by Page,Selena
"No," Iowin answered so softly as to be almost inaudible, stepping quietly through the double doors behind them. "I think at last someone finally understands."
Chapter 9
He stepped toward them like a creature from a dark dream, like she’d always imagined a fallen angel to walk. Shadow-like grace, and yet with an earthy quality that assured he wasn't a trick of the imagination. His footsteps weren’t soundless but neither did they echo across the expanse of the cathedral. Just, soft. Muted. A hush rose up around them, a silent noise broken only by his footsteps and Lauren’s sobs and the flickering candle flames.
Again, he was dressed in black, his hair and eyes glittering like jewels against the unrelieved darkness. She was mesmerized by him, lost somewhere between amazement and horror. Here was a killer, a man that had blood on his hands, and all she wanted to do was take those hands and wash them clean with her tears.
Like Lauren had and Marta before.
"I can’t," Alynia whispered. "Can’t you see I'm not like them? Let me go, please. I’m begging you, Iowin, let me go. Don’t turn me into another ghost to haunt your home."
He stood before her, and she refused to look into his eyes. If she did, she’d take back her words so fast she would choke on them. It was easy to say the things she had said to Lauren when not staring into his green eyes. It was easy to play the righteous woman when not faced with the greatest temptation in her life. And it was so easy to show others how to fix their problems when her own weren’t staring her in the face.
"Lauren," he said softly, his eyes never leaving Alynia. "Could you give us a few moments, please?"
She didn’t think the other woman turned to face him, either. Maybe, possibly, Alynia had gotten through to her. They could forgive him until the end of the world, but if he could not forgive himself, he was never going to move on.
Lauren’s shoes clicked against the floor, and a soft boom echoed as the doors closed behind her. Leaving her alone with Iowin.
"May I touch you, Nia?"
She wrapped her arms around herself. "No."
He sighed slightly, a profoundly sad sound.
"Will you let me go?"
"No. You are free to leave here, but I will never let you go."
"You have to let me go, Iowin. Why can’t you see that? You have to let us all go. And you have to forgive yourself for what you’ve done."
"Don’t you think I know that?" he asked, reaching out, his fingertips halting an inch from brushing her cheek. "You know each life taken, the blood spilled, cuts into my heart and burns itself into my brain. I can’t stop the cycle, Nia. Not if it means I have to forgive those that wronged me. Not if it means I can’t protect those whom I love."
"You can’t love, and that’s your problem. That’s why you keep us here, haunting your heart and your soul. Iowin, you can’t love until you forgive yourself. It has nothing to do with those that have wronged you."
He turned away from her, pacing a few steps and placing his hands on his hips. She knew that posture so well, the lines of helpless frustration in his body. "Why do you say this to me?"
And finally she got it. Finally, it clicked into place. "Because you brought me here to tell you these things. You brought me here to be your dark mirror." She took his face in her hands, forcing him to look up at her. "You were right. I wasn’t ready until now. I didn’t understand. But I do now. I do, and I love you."
She glanced around them, at the setting of the conversation. A tomb, a sacred place for memories of those long departed. A church meant for worship and joy and the things that made life worth living. And there they stood, speaking in hushed tones about ghosts and sins, things unclean and unfit for reverence.
He touched her then, arms wrapping around her waist, pulling her forward. "I knew you would see it," he whispered. "Help me put an end to it."
For a moment she thought he meant to kill himself, to make it stop with the single pull of a trigger. Her arms tightened around him. "What do you mean?"
"The ritual you saw earlier in my mind. It will free the souls of those harmed by ShadowBlack. It will free me. Please, help me. Help us."
Chapter 10
She should have known the compass in the foyer’s floor wasn’t just for decoration or defense. The four concentric circles in its center were too perfect, too evenly spaced. Each was made of a different element. Copper for peace and goodness. Tin for healing. Iron for strength. And a final loop of gold for protection. The last loop could have been a multitude of metals, though gold was most commonly used by men. Something about it hailing from Ra, the Sun God, or some such myth. Alynia favored silver for protection work. But if she was to be fair about it, traditionally silver came from the Moon-Goddess and favored feminine power.
