How could she possibly have forgotten what his kisses felt like? Ginny’s memories hadn’t even come close. His lips were full and soft, sliding over hers with warmth and possession.

Everything he’d said, all the crazy stories and the crazier things she’d witnessed faded away beneath the sensual glide of his mouth over hers, the warm, wet thrust of his tongue against her teeth and the sensitive roof of her mouth.

She’d never been kissed quite so thoroughly in her life, never felt her body go soft and pliant so that it fit against a man’s with such perfection. His angles and ridges seemed to correspond perfectly to her curves and valleys. Where she left off, Alton began. When Ginny breathed out, he inhaled. Even their hearts beat in a synchronized rhythm, pounding at breakneck speed, faster and faster, yet keeping perfect pace.

One with the other.

Ginny moaned.

Alton groaned.

She plucked at his shirt. It pulled loose from his jeans and her fingers found warm, living skin beneath. His callused palm slid against her back, skin to skin, leaving a trail of heat and sensation wherever he touched her. His fingers wrapped around her ribs and softly stroked the full side of her breast.

She arched into him, silently begging for more. Her nipples puckered up against the lace of her bra as his fingers glided closer.

A car pulled into the parking lot. Lights flashed over them, dousing Ginny like a bucket of cold water. She ripped her mouth free of Alton’s and backed as far away as his arms allowed, breathing in and out in harsh, explosive breaths.

He leaned his forehead against hers and she felt his laughter before she heard it.

“Nine hells,” he said, gasping for air with each harsh breath. “Nine hells and then some. Woman…what you do to me!”

For the weirdest reason, his curse alone convinced her. No one said nine hells. Not anyone from this world. Still sucking air, she stared at his chest. If she concentrated hard enough, she saw the leather strap that crossed from one shoulder, over his chest, and around his waist on the opposite side.

“Turn around.” Ginny stepped out of his embrace and planted both hands on her hips. Damn it all if he didn’t do as she said. He turned slowly and she saw it then, the tooled-leather scabbard across his back with that damned crystal sword glowing through the design. The jeweled hilt stuck out of the top, glinting silver in the reflected parking lot lights.

“I can see it now.” She walked around him until she stood directly in front of him again and folded her arms across her chest. “I couldn’t see the sword before. Not at all. How come?”

Alton smiled and his green eyes twinkled. “It’s called a glamour, sort of a spell I cast to hide the blade from curious eyes. If you really want to see it, or if you know of the glamour, the sword will be visible only to you. It’s a simple compulsion, one that doesn’t take a lot of energy but it works for most people.”

He shrugged and laughter crinkled the corners of his eyes. “If it’s any consolation, I learned early on that a simple compulsion doesn’t work on you. For some reason, you’re much too powerful. That’s why I had to kiss you the night the demon’s avatar—that bear—attacked you. I tried a simple compulsion to make you forget, but it wouldn’t stick. I finally had to resort to a kiss.”

“That’s the only reason you kissed me? To make me forget?” She ran her tongue over her just-kissed lips, aware of a horrible hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach.

He at least had the good graces to look embarrassed. “That’s what I told myself, and it did work, at least for a couple of days.” He placed both his hands on her shoulders. His palms rested, warm and solid, against her. “Truth? I was looking for any excuse I could find to kiss you, Ginny. I’m not sure why, but I thought you were absolutely fascinating the first time I saw you, huddled down behind that filthy garbage bin, swinging a piece of scrap lumber at a concrete bear five times your size. Even then I knew you were special.”

“You did?” That was the best she could come up with? Shit.

He grinned. “I did. I still do. I’m so sorry I got you into this mess. I sent you here because I wanted to keep you safe. I never imagined the demons would invade Sedona, but it looks like that’s what’s going on.”

“Markus told me that’s what the vet said—that the animals were possessed.”

Alton nodded. “The vet is very perceptive. They’re possessed by demons—which means the demon king can’t be far away. I need to get Dax and Eddy here. BumperWillow, too. I can’t fight a full-out invasion by myself.”

“BumperWillow?” He’d mentioned someone named Willow, but wasn’t Bumper that mutt that…?

“Bumper is Eddy’s dog and Willow is the will-o’-the-wisp who drew energy out of the air to drive Dax’s demon powers. The demon king, when it was using the stone gargoyle as its avatar, attacked and ate Willow.”

