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Great Goddess, let me dance in her blood for all time.
One drop of ruby glistened on her thumb, sharpening all my senses. Her blood wasn’t just red. Waves of shimmering energy rippled in the air around that single drop, giving her a prismatic glowing aura of power. Stretching up high to reach the nearest sphinx’s head, she pressed her bleeding thumb to its muzzle.
Its tongue swept out, stone grating against stone. The scent of lion musk and blowing desert sands mixed with the tantalizing lure of her blood.
My canines ached. Every muscle in my body tightened. Resisting the urge to shift, embrace my own beast, and tear her enemies apart at the head of the legion. Feasting for all time.
On her.
She turned to walk across the aisle to the other statue, and the one behind her hopped down off its pedestal to follow with a deep, eager rumble. Shara pricked her other thumb, bringing the second sphinx to life, while allowing the first one to continue licking the small wound.
“Wow.” She flashed a quick smile at me, not intimidated in the slightest by having two large predators licking her blood. “Thank you for standing guard for so long. I’m sorry you were taken from your homeland to be in Paris.”
With every drop, the stone faded to warm living fur. Though they were deadly guardians in either form, a flesh and blood sphinx made for a rare and fearsome weapon. Created by She Who Dances in Blood, they knew only endless rage. True African lions would kill to feed their pride or to protect their territory, but sphinxes would kill simply to revel in the act of shedding blood.
Without me present, they would eagerly kill the stunned human who could only gape at the statues he’d cared for these past years, never realizing the secret inside them, and then paint the streets of Paris red. Humans. Thralls. Aima. The more they killed, the more they reveled in bloodshed. Once the killing started…
I didn’t doubt my ability to control them. Not exactly. They would heed my commands as their general. But in the split second it took me to react…
They could easily rip Shara’s throat out in their eagerness to taste her.
“Their names are Ini and Isesi.” My voice was a dry rasp. “Sisters.”
Ini let out several low, deep growls that needed no translation. No amount of endless, silent duty would ever be too much if a single drop of our queen’s blood would be the bounty and reward. Though the more they tasted, the more they hungered. They crowded closer, bumping her in their eagerness. Claws scraping the tile. Canines as sharp and vicious as mine. It wouldn’t take much for them to knock her to the floor.
Then Rik would have my hide. I’d slit myself open head to stern if they harmed her, even accidentally. He hovered a few steps behind her, eyes narrowed, jaw tight, only watching their interaction. Because he trusted me to intervene if necessary.
His granite fists would be as ineffective on them as they’d been on me when Shara brought me to life.
“They’re eager to be of service, Your Majesty. Though it would be best to allow them to feast on your enemies and not your own blood.”
Isesi turned her head to glare at me, her lips peeling back slightly. Though she didn’t dare to fully bare her canines at me.
There would not be anything left of her to return to her pedestal if she dared challenge the General of the All Seeing, Never Sleeping Legion. I stared at her levelly. Unblinking. My intensity ratcheted higher.
“Did I make a mistake in bringing them to life?”
“No.” My voice rumbled deeper, lower, than even Rik’s alpha bass. No Aima alpha could control a sphinx. Only another sphinx—or the goddess Herself—could bend us to Her will. Ini had most of Shara’s thumb in her mouth. My queen could certainly live without the digit, though I would rather allow the smart-ass dragon a win than cause our queen a single moment of fear or pain. “They will heed your commands as they heed mine, or they will return to Sekhmet in a thousand tiny pieces. Release our queen and return to your posts.”
Not what they wanted to hear.
Not that I gave a shit.
They didn’t immediately leap to do my bidding. Which pissed me the fuck off.
Without shifting, I let out a roar that echoed for miles. The nearest human shrieked and covered his ears, quailing. Our queen’s other humans bunched together, as wide-eyed and pale as they’d been last night when the thralls attacked.
I kept my gaze locked on Isesi so I couldn’t see the other Blood’s reaction, though I felt them in our bonds. Rik swelling, nearly tearing his pants again. Guillaume silently drew the longest blade he currently carried. Not that any sword would stop a sphinx.
Slinking low to the ground, Daire crouched beside Shara, not shifted but mimicking a cat winding low, twining like a house cat around her leg. Rather than pissing himself, which honestly would have been my first guess, he nudged in between her and the other predator. He let out a soft mewl more like a kitten than anything I would ever make in my entire life.
Which intrigued both of the larger sphinxes. Ini even released our queen’s thumb so she could drop her nose down to investigate the creature who sounded like a cat—but still walked on two legs.
“You heard your general,” Shara said. “Go.”
Ini let out a plaintive bleat more like her ram head than the rest of her lion.
“I know you’re hungry.” Shara stroked both sphinxes’ shoulders, enjoying the fur beneath her fingers. “Wait just a little longer, and I will provide a feast. If I’d known you were here, I would have awakened you so you could help us with cleanup duties yesterday. Can you pretend to be statues once more until I have need of you?”
