With the stunned distraction it had functioned as, Cassius shot a stream of his white magic at me, tethering Sylas too.
In the next moment, he snagged VelraandSorin, then teleported us from the fucked-up scene, his magic swirling violently all around us.
20
~Velra~
My brother was in custody.
Not Guardian Movement custody.
Ours.
I’d found out something about Cassius and Ketheron tonight as a result.
The two of them had a contingency plan that nobody knew about.
If the supernatural world ever became afraid of Ketheron again, or turned on him, they had a plan to hide him away from everyone and everything.
They had three locations, which they’d determined the viability of during theiradventure trips, which I now knew hadn’t just been about the exploratory, tourist-like nature of it all for them. The locations were heavily warded and within pocket dimensions, something that the people who’d hurt and experimented on both me and Ketheron had used to keep themselves off the radar before they’d been destroyed—Chimera Circle. And now Cassius and Ketheron had used that idea to their advantage.
Within the tiny pocket dimensions was also a large structure that resembled a sprawling luxurious estate that was protected with Ariana Martel’s magic. Something that Cassius had secretlyborrowedfrom the cell that they’d kept Ketheron in beforehand when everyone had believed him to be a threat because Corvin Morvain had been controlling him. Ariana had erected her own ward around it which no one could penetrate. It had kept Ketheron safe from everyone. And it would do the same again if it ever came to it.
And right now an estate within one of their pocket dimensions was being used to hold Sorin—off the radar of everybody. He’d already escaped once and fromThe Void, no less, a supernatural prison that was supposed to be impenetrable.
Although, with Sylas cracking the key to the antidote for the new version of Dark Fae mind-meddling out there and sending the details on to Arcanum Order, hopefully, that would never be possible again.
This Dark Fae situation had become severe and abnormal, even for that realm. So many joining the ranks ofPuritas?Something was happening, something I needed to—
“Wraithqueen?”
I spun from staring out of the window into the dark forest surrounding Cassius and Ketheron’s apartment to see Lazriel standing there freshly showered and dressed, holding his forest green hoodie up expectantly. “This smells so much more like you than me now.” He frowned curiously and with humor sparking. “Have you been wearing this the entire time I’ve been gone?”
Obviously he already knew the answer. His scenting of it had given it away. “You really need to hear me say it, huh?” I teased, going to him and pressing my hands to his chest and gazing up at him. “Yes. I’ve been wearing it since you’ve been away.” I arched an eyebrow. “Problem, sweets?”
“Shit, yeah, there’s a major problem.” His palms covered my hands on his chest, holding them to his sexy black tank that was really working for him and all that glorious muscle of his, those bulging biceps and… everything. Absolutely everything. “It’s a problem that I was gone so long that you had to do that.”
I pushed into him and he smiled down at me adoringly. “I know why you had to. It was important, so important. Not just for the gathering of information, but actually foryou, Lazriel.”
“I met my dad!” he burst out with, excitedly. “Not justmethim either! I spent some actual quality time with him, bonded with him, trained with him, fought alongside him! All of that, Velra!”
I grinned. “I know, sweets. It’s incredible.”
“We even… fed together. Not just from blood bags, or even glasses. From… feeders.”
My fingers flexed on his chest, feeling his pendant beneath, stroking over it. “Really?”
“Yeah,” he responded nervously. “I know I told you before that I didn’t like that. And I thought I didn’t, but—”
“That is amazing!”
“Really?”
“Yes, of course! All these years and you’re doing it! Being a vampire as well as a wolf. Embracing both! Sylas even told me that you wolfed outwithfangs.”
“Sure did. Sure fucking did.” He released my hands, then shifted them to my hips, holding me tighter to him. “You did the same thing, you know? I saw your shadows and frost working together even with your Dark Fae power. It was wild, fucking extraordinary.” He winced. “I mean, if you paper over the actual circumstances.” He shook his head to himself and pulled away. “Fuck, I’m sorry. I’m gushing about spending time with my dad when your brother… your family even back in the Dark Fae Realm—”
“Shh,” I said, reaching up and cupping his face. “I’m so happy for you. I don’t care about my parents, not having a blood family. It’s different for me. You were always denied a father. I had that and it didn’t exactly work out. But it doesn’t matter. I have you, the three of you. You’re my family. For me, that’s all I need. For you, with you denying your vampire nature so much and the reason behind that, you need this connection with your father.” I smiled. “You see? It’s different for each of us where all that’s concerned.” I stroked his bristly cheeks, noting the thicker stubble along his jawline that gave him even more of a rugged edge. “Iwantto hear about everything with your dad, all your adventures with the big, bad boss of the vampiric underworld.”
