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to my dragon. Plus,
when he needed to teach me something he could just do it himself and I felt
exactly what I should be doing.”
    “I’ve seen the games the
lions play, the power struggles, and I have no interest in playing them,”
Liliana told Rachel. “When I become a nightshifter I will be a lion because
Lucien is my mate, but if he wasn’t going to be my sire and my clan leader I
wouldn’t even consider being a lion.”
    Doyle snorted. “If you think
lions play games, you haven’t been around enough wolves yet.” He just shook his
head probably thinking about all the drama he had to deal with on a daily
basis. Doyle’s horror stories always made me glad to be a fox.
    “You should think about the
sun too,” I said adding my two cents into the mix. “You spend a lot of time
sunbathing Rachel. Are you ready to give that up? Most nightshifters can handle
some indirect sunlight now that our beasts are awake, but even a moment of
direct sunlight could cause severe burns and death shortly after that.”
    “Okay, I get it,” Rachel
relented, throwing her hands in the air. “Isn’t there a way to make this
decision easier?”
    “ Twists and turns, the
world burns. Her only hope, a soul that yearns ,” Claire said cryptically
and tossed Rachel a gold coin.
    We all sat in stunned silence
as Rachel examined the coin. Claire probably saw hundreds of visions from the
future every day that only affected a small number of people. Then every once
in a while she saw what we called golden prophecies. During those visions she
cried golden teardrops and mumbled poems that later helped her make sense of
the images in her mind. She always had the gold she cried fashioned into
jewelry or coins that she gave to the person or people that would be involved
in fulfilling the prophecy.
    “What is that supposed to
mean?” Rachel finally asked.
    “It means that you shouldn’t
worry too much about making this decision dear, because it’s already been
made.”
    “Huh?”
    Claire just smiled serenely,
and locked eyes with Jasper.
    And that was the problem with
Claire. She controlled the future by doling out bits of information - not
enough to give us the full picture, but enough to keep us on the right paths.
The paths she thought we should follow at any rate. She felt that if she gave us
any more, then we might accidentally erase the futures we were meant to have.
    Dragon cleared his throat.
“Just remember, no one is allowed to create another nightshifter without my
approval.”
    He gave Rachel a hard look
that made her shrink back into her chair and squeak, “I won’t forget.”
    We lingered a while longer
talking about Peyton Manning’s record-tying performance in the game but when
they decided to watch a movie I took off. If I was lucky, Renee would still be
at the club and I’d be abl e to get some answers tonight.

Chapter Four
    ~ Solomon ~
    The Myths and Legends castle
was decorated in a style reminiscent of a Hard Rock Cafe, but instead of
focusing on music legends, the memorabilia and artwork highlighted various
supernatural themes based on the nearest attraction. Once you passed the
vampire lore outside Lilith’s Lounge and the nine circles of Hell surrounding
The Inferno, our fine dining restaurant, you came to a forbidding iron gate and
the entrance to The Dungeon, the Myths and Legends fight arena.
    The corridor beyond the gate
leading up to the arena was dark and damp, and thanks to my magic evoked a bone
deep chill that had humans looking over their shoulders as they passed the
small alcoves lining the rough, stone walls. Each of those alcoves housed an
old door with wide iron bands reinforcing the scarred planks of wood. The doors
had a small, barred window set at eye level. When humans looked through those
windows, they saw any number of mythical creatures trapped in the rooms beyond.
When supernaturals looked through the same windows, the shimmering rainbow of a
portal greeted them.
    The portals led to