Archangel's Sun (Guild Hunter #13)(99)

A rare and unique gift that shouldn’t be squandered.

“I leave you to the scent of arrogance, my lady.” A bow so suave it was poetry.

Smiling, she returned her attention to the letter. It was just like Aegaeon to pretend to be asking permission, but to actually be dictating terms. Her immediate response was to carrier back a cool rejection, but then she paused, thought about it. The past was past, yes, but one question haunted her to this day.

So she’d take this chance to ask it.

She’d face the man who was, to her, the embodiment of cruelty. “Come, Aegaeon. I think it’s time this was done.”

It was as she was returning inside to ready herself for the dinner with her squadron that her phone rang. Illium’s face filled the screen. “My son,” she said, her heart ablaze with piercing love. “You surprise me.”

“Ha! I’m not the one dispensing surprises.” Suspicious eyes. “A little bird told me that you and Titus . . .” He blew out a breath, the arches of his healing wings shifting against a background that told her he was in his Tower suite. “Is it true?”

Sharine smiled at the streaks of color on his cheekbones. “Would it shock you if it was?”

Eyes of beaten gold connecting with hers, the blush forgotten. “I like Titus, but I don’t want you hurt.”

Still protecting her, her beautiful child who’d had to look after his mother for far too long. “I’m living now, Illium,” she said, gentle because he’d earned such gentleness even when he trod where most children would never be permitted. “I won’t hide, not even from pain. I’ll never again choose to hide when I can spread my wings and breathe the air and yes, make mistakes and grow.”

Her son took in her face. “You’re truly different,” he said at last, a faint smile edging his lips. “Do you remember how I once insisted you paint me blue from head to toe and you did?”

“Oh.” Her hand flew to her mouth. “You were so very small! How do you remember?”

A shrug that reminded her of the boy he’d been. “I was so excited to be blue.” Smile segueing into a grin, he said, “Does Titus know who you are when you’re you?”

Bubbles of laughter in her bloodstream. “Oh, yes, I’ve concealed nothing from him. He considers me stubborn and aggravating in the extreme.”

A burst of laughter from Illium that made her join in, it was so wildly infectious. When they both calmed down, he said, “I think I’m going to mind my own business now, and not think too hard about what you might be up to with Titus.”

She bit back her smile. “Such is wise indeed, else you might have nightmares.”

“Mother.” His tone was stern, but when she asked him about his life, he answered in good humor, and they ended the conversation with words of love from a mother to her son, and a son to his mother.

Then, of course, she had to call Aodhan, too, to ensure he was well. He’d heard rumors of a possible liaison between her and Titus, and had the same reason to ask her about it. “I wouldn’t have you in pain, Eh-ma.” Emotion-filled words, his eyes shards of blue and green shattering outward from a black pupil.

Truly, she thought after the conversation ended, she was blessed to have known two such hearts from childhood.

Darkness lay heavy on the horizon now. She knew the worst of it was about to begin for Titus and his people; her stomach clenched as it did every night at this hour, a visceral fear thick in her blood. “Stay safe, Titus. Fly home to me.”



* * *



*

Titus had been battling the reborn for months.

So he could hardly believe it when the day came that he found himself standing at the southern tip of his territory, after a blazing wave of battle that laid waste to reborn nest after reborn nest. The Guild Hunters had come through again and again, and though Titus knew that he and his troops hadn’t wiped out the scourge, it was now a matter of isolated nests, and of hunting down lone reborn who’d managed to evade the hunt.

The rotting and infectious creatures were no longer a plague over his land. His people could once more farm their lands, build their homes, live lives free of constant fear.

The first thing he did—after allowing himself a roar of victory echoed by his troops—was gather together all senior field commanders, loop in Tzadiq from Narja, and nut out a plan for eliminating those reborn who’d slipped through the net. Tzadiq took on the duty of creating specialist squadrons who’d work with equally specialist vampiric and Guild Hunter teams.

The other members of the Guild would return to their normal duties because sadly, Africa wasn’t proof from idiot vampires.

The rest of Titus’s forces would turn their minds to assisting people who’d been scraping by with far too little. With the northern half of the continent declared clear much earlier, Tzadiq had already repurposed the standing force of multiple cities to outward areas, their task to assist farmers to rebuild, put up heavy-duty fences, and take other such necessary protections against any lingering reborn.

“Charisemnon’s commanders stared at me as if I was talking gibberish when I gave that order,” Tzadiq had told him when they’d spoken at the time. “The idea of sullying their hands with anything but battle glory seemed to be beyond them.”

Titus had snorted; he felt no surprise that Charisemnon’s troops knew nothing of what it was to be part of a functioning ecosystem. “How do they believe the cities will be fed if the farms go fallow? No other territory is in a much better position, so we can’t rely on imported food.”