The Rhiannon Chronicles by Maggie Shayne

Author:Maggie Shayne
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: vampires, children, paranormal romance, vampire romance, good vs evil, mutant, immortals, maggie shayne, wings in the night, human weapons
Publisher: Maggie Shayne

Chapter Ten

I was troubled, traumatized, and murderously furious over what had been done to my love. But those emotions troubled me less than the one that was all but foreign to me. Fear. I was afraid. Not for myself, of course. My Roland couldn’t harm me, and even if he could, I was as strong as he. But I feared for the children. As much as I denied it, there was a cold terror in my heart for what the intruder living inside my husband might attempt to do to them.

I had meant what I had promised my love. I would take his life if it came to that. And if it did, I would cross that dark valley with him. I would not stay in this world without him. We were one. There was no Rhiannon without Roland. I would never allow there to be. The pain of losing him was simply not something I was willing to suffer.

Eric Marquand, one time French aristocrat whom Roland had saved from the guillotine, was my husband’s closest friend. His bride Tamara, a product of the modern age, was sweet, insufferably cheerful, and beloved by us both. And when the two of them arrived at our home within hours of Roland’s call, I felt the most immense rush of relief I had ever felt.

I even hugged the little chit, with her long frizzy curls and her big innocent eyes. Eric, I embraced even harder. “Thank the gods for you both,” I said, and I meant it. Their very presence seemed to relieve a tremendous weight from my shoulders.

Eric looked past me, though, even before our embrace was complete. I knew why. My Roland sat in a chair, before the fireplace, watching the flames devour the wood in a macabre dance of destruction. I believe he saw in that dance a reflection of his darkest fears. Fears he seemed to believe were manifesting in his mind even now.

My tormented love! My heart bled for his pain, and it was worse that I could do nothing about it. If there were villains to be eviscerated, cities to be razed, I would’ve been fine. But to sit helpless while he was tortured by an unseen enemy... It was not my way.

Eric lowered his head, seemed to gather himself, then surged across the room with a full voiced and confident “Hello, old friend.”

Roland rose only, I knew, because it was the polite thing to do, and Eric clasped his hand hard, pulled him in close and clapped him on the back. “You look like hell.” It sounded almost lighthearted.

“I feel worse,” Roland said. Their eyes met and locked. Tamara clasped my hand in her smaller one and gave a squeeze that I supposed was meant to be reassuring. It was a good thing she was a vampire, I thought. Otherwise, her bird-sized bones would break like fine china. I caught her eyes, huge and heartsick for Roland and for me.

Then Roxanne came in, the children trailing behind her like the fractious, noisy tails of a comet.

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