Tane pointed his stolen sword toward the fey in unspoken warning.
“The truth Sylvermyst.”
Ariyal deliberately paused, as if to ensure Tane understood he was answering because he wanted to and not because he was intimidated.
“It’s a prophecy,” he at last admitted.
“Of course it is,” Tane muttered.
Laylah pressed a hand to her throat. “What does it say?”
The Sylvermyst closed his eyes as he quoted the prophecy he’d obviously memorized:
“Flesh of flesh, blood of blood, bound in darkness. The alpha and omega shall be torn asunder and through the mist reunited. Pathways that have been hidden will be found and the veil parted to the faithful. The Gemini will rise and chaos shall rule for all eternity.”
Tane snorted. Shit. He hated the mumbo-jumbo prophets spouted.
“The usual babble,” he said in disgust. “Why can’t they just say what the hell’s going to happen?”
Ariyal narrowed his gaze. “Chaos ruling for all eternity seems pretty straightforward.”
“Flesh of flesh?” Tane pointed out. “It’s gibberish.”
The fey nodded toward the mage who remained pressed against the far side of the tunnel.
“The Dark Lord created the brats out of his flesh.”
Laylah cursed. “Stop saying that.”
The bronzed gaze swung back to regard Laylah with a bleak gaze.
“Not saying it doesn’t make it any less true.” “The children are innocent,” Laylah insisted. “They’re vessels. With them the Dark Lord will be able to return.”
“No.” Laylah shook her head. “You don’t know that.” “I’m not willing to risk it.” The unnerving bronze gaze shifted to Tane. “Are you, vampire?”
Chapter 23
Laylah glared at the fey, wishing she had enough strength left to break his perfect nose.
What would it solve? Nothing. But it damned well would feel fantastic.
Instead she reached down to grab the sword she was too weary to lift and pretended that she wasn’t about to fall flat on her face.
“Don’t be looking to me for support, fey,” Tane growled at her side. “You try to hurt my children and I’ll cut your fucking head off.”
Ariyal hissed in frustration. “You will sacrifice the world for them?”
“The world is already damned if it demands the blood of innocents,” Laylah said. “You can’t fight evil with evil.”
“Are you bloody kidding me?” The Sylvermyst studied her as if she’d grown a second head. “No one is that naïve.”
There was a low cry from one of the babies as Sergei stepped forward, sweat coating his forehead despite the brutal chill in the air.
“If you want the brats I’ll give them to you.” He looked directly at the fey. “Once I’m out of here.”
Tane swung his sword in Sergei’s direction, his low growl stopping the mage in his tracks.
“Take one more step and you’re dead, mage.”
Licking his lips, Sergei briefly glanced toward the lethal vampire before grimly turning his attention back to Ariyal.
“I’m not without power. If you’ll join with me we can escape.” He shook the babies dangling in his hands and it was only Tane’s hand landing on her shoulder that kept Laylah from launching herself at the bastard. “Once we’re away from here you can do whatever the hell you want with the babes.”
“You wouldn’t,” Jaelyn muttered, studying Ariyal with an odd mixture of fury and … confusion. As if unable to accept the Sylvermyst could truly harm an innocent child.
The fey’s beautiful features tightened, his gaze refusing to stray toward the female vampire.
“Someone has to stop the looming apocalypse. And if this Scooby-Doo gang doesn’t have the stomach to make the tough choices then I’ll do it for them.”
“Don’t pretend you have some altruistic motive for slaughtering children,” Laylah snapped. “All you care about is saving your own worthless hide.”
“Are you deaf?” The Sylvermyst pointed a finger toward the squirming babies. “They are not children, they’re the spawn of the Dark Lord.”
“He’s right,” Sergei parroted.
Laylah managed to force a small rock to drop onto his head. “Shut up, mage.”
Sergei hissed, stabbing her with a furious glare. “They’re creatures of dark magic, created by evil.”
Laylah ignored the thick tension that blanketed the tunnel.
She wasn’t stupid. She knew that the others suspected her overwhelming maternal instincts were blinding her to the truth of the babies. And in one sense they were right.
She refused to consider who or what had created the babies. Or what they intended to do with them. So far as she was concerned, they had been born the moment she’d taken them from the mist.
But it wasn’t just blind hope.
To the very depths of her soul she believed the children were innocent.
After all, she was a creation of evil.
What else could you call the brutal rape of a helpless woman that had been orchestrated by her own sister?
She had to believe that it was possible for good to come out of such wickedness.
“It doesn’t matter how they were created,” she said, her voice thick.
Ariyal swore, the aroma of herbs so strong it overwhelmed every other scent. Not entirely a bad thing considering Marika had left behind the stench of burning flesh.
Nasty.
