He glanced down at his naked chest. “Is there an extra shirt in that closet of yours?”
“Not necessary. Dad may want us to shift for him, so the less you’re wearing, the easier it is.”
He wondered if he’d ever get used to the Chanku concept of relaxed dress, but then Lily grabbed his hand and the two of them left her cottage. Half naked or not, he held on tight as they headed across the meadow to her father’s house.
Anton was in the den with a cup of coffee and the news playing softly on the big wall screen, but he turned it off as soon as they entered. “Coffee’s fresh and hot on the bar. And yes, Lily, I made it myself.”
Sebastian flashed Lily a quick look and caught her trying not to giggle. “Good,” she said. “It’s nice to know that even über-alphas can be taught a thing or two.”
Anton grunted and gave Sebastian a look that could only be described as
long-suffering
. “My daughter thinks I depend too much on my lovely wife for creature comforts. She insists I make my own coffee when her mother wants to sleep in.”
“Hey, it’s only fair.” Lily grabbed the pot and filled two big mugs. Sebastian laughed as he took the cup she handed to him.
“What’s so funny?”
“Nothing. Except you just poured my coffee.”
She cocked one perfectly slim hip and planted her hand on it. “That’s different. I only poured one for you because you voluntarily helped me clean up the kitchen.”
“You cooked. As you said, it’s only fair. But thank you.” He leaned close and kissed her. She blinked, surprised, he imagined, that he would kiss her in front of her father, but there was no better time than the present to establish his place in her life.
And he would have a place in her life. He took his cup and sat on the couch across from her father.
Anton glanced over the rim of his mug as he took a sip. “I hope you realize that by voluntarily doing housework, you’re giving the male of the species a bad name.”
Sebastian glanced at Lily, and as so often happened, he couldn’t look away from her. She wore a crop top and loose yoga pants and her long hair was twisted up on top of her head, held in place with what looked like a couple of chopsticks.
He’d never seen a more beautiful woman in his life.
“Sorry, Mr. Cheval. I can’t seem to help myself.”
Her dad let out a long, dramatic sigh. “I think you can drop the ‘Mr. Cheval’ and go with my given name. I have a feeling we’ve moved beyond formalities.”
Lily glanced at Sebastian, and he knew she expected some kind of teasing comment, but he was looking at her, not at Anton. “Thank you. I certainly hope so.”
Did she have any idea how he felt about her? How much he hated the fact that his father stood between them? Somehow, Aldo Xenakis had to be stopped, but the first thing they had to do was figure out how to keep him out of their heads.
The memory—or lack of memory—of his time running with Lily haunted him. That couldn’t happen again. He wouldn’t allow it to happen again.
He turned abruptly away from Lily and focused on her father. “Okay, Anton. Where do we start?”
They broke for lunch around two, only because Lily’s mother swept into the den with a tray of sandwiches and insisted her husband take time to eat. “He gets grumpy when he misses a meal,” she said in a rather loud whispered aside to Sebastian.
Lily hugged her mom, Anton kept his mouth shut, and Sebastian wanted to bless the woman for feeding him before he keeled over. Breakfast had been hours ago, and the work Anton had them doing, though it was mental, not physical, was exhausting, drawing on whatever reserves he might have had.
They ate, cleared away the mess, and Sebastian carried the empty tray to the kitchen. Keisha stood at the big restaurant-sized range, checking the temperature on a roast that looked like it could feed an army.
“We do feed an army,” she said when he commented. “It’s my night to cook. You’ll see Stefan and Xandi Aragat, Alex’s parents—you met them last night. Possibly Oliver and Mei. You might have seen them as snow leopards last night. I know Lisa and Tinker McClintock will be here. There might even be more than usual, as I imagine they’ll be curious about you.”
He didn’t ask, but she answered, anyway. “You’re the first young man our daughter has ever brought home. The pack is already buzzing about your presence, so be ready to answer a lot of questions, some not at all subtle.” She slid the roast back into the oven, stood, and leaned against the counter beside the stove.
