His voice, his scent, they were touching her, stirring her magic into pleasant tingles. “Use magic to convince them to believe what I tell them.”
“How bad did he hurt you?”
He was too close, right in front of her. She had the oddest sensation of feathers reaching out to brush over the bare skin of her arms. It was soothing and unsettling at the same time. She stepped back, trying to regain her senses. What had he asked her? Oh, right, how badly she was hurt. “That was new. Up till now, it’s all been seduction. First time that bastard used someone to attack me. Or hurt an animal.” Cold fury swirled in her emotional stew, and just to keep it all interesting, she pulled out her suspicion. “How did you happen to show up at just the right moment?”
“Didn’t you hear my motorcycle?”
She pulled her lips in. Hell, she had heard a roar, but she’d thought it was from hitting her head. “I was a little busy.” She wasn’t ready to actually move, so she stood there and demanded, “Why should I believe that you can’t be possessed?”
“Wing Slayer created us, and he’s half demon and half god. He knows the tricks of a demon and made sure we couldn’t be possessed and controlled the way a human can. He and Asmodeus have been enemies for a long time. We were created to hunt and kill the witches corrupted by the demon.”
She frowned at that. Carefully, she tested her left leg and found it held her weight, so she walked into the kitchen. “I thought Wing Slayer was dead.” She opened the refrigerator, reached for the waters she kept on the shelf, and sucked in her breath. Damn, her left breast hurt. She took a second, leaning on the door while breathing.
“That’s what everyone thought but us. They were wrong. He’s alive, and he’s regaining his god power to fight back against Asmodeus.”
He was there suddenly. Behind her. So close that she felt his body, felt the weight of him, the security. If she stood up, her back would touch his chest. A sizzle slipped into her skin and stirred gently. Not the harsh, fast, fake sizzle of the handfast, but a softer sensation that she wanted to just feel and enjoy.… Damn, just how hard had she hit her head? “What are you doing?”
“You’re hurt. I can almost feel it.”
His breath shifted her hair and traveled down her back. Soft waves of pleasure. She didn’t understand it. “Move. I’m just getting water.”
“Got it.” He reached past her.
His arm slid by her face but didn’t actually touch her. It was weird being surrounded by him, by his leather, soap, and tangy, thick musk scent that made her want to lean closer and inhale until her lungs were saturated. It was as if she could almost soak in his strength and feel safe. She frowned. Obviously she had a concussion and it was making her sappy and stupid. “Don’t touch me.”
He moved away, leaving her in the fog of cold air from the fridge. Ailish straightened, shut the door, and turned. He was right there in front of her. His huge body felt like some kind of shield. Protection. In fact, she could almost see his shadow spreading wings.
He handed her a bottle of water and asked, “Why didn’t you heal yourself when you healed the kitten?”
She blinked and looked again. His shadow was just the vague outline of a huge man. Concussion, that’s all. She took the bottle, opened it, and answered, “Didn’t have enough juice.”
“You ran out of power?”
For the first time, she noticed the edge in his voice. As though maybe he wasn’t having the best day ever, either. “I’ll be fine after I eat.”
“How about pizza? Pepperoni?”
What was he doing? “Yeah,” she heard herself answer. While he called in the pizza order, she wondered why she was being passive and not throwing him out of her house. Wait, why was he here to begin with?
He walked by her while rattling off her address on the phone.
She tilted her head, tracking him as he ended the call, watching as he bent over as if there were something on the floor. Then he rose and moved to the other side of the counter. What was he doing? “Why are you here?”
“To talk to you.” She heard him slide onto a bar stool, then the sounds of him fiddling with something, probably his cell phone, as he said, “I Googled you last night. You’re a professional kickboxer.”
There was something unnerving about him being in her house. It wasn’t the handfast link; that felt cold and dead on her wrist. He was causing the odd reactions in her. Like worrying that she wasn’t measuring up to his standards or some bullshit like that. Annoyed, she said, “That’s not a news flash, Slick.”
