweled Prince who had gone without pleasure for a long time could be an unintentionally rough companion, but he didn't worry her. She, too, wore the Gray, but never for this job. She always wore her Birthright Green, or no Jewel at all, allowing her clients to feel in control. Still, tonight he wouldn't mind a little rough handling, and he was one of the few men she knew in her second profession who actually wanted to give as well as receive pleasure.

Yes, Philip was a good way to begin this stay.

Surreal dimmed the candlelights, turning the room to smoke, to dusk. He didn't rush now. He touched, tasted, savored. And she, subtly guiding, let him do what he had come here to do.

It was dawn before Philip dressed and kissed her goodbye.

Surreal stared at the gauze canopy. He'd gotten his money's worth and more. And he'd been a pleasant distraction from the memories that had been crowding her lately, that were the reason she'd come to Chaillot. Memories of Titian, of Tersa ... of the Sadist.

Surreal was ten years old when Titian brought Tersa home one afternoon and tucked the bedraggled witch into her own bed. During the few days the mad Black Widow stayed with them, Titian spent hours listening to Tersa's gibberish interspersed with strange jokes and cryptic sayings.

A week after Tersa left them, she returned with the coldest, handsomest man Surreal had ever seen. The first Warlord Prince she had ever seen. He said nothing, letting Tersa babble while he watched Titian, while his gaze burned the child trembling beside her mother.

Finally Tersa stopped talking and tugged at the man's sleeve. "The child is Blood and should be trained in the Craft. She has the right to wear the Jewels if she's strong enough. Daemon, please."

His golden eyes narrowed as he came to a decision. Reaching into the inner pocket of his jacket, he removed several gold hundred-mark notes from a billfold and laid them carefully on the table. He called in a piece of paper and a pen, wrote a few words, and left the paper and a key on top of the notes.

"The place isn't elegant, but it's warm and clean." His deep, seductive voice sent a delightful shiver through Surreal. "It's a few blocks from here, in a neighborhood where no one asks questions. There are the names of a couple of potential tutors for the girl. They're good men who got on the wrong side of the ones who have power. You're welcome to use the flat as long as you want."

"And the price?" Titian's soft voice was full of ice. "That you don't deny Tersa access to the place whenever she's in this part of the Realm. I won't make use of it while you're there, but Tersa must be able to use the refuge I originally acquired for her."

So it was agreed, and a few days later Surreal and Titian were in the first decent place the girl had ever known. The landlord, with a little tremor of fear in his voice, told them the rent was paid. The hundred-mark notes went for decent food and warm clothes, and Titian gratefully no longer had to allow any man to step over her threshold.

The next spring, after Surreal had begun making some progress with her tutors, Tersa returned and took Surreal to the nearest Sanctuary for her Birthright Ceremony. Surreal returned, proudly holding an uncut Green. With tears in her eyes, Titian carefully wrapped the Jewel in soft cloth and stored it in a strangely carved wooden box.

"An uncut Jewel is a rare thing, little Sister," Titian said, removing something from the box. "Wait until you know who you are before you have it set. Then it will be more than a receptacle for the power your body can't hold; it will be a statement of what you are. In the meantime"— she slipped a silver chain over Surreal's head—"this will help you begin. It was mine, once. You're not a moonchild; gold would suit you better. But it's the first step down a long road."

Surreal looked at the Green Jewel. The silver mounting was carved into two stags curved around the Jewel, their antlers interlocking at the top, hiding the ring where the chain was fastened. As she studied it, her blood sang in her veins, a faint summoning she couldn't trace.

Titian watched her. "If ever you meet my people, they will know you by that Jewel." "Why can't we go to see them?" Titian shook her head and turned away. Those two years were good ones for Surreal. She spent her days with her tutors, one teaching her Craft, the other all the basic subjects for a general education. At night, Titian taught her other things. Even broken, Titian was expert with a knife, and there was a growing uneasiness in her, as if she were waiting for something that made her relentless in the drills and exercises.

One day, when Surreal was twelve, she returned home to find the apartment door half open and Titian lying in the front room with her throat slit, her horn-handle dagger nearby. The walls pulsed with violence and rage . . . and the warning to run, run, run.

Surreal hesitated a moment before racing into Titian's bedroom and removing the carved box with her Jewel from its hiding place. At a stumbling run, she swept the dagger up from the floor and vanished it and the box as she'd been taught to do. Then she ran in earnest, leaving Titian and whoever had been hunting them behind.

Titian had just turned twenty-five.

Less than a week after her mother's death, Surreal was speared for the first time. As she fought without hope, she saw herself falling down a long, dark tunnel, her thread in the abyss. At the level of the Green was a shimmering web that stretched across the tunnel. As she fell toward it, out of control, as the pain of being broken into washed the walls with red, Surreal remembered Tersa, remembered Titian. If she hit her inner web while out of control, she would break it and return to the real world as a shadow of her self, forever aware and grieving the loss of her Craft and what she might have been.

Remembering Titian gave her the inner strength to fight the pounding that seemed to go on forever, each thrust driving her closer to her inner web. She hung on, fighting with all her heart. When the thrusts stopped . . . when it was finally over . . . she was barely a hand's span away from destruction.

Her mind cowered there, exhausted. When the man left, she forced herself to ascend. The physical pain was staggering, and the sheets were soaked with her blood, but she was still intact in the most important way. She still wore the Jewels. She was still a witch.

Within a month, she made her first kill.

He was like all the others, taking her to a seedy room, using her body and paying her with a copper mark that would barely buy her enough food to stagger through the next day. Her hatred for the men who used her, and Titian before her, turned to ice. So when his thrusts became stronger, when he arched his back and his chest rose above her, she called in the horn-handle dagger and stabbed him in the heart. His life force pumped into her while his life's blood spilled out.

Using Craft, Surreal pushed his heavy body off hers. This one wouldn't hit her or refuse to pay. It was exhilarating.

For three years she roamed the streets, her child's body and unusual looks a beacon to the most sordid. But her skill with a knife was not unknown, and it became common knowledge in the streets that a wise man paid Surreal in advance.

Three years. Then one day as she was slipping down an alley she'd already probed to be sure it was empty, she felt someone behind her. Whirling around, dagger in hand, she could only stare at Daemon Sadi as he leaned against the wall, watching her. Without thinking, she ran up the alley to get away from him, and hit a psychic shield that held her captive until his hand locked on her wrist. He said nothing. He simply caught the Winds and pulled her with him. Never having ridden one of those psychic Webs, Surreal clung to him, disoriented.

An hour later, she was sitting at a kitchen table in a furnished loft in another part of the Realm. Tersa hovered over her, encouraging her to eat, while Daemon watched her as he drank his wine.

Too nervous to eat, Surreal threw the words at him. "I'm a whore."

"Not a very good one," Daemon replied calmly.

Incensed, Surreal hurled every gutter word she knew at him.

"Do you see my point?" he asked, laughing, when she finally sputtered into silence.

"I'll be what I am."

"You're a child of mixed blood. Part Hayllian blood." He toyed with his glass. "Your mother's people live— what—a hundred, two hundred years? You may see two thousand or more. Do you want to spend those years eating scraps dumped in alleys and sleeping in filthy rooms? There are other ways of doing what you do—for better rooms, better food, better pay. You'd have to start as an apprentice, of course, but I know a place where they'd take you and train you well."

Daemon spent several minutes making out a list. When he was done, he pushed it in front of Surreal. "A woman with an education may be able to spend more time sitting in a chair instead of lying on her back. A sound advantage, I should think."

Surreal stared at the list, uneasy. There were the expected subjects—literature, languages, history—and then, at the bottom of the page, a list of skills more suited to the knife than to paid sex.

As Tersa cleared the table, Daemon rose from his chair and leaned over Surreal, his chest brushing her back, his warm breath tickling her pointed ear. "Subtlety, Surreal," he whispered. "Subtlety is a great weapon. There are other ways to slit a man's throat than to wash the walls with his blood. If you continue down that road, they'll find you, sooner or later. There are so many ways for a man to die." He chuckled, but there was an underlying viciousness in the sound. "Some men die for lack of love . . . some die because of it. Think about it."

Surreal went to the Red Moon house. The matron and the other women taught her the bedroom arts. The rest she learned quietly on her own. Within ten years, she was the highest-paid whore in the house—and men began to bargain for her other skills as well.

She traveled throughout Terreille, offering her skills to the best Red Moon house in whatever city she was in and carefully accepting contracts for her other profession, the one she found more challenging—and more pleasurable. She carried a set of keys to town houses, suites, lofts— some in the most expensive parts of town, others in quiet, backwater streets where people asked no questions. Sometimes she met Tersa and gave her whatever care she could.

And sometimes she found herself sharing a place with Sadi when he slipped away from whatever court he was serving in for a quiet evening. Those were good times for Surreal. Daemon's knowledge was expansive when he felt like talking, and when she chattered, his golden eyes always held the controlled amusement of an older brother.

For almost three hundred years they came and went comfortably with each other. Until the night when, already a little drunk, she consumed a bottle of wine while watching him read a book. He was comfortably slouched in a chair, shirt half unbuttoned, bare feet on a hassock, his black hair uncharacteristically tousled.

"I was wondering," Surreal said, giving him a tipsy smile.

Daemon looked up from his book, one eyebrow rising as a smile began to tweak the corners of his mouth. "You were wondering?"

"Professional curiosity, you understand. They talk about you in the Red Moon houses, you know."

"Do they?"

She didn't notice the chill in the room or the golden eyes glazing to a hard yellow. She didn't recognize the dangerous softness in his voice. She just smiled at him. "Come on, Sadi, it would be a real feather in my cap, career-wise. There isn't a whore in the Realm who knows firsthand what it's like to be pleasured by Hayll's—"

"Be careful what you ask for. You may get it."

She laughed and arched her back, her nipples showing through the thin fabric of her blouse. It wasn't until he uncoiled from his chair with predatory speed and had her pressed against him with her hands locked behind her back that she realized the danger of taunting him. Pulling her hair hard enough to bring tears to her eyes, he forced her head up. His hand tightened on her wrists until she whimpered from the pain. Then he kissed her.

She expected a brutal kiss, so the tenderness, the softness of his lips nuzzling hers frightened her far more. She didn't know what to think, what to feel with his hands deliberately hurting her while his mouth was so giving, so persuasive. When he finally coaxed her mouth open, each easy stroke of his tongue produced a fiery tug between her legs. When she could no longer stand, he took her to the bedroom.

He undressed her with maddening slowness, his long nails whispering over her shivering skin as he kissed and licked and peeled the fabric away. It was sweet torture.

When she was finally naked, he coaxed her to the bed. Psychic ropes tightened around her wrists and pulled her arms over her head. Ropes around her ankles held her legs apart. As he stood by the bed, Surreal became aware of the cold, unrelenting anger coiling around her . . . and a soft, controlled breeze, a spring wind still edged with winter, running over her body, caressing her breasts, her belly, riffling the black hair between her legs before splitting to run along the inside of her thighs, circling her feet, traveling up the outside of her thighs, past her ribs to circle around her neck and begin again.

It went on and on until she couldn't stand the teasing, until she was desperate for some kind of touch that would give her release.

"Please," she moaned, trying to shake off the relentless caress.

"Please what?" He slowly stripped off his clothes.

She watched him hungrily, her eyes glazing as she waited to see the proof of his pleasure. The shock of seeing the Ring of Obedience on a totally flaccid organ made her realize the anger swirling around her had changed. His smile had changed.

As he stretched out beside her, his warm body cool compared to the heat inside her, as his living hand began to play the same game the phantom one had, she finally understood what was in the air, in his smile, in his eyes.

Contempt.

He played with deadly seriousness. Each time his hands or his tongue gave her some release, the gauze veils of sensuality were ripped from her mind and she was forced to drink cup after cup of his contempt. When he brought her up the final time, she thrust her hips toward him while pleading for him to stop. His cold, biting laughter tightened around her ribs until she couldn't breathe. Just as she started sliding into a sweet, unfeeling release, it stopped.

Everything stopped.

As her head cleared, she heard water running in the bathroom. A few minutes later, Daemon reappeared, fully dressed, wiping his face with a towel. There was a throbbing need between her legs to be filled, just once. She begged him for some small comfort.

Daemon smiled that cold, cruel smile. "Now you know what it's like to get into bed with Hayll's Whore."

She began to cry.

Daemon tossed the towel onto a chair. "I wouldn't try using a dildo if I were you," he said pleasantly. "Not for a couple of days anyway. It won't help, and it might even make things much, much worse." He smiled at her again and walked out of the apartment.

She didn't know how long he'd been gone when the ropes around her wrists and ankles finally disappeared and she was able to roll over, her knees tucked tight to her chest, and cry out her shame and rage.

She became afraid of him, dreaded to feel his presence when she opened a door. When they met, he was coldly civil and seldom spoke—and never again looked at her with any warmth.

Surreal stared at the gauze canopy. That was fifty years ago, and he had never forgiven her. Now . . . She shuddered. Now, if the rumors were true, there was something terribly wrong with him. There hadn't been a court anywhere that could keep him for more than a few weeks. And too many of the Blood disappeared and were never heard from again whenever his temper frayed.

He had been right. There were many, many ways for a man to die. Even as good as she was, she still had to make some effort to dispose of a body. The Sadist, however, never left the smallest trace.

Surreal stumbled into the shower and sighed as her tight muscles relaxed under the pounding hot water. At least there didn't seem to be any danger of stumbling upon him while she stayed in Beldon Mor.

4 / Hell

Even the fierce pounding on his study door couldn't compete with Prothvar's unrestrained cursing and Jaenelle's shrieks of outrage.

Saetan closed the book on the lectern. There was a time, and not that long ago, when no one wanted to open that door, let alone pummel it into kindling. Easing himself onto a corner of the blackwood desk, he crossed his arms and waited.

Andulvar burst into the room, his expression an unsettling blend of fear and fury. Prothvar came in right behind him, dragging Jaenelle by the back of her dress. When she tried to break his grip, he grabbed her from behind and lifted her off her feet.

"Put me down, Prothvar!" Jaenelle cocked her knee and pistoned her leg back into Prothvar's groin.

Prothvar howled and dropped her.

Instead of falling, Jaenelle executed a neat roll in the air before springing to her feet, still a foot above the floor, and unleashing a string of profanities in more languages than Saetan could identify.

Saetan forced himself to look authoritatively neutral and decided, reluctantly, that this wasn't the best time to discuss Language Appropriate for Young Ladies. "Witch-child, kicking a man in the balls may be an effective way to get his attention, but it's not something a child should do." He winced when she turned all her attention on him.

"Why not?" she demanded. "A friend told me that's what I should do if a male ever grabbed me from behind. He made me promise."

Saetan raised an eyebrow. "This friend is male?" How interesting.

Before he could pursue it further, Andulvar rumbled ominously, "That's not the problem, SaDiablo."

"Then what is the problem?" Not that he really wanted to know.

Prothvar pointed at Jaenelle. "That little . . . she . . . tell him!"

Jaenelle clenched her hands and glared at Prothvar. "It was your fault. You laughed and wouldn't teach me. You knocked me down."

Saetan raised one hand. "Slow down. Teach you what?"

"He wouldn't teach me to fly," Jaenelle said accusingly.

"You don't have wings!" Prothvar snapped.

"I can fly as well as you can!"

"You haven't got the training!"

"Because you wouldn't teach me!"

"And I'm damn well not going to!"

Jaenelle flung out an Eyrien curse that made Prothvar's eyes pop.

Andulvar's face turned an alarming shade of purple before he pointed to the door and roared, "out!"

Jaenelle flounced out of the study with Prothvar limping after her.

Saetan clamped a hand over his mouth. He wanted to laugh. Sweet Darkness, how he wanted to laugh, but the look in Andulvar's eyes warned him that if he so much as

chuckled, they were going to engage in a no-holds-barred brawl.

"You find this amusing," Andulvar rumbled, rustling his wings.

Saetan cleared his throat several times. "I suppose it's difficult for Prothvar to find himself on the losing end of a scrap with a seven-year-old girl. I didn't realize a warrior's ego bruises so easily."

Andulvar's grim expression didn't change.

Saetan became annoyed. "Be reasonable, Andulvar. So she wants to learn to fly. You saw how well she balances on air."

"I saw a lot more than that," Andulvar snapped.

Saetan ground his teeth and counted to ten. Twice. "So tell me."

Andulvar crossed his muscular arms and stared at the ceiling. "The waif's friend Katrine is showing her how to fly, but Katrine flies like a butterfly and Jaenelle wants to fly like a hawk, like an Eyrien. So she asked Prothvar to teach her. And he laughed, which, I admit, wasn't a wise thing to do, and she—"

"Got her back up."

"—jumped off the high tower of the Hall."

There was a moment of silence before Saetan exploded. "What?"

"You know the high tower, SaDiablo. You built this damned place. She climbed onto the top of the wall and jumped off. Do you still find it amusing?"

Saetan clamped his hands on the desk. His whole body shook. "So Prothvar caught her when she fell."

Andulvar snorted. "He almost killed her. When she jumped off, he dove over the side after her. Unfortunately, she was standing, on the air, less than ten feet below the ledge. When he went over the side, he barreled into her and took them both down almost three quarters of the way before he came out of the dive."

"Mother Night," Saetan muttered.

"And may the Darkness be merciful. So what are you going to do!"

"Talk to her," Saetan replied grimly as he flicked a thought at the door and watched it open smoothly and swiftly. "Witch-child."

Jaenelle approached him, her anger now cooled to the unyielding determination he'd come to recognize all too well.

Fighting to control his temper, Saetan studied her for a moment. "Andulvar told me what happened. Have you anything to say?"

"Prothvar didn't have to laugh at me. I don't laugh at Mm."

"Flying usually requires wings, witch-child." "You don't need wings to ride the Winds. It's not that different.  And even Eyriens need a little Craft to fly. Prothvar said so."

He didn't know which was worse: Jaenelle doing something outrageous or Jaenelle being reasonable.

Sighing, Saetan closed his hands over her small, frail-looking ones. "You frightened him. How was he to know you wouldn't just plummet to the ground?"

"I would have told him," she replied, somewhat chastened.

Saetan closed his eyes for a moment, thinking furiously. "All right. Andulvar and Prothvar will teach you the Eyrien way of flying. You, in turn, most promise to follow their instructions and take the training in the proper order. No diving off the tower, no surprising leaps from cliffs . . ." Her guilty look made his heart pound in a very peculiar rhythm. He finished in a strangled voice, ". . . no testing on the Blood Run ... or any other Run until they feel you're ready."

Andulvar turned away, muttering a string of curses.

"Agreed?" Saetan asked, holding his breath.

Jaenelle nodded, unhappy but resigned.

Like the Gates, the Runs existed in all three Realms. Unlike the Gates, they only existed in the Territory of Askavi. In Terreille, they were the Eyrien warriors' testing grounds, canyons where winds and Winds collided in a dangerous, grueling test of mental and physical strength. The Blood Run held the threads of the lighter Winds, from White to Opal. The other ...

Saetan swallowed hard. "Have you tried the Blood Run?"

Jaenelle's face lit up. "Oh, yes. Saetan, it's such fun." Her enthusiasm wavered as he stared at her.

Remember how to breathe, SaDiablo. "And the Khaldharon?"

Jaenelle stared at the floor.

Andulvar spun her around and shook her. "Only a handful of the best Eyrien warriors each year dare try the Khaldharon Run. It's the absolute test of strength and skill, not a playground for girls who want to flit from place to place."

"I don't flit!"

"Witch-child," Saetan warned.

"I only tried it a little," she muttered. "And only in Hell."

Andulvar's jaw dropped.

Saetan closed his eyes, wishing the sudden stabbing pain in his temples would go away. It would have been bad enough if she'd tried the Khaldharon Run in Terreille, the Realm furthest from the Darkness and the full strength of the Winds, but to make the Run in Hell . . . "You will not make the Runs until Andulvar says you're ready!"

