“You’ve come to me stripped of your power. You should never have uncloaked yourself.”
Go, power. Go back to my dad. Go back, go back, go back.
“Why would I believe you’d harm me? All I’ve ever done is serve you. You trusted me to protect Máthair.”
“Do not speak her name,” Seanair said in a harsh whisper. “You stand here in dishonor. She was grace. I will not relinquish the cuff, and I will not abide anyone who asks me to sacrifice the one thing I love.”
A red haze streamed beneath the pews and dispersed over the ground. The temperature shifted from bitter to boiling. Aleron pressed himself flat to the stone. The ring vibrated against his chest, and the bloodied mist clung to his skin.
Unimaginable burning spread over him. Heat gave way to choking pain and sent his mind somewhere else. Higher, maybe. Or somewhere simpler. Pressure exploded behind his eyeballs. A scream stuck in his throat. Nothing in his eighteen years had prepared him for the unleashed power of an Alpha Fire. The ring against his chest heated as if strong-arming the threatening energy, the metal’s scald lessening and then cooling in a snap. Something coated his body as if he’d been dipped in wax then shoved in ice. The thump in his ears returned, the sound stuttering like his heart was on the verge of stopping. He heard a voice, calm and cool and without an ounce of remorse.
“You have disappointed me, Bill,” Seanair said.
And then, through the frantic pounding of his heart, he heard his father plead, “Please, no.”
A strange noise sounded, like candy wrappers crinkling. No. Steak. Sizzling. Done.
Everything slowed. A hint of barbecue-like smoke cut across his nose, leaving as quickly as it came. The stillness returned. A hum came from the ring. A toll. Soft and mellow and solemn.
A weird, staticky glove clung to his hand. No heat. No chill. Just a heaviness. A memory.
Of a long-ago handshake.
“Show yourself, Aleron.”
He turned his head left, right, wondering if he’d really heard his name. His hand tingled anew. Stung. A phantom electricity crackled.
“I marked you all those years ago, at your party. It was wise to keep tabs on the young man who’d one day serve me more honorably than his father.”
Wait. Why didn’t his dad say something?
“I won’t ask again. Come to me. Now.”
Goose bumps broke over his skin at the low, smooth command.
I’m sorry.
The woman’s voice. Again. That creepy, invisible, not-there female voice that wouldn’t stay the fuck out of his head.
Aleron pushed to his knees and rose between the pews like a rogue weed above grass. He looked to the back of the temple, then to the front—
He spied the mound on the floor. A small, gray heap. His eyes went wild, leaping around, shifting from the mound to Seanair, mound to Seanair.
Their leader’s white, thick hair was slicked back, his manner elegant but total darkness weighing in his eyes.
“What did you do?” Aleron choked out, shoving aside a truth he couldn’t acknowledge.
“I cannot step down as Fire Magnus. To do so would be our element’s end.”
His mind blanked, and his chest hollowed, as if his body were shutting down part by part, protecting itself from the onset of truth. “What did you do?” he repeated.
“What had to be done. A message had to be sent, and I sent it. He did not suffer. It was instant.”
Aleron turned to leave, knowing it was stupid, knowing he would fail, knowing he would be ash on the ground like his dad. The best man he knew. The best man, who was…gone.
He couldn’t focus