Lucinda laughed at what she saw on Dontaine's face as he swung about to face her. "Still want to play?" she asked, her dark brown eyes sparkling like hot chocolate, eager to melt, eager to burn.

Dontaine growled. Literally growled, a deep warning animal rumble that sounded odd coining from a human throat. Then he moved, with Monere quickness, a fast blur. But still motion you see. He struck at her but she was no longer there, like a ghost suddenly vanishing to reappear yards away, closer to me, closer to Tomas.

Tomas gave no warning, like the sword he had drawn. He simply rushed to attack her, to fend off the threat he perceived to me. Both my men rushed her from opposite sides, coming together in a blur of motion. And Lucinda stood there, a calm little demon, until they were almost upon her, a fierce light in her eyes, a little smile curling her lips. And then she moved. They all moved. With sound and motion and grunts and thuds as they fought fiercely. As Dontaine went tumbling head over heels, tossed away like a stick playfully thrown for a dog to fetch. As Tomas slammed hard to the ground, Lucinda kneeling on his chest, looking too tiny to have done what she had done  -  overpower two strong warriors.

Looking like a kitten who had the claws of a monstrous tiger, the sharp points of her left hand were buried like nails through Tomas's wrist, pinning his hand and the sword he still held to the ground in a brutal, effective manner. But his other hand was free and had drawn a hidden dagger.

"Not fair odds." Lucinda tsk-tsked. "Too little men to challenge me. But then I never claimed to be fair." She drew back to strike, to move.

"Don't!" My voice rang out in a hoarse croak. And Tomas's dagger froze in its striking drive, not because of my command, but because Lucinda's tiny hand gripped his. "Don't... hurt," I gasped.

"Don't hurt whom? Him or me?" Lucinda asked, both menace and amusement in her voice.

"Both," I whispered. "Both." I tried to stand, to move toward them, but that other thing within me fluttered, stirred in protest. No, it screamed. Not closer. Away. Away from the danger, not to it! I fought to stand and lost the battle, unable to. But you didn't need to stand to move. I started crawling toward them, on hands and knees, my whole body trembling, shaking, resisting, as I dragged myself closer.

"Halcyon's sister. No, Dontaine," I rasped as I sensed movement behind her. I blinked the sheen of pain-driven tears from my eyes  -  odd that fear dried your mouth, but pain moistened your eyes  -  and as my vision cleared, I saw Dontaine frozen like a literal statue behind the dainty golden demon, his sword angled for a downward thrust into her back, held unnaturally poised on the brink of that violence. And I knew it was not from obedience to my command  -  I would have been too late  -  but from the invisible power of her will. Her psychic powers were what held him immobile, a frozen prisoner in the tendrils of her invisible force. She didn't need physical touch to stop him. It was not just their physical strength that made demons greatly feared.

She stood, pulled her claws casually from the ground, from Tomas's pierced wrist as his face writhed with silent agony. With a thought, she held him immobile, too. A shimmer of that dark shadowy power, and that hideous claw shrank back down to just pointy nails. She licked each bloody tip, slowly sucking each digit clean, savoring it; her cheeks hollowed with each sucking pull, her lips pursing around her fingers like a puckered kiss, making the motions dangerously sensual. The flash of ivory fangs I glimpsed made her just plain dangerous. She swayed her way to me slowly, seductively, like death come to play.

She crouched down before me, looked into my eyes, those sharp nails freshly cleaned of Tomas's blood inches from my face. Curiosity was in those dark, dangerous eyes. "Halcyon's sister," she said, repeating my words. "What an odd creature you are to wish me no harm just because I am your lover's sister."

The tremors shaking my body were becoming wilder, stronger, with her near presence. It was as if my very skin tried to crawl off me, away from her. The skin on my back, shoulders, and arms rippled, moved, as if it had a will of its own. As if something beneath it was moving, struggling to come out, like a vulture's wings  -  Mona Louisa's other form. My skin burned as it stretched and I gasped at the pain, at the fight I had within myself just to stay planted there, not scramble away from her as every instinct in me was screaming to do.

"Me," I wheezed, fighting to take the breath back into my lungs that the pain had forced out of me. "Just me. Let my men go." I deserved to die, for so many reasons, not just one. They didn't.

"You would not still be living, breathing, had my brother not claimed you as his mate," Lucinda said, and her voice was no longer sensual. Just hard, as if all pretence had been stripped away. "My kind hunted and killed things like you long ago." Her eyes, dark like bittersweet chocolate, the one feature so like her brother, looked down at me with none of the affection, the warmth, usually in his. And I realized then how cold those eyes could be without emotion. "But he did, and my father spared you when he should have destroyed you after what you had done and become. I shall abide by his choice. For now." She stood and smiled, and it was not a friendly gesture. "I can always kill you later," she said like a soft promise, and walked away.

Like a breeze blowing cobwebs away, the invisible bonds holding my men vanished and they were free. They rushed to my side, crouched protectively in front of me. But she was truly gone, back into the night, a child of darkness. Demon dead. And suddenly all I could smell was blood. The rich heady scent of it, its pounding, throbbing call. I could almost taste it like sweet wine rolling down my tongue. My eyes, my body, my entire being was drawn to the man who stood to my left, slightly before me, the flexing of his hand gripping the sword, pushing the blood out of his wounded wrist, two gaping holes where Lucinda's claws had pierced through like Crucifixion nails. Fat drops of red blood fell to the ground like precious wine spilt wastefully, and an ache started in my body, in my soul, for that dripping blood. An ache that throbbed and grew with each spilling, hypnotic drop... plunck... plunck... plunck... A thirst that seemed enormous, unquenchable. I wanted to lap that blood up, take it into me like air, as if I would perish and die if I didn't have it. And it was not the hunger of my tiger beast for raw meat. I just wanted to drink down his blood, a horrified part of me realized.