Planet Dragos

“Thanks.”

  Even though she had been given the all clear, she hesitated, torn.

  Other people were arriving for the wedding, and Carling and Rune had reserved an entire floor in the Spa Tower for the wedding guests.

  Of Dragos’s original sentinels, Aryal had flown in with Dragos and Pia, and Bayne, Graydon, and his mate, Beluviel, would be arriving later in the afternoon. The two newer sentinels, Alexander and Aryal’s mate, Quentin, had remained back in New York, while Tiago and his mate, Niniane, were in Adriyel and unable to attend.

  Rune and Carling also had friends from Florida who would either already be here or arriving soon—Duncan and Seremela, Grace and Khalil, and Claudia and Luis—but Pia didn’t know any of those couples very well.

  Part of her felt as if she should stay and be social, but the other part…

  The other part didn’t want to look into their faces as they saw how much she had changed.

  She would have to face the others soon enough this evening. For now she was going to give herself permission to avoid everything.

  She jotted a quick note for Dragos on hotel stationery and left it in a prominent place on the hall table by the suite’s double doors. Then, grabbing her purse, she said to Eva, “Let’s get out of here.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “To the Riverview Casino.”

  Chapter Two

  Fifteen minutes later, Pia and Eva walked into the Riverview. Like the other Las Vegas great hotels and casinos, the Riverview glittered with flashing lights and luxurious appointments—marble floors, soaring ceilings, and lavish works of art.

  Unlike the other hotels and casinos, the Riverview was under the sole ownership of an Elder Races company, the Light Fae Queen Tatiana’s Northern Lights.

  While a proportion of Elder Races creatures were scattered throughout the rest of the city, here they were in the majority. Demonkind servers walked by, carrying trays of drinks. Nearby, a medusa sat playing slots at three adjacent machines, his head snakes wrapped firmly around the handles. Pia stared at him, fascinated.

  “Ah, Las Vegas,” Eva said as they walked across the open floor. “The Cirque du Soleil, Cher, Ricky Martin, Paul Simon… So many great things to do, so little time. Did you know that Vampyres love the fake sky at the Venetian Resort? They have gondola rides down the Grand Canal, and it’s all inside. Want to get in a little slot machine action?”

  “What?” Glancing at the other woman, Pia realized Eva had noticed the direction she was staring. She was probably being rude by staring so openly, not that the medusa would notice. His concentration on the slot machines was total. “I’m not a gambler.”

  “Oh, come on. Live a little,” Eva coaxed. “I could get you some chips, and we could try our luck at one of the tables.”

  Pia laughed. “I still remember how hard I worked to make money. I’m not comfortable throwing it away at blackjack or roulette.”

  “I bet Dragos wouldn’t be throwing his money away.” Eva grinned. “I’d love to see that dragon in a poker game.”

  “That’s not going to happen here,” Pia told her. “Dragos is banned from gambling in Las Vegas. He’s too good at counting cards, and nobody with any sense will sit in on a poker game with him. All he can do is see some shows and attend Rune and Carling’s wedding.”

  Eva laughed. “You didn’t tell me why you wanted to come to the Riverview instead of hanging out at the Bellagio.”

  “I’m looking for the Midnight Lounge. There’s a show called Last Dance that I want to check into.” Scanning the area, she caught sight of a sign. “It’s over there, down that hall.”

  Eva kept pace beside her. Stepping inside the Midnight Lounge was somewhat disappointing. While it was indisputably the scene from the billboard, the photoshopped magic was missing. Except for a ghoul mopping the floor and another one working behind the bar, the lounge was empty and the stage dark.

  “Vegas may never sleep, but they’ve got to mop the floors some time.” Eva regarded both ghouls with a smile.

  Pia frowned. The damn drug protocol not only damped her immune system, it also muffled her ability to sense magic. She asked, “Can you sense anything? Any residual Power or magic?”

  “Nothing out of the ordinary. Sparks here and there, magic items, individual people. It comes and goes. There are dampening fields all over casinos so players can’t communicate with each other telepathically or cheat with other kinds of spells.” Eva looked at her thoughtfully. “Why? What are you looking for?”

