Jumping back on board, Kyle came immediately to Lucas’s side. “So far, there’s been no sign of Kai, but the queen and the dowager are inside the palace. The army on the palace grounds is not as well-organized as we’d feared. The ground commander is negotiating with their leader now for a total surrender.”

“Any sightings of Kai?”

“Not exactly.The Scythian leader claimed she hadn’t seen him, but said there’d been reports from some of the staff that Kai could be inside the palace with the queen. Some of the palace kitchen staff apparently saw him going up to her rooms.”

Lucas surged to his feet, ripping at his clothes, unable to hold the shift at bay any longer. He felt his wolf spring eagerly forward and saw that Nikolai and Kyle followed his lead.

Leaping off the back of the land transport, the three Lycans rushed through the gates of the palace grounds, the strike force falling in behind them with many of the Lycans tearing off their uniforms and shifting to their wolves as well. Moving at an incredible speed, Lucas raced toward the palace, aware of the Scythian army falling fearfully away in front of him and making no effort to hold him and his cousins back.

Once he burst through the palace doors, Lucas followed his nose, able to pick out his mate’s strong scent clearly, even inside this huge structure. Racing to the second floor, he caught the scent even stronger in the upstairs corridor. Kai must have come this way only a short time before. The scent led to a set of double doors halfway down the hallway. The three Lycans burst easily through the locked doors, but had to duck quickly as shots rang out. The bullets from the weapon hit the wall above their heads and embedding themselves in the wood above the door.

A confusion of shouting as they skidded to a stop, crouching over, and then Lucas looked up wildly and saw who had shot at him.It was Kai, standing protectively in front of his mother, holding out one of the soldier’s weapons. He had a small cradle behind him, and he was pointing the Alliance weapon straight at Lucas’s chest. Lucas straightened slowly, making all his moves deliberate and easy, not wishing to startle him into firing again. Kai stared directly at him, his eyes wide and scared.

“Kai,” Lucas tried to say in a low voice, “I’m not going to hurt you.” As the words fell on the charged air around him, he realized his voice was too deep and garbled with the extra teeth in his mouth. Lucas and his cousins stood up, panting heavily for a moment that seemed to stretch out impossibly long. With a hoarse growl, Lucas forced the shift back on himself and stood in front of Kai, naked, his chest heaving. Kai’s eyes were round with fright, but he held the weapon steadily on Lucas.

Kai’s sister, Delanon, was standing beside him, supporting herself by holding onto the bed. Her long, white gown was stained with blood, confirming Lucas’s suspicions that she had only recently given birth. Lucas was vaguely aware of several others in the room, most of them falling away to press themselves against the walls, but he couldn’t spare any of them any attention. All of it was focused on Kai.

Kai shook the gun at him. “Get back, Lucas. Please.”

“Are you planning to use that on me again, Kai?” Lucas managed to say, his voice still a bit harsh and raspy.

“Not unless I have to,” Kai said, lifting his chin. “I don’t want to hurt you. Please don’t make me, Lucas.”

“You’ll have to kill me then. Can you kill me, Kai? I wonder,” he said, taking a step forward. “Try for the heart when you shoot me, so it’ll be quick. Mine is here, baby,” he said, pointing low on his chest. “A little different than yours.”

Kai trembled, the gun wavering in his hand. “Don’t. Please Lucas, don’t do this.”

“You know I can’t let you go. I have to take your mother and your sister until we get this straightened out. I promise you they’ll get a fair hearing. No one will hurt either of them—do you believe me?” He took another step closer and Delanon hissed a warning at Kai.

“Shoot him, damn you. My guards will take care of the rest and we can make it to my private transport. We can get away, Kai, if you shoot him!”

Kai glanced over at her and then back at Lucas. “Give me the gun, baby,” Lucas said softly. “Can you really kill me?”

Kai held his gaze for another moment before he crumpled in defeat, dropping his arm. “No, no, I can’t.” He turned his face toward his mother. “I’m sorry, Mama. I’m so sorry.”

“Maybe you can’t, but I can,” Delanon said, raising a small gun and leveling it straight at Lucas. She’d been holding the weapon down by her side, between the folds of her long gown and the foot of the bed, so Lucas had never even seen it with all his focus on Kai. She leveled it on him and Lucas braced himself for the bullet, knowing he couldn’t reach her in time to save himself.

“No!” Kai screamed and leaped on his sister, who’d been standing only a few steps away from him. He knocked the barrel of the gun upward, and as it fired into the ceiling, he wrenched the gun away from her. She fell back on the bed, but she wasn’t done yet. The birthing knife used by the midwives to cut the cord had been discarded on a table by the bed. Delanon rolled toward it, seized this knife, and then drew back her arm to leap for Kai, screaming mostly incoherent words of hatred and jealousy.

