I struggle to control my fast breathing, balling my hands into fists.
Dove is giving me a considering look. “And do you feel better for tasting that blood?”
I hesitate.
It should be easy to answer. But it isn’t simple.
“I feel better,” I reply with an intensity that feels like my soul spilling from me, “that every one of the spirits of my ancestors with the Power know that the last of their kind didn’t die hunted, oppressed — the victim. That I can honor them today, equally with the rest of my family, knowing that I avenged them. But it didn’t unite me with my twin. And that is the only thing that would in any way make up for what Nebet and Ruin stole from us.”
“What if you could never unite with your brother?” Daire is avoiding my gaze. “What if someone…?”
Murdered him? Is what he’s trying to say?
I would rip out the tongue of anyone else who dared say that to me.
Grief howls through me because I know, however, that he’s right.
I also know that I can’t tell my nest mates the truth that I am just as lost as Lazarus.
“Then half of my soul would die alongside his.” I bare my fangs. “And whoever killed him had better fear the half that remains.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Diamond Ballroom, Blood Kingdom
Lanlin
“Now,let us have no more talk of killing.” I swallow my grief and thoughts of Lazarus. Hasn’t my life been defined by blood and bones? For the first time, I allow myself instead to focus on the warm sunshine of my pretty, living nest mates, who are standing in front of me ready for the ball. “We should enjoy our night together. I don’t need anyone else with me. I have you two. You are enough.”
Dove still appears worryingly pale, but he smiles. “Then show me the way to the cakes. What do you want to eat, love?”
Freya smiles. “Something sweet.”
Dove drags his wings back, before twirling to grasp Freya and bend her back into a deep kiss. “Sweet enough, love?”
Dazed, Freya licks her lips. “Hmm, give it another try.”
Dove kisses her again, slower this time.
They truly are beautiful together.
My mates. Bat riders.My King and Queen.
Freya is breathing hard this time, when Dove pulls back. He rights her, and she raises her wrist to her mouth, lightly kissing over the snowflake bond mark.
Then she kisses the Ankh mark as well.
I shiver at the pleasure that winds through our bond and the sense of her deep love and joy.
Both Dove and I smile at the same time.
I grab Dove, swinging him in the direction of the low tables of food to help him without making it look to our Omega like I am.
An Alpha shouldn’t cut off another Alpha’s knot.
Unless it belongs to Horus.
“The food is on long tables at the back of the room beside the silver altar,” I mutter, quietly enough for only Dove to hear.