  “Anything. Nothing.” She shrugged. “I had a weird moment back at the Bellagio. And there was somebody that looked like Dragos on the billboard for this show, but obviously it wasn’t him. When I asked Dragos about it, he brushed me off and told me to ignore it.”

  Eva raised an eyebrow. “So naturally you thought to run right over here.”

  When Eva put it like that, Pia felt a little sheepish. “I was running away from the hotel as much as anything.”

  “You said you had a weird moment.” Eva frowned, hands on her hips as she surveyed the area. “I’m not a fan of weird, but I don’t see or sense any danger.”

  “Weird isn’t necessarily bad. Just look at our lives. Every single thing in it could be labeled weird.” Pia headed to the bar where an older ghoul unloaded a dishwasher and stacked the clean glasses on a shelf. “Excuse me—is Last Dance showing here?”

  He shrugged. Like all ghouls, he had a long, mournful face. “Sure. Maybe. I don’t actually know. This is my first day back at work after a two-week vacation. After a while all the shows start to look alike, know what I mean?”

  “I guess so.” Amused, she glanced at Eva, who had approached the other ghoul.

  “Hey, buddy,” Eva said. “Anybody back in the dressing rooms?”

  He paused to lean on the handle of his mop as if he were too tired to stand upright. “Might be.”

  Eva handed him a few twenties. “Why don’t you check for us? If there is someone back there, could you tell them we’d like to speak to them?”

  “Okay.” Pocketing the cash, he shuffled toward the back.

  As they waited, Pia strolled over to look at the stage. It was decorated the same as the scene in the billboard, with tall ebony vases filled with long-stemmed red roses. Impulsively, she walked up the three steps to stand on the stage. There was a trapdoor in the middle of the worn floor.

  As she viewed the lounge from her new vantage place, the stage lights switched on. White light hit her full in the face, blinding her, while the rest of the lounge receded into darkness.

  “Sorry, did I trigger that?” she called out as she threw up a hand to shield her eyes.

  From behind the shelter of her fingers, she could make out Eva’s outline where she waited by a table. The muted figure of a ghoul walked up to her, and they talked. They both seemed very far away, and neither one of them appeared to notice Pia.

  “Eva?” she said uncertainly. If there was one thing Eva should be doing, it was noticing Pia, especially when she called out to her. “Eva!”

  The other woman gave no indication she’d heard. And that wasn’t the good kind of weird.

  Booted heels sounded on the hardwood floor, and a tall man came to stand beside her. As Pia looked at him, her heart began to race.

  He had a hard profile, much like Dragos’s, and he had the same black hair, broad shoulders, and strong, sensual mouth.

  “Hello, Pia Giovanni Cuelebre,” he said. His voice was deep and not quite unfamiliar.

  Her leg muscles clenched until she stood on the balls of her feet, ready to run. She sensed nothing from him—no danger, no magic. No Power. But Eva wasn’t answering her, and this man knew her full name.

  Taking a wary step back, she asked, “Do I know you?”

  “I know you. We came close to meeting once.” Turning toward her, the man smiled. His eyes were green. “You were pregnant with your first son then. He saved your life, almost at the expense of his.”

  That kick
ed her pulse into higher gear. Nobody except Dragos knew what her peanut had done, back when she had suffered a wound that had nearly turned mortal. She whispered, “How do you know that?”

  He was much more handsome than Dragos if the truth were told. Magnetically so. But he carried the same kind of blade in his smile. “The same way I know how much your mother loves you. She told you that you could go to her if you wished. Remember?”

  Shock moved through her like a slow-shifting glacier, numbing her hands and lips. “I never told anybody about that, not even Dragos. Who are you?”

  “You can call me Rael if you like.” Putting his hands in his pockets, he shifted to look out over the near-empty lounge.

  A thought occurred to her, as preposterous and vast as an ocean. It couldn’t be, but… so many things in her life were preposterous. Were weird.