Startled by his vehemence, Jaenelle studied him. "I scared you."

Saetan circled the room, looking for something he could safely shred. "You're damn right you scared me."

She fluffed her hair and watched him. When he returned to the desk, she performed a respectful, feminine curtsy. "My apologies, High Lord. My apologies, Prince Yaslana."

Andulvar grunted. "If I'm going to teach you to fly, I might as well teach you how to use the sticks, bow, and knife."

Jaenelle's eyes sparkled. "Sceron is teaching me the crossbow, and Chaosti is showing me how to use a knife," she volunteered.

"All the more reason you should learn Eyrien weapons as well," Andulvar said, smiling grimly.

When she was gone, Saetan looked at Andulvar with concern. "I trust you'll take into account her age and gender."

"I'm going to work her ass off, SaDiablo. If I'm going to train her, and it seems I have no choice, I'll train her as an Eyrien warrior should be trained." He grinned maliciously. "Besides, Prothvar will love being her opponent when she learns the sticks."

Once Andulvar was gone, Saetan settled into his chair behind the blackwood desk, unlocked one of the drawers, and pulled out a sheet of expensive white parchment half filled with his elegant script. He added three names to the growing list: Katrine, Sceron, Chaosti.

With the parchment safely locked away again, Saetan leaned back in his chair and rubbed his temples. That list disturbed him because he didn't know what it meant. Children, yes. Friends, certainly. But all from Kaeleer. She must be gone for hours at a time in order to travel those distances, even on the Black Wind. What did her family think about her disappearances? What did they say? She never talked about Chaillot, her home, her family. She evaded every question he asked, no matter how he phrased it. What was she afraid of?

Saetan stared at nothing for a long time. Then he sent a thought on an Ebon-gray spear thread, male to male. "Teach her well, Andulvar. Teach her well."

5/Hell

Saetan left the small apartment adjoining his private study, vigorously toweling his hair. His nostrils immediately flared and the line between his eyebrows deepened as he stared at the study door.

Harpies had a distinctive psychic scent, and this one, patiently waiting for him to acknowledge her presence, made him uneasy.

Returning to the bedroom, he dressed swiftly but carefully. When he was seated behind the blackwood desk, he released the physical and psychic locks on the door and waited.

Her silent, gliding walk brought her swiftly to the desk. She was a slender woman with fair skin, oversized blue eyes, delicately pointed ears, and long, fine, silver-blond hair. She was dressed in a forest-green tunic and pants with a brown leather belt and soft, calf-high boots. Attached to the belt was an empty sheath. She wore no Jewels, and the wound across her throat was testimony to how she had died. She studied him, as he studied her.

The tension built in the room.

Harpies were witches who had died by a male's hand.

No matter what race they originally came from, they were more volatile and more cunning than other demon-dead witches, and seldom left their territory, a territory that even demon-dead males didn't dare venture into. Yet she was here, by her own choice. A Dea al Mon Black Widow and Queen.

"Please be seated, Lady," Saetan said, nodding to the chair before the desk. Without taking her eyes off him, she sank gracefully into the chair. "How may I help you?"

When she spoke, her voice was a sighing wind across a glade. But there was lightning in that voice, too. "Do you serve her?"

Saetan tried to suppress the shiver her words produced, but she sensed it and smiled. That smile brought his anger boiling to the surface. "I'm the High Lord, witch. I serve no one."

Her face didn't change, but her eyes became icy. "Hell's High Priestess is asking questions. That isn't good. So I ask you again, High Lord, do you serve her?"

"Hell has no High Priestess."

She laughed grimly. "Then no one has informed Hekatah of that small detail. If you don't serve, are you friend or enemy?"

Saetan's lip curled into a snarl. "I don't serve Hekatah, and while we were married once, I doubt she considers me a friend."

The Harpy looked at him in disgust. "She's important only because she threatens to interfere. The child, High Lord. Do you serve the child? Are you friend or enemy?"

"What child?" An icy dagger pricked his stomach.

The Harpy exploded from the chair and took a swift turn around the room. When she returned to the desk, her right hand kept rubbing the sheath as if searching for the knife that wasn't there.

"Sit down." When she didn't move, the thunder rolled in his voice. "Sit down." Hekatah was suspicious of recent activities, and rumors of a strange witch appearing and disappearing from the Dark Realm had sharpened her interest. But he had no control of where Jaenelle went or who she saw. If the Harpies knew of her, then who else knew? How long would it be before Jaenelle followed a psychic thread that would lead her straight into Hekatah's waiting arms? And was this Harpy a friend or an enemy? "The child is known to the Dea al Mon," he said carefully.

The Harpy nodded. "She is friends with my kinswoman Gabrielle."

"And Chaosti."

A cruel, pleased smile brushed her lips. "And Chaosti. He, too, is a kinsman."

"And you are?"

The smile faded. Cold hatred burned in her eyes. "Titian." She swept her eyes over his body and then leaned back in the chair. "The one who broke me ... he carries your family name but not your bloodline. I was barely twelve when I was betrayed and taken from Kaeleer. He took me for his amusement and broke me on his spear. But everything has a price. I left him a legacy, the only seed of his that will ever come to flower. In the end, he'll pay the debt to her. And when the time comes, she'll serve the young Queen."

Saetan exhaled slowly. "How many others know about the child?"

"Too many ... or not enough. It depends upon the game."

"This isn't a game!" He became very still. "Let me in."

Loathing twisted Titian's face.

Saetan leaned forward. "I understand why being touched by a male disgusts you. I don't ask this lightly ... or for myself."

Titian bit her lip. Her hands dug into the chair. "Very well."

Focusing his eyes on the fire, Saetan made the psychic reach, touched the first inner barrier, and felt her recoil. He patiently waited until she felt ready to open the barriers for him. Once inside, he drifted gently, a well-mannered guest. It didn't take long to find what he was looking for, and he broke the link, relieved.

They didn't know. Titian wondered, guessed too close. But no one outside his confidence knew for sure. A strange child. An eccentric child. A mysterious, puzzling child. That would do. His wise, cautious child. But he couldn't help wondering what experience had made her so cautious so young.

He turned back to Titian. "I'm teaching her Craft. And I serve."

Titian looked around the room. "From here?"

Saetan smiled dryly. "Your point's well taken. I've grown tired of this room. Perhaps it's time to remind Hell who rules."

"You mean who rules in proxy," Titian said with a predatory smile. She let the words linger for a moment. "It's good you're concerned, High Lord," she acknowledged reluctantly. "It's good she has so strong a protector. She's fearless, our Sister. It's wise to teach her caution. But don't be deceived. The children know what she is. She's as much their secret as their friend. Blood sings to Blood, and all of Kaeleer is slowly turning to embrace a single dark star."

"How do you know about the children?" Saetan asked suspiciously.

"I told you. I'm Gabrielle's kinswoman."

"You're dead, Titian. The demon-dead don't mingle with the living. They don't interfere with the concerns of the living Realms."

"Don't they, High Lord? You and your family still rule Dhemlan in Kaeleer." She shrugged. "Besides, the Dea al Mon aren't squeamish about dealing with those who live in the forever-twilight of the Dark Realm." Hesitating, she added, "And our young Sister doesn't seem to understand the difference between the living and the dead."

Saetan stiffened. "You think knowing me has confused her?"

Titian shook her head. "No, the confusion was there before she ever knew of Hell or met a Guardian. She walks a strange road, High Lord. How long before she begins to walk the borders of the Twisted Kingdom?"

"There's no reason to assume she will," Saetan replied tightly.

"No? She will follow that strange road wherever it leads her. What makes you think a child who sees no difference between the living and the dead will see a difference between sanity and the Twisted Kingdom?"

"no!" Saetan leaped out of his chair and went to stand before the fire. He tried to suppress the thought of Jaenelle sliding into madness, unable to cope with what she was, but the anxiety rolled from him in waves. No one else in the history of the Blood had worn the Black as a Birthright Jewel. No one else had had to shoulder the responsibility— and the isolation—that was part of the price of wearing so dark a Jewel at so young an age.

And he knew she had already seen things a child shouldn't see. He had seen the secrets and shadows in her eyes.

"Is there no one in Terreille you can trust to watch over her?"

Saetan let out a pained laugh. "Who would you trust, Titian?"

Titian rubbed her hands nervously on her trousers.

She was barely a woman when she died, he thought with tender sadness. So frail beneath all that strength. As they all are.

Titian licked her lips. "I know a Black-Jeweled Warlord Prince who sometimes looks after those who need help. If approached, he might—"

"No," he said harshly, pride warring with fear. How ironic that Titian considered Daemon a suitable protector. "He's owned by Hekatah's puppet, Dorothea. He can be made to comply."

"I don't believe he'd harm a child."

Saetan returned to his desk. "Perhaps not willingly, but pain can make a man do things he wouldn't willingly do."

Titian's eyes widened with understanding. "You don't trust him." She thought it over and shook her head. "You're wrong. He's—"

"A mirror." Saetan smiled as she drew in a hissing breath. "Yes, Titian. He's blood of my blood, seed of my loins. I know him well . . . and not at all. He's a double-edged sword capable of cutting the hand that holds him as easily as he cuts the enemy." He led her to the door. "I thank you for your counsel and your concern. If you hear any news, I would appreciate being informed."

She turned at the doorway and studied him. "What if she sings to his blood as strongly as she sings to yours?"

"Lady." Saetan quietly closed the door on her and locked it. Returning to his desk, he poured a glass of yarbarah and watched the small tongue of fire dance above the desktop, warming the blood wine.

Daemon was a good Warlord Prince, which meant he was a dangerous Warlord Prince.

Saetan drained the glass. He and Daemon were a matched pair. Did he really believe his namesake was a threat to Jaenelle or was it jealousy over having to yield to a potential lover, especially when that lover was also his son? Because he honestly couldn't answer that question, he hesitated to give the order for Daemon's execution.

As yet there was no reason to send for Marjong the Executioner. Daemon was nowhere near Chaillot and, for some reason, Jaenelle didn't wander around Terreille as she did Kaeleer. Perhaps Titian was right about Daemon, but he couldn't take the chance. His namesake had the cunning to ensnare a child and the strength to destroy her.

But if Daemon had to be executed to protect Jaenelle, it wouldn't be a stranger's hand that put him in his grave, He owed his son that much.

PART II

chapter three

1 / Kaeleer

Saetan smiled dryly at his reflection. His full head of black hair was more silvered at the temples than it had been five years ago, but the lines left in his face by illness and despair had softened while the laugh lines had deepened.

Turning from the mirror, he strolled the length of the second-floor gallery. His bad leg still stiffened if he walked too long, but he no longer needed that damned cane. He laughed softly. Jaenelle was a bracing tonic in more ways than one.

As he descended the staircase that ended in the informal reception room, he noticed the tall, slim woman watching him through narrowed eyes. He also noticed the ring of keys attached to her belt and felt relieved that finding the current housekeeper had been so easy.

"Good afternoon," he said pleasantly. "Are you Helene?"

"And what if I am?" She crossed her arms and tapped her foot.

Well, he hadn't expected an open-armed welcome, but still . . . He smiled at her. "For a staff who's had no one to serve for so long and so little incentive, you've kept the place quite well."

Helene's shoulders snapped back and her eyes glinted with anger. "We care for the Hall because it's the Hall." Her eyes narrowed even further. "And who are you?" she demanded.

He raised an eyebrow. "Who do you think I am?"

"An interloper, that's what I think," Helene snapped, placing her hands on her hips. "One of those who sneaks in here from time to time to gawk and  'soak up the atmosphere.' "

Saetan laughed. "They'd do well not to soak up too much of the atmosphere of this place. Although it was always calmer than its Terreille counterpart. I suppose after so many years away, I am an interloper of sorts, but . . ." He raised his right hand. As the Black Jewel in the ring flashed, there was an answering rumble from the stones of SaDiablo Hall.

Helene paled and stared at him.

He smiled. "You see, my dear, it still answers my call. And I'm afraid I'm about to wreak havoc with your routine."

Helen fumbled a low curtsy. "High Lord?" she stammered.

He bowed. "I'm opening the Hall."

"But . . ."

Saetan stiffened. "There's a problem with that?"

There was a gleam in Helene's gold eyes as she briskly wiped her hands on her large white apron. "A thorough cleaning will help, to be sure, but"—she looked pointedly at the drapes—"some refurbishing would help even more."

The tension drained out of him. "And give you something to be proud of instead of having to make do with an empty title?"

Helene blushed and chewed her lip.

Hiding a smile, Saetan vanished the drop cloths and studied the room. "New drapes and sheers definitely. With a good polishing, the wood pieces will still do, providing the preservation spells have held and they're structurally sound. New sofas and chairs. Plants by the windows. A few new paintings for the walls as well. New wallpaper or paint? What do you think?"

It took Helene a moment to find her voice. "How many rooms are you thinking of restoring?"

"This one, the formal receiving room across the hall, the dining room, my public study, my suite, a handful of guest rooms—and a special suite for my Lady."

"Then perhaps your Lady would like to oversee the redecorating."

Saetan looked at her with horrified amusement. "No doubt she would. However, my Lady will be twelve in four months, and I'd much prefer that she live in a suite I've decorated on her behalf than that I live in a Hall decorated with her somewhat . . . eclectic . . . tastes."

Helene stared at him for a moment but refrained from asking the question he saw in her eyes. "I could have some swatch books brought up to the Hall for you to choose from."

"An excellent idea, my dear. Do you think you can have this place presentable in four months?"

"The staff is rather small, High Lord," Helene said hesitantly.

"Then hire the help you need." Saetan strolled to the door that opened onto the great hall. "I'll meet you again at the end of the week. Is that sufficient time?"

"Yes, High Lord." She curtsied again.

Having been born in the slums of Draega, Hayll's capital, as the son of an indifferent whore, he'd never expected or wanted servants to grovel in his presence. He didn't mention this to Helene because, if he read her right, that was the last curtsy he would ever receive.

At the end of the great hall, he hesitated before opening the door of his public study. He walked around the room, lightly touching the covered furniture, grimacing slightly at his dusty fingertips.

He'd once ruled Dhemlan Kaeleer from this room. Still ruled, he reminded himself. He'd given Dhemlan Terreille to Mephis when he became a Guardian, but not her sister land in the Shadow Realm.

Ah, Kaeleer. It had always been a sweet wine for him, with its deeper magic and its mysteries. Now those mysteries were coming out of the mist once more, and the magic was still strong. Strand by strand, Jaenelle was rebuilding the web, calling them all to the dance.

He hoped she'd be pleased to have the use of this place. He hoped he'd be invited when she established her own court. He wanted to see whom she selected for her First Circle, wanted to see the faces attached to that list of names. Did they know about each other? Or him?

Saetan shook his head and smiled.

Whether she'd intended to or not, his fair-haired daughter of the soul had certainly thrown him back among the living.

2 / Terreille

Surreal switched the basket of groceries from one hand to the other and fished her keys out of her trouser pocket as she climbed the stairs to her third-floor apartment. When she reached the landing and saw the dark shape curled up against her door, the keys vanished, replaced by her favorite stiletto.

The woman pushed the matted black hair from her face and staggered to her feet.

"Tersa," Surreal whispered, vanishing the stiletto as she leaped toward the swaying woman.

"You must tell him," Tersa muttered.

Surreal dropped the basket and wrapped her arm around Tersa's, waist. After calling in her keys and unlocking the door, she half-carried the muttering woman to the sofa, swearing under her breath at the condition Tersa was in.

She retrieved the basket and locked the door before returning to the sofa with a small glass of brandy.

"You must tell him," Tersa muttered, weakly batting at the glass.

"Drink this. You'll feel better," Surreal said sternly. "I haven't seen him in months. He doesn't have much use for me anymore."

Tersa grabbed Surreal's wrist and said fiercely, "Tell him to beware of the High Priest of the Hourglass. He's not a forgiving man when someone threatens what is his. Tell him to beware of the Priest."

Sighing, Surreal pulled Tersa to her feet and helped the older woman shuffle to the bathroom.

Tell him? She didn't want to get anywhere near him.

And what was she going to do with Tersa? There were only two beds in the place. She knew better than to give up her own, so Tersa would have to use Sadi's. But Hell's fire, he'd become so sensitive about having a woman in his room, he could tell if there had been a different cleaning woman, even if she came only once. Shit. He wasn't likely to show up—sweet Darkness, please don't let him show up—but if he did and he objected to Tersa's using his bed, he could throw her out.

Surreal stripped off Tersa's tattered clothing. "Come on, Tersa. You need a hot bath, a decent meal, and a good night's sleep."

"You must tell him."

Surreal closed her eyes. She owed him. She never forgot that she owed him. "I'll tell him. Somehow, I'll tell him."

3 / Terreille

After several minutes of uncomfortable silence, Philip Alexander shifted on the couch and faced his niece. He reached for her limp hand. She pulled away from his touch.

Frustrated, Philip raked his fingers through his hair and tried, once more, to be reasonable.

"Jaenelle, we're not doing this to be cruel. You're a sick little girl, and we want to help you get better."

"I'm not sick," Jaenelle said softly, staring straight ahead.

"Yes, you are." Philip kept his voice firm but gentle. "You can't tell the difference between make-believe and the real world."

"I know the difference."

"No, you don't," Philip insisted. He rubbed his forehead. "These friends, these places you visit . . . they aren't real. They were never real. The only reason you see them is because you're not well."

Pain, confusion, and doubt filled her summer-sky blue eyes. "But they feel so real," she whispered.

Philip pulled her close to him, grateful that she didn't push him away. He hugged her as if that would cure what years of treatment hadn't. "I know they feel real to you, sweetheart. That's the problem, don't you see? Dr. Carvay is the leading healer for—"

Jaenelle twisted out of his arms. "Carvay is not a healer, he's—"

"Jaenelle!" Philip took a deep breath. "That's exactly what we're talking about. Making up vicious stories about Dr. Carvay isn't going to help you. Making up stories about magical creatures—"

"I don't talk about them anymore."

Philip sighed, frustrated. That was true. She'd been cured or had outgrown those fantasies, but the stories she made up now were a different coat cut from the same cloth. A much more dangerous coat.

Philip rose and straightened his jacket. "Maybe . . . maybe if you work hard and let Dr. Carvay help you, you'll be cured this time and will be able to come home for good. In time for your birthday."

Jaenelle gave him a look he couldn't decipher.

Philip guided her to the door. "The carriage is outside. Your father and grandmother will go with you, help you get settled."

As he watched the carriage disappear down the long drive, Philip sincerely hoped that this time would be the last time.

4 / Kaeleer

Saetan sat behind the blackwood desk in his public study, a half-empty wineglass in his hand, and looked around the refurbished room.

Helene had worked her hearth-Craft well. Not only were the rooms he had requested to be refurbished done, but most of the public rooms and an entire wing of the living quarters as well. That she'd hired practically the whole village of Halaway to. accomplish it ... Well, they all needed a purpose. Even him. Especially him.

A sharp rapping on the door finally drew his attention. "Come," he said, draining the wineglass.

Helene gave the room a satisfied look before approaching the desk and squaring her shoulders. "Mrs. Beale wants to know how much longer she should hold dinner."

"An excellent meal such as Mrs. Beale has prepared shouldn't be wasted. Why don't you and the others enjoy her efforts?"

"Then your guest isn't coming?"

"Apparently not."

Helene put her hands on her hips. "A hoyden, that's what she is, not to have the manners at least to send her regrets when—"

"You forget yourself, madam," Saetan snarled softly. There was no mistaking the anger in his words, or the threat.

Helene shrank from the desk. "I ... I beg your pardon, High Lord."

