“What happened?” she asked.

“You blasted the kajmelas to hell. The fire got a little out of control, but Logan patched you up good as new.”

There was an odd quality to his voice that set off warning bells in her head. She pushed herself up so she could lean back against the headboard and put enough distance between them so she could get a good look at Drake.

He looked tired, strained, but that’s not what had bothered her. It was something else. Something she remembered seeing in him when they first met—a kind of unnatural tension that radiated through his body. Pain.

“Did you get hurt?” she asked.

He was wearing a long-sleeved mock turtleneck and jeans that completely hid his body. Maybe he’d been injured and didn’t want her to know. She couldn’t think of any other reason he’d be so heavily clothed in the middle of summer.

“I got a few burns. Logan fixed me up, too. Don’t worry.” He gave her a warm smile and kissed her forehead.

Helen reached out, trying to poke around in his head to figure out what was wrong, but she hit a wall. She couldn’t feel a thing.

Her hand strayed to her neck, which was bare. “It came off.”

“Yeah. We found the sword, remember?”

She did, in the pain-hazed recesses of her memory. He’d picked up the hot metal using his shirt. He’d been beautifully bare chested and the leaves were falling from his lifemark like snow.

Helen’s eyes went back to his chest, now covered with gray cotton. That’s what he was hiding. “Take off your shirt,” she ordered.

He grinned and winked, but she could see the subtle lines of strain around his mouth. “You’re too tired for that right now. Just lie down and rest.”

She was tired, but not so much that she wouldn’t fight him over this. “Take off the damn shirt and let me see.”

She reached for the hem of his shirt, but his hands collected hers and held them against his hard abdomen. His face was solemn, his eyes shadowed with pain. “I look like I did before I met you.”

Probably felt like he did before, too. “You’re hurting.”

He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, but at least he hadn’t lied.

She freed one hand before he could stop her and fished under his collar in search of the luceria. It was there, around his neck, slippery and warm from his body heat. Drake’s hand tugged hers out and she let him, feeling a heavy sense of loss.

Helen glanced at his ring. It had returned to its original iridescent, silvery mix of too many colors to count. It didn’t remember her at all, which, for some reason, hurt her feelings.

But not as much as the fact that Drake didn’t want her to wear the luceria again. She’d tricked him, forced him to sleep and gone after Kevin’s sword by herself, but she’d done it for his own good. Surely he had to know that. He wasn’t stupid.

There was a light rap on the doorway leading into the bedroom. Sibyl was standing there, dressed in pale pink today, clutching her black-eyed doll to her chest.

“Sibyl,” said Drake, in a shocked tone. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

“No one ever does,” said the little girl. She looked right at Helen. “We have to talk.”

“I’ll be right outside.” Drake started to get up, but Sibyl held up a dainty hand.

“Stay, Theronai.”

Helen felt Drake tense, but he settled back beside her, keeping a tight hold on her hand. “What is it?”

“Helen has some questions for me and I wanted to make sure I had time to answer them before I left.”

“Left?” asked Drake. “Where are you going?”

“It’s not important. Helen? Your questions?”

The creepy girl was right. Helen did have some questions, she just hadn’t been awake long enough to think about them, until now. “You said that if I didn’t like the vision of my death, I should choose another. You also said my vision couldn’t be avoided.”

“And it wasn’t.”

“But it wasn’t a vision of my death.”

“No.”

“Why didn’t you tell me that?”

“You didn’t ask. You only asked if it was real, which it obviously was. You also asked how you could avoid it, which you couldn’t.”

“But why didn’t you just tell me that I wasn’t going to die then?”

“Because if I’d told you that, you would have died. It was your acceptance—your willingness to sacrifice your own life for someone else—that gave you the strength to do what you had to do. I had to know you were strong enough.”

“Strong enough? For what?” asked Drake.

Sibyl’s arm tightened around her doll and for a moment, she looked like a frightened little girl. “Things are changing and the Gray Lady isn’t able to fight off what’s coming without help. The only thing strong enough to defeat the Synestryn is love and I had to know that Helen had that kind of power inside her.”

“Love?” asked Drake, looking at Helen with a hopeful expression.

“You should tell him,” said Sibyl. “He’s insecure and needs to hear the words.”

“I am not insecure,” objected Drake, sounding insulted.

