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  Liv didn’t care what he needed to harvest—all she knew was that her mind kept filling up with that horrible, nameless dread, making it almost impossible to think. It was like someone was pouring black, cloudy water into her skull, coloring everything with its murky presence. “Please,” she whispered through trembling lips. “Please, no. I’m not who you think. There must be some…some mistake.”

  “We shall see.” Her captor nodded at the guards. “Bring her before the throne and leave her there. The AllFather’s aura will keep her from trying anything rash.”

  Her upper arms ached from where the guards gripped her as they dragged her across the threshold of the room and up a long, broad series of steps made of black stone. The fear made her legs too weak to work and she stumbled forward stupidly until at last, at the top of the steps, they let her go.

  Liv collapsed in a little heap, a soft sob leaving her throat. Not since she was a little girl and had night terrors had she felt so helplessly frightened. But back then when she’d woken screaming in the blackness there had always been someone to hold and comfort her—her mother or father or Sophie. Now there was no one. She was lost, alone in the dark. No one loved her. No one would ever love her again… No, that’s not right. Baird loves me. I know he does.

  The thought felt right in her head and it pierced through the haze of darkness that clouded her mind. It gave Liv the courage to lift her eyes and see what was sitting on the massive metal throne before her.

  The throne was decorated in the same glowing green alien script that the doors had been and on it sat a being that seemed to be cloaked in robes made of shadows—the AllFather. When he—or it—moved, they roiled around it like smoke. In the deep recesses of its shadowy hood its eyes glowed a pure, pulsing red. More than that Liv couldn’t see—not that she wanted to.

  “Who…what…?” Her voice was little more than a croak but it didn’t matter because her half questions weren’t answered anyway.

  “Ssso thisss is the girl.” The deep, hissing voice seemed to make the dread she felt worse.

  “This is she,” the tall man with the black and red eyes answered. Had Liv thought he looked alien and strange? He looked like a GQ cover model compared with the thing sitting on the throne. “We intercepted her shuttle on its way to Earth.”

  “Excellent. Does ssshe have the mark?”

  “I do not know. I brought her directly to you as you requested, Father.” The tall man stood impassively beside her, arms crossed behind his back. Either the enveloping feeling of horror didn’t affect him or he was so used to it, it didn’t bother him anymore.

  “What are you waiting for, Xairn? Check her.” The AllFather raised one skeletal hand, his shadowy, smoke-like sleeve moving in dreamy slow-motion with the gesture.

  “On your feet.” The tall man with the black and red eyes scooped her up and forced her to stand. He wasn’t unnecessarily rough but his hands on her were cold and impersonal, as though he was handling an inanimate object.

  “Please, you have the wrong person. I don’t know who you want but I’m sure it isn’t me.” Liv clutched at his muscular arm to keep herself from falling over. His skin was cold but at least he didn’t exude that feeling of terror she felt from the AllFather.

  “That remainsss to be ssseen.” The AllFather gestured again. “Check for the mark.”

  “As you wish.” With no warning the tall man grabbed the V neck of the dark blue t-shirt Liv was wearing and ripped it open. Then he twisted her bra in one horribly strong hand, popping and shredding the elastic as easily as if it was paper to reveal her bare breasts.

  It was so much like what Baird had done to her earlier in the unmated males’ area that Liv was momentarily stunned. Guess it’s my day to get stripped in public, she thought stupidly, staring down at her breasts, her nipples tight with fear. Then the reality of what had happened hit her and she tried to cover herself with her arms.

  “There is no need for that.” The man the AllFather had called Xairn pulled her arms away easily though Liv was fighting with all her might to keep herself covered. “We wish only to see if you bear the mark between your breasts.”

  “The mark of what?” Liv managed to ask through numb lips but he didn’t answer. Instead, he knelt in front of her and cupped her breasts in his cold hands, pushing them apart and studying the smooth skin of her chest and sternum carefully. Liv shivered under his touch but there didn’t seem to be anything she could do about it. At least he didn’t seem to be getting any pleasure out of the contact—his touch was as clinical and impersonal as a doctor’s. Finally he shook his head and let her go.

  “I see nothing.”

  There was a hiss of frustration from the being on the throne. “I thought ssshe was the one. The thought message you intercepted…”

  “Showed much promise. However there is no mark and the prophesy says—”

  “I know what it sssays.” The AllFather made an impatient gesture, his red eyes glaring.

  “Except for the mark she fits very well.”

  “Which is why we must be sssure. Ssstep back and let me taste her.”

  “What?” Liv stumbled backward and would have gone head first down the broad, steep steps if Xairn hadn’t caught her.

  “Be still, Earth female. The AllFather will not touch you. He means to taste your emotions, nothing more.”

  Liv trembled in his grip. For one horrible instant she’d thought he meant to taste her the way Baird had. The thought of that…that thing on the throne with its boney scabrous hands and glowing red eyes between her legs was too much, too horrible. She would rather die than let it touch her so intimately.

  Barely managing to stand upright, Liv clutched her torn shirt closed to cover herself. Despite Xairn’s promise that the AllFather wouldn’t touch her, it took everything that was in her not to collapse when he stood, shaking his smoke-like robes loose from the metal throne, and came toward her. If it touches me I’ll go crazy. I know I will—I won’t be able to help it.

  But the AllFather didn’t touch her. He—it—as Liv’s mind kept insisting, came within a few feet of her and raised a hand to the level of her face. Then those glowing red eyes closed and the tasting began.

  “I’m telling you, you can’t do this, Baird. It’s crazy—a suicide mission.” Sylvan glared at his brother.

  “You think I don’t know that?” He nodded at Sylvan. “You gonna strap in or what?”

  Sylvan frowned as he slipped into the shuttle and fastened the harness. “I can’t believe you got permission from the Council to do this.”

  “Council member Shirafe owed me a life debt—I saved his son during the battle of Brenii—remember?” Baird shrugged. “He told me if I wanted to spend my debt this way I was welcome to do it.”

  “But you’re not even bonded,” Sylvan protested as he engaged the shuttle’s engines.

  “You think that matters to me?” Baird frowned at him fiercely. “I love her, Sylvan, bonded or not. Wouldn’t you have done the same for Feenah if you’d had to?”

  “Of course,” Sylvan said instantly. “Even though she didn’t want what I had to offer I still would have given everything I had to make her safe.”

  “Then you know how I feel.” Baird sighed and ran a hand through his hair as the shuttle lifted off. “Don’t you get it, Sylvan? This is what the priestess was talking about. I thought after all that trouble in the unmated males section that the danger was over. Thought the sacrifice I had to make was letting them see me mark my female.”

  Sylvan nodded thoughtfully. A public marking like the one Baird had done was considered a humiliation but his brother had taken it in stride despite his bride’s defiant attitude. Not his bride anymore, he reminded himself. They’re not even bonded and still he’s willing to give up everything to save her. “I see,” he said neutrally, piloting the shuttle out of the docking bay.

  “But that wasn’t it,” Baird continued as they left the Kindred ship behind. “This is. I can see it now and I�€