The Phantom King (The Kings) (6 page)

He wore
the responsibility surprisingly well. As Roman studied the warlock’s strong profile, it occurred to him that Alberich had been born for this position.

And quite possibly a good deal more.

Thus far,
three different attempts on Alberich’s
life had been made by warlocks who felt they could do a better job at ruling over
their kind than he could. The Warlock King had
batted them down as if swatting flies. The power he’d come into this world possessing had grown exponentially, and now
it
w
as
like an
armor around him,
sturdy and dark. It
draped itself over his broad form as if it knew who its master was.

It
had been like that for Malachi Wraythe.
But Roman had to admit that even Wraythe hadn’t carried it with such grace and ease. Alberich was a natural.

And that was perhaps the crux of what bothered Roman. If Alberich was a natural warlock – a born Warlock King,
in fact
– what would become of his morals? What would befall his soul?
Would he ultimately become like Wraythe?

As if he could sense that Roman was considering him in such detail, Alberich
turned and shot him a look filled with ice
. His green eyes speared through Roman
as
a
ll but one other of the 13
Kings
left the room. There were three remaining
around the table
now – Roman,
Jason
Alberich, and the Phantom King, Thane.

Alberich broke the silence. “Malcolm Cole sends the queen his congratulations on making the New York Times bestseller’s list,” the Warlock King said. His smooth voice echoed the power he’d amassed. It had deepened right along with his magical knowledge.

Roman lifted his chin as he said, “I’ll be sure to give her the message.”
Roman was the Vampire King, and Evie, his wife, was the queen. Evie had recently hit the New York Times list with a self published novel, something not many authors did.
Malcolm Cole, author and exonerated killer, was one of the most
famous werewolves in existence. He’d no doubt been well informed of Evie’s success.

Due to Roman’s friendship with Lalura, the ancient witch who acted as receptacle for all supernatural knowledge, Roman had it on good authority that Alberich had
been spending a lot of time amongst the werewolves lately. And for good reason. The young and powerful Dannai Caige, also known as the Healer, was
a werewolf. She was also
very important to Alberich, and she was eight months pregnant. Ever since she had attempted to heal an injured woman at a mall in December and fallen ill because of it,
both her husband
Lucas and Jason Alberich had taken turns never leaving her side.

It was an uneasy and somewhat uncomfortable arrangement,
as Lucas Caige and Jason Alberich had once been mortal enemies. In fact, it was Caige who’d put silver bullets in Alberich’s heart and sent him careening down a spiral of death, resurrection, and imprisonment within the home of the former Warlock King.

Ironic, that.

But Caige and Alberich put up with one another by sheer force of will
, begrudging acce
ptance that they needed each other’s help
,
and
a shared love for Dannai.
Jason
, for all intents and purposes, had become “godfather” to Dannai’
s unborn twins
. Amongst the witches of the various covens throughout the world, a man in his position was referred to as
the children’s
Patronum
or
Patra,
for short
.

Roman reasoned that there was probably nothing else in the known world that Jason Alberich cared as much for as the welfare of those two souls.
And Alberich had been forced to watch over them despite the uprisings amongst his warlocks, the major adjustment of becoming their king, and… something else.

There was a distracted air about Alberich
. Roman had been dealing with people for a very long time, so it was wi
th a practiced wisdom that he
determined the Warlock King’s distraction did
not stem from his worries over the health of the Healer and her unborn children.
Nor was it the various attempts on his life that had him preoccupied
. He had more than enough power to deal with that
, anyway
.

“How is the Healer coming along?” Roman asked.

“She is well,” Alberich replied.
To their left and across the table, Thanatos the Phantom King waited silently and patiently, his quicksilver eyes studying Alber
ich as carefully
as Roman’s did.
However, Roman had taken it a step further. Thane wasn’t in Jason’s head – Roman was.

And it was there that he glimpsed the image of a woman
with long
,
light blond
e
hair and sea-blue eyes. The picture
was
incredibly easy to come by; these
thoughts were on the surface
of the Warlock King’s mind
and it was clear that they had been for some time. The woman was an Akyri, and she was running away.

