From behind him came the amused tenor of Silas. “It seems these interlopers won’t be a problem after all, my lord. Providence is once again on our side.”
Dominus didn’t turn or invite him forward out of the shadows where he’d been standing for the last hour and would remain indefinitely until directed to do otherwise. He merely pushed aside the empty bowl of lamb stew he’d eaten for dinner at his desk while watching the international news and spoke to the hulking alabaster statue of Horus—god of vengeance, god of war—set directly across from him, against the wall.
“Fortune favors the bold, Silas.”
And he had been bold, every day of his life. How thrilling that the culmination of all those years of boldness was so close to fruition. So, so close...
Dominus pressed a napkin to one corner of his mouth. “Has it arrived yet?”
“Not as of this afternoon, sire,” Silas murmured with real regret. “However, there is the possibility of a late delivery. The courier was told to wait as long as necessary.”
Dissatisfaction thrummed through him. He wanted the lab results before the
Purgare
. He wanted to be able to make an announcement that would lift all their spirits. He wanted to be able to tell everyone definitively
when
all their lives would change.
“Go and see if there is any word,” Dominus instructed, pulling a thick notebook from a locked drawer in his desk. He set it carefully on the blotter and ran his fingers over the fine linen cover, darkened with use and frayed at the edges. Leather would have been more durable, but he found the idea of his life’s work bound in the skin of a bovine corpse disgusting.
Silas murmured an acknowledgment and drifted silently to the door. Once there, he executed a low bow and straightened, allowing Dominus a clear view of the long, aquiline nose, the impenetrable black eyes, the small, secret smile.
Silas had good reason to smile. He alone knew the full measure of his King’s plans.
“And bring that new female you acquired yesterday to the
fovea
,” Dominus added, a flash of heat tightening his groin at the memory of the blonde tourist who had been snatched by one of the
Legiones
from a bar near the Pantheon. She looked a lot like the newscaster. Blonde. Busty. Stupid.
He wondered how loudly he could make her scream.
Silas bowed again and retreated silently into the opaque darkness of the winding corridor beyond the library. When he was alone, Dominus opened his notebook and began to write, his script fluid and precise:
In keeping with the results of Dodd’s experiments with reproductive isolation, my calculations suggest a period of eight generations will be necessary to engender a permanent alteration in the gene pool to achieve speciation once the correct antiserum formula has been isolated and applied to the existing population. Further, through artificial insemination of stud-quality females and embryonic transfer to surrogate females we may concurrently increase the number of pure-Blood offspring, thereby exponentially expanding both breeding stock and pure-Blood subjects. In a matter of only a few generations, the enemy gene pool will be irreparably damaged and ultimately destroyed.
Along with their terrible legacy of war, ignorance, and unrelenting greed, Homo sapiens will vanish from the face of the earth forever.
Dominus set the fountain pen on the blotter, closed the notebook, and slowly exhaled.
And so their world will end
, he thought with deep satisfaction, staring at Horus,
just as T. S.
Eliot predicted. Not with a bang, but a whimper. And I will be the architect of it all.
He locked the notebook away and rose, heading for the
fovea
, hoping Silas remembered to bring his favorite steel qilinbian whip along with the blonde.
The knock that came through the closed bedroom door was tentative, and so was the voice that followed it.
“Alexander,” Bartleby murmured through the wood.
Xander tightened his arms around Morgan’s body and pulled her closer. They’d spent the entire day in bed, making love, dozing in the semidark, not speaking of anything or anyone outside the walls of this room. He felt twilight descending outside, but he wasn’t ready to get up yet. He was going to savor every last moment.
“Not a good time, Doc,” said Xander quietly, looking down at Morgan’s sleeping face. She still radiated the heat of the Fever, but it burned lower now. Soon it would be done...and so would they.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, but there’s something you need to see.” Bartleby cleared his throat, a worried sound. “It’s important.”
