Saving Daylight Read online

  NOVELS BY SHANNON K. BUTCHER

  THE SENTINEL WARS

  Burning Alive

  Finding the Lost

  Running Scared

  Living Nightmare

  Blood Hunt

  Dying Wish

  Falling Blind

  Willing Sacrifice

  Binding Ties

  Blood Bond

  THE EDGE

  Living on the Edge

  Razor’s Edge

  Edge of sanity

  Edge of Betrayal

  Rough Edges

  DELTA FORCE TRILOGY

  No Regrets

  No Control

  No Escape

  AND MORE

  Go to www.ShannonKButcher.com for details.

  Saving Daylight

  by

  Shannon K. Butcher

  Saving Daylight

  The Sentinel Wars, Book Eleven

  By: Shannon K. Butcher

  Published by Silver Linings Media, LLC

  Copyright © 2018 by Silver Linings Media, LLC

  ISBN: 978-1-945292-24-8

  All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law. For permission requests, contact the author at ShannonKButcher.com.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

  Cover art: Dar Albert

  Editing: Julie Finley

  Table of Contents

  NOVELS BY SHANNON K. BUTCHER

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Chapter Twenty-two

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Chapter Twenty-four

  Chapter Twenty-five

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Chapter Thirty-two

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Novels by Anna Argent

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  Texas, January 23

  Morgan Valens had been assigned countless dangerous missions over the centuries, but this one was definitely going to end up in the top five, assuming it didn’t simply kill him.

  Serena Brinn was as deadly as she was beautiful. More than one Theronai warrior had returned home bearing the scars she’d given them as a warning not to seek her out again. Now it was Morgan’s turn to convince the stunning, violent woman to come home, where she belonged—where her people could protect her.

  Not that she seemed to need much help in the protection department.

  After two weeks of searching, Morgan had finally found her a few miles outside Austin, Texas, out in the middle of nowhere, standing at the maw of a giant system of caves known to house Synestryn demons. Her sword danced through the night air, the blade wet with dark red blood, and glinting, tiny reflections of the stars overhead.

  Her lean body was completely encased in dark leather that clung to her like a second skin. Her long, flaming red hair had been cut off at her shoulders recently. She wore no coat to protect her from the cold—or to give the demons she fought something to grab hold of. She was a streamlined, practical killing machine, all wrapped up in a sleek, curvy package.

  Morgan stood mesmerized for a moment. He was so stunned to see a woman fight like her—using a sword rather than magic—that even the crushing pain he carried around seemed distant and muted.

  He was completely entranced by the efficient beauty of her movements. Each one seemed choreographed, as if it had been designed to accompany an epic, sweeping soundtrack. The slash of her sword was too fast to see, leaving behind only arcs of silver starlight. While she lacked the strength he had, every blow was both powerful and clean, severing limbs or heads with each strike.

  A pile of demon bodies lay all around as proof of her skill.

  From his position a dozen yards away, he could see her breath glisten in the cold night air, mingling with that of the monsters she fought. Their animal stench was on the breeze, as well as the scent of wood smoke from a nearby farmhouse.

  Several of the demons were still alive—all eerily humanoid—wielding rough, rusty metal blades that were more clubs than swords. Unlike their furry cousins Morgan was used to fighting, these Synestryn were nearly hairless, with only small patches of fur dotting their shiny, grayish skin. They were almost seven feet tall, dwarfing Serena, with huge hands, thick limbs, and heads too wide for their bodies.

  Round, black eyes bulged from their sockets, gleaming with a feral light. Each beast that fell by her sword served only to embolden those left standing—more of her blood left for them.

  Only a second or two had passed, but it was too long to stand by and let her defend herself. As skilled as she was, a lucky blow could kill her just as dead.

  Morgan shook off his surprise at finding her in the midst of battle, drew his sword and charged.

  Before he’d taken three steps toward her, he realized his two-second pause had been too long. He was going to be one second too late to save her.

  Her sword arm extended for a heavy thrust into the guts of one demon, but in doing so, she’d left herself exposed. The creature on her right flank saw the opening and moved fast to take advantage of it.

  The heavy, rusty weapon it wielded swooped down hard. There was no way she could escape the blow—nowhere she could move to save her sword arm from amputation. Once she was weaponless and bleeding, it wouldn’t take long for the Synestryn to finish her off.

  And if these creatures didn’t, the scent of her blood would draw more from miles around.

  Morgan sprinted as he pulled in a breath, but before he could shout a warning, her body blurred, moving faster than he could believe.

  The air around them shimmered, and a strange, dull pop emanated from the center of combat. As that odd vibration washed over him in his mad dash toward combat, he felt a moment of vertigo and a rolling swell of nausea.