“How does a witch get involved in something like that? Most witches are …”
Oh, this would be good. “Are what?”
“More gentle.”
She snorted. “Well, maybe most witches don’t have a demon stalking them. You get over that gentle shit real quick.” She used to be gentle, sweet, naïve, and look where that had gotten her—handfasted to a demon. So if she didn’t fit Phoenix’s idea of what a witch should be, too bad. She picked up the bottle and drank some of the cool water to wash out the memories. “This little chitchat is special, but why are you really here?”
“Your voice is unleashing dangerous magic. This morning, a rogue I killed claimed that the enhanced witch blood made them stronger.”
The implications stunned her. “My voice can do that?”
He kept playing with whatever was in his hands. “You told me it enhances all magic, so yeah, we think it’s possible.”
She tried to grasp what it meant. “But if that’s true, it would make the witches stronger.” Wasn’t that good?
“They have no defense against rogues.” His voice hardened. “They can’t use their powers, no matter how strong, because of witch karma. They are sitting ducks, and if it’s true the rogues think they’ve hit the mother lode of power in witch blood, they’ll go after them with a vengeance to feed their addiction. We are the only defense the witches have.”
His fury pounded at her, making her skin feel tight and her stomach churn. Worry set in. Was it possible? Could she be doing harm while trying to get control of her magic? If so, then she had to stop. But there hadn’t been any witch-karma backlash, not like when she was blinded. She needed her voice power to break the handfast. Then she picked up on the one word he kept using.
“Who is we?”
“Wing Slayer Hunters.”
“Because you believe the Wing Slayer is alive.” She wasn’t sure about that. Her mother insisted the witches had killed the god with the curse.
“We’re committed to him. We know he’s alive. He’s granted two of our hunters immortality.”
Shocked, she set down her water bottle and leaned her hands on the cool countertop. “How did he do that? Hunters lost their immortality with the curse.”
“There’s a loophole called soul mirrors.”
She’d never heard that term. Could he be lying? Making shit up to manipulate her somehow? She wished she could see him, see his face. His eyes. Ailish wondered what he looked like. From tangling with him last night, she knew he stood a few inches over six feet and weighed about 110 pounds more than her 130 fighting weight. He was faster and stronger than anyone she’d ever encountered. But what stood out the most was when he’d pinned her and she’d felt his biceps.
Feathers.
For a second, she’d thought she felt feathers. Since that was last night, she couldn’t blame that on a concussion.
It had to be her imagination, maybe some kind of hallucination from all the hormones or stress or even from nearing the end of her handfast contract.
“Soul mirrors are usually a good thing,” he was saying. “They can break the curse for the hunter and the witch.”
“What?” She’d been daydreaming. What the hell was wrong with her? “So this soul-mirror thing lets a witch bond with a familiar and access her high magic?” She would be able to control her voice power and break the handfast. “How do you get this soul mirror, is it magic?”
“A kind of m
agic,” he said, his voice going to that edge again. He got off the bar stool and prowled the room. “When the demon witches cast the curse, they used the words, We bind thee soul to soul; in the blooded power that you crave above all else; in sex to claim your descendants. They were attempting to bind witch hunters to them, turning us into nothing more than mindless creatures to do their bidding.”
She heard the hatred and revulsion in his voice as he moved around. Knowing what she did now about demon witches, she couldn’t blame him. He’d hate her, too, if he knew she was the daughter of not only a demon witch, but the high witch of the coven. “Go on.”
He moved back to the bar. “It all turned into a clusterfuck. The souls were pulled out of the witches’ and witch hunters’ bodies, binding together as the curse decreed. The earth witches called the souls back, causing them to halve. In essence, we all have half a soul now.”
Ailish felt a fission of recognition ring in that hollow place in her chest. The place that had always felt empty, not quite full.
Incomplete.
