“Don’t pretend you have some altruistic motive for slaughtering children,” Laylah snapped. “All you care about is saving your own worthless hide.”
“Are you deaf?” The Sylvermyst pointed a finger toward the squirming babies. “They are not children, they’re the spawn of the Dark Lord.”
“He’s right,” Sergei parroted.
Laylah managed to force a small rock to drop onto his head. “Shut up, mage.”
Sergei hissed, stabbing her with a furious glare. “They’re creatures of dark magic, created by evil.”
Laylah ignored the thick tension that blanketed the tunnel.
She wasn’t stupid. She knew that the others suspected her overwhelming maternal instincts were blinding her to the truth of the babies. And in one sense they were right.
She refused to consider who or what had created the babies. Or what they intended to do with them. So far as she was concerned, they had been born the moment she’d taken them from the mist.
But it wasn’t just blind hope.
To the very depths of her soul she believed the children were innocent.
After all, she was a creation of evil.
What else could you call the brutal rape of a helpless woman that had been orchestrated by her own sister?
She had to believe that it was possible for good to come out of such wickedness.
“It doesn’t matter how they were created,” she said, her voice thick.
Ariyal swore, the aroma of herbs so strong it overwhelmed every other scent. Not entirely a bad thing considering Marika had left behind the stench of burning flesh.
Nasty.
“Don’t be a fool.” The fey stabbed a finger toward the babies. “They are destined to open the path to the Dark Lord and his minions.”
“Cousins of yours?” Jaelyn abruptly mocked.
“Yes.” The furious bronze gaze swung toward the female vampire. “And trust me, they don’t have my exquisite charm.”
Jaelyn snorted. “Hard to believe they could be worse.”
“You have no idea.” Ariyal turned back to Laylah. “And they wouldn’t even be the worst of what would crawl out of hell.”
She believed him.
She truly did.
Whatever his selfish motive in wanting to prevent the return of the Dark Lord, he wasn’t lying when he spoke of the horrors that would engulf the world if the veil between worlds was ripped open.
That didn’t mean, however, he wasn’t a big fat liar when it came to the supposed fate of her beautiful children.
“Where did you hear this prophecy?” she demanded between clenched teeth.
He waved a slender hand. “It’s taught to all Sylvermyst before they ever leave the cradle.”
“Convenient.” Ariyal intended to commit murder because of a vague bedtime story? She stuck out her chin. “Did you ever think it might have been a lie that was invented by the Dark Lord?”
He stuck out his own chin. “It couldn’t have been.”
Tane brushed a comforting hand up and down her back. “How do you know?” he challenged the Sylvermyst.
Ariyal muttered words in a harsh, foreign language, looking at them as if they were too stupid to endure.
“After the Dark Lord heard the prophecy he realized that he would eventually be banished from the world,” he said, his tone indicating he was repeating something that should be obvious to the most dense creature. Jackass. “Everyone knows that it drove him crazy and he commanded that all prophets be slaughtered.”
Tane and Laylah shared a brief glance. It was common knowledge that the Dark Lord had commanded that true prophets be destroyed. Still, Laylah had never heard that it was because he’d learned of a foretelling he didn’t like.
Frowning, Tane swiftly came to the same conclusion. “He could have twisted it to make sure you remained faithful even during his banishment.” He continued to stroke Laylah’s back, his steady touch keeping her volatile temper in check. A good thing considering she was too weak to do more than get herself killed. “So long as there was hope he would eventually return to this world, he could be certain you would continue to search for a means to open the veil.”
The heat of Ariyal’s anger swirled around them, only to be swiftly countered by Tane’s blast of frigid power. The combination made the ground shift beneath them. Laylah grimaced. The mountain was unstable enough without adding the stress of two alpha demons flexing their muscles.
“The prophecy hasn’t been altered by the Dark Lord or anyone else,” the Sylvermyst said between clenched teeth.
Laylah shook her head at his stubborn refusal to accept he could be wrong. “How can you be so certain?” “Because it came from the lips of an Oracle.” Tane stiffened at her side. “What Oracle?” “Siljar.”
“Shit.” Tane’s hand gripped Laylah’s shoulder and she turned to study his grim expression. “She’s a prophet?”
Ariyal slowly nodded, easily reading Tane’s shock. “The rumors are that it was her one and only foretelling and that when she spoke the words it unleashed such fury in the world that whole civilizations tumbled into dust.”
Tane snorted, his hand shifting from Laylah to rub the tattoo marring the skin of his chest.
“Yeah, she does have a way of making her point,” he muttered.
Laylah sent him a frown of astonishment. “Was she the one …?” “She was.”
“Dammit.” Ariyal moved forward until the silent Jaelyn stepped directly in his path. With a hiss of frustration, he stabbed Laylah with a fierce frown. “Then you understand this isn’t a joke. You can save the world or destroy it.” His hands clenched at his side. “Your choice.”
“No.” Laylah didn’t even hesitate. “There is no choice.”
The Sylvermyst turned his frown toward Tane. “Can’t you control your female?” The words barely left his lips before he jerked in response to Laylah’s infuriated bolt of electricity. “Shit.”
Tane smirked in pleasure. “You want to try?”
Laylah ignored the byplay, just as she ignored the ball of dread in the pit of her stomach.
Okay, the prophecy hadn’t been concocted by the Dark Lord, but that didn’t mean it had anything to do with the children.
Dammit. She’d held Maluhia in her arms for years. She would know if he was evil.
Just as she’d known there was a second child? A ruthless voice whispered in the back of her mind. A child she still couldn’t sense despite being only a few feet apart.