Free Pursuit: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 4) by J.A. Cipriano

Guard before looking back at each other. Joshua quirked his lips into a grin as he stepped toward me, arms at his side.
    “Do I get a hug too?” he asked, standing there unsure of what to do.
    “No,” I replied, and he seemed to deflate a little, shoulders slumping in defeat. “I only hug people I like,” I added because I was feeling particularly snotty.
    “Look Lillim, I’m sorry about the dragon thing,” he said, glancing past me and staring at some fixed point in the distance to the left of my head.
    “You can’t even say that without looking away like a liar. And besides, you just knocked out Charlie. He was harmless,” I snapped.
    “He was here to take you back to Masataka,” Joshua said, an incredulous look plastered across his face.
    “For reasons,” I said, waving off his comment. “You ran away from him. How do you expect me to believe you’re here to save me when you ran away at the first sign of trouble?”
    Joshua shut his eyes and clenched his hands into fists for a moment before very slowly opening his eyes. “Look, we don’t have time for this. Anyone keeping tabs on these two buffoons will have seen that Vajra explode. If I’m right, Masataka will be on his way here right now. We need to leave,” he said, reaching out and seizing my wrist in his hand. His flesh was cool and clammy against my skin as he tried to tug me forward.
    “So how did you find me?” I asked, resisting for a moment before allowing him to pull me away from Charlie’s unconscious body.
    “I’m a demon. You’re in the demon home-world. This is like the one place I would be able to find you,” he responded with a shrug.
    “Okay… Let’s say I buy that, which I don’t, but let’s say I do. That doesn’t explain how he found me,” I said, pointing at Charlie.
    “The fates pinpointed your location. As soon as they couldn’t find you anywhere it correlated you last known position with that of Ordain’s and posited you could be here.”
    “So how’d they get here then? You said it yourself, this is a demon world.”
    “Well…” he trailed off for a moment. “That’s the thing. Masataka has been doing some bad stuff back home. He got your mom to open the gate. He tried to get me to do it, but I escaped before he could manage that. Your mom was ordered by the council to open the gate here.”
    “My mom wouldn’t help Masataka, not after what he did,” I replied and couldn’t keep the relief out of my voice as tears filled my eyes. It was the first good news I’d had in a long time because, despite the Royal Guards coming for me, Masataka hadn’t killed my mother after our squabble.
    Joshua spun, grabbing me by the shoulders and shaking me so suddenly that it surprised the crap out of me. I was raising my hands to throw him off when he stopped and looked at me with a mixture of pain and anger that didn’t fit on his normally aloof face.
    “Lillim, you don’t get it. You’re a fugitive from the Dioscuri and Masataka is forcing everyone who knows anything about you to help bring you in. He’s saying you murdered Reath Al Akeer.” Joshua’s voice was so angry that it made me shiver. I swallowed once, not quite looking at him.
    “But Masataka killed him. My mom was there, she saw it—”
    Joshua cut me off with another shake. “So what? That’s what you don’t get. Your mom is a prisoner in the dungeon. Nothing she says matters. Even your dad can’t get her out of holding. No one but Masataka is talking to her.”
    “How can that be possible? She’s the leader of the Dioscuri, the Sagalie Tyee!” I growled. “She’s the most powerful Dioscuri in Lot.”
    “And Masataka is the leader of the Royal Guard and brother to the King. You think Mitsoumi is going to stop Masataka? Mitsoumi won’t do anything to stop his brother, you know that,” Joshua said with a sigh that made my heart sink.
    That was true. For better or for worse, Mitsoumi would not interfere with his brother, even if it