“Ick! How awful!” She didn’t even know Willow, but—

“Yeah. It was pretty horrible and we thought she was gone, but she’d managed to slip her consciousness out of her little fairy body just in time. She hid inside Bumper. With her body gone, though, she’s stuck there, sharing Bumper’s body.”

He laughed. “The two of them seem perfectly content with the situation, but since both of them are in there, we’ve been calling them BumperWillow. Dax doesn’t need Willow to access his powers anymore, not since he got rid of the cursed snake tattoo and got the phoenix, but—”

“Whoa. You’re losing me here.” Shared bodies and cursed tattoos. She needed some quality time with Alton if she was ever going to make sense of any of this. The weird thing was, she believed him. It was too crazy a story for anyone to make up.

And there was that disappearing, talking sword, Tom the cat and his glowing eyes, and the coyote with way too many teeth. Too many visuals to ignore, but they still made her head spin.

She really needed to sit down.

Alton’s arm went around her waist. Once again, he was much too close, his body too perfectly aligned with hers.

“Where are you staying?”

And that voice. She wanted to sigh. Just sigh and melt against him like a stupid damsel in distress, except she wasn’t in distress and she was no weak-kneed damsel. And just because she believed him didn’t mean she trusted him. “I just got here today,” she said. “I was planning to stay at my cousins’, but I don’t think that’s going to work.”

She stopped and took a deep breath, stepped back out of his embrace, and planted her feet. She needed the solid feel of pavement beneath her sandals. Needed to know she was standing under her own power. She’d never been quite as pragmatic as Eddy, but even if she was a little more open-minded than her best bud, her head was reeling with everything Alton had said.

Crazy as all of it sounded, his wild explanation answered so many questions.

“You just got here today?” Alton tilted his head and looked at her with a frown. “But I sent you days ago. I checked your house over the weekend to make certain you were safe. You weren’t there. I thought you were already in Sedona.”

She shook her head. “I flew into Phoenix on Friday, but I hung around and shopped. I really didn’t want to come here. I mean, we send cards at Christmas, but I’m not that close to my Aunt Betty, especially since my mom, her older sister, died.”

She glared at him and tried to look fierce. “I couldn’t get past the feeling that I had to be in Sedona.” Then she lost it entirely and laughed. This was all just way too bizarre. “I finally gave up, rented a car, and drove the two hours to my cousins’ house, where I was immediately attacked by their cat. Now I find out it’s all your fault.”

Alton groaned. “I am so sorry for that. Will you ever forgive me?”

She wanted to be angry with him, but how could she? He’d wanted to protect her. She couldn’t think of another man who’d been as thoughtful. All the men she knew wanted something from her, whether it was sex or money or help for one thing or another. She’d gotten quite good at saying no to all requests.

Alton had only wanted to keep her safe.

“Let me think about it,” she said, teasing him, but it was obvious he didn’t get the joke.

He merely nodded his head and stared at the ground. She bit her lips to keep from laughing again. “Alton? I was teasing. You’re forgiven. There’s nothing to forgive.”

He raised his head and smiled at her and she was sure she felt it all the way to her toes. “Thank you, Ginny.”

She shrugged. “You’re welcome, I guess. Look, we need to find a place to stay. My Aunt Betty is already freaking out since their cat went nuts this morning. She doesn’t need any visitors right now, and I couldn’t take you there with me anyway. There’s no room, and no way to explain you.”

She grabbed her cell phone out of her purse and punched in her aunt’s number. When Markus answered she told him she’d decided to stay in town. He sounded relieved when he promised to pass the message on to his mom. Ginny tucked the phone back in her purse after checking for messages.

Nothing. Not even a message from Eddy, but if what Alton said was true, Eddy probably had other things on her mind.

Like an immortal lover? Sheesh…

“C’mon.” Ginny grabbed Alton’s hand and tugged him toward the car. “Let’s find a motel somewhere and figure out what we’re going to do next.” She glanced at him and caught the raised eyebrows. “Don’t even think of it. I’m tired and we are not sharing a bed.”

Alton laughed. “If you say so.” He walked with her, hand in hand, to the little car.

She hardly knew the man and she was planning to stay with him in a motel room tonight. This was not the way she did things. So why was she smiling like a total idiot?

Because the world was suddenly not the world she’d always known. Because there were demons and magic and her best friend forever was now immortal.

