Demon Marked

by Meljean Brook

  Nicholas frowned. The bargain bound her to the truth. But how could she have no memory, yet know something as specific as a numerical code? “Did you come to this house in the past month?”

  “No.”

  Then Madelyn had. “When was the last time you were in contact with her?”

  “Almost three years ago, when she left me at Nightingale House.”

  Exactly as she’d claimed earlier. Nothing she’d said contradicted anything from before the bargain. Nicholas hadn’t expected that. Either she was manipulating him in some brilliant way that he couldn’t comprehend . . . or she had been telling the truth all along.

  He didn’t know what to think of that. So he could only press on, and try to figure out her game after he found Madelyn.

  “How did Madelyn escape from Hell?”

  After breaking the Rules and killing a human, Madelyn should have been punished by Lucifer, and either tortured or slain. Six years wouldn’t have been long enough of a punishment—let alone three years, if this demon spoke the truth about when Madelyn had left her at Nightingale House.

  She should have been punished in Hell . . . and even if she had escaped the Pit, Madelyn shouldn’t have been able to leave the realm. Almost three years ago, Lucifer had lost a wager with a Guardian, and every portal between Earth and Hell had been closed. They wouldn’t reopen for another five hundred years, and every demon who’d been in Hell would remain in that realm until the Gates opened again.

  Almost three years . . .

  Shit. The timing was exactly right. Somehow, Madelyn had escaped from Hell just before the Gates closed.

  Had she brought this demon with her?

  The demon shook her head. “I don’t know how she escaped Hell. I didn’t even know that Hell is a real place.”

  How could that be true? “Then where were you before Nightingale House?”

  Demons were creatures of habit. If Madelyn had hidden in a specific location between the time she escaped from Hell and left this demon at the psychiatric hospital, she might return there to conceal herself again.

  “I don’t remember. Before Nightingale House, I don’t remember anything clearly. Only that Madelyn and I were . . . somewhere. I don’t know where. There was someone else with us. He cut these marks into me. His voice was so big—more painful than the knife.” She closed her eyes. “And I was frightened.”

  For the first time, strong emotion came through in the tremble of her voice, in the clenching of her hands. But by the time she looked at him again, he couldn’t see any fear. Only expectation. Perhaps a faint hope.

  And for an instant, he believed it was hope. As if she wasn’t acting, but truly thought he had answers for her.

  God, he was in over his head. He didn’t even know if this memory loss she claimed was possible. Maybe none of this was true. Maybe she’d already broken a bargain with someone else and had nothing to lose by lying to him now. Before he went any further, he had to find out.

  He set the crossbow on the mattress and retrieved his mobile phone. “Don’t move,” he said. “Don’t talk.”

  She only lifted her eyebrows as if to ask where she would go, and watched from the edge of the bed as he found Rosalia’s number in his list of contacts.

  The Guardian didn’t like him, but she’d answer any questions he had—and she was one of the few people he trusted to be honest with him. Three hundred years ago, her father had also been replaced by a demon; she understood his quest for vengeance better than anyone else could. She’d taught him how to search for Madelyn, to distinguish demons from humans, and which weapons would be most effective against one of their kind. Most demons and Guardians fought with swords, but in a physical match, pitting a demon against a human was no contest at all. Nicholas wasn’t fast or strong enough to pose a threat. Knowing the Rules—that a demon couldn’t fight him or hurt him—evened the odds. So did knowing their susceptibility to electric shock, and how to kill or slow them down.

  Rosalia answered on the third ring, her rich Italian accent rolling over his name. “Nicholas.”

  No need to ask why he was calling. He only contacted her when she was useful to him—when he had a question for her.

  “Have you ever heard of a demon with amnesia?”

  “Amnesia? No.”

  That’s all he wanted to know. “All right—”

  “But I’ve heard of those with their memories stripped away.”

  He frowned. On the bed, the demon had straightened, her gaze locked on the phone. She could hear everything they both said, and there was probably no point speaking in Italian rather than English. He’d never heard of a demon who hadn’t lived on Earth long enough to pick up almost every human language.

