"Nathan, help me!"
Nathan looked confused.
"Now!"
Slowly, Nathan began to comply. Too late, as Liam's fate was practically assured.
Desperate, I touched the other side of the captain's neck, visualizing the power flowing into me instead.
It came with startling ease, flooding up from his vein into my fingers. It roared through me.
The fates reversed. Only this time it was my death I saw written.
The power would burn me up from the inside unless I did something to stop it.
The metal of the crown grew scorching hot against my fingertips.
Yes. That might work.
With a thought, I reversed the course of the power, envisioning a net to capture any of the spare. I fed it into the crown. It gulped the power down like it had been starved for centuries, a black hole where Travis's power was a mere drop.
Yes,it seemed to breathe.
I felt the veil withdraw several steps, pulling back as the crown absorbed power it had long been denied.
This was the missing piece. The crown needed to be fed or the realm shrank. Whoever ended up wearing it would be a constant source of energy for it.
No wonder the king had accepted my rejection so easily. He had to have known I could never have sustained the crown for long.
He would have let me try though, if I'd been so greedy and arrogant as to think I could.
A test, I realized. The only question was whether I'd passed or failed.
The captain slumped to the ground, his power guttering. Between Liam and I, we had taken a significant chunk. If we took anymore, I risked the crown falling to him by default. It could decide only his power would do.
I let Travis go and grabbed Liam. He resisted. Filled near to bursting with power as he was, I couldn't see us forcing him to stop.
Not letting myself think, I dragged a finger across one of my fangs, a drop of blood welling. I waved that finger under Liam's nose.
"Wouldn't you prefer something a little sweeter?"
His head lifted, his eyes glazed.
"You let him go and you can have your dessert." I dragged that finger along my neck, smearing the blood there.
I didn't even see him move before he was on me. His fangs gently slid into my skin, causing no more than a prick of pain. Sensation burned through me; my core tightened as lust rose with a white-hot fury.
Liam had somehow wedged his hips between my legs. He ground his hardened length against me, the sounds he made against my throat erotic.
I struggled to push past the haze of passion, dimly aware of Nathan yelling at us.
Only the knowledge of the incredible danger we were in kept me from giving in to my need.
As if sensing the shift in my mood, Liam unlatched, his tongue licking the twin punctures he'd made, its warmth pulling at things low in my center.
He raised his head, his gaze searching. "I thought I lost you."
I ran a thumb across his cheekbone. "Me too."
