Unchained: An Eternal Guardians Novella Read online

  I’m sorry, she mouthed to him, tears filling her eyes. Did he feel any of what she did? She’d never know. Not when she was Zeus’s prisoner on Olympus and he was trapped here.

  Prometheus shook his head slightly, telling her in one brief motion that it wasn’t her fault, that he didn’t blame her, that he was sorry too.

  That he did feel at least some of what she did.

  The pain in her heart grew exponentially until it choked her throat.

  “Where the hell is that eagle,” Zeus said, his voice growing impatient as he glanced past Prometheus toward a dark cave opening Circe had tried—and failed—to ignore.

  Almost as if on cue, a screech echoed from inside the cave.

  “That’s more like it.” Zeus grinned down at Circe once more. “Let’s get this show on the road so we can get on to other, more enjoyable activities.”

  Sickness threatened to overwhelm Circe, but she kept her gaze locked on Prometheus. Refused to give Zeus even a fraction of her concentration. Wanted him to know that she wouldn’t leave him until forced.

  Light flashed to her left. Zeus muttered a curse and turned in that direction. Voices echoed—several, male—dragging at Circe’s attention. She finally looked that way, eyes widening when she spotted two, three, no seven Argonauts, their arms and hands covered in the ancient Greek text of their forefathers as they drew their swords and rushed toward Prometheus.

  “Stop them!” Zeus screamed. Lifting his hand toward the heavens, he grasped a lightning bolt out of thin air and hurled it toward the Argonauts.

  The six Sirens who’d accompanied them to this place abandoned Prometheus and reached for their bows, readying for battle. The Argonauts jumped out of the way of Zeus’s lightning bolt and continued streaking toward them. Shock widened each of the Sirens’ eyes. Only one was able to grasp her bow in time. The others quickly reached for their secondary weapons, the daggers strapped to their thighs.

  Zeus continued hurling lighting bolts, barely missing one of his Sirens. The Argonauts darted away from his bolts, rolled across the ground to avoid being singed. Argonaut clashed with Siren, the sound of a battle rising in the air. Unable to move, to do anything to help, Circe looked back at Prometheus and spotted a flash of red out of the corner of her eye, rushing his way.

  Seconds later the entire rock outcropping was engulfed in flames, consuming Prometheus. A scream tore from Circe’s throat before she could stop it.

  Zeus whipped back, saw the flames and growled. “Fucking Argonauts.” His gaze shot back to the battle where several Sirens were already on the ground, pinned by the Argonauts. “They’re not going to win. Not this time.”

  He wrapped a hand around Circe’s biceps and jerked her into him. “I still have you, witch.”

  * * * *

  “Natasa...” Prometheus’s eyes grew wide as the wall of flames surrounded him and his daughter drew close. “What are you doing here? How did you—”

  She knelt at his feet and laid her hand over the chain at his ankles. “Titus figured out you were going to Olympus. We followed and found Circe’s cave thanks to Cerek.”

  The chain grew red beneath her hand, and he hissed in a breath as the heat of the fire element inside her melted the adamant chain as if it were nothing. It broke open and dropped to the ground, freeing his legs. “But how—”

  “I fanned the flames in her cauldron.” Pushing to her feet, she grasped a piece of the rock wall sticking out and climbed two feet off the ground so she could place her hand over the chain above his right arm. “Her spell was still active. It showed me where to find you.”

  The chain above his head broke free. He dropped his arm, rolled his shoulder to stretch his sore muscles as she moved around him and did the same to the last chain pinning him to the rocks.

  “Zeus set this all up,” he said as the final chain melted, freeing him. He rubbed at his sore wrist, a growing panic rising in his chest. “He tricked her. He wants me to suffer, and he’s using her to make that happen.”

  “I know.” Natasa moved to stand in front of him, the wall of flames crackling around them a barrier even Zeus couldn’t penetrate. “Which is why this just got a whole lot trickier. We’ll only have one shot to get her away from Zeus.”

  His gaze narrowed. “What are you thinking?”

  “Something that’s only going to happen with Circe’s help. How sure are you that she’s on our side?”

  * * * *

  Circe fell against the hard wall of Zeus’s chest with a grunt. Zeus’s black eyes reflected the flames as he squeezed her upper arm, sending pain all through her biceps.

  “You’ll pay for this, witch,” he growled. “You’ll pay for all of this.”

  Her gaze shot to the flames as she felt Zeus’s energy build around them. Zeus was going to flash them back to Olympus. Before she would ever know if Prometheus was alive or dead.

