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  I felt them lifting me again only this time it was Lucian carrying me. The shadows of the city gates fell over my face again, plunging me into darkness and I knew no more.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Rylee

  My eyelids fluttered several times on the frantic trip to Lucian’s apartment. I had a blurred impression of my guys hustling me into some kind of hovering vehicle and a male voice asking where they wanted to go. Lucian gave instructions and we rose up into the sky.

  Flying cars, I remember thinking hazily. Oh my God, they have flying cars, just like in the Jetsons. Which was my favorite vintage cartoon when I was a kid.

  I blacked out again and the next thing I knew, Drace was holding me in his arms while Lucian pressed his palm flat to the surface of a door made of rich, dark blue wood and trimmed in gold leaf. His handprint lit up and the door clicked open.

  “In here,” I heard him saying. “Put her on the couch—I’ll get the anti-venom injection.”

  Drace settled on the couch across from the front door—a high-legged, plush affair with gold brocade fabric—still holding me. The pain was all gone from my leg now—in fact, I couldn’t feel much of anything at all in my right thigh where I’d been bitten. I just felt spacey and cold—really, really cold, despite the big, warm, male body cradling me.

  “Drace?” I mumbled, trying to focus on his face. “What…where…?”

  “Don’t worry, baby,” he murmured, though his own face looked terribly anxious. “Everything’s gonna be okay. Lucian has some medicine that will fix you right up.”

  “Here!” Lucian was suddenly beside me holding a weird looking thing in one hand. It looked sort of like a hypodermic but instead of one long needle, it had dozens of tiny short ones. The liquid it was filled with was a bright, vivid blue.

  “What’s that?” I asked groggily. “Looks like…you’re about to inject me with…with Windex.”

  “Hold still,” was all Lucian said before ripping open one of my billowing sleeves and jabbing the multi-needle hypodermic against the skin of my arm.

  The minute the needles bit into my flesh, I felt a flaring heat through my body. Then the pain in my leg returned, only a hundred times worse.

  “Ah!” I shrieked, jack-knifing in Drace’s arms. “Lucian, that hurts! It burns!”

  “That’s a good sign—it’s supposed to,” he said grimly. “I’m sorry, ma 'frela, but I’d be much more worried if it didn’t hurt.”

  As he spoke, the burning agony in my leg suddenly disappeared as quickly as it had come.

  “Whew…” I breathed a sigh of relief as my muscles unknotted. I collapsed against Drace’s broad chest.

  “You okay, baby?” he asked anxiously.

  “Yes. The pain is gone now.” I wiped an arm over my forehead. “Glad that’s over.”

  Drace looked relieved too but Lucian looked more worried than ever. What was it about this awful venom that made pain a good sign?

  “It shouldn’t be over this quickly,” Lucian said. “The anti-venom gives pain for hours as it’s neutralizing the poison infecting your system.”

  “Hours?” I stared at him in horror. I couldn’t imagine experiencing that burning, stabbing agony for hours—I would go crazy.

  “What does it mean that the pain faded so quickly?” Drace asked. “Come on, Lucian—what aren’t you telling us?”

  The big green alien shook his head. “That the anti-venom isn’t working. Maybe because Rylee has different blood chemistry than a Denarin.”

  “Well, what can you do about it?” Drace demanded.

  “First I need to see where she was bitten.” Lucian looked at me questioningly.

  “Here.” I pointed to the loose trousers made of silvery-tan linen. “My right inner thigh.”

  Lucian didn’t even try to get the trousers off me, he just grabbed the fabric and ripped a huge, gaping hole in it.

  “Lucian!” I started to protest, then I saw the place where the morata had bitten me and the protest died on my lips.

  There, on my inner thigh, were two tiny blood red dots. Almost like a spider bite, I thought sickly. But unlike a spider bite, there were crooked black lines running from the red dots—black veins of pure corruption tracing over the smooth brown of my skin.

  “Oh my God,” I whispered weakly. “That…doesn’t look so good.”

  “It’s not so good,” Drace growled. “Look, Lucian, I know you want to keep a low profile but we need to get her to a house of healing now.”

  “That won’t do any good.” Lucian snapped. He ran both hands through his hair in a gesture of pure agitation. “Don’t you think I’d sacrifice my social status in a heartbeat to save our female? But what I just gave Rylee is the strongest anti-venom available. They won’t be able to do anything for her in a healing house but make her comfortable.”

  “Make me comfortable?” I was feeling more and more unreal. “You mean make me comfortable so I can die?”

  “They don’t call the moratas ‘death goddesses’ for no reason,” Lucian said grimly. “Unless it’s treated quickly, their bite is invariably deadly to one who isn’t of the Fang Clan or mated to one of the Fang Clan.”

  “Stop it, Lucian,” Drace said harshly. “You’re scaring Rylee.”

  “She is right to be scared—we all are.” Lucian knelt in front of me, cupping my cheek. “Ma 'frela, this is on my head. I should have protected you better.”

  “You tried,” I said numbly. “I was the one who didn’t want to wear the ugly-ass boots. I’m sorry, Lucian—I should have listened to you.”

  “Stop it,” Drace barked. “Both of you stop talking like Rylee is going to…to die.” He coughed, as though the words choked him. “There must be something we can do—there has to be a solution!”

  “But what can we do?” I asked. "Lucian said the bite of the moratas is fatal to anyone who isn’t Fang Clan or bonded to someone from the Fang Clan.”

  “That’s it!” Lucian was suddenly on his feet again and pacing.

  “What’s it?” Drace demanded. “If you have a solution, now’s the time to share bond-mate.”

  “You said it—‘bond-mate’.” Lucian pointed at him. “I was thinking last night when the three of us were together that you and I aren’t the only temporary bond-mates in this equation—Rylee is too. She’s part of us, Drace, even if only temporarily.”

  “Not enough to save her, apparently,” Drace said angrily. “You only have to look at her fucking leg to see that, Lucian. If I didn’t get any of your immunity, she sure as Hell didn’t.”

  “It doesn’t matter if either of you have my immunity—the question is can I give it to you now?” Lucian said.

  “What?” Drace frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “Our tie to Rylee isn’t strong because we haven’t been physical with her—not really since every time we’ve touched her intimately we’ve been in the dream-realm.” Lucian was still pacing, thinking this out as he spoke.

  “Are you suggesting we bond her to us right now? That we seal our bond?” Drace asked. “Because that would be permanent, Lucian. I’ll do it to save her life—I’ll do anything. But that means you and I will never be free of each other.”

  “No,” I said quickly. “I don’t want you tying yourselves together permanently on my account.” Besides, I knew the bonding process was sexual and right at the moment, with my right leg looking like a roadmap of Hell, I was so not feeling sexy. I didn’t think I could handle the whole “two poles in one hole” thing even in the best of health, let alone when I was pumped full of deadly poison. “There has to be another way,” I said.

  “There’s no time for further bonding now.” Lucian waved the suggestion away impatiently. “I’m just saying that there might be enough of a connection between us for me to transfer my immunity to you, Rylee.” He looked at Drace. “But you’ll have to help too.”

  “Anything,” Drace said hoarsely. “Anything to save our female—you know that.”