Or all three at once.
He’d also had three cold showers and a brief period around noon where he feared he was descending into lunacy. Oh, yeah, it had been a hell of a day. And now his fragile, darling, innocent sex kitten of a princess was telling him to shut up.
“Yes, as I said the other five times, Daniel. Please be quiet now, so I can try to sense the Emperor again.” She leaned against a tree and looked up into the sky. “Look. It’s Draco, curled around the Little Dipper. Was that one of your names?”
“Honey, there’s nothing little about my dipper.”
She rolled her eyes, but at least he’d made her smile. It lightened the shadows in her eyes, if only for a moment. “No, Draco. Or Drakos.”
“How could you know that?”
“Oh the attendants in the temple loved to gossip, and the exploits of Conlan and his warriors were constant fodder. I heard much of their vampire ally Drakos. A vampire who was a friend to the high prince’s brother was very gossip-worthy. It never occurred to me that Drakos could be . . .” she finished in a strained voice.
“I’ve had many names over the years,” he said, shrugging the backpack to a more comfortable position. “Something to pass the time. Daniel was not always a name that fit in where I happened to be.”
“What are some of the others?”
He breathed deep of the pine-drenched desert night air and caught the slightest scent of sea salt and woman.
His woman.
He shook his head. She was his only in his dreams. The beauty never ended up with the beast, despite brief moments of pleasure and the beast’s futile wishes.
“Names? Or are you ignoring me on purpose?” she asked teasingly.
“They almost always began with the same letter, for ease of remembering. Drakos, Demetrios. Lately, Devon. Once, for a memorable period, D’Artagnan. Generally back to Daniel whenever possible.”
“Because it’s your real name.”
“Yes, but that’s not the reason. I kept coming back to Daniel because it was the name you’d called me,” he said softly, but he knew by her indrawn breath that she’d heard him.
“I . . . Wait. Daniel, I can feel it. The Emperor. It’s closer than ever before, and it’s moving.” She started running forward and he caught her arm.
“No. Let’s not charge headlong into danger, okay? It’s safe to bet that whoever has the gem is not going to want to give it up and is almost certainly not after it for innocent reasons. It has a lot of power, which tends to draw the attention of those who want to accumulate a lot of power. These are rarely the nicest people you might want to meet.”
She turned toward him, and he tried not to think about touching the curve of her neck, or the delightful curve where her hip met her waist. Tried not to think about unbraiding her hair and wrapping his hands in fistfuls of those lush curls.
Tried not to think about it. Failed miserably, but at least he’d tried.
“Daniel. You’re looking at me the way I looked at that chocolate cake,” she murmured. “I confess I like it, but now isn’t the best time.”
He leaned down and stole a single kiss. It would have to tide him over. “You’re right, of course. Now tell me about what you feel, and how close you think the Emperor is to where we are now.”
“It’s north—no, west of here. Where is that?”
“It’s the Red Rock Secret Mountain Wilderness area,” Daniel said grimly. “Of course they couldn’t be at a coffee shop. Well, enough of this. We can’t do much with the car Melody’s friends brought us, since the direction you’re sensing is pure hiking country, but we’re certainly not hiking, in spite of these fancy clothes and boots. You’re wasting energy you don’t need to expend, especially when you’re traveling with someone who can fly.”
“No!” She backed away from him, violently shaking her head back and forth. “I can’t.”
“I’ll keep you safe. It’s just a matter of closing your eyes if you feel dizzy.” He knew it was easier to show her, so he swept her into his arms and launched into the air. He made it about ten feet above the ground before she started to scream.
In his ear.
He was so startled he nearly lost his grip on her waist, and she slipped a little and then started screaming even louder. Then her entire body started shaking and spasming in his arms, and he headed back for the ground, fast. When he landed and her feet were firmly on the ground, though, the screaming didn’t stop. If anything, it intensified in volume, and she kept shaking so hard he was afraid she was having a seizure.
“Serai, please, tell me what to do. I’m sorry, I didn’t know, please help me. Damn it, I don’t know what to do here,” he said, holding her tightly to try to calm the spasms.
Slowly—ever so slowly—the shaking subsided. She stopped screaming and began sobbing, loud, hoarse sobs that were almost as painful to him as they must be to her. She pulled away from him and sank to the ground, still sobbing as if her heart would break any minute.
“Delia. Oh, no, poor Delia, she was the youngest of us. All that lovely golden hair, oh no, oh no, oh no,” she kept repeating, tears streaming down her face.
He crouched down and took her in his arms and patted her back and stroked her hair—anything that might offer her some comfort. He had a sinking suspicion about who Delia might be, and even the monster crouched inside him roared its anguish at the thought. If one of the other maidens had just died, how long might it be until the person wielding the Emperor’s powers caused Serai to join her?
Daniel would find this witch and kill her. Take the Emperor back to Atlantis, so Alaric and the rest of them could figure out a way to save Serai and the others. He’d capture Poseidon himself and demand the sea god’s help, if need be.
Whatever it took.
“Whatever it takes,” he said, out loud, as Serai’s sobs began to quiet. “We will find the Emperor and rescue your sisters. I swear this to you on my life.”
She finally stopped crying and took a deep, shuddering breath before looking up at him. “I felt it, Daniel. I felt her die.”
“Delia?”
She nodded. “Yes. She—The Emperor’s connection to us stuttered and grew weak, but then a powerful surge of energy speared out through it and the witch who’s trying to access its power. She’s learning how to use it, Daniel. But I don’t think she has any idea that she’s hurting people by doing it. She’s . . . afraid, I think. And Delia. Oh, Daniel. She never had a chance to live her life at all. It’s not fair.”
As she cried, curled against his chest like a wounded child, his heart shattered and then re-formed in ice and granite. So the witch who played with the Emperor’s magic was afraid, was she? Not yet she wasn’t. She hadn’t known anything like the terror he was going to crash down on her head. When he got his hands on her and anyone else who’d been participating in this deadly game, they’d all be very, very afraid.
They would be afraid, and then they would be dead. He swore it on his ancient oath as a mage of the Nightwalker Guild.
“I can’t fly, Daniel. I’m sorry,” she whispered, interrupting his silent plans to rip, tear, and maim.
A horrible thought jumped into his mind. “Is that why you had the seizure? Serai, I’m sorry. I thought if you saw how safe it is, you’d—”
“No. No, the seizure was due to the Emperor, but I can’t fly. I’m terrified of heights, and I don’t know how to calm down. I don’t think we have time for me to try to learn how to be unafraid, not now. Maybe later?” She attempted a smile, but her face was far too pale, and her terror was evident in her eyes and the way she bit her lip.