  Panic clawed at her chest. “Titos,” she whispered.

  The wall of flames parted. Prometheus’s large body launched through the opening and smacked into Zeus. The king of the gods jerked her forward, but the force of Prometheus’s blow broke his hold on Circe, and she stumbled before finding her footing.

  The two gods rolled across the ground, a tangle of arms and legs, swinging fists and bunching muscles. Zeus gathered electrical energy in his hand and zapped Prometheus’s shoulder, causing the Titan to lurch back. Before he could zap Prometheus a second time, a fireball that seemed to come out of nowhere struck Zeus’s hand, tearing a screech from Zeus’s throat.

  Circe’s eyes grew wide, and she staggered back from the fight, from the flames. Her back hit something hard.

  “Hold still,” a female said behind her.

  Warmth gathered around Circe’s wrists, followed by a burn that cut across her skin. She cried out, but before the sound fully escaped her lips, the chains at her wrist fell to the ground, freeing her hands.

  She whipped around and looked into Prometheus’s daughter’s eyes. “How did you—”

  “We don’t have time for that. These chains were forged by Hephaestus, correct?”

  “Yes. They’re made of adamant.”

  “So if we get them on Zeus, he won’t be able to break free, will he?”

  Circe saw where this was going. Grunts, the sounds of fists hitting bone, and blade clashing with blade, echoed around them. “Yes. Yes, that’s right.”

  “Then do your thing and get them on Zeus’s wrists.” Natasa rushed past her, held out her hand. A fireball formed in her palm. She watched Zeus and Prometheus, rolling over the ground. When Zeus shifted on top, pinning Prometheus beneath him, Natasa launched the ball, hitting Zeus in the back. The god’s shirt erupted in flames.

  Zeus shrieked, released Prometheus, and lurched to his feet. Knowing this was her only shot, Circe held her hands over the chains that had just fallen from her wrists, closed her eyes, blocking out all that was happening around her, and summoned forth an attraction spell.

  The chains rattled. Zeus growled somewhere close and said, “She’ll die for this, Titan. She and your precious offspring will both die for what you’ve done here.”

  Circe’s focus honed in on the chain, on the spell, and with the last uttered word, she felt the chain rise from the ground and shoot to her left.

  “Noooo!” Zeus’s shocked voice echoed in the air, followed by a thwack and a grunt.

  Opening her eyes, Circe turned to look. The king of the gods lay on his back on the ground, his bound wrists shackled at his front.

  “You can’t do this. You can’t!” Zeus screamed as Prometheus pushed to his feet, sweaty and dusty as he crossed to stand over the king of the gods. Zeus’s dark eyes shimmered with retribution. “Sirens!”

  “Oh, you mean those Sirens?” Prometheus angled his head to his left. Circe’s gaze drifted to the battle—or what was left of it. Bows and daggers littered the ground out of reach of the six Sirens standing in a circle, surrounded by the Argonauts with weapons drawn, just in case. “T
hey’re out of commission.”

  Fury twisted Zeus’s face. “You’ll pay for this. Do you hear me? You and all the fucking Argoleans will pay.”

  “Not today we won’t.” Prometheus grasped Zeus by the arm and hefted the king of the gods to his feet. “Natasa?”

  Prometheus’s daughter rushed over and helped him maneuver Zeus to the rock wall where Prometheus had been chained.

  “What are you doing?” Zeus’s eyes grew so wide, the whites glowed all around his coal black irises as they jerked his arms over his head and chained him to the rocks. “What do you think you’re doing? You can’t leave me here.”

  “Can and will.” Prometheus stepped back as Natasa latched the last chain to Zeus’s feet. “You like torture so much, I think it’s about time you got a taste of it yourself.”

  A screech echoed from the cave to their left. Zeus’s eyes grew even wider as he looked in that direction, panic and true fear rushing over his features. “Release me. Release me right now!”

  Natasa rose and stepped back. Looking toward her father, she said, “We’re good here. Go to her.”

  He squeezed his daughter’s hand. Then turned to face Circe.

  Circe’s breath caught as Prometheus headed toward her. Dust covered his hair, his ripped shirt, and torn pants. A track of blood from a gash in his forehead stained his cheek but the wound was already sealing from his Titan genes. He stopped a foot away from her, and as he looked at her—really looked at her as he’d done in their gazebo—her heart sped up, tripping over itself until pain ricocheted all through her chest.

