Daughter of the Blood

CHAPTER ONE

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.

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, 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, watching, 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 wildcard that Tersa had added to the game of submission and control. The wildcard Dorothea didn't know about. The wildcard 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.

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."

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 if 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 blackwood 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

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 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.

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 blackwood 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."

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 entrées 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.

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 him."

"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."

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.