It had been nearly two weeks since they'd started looking for her aunt Luna, and though they'd gotten a few leads and followed them, ultimately it had all been fruitless. The best information they had gotten was about the berries Damien had found near the door, and they were isolating where they grew. That information was supposed to be encouraging, but instead it just damped Meredith's mood. Plants grew everywhere, and they were going to need more to save Luna.

Unlike Damien who could just go without sleep when he wanted to work really hard, Meredith was human. She had to take breaks from digging through obscure evidence in Paul's caves and raging at the men who'd taken her aunt. Break, though, she'd learned, was a subjective word. The Shades didn't take breaks, and as Meredith Shade–even if she hadn't fully decided on the name–her down time was split between her mate nearly killing her in training and then fucking her just as mercilessly every dawn and dusk. Neither of those things she complained much about.

Right now, it was training.

Mer circled Rush out in the flat field behind his castle, the dusk light edging everything with a golden shimmer. This was when both she and the vampires were at her prime. It wasn't real enough if it didn't bruise and ache for a few days, and so they fought at their best. Rush was the sort of brutal that he wouldn't even let one of the mages heal her until she fully felt what it was like to lose, to have a vampire win. She couldn't say she liked it, but she also didn't hate it. Everything had consequences, and they both needed to grow stronger. With Rush now the leader of the Shades and her as his mate with just as much power to throw around, they had to rise together.

Or they would fall.

The first move was his, and he slid his fingers across a small spell to snatch the light. Just like that, her vision blackened to a void, and she knew she had seconds to counter or he'd slam her into the dirt again. Drawing on her light magic, she rubbed her hands together and cast them out before her to release spores. It was a spell she'd hybridized from a mix of Copse and Aurion spells. Most spells didn't fully utilize her power unless she modified them and this was one of her secret weapons she'd been hiding from Rush. If he knew all her spells, the fights weren't fair, so they spent time apart now as much as together to hone themselves.

The spores pushed back his darkness, but he was no longer in the space she'd left him. She spun around to face his magic, and he jumped back, not having expected her to follow his movements. A smirk climbed her lips as she brandished her blades, one of darkness, one of light.

"Can't sneak up on me, vampire," Mer whispered as she rubbed her blades together. The screech of magic as the blades ground together had Rush covering his ears, and she ran her hand over the darkness to cloak her within Rush's magic. He wasn't the only one who could use his dark field.

Of course, he also had super hearing.

Snakes burst at her feet, and she yelped and ran her light blade around her legs to behead them. They just had to be snakes. Like kittens hadn't been feasible? A puppy? Wolves? Anything but them. Well maybe not spiders. Snakes and spiders gave her the heebie-jeebies. It was too much movement and sound, and she dropped to the ground and rolled as Rush roared above her and came crashing down with an earth-shattering punch into the dirt. Before she could even stand, he was over her with his fangs bared, and it was now or never on those spores.

For the start, she'd held the spell in place but when she released it they latched onto his skin wherever they'd attached to him as he moved. Rush looked to them and hissed as he tried to get them off, but the magic had already sank into his arms legs and chest. It wasn't light magic of course, though it could be if she wanted them lethal. These were like malt balls, except reverse. Little fuzzies of harmless light until they were opened and then darkness reared its ugly head and ate at his flesh.

Rush thrashed and backed away from her, building up magic inside of him to a height powerful enough to expel hers. Like him though, she wouldn't give him the chance. If she got bruises and had to live with them, so did he. Mer parried his hand as he tried to push her away, and she thrust her blade of light out and grazed his side.

She'd meant to pierce it, and she cursed as he slammed the back of his hand into her. Most of the blow was absorbed into her blade of darkness as she blocked it with a small shield spell, but it sent her flying through the air. The air was fine. Rush was still struggling with his insides enough that she had time for a spell. This one she'd worked on with her aunt and father. Lifting her blade, she called down her magic like rain, and it formed together in globs of darkness that fell on both of them.

They were slow, so Rush had no issue dodging them, but when the amorphous meteors hit the ground they exploded and sparks of light magic shot out and pelted him. Flesh singed where they touched and Rush roared again as he tried to get at her but was kept away by the explosions of magic. All around him was a cascade of painful embers, and he'd yet to dispel the dark magic she'd shoved into him. He knelt to concede defeat, and excitement bubbled up in her as she allowed her magic to hisss away.

"Are you okay?" Mer asked as she walked up to him, and Rush flicked his emerald eyes up with a fire burning in them.

"You are getting better," Rush said. Any praise from him was high praise because he barely gave it out.