And there’s a man walking beside me who’s not even human, yet he makes me feel things I’ve never felt in my life. Good things. If she added it all together, it still made no sense, but Ginny knew she couldn’t have wiped that smile off her face for anything.

She just wished the little frisson of fear that accompanied it would quit coiling along her spine.

 

Ginny made him wait in the car while she got a room in a place called a Super 8. He wasn’t sure what that meant, but she seemed to know what she was doing, which was a good thing. He wondered if he’d ever figure things out.

This dimension was nothing like Lemuria.

No, it was so much better, so much more alive, that he couldn’t get enough of it.

Couldn’t get enough of Ginny either, for that matter, which probably wasn’t his smartest move, but she fascinated him. Everything about her, from her attitude to her tall, lean body, and her beautiful tiger’s eyes that flashed with life and light. He loved her dark, dark skin and the subtle scent that was all hers, the soft fullness of her lips and the way she kissed. He leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes.

Damn, but the woman could kiss. Her lips were so soft and sleek and her mouth fit perfectly to his. He realized he was running his fingertips over his lips in a vain attempt to bring back that amazing sensation.

He wasn’t even close. Feeling like a complete idiot, Alton folded his hands in his lap and gazed toward the office. Ginny stepped through the door and got into the car beside him. “The place is pretty full, but I got us a room in the back. Two beds. I could only get it for tonight. They’re booked solid tomorrow.”

He nodded. “That should give us time to figure out what we’re going to do next. I really need to get in touch with Eddy, but I’m not getting an answer on her cell phone.”

Ginny drove around the back of the motel complex. “Have you tried the house?”

He shook his head. “I don’t have the number, but you’re right. Ed would know what’s going on.” Why hadn’t he thought to get Ed’s phone number?

Maybe because he still didn’t quite understand how cell phones worked. Telepathy was so much easier. Unfortunately, he’d been unable to maintain his link with Taron back in Lemuria, and he, Eddy, and Dax had never established a very strong connection.

Come to think of it, he had no connection at all with Ginny, so maybe it wasn’t all that great.

Ginny drove slowly through the parking lot, staring at the various doors they passed. “I’ll call once we get in the room,” she said. “I know all of Eddy’s contact numbers.” She pulled into a parking space and turned off the engine. “It’s that one up there.”

She pointed to a room on the second floor. Alton unfolded himself from the small front seat and got out. He grabbed the scabbard with HellFire and the pack with his extra clothes and followed Ginny’s instructions on how to lock the car door.

She handed a little plastic card to him. “That’s the key to get into the room. C’mon. I’ll show you.” She tugged a small bag behind her that rolled on wheels and he followed her to the stairs. She did something to the handle on the bag and suddenly she had a tote bag. He grabbed it out of her hand to carry it for her.

“Thank you.” She smiled at him and went on up the stairs. Alton followed, pleased that he’d obviously done something right by carrying her bag. With human women, one never knew. They were terribly independent.

It had bothered him at first, when he’d watched Dax defer to Eddy on so many points, until he realized that Eddy knew more about this world and her decisions usually made more sense than something he or Dax might choose to do. It had taken some getting used to, women who were so self-assured, who had no problem taking the lead, even in battle.

He wondered what Ginny would be like if she were ever to fight beside him. The image of her striking out at that concrete bear when it had her cornered that night in Evergreen flashed through his mind.

Ginny would be an amazing warrior. Unfortunately, she was a mortal and no match for demons. Then he remembered that Eddy had been mortal when she’d bested the demon king, and she’d come through that battle in better shape than any of them.

He was still pondering that when they paused in front of a door that looked like all the others along this stretch. Ginny slipped her square of plastic into a slot on the door, waited until a light blinked, shoved the handle down, and entered. It all seemed relatively simple. Taron would love it here. His friend was fascinated by technology. There were so many amazing things humans used to make their lives easier—as well as a lot more complicated.

Alton followed Ginny into the room. It was fairly large with two big beds and a small table with two chairs sitting by the window. He really couldn’t let himself think about the beds, not when he knew Ginny would be sleeping in one while he tried to sleep in the other.

It was going to be impossible, actually sleeping with her so close beside him, yet not with him. He put that out of his mind. No reason to borrow trouble.

He opened a couple of doors and found a closet and a bathroom. Everything they’d need for the night, though he could have done without the extra bed. Ginny tossed her purse on the one by the window and punched numbers into her cell phone. Alton left his bag on the bed by the door and slipped his scabbard off his shoulder. He left everything lying on the colorful bedding and went into the bathroom.

