Hunt the Darkness (Guardians of Eternity #11)(73)

“You will,” he said with an arrogant assurance that grated on her already raw nerves.

“You’re standing right there, whether you’re real or not,” she snapped. “Why don’t you just tell me how to get to you?”

He was shaking his head before she finished. “The portal is not a human tunnel from one place to another. It is made of magic that . . . floats.”

Sally frowned. “What does that mean?”

“It doesn’t remain in the same place.” He pointed toward the box. “The glyphs are carved with my power. They will always be capable of finding me.”

His confidence that she would rush to fulfill her destiny didn’t do anything to ease her temper.

As far as he was concerned she was just a tool he’d created to pick the lock on his prison cell.

It didn’t matter to him that her life had been a brutal battle for survival. That she’d been fighting one enemy after another . . .

Abruptly reminded of her most recent battle, she narrowed her eyes to glare at the finely carved face.

“And what about the psycho demon who’s been trying to get his hands on the box?”

She expected dismissal at her welfare; instead a vibrant anger darkened the amber eyes.

“You allowed another to know about our secret communication?”

“It wasn’t a matter of letting him know,” she said. “I never saw him before Levet removed the layers of illusion from the box and glyphs started glowing like a neon sign.”

The scent of wine saturated the air, Sariel clearly not pleased with her explanation.

“Who is Levet?”

“A gargoyle who has helped me more than once.”

He was indifferent to her pointed reminder that there were demons who’d actually thought she was worth trying to protect.

Demons like Roke.

Her heart clenched with a sharp, near debilitating need to be in his arms.

“Who else knows of the box?”

She shrugged. “The vampires.”

He hissed out a low breath. “You have put me in great danger.”

“I’ve put you in danger?” She shook her head at his total self-absorption. She’d thought her mother was a narcissist, but she was an amateur when compared to Daddy Dearest. “I’m the one who has nearly been killed twice by the lunatic demon. Does he have something to do with you?”

He ignored her question, along with any concern for her safety.

“You must use the map to find me,” he commanded, taking a step back, then another. “Until then.”

The charming meadow began to fade around the edges, as if it was collapsing on itself.

At the same time her father was growing more and more distant.

Crap.

Her father was about to disappear and she hadn’t even asked him how she’d managed to mate with a vampire, let alone how to break it.

If the weird demon didn’t kill her, Roke would.

“Wait . ..”

Roke earned his title of being a stubborn SOB.

If someone gave him an answer he didn’t like, he simply waited until they gave him the one he wanted.

Even if the waiting included some broken bones, some blood, and a whole lot of tears.

Standing in silence as Troy tried to explain to him all the reasons he couldn’t open the portal or use his fey magic to locate Sally, he at last lifted a hand to halt the useless chatter.

“There has to be some way to trace her,” he insisted, his arms folded over his chest.

Sunrise was less than an hour away.

He intended to have his mate in his arms before that happened.

Troy heaved a frustrated sigh. “If she’s your mate, you should be able to sense her location, shouldn’t you?”

Roke hissed, the absence of Sally a raw wound that was slowly destroying him.

“It’s being . . . muffled,” he admitted in bleak tones.

Troy narrowed his emerald gaze. “Then she’s either using a spell to mask her location—”

“No,” Roke denied.

Sally wouldn’t be hiding from him.

But what if she still believed he’d deliberately abandoned her in the mines, a treacherous voice whispered in the back of his mind.

Maybe she was so pissed she was trying to avoid him.

Or worse . . . frightened.

No. That he couldn’t bear.

“Or she’s in another dimension,” Troy offered, thankfully distracting his dark thoughts.

“Can fey move between dimensions?” he asked.

Troy hesitated before giving a grudging nod. That was no doubt another one of those secrets the fey preferred to keep off the record.

“Only the very powerful,” he admitted. “But why would she want to?”

It was a question that made his fangs ache. “She had to have been forced.”

Troy looked baffled. “By who?”

“It could be one of the fey,” he muttered. “Or the damned Miera demon who’s been chasing us.”

The imp shook his head. “A Miera can’t manipulate portals.”

Roke made a sound of impatience, resuming his pacing as he struggled against the tidal wave of frustration.

“This was no normal Miera.”

Styx stepped forward, his large body consuming more than its fair share of space.