“If anyone is going to die, it will be you, Octavia!” Talula screamed. Three dryads held her back.
Octavia continued to pace and mutter to herself like a madwoman.
Xavier bet Octavia would get shanked before the night was over.
“Enough!” Melcori shouted. “I don’t care about your petty bickering. You need a new Grove, and Rance will make it. What you do with the Grove afterward and who you allow inside is on you.”
“He’s too old to be in the Grove, Green Man or not,” an unnamed dryad argued.
“So it’s okay if he makes your home but not if he lives there?” Xavier couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
The dryad blushed but didn’t change her statement.
“Unbelievable,” Xavier whispered.
“I’ll die before I let you steal our treasures,” Talula swore.
“Then I’ll drain you all. Dryad blood is valuable in the black market.” Melcori’s smile wasn’t the reassuring and kind one he used during Xavier’s childhood. This was the ruthless Blood Mage who had gambling debts to clear and few morals.
“That wasn’t our deal!” Octavia shouted, snapping out of her trance.
Melcori’s expression hardened. “Our deal was I get the gems, and you lead the new Grove. You won't have one if you don’t let the Green Man grow your Grove. That means you broke the contract!”
“I’ll die before I let a filthy male build my Grove!” Octavia screamed.
“Then you’ll die, and I’ll still get all your blood.” Their appalled silence had Melcori laughing. “Fools. Think it over. I’ll return tomorrow for your reply.” He spun on his heel. “Come, Xavier, we have work to do. Maybe one of our books will tell us about different uses of dryad blood.”
His stomach churned, and Xavier followed Melcori, not wishing to be left behind with the dryads. He hoped Melcori was only saying that to get a rise from the dryads.
He couldn’t always tell.
CHAPTER11
“Damn it.” Kat tripped on his fifteenth tree root in the past hour. He suspected the trees were taunting him since Rance didn’t trip on a single one.
Rance giggled as he loped alongside him, his gangly limbs surprisingly graceful.
“Laugh it up, bark boy. Have you found a space yet?”
“Not yet. None of these are big enough, even if I’m not there.” He finished with a sad tone.
Kat couldn’t imagine how much it hurt to know you were unwanted in your own family because that’s what the Grove was to Rance, or at least what it was supposed to be.
“Hmm.” He peered between trees. They had yet to find anything close to the amount of space needed.
Kat caught sight of an enormous pinecone dangling from one branch and lost his footing again. As he slammed into the pine-needle-covered earth, a chunk of the tree exploded.
“Get down!” Kat shouted.
Rance crouched beside him. “Did you hurt yourself?”
“Someone is shooting at us,” Kat hissed. He didn’t dare raise his head high enough to see the shooter. If he got out of this, Xavier wouldn’t let him live this down after his big talk of being able to take care of himself.
“Where?”
Kat glanced up at the bullet hole. “Over there,” he waved toward the right. “Follow me and stay down.”
Kat transformed into his mountain lion form without giving Rance a chance to respond. Time wasn’t on their side. There was no guarantee that there was only one shooter, and he couldn’t chance tripping like a bimbette in a horror film.