He still smelled the stench of demon on his skin and in his hair. While Ginny was on the phone, he took a quick shower. There were little tubes of shampoo and conditioner, similar to what he used in Lemuria, though at home they came in ceramic pots set into the walls of a natural hot spring in his private rooms.

He was scrubbed and out of the shower in a matter of minutes, but he’d forgotten to bring clean clothing into the bathroom. He ran his fingers through his hair and tossed the tangled mess over his shoulder. He’d comb it out later, maybe braid it the way he usually wore it. He’d hardly had time the past few days. Life in Earth’s dimension was so much more complicated than Lemuria.

He glanced toward the closed door and listened. Ginny was still speaking to someone, so he wrapped a towel around his hips, grabbed his dirty clothing and walked back into the room.

Ginny’s back was to him. He dug through his bag and found clean underwear and a new shirt. The jeans he’d been wearing would have to do for tomorrow. He didn’t plan to sleep in them.

He dropped the towel and slipped on a clean pair of the soft pants Eddy’d called boxer shorts. After millennia wearing nothing but his flowing robes, he’d had a hard time getting used to such restrictive clothing, but the navy blue knit shorts with the narrow white stripes weren’t too uncomfortable.

He was folding up his dirty clothes and stashing them in his bag when Ginny ended her call.

 

She stared at the phone for a moment. To think that just a few short hours ago, if anyone had mentioned demons she would have thought they were nuts. But the conversation she’d just had with Ed Marks had thrown an entirely new light on the situation.

She heard Alton behind her. She’d been vaguely aware of the sound of the shower, and the thought of him in there naked might, at any other time, have made her crazy.

Not now. There was just too much weird, unbelievable, and truly scary stuff going on—but when she turned around, she almost dropped the phone.

He was on the other side of the bed, his fair skin glowing and damp from the shower, his long hair hanging loose over his shoulders in thick, wet, streaky blond tangles. A fitted pair of knit boxer shorts hugged his slim hips and muscular thighs, but they didn’t come close to hiding the rest of him.

He certainly looked human, though surprisingly muscular. She hadn’t expected the ripple of muscle across his chest, the dusting of pale gold hair connecting two perfectly shaped, coppery nipples, or the hard ridges defining his flat belly. Water beaded on his skin and glistened in the perfect dip of his navel. A darker line of hair trailed down from the indentation and disappeared beneath the elastic band of his shorts.

Ginny swallowed. She raised her chin and caught Alton grinning at her, obviously well aware of what she’d been admiring. She felt heat rising from her chest to her cheeks. “I just talked to Ed,” she said. Or tried to say. She cleared her throat. “Eddy and Dax are somewhere up near Grant’s Pass, Oregon. There’ve been reports of cats and dogs acting crazy, sort of like what we’ve got here in Sedona.”

Alton walked around the bed and sat on the side closest to her, totally unconcerned about the fact he was wearing nothing but his underwear. “I was afraid of that,” he said. “There’s a place I’ve heard of in southern Oregon. Eddy says it’s just a tourist spot, but in Lemuria we’ve long been aware of it as a lesser vortex. It’s similar to Mount Shasta—the same idea, anyway, though not as powerful. The demons must have created another portal to cross through from Abyss.”

She would not look at anything but his eyes. It was impossible to carry on a conversation with all that beautiful bare skin so close—so clean and damp and utterly touchable. At least he had gorgeous green eyes. She could do this. Maybe.

“Where’s their entryway here?”

His grin spread even wider and she was sure he knew what she was thinking. How much she wanted to look and touch and even taste. She was not going to go there. Absolutely not.

“Bell Rock,” he said. “Though it might not be the only one. There are multiple energy vortexes in this area, but I found and sealed a portal in Bell Rock on my way here from Mount Shasta. We use the portals to move between dimensions—they’re powered by the energy of the vortexes, and no, I have no idea what causes the power. They are what they are—and where they are. That’s how I got here so fast, using the portal in the Shasta vortex. All of them connect on another dimensional plane. When I entered at Shasta and exited at Bell Rock, it was the equivalent of about a hundred yards down a tunnel. In reality it’s over a thousand miles.”

“I know. I flew here in a jet, remember?” She still couldn’t believe she was having this conversation. It was just wrong on so many levels, beginning with the fact he was sitting here practically naked and they were talking about interdimensional travel. It would be so much easier if he’d just put his jeans back on…and if she could go back to thinking he was nuts. Unfortunately, everything was making such a weird kind of sense, she had to believe. Especially after talking to Ed.