Morgan made a little noise in her sleep and burrowed closer to Xander’s chest. He put his nose into the dark mass of her hair and inhaled deeply, wondering if this would be the last time he’d ever be able to do it. The thought sent a spike of pain through his chest.
“
Amada
,” he murmured. Beloved. He stroked a hand up her arm. “I need to leave for a minute.”
She made another sleepy noise, protesting, and he pressed a kiss to her temple.
“I don’t want to either, but I’ll bring you something to eat,” he whispered, nuzzling against her throat. She arched into him, responsive even when asleep, her fingers twined into his hair. He hardened instantly, eager for her—again—but there came another tentative knock on the door and he sighed.
Just a few minutes. He’d take only a few minutes, and then he’d be back, back with her scent and her skin and that slow, mischievous smile that melted his heart and inflamed his body...
He couldn’t get enough of her. He couldn’t imagine not being able to touch her, kiss her. Not now, not after they’d stared silently, rapt and amazed, into one another’s eyes while their bodies and souls merged, over and over again. And he suspected, in a very dark, abandoned corner of his heart, he wasn’t going to honor his promise to end things between them.
She would make him a liar, consequences be damned.
He pressed a quick kiss against the pulse in her throat and rose, pulling the sheet up to cover her naked body. She murmured something not quite audible—
goblins
?—then drifted back down into slumber.
He dressed quickly, strapped on the knives he was never without, and went to the door.
“I’m sorry,” Bartleby said again when Xander stepped into the corridor. He shut the door softly behind him.
“What is it?”
The doctor shook his head, motioned to the stairs. “You’ll want to see this.” He turned and quickly made his way down the hallway with Xander close on his heels.
They climbed the stairs and entered the big media room with its somber, masculine decor of charcoal walls, black leather sofas, glass-and-stainless-steel coffee and side tables. Recessed lights in the ceiling glowed softly off the flat screen that hung above a sleek black credenza.
A large red banner across the top of the television screen read, “Rare melanistic panthers captured in vicious attack.”
Xander’s blood turned to ice.
And then came the grainy video captured by an eyewitness. Motion and chaos, wobbly images of a panicked crowd shoving and screaming, the impossible sight of six huge, snarling black panthers attacking one another on a dance floor. A shot rang out, then another, then one of the animals collapsed, three of them bolted, and the other two turned on the officer who’d fired and began to rip him to shreds. A solemn male voice spoke over the video.
“As you can see from this disturbing video, these animals are highly aggressive and dangerous.
Wildlife experts tell us these particular animals have been living in open areas and feeding on large prey and may have even been somehow genetically enhanced, evidenced by their enormous size in comparison with the norm for the species. Like the other panthers that have been captured and killed over the past several years in this area, these nocturnal predators are so large it is unlikely a novice wildlife enthusiast was able to raise these big cats unnoticed in the middle of an urban area.
“Several members of the European Union’s Wildlife Preservation Fund, including the preeminent evolutionary biologist Dr. Hermann Parnassus, are expected to arrive in Rome tomorrow to provide expert opinion and conduct testing on the animals. The authorities are urging citizens who live nearby to stay indoors until the other three panthers are captured, but even once they are the question will remain: From where did these extraordinary creatures come?”
Downstairs in the bedroom where he’d left Morgan, Xander’s cell phone began to ring.
“Shit,” he breathed, frozen with disbelief. Bartleby lowered the volume on the television while the screen switched to scenes of the hospital where the police officer was being treated, the facility where the animals were being held. He noted the address.
“It’s them, isn’t it?” Bartleby asked, glum. “Mateo and Tomás and Julian?”
Xander nodded, listening to his phone ring and ring. To his ears, the innocent sound was as ominous as a volley of gunfire. It had to be Leander. If the Assembly had seen this, they would use it as evidence of guilt. Such flagrant violations—Shifting in public, allowing it to be filmed, being captured by humans—would undoubtedly trigger three executions.
If
, that is, Mateo, Tomás, and Julian made it out of captivity.
Which they would. He would ensure that much. But he wasn’t going to save them so they could then be executed, that was for sure. So he was going to save them and then...help them disappear.
