Wings of Fire (Guardians of Ascension #3)(7)
Author: Caris Roane

He’d just emerged from the future streams and was devastated all over again. The same prophecy from last night had returned even stronger just moments ago, while the shower had been running and Parisa had been going through her nightly ritual.

Parisa Lovejoy was to share a bond with Commander Greaves.

It couldn’t be true. It just couldn’t.

Parisa’s unspecified yet critical role in the war against the Commander had already been foretold numerous times. Rith had recommended her death to his master over and over, but for whatever incomprehensible reason, Greaves tended to play fast and loose with Seers’ prophecies. He couldn’t be entirely faulted for this, since the prophecies didn’t always come to pass. And Greaves preferred to work every angle of a prophecy before acting, and often succeeded in his rather daring ventures.

But where the mortal-with-wings was concerned, the Seers’ predictions had been constant, and increasing in intensity in recent days. Rith had developed a sense of near-panic where Parisa was concerned. He was, himself, a man of power, perhaps more than the Commander realized, and of late he had developed a real knowing about just how dangerous Parisa was both to himself and to the Commander. He had several times urged Greaves in the proper direction, to get rid of the woman, but the Commander would not be moved.

However, even with all Rith’s knowing, even with the numerous prophecies and their intensity, what had finally pushed Rith over the edge was this latest future stream about a bond-forging event. A sense of deep despair and of jealousy now devoured Rith whole. He could forgive the predictions about Parisa’s danger to the Coming Order—but not that she would become so intimately connected to his master.

He could not imagine, even on a prophetic level, how Greaves could allow this travesty when even he, Rith Do’onwa, the master’s most favored servant, did not have such a bond.

Earlier, when Parisa had asked to fly one last time before nightfall, he saw an opportunity to kill her himself. If she left his artfully crafted domes of mist, he could follow after her and cause a most unfortunate but very fatal accident.

But she hadn’t left. She had floated above the tamarind tree and somehow read his mind. So now she was safe and secure in her bed and he had no means of taking her life.

Were all his centuries of service to be thus rewarded?

He knew only one thing: He must prevent this bond.

He loved Greaves as no one could love him. Greaves was his master; he would lay down his life for him. He wanted a bond, a link with the Commander. He deserved such a bond. Why should Parisa be allowed to forge one?

It was obscene.

Rith took deep breaths. He had to focus. He must find a way to counteract the event.

As he breathed, his mind settled. After a few minutes, his fierce jealousy abated.

He focused on the ribbons of light. Whenever a change in destiny was imminent, ribbons would glow. As he mentally reviewed all the critical people involved in the Coming Order, on both sides of the equation, he found a burnished bronze ribbon that grew so brilliant with light, even though his eyes were closed he felt the light burned through his eyelids.

He mentally picked up the ribbon, which belonged to Warrior Medichi. He slid his mind along the future streams and came to an image that caused his heart to seize, in part because of the nature of the vision but also due to its location. He saw the warrior trapped in a dark space, one made of oversized terra-cotta bricks. He knew this particular Second Earth temple in Bengal Two. He had built it himself, modeled on Mortal Earth structures, but with a very convenient basement designed just for his purposes.

He smiled now. Even though he wanted the mortal-with-wings dead, the sure knowledge that one day very soon he would have within his power a Warrior of the Blood changed everything. If the Creator was good and shined his favor upon Rith, he would fulfill this prophecy. Perhaps then his standing with Greaves would increase to include a forged bond as well.

***

Was Parisa still alive?

Medichi sat on the side of his bed, sleep-deprived and on edge. He was in the master suite of his villa, a retreat that had become a prison because the woman meant for him was missing … gone … taken. But in a few minutes, he would know if she still lived: She would come to him as she always did at this hour.

He’d been to the Cave, arriving later than usual, so that only Thorne remained. Thorne had been slumped on a stool in front of the bar, a bottle of Ketel One at the ready, his fingers sliding up and down a full tumbler, his gaze fixed on nothing in particular. Medichi had told him of the death vampire at the Grand Canyon and what he’d learned in the pretty-boy’s mind.

The news had brought a little life into Thorne’s red-rimmed hazel eyes. He’d even smiled and clapped Medichi on the shoulder. “We’ll find her and don’t worry, Carla will keep me up to speed. Jeannie, as well, when she comes on later today.”

Medichi had nodded.

Thorne had nodded.

Medichi had headed home and now here he was, sitting on the side of his bed, ready to complete his morning ritual, ready to hear Parisa’s voice in his head once again, ready to be assured that she was still alive.

Oh, God, please let her be alive.

He’d just showered and his long hair dripped at the ends, forming rivulets that tracked down his abdomen and down his back. He loosed the black towel from around his waist and laid it in a heavy loop across his knees.

At least he had privacy. The first time this had happened was three days after Parisa’s abduction. Both Havily and Marcus still lived in his villa. They were his closest friends, his strongest support, but that day Hav had brought tangerines home from the market without thinking what it would do to him, without remembering that for Medichi, Parisa smelled of tangerines, her special scent meant only for him. For Parisa, Medichi smelled of sage.

Havily should have known better. For her, Marcus’s special scent was like earthy grasses and fennel combined.

But Havily hadn’t remembered, and Medichi had been left aroused as hell with nowhere to go. Naturally, he’d complained of not feeling well and had retired to his suite of rooms at the south end of the villa.

The tangerines had acted as an aphrodisiac. He hadn’t wanted to pleasure himself but that was the curse of his situation: Because of the breh-hedden, the scent of tangerines meant Parisa, and Parisa meant pure hot-blooded sex.

Damn the breh-hedden. He’d been struck down the moment he’d smelled Parisa’s lovely pheromone-riddled tangerine scent.

The breh-hedden was a terrible mate-bonding ritual that occurred only between preternaturally powerful women and Warriors of the Blood. Before Warrior Kerrick had found his breh in Alison Wells, all the warriors had thought the ritual a myth. Then Marcus had bonded with Havily in exactly the same way. No more myth. Just hard agonizing reality.