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I released the death grip on Sekh’s fingers so he could eat. “Hopefully not so much now. I feel a lot better.”
Ezra blew out a huff. “That wasn’t a complaint, my queen. Bring it the fuck on.”
Lew climbed to his feet, though he bent down to press our foreheads together, his hands cupping my face in a gentle caress. Then he turned to Sekh and bowed at his waist while still holding his gaze. “I’m Llewellyn. Thank you for sharing my former queen’s last moments with us.”
Sekh inclined his head, and I could almost hear the grinding stone of the sphinx statues as they’d looked at me. “It’s my great honor to be of service to our queen, Llewellyn.”
Guillaume made himself a sandwich and sat back down. Ezra ate half a chocolate cake for dessert. Daire roused enough to lick his way up my calf, his purr deepening to a dull buzzsaw.
A deep, throaty growl rumbled the table, rising in intensity to a bone-shaking roar. My heart pounded. Fragments of the roar still vibrated in the room, strumming my nerves.
Daire scrambled out from beneath the table and leaped to his feet.
Gnawing on a chicken leg, Sekh stared levelly at him. He didn’t roar again. He didn’t say anything at all. Even in the bond.
But Daire stopped purring. Immediately.
I braced for some yowling and posturing, like two alley cats meeting for the first time. Lew was part lion, and he’d never had a problem with the warcat. At least not to my knowledge. Sekh wasn’t all lion either. Not with the ram’s head. But evidently it didn’t matter.
Daire meekly turned and walked into the kitchen to get himself something to eat.
“Guess we know whose cat is bigger,” Guillaume said mildly.
“Um, are you going to have a problem with Daire?”
Sekh dropped a completely cleaned bone back to his plate and picked up another leg. “No problem whatsoever, Your Majesty.”
“Shara,” I said firmly.
He gave me a slow, sleepy blink of those heavy-lidded golden eyes. “Shara, Your Majesty.”
Ezra snorted. “Welcome to House Isador. I’m Ezra.”
“I know you, grizzly. Thank you for the food. Who’s the wolf?”
Silent as always, Xin glided closer to the table, not as his wolf, though. He’d pulled on soft gray pants but didn’t wear a shirt or shoes. He circled behind my chair and started to step around Sekh’s. Perhaps to test his reflexes, or to simply take the other seat, though he could have just as easily gone behind Ezra.
Sekh’s left hand shot out and closed around Xin’s throat. His hair whipped back, his body arching away as he tried to flip out of the man’s grip. Silver flashed and Sekh leaned aside, easily tossing Xin away from him.
Still casually eating another chicken leg. With my Blood’s knife buried in his shoulder.
Sekh pulled the blade out of his shoulder and tossed it toward Xin without even looking at him. “I Saw you holding the enemy queen for our queen’s vengeance in New York City. Nice work.”
Braced in a crouch to attack again, Xin snagged the wickedly sharp blade effortlessly. “Wu Tien Xin. You can see me?”
“I’m All Seeing,” Sekh drawled. “Of course I can See you. However, I am not All Knowing, so I’m still connecting names to faces for each of you.”
Though he turned his head and gave G a nod. “No introduction is required, Sir Guillaume de Payne. The knife earlier gave you away, combined with the scar on your throat and the hell horse.”
G flicked his wrist and a blade dropped to his palm. He tapped the slim knife to his heart and then made it disappear back up his sleeve again.
The scent of blood stirred my hunger. Yes, I’d pulled an ocean of blood from him already. Enough to bring thousands of sphinxes to my side. I still wanted more. Though at least this wasn’t the punishing, desperate hunger that made me want to gnaw my own arm off.
Slow, sultry heat pulsed through me.
I tried not to react in any way. The man deserved some food after millennia. But I felt the throb of Rik’s erection against the back of my head. With the smell of blood in the air…
Sekh stood so fast the chair tumbled over and crashed against the wall. “You think I’d rather eat human food when I could have you?”
