Casstiel; Born of Lightning

  CASSTIEL

  BORN OF LIGHTNING

  SHERI-LYNN MAREAN

  All rights reserved. Copyright © 2018 This book is for your enjoyment only. You may not sell, give away, copy, reproduce, distribute or transmit, in any form, (whole or part) by any means, electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, including photocopying, recording, printing, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior written permission from the author. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

  ALSO BY SHERI-LYNN MAREAN

  DRACONES; CURSED & HUNTED

  0~Primalthorn ~ Prequel Novella

  0.5~ Dragonsworn Guardian

  1~Dracones Awakening

  2~Dracones Revelation

  3~Dracones Betrayed

  4~Dracones Thaniel

  5~Dracones Rogue

  6~Dracones Guardian

  7~Dance with Darkness

  8~Defiant Wolf; Curse Breaker

  Sanctuary; Dragon Heart Awakened

  Return to Sanctuary; We All Gots Beasts

  LEAGUE OF SUPERNATURAL ASSASSINS

  1~ The Dragon Assassin

  * * *

  DRAGON HUNTER BROTHERHOOD

  1~ Saberthorn

  2~ Casstiel; Born of Lightning

  1~Alien Vampire Hunter; Kiss of Darkness

  1~Fantasy Lovers; Her Dragon, Wolf & Vampire Mates

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A huge thank you goes to the following people; my amazing Editor Laura LaTulipe, My Beta Readers: Christine Works, Tomirika Myles, Denise Keel & Justine Beltrame, my fantastic ARC team and my wonderful PA & VA; Barb Shuler & Mindy Seal.

  FREE BOOK

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  GLOSSARY/PRONUNCIATIONS

  Adariasthorn - Ad air ee as thorn.

  An bell = Angel’s underbelly, Cass’s village.

  Aries - Air ees = Cass’s son.

  Assaul - Ass aul = Rebel.

  Ashara - Ash air ah = 1/2 human, 1/2 Fire-born.

  Ban Seeve - Ban See v = Dead Realm.

  Boarkin = Large, shaggy, 4 legged, horned creatures.

  Calelah - Call eh ah = Ilyium city on Tartaria.

  Casin - Case in = Ashara’s oldest son/deceased.

  Casstiel - Cass tee el.

  Chairal - Share all = Clan Thundrace.

  CorZica Di’osa = Core zick ca de osa. Dying realm.

  Diamosa - Die ah mosa. Red Realm.

  Estan - Es tan = Ilyium council leader.

  Fensavinor - Fen Sav in or = Dracones male.

  Flutterby - Flutter by = Butterfly 3-6” long.

  Git-lizers - Git liz ers = Reptile with wings.

  Gitlocks - Git locks = Reptile. Wingless.Suction feet.

  Greegores - Gree Gore’s = Ilyium council member.

  Haszar - Hays are = Cass’s dead brother.

  Joustal - Joust al = Another Realm.

  Koya - Koy ya = Thick, long black veggie.

  Lee-en - Lee en = dragonkind girl

  Mata - Mah tah = Mother in Tartarian.

  Maya - May ah = Cass’s dead mate.

  Mihel - My el = Tirah’s brother.

  Night - Night = Rebel.

  Rockiah - Rock kiah = Clan mate, tough female.

  Rockon - Rock on = Rockiah’s father.

  Saberthorn - Saber thorn.

  Selkerova - Sell care ovah = Ancient Fallen.

  Shayaira - Shay air ah = Clan mate.

  Shennta - Shen ta = Healer/Clan Leader/Thundrece.

  Skye - Sky.

  Tabbela - Tab bella/clan mate.

  Tarnus - Tarn us = Tartarian curse word.

  Teros - Ter ose = dragonkind boy.

  Thundrace - Thund race = Male Clan Leader.

  Thundrece - Thund reese = Female Clan Leader.

  Tirah - Tear ah = Saber’s Mate, Ashara’s daughter.

  Vai - V eye = Tartarian word for love.

  Wren - Ren = Ashara’s youngest son.