“I hope Alex and Annie come. Lily always said those two were meant for each other, but I never could see them as a pair. I was wrong. It’s a lesson well learned.” She smiled at him. “I need to pay heed to what our daughter says. Anyway, Sebastian, our doors are always open to members of the pack. To you, as well, since you obviously have our daughter’s blessing.”
She was so warm, so accepting that he stood there a moment, speechless. He felt as if something inside broke free, and he wondered if it was the darkness he’d carried in his soul. Then he sensed Anton’s call. It was time to go back. “Thank you,” he said. And for some reason, he, who was never comfortable with people he didn’t know well, leaned over and kissed Keisha’s cheek. “You’ve made me feel very welcome. It means more than you can possibly imagine.”
She took both his hands in hers. “You are welcome, Sebastian. I feel the good in you, and I feel my daughter’s love for you.” She smiled. “Like I said, I’ve learned to trust Lily. In case you hadn’t noticed, she’s an amazing young woman. Now hurry. I sense my impatient spouse growing anxious.”
It was after five before he and Lily escaped, with plans to return for dinner by eight, but Anton’s parting words stayed with him. Lily had gone ahead when her father stopped him at the door and put both his hands on Sebastian’s shoulders.
“You’re a good man,” he’d said. “A worthy man. Aldo Xenakis may have provided the sperm that gave you life, but you are not your father’s son. You are your mother’s, and I believe she was Chanku.” Then he’d laughed and dropped a bombshell on Sebastian.
“You said your mother’s name was Angela Lupei. We have a packmate whose name is Daciana Lupei. I’m going to see what I can find out. You might be related.”
His mind was still reeling from that bit of information when he caught up to Lily and grabbed her hand. He needed her to hold on to him, to ground him. She squeezed his fingers, then led him down the hallway and through the big kitchen. The rich scent of the rib roast cooking had him salivating, but Lily tugged him past the stove. At the far end of the huge kitchen, she opened a door to stairs going down into a basement he hadn’t expected.
Lily closed the heavy door behind him. Thick and made of metal, it was obviously fireproof. “Where are we going?”
“Someplace very special. I had to get permission from Dad to bring you down here. Since he didn’t hesitate, it tells me you’ve passed inspection. Here.” She stopped by a doorway with hooks beside it and grabbed a white cotton T-shirt. “You’ll need this.”
Curious, he put it on. It was snug and stretched over his wide shoulders, but at least it covered him, though suddenly needing clothing was an interesting thing. He hadn’t told her what her father had said to him about his mother’s name, but even Anton’s comments couldn’t compete with where Lily took him—down a tunnel that led them to a wonderland that defied description. They stepped out into a huge cavern with a large, shallow pool set in worn rock along one side. Slowly swirling tendrils of steam rose from the spring-fed pond, and the air in the cavern was warm and somewhat humid. He tried to imagine the entire pack hiding out down here during the forest fire Lily had told him about. The one that burned the original house to the ground.
It certainly explained the fireproof door.
They walked around the pool, and Lily pointed out hieroglyphs along the cave wall. She ran her hands over them as if they were old friends, before finally stopping at a point where the writing ended. She glanced at him, and he figured his amazement was written all over his face. “These are the symbols you said you could read when you were just a little girl? But how?”
She shrugged. “I never really found out. Either the goddess or the Mother, or maybe even the ancients who called me, but they’re still as clear as the printed page to me. When we have time, I’ll read them to you. They’re the history of our kind. At least part of it. I got the details from the ancient ones on the astral, which is where we’re headed now.”
He had so many questions he couldn’t narrow them down to the ones he wanted to ask, so he merely waited for Lily to show him. She put her hands against prints carved into the stone and stared at the rough wall in front of her. He sensed a change, a shimmer, and then a brighter glow until he was blinking against the light.
Stunned, he watched as the rock dissolved in front of Lily, opening up into the most beautiful place he’d ever seen—blue skies, green grass, and greener trees. Lily merely grabbed his hand and dragged him through the portal she’d opened. He stepped into a world he’d barely glimpsed the day before, a world too perfect to be real.
