Page 88 of A Dawn Of Blood

Just thinking about it makes me want to spend the night sobbing into my pillow. Tears start to run down my face.

But the more Idothink about it, the clearer my path becomes. Sure, his worldview is still highly problematic and inexcusable, but my mate is not someone who’s had any semblance of a normal life. I shouldn’t be worrying about him resisting me, I should be focusing on exercising patience, to a greater extent than ever before.

Already worn out but slightly comforted by that conclusion, I wipe my tears away and open the book again.

They’re not logograms, they’re syllabic signs, he said, which would mean that the symbols don’t represent whole words, but sounds.

This shouldn’t be true, because it would mean the text is much older than the contents suggest, but it’s not like I have an abundance of options.

The first part could bereh.

The secondyah.

Reh-yah, I mouth to myself. Reh-yah.

I frown.

That’s an actual place. The Reh-yah Temple.

But it can’t be. If I’m lucky and this really is referring to Baldur’s mother, what in the name of gods could she have to do with a place in Deep Egypt?

The very next moment, my eyes widen and my skin breaks out in goosebumps as a memory from a past life floods me.

Of what Baldur looked like when I knew him, before I dismembered him.

I push myself up in bed, straining not to lose the memory.

The first time I ever laid my eyes on Baldur was during a hunt in the forest near my birthplace. It was in the dead of winter and the world around me was so white, it was hurting the eyes.

There, in the midst of a snowstorm, I saw a man emerge from among the trees. He was unlike any man I’ve ever seen before. While the people I grew up with were all pale, blonde and bulky, this one was dark-skinned, black-haired and slender.

The Baldur from my past life, he never did look Norse at all.

Chapter 61

I’m excited because I strongly think this will be it — the last part of our mission to get the bones. It’s in the middle of the night that we finish the preparations and use the Pull to get to the main railway station in Cairo. It’s the closest one to the temple that we could find. I jump out and take a moment to look around.

Even after midnight, the crowd and the heat are unbearable, so I’m feeling grateful we didn’t take Lorcan with us this time. It’s just Nuala, Dryden, Raven, Cain and myself.

“Alright,” Nuala tells us as soon as we all gather around her. “The temple is in the catacombs, which actually goes in our favor. There shouldn’t be anyone there. But until we get there… Given that Cairo is part of the Free World as well, this shouldn’t be a dangerous mission. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be careful or wary of interacting with people while we’re still above ground. We don’t want anyone to find out what we’re doing here.”

She finishes with a pointed look she throws at everyone individually. We all nod and with that, she gets moving, turning on her heel and starting to lead us through the crowd.

It’s to the outskirts of the city that we’re headed, where the entrance into the catacombs hides. As we walk, my excitement only doubles. I’m not just about to get the second of the three items we need for the sword. I’m also about to see a part of Deep Egypt — a web of already existing catacombs the vampires settled in after the ancient Egyptians decided they posed a threat and forced them underground.

But once we get to the entrance, it’s not a quiet, mystical place exuding history that we find. Sure, it’s in the middle of nowhere, it’s a crumbling opening and it’s still adorned with ancient carvings, but there’s unambiguously modern music blaring from its depths and little groups of drunk people hanging outside.

We slow to a stop, exchanging a hesitant look.

“Want some molly?” a dark-skinned guy with dreadlocks comes to ask.

Nuala just shakes her head and makes us take a few steps back. “What the hell is going on here?” she hisses.

I press my lips tight to suppress a chuckle. “I believe it’s called a rave. It falls under the general category of ‘fun’.”

“Really?” Dryden asks teasingly. “Should I have taken you to one of those then?”

I turn to roll my eyes at him, but it’sCainmy gaze gets drawn to. He’s gone unnaturally still, only his eyes darting between me and Dryden.

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