  But then, he’d never heard of a demon with her memories stripped, either.

  “Why would that happen?” He switched to Italian and watched the demon’s brow furrow with confusion. Maybe an act . . . but he didn’t think so.

  “As punishment, if they’d upset Lucifer—or just because he didn’t want the demon to know something.”

  Perhaps that was what had happened to this demon. It didn’t explain how or why she resembled Rachel, but he found punishment easier to believe than a demon breaking a bargain.

  “Just tell me, Rosalia: Even if the demon had no memory, would you still slay them?”

  “Of course, unless it was more useful at the time to keep them alive. But I’d slay them eventually—and I’d be wary all the while it was alive. A demon’s nature doesn’t change, even if its memories do. The rebel angels who followed Lucifer were physically transformed into demons, but their new forms only revealed what they were inside. So never forget that they are evil, Nicholas. Every single one of them.”

  He eyed the demon. “I suppose a former nun doesn’t call someone ‘evil’ lightly.”

  To his surprise, Rosalia laughed. “No, I don’t.”

  “What are you saying?” The demon got to her feet and started toward him. She froze when Nicholas showed her the remote device again. Her fingers curled at her thighs. Frustration? If so, good. She ought to feel a little of what Nicholas had, talking to her and receiving no answers at all.

  She looked to the phone. “This woman knows more about demons than you? Who is she? Can I speak with her?”

  Rosalia’s voice sounded sharply in his ear, her laughter gone. “Who is that, Nicholas? If a demon is there, don’t trust—”

  Nicholas hung up, cutting her off. No, he couldn’t trust the demon. But she might be his only way to find Madelyn, so he’d take the risk.

  If they were going to risk anything, though, they had to do it quickly. Rosalia wouldn’t wait around for him to call her back. She was probably heading to London right now—either flying with her wings or using her Guardian power to gather the darkness around her and speed through the night. If she found them, this demon would be dead within seconds.

  Knowing Rosalia’s skill with a sword, perhaps she’d be dead in less than a second.

  He tossed the remote to the bed. “We need to go. Now, before the Guardians catch up to us.”

  She stood still as he reached for her neck. “Who are the Guardians?”

  Whether she played stupid or just didn’t know, he didn’t have time to explain it. The heat of her body had warmed the steel collar. He unlocked it, tossed it aside.

  “All you need to know right now is that the Guardians will kill you. So let’s head out.”

  She nodded and started for the door. “Where to?”

  The demon didn’t know how to find Madelyn, so they’d try to find Madelyn through her connection to Rachel . . . and get as far from London as they could.

  “The States,” he said. “We’ll fly there tonight.”

  “I can’t. I don’t have any ID.”

  “And I wasn’t thinking of a plane.” When she looked at him blankly, Nicholas clenched his teeth and counted to three. “I know you can fly.”

  Her eyes widened and she looked down at her ha
nds. “I can shape-shift into a bird? How?”

  Jesus H. Christ. The next time he made a bargain, Nicholas would damn well make certain the demon knew more than a bag of bricks.

  “You can’t turn into a bird. You can only form wings—” Oh, fuck it. He turned for the door. “I have Rachel’s passport. I’ll charter a jet.”

  “That’s good. It’s probably less likely to crash into the Atlantic than I am.” She hurried into the hallway after him. “Why do you have Rachel’s passport? Did you kill her?”

  Even if this demon truly didn’t know that Madelyn had done it, why would she care? Perhaps she was just testing him to see if he’d break down into some guilt-induced confession. To see if Nicholas secretly felt that he was to blame, that his actions had killed her, boohoo.

  Thanks to Madelyn, he’d stopped boohooing as a kid. Nicholas did feel guilt—that he’d used Rachel, that she’d fallen in love with him, that he couldn’t save her when she was dying in his arms—but he wasn’t responsible for her death. Madelyn had killed Rachel. Full stop.

  He didn’t know this demon’s reasons for asking, and he didn’t have to speak the truth. But in the end, truth was just simpler.