Eddy’s dad had sounded too concerned to be putting her on.

Alton nodded. “I know. And it’s all my fault.”

“You already said that. It’s okay. You’re forgiven.” She sat on the bed and realized it was a mistake the moment she sat down. Their knees practically touched, so she slowly curled her legs under her and scooted back on the bed, like it was the way she’d planned to sit in the first place.

Except Alton’s big grin said he knew exactly what she was up to. She decided to ignore him. Or at least ignore what she thought he might be thinking.

“So what now?” she said. “We’ve got demons taking over animals in Sedona, possible demon issues in southern Oregon, and demons in Evergreen. Your entire army consists of one ex-demon and my best friend, both armed with talking swords, Eddy’s dad, who has a bad hip and has to be in his late sixties, and a dog with a fairy stuck in her head. And you. I hate to be a killjoy, but that doesn’t give me much confidence.”

Alton laughed. “You forgot to mention my sword, or the fact that Eddy, Dax, Bumper, and I are immortal. We’re not easy to kill. And Ed’s hip is all better. That was part of the deal Dax made with the Edenites.” After dropping that little nugget without more explanation, he sighed. “You’re right, though. The demons are gaining strength and there are too few of us. I would like to study some of these possessed animals up close. Can you take me to the vet’s clinic in the morning? With so many avatars caged, I might be able to destroy the demons within their hosts without harming the animals.”

“You’re kidding, right? You’re just going to waltz into the clinic with your glowing sword and start killing demons?” He obviously didn’t have a clue how the real world worked.

He shook his head. “Not quite. I want to be there before the clinic opens for the day. Hopefully a few staff members will have arrived early so they can let us in. I don’t want to break your laws, but I’ll use a compulsion to hide our presence. Once I have an idea how the demons are gaining control over their avatars, I’ll know better how to fight them.”

Maybe he did have a clue, after all. She’d forgotten about his ability to hypnotize people. Did that mean he was going to kiss everyone at the vet’s? There’d been a couple of really cute assistants working there when she and Markus dropped Tomoff, and…Ginny touched her fingertips to her lips.

Alton’s soft chuckle had her blinking and staring at him. “What?”

“Your face is too expressive for your own good. No, I won’t have to kiss anyone to compel them to forget my presence. Remember? You’re an exception, Ginny. I merely have to wave my hand in front of most people. You I had to kiss.”

“You keep saying that like it’s punishment.” She tilted her head and cocked an eyebrow, well aware she was flirting with him. She never flirted. It just led to expectations she wasn’t about to fulfill, but there was something about Alton. No. Flirting with him was an even bigger mistake, especially since they were sharing a motel room.

Before he had a chance to respond, she straightened up and said, “Tell me about your world. About Lemuria. According to Ed’s books, you’re supposed to have a horn in the middle of your forehead, wear long, white robes and lots of weird jewelry, and be close to twelve feet tall.”

He flipped his long legs up on the bed, plumped the pillows, and leaned back against the headboard. He was so tall, he’d have to sleep crosswise, even on the queen-size bed, but he wasn’t anywhere close to twelve feet tall.

He’d already told her his height. Six feet, eight inches tall. Wow. His green eyes twinkled with good humor and Ginny realized she was grinning right back at him.

“I’ve read all about your concept of Lemurians. Ed Marks had more than enough of our supposed ancient history. Not much of it, beyond our name, is right. Our name, and the fact that our world sank beneath the sea many thousands of years ago.”

“That really happened?”

He nodded. “It did. I was still a child when the end came, but I remember our lives before, playing on the beautiful beaches, swimming in the sea. The island continent of Lemuria was a wonderful place to be a child.”

“Wait a minute. You said it happened thousands of years ago. So how could you remember? You’re what? Maybe thirty? Thirty-five?”

He got an odd, uncomfortable look on his face. Then he slowly shook his head and sat up, grabbed a comb out of his bag, and began running it through his long hair, tugging roughly at the wet tangles. After a moment he stopped. His shoulders rose and fell with the deep breath he inhaled and then exhaled.