  Zabelliat Zarch - Zabel ee at Zar ch = Dead Realm.

  Zales thorn - Zay ells thorn.

  Ziri - Zeer ee = 1/2 hell demon, 1/2 rift dragon.

  CHAPTER 1

  Eight years after Maya …

  * * *

  I’m dying, yet I live without you. Casstiel directed the thought up to his mate in heaven, then closed his eyes. As his magic faded, the thunder eased up and the snapping and sizzling bolts of lightning slowly died out. His head fell into the blood-soaked dirt. He lay there and let his body go lax. A rancid, charred stench surrounded him as ash slowly fell to the ground like grey flakes of snow, only nastier. It was done. He should feel better but never did. That angry pit—the bottomless black void inside him—continued to stretch for miles, yawning, craving more.

  He sought oblivion but was never quite able to reach it, no matter how he tried, or what he did, and today wasn’t any different. Bit by bit, his body came out of the comatose state he sought and awareness grew, until he could feel each and every stinging cut and wound. They covered him, and he didn’t care. They’d heal and the pain was good.

  Maya, why did you sever our bond and leave me behind? The question reverberated quietly through his mind, just as it had millions of times over the last eight years since his soul mate’s brutal murder. Though he hadn’t always been silent in his quest for an answer. The agony of loss so long ago, yet so fresh, had moisture prickling the backs of his eyes. Then a noise snapped them open. Shit, he was found once again.

  “Damn, Cass, you’ve got to stop this. It’s killing you.” Zales crouched beside him.

  “I fucking wish,” Cass groaned and rubbed at his face. He sat up and attempted to stand.

  Zales put a hand on his chest, stopping him. “Wait. At least let me remove the blade embedded in your side first.”

  Cass really didn’t care if it stayed or left his body, though it would probably be a hindrance if it wasn’t removed. When the enemy’s short sword was no longer piercing him, Cass’s wound started to knit itself back together.

  Zales tossed the blood-soaked weapon and helped him to his feet. “I called Saber. We’ve been looking everywhere for you … again.” Zales glanced around with dispassion.

  Cass gazed at his handiwork—the bodies and scorched remains of his enemy’s outpost. A sick satisfaction filled him at the sight of another Ilyium base wiped out.

  Yet no matter how many he destroyed, it wasn’t enough. The rage still ebbed and flowed like an out-of-control river, demanding more, and he knew it would never be enough. Not after what the bastards had done—what they had taken from him. No, he’d not stop until they were all burned to ash and scattered to Tartaria’s four corners. Or, until he found what he was looking for.

  “Cass?”

  He shoved a couple strands of blood-and sweat-streaked, dark-blond hair out of his face and took in his friend. With piercing blue eyes, and dark hair trimmed in a skull cut, Zales was more than a friend. Zales and his brother Saber were of the few remaining who he could call family.

  “I know you want to die. Anyone who lost a soul mate they’d bonded to would, but this …” Zales shook his head. “Don’t you think you’ve been punished enough?”

  “No. Never. And I’ll not stop until I fuck fate right up her twisted ass.”

  “What does fate have to do with anything?”

  Cass blinked and looked away. “She’s fucking with me.” At the question in Zales’s eyes, he sighed. “It’s nothing. Forget it.”

  “Cass, is there something you’re not telling me?”

  “Don’t know. What am I supposed to tell you? When I piss, or jack—”

  Zales let out a growl. “This is the third outpost you’ve torched his month, and the seventh this year. How do you even find them with their cloaking?”

  Cass smirked without humor. “Takes some doing, but it’s a neat little trick that I recently discovered.”

  “You still seem to be out of control.” Zales indicated their surroundings and wrinkled his nose at the stench.

  “They deserved it.”

  Zales sighed. “They do. For all the pain and suffering they’ve caused, I agree. But you’re lucky there weren’t any innocents here. What about next time?”

  “None of them are innocent. Besides, I’d never hurt anyone who doesn’t deserve it,” Cass answered.

  “I understand Maya’s murder, and her breaking your soul-bond hurts you still after all these years—”

  “She took half my soul with her,” Cass snarled.

