Ash was beside her in an instant. "Breathe easy," he whispered.
Tabitha couldn't speak anymore as she laid her head against Valerius's neck and inhaled the warm scent of his skin. She would have never thought to feel this way about anyone.
She felt strangely protected even though she couldn't fight for herself.
"We need to get her to safety," Valerius said sharply.
Ash nodded.
One second they were in the driveway outside of Kyrian's house and in the next they were in Valerius's room in his home.
Valerius looked relieved as he laid her gently down on his mattress. "Are you all right?"
"I think so," she whispered. The pain was starting to abate a bit.
He offered her a warm smile before his face hardened and he turned to look at Ash. "What are we facing?"
Ash took a deep breath and appeared to debate what to say for several minutes. "That ghost outside of Kyrian's house was Desiderius. The good news is he isn't corporeal... yet."
"But I fought him in corporeal form," Valerius said. "He attacked me earlier."
"When?" Tabitha asked as her terror returned tenfold. "I didn't see him."
"He was the one the ghost protected at the end of the fighting. Remember?"
Tabitha shook her head. "That wasn't Desiderius. Believe me, I remember that bastard's face." She touched the scar on her cheek.
"No," Ash said. "It was his eldest son. According to Urian, they share the same name."
Tabitha rolled her eyes. "What is it with you ancient people that you only had, what? Three names in the whole family lineage and everybody recycled them?"
"It was tradition," Valerius said. "One I'm glad to have seen broken. Believe me, I take no joy from a name that reminds you of a cheesy song and a man doing unspeakable things in a high school gym. But I suppose, all things considered, 'Valerius' is infinitely better than 'Newbomb Turk.'"
Tabitha laughed at his unexpected comment, amazed that he'd actually understood her earlier reference to the movie The Hollywood Knights.
"Knowing Tabitha, I'm not even going to ask about that one," Ash said, rubbing a hand over his eyebrow.
Ash went suddenly rigid. Tabitha could sense his dread.
"Ash?"
"What happened?" Ash whispered without acknowledging her. It was as if he were talking to someone else.
"Ash?"
"You two stay here and do not leave this house again tonight." He vanished instantly.
She looked at Valerius, whose frown made a mockery of her own. "What was that about?" she asked.
"I don't know, but I have a feeling it's not good."
Ash entered his home in Katoteros with a whirlwind maelstrom flowing behind him. The fifteen-foot-tall, solid oak doors echoed menacingly as they slammed shut of their own accord in his wake. The minute he crossed the elegant threshold, his clothes changed from his modern-day Goth to ancient Atlantean. The seams of his jeans turned into tightly woven, crisscrossed laces that held the tight black leather pants perfectly sculpted to his lower body. His shirt and jacket dissolved away into a heavy black silk foremasta, a long duster-like robe that was left to flow regally around his lithe, muscular body. On the back of the foremasta was embroidered the emblem of a golden sun pierced by three silver bolts of lightning.
It was his personal symbol of power and it marked everything he owned.
Without stopping, he walked directly across the large black marbled foyer that held the same design in the center of the floor.
There was no furniture in the circular foyer, but the golden domed ceiling above him was supported by sixteen columns that had been carved into statues of the most prominent of the Atlantean gods.