“That’s why we can’t bond with a familiar. An earth witch must have her soul to form that magical bond.” It made sense. Her mother had only told her that the curse had been a power play by Wing Slayer and that he’d failed, getting himself killed and leaving his witch hunters without a god. Of course, her mother lied. But did that mean Phoenix was telling the truth?
In a dry voice, he said, “The curse left witch hunters with the unbearable craving for power in witch blood, as well as a craving for sex.”
A whole different kind of soft tingles glided along her nerves at the mention of sex. She ignored that, however, and was thinking over the implications of what he’d told her when the doorbell rang. Pizza. “Wait here,” she told him.
She walked into the living room, hooked a right, and had reached for her backpack purse when she heard the door open and Phoenix say, “How much?”
The pizza guy named the price. Ailish had the bills in her wallet folded to tell her the denomination. She pulled out a twenty and a five. “Here.” She pushed the money toward the shape of Phoenix.
“Already got it.” He stepped back and closed the door. “By the way, here’s your cell phone. I found it on the floor.” He pushed it into her hand and strode away.
It must have fallen out of her pants when she’d been struggling with the demon-possessed man. But then she remembered Phoenix fiddling with something while sitting at her counter. What had he done to her phone? And why?
The smell of yeasty bread, tomato sauce, and warm cheese filled the living room. Her stomach practically twisted in hunger.
“Got paper plates?” His voice floated back as he walked to the table.
Normally she’d force the money on him and toss his ass out of her house, but he’d intrigued her with the soul-mirror stuff. She tucked her phone into her pocket and went into the kitchen, snatched up a few plates and napkins, then took them to the table. She moved with confidence, pausing only at the table to find his shape already in a chair on the side of the kitchen bar. She sat on the patio side of the table. Rather than fumble for the box to get a slice, she summoned her powers to—
“Don’t. No more magic. Bloodlust.” His voice was low and rough, almost like a Rottweiler’s warning bark.
With the threat of the demon looming over her, she’d forgotten about the bloodlust. Was that why the edge kept appearing in his voice? He was fighting the urge to cut her and get her blood? She should be afraid or worried. She didn’t want to dwell on why she wasn’t.
“Tell me more about the soul-mirror thing. How can I do it and get a familiar?” She put out her hand, found the box, and was able to get a slice onto her plate. As far as she knew, she didn’t knock anything over. Refusing to care, she took a bite of the pizza.
“Your water is at two o’clock.”
Swallowing, she looked at his shape, biting back a sharp comment. But he wasn’t treating her like an idiot, he’d just told her where he put her water. She nodded in thanks. The truth was that her blindness didn’t seem to bother him at all.
“Your soul mirror becomes your familiar.”
She froze in surprise, then said, “What does that mean? Is a soul mirror a person or an animal?”
“Both, I guess. Witch hunters have wings tattooed somewhere on their bodies. When they bond with the witch who is the other half of their soul, the bird comes to life. That bird acts as the witch’s familiar. You have to find the other half of your soul, then finish the bond.”
She’d wolfed down almost her entire slice. She dropped the crust and wiped her greasy hands on a napkin. “Find the witch hunter who my soul was joined with, then halved. Is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes. And then you exchange blood and sex to finish the bond.”
She reached for her water, which was exactly where he’d said it would be. Yet alarm bells blared in her head. Sex finished the handfast with the demon, so she avoided it altogether. Just because Phoenix said he couldn’t be possessed didn’t mean it was true. Or hell, maybe her mother and the coven had found a way to control a witch hunter. Maybe he was gaining her trust and then Asmodeus would possess him. Setting down her water, she said, “I thought witch hunters craved our blood. Yet you’re sitting there eating with me.”
“I’m fighting the bloodlust. Right now, my veins are on fire. So don’t push me, Ailish. How is it that you don’t know any of this stuff?”
Was he a threat to her? “How would I know? Earth witches won’t talk to me once they see this.” She held up her left hand. “I avoid demon witches, and until last night, I’d never encountered a witch hunter.”
