Then she felt him bite the back of her neck hard, really hard. At first it felt so good then it started to hurt.

She whimpered because of the pain of it, despite the thrall. His breathing became ragged and rough and his teeth, bigger and sharper than usual, pierced her spine deep, penetrating the tissue, working between the vertebrae.

Fire began to flow up and down her spine, and it hurt.

Flames leaped through her, driving down to her tailbone then into her adjoining pelvis and leg bones. Up through her neck and into her skull, wrapping around her brain with fire, looping back to drive through the rest of her bones, her arms, wrists, hands, shoulders, and through her ribs until the deepest part of her, the marrow of her bones, was burning.

He had killed her—that was what she thought as the fire tore through her and completely engulfed her.

He had incinerated her to the core.

His voice floated through her mind. You are more than vampire now, and you are mine. Mine.

Then everything turned black.

Braulio looked down at the glowing body. He knew what this felt like, the burning agony, the fiery pain. Of all the assignments he’d undertaken, on behalf of the Council of Sixth Earth, this was the one he despised the most, that he’d taken the famous She’when’endel’livelle and done this to her without her permission, the woman destined to save two worlds from a monster, if only he could keep her alive.

He knew she’d reached the lowest point in her life. He could feel her despair as though it rolled in heavy waves off her unconscious body. He wanted to ease her, to comfort her, but her greater trials were in front of her, and yes, he had to somehow keep her alive, keep Greaves from destroying her before her own new powers emerged so that she could battle all the monsters to come.

He knelt beside the chaise-longue and took her limp hand. Bending her elbow carefully, he leaned in to kiss each of her fingers. “I’m so sorry, my faithful one. I’m so sorry. You are beloved in the Upper Dimensions, honored, and revered. They sing songs about you, about your service and suffering. Stay the course, my beloved, and you will win this war, but you must stay the course. Forgive me for this. Forgive me. Oh, God, how much I love you. How much I’ve always loved you. Be strong and be brave.”

He felt the pull of Sixth Earth, but he resisted. The Council could go fuck themselves. He needed a minute. He closed his eyes and held the back of her hand to his cheek. He breathed and begged her forgiveness.

His cock was rigid and weeping. It had been all he could do to keep from piercing her, but he would not rape her, even though his body called to hers like ocean to earth. When he got back to Sixth, he’d give himself some relief, but it wouldn’t be the same. To mark her neck as he had, but not come inside her, had been an agony beyond belief.

Sixth Earth pulled on him again, but he couldn’t bring himself to move, to leave Endelle, to leave her without an understanding of what had transpired, to leave her all but blind for the coming weeks and months.

What he had done to her would change her.

Forever.

When Sixth Earth called a third time, it was with a resonant telepathic chime that about killed him. He released Endelle’s hand and in the swooshing sensation of nether-space, he glided home.

Owen Stannett drifted a hand over the wave on the side of his head. His fingers trembled, but he couldn’t exactly help that.

He stood in the center of Greaves’s peach orchard on Second Earth, a high-security location, very private, with terra-cotta pavers and stone benches.

Casimir also stood near one of the benches, arms crossed over his chest as though he was embracing himself. No surprise there. That he faced outward, however, as though scrutinizing rows and rows of peach trees wasn’t like him. He stood very still, almost statue-like, also not like him. Apparently, Stannett wasn’t the only one rattled by the failure the night before at the Creator’s Convent in Prescott Two.

Greaves was on his phone to Moscow Two. His extensive spectacle team, coordinated by a group of Beijing specialists, was working night and day to bring together every aspect of the forthcoming military review spectacle. There seemed to be some problem with the white tigers. One of them had gotten loose and killed several of his ALA Militia Warriors and even one death vampire. Two other death vampires had been severely wounded in the encounter. The greater misfortune, however, seemed to be that one of the tigers had died.

Greaves’s face was red as he spoke into the phone. “You will secure a second tiger. I am most displeased.” He maintained his usual demeanor but there was resonance to his words that brought a knife-like sensation straight to the center of Stannett’s brain.

Nausea afflicted him. He turned to the nearest stone seat, sat down, and put his head between his knees.

Greaves’s ability to hurt with resonance was unlike any other ascender he’d ever known.

Stannett was sweating now, but it wasn’t from the pain, which had already begun to ease. Nor was it from the necessity of offering a report to the Commander about their failure to off Leto and Thorne’s sister.

No, what really troubled him had his heart pounding in deep terrible thrums.

