Bastion made a noise of relief. He was looking up at the balcony. “The fire’s out.” He concentrated, listening. She hadn’t noticed, but they hadbeen cast in near darkness, lit only by the torches on the street. “Everyone seems to have made it out.”
Myrddin shifted, placed himself between them and held his hands out, palms up. “On the count of three.”
They both nodded.
“One.”
Lilac braced herself, readying her palm above his, shifting Garin in her arms. Bastion did the same, looking utterly skeptical and ready to recoil, probably thinking about Kestrel’s unpleasant portaling experience.
“Two…”
Myrddin clamped a steel grip on her outstretched forearm. She heard Bastion scream somewhere off to her right, and her stomach dropped as the ground disappeared and the world started spinning. She hugged Garin tight and shut her eyes.
There wasa rush of warm air, and a set of new screams. The world—the room they’d landed in—had slowed and eventually came to a stop, but they were contained within a vortex of wind that loosed every piece of parchment and shuddered the hanging pots suspended by the beams on the ceiling.
They’d teleported into a firelit room shrouded in potted, hanging greenery, amber and cobalt bottles galore—no Low Forest plants to be seen this time. Adelaide shot up in a small bed tucked in the right hand corner of the room, cussing and pulling the covers up over herself, her bare shoulders barely visible above the knitted comforter. Lorietta was dressed in a pretty, puffed sleeve white gown with a hem adorned in pink roses, in the middle of pulling a pair of brown boots on.
She dropped the second shoe and stumbled back. “Modron!” Lorietta squeaked as Myrddin dipped into a bow, seemingly unbothered by the way his vortex had promptly floated the bottoms of his robes.
“Stake me now,” Bastion said, shielding his eyes with one hand and tugging Myrddin’s robes down with the other. “You couldn’t bother to at least wear your braies?”
“Greetings and salutations,” Myrddin shouted above the wind that continued around them, several pieces of crumpled paper and leaves making their rounds. “A delivery for you. Two vampires, intact. Mostly.”
“Myrddin,” Lorietta screeched, her large eyes falling upon Garin’s limp form in Lilac’s arms—the gore staining his face and body. “Not my chamber!”
There was a large lump on her bed, under the covers, where Adelaide had been.
“If I’m teleporting within a property’s walls, I can only teleport topeople. Or Daemons. An arcane law meant to protect… ethics?” He waved a vague hand. “Seems rather counterintuitive in this particular circumstance. I hate to deposit this dormant, rather deadly vampire and his aloof brother on you, I truly do. My apologies, my friends.”
Lilac wanted to close her eyes again, on the verge of throwing up, but she kept them open out of burning curiosity. The air around them had slowed considerably, almost making the spinning sensation worse. Myrddin shook Bastion off, and the vampire coughed and stumbled out of the vortex onto Lorietta’s rug next to the pit-style hearth in the center of the room.
The warlock then elbowed Lilac but clamped his now free hand over hers, which had been tucked under his arm. “Well, Your Majesty? What are you waiting for?”
Keeping her distance, Lorietta refused to get any closer but craned her neck to get a better view of Garin as Bastion gingerly righted himself before her. Lilac held him close, a carnal feeling of distrust flooding her body.
“It will be okay,” Myrddin shouted over the wind. “I promise.”
“I can’t.” She shook her head, clutching him. “I can’t leave him.”
“You can. This place is his home,” the warlock said with a reassuring squeeze of her hand, his crystal gaze warming her even as she held tears back. “You will see him soon. You have no choice.”
“I thought we were severing their bond,” Lorietta interjected.
Myrddin glanced knowingly at Lilac, unmoved by the sickening motion. “We can try. If that’s the case, I’d prepare for more casualties, though.”
There was a simultaneous exclamation of fear and protest from Lorietta and Adelaide. “That goes against everything he wanted for her.” Lorietta glanced at Garin in horror. “What made him change his mind?”
“It was me.” Lilac shifted Garin forward as they all looked to her. “I didit. I made myself his thrall.” Gingerly, cradling his head, she leaned over. “Be careful with him.”
Bastion took him from her, and the moment he was out of her hands, she attempted to follow—tried to step out from the vortex. She was yanked back by the collar by Myrddin, who held her close around the shoulders as the wind picked up.
The room dissipated into blurs of orange and green.
19
Lilac made the mistake of shutting her eyes again, opening them moments later when she felt dew on her face and the ground beneath her feet. She stumbled into the dark when the spinning stopped, nearly launching herself into the brush before Myrddin caught her by the arm and led her to a nearby oak trunk. Her stomach heaved as she steadied herself against it.
“There now,” Myrddin muttered, releasing her. “For all the things you could’ve inherited from Garin, you’d think he would have spared you some of his grace, too.”