Given how cursed her family was, she’d been willing to use whatever bonuses she could lay hands to when working magic. Myth-based or not.
And yet as she paced the length of Iowin’s circle of power, she felt different about it. When crossing it on her entrance to his house, it had held no real draw to her. Simply a ward temporarily disabled by his own command. Now that she’d bonded to him, she didn’t have to close her eyes and concentrate to sample the magic singing through the precious metals. It was there in her next breath, thrumming in time to her heartbeat, a silent servant awaiting her every command.
She jerked backward, breath heaving in and out of her chest. "Screw me."
Iowin glanced up swiftly, hands paused over intricate writing and runes above the outermost circle. "You OK?"
"Magic." She swallowed hard, as if that one word explained everything.
He chuckled softly. "First taste of it, of real unfiltered magic?"
"You might say that."
"It’s different when you aren’t using an artifact to channel it." He nodded, hands moving through the precise motions of the runes once more. "Raw and untapped, it’s almost like a sentient force."
"And you say that like it’s no big deal."
"It isn’t," he shrugged. "Not for my family at any rate, and hopefully not for yours in the near future."
She glanced back at the circle, saw the shimmering power begin to rise again at her command. "Christ, it’s like a freaking puppy or something. Just glance at it, and it’s happy to be of service."
Iowin winced. "Think of it more like a caged dragon than a puppy, please. It’ll do what you say, but treat it the wrong way . . ."
"And it’ll rip your throat out. Right. Got it."
He rose to his feet, tossing the chalk carelessly onto a side table that cost more than her car and dusting off his hands. "Are you ready?"
She gave herself a good shake, both mentally and physically, and nodded. Now or never, as the old saying went. "Right," she said. "Let’s do this."
He gestured to the southernmost point of the compass, it’s tip stylized to look like living flame. South and fire, it was a rather fitting representation of herself. Southern raised with a temper hot enough to match the inside of the sun, while he took up the northernmost point. Again, the symbolism wasn’t lost on her. Cool of temper, strong as stone. North and earth. It was a miracle they’d fallen in love instead of killing each other.
Iowin lifted his hands, one hovering above his heart, the other with palm facing her. She mirrored him, and as if that action was a key to some sort lock, magic exploded between them. Her eyes widened, the sigil flashing and pulsing across her vision. Lightning arched between their palms, raced up her limbs and damn near locked up her joints. She couldn’t move, couldn’t see past her pulse, past that sigil of their mingled power. It was too much, this ritual, too powerful. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.
Beneath their feet, the compass swirled, the circles moving in opposite directions, the points writhing and folding upon themselves. As if the elements they represented were confused and angry, cast adrift without the cardinal directions to secure them in place. She didn’t need her eyes to tell her the swirling vortex beneath her feet grew wider and darker,
blackness swallowing the colored marble until a pit of . . . of . . . fuck her, there were no other words to describe it other than abyss. A portal of abyss beneath her very feet, and there she hung like a sacrificial lamb all trussed up in magic and ready for her great plunge. This couldn’t be part of the ritual, could it? Weren’t they supposed to be freeing souls tainted by black magic, not feeding it?
Iowin! She screamed across their bond. Iowin, what’s happening?
There was no answer to her plea, and that terror spiked her adrenaline into full swing. For a moment, it was enough. For a moment, she could see and stared wide at Iowin. Another face superimposed itself across Iowin’s open features. This one similar, with the same strong jawline, with the same aquiline nose and expressive brow. But the eyes, the mouth, they were all different. They belonged to another man, a man she’d seen cast in iron not hours before.
"Sean?" she whispered, lips barely able to form the cursed name.
The image above Iowin’s face smiled. Upon his chest, that lightning bolt tattoo glowed darkly. "It’s so good to see you again, Nia."
