She blinks, as if surprised at my words. That makes me pause to think.
I’ve yet to show Sierra—verbally or otherwise—just how much she means to me. I’ve given her little reason to see that she is the most important figure in my life. That’s something I’ll have to change.
It’s been a long time since pretty words were thrown around my family. Almost twenty years. When my mother was alive, she never let any of the Kents forget that she loved us—through word and deed. When she died, that changed. My father turned somber, solemn, stoic, and eventually cruel, which rubbed off on both of his sons. Me more so than Wyatt.
My father.He no longer lives in the castle—he has his own property not far away—but I’ll need to send word of what happened here soon. His health has been declining quickly as of late and I haven’t wanted to bother him, but he deserves to know when something happens of the magnitude of what occurred during dinner tonight.
Suspiciously, Sierra says, “You’re welcome. Leisel just fell asleep, so we can’t talk here—I won’t risk waking her after the night she’s had.”
My heart warms. Sierra will be a wonderful mother—she already is. She treats her younger sister like one would a daughter, which stands to reason considering she raised Leisel.
Though I don’t see us having children anytime soon, it will happen eventually, and when it does, I know I’ll never need to worry about their safety—Sierra will protect them as fiercely as she does Leisel. Even so, I’ll be just as protective, and I can already see just how muchI’ll adore any of our offspring. Whether they be earthly witchlings or shifter wolf pups.
“Let’s go to the sitting parlor on the second floor,” I offer. “It has a fully stocked bar, and you look like you could use a drink.”
She looks at me warily for a beat, before letting out a soft puff of laughter, her shoulders slouching. “It’s that obvious?”
She sounds incredibly…tired. Exhausted not just in body but in mind. Everything within me demands that I take her into my arms and soothe her, but I resist the urge, clenching my fists to keep myself from reaching for her. “Follow me.”
“One moment,” she mutters.
She pulls a knife out of her pocket—the same one I recall her sharpening when we were camping for the night while en route to the Kinrith—and flicks open the blade before I can blink.
Is she going to try to stab me?The last time she hurt me with lethal intent, I delivered a punishment that I have no wish to repeat. I tense, preparing to defend myself and disarm her, but find doing so unnecessary when she pricks her thumb with the blade.
I know enough about magic to understand that magical blood bolsters spells exponentially, especially if it’s powerful—and Sierra’s blood isverypowerful. Claude echoed my suspicion earlier. Nevertheless, seeing her blood drawn makes my wolf slink closer to the surface. He despises the scent of it and the fact that she’s injured—no matter how small that injury might be or the fact that it’s self-inflicted in service of magical protection.
She walks up to Leisel’s door and uses her bloodied finger to draw a small symbol at the base of it, repeating the same gesture on hers. Then she pockets her blade and straightens.
I grit my teeth against the questions wanting to spill forth, knowing that she won’t be keen to give me answers. Also knowing that myreal objective—no matter how much I may not like it—is to piss her off enough to make her control slip. Something that may well be detrimental.
We walk through the halls and down sets of stairs in silence. As soon as I lead her into the sitting parlor—one of many in the castle, but my personal favorite—she pauses for a moment to examine it. Her eyes run over the polished wooden walls adorned with paintings of past royal families. She takes in a bookshelf in the corner of the room before her gaze rises to the orbs of brightness hovering by the ceiling and casting light about the room. It lowers to examine the ornate marble-carved fireplace with a settee before it and finally flicks over to the carved stone bar in the far corner of the room. I watch as her eyes take on a glimmer of curiosity with each new item she examines and follow the path of her gaze with my own, feeling like I’m seeing everything through new eyes.
Sierra’s inquisitiveness and interest in things that are menial and commonplace to me serves to incite my own curiosity, giving me the chance to look upon my surroundings with a new perspective.
Once she’s done thoroughly cataloguing the room, she rounds on me. “How did the vampire get in tonight? Why weren’t there preternatural security measures in place to prevent something like this?”
I close the door behind me and calmly walk over to the bar in the corner. Selecting a bottle of wine and another of aged whiskey, I tell her, “There were. Kyron had an accomplice—a vampire hybrid with magic. The accomplice took down the barrier surrounding the castle, which kept out intruders and allowed Kyron to teleport inside.”
She doesn’t pause before questioning, “Was Kyron a hybrid too? Is that how he could teleport?”
I shake my head, grabbing a corkscrew from the counter and getting to work opening the bottle of wine. “No. Members of certain species,even those who don’t inherently have magic, occasionally develop a single magical power—a twist of fate, so to speak. Kyron was one of those individuals. He was also the youngest member of the vampire’s royal and ruling family, so his death will not go unnoticed or unavenged.”
Sierra pauses as she takes in the new information, turning her gaze to the fireplace with a contemplative expression. That contemplation quickly gives way to a solemnness edged with disgust as she looks back at me. “Leisel told me about the witch doctor who examined me when I passed out. Is he the one who put up the barrier?”
Walking over to the sofa in front of the grand fireplace, I set both our drinks on the table in front of it before motioning for her to join me. As expected, she doesn’t, so I remain standing. “Yes,” I respond.
“So, his magic is weak to have been overpowered by another,” she concludes.
“Not weak,” I correct, “but not as powerful as yours.”
Sierra lets out a bitter laugh. “And I suppose you expect me to put up a new barrier that’ll hold against powerful intruders?” She adds with a mutter, “Using me for all my worth, typical of your kind.”
Seeing my chance, I demand, “Why is it you seem to despise all mythics?”
She looks at me like I’m slow, eyebrows furrowed. “Are you kidding me?”
“No. I want to know why you look like you’d happily kill me every time we’re in the same room together. I want to know why you fight against us being mates so vehemently.”