Something about her struck Roman as familiar… she reminded him of his own wife, Evie.

My god
, he thought suddenly. The bl
onde woman
was a
queen
. She was one of the thirteen queens Lalura had spied in a vision. And she was
Alberich’s
queen.

The news was more than stunning to Roman. It was prophetic. It meant that Lalura was absolutely, unequivocally right. There really
were
thirteen queens out there s
omewhere – one for each of the k
ings of the supernatural world. And for some reason, they were making their appearance
s
now
.

No wonder Alberich was distracted. If he felt even remotely toward this blonde stranger as Roman did toward Evie, then no doubt every nerve ending in his warlock’s body was screaming at him to go after her. Wherever she had gone.
But his love for his
chavas
or unborn “godchildren” and his devotion to Dannai, who was quite possibly his only and best friend in the world, kept him here at her side.
It must have been killing him.

“She’s due any day now, isn’t she?” Thane asked, continuing the conversation
about Dannai’s pregnancy
as if he could tell that Roman had been temporarily distracted.

But Alberich was no fool. Not now. His green eyes cut to Thane
in brief acknowledgement
and
then slid
back again, settling on Roman with a knowing gaze.
At once, Roman’s mental tie to the Warlock King was severed, as if he’d been caught with his fingers in the cookie jar and they’d been harshly slapped away. “Yes,” Alberich
said
, allowing his irritation to lace his tone
. “Any day.”

Roman met his gaze head-on. A second passed. Another. And with that, Alberich
slowly
turned and stepped away from the table to
leave the room
.
Roman watched him go.

Once he was gone, Thane asked,
“He
kicked you out, didn’t he?” His handsome face wore a knowing smile
.

Roman
shot him a warning glance that was really more amused than anything. “Indeed,” he admitted. “He’s grown much, much stronger.”

It wasn’t that Roman couldn’t have fought past Alberich’s barriers and delved right back into his mind to extract whatever he wanted. He could have. But it would have taken a good deal more strength than he was willing to expend, and Roman wasn’t one to go pushing his way into people’s brains when they clearly wanted him out
anyway
.

All in all, he was
duly
impressed.

“Yes, he has.”
Thane leaned forward in the chair he had yet to vacate, and the white button-up shirt beneath his suit coat stretched taut across his broad chest. Thane always wore a suit to these meetings, and they were the finest tailored suits that money and magic could buy. None the less, he never failed to appear less than comfortable in them. It wasn’t that they were ill fitting, quite the opposite. Thane could have modeled for any designer label. But Thanatos was a solitary sort of figure, an outsider normally found in blue jeans, b
lack leather, and tattoos that morphed and changed to become as varied and telling as his moods
.

Still, he was a king, this was a meeting place of kings, and Thane was smart enough to defer to tradition when the circumstances called for it.

Hence, the rebel rider currently looked like a sable haired god of war trapped in a three piece cage. His hair had been tamed into place, the five-o-clock shadow of scruff normally darkening his chin had been cleanly razored off, and the silver of his expensive tie set off the lightning in his mercury gaze. He gave t
he appearance of being well bre
d, but slightly out of place.

And barely contained.

Roman joined him
at the table
, re-taking his
own
seat. The Phantom King looked down at his hands where he had them clasped on the table top.
His cuff links glimmered in the light of the overhead lamps.
“
Alberich’s power is what I want to talk to you about, actually,” he said. “
Do you think he would consider using a bit of that
dark
magic as a favor to me?”

Roman’s brow rose. The Phantom King had use of
a
warlock
’s
magic?
His attention was officially captured.
“I’m intrigued,” he admitted
.
“Elaborate.”

Thane looked up, met his gaze for a moment, and then
took a deep breath before letting it out in a heavy sigh and leaning back in his chair once more. “A week and a half ago, a spirit popped into my world like usual,” he said
.
“And then not a minute later,” he paused, spread his hands
in an open gesture
, “he popped back out again.”