  “No,” he said, and started down the stairs. “I didn’t shoot her. Madelyn did.”

  He glanced over his shoulder to catch her response. Her eyes had narrowed, and he easily read the suspicion in them.

  She thought he was lying.

  Now, wasn’t that just fucking hilarious? Shaking his head, he pulled out his phone again. He’d take time to be amused when they were on American soil, and a Guardian wasn’t hot on their asses . . . a Guardian who could come for them even after they were in the air.

  It was going to be a damn long flight.

  CHAPTER 3

  Michael was gone, and the walls of his temple were cracking.

  Taylor stared at the thin lines twisting through the pale marble. If there was one place a Guardian should have felt safe, it was here—in the center of Caelum, the Guardian realm, standing within Michael’s great hall. The first and strongest of all the Guardians, he’d been entrusted with great powers by the angels themselves after killing a dragon and ending the second war between Heaven and Hell. He’d built the massive temple simply through the power of his voice and will. And for the past six months, almost without realizing the adoption taking place, Taylor had come to consider this temple her home. She should have felt safe.

  But she was terrified, because Michael was gone. At least, part of him was—the part she could usually feel in the back of her mind, after he’d linked his psyche to her through blood and a kiss. The part of him that sometimes protected her, guided her. The part she often fought against. The part that was probably responsible for her coming to accept his temple as her home. But that was only part of him, and a tenuous connection, at best.

  The rest of him was in Hell, tortured in the icy field surrounding Lucifer’s throne. Buried, with only his face showing, his eyes frozen open and fixed on Lucifer’s tower; his body eaten by dragons in the Chaos realm before it regenerated to be ravaged again.

  Surrounded by the screams of the damned, he’d been in that field for a year now, and for the past six months, Taylor had visited him as often as she dared—using his power of teleportation, which was also a part of her, and which Taylor had begun thinking of as her own Gift. They’d come to an agreement of sorts: He wouldn’t teleport her without her knowledge or against her will, but if she needed protection, he could take over her body and fight for her.

  Obviously, that agreement had changed. Because whatever of Michael was left in Taylor’s mind, he still allowed her to teleport . . . he just didn’t allow her to teleport to Hell anymore.

  That scared her more than the cracks in the walls, scared her more than the sense of shattering and pain that she felt when her hand flattened against the marble—because it meant that whatever was happening to him in Hell, Michael was protecting her from it. Through their link, Taylor had become used to the echo of the pain and horror he experienced, though she knew Michael shielded her from most of it. Now, whatever was happening, he shielded her from all of it.

  Could it truly be that bad? Worse than what she’d already seen?

  She was afraid of that answer. A former detective, she’d seen every evil that a human could visit upon another being. That evil didn’t even scratch the surface of Hell.

  Michael had sacrificed his life and broken a bargain to save Earth and Caelum, and in the faith and hope that, eventually, his friends and fellow warriors would find the right spell to release him. Six months ago, Taylor had sworn that she’d find a way to free him. But she was no closer to finding a solution . . . and she couldn’t feel him anymore.

  And she knew that was what scared her most of all: that she wouldn’t be able to save him.

  Outside the temple, Caelum’s sun shone brightly in a cloudless blue sky—as it always did. The shining marble city was nearly empty of any other Guardians—as it always was.

  At least, for as long as Taylor had known it. Through Michael, she had the faintest memory of the city filled with thousands of Guardians, mentors and novices, warriors and scholars. Less than a hundred Guardians remained now, and they didn’t pass their time here. There were simply too many demons and too much to do on Earth.

  A few were passing through, however, visiting the archives or taking a short rest between assignments. Taylor could hear their heartbeats and voices, and at times, it seemed as if she felt their footsteps vibrating through the marble streets and courtyards. She hadn’t yet decided whether she truly felt those vibrations, or if it was another echo from Michael: his connection to the realm, channeled to her.

  She doubted that her singing would reshape the arches and spires as Michael’s singing did, however.

