Blood Double (God Wars #1)(56)

Sniffing around it, I encountered mostly humanoid scents, until I reached the last chair on the far side. Hair lifted on my head and neck. Prescience kicked in and I realized that Rathik Erwin, the f*cking weasel, had sat there. Not only had he sat there, he'd sat there recently. As in hours, not days or weeks. If he'd ever made it off the planet, he was back now.

Later, I held my head in my hands as I sat atop a building housing luxury condos, working to piece a puzzle together that defied logic. Sighing, I realized that my headache, which the painkill barely dulled, would prevent me from working anything out at the moment. I needed sleep, but it wouldn't come as long as the headache Kal had given me pounded against my skull. Silently I cursed him as I gathered what strength I could and misted back to the palace.

*

Lissa's Journal

"What the hell is that?" I asked as the dust cloud continued to blow in our direction.

"I don't like this," Merrill came and took my elbow. Adam was already beside Kiarra, prepared to take her away.

"But what is it?" I said as the wind began to scream around us and the first grains of sand blew into our faces. I threw up a shield, as did Kiarra and the others. Our barriers had absolutely no effect—the winds and sand sailed right through them. Kiarra screamed as she was buffeted by winds so strong Adam had to hold her upright.

How the hell is this possible? I sent mindspeech to my Saa Thalarr companions. Suddenly terrified that none of our abilities might work against this aberration, I turned away from fiercely blowing grit that threatened to scrape away exposed skin. What happened next might only occur in nightmares or horror films. Merrill folded me out of there; if he hadn't, my skin might have been flayed from my body while I attempted to get to the cause of a shrieking sandstorm on a portion of a world where there was no sand.

*

"I can't get through to Belen." Kiarra dropped onto the sofa beside me, dressed in a robe with a towel wrapped around her white-blonde hair. She and I had been transported to Adam's ancestral home in Kent, and all of us had raw skin from the sudden sandstorm, which should never have happened.

I'd hurried through a shower, and Joey, kind soul and healer that he is, had worked to fix the raw scrapes on exposed skin. Norton, one of Joey's mates, put his hands on Kiarra and was doing the same for her. Bearcat, another of Joey's mates and a former Saa Thalarr, helped Adam and Merrill with raw wounds. They'd protected Kiarra and me from the worst of it, after all, before getting us away.

"You think that was the reason so many died? Freak sandstorms that shouldn't even happen?" I blinked at Kiarra.

"It might explain a lot," she nodded wearily. "We didn't find a bit of skin or hair around the bones of those gryphons, and there should have been."

"All that got sanded away? That's horrible," I muttered.

"Belen has me worried, now," Kiarra sighed.

"Sweetheart, he'll get back to you. He always does," Adam said. "Come here. I'll hold you."

"It's his week," Joey said quietly next to my ear as Kiarra gripped the robe around her and went to Adam, who sat on an identical sofa on the opposite side.

"Huh?" I blinked at Joey as he healed a raw place on my arm.

"They get weeks. Each mate. It's a good system."

"Well, that might work if you only have three," I snorted. Joey laughed.

*

"Grampa, I hear she can read anyone in a matter of seconds. She has mindspeech, too. If they're planning to up their price, she can tell us that with very little effort. You can make an informed decision after that."

"I grow tired of this blackmail," Glendes Grey muttered as he rose from his desk to pace. "Forty years of payment, and still they threaten to expose us. Those spells were foolproof; I checked them myself. Yet here we are, bleeding Grey House to shut them up and to keep our other clients from losing faith in our work."

"Grampa, perhaps it's time we informed the other wizards. We've worked them mercilessly to make up for what Bexari takes from us." Shadow Grey offered the Eldest of Grey House an imploring look.

"I know as well as anyone that we're exhausting our wizards."

"And they have no idea why, Grampa."

"I know that, too. I chose to tell only the Master Wizards, thinking there would be no need to tell the others. Our original agreement with Bexari was for twenty years."

"That was before the King's brother died and left that thieving nitwit of a Prime Minister in charge," Shadow growled. "And now it seems he wants even more money. I believe Grey House has become Bexari's sole source of income, and we bow beneath that yoke, just to save our reputation."

"You're suggesting that we ask for a preliminary meeting with Vyris, and bring this girl with us?"

"She's not a girl, she's a modified vampire and Shadow and I have already discussed this," Raffian, Shadow's father, stalked into Glendes' study and flopped wearily onto a chair. "What do we have to lose, Dad? Gavin can command her to keep quiet—we don't even have to tell him what our problem is. We'll just say it's a sensitive matter and ask him to place compulsion for her not to speak about it."

"You're sure of this?" Glendes lifted an eyebrow in Raffian's direction.