Tradition Be Damned

by Rebecca Royce

  “You make me believe there’s still good in the world.”

  Kieran ran his hand down the side of my face. “You believe that all on your own. He’s affecting your mood, your outlook. But I’ll remember; I’ll hold on to who you are for you so it never goes away. When you need to be reminded, I’ll tell you. I know who you are, Anne. I knew when you were under the hood, and I know who you are now. I’ll hold on to you. I promise.”

  “How do I deserve you?” I kissed him hard, and he let me lead our caresses for a while until my hand started to shake.

  I sighed. Losing control was awful. How much longer would I be able to hold on?

  “This is a dash of time. It will become a distant memory, something you can hardly remember happening.”

  My heart turned over, and his eyes turned white. He sucked in his breath, and a slow, sexy smile took over his serious expression. Apparently it must have felt good, but I wasn’t getting the same results. I kissed the top of his head. He smelled clean, like soap. “Kieran, you have the biggest heart. You take care of me over and over again.”

  He raised his changed gaze to look at me. “You’re giving up. I can actually feel it now. We’re almost there. If this Sister can do what you say she can do, then this will all be over soon. I can tell you about the year we had.”

  “Must have been some year; you keep teasing me with it.”

  Kieran kissed my knuckles. “I don’t want that demon hearing about it. There were people involved I’d rather not give away to him.”

  I opened my arms. “Come cuddle before you pass out.”

  Mason had held out through our shower and breakfast but the others had all fallen off quickly after co-joining with me. I decided with the mine coming and the demon so close to taking me over, I was going to enjoy riding in the carriage with Kieran for as long as we had together.

  After a while, he did fall asleep, and like the others, he was silent in how he slept. I stroked his cheek and stared out the carriage window. The landscape was barren, and a puff of black smoke filled the air in the distance. I wondered what it was. Dizziness threatened me, and a strange, bitter taste filled my mouth.

  I gently moved Kieran until he lay on his side, and then I stood. I knocked on the top of the carriage three times, and it came to a stop. That’s how I’d seen the others do it when they needed to get out. Bryant stuck his head in. “I was going to come down. What’s wrong?”

  “He’s taking me.” I walked into Bryant’s arms and let him tug me upwards.

  “You need company. It’s all part of the energy.” He took me above, on top of the carriage with him. “Sit up here with us for a while. Get some fresh air.”

  Bryant was out of ideas, and so was I.

  Kieran roused in time for us to arrive at the mines. He poked his head out the window and looked up at us with a concerned look on his face. “Holding it together, Anne?”

  I wasn’t, but the mines were ahead. Mason sighed loudly. “An hour north is where my mother and sisters live. That’s where my father died, well below us.”

  “We can’t handle the demons down there until we find Sister Teagan. She can fix our sweetheart.” Garrett took my hand in his.

  I started to sweat. My hands shook, and a roaring sounded in my ears. I’d never been on this side of a possession before, but this couldn’t be good news.

  Frank stood in front of me. He reached out his arms. “I know this hurts. Honestly? I don’t know how I ended up possessing you to begin with, but it happened. How you have held out when I am who I am and you are who you are is beyond me. But you’ve done it. We’re done now. I can make this stop hurting.”

  Kieran rushed to my side. “Don’t listen to him. He’s a demon. He lies.”

  My body shook, and Frank finished speaking. “Or I can make it hurt more, Anne.”

  “She told Anne she was with the women hauling coal,” Bryant shouted. “Move. Move. Move.”

  Mason jumped down, and in a flurry of movement, I found myself in Kieran’s arms while the rest of them hauled off, presumably to find Teagan. I’d have fallen over if Kieran hadn’t been there.

  “You know you can’t beat me. Do you think they’ll take you back home? To the spirits? Or will you be here with me, forever? What will they call you? The Damned Sister. The Weird Sister who thought she could go north to help people and ended up possessed herself. What an entire disappointment you must be to your men. They took such a chance on you, came here and fought believing in worthless you.”