Somewhat mollified, Saetan took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. "If she couldn't come, she had her reasons. Don't judge her, Helene. If she's here and you have some complaint about serving her, then come to me and I'll do what I can to alleviate the problem. But don't judge." He slowly walked to the door. "Keep sufficient staff on hand to serve any guests who may arrive. And keep a record of who comes and goes—especially anyone who inquires about the Lady. No one enters here without identifying themselves beforehand. Is that clear?"

"Yes, High Lord," Helene answered.

"Enjoy your dinner, my dear." Then he was gone.

Saetan walked the long stone corridor toward his private study deep beneath the Hall in the Dark Realm. He had abandoned the small apartment adjoining it, having returned to his suite several floors above, but as the days and weeks had passed, he found himself returning, and staying. Just in case.

A slight figure stepped away from the shadows near the study door. Anxiety rolled out of the boy in waves as Saetan unhurriedly unlocked the door and beckoned him in. A glance at the candlelights produced a soft glow, blurring the room's edges and relieving the feeling of immense power that filled the room he'd occupied for so long.

"Would you join me in a glass of yarbarah, Char?" Without waiting for an answer, Saetan poured a glass from the decanter on his desk and warmed it with a little tongue of fire. He handed the glass to Char.

The boy's hand shook as he took the glass, and his eyes were filled with fear.

Uneasy, Saetan warmed a glass for himself before settling' into the other chair by the fire.

Char drank quickly, a momentary smile on his lips as he savored the last mouthful. He glanced at the High Lord, at the face that seldom betrayed any flicker of emotion, and looked away. He tried to speak, but no sound came out. Clearing his throat, he tried again. "Have you seen her?" he asked in a cracked whisper.

Saetan sipped the blood wine before answering. "No,  | Char, I haven't seen her in three months. And you?"

Char shook his head. "No, but . . . something's been  | happening on the island. Others have come."

Saetan leaned forward. "Others? Not children?"

"Children, yes, but . . . something happens when they come. They don't come through the Gates, or find the island by riding the Winds. They come ..." Char shook his head, stumbling for the words.

Saetan dropped his voice into a deep, soothing croon. "Will you let me in, Char? Will you let me see?" Char's relief was so intense, it made Saetan more uneasy. Leaning back in his chair, he reached for the boy's mind, found the barriers already opened, and followed Char to the memory of what he had seen that had troubled him so much.

Saetan expelled his breath in a hiss of recognition and severed the link as quickly as he could without harming the boy.

When had Jaenelle learned to do that?

"What is it?" Char asked.

"A bridge," Saetan answered. He drained his glass and poured another, surprised that his hand was steady, since his insides were shaking apart. "It's called a bridge."

"It's very powerful."

"No, the bridge itself has no power." He met Char's troubled look and allowed the boy to see the turmoil he felt. "However, the one who made the bridge is very powerful." He put the glass down and leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees, his steepled fingers brushing his chin. "Where do these children come from? Do they say?"

Char licked his lips. "From a place called Briarwood. They won't say if it's a village or a town or a Territory. They say a friend told them about the island, showed them the road." He hesitated, suddenly shy. "Would you come and see? Maybe . . . you'd understand."

"Shall we go now?" Saetan rose, tugging on his jacket's sleeves.

Char stared at the floor. "It must be an awful place, this Briarwood." He looked up at Saetan, his troubled eyes pleading for some comfort. "Why would she go to such an awful place?"

Pulling Char to his feet, Saetan put an arm around the boy's thin shoulders, more troubled than he wanted to admit when Char leaned into him, needing the caress. Locking the study door, he kept his pace slow and steady as he fed the boy drop after psychic drop of strength and the feeling of safety. When Char's shoulders began to straighten again, Saetan let his arm casually drop away.

Three months. There had been no word from her for three months. Now children were traveling over a bridge to the cildru dyathe's island.

Jaenelle's new skill would have intrigued him more if Char's question hadn't been pounding in his blood, throbbing in his temples.

Why would she go to such an awful place? Why, why, why?

And where?

5 / Terreille

"Briarwood?" Cassandra warmed two glasses of yarbarah. "No, I've never heard of Briarwood. Where is it?" She handed a glass to Saetan.

"In Terreille, so it's probably on Chaillot somewhere." He sipped the blood wine. "Maybe a small town or village near Beldon Mor. You wouldn't have a map of that damned island, would you?"

Cassandra blushed. "Well, yes. I went to Chaillot. Not to Beldon Mor," she added hurriedly. "Saetan, I had to go because . . . well, something strange has been happening. Every once in a while, there's a sensation on the Webs, almost as if . . ." She made a frustrated sound.

"Someone was plucking them and then braiding the vibrations," Saetan finished dryly. He and Geoffrey had spent hours poring over Craft books in the Keep's library in order to figure out that much, but they still couldn't figure out how Jaenelle had done it.

"Exactly," Cassandra said.

Saetan watched her call in a map and spread it on the kitchen table. "What you've been sensing is a bridge that Jaenelle built." He deftly caught the glass of yarbarah as it fell from her hand. Setting both glasses on the table, he led her to a bench by the hearth and held her, stroking her hair and crooning singsong words. After a while, she stopped shaking and found her voice.

"That's not how a bridge is built," she said tightly.

"Not how you or I would—or could—build one. no."

"Only Blood at the peak of their Craft can build a bridge that spans any distance worth the effort. I doubt there's anyone left in Terreille who has the training to do it." She pushed at him, then snarled when he didn't let her go. "You'll have to talk to her about this, Saetan. You really will. She's too young for this kind of Craft. And why is she building a bridge when she can ride the Winds?"

Saetan continued to stroke her hair, holding her head against his shoulder. Five years of knowing Jaenelle and she still didn't understand what they were dealing with, still didn't understand that Jaenelle wasn't a young Queen who would become Witch but already was Witch. But, right now, he wasn't sure he understood either. "She's not traveling on the bridge, Cassandra," he said carefully. "She's sending others over. Those who wouldn't be able to come otherwise."

Would the truth frighten her as .much as it had frightened him? Probably not. She hadn't seen those children.

"Where are they coming from?" she asked uneasily.

"From Briarwood, wherever that is."

"And going to?"

Saetan took a deep breath. "The cildru dyathe's island."

Cassandra pushed him away and stumbled to the table. She grabbed the edge to hold herself upright.

Saetan watched her, relieved to see that, although she was frightened, she wasn't beyond reason. He waited until she'd regained her composure, saw the moment when she stopped to consider, and appreciate, the Craft required.

"She's building a bridge from here into Hell!"

"Yes."

Cassandra pushed a stray lock of hair from her face, the vertical line between her eyebrows deepening as she thought. She shook her head. "The Realms can't be spanned that way."

Saetan retrieved his glass of yarbarah and drained it. "Obviously, with that kind of bridge, they can." He studied the map, beginning at the south end of the island and working north toward Beldon Mor, section by section. He rapped the table with his long nails. "Not listed. If it's a small village near Beldon Mor, it might not be deemed significant enough to identify."

"If it's a village at all," Cassandra murmured.

Saetan froze. "What did you say?"

"What if it's just a place? There are a lot of places that are named, Saetan."

"Yes," he crooned, a faraway look in his eyes. But what kind of place would do that to children? He snarled in frustration. "She's hiding something behind that damned mist. That's why she doesn't want anyone from the Dark Realm in that city. Who is she protecting?"

"Saetan." Cassandra tentatively placed a hand on his arm. "Perhaps she's trying to protect herself."

Saetan's golden eyes instantly turned hard yellow. He pulled his arm from beneath her hand and paced around the room. "I'd never harm her. She knows me well enough to know that."

"I believe she knows you wouldn't deliberately harm her."

Saetan spun on the balls of his feet, a graceful dancer's move. "Say what you're going to say, Cassandra, and be done with it." His voice, although quiet, was full of thunder and a rising fury.

Cassandra moved around the room, gradually putting the table between them. Not that it would stop him. "It's not just you, Saetan. Don't you understand?" She opened her arms, pleading. "It's me and Andulvar and Prothvar and Mephis, too."

"They wouldn't harm her," he said coldly. "I won't speak for you."

"You're insulting," she snapped, and then took a deep breath to regain control. "All right. Say you show up on her family's doorstep tonight. Then what? It's unlikely they know about you, about any of us. Have you considered what kind of shock it will be to them to find out about your association with her? What if they desert her?"

"She can live with me," he snarled.

"Saetan, be reasonable! Do you want her to grow up in Hell, playing with dead children until she forgets what it feels like to walk among the living? Why would you inflict that on her?"

"We could live in Kaeleer."

"For how long? Remember who you are, Saetan. How eager will those little friends be to come to the house of the High Lord of Hell?"

"Bitch," he whispered, his voice shaking with pain. He splashed yarbarah into his glass, drank it cold, and grimaced at the taste.

Cassandra dropped into a chair by the table, too weary to stand. "Bitch I may be, but your love is a luxury she may not be able to afford. She has deliberately kept all of us out, and she doesn't come around anymore. Doesn't that tell you something? You haven't seen her, no one's seen her for the past three months." She gave him a wavering smile. "Maybe we were just a phase she was going through."

A muscle twitched in Saetan's jaw. There was a queer, sleepy look in his eyes. When he finally spoke, his words were soft and venomous. "I'm not a phase, Lady. I'm her anchor, her sword, and her shield."

"You sound as though you serve her."

"I do serve her, Cassandra. I served you once, and I served you well, but no longer. I'm a Warlord Prince. I understand the Blood Laws that apply when my kind serve, and the first law is not to serve, it's to protect."

"And if she doesn't want your protection?"

Saetan sat down opposite her, his hands tightly clasped. "When she forms her own court, she can toss me out on my ass if that's what she wants. Until then . . ." The words trailed away.

"There may be another reason to let her go." Cassandra took a deep breath. "Hekatah came to see me a few days ago." She flinched at Saetan's hiss of anger but continued in a sassy voice, "On the surface, she came to see your newest amusement."

Saetan stared at her. She was inviting him to make light of it, to dismiss Hekatah's appearance as if it meant nothing! No, she understood the danger. She just didn't want to deal with his rage.

"Go on," he said too softly. That blend of fear and wariness in her eyes was too familiar. He'd seen that look in every woman he'd ever bedded after he began wearing the Black. Even Hekatah, although she had hidden it well for her own purposes. But Cassandra was Witch. She wore the Black. At that moment he hated her for being afraid of him. "Go on," he said again.

"I don't think she was very impressed," Cassandra said hurriedly, "and I doubt she knew who I was. But she was disconcerted when she realized I was a Guardian. Anyway, she seemed more interested in finding out if I knew of a child that might be of interest to you, a 'young feast,' as she put it."

Saetan swore viciously.

Cassandra flinched. "She went out of her way to tell me about your interest in young flesh, hoping, I suppose, to create sufficient jealousy to make me an ally."

"And what did you tell her?"

"That your interest here was the restoration of the Dark Altar that was named in honor of the Queen you once served, and while I was flattered that she thought you might find me amusing, it was, unfortunately, not true."

"Perhaps I should rectify that impression."

Cassandra gave him a saucy smile, but there was panic in her eyes. "I don't tumble with just anyone, Prince, What are your credentials?"

Out of spite, Saetan walked around the table, drew Cassandra to her feet, and gave her a gentle, lingering kiss. "My credentials are the best, Lady," he whispered when he finally lifted his lips from hers. He released her, stepped away, and settled his cape over his shoulders. "Unfortunately, I'm required elsewhere."

"How long are you going to wait for her?"

How long? Dark witches, strong witches, powerful witches. Always willing to take what he offered, in bed and out, but they had never liked him, never trusted him, always feared him. And then there was Jaenelle. How long would he wait?

"Until she returns."

6 /Hell

It tingled his nerves, persistent and grating.

Growling in his sleep, Saetan rolled over and pulled the bedcovers up around his shoulders.

The tingling continued. A calling. A summons.

Along the Black.

Saetan opened his eyes to the night-dark room, listening with inner as well as outer senses.

A shrill cry of fury and despair flooded his mind.

"Jaenelle," he whispered, shivering as his bare feet touched the cold floor. Pulling on a dressing robe, he hurried into the corridor, then stopped, unsure where to go. Gathering himself, he sent one thunderous summons along the Black. "Jaenelle!"

No answer. Just that tingling laced with fear, despair, and fury.

She was still in Terreille. The thought spun through his head as he raced through the twisting corridors of the Hall. No time to wonder how she'd sent that thought-burst between the Realms. No time for anything. His Lady was in trouble and out of easy reach.

He ran into the great hall, ignoring the burning pain in his bad leg. A thought ripped the double front doors off the Hall. He raced down the broad steps and around the side of the Hall to the separate building where the Dark Altar stood.

Gasping, he tore the iron gate off its hinges and entered the large room. His hands shook as he centered the four-branched silver candelabra on the smooth black stone. Taking a deep breath to steady himself, he lit the three black candles that represented the Realms in the proper order to open a Gate between Hell and Terreille. He lit the candle in the center of the triangle made by the other three, the candle that represented the Self, and summoned the power of the Gate, waiting impatiently as the wall behind the Altar slowly changed from stone to mist and became a Gate between the Realms.

Saetan walked into the mist. His fourth step took him out of the mist and into the ruin that housed this Dark Altar in Terreille. As he passed the Altar, he noticed the black candle stubs in the tarnished candelabra and wondered why this Altar was getting so much use. Then he was outside the building, and there was no more time to wonder.

He gathered the strength of the Black Jewels and set a thought along a tight psychic thread. "Jaenelle!" He waited for a response, fighting the urge to catch the Black Web and fly to Chaillot. If he was on the Winds, he'd be out of reach for several hours. By then it might be too late. " Jaenelle!"

"Saetan? Saetan!" From the other side of the Realm, her voice came to him as a broken whisper.

" Witch-child!" He poured his strength into that tenuous link.

"Saetan, please, I have to ... I need . . ."

"Fight, witch-child, fight! You have the strength!"

"I need . . . don't know how to ... Saetan, please."

Even the Black had limits. Grinding his teeth, Saetan swore as his long nails cut his palms and drew blood. If he lost her now . . . No. He wouldn't lose her! No matter what he had to do, he'd find a way to send her what she needed.

But this link between them was spun out so fine that anything might snap it, and most of her attention was focused elsewhere. If the link broke, he wouldn't be able to span the Realm and find her again. Holding his end of it was draining the Black Jewel at a tremendous rate. He didn't want to think about what it had cost her to reach him in Hell. If he could use someone as a transfer point, if he could braid his strength with another's for a minute . . . Cassandra? Too far. If he diverted any of his strength to search, he might lose Jaenelle altogether.

But he needed another's strength!

And it was there. Wary, angry, intent. Another mind on the Black psychic thread, turned toward the west, toward Chaillot.

Another male.

Saetan froze. Only one other male wore the Black Jewels.

"Who are you?" It was a deep, rich, cultured voice with a rough, seductive edge to it. A dangerous voice.

What could he say? What did he dare say to this son he'd loved for a few short years before he'd been forced to walk away from him? There was no time to settle things between them. Not now. So he chose the title that hadn't been used in Terreille in 1,700 years. "I'm the High Priest of the Hourglass."

A quiver passed between them. A kind of wary recognition that wasn't quite recognition. Which meant Daemon had heard the title somewhere but couldn't name the man who held it.

Saetan took a deep breath. "I need your strength to hold this link."

A long silence. "Why?"

Saetan ground his teeth, not daring to let his thoughts stray. "I can't give her the knowledge she needs without amplifying the link, and if she doesn't get the knowledge, she may be destroyed." Even without a full link between them, he felt Daemon weighing his words.

Suddenly a stream of raw, barely controlled Black power rushed toward him as Daemon said, "Take what you need."

Saetan tapped into Daemon's strength, ruthlessly draining it as he sent a knife-sharp thought toward Chaillot. "Lady!"

"Help . . ." Such desperation in that word.

"Take what you need." Words of Protocol, of service, of surrender.

Saetan threw open his inner barriers, giving her access to everything he knew, everything he was. He sank to his knees and grabbed his head, sure his skull would shatter from the pain as Jaenelle slammed into him and rummaged through his mind as if she were opening cupboards and flinging their contents onto the floor until she found what she wanted. It only took a moment. It felt like forever. Then she withdrew, and the link with her faded.

"Thank you." A faint whisper, almost gone. "Thank you."

The second "thank you" wasn't directed at him.

It seemed like hours, not minutes, before his hands dropped to his thighs and he tilted his head back to look at the false-dawn sky. It took a minute more to realize he wasn't alone, that another mind still lightly touched his with something more than wariness.

Saetan swiftly closed his inner barriers. "You did well, Prince. I thank you ... for her sake." He cautiously began to back away from the link between them, not sure he could win a confrontation with Daemon.

But Daemon, too, backed away, exhausted.

As the link faded, just before Saetan was once more alone within himself, Daemon's voice came to him faintly, the words a silky threat.

"Don't get in my way, Priest."

Grabbing one of the posts of the four-poster bed, Daemon hauled himself to his feet just as the door burst open and six guards cautiously entered the room.

Normally they had good reason to fear him, but not tonight. Even if he hadn't drained his strength to the point of exhaustion, he wouldn't have fought them. Tonight, whatever happened to him, he was buying time because she, wherever she was, needed a chance to recover.

The guards circled him and led him to the brightly lit outer courtyard. When he saw the two posts with the leather straps secured at the base and top, he hesitated for the briefest moment.

Lady Cornelia, the latest pet Queen who had bought his services from Dorothea SaDiablo, stood near the posts. Her eyes sparkled. Her voice dripped with excitement. "Strip him."

Daemon angrily shrugged off the guards' hands and began undressing when a bolt of pain from the Ring of Obedience made him catch his breath. He looked at Cornelia and lowered his hands to his sides.

"Strip him," she said.

Rough hands pulled his clothes off and dragged him to the posts. The guards lashed his ankles and wrists to the posts, tightening the leather straps until he was stretched taut.

Cornelia smiled at him. "A slave is forbidden to use the Jewels. A slave is forbidden to do anything but basic Craft, as you well know."

Yes, he knew. Just as he'd known that Cornelia would sense the unleashing of that much dark power and punish him for it. For most males, the threat of pain—especially the pain that could be produced by the Ring of Obedience—was enough to keep them submissive. But he'd learned to embrace agony like a sweet lover and used it to fuel his hatred for Dorothea and everything and everyone connected with her.

"The punishment for this kind of disobedience is fifty strokes," Cornelia said. "You will do the counting. If you miss a stroke, it will be repeated until you give the count. If you lose your place, the counting will begin again."

Daemon forced his voice to remain neutral. "What will Lady SaDiablo say about your treatment of her property?"

"Under the circumstances, I don't think Lady SaDiablo will mind," Cornelia replied sweetly. Then her voice became a whip crack. "Begin!"

Daemon heard the lash whistle before it struck. For a brief moment, a strange shiver of pleasure ran through him before his body recognized the pain. He drew in a ragged breath. "One."

Everything has a price. "Two." A Blood Law, or part of a code of honor? "Three." He'd never heard of the High Priest of the Hourglass until he'd found one of Surreal's warnings, but there was something vaguely familiar about that other mind. "Four." Who was the Priest? "Five." A Warlord Prince . . . "Six." . . . like himself. . . "Seven." ... who wore the Black Jewels. "Eight." Everything has a price. "Nine." Who had taught him that? "Ten." Older. More experienced. "Eleven." To the east of him. "Twelve." And she was to the west. "Thirteen." He didn't know who she was, but he did know what she was. "Fourteen. Fifteen."

Everything has a price.

The guards dragged him back to his room and locked the door.

Daemon fell heavily onto his hands and knees. Pressing his forehead to the floor, he tried to dull the burning pain in his back, buttocks, and legs long enough to get to his feet. Fifty strokes, each one slicing through his flesh. Fifty strokes. But no more. He hadn't missed the count once, despite the bursts of pain that Cornelia had sent through the Ring of Obedience to distract him.

Slowly gathering his feet under him, he pushed himself to an almost upright position and shuffled to the bathroom, unable to stifle the moaning sob that accompanied each step.

