But I hadn’t.
Had I?
Even as I thought about it, a sudden jagged sense of pain swiped through my body.
It doubled in strength with each yard we took deeper onto the grounds. Before a minute had passed, I was clutching my stomach with one hand, gripping my head with the other.
“What is it?” Darius urged, the vehicle swerving as he braked abruptly, taking us off the path as he turned around to face me.
“I don’t know,” I gasped out the words one by one. “It. Hurts.”
“Where? Why?” Barclay asked, his hands running over me as though searching for boo-boos.
His touch helped, but it was when Keiran pressed a hand to my shoulder that I screamed. It was like an electric shock to the nervous system. Like a Taser had been pressed to my spinal cord.
My body surged up, straightening unnaturally in the tight confines of the SUV, as the electric charge went through me.
“…stop fucking touching her!”
“I can’t!” Keiran bit back, and I could hear he was panting, hear that he was trying to get things under control and was failing.
“What the fuck is going on?” Cade rasped, and I felt his hand touch Keir’s, felt him try to drag Keir’s away. The pain was excruciating, but it was Raven who slipped into my mind, who seemed to read what was happening as he crossed the limits of my psyche, tumbling into Keir’s and Cade’s seconds later.
“Arthur.”
One word and the others in the vehicle froze.
“What about him?” Darius demanded.
“He’s warning us.”
“He’s Awake?” Barclay growled.
“No. It’s like…” Raven winced. “Reverse, Darius. Back up and get us back to the driveway at least. She wasn’t suffering then.”
I wanted to weep with gratitude but didn’t. Instead, I held my shit together as Darius screeched the SUV into motion and we reversed away from our ultimate destination. With each retreating foot, I felt the pain disperse until I was left sagging against Barclay, sweat pouring from me, every inch of me exhausted and tired.
“What the hell just happened?” Gideon barked, as he and Darius turned around from their seats in the front to stare at me.
“I’d hazard a guess and say that Arthur rested here for Marcella’s sake,” Raven grated out, his voice low, hoarse. Had he done as he had the other day? I’d heard the tales of how he’d slipped into Morgana’s mind, had made her act on his will. Had he managed to achieve the impossible twice? In under a week?
“Maker, why? Why the fuck would a Sire do that?” Barclay spat.
“She’s important to them,” Darius reasoned. “I don’t know why, but if Raven’s right, then…” He blew out a breath. “He rested here to keep watch—”
“He didn’t do a good job of it, did he?” I snarled, my arms curving about my belly as, though the pain was no longer a fiery burn, it still lingered. Sending sparks of agony around my nervous system. “I was miserable here,” I whispered, my voice husky.
“Miserable but not in immediate danger,” Cade said softly. “Who are you, honey? What are you to them?”
Silence fell at his question, as though the others were waiting on me to answer, but what the hell could I say? I didn’t know what I was. I didn’t know why I could do the shit that I could. Didn’t know why I had six mates instead of five, why I could weave shadows and…
Heat prickled down my spine and I jerked in my seat.
“What is it?” Cade demanded. “What’s wrong?”
Raven stated immediately, “We need to get out of here. He was warning us for a reason. Someone’s after us.”
I closed my eyes as the fear, those fucking spiders and rats began crawling their way over my body. Was this Arthur’s idea of an alarm system?
Maker help me!
The sensations grew, but it wasn’t painful, just terrifying, until my worst fears were realized. The SUV had started up again, with Darius pushing the engine until it began screaming at him, its capacity driven beyond its own engineering as he tried to get us away from whatever threat Arthur sensed that we didn’t.
But it was too late.
Too late.
I knew that like I knew my face in the mirror.
“Fuck!”
The words were bitten off by my mates. Each of them spitting it out as the SUV braked to a halt that had the wheels groaning and shuddering beneath us.
But I didn’t need either physical warning to know that the threat had reached us.
Before I knew it, the doors to the SUV were dragged open, and I heard Darius raging, “Do you have any fucking idea who I am?”
