“Anoush’s prediction will come to pass,” Kaliq said. “You have united the worlds, Lara, my love.”

She was silent for a moment. “Aye,” she replied. “But this world is small, Kaliq, and eventually it would have all come together. It is true I have touched each part of it. Hetar. Terah. The Dark Lands. But my influence has faded away now. Why? The magic world tried to teach these mortals who inhabit these lands that war was not a solution. That there was enough for all.” She laughed bitterly. “At least that lesson took, after the era of the Hierarch. Hetar sees that all its people are fed, clothed and housed. But none of them has any purpose. The magnates and the merchants continue on as they always have. The Crusader Knights are few now for there are no challenges left to conquer. I had hoped Hetar would change and grow. It has not.”

“I know,” he replied. “Change is difficult, Lara. It takes courage for a leader to stand up and effect it. Such men and women are not being born into Hetar or Terah.”

“I cannot just give up, Kaliq,” Lara told him. “But for the first time in my existence I do not know what to do. If I curse Nyura’s womb, or put a spell upon her so that she does not produce Kolgrim’s son, he will know the blame lies with me. He will harm Marzina. Oh, he will not spill her blood, but dropping her into the bottomless ravine would be worse than death for Marzina, and for me. And I will not give Kolgrim that pleasure, for to see me in pain would pleasure him.”

“He wants you to love him,” Kaliq said. “That is natural for he is your child.”

“How can I love him?” she asked despairingly. “I hated his father. His birth, and that of his twin, was an aberration.”

“The birth of your sons has helped to keep the darkness at bay for over a century,” Kaliq reminded her.

“To what purpose, my lord? Cronan says that Hetar is doomed. That within the next few months the darkness will claim it, and the light will go out of this world,” Lara said. “So why did the magic world use me to birth Kolgrim and Kolbein? One has lived to rule. The other lives imprisoned. What has it all been for, Kaliq?” She gazed up at him, her beautiful faerie green eyes wet with her tears.

“You gave the world of Hetar the opportunity to turn back from the brink of its own destruction. You showed them the way when you defeated Kol, the previous Twilight Lord, in the battle for The City. For a few years, I believed that they could make this world the place it should be. A place of peace and plenty. A place where all races, mortal and magic, could live together, respecting each other and our different customs. A place where we would all have a purpose and that purpose would be to the good. But it did not happen, despite all we did to make it so.”

“So now we will desert Hetar because it hasn’t lived up to our expectations?” Lara asked him. “How does that make us any better than the mortals we have tried to protect, my dear lord?”

“Perhaps that has been our mistake,” Kaliq told her. “Mayhap we should not have interfered in their growth. But we did. We tried to help, and it only made it worse, for mortals, it seems, are their own worst enemy. We did not create them so we cannot accept all of the blame for their behavior.”

“If we leave them, what will happen to them?” Lara wondered.

“The darkness will overtake the world of Hetar. But even in the darkness, my love, there is always a pinpoint of light. And if that tiny light is strong and someone nurtures it, it will grow, and perhaps one day it will overcome the darkness that will take this world shortly,” Kaliq said.

Lara put her arms about his neck, and laying her head against him, she wept softly. Finally when she had eased her grief she asked him, “Where will we go, Kaliq?”

“First to Belmair, for the darkness will not touch that world for many centuries to come. The magic that lives on this world will evacuate Hetar and regroup there to consider where we will make our new home. The Cosmos is vast, Lara, and there are many worlds. I think, however, we will find one that is not inhabited, or perhaps make one for ourselves. We will cloak it from mortal eyes so we may live in peace without fear of the darkness,” Kaliq told her.

“I will not leave until I must,” Lara said. “Perhaps I may foil Kolgrim, if not entirely, a little bit.” She nestled against him, breathing the familiar fragrance of him. It soothed her, and she was overcome by calm. Lara still could not quite believe with all of her heart that the world of Hetar was doomed. Perhaps there was something she might do to buy her world more time.

“You are plotting,” Kaliq said. His voice held a hint of amusement.

“It isn’t polite to intrude on another’s private thoughts,” Lara scolded him, but she was smiling. Then she said to him, “We are going to Kolgrim’s wedding, Kaliq. It will please him, and perhaps I can in that way delay the inevitable.”

Kaliq shook his dark head. “You are not a faerie woman to give up easily or without a fight, are you, my love? Very well, we will go to Kolgrim’s wedding.”

“Is Lothair still serving on the High Council?” Lara asked.

“He is for the interim, but when our brothers depart for Belmair, he will withdraw, too,” Kaliq said.

“Have him inform Grugyn Ahasferus that the Twilight Lord’s mother and her life mate will attend the wedding. Then he is to tell Palben that we will expect accommodation for several nights at the palace. We will arrive tomorrow,” Lara said.

Kaliq laughed heartily. “We will create quite a stir amid a kingdom that espouses an official policy that magic does not exist. Shall we make an entrance like we did last time, my love? Or shall we be polite, and just pretend we are normal guests.”

“That will depend upon our reception,” Lara said. “I think Dominus Cadarn and his wife, the Domina Paulina, should also attend Kolgrim’s wedding. Have Lothair tell the Lord High Ruler that they will also need accommodation. It is time my descendants met face-to-face. Perhaps if they know one another their blood tie will help them in the darkness that Kolgrim means to bring. Oh, I wish I could prevent his wedding, Kaliq. Is there no way? No way at all?” she asked. Then her eyes narrowed.

“I gave him life, Kaliq. Could I not take that life away?”

