She didn’t have to read his mind to know that the guy in Thronos wanted the two orgasms he’d given her to, well, count. “Placebo effect maybe? All I know is that Feveris—or faux Feveris—changes nothing.”

“I think I’m your mate just as much as you are mine.” Cocky Thronos was back.

She repeated her standard reply. “Sorceri don’t have mates.”

When he opened his mouth to argue, she held up her free hand. “I’m too tired for this, Thronos. At least wait until all my skin regenerates before you hassle me.”

With a scowl, he started forward once more, toward a horizon of nothingness.

Nïx had told her to set worlds aflame. What could Lanthe possibly affect in a place like this? And she hadn’t exactly been a torch in that belly.

Lanthe had thought she could at least learn from this experience, from her travels. All she’d learned from faux Feveris was that Thronos could be sexy as sin, and that he had a very talented—pointed—tongue.

Oh, and that being intimate with him had been life altering.

For her.

When they’d lain in each other’s arms . . . as if nothing had ever torn them apart . . .

As the terrain grew even more challenging, he took her arm, helping her along. Gods, her awareness of him had gone through the roof. She could not, could not, could not be falling for Thronos.

Doomed did not even begin to describe a future together with him.

If she told Sabine, “I want to be with a Vrekener,” her sister would have no doubt that Lanthe had been brainwashed. Which would make Sabine and Rydstrom murderous.

How could Lanthe keep them from killing Thronos? Oh, wait—she couldn’t.

A briny gust of wind howled over the flats, chilling her bare skin. To escape her current dismal reality, she lost herself in thoughts of her sister and their new extended family, bracing for homesickness. She missed Sabine to the point of pain. She missed Rydstrom, their bedrock of stability. She missed her gurgling nieces with their downy blond hair and wide violet eyes.

The elder by seconds was called Brianna, Bri for short, and the younger was Alyson, or Aly. Cadeon and Holly had wanted to name their girls after loved ones, but in the end, the appeal of three-syllable names that could be shortened to three-letter nicknames was too overwhelming for Holly (she had an OCD thing for threes, thwarted in itself by twins).

Aly and Bri were little badasses. Everyone had been worried about the Pravus making attempts on their lives—as the vessel of this Accession, Holly had certainly been besieged by them—but there’d been no cause for alarm.

Lanthe’s nieces were super brilliant, could already trace. If they sensed danger—or bath time—they would simply teleport their diapered butts away.

When hungry, they traced right to their mother’s breast, which still freaked out the rather staid Holly. Cadeon thought it was uproarious, would croon praise to them. The twins and the boobs.

Rydstrom’s ne’er-do-well mercenary brother had finally done well, abandoning his soldier-of-fortune past to build a life and start a family with his mate. Like Rydstrom and Sabine, Cadeon and Holly were as opposite as they could be.

Maybe the differences kept things interesting. Lanthe’s gaze was helplessly drawn to Thronos.

But none of their factions were at war. None of their siblings would want to murder significant others.

She felt . . . despairing over the future. Because she couldn’t have Thronos? She wished she didn’t know how warm his chest was when he held her close—or what it would be like to make love to him.

Lanthe was a sorceress who wanted what she wanted when she wanted it. . . .

Not to be.

Despair promptly turned to resentment. Thronos had done this to her.

Made her wonder. Made her imagine more.

After several minutes of silence, he said, “I can’t stop thinking about Feveris.”

She yanked her hand from his. “Try!” When another gust hit them, she glared at her surroundings and kicked a stone. “This whole ordeal is like motherfucking Time Bandits, and I’m over it!”

“Don’t know who those bandits are, Lanthe.”

“Of course you don’t.” Because he’d never watched a movie in his eternal life.

They had nothing in common, except for some shared childhood experiences and recent hallucinatory orgasms.

Extremes.

Thronos now knew what it would be like to lose Melanthe forever, powerless to save her, forced to watch her die.

But he’d also glimpsed what it would be like to claim her as his woman. Neither experience had actually happened, which made him question if he were truly here with her even now. And she wondered why he kept touching her?

In their last two realms, he and Melanthe had been tested together—making him feel closer to her. Yet she was drawing away.

The situation wasn’t helping. Her skin was wounded. She must be freezing from regeneration, and still half shocked over where they’d been.

She was probably starving as well. He had no idea when they’d last eaten. How many days or weeks were we within that beast? Already, he’d suspected Pandemonian time moved differently. He could only guess how long he and Melanthe had been missing.

He helped her over a gulley, his thoughts ricocheting among four things: concern for her immediate safety, reliving her death in those harrowing loops, recalling his pride as she’d manipulated those demons to save him—and relishing how she’d responded to him in their dream of Feveris.