  “I know. I can’t imagine how you’re even alive, but are you sure you aren’t turning rogue?” Zales studied him with eyes that always seemed to see so much.

  Cass ground his teeth, the reminder of what he lost raising his anger another notch. Though she was taken from him eight years ago, the agony, despair—that dark, gaping hole in him—all made it seem like it was just yesterday. “I’m not turning rogue. I swear on Maya’s soul.”

  “You don’t know that, and this shit”—Zales indicated what was left of the Ilyium base, then stared pointedly at Cass’s shaggy beard and mustache—“along with the way you’ve let yourself go, is a damn good indicator that your humanity is deteriorating.”

  Cass had considered shaving the beard off but just didn’t care enough to follow through, and besides, what he did with his body wasn’t Zales’s business. “Just because I’ve decided to be proactive where our enemie
s are concerned means I’m turning rogue?” he snapped, though in all honesty, he should be worried at how often he got lost in the darkest part of himself.

  “You know that isn’t what I mean. We all turn rogue when we lose enough of our souls, and without a mate—” Zales left the rest unsaid. Without a mate, all dragonkind males started to lose their souls. Then their humanity went, leaving them angry, fire-breathing, killing machines.

  Cass’s heart squeezed in his chest. Maya had hurt him more than he could have ever imagined when she severed their bond so that he wouldn’t follow her. Even worse was the feeling that he hadn’t been enough for her. That no matter his love, she obviously hadn’t felt the same. “I promise you, I’m not losing my soul,” he ground out, ready to be done with the conversation.

  “How can you promise that?” Zales asked but didn’t wait for a reply. “Cass, if the need to scorch the realms is upon you, you have to let me or Saber know.”

  “Why, so you can attempt to put me down? Good luck with that. Or, maybe you hope to contain me?”

  Zales sighed. “You’re family. You need to let us know.”

  Zales was right and Cass should have felt guilt at the very least for failing at his duty. He was a sentinel if the dragon hunter brotherhood. A brotherhood tasked with defending dragonkind and all innocents. What was more, Saber and Zales were like brothers to him. Yet he felt nothing but a cold darkness inside.

  * * *

  Zales hated causing his friend more pain, but he needed to know what was going on. “I’m concerned, that’s all.” Maya’s death had hit them all hard, but what she’d done to Cass should have been impossible. If you couldn’t count on joining your mate in the afterlife, what could you count on?

  “Don’t be. I’m not worth it.” Cass’s green eyes grew dull.

  Zales wanted to growl in frustration, but instead, held his tongue and turned to stare into the sky where a large, black dragon was bearing down on them. Saber.

  Another who Zales couldn’t help but worry over.

  With Saber’s reckless ways and thirst for vengeance, Zales knew it was only a matter of time before his brother was completely lost. When Saber did turn rogue, there wouldn’t be a hell of a lot that Zales would be able to do for him. Saber was older, stronger, and much more powerful than him. Who could he turn to for help? His gaze landed on Cass. Though older than both he and Saber, the other dragon shifter was nowhere near powerful enough to take out a Thorn brother. Besides, even if he were, Zales could never ask it of him.

  He had no good answers and bit back the agony at the thought of losing yet another sibling.

  Saber landed and shifted into human form. “Doing some more cleanup, Cass?” Saber’s blue eyes gleamed in satisfaction as he surveyed the carnage.

  “Keeps me busy.” Cass’s shoulders drooped, and he limped a slight bit as he walked away from them.

  “Cass,” Zales called, wanting to understand what his friend meant earlier.

  “Ask Saber. He’ll tell you.” Cass didn’t look back and instead shifted into a luminous silver dragon, then shot into the waning evening sky. They felt his power: an angry magic. Dark clouds swiftly gathered, followed by bright flashes of white, blue, green, and pink lightning, zipping from the heavens, and drawn to him.

  “Ask me what?” Saber eyeballed the carnage.

  “Cass claims he isn’t turning rogue.” Zales sighed.

  “He isn’t.”

  “Why are you both so certain?” Zales asked.

