You know him, whispered the voice in her head. He’s important.
Yes, but who was he? Though she searched her mind frantically, Alli couldn’t find a name to match with the tall stranger.
“So,” the Overlord boomed as the warrior came to stand before him. “You come by yourself this time. Where is that pretty little concubine of yours? The one who’s going to be mine very shortly?”
“She will never be yours,” the warrior growled. His deep gravelly voice sent shockwaves through Alli. “She has gone beyond your reach.”
“Liar!” the Overlord snarled. “Did you think to hide her in another universe, perhaps? I can find her there just as well as here.”
“Even if you do, you’ll never be able to feed on her,” the warrior with the mirrored eyes said. “Because she’s bonded to me. You’ll be unable to get a single shred of emotional sustenance.”
“What?” the Overlord roared. “How dare you deny me the female I want?”
“It’s about time somebody denied you,” the warrior snapped back. “You’ve gotten away with far too much already. You’re in the process of ruining our society with your wanton cruelty and corruption! We never used to torture the females we fed from, but you’ve normalized it, just as you’ve normalized so many other forms of evil.”
The Overlord seemed to grow even angrier for a moment. His eyes glowed blood red. But then, to Alli’s surprise, he threw back his head and laughed.
“I should be angry with you for putting your little concubine out of my reach, but why bother?” He sneered at the warrior. “You fool—you bonded with her and sent her back to her own place, leaving yourself with no sustenance. You’ll starve to death—you’ve signed your own death warrant!”
“Not before I sign yours!” The warrior sprang forward and as he did, a glittering silver knife appeared in his hand.
The Overlord saw it and jumped to his feet. Throwing off the fur cloak he wore, he pulled out a knife of his own. He got the blade up just in time to block the warrior’s attack. But the warrior wasn’t done yet.
“I challenge you,” he growled as the two males started circling each other before the golden throne. “To a fight to the death—for your throne and title and for the honor of our people. I challenge you, Overlord!”
“No!” Alli screamed, sinking to her knees. She was clutching her head in both hands, squeezing to try and stop the horrible bolts of pain ripping through her temples like jagged shards of lighting. “No, turn it off. Turn it off!”
“Alli, honey, are you okay?” Sophie knelt beside her, an arm around Alli’s shoulders while Caroline hastened to shut off the PORTAL.
“No,” Alli was moaning, over and over again. “No, no, no, no…”
“What’s the matter, was that him?” Caroline asked, kneeling on her other side. “Was one of those men we saw the one who took you?”
But Alli could only shake her head. Her mind was in turmoil. The little voice kept insisting that she knew those people she’d seen in the other universe—that the warrior with the mirrored eyes was vitally important. But her brain wouldn’t tell her who he was or how he was important.
The dichotomy between the two sides was ripping her apart and the pain in her head was so bad Alli felt like it was going to explode.
“Call Liv!” Sophie ordered Caroline. “Get on the Think-me and get her here now!”
A few eternities later, Sophie’s twin sister, who was also a doctor, was there.
“…having some kind of attack,” Sophie was telling her. “Seems to have something to do with something she saw on the PORTAL.”
They tried to talk to Alli but by that time she was curled into the fetal position, her head clutched in both hands, moaning. The headache was like the worst migraine imaginable and it was made worse by the constant voices in her head.
You know him! No, I don’t! Yes, you do! What’s his name then? You know him…
Over and over, round and round, until Alli thought she was going crazy.
“Some kind of mental break,” Liv was saying. “Need to give her a sedative to help her relax.”
Then something was being injected into Alli’s arm. As the needle bit into her flesh and darkness began to eat her vision, her last thought was,
It only hurt for a moment when he Stung me. After that it was all pleasure…
And then everything went black and she knew no more.
Thirty-Eight
Kane stood over the body of the Overlord, his knife dripping red, still clutched in one hand.
I won, he thought, feeling stunned. How did I do that? How did I best the Overlord?
But he knew the answer—it was the Goddess. The one from the other universe—Allisandra’s universe.
After a long and vicious fight, the Overlord had overpowered him. His blade had been at Kane’s throat and Kane had been thinking,