RedFire






Chapter 23
River sat on the stone hearth and watched Shay, maintaining a cautious distance even though Jax had left the room for a moment. Mortals made him un easy, especially ones of the female variety. He’d spent so long apart from her kind, he wasn’t sure he’d even know what to say should she address him directly. But that sadness in her eyes haunted him, made him want to think of something witty to chase her visible pain away.
She and Ajax had been laughing earlier when he’d passed their room, and although he’d briefly resented that fact, they were supposed to be happy now that they were finally together. Damn it, it was their right after such a long path in finding each other. Yet neither of them had looked very happy since they’d emerged from that bedroom. He could only guess at what she might be feeling right now, how she feared losing Jax, worried for his safety in the upcoming battle.
He suddenly felt like an intruder, as though he had no right to speculate about her personal pain, and so he made a great show of retying his bootlaces. Hell, of doing anything to avoid her vulnerable, mortal gaze. If only he could come up with anything worthwhile to say, but he was as tongue-tied as he always was while in the presence of a mortal woman—and a beautiful one, at that.
When his laces were triple knotted he sat up straight, and it was Shay who finally broke their awkward silence. “You’re River.” She leaned back in her chair, studying him openly. “You’re the one who helped save me in the cemetery and then again in the tunnel.”
“Oh, yeah.” He met her gaze boldly. “Sorry I didn’t introduce myself properly.” He extended a hand, and she leaned forward in her chair to take it. Her grip was firm and light, her hand shockingly soft. She had sat in silence during his discussion with Jax.
“I’m Shay Angel. But you obviously know that al ready. Thank you for what you did.” She smiled at him, such a lovely, open expression. “I owe you big-time.”

Gods of Olympus. As he released her grasp, he wished he could morph into an arrow and shoot right out of the room, because she’d instantly made him blush.
“My duty.” He gave a curt, dismissive nod and rose to his feet, breezing right past her.
“You look after Jax. I heard you earlier.” She rose and followed after him. “Thank you for taking care of him like you do. If only he’d agreed with you, huh?”
River halted. He stood frozen, then slowly pivoted to face her.
“You heard my plan?” Although he hadn’t wanted to admit it, he’d felt wounded by how brusquely Ajax had dismissed his strategy—one that Leonidas had already endorsed. Especially because in his mind it had been a damn good plan.
Her eyes brightened. “I think it’s brilliant.”
He blushed even more and, staring at his feet, de spised himself for the weakness. What kind of warrior reddened when a lady deigned to speak to him? Only a servant would react so awkwardly. Just more proof that in his heart, no matter how his circumstances changed, he would always be just that. And that, no matter how violent his transformation might make him—how it made him crave and lust for a woman like Shay—he’d never find fulfillment, not even for that blackest part of his soul.
Shay’s eyes narrowed on him. “I mean it, River. Your strategy is pure genius. It manages to circumvent both Ares’ rules and the prophecy.”
River couldn’t help himself; his heart quickened with the possibility that she might help him convince Jax to go along with the idea. But his hope crashed earthward the moment he remembered how particularly nasty his master had just been about the whole affair.
He shook his head resolutely. “Ajax won’t go for it. I can already promise you that.” He shrugged like none of it mattered. “He made that much perfectly clear earlier. You heard him yourself.”
She peered up into his face. “What if I helped?”
“Helped how?”
A conspiratorial gleam brightened her eyes even fur ther. “You could ride in my hip pocket. I mean, that was your plan, as I understood. That you’d transform into your weapon form before the portal opened, and you’d go in Jax’s possession so that you’d be there with him, ready for his fight with Sable. That he’d take you pre-transformed . . . that was it, right?”
He smiled despite himself. “You pick up on things fast. I like that in a fighter.”
“Trust me—I’ve had a lot of curveballs thrown my way over the years. Jax is just the latest in a series of them. Well, more of a line drive, you could say.”
“Are you talking cricket?” River didn’t fully understand her metaphors, but it sounded like the English game to him.