  There were so many things she wanted to say to him, so many things she needed to make him understand. So many things she needed to make up for. “Titos, I—”

  “Can you cast a spell on those Sirens so they think Zeus is dead?”

  Confusion drew her brow together. That wasn’t what she’d expected him to say. “Yes.”

  “Do it before that eagle comes out and we run out of time.”

  Turning away from him, she looked toward the Sirens and held out her hands. The Argonauts kept their weapons drawn but stepped back. She tuned out the sound of Zeus’s continued threats, ignored the pain still burning her wrists from that melted chain, and tried not to be so aware of Prometheus standing close, but not close enough.

  But as the cloaking spell fell from her lips, she knew she’d never be unaware of him. She cared for him. Would always care for him because he made her a better person.

  “There,” she said when the spell was done. “It’s cast.”

  Prometheus looked toward the Argonauts, blocking the Sirens’ view of Zeus, and nodded. Blinking, Circe watched as the Argonauts opened a portal and took the Sirens and Natasa through.

  When the portal closed, she gathered her courage and turned to Prometheus. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I didn’t mean for—”

  He moved before she saw him. And when his mouth closed over hers and his hands encircled her wrists, lifting them to rest against his chest, she gasped.

  The gasp turned to a sigh as he drew her into a kiss that finally felt...free.

  “I’ll kill you for this,” Zeus screamed in a crazed voice. “I’ll kill you all, do you hear me?” The ground shook, followed by another shriek, this one not from a god but from a beast. A giant, winged, sharp-beaked beast.

  “Oh, fuuuuuck,” Zeus hollered just before the sound of flesh tearing echoed in the air.

  Circe never had time to look because she felt herself flying, and when Prometheus finally drew back from her lips and she looked up into his mesmerizing eyes, she realized she wasn’t in a barren desert anymore. She was in her gazebo—their gazebo—surrounded by the lush green forests of Argolea.

  She glanced around the familiar surrounding and listened to the soft trickle of water rolling over the rocks in the river below. “You brought us back here.”

  He let go of her wrists—wrists, she realized, that were no longer burned but healed from his magical hands—and slid his arms around her waist. “Seemed like the perfect place for both of us to start over. Together, if that’s what you want.”

  Her gaze shifted back to his. Warmth gathered in her chest, pushing aside all the fear and doubt and longing she’d lived with for far too long. “I do want. Oh, do I want, Titos. But...the spell I cast on those Sirens won’t last. Athena will be able to tell they’re charmed. Zeus will be free before long.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “You have to. He’ll come after you. What will you do?”

  “What I should have done a long time ago. Help the Argonauts find the water element so Zeus can’t use the Orb.”

  Her heart swelled. He might be a Titan but he was every bit a hero as the Argonauts.

  “We’re safe here,” he said, gazing down at her with soft eyes. Eyes she could see a future in. A real future. “Zeus can’t cross into this realm, and his Sirens are no match for me...or us.”

  Her heart skipped a beat. “Are you sure you want me? Knowing everything you now know about me?”

  A sexy half-smile curled his lips, and he tightened his arms around her waist, pulling her against the heat and life of his body. “Yes, I want you, Keia. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re the same, you and I. And the intensity with which I want you has not changed in the last day. If anything, it’s only amplified.”

  She smiled because she definitely felt that intensity amplifying against her belly. “You won’t grow tired of me? Witches aren’t the easiest of beings to get along with.”

  “Neither are Titans.” Flexing his hands against her lower spine, he pulled her in closer and leaned down toward her mouth. “But I have a feeling we have plenty of time to work all of that out.”

  They did. Sighing, she lifted to her toes and threaded her fingers through his silky dark hair as she opened to his kiss.

  Thanks to him, nothing but eternity stretched before her, and she intended to spend every moment of it with him.

  Also from 1001 Dark Nights and Elisabeth Naughton, discover Ravaged.

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  Ari — Once an Eternal Guardian, now he's nothing but a rogue mercenary with one singular focus: revenge.

  His guardian brothers all think he’s dead, but Ari is very much alive in the human realm, chipping away at Zeus’s Sirens every chance he can, reveling in his brutality and anonymity. Until, that is, he abducts the wrong female and his identity is finally exposed. It will take more than the Eternal Guardians, more even than the gods to rein Ari in after everything he’s done. It may just take the courage of one woman willing to stand up to a warrior who’s become a savage.

  * * * *

  Daphne darted a look between Zeus and Athena, sure she had to have heard them wrong. “What you need from me?”