“It’s not work,” Phaedra insisted. “Looking after the women and children who come here looking for safety and protection never feels like an obligation to me.”
“I know it doesn’t.” Sia knew that better than most.
Very recently, she had helped Phaedra run the shelter for a few weeks after Sia had been exiled from the Atlantean colony where she’d once been a high-ranking member of the Council of Elders. Sia’s misplaced alliance with one of the colony’s own had cost her dearly, but she had since redeemed herself. Now, she lived at the Order’s compound in Rome with Trygg, the Breed warrior she’d fallen in love with and taken as her mate.
For Phaedra, an immortal who’d lived for as many countless centuries as her friend, the shelter had become her life’s purpose.
It was all she had left in this world.
“I’m perfectly fine, Tamisia. Please, don’t worry about me.”
“I’m your friend. Worrying about you comes with the territory.” She placed a tender hand on Phaedra’s arm. “You need a break. Actually, what you really need is a full-time assistant here at the shelter. I’d be more than happy to help you find someone trustworthy and qualified. In fact, I’ll manage the shelter myself while you’re gone.”
“No. It’s really not necessary.”
“It’s the least I can do for you, and besides, I’ve already worked with most of the residents. They know me. And if anything should come up, between Trygg and me, I’m sure we can handle it.”
“I appreciate the offer, Sia, but—”
“Wonderful. Then it’s settled.” Sia gave her a look that invited no argument.
While Phaedra had once been part of the Atlantean royal court with her parents, those days were long past. Tamisia had only been exiled from her station as an Elder for a matter of months, and it showed in her unwavering gaze.
“First, we’ll have our tea and lunch, and you can tell me what happened in the dream this time,” Sia said. “Then we’ll start making plans for you to take a well-deserved, and much needed, break. Someplace relaxing and stress-free.”
Phaedra knew better than to argue once Tamisia had made up her mind about something. And she had to admit, if even to herself, that the idea of getting away from the crowds and bustle of Rome for short time did sound appealing. She wasn’t sure where she might want to go, nor did it matter.
Wherever she went now, she knew nothing would ever deliver her from the soul-shredding cries of the men who had perished so horrifically in the terrible light of her dream.
CHAPTER 2
One week later . . .
The translator seemed nervous.
Tegan wasn’t sure if the young Kazakhstani looked ready to piss himself because of what he was hearing from the wary old man he spoke with, or because of the big, scowling vampire waiting impatiently to receive the troubling news.
Tegan’s brows furrowed even deeper, his fangs prickling in his gums. He was in no mood for roadblocks or delays. He’d been gone from his home and his beloved mate back in the States for close to seven days now. His boots had covered countless miles of rough terrain, starting in Budapest where the missing Order warriors had last been heard from, then through the forested taiga of Siberian Russia where the team’s secret mission had abruptly lost all contact.
A combination of instinct, logic, and desperate guessing had brought him down into neighboring Kazakhstan last night. He’d waited out the daylight hours in Petropavl, a small city just across the border. With a train station and a university nearby, there had been plenty of humans around to provide him with the sustenance he’d sorely needed.
As a Gen One Breed, Tegan had to feed every few days. After trekking alone for at least that long through the Russian wilderness, he’d been half-starved by the time he finally sank his fangs into the throat of a young thug who’d had the bad sense to try to pick his pocket outside the station after nightfall.
It wasn’t until Tegan had taken his fill of fresh red cells from the thug’s carotid that he noticed the unusual weapon that had clattered out of the human’s hand. The long dagger was too well-made to belong to a common street hood, especially one who likely hadn’t ventured more than a few hundred kilometers away from the remote city or the barren steppes of his homeland.
No, the blade was not some crude weapon. It was beautiful, and crafted of something more than pedestrian steel. Hand-forged titanium.
The kind of weapon that belonged to a Breed warrior.
When Tegan saw the tooled grip that had been custom-fitted to the hand of the Order member who’d carried it, every cell in his body lit up with recognition—and with a cold dread he refused to acknowledge.
No warrior in the Order would ever willingly surrender his blade. Most especially, not the formidable male who had lost this one.
Tegan hadn’t needed to pick up the blade to know that it would fit his own large hand nearly perfectly.
After all, it had been made for his son, Micah.
He glowered at the thug he’d pressed into service as his translator back in Petropavl, who was currently asking questions on Tegan’s behalf. “What’s the old man telling you? You said you bought that blade off him three days ago. Where the fuck did he get it?”
Both humans flinched at his biting tone. No doubt, the glint of his elongating fangs in the dim light of the round, tent-like yurt didn’t give either man much comfort.
Good. His patience had been threadbare even before he arrived in this desolate patch of flat grasslands in Kazakhstan’s north country. Each second that kept him away from the truth about Micah’s blade only made his fury simmer closer to a boil.
The gray-haired man seated on the rug in the center of the candlelit tent was the patriarch of the clan of nomad herders temporarily camped on the steppe. They had set up there to let their sheep and cattle graze on the yellowed grasses before autumn turned to brutal winter.
The makeshift village was comprised of fewer than a dozen similar yurts. Outside the one where Tegan braced for bad news, nervous livestock bayed and snuffled, instinctively aware of the presence of the apex predator in their midst. A predator who was growing increasingly dangerous by the second.
The pair of humans staring at Tegan showed similar anxiety as the animals.
“The dagger,” he growled. “Where did the old man get it?”
The translator swallowed. “He says it came from a wanderer who showed up here in the camp last week. He was gravely wounded, traveling alone on foot. The old man says the wanderer was a . . . one of your kind.”
Tegan let a curse slip through his clenched teeth. He didn’t want to think the injured Breed male could have been his son, but the alternative was a cold comfort too. What might have happened to Micah to separate him from his teammates? He was their captain, a devoted soldier who would never abandon his comrades under any circumstances.
Just as Tegan was certain his son would never surrender his blade unless he was too weak to hold it. Or worse.
Those were thoughts he refused to consider.
“Tell the old man I need more information. Did the wanderer say anything—anything at all? What kind of injuries did he have? Where had he come from? How long was he here at the camp?”