  Saber grimaced as he glanced at the speck in the sky that was Cass flying away from them. “Because there’s something—someone keeping Cass here. It is tethering him to the land of the living and is what prevented him from taking his life and joining Maya.”

  Zales soaked up that bit of news. “I’ve never in all my years heard of such a thing happening.”

  Saber shrugged. “Me neither.”

  “Do you think it’s his and Maya’s young?”

  Saber shook his head. “No, it’s not them.”

  “Damn.” Zales swore softly. “No wonder he’s so full of rage. I wish I would have known.”

  “Sorry, wasn’t my place to say.”

  “So, how do we help him?” Zales asked.

  A familiar darkness, along with resignation in Saber’s blue eyes, made Zales shiver.

  “We can’t.”

  CHAPTER 2

  Truth Revealed

  * * *

  Ten years after Maya …

  Cass was in the middle of trying to save his best friend’s life when that faint, elusive, and detested connection that always seemed to be with him, slowly began to grow. Hands suddenly shaking, he paused in cutting the poisoned flesh from Saber’s back and drew in a steadying breath before he dropped the blade.

  Hatred surged anew at the link tethering him to this world, and just like it always did when he thought about it, his resolve to join his lost mate in the afterlife strengthened. It didn’t matter that he was no closer to discovering why Maya had broken their bond and left him behind in the first place.

  However, he needed to find and destroy the one holding him here first.

  Was it possible that after ten excruciating years, that possibility was drawing near? He sucked in another deep breath and fought to rein in the urge to go—to drop what he was doing and seek out the witch holding him here.

  How he knew it was a female he couldn’t say … and didn’t care. It had to be a druid witch who had conjured the spell, for who else would even want to. He could just imagine whoever it was who had him tethered to this world must be laughing her ass off over how she’d screwed him.

  Cass gazed down at Saber and bit back his frustration. He needed to hurry, then he could leave, yet he also needed to be careful he didn’t do any more damage than had already been done to his friend. Drawing in another deep breath to steady himself, Cass attempted to clear his mind. He couldn’t just leave Saber like this, he’d die. “Demons, Sabe. How do you get into these messes?”

  There was no answer, but Cass knew how. With the same disregard for his own life as Cass, Saber ended up being stabbed in the back when he fell for the fiery-haired female hovering over him with tears in her eyes.

  Cass knew it wasn’t her fault, but rather her evil brothers. Still, it angered him. “Good thing that bastard is dead,” Cass muttered under his breath, as he finished removing the putrid substance.

  In the back of his mind, he kept tabs on the steadily growing connection, mildly reassured that he wouldn’t lose it. This was the strongest he’d ever felt it.

  When he was finally done, he went and washed his hands and his blade off.

  Cass returned to Saber’s bedroom, prepared to take his leave, only to hesitate. The witch was close. Really, really close. He tensed up and was on the verge of telling Zales that there were some Ilyium near, when he realized what Tirah was about to do.

  Unable to help it, a low growl slipped out. She was going to bond with his best friend, and it was hard to get over the fact that she had helped murder Maya.

  Cass wanted to rage at the heavens. He loved Saber like a brother, and wanted him to live, but damn, to bond with the enemy?

  What the hell had Saber been thinking?

  Saber spent ten years of his life tracking this female, going from realm to realm, all so that he could destroy her—the last Ilyium who’d been there that night Maya was killed and his brother was sucked into a hell realm. And Cass had followed, wanting his shot at her.

  Damn, Saber. You were supposed to kill the female, not mate with her.

  Though really, if Saber had kept his promise to Cass, he would have turned her over and let Cass take his revenge. It was only fair. After all, Saber had been the one to interrogate and dispose of everyone else responsible for Maya’s murder.

  Yet if he were honest, he had to respect Tirah for seeking him out when she knew he wanted her head. All to save the male she loved.

  A sound outside of Saber’s room snapped Cass from his dark thoughts and his heart nearly stopped. She was here, now. But how could this be? Saber’s lair was warded. No one but a friend, ally, or family should be able to get it.