Greaves ended his call. Stannett looked up at him, but the Commander shifted his gaze out into the peach orchard. All the rage dissipated, to be replaced by a haunted look in his very round brown eyes. “My mother loved peaches,” he said, barely a whisper.

Ah, yes, Greaves’s mother, the famous Beatrice of Fourth, Eternal Therapist of the Highest Order, memoirist, poetess, collector of proverbs. There were rumors that her relations with a death vampire had resulted in Darian Greaves, which of course would explain so much of the Commander’s drive, his sociopath tendencies, and his power levels.

Greaves turned toward him, glanced at Casimir, then back to Stannett. “I do not know which of you is surprising me more in this moment. You, Owen, look so cast down as to appear utterly demoralized.” He shifted toward Casimir but added just a hint of resonance to his words. “And as for you, Caz, good God, what on earth has happened that not only did you send Julianna back to me, but your recent adventure in Prescott Two failed completely?”

Stannett did his best to ignore the pain from that level of resonance, but he couldn’t help but rock back and forth a little.

There would have been a time when Greaves fixing his attention on Casimir first would have brought Stannett a profound sense of relief. Now it just didn’t seem to matter. None of it mattered anymore.

He saw no way out for himself—or Second Earth for that matter. Some higher roll of the dice had occurred, and he didn’t think the play could be withdrawn.

Stannett watched Casimir shift to stare at Greaves for a long moment, his dark eyes almost glassy. Then he drew in a shuddering breath and his shoulders relaxed. He pursed his lips and he, too, sat down on the stone bench nearest him.

Casimir planted his hands on either sides of his legs on the smooth rounded edge of the seat. He leaned forward, which caused his mass of long hair to sway in front of him. That dark hair was his finest feature, but Stannett didn’t envy him so much curl. His own waves were perfect for styling. Stannett couldn’t imagine how much crème rinse the man had to use to keep his hair in order.

“So you want a report,” Casimir stated. He didn’t smile. That was also unusual for the Fourth ascender. The man always had a smile, or a sneer, or a lascivious glance, to throw around.

“At your convenience,” Greaves said, using more resonance.

Oh, God, the pain. Stannett swallowed hard and took deep breaths. Stannett had a lot of power, but whenever he was around Greaves and was on the receiving end of the master’s display, he was astonished all over again. He glanced at Casimir. Even the Fourth ascender had paled.

Casimir, however, lifted his chin. “I can’t account for what the fuck happened. I created shifting mist—”

“And I was most impressed.”

Casimir inclined his head at this significant compliment. He continued, “But somehow the warriors arrived, as well as the obsidian flame Seer, Marguerite. There should not have been a way for them either to realize the mist was there or to pierce it. So no, I have no accounting for the failure of my plan.”

“And I lent you a Third ascended death vampire, one of a rare group I have in my arsenal, and he did not report back to me.”

“He’s dead,” Casimir said.

“How is that possible?”

Casimir shrugged. “He battled Thorne.”

Thorne.

Stannett shuddered inwardly. Something was going on, something big, he could sense it.

At that, Greaves turned once more to face the peach orchard.

Stannett glanced out at the rows and rows of trees. The orchard was laid out in a vast circle above the Commander’s Estrella Mountain military compound. Greaves had won several prestigious horticultural awards for his use of graded microclimates to sustain a single body of plants in twelve evolving stages of development. As a result, Greaves had ripe peaches every day of the year.

It was because of the orchard that Endelle called him “the little peach.”

Greaves turned back to Stannett, holding his hands behind his back. “I was given to understand that this plan could not fail, that you would be in the future streams blocking prophetic information to the Seer Marguerite. I can only presume from what Casimir has told me that somehow she found her way into this stream, saw the future in every sharp detail, then relayed the rest to Warrior Thorne. Would that not be your take on it as well?”

Casimir, too, shifted to look at him. Stannett remained silent, clasping his hands together as he leaned forward on his knees.

So here it was, the moment he’d been dreading; he must now reveal this terrible truth. Nausea overtook him again. Sweat poured. He tried to soothe himself by touching the wave on the side of his head, but now his whole hand shook.

“Good God, man,” Greaves cried. “I won’t kill you for telling me what happened.”

He shook his head and looked up at Greaves. He was always surprised by those wide, brown, innocent-looking eyes. “I don’t fear you, in this moment, Commander. I fear her, the one who achieved pure vision.”