When he finally reached the bathroom, he braced one trembling hand against the wall and turned the water taps to fill the bath with warm water. His vision kept blurring, and his body shook with pain and exhaustion. It took three tries to call in the small leather case that held his stash of healing supplies. Once he had it open, it took a minute for his vision to clear sufficiently to find the jar he wanted.

When combined with water, the powdered herbs cleansed wounds, numbed pain, and allowed the healing process to begin—// he could keep his mind fixed enough, and if he could withdraw far enough into himself to gather the power, the Craft he would need to heal the torn flesh.

Daemon's lips twisted in a grim smile as he turned off the water. If he sent a summons along the Black, if he asked the Priest for help, would he get it? Unlikely. Not an enemy. Not yet. But Surreal had done well to leave those notes warning him about the Priest.

Daemon let out a cry as the jar slipped from his hands and shattered on the bathroom floor. He sank to his knees, hissing as a piece of glass sliced him, and stared at the powder, tears of pain and frustration welling in his eyes. Without the powder to help heal the wounds, he might still be able to heal them to some extent, still be able to stop the bleeding . . . but he would scar. And he didn't need a mirror to know what he would look like.

"No!" He wasn't aware of sending. He was only trying to relieve the frustration.

A minute later, as he knelt on the bathroom floor, shaking, trying not to vent the sobs building in him, a hand touched his shoulder.

Daemon twisted around, his teeth bared, his eyes wild.

There was no one in the room. The touch was gone. But there was a presence in the bathroom. Alien . . . and not.

Daemon probed the room and found nothing. But it was still there, like something seen out of the corner of the eye that vanishes when you turn to look at it. Breathing hard, Daemon waited.

The touch, when it came again, was hesitant, cautious. He shivered as it gently probed his back. Shivered because along with exhaustion and dismay, that gentle touch was filled with a cold, cold anger.

The powdered-=herbs and broken glass vanished. A moment later a brass ball, perforated like a tea ball, appeared above the bath and sank into the water. Small phantom hands, gentle yet strong, helped him into the bath.

Daemon gasped when the open wounds touched the water, but the hands pushed him down, down, down until he was stretched out on his back, the water covering him. After a moment he couldn't feel the hands. Dismayed that the link might be broken, he struggled to rise to a sitting position only to find himself held down. He relaxed and slowly realized that his skin felt numb from his chin down, that he no longer felt the pain. Sighing with gratitude, Daemon leaned his head against the bath and closed his eyes.

A sweet, strange darkness rolled through him. He moaned, but it was a moan of pleasure.

Strange how the mind could wander. He could almost smell the sea, feel the power of the surf. Then there was the rich smell of fresh-turned earth after a warm spring rain. And the luscious warmth of sunlight on a soft summer afternoon. The sensual pleasure of slipping naked between clean sheets.

When he reluctantly opened his eyes, her psychic scent still lingered, but he knew she was gone. He moved his foot through the now-cold water. The brass ball was gone too.

Daemon carefully got out of the bath, opened the drain, and swayed on his feet, unsure what to do. Reaching for a towel, he patted the front of his body to absorb most of the water, but he was reluctant to touch the back. Gritting his teeth, he turned his back to the mirror and looked over his shoulder. Best to know how bad the damage was.

Daemon stared.

There were fifty white lines, like chalk lines on his golden-brown skin. The lines looked fragile, and it would take days of being careful before the wounds were truly, strongly knit, but he was healed. If he didn't reopen the wounds, those lines would fade. No scars.

Daemon carefully walked to the bed and lay face down, inching his arms upward until they were under the pillow, supporting his head. It was hard to stay awake, hard not to think about how a meadow looks so silvery in the moonlight. Hard ...

Someone had been touching his back for some time before he was aware of it. Daemon resisted the urge to open his eyes. There would be nothing to see, and if she knew he was awake, she might pull away.

Her touch was firm, gentle, knowing. It traveled in slow, circular lines down his back. Cool, soothing, comforting.

Where was she? Not nearby, so how was she able to make the reach? He didn't know. He didn't care. He surrendered to the pleasure of that phantom touch, a hand that someday he would hold in the flesh.

When she was gone again, Daemon slowly eased one arm around and gingerly touched his back. He stared at the thick salve on his fingers and then wiped them on the sheet. His eyes closed. There was no point in fighting the sleep he so desperately needed.

But just before he surrendered to need, he thought once more about the kind of witch who would come to a stranger's aid, already exhausted from her own ordeal, and heal his wounds. "Don't get in my way, Priest," he muttered, and fell asleep.

chapter four

1 / Hell

Saetan slammed the book down on the desk and shook with rage.

A month since that plea for knowledge. A month of waiting for some word, some indication that she was all right. He'd tried to enter Beldon Mor, but Cassandra had been right. The psychic mist surrounding the city was a barrier that only the dead could feel, a barrier that kept them all out. Jaenelle was taking no chances with whatever secret lay behind the mist, and her lack of trust was a blade between his ribs.

Embroiled in his own thoughts, he didn't realize someone else was in the study until he heard his name called a second time.

"Saetan?" Such pain and pleading in that small, weary voice. "Please don't be angry with me."

His vision blurred. His nails dug into the blackwood desk, gouging its stone-hard wood. He wanted to vent all the fear and anger that had been growing in him since he'd last seen her, months ago. He wanted to shake her for daring to ask him to swallow his anger. Instead he took a deep breath, smoothed his face into as neutral a mask as he could create, and turned toward her.

The sight of her made him ill.

She was a skeleton with skin. Her sapphire eyes were sunk into her skull, almost lost in the dark circles beneath them. The golden hair he loved to touch hung limp and dull around her bruised face. There were rope burns and dried blood on her ankles and wrists.

"Come here," he said, all emotion drained from his voice. When she didn't move, he took a step toward her.

She flinched and stepped back. His voice became soft thunder. "Jaenelle, come here."

One step. Two. Three. She stared at his feet, shaking.

He didn't touch her. He didn't trust himself to control the jealousy and spite that seared him as he looked at her. She preferred staying with her family and being treated like this over being with him, who loved her with all his being but wasn't entrusted with her care because he was a Guardian, because he was the High Lord of Hell.

Better that she play with the dead than become one of them, he thought bitterly. She wasn't strong enough right now to fight him. He would keep her here for a few days and let her heal. Then he would bring that bastard of a father to his knees and force him to relinquish all paternal rights. He would—

"I can't leave them, Saetan." Jaenelle looked up at him.

The tears sliding down her bruised face twisted his heart, but his face was stone carved, and he waited in silence.

"There's no one else. Don't you see?"

"No, I don't see." His voice, although controlled and quiet, rumbled through the room. "Or perhaps I do." His cold glance raked her shaking body. "You prefer enduring this and remaining with your family to living with me and what I have to offer."

Jaenelle blinked in surprise. Her eyes lost some of their haunted look, and she became thoughtful. "Live with you? Do you mean it?"

Saetan watched her, puzzled.

Slowly, regretfully, she shook her head. "I can't. I'd like to, but I can't. Not yet. Rose can't do it by herself."

Saetan dropped to one knee and took her frail, almost transparent hands in his. She flinched at his touch but didn't pull away. "It wouldn't have to be in Hell, witch-child," he said soothingly. "I've opened the Hall in Kaeleer. You could live there, maybe attend the same school as your friends."

Jaenelle giggled, her eyes momentarily dancing with amusement. "Schools, High Lord. They live in many places."

He smiled tenderly and bowed his head. "Schools, then. Or private tutors. Anything you wish. I can arrange it, witch-child."

Jaenelle's eyes filled with tears as she shook her head. "It would be lovely, it truly would, but . . . not yet. I can't leave them yet."

Saetan bit back the arguments and sighed. She had come to him for comfort, not a fight. And since he couldn't officially serve her until she established a court, he had no right to stand between her and her family, no matter what he felt. "All right. But please remember, you have a place to come to. You don't have to stay with them. But ... I'd be willing to make the appropriate arrangements for your family to visit or live with you, under my supervision, if that's what you wish."

Jaenelle's eyes widened. "Under your supervision?" she said weakly. She let out a gurgle of laughter and then tried to look stern. "You wouldn't make my sister learn sticks with Prothvar, would you?"

Saetan's voice shook with amusement and unshed tears. "No, I wouldn't make her learn sticks with Prothvar." He carefully drew her into his arms and hugged her frail body. Tears spilled from his closed eyes when her arms circled his neck and tightened. He held her, warmed her, comforted her. When she finally pulled away from him, he stood quickly, wiping the tears from his face.

Jaenelle looked away. "I'll come back as soon as I can."

Nodding, Saetan turned toward the desk, unable to speak. He never heard her move, never heard the door open, but when he turned back to say good-bye, she was already gone.

2 / Terreille

Surreal lay beneath the sweating, grunting man, thrusting her hips in the proper rhythm and moaning sensuously whenever a fat hand squeezed her breasts. She stared at the ceiling while her hands roamed up and down the sweaty back in not-quite-feigned urgency.

Stupid pig, she thought as a slobbering kiss wet her neck. She should have charged more for the contract—and would have if she'd known how unpleasant he would be in bed. But he only had the one shot, and he was almost at his peak.

The spell now. Ah, to weave the spell. She turned her mind inward, slipped from the calm depths of the Green to the stiller, deeper, more silent Gray, and quickly wove her death spell around him, tying it to the rhythms of the bed, to the quickened heartbeat and raspy breathing.

Practice had made her adept at her Craft.

The last link of the spell was a delay. Not tomorrow, but the day after, or the one after that. Then, whether it was anger or lust that made the heart pound, the spell would burst a vessel in his heart, sear his brain with the strength of the Gray, shatter his Jewel, and leave nothing but carrion behind.

It was an offhand remark Sadi had made once that convinced Surreal to be thorough in her kills. Daemon entertained the possibility that the Blood, being more than flesh, could continue to wear the Jewels after the body's death— and remember who had helped them down the misty road to Hell. He'd said, "No matter what you do with the flesh, finish the kill. After all, who wants to turn a corner one day and meet up with one of the demon-dead who would like to return the favor?"

So she always finished the kill. There would be nothing traceable, nothing that could lead them to her. The Healers that practiced in Terreille now, such as they were, would assume he had burned out his mind and his Jewels trying to save his body from the physical death.

Surreal came out of her reverie as the grunts and thrusts increased for a moment. Then he sagged. She turned her head, trying not to breathe the enhanced odor of his unwashed body.

When he finally lay on his back, snoring, Surreal slipped out of bed, pulled on a silk robe, and wrinkled her nose. The robe would have to be cleaned before she could wear it again. Hooking her hair behind her ears, she went to the window and pulled the curtain aside.

She had to decide where to go now that this contract was done. She should have made the decision days ago, but she'd kept hesitating because of the recurring dreams that washed over her mind like surf over a beach. Dreams about Titian and Titian's Jewel. Dreams about needing to be someplace, about being needed someplace.

Except Titian couldn't tell her where.

Maybe there were just too many lights in this old, decrepit city. Maybe she couldn't decide because she couldn't see the stars.

Stars. And the sea. Someplace clean, where she could take a light schedule and spend her days reading or walking by the sea.

Surreal smiled. It had been three years since she'd last spent time with Deje. Chaillot had some beautiful, quiet beaches on the east side. On a clear day, you could even see Tacea Island. And there was a Sanctuary nearby, wasn't there? Or some kind of ancient ruin. Picnic lunches, long solitary walks. Deje would be happy to see her, wouldn't push to fill every night.

Yes. Chaillot.

Surreal turned from the window when the man grunted and thrashed onto his side. The Sadist was right. There were so many ways to efficiently kill a man other than splattering his blood over the walls.

It was too bad they didn't give her as much pleasure.

3 / Terreille

Lucivar Yaslana listened to the embroidered half-truths Zuultah was spewing about him to a circle of nervous, wide-eyed witches and wondered if snapping a few female necks would add color to the stories. Reluctantly putting aside that pleasant fantasy, he scanned the crowded room for some diversion.

Daemon Sadi glided past him.

Lucivar sucked in his breath, suppressed a grin, and turned back to Zuultah's circle. The last time the Queens had gotten careless about keeping them separated, he and Daemon had destroyed a court during a fight that escalated from a disagreement over whether the wine being served was just mediocre or was really colored horse piss.

Forty years ago. Enough time among the short-lived races for the randy young Queens to convince themselves that they could control him and Daemon or, even better, that they were the Queens strong-willed enough and wonderful enough to tame two dark-Jeweled Warlord Princes.

Well, this Eyrien Warlord Prince wasn't tamable—at least, not for another five years. As for the Sadist . . . Any man who referred to his bedroom skills as poisoned honey wasn't likely to be tamed or controlled unless he chose to be.

It was late in the evening before Lucivar got the chance to slip out to the back garden. Daemon had gone out a few minutes before, after an abrupt, snarling disagreement with Lady Cornelia.

Moving with a hunter's caution, Lucivar followed the ribbon of chilled air left by Daemon's passing. He turned a corner and stopped.

Daemon stood in the middle of the gravel path, his face raised to the night sky while the delicate breeze riffled his black hair.

The gravel under Lucivar's feet shifted slightly.

Daemon turned toward the sound.

Lucivar hesitated. He knew what that sleepy, glazed look in Daemon's eyes meant, remembered only too well what had happened in courts when that tender, murderous smile had lasted for more than a brief second. Nothing, and no one, was safe when Daemon was in this mood. But, Hell's fire, that's what made dancing with the Sadist fun.

Smiling his own lazy, arrogant smile, Lucivar stepped forward and slowly stretched his dark wings their full span before tucking them tight to his body. "Hello, Bastard."

Daemon's smile thawed. "Hello, Prick. It's been a long time."

"So it has. Drunk any good wines lately?"

"None that you'd appreciate." Daemon studied Lucivar's clothes and raised an eyebrow. "You've decided to be a good boy?"

Lucivar snorted. "I decided I wanted decent food and a decent bed for a change and a few days out of Pruul, and all I have to do is lick the bottom of Zuultah's boots when she returns from the stable."

"Maybe that's your trouble, Prick. You're not supposed to lick her boots, you're supposed to kiss her ass." He turned and glided down the path.

Remembering why he'd wanted to talk to Daemon, Lucivar followed reluctantly until they reached a gazebo tucked in one corner of the garden where they couldn't be seen from the mansion. Daemon smiled that cold, sweet smile and stepped aside to let him enter first.

Never let a predator smell fear.

Annoyed by his own uneasiness, Lucivar turned to study the luminescent leaves of the fire bush nearby. He stiffened when Daemon came up behind him, when the long nails whispered over his shoulders, teasing his skin in a lover like fashion.

"Do you want me?" Daemon whispered, brushing his lips against Lucivar's neck.

Lucivar snorted and tried to pull away, but the caressing hand instantly became a vice. "No," he said flatly. "I endured enough of that in Eyrien hunting camps." With a teeth-baring grin, he turned around. "Do you really think your touch makes my pulse race?"

"Doesn't it?" Daemon whispered, a strange look in his eyes.

Lucivar stared. Daemon's voice was too crooning, too silky, too dangerously sleepy. Hell's fire, Lucivar thought desperately as Daemon's lips brushed his, what was wrong with him? This wasn't his kind of game.

Lucivar jerked back. Daemon's nails dug into the back of his neck. The sharp thumbnails pricked his throat. Keeping his fists pressed against his thighs. Lucivar closed his eyes and submitted to the kiss.

No reason to feel humiliation and shame. His body was responding to stimulation the same way it would to cold or hunger. Physical response had nothing to do with feelings or desire. Nothing.

But, Mother Night, Daemon could set a stone on fire!

"Why are you doing this?" Lucivar gasped. "At least tell me why."

"Why not?" Daemon replied bitterly. "I have to whore for everyone else, why not you?"

"Because I don't want you to. Because you don't want to. Daemon, this is madness! Why are you doing this?"

Daemon pressed his forehead against Lucivar's. "Since you already know the answer, why ask me?" He kneaded Lucivar's shoulders. "I can't stand being touched by them anymore. Ever since ... I can't stand the feel of them, the

smell of them, the taste of them. They've raped everything I am until there's nothing clean left to offer."

Lucivar wrapped his hands around Daemon's wrists. The shame and bitterness saturating Daemon's psychic scent scraped a nerve he had refused to probe over the past five years. Once she was old enough to understand what it meant, would that sapphire-eyed little cat despise them for the way they'd been forced to serve? It wouldn't matter. He would fight with everything in him for the chance to serve her. And so would Daemon. "Daemon." He took a deep breath. "Daemon, she's come."

Daemon pulled away. "I know. I've felt her." He stuffed his shaking hands into his trouser pockets. "There's trouble around her—"

"What trouble?" Lucivar asked sharply.

"—and I keep wondering if he can—if he will—protect her."

"Who? Daemon!"

Daemon dropped to the floor, clutching his groin and moaning.

Swearing under his breath, Lucivar wrapped his arms around Daemon and waited. Nothing else could be done for a man enduring a bolt of pain sent through the Ring of Obedience.

By the time it was over and Daemon got to his feet, his beautiful, aristocratic face had hardened into a cold, pain-glazed mask and his voice was empty of emotion. "It seems Lady Cornelia requires my presence." He flicked a twig off his jacket sleeve. "You'd think she would know better by now." He hesitated before he left the gazebo. "Take care, Prick."

Lucivar leaned against the gazebo long after Daemon's footsteps had faded away. What had happened between Daemon and the girl? And what did "Take care, Prick" mean? A warm farewell ... or a warning?

"Daemon?" Lucivar whispered, remembering another place and another court. "Daemon, no." He ran toward the mansion. "Daemon!"

Lucivar charged through the open glass doors and shoved his way through gossiping knots of women, briefly aware of Zuultah's angry face in front of him. He was halfway up the stairs leading to the guest rooms when a bolt of pain from the Ring of Obedience brought him to his knees. Zuultah stood beside him, her face twisted with fury. Lucivar tried to get to his feet, but another surge from the Ring bent him over so far his forehead pressed against the stairs.

"Let me go, Zuultah." His voice cracked from the pain.

"I'll teach you some manners, you arrogant—"

Lucivar twisted around to face her. "Let me go, you stupid bitch," he hissed. "Let me go before it's too late."

It took her a long minute to understand she wasn't what he feared, and another long minute before he could get to his feet.

With one hand pressed to his groin, Lucivar hauled himself up the stairs and pushed himself into a stumbling run toward the guest wing. There was no time to think about the crowd growing behind him, no time to think about anything except reaching Cornelia's room before . . .

Daemon opened Cornelia's door, closed it behind him, calmly tugged his shirt cuffs into place, and then smashed his fist into the wall.

Lucivar felt the mansion shudder as the power of the Black Jewel surged into the wall.

Cracks appeared in the wall, running in every direction, opening wider and wider.

"Daemon?"

Daemon tugged his shirt cuffs down once more. When he finally looked at Lucivar, his eyes were as cold and glazed as a murky gemstone—and no more human.

Daemon smiled.

Lucivar shivered.

"Run," Daemon crooned. Seeing the crowd filling the hall behind Lucivar, he calmly turned and walked the other way.

The mansion continued to shudder. Something crashed nearby.

Licking his lips, Lucivar opened Cornelia's door. He stared at the bed, at what was on the bed, and fought to control his heaving guts. He turned away from the open door and stood there, too numb to move.

He smelled smoke, heard the roar of flames consuming a room. People screamed. The mansion walls rumbled as they split farther and farther. He looked around, confused, until part of the ceiling crashed a few feet away from him.

Fear cleared his head, and he did the only sensible thing. He ran.

4 / Terreille

Dorothea SaDiablo, the High Priestess of Hayll, paced the length of her sitting room, the floor-length cocoon she wore over a simple dark dress billowing out behind her. She tapped her fingertips together, over and over, absently noting that her cousin Hepsabah grew more agitated as the silence and pacing continued.

