The first morning light was brightening the windows when the pool began to glow. It was so dim that at first Rose thought it was just a trick of the dawn. But no—the water rippled with a faint, silvery radiance, brightening and fading in a steady rhythm.
Rose sat up quickly, dumping Connie’s feet off her lap. “Neridia!”
The sea dragon Empress awoke with an unladylike snort, her hand splashing into the basin. They all crowded around as the silver glow steadied.
The Master Shark’s craggy face looked up at them from the water. “I found him. I went through the Sea Gate intending to start the search at Atlantis, but the Phoenix’s blood-scent dragged me out at quite a different location. And not one I would ever have expected.”
“Where?” They all said it at the same time, their voices overlapping.
“A place I know well. But I cannot imagine the warlocks are there for the same reason I was.” The Master Shark looked grim as death. “My Empress, we must move quickly. They are on the island of Shifting Sands.”
Chapter 20
Shifting Sands. We’re on the island of Shifting Sands.
Ash had never been here before himself, but Chase’s cut-off sentence combined with the unmistakably tropical climate had allowed him to work out their location. Chase had once won a vacation at the all-shifter resort here, as a finalist in some ridiculous ‘Mr. Shifter’ pageant. The pegasus shifter had waxed eloquent—even more so than usual—about the many delights of the island for months afterward.
He’d even mentioned that there was a disused villa on the far side of the island, well away from the main resort. It had once been the private residence of the island’s previous owner, a man who had kept a secret zoo of imprisoned shifters. Justice had caught up with the collector; the captives had been liberated, and no one had used the place since.
Ash was fairly certain that Corbin was using it now. He also suspected that Corbin had known the previous owner—he certainly sounded like a man whose interests would have aligned with those of the High Magus, even if he hadn’t been a warlock himself. Corbin seemed just a little too familiar with the layout of the dusty, abandoned mansion.
And Ash had a growing, terrible certainty that he knew why Corbin was here.
The warlock had been using his power to portal in dozens more warlocks throughout the day. But these warlocks had all come alone, without familiars. The runes around their left wrists had just been flat black ink, the tattoos not yet shimmering with power. They’d all had hungry, eager expressions. Ash had seen people like that before.
Acolytes. Trained in binding shifters, but not yet with familiars of their own.
And across the island, there was a whole resort full of shifters, unguarded and unaware…
“More,” Cor
bin demanded.
Ash clenched his teeth, feeling the warlock’s will probing at him like a dagger between his ribs. He kept his own mental walls high and tight, as blank as his face.
He had years of experience in hiding his soul. He’d sat night after night in Rose’s pub, watching her from the corner, and never revealed his feelings.
He used all that hard-earned discipline now. The binding cut into his arm like red-hot wire. He couldn’t stop the warlock from drawing power from him, but he could at least slow the torrent.
The warlock held up one hand, studying the orange light jumping fitfully over his runes. “This childish defiance is pointless, Blaze. You are only hurting yourself.”
Despite Ash’s resistance, Corbin’s fingertips still burned with flickering flames. They glowed bright in the dim, shuttered room, reflecting in the glassy eyes of the stuffed animal heads on the walls.
Corbin rubbed his hands over each other, as though smoothing lotion into his skin. As the fire faded, so did the age spots and wrinkles lining his old flesh. His swollen knuckles straightened and strengthened.
Corbin let out a long, pleased sigh. He opened and closed his hands experimentally, his fingers moving more smoothly now.
“Twenty years will take some time to undo,” he said, admiring his own rejuvenated flesh. “It was the one spell I could not perform with any lesser shifter. Even I can only be reborn in Phoenix fire.”
He’d never wondered, before, why Corbin had never seemed to change. When Ash had been a child, Corbin had just been a towering, god-like figure. Even as he’d grown, he hadn’t really noticed that Corbin didn’t age. When you were in your twenties, everyone over the age of forty just fell into the vague category of old.
But now that he was in his forties, it was painfully obvious in retrospect that Corbin had never aged naturally. Ash cursed himself for not realizing exactly why Corbin had been so fixated the Phoenix. No wonder the warlock had pursued him across twenty years and two continents.
If he’d known, he would never have allowed himself to grow so complacent. He would never have assumed that the warlock had given up or died.
He would never have gone back to Rose…
Even as he thought it, he knew it was a lie. He’d known, at some deep, dark level, that he was putting her in danger just with his presence. He simply hadn’t been able to stay away from her. He never would be able to.