by Jory Strong
It was pointless to deny his physical desire for her. Lust burned away any possibility of being with her and not touching her.
He wanted to keep her with him. Told himself it was only to sate his carnal hunger and help him navigate a world he’d never moved about freely in. But part of him remembered his attempt to leave her earlier, how a tightness had gathered in his chest, silken strands of unnatural worry weaving, encasing his heart until he finally stopped and turned back toward the path she’d taken. And that part both feared she was part of a trap and considered the possibility that her presence wasn’t an accident, that she’d been sent by some unremem bered ally to help him.
Tir lifted his mouth from Araña’s. He stroked the smooth skin of her cheek, brushing his knuckles over the spider now resting there, so thoroughly a part of her he couldn’t feel where it began and ended.
Imprisoned as he’d been in the back of the trapper’s truck, he had only been able to follow the events leading to his physical freedom based on what he heard. It was clear Araña and the others were waiting in ambush. “Who are the others to you? The Were and the gifted human?”
“They’re strangers who offered me shelter last evening when I escaped the maze.”
Shock reverberated through Tir. It wasn’t the answer he’d expected. “You didn’t know them before?”
“Until yesterday I’d never been to Oakland.”
Her grief slid over him, a deep swell of anguish that rose from the black depths of her eyes and then receded as she got control over it. “The dragon lizards were meant to be used against Weres in the maze, including Levi’s brother. Rebekka’s gift is to heal both Weres and animals. That’s why they ambushed the trapper’s truck.”
He rubbed his thumb over the spider, making the connection from an earlier answer. “You saw it in a vision?”
“I saw the graveyard the truck would pass through. I knew what it held and thought it would pass through today.”
“Where’s your home?”
She blinked rapidly and looked away from him, locked down her emotions so tightly all he felt was the strength of her will. “It’s days away,” she said after a long pause. “I’ve got business in Oakland to attend to, and before I can leave, I need to reclaim the Constellation.”
“Your boat?”
She swallowed. Nodded, then said, “It will have been confiscated by now. I need to get her back before I can go… home.”
“From the guardsmen?”
She gave a slight shrug. “Or the pier owner. We had to take a public berth in the port. The dockhand warned us if there was any trouble the boat would be impounded along with everything on board her.”
“We?”
“My family.” The grief broke through her mental barriers, revealing its source.
“I will help you avenge them,” he said, knowing they were dead. “And I will help you recover your boat.”
Araña didn’t say anything as the wild ride of her emotions and the events of the day caught up to her, leaving her feeling unsteady and unsure. She was intensely aware of Tir’s weight and the feel of his skin against hers, how much she already craved his touch, how easy it would be to not think, not feel anything but the physical pleasure he could give her—to forget he was a supernatural being whose life span was probably measured in centuries, if not longer.
“Why?” she asked, looking at his face again.
He didn’t pretend not to know what she was asking. “I need your help as well. This is your world more than mine. Avenging your dead and recovering your boat is a small price to pay if because of you I’m able to translate the tattoos on my arms. They hold the answer to getting the collar off my neck.”
She thought of his hooded eyes when she’d asked about them. “You don’t know what they mean?”
“If I once did, I no longer do. This land was a vast wilderness yet to be discovered by Europeans when the last acolyte sat next to me restoring the faded writing.”
Her heart gave a hard beat then slowed to a painful throb. She glanced away, telling herself not to be foolish and weak. She’d known there was no future with Tir when she lay with him. She’d taken his cock inside her with no expectation that he would remain with her even through the night. And now he was offering…
Her cunt clenched, giving its answer. Her mind hesitated. She knew only too well how few important books had survived in the aftermath of The Last War.
Hadn’t she and Matthew and Erik lived well by selling their services as thieves to rich men who loved to play the game of stealing one another’s treasures, including books? “What if the information is lost?”
Tir nuzzled her cheek, and with a thought she found the spider beneath his lips. “I believe I’ll find what I seek in Oakland. Otherwise I don’t think you would have found your way into my dreams.”
Araña had only to remember the moment his eyes opened, his gaze meeting hers deep in the vision, followed by the shimmering touch of soul against soul, to believe he was right. “I’ll help you,” she said, agreeing, shivering with renewed ecstasy as he rewarded her answer by joining his body to hers—and doing it over and over again after darkness drove them into the shelter of the lair.
IT was well after midnight when the werewolf crept closer to the wrecked remains of the truck. He remained cautious, alert for scents that might hint at booby traps.
The stink of guardsmen was everywhere. They’d fanned out, split into groups.
Some of them followed the path he’d taken in order to stay close to the werecougar and healer. Others had gone in the same direction as the once-chained man and the woman who’d managed to free him. None of the guardsmen had gone far.
Cowards. From the safety of their trucks and helicopters they reigned with their guns. But they didn’t have the courage to take their fights into the forest, where the question of who was the most efficient predator would be settled with their deaths.
They’d left Hyde’s body to rot, and the scavengers had already made a meal of it. Little remained. Still, the werewolf paused when he reached it. He lifted his leg and urinated on the bloody, shredded shirt and gleaming rib bones.
