“So you want Fury on the Siren throne?” Layla spoke, gesturing to her Bound Silver Siren as he returned to Reginald, both of them talking and gesturing angrily now beyond the dome. “Is that why you took me? To push him?”
“Fury needs no more pushing.” Hunter spoke calmly, watching the argument between his sons. “I took you because Reginald and Fury need the proper motivation to decide among themselves who is to be the next Siren King.”
“And what motivation is that?” Layla snarled. “Terror?”
“Love.” Hunter glanced back to her, his gaze deep. “Dragon Binds can weave something even more heavenly than ether, or any of the elements, Layla. We can weave the most elemental substance of all, which creates the entire pattern of the universe – love. The material of Divine Creation. This is what you have woven through your men, and yourself, as you Bound them. They love you, deeply. They will do anything I ask of them, to see you returned to their arms. They do as they do for love. As do I.”
“Yousodo not work love, buddy.” Layla snarked, her Dragon hijacking her mouth as it blistered inside her veins.
“Everything I do is because of love,” Hunter spoke softly, though his dawn-light gaze was intense. “Everything any Bind does is because of love, Layla Price.”
Turning back towards the mayhem visible through the shimmering barrier, Hunter said no more. Turning also, Layla watched as arguments devoured Reginald, Fury, and their family, plus Rhennic. Leni had finally come to and realized the terrible extent of everything that had happened. Like a professional diplomat, she had charged into the situation despite her bleeding head, barking orders at guards to control the situation even as she held one hand to her temple. At Leni’s orders, a veritable horde of guards were now ushering everyone out of the hall. Another group of Siren-guards stood around the arguing royal family, holding their tridents uncertainly, while others guarded the dead body of Léviathan. Beltane was over, and as Layla stared at her Bound men, her heart flooding out to them but only feeling the weakest sensations through the shimmering barrier between worlds, she faced Hunter.
“What are you going to do?” She asked him, trying to not let her voice tremble with fear.
“I will do as I have told them,” Hunter nodded toward her Bound lovers. “They must decide who is to be Siren King, and who will die. It is Siren law that since the final blow to end a King was made by a foreigner, the last to fight him directly must now battle for the top spot. The victor takes the throne; the lesser Siren dies. We will remain here, and watch until that happens.”
“You bastard! YouknewFury and Reginald would have to battle each other to the death when you delivered that killing-strike to Léviathan!” Layla growled at him, but her growl was twisted in knots as she set both hands to the barrier, her heart keening for her Royal Sirens. With desperation, Layla hammered fire and wind into the barrier with her fists, but it was useless as everything simply dissipated. Her power was just as helpless against the etheric barrier as everyone else’s.
Only Hunter could dissolve this wall he’d built between worlds.
As Layla gazed at Reginald in his battle-naked glory, his haughty, beautiful face suddenly contorted in rage as he left off arguing with Fury, striding to the nexus-space and hurling spear after spear of raging golden energy at it as if he’d felt Layla’s efforts. Clamping a hand on his shoulder, Fury hauled him back – the more controlled of the two now with Layla’s Bind and Rhennic’s calm pouring through his veins. With a roar, Reginald shook him off, and turning back to Fury, the twins’ argument started all over again as Rhennic stood by with a dark worry. As Layla watched, she saw Rhennic startle, then take his cell phone from an inner pocket of his vest. Tapping it and holding it to his ear, he set a hand on his hip, as his strong face fell into a terrible hardness.
The hardness of a commander having to tell the troops the battle had gone all wrong.
Hey Adrian, Dusk.Layla heard Rhennic speak quietly as the Sirens argued.Yeah, shit’s hit the fan up here. Hunter’s got Layla. And he’s asked Fury and Reginald to battle to the death to get her back. Yeah… I know…
Layla’s heart screamed for them, though she could feel only the barest hint of Adrian’s rage and Dusk’s roar from where she stood in the nexus Realm. But as Fury snarled and raked a hand through his long silver hair, then shouted at Reginald, gesturing to the space where Layla now was, her heart broke for him also. Though Reginald, Rhennic, Adrian, and Dusk were beloved to her, Fury was a part of her now also, and she could feel a vast love inside herself for him – a love borne of their Bind. It wasn’t mature like it was for the rest of her Bound lovers yet, but it was there.