“Don’t be a fool.” The fey stabbed a finger toward the babies. “They are destined to open the path to the Dark Lord and his minions.”
“Cousins of yours?” Jaelyn abruptly mocked.
“Yes.” The furious bronze gaze swung toward the female vampire. “And trust me, they don’t have my exquisite charm.”
Jaelyn snorted. “Hard to believe they could be worse.”
“You have no idea.” Ariyal turned back to Laylah. “And they wouldn’t even be the worst of what would crawl out of hell.”
She believed him.
She truly did.
Whatever his selfish motive in wanting to prevent the return of the Dark Lord, he wasn’t lying when he spoke of the horrors that would engulf the world if the veil between worlds was ripped open.
That didn’t mean, however, he wasn’t a big fat liar when it came to the supposed fate of her beautiful children.
“Where did you hear this prophecy?” she demanded between clenched teeth.
He waved a slender hand. “It’s taught to all Sylvermyst before they ever leave the cradle.”
“Convenient.” Ariyal intended to commit murder because of a vague bedtime story? She stuck out her chin. “Did you ever think it might have been a lie that was invented by the Dark Lord?”
He stuck out his own chin. “It couldn’t have been.”
Tane brushed a comforting hand up and down her back. “How do you know?” he challenged the Sylvermyst.
Ariyal muttered words in a harsh, foreign language, looking at them as if they were too stupid to endure.
“After the Dark Lord heard the prophecy he realized that he would eventually be banished from the world,” he said, his tone indicating he was repeating something that should be obvious to the most dense creature. Jackass. “Everyone knows that it drove him crazy and he commanded that all prophets be slaughtered.”
Tane and Laylah shared a brief glance. It was common knowledge that the Dark Lord had commanded that true prophets be destroyed. Still, Laylah had never heard that it was because he’d learned of a foretelling he didn’t like.
Frowning, Tane swiftly came to the same conclusion. “He could have twisted it to make sure you remained faithful even during his banishment.” He continued to stroke Laylah’s back, his steady touch keeping her volatile temper in check. A good thing considering she was too weak to do more than get herself killed. “So long as there was hope he would eventually return to this world, he could be certain you would continue to search for a means to open the veil.”
The heat of Ariyal’s anger swirled around them, only to be swiftly countered by Tane’s blast of frigid power. The combination made the ground shift beneath them. Laylah grimaced. The mountain was unstable enough without adding the stress of two alpha demons flexing their muscles.
“The prophecy hasn’t been altered by the Dark Lord or anyone else,” the Sylvermyst said between clenched teeth.
Laylah shook her head at his stubborn refusal to accept he could be wrong. “How can you be so certain?” “Because it came from the lips of an Oracle.” Tane stiffened at her side. “What Oracle?” “Siljar.”
“Shit.” Tane’s hand gripped Laylah’s shoulder and she turned to study his grim expression. “She’s a prophet?”
Ariyal slowly nodded, easily reading Tane’s shock. “The rumors are that it was her one and only foretelling and that when she spoke the words it unleashed such fury in the world that whole civilizations tumbled into dust.”
Tane snorted, his hand shifting from Laylah to rub the tattoo marring the skin of his chest.
“Yeah, she does have a way of making her point,” he muttered.
Laylah sent him a frown of astonishment. “Was she the one …?” “She was.”
“Dammit.” Ariyal moved forward until the silent Jaelyn stepped directly in his path. With a hiss of frustration, he stabbed Laylah with a fierce frown. “Then you understand this isn’t a joke. You can save the world or destroy it.” His hands clenched at his side. “Your choice.”
“No.” Laylah didn’t even hesitate. “There is no choice.”
The Sylvermyst turned his frown toward Tane. “Can’t you control your female?” The words barely left his lips before he jerked in response to Laylah’s infuriated bolt of electricity. “Shit.”
Tane smirked in pleasure. “You want to try?”
Laylah ignored the byplay, just as she ignored the ball of dread in the pit of her stomach.
Okay, the prophecy hadn’t been concocted by the Dark Lord, but that didn’t mean it had anything to do with the children.
Dammit. She’d held Maluhia in her arms for years. She would know if he was evil.
Just as she’d known there was a second child? A ruthless voice whispered in the back of her mind. A child she still couldn’t sense despite being only a few feet apart.
With a shake of her head she dismissed the troubling suspicions.
“You’re taking an obscure prophecy and twisting it to suit your purpose,” she accused. “The words could mean anything. Or nothing.”
“You’re being willfully blind, and you know it.”
“You’ll say anything to get what you want.”
“I don’t need your help to get what I want, Jinn.” For some reason the Sylvermyst’s attention turned toward the female vampire. “I can take care of that all on my own.”