Kissed by a Dark Prince(102)

Erratic behaviour, but Loren didn’t have time to ponder why his brother had been returning to them before he had gone back to wherever they were holding Olivia.

“Thorne.” Loren looked at Sable and Bleu, and then at the large male demon. “How powerful are your portals?”

Thorne squared his broad thickly muscled shoulders. “More powerful than elf ones.”

“Can you teleport three with you?” Loren could manage to teleport one other beside himself and that often took a lot of focus and could weaken him depending on the situation. He didn’t feel weakened when he teleported Olivia or Sable, but he had teleported elves before and the drain on his powers was intense then. The theory went that the more powerful the creature you wanted to transport with you, the more power you needed to make it happen.

He was asking Thorne to teleport two powerful elves and a human.

The Third King lifted one shoulder in an easy shrug. “It would not be a problem.”

He had his arm slung around Sable before she could move, pulling the slender female against his broad frame. Sable squeaked and tried to break free, but the demon’s large hand settling on her hip made her still and a fierce blush stained her cheeks.

Bleu frowned and tightened his grip on his spear.

“You want me to stab you?” Sable said and the demon looked down at her.

“No.” His rough gravelly voice held a confused note. “Why would I desire that?”

“Because it’s what’s going to happen if you don’t stop manhandling me.” She pushed again and the demon reluctantly loosened his grip on her, allowing her to break free.

Sable smoothed her black t-shirt down, neatly arranging the hem along the belt of her combat trousers.

Thorne still looked confused. Loren didn’t have time for this.

He grabbed Thorne’s arm and then grabbed Bleu with his other hand. “Sable.”

She looked up, a hint of colour lingering on her cheeks, and stared at all three of them before she stepped forwards and took hold of Bleu and Thorne’s hands. Both males shot deadly glares at each other and then Thorne’s eyes burned red and a vast black hole opened beneath them.

“Hold on,” Thorne growled and Loren hoped to the gods that Sable did as he said because a portal was no place to get lost. If she let go, she could end up anywhere, in this world or the demon one.

Darkness swirled around them and then lifted to reveal a decrepit manor house illuminated by floodlights. The hum of a nearby generator filled the silence, obliterating the softer sounds of the nature all around them. Shadowy silhouettes of trees speared the sky, swaying in the cool night breeze.

Scaffolding covered the sandstone three storey façade of the manor house and there were no lights on inside. Several of the windows had been boarded up.

Loren ran a calculating gaze over the building and released Thorne and Bleu. It was falling apart and looked as though it hadn’t been lived in for at least fifty years. Vail could have been hiding here with Kordula for all that time, or possibly longer.

How long had Vail and Kordula been in the human world?

Sable broke away from them and flipped open her small crossbow. She loaded a bolt and looked over her slender shoulder at Thorne. “So, Demon, where’s the bastard who took my friend?”

Thorne arched a dark slash of an eyebrow at her biting tone and pointed towards the house. “I thought it was rather evident, little female. He awaits yonder.”

“Yonder? Who the hell says yonder anymore?” Sable hooked her crossbow on her belt and turned away, missing the black scowl Thorne directed at her back.

Loren thought yonder was a perfectly good word.

Bleu called his helmet, the black scales forming it over his cheeks and his forehead, and then flaring back into twin curved horns.

Loren followed suit, mentally commanding his black spiked crown and helmet to form but leaving his face mask. He needed to be able to speak with the others without it hindering him.

Sable stalked off. Bleu followed with Thorne.

Loren focused on the building, his senses mapping every floor. He could hear three heartbeats. One far slower than the other two. Olivia. She wasn’t inside the building. She was outside somewhere. The link between them was as hazy as ever, but it was dull and calm too. Combined with her slower heart rate, it left him in no doubt that she was unconscious.

He closed his eyes as he walked towards the rundown manor, focusing all of his power on enhancing his senses so he could pinpoint the locations of the owners of the three heartbeats.

“They are outside.” Loren frowned and felt Bleu, Sable and Thorne halt and turn their gazes on him. “Olivia is unconscious. Higher than the other two. Vail is bleeding. I can smell his blood. He is weakening. Kordula is...”