“At the cost of your own soul, my love? And it would change nothing, for with Kolgrim’s death both Kol and Kolbein would be freed. Their joint reign would be a far more violent and cruel one than Kolgrim’s will be,” Kaliq told her. “Despite his strength of will, Kolgrim has inherited some of your good, Lara. He shuns it, to be sure, but it still exists deep within him. It is why he showed you Marzina’s fragile prison, and gave you the opportunity to be reasonable with him rather than just simply releasing his sister into the bottomless ravine, and then demanding Nyura’s return. Kolgrim is the child you created from the one Kol gave you. Kolbein is his father’s son. He inherited nothing of you, Lara. He is pure evil. Far worse than any Twilight Lord ever created, even Kol,” Kaliq explained. “When you split the unborn child within you, most of the evil remained with the first infant, Kolbein. Only some of it burgeoned with the second baby who was Kolgrim. That is why he has always felt an affinity for you where his twin did not. And that is also why you have felt an affection for him that you could not, would not admit even to yourself, Lara.”

“He is Kol’s son, Kaliq,” she quickly replied.

“He is your son, also, my love. For all his wickedness, Kolgrim is your child, too,” Kaliq told her. “I think you clever to attend his wedding and give him what he wants. Your love and your respect.”

Her eyes filled with tears again. “I have tried so hard not to care for him,” she admitted to Kaliq. “He should not have my love! He should not!”

“But he does, Lara,” Kaliq replied. “And you are, as always, an amazing faerie woman that you can admit to it honestly.”

“Do not dare to tell Ilona!” Lara said. “She would destroy me where I stood if she knew I harbored any affection for Kolgrim. And I do not understand why I do, Kaliq.”

“It is that tiny bit of mortal within you, my love,” he answered her. “Mortals may be foolish, but they are good creatures at heart.” He kissed the top of her golden head. “Now, if we are going to that wedding and we must stop in Terah to convince the annoying Cadarn that he must go, too, then we had best hurry. But first we must eat. I am ravenous. And then we must rest. We may be magic, but we are not indestructible.”

She stroked his handsome face. “Aye, food, rest, a few pleasures, a bath. And then I will be ready to face The City, and my descendants.” She smiled seductively up at him. “But which shall we have first, my lord?”

10

“IF YOU CANNOT MAKE UP YOUR MIND, MY LOVE, then perhaps I shall do it for us,” Kaliq said teasingly. “Remember that I am ravenous?”

“But for food or pleasures?” she teased back, laughing softly.

“Ahh, faerie witch, I know what you would have me say, but I tell you, both!” Kaliq answered her with a chuckle. With a wave of his hand he transported them to her bedchamber and onto the bed, where a tray of tempting foods awaited. They were both now quite naked. “Pity the poor mortals who cannot indulge their twin appetites at the same time, Lara, my love.” He caught up her hand, kissing it tenderly, then kissing the inside of her wrist, as well.

Lara caused a strawberry to appear in her upturned palm. He smiled at her as their eyes met, his white teeth carefully picking up the strawberry and eating it. When he had swallowed she pulled his head toward her, kissing him, her tongue finding his, murmuring with delight as she tasted the strawberry, breathing the fragrance of it into her own mouth. “Delicious!” she said softly, magicking the tray to the sideboard as she lay back, and three more berries appeared in the shallow chasm between her breasts.

His dark head bent, and one by one he plucked the strawberries with his teeth, crushing them so that juice ran from between her breasts, down her belly and into the cleft between her nether lips. His tongue followed slowly, thoroughly, licking up the juice, pushing between those tempting folds of flesh to touch her hidden jewel. His fingers spread her open so he might have greater access to the prize, which he taunted and teased with delicate licks, then stronger strokes of his tongue until she was writhing and moaning softly with his attentions. When her juices began to come forth for him, Kaliq raised up his head, pushing two fingers slowly into her sheath, moving them rhythmically back and forth until Lara sighed with her small release. Leaning forward, he kissed her lips passionately.

Her arms wound about his neck as Lara drew him close. “You have but whetted my appetite, my lord,” she said to him. “Now you must satisfy that appetite.” Then she swiftly rolled him onto his back. Bind my love so he must yield! And let him not raise his shield! But let him a strong weapon wield! Lara silently invoked her spell before Kaliq might check her.

Surprised, he found himself spread upon her bed, arms and legs bound with silk. The Shadow Prince burst out laughing. “In all our years together, my love, you have never been so bold,” he told her.

“You delight in teasing me, my lord, and so I thought perhaps you should be teased instead,” Lara told him.

“I am faint from hunger for food,” he said to her pleadingly.

She pinched his muscled arm. “You do not seem too slender to me,” Lara said.

“I shall be unable to wield a strong weapon,” he said, quoting a piece of her spell.

“I can make you strong, my lord,” Lara told him as she slithered between his shapely legs. Reaching up she undid her long gilt-colored hair from its plait. Then, moving her head, she trailed her long, soft tresses across his torso several times, watching as his manhood, already interested in play, twitched. “Ohh,” Lara purred, “I think your weapon considers battle, my lord.”

“You will have to do more than just tickle me with your hair, faerie witch,” he taunted her.

Lara complied, positioning herself so she might play with his cock. She caressed it. She held it between two fingers and slowly licked its length several times, making him groan for the heat from her tongue was delicious. Lara took him into her mouth and suckled upon him until he was so swollen she could no longer contain him between her lips. Releasing him, she burrowed beneath the standing pillar of hard flesh, finding his sac, again licking, finally taking it into her mouth, her tongue rolling the twin seedpods about their container of cool flesh. Then Lara sucked hard thrice, and Kaliq actually cried out, a sound of both pleasure and pain.