Page 131 of The Wolf and the Chimera
When I gazed at them, they didn’t look like monsters, but rather, warriors.
Their gray and golden fur gleamed in the sunlight, and their wings were held proudly off the ground. Their ruby eyes were sharp and keen, but the man raced toward them without fear. Reminding myself they couldn’t see me, I sprinted behind him.
As the man darted up the steps, the towering black doors swung open on silent hinges. Before they could shut, I slipped inside.
My steps faltered.
Blazing in the center of the glimmering, dark space was a miniature sun. Red, orange, yellow, and white light churned within its depths. A female chimera stared at it pensively with ruby eyes. She wore a simple tunic, but a golden crown sat atop her silky, dark hair. In its center was a large, round obsidian.
Her gaze shot to the man, who drew close to her side and took her hands in his. As he sank to his knees, her jaw tightened.
“Dawn,” he whispered in Mycenaean Greek. I was grateful my father had taught me the ancient language. “We have only until the rise of the next dawn, Anassa.”
The light in Anassa’s eyes guttered, revealing dark pupils, but just as quickly, they blazed anew, and the sun in the center of the room became even brighter.
“I trust you’ve warned the others,” she said. “The leaders of the wolves, tigers, hawks, and bears—everyone must know.”
So many different leaders,I thought,but they still live together here.
Did shifters of all kinds used to intermarry?
It explained so much—why Ryder and I were mates, why so few wolves now found their other halves…
Their mates had been ripped from existence because of their ancestors’ mistakes. The other halves of their souls had been deprived of the chance to be born.
My chimera growled, and I forced myself to shelve the realization. It wasn’t what I was here to learn.
“They’re ready,” the man promised. “The shifters will fight as one.”
Anassa swallowed. “Good. It will take all of us to triumph over the gods.”
Disgust twisted the man’s features, and he shook his head.
“I knew they were desperate for power,” he said, “but I never thought they would try to use us as their vessels.”
Shock unhinged my jaw.
The gods betrayed us?
See,the sorceress whispered.I’m no different from the monsters you pray to.
“They’re desperate,” Anassa said. “With the tides of religion turning, they soon won’t be able to hold onto their physical forms.”
I had read that the gods once roamed the earth in physical forms, but I had assumed those stories were merely legends. The gods had no tangible bodies, except for the tides of the ocean, the winds of fate, and their influence over mortals. Artwork depicted them in certain bodies, but I always assumed those appearances were contrived from mortal imagination.
“It doesn’t give them the right to steal ours,” the man grumbled.
Anassa’s eyes brightened like brilliant, blazing rubies.
“No,” she agreed. “It does not.”
From the back of the room, a door creaked open, and a little, dark-haired girl rushed in. She threw herself into the man’s arms, and he forced a smile on his face.
“Hello, my girl,” he greeted.
She pulled back. “Aunt Anassapromisedshe’d tell me when you got home, Father.”
As the girl shot a playful glare at her aunt, the man ruffled his daughter’s dark curls, and she laughed. Sheappeared to be in her tween years. Youth still shined in her round cheeks, but her tan arms were toned by muscle, and her lanky form was too small to belong to a young child. Fierce as she was, she reminded me of Cadence.