He fell silent and there was a thud that told me he’d been incapacitated. The belief was confirmed when I felt our link shut off as though he’d lost consciousness. I tried to get up, to get out, to move and to help him, but my limbs wouldn’t work. They wouldn’t respond. I tried. I fucking tried, but no matter how hard I worked, no matter how much I sweated, I couldn’t move. Not an inch.
“Put him in the car.”
The voice, not the order, sent shards of glass exploding down my spine. If I hadn’t been able to move before, now, it was impossible.
I was frozen in place. A fear that was born decades earlier held me in its grasp.
With my eyes still closed, I heard each nuance, each gentle rise and fall of the man’s tone, and every part of me was razed to the ground as recognition flared to life.
Slowly, I opened my eyes just in time to see Barclay being dragged out of the car. Beside me, Cade was forced out too. Yanked out like puppies being caught at the scruff by their mother’s teeth.
Then, it was my turn.
Except when I stared at the man whose hand reached for me, all of a sudden my fear disappeared. I had more reason to fear this male than most, and yet, I didn’t.
Couldn’t.
He’d terrorized me all my life. In my dreams, in the shadows, but now?
I felt the power surging inside me and knew, knew I was a thousand times more terrifying than this creature could ever hope to be.
With all the regalness that hadn’t been bred into me, I dipped my chin at the male and with a calm that wasn’t feigned, with the power he’d helped create in me, I stated, “Father, how unpleasant it is to see you again.”
TO BE CONTINUED
Also by Serena Akeroyd
I’d love to see you in my Diva reader’s group where you can find out all the gossip on new releases as and when they happen. You can join here.
Until I see you there, here are more of my books for you to read…
The Gods Are Back In Town
Hotter than Hades
The Sun Revolves Around Apollo
Five Points, Hell’s Kitchen
A Screwed Duet
Screw You
Screw Me
Filthy Feckers
Filthy Hot (COMING SOON)
FourWinds
Queen of the Vamps
Kingdom of Veronia
Perry & Her Princes
Her Highness, Princess Perry
Long Live Queen Perry
QUINTESSENCE
Charmed by Them
Healed by Them
Worshipped by Them
Protected by Them
QUINTESSENCE: The Sequels
Sawyer
Andrei
Kurt
Anchor Pride Series
Claimed by Caden
McKinnon’s Mate
The Corsakis
Three’s Never A Crowd
Old Enough to Know Better
The Federation
A Menage Made on Madison
La Belle sans La Bete Series
Menage Material
A Thoroughly M
odern Menage
Forever Theirs
Secrets & Lies
The TriAlpha Chronicles
Origin
Trinity
Triskele
Triad
Triumph
Trierna
TriAlpha
Los Lobos
The Raw Touch
The Salsang Chronicles (written with Helen Scott)
Stained Egos
Stained Hearts
Also by Helen Scott
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Don’t forget to check out Helen’s other series.
Four Worlds
Wounding Atlantis
Finding Hyperborea
Escaping El Dorado
Embracing Agartha – Coming Soon
Joining Avalon – Coming Soon
Cerberus
Daughter of Persephone
Daughter of Hades
Queen of the Underworld
Cerberus Box Set
Wardens of Midnight
Woman of Midnight (A Wardens of Midnight Novella)
Sanctuary at Midnight
The Siren Legacy
The Oracle (A Siren Legacy Novella)
The Siren’s Son
The Siren’s Eyes
The Siren’s Code
The Siren’s Heart
The Banshee (A Siren Legacy Novella)
The Siren’s Bride
Fury’s Fire
Fury’s Valentine (A Fury’s Fire Novella)
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank you most of all, as the reader, for giving me a chance to entertain you and invite you into my world. Thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed it! A big thank you to our cover designer, Natasha Snow, for helping us bring this book to life. Thank you to my family for helping me pursue my dream and putting up with my wandering mind. Last, but not least, thank you to my husband for pushing me to share my stories with the world. Thanks for putting up with me every day, babe. You’re amazing!
About the Author
Helen Scott lives in the Chicago area with her wonderful husband and furry, four-legged kids. She spends way too much time with her nose in a book and isn’t sorry about it. When not reading or writing, Helen can be found absorbed in one video game or another or crocheting her heart out.