Concordia, Eleven Hundred Years BeforeThaelen woke with Gera pressed tight to his chest. The human had massaged and fed Thaelen, and then slept contentedly at his side. Thaelen had fed heavily from Gera in the hopes that between the blood loss and lack of privacy, the human would not find the lack of sex remarkable and Gera did not stir as Thaelen eased himself free of his embrace and tiptoed out of the tent.He was not surprised to find Egren feeding on a blood slave outside and nodded his greeting to her. “Do not interrupt your meal,” he told her. “I will go to the beach to bathe and return anon.”His path through the stronghold was heralded by greetings and offers of company however he declined them, needing to spend some time alone with his thoughts and his grief. The sand was spotted with camp sites, smouldering fires ringed by sleeping vampires and blood slaves, and the debris of their belongings.He stripped to his skin, leaving his clothes in the sand, and plunged into the wa

Concordia, Eleven Hundred Years BeforeThaelen burst into the tent to find Isolte supporting Meguitte’s head whilst Caerin soaked cloth in a bowl.Sigrid licked a wound on her wrist closed, turning to face him. “It is not good,” she told him grimly. “I gave her blood not knowing how long it would take Gera to find you, but my blood does not have your potency.”“What is wrong?” Thaelen took Isolte’s place and accepted the athame that Gera brought him, slicing over his wrist and placing it at the witch’s mouth. She was unconscious, and he could feel the heat of her fever, smell the sharp stench of illness on her sweat.“I do not know,” Sigrid told him, shaking her head.“I think I do,” Isolte offered hesitantly. “I have seen mothers take suddenly like this, without warning, after hard births. The midwives say that it is an infection inside that spreads so quickly.” She shook her head to indicate that such cases were lost.“No,” Thaelen shook his head in disagreement. “I refuse to let it

Havermouth, Three Weeks BeforeHeath and Cameron were gone for a very long time. Long enough that Rhett had time to cry his self-pity out and pull himself together to face his mates when they returned. He washed his face in the sink and packed away all signs of Aislen’s imprisonment from his bedroom, before brushing his hair back into a pony-tail and inspecting himself in the mirror. It was ridiculous, he thought, to dress up to fight with his mates, but after he’d changed his top and added some jewellery and a leather jacket, he felt better equipped to defy Heath.In the spirit of defiance, he poured himself a glass of wine and took it and a smoke out onto the balcony, leaning against the handrail and looking over the river, listening for wolf howls. He was three quarters of a bottle down by the time that he saw his mates in wolf-form streak through the grasses on the other side of the river and plunge into the water. They shifted as they reached the bank, with Heath leading, and wal

Havermouth, Three Weeks Before“She doesn’t want you.” Abigail’s words sat heavily on the air.Cameron couldn’t resist flicking his eyes to Rhett. Aislen didn’t want Heath and Cameron, but she wanted Rhett. She couldn’t have him though, not whilst he was part of the Triquetra. For the first time, Cameron felt fear grip his heart icily. What if Rhett chose Aislen? Would he reject the Triquetra, would he reject Cameron and Heath, in order to have her?Would Cameron if he were Rhett? He wondered. The thought had never crossed his mind before, but once it was there, it lodged deep. He pictured walking around Havermouth hand in hand with Aislen as they had done years before, just like everyone else, just a boy and a girl in love… He had never been able to walk around Havermouth like that with Rhett or Heath, and probably never would, he thought sadly.He looked at Heath and Rhett next to him. Heath had been part of Cameron’s life since childhood and Rhett… Rhett was Rhett. He remembered ho

Havermouth, Three Weeks Before“Nice place,” the driver said with admiration as they approached the safe house. The setting sun caught in the windows in a spectacular display of pinks and oranges. “Beautiful view from here.”“It is,” Talen agreed.“Town’s on the creep-list though,” the driver added as he followed the curve of the driveway. “Story is that the family massacred the natives when they took over the land here, and were cursed as a result. Then, not ten years later, beau from Rideten hadn’t heard from his dearly beloved for over a month, and decided to ride over with the regular traders who made the journey, and found the place abandoned.“A lot of old dried blood and a big bonfire with charred human bone, all the farm-animals, horses, chickens, and wandering free, and not a living person to be seen. Some think there was a plague of some sort, but then, if everyone died, what happened to the bodies of the last ones to cark it?” The driver said with relish as he parked. “So,