It wasn’t even a choice. It had to be done. And quickly.
“If they’re being held it means they’re hurt, which means they can’t Shift,” Xander said, his voice shaking. Adrenaline coursed through his veins; he wasn’t sure if he could Shift either, wasn’t sure if his stomach wound had entirely healed. He’d be going in blind. “Which means it’s going to be tricky getting them out. We’ll have to find a way in, use subterfuge, find a way to distract—”
“We don’t need subterfuge,” Bartleby said, blinking at him from behind his spectacles. “We’ll be able to just walk right in.”
Xander raised his eyebrows.
“My dear boy, I’m a
doctor
, remember? And a specialist with these particular...beasts.” He patted the tufted clouds of his white hair, adjusted his bow tie, and sent him a wry smile. “Also I’m extremely handsome. And charming. I can talk the birds right out of the trees. Whoever is holding our boys simply won’t be able to resist me.” His smile grew wider. “Especially when presented with official documentation.”
Though Xander’s body was still frozen with disbelief, his mind broke through the thaw and snatched at Bartleby’s genius plan. “Dr. Hermann Parnassus.”
Bartleby executed a bow, managing to make it look both elegant and mocking. “At your service, sir.”
Downstairs, his cell phone began to ring again. “How long do you need?”
Bartleby shrugged. “About twenty minutes. After all these years with you boys, I’ve become something of an expert on faking identities.”
The ringing stopped. He heard a chime, indicating a new voicemail. “Make it ten,” said Xander, and sprinted away, heading for the stairs.
The fog obscured almost everything and muffled all the sounds of the forest in its cool, clinging gray swirls. Eddies of it pooled around Morgan’s feet as she walked over perfumed beds of leaves and bracken, searching for him, calling out his name, her voice nearly soundless in the endless mist.
She heard laughter nearby and stumbled toward it, catching her foot on the twisted root of an ancient, towering pine. She fell into a soft bed of dry needles and struggled to get up, but the needles had turned to quicksand, sucking her down, clinging to her skin, pulling, relentlessly pulling.
“Xander!” Morgan cried out helplessly, digging her fingers into the soft sand. She sank chest-
deep and craned her neck, desperately searching the dark forest for him. The clawed boughs of trees loomed close and black overhead. “Xander, help me!”
And then there he was, walking slowly through the forest toward her in a ray of light, smiling, heart-stoppingly beautiful, a black-clad angel with swords sheathed on his back.
“Help me!” she gasped, the cold, wet sand sliding thick over her shoulders, her neck, her chin.
It slid between her lips and she spat it out, choking. “Xander!”
He stopped beside the pool of sand and gazed down at her, beatific, his brilliant golden eyes dazzling in the gloom. “You’re in too deep,” he murmured, calm as morning. “A thousand kisses deep.
Nothing can save you now.”
The sand was in her ears, her mouth, her eyes. The silence of the forest echoed all around them.
“Please!” she begged, crying, suffocating, drowning in darkness. “Please!”
“Farewell, my love,” Xander crooned, smiling. “Give the devil my fond regards.”
He turned and disappeared back into the forest. The darkness swallowed her whole.
“Morgan!”
She jerked up in bed, gasping, her hand at her throat. Something touched her shoulder and she reeled, swinging blindly at it.
“It’s only me! Morgan! Wake up! It’s me!”
Xander had her by the shoulders, shaking her awake. It took a moment before her mind registered it, recognized his voice and his scent, then she threw herself into his arms, trembling.
“It’s all right,” he murmured, holding her tightly against his chest. He sat on the edge of the mattress with his arms around her as she shook and blinked, trying to dispel the horrible feeling of doom. “You were having a nightmare. It was just a dream.”
She squeezed her eyes shut. Just a dream.
A thousand kisses deep.
He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I have to go out for a while.”
She raised her head and looked into his eyes. They were worried, tense, and suddenly she was, too. “Why? What is it?”