She giggled, brushing a lock of hair out of her eyes.“I’m saying this: that you transform soon—now—whenever, and that I stick you in my pants, or maybe my bra—”
She stopped, interrupted no doubt by the choking gasp he’d just emitted, then continued. “Just basic trans port method . . . pants, bra, whatever works best for hiding you.”
River tried to talk, but only a rasping sound came forth as he rubbed his burning face. “Very few . . . la dies have offered me that sort of access . . . to their undergarments”—he coughed, clearing his throat—“in the past ... ever.”
“Okay, so we go with the hip-pocket plan. It’s agreed.” She bobbed her head, eyes locked with his until slowly he began to nod along in agreement.
“He’d never forgive us,” River warned, thinking of the possible repercussions he’d encounter because of deceiving Ajax. “There could be serious consequences for me as well,” he added heavily. “And for you. Like I said, forgiveness might be slow coming on this one.”
“A calculated risk.” She matched his serious tone. “But if we succeed, we just might save his stubborn soul.”
“We might indeed.” River glanced about the great room; all the other warriors were in Leonidas’s study. It was the perfect moment.
Shay extended her hand again, this time offering the iron grip of a fellow warrior. “So we agree, then? We do it?”
“Yes, my lady.” River swallowed hard, battling the edges of fear that threatened to smother him if he didn’t act now. Yes, there were many potential consequences—some even far more serious than Jax’s anger. But his inner voice was practically screaming that this was im portant, that all their lives depended on it. Consequences be damned.
Gathering his internal energy, River dropped to his knees. The power rush always sent him sprawling at the beginning. Shay knelt beside him, placing a warm hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay?”
He couldn’t even answer at first: His physical reaction to the impending transformation was just too intense. Glittering silver washed across his vision, morphing everything around him to the same otherworldly hue, and he turned back to Shay one last time.
“A dagger,” he rasped. “I’ll assume the form of a dag ger. Elegant . . . a lady’s weapon, but with a grip made for a warrior.”
She smiled, eyes narrowing, catlike, and she squeezed his shoulder supportively. “A perfect form of protec tion,” she agreed. “I will protect you, too, River . . . while you’re in my care. I promise.”

I know, my lady. I’m certain you are worthy of my master’s love.

He didn’t have a chance to utter the words. His flow ing source, the silver itself, exploded through his entire body, but not before she pressed a brief, chaste kiss to his forehead.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’ll owe you my life for saving his.”
Jax glanced at his watch. It was past eight p.m. here in the U.K., which meant it was just after three p.m. in Savannah. He and Shay needed to get a move on. Their first order of business, she’d told him, was to visit a museum on Oglethorpe Square. She believed it would hold the first clue toward solving the prophecy.
To mark their departure, the full cadre had gathered in the great room, circling Jax and Shay—all except for River, that was—and Jax wondered if his friend was still angry because of how roughly Jax had treated him earlier.
Leonidas stepped forward, placing both hands heavily on Jax’s shoulders. “You fight well, Spartan. Remember who you are, the many battles you’ve waged and won. You will defeat this foe as well.”
“Yes, Commander.” Jax bowed his head, tightening his hold on Shay’s hand. She stood just beside him, waiting calmly for the portal that would transport them back to her home city.
But Leo wasn’t finished; he moved down their line of two, stopping in front of Shay. She lifted her head, sur prised as he addressed her. “You, our Shayanna, are a warrior now as well. Fight hard, be strong for this Spar tan who stands beside you. I . . .All of us . . . are depending upon you.”
Jax felt Shay’s hand tremble in his grasp; she bowed her head as he’d done, murmuring, “Yes, sir.”
The edges of Jax’s lips curved upward into an inadver tent smile. What must it be like for Shay at this moment, being charged for warfare by one of the greatest warriors and kings in history?
“The portal?” Leonidas directed. “Are you ready?”
Jax searched the gathered warriors once more, hoping to see River, but he searched in vain. After a moment’s hesitation, he answered, “Yes, my king. We are ready.”