And yet it was. He turned, expecting to see the cave behind him, but it was more of the same—green, green grass, a beautiful forest filled with trees and flowers of every description—perfection so complete it was totally disconcerting.
“Look. Eve’s here.”
He spun around and stared as a subtle shimmer in the meadow in front of them grew brighter, sparkling beneath a brilliant sky without a sun, taking on form and shape until a beautiful woman stood not ten feet away.
Her aura shimmered like silver fire with streaks of gold and red leaping within the silver, more flames covering the full color spectrum, a woman of power. Unimaginable power, tempered by love. She raised her head and smiled. “Lily! You’ve come back.”
He was caught in the unusual swirling color of her eyes, constantly changing from green to gold to blue until he felt dizzy. She focused on Sebastian, and he blinked as she recognized him. “It was you. You are the one bringing darkness to my world.”
He glanced at Lily, but she was shaking her head. “No, Eve. This is Sebastian Xenakis. I don’t think he’s the one. We believe his father is the source of the darkness, but touch him. See what you sense.” She glanced at him. “Is that okay?”
He nodded. “Of course.”
Eve stepped closer and gazed up at him. She was tall and beautiful, similar to the Chanku he’d met so far, but there was such power in her aura that he felt as if he should kneel before her. A goddess. She really was a goddess. His knees actually trembled, but when she placed her hands on his forearms, a great well of calm filled him.
“Please?” She looked up at him out of those odd eyes.
And Sebastian realized he would give her anything. No matter what she asked. “Whatever you need.”
She smiled and placed her hands beneath his shirt so that they touched, skin to skin. Her touch was warm—sensual without feeling sexual—yet he felt as if his heart might beat right through his rib cage. She smiled, slowly shaking her head as if she’d discovered something unexpected.
“You’re right, Lily. The darkness is there, but it’s from association, not nature.” She stepped back and he pulled his shirt back down, but his skin felt all prickly, as if energy sparked over the areas where she’d touched him.
“Come. We need to talk. I have learned things, and you have experienced even more.”
Lily grabbed his hand again, and they followed Eve through a meadow that was too perfect, through a small forest much too lush to be real, and then to a grassy knoll beside a perfect stream.
Eve found a spot in the shade of a huge tree and sat. Sebastian hadn’t really paid close attention to his surroundings. As beautiful, as ethereal as was this part of the astral, nothing could compare with Lily. When she folded her long legs and sat beneath the tree beside Eve, Sebastian watched each graceful movement, losing himself once again in her beauty. Once she settled herself, though, she glanced up at him with one eyebrow artfully cocked, as if asking what he thought of the place.
He didn’t know. He’d not really looked, but now he took a moment to glance at the wonders around him, and the mystery of where he was, who he was with, washed over him with a sense of wonder, of indescribable joy.
He was really, truly here. Not as a spirit but as a man. He, Sebastian Xenakis, a man who so often felt totally inept and out of his league, was actually on the astral plane, the guest of a goddess and a woman who seemed to love him in spite of himself.
His skin prickled with a frisson of awareness, a familiar rush of power that caught his attention and dragged his avid glance to the tree sheltering this beautiful spot of ground.
It wasn’t the same tree. Not his oak, the one where he’d first drawn the power to shift, but he knew, without any doubt, that it held the same spirit.
His lady was here. Not a dryad. No, this was no simple wood spirit. Here, on the astral, she was more than spirit. More than an ancient power. Here, she
was
Power. She was his lady, and he knew her with a visceral sense of destiny.
Without hesitation, without any thought at all beyond giving her thanks and the obeisance due a presence of undeniable importance, Sebastian fell to his knees before the tree, bowed his head, and waited to see what his lady wanted.
Lily shot a quick glance at Eve and caught the raised eyebrow, the shock on the goddess’s face as Sebastian suddenly knelt before the massive tree and bowed his head.
Then Eve’s eyes went wide and she knelt as well. Confused, Lily opened her senses to the tree. The blast of power almost sent her reeling.
She was on her knees beside Sebastian before she realized what had happened. He reached for her and grabbed her hand, and she realized he was holding on to Eve as well.