Inside her, the sigil flashed and roiled, the Tintreach lightning bolts flickering and striking at the invisible bonds holding her in place. Inside, she heard screaming, so faint and muffled as if coming from a great distance or bottled up. The reverberation of fists striking metal. Her palms ached from the pain of it, her throat raw from screams louder than she’d ever made before. Iowin. God, it was Iowin screaming. It was Iowin locked in iron. Trapped inside--
It took everything to glance downward into that darkness, and she felt the scream rise up into her throat. The sarcophagus--Sean’s sarcophagus--slowly rose through the black murk. Only it wasn’t Sean’s anymore. No, the image picked in perfect relief upon its lid was Iowin’s. The sigil blasted against her senses, slamming against her will and throwing everything it could toward the death box. Toward the other half of her soul trapped within it.
God, Iowin was in the box now. Stars in heaven, he hadn’t killed his brother. He’d bound him with a more complicated spell than the freaking beads, tying himself to the iron box through that damned Tintreach tattoo. Iowin the Just, hoping against hope that he’d find a way to redeem his brother. His compassion always his undoing.
"That’s why," she stuttered. "Save us, he’d said. Save us, not save him. He didn’t kill you. He thought he locked you away, but he hadn’t. You’d taken part of him."
The thing that was once Iowin lowered his head in a mockery of a bow. "Took you long enough to figure it out, didn’t it? All this time I’d been whispering in his head, coaching him through every decision. Every little change in his personality, in his decisions, went completely unnoticed by you. Blamed away on rationality. Until he finally got to this point. To bring you here. A Caprice witch, an innocent suffering under a curse you had nothing to do with. The injustice of it is a power all on its own, and I needed it to get free. And, I needed you for something else."
Sean tipped his head to the side, and her body turned in the proffered direction against her own wishes. Lauren appeared from behind one of the massive columns, a bright smile on her lips and fucking daisies in her hair. She clutched a rather large hunting knife in her hand.
"You wouldn’t listen." Lauren held the knife to the light, the edges glinting red with stolen power. "If you’d agreed in the tomb, we would have done this without the need for bloodshed."
"Done what?"
The scent of daisies was suddenly uncontrollable, cloying and choking and filling the back of her throat until she gagged. Her face felt tight, hot, and not her own. Darkness started to eat away at her vision, and she swore a stream of brown curls cascaded down her shoulders to drift in the metaphysical winds. Lauren’s hair. Lauren’s face on her own. Lauren’s fucking daisies filling her senses.
It made sense now, the numbness in her fingers after accepting the daises from Lauren. The sudden panic attack and inability to decide to run or fight in the tomb. She’d accepted a spell with the flowers, reinforced the more Lauren wove them into her hair.
If Iowin hadn’t chosen that moment to appear, would she have given in and let Lauren take her soul?
Sean turned his outstretched hand over and flexed his fingers in a beckoning gesture. To her credit, she tried to scream. But how could she make a sound when her soul was ripping itself from her flesh? Silvery flecks of light left her open mouth, floating on invisible winds to his hand. Her power, her magic, even the curse that had come to define her family, road those currents toward damnation.
"Iowin loves you," Sean answered, greedily drawing those motes of her life into his palm. "I love Lauren. We can’t very well be seen as ourselves anymore. But Alynia and Iowin? They’re free to walk the earth. No one is going to think twice if Iowin takes the seat of the Tintreach Empire across the seas, especially not after Alynia Caprice suddenly retires from the force to become a consultant. In layman’s terms, dear Alynia Caprice, I’m going to suck the soul out of your body and feed it to the abyss. All this to fuel my resurrection and give Lauren a new face to wear. Think of it as an anniversary gift to us."
The sarcophagus crested the edge of darkness, landing with a heavy thud. The lid shook as another fist hit it from the inside, and the sigil within her flashed again, driving her to her knees. She screamed, the pain in her hands unbearable. The pain in Iowin’s soul unbearable. The pain within her heart like a dagger. All this time, she should have known. She should have believed in Iowin instead of hunting him. And now they would die together because of her pride. Because he couldn’t forgive himself, couldn’t kill his own brother.