Warmth flooded her chest and she reached to hug him, but he groaned as her arms circled him. With a breath of her magic, she pulled out the lingering weight of her darkness within him, and he slumped against her with a relaxed sigh. Rush didn't do halfway, so he took her all the way to the ground, lying on her with his full body of taut muscles as he inhaled her scent and growled. It wasn't in desire as she'd expected, and she lifted his face to frown at him.

"You're upset?" Mer asked. "You said you wanted me to be stronger, so you can't get grumpy the first time I win." This was her first win, but something in Rush's eyes seemed off. They weren't filled with pride like she'd hoped they'd be, and she flopped on her back to relax with him half lying on her.

"I'm not upset," Rush whispered into her collar bone as he trailed his lips up her skin in hunger more than anything. When she nicked and bled him in a fight, he craved fresh blood to heal his wounds.

"Well then what are you?" Mer asked, threading her fingers through his short dark hair and loving the feel of his magic under her fingertips.

"Afraid."

Mer wasn't sure she'd heard him right, and pain tightened her chest.

"I'm sorry. I do not mean to be," Rush said into her skin, not lifting his eyes. "I love you and I know you love me, but generations of your house have decimated mine on the battlefield. It is irrational to think, but instinctual for me to feel. Powerful Aurion magic drives something into me that makes me worry that you will... change your mind."

"Rush," Mer chastised, lifting his chin and he bared his fangs at her in a superficial growl that she ignored. Had he wanted to see if he frightened her? "I am with you because I want to be, not because I didn't have another choice. You know that. Damien offered many time to off you, for which I declined, and there were several times I could have asked to be returned to the mages. I chose to stay. Here. With you. Even if I get powerful, I will never turn my magic on you, Rush."

"I know these things," Rush said, rolling off of her and looking up into the stars as the sun fully disappeared beyond the trees. "It will just take some time for me to become comfortable with your magic."

"Well, the more I shove it in you, the more familiar it will feel. Would you like an encore?" Mer held up her hand and spores floated around them that had Rush pressing back into the dirt. Laughing, she released the spell and they faded. "There are other ways to get familiar," she whispered into his shoulder as she rolled and slid a hand across his abs. "Perhaps you can shove something in me."

His muscles tightened, and he touched her fingers with his own, moving them lower until they glided over his erection that pulled his pants tighter. She gave it a squeeze, and he thrust into her hand with a groan of desperation that would have had him pinning and undressing her if another aura hadn't show up not far from them.

"Remus," Darius called out to him, and it wasn't like Rush could just brush off his father.

Rush let out a whine of agony that had her chuckling as he wrapped her fingers around the length of him through the jean fabric. "We're busy," Rush growled, but Darius walked closer and stood his ground, his long black hair flowing on the wind of the evening, blending in well with his black ornate robes he always wore.

"I can see that. It's nothing you don't do half a dozen times in any given day. A strange emissary arrived a moment ago claiming to be a vampire by the name of Vice. Said it was concerning your newling and Meredith's missing aunt. I assumed this matter was urgent but if you'd rather rut like ani–"

Rush was on his feet in an instant as was she, and he pushed past Darius before he finished his snarky retort. It had been nearly two weeks with no leads and Mer had been starting to lose hope. These torture sessions with Rush were all she could do to distract herself from the sinking feeling that her aunt might no longer be alive. Darius had also mentioned Dawn, and she hadn't seen the girl since they'd handed her over to Vice. If anything had happened to her...

In the greeting room, Vice stood still as stone with Dawn walking around him and looking at everything. Relief flooded through Mer as Dawn's smile found her way over, and in an instant, the girl was hugging her with a rumble of affection only vampires could make.

"Hey, Dawn," Mer said down to her, running her handover her curls, and the girl blushed from the affection, peeking over at Rush who looked just plain downtrodden that the girl hadn't miss him. As usual, she skittered behind Mer and narrowed her eyes on her real sire.

"It's nice to see you well, Dawn," Rush managed, and Dawn relaxed just a bit when he wasn't hostile. His expression wasn't exactly welcoming, but that was because Rush didn't have that expression for much of anyone but Mer herself. "Vice, you told my father you had news?" Rush turned to Vice and the man shifted nothing but his eyes to Rush, dressed in full stretch suit again.

Before he spoke, he pulled down his face covering. "Damien had been chasing leads from the berries he found in the complex, as you know. While the Dragon Blood trees were limited to a certain climate, it happened to be all of the lands north of Talamayas Sol's territory."

"The territory used to belong to the Valks and the Zehirs," Rush said with a nod.

"Yes," Vice responded, lowing his gaze to Dawn as if checking on her before he spoke again. "While the land is primarily empty, the complex is hidden and even spreading out as many foot soldiers as I could muster from my master, it was fruitless. There was just too much to cover."

