“They wanted to die.” Lucien closed his eyes. “This evil—”

“Has come to an end.” Baojia put a hand on his shoulder. “You have ended it, Lucien. You and your mother. Our world can make a fresh start. We’ll find whatever stockpiles of Elixir are left and destroy them. No one will dare defy Saba when word of this spreads. You’ve found a cure for the survivors. We can begin again.”

But he hadn’t found the cure. Not on his own. “Where’s Makeda?”

“In your quarters.”

“Has she barred the door?”

Baojia raised his hands. “This is where I back away slowly and find someone who can call my mate.”

“There should be a satellite phone on the bridge,” he said. “Try that.”

“Thanks. And good luck.”

Lucien knew she’d be furious with him, but all he wanted was to crawl beside her, lose himself in her touch, and wipe the horror of this night from his mind. If he was very, very persuasive, he might put off the dressing-down he probably deserved until the following night.

If he was lucky.

He knocked on the door when he found it locked. A few moments passed, and he heard slow movement inside.

“Lucien?”

“It’s me, Makeda.”

Beeping followed by clicked release. She was swaying when she opened the doors, and he realized how close to dawn it must have been. She was barely conscious.

“Sorry.” He scooped her up and brought her to the bed, laying her down before he went to secure their quarters.

“Mad… at you.”

“I know.” He stripped off his clothes and got in bed beside her. “I deserve it.”

“Mad…”

“Sleep,” he said, kissing her temple. “Be mad at me tomorrow. For now, rest.”

And know that you are my world.

He held her tightly through the day, his body resisting the daily torpor of the sun. His mind flashed to the battle the night before. The hail of rain and ash, the surging of earth and sea. In that moment, Lucien had truly understood how delicately balanced it all was. It could crash around him. Seas could rise and the earth sink. His very existence, the air he breathed, was an incalculable and precarious gift.

The complex dance of life had never seemed so fragile. He was spun and woven into it, a tiny thread in an endless tapestry. He could break. They all could.

And they could begin again.

Sometime when the sun reached its apex, he fell asleep only to wake when he felt Makeda stir in his arms. Her amnis rose and reached for his. He was selfishly grateful they were mated. Though she could seethe and rage at him, they were already tied in a way that would make true detachment nearly impossible.

“Makeda?” he whispered.

“You are lucky I love you so damn much, Lucien Thrax.”

He let out a long breath. “I know. For the record, I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I’m sorry, and I’m not.”

She punched his shoulder. “When you walked into that mess last night—”

“I knew I might be the only one who could make my mother see reason.” He kissed her forehead. “And she might not have. She might have pulled the island into the sea, and if that had happened—”

“I am a water vampire. I would have been fine. You were being irrational.”

He let out a long breath. “Only ever with you, Dr. Abel.”

“Do you think”—she turned in his arms and looked straight into his eyes—“that I want to live in this crazy world without you? That if you had… died that I would just move on, find another—”

He kissed her hard. “You have a family. Friends. You have important, vital work to finish. And I only have you. You cannot ask me not to risk my life for yours. Not when I’ve just found you, Makeda.”

“We risk together,” she said. “We fight together. We search for answers together. That is the only way I can do this, Lucien.”

“You’re not a warrior,” he said.

“Then teach me.”

Kato’s words of warning came to him. If you try to change who she is, you will learn to hate the thing she becomes.

“Don’t you think I can learn?” she asked.

Kato was right. And he was also wrong.

“You, Dr. Abel?” He gripped her hip. “You told me once that you never forget a lesson. Of course you can learn.”

“That’s right. Don’t forget it.”

Kato was right because Makeda’s humanity defined her as a healer. But he was wrong because Makeda was also a protector.

She was no longer human. She had eternal life in front of her, and change would now be her constant. Change brought life. Perhaps he’d forgotten that for too long.

“If you want to fight with me,” he said, “I will teach you. But right now…” His hand moved down her back to cup the rounded bottom he loved so much. “Make love to me, Makeda. Let me make love to you.”

She pushed Lucien to his back and moved over him, straddling his hips with her long legs. She kissed his chest over his heart. His neck. His jaw. His lips. Lucien put his hands on her hips and watched her love him, marveling at the play of light over her skin. The wild curls on her head. The soft, blood-flushed lips kissing every inch of his body. She took him in her mouth, making him close his eyes at the heady pleasure of it. He was mindless to anything but her tongue and her hands and the bite she sank into his thigh. He lay before her, a willing offering.