  Tears sprung from my eyes. Kieran was talking, but I couldn’t hear him, as if all other noises ceased to exist except for Frank. He wasn’t Frank, the demon I kept at bay; he was an original demon. I wasn’t anything.

  Still, I couldn’t go down without a fight. “I’ll choose pain.”

  And so he gave it to me.

  Eighteen

  Kieran

  I didn’t know about other worlds, about Sisters, spirits, or light. Milo could understand those things inherently, Garrett read about them, and sometimes Bryant seemed to remember. But not me. All I knew was that I loved the woman in front of me. I loved Anne like I had been born to do so, and therefore I believed I had been.

  I was simple that way.

  I held her in my arms as she screamed like the world was coming to an end. Her body shook, and eventually she full on seized against me. I held in the tears I wanted to shed. She needed me to be strong. I wasn’t weak, and I never would be, especially when it came to her.

  My mother had left me to die outside the prison where my father rotted inside. A possessed orphanage mistress used to try to strangle me in my sleep. I wouldn’t lose my Anne.

  Her pain, both physical and mental, filled me up inside. The demon had her emotionally in a chokehold. She rocked against me, screaming for help in a language I didn’t comprehend but somehow, because I’d co-joined with her, could fully understand at that moment.

  I kissed her cheek. Could she even hear me? I didn’t think she could. “They’re cold creatures, and you’re not, Anne.”

  I carried her to a sunnier location. This north in the Deadlands, the sky was always gray. Rain loomed constantly and, when it came, was unforgiving in its wrath. She needed sunlight.

  I found a patch and sat us both down in it. I took her cheeks in my hands. “I would battle this for you. I would change our places if I could. But you don’t need that from me. You are your own warrior; you rescue yourself. We pulled you out of a cage, but it was you who kept yourself alive. You never cease to amaze me. This … won’t go on much longer.”

  I really hoped I was right because I didn’t think I could take any more of her pain. She grabbed my shirt and stared up at me. “I asked you to end me if this happened. I asked you guys. Kieran, don’t leave me like this.”

  My heart stopped beating for a moment. I would have liked to have pretended I didn’t know of what she spoke, except I did. I wanted to crawl inside of her mind and kill that creature that had done this to her. I would cause him pain over and over again. I couldn’t see him anymore; he was fully inside of her.

  I gritted my teeth. “Not yet. You hold on, Anne. I know what you’re asking of me. But we’re here. At the mines. Sister Teagan is here. She can help you. Remember that. I will not let you suffer endlessly.” Even if I had to fight the others to do so, although I doubted that would be the case. When it came to Anne, we were almost always in near agreement. They were my brothers, the only ones I’d ever share her with. It had always seemed like it was supposed to be so.

  If there was no hope, I’d see to it this stopped and then I’d follow her wherever she went. I always would.

  The possessed appeared in the distance, like roving bands of pain travelling the countryside. With my sword on my back, I wasn’t concerned. They were drawn to her like flies to honey, but she had nothing for them right then, and I would not let her be taken under by the needs of others. Like she’d done when she saved Bryan
t, she’d give until she simply didn’t exist anymore.

  Her body seized again, and I held her tightly. “Let me tell you about the first time I saw you.”

  Tears flowed down her face, and she spoke with her eyes closed. “I don’t think you remember it.”

  “I’m not talking about wherever else or whatever else we decided. I mean in this world. The one we live in.” I pressed my forehead to hers. How was she surviving this much pain? I could only feel a portion of it, and I shared it with the five others. I wanted to rage, yet she needed me to be calm.

  “Okay.” She opened her lids, her breath hitching in a way I didn’t like. The possessed could die under demon ministrations, and then the demon, if it so chose, could walk around in the body until it was used up. That wouldn’t be happening.