He raised his head and smiled sadly at her. “I told you I was an immortal, Ginny. My world sank beneath the sea around twelve thousand years ago. I have existed, since my birth, for almost fifteen thousand of your years. Among my people, I am a young man. My father, who is much older than I am, remembers a time when we traded with the people of Atlantis, when our older members traveled among the stars.”

He stared down at the tangles he’d snagged with his comb and sighed. When he raised his head, Ginny was almost certain there were tears in his eyes. “I’ve lived through the birth of your civilization, through wars and climate changes, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. But never, in all my long years, have I seen a threat as terrifying as the one our worlds face now. Demons have always existed, but not like this. Not with the strength to actually offset the balance between good and evil. The strength to destroy your people. To end mine.”

His pain arced between them, so powerful it was almost tangible. Ginny stood up and crossed the small distance between the two beds. She took the comb out of his hands. “Turn around, Alton.”

He gazed at her a moment, and then he turned and sat in the middle of the bed with his legs crossed. She knelt behind him and worked the comb slowly through the long, silky strands of his hair, carefully removing the tangles one by one.

“You said Eddy and Dax went to Lemuria to see if your people would help fight. What happened with that? Why’d they end up in jail?”

He sighed. “It’s a long, sad story. Lemurians were once great fighters. Your legends say we almost destroyed ourselves with thermonuclear war, but that’s not true. We were a people of honor, armed with our sentient swords, and our fight wasn’t with Atlantis or any other humanoid peoples. We fought demons and we kept balance between the worlds. Then, shortly before my birth, when Lemurians had the demon threat under control, my people began to fight among themselves. They came very close to destroying Lemurian civilization. By the time I was born, level heads had prevailed and our soldiers had become philosophers instead of fighting men.

“No one realized, though, that when our swords stopped speaking to us, it meant we had gone too far in our quest for peace through philosophical discourse. We had lost something important. Something that we, as a people, still needed—our strength in battle and our honor. When Dax and Eddy asked for Lemuria’s help to fight demons, they were imprisoned. I think it’s because the senators of the Council of Nine were embarrassed by their request. Embarrassed to admit they’ve lost not only the will, but the ability to fight.”

Ginny finished combing out one section of his hair and went to work on another. “So why are you different? What made you decide to help total strangers?”

“I had been talking with my friend Taron. You would like Taron. He’s like a brother to me, only Taron’s a lot smarter.” He laughed. “I was telling him how dissatisfied I was with my life. How I sensed there should be more, that our lives within the mountain were meaningless because we accomplished nothing. Essentially, I complained that we had nothing to fight for.” He chuckled and turned to smile at her. “Don’t ever tempt the gods. They often take your wishes seriously.”

“So you met Eddy and Dax and just like that, up and left the only home you’d ever known?” She concentrated on a thick tangle and tried to imagine everything Alton had given up.

“It wasn’t that simple. I went to the council and asked them to consider the captives’ plea. I tried to convince them that the demon threat was real, that Taron, who discovered the threat even before Dax and Eddy arrived, had lost count of the demons passing through from Abyss into Earth’s dimension. The council said it was not Lemuria’s problem. That Earth must save itself and we should not get involved. What they don’t seem to realize is that if Earth falls to demon rule, a tipping point could be reached. Lemuria and Atlantis could be next, and if they fall, even Eden might be lost. The battle between good and evil has gone on since time began, but we are faced with the fact that—this time—evil could very well prevail. If evil wins, the battle is over for all time. It’s a terrible risk. One I couldn’t ignore.”

“Have you heard from your friend? From Taron?”

Alton shook his head. “No. I’m beginning to think that it might be worth the risk to return to Lemuria. We need help. My people were warriors once; maybe they can be warriors again. We need them. Our small band can’t defeat demonkind on our own.”

He reached across the bed for his scabbard and withdrew HellFire. The glowing blade fascinated Ginny, the sense of life she felt when he freed the sword from its sheath. She reached out and touched the blade, ran her fingers over the crystal. “It’s warm,” she said. “Almost like it’s alive.”

“I am alive. Haven’t you been listening?”

She snatched her fingers back and stared at Alton. He looked just as surprised as she felt. Ginny turned back to the sword. “Well, Alton merely said you could speak. I guess I didn’t realize the full ramification of that. I’m sorry.”

She stroked the blade once again and ran her fingers over the jeweled hilt. “Alton, have you asked HellFire for advice? I mean, if the swords have been around for as long as you say…”

“Of course he hasn’t thought to ask me. That would be too much to hope for.”

