Page 3 of Bound By Blood
“I was once aSavage,” Saber said.
A few of themgasped while a murmur made its way through the others. Angerstiffened some of their shoulders, and others looked between himand Ronan in disbelief.
Saber ignored themas he continued speaking. “I’ve overcome my past, but there was atime when I worked with the demons.”
“Why didn’t youtell us?” Nathan demanded of his brother-in-law.
“As I said, it wasnot my past to reveal after Saber told me about it,” Ronan said.“And it’s obvious he’s not a Savage now. That was enough for me. Ifhe chose not to tell anyone else, then so be it. Even after allthese years, there is much we don’t know about each other, but westill trust each other with our lives. We’ve trusted Saber all thistime; there’s no reason not to trust him now.”
Saber felt theireyes burning into him as they assessed him. He almost thanked Ronanfor his vote of confidence and keeping his secret, but words failedhim.
Ronan seemed tounderstand as a small smile curved the edge of his mouth. Saberbowed his head in response and thanks. He didn’t have to say thewords; Ronan knew.
Saber didn’t speakwhile he waited for those in the room to absorb the knowledge ofhis past. Instead, he stared at the woman, who continued to studyhim from behind Asher’s shoulder.
“The demonsweren’t as prevalent on Earth while I was with them,” Sabercontinued. “Many of them died in the last battle against ourancestors. It took time for them to recoup their numbers and bravecoming above again.
“While I was withthem, they were looking for the stones, but many believed they wereforever lost. I assumed they’d given up the search and consideredthem lost to time until Willow’s sword was discovered.”
“Why didn’t youtell us about the stones?” Declan demanded.
“There was nothingto tell. Even after Willow’s sword was discovered, I believed itwas a fluke that we uncovered one of the stones. One random stonemight have survived that battle and the thousands of years sincethen, but all of them? I didn’t think it was possible. Besides,none of us had any way of locating the stones even if more stillexisted.”
“Kadence couldhave helped locate them,” Nathan said.
“No, she couldn’t.Her visions are nowhere near strong enough to have found all thesestones.” His attention shifted to the mysterious woman again. “Didyoufind them?”
She gulped beforenodding. The niggling memory became a dull roar threatening todrown out all reason.Thoseeyes….
He’d once been sofamiliar with that unusual color, but it was centuries ago, andthat vampire was dead. It couldn’t be possible that she was thesame vamp. She must be someone else.
It. Could. Not.Be. Possible.
“How?” hedemanded.
The woman shiftedher attention to the stones. “I saw them.”
Her voice wasbarely more than a whisper, but it caused the hair on his nape torise.Itcan’t be!
CHAPTER 3
That voice.Shesawthe stones!
He knew of onlyone other vampire, besides Kadence, with such an ability, but itsimplycould not be.Brie was dead, and this woman was verymuch alive.
Asher had said thewoman in the airport was named Brie, and at the time, with thewarning she’d given him about evacuating the compound, he’d brieflywondered if it could be his sister. But he shut the idea downinstantly.
Brie was dead.He’d seen her body in that fire, watched what little of it thatremained crumple and burn.He’dseen her.
Besides, Asher hadsaid that he wasn’t sure if her name was Brie or not. He’d said itcould have been something else, so Saber immediately buried anythoughts about his sister being the same woman from theairport.
There wereprobably thousands of Bries out there in the world, and it couldhave easily been a nickname for something. And that wasifthe woman’s name was Brie.
And he hadn’t paidany attention to Asher’s disappearance while hunting the woman. Hehad his own shit to deal with. If the hunter survived, so be it. Ifnot, oh well.
But now, he waskicking himself. He should have asked more questions, should havelearned the name of the woman Asher was with and learned more aboutthe situation. He’d been caught off guard, and hehatedit.
Saber struggled torecall his sister’s face. He’d tried to keep the details of it andtheir parents alive in his mind, but time eventually won thebattle. Over the years, they’d become little more than blurs whenhe tried to recall more.