Shielding Shay close against his chest, he heard a humming sound fill the room, an almost high pitched wail ing sound that he’d long ago learned to associate with a portal’s appearance. Clutching Shay even closer, he welcomed the change in atmosphere, and offered a quick prayer that this journey would save all their souls.
Jax couldn’t believe it. Shay held a gleaming silver dagger in the palm of her hand, wings engraved from the hilt right down to the tip of the weapon’s blade.
They’d been walking down the busy Savannah street toward their first stop, a museum house that overlooked Oglethorpe Square. Together they’d been hurrying so fast that he’d nearly tripped several times, his boots catching on the uneven bricks that formed the sidewalk. She moved much more gracefully, although, of course, she’d had a lifetime to grow accustomed to her city’s ec centricities. Now she’d stopped him in his tracks with a mild, “Hold up. I need to give you something.”
“What the hell is that?” Jax demanded.
She shifted her grip on the dagger, trying to put it into his hand. “Just take it, okay?”
“No. Not until you answer me.” He jabbed a finger at the weapon, not wanting to believe the evidence before his eyes. “I shall repeat: What in bloody hell is that?”
“Who do you think it is?” She made her eyes wide and big. “If I were you, I’d be a bit more polite to him right now. He worships the ground you walk on.”
Ajax sighed, shook his head, and decided that going the wrathful route would accomplish precisely nothing. Taking the dagger from her, he sheathed it against his hip, where he’d already stored a much simpler blade. “You went behind my back and conspired against me. Both of you.”
She pointed a finger at him accusingly. “We simply forced you to obey your king.”
“My decision—not yours.” He could hardly contain his fury at their betrayal. “And certainly not River’s,” he spat.
“Excuse me. Are you saying that I have no say in this fight? That River doesn’t have any vote? Think again, Petrakos.” She tilted her chin upward, met his gaze head-on, then shocked the hell out of him with her next gesture. She shot him a bird, waving her curved fingers right in front of his face.
He lifted an eyebrow. “Not very ladylike.” Truth was, her ballsy side turned him flat on.
“The flying salute seems perfect for you, hawk,” she snapped.
Cupping her face, he bent down and planted a fiery, wet kiss on her lips. He didn’t care if they were standing on a public sidewalk or in a bedroom; he wanted this woman every moment he was with her. Besides, he was at least cloaked by his immortal’s protection, so at the moment there wasn’t anyone who could see them together—kissing or otherwise. Unless a band of demons suddenly appeared, that was.
The thought sobered him, and even with the tempta tion of her tongue halfway down his throat, and those greedy little hands of hers winding up underneath his T-shirt, he forced himself to break the kiss.
“Although I’d far prefer to kiss you blind right here and now, we’d better get this mission over with.” He nodded toward the Telfair Museum, their current destination that awaited just a block down the road.
They’d arrived on Savannah soil only fifteen minutes ago, but Shay had already offered incisive thoughts about the prophecy. She was convinced that the Ora cle’s emphasis of the one prophetic line, “Tell thee fair, doubting Thomas . . . ,” was a reference to the Telfair Museum’s Owens Thomas House. Especially since, as she’d pointed out, it sat right on Oglethorpe Square.
Even though Telfair was not pronounced in the way that the Oracle had spoken—“tell the fair”—but rather Tell-far, such were the vagaries when it came to their lady’s pronouncements. Therefore Ajax agreed with Shay’s instinct that the Oracle had been referring to the Telfair Museum.
They hurried down the sidewalk, nearing the carriage house entrance. “You’d better hope they don’t have metal detectors at the entrance. Otherwise they’re gonna go wild with the way you’re packing.”
He sniffed. “I’m not the one who smuggled River Kassandros along for the ride.”
She skipped several steps ahead of him on the side walk. “You know,” she called over her shoulder, “I bet he’s ready to stab you through the heart, the way you keep talking.”