Lucas jumped for him too, but Kai’s mother got there first, and Delanon’s blade plunged deep into her chest. Lucas heard Kai’s hoarse shout of horror as he grabbed for his mother, but Lucas reached him first. Pulling Kai into his arms, he shielded him while Kyle and Nikolai subdued his sister. By the time they were secured, and Lucas was able to let Kai go, his mother was gasping out her final breaths and died in Kai’s arms.

In the chaos that followed, Delanon and her guards were led from the room by some of the Alliance soldiers who had finally caught up with the three Balenescus. Unable to even look at the bitch who’d tried to kill Kai, Lucas had given the orders over his shoulder, looking down at a sobbing Kai.

“Take her to a bedroom somewhere and allow her these women to attend her,” he said, gesturing toward the women who must have been the midwives, their backs still pressed to the wall. “Kyle, go with them and see it’s done properly. Just because they’re barbarians doesn’t mean we are, and she just had a child. Take the guards outside with the rest.”

Merrial stepped up beside him and curtsied. “Sir, might I be allowed to take the child somewhere and find a wet nurse for the little mite?”

Lucas hesitated, but leaned over and asked Kai if it was safe to let the woman take the baby and he nodded, still unable to raise his head. Lucas turned back to her. “All right.Take him, but not too far. Keep him here in the palace and I’ll send a guard with you.”

She wrapped the baby in a blanket and left, touching Kai on the shoulder and leaning over to murmur something softly to him. When she’d gone, leaving only Kai, Lucas and Nikolai, Lucas put his hand on Kai’s shoulder. “We need to put your mother on the bed, Kai.” He nodded and moved out of the way while Lucas and Nikolai arranged the body on the bed and covered her with the sheet.

Kai sat down on the bed beside her, and Lucas bent down next to him. Wrapping his arms around his waist, he rocked Kai gently in his arms while he grieved silently. When the Alliance doctors came in, Lucas helped Kai to his feet, had a quiet word with the doctors and then pulled Kai gently from the room.

It was only then that Lucas realized he and Nikolai were both still completely naked. Kai saw them notice and jerked his head to a room a few doors down. “That’s my old room. I probably still have some leggings in there or maybe some robes.”

Lucas and Nikolai grinned at each other over his head. Nikolai headed down the hallway to the room. “Some robes maybe,” he said over his shoulder. “Definitely no leggings, though. These Scythian women simply aren’t ready for that.”

Lucas smiled and tightened his arm around Kai. Kai looked up at Lucas and then glanced away quickly. “Will they put me in a room like Delanon or will they send me to the dungeons?”

“They aren’t sending you anywhere. You’re coming with me.” Lucas pulled him close and whispered in his ear. “You’re exhausted, Kai. I have so much to tell you, to explain to you, if you’ll let me. Come on, love, let me take you home.”

Epilogue

Lycanus 3, First Month, 2258 CE

Lucas held the baby on his lap while he played with Lucas’s fingers, putting one knuckle solemnly in his mouth and sucking it. Lucas smiled down at him, and pulled him closer to his chest. Even though he was just Kai’s nephew, he still looked so much like him.

They had just returned from his naming ceremony, performed when a Lycan child was into his sixth quarter cycle, and now Ashton Balenescu sat in his father’s lap while his other father was in the kitchen with Ryan and Ethan, preparing a family luncheon. The little windiga, Merri, lay at their feet, totally in the way, hoping to scoop up any scraps that might fall.

Blayde sat down beside Lucas, plucking the baby neatly away, plopping him down in his lap, and placing a kiss on the top of his head.

“You and Ryan should adopt your own,” Lucas said, smiling.

“No, Ryan and I travel too much. I’ll just spoil my nephew,” he said, holding the baby up in the air and making funny faces at him while the baby stared down delightedly at him.

“He just had a bottle, so if he throws up all over you, don’t say I didn’t warn you,” Lucas told him and then laughed when Blayde quickly lowered Ashton back to his lap.

Konnor sat across from them and glanced over at Ethan, who was in the kitchen helping Kai prepare lunch. “Kai said there might be more babies coming up for adoption soon. Ethan and I have thought about adopting one of them. ”

“I highly recommend it,” Lucas said, pulling the baby back into his own lap. “I suppose I’ll still have to have a Lycan surrogate give Ashton a little brother one day, but you can see what beautiful babies these Scythians produce.” He glanced over at Kai when he said it, and received a warm smile in return.