Blood Vow (Blood Moon Rising) (21 page)

And with that, her heart constricted painfully at the thought of losing his love and respect. She now understood completely why, after Luca discovered Mara was not only still alive but a Slayer, he had kept those facts from her and Rafe. For the simple fear of losing her. What he had done was wrong but she understood the reason behind it. What she was doing now was worse.

But she could not tell them! Not now. It would be devastating, and the nation needed the powerful alphas completely focused. Maybe she would tell them after the rising, if they survived it. If she had the courage . . .

Instinctively her hand dropped to her belly. What of her child? Would they allow her to live long enough for him to be born? And then kill him, too?
No!
She would fight for her child’s life even at the expense of her own and his father’s. She would tell them nothing. Just simply slip away one night, have her baby, and look over her shoulder for the rest of her life.

And what a miserable lonely existence that would be.

“Angel face,” Lucien said softly, leaning into her. He smiled and pressed his hand over the one on her belly. “You look like you have the weight of the world on your shoulders.”

She smiled a sad smile, forcing back tears. Tracing her fingertips across his full bottom lip she said, “Promise me, no matter what happens, you will never stop loving me.”

He grasped her hand, and nipped her fingertip. “You own every part of me. There is nothing that will ever change that.”

Fisting his hair in her hand, Falon drew his lips to hers and deeply kissed him. His strong arms slipped around her waist pulling her into him. Inwardly she sighed, feeling safe in his strong arms.

Lucien was slow and deliberate in his kiss, drawing her away from what plagued her thoughts. Her skin flickered warmly as his tongue languidly swirled along her lips then against hers. She loved kissing him, her wicked, wicked Lycan.

When he broke the kiss several minutes later she was breathing heavily and not thinking about anything except his hands and mouth on her.

His beautiful golden eyes glowed with passion and—a mischievous smile tugged at the corner of his full lips. “I love you, angel face,” he said softly. “I vow to you I will never forsake you.” He kissed her nose, and smiled. “Never doubt me.”

She knew Lucien believed what he said, but he was making his commitment not knowing the truth. As such, it didn’t count. She clasped him tightly to her.

Would Luca truly stand by her? Could he when faced with the truth?

Both alphas had the same demons but carried them differently.

While Luca dragged around the guilt of not doing what he had wanted to do the day Clan Corbet viciously slew his parents, it was Rafa who bore the responsibility by barring Lucien from going to their mother’s aide. It would be Rafe who could not,
would
not, allow himself to set down the guilt, even after he destroyed Corbet and his entire line. It was a no-win situation for Rafa and his guilt because he held himself solely responsible because of his inaction.

Never mind he was only ten years old at the time and would have been as hideously tortured and killed as his parents and so many others that day had he not honored the promise he made to his mother. Thank the gods for that.

But even with the truth of what would have happened had he tried to save his parents, if Rafa knew the truth about her, he would never be able to look at her again without seeing his parents’ blood on her hands. She would always pay the price for her father’s sins.

She opened her eyes to find Rafa’s equally brooding eyes watching her. Fear prickled along her spine. Did he know? Suspect? To diffuse the uncomfortable feeling she said, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

He slowly shook his head, not breaking his stare. “What aren’t you telling us, Falon?”

Her throat tightened, and her hands shook. “Why do you say that?” she nervously asked, pushing out of Lucien’s embrace.

“Don’t answer a question with a question, Falon,” he said quietly.

She opened her mouth to deny what he asked but decided that would add to the thickening tension. Instead she gave him a different truth. “I’m worried. I’m afraid, and I feel helpless.”

Rafe nodded. “I’m worried, too, and afraid something is going to pop up we’re not prepared to handle. And because of it, we’ll lose the final battle.”

Falon gasped. “Like what?” She was afraid to ask.

“Like more witches or an attack by demons or goblins we have no clue exist. Or that Fenrir is going to pull some magic wand out of his ass we can’t overcome.”

Falon’s heart thundered inside her rib cage, choking her breath from her lungs. “We have the sword,” she breathed, her voice shaky. Fenrir knew her secret and she knew in her heart if Corbet didn’t reveal it, Fenrir would. Her father had given her two weeks. Fenrir would not be so indulging.

