don't remember, i returned his sending.

you don't take from the boys?

i've never taken from them. it was an insult that he'd even suggest it. i only drank from roff or my vampire mates and only then when they demanded it. roff was bitten twice a month, at his insistence. i'd drank from shadow, once, but i'd begged him not to ask for it again.

"fuck," dragon sighed and rubbed his forehead. "somebody see that she eats." he left the table and stalked off. devin started to get up and follow him, but crane held her down.

eat something, love. drake was sending, now. we have a long ride ahead of us. you won't make it if you don't eat.

the food tasted almost as much like sawdust as it used to, when i ate food as a full vampire. i forced as much down as i could, remembering my lessons with merrill. all that seemed like a thousand years ago. tava, hart and nima had sat at the far end of the table, near drake and drew. they'd watched the entire episode, not saying anything. i thought i saw contempt in their eyes, though. maybe that's how dragon saw me, too, now.

we'd almost reached our camping spot for the evening when the attack came. the enemy had somehow gotten there, even though the scouts hadn't found them. i didn't know how that could be but i didn't waste any time, just like the others. we were in the foothills and archers had been placed carefully somewhere above us. the entire army was in turmoil, getting horses out of the way so they could handle the enemy's ground troops. and then the arrows came raining down. i misted in the direction of the arrows; i didn't care what dragon had to say about it and didn't ask.

nearly a hundred archers, this time, all equipped with long bows. i wondered if the falchani army was going to take the hint soon and train archers of their own. i started with the back row and worked my way forward. it took a while for them to realize that something was there, killing them. these had swords with them, but i was more careful, this time. i barely let my hands and claws materialize as i took heads. it might have taken fifteen or twenty minutes, with the last five or so spent while they hunted me with their blades. one whacked a blade against my claws and screamed when the blade was sheared off. that one died, just like the others.

i sped down the mountainside, then, to join the other troops. materializing beside drake and drew, i lifted my blades from the sheath at my back and went to work. if dragon wanted to see me go on the offensive, well, he might have gotten his wish that night. and i had better night vision than anyone there; i knew that for a fact. heads flew as i whirled through the enemy in a blur. i had no idea how many died that night at my hands. a lot, i suppose. when the last ones i could find had been dispatched, i stood on the blood-soaked grass, panting from the exertion. there wasn't anyone alive around me when i stopped and i wondered where the falchani army was. i turned to look behind me.

the nearest person was perhaps a hundred yards behind me, and that was dragon. caylon, pheran and crane were a short distance behind him and they were walking in my direction. now what? was he going to yell that i needed to appear more human? he hadn't said anything about that to me. somebody should have gone over the ground rules with me before this whole thing got started.

"lissa." dragon walked up to me slowly.

"what? what did i do wrong this time, dragon?"

"lissa, come back with us, now. they're all dead." dragon was holding out a hand in a calming gesture. he and the others were stepping over dead bodies, some two or three deep. i reached down and ripped off the clean portion of an enemy's tunic to wipe my blades-they were covered in blood.

"lissa, come." dragon's voice was even and calm. calmer than i'd heard it in the past few days, anyway.

"i'm coming, keep your shirt on," i grumped. that was a joke-he was bare-chested and his tattoos were visible to me in the sliver of moonlight that shone down.

i hadn't realized that the camp was so far away. we walked for almost a mile. wounded were being tended when we got back and tents had been erected hurriedly so the healers could get to the ones most in need.

"thank goodness." drake and drew were waiting for us around a campfire and a quick meal had been brought from the cooking tents. "lissa, sit down."

i was waiting to see what all the fuss was. i was fine-nobody had touched me. i held out my bare arms just to make sure. nope, not a scratch.

"here, baby." drew handed a bowl of rice with beef and gravy to me. drake offered chopsticks, so i dipped in.

"have you two had something to eat?" i turned to each of my twins.

"we ate." drake was nodding. "here," he handed a cup of rice wine to me.

"where are devin and the others?" i asked.

"doing a bit of healing," dragon said, seating himself on the opposite side of the fire. caylon, pheran and crane settled down around the fire, too, and crane passed around a large bottle of rice wine.