Hepsabah squirmed in her chair. "You're not really bringing him back here?" Her voice squeaked with her growing panic. She tried to keep her hands still because Dorothea found her nervous gestures annoying, but the hands were like wing-clipped birds fluttering hopelessly in her lap.

Dorothea shot a dagger glance in Hepsabah's direction and continued pacing. "Where else can I send him?" she snapped. "It may be years before anyone is willing to sign a contract for him. And with the stories flying, I may not be able to even make a present of the bastard. With so much of that place burned beyond recognition . . . and Cornelia's room untouched. Too many people saw what was in that bed. There's been too much talk." "But. . . he's not there, and he's not here. Where is he?" "Hell's fire, how should I know. Nearby. Skulking somewhere. Maybe twisting a few other witches into shattered bones and pulped flesh." "You could summon him with the Ring." Dorothea stopped pacing and stared at her cousin through narrowed eyes. Their mothers had been sisters. The bloodline was good on that side. And the consort who'd sired Hepsabah had shown potential. How could two of Hayll's Hundred Families have produced such a simpering idiot? Unless her dear aunt had seeded herself with a piece of gutter trash. To think Hepsabah was the best she had to work with to try to keep some rein on him. That had been a mistake. Maybe she should have let that mad Dhemlan bitch keep him. No. There were other problems with that. The Dark Priestess had warned her. As much good as it did.

Dorothea smiled at Hepsabah, pleased to see her cousin shrink farther into the chair. "So you think I should summon him? Use the Ring when the debris in that place is barely cooled? Are you willing to be the one to welcome him home if I bring him back that way?"

Hepsabah's smooth, carefully painted face crumpled with fear. "Me?" she wailed. "You wouldn't make me do that. You can't make me do that. He doesn't like me."

"But you're his mother, dear," Dorothea purred.

"But you know . . . you know . . ."

"Yes, I know." Dorothea continued pacing, but slower. "So. He's in Hayll. He signed in this morning at one of the posting stations. He'll be here soon enough. Let him have a day or two to vent his rage on someone else. In the meantime, I'll have to arrange a bit of educational entertainment. And I'll have to think about what to do with him. The Hayllian trash and the landens don't understand what he is. They like him. They think that pittance generosity he shows them is the way he is. I should have preserved the image of Cornelia's bedroom in a spelled crystal and shown them what he's really like. No matter. He won't stay long. I'll find someone foolish enough to take him."

Hepsabah got to her feet, smoothed her gold dress over her padded, well-curved body, and patted her coiled black hair. "Well. I should go and see that his room is ready." She let out a tittering laugh behind her hand. "That's a mother's duty."

"Don't rub against his bedpost too much, dear. You know how he hates the scent of a woman's musk."

Hepsabah blinked, swallowed hard. "I never," she sputtered indignantly, and instantly began to pout. "It's just not fair."

Dorothea tucked a stray hair back into Hepsabah's elegant coils. "When you start getting thoughts like that, dear, remember Cornelia."

Hepsabah's brown skin turned gray. "Yes," she murmured as Dorothea led her to the door. "Yes, I'll remember."

5 / Terreille

Daemon glided down the crowded sidewalk, his ground-eating stride never breaking as people around him skittered out of his way, filling back in as he passed. He didn't see them, didn't hear the murmuring voices. With his hands in his trouser pockets, he glided through the crowds and the noise, unaware and uncaring.

He was in Draega, Hayll's capital city.

He was home.

He'd never liked Draega, never liked the tall stone buildings that shouldered against one another, blocking out the sun, never liked the concrete roads and the concrete sidewalks with the stunted, dusty trees growing out of circular patches of earth cut out of the concrete. Oh, there were a thousand things to do here: theaters, music halls, museums, places to dine. All the things a long-lived, arrogant, useless people needed to fill the empty hours. But Draega ... If he could be sure that two particular witches would lie crushed and buried in the rubble, he would tear the city apart without a second thought.

He swung into the street, weaving his way between the carriages that came to a stuttering halt, oblivious of their irate drivers. One or two passengers thrust their heads through a side window to shout at him, but when they saw his face and realized who he was, they hastily pulled their heads back in, hoping he hadn't noticed them.

Since he'd arrived that morning, he'd been following a psychic thread that tugged him toward an unknown destination. He wasn't troubled by the pull. Its chaotic meandering told him who was at the other end. He didn't know why she was in Draega of all places, but her need to see him was strong enough to pull him toward her.

Daemon entered the large park in the center of the city, veered to the footpath leading to the southern end, and slowed his pace. Here among the trees and grass, with the street sounds muted, he breathed a little easier. He crossed a footbridge that spanned a trickling creek, hesitated for a moment, then took the right-hand fork in the path that led farther into the park.

Finally he came to a small oval of grass. A lacy iron bench filled the back of the oval. A half-circle of lady's tears formed a backdrop, the small, white-throated blue flowers filling the bushes. Two old, tall trees stood at either end of the oval, their branches intertwining high above, letting a dappling of sunlight reach the ground.

The tugging stopped.

Daemon stood in the oval of grass, slowly turning full circle. He started to turn away when a low giggle came from the bushes.

"How many sides does a triangle have?" a woman's husky voice asked.

Daemon sighed and shook his head. It was going to be riddles.

"How many sides does a triangle have?" the voice asked again.

"Three," Daemon answered.

The bushes parted. Tersa shook the leaves from her tattered coat and pushed her tangled black hair from her face. "Foolish boy, did they teach you nothing?"

Daemon's smile was gentle and amused. "Apparently not."

"Give Tersa a kiss."

Resting his hands on her thin shoulders, Daemon lightly kissed her cheek. He wondered when she'd eaten last but decided not to ask. She seldom knew or cared, and asking would only make her unhappy.

"How many sides does a triangle have?"

Daemon sighed, resigned. "Darling, a triangle has three sides."

Tersa scowled. "Stupid boy. Give me your hand."

Daemon obediently held out his right hand. Tersa grasped the long, slender fingers with her own frail-looking sticks and turned his hand palm up. With the forefinger nail of her right hand, she began tracing three connecting lines on his palm, over and over again. "A Blood triangle has four sides, foolish boy. Like the candelabra on a Dark Altar. Remember that." Over and over until the lines began to glow white on his golden-brown palm. "Father, brother, lover. Father, brother, lover. The father came first."

"He usually does," Daemon said dryly.

She ignored him. "Father, brother, lover. The lover is the father's mirror. The brother stands between." She stopped tracing and looked up at him. It was one of those times when Tersa's eyes were clear and focused, yet she was looking at some place other than where her body stood. "How many sides does a triangle have?"

Daemon studied the three white lines on his palm. "Three."

Tersa drew in her breath, exasperated.

"Where's the fourth side?" he asked quickly, hoping to avoid hearing the question again.

Tersa snapped her thumb and forefinger nail together, then pressed the knife-sharp forefinger nail into the center of the triangle in Daemon's palm. Daemon hissed when her nail cut his skin. He jerked his hand back, but her fingers held him in a grip that hurt.

Daemon watched the blood well in the hollow of his palm. Still holding his fingers in an iron grip, Tersa slowly raised his hand toward his face. The world became fuzzy, unfocused, mist-shrouded. The only painfully clear thing Daemon could see was his hand, a white triangle, and the bright, glistening blood.

Tersa's voice was a singsong croon. "Father, brother, lover. And the center, the fourth side, the one who rules all three."

Daemon closed his eyes as Tersa raised his hand to his lips. The air was too hot, too close. Daemon's lips parted. He licked the blood from his palm.

It sizzled on his tongue, red lightning. It seared his nerves, crackled through him and gathered in his belly, gathered into a white-hot ember waiting for a breath, a single touch that would turn his kindled maleness into an inferno. His hand closed in a fist and he swayed, clenching his teeth to keep from begging for that touch.

When he opened his eyes, the oval of grass was empty. He slowly opened his hand. The lines were already fading, the small cut healed.

"Tersa?"

Her voice came back to him, distant and fading. "The lover is the father's mirror. The Priest . . . He will be your best ally or your worst enemy. But the choice will be yours."

"Tersa!"

Almost gone. "The chalice is cracking."

"Tersa!"

A surge of rage honed by terror rushed through him. Closing his hand, he swung his arm straight and shoulder-high. The shock of his fist connecting with one of the trees jarred him to his heels. Daemon leaned against the tree, eyes closed, forehead pressed to the trunk.

When he opened his eyes, his black coat was covered with gray-green ashes. Frowning, Daemon looked up. A denial caught in his throat, strangling him. He stepped back from the tree and sat down on the bench, his face hidden in his hands.

Several minutes later, he forced himself to look at the tree.

It was dead, burned from within by his fury. Standing among the green living things, its gray skeletal branches still reached for its partner. Daemon walked over to the tree and pressed his palm against the trunk. He didn't know if there was a way to probe it to see if sap still ran at its core, or if it had all been crystallized by the heat of his rage.

"I'm sorry," he whispered. Gray-green dust continued to fall from the upper branches. A few minutes ago, that dust had been living green leaves. "I'm sorry."

Taking a deep breath, Daemon followed the path back the way he'd come, hands in his pockets, head down, shoulders slumped. Just before leaving the park, he turned around and looked back. He couldn't see the tree, but he could feel it. He shook his head slowly, a grim smile on his lips. He'd buried more of the Blood than they would ever guess, and he mourned a tree.

Daemon brushed the ash from his coat. He'd have to report to Dorothea soon, tomorrow at the latest. There were two more stops he wanted to make before presenting himself at court.

6 / Terreille

"Honey, what've you been doing to yourself? You're nothing but skin and bones."

Surreal slumped against the reception desk, grimaced, and sucked in her breath. "Nothing, Deje. I'm just worn out."

"You been letting those men make a meal out of you?" Deje looked at her shrewdly. "Or is it your other business that's run you down?"

Surreal's gold-green eyes were dangerously blank. "What business is that, Deje?"

"I'm not a fool, honey," Deje said slowly. "I've always known you don't really like this business. But you're still the best there is."

"The best female," Surreal replied, wearily hooking her long black hair behind her pointed ears.

Deje put her hands on the counter and leaned toward Surreal, worried. "Nobody paid you to dance with . . . Well, you know how fast gossip can fly, and there was talk of some trouble."

"I wasn't part of it, thank the Darkness."

Deje sighed. "I'm glad. That one's demon-born for sure."

"If he isn't, he should be."

"You know the Sadist?" Deje asked, her eyes sharp.

"We're acquainted," Surreal said reluctantly.

Deje hesitated. "Is he as good as they say?"

Surreal shuddered. "Don't ask."

Deje looked startled but quickly regained her professional manner. "No matter. None of my business anyway." Coming around the desk, she put an arm around Surreal's shoulders and led her down the hall. "A garden room, I think. You can sit out quietly in the evening, eat your meals in your room if you choose. If anyone notices you're here and makes a request for your company, I'll tell them it's your moon time and you need your rest. Most of them wouldn't know the difference."

Surreal gave Deje a shaky grin. "Well, it's the truth."

Deje shook her head and clucked her tongue in annoyance as she opened the door and led Surreal into the room. "Sometimes you've no more sense than a first-year chit, pushing yourself at a time when the Jewels will squeeze you dry if you try to tap into them." She muttered to herself as she pulled down the bedcovers and plumped the pillows. "Get into a nice comfy nightie—not one of those sleek things—and get into bed. We've got a hearty soup tonight. You'll have that. And I've got some new novels in the library, nice fluff reading. I'll bring a few of them; you can take your pick. And—"

"Deje, you should've been someone's mother," Surreal laughed.

Deje put her hands on her ample hips and tried to look offended. "A fine thing to say to someone in my business." She made a shooing motion with her hands. "Into bed and not another word from you. Honey? Honey, what's wrong?"

Surreal sank onto the bed, tears rolling silently down her cheeks. "I can't sleep, Deje. I have dreams that I'm supposed to be somewhere, do something. But I don't know where or what it is."

Deje sat on the bed and wiped the tears from Surreal's face. "They're only dreams, honey. Yes, they are. You're just worn out."

"I'm scared, Deje," Surreal whispered. "There's something really wrong with him. I can feel it. Once I started running, hoping I was going in the opposite direction, that whole damn continent wasn't big enough. I need a clean place for a while." Surreal looked at Deje, her large eyes full of ghosts. "I need time."

Deje stroked Surreal's hair. "Sure, honey, sure. You take all the time you need. Nobody's going to push you in my house. Come on now, get into bed. I'll bring you something to eat and a little something to help you sleep." She gave Surreal a quick kiss on the forehead and hurried out of the room.

Surreal put on an old, soft nightgown and climbed into bed. It was good to be back at Deje's house, good to be back in Chaillot. Now if only the Sadist would stay away, maybe she could get some sleep.

7 / Terreille

Daemon knocked on the kitchen door.

Inside, the spright little tune someone was singing stopped.

Waiting for the door to open, Daemon looked around, pleased to see that the snug little cottage was in good re-pair. The lawn and flower beds were neatly tended. The summer crop in the vegetable garden was almost done, but

the healthy vines at one end promised a good crop of pumpkins and winter squash.

Still too early for pumpkins. Daemon sighed with regret while his mouth watered at the memory of Manny's pumpkin tarts.

At the back of the yard were two sheds. The smaller one probably contained gardening tools. The larger one was Jo's woodshop. The old man was probably tucked away in there coaxing an elegant little table out of pieces of wood, oblivious to everything except his work.

The kitchen door remained closed. The silence continued.

Concerned. Daemon opened the door enough to slip his head and shoulders inside and look around.

Manny stood by her worktable, one floury hand pressed to her bosom.

Damn. He should have realized a Warlord Prince's appearance would frighten her. He'd changed enough since he'd last seen her that she might not recognize his psychic scent.

Putting on his best smile, he said, "Darling, if you're going to pretend you're not home, the least you can do is close the windows. The smell of those nut cakes will draw the most unsavory characters."

Manny gave a cry of relief and joy, hustled around the worktable, and shuffle-ran toward the door, her floury hands waving cheerfully in front of her. "Daemon!"

Daemon stepped into the kitchen, slid one arm around the woman's thick waist, and twirled her around.

Manny laughed and flapped her arms. "Put me down. I'm getting flour all over your nice coat."

"I don't care about the coat." He kissed her cheek and set her carefully on her feet. With a bow and a flourish of his wrist, he presented her with a bouquet of flowers. "For my favorite lady."

Misty-eyed, Manny bent her head to smell the flowers. "I'll put these in some water." She bustled around the kitchen, filled a vase, and spent several minutes arranging the flowers. "You go into the parlor and I'll bring out some nut cakes and tea."

Manny and Jo had been servants in the SaDiablo court when he was growing up. Manny had taken care of him, practically raised him. And the darling was still trying.

Hiding a smile, Daemon stuffed his hands in his pockets and scuffed his gleaming black shoe against the kitchen floor. He looked at her through his long black lashes. "What'd I do?" he said in a sad, slightly pouty, little-boy voice. "What'd I do not to deserve a chair in the kitchen anymore?"

Trying to sound exasperated, Manny only laughed. "No use trying to raise you proper. Sit down, then, and behave yourself."

Daemon laughed, lighthearted and boyish, and plunked himself gracelessly into one of the kitchen chairs. Manny pulled out plates and cups. "Although why you want to stay in the kitchen is beyond me."

"The kitchen is where the food is."

"Guess there's some things boys never grow out of. Here." Manny set a glass in front of him.

Daemon looked at the glass, then looked at her.

"It's milk," she added.

"I did recognize it," he said dryly.

"Good. Then drink it." She folded her arms and tapped her foot. "No milk, no nut cakes."

"You always were a martinet," Daemon muttered. He picked up the glass, grimaced, and drank it down. He handed her the glass, giving her his best boyish smile. "Now may I have a nut cake?"

Manny laughed, shaking her head. "You're impossible." She put the kettle on for tea and began transferring the nut cakes to a platter. "What brings you here?"

"I came to see you." Daemon crossed his legs and steepled his fingers, resting them lightly on his chin.

She glanced up, gasped, and then busily rearranged the cakes.

Puzzled by the stunned look on her face, Daemon watched her rearrange everything twice. Searching for a neutral topic, he said, "The place looks good. Keeping it up isn't too much work for you?"

"The young people in the village help out," Manny said mildly.

Daemon frowned. "Aren't there sufficient funds for a handyman and cleaning woman?"

"Sure there are, but why would I want some other grown woman clumping about my house, telling me how to polish my furniture?" She grinned slyly. "Besides, the girls are willing to help with the heavy work in exchange for pocket money, a few of my special recipes, and a chance to flirt with the boys without their parents standing around watching them. And the boys are willing to help with the outside work in exchange for pocket money, food, and an excuse to strip off their shirts and show their muscles to the girls."

Daemon's laughter filled the kitchen. "Manny, you've become the village matchmaker."

Manny smiled smugly. "Jo's working on a cradle right now for one of the young couples."

"I hope there was a wedding beforehand."

"Of course." Manny said indignantly. She thumped the platter of nut cakes in front of him. "Shame on you, teasing an old woman."

"Do I still get nut cakes?" he asked contritely.

She ruffled his hair in answer and took the kettle off the stove.

Daemon stared into space. So many questions, and no answers.

"You're troubled," Manny said, filling the tea ball.

Daemon shook himself. "I'm looking for information that may be hard to find. A friend told me to beware of the Priest."

Manny slipped the tea ball into the pot to steep. "Huh. Anyone with a lick of sense takes care around the Priest."

Daemon stared at her. She knew the Priest. Were the answers really this close? "Manny, sit down for a moment."

Manny ignored him and hurriedly slid the cups onto the table, keeping out of his reach. "The tea's ready now. I'll call Jo—"

"Who is the Priest?"

"—he'll be glad to see you."

Daemon uncoiled from the chair, clamped one hand around her wrist, and pulled her into the other chair. Manny stared at his hand, at the ring finger that wore no Jeweled ring, at the long, black-tinted nails.

"Who is the Priest?"

"You mustn't talk about him. You must never talk about him."

"Who is the Priest?" His voice became dangerously soft.

"The tea," she said weakly.

Daemon poured two cups of tea. Returning to the table, he crossed his legs and steepled his fingers. "Now."

Manny lifted the cup to her lips but found the tea too hot to drink. She set the cup down again, fussing with its handle until it was exactly parallel to the edge of the table. Finally she dropped her hands in her lap and sighed.

"They never should have taken you away from him," she said quietly, looking at memories. "They never should have broken the contract. The Hourglass coven in Hayll has been failing since then, just like he said it would. No one breaks a contract with the Priest and survives.

"You were supposed to go to him for good that day, the day you got your Birthright Jewel. You were so proud that he was going to be there, even though the Birthright Ceremony was in the afternoon instead of evening like it usually is. They planned it that way, planned to make him come in the harshest light of day, when his strength would be at its lowest.

"After you had your Birthright Red Jewel and were standing with your mother and Dorothea and all of Dorothea's escorts, waiting for the okay to walk out of the ceremonial circle to where he was waiting and kneel to him in service . . . that's when that woman, that cruel, scheming woman said you belonged to the Hourglass, that paternity was denied, that he couldn't have sired you, that she'd had her guards service the Dhemlan witch afterward to ensure she was seeded. It was a warm afternoon, but it got so cold, so awfully cold. Dorothea had all the Hourglass covens there, dozens and dozens of Black Widows, watching him, waiting for him to walk into the circle and break honor with them.

"But he didn't. He turned away.

"You almost broke free. Almost reached him. You were crying, screaming for him to wait for you, fighting the two guards who were holding your arms, your fingers clenched around that Jewel. There was a flash of Red light, and the guards were flung backward. You hurled yourself forward, trying to reach the edge of the circle. He turned, waiting. One of the guards tackled you. You were only a hand span away from the edge. I think if so much as a finger had crossed that circle, he would have swept you away with him, wouldn't have worried anymore if it was good for you to live with him, or to live without your people.