He stopped midstream, wanting to finish the task in human form, and once again attempting the change. He whined as, this time, muscle and bone reshaped themselves.
The change was excruciatingly slow and painful, feeding the terror he’d been carrying with him, that the witch-cursed silver wire he’d worn around his neck for almost a day would result in his becoming caught between two forms when he tried to regain his human one.
He fell onto his side, writhed in dirt and leaves and torn bits of Hyde’s flesh until finally it was done. And then Raoul looked down the line of his body and laughed. He was whole, his limbs ending in fingers and toes, his skin free of fur.
His hand went to his cock. He stroked himself, savoring the scent of the trapper’s death—his father’s death—though he hadn’t been sure of it until Hyde stood in front of the cage, gun lifted, taunting him, intending to kill him.
Raoul turned his head. Eyes more wolf than human contemplated the bloody strips of torn clothing, the bones not yet carried away by scavengers.
He fantasized about his return to the compound. Imagined mounting his father’s wife, claiming her just as he would everything else belonging to his sire.
A snarl escaped thinking about the way she’d been forced to remain overnight in the prisoner’s cage. He’d caught the scent of semen when he finally returned to consciousness as a wolf. If her womb thickened with child, he’d rid her of it, just as he would have rid her of Eston if he’d been freed during the wreck as the hyenas and dragon lizards had been.
Better that he hadn’t. Part of Raoul recognized that. He’d seen the way Hyde used the toddler to tether the mother.
He could decide later what to do about his half-brother, whether it would be smarter to return to the compound with him and receive a hero’s welcome, or leave him at the place where the healer intended to
take him in the morning.
Raoul’s thoughts lingered for a moment on the healer and the Were. They were going to be his best chance at recapturing the being their companion had freed. He hoped he’d be able to track them to the place they called home—after they got rid of Eston. He’d left them when he realized Eston would recognize his human form and show no fear, making them suspicious of him and eradicating any advantage he might have if he needed to use them.
Raoul stood, cock still in hand. He widened his stance and let loose another stream of urine, pissing on what little remained of his father, shaking the last drops from his penis when his bladder was empty.
He stepped over the shackles that had once held the prisoner, the being he’d thought of as a human-demon from the moment they’d found him alive in the foothill settlement, imprisoned in a church basement, his clothes bloodied and torn as if he’d been massacred along with the rest of the people there but had come back to life. He’d smelled human then, too. But no ordinary man would have survived whatever happened to the settlers.
The presence of the priest at the compound the day before, arriving with the men who’d taken the lion when they left, was enough to confirm Raoul’s belief that the tattooed man was a demon kept trapped in a human body by the sigil-inscribed collar.
Finding the dead dragon lizard next to the creek was added proof. The woman couldn’t have killed it; no human armed only with knives could have.
Raoul was glad the guardsmen hadn’t recaptured the human-demon. If they had, there would be no chance of getting him back, no point in lingering in Oakland. They’d be the ones to make a profit.
He’d only risked returning to the ambush site in order to scavenge clothing and the cash Hyde thought was so cleverly hidden. Now the sight of the truck stripped of its useful parts, blackened by fire, enraged him.
The human-demon was all that remained of the valuable cargo, and if he didn’t hurry, he’d lose his chance to collect what was rightfully his. The man left behind to travel with them to Oakland had probably already reported to the priest what had happened.
It would be easy enough for the priest to learn from the guardsmen that the prisoner had escaped. By daybreak tomorrow, those in his pay would be hunting the human-demon.
Raoul gnashed his teeth in frustration. Working for the Church was out of the question. They’d use him and then call him an abomination before making sure he met his death.
He had no way of gauging the human-demon’s strength, but the chains and restraint chair along with the dead dragon lizard were warning enough. From the tracks he’d followed, it seemed that the prisoner had split away from the woman who’d remained behind to unlock his shackles. He’d gone a couple of miles before turning around and backtracking, then following the female and rejoining her.
It didn’t surprise Raoul. In the wolf’s form he’d smelled the desire between the two of them when they first saw each other.
It was probably the woman’s blood that had drawn the dragon lizard. Drops of it lay along the trail leading away from the truck, and he’d caught the scent of it when she first appeared after the ambush.
As with Hyde’s corpse, the scavengers had already gotten to the dragon lizard’s carcass. It was hard to tell exactly how it had been killed.
There were slashes. Raoul had seen that much. He thought the demon might be powerful enough even in a human form to possess talons when the need arose. It would explain why his wrists had been shackled on short chains to his waist.
Regardless, the demon-possessed human lusted enough for the woman to follow her. Knowing it gave Raoul an advantage.
He could use her in setting a trap. He could use the healer and the Were as well. But he still needed more help if he was going to recapture the prisoner and deliver him to a buyer.
The most logical place to go was to the maze. Who else besides the Church would be interested in acquiring a demon-possessed human?
Once he’d gone with Hyde to one of the gaming clubs that didn’t screen for nonhumans during the daytime. They’d watched on a big-screen television as Anton’s demon hunted the maze.