  “I saw you before I was supposed to. You came walking out of the area where they keep the students, the initiates. You came out wearing your hood, and you looked up to smile at another Sister. Or at least I think you were smiling. Your eyes looked like they were smiling. I was so overcome. I wanted you to be the one I was there for. Two years later, I got my wish.”

  She laughed a quiet sound, which surprised me. The noise was almost sad in its slight humor. “And now here you are. In the dirt. Back in the Deadlands. I’m not at all sure I’m worth this mess.”

  That was the demon making things worse. “You’re worth more than I could possibly explain to you.”

  I wished she could feel me like I did her. I knew her love for me, and I would hold onto it forever. “Hold on, Anne.”

  I cradled her against me. Helplessness and ineffectualness were not things I was comfortable with, but for Anne I would endure. I almost hoped the possessed got close. I could use a good battle.

  Bryant

  I scanned the scene in front of me. There were at least two hundred women hauling coal back and forth from the entrance of the mine to waiting carriages. Men chewing tobacco and spitting it on the ground waited to take the coal to wherever it went from there.

  Two hundred women, and I had no idea which one was Teagan. Anne hadn’t offered a description. Mason shifted his weight. “She’s got to be one of the ones chained up. Otherwise why would she still be here? Guards or no guards, she’d run away.”

  “One would hope.” I did a quick headcount to confirm what Mason said. I trusted my fellow guards implicitly. But a second count could only help, not hurt. I could barely concentrate. Anne was in horrible pain. Kieran was with her, and I trusted Kieran to care for her. Feeling her pain made me want to throw something or burn down the world, whichever came first.

  Garrett knelt down. “There.” He pointed at a blond woman carrying a heavy load. An older woman with black hair followed her while holding a whip. “I can see her power. So can you. See how she glows like Anne?”

  “No one glows like Anne,” Milo cut in. “But, yes, she glows, too. I’ll go get her.”

  I grabbed his arm. “We can’t just walk in and take her. See that woman with the whip? She’s there to stop us from doing just that.”

  Milo shrugged. “I’m not afraid of one woman with a whip. Let her try.”

  If the situation weren’t so dire, I’d smile at Milo’s ego. “Maybe we should begin with the idea that the woman with the whip isn’t the only means they have for keeping the women who don’t want to be here, here. I’m happy to take a beating, unconcerned as you would be. I want an idea of what exactly we’re in for. I know we have to hurry. We aren’t going to be stupid in doing so. If I’m about to be assaulted by a thousand possessed or if there is some indication of a demon we can’t see but is there, I want to know. Pause. And look.”

  Mason nodded. “Do it.”

  Milo would burn at the instruction but do it just the same. If Garrett took issue, he’d keep it to himself. Mason was probably better capable of leading than me but had never indicated he wanted the role, ever.

  “Thoughts?”

  Milo pointed left. “See how that tree is moving in the wrong direction? Demon movement.”

  “Good call. We can’t see it, but we know it’s there. Although”—I hated even to think what I thought, let alone what I was about to say—“we can find a way to see it.”

  Mason raised his eyebrows. “Are you suggesting we draw upon that power now? Anne is barely hanging on.”

  I struggled with the idea too. I remembered things the others didn’t. Although I wondered if Milo actually did. We’d all chosen this. I loved the idea. Anne had always been ours. Her bright light combining with my own. The feeling of finally being whole. Loving her. Worshiping her. But that was all very far away. Closer was the knowledge that I’d lived in poor nobility in a small town close to the Sisterhood and poorer poverty in the Deadlands when I slept in the corner of a basement in a former guard’s home. The only place I’d ever felt like I was home was with Anne.

  And she needed me to get that woman out of there. If I had to draw from our co-joining, then I would do so and explain why later.

  Anything to save her. Even, in this case, if it meant I had to hurt her a little bit more. “You’ll never hate me for this more than I hate myself.”

  Milo’s jaw hardened. “Do it. Then we can get this done.”