"You didn't make it. You were too young, and they were too strong.

"So he left. Went to that house you keep visiting, the house you and your mother lived in, and destroyed the study. Tore the books apart, shredded the curtains, broke every piece of furniture in the room. He couldn't get the rage out. When I finally dared open the door, he was kneeling in the middle of the room, his chest heaving, trying to get some air, a crazy look in his eyes.

"He finally got up and made me promise to look after you and your mother, to do the best I could. And I promised because I cared about you and her, and because he'd always been kind to me and Jo.

"After that, he disappeared. They took your Red Jewel and put the Ring of Obedience on you that night. You wouldn't eat. They told me I had to make you eat. They had plans for you and you weren't going to waste away. They locked Jo up in a metal box, put him out where there wasn't any shade and said he'd get food and water when I got you to eat. When I got you to eat two days in a row, they'd let him out.

"For three days you wouldn't eat, no matter how I begged. I don't think you heard me at all during those days. I was desperate. At night, when I'd go out and stand as close to the box as I was allowed, I'd hear Jo whimpering, his skin all blistered from touching that hot metal. So I did something bad to you. I dragged you out one morning and made you look at that box. I told you you were killing my man out of spite, that he was being punished because you were a bad boy and wouldn't eat, and if he died I would hate you forever and ever.

"I didn't know Dorothea had run your mother off. I didn't know I was all you had left. But you knew. You felt her go.

"You did what I said. You ate when I told you, slept when I told you. You were more a ghost than a child. But they let Jo out."

Manny wiped the tears from her face with the edge of her apron. She took a sip of cold tea.

Daemon closed his eyes. Before coming here, he'd gone to that crumbling, abandoned house he'd once lived in, searching for answers as he did every time he was in this part of the Realm. Memories, so elusive and traitorous, always teased him when he walked through the rooms. But it was the wrecked study that really drew him back, the room where he could almost hear a deep, powerful voice like soft thunder, where he could almost smell a sharp, spicy, masculine scent, where he could almost feel strong arms around him, where he could almost believe he had once been safe, protected, and loved.

And now he finally knew why.

Daemon slipped his hand over Manny's and squeezed gently. "You've told me this much, tell me the rest."

Manny shook her head. "They did something so you would forget him. They said if you ever found out about him, they'd kill you." She looked at him, pleading. "I couldn't let them kill you. You were the boy Jo and I couldn't have."

A door in his mind that he'd never known existed began to open.

"I'm not a boy anymore, Manny," Daemon said quietly, "and I won't be killed that easily." He made another pot of tea, put a fresh cup in front of her, and settled back in his chair. "What was ... is his name?"

"He has many names," Manny whispered, staring at her cup.

"Manny." Daemon fought for patience.

"They call him the Seducer. The Executioner."

He shook his head, still not understanding. But the door opened a little wider.

"He's the High Priest of the Hourglass."

A little wider.

"You're stalling," Daemon snapped, clattering the cup against the saucer. "What's my father's name? You owe me that. You know what it's been like for me being a bastard. Did he ever sign the register?"

"Oh, yes," she said hurriedly. "But they changed that page. He was so proud of you and the Eyrien boy. He didn't know, you know, about the girl being Eyrien. Luthvian, that was her name. She didn't have wings or scars where wings were removed. He didn't know until the boy was born. She wanted to cut the wings off, raise the boy as Dhemlan maybe. But he said no, in his soul the boy was Eyrien, and it would be kinder to kill him in the cradle than to cut his wings. She cried at that, scared that he really would kill the babe. I think he would have if she'd ever done anything that might have damaged the wings. He built her a snug little cottage in Askavi, took care of her and the boy. He would bring him to visit sometimes. You'd play together ... or fight together. It was hard to tell which. Then she got scared. She told me Prythian, Askavi's High Priestess, told her he only wanted the boy for fodder, wanted a supply of fresh blood to sup on. So she gave the boy to Prythian to hide, and ran away. When she went back for him, Prythian wouldn't tell her where he was, just laughed at her, and—"

"Manny," Daemon said in a soft, cold voice. "For the last time, who is my father?"

"The Prince of the Darkness."

A little wider.

"Manny."

"The Priest is the High Lord, don't you understand?" Manny cried.

"His name."

"No."

"His name, Manny."

"To whisper the name is to summon the man."

The door blew open and the memories poured out.

Daemon stared at his hands, stared at the long, black-tinted nails.

Mother Night.

He swallowed hard and shook his head. It wasn't possible. As much as he would like to believe it, it wasn't possible. "Saetan," he said quietly. "You're telling me my father is Saetan?"

"Hush, Daemon, hush."

Daemon leaped up, knocking the chair over. "No, I will not hush. He's dead, Manny. A legend. An ancestor far removed."

"Your father."

"He's dead."

Manny licked her lips and closed her eyes. "One of the living dead. One of the ones called Guardians."

Daemon righted the chair and sat down. He felt ill. No wonder Dorothea used to beat him when he would nurse the hurt of being excluded by pretending that Saetan was his father. It hadn't been pretend after all. "Are you sure?" he asked finally.

"I'm sure."

Daemon laughed harshly. "You're mistaken, Manny. You must be. I can't imagine the High Lord of Hell bedding that bitch Hepsabah."

Manny squirmed.

Memories kept pouring over him, puzzle pieces floating into place.

"Not Hepsabah," he said slowly, feeling crushed by the magnitude of the lies that had made up his life. No, not Hepsabah. A Dhemlan witch . . . who'd been driven out of the court. "Tersa." He braced his head in his hands. "Who else could it be but Tersa."

Manny reached toward him but didn't touch him. "Now you know."

Daemon's hands shook as he lit a black cigarette. He watched the smoke curl and rise, too weary to do anything else. "Now I know." He closed his eyes and whispered, "My best ally or my worst enemy. And the choice will be mine. Sweet Darkness, why did it have to be him?"

"Daemon?"

He shook his head and tried to smile reassuringly.

He spent another hour with Manny and Jo, who had finally come in from the woodshop. He entertained them with slightly risquй stories about the Blood aristos he'd served in various courts and told them nothing about his life. It would hurt him beyond healing if Manny ever thought of him as Hayll's Whore.

When he finally left, he walked for hours. He couldn't stop shaking. The pain of a lifetime of lies grew with each step until his rage threatened to tear apart what was left of his self-restraint.

It was dawn when he caught the Red Wind and rode to Draega.

For the first time in his life, he wanted to see Dorothea.

chapter five

1 / Terreille

As Kartane SaDiablo walked from his suite to the audience rooms, he wondered if he'd fortified himself with one glass of brandy too many before appearing before his mother and making a formal return to her court. If not, the whole damn court was acting queer. The Blood aristos scurried through the halls, eyes darting ahead and behind them as they traveled in tight little clusters. The males in the court usually acted like that, jostling and shoving until one of them was pushed to the front and offered as the sacrifice. Being the object of Dorothea's attention, whether she was pleased with a man or angry, was always an unpleasant experience. But for the women to act that way as well . . .

When he saw a servant actually smile, he finally understood.

By then it was too late.

He felt the cold as he swung around a corner and skidded to a stop in front of Daemon. He'd stopped trying long ago to understand his feelings whenever he saw Daemon—relief, fear, anger, envy, shame. Now he simply wondered if Daemon was finally going to kill him.

Kartane retreated to the one emotional gambit he had left. He pulled his lips into a sneering smile and said, "Hello, cousin."

"Kartane." Daemon's toneless court voice, laced with boredom.

"So you've been called back to court. Was Aunt Hepsabah getting lonely?" That's it. Remind him of what he is.

"Was Dorothea?"

Kartane tried to keep the insolence in his voice, tried to keep the sneer, tried not to remember all the things he couldn't forget.

"I was about to report to Dorothea," Daemon said mildly, "but I can delay it for a few more minutes. If you have to see her, why don't you go ahead. She's never in the best of moods after she's seen me."

Kartane felt as if he'd been slapped. Daemon hated him, had hated him for centuries for what he'd said, for the things he'd done. But Daemon remembered, too, and because he remembered, he would still extend this much courtesy and compassion toward his younger cousin.

Not daring to speak, Kartane nodded and hurried down the hall.

He didn't go directly to the audience room where Dorothea waited. Instead, he flung himself into the first empty room he could find. Leaning against the locked door, he felt tears burn his eyes and trickle down his cheeks as he whispered, "Daemon."

Daemon was the cousin whose position within the family had never quite been explained to the child Kartane except that it was tenuous and different from his own. Kartane had been Dorothea's spoiled, privileged only child, with a handful of servants, tutors, and governesses jumping to obey his slightest whim. He had also been just another jewel for his mother, property that she preened herself with, showed off, displayed.

It wasn't Dorothea or the tutors or governesses that Kartane ran to as a child when he scraped his knee and wanted comforting, or felt lonely, or wanted to brag about his latest small adventure. Not to them. He had always run to Daemon.

Daemon, who always had time to talk and, more important, to listen. Daemon, who taught him to ride, to fence, to swim, to dance. Daemon, who patiently read the same book to him, over and over and over, because it was his favorite. Daemon, who took long, rambling walks with him. Daemon, who never once showed any displeasure at having a small boy attached to his heels. Daemon, who held him, rocked him, soothed him when he cried. Daemon, who plundered the kitchen late at night, even though it was forbidden, to bring Kartane fruit, rolls, cold joints of meat—anything to appease the insatiable hunger he always felt because he could never eat his fill under his mother's watchful eye. Daemon, who had been caught one night and beaten for it, but never told anyone the food wasn't for himself.

Daemon, whose trust he had betrayed, whose love he lost with a single word.

Kartane was still a gangly boy when Daemon was first contracted out to another court. It had hurt to lose the one person in the whole court who truly cared about him as a living, thinking being. But he also knew there was trouble in the court, trouble that swirled around Daemon, around Daemon's position in the court hierarchy. He knew Daemon served Dorothea and Hepsabah and Dorothea's coven of Black Widows, although not in the same way the consorts and other men serviced them when summoned. He knew about the Ring of Obedience and how it could control a man even if he were stronger and wore darker Jewels. He puzzled over Daemon's aversion to being touched by a woman. He puzzled over the fights between Daemon and Dorothea, shouting matches that made stonewalls seem paper-thin and grew more and more vicious. More often than not, those arguments ended with Dorothea using the Ring, punishing with agonizing pain until Daemon begged for forgiveness.

Then one day Daemon refused to service one of Dorothea's coven.

Dorothea summoned the First, Second, and Third Circles of the court. With her husband, Lanzo SaDiablo, by her side—Lanzo, the drunken womanizer whose only value was in providing Dorothea with the SaDiablo name—began the punishment.

Kartane had hidden behind a curtain, chilled with fear, as he watched Daemon fight the Ring, fight the pain, fight the guards who held him so he couldn't attack Dorothea. It took an hour of agony to bring him to his knees, sobbing from the pain. It took another half hour to make him crawl to Dorothea and beg forgiveness. When she finally stopped sending pain through the Ring, Dorothea didn't allow him to go to his room, where Manny would give him a sedative and wash his sweat-chilled body so he could sleep while the pain slowly subsided. Instead, she had him tied hand and foot to one of the pillars, had him gagged so his moans of pain would be muffled, and left him there to humiliate him and warn others by the example while she leisurely conducted the other business of the court.

The lesson was not lost on Kartane. To be Ringed was the severest form of control. If Daemon couldn't stand the pain, how could he? It became very important not to give Dorothea a reason to Ring him.

That night, after Daemon had been allowed to rest a little, he was ordered to serve the witch he'd earlier refused.

That night was the first time Daemon went cold.

Among the Blood, there were two kinds of anger. Hot anger was the anger of emotion, superficial even in its fury—the anger between friends, lovers, family, the anger of everyday life. Cold anger was the Jewel's anger—deep, untouchable, icy rage that began at a person's core. Implacable, almost always unstoppable until the fury was spent, cold anger wasn't blunted by pain or hunger or weariness. Rising from so deep within, it made the body that housed it insignificant.

That first night, no one recognized the subtle change in the air when Daemon walked by on his way to the witch's chamber.

It wasn't until the maid came in the next morning and found the windows and mirrors glazed with ice, discovered the obscenity left in the bed, that Dorothea realized she had broken something in Daemon during that punishment, had stripped away a layer of humanity.

Hekatah, the self-proclaimed High Priestess of Hell, would have recognized the look in Daemon's eyes if she had seen it, would have understood how true the bloodline ran. It took Dorothea a little longer. When she finally understood that what Daemon had inherited from his father was far darker and far more dangerous than she'd imagined, she gifted him to a pet Queen who ruled a Province in southern Hayll.

Dorothea said nothing about the killing. Among the Blood, there was no law against murder. She said little about Daemon's reaction to kneeling in service, commending his training as a pleasure slave and only adding that he could be somewhat temperamental if used too often.

Before the week ended, Daemon was gone.

Not long after, Kartane learned what Daemon's presence had spared him. Dorothea's appetite for a variety of pretty faces was no less demanding than Lanzo's, the only difference in their taste being gender, and she kept a stable of young Warlords at the court to do the pretty for her and her coven. Until then, Kartane had been nothing more than Dorothea's handsome, spoiled son.

One night she summoned Kartane to her chamber. He went to her nervously, mentally ticking off the things he'd done that day and wondering what might have displeased her. But she soothed and stroked and petted. Those caresses, which always made him uneasy, now frightened him. As she leaned toward him, she told him his father had been loyal to her and she expected him to be loyal too. Kartane was too busy trying to figure out how Lanzo's spearing a different serving girl every night could be considered loyalty to recognize the intent. It wasn't until he felt Dorothea's tongue slide into his mouth that he understood. He pushed her away, threw himself off the couch, and crawled backward toward the door, not daring to take his eyes off her.

She was furious with his refusal. It earned him his first beating.

The welts were still sore when she summoned him again. This time he sat quietly as she stroked his arms and thighs and explained in her purring voice that a Ring could help him be more responsive. But she didn't really think that would be necessary. Did he?

No, he didn't think it would be necessary. He submitted. He did what he was told.

Lying in his own bed later that night, Kartane thought of Daemon, of how night after night, year after year Daemon had done what Kartane had been forced to do. He began to understand Daemon's aversion to touching a female unless he was forced to. And he wondered how old Daemon had been the first time Dorothea had taken him into her bed.

It didn't end with that first time. It didn't end until years later when Dorothea sent him away to a private school because he was spearing the serving girls so viciously that Lanzo and his companions complained that the girls weren't usable for days afterward.

The private school he attended, where the boys all came from the best Hayllian families, put the final polish on Kartane's taste for cruelty. He found Red Moon houses disgusting and could satisfy himself with an experienced woman only if he hurt her. After being barred from a couple of houses, he discovered that it was easy to dominate younger girls, frighten them, make them do whatever he wanted.

He began to appreciate Dorothea's pleasure in having power over someone else.

But even the youngest whore was still a witch with her Virgin Night behind her, and she was protected by the rules of the house. He didn't have, as his mother had, absolute power over whoever he mounted.

He began to look elsewhere for his pleasure, and found, quite accidentally, what he craved.

Kartane and his friends went to an inn one night to drink, to gamble, to get the nectar free. They came from the best families, families no mere innkeeper would dare approach. The others had their sport with the young women who served ale and supper, using the small private dining room, like most inns had for important guests. But Kartane had been intrigued by the innkeeper's young daughter. She had the beginning blush of womanhood, the merest hint of curves. When he dragged her toward the door of the private room, the innkeeper rushed him, bellowing with rage. Kartane raised his hand, sent a surge of power through the Jeweled ring on his finger, and knocked the man senseless. Then he dragged the girl into the room and closed the door.

Her trembling, paralyzing fear felt delicious. She had no musky smell of woman, no psychic scent of a witch come to power. He reveled in her pain, stunned by the intoxication and pleasure it gave him to drive her beyond the web of herself and break her.

When he finally left the room, feeling in control of his life for the first time in oh-so-many years, he threw a couple of gold mark notes on the bar, gathered his friends, and disappeared.

That was the beginning.

. Dorothea never disapproved of his chosen game as long as he satisfied her whenever he returned to court and as long as he didn't spoil any of the witches she wanted for her court. For two hundred years Kartane played his game with non-aristo Blood. Sometimes he kept the same girl for several weeks or months, playing with her, honing her fear, becoming more depraved in his requirements, until he seeded her. Many times even a broken witch was still capable of spontaneous abortion and would choose it rather than bear the seed of a man she hated, even though she would never bear any other child. Sometimes, if the girl hadn't gone completely numb and was still amusing, he got a Healer corrupted by hunger and hard times to provide the cleansing brew. Most times he simply turned them out, let them return to their families or a Red Moon house or the gutter. It was all the same to him.

Kartane played his game for two hundred years. Then, on one of his required returns to court, he found Daemon waiting for him.

By then Kartane understood why Daemon was Sadi not SaDiablo, why that was as much of a compromise as the family was willing to make. But seeing the anger in Daemon's eyes, he knew that, unlike Dorothea, Daemon would never approve of what Kartane had done. As he listened to a blistering lecture about honor, Kartane struck out at Daemon's weak spot. He told Daemon that he, Kartane, the High Priestess's son, didn't have to listen to a bastard.

A bastard.

A bastard.

A bastard.

He never forgot the shock and pain in Daemon's eyes. Never forgot how it felt when the one person he'd loved and who had loved him gathered himself into that aloof court demeanor and apologized for speaking out of turn. Would always know that if he'd run after Daemon right then and apologized, begged to be forgiven, explained about the pain and the fear, asked for help ... he would have had it. Daemon would have found a way to help him.

But he didn't. He let the word stand. He drove it in again and again until the wedge became a chasm and the only thing they had in common was their fury with each other.

In the end, Dorothea sent Daemon away and lost him for one hundred years. By the time he returned, he'd made the Offering to the Darkness. The rumors were that Daemon had come away from the ceremony wearing a Black Jewel, but no one knew for sure because no one had seen it.

It didn't matter to Kartane what Jewels Daemon wore. He was frightened enough by what Daemon had become. Since then, they'd done their best to avoid each other.

Kartane wiped the tears from his face and straightened his jacket. He would see Dorothea and make his escape as quickly as possible. Escape from her, from the court . . . and from Daemon.

2 / Terreille

Daemon glided through the corridors of the SaDiablo mansion until he reached his suite of rooms. Presenting himself to Dorothea had been as unpleasant as usual, but at least it had been brief. Seeing her had frayed his temper to the breaking point, and right now his self-control was tenuous at best. He needed a quiet hour before dressing for dinner and spending the evening doing the pretty for Dorothea and her coven.

He walked into his sitting room and choked back the snarl when he noticed the visitor waiting for him.

Hepsabah turned toward him, a smile flickering on her lips, her flitting hands performing an intricate dance with each other. He loathed the hunger in her eyes and the muskiness of her psychic scent, but knowing he was required to play the game, he smiled at her and closed the door.

"Mother," he said with barely disguised irony. He bent his head to kiss her cheek. As always, she turned her head at the last minute so his lips brushed against hers. Her arms wound around his neck, her tongue greedily thrusting into his mouth as she pressed herself against him. Usually he pushed her away, disgusted that his mother could want such intimacy. Now he stood passively, neither giving nor taking, simply analyzing the lies that had made up his life.

Hepsabah stepped away from him, pouting. "You're not pleased to see me," she accused.

Daemon wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "As pleased as I usually am." There she was, dressed in an expensive silk dress while Tersa, his real mother, wore a tattered coat and slept who knew where. Despite Dorothea's and Hepsabah's efforts, Tersa had given him what love she could, in her own shattered way. Somehow he was going to make it up to her, just as he was going to repay them. "What do you want?"

"It would be nice if you could be a little more respectful to your mother." She smoothed her dress, running her hands over her breasts and belly, looking at him from beneath her eyelashes.

