When Darkness Ends (Guardians of Eternity #12)(3)

She frowned, belatedly realizing she couldn’t try and pin the blame of their abrupt teleportation on him.

Odd, she hadn’t struck him as stupid.

Just the opposite, in fact.

“Fey aren’t the only creatures who can create portals.” She tried to hedge.

“Well, I obviously didn’t do it.”

“Neither did I.”

He made a sound of impatience. Why was she continuing with this game?

“You expect me to believe you?”

The flecks of emerald shimmered in her eyes. “My father has forbidden his people to leave our homeland.”

“Oh aye, and a daughter has never dared to disobey her father.”

She cast a condemning glance around the barren cave. “Trust me. If I did decide to defy my father, I wouldn’t choose to travel to this dump.”

His low growl filled the air. He was a true hedonist. A vampire who reveled in rare books, fine wine, and beautiful women.

And in turn, women adored him.

All women.

But this female . . .

She wasn’t the warm, willing, bundle of pleasure he was accustomed to. She was rude and prickly and downright dangerous.

“Watch your tongue, princess,” he snarled. “This dump happens to be a part of my private lair.”

“There.” She pointed an accusing finger toward him. “I knew it. You kidnapped me.”

Cyn rolled his eyes. Could this farce get any more ridiculous?

“The only one kidnapped was me.”

“Why would I kidnap an oversized, ego-bloated vampire?”

Yeah. Why would she? It took him a minute to shuffle through his still-fuzzy thoughts.

“To keep me from protecting my friend,” he at last concluded.

Hadn’t she pulled him out of the throne room, leaving Roke at the mercy of her father, Sariel? And then she’d plied him with some wicked fey brew that had knocked him unconscious.

Aye. It made perfect sense that it was a nefarious plot to separate him from his friend.

At least it did until she glared at him in outraged disbelief.

“Are you completely mental? Your friend was exactly where he wanted to be.”

Okay. She had a point.

Roke hadn’t looked like he needed Cyn’s services. In fact, the last he’d seen of his fellow vampire, he was wrapping his mate in his arms, his expression one of besotted devotion.

Bleck.

“Then perhaps you simply wanted to be alone with me.” He flashed a smile that revealed his snowy white fangs. One way or another he was getting answers. “You wouldn’t be the first female to use magic to get me into your bed.”

She muttered something distinctly unladylike beneath her breath.

“I am a fairy princess.”

“And?”

“And I don’t share my bed with—”

He planted his hands on his hips, his expression daring her to finish the sentence.

“With?”

Her lips parted to complete her insult, but before she could speak there was a sizzle of power in the air. Cyn turned toward the center of the cave, his muscles coiled to attack as there was a faint pop, and then a tiny demon dressed in a long white gown appeared out of thin air.

Cyn gave a startled hiss, his eyes widening at the creature who could easily pass as a young girl with her small stature and long silver braid that nearly brushed the floor. Cyn, however, wasn’t fooled. He recognized the strange oblong eyes that were a solid black and the sharp, pointed teeth.

This was no harmless juvenile.

She had enough power to crush him and his entire clan.

Even worse, she was an Oracle. One of the rare demons who sat on the Commission, the ultimate rulers of the demon world.

“Enough squabbling, children,” she chided, folding her hands together as she studied them with an unnerving intensity.

“Holy shite.” Cyn offered a belated bow. “Siljar.”

Fallon crouched on the ground, her arms wrapped around her knees in a futile effort at modesty.

“You know this person?”

“Not person,” Cyn corrected, shivering as Siljar’s energy sizzled over his skin. “Oracle.”

The amber eyes widened. “Oh.”

“Forgive me.” Siljar gave an absent wave of her hand and Cyn made a strangled sound of shock as he found himself covered by a plain white robe that hit him just below the knees. The Oracle gave another wave of her hand and Fallon was covered in a matching robe. “I haven’t created a portal into the fairy homeland for a number of centuries.”

Cyn scowled, ignoring Fallon’s I-told-you-so glare. “You brought us here?” he demanded.

Siljar gave a nod of her head. “I did.”

“Why?”

“Because I have need of you.”

His acute hearing picked up Fallon’s soft sigh of relief as she rose to her feet and brushed her hands down the satin robe.

“You need the vampire?”

“I have a name,” he reminded the princess with a snap.

Siljar clicked her tongue, her gaze shifting from Fallon to Cyn.

“I need both of you.”

Cyn stiffened. It was never, ever a good thing when an Oracle had need of him.

“Why?”

There was the unmistakable scent of sulfur as Siljar’s expression tightened with anger.