  Before the sensation vanished a split second later, Serena and her overextended arm were gone, leaving the demon swinging through nothing but air.

  With nothing to slow the momentum of the blow, the creature pitched forward in a clumsy fall.

  Serena stepped out from behind the demon and lopped off its head before it could recover its balance. Then she shifted her stance to avoid a heavy, lumbering blow from another one of the enemy coming from her left.

  “Behind you!” Morgan shouted as he ran toward her.

  Her gaze flicked to him, and then she spun around and launched into a series of slashes that were an impossibly fast blur of motion.

  “They’re mine!” she shouted as he raced through the surrounding brush. Before the w
ords even reached his ears, another of those bulbous heads was severed by her wicked blade. “Stand down!”

  If she thought he was going to simply watch her fight and wait for one of those creatures to get in a killing blow, she was even more off her rocker than reported.

  Rather than waste oxygen arguing with her, Morgan entered the fray, lifted his blade and went to work.

  The first demon was so intent on reaching Serena’s tender flesh that it didn’t even see Morgan coming. He sliced it in half with one powerful blow through its midsection that both killed fast and left a hell of a mess in its wake.

  The smell of rotting flesh and filth hit him hard. He had to hold his breath to keep the fetid stench from reaching inside of him. Better to fight without air than to breathe in something so noxious.

  He shifted his stance to engage one of the two demons left standing, and hoped for a nice, brisk breeze to carry away the smell of death.

  Even with all the gruesome trappings, Morgan loved combat. His muscles sang with familiar exertion. His pain eased enough that he could see through his entire field of vision. His mind cleared of all but the singular focus of taking out the enemy. He’d never fought shoulder-to-shoulder with a woman armed with a sword before, but there was a first time for everything—even for a man who had lived as long as he had.

  He was used to fighting beside his brothers, guarding each other’s flanks, and tracking minute shifts of movement that signaled their intent. But fighting with Serena was different.

  Female Theronai were rare. They were to be protected at all costs, not cast into the front lines of combat—at least not without the ability to sling around some serious magical firepower.

  She wasn’t bound to a male. She didn’t have access to the stores of energy they carried. As deadly as she might be, she had no business facing so many enemies in melee.

  He was so worried for her safety that his blows were off by a fraction of a second.

  That fraction cost him.

  Rather than lopping off the sword arm of the nearest demon, Morgan’s blade lodged in the thing’s hip bone and stuck fast.

  The monster screamed in rage. Its eyes bulged in pain as it flailed around, twisting him off balance. He tried to rip his sword free, but there wasn’t time. The demon’s weapon was speeding toward his head, and there was no way Morgan could stop it in time.

  A split second later, he saw a flashing arch of light, and the hand holding the crude sword spun off to his left in a twirling arc. The rusty blade hit his shoulder, but there was no force behind the blow anymore.

  Morgan shoved his boot against the demon’s thigh and jerked his sword free. Before he was done, there was another arcing gleam of light, and the creature’s head flew off in the same direction as its hand.

  The giant demon body toppled over next to the rest of its kind, spewing a pulsing ribbon of oily, dark red blood from its neck.

  The night fell quiet, except for the sound of dripping blood.

  Now that the demons were dispatched, Serena whirled on him, glaring. “I told you they were mine. You had no right to interfere.”

  Morgan scanned the area for more threats. “You looked like you needed help.”

  The second the words left his mouth he knew that had been the exact wrong thing to say.

  The temperature around him dropped in the face of her icy stare. “I’ve been on my own a long time, Theronai. If I’d wanted help, I would have requested it.”

  “Morgan,” he said.

  Her perfect brow wrinkled in confusion. “What?”

  “My name is Morgan, not Theronai.”

  Convinced that there were no immediate threats lurking in the shadows, he turned his gaze to her.

  As soon as he did, he forgot how to breathe.

  Serena was even more beautiful than he’d thought. He’d seen her from a distance once or twice at Dabyr before she’d gone out on her own, but he’d never been this close to her before.

  There was a powerful presence around her that sucked him in and refused to let go. He knew he was staring, but he couldn’t help it. She was so damn pretty, so enticing, he couldn’t even blink.

  Loose red curls framed her face, which was an artistic composition of dainty and bold features. Her eyes were huge, almost doll-like, the same rich, deep blue as a summer twilight. Her lips were a sweet ruby pink, full and completely kissable. She had a few freckles scattered across her narrow nose, but her skin was otherwise flawless. Not that he saw those freckles as flaws. He found them the only cute thing about her in the midst of sheer elegant beauty. They somehow made her seem more real, almost touchable.