“Where are we going now?”

“North to the battleground.”

“Where is that?”

“The tribes call it Naparyarmiut, but on the map it’s Hooper’s Bay. It’s on the west coast of Alaska on the Bering Sea,” Lucien said.

“The packs have been moving north for weeks, many of them will be there when we arrive with the balance to follow over the next week.”

“What will happen? How will the battle commence?”

“As it did three hundred years ago, face-to-face, hand to hand, sword to sword.”

Falon shivered as the image of the gruesome battle to come played out in slow motion in her head. Fenrir leading legions of powerful Slayers against them but in her vision, Rafe and Lucien were not with her, but together. Where was she? Had they learned her truth and—

“We must call out Fenrir before the rising,” she said hoarsely. “With his death the Slayers have nothing.”

Rafe withdrew the Cross of Caus from the scabbard on the floor beside him. His eyes shone brightly as he held it up and she noticed the ring on his finger glowed warmly. “With the sword, the ring and the power of the three, we can defeat him. We
will
defeat him.” His eyes flared and he caught her gaze. “And then we will annihilate every Slayer and hybrid on the planet.”

Falon lowered her gaze unable to look Rafe in the eye when she hid such a terrible lie. But it was exactly that shame and the fear of discovery that planted the seed of an idea in her brain.

“What will you tell the packs—about us?” Falon asked.

Lucien gathered her back into his arms and kissed the top of her head. “That we are united and anyone who has a problem with it is free join another pack.”

Falon glanced at Rafe who nodded. “I am the eldest, and when I speak to the council, I will speak on behalf of Vulkasin and Mondragon when both packs arrive. If any human or Lycan challenges me, I will accept the challenge, and win.”

“What if the packs as a whole reject us as a trio?”

“They won’t,” Rafe assured her.

Lucien squeezed her. “If I had any doubt that what we were doing would be detrimental in any way to either pack, Falon, I would not have agreed to this unusual relationship.” He looked past her to Rafe. “I love my brother. I regret the years we spent separated. I regret the heartache our packs have endured. I would not put them through anything like that again.” He sighed heavily. “I would step down as alpha first.”

“You would do that, for me?”

He nodded. “For us.”

Emotion caught in her throat. “Oh, Luca, I love you more for saying that, but alpha is as much a part of you as your golden eyes. You would be miserable with anything less.”

He took her chin in his hand and raised it so that their eyes locked. “I would be more miserable without you.”

He kissed her and in that brief moment, Falon believed if Lucien knew the truth he would not cast her aside. He pulled her into his lap and she curled up in his protective arms and as her eyes fluttered closed the last image she saw was Rafe’s intense scowl.

Her dreams were fraught with despair. Of running from who she was, straight into the jaws of Fenrir. Those aimless gray souls, the ghost walkers howled mournfully around her, fearful she would not release them from their endless purgatory.

In them she looked for Rafael and Lucien’s parents.
Tamaska! Arnou! Are you there?
She sobbed.
I love your sons! I hate my lie but I’m so afraid to lose them
.
Tell me what to do!
she pleaded.
Tell me what to do!

Deafening silence answered. An omen. There was no answer therefore there would be no life for her with her alphas after the rising.

On every side of this feud there was heartache and pain. Slayers lost loved ones, Lycan, too, and even Fenrir, that disgusting excuse for a wolf had feelings. Imagine that? He wasn’t just driven by his rejection. Deep down inside that wolf had a heart and wanted the same thing everyone wanted: to be loved. Unconditionally. How odd that her parents of all people loved each other enough to stay together all these years and even bring another child into the world. How difficult it must have been and still be.

Would Rafe or Lucien give it all up for her like her father did her mother? She would not ask them to, and she would never in a thousand years lay as her mother had with the man who destroyed so many people she loved. Anger swept away any compassion she had for her mother, father, or Fenrir. Her mother was weak, a traitor to her people and to her children. Thomas and Fenrir perpetuated an eight-hundred-year-old hatred. She would end it.

