He couldn’t go through it again.

Her voice cut into the tangle of his thoughts. “Do you really think taking the warrior training is a bad idea?” Her fingers tugged at the hairs on his arms.

How did he answer that?

He wanted to shout and rail, to tell her to stay away from the camps, to stay in the villa, to hide here with him. They would hide together, forever, live like hermits.

But he didn’t want to lose her. “You should take the training if that’s what you want to do. Become a warrior.”

He stared up at the ceiling, the words of his wife’s poem running through his mind. Love rises on wings of fire …

She shifted in his arms so that she could look at him. She leaned up on her elbow. “You sang a very different tune before the sex.” She smiled, but it dimmed. “What’s wrong?”

His gaze was still fixed on the coffered beams overhead, the ceiling like a chessboard. “Everything. Nothing. The hell if I know what to do.”

She turned and followed his gaze, dropping back down on the bed, setting her head into the well of his shoulder. “Tell me what it says.”

He pointed straight up. He took his time and translated each line for her.

“That’s beautiful and it does, doesn’t it? Love rising like that, like wings of fire?”

“I can’t do this,” he whispered.

She didn’t even tense. “I know. That’s why I’m going to train as a warrior. What chance does love have between us so long as there is a Rith, a Greaves, and a war? We’ve already been separated once.”

He turned into her until he was on his side. She faced him on her side as well. “I’m already in love with you, maybe not all the way, but almost,” he said. “But I can’t go any farther. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She traced his lips with her finger. “I know. It’s okay.”

She looked as serious as he felt, her brow puckered slightly. “How do the others do it? Havily and Marcus? Alison and Kerrick?”

“I don’t know.” He leaned forward and kissed her.

“I love you, too, you know, as much as I can.”

“I know.”

“I want to go back to the guest room tonight. Tomorrow, I’ll talk to Endelle about the training camps.”

“Good.” He expected her to pull away, to draw out of his arms, to make good on her word. Instead, she snuggled closer.

Just a little longer, she whispered through his mind.

Yes.

But after maybe only a minute, he felt her sigh and begin to rise up. She leaned over to kiss him, a soft press against his lips.

His head slid against his pillow, pulling on his hair. He watched her leave. He worked to keep his arms immobile. He wanted to reach for her, grab her, drag her back down to the bed, but what good would that do?

This was for the best.

Really.

The lesson ignored twice then thrice,

Creates chaos in the lives of many.

—Collected Proverbs, Beatrice of Fourth

Chapter 21

Parisa stood on one side of Fiona’s hospital bed and Havily on the other.

Fiona had the bed raised in a full-sitting position. “I want to get out of here. I’m not sick. Just drained.”

Parisa smiled. “Was that a joke?”

Fiona glanced at her, arched her brown eyebrows as if in question, then smiled. She even chuckled softly. “Yes, I guess it was.” She sighed. “I slept well last night, and no drugs in my system anymore.”

She wore a gold locket around her neck, the one Jean-Pierre had given her. Apparently, he’d found it in Toulouse behind an armoire but how he’d found it, Parisa couldn’t imagine. Didn’t matter. Fiona was safe.

Havily turned away from the bed and drew a chair forward. She sat down. “So, we’re actually here for a reason, not just to pay a social call. We’ve been talking about the D and R refugees, for want of a better word. I hate using the word slave.”

“But slave is accurate, believe me. Even though we had daily exercise and a healthy diet, full of iron, naturally.”

Parisa didn’t leave her post by the bed. She had an uneasy sensation about Fiona. The woman had an aura of dry brittle leaves. “This must be so disorienting for you,” she said.

“Yes, I suppose it must seem that way.” She lowered her gaze to stare at her clasped hands. The thumbs touched, rolled against each other. “I’m glad to be here. Let me at least say that. I am glad to be alive and to no longer be in that place or under Rith’s command.”

Parisa glanced at the doorway. The hospital was buzzing with activity. Antony was talking with Colonel Seriffe, and several of the Warriors of the Blood were here. She had seen Alison pass by once or twice as well.

Outside the building, a number of Militia Warriors could be seen through the street-side window, patrolling the hospital grounds.