“How? How the hell is that possible? What about your family? Your mother? Can’t they help you?”
Depends on how you define help. Her mother was desperate to force Ailish to become a demon witch. But damned if she was going into the saga of her pitiful family history with him. “No.”
She could feel him studying her. Then he said, “I don’t see you wearing anything silver. Where’s your witch book?”
Her what? She didn’t think he meant a novel type of book. Thinking quickly, she guessed it was some kind of book witches had, one kept in silver, and one that she wouldn’t need her sight to use. At a loss, she turned the question back on him. “What do you want with it?”
“What are you hiding?”
She smiled dryly. He was feeding her just enough information to keep her talking. “No more than you, I suspect. You’re here to pump me for information. For who? Why?”
“For me. Because I might be your soul mirror.”
Ailish couldn’t quite take in the idea that she and this hunter could be soul mirrors. “You? But—” But what? Wasn’t this what she wanted? A possible solution? But what if it was a trick? She’d believed the kitten story, and that had been a trick. She had to be careful, had to think.
She’d learned the hard way that her choices mattered, and they had consequences. Easy answers weren’t always the way. Asking her mother to make Kyle love her again … yeah, there were consequences.
But what if this was real? Her thoughts kept circling, but it was obvious she needed more information. “How do you know it’s me? That we’re soul mirrors?”
He shifted as if trying to find the words. “I have the wings of a phoenix tattooed on both biceps. After touching your blood last night, the bird is coming to life. A head and part of the body showed up today.”
She strained her eyes, struggling to see him, to see this man who claimed to be her soul mirror. But all she could make out was the shadowed outline. How could she check the tattoo? She couldn’t. And yet hadn’t she thought she’d felt feathers? Frustration bubbled up. “That doesn’t help. I don’t know what your tattoo looked like or if it changed.”
She heard him move, a hush of sound, and then he stood on her left. He leaned over her then, placing one hand on the table and the other on the back of her chair.
The air shivered between
them, and she couldn’t get her breath. But she could feel his heavy stare on her.
In a low voice, he said, “Touch the wings, Ailish. Tell me what you feel.”
Before she thought, before she considered her actions, she lifted both hands. Inside, deep against her spine, a burbling began, as if her powers were swirling and jumping in her chakras. She touched his forearms, feeling the hot skin over thick, bunched muscles.
“Higher,” he said in a rough voice.
She skimmed her palms over his elbows and up the steep curves of his muscles. She hadn’t felt a man in eight years. And never like this. Kyle had been a boy and she a girl. But Phoenix, she could feel the leashed strength of him in the flexed muscles of his arms. He felt … safe.
That was insane, she told herself. But her chakras slid open and her energy streamed out, bouncing and pinging inside her.
She skimmed higher and froze.
“Feathers.”
Her powers slowed their pinging, almost as if they heard her. Then they joined together and forged a path straight to her fingers. She couldn’t stop herself—she stroked over the hard curves of his thick arms, feeling the skin, then the feathers. The feathers lifted and caressed her palms as if they knew how much she needed that kind of connection.
His muscles twitched and tightened even more, feeling like hot marble. “I feel your powers, your magic. What do you feel, Ailish?”
His breath touched her face, and she shivered. More sensations rolled over her. Not the sudden, painful forced lust of the handfast, but a warm, liquid feeling that softened her muscles so that she found herself gripping his arms for support.
Trusting him.
“Feathers. I can feel …” She touched again, trying to explain it. “The sweep of a wing with a bend at the top. The feathers are soft, but the wing itself is strong. And higher up, here, I can feel the head of the bird.”
“Believe me now?”
“I don’t know.” She couldn’t stop stroking the bird, but she wanted to touch more of him. Wanted, needed, to see him with her fingers. “What do you feel?”
“You. Jesus, Ailish, from the second you touched me, I felt you. When I was sitting across from you, I burned with the curse, but once you touched me, hell …”
Night Magic: A Wing Slayer Novel Page 8
