Ascended (War of the Covens 3)

Dear Gaia, one war was enough for Kirios.

His people had assured him they could find the lykan without him, and off he’d gone. It was, after all, a break from the tedium of hunting rogue Daylights. He much preferred the chance to cut down Midnights, whether magik or faerie, loving the complete shock on their face when they realized he was impervious to their magik—another beautiful gift from the Prophet’s blood.

“We did not just meet by chance,” she said softly, drawing the bedcovers over herself nervously.

Kirios shook his head. “I’m not sure I understand, Saffron.”

“I was captured within the stronghold of the Midnight Coven when I was spying. I was careless. Or maybe I wasn’t. He was a Cassandrian and knew I was there. He told me to call him the Prophet. That he had seen me in his visions. That I would play a part in bringing the war to an end … seven hundred years in the future.” She shook her head in amazement. While she spoke, Kirios’s pulse raced.

He stumbled over to the bed and plunked down beside her, his eyes wide with excitement. All these years and nothing. He’d almost gone crazy with frustration because nothing had pointed him in the right direction. Finally, here was something.

“Only the strongest of us live that long now, Kirios. He says I am strong too.”

Kirios chuckled and stroked her cheek. “I’m not surprised. You’re just a baby and already you’re one of the greatest spies within the coven.”

She blushed. “You think so?”

He tsk-ed. “No more compliments for you until you tell me what else he said.”

“He told me about you. Nothing more … just where to find you.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this when we first met?”

“I was afraid. I didn’t know if I could trust you.”

“And now …”

She laughed. “Kirios, I brought you all the way to France with false information to speak with you about this.”

He snorted. So that was why things had been so quiet around here, why they couldn’t find any signs of an imminent attack from the Midnights.

“Why did you not speak with me in Scotland?”

Saffron bit her lip and ducked her head, her long, silver-blond hair falling in front of her stunning face. “I wanted to be on home ground for such a declaration.”

Kirios struggled not to laugh at her logic. “Of course. How silly of me.”

She shrugged off his teasing and looked up at him with wide, pleading eyes. “Why did he tell me to find you, Kirios?”

“Because he once visited me too.”

With that he told her all he could, about the Prophet, about his visions, of what he thought Kirios’s help would do. And now Saffron too.

“So.” She frowned in thought. “What does that mean for us?”

“I think it means that you and I are stuck with one another for a very long time.”

St. Petersburg, Russia, 1725

Kirios waited impatiently for Petrovsky, burrowing into his fur coat. He wasn’t cold. He was never cold. But the city was charged with apprehension. Peter, the emperor of Russia, had died the night before, and with no heir apparent, a sense of foreboding hung above St. Petersburg like an omen of what was to come.

His ears perked up, and he spun around at the sound of approaching footsteps. Petrovsky.

“Reuben,” he muttered, coming toward him. Kirios had caused a lot of suspicion over the years; legends of a vampyre who couldn’t be hurt by magik had circulated. He’d found it necessary to change his name and stay out of the magiks’ way so the legend could die. His instincts told him he should remain a shadow until the time was right.

“What took you?”

“Anna’s father. He thought we should properly mourn the emperor.”

Kirios frowned. “I forgot he’s quite involved in human affairs.”

Petrovsky nodded. Theirs was a strange and unexpected friendship. A few years back, when Kirios had been on a hunt in St. Petersburg, he’d come across this young Midnight trying to help a Daylight. At first he couldn’t believe what he was seeing, so he stalked him for a while. Petrovsky was of lower-class descent among the Midnights and seemed to go out of his way to find Daylights, spending his nights searching the underworld of St. Petersburg with the determination of a bloodhound. Finally, Kirios, concerned for the overeager young magik who was most certainly going to be killed by the supernaturals who intrigued him merely for being a Midnight, had enough and revealed himself to the boy.

Petrovsky was fascinated by other supernaturals, had no ill-feeling toward them whatsoever. And for some reason, Kirios believed him. Petrovsky hated the mindless prejudice of the Midnights who had never treated him well anyway, and like a young soldier desperate to join the war, accepted Kirios’s command. A Midnight working for the Daylights was an unimaginable gift.

First Kirios had masked Petrovsky’s trace so that the Head of the Midnight Coven would never know his true intentions, and then he’d set about making the boy wealthy. Kirios spread rumors that Petrovsky had killed many Daylights and that, alongside the boy’s quirky charm, made him a great favorite with the Head of the Midnight Coven. Certain sacrifices had to be made to prove himself. Petrovsky had to kill some Daylights, but Kirios compartmentalized that issue as a necessity of war and was proven right when Petrovsky was given a position on the Council. It was not long after he married Anna, the daughter of a prominent Midnight and a member of a very old, influential family within the coven.