A Clash of Storms (A Shade of Vampire #50)(71)

“It’ll be okay, darling,” my grandmother said in a soft voice. “We’ll figure this out.”

Her emerald-green eyes urged me to stay strong. I gave her a thankful nod, then turned to speak to Victoria and Grace. They both rushed around the massive council table and wrapped their arms around me. I responded with equal affection, as I could feel their pain and desperation.

“How could this happen?” Grace asked, tears glazing her turquoise eyes.

Caia and Dmitri came to our side, exchanging sympathetic glances with Harper.

“I don’t know,” I replied, my voice raw with emotion. “We don’t know… It’s like…”

“It’s like they never existed until half an hour ago.” Victoria sighed, rubbing her face with her palms. “This doesn’t make sense! You don’t just give birth to two perfect babies and then forget you ever had them. It’s ludicrous!”

“It’s very powerful magic,” Ibrahim announced, standing up. “I don’t know yet what could’ve caused it. Or who. But I’ve already sent out a message to Sherus and Nuriya, so we should be hearing from them soon.”

“And what do we do in the meantime?” Bastien growled. “My son, my daughter, our children are out there… Good grief, we haven’t seen them in twenty-one years…”

Sobs and murmurs rippled through the Great Dome as we tried to understand how all this had come to happen. We all agreed that our memories had been wiped clean on the night of Sherus and Nuriya’s ball.

“D-Do you think… they had something to do with it?” River asked, holding Ben tightly as she wiped her tears.

“But why?” Ben replied, frowning deeply as he gazed at his wife. “It makes no sense. Nuriya is like an aunt to me, and Sherus…The Nasiri jinn and the fire fae are our allies and well-wishers.”

“Of course, Nuriya would never do such a thing!” Aisha piped up from her seat next to Horatio, her cheeks flushed with indignation.

We all looked at one another, utterly baffled and frustrated beyond belief. How would we get our children back? Where were they? Why hadn’t they reached out in all these years? The more we talked about this, the more questions we had.

“The fae and jinn had nothing to do with this.” A female voice suddenly boomed through the Dome.

We all stilled, turning to look at the main entrance, where a pink mist had gathered out of thin air, shimmering as it formed the figure of a beautiful young woman with long reddish pink hair and bright violet eyes. She held a golden mask in her hand, and was covered in beautiful, colorful layers of fine silk and an abundance of jewels.

A couple of seconds went by in silence before Tejus shot across the hall, his expression darkened by fury.

“Did you do this?” he asked, gritting his teeth.

The creature lifted a hand and sent out an invisible pulse, stopping Tejus in his tracks. It prompted the rest of us to move toward her, as our instincts kicked in. I treated her as a potential hostile, using my fury to fuel me into fighting mode, but the strange woman raised both arms and launched another pulse, this time keeping us all back.

“Who are you?” I snapped, trying to move past her barrier.

It was impossible. How did she even break through The Shade’s protective barrier?

I looked over at the others. They were all dealing with the same invisible opposition. A room full of vampires, werewolves, fae, jinn, sentries, Hawks, and witches, and none of us could do anything against her.

“What did you do with our children?” Bastien snarled, struggling to get to her.

“Please,” the creature said. “I mean you no harm. I come here in peace. I wish to take you to them.”

“Who are you?” I repeated my question, feeling my nerves stretch beyond their limits.

“I am a Daughter of Eritopia,” she replied, her glowing violet eyes capturing my attention. “It is a galaxy many lightyears away from Sherus and Nuriya’s star, in the In-Between. Your children and siblings are there. They are alive. They are now safe and eager to see you.”

I blinked rapidly as I processed the news.

“Wait, wait,” I replied. “What do you mean they are now safe? Weren’t they safe before? What happened?”

“And what’s a Daughter of Eritopia?” Dmitri chimed in, scrunching his face in bewilderment, before Harper nudged him in the ribs. “Ouch… What, don’t you want to know?”

“Maybe now’s not the right time,” my daughter hissed, silencing the young half-wolf. Looking back now, Dmitri and Jovi were like two peas in a pod.

“We are guardians of our galaxy,” the Daughter replied gently. “And we owe your children a great debt. They put their lives at risk to save our world when we failed.”

“Take us to them, now!” Tejus commanded furiously.

“I will. But you must be aware,” she said. “We’ve had to put Eritopia in a time freeze of sorts, to hide it from the rest of the universe and keep the darkness that had festered inside it from spilling out and destroying other planets. Time has passed differently there because of that. You have not seen your children in twenty years, but it has only been weeks since they saw you.”

We all needed a long moment to take that in. Grace, Victoria, River, and I looked at one another as the realization sank in.