"I have a great deal of respect for my mother," he replied blandly.

Looking uneasy, she patted the air near his sleeve and said with brittle cheerfulness, "I've got your room all ready for you. Nice and comfy. Maybe after dinner we can sit and have a nice little coze, hmm?" She turned toward the door, swinging her hips provocatively.

Daemon's temper snapped. "You mean I should be more amenable to putting my face between your legs." He ignored her shocked gasp. "I won't be more amenable, Mother. Not tonight. Not any night. Not to you or anyone else in this court. If I'm commanded to kneel while I'm here, I promise you that what happened to Cornelia will be nothing compared to what I'll do here. If you think the Ring can stop me, you'd better think again. I'm not a boy anymore, Hepsabah, and I want you dead."

Hepsabah backed away from him, her eyes wide with terror. She snatched at the door handle and flung herself into the corridor.

Daemon opened a bottle of brandy, paused only long enough to probe it to be sure there were no sedatives or other nasty surprises added to the liquor, put the bottle to his mouth, and tipped his head back. It burned his throat and caught fire in his stomach, but he continued to swallow until he needed to breathe. The room swam a little but steadied quickly as his metabolism consumed the liquor as it consumed food. That was a drawback to wearing darker Jewels—it took a massive amount of alcohol to get pleasantly drunk. Daemon didn't want to get pleasantly drunk. He wanted to numb the anger and the memories. He couldn't afford a full confrontation with Dorothea now. He could break the Ring, and Dorothea with it. Over the past few years he'd become sure of that. What he wasn't sure of was how much damage she might do to him before he destroyed her, wasn't sure if he'd be permanently maimed by the time he got the Ring off, wasn't sure what other damage he might do to himself that might prevent him from ever wearing the Black again. And there was a Lady out there, somewhere, that he wanted to be whole for. Once he found her . . .

Daemon smiled coldly. The Priest owed him a favor, and two Black Jewels, even if one was Ringed, should be quite sufficient to take care of an arrogant Red-Jeweled High Priestess.

Laughing, Daemon went into his bedroom and dressed for dinner.

3 / Terreille

Chewing his lower lip, Kartane walked up to Daemon, who was studying a closed door. They hadn't been seated near each other at dinner last night, and Daemon had retired early—to everyone's relief—so this was the first time since their abrupt meeting yesterday afternoon that they were together without dozens of people to act as a buffer.

Kartane wasn't a small man, and even with his excesses he remained trim and well toned, but standing next to Daemon made him feel like he was still in a boy's body. It was more the breadth of Daemon's shoulders than the couple of inches in height, the face matured by pain rather than age that made Kartane feel slight next to him. It was also the difference between a long-lived youth and a male in his prime.

"Do you know what this is about?" Daemon asked quietly.

Kartane shook his head. "She just said our presence is required for an entertainment."

Daemon took a deep breath. "Damn." He opened the door, then stood aside for Kartane to enter.

Kartane took a couple of steps into the room and felt the air behind him chill as the door closed. He glanced at Daemon's face, at the narrowed eyes suddenly turned hard yellow, and wondered, as he surveyed the room, what had provoked Daemon's temper.

It was an austere room, furnished with several rows of chairs arranged in a semicircle in front of two posts attached to the floor. Beside the posts was a long table with a white cloth pulled over it. Under and around the posts was a thick pile of white sheets.

Daemon swore viciously under his breath. "At least as the privileged son you can rest easy that you won't be part of the entertainment. You'll only have to endure watching it."

Kartane stared at the posts. "I don't understand. What is it?"

Pity flashed in Daemon's eyes before his face became impassive and his voice took on that toneless, bored quality he always used in court. "You've never seen this?"

"It seems a bit overdone if she's going to have someone whipped," he said, trying to put a sneer into his voice to hide his growing fear.

"Not whipped," Daemon said bitterly. "Shaved."

The look in Daemon's eyes turned Kartane's guts to water.

Daemon didn't speak again until they reached the first row of chairs. "Listen, Kartane, and listen well. What happens to the poor fool Dorothea's going to tie between those posts is going to depend on how much you squirm. If you stay disinterested, she won't do any less than she's already planned but at least it will be done quicker, and you'll have to endure watching for less time. Understand?"

"Shaved?" Kartane said in a strangled voice.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you how they make eunuchs?" Daemon slipped his hands in his pockets and turned away.

"But. . ." Kartane tensed when Dorothea and her coven walked through the door. "Why this?" he whispered. "Why all these chairs?"

Daemon's eyes had a worried, faraway look in them. "Because they find it amusing, Lord Kartane. This is the afternoon's entertainment. And if we're both lucky, we'll only be the guests of honor."

Kartane looked quickly at Daemon and then at the posts. Dorothea wouldn't. She couldn't. Was that why Daemon warned him, because he wasn't sure if ... No. Not to Daemon. Not to Daemon.

Kartane kicked a chair before dropping into another with his arms crossed and his legs sprawled forward, looking like a sulky child. "I have better ways to spend my afternoon," he snarled.

Daemon turned, one eyebrow raised in question. Dorothea walked toward them, her eyes flashing with annoyance at Kartane's behavior.

"Well, darling," she purred, "we'll do our best to amuse you." She settled into the chair next to Kartane's, and with a gracious gesture of her hand, indicated to Daemon that he should sit on her left.

Kartane sat up straighter, but kept a sulky look on his face. He flinched as the chairs behind him filled and female voices murmured as if they were in a theater waiting for the play to begin.

Dorothea clapped her hands, and the room became silent. Two massive, raw-looking guards bowed to Dorothea and left the room. They returned a moment later leading a slightly built man.

Daemon flicked a bored glance at the man being led to the posts, leaned away from Dorothea, and propped his chin in his hand.

Dorothea hissed quietly.

Daemon straightened in his chair, crossed his legs, and steepled his fingers. "Not that it matters," he drawled, "but what did he do?"

Dorothea put her hand on his thigh. "Curious?" she purred.

Daemon shrugged, ignoring the fingers sliding up his thigh.

Dorothea removed her hand, annoyed by the bored expression on Daemon's face. "He didn't do anything. I just felt like having him shaved." She smiled maliciously, nodded to the guards, and watched with great interest as they fastened their victim spread-eagle to the posts. "He's a Warlord but a valet by profession. Comes from a family who specializes in personal service to darker-Jeweled

Blood. But after today, I doubt there'll be a male in all of Hayll who'll want him around. What do you think?"

Daemon shrugged and once more propped his chin on his hand.

When the man was securely fastened to the posts, one of the guards pulled the cloth off the table. There were appreciative murmurs from the audience as whips, nut-crushers, and various other instruments of torture were presented for view. The last things the guard picked up were the shaving knives.

Kartane felt ill and yet hopeful. If all of those things were being presented, maybe . . .

"No," Daemon said on a spear thread, male to male. "She'Il shave him."

"You don't know for sure."

"You can't have the entertainment end too quickly."

Kartane swallowed hard. "You don't know for sure."

"You'll see."

Dorothea raised one hand. The guard went to the far end of the table and raised the first whip. "What shall it be today, Sisters?" Dorothea called out gaily. "Shall we whip him?"

"Yes, yes, yes," a number of female voices yelled.

"Or ..."

There was applause and laughter as the guard, looking more nervous, raised the nutcrusher for their viewing.

"Or . . ." Dorothea pointed, and the guard lifted the shaving knives.

Kartane studied the floor, trying not to shake, trying not to bolt for the door. He knew he wouldn't be allowed to leave, and he wondered with a touch of bitterness how Daemon could sit there looking so bored. Maybe because Sadi didn't have any use for those organs anyway.

"Shave him, shave him, shave him!" The room thundered with the coven's voices.

Kartane had been to dogfights, cockfights, any number of spectacles where dumb animals were pitted against each other. He'd heard the roar of male voices urging their favorite to victory. But he'd never heard, in all those places, the glee he heard now as the coven urged their decision.

He jumped when Dorothea's hand squeezed his knee, her cold smile letting him know she was pleased by his fear.

Dorothea raised her hand for silence. When the room was absolutely still, she said in her most melodious purr, "Shave him." She paused a long moment, then smiled sweetly. "A full shave."

Kartane's head snapped around in disbelief, but before he could say anything, Daemon turned his head just enough to look at him. The look in Daemon's eyes was more frightening than Dorothea could ever be, so Kartane swallowed the words and slumped a little farther in his chair.

The Healer and the barber entered the room and walked slowly to the table. The barber, a cadaverous man wearing a tightly cuffed black robe, had a receding hairline, pencil-line lips, and dirty yellow eyes. He bowed to Dorothea and then bowed to the coven.

The Healer, a drab woman retained to handle the servants' ills since she wasn't well versed enough in her Craft to attend to the Blood aristos, called in a bowl of warm water and soap. She held the bowl while the barber washed his hands.

Then the barber leisurely soaped his victim's testicles.

"Why?" Kartane sent on a spear thread.

"Makes them slippery," Daemon replied. "Harder to get a clean cut the first time."

The barber picked up a small curved knife and held it up for them to see. He positioned himself behind the man.

"So everyone can see," Daemon explained.

Kartane clenched his fists and stared at the floor.

"Watch, my dear," Dorothea purred, "or we'll have to do it again."

Kartane fixed his eyes on one of the posts just as the barber pulled the knife back. A moment later, a small dark lump lay on the swiftly reddening sheets.

The Warlord tied to the posts let out a howl of agony and then clenched his teeth to stifle the sound.

Kartane's stomach churned as a disappointed murmur swept through the room. Mother Night! They'd been hoping for a second cut!

The barber set the bloody knife on a tray and washed his hands while the Healer sealed the blood vessels. When she stepped aside, he took a straight knife and positioned himself in front of a post. He pulled the man's organ to its full length, turned to his audience, shook his head sadly, and said, "There's so little here, it will hardly make a difference."

The coven laughed and applauded. Dorothea smiled.

Kartane expected a swift severing. But when the barber laid the knife on the Warlord's organ and leisurely sawed through the flesh, each stroke of the knife accompanied by a scream, Kartane found himself mesmerized, unable to look away.

They deserved what he did. They were foul things only fit for breeding and a man's pleasure. It was right to break them young, good to break them young before they became things like the ones sitting here. Break them all. Destroy them all. Blood males should rule, must rule. If only he could kill her. Would Daemon help him rid Hayll of that plague carrier? All of them would have to be killed, of course. Then break all the young ones and train them to serve. It was the only way. The only way.

The silence made him blink.

Dorothea rose from her chair, furiously pointing a finger at the Healer. "I told you to give him something to make sure he wouldn't faint on us. Look at him!" Her finger swung to the man hanging limply from the posts, his head dropped to his chest.

"I did as you asked, Priestess," the Healer stammered, wringing her hands. "I swear by the Jewels I did."

Was it his imagination, or was Daemon pleased about something?

"We'll have no more sport today because of your incompetence," Dorothea screamed. She made an impatient gesture. "Take it away." Then she swept from the room, her coven trailing behind her.

"I really did give him the potion," the Healer wailed, trailing after the barber as he left the room.

Kartane sat in his chair, too numb to move, until the guards bundled the man into the bloody sheets along with the discarded organs. Then he bolted for the nearest bathroom and was violently ill.

4 / Terreille

Dorothea slowly paced her sitting room. Her flowing gown swished with the sway of her hips, and the low-cut bodice displayed to advantage the small breasts that still rode high.

She picked up a feather quill from a table as she passed. Most men's backbones turned to jelly when she picked up a quill. Daemon, however, just watched her, his cold, bored expression never changing.

She brushed her chin with the quill as she passed his chair. "You've been a naughty boy again. Perhaps I should have you whipped."

"Yes," Daemon replied amiably, "why don't you? Cornelia could tell you how effective that is in making me come around."

Dorothea staggered but continued walking. "Perhaps I should have you shaved." She waved the feather at him. "Would you enjoy being one of the brotherhood of the quill?"

"No."

She feigned surprise. "No?"

"No. I prefer being neat when I piss."

Dorothea's face twisted with anger. "You've gotten crude, Daemon."

"Must be the company I keep."

Dorothea paced rapidly, slowly down only when she noticed the cold amusement in Daemon's eyes. Damn him, she thought as she tapped the quill against her lips. He knew how much he upset her, and he enjoyed it. She didn't trust him, couldn't trust being able to control him anymore. Even the Ring didn't stop him when he went cold. And he just sat there, so sure of himself, so uncaring.

"Perhaps I should have you shaved." Her usual purr turned into a growl. She twitched the quill in the direction of his groin. "After all, it's not as if you have any use for it."

"Hardly good for business, though," Daemon said calmly. "The Queens won't pay you for my service if there's nothing to buy."

"A worthless piece of meat since you can't use it anyway!"

"Ah, but they do so enjoy looking at it."

Dorothea threw the feather down and stamped on it. "Bastard!"

"So you've told me time and time again." Daemon waved one hand in irritation. "Enough theatrics. You won't shave me, now or ever."

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't!"

In one fluid move Daemon was out of the chair, pinning her against the table. His hands tightened on her upper arms, hurting her, while his mouth clamped down on hers, bruising her lips with his teeth. He thrust his tongue into her mouth with such controlled savagery that she couldn't think of anything but the feel of him and the sudden liquid heat between her legs.

It was always like this with him. Always. It was more than just his body. Not quite the Jewels, not quite a link. She could never touch his thoughts or feelings, never reach him. Yet there was such a sense of savage, controlled power, of maleness, that flowed from him, swirled around him. His hands, his tongue . . . just channels for that flow. Sensory conductors.

When she thought she couldn't stand any more, when she thought she had to push him away or drown in the sensation, he thrust his hips forward and swayed against her. Moaning, Dorothea pushed herself against him, wanting to feel him harden, needing him to want her.

Just as she raised her arms to wrap them around his neck, Daemon stepped back, smiling, his golden eyes hot with anger, not desire.

"That's why you won't shave me, Dorothea." His silky voice roughened with disgust. "There's always a chance, isn't there, that someday I'll catch fire, that the hunger will become unbearable and I'll come crawling to you for whatever release you'll grant me."

"I'd never let you go hungry," Dorothea cried, one hand reaching for him. "By the Jewels, I swear—" Shaking with anger, Dorothea forced herself to stand up straight. Once again she'd humiliated herself by begging him.

Daemon smiled that cold, cruel smile he wore whenever he had twisted the love game to hurt the woman he was serving. It's so easy, his smile said. You're all so foolish. You can punish the body all you want, all you dare, but you can never touch me.

"Bastard," Dorothea whispered.

"You could always kill me," Daemon said softly. "That would solve both our problems, wouldn't it?" He took a step toward her. She immediately pushed back against the table, frightened. "Why don't you want me dead, Dorothea? What will happen on the day when I no longer walk among the living?"

"Get out," she snapped, trying not to sound as weak as she suddenly felt. Why was he saying this? What did he know? She had to get him away from Hayll, away from that place, and quickly. Furious, she threw herself at him, but he glided away, and she fell heavily to the floor. "Get out!" she screamed, beating the floor with her fists.

Daemon left the room, whistling a tuneless little song. As a butterball Warlord puffed his way down the hall toward Dorothea's room, Daemon turned halfway to face him. "I wouldn't go in there until she's a little calmer," he said cheerfully. Then he winked at the startled man and continued down the hall, laughing.

"Damn your soul to the bowels of Hell, hurry up with that!" Kartane screamed at the manservant assigned to him when he was at court. He threw his shirts into one trunk and fastened the straps.

When the trunks were packed, Kartane's eyes swept the room for anything he might have missed,

"Lord Kartane," the manservant panted.

"I'll take care of this. You're dismissed. Get out. Get out!"

The manservant scurried out of the room.

Kartane wrapped his arms around the bedpost. He desperately wanted to rest, but every time he closed his eyes, he saw the bloody sheets, heard the screams.

Away from here. And quickly. Before Dorothea summoned him, before he was trapped. Someplace where the witches were already being silenced. A place that stood in Hayll's shadow, where they would fawn over the Priestess's son, but not yet completely tainted with the ancient land's decay. Not quite virgin territory, but still a maid learning Hayll's desecrations.

"Chaillot," Kartane whispered, and he smiled. The other side of the Realm. Hayll had an embassy there, so no one would question his appearance. Robert Benedict was an astute protege. And there was that wonderful place he'd helped them build in Beldon Mor, that "hospital" for young, high-strung girls from aristo Blood families, where men like Lord Benedict could partake of delicacies that no respectable Red Moon house would offer. It could take weeks for Dorothea to track him down, particularly if he impressed on the embassy staff that he was there doing research for the Priestess. They'd be too frightened of what he might say about them to report his presence.

Kartane vanished the trunks and slipped from his room to the landing web. He caught the Red Web and rode hard toward the west, toward Chaillot.

5 /Hell

Hekatah flowed into the parlor, the spider silk gown swirling around her small body, the diamonds sewn into the high neckline glittering like stars against a blood-red sky. She'd dressed with care for this well-thought-out "chance" meeting. Despite the plebeian gallantry that made him courteous to any woman, whether she was pretty or not, Saetan did appreciate a woman who displayed herself to advantage, and even past her prime, Hekatah had never wanted for men.

But he, gutter-child bastard that he was, glanced at her over the half-moon glasses he'd begun wearing, marked the page in his book, and vanished the glasses before, finally, giving her his full attention.

"Hekatah," he said with pleasant wariness.

Biting back her fury, she strolled around the room. "It's wonderful to see the Hall refurbished," she said, her girlish voice full of the cooing warmth that had once made him cautiously open to her.

"It was time to have it done."

"Any special reason?"

"I thought of giving a demon ball," he replied dryly.

She tipped her chin down and looked up at him through her lashes, not realizing it was a parody of the sulky, sensuous young witch she'd been long centuries ago. "You didn't redo the south tower."

"There was no need. It's been emptied and cleaned. That's all."

"But the south tower has always been my apartment," she protested.

"As I said, there was no need."

She stared at the sheer ivory curtains beneath the tied-back red velvet drapes. "Well," she said, as if giving the matter slow consideration, "I suppose I could take a room in your wing."

"No."

"But, Saetan—"

"My dear, you've forgotten. You've never had an apartment in the Hall in this Realm. You haven't lived in any house I own since I divorced you, and you never will again."

Hekatah knelt beside his chair, pleased by the way the gown pooled around her, one shimmering wing of her sleeve draped across his legs. "I know we've had our differences in the past, but, Saetan, you need a woman here now." She could have shouted with triumph as his eyebrow rose in question and a definite spark of interest showed in his eyes.

He raised one hand and stroked her still-black hair, flowing long and loose down her back. "Why do I need a woman now, Hekatah?" he asked in a gentle, husky voice.

His lover's voice. The voice that always enraged her because it sounded so caring and weak. Not a man's voice. Not her father's voice. Her father would never have coaxed. He would never have allowed her to refuse him. But he had been a Hayllian Prince, one of the Hundred Families, as proud and arrogant as any Blood male, and not this . . .

Hekatah lowered her eyes, hoping Saetan hadn't seen, again, what she thought of him. All that power. They could have ruled all of Terreille, and Kaeleer too, if he'd been the least bit ambitious. Even if he'd been too lazy, she could have done it. Who would have dared challenge her with the Black backing her? He wouldn't even do that. Wouldn't even support her in Dhemlan, his own Territory. Kept her leashed to Hayll, where her family had enough influence to make her the High Priestess. All that power wasted in a thing that had to give himself a name because his sire didn't think the seed fit enough to claim. But Terreille would be hers yet, even if she had to use a weak little puppet like Dorothea to get it.

"Why do I need a woman now?" Saetan's voice, less gentle now, called her back.

"For the child, of course," she replied, turning her head to press a kiss into his palm.

"The child?" Saetan lifted his hand and steepled his fingers. "One of our sons has been demon-dead for 50,000 years, and you, my dear, probably know better than anyone where the other one lies."