  Across the courtyard facing Michael’s temple, Rosalia emerged from beneath one of those arches, which doubled as a Gate between Caelum and the human realm. Used by the Guardians who didn’t possess a teleportation Gift—which was most of them—each Gate led to a different location; Rosalia was coming in from France.

  Dark-haired, stunningly beautiful, and so nice that it was impossible to hate her for it, Rosalia smiled when she spotted Taylor on the steps of Michael’s temple. Her yellow sundress flirted with her knees as she crossed the courtyard, and she looked so sunny and cheerful that it was easy to forget that this woman could manipulate shadows like a weapon, and that behind those warm eyes lay a mind that had formulated a plan that tricked hundreds of demons into destroying each other.

  And her warm eyes also saw too much. Her smile dimmed when she drew in close, and Taylor wondered if the cracks were showing inside her, too.

  “Are you feeling well, Taylor?”

  “Fine.” No need to worry her about Michael or the temple yet. For all of Rosalia’s brilliance, for all that she could manipulate people and form devastatingly successful plans, she knew no more than Taylor about spells or how to free Michael from Hell. “Just one of those days.”

  Rosalia nodded as if accepting that explanation, but Taylor wasn’t certain that the other woman wasn’t on the verge of feeling her forehead for a fever, even though Guardians couldn’t become sick. Rosalia had that way about her.

  But she didn’t pull out a thermometer. She only sighed and said, “I see.”

  She probably did see, and understood that Michael was at the root of it, even if she didn’t know the specifics. Rosalia had witnessed the worst of Taylor’s battle with Michael for control of her own body. Hell, Rosalia had healed from the worst of it, when Taylor, possessed by Michael, had stabbed the other Guardian through the chest.

  Strange how that incident had resulted in a bond of friendship between them. But then, since becoming a Guardian, a whole lot of Taylor’s life had become strange.

  Strange was her new normal.

  Though now that she thought about it, Rosalia being in Caelum wasn’t normal, either. The Guardian didn’t visit the realm very of
ten, and usually only when meeting her friends. Neither Radha nor Mariko was here now, so that meant she’d probably come looking for Taylor. If so, now Rosalia was probably wondering if she’d come at a bad time.

  “Did you need me for anything? It’s not that bad of a day, if you are.”

  Smiling faintly, Rosalia stepped close enough to adjust Taylor’s white shirt collar, then smooth her hands over Taylor’s shoulders. Though she might have punched anyone else, Taylor allowed Rosalia this, too. The poor woman couldn’t stand seeing someone that she cared about looking untidy—and in any case, Rosalia wasn’t really paying attention to what her hands were doing. She’d gotten that look in her eyes that said: A demon would be dying soon.

  “Do you remember Nicholas St. Croix?”

  Taylor frowned. Did she? The name was familiar, but she couldn’t recall a face.

  Rosalia helped her out. “The dungeon in Rome.”

  Ah, yes. No wonder Taylor couldn’t immediately remember. She’d spent half of her time in the dungeon watching a few hundred demons being slaughtered, and waiting for Michael to take over her body and save the humans stuck in the center of the massacre.

  St. Croix had watched the massacre, too. He’d made being present for it a condition before allowing Rosalia use of the dungeon.

  “Let me see if I remember,” Taylor said. “Caucasian. Sixtwo, one-seventy, black-brown hair, and blue eyes that remind me of ice chips from the frozen field in Hell. A handsome devil of the GQ variety, and if I’m not mistaken, you thought he actually was a demon for a while.”

  “You’re not mistaken. He’s a straight-up bastard.”

  “Who you helped anyway.”

  “Yes, well. He was useful.” Rosalia stepped back, and seemed satisfied with the straight line she’d made of Taylor’s button-up front. “I think he’s found his mother.”

  “Oh.” Yes, Taylor recalled part of that, too. He’d bought the dungeon because he’d been searching for a demon who’d posed as his mother. Maybe after he’d had his revenge, he’d be less of a bastard. Taylor doubted it, though. “So is he headed to Rome, intending to lock her up and slay her?”