Her plan took root. When they arrived in Alaska, she would take the Cross of Caus and set out on her own odyssey to destroy her father and the wicked wolf Fenrir, thus ending the curse upon both peoples.

* * *

“ANGEL FACE,” LUCIEN said softly. “Wake up, we’re here.”

Falon slowly roused, unsure of where
here
was.

“The hunting grounds. C’mon.”

Before she could move, Lucien hoisted her up into his arms, and carried her out of the plane into the cold night air. The crisp artic air felt good in her lungs. The fresh scents of nature welcomed her. As Lucien set her down she saw Rafe loading a black SUV. He glanced up, and caught her stare before turning back to the loading.

Foreboding haunted her. Did Rafe suspect? Gently she tried to probe his thoughts but he had closed himself off to her. Even more cause for alarm.

“C’mon, let’s get you warm,” Lucien said, steering her toward the SUV. He settled her in the backseat, then climbed up front in the passenger seat as Rafe took the driver’s seat. Without conversation they drove off the tarmac of the small airfield and into the blackness of night.

As they drove, Falon watched the blackness speed by, and her mood settled more uncomfortably within her. She kept telling herself there was no way out except with the deaths of the two beings who knew about her but who perpetuated the hatred. It was a twofer since both her father and Fenrir were in all Lycan’s crosshairs. Layla she wasn’t worried about. Her mother would keep her secret for fear of punishment for them both. At least in that her mother had some loyalty. And her sister! Alana.

That sweet little girl.

They had shared a kindred heart the minute Falon held her in her arms and told her she would protect her. The girl had instantly quieted and settled into Falon’s arms. The emotion that had exploded in her chest was what she surmised a mother must feel for her child. And now, that poor kid would grow up hating Falon for killing her father. But did she have a choice?

She glanced up at the rearview mirror and caught Rafe’s penetrating stare. “What is it, Rafa?”

He glanced at the road then back at her. “You tell me.”

Once again that feeling that he suspected the worse overcame her.

“You’ve been quiet the entire trip back, Rafe, what’s up?” Lucien asked.

Long minutes passed before he answered. “Corbet’s claim that the child was his daughter is eating at me.”

“It’s been on my mind as well. Unless a Lycan was forced, I can’t see how he could have sired a child.”

“What if that Lycan, like me, didn’t know she was Lycan until it was too late?” Falon offered hoping to steer the conversation away from connecting any dots. It made her feel guiltier. It was one thing to not know the truth but to know it now as she did and to propagate the lie to protect herself . . .

“I suppose that’s possible, but improbable.” Rafe looked up at the rearview mirror again and asked, “Did Layla ever tell you why she deserted you?”

Falon’s chest squeezed so tightly she had to suck hard for a breath. “Being out of the protection of her pack, she feared that so long as we were together, Slayers could sniff her out and thereby sniff me out.”

“So for your protection, she abandoned you?”

It was a bitter pill to swallow but— “Yes.”

“Why didn’t she return to the pack?” Lucien asked, turning to face her.

“All she would tell me was that she had survivor’s guilt. That she could not bear to relive what had happened, and being among her pack she would relive it constantly.”

“Sounds like a cop-out,” Rafe said.

Falon nodded, understanding why he would say that but knowing the truth, she understood completely, even though she would never have abandoned not only one but two children.

“Did she ever speak of her time with Corbet?” Rafe pushed.

Falon’s belly dropped to her feet. “She—she refused to speak of it.” And in hindsight Falon understood perfectly by what her mother hadn’t said exactly what had happened. She fell in love with him. He stayed away from his clan to be with her mother and raise her. He battled his demons, but in the end, blood trumped love and child. Thomas Corbet’s destiny would not be denied. It was as tragic as any Shakespearean play and for the first time, knowing the truth, Falon felt compassion for her mother and her father. Though she could not understand how on earth Layla could fall in love with the Master Slayer who had viciously destroyed her family, she understood the depths of love.

And the heartbreak of having it ripped from your arms.

“Did she speak of your father?” Rafe asked.

This time the blood leeched from her cheeks. “Only that he loved me.”