"lissa, what do you remember about the battle?" dragon asked after a while. i looked up from my food. i had to think for a minute.

"not much, i guess. i just remember when it started and when it ended, i think. what time is it?"

"around three hours before dawn. you were fighting from just after sunset until only a little while ago. the enemy was running away after a while, lissa. you saw where they were when you finished them off."

"that's bad." i put my bowl down.

"no, baby, eat the rest of it. dad's not finished." drew picked up my bowl and smiled encouragingly as he handed it back.

"lissa, the ones we fought tonight-at least half of them, anyway, were altered in some way. they were all faster and stronger than they should have been." dragon sighed and shook his head as if he were having trouble with that information. "that's how they managed to engage us so quickly. i know you're not aware of everything the dark elemaiya did before you came along, or even during the three hundred years of time you missed," dragon went on. "they've allied with the ra'ak before and at one time they had one among them called the khos'mirai, or dark mirror. he's the opposite of the ka'mirai-the true mirror. i'm thankful he's no longer alive-the bright elemaiya killed him centuries ago. we were seeing the results of the dark mirror's alliance with the ra'ak tonight."

"what are you talking about?" i stared at dragon in alarm.

"lissa, somehow, the khos'mirai must have convinced the ra'ak long ago that it was in their best interest to splice ra'ak dna with that of the elemaiya, instead of making them spawn as they would normally have done. we were facing an army of those creatures, tonight. they were difficult for a regular soldier to kill-all these ra'ak-enhanced warriors were much stronger and faster. our company took out its share, but we would have lost this battle, lissa. except for you. i see, now, why a queen vampire is as important as she is. i've never seen anything like that. pheligar was here just a short while ago, telling us where to find you since we can't track you in any way. i think you had some sort of battle rage going and you took every one of those fuckers down."

"no wonder i'm so tired," i sighed. "please tell me i can sleep in a bed soon."

"we will see that you sleep in a bed soon," dragon replied, his dark eyes focusing on my face. "crane and i will go to kiarra and let her know what we found here. the ra'ak may have seeded these creatures everywhere in the past three hundred years, building up a widespread army and waiting for the opportunity to strike. there was more than twenty thousand of the enemy here. likely more than half of them were ra'ak enhanced-enough to take down the falchani army. who knows when they were left here to breed? as it is, the falchani lost more than a third of their numbers."

"they can breed?" i stared at dragon in alarm.

"just as the ra'ak spawn can breed," dragon nodded. "the seed is in their blood or saliva."

"are you sure we got all of them?" i felt like hyperventilating.

"you got the last of them on falchan, lissa. belen and pheligar have confirmed it. but there could be more, perhaps in the millions, scattered across the universes. this bears thinking about," dragon leaned back and shook his head. "they instructed the reldani archers that came against us, too, so they have weapons training."

"then i hope you tell the warlord to start training archers," i sighed, eating the last of my beef and rice. "i killed a hundred of them first before i ever drew a blade."

"i'll try to pass that message along."

"remind me never to spar with her again," caylon muttered, after drake and drew hauled lissa off toward their tent.

"we still haven't told her about tava," pheran said.

"it's just as well; tava approached drew the other night while lissa was at the river."

"as if he'd be interested," crane huffed.

"he wasn't, but she wasn't complimentary toward lissa. she told drew that he didn't need to be with, in her words, that tiny, weak excuse for a warrior. she offered to bed him while lissa was gone."

"what did drew do?" pheran was just as interested in gossip as anyone else.

"he told her to get out of his sight or he'd toss her out of our camp."

"that tiny, weak excuse for a warrior just took down half the enemy," crane said.

"more than half," dragon agreed. "let's go find devin before she wears herself out."

drake and drew let me sleep in (for a little while, anyway), before getting me up and off to breakfast. the others were already eating at the table when we got there. the badger dude was banged up but standing in line ahead of us. we got our plates and headed for our seats. tava was missing-only hart and nima were there. they didn't look at me-they just kept eating.

"what happened?" i stared at the empty seat on the bench.

"tava didn't make it," devin said. "lissa, sit down and eat. it was a clean, swift kill. she didn't suffer."