Hekatah drew in her breath with a hiss and exhaled with a smile. "The girl child, High Lord. Your little pet."

"I have no pets, Priestess."

Hekatah hid her clenched fists in her lap. "Everyone knows you're training a girl child to serve you. All I'm trying to point out is she needs a woman's guidance in order to fulfill your needs."

"What needs are those?"

Hekatah smacked the arm of the chair. "Don't play word games with me. If the girl has any talent, she should be trained in the Craft by her Sisters. What you do with her afterward is your concern, but at least let me train her so she won't be an embarrassment."

Saetan eased out of the chair, went to the long windows, and pulled the sheer curtains aside for a clear view of Hell's ever-twilight landscape. "This doesn't concern you, Hekatah," he said slowly, his voice whispering thunder. "It's true I've accepted a contract to tutor a young witch. I'm bored. It amuses me. If she's an embarrassment to someone, it's no concern of mine." He turned from the window to look at her. "And no concern of yours. Leave it that way. Because if you persist in making her your concern, a great many things I've overlooked in the past are going to become mine."

Saetan dropped the edge of the curtain, flicked the folds back into place, and left the room.

Using the chair for support, Hekatah got to her feet, drifted to the windows, and studied the sheer curtains. She reached up slowly.

Selfish bastard. There were ways around him. Did he think after all this time she didn't know his weak spot? It had been such good sport to watch him squirm, the great High Lord chained by his honor, as those two sons she'd helped Dorothea create were battered year after year, century after century. They hate you now, High Lord. What bastard doesn't hate the sire who won't claim him?

The half-breed had been a bonus. Who could have anticipated Saetan having so much fire and need left? Fine, strapping boys, and neither one capable of being a man. At least the half-breed could get it up, which was a great deal more than anyone could say for the other.

With her help, Dorothea had gotten the strong, dark SaDiablo bloodline returned to Hayll. Waiting until Daemon's Birthright Ceremony to break the contract with Saetan had been a risk, but that was the time when paternity was formally acknowledged or denied. Up to that point, a male could claim a child as his, could do everything a father might do for his offspring. But until he was formally acknowledged, he had no rights to the child. Once the acknowledgment was made, however, a male child belonged to his father.

Which had been the problem. They had wanted the bloodline, but not the man. Having watched him raise two sons, Hekatah had known from the beginning that any child who grew up under Saetan's hand could never be reshaped into a male who would give his strength for her ambitions. She had thought that, since he visited each boy for only a few hours a week, his influence would be diluted, that the mark he would leave on them wouldn't begin until they were his and he began their training in earnest.

She'd been wrong. Saetan had already planted his code of honor deep in the boys' minds, and by the time she had realized that, it was too late to lead them down another path. Without knowing why, they had fought against anything that didn't fit that code of honor until the fighting, and the pain and the punishment, had shaped them, too.

And now there was this girl child.

Five years ago, she'd sensed a strange, dark power on the cildru dyathe's island. Ever since then, she'd been following whispered snippets of talk, leads that faded to nothing. The tangled webs she'd created had only shown her dark power in a female body, the kind of power that, if it were molded and channeled the right way, could easily control a Realm.

It had taken five years to discover that Saetan was training the child, which infuriated her. That girl should have been hers from the start, should have been an emotionally dependent tool that would have fulfilled all of her dreams and ambitions. With that kind of power at her disposal, nothing—and no one—could have stopped her.

But, again, she was too late.

If Saetan had been willing to share the girl, she might have reconsidered. Since he wasn't willing, and she wasn't going to let that child mature to become a threat to her plans, she was going to use the most brutal weapon she had at her disposal: Daemon Sadi.

He would have no love for his father. He could be offered ten years of controlled freedom—still held by the Ring, of course, but not required to serve in a court. Ten years—no, a hundred—not to kneel for any witch. What would eliminating one child be, a stranger fawned over by the very man who had abandoned him, compared with not having to serve? And if the half-breed were thrown in for good measure? Sadi had the strength to defy even the High Lord. He had the cunning and the cruelty to ensnare a child and destroy her. But how to get him close enough for an easy strike? She'd have to think about that. Somewhere to the far west of Hayll. She had tracked the girl as far as that, and then nothing ... except that strange, impenetrable mist on that island.

Oh, how Saetan would twist, screaming, on the hook of his honor when Sadi destroyed his little pet.

Hekatah lowered her arms and smiled at the curtains hanging in shreds from the rod. She made a moue as she pulled a bit of fabric from a snag in one of her nails and hurried out of the parlor, eager to get away from the Hall and begin her little plan.

Saetan Black-locked his sitting room door before going to the corner table that held glasses and a decanter of yarbarah. A mocking smile twisted his lips when he noticed how badly his hands shook. Ignoring the yarbarah, he pulled a bottle of brandy out of the cupboard below, filled a glass, and drank deep, gasping at the unfamiliar burn. It had been centuries since he'd drunk straight alcohol. He settled into a chair, the brandy glass cradled in his trembling hands.

Hekatah would be elated if she knew how badly she'd frightened him. If Jaenelle became twisted by Hekatah's ambition and greedy hunger to crush and rule . . . No, not Jaenelle. She must be gently, lightly chained to the Blood, must accept the leash of Protocol and Blood Law, the only things that kept them all from being constantly at each others' throats. Because soon, too soon, she would begin walking roads none of them had ever walked before, and she would become as far removed from the Blood as they were from the landens. And the power. Mother Night! Who could stop her?

Who would stop her?

Saetan refilled his glass and closed his eyes. He couldn't deny what his heart knew too well. He would serve his fair-haired Lady. No matter what, he would serve.

When he had ruled Dhemlan in Kaeleer and Dhemlan in Terreille, he had never hesitated to curb Hekatah's ambition. He'd believed then, and still believed, that it was wrong to use force to rule another race. But if Jaenelle wanted to rule ... It would cost him his honor, to say nothing of his soul, but he would drive Terreille to its knees for her pleasure.

The only way to protect the Realms was to protect Jaenelle from Hekatah and her human tools.

Whatever the price.

6 / Terreille

Daemon reached his bedroom very late that evening. The wine and brandy he'd drunk throughout the night had numbed him enough for him to hold his temper despite the onslaught of innuendoes and coy chatter he'd listened to at the dinner table, despite the bodies that "accidentally" brushed against him all evening.

But he wasn't numb enough not to sense the woman's presence in his room. Her psychic scent struck him the moment he opened his bedroom door. Snarling silently at the intrusion, Daemon lifted his hand. The candlelights beside the bed immediately produced a dim glow.

The young Hayllian witch lay in the center of his bed, her long black hair draped seductively over the pillows, the sheet tucked demurely beneath her pointed chin. She was new to Dorothea's court, an apprentice to the Hourglass coven. She had watched him throughout the evening but hadn't approached.

She smiled at him, then opened her small, pouty mouth and ran the tip of her tongue over her upper lip. Slowly peeling off the sheet, she stretched her naked body and lazily spread her legs.

Daemon smiled.

He smiled as he picked up the clothes she'd strewn across the floor and tossed them out the open door into the hall. He smiled as he teased the sheet and bedcovers off the bed and tossed them after the clothes. He was still smiling when he lifted her off the bed and pitched her out the door with enough force that she hit the opposite wall with a bone-breaking thud. The mattress followed, missing her only because she'd slumped over on her side as she began to scream.

Following the sound of running feet, Dorothea rushed through the corridors while the mansion walls shook with barely restrained violence. She pushed her way through the pack of growling guards until she reached the abigails and other witches of the coven whose concerned twittering was drowned by screams increasing in pitch and volume.

"What in the name of Hell is going on here?" she shouted, her usual melodious purr sounding more like a cat in heat.

Daemon stepped out of his bedroom, calmly tugging his shirt cuffs into place. The hallway walls instantly glazed with ice.

Dorothea studied Daemon's face. She'd never actually seen him when he was deep in the cold rage, had seen him only when he was coming back from it, but she sensed he was in the eye of the storm and something as insignificant as the wrong inflection on a single word would be enough to set off a violent explosion that would tear the court apart.

She narrowed her eyes and tried not to shiver.

It was more than the cold rage this time. Much more.

His face looked so lifeless it could have been carved from a fine piece of wood, and yet it was so filled with something. He appeared unnaturally calm, but those golden eyes, as glazed as the walls, looked at her with a predator's intensity.

Something had been pushing him toward the emotional breaking point, and he had finally snapped.

Among the short-lived races, pleasure slaves became emotionally unstable after a few years. It took decades among the long-lived races, but eventually the combination of aphrodisiacs and constant arousal without being allowed any release twisted something inside the males. After that, with careful handling, they still had their uses, but not as pleasure slaves.

Daemon had been a pleasure slave for most of his life. He'd come close to this point several times in the past, but he'd always managed to step back from the edge. This time, there was no stepping back.

Finally Daemon spoke. His voice came out flat, but there was a hint of thunder in it. "When you've gotten the stench completely out of my room, I'll be back. Don't call me until then." He glided down the hall and out of sight.

Dorothea waited, counting the seconds. 'Several minutes passed before the front door was slammed with such force that the mansion shook and windows shattered throughout the building.

Dorothea turned to the witch, a promising, vicious little creature now modestly covered with the sheet and bravely whimpering about her cruel treatment. She wanted to rake her nails over that pretty face.

There was no way to control Sadi, not after tonight. Pain or punishment would only enrage him further. She had to get him away from Hayll, send him somewhere expendable. The Dark Priestess had been full of suggestions when he'd been conceived and when they broke the contract in order to keep the boy for the Hayllian Hourglass. Well, the bitch could come up with a suggestion now when he was cold and possibly sliding into the Twisted Kingdom.

Straightening the collar of her dressing gown, Dorothea gave the young witch a last look. "That bitch is expelled from the Hourglass and dismissed from my court. I want her and everything to do with her out of my house within the hour."

Taking the arm of the young Warlord who'd been warming her bed before the screams began, she returned to her wing of the mansion, smiling at the wail of despair that filled the hall behind her.

7 / Terreille

Dorothea hurried up the broad path to the Sanctuary, clutching at her cloak as the wind tried to whip it from her body. The old Priestess, bent and somewhat feeble-minded, opened the heavy door for her and then fought with the wind to close it

Dorothea gave the old woman the barest nod of acknowledgment as she rushed past her, desperate to reach the meeting place.

The inner chamber was empty except for two worn chairs and a low table placed before a blazing fire. Throwing off her cloak with one hand, she carefully placed the bottle she had held tight against her body on the table and sank into one of the chairs with a moan.

Two short days ago, she had felt insolent about asking for help from the Dark Priestess, had chafed at the offerings she had to provide from her court or Hayll's Hourglass. Now she was ready to beg.

For two days, Sadi had stalked through Draega, restlessly and relentlessly trying to blunt his rage. In that time, he'd killed a young Warlord from one of the Hundred Families—an exuberant youth who was only trying to have his pleasure with a tavern owner's daughter. The man had dared protest because his daughter was virgin and wore a Jewel. The Warlord had dealt with the father—not fatally—and was dragging the girl to a comfortable room when Sadi appeared, took exception to the girl's frightened cries, and savaged the young Warlord, shattering his Jewels and turning his brain into gray dust.

The grateful tavern owner gave Sadi a good meal and an ever-full glass. By morning the story was all over Draega, and then there were no tavern owners or innkeepers, Blood or landen, who didn't have a hot meal, a full glass, or a bed waiting for him if he walked down their street.

She wasn't sure the Ring would stop him this time, wasn't sure he wouldn't turn his fury on her if she tried to control him. And if he outlasted the pain . . .

Dorothea put her hands over her face and moaned again. She didn't hear the door open and close.

"You're troubled, Sister," said the crooning girlish voice.

Dorothea looked up, trembling with relief. She sank to her knees and bowed her head. "I need your help, Dark Priestess."

Hekatah smiled and hungrily eyed the contents of the bottle. Keeping her cloak's hood pulled well forward to hide her face, she sat in the other chair and, with a graceful turn of her hand, drew the bottle toward her. "A gift?" she asked, feigning surprised delight. "How generous of you, Sister, to remember me." With another turn of her hand, she called in a raven glass goblet, filled it from the bottle, and drank deeply. She sighed with pleasure. "How sweet the blood. A young, strong witch. But only one voice to give so much."

Dorothea crawled back into her chair and straightened her gown. Her lips curved in a sly smile. "She insisted on being the only one, Priestess, wanting you to have her best." It was the least the little bitch could do, having caused the trouble in the first place.

"You sent for me," Hekatah said impatiently, then dropped her voice back into the soothing croon. "How can I help you, Sister?"

Dorothea jumped out of the chair and began to pace. "Sadi has gone mad. I can't control him anymore. If he stays in Hayll much longer, he'll tear us all apart."

"Can you use the half-breed to curb him?" Hekatah refilled her glass and sipped the warm blood.

Dorothea laughed bitterly. "I don't think anything will curb him."

"Hmm. Then you must send him away."

Dorothea spun around, hands clenched at her sides, lips bared to show her gritted teeth. "Where? No one will have him. Any Queen I send him to will die."

"The farther away the better," Hekatah murmured. "Pruul?"

"Zuultah has the half-breed, and you know those two can't be in the same court. Besides, Zuultah's actually been able to keep that one on a tight leash, and Prythian doesn't want to move him."

"Since when have you been concerned about what that

winged sow wants?" Hekatah snapped. "Pruul is west, far west of Hayll, and mostly desert. An ideal place."

Dorothea shook her head. "Zuultah's too valuable to our plans."

"Ah."

"We're still cultivating the western Territories and don't have a strong enough influence yet."

"But you have some. Surely Hayll must have made overtures someplace where not all the Queens are so valued. Is there nowhere, Sister, where a Queen has been an impediment? Nowhere a gift like Sadi might be useful to you?"

Dorothea settled into her chair, her long forefinger nail tapping against her teeth. "One place," she said quietly. "That bitch Queen has opposed me at every turn. It's taken three of their generations to soften their culture enough to create an independent male counsel strong enough to remake the laws. The males we've helped rise to power will gut their own society in order to have dominance, and once they do that, the Territory will be ripe for the picking. But she keeps trying to fight them, and she's always trying to close my embassy and dilute my influence." Dorothea sat up straight, her eyes glittering. "Sadi would be a perfect gift for her."

"And if his temper gets out of control..." Hekatah laughed.

Dorothea laughed with her. "But how to get him there."

"Make a gift of him."

"She wouldn't accept it." She paused. "But her son-in-law is Kartane's companion and a strong leader in the counsel—through Hayll's graces. If the gesture was made to him, how could he refuse?"

Hekatah toyed with her glass. "This place. It's to the west?"

Dorothea smiled. "Yes. Even farther than Pruul. And backward enough to make him chafe." Dorothea reached for her cloak. "If you'll excuse me, Priestess. There are things I must attend to. The sooner we're rid of him, the better."

"Of course, Sister," Hekatah replied sweetly. "May the Darkness speed your journey."

Hekatah stared dreamily at the fire for several minutes. Emptying the bottle, she admired the dark liquid in the

smoky black glass, then raised the goblet in a small salute. "The sooner you're rid of him, the better. The sooner he's in the west, the better still."

8 /Hell

"SaDiablo, there's something you should know."

Silence. "Have you seen her?"

"No." A long pause. "Saetan, Dorothea just sent Daemon Sadi to Chaillot."

PART III

chapter Six

1 / Terreille

Instantly awake, Surreal probed the dark room and the corridors beyond for whatever had disturbed her sleep.

Men's voices, women's voices, muted laughter.

No danger she could feel. Still . . .

A dark, cold ripple, coming from the east, rolled over Chaillot.

Surreal snuggled deeper into the bed, tucking the covers around her. The night was cool, the bed warm, and the sleeping draught Deje had given her gently pulled her back into the dreamless sleep she'd enjoyed for the past few nights.

Whatever it was, it wasn't looking for her.

Kartane slammed the door of his suite and locked it with a vicious snap of his hand. For an hour he paced his rooms, cursing softly.

It had been a delightful night, spent with a frightened, porcelain-faced girl who had been gratifyingly revolted by everything she'd had to do for him—and everything he had done to her. He had left that private playground relaxed and sated until Robert Benedict had stopped him at the door and told him how delighted, how honored his family was to receive such a gift from Lady SaDiablo. Of course, his bastard brother, Philip, performed consort duties for Lady Angelline, and she probably wouldn't put him completely aside for a pleasure slave, no matter how celebrated, but they were honored.

Kartane cursed. He'd woven his web of lies to Hayll's embassy tight enough to ensure that Dorothea, even if she found him quickly, wouldn't be able to call him back without embarrassment to herself. It also meant he couldn't bolt now without answering some difficult, and very unwanted, questions. Besides, this had become his favorite playground, and he had planned to stay a while.

He undressed and fell wearily into bed.

There was time. There was time. Daemon wasn't here.

Yet.

Cassandra stood in the Sanctuary doorway and watched the sun rise, unable to pinpoint the cause of her nervousness. Whatever it was, it was coming over the horizon with the sun.

Closing her eyes and taking a slow, deep breath, she descended to the depth of the Black, took that one mental step to the side that Black Widows were trained to take, and then she stood at the edge of the Twisted Kingdom. With eyes gauzed by the dreamscape of visions, she looked at the sun climbing above the horizon.

She stared for a long moment, then shook her head violently to clear her sight and pressed her body hard against the stone doorway, hoping for support. When she was sure she was truly out of the dreamscape, she went into the Sanctuary, keeping her back to the sun.

She stumbled to the kitchen, hurriedly pulled the curtains across the windows, and sat on the bench by the banked fire, grateful for the dark.

A Black Widow who stood on the edge of the Twisted Kingdom could see the true face behind whatever mask a person wore; she could draw memories from wood and stone to know what happened in a place; she could see warnings about things to come.

The sun, when Cassandra had looked at it through the dreamscape of visions, had been a torn, bloody orb.

Alexandra Angelline studied the room with a critical eye. The wood floor gleamed, the throw rugs were freshly washed, the windows sparkled, the bed linen was crisp and new, and the wardrobe was filled with freshly washed and pressed clothes that hung in a straight row above the polished shoes. She breathed deeply and smelled autumn air and lemon polish.

And something else.

With an angry sigh, she shook her head and turned to her housekeeper. "It's still there. Faint, but there. Clean it again."

Lucivar studied the cloudless sky. Heat waves already shimmered up from the Arava Desert in Pruul, but Lucivar shivered, chilled to the bone. His outer senses told him nothing, so he turned inward and instantly felt the cold, dark fury. Nervously licking his lips, he sent a thought on an Ebon-gray spear thread narrowed toward a single mind.

"Bastard?"

Whatever rode the Winds over Pruul passed him and continued west.

"Bastard?"

Cold silence was his only answer.

In Hell, Saetan sat behind the blackwood desk in his private study deep beneath the Hall and stared at the portrait across the room, a portrait he could barely see in the dim light. He'd been sitting there for hours, staring at Cassandra's likeness, trying to feel something—love, rage— anything that would ease the pain in his heart.

He felt nothing but bitterness and regret.

He watched Mephis open the study door and close it behind him. For a long moment he stared at his eldest son as if he were a stranger, and then turned back to the portrait.

"Prince SaDiablo," Saetan said, his voice full of soft thunder.

"High Lord?"

Saetan stared at the portrait for several minutes more. He sighed bitterly. "Send Marjong the Executioner to me."

In a private compartment on a Yellow Web Coach, Daemon Sadi sat across from two nervous Hayllian ambassadors. Behind a face that looked like a cold, beautiful, unnatural mask, his rage was contained but undiminished. He'd said nothing to his escorts throughout the journey. In fact, he'd barely moved since they left Hayll.

Now he stared at a blank wall, deaf to the men's lowered voices. His right hand continued to seek his left wrist, the fingers gently rubbing back and forth, back and forth, as if needing reassurance that the scar Tersa had gifted him with was still there.