  Not that he would make that mistake. She was too fast with her blade for him to take any chances. He liked all of his parts firmly attached to his body, right where they belonged.

  Besides, the warnings of the other men who’d come back with scars she’d caused were enough for him to proceed with caution.

  “I’m aware of your name, Theronai.” Her gaze dipped to his throat where the iridescent ribbon of his luceria lay close to his dark skin. Infinite colors swirled in the band, matching perfectly with those moving within the ring on his left hand.

  He’d been born wearing the trappings of his kind, and the fact that he still wore the necklace told the world he had yet to find his mate.

  It had been so long since he’d been in the presence of an unbonded female, he’d forgotten how intimate it could be to have a woman lay eyes on the necklace.

  But rather than seeing longing for what he could offer her in her twilight blue eyes, all Morgan saw was a cold, empty chill.

  The rumors were true. Serena Brinn was no longer the happy, carefree girl she’d been before her ordeal. She was hard, relentless, angry.

  Deadly.

  She bent to wipe the blood from her sword—blood that was more red than black, which made it somehow even more disturbing.

  Demon blood was supposed to be black. It had always been black. That it was changing to become more human in color was deeply unsettling.

  All Theronai warriors had taken oaths to protect humans. If the demons the Theronai fought became too much like those they were sworn to protect…

  Morgan refused to dwell on that thought for long. He had a job to do, and one that demanded his full attention.

  “I saw your car parked out at the road,” he said. “Will you promise to follow me back to Dabyr, or do I need to make you ride with me?”

  “Neither. If you’ll excuse me, Mr. Valens, I’ll be on my way.”

  So, she did know his name. It made him wonder what else she knew about him.

  Or what she thought she knew.

  Everyone thought he was a player, with women three deep wherever he went. They thought he hopped from bed to bed whenever the whim struck him. He’d gone to great pains to cultivate that persona, because it was the only way to keep his fellow warriors from learning the truth—a truth he barely even allowed himself to think about.

  “No mister. Just Morgan,” he said. “And I can’t let you wander off alone again, especially after seeing the kind of risks you’re willing to take. I think you know that.”

  She sheathed her sword, and instantly, it disappeared. He could see the slight tug of its weight at the waistband of her clinging black leather pants, but that was the only visible sign, thanks to some ancient hocus pocus.

  His kind had learned long ago that walking around wearing a visible weapon was a good way to draw unwanted attention among humans. So, invisible swords were born to solve the problem, because going without was too dangerous. Until the recent surge of these too-human demons, the only way to kill a Synestryn had been through fire or decapitation, and beheading was definitely faster.

  The only thing worse than a demon coming at you to eat your face was one coming at you that was also on fire.

  Serena let out a longsuffering sigh. “Please don’t make me hurt you, Mr. Valens. I’m far too busy to spare the time.”

  Morgan cleaned and sh
eathed his own weapon in a series of movements as familiar as breathing.

  “I suppose you could try,” he said, his tone light, almost teasing. “I might even like it.”

  Her deep blue gaze hit his like a brick made of ice. “I promise you would not.”

  Morgan nodded. He knew this wasn’t going to be easy, but he’d hoped that she’d found some sense of reason since the last man had tried to bring her home. “Joseph’s orders were clear, Serena.”

  She flinched slightly at the use of her given name. She’d only been free from her prison for a few months now, and clearly, she wasn’t used to the current lack of formality in society. In her time, the use of first names was an intimacy saved for close friends and family, not men she barely knew.

  “I’m aware of his orders,” she said. “I simply don’t care for them. I’ve sworn him no oath of obedience.”

  “You’re worried about oaths? The walls of Dabyr have fallen. What’s left of our home is under attack almost daily. The first Theronai baby in two-hundred years has been born and there are more on the way. Demons want them. Our fighters are spread out among shelters, trying to protect both them and the humans who managed to make it out of the attack alive. We need every sword arm we can get, and from what I’ve seen, yours is formidable.”

  Serena hadn’t been at Dabyr when the walls fell. She hadn’t seen the carnage and devastation left behind after the attack. As much as Morgan wanted to spare her the pain of seeing their home destroyed, seeing the graves of the dead, her feelings were a luxury their people couldn’t afford.

  She started walking away, back toward the nearest road where she’d parked her ride.

  Morgan followed.

  This time of year, the brush was crunchy and dry, scratching at them as they passed. “I heard you were a charmer. Please know that flattery will get you nowhere.”

  “Why don’t you want to go back?” he asked. “What possible reason could you have to abandon your people when they need you most?”

  “My reasons are my own. Please respect them.”

  “I’m sorry, Serena. I can’t do that. If you’re not going to play nice, you at least have to tell me why.”