Alton’s snort disappeared behind the hand he pressed over his mouth. Ginny had to bite her lip. A snarky sword?

“HellFire, I apologize, but after carrying you for thousands of years with nary a word, I’ve not yet grown accustomed to conversing with you on a regular basis.” Alton glanced at Ginny with raised eyebrows. Then he picked up the sword and held it across his lap. “Do you have any idea what we can do?”

“You and this woman must go to Lemuria. Speak with your father and the Council of Nine.”

“Great. What if they throw us in prison, or worse, decide to kill me on the spot?”

The sword glowed a brilliant shade of blue. “They would not dare, not when you are accompanied by a sentient sword and a lost daughter of Lemuria.”

Ginny felt a shiver run along her spine. She slowly pulled the comb free of Alton’s snarls and stared into his green eyes when he turned to look at her.

“Lost daughter of Lemuria? Ginny?”

“Me?” Ginny cleared her throat and tried again. “You’re saying that I…”

The blade glowed. “Descended from one who ventured forth from the continent before it disappeared beneath the sea. Her veins carry the blood of ancient Lemurian royalty, from a time before Lemuria was ruled by the Council of Nine. Her presence and mine shall ensure safety.”

The crystal went dark. Ginny ran trembling fingers along the blade. Now it was merely cool and empty, like a beautiful piece of glass. “I don’t believe that.” She swallowed. “I’m not Lemurian. Look at me. I’m black!”

Alton still had a bemused expression on his face. “There are some among us who are darker skinned, though none as dark as you. Some of our men have crossed into Earth’s dimension to consort with human women, but our fertility rate is so low, I never dreamed there might be children of such matings. Who’s to say what woman that ancient Lemurian fell for.” He laughed as he carefully slipped HellFire back inside the scabbard and set it on the little table by the window. “HellFire said you’re descended from royalty. I knew you were special the moment I saw you. I just didn’t know how special.”

He turned around and pulled Ginny into his arms, but he didn’t kiss her. No, he merely pressed his forehead to hers and stared deep into her eyes. “It explains why I couldn’t use my compulsion on you. It doesn’t work at all against Lemurians.”

“I don’t believe it.” But she did. Deep inside, she knew the sword was telling the truth. Maybe that’s why she’d never wanted to leave the little town of Evergreen, so close beside Mount Shasta. She’d felt drawn to the volcano. Always knew she wanted to live close by, even though she’d never believed any of that mystical stuff that people always talked about.

Maybe she should have been listening a little closer.

“What were your parents like?”

She blinked and stared at Alton. Shook her head. “I don’t know. I was adopted. All I know about my mother is that she was an unwed teenager from Sacramento. I was adopted by a couple in Evergreen when I was a newborn, but they were a lot older. They’ve both been gone for a few years now.”

“Then Markus isn’t really your cousin? Your Aunt Betty…?”

“Nope. Adopted family. Aunt Betty was my adoptive mom’s baby sister. No blood line to me at all.”

Alton scooted back against the headboard, dragging Ginny with him. He held her in his arms as if she weighed nothing at all, and she had to admit, she liked the way it felt to be cuddled by a man as big and powerful as he was.

“So,” she asked, “now what?”

“I wonder if you were targeted? Tom the cat, the coyote. Do demons recognize you as Lemurian? See you as an ancient enemy?”

She shivered, thankful for Alton’s embrace but not at all happy about his suggestion. “I hope not. I’d rather think it was coincidental if you don’t mind.”

He chuckled softly. “If you like. Now we sleep, if we can. Then we pack up our stuff and get any supplies we might need, go to the clinic early, and check on the animals. Then we go to Bell Rock, hike to the top, and step through the portal into the mountain. Once we’re inside, we’ll take the gateway into Lemuria and hope HellFire knows exactly what he’s talking about.”

Ginny tilted her head and, for some unexplainable reason, kissed his cheek. “You’re saying you’ll believe a snarky sword?”

Alton laughed. “He is snarky, isn’t he? I don’t understand why. Dax’s sword is very polite, and Eddy’s is definitely a very brave and calm female, which is really weird, if the sentience in our swords comes from the souls of fallen warriors. Lemurian women don’t fight. As far as I know, only one woman may have ever seen battle, and her story is more likely legend rather than fact.” He shrugged. “For whatever reason, Eddy and Dax have polite, even friendly swords.”

“But you got snark?” She cuddled close.

“I got snark.”