Sibyl rolled her blue eyes in disgust and left the room.

“So?” asked Drake with his brows raised. “Was she right?”

Sibyl was right. He was insecure about her love for him, which was so endearing she had to hold back her smile. “Yes.”

“Then say it,” he demanded. He turned aggressive and straddled her lap, looming over her.

Helen thought he was too cute for words and she had to put him out of his misery. “I love you, Drake.”

He gave her a satisfied smile. “About damn time, too.”

“What do you mean, about time? I’ve known you for all of three days.”

He leaned closer and she could see the golden shards in his eyes lit with happiness. “A lot has happened in those three days, though.”

“More than enough,” she agreed.

“I don’t want you to leave me. I’ll let you go if that’s what you want, but I don’t want you to leave me. Not ever.” He whispered the words as if ashamed to say them aloud.

“I don’t want to leave you, Drake.”

“Because you love me?” he insisted.

Helen nodded. She had the feeling he wasn’t going to give up on making her say it any time soon. And that was fine with her. “Because I love you.”

“No pity, right?”

“None. How could I pity someone as big and manly as you?”

“Damn right,” he said. “So, do you want to wear my luceria again?”

His casual attitude broke her heart because she knew how much it cost him. He was giving her every chance to turn him down without guilt, which only made her love him more.

“I do.”

Drake gave a relieved nod and pulled off his shirt.

One solitary leaf hung from the tree and it was shriveled and dry, barely clinging to the branch. No wonder he’d been in so much pain. He was much worse off than he’d been before she met him.

Helen sucked in a breath and reached her hand out to him. “Oh, Drake.”

“No pity,” he growled at her. “Remember.”

Helen bit her lower lip to keep it from trembling. “No pity. Just love.”

Helen reached up and willed the luceria to fall off. The band slithered from around his neck and pooled in her palm. She handed it to him and he took it with shaking hands. “So, what do I promise this time?” she asked.

“That’s up to you. I’ll take what I can get and try not to ask for anything more. I swear it.”

Helen lifted her hair. “All right, then I promise to wear the luceria and fight by your side until every last one of the Synestryn are gone.”

“But that may take forever. And you’re one of us. You’re going to live for centuries now, so you’ll be with me a really long time.”

“That was kind of the point. Unless you think you’ll get sick of me.”

“Hell no. I love you, Helen. And it’s too late to go back on your word now. You’re mine.” He fastened the necklace around her throat and she welcomed the slippery weight once again.

A flurry of feelings swelled inside her, but they were all good—overwhelming in their intensity, but good. Drake’s love, his hope for their future, his resolve to keep her safe and by his side forever.

He groaned and pulled her to him for a kiss. Helen melted into him, amazed once again at her good fortune. Not only had she got a new life; she got to spend it with Drake. She was the world’s luckiest woman.

Drake pulled away enough to smile down at her with a sexy glow lighting his brown eyes. “I’ll show you lucky.”

And he proceeded to do just that.

Epilogue

Canaranth tried not to display any signs of fear as he stood before his master’s giant stone desk. The black surface gleamed in the flickering candlelight of the Synestryn lord’s office.

His master, Zillah, steepled his pale fingers. Those hands looked almost human—only slightly longer with too-dark fingernails. Zillah’s face was also very human looking. He could go out in public wearing only a hat to shadow his face and no one knew he didn’t belong among the cattle.

Canaranth didn’t even need the hat. As long as no one saw his eyes, they thought he was completely human. It had been handy on more than one occasion, and tonight was no exception.

“They found the Sentinel sword, sire,” said Canaranth. He was proud that his voice hardly wavered at all. “It was an excellent distraction.”

Zillah leaned back in his leather chair, smiling. Sharp, pointed teeth glowed in the candlelight. “The blooded child?”

“She’s downstairs with the others. She’s still young enough that there’s time to alter her properly.”

“And the Sentinels?”

“They are congregating at their compound, preparing for our attack, as you planned. None of them were guarding her home and her parents were no problem. I doubt the Sentinels even know she exists.”

“We will keep it that way.”

“And the sword?” asked Canaranth.

“Let them have it. The girl is worth the loss of the sword.” Zillah smiled, baring more of his sharp teeth. “She will give us beautiful children.”