Total pages in book: 161
Estimated words: 162269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 541(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 162269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 541(@300wpm)
But last…
There were ten of them.
Five women.
And all five men.
The men had all escaped.
But…
How?
“It wasn’t right,” one man said.
“It’s done,” another one replied wearily. “Let us cease talking about it.”
“I swear to the gods, Nick, that man with the woman…at one point he had grown fangs,” the first man said.
“Think not on it, for it is done,” Nick replied.
“The one I chased disappeared into thin air,” another said.
“A sorcerer?” one of the women asked.
“Had to be,” the man who chased him answered.
“If he was a sorcerer, Leith, he would not run. He’d cast,” another man said.
“He did cast, Angus, to disappear,” Leith replied.
“And be glad of it,” Nick advised. “For this night we rode up on evil, so intent on coin, we didn’t feel it until it was almost too late, and now, we are all here, still breathing.”
Yes, they were.
All there.
Still breathing.
But…
How?
“I’ll take that bottle of gin, love,” the first man who spoke said.
“Here you go, my Rory,” a woman whispered, proffering a bottle.
He took it then pulled her down to her hip beside where he lounged on a thick rug against a rolled pillow up against a log.
“Kaden?” Nick called, apparently to the last man, who was at the edge of their encampment, staring into the night.
“We should report this,” he said.
There was silence.
Eventually, Nick, who Jellan sensed was the leader, muttered, “Aye.”
“Report what?” another of the women asked.
“I’m not sure we should report anything,” Leith said.
Kaden turned to the gathering. “That…thing on Airenzian soil, our Regent finally sticking it to those arseholes, he does not need another bother. And where there is one, there might be others. He might even be at the call of the AG. Prince Cassius should know.”
Jellan was shaken.
No one along their journey had sensed anything amiss with Daemon.
Indeed, many a woman had gazed on him with no small amount of admiration.
How had these men sensed what he was?
Or that he was…other.
They had mentioned fangs, but they had also all survived a run-in with the Beast.
And if he had fully transformed, there was no chance of that happening.
The only answer to this puzzle was that it was clear, for some reason, he had not.
He had let them get away.
And Jellan did not have to ponder the why of that.
Marian.
But now, these men lived to share their tale. Perhaps even with Prince Cassius.
Oh yes, the woman was a crafty, clever cunt.
And it should please Jellan they were both about the same business.
But he loathed her so much, it did not.
He would be the hero of this tale.
He would have the stories told about how he helped save Triton.
She would be forever remembered as the harridan who raised the Beast.
“We will think on it the night and vote on it on the morrow,” Nick decreed. “Now I need whiskey and my wench,” he stated, reaching out and jerking the arm of one of the women so she cried out not in protest and fell astride him with a husky laugh. “And all will be well,” he finished.
It appeared the course of the evening had changed for this crew, something Jellan did not intend to witness, so he turned his mount and headed away.
He made certain he could no longer see the campfire before he relieved himself of his magical shroud.
And he rode on.
There was much to think on of that night.
He was also tired.
But he could not rest.
“You need a name, old boy, what should we call you?” he muttered to his steed to turn his thoughts to something that was not sleep.
The animal had naught to say.
“Chance,” Jellan decided, gazing into the moonlit night.
Making his way through Airen.
On his way to Sky Bay.
142
The Rainbow
Prince Cassius
Divinity Boulevard, Sky Bay
AIREN
Cassius rode with Aelia tucked to his front, Theodora astride Caelus at his back, and he did this with his eyes to their surroundings, wondering why the bloody hell he’d allowed Ellie to convince him they should participate in this ridiculous affair.
But he had.
Thus, on his wedding day, he rode to the Combined Cathedral of the Gods in order to take his woman to wife.
And he did this with crowds on either side of the boulevard, held back by Airenzian soldiers, what seemed like the lot of them throwing coral, purple and sky-blue bloody confetti at him.
Lahn and Circe, Frey and Finnie led the way.
Apollo and Madeleine, Noctorno and Cora rode behind them.
True and Farah rode side by side next to Jorie just ahead of Cass and his girls.
Aramus and Ha-Lah rode to his left.
Mars and Silence to his right.
A guard of twenty paraded before Lahn, Circe, Frey and Finnie.
And a guard of twenty trotted to Cass’s back.
Elena was somewhere even farther back, and the only argument he’d won in this hellish affair (notwithstanding him demanding their daughters rode with him, thus under his guard) was that Mac, Ian, Nero and Severus accompanied her, along with Hera, Serena and Chu.