  “Rael, as in…” Her voice shook, and she had to swallow and start again. “As in Azrael?”

  He neither confirmed nor denied it. Like a mountain, he simply was. “You know, everybody was so surprised by you when Dragos took a mate. It was the last thing anybody expected. You’ve taught him how to love something more than himself, but long ago and for many centuries he was known as the Great Beast. The Great Beast made powerful, long-lived mortal enemies, and they remember. Never forget, Pia Giovanni Cuelebre—you and your children are his greatest triumph, but you are also his biggest weakness.”

  Yeah, yeah, she’d heard that before. She fast-forwarded through it impatiently to focus on the most important thing.

  “My mom,” Pia breathed. “Can—Would you let me talk to her? Please?”

  He shook his head. “She is not here, Pia.”

  “But she was, back then.”

  “Back then you were close enough to dying you could hear her.”

  “Is that what I need to do in order to hear her again?”

  Turning his head, Death speared her with one of those bladelike smiles. “Do you want to get close enough to death again to find out?”

  “I guess not,” she whispered.

  Her thinking crumbled into shambles. Unless she was hallucinating, she was actually in conversation with one of the world’s Primal Powers. Questions and fears piled up on each other.

  “Why—How are you a single person? Aren’t there people dying all over the world?”

  He lifted one black eyebrow. “Not all of them require my personal attention.”

  That didn’t answer anything. She demanded, “Wh-why do you look like Dragos? And why are you here, talking to me?”

  “Come on now,” he chided. “Catch up. You of all people should know how closely related death and the dragon are. As for why I’m here… that will become apparent soon enough. You’re going to have to make some unpleasant choices, and a lot is going to hinge on the things that you and others do next.”

  “Pia!” Eva’s sharp voice jolted her into looking. The other woman had walked to the edge of the stage and was looking up at her. “Nobody’s here. What do you want to do?”

  “That’s not true, I was just…” Her voice trailed away as she realized the man who had been standing beside her had disappeared.

  “You were just what?” Eva looked concerned. “What’s going on? You look like you were a million miles away.”

  She listened to the sound of her own breathing. It took a thousand years for her eyelids to close in a single blink.

  What’s going on? I was just talking to Death, who is apparently closely related to my husband. No big deal.

  I didn’t realize Dragos had any family other than his sentinels. It’s not like Death has shown up for any of our holiday dinners or brought the kids presents.

  Come on, Pia. Catch up.

  Then finally, just as Eva was about to jump onto the stage, Pia seemed to snap into time and place. Regaining the use of her limbs, she rushed to the stairs.

  “Never mind,” she said. Explaining what had just happened would take too much time, and she wasn’t prepared to put it into words. Not yet, and maybe not without a lot of alcohol involved. “We need to go back to the Bellagio.”

  “Sure.” Eva sounded easygoing, but her gaze was sharp. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “Maybe I have. I don’t want to talk about it.” All she knew for sure was that she needed to see Dragos.

  They had only been together for a couple of years. They had a young marriage and relationship, and even though their eldest son Liam had gone off to college, that was because he was an intensely magical being who had sprung into existence with a speed reminiscent of the first generation of Elder Races. If he had been any other boy, he would still be a toddler.

  Still, she and Dragos had faced more than their fair share of conflict over their short time together, enough times to make Pia ask more than once, just who have I mated with?

  Now her question shifted.

  It was no longer who had she mated with but what?

  The need to connect with him was so intense she reached out telepathically. Most people with telepathy had a range of only ten or so feet, but Dragos’s range covered a hundred miles.

  Silence greeted her attempt. She had already forgotten what Eva had told her, that casinos dampened telepathy.

  As they left the lounge and strode through the gambling floor of the Riverview, a tall, dark man walked with them.

  Death said, “Call on me anytime you want. Consider me at your disposal for the near future.”

  She felt her eyes strain as she looked around. There was nobody walking alongside her. Nobody but Eva, who was walking a little too close. There was an edge to Eva’s jawline that said she was not as relaxed as she tried to appear.