Lauren laughed, stepping up behind her. "You live here now," Lauren repeated, bringing the knife to Alynia’s throat. "How could you not have understood what I meant? This is your tomb, not mine. This is my love story, not yours. I am the hero here. I get my happily ever after. I’ve earned it."
Sean tipped his head to the side, smiling all the more. "I take it the priest’s soul is inside that blade?"
"Freshly bound." Lauren smiled in return. "Father Sanchez is dead at the feet of that stupid statue."
The Sean-Iowin thing smiled, glancing at the tomb and the blade in Lauren’s hands. "My brother made such marvelous toys, didn’t he?"
"And so will you, my love, once you finish swallowing Iowin’s soul." Lauren blew a kiss in his direction. "They’ll be no witnesses, my love, when we are finished. The Foundation will approve."
The abyss churned and boiled, chittering like a thousand starving insects. Hot tears burned at the back of Alynia’s eyes. Alejandro, dammit, she’d been wrong about the man. And now he was dead, too. Another body on the ground as a result of the Tintreach Empire, another homicide courtesy of Sean Tintreach’s cold-blooded thirst for immortality.
That made him hers now, didn’t it? That made Father Alejandro Sanchez her responsibility.
I am the job now, Tintreach. So don’t tell me to divorce myself from my work and chat about the fucking weather. It always circles back to the job for me. Once, it did the same for you.
For the first time, she accepted that bond with Iowin and poured her love, her hate, her rage at this monster who was still killing people even after his death. Her utter loathing for the unnecessary guilt Iowin carried in his heart, his unwillingness to forgive himself for crimes he hadn’t committed. It was all so damn useless, and so fucking unfair. She fed everything into the magic, into her link with Iowin, until she was near bursting.
Alynia slammed her teeth closed, digging deep and throwing every bit of innate and borrowed magic into keeping her soul inside her flesh. "This isn’t a love story, Lauren," she gritted out. "He’s using you like he used Iowin."
"I’m supposed to fall for that tactic?" She glowered. "You forget I was a cop once, too. He’s giving me a new life with him. He’d never leave me. As long as the daisies grow, he’ll love me. Can you say the same about your love for Iowin?"
She never got to answer. Another slam of a fist agains
t that lid, another scream, the iron top nearly popping free of its bonds. The edge of Lauren’s blade touched her skin, and Alynia screamed anew, feeling it slip past her flesh without harm, sinking into the soul within. The abyss responded almost joyfully, the rippling waves of darkness transforming into clawed hands, sensing the soul-blood dripping from her throat, hungering for another life force to feed them. Inside her chest, the sigil flared in response, angry bolts of lightning sweeping out at those claws, severing them.
The lightning struck Lauren’s hand, burning the flesh to near ash in a second. She screamed, and the blade slipped a fraction, enough to lose its grip on Alynia’s soul.
She moved without thinking, reaching behind her and grabbing handfuls of Lauren’s chestnut hair and her ridiculous crown of daisies and hauling Lauren over her head. Lauren slammed into the abyss, the knife tumbling from her fingers. The mouths of thousands of hungry souls latched onto the her, tearing at her flesh and swallowing her screams.
Sean snarled, fingers snapping out three bolts of white-hot flame in her direction. The lid blew off the top of the tomb, flying into the path of the bolts. Iowin’s spirit stood, ethereal and glowing, in nothing more than his favorite old jeans and his own well-worn MDPD T-shirt. Upon his waist glittered the ghostly echo of the Lieutenant’s shield he’d once so proudly worn.
"Not this time, brother," he bellowed. "Not Alynia. I won’t allow it."
He crashed into Sean--through Sean--and beyond. Iowin’s body crumbled to the floor, the two souls battling for control above it.
She didn’t have time to help him, even if she could help in a ghost fight. Lauren screeched again, scrambling out of the path of the souls, blood pouring from her wounds.
"Bitch!" she roared, leaping for the blade.
Alynia slammed a fist into her ruined face, slapping the blade away with her other hand. Pain shot up her arm just from the contact with that cursed weapon, invisible wounds opening in her soul and leaving the limb numb and useless at her side.