Anton and his assistant Farold wouldn’t question his story about surviving an ambush. They’d seen him with Hyde before and thought he was human—or if not, they didn’t care.
Telling them about the loss of the dragon lizards would add credibility, as would the Church’s interest in the prisoner. Involving them would mean the loss of at least half of his profit, if not more.
He hated the thought of it, but he didn’t see any other way. If the priest’s men located the human-demon first, he’d get nothing.
Raoul finished searching through the items thrown from the truck by guardsmen as they tore it apart looking for things of value. He rolled the salvaged shirt, pants, and shoes into a bundle then changed back into the wolf’s form so he could travel through the night. His father’s things weren’t the right size, but they’d allow him to slip into the red zone at dawn and go to the maze.
Eight
ARAÑA woke alone and knew an instant of panic—not from the close confines of the space she was in, but from Tir’s absence and the loss of his skin against hers. She sat up, aware of the meshed ceiling only inches above her head, high enough to allow a lion to walk easily and a human to sit, wide enough for a couple of Weres, in either of their forms, to lounge comfortably. Levi’s lair was just that, a hollowed out place fortified by wire and steel scavenged from the human world and hidden beneath the rock and wood of the natural one.
Air and light and sound filtered in, enough of it so she knew it was morning and Tir was close by, cooking something. Her stomach rumbled at the smell of roasting meat.
She glanced around the lair and found her clothes missing, guessed he’d taken them outside and placed them near the fire to dry. In the hopes of being less noticeable when they got to the city, she’d washed the blood out of them before they’d taken shelter for the night.
A blush rose to her cheeks at the thought of emerging from the lair naked. It was foolish to feel shy after all she and Tir had done together. She knew it, but flaunting herself didn’t come naturally to her.
For the first twelve years of her life she’d been trained to modesty—even her nightgowns had been flannel and cotton versions of the long dresses that covered her from neck to wrists to ankles. It had been easy to shed the restrictive clothing for shorts and tank tops, but she’d never lost her reticence even though she often saw men and women swimming naked when boats joined together to form impromptu floating cities.
She wasn’t ashamed of her body or embarrassed by the sight of others naked, but she’d never slipped into the water during those times. At first it was because she feared someone would brush against the spider and die as a result. Then later, as she matured, she didn’t join them because her bare mound set her apart from the other women. She’d worried…
Never again.
A shiver went through her as she remembered the heat in Tir’s eyes when he’d lifted his face from between her thighs. Arousal slid from her opening at the memory of what he’d done with his tongue and mouth.
She wanted him to touch her that way again. She wanted to give him the same pleasure.
Her hand slid over the smooth flesh of her cunt, fingers seeking and finding the wet evidence of desire. She stroked and probed, gathered the silky moisture on her fingertips, and caressed her stiffened clit.
A moan escaped, loud in the confines of the lair, and her face heated as she imagined Tir hearing it and knowing she was touching herself as she thought about him. Her nipples hardened, ached for his touch. Spikes of need shot up her spine with each pass over the tiny, naked head of her clit.
Araña closed her eyes and tilted her head back, imagining Tir hovering over her, watching, commanding that she give him her release.
Heat suffused her body. Orgasm shimmered through her, a pale imitation of what she’d experienced with him.
Worry rose in its wake, about
the pain sure to come later when he was gone, leaving her bereft of touch and heartbroken. She didn’t think she could keep the needs of the body and the needs of the soul separate.
The demon mark lay on her hand. She touched it, wishing she could draw answers from it.
She was meant to find and free Tir. That much she believed beyond any doubt. The vision leading her to him was too different from the ones she’d had before for it to be otherwise.
But she was mortal, a human damned to Hell by the mark, and he was something else, something so much more. He was hundreds of years old, perhaps thousands, perhaps truly immortal.
Araña hugged herself, suddenly afraid of how much she already craved his touch, how much more she’d come to need it the longer she experienced it. Part of her recognized it was already too late to free herself from the web of destiny. It had been too late the moment she touched the thread of Tir’s soul.
Taking one of the blankets with her, she crawled to the lair entrance, wanting to escape thoughts of the future. Life had taught her such thoughts did little good. In the end, as long as she wore the demon mark, it defined her future—a fiery hell and a demon master.
The metal hatch hiding the entrance to the lair was heavy, but she managed to open it and escape into morning light. She detoured at nature’s call, then wrapped the blanket around her like a sarong before joining Tir by a fire pit far enough from the lair not to draw attention to it.
He was naked, crouched near the fire, black hair fanning over his shoulders and cascading in waves to his hips. His skin was marbled perfection, bone and muscle sculpted into a form that would inspire poetry and song and magnificent paintings.
Once again she was reminded of the angels in Erik’s art history books, divine beings captured in oil by masters dead centuries upon centuries before The Last War. She didn’t believe in angels, at least not on earth. None had been sighted since the early days, when some of the texts making up the Bible had been written. And if there once was a God—the creator of mankind—then she thought he’d long since lost interest in this world. Otherwise, why would angels not have made themselves known along with all of the other supernaturals?
