Dane. Elizabeth Amber

      KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.

       http://www.kensingtonbooks.com

      For Heather Brewer, Mippy Carlson, J.A.M. Jansing, Debbie Tsikuris, Pam Mann, Katy Marcille, Kimmy Lane, Roberta Espinoza, Julie Kiesow, Tracy Brainard, and all the wonderful readers in my e-newsletter group at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ElizabethAmber.

      —Elizabeth Amber

      Contents

      PROLOGUE

      CHAPTER 1

      CHAPTER 2

      CHAPTER 3

      CHAPTER 4

      CHAPTER 5

      CHAPTER 6

      CHAPTER 7

      CHAPTER 8

      CHAPTER 9

      CHAPTER 10

      CHAPTER 11

      CHAPTER 12

      CHAPTER 13

      CHAPTER 14

      CHAPTER 15

      CHAPTER 16

      CHAPTER 17

      CHAPTER 18

      CHAPTER 19

      CHAPTER 20

      EPILOGUE

      PROLOGUE

      In centuries past, the Satyr lords secretly dwelled throughout Europe, working the ancient vineyards of the wine god, Bacchus. By 1820, their numbers had dwindled until few remained to protect the sacred gate between Earth and ElseWorld, a parallel realm populated with satyr, pixies, nereids, faeries, and other creatures of myth. Thirty years later, a treaty allowed more such creatures to come through the gate, and the satyr flourished in Italy. Other species were less fortunate. A Great Sickness arose, affecting females born of blood other than human, and in great numbers they died or were rendered infertile.

      It is now 1880. Interworld travel is largely restricted, except for business or diplomatic purposes specifically sanctioned by the ElseWorld Council. Within a corridor of lands that extends from Tuscany southward to Rome, all is so thoroughly bespelled that ElseWorld immigrants go unnoticed.

      Still, the magic that cloaks this territory is fragile, and discovery by humans is a constant threat to a small clan of Satyr lords in Rome. These brothers of ancient royal blood have been entrusted to safeguard artifacts, relics, and antiquities created by their ancestors, which are now under excavation by archeologists.

      Upon the coming of each new month, their blood beckons them to heed the full moon’s call to mate. To deny this carnal call is to perish. To heed it, bliss.

      1

      Rome, Italy

       EarthWorld, 1880

      “Dieux! Where the devil is it?”

      The sound of the woman’s voice drifted to him through a grove thick with olive trees. The early October breeze rattled silvery green leaves on gnarled branches, alternately revealing and concealing the meddling female from view. As she moved past in a direction parallel to him, he angled his jaw so his eyes could follow her.

      Perfect. Now he wouldn’t have to go hunting tonight.

      But he was still in transition, not yet fully in control, and so for now only filed the information of her arrival away to be considered later. Breathing deep of the cool twilight, Dante continued to slowly ease his way into a mind that belonged to another—Dane, his reluctant host.

      It’s for your own good, Dante soothed. For your protection. I’ll be gone again come morning. Relax now. Sleep.

      But Dane ignored this and fought on with an inner strength that was as admirable as it was futile. Subjugation could not be pleasant for one so strong willed. This changeover was always a strange time and an uncomfortable one, dredging up memories they would both prefer to forget. So Dante treaded carefully, confident he would ultimately prevail. Just as he had on the night of the full moon last month, and during all the Moonfuls that had come before over the latter half of Dane’s life.

      In a matter of moments, he’d assumed full possession. He was Dante now. Not a person in his own right, but rather an alternate personality that lay dormant inside Dane and came forth only when required. On occasions such as this one.

      Slowly, he uncoiled from his crouch on the forest floor. He shrugged broad shoulders, adjusting himself to the fit of this familiar set of bones and flesh he’d donned. The mind and, therefore, the body were his for the present. He would be master of them only until dawn.

      The tailored linen shirt he wore hung unbuttoned and open in front, gleaming white against the shadowed flesh of his sculpted chest. He flexed his hands and found them sore. He noted the ax on the ground a yard away and the felled limbs, the piles of encroaching vines, which had been freshly cut away from twisted trunks nearby.

      Ah, yes, he remembered now. When he’d first come into consciousness, they’d been working.

      He and Dane.

      Two facets of the same mind. Possessors of a single body.

      And it was a body women admired, sought, swooned over. Six and a half feet of solid brawn, wide of shoulder, narrow of hip. A strong column of throat, topped by a square-jawed masculine face with a prominent blade of a nose, and crowned with tousled sable hair. A face bearing a distinct resemblance to those of his brothers. It would have been too handsome save for one feature. From below straight brows, eyes of icy silver reflected the world, making him appear otherworldly and strange. Which he was.

      Through the fabric of his trousers, he found the feature that perhaps rendered him most aberrant. One he reveled in on these nights. Fondly, he stroked its considerable length with the pad of his thumb as if sharpening a precisely made weapon meant only to give and take pleasure. Already it stood thick and lofty and barely confined within his trousers.

      This cock of theirs symbolized the entirety of Dante’s role in things. He was the fornicator—only one aspect of the whole that was Lord Dane Satyr. Brought forth whenever this body’s lecherous need arose. He relished his role. And Dane envied him for it. Craved it for himself.

      A thrashing sound reached his ears. The woman. He’d known she was there all along, of course, had been tracking her with a small corner of his mind. Now his eyes found her again.

      She moved heedlessly through the grove, thinking herself alone. Now and then, she paused to tug at a branch, plucking an unripe olive or two from it. Holding these small bits of plunder to her nose, she then pocketed them as if gathering samples. The olives would not be ready for picking for another month, so he briefly wondered at her actions. But curiosity was not a failing of his. Dane, however, suffered from a wealth of it. And look where that had gotten them.

      Beyond her, the sun had just met the horizon, a huge ball of juicy orange jailed by black cypress spears that marched along the hilltop opposite this one. It turned her pale skin to gold, the shadows of her face to lovely bruises, her dark hair to