And she knew he loved her too now, as much as Reginald and the rest.
“I gave them a chance to finish the battle without repercussion,” Hunter spoke beside Layla. “They refused. Now they must decide as per Siren law who will live and who will die so one of them can take the throne. Talk to them, Layla. Speak with them through the Bind. I will weaken the dome enough so you can. Tell them you are alive and convince them to come to a decision.”
“Never.” Layla growled, turning and facing Hunter with pure hate boiling in her veins. “Take that mask off and face me, asshole. Because you’ll have to kill me before I do anything to help you in your mad schemes.”
“As you wish. But you will not like what you see.”
Slowly, Hunter reached up, untying the velvet cords that kept his masque on. As he lowered it from his face, Layla’s breath caught – dysphoria rolling through her as she had aPhantom of the Operamoment. Beneath his masque, Hunter’s face changed and changed again with a thousand different visages, each one shifting and morphing with disorienting grace and ripples of light. Only his eyes remained the same; and as Layla stared at them, she suddenly realized the green and gold he’d previously shown her, and the forest-black they’d gone when he’d been irate had been inaccurate. Since he’d not been able to recall his own self for thousands of years, Hunter’s memory of his eyes had been wrong also. His eyes weren’t green at all – they were this, Layla knew as she stared at him; luminous, incredible.
Beautiful as the dawn rising over a desert ocean as Hunter stared her down in his disastrously morphing face.
“Those are your real eyes…” Layla spoke, amazed as she watched him. “You remembered them after we had our moment of resonance in Manarola.”
“Yes.” He spoke quietly, watching her with an ancient depth in those beautiful eyes. “I recalled my body also, after Manarola. Would you like to see it?”
“Yes.” Layla breathed, before she could take it back.
Even as she watched, Hunter’s body morphed elegantly inside his gossamer Siren-robe until a different man stood before her. Exceptionally well-made, Hunter was just as tall but more fit as he gazed down upon her now like some elder god come alive. Burnished like gold, his skin was a caramel color so radiant it shone beneath the watery dome. Waves of honey-gold hair fell over his shoulders and cascaded down his back, beautiful. His entire body was perfect, from his long, straight limbs to the high arches of his feet, to the strong, lean muscles that bunched in perfect coordination as he reached up, passing a hand over those long waves to pull them back from his temples just like Reginald.
No artist could have made any creature more beautiful. And standing before him now, it smote Layla with shock that a man so awful could be so stunning. Only his face was still wrong – morphing so fast it was disorienting. Layla looked away from him, feeling sick. Reaching out, Hunter’s warm fingers were like a sweet zephyr as he caressed her cheek with his knuckles.
“Does my true form displease you so much?” He spoke quietly.
“Don’t touch me.” Layla hissed, but it was weak now that she had seen what he’d been; what he could be again. Like a fallen angel, like a lion of the desert, Hunter had a godly beauty. With a deep need, Layla’s Dragon suddenly stirred – a golden fire filling her veins as her drakaina roared to have him. Layla’s drakaina had once roiled to Adam’s touch, but this was unreal how much she was feeling for Hunter now that he’d found his true form again. With a disastrous need, Layla felt the Bind roll out from her as she breathed hard, a hot bourbon-orange scent flooding from her skin. She felt it wrap into Hunter, and she heard his soft exhalation as his lips fell open.
Feeling it, too.
“I never had a chance to thank you, Layla, for bringing my true form back to me.” He spoke quietly, his voice deep and smooth in what Layla knew to be his own real voice now. “It means far more to me… than I could ever really say.”