Parisa had felt uneasy all morning. She had slept in the guest room, alone, the bed cool after Antony’s warm presence. As tall as he was, as muscled, the man created a lot of heat. She had awakened more than once, forgetting where she was, reaching across the bed and patting cold sheets.

She would get used to it. She had to. They’d decided together that this was for the best.

Earlier, they’d met with Endelle, and she’d agreed to permit Parisa to enter the Female Warrior Training Camps. It seemed strange to have settled on that course, but of everything she’d been through in the past year and a half, warrior training was the one thing that felt completely right to her.

“So, what’s going on?” Fiona asked.

Parisa glanced at Havily. “Well,” Havily began, “it may be early in the process here, but the bottom line is that we’ve learned there are twenty-one other D and R facilities around the world.”

“Yes,” Fiona said her clasped hands coming loose. “Yes.”

“Yes, what?” Parisa asked.

Fiona looked up at her. “I want to help get them out, all of them. Whatever it takes. But I’m not sure how we’re going to do that and not cause even more problems. Even if we break up the D and R program, what happens next? Greaves will want to set up more of them, and in the meantime where will all the death vampires get their blood?”

Havily met Parisa’s gaze. “She’s right,” Havily said. “If we disturb all twenty-one nests at once, two things will happen. More mortals will be abducted to replace them, and a lot more women will die. She’s absolutely right. We have to battle this more extensively.”

“How?” Parisa asked.

“Well, I’ve been thinking,” Havily said, staring hard at Parisa. She shifted her gaze to Fiona. “The three of us have one thing in common. We’ve all been abducted. We all know what it feels like to be helpless, in the grip of someone more powerful. And the reason this hospital is crawling with Militia Warriors is because we are all still in danger. Rith will want his slaves back as well.” She glanced at Parisa. “So, are you headed to the camps?”

She nodded. “Medichi’s here talking with Colonel Seriffe about security at the training camps for me. No one really knows what to do, but I’m determined to go.”

“What are the camps?” Fiona asked.

“Warrior training. I’m becoming a warrior.” She laughed. “It feels so strange to say that out loud.”

Havily rose from the chair. “Did you know that Endelle wanted Alison to go the camps, to train as a warrior, when she first ascended?”

“No, I didn’t,” Parisa said. “Do you mean Alison didn’t want to be trained?”

Havily shook her head. “You know what she is … a healer. She couldn’t even kill her opponent in the arena battle and it was supposed to be a battle to the death. The warrior was intent on killing her, but Alison … you won’t believe this … cut off his arm then reversed a pocket of time so that he got his arm back.”

“No,” Fiona cried. “Is that possible in this dimension?”

Parisa glanced at her. “I had wings on Mortal Earth. That was supposed to be impossible as well.”

Fiona turned to Havily. “What of you? What is your power that makes you a target?”

“Well, I have two actually. My blood has special properties and tends to act like dying blood in some respects. It made Crace maniacal. He was a High-Administrator-turned-death-vampire who wanted my blood more than anything. He was the one who orchestrated my abduction.

“In addition, I work with Endelle in the darkening. Yeah, I know … well, it’s a nether-space thing, a place that exists between dimensions. When she and I do darkening work, we hunt for Greaves all night because he uses that time to travel around the world to ship death vampires to this area, to Phoenix Two. You know how the Warriors of the Blood battle all night? Greaves has been building an army of death vampires throughout the world by turning High Administrators and in addition making one of their tasks the creation of more death vampires through the taking of dying blood.”

Fiona leaned her head against the mattress. She covered her face with her hand. “And he supplies the High Administrators with our blood, with the blood we died for every month.”

“Yes,” Havily said. “But yours no more.”

Fiona’s hand shot out and grabbed Havily’s arm. “But Rith will acquire more women to meet the demand. And if not, the death vampires must feed. I’ve heard that to go without dying blood creates unbearable abdominal cramps.”

Parisa turned and settled a hip on the bed. She took Fiona’s free hand and held it tightly in hers. “That is not your responsibility,” she said. “Your job is to get well quickly and to serve on our committee to free the rest of the slaves.”

Fiona shook her head. “They will feed on mortals because they’re weak. There has to be a better way. Something more permanent. The blood is packaged and distributed all around the world. What if we followed that trail and eliminated the source that needed the blood.”