The Lady of the South Carolina Elven demesne was beautiful, of course. All the normal requisites for a face were arranged in the most pleasing proportions imaginable. She had a wide, dark gaze filled with calm intelligence, and her long, shining dark hair, also unadorned, cascaded down, like a silken waterfall, to her hips.

Beluviel’s beauty was the first thing anybody seemed to notice. Graydon thought it was the least important thing about her.

As one of the eldest of the Elven race, her Power had grown with age. It manifested as a brightness of spirit that lightened everything around her, gently transformative, like the first, tantalizing breath of spring when Graydon knew the season had changed, the cold of winter had fled, and life was beginning to burgeon once again.

That single breath was the rarest of delights. You could only take one breath like that in a year’s time. Each successive breath might be pleasurable and refreshing, but none of them quite held the same power as the first epiphany of spring.

That was the essence of what Beluviel’s presence brought to him. Also, like the first breath of spring, she was a rare, passing delight. She did not always attend public functions, preferring, or so he had heard, the peace and quiet of her Wood.

Except, this time was different. Graydon looked at her with every anticipation of the pleasure that the sight of her had always brought to him. What he saw instead made his fingers clench on his champagne glass.

She carried the same brightness of spirit. She couldn’t help but do so; the quality was an intrinsic part of her and woven into the fabric of her being.

But his sharp eagle’s eyes picked up a multitude of tiny fractures in her demeanor. The flex of tension in those long, graceful fingers. The rigid set to her shapely shoulders. The hooded quality to her gaze, and the tight line of her slender jaw.

Disappointment and concern welled up inside of him.

The disappointment was ludicrous and inappropriate. She was her own unique person. The purpose of her existence was not to bring him pleasure. He shoved the feeling aside and studied her more closely.

That was when the vision of the white ground, black rocks, and the red of his blood swept over him for the first time.

With an instinct born from long experience, he held still, enduring the image until it faded enough so that he could glance around surreptitiously to see if anyone had taken note of his odd stillness.

Neither Francis nor Constantine appeared to have noticed that anything was amiss. The two other men had turned their attention to the refreshments table and were piling plates high with food.

As they returned to his side, Francis asked, “Aren’t you going to eat?”

Shaking his head, he put effort into making his voice sound normal. “I stole some sausages earlier off one of the tables. I might have more to eat in a bit.”

As he spoke, he watched Bel send away her attendants, and her brief conversation with Oberon. How could Oberon flirt with her and not see that something was wrong? Was the Daoine Sidhe King that shallow and self-absorbed?

The taut, delicate set of her mouth, and the fist that she made of one hand then pressed against her thigh, as if to hide it in her skirts…

Something about her distress – or what caused it – mattered so much that it had triggered an image of his heart’s blood dripping between his fingers.

The second sight was a tricky bitch. If he chose to ignore Bel and turned away to focus on his own life and concerns, would that indifference trigger events that would lead to the vision coming true?

Or, if he stepped forward to involve himself in whatever troubled her, would that lead to the incident?

Action or nonaction – there was literally no way to be sure. He could waste his life trying to second-guess everything he did, but that was no way to live. A very long time ago, he had decided to set aside second-guessing for the useless endeavor that it was.

He had not become a sentinel by worrying about what he should or shouldn’t do. He would live or die as he always had, by making decisions he knew to be right.

If Beluviel truly was in some kind of distress, there was no way in hell he could walk away from her. That would be like closing the door on spring to spend his life hiding indoors.

Graydon didn’t hide from life. He flew at it with everything he had.

He glanced at Beluviel’s husband. Lord Calondir looked like he was enjoying himself, as he bent his head close to his female companion.

The physical and psychic distance between the smiling Elven Lord and his tense wife couldn’t have been more apparent. They existed in two completely separate realms.

What’s going on, Gray? Constantine asked telepathically. Appearing to have not a care in the world, the other sentinel popped a fantastically shaped meringue into his mouth.

So his behavior had not gone unnoticed after all. He wasn’t really surprised. Constantine was an observant son of a bitch. After working together for so long, he knew Graydon much better than Francis did.

I don’t know, he said. Dismissing Calondir, he turned his attention back to Bel. Something.

Constantine glanced in the direction of his gaze then swiveled his whole body to face Graydon. His handsome face turned sober. That, my friend, is the very definition of unobtainable.

A rare surge of anger flashed through him. He bit out, That’s not what this is about.

A pause. Graydon could almost see the other male’s mental shift.

Okay, said Constantine. His mental voice remained neutral. What is this about?

It was about decency and concern for another being’s welfare. It was about living his life to the fullest, and making the right decisions in defiance of any potential future harm that may or may not come to him.

He told Constantine, I don’t know, but I’m about to find out.

He took his leave of the other two men and strode forward. Whatever this challenge was, and whether or not the vision came to fruition, he would approach this like he did the rest of his life – with everything he had.