He caught up with her and spun her to face him. She needed to hear what he was about to say, not dismiss it as just more of their flirty banter. “I love River,” he told her intensely, hoping that perhaps his loyal servant could hear him as well. He wanted both of them to know the real reason behind his previous hesitation—that it wasn’t him treating River like a second-class warrior or dismissing his strategies.
“But the thought of River staying in his weapon form for so long—across a portal jump, no less—makes me very nervous. He’s never attempted such a lengthy transformation before, and we don’t know how it will affect him. That’s why I tried to keep him out of this fight.”
Jax patted his side belt, letting his palm come in physical contact with the hilt of River’s dagger. He knew from experience that sometimes River only sensed impres sions as they fought together—felt the emotions pres ent more than understood the actual words being used. He hoped that the touch of his hand against the silvered blade would transmit his true feelings.
“It’s not just my concern for River’s safety I’m wor ried about,” he explained. “Ares made it clear that only you could be part of solving the prophecy. Trust me—you don’t want to see an ancient Greek god angered.” Ajax shivered just thinking about the proposition. “What if Ares punished you somehow for my own indiscretion?”
The anger in her eyes melted away, replaced by such a tender, sweet look that he had to kiss her one more time. Less restrained, he pulled her flush against him, arching her slightly backward. They kissed like a pair of lovers in the midst of great turmoil, hungry and needing each other. Her hands threaded through his hair, loosening his ponytail until his long hair fell across his shoulders.
“This way I want you,” he murmured, breaking the kiss with a glance around them. Only one elderly lady was staring at Shay in confusion, and he bent low, kiss ing her again. “This way I need you, the taste . . . it overcomes me sometimes.”
“The street is not the best spot for overcoming . . . or coming undone.” She giggled, wiping the back of her hand across her wet lips.
He recomposed himself, assuming soldier mode. “The entrance is on the right, and you’ll go in first—then I will follow.”
“Tell me again how you plan to circumvent the metal detectors and security check?”
“Simple. You’re going in, and I’m sneaking in.”
She stopped dead in her tracks. “Sneaking how?”
“You’re the only one who can see me right now, sweetness.” He glanced down at their joined hands, then gave her an innocent grin. “And so I’d guess that anyone passing by wonders who you’re pretending has hold of your hand.”
She stomped the ground, tossing him a mock glare. “Lovely. Now I’m not only that eccentric girl from the demon hunting family. Now I’m also the pitiful girl with an imaginary boyfriend. Thanks a ton for helping out my reputation in what, I should point out, is a very small city.”
He gave a shrug. “If it keeps future suitors away, I’m all for it.” He’d meant the barb to be funny, but by the way she instantly dropped his hand and set off ahead of him, he knew that reminding her of the reason for this treasure hunt hadn’t been a smart move.
He picked up his pace and fell in beside her. She’d stopped in front of the museum’s carriage house and was staring up at a sign that stated its hours of operation. “We have plenty of time,” she said. “But it’s a guided tour only.” She sighed, although clearly not about the scheduled museum tours. He felt her sadness pierce his own heart like a wounding arrow.
Wrapping her in his arms, he held her from behind. Bending his mouth low to her ear, he whispered, “I want your happiness when I’m gone. Even if it means that there will be other men in your life.”
She was stiff in his grasp, not breathing, it seemed. Then finally she relaxed a little. “I don’t want to talk about that right now. I just want to focus on solving the prophecy. We’ll work out the details later.”
Although her words were brave ones, he didn’t miss the jagged pain in her tone.
“Yes,” he murmured, nuzzling her, “there is time for all of that later.”
Shay looked at her watch. They’d gained five hours during the portal jump, and now she was back on East ern Standard Time. Confusing, to say the least. “It’s three thirty four p.m. right now. We have to know where to go by seven a.m. tomorrow morning. Can you cloak me, too?” she whispered under her breath. “That way we don’t have to fool with the tour.”
“Of course.” The truth was, he’d already done so the second time he’d moved to kiss her. “Done.”
Jax held her tighter and prayed to the Nameless, High est, Truest God that they would beat Sable in solving the mystery. All of their lives, mortal and immortal, were going to depend on that fact.