  Pia heard herself say, “I don’t think I’m okay.”

  Eva’s reaction was immediate and warm. Putting her arm around Pia, she said strongly, “You will be. Soon as we get into a cab, I’m going to call the doctor. And Dragos. Everything is going to be all right, honey.”

  Eva thought she meant physically, and Pia didn’t attempt to correct her. Maybe there was something physically wrong and she had hallucinated what had just happened. Or maybe there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for it. As they approached the main doors of the casino, she allowed herself to believe everything really would be okay.

  Until several people strode through the main doors and approached them.

  The leader was a tall, powerfully built Elven woman. A jagged white scar split her splendid features. She was accompanied by six soldier types, all of them wearing flak jackets and weapons.

  “I really don’t like this,” Eva muttered under her breath. “Okay, Pia, back up now onto the gambling floor. We need to flag security.”

  Pia moved to obey, feeling as though she were swimming through mud. Whatever this impending confrontation was about, she and Eva weren’t going to escape it. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of the logo on the nearest soldier type. DEVIL’S GATE SECURITY.

  Quickly the soldier types fanned out until she and Eva were surrounded. Smiling, the Elven woman said, “Pia Cuelebre? Oh, look how pregnant you are. That’s just precious. My day keeps getting better and better.”

  Moving so fast she blurred, Eva pulled her Glock and aimed for the Elven woman’s head. “Back up, asshole.”

  Instantly the soldiers that surrounded them pulled their weapons too, all aiming at Eva. Dread drove like a spike into Pia’s chest. They weren’t bluffing.

  “Eva,” Pia whispered, “put your gun down.”

  “Not a chance.” Eva’s expression had turned ruthless. She bared her teeth at the Elven woman. “You want to go there? Let’s all go at once. They shoot me, I shoot you. Sure, I’ll be dead, but so will you. I don’t know who you are, and I don’t give a shit. We’re backing up onto the gambling floor, so get yourself out of my face.”

  “We don’t have time for suicidal heroics,” the Elven woman said. Her gaze switched to Pia, and her smile widened. She said to the soldiers, “Holster
your weapons.”

  They did. Pia glanced quickly around. They stood at attention, watching the Elven woman, who said to Pia, “There, see? We’re not going to have any violence here, only choices.”

  Choices – just as Azrael had warned. Pia’s heart pounded harder.

  Ignoring Eva, who had not lowered her gun, the woman held out a phone to Pia as she strode closer. “I’ve taken a friend of yours, Carling Severan. Here, you can see her for yourself.”

  She hadn’t thought she could feel more fear than she already did, but it spiked again. Dragging her gaze from the Elf’s face, she looked at the phone’s screen.

  The scene was no static photo. It was live footage. She stared at the beautiful unconscious woman sprawled on the desert ground. It was indisputably Carling, her short auburn hair tousled. She was bound with strands of what looked like shining silver wire, and a silver arrow protruded from her chest.

  There were at least two people with Carling. One stood visible from the waist down, holding a crossbow pointed at Carling’s head, while the other unseen person held the phone that filmed the scene.

  “If you don’t come with me right now,” the Elven woman said softly, “he’s going to shoot. Are you going to save Carling’s life, or are you going to watch her die?”

  No ordinary arrow would bring down a Vampyre of Carling’s age and strength, nor would ordinary silver bind her. Carling was one of the most powerful sorceresses in the world, yet this woman had captured her.

  And Rune was mated to her, indisputably mated for life. Their Las Vegas wedding was nothing more than putting icing on the proverbial cake. If Carling died, Rune died. It was as simple as that.

  Pia looked up to meet the Elven woman’s fearless, tigerish gaze. The Elf was a dead woman, of course, but some pretty important questions still remained. How would she die and how many casualties would she take down with her when she did?

  Pia told her, “Of course I’ll come.”

  “No,” Eva snapped, tightening her arm around Pia’s shoulders. “No, you will not!”

  Even as she protested, one of the soldiers walked up to slam the butt of his gun into the side of her head. Eva dropped like a stone.