"What does this have to do with Dawn?" Mer asked, impatient for what this had to do with the girl. All Vice was saying was that they'd found nothing, and she got irritated the more she thought about it. It was no fault of Vice's but every second spent meant another her aunt would suffer.

"She may be the key to us finding your aunt, which was why she was changed in the first place, I'm told." Vice narrowed his eyes on Rush even though they'd already been over this. There were mixed feelings on everyone's sides involving Dawn's change when she wasn't yet an adult. Vice had thanked him for changing her and giving her a chance at life, but also knew the repercussions as well as what she must now suffer.

A quiver shook Dawn, and Mer looked down to as she trembled against her. Magic pulsed from Dawn, and though her eyes stared directly ahead into nothing, one of them darkened into a roll of indigo. Vice was kneeling in front of her in an instant, and he waved a hand in front of her face to get her attention.

"Count with me," Vice said, and Mer could only watch as he held up ten fingers and slowly dropped and raised them intermittently enough that Dawn had to focus to imitate him until the purple glow in her eye dimmed to nothing. "There, it's okay now." Vice had such a soft voice for how emotionless he usually was, and Dawn stuffed herself into Mer's side.

"What was that?" Mer asked, resting her hand on Dawn's dark curls again.

"Dawn's magic manifested rather quickly," Vice said. "Most vampires feel a rush of power when they are sired and their calling is made apparent, but it usually ebbs off until they can focus on it as opposed to the hunger. In Dawn's case, the nature of her calling is not allowing it to fall away and wait till later. She has poor control and ends up sinking into it if she doesn't focus hard enough on outside stimuli."

"And the nature of her magic is what can help us find, Luna," Rush said, taking a few easy steps toward Dawn but staying far away enough that she wouldn't flee.

"Yes. Dawn's magic gives her the unique ability to see through the eyes of anyone who has..." Vice frowned and turned away from them. "It is much as it is with any vampire when they form a bond. Either an exchange of blood or fluids creates a connection to their magic and forms threads that they can feel. Anyone Dawn bites or..."

"You're saying she can see through the eyes of the masters because they raped her." Mer growled, and dark magic crawled up the arm that was not being held by Dawn. "That's it, isn't it? Vampires form bonds by sleeping with or biting someone, and she hasn't bitten anyone useful."

"That is the essence of it," Vice said, dropping his expression to his neutral. "Meredith Aurion, I want the masters dead as much as you, and Dawn has the ability to track each and every one of them. I would even say that it is beneficial for us to use her to find them, because by killing them, we can remove the unfortunate situation that has her seeing through their eyes. Such heinous things do not belong in the mind of a girl this young."

"What is it you need of us?" Rush asked, always more level-headed, but there was urgency in his voice.

Dawn was the first vampire he'd sired, and her being tormented every moment of any given day was clearly something he wished to stop. Even if Dawn did not love him as a sire, Rush cared for her. It was something that was charming about vampires, how much they loved their people, their loyalty to their own, and their willingness to do anything to protect their lives and happiness.

"We have narrowed down a few potential locations," Vice spoke to pull their attention. "Places with dangerous terrain and enough hard rock and soil to hide an underground complex. It will take too long to search every part of those areas though. We might not reach Luna in time. What we need is something concrete, a vision of the sky, a natural structure unique to the area."

"How do we come in?" Mer asked.

"Dawn is not calm enough yet to describe what she sees. Much of it is horrific. A sire can see into their newling's mind in the early stages, guide it through her memories and find something we can use. It has to be the real sire though. As much as Dawn loves you, Meredith, your mind could either be damaged or damage Dawn's depending on your power. Remus is the only one strong enough to withstand her dark magic and keep his own passive."

"I am familiar with the process," Rush said, glancing to Dawn. "It is sometimes used to stabilize the mind of a newling who does not take well to the change, guiding and pruning it." Rush looked to Mer's concerned face and smiled gently, just the barest lift of his lips. "I can allow you to see as well, Meredith, but you will not be able to interact with her mind as I can. Are you sure you want to see? You also feel her emotions, her fears, hunger, and desires. It is not something a human will handle well."

"I've been inside my father's mind when he's fed from someone, Rush. I think I can handle it. I know there is a lot I won't want to see, but Dawn gets no choice about any of it. If she can fight and persevere, so can I. We do it together?" Mer asked, reminiscent of their agreement as mates to never go it alone.

"Together," Rush answered, and they both looked to Dawn where she was nervously waiting for them. Now they just have to find a way to convince her that Rush wasn't dangerous. That was a feat with anyone.

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