  I tugged at our joined power. It felt like a rope connected us all. I need only hold the right portion of it to get what I needed. If Anne could see demons, I could see them, too, by doing this. She just had to give me some of her power.

  The flow jerked toward me, and inside my mind she screamed. I shuddered. My Anne didn’t even know what was happening. She was blocked from taking from us, couldn’t even feel us.

  I would rather have slit my wrists. I could see the demons, as I’d wanted. I had to do this to save her. I’d hate myself later.

  “Everyone ready?”

  Garrett stood. “More than.”

  “When this ends, I’m going to see to it Anne never feels pain another day in her life.” I would find a way to protect her.

  Mason

  I wanted to pound on someone. My girl needed me, and I was out here rescuing another woman who should have had five guys with her to make sure this didn’t happen. Not that I could judge; I’d lost Anne for over a year. I’d like to think I’d have found this woman in less time than it was taking her men to locate her.

  Maybe they were dead.

  I stood and walked straight for Teagan; seeing her chained up made my stomach pang. No one should be in chains. Before they left here, I was getting everyone out. In fact ….

  I turned to Garrett and Milo. “Get the girl.”

  With a nod to Bryant, who would stay back to watch in case of other threats, I walked away from the others. I wasn’t leaving anyone here who didn’t want to be here.

  The second the woman with the whip saw me, she started to back away. That was good. I didn’t like bullies, never had, and she’d been beating on people. She should be afraid. I took off running, grabbed the end of the whip when she would have used it, and yanked her to the ground instead.

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  The woman was older, maybe in her mid-fifties, which was downright old for the Deadlands. “I didn’t want anything to do with this. I told them. They insisted.”

  I bent over. “Who are they?”

  Someone ran this operation. Why did they have all these people tied up? When my father worked here, it hadn’t been that way. It had been hard work, and a lot of people didn’t survive doing it, but honest and legitimate. The owners would never have put up with this. Of course, there were demons running rampant in the mines, so who knew what went on anymore.

  “The Sisterhood. They keep these things running. Pay for it. We don’t get in the way of what they’re doing.

  The Sisterhood? That didn’t even make any sense. Okay, I’d asked and gotten my information. That would have to be good enough for now. I drew her up by her arm. “Every person here who is in chains is to be relea
sed right now.”

  “You don’t necessarily want to do that,” she shrieked. “There’s a reason they’re locked up. Some of them are possessed.”

  I couldn’t fathom why they’d chain up the possessed rather than deal with them some other way. I wasn’t going to question it. I didn’t have the time. “The possessed don’t frighten me. If they scare you, then I suggest you run fast. No more chains.”

  Ever. I grabbed a keychain off her waste. “Garrett.” I threw it toward where Milo and Garrett stood. Garrett would catch it. I had no doubt.

  Garrett

  I caught the keys and bent back over Teagan, who sat on the ground staring at me with large blue eyes. She was pretty, but she didn’t hold a candle to my Anne. “You’re almost free.”

  She sniffed, tears falling down her face. “I didn’t really believe you would come. I thought I would die here.”

  “You’re almost out.” And then she was going to help my love. I took her hand and hauled her to her feet. “Anne’s in bad shape. We’re counting on you to get the demon out of her.”

  She waved her hand in the air. “Don’t worry. I’ve been taking them out since before I could talk. They had to teach me to stop doing it at the Sisterhood. I’ll get it out. Must be some demon to possess a Sister.”

  “To say the least.” I took her hand. It felt wrong to have linked fingers with anyone other than Anne. I gritted my teeth. “How did this happen to you?”

  “The Sisterhood sent me away like they do all the Sisters they can’t deal with. I’m sure the same way Anne was sent.”

  I shook my head. “Anne didn’t get sent away. She wanted to come up here.”

  “All that means is that she did them a favor and outed herself. No one has talent like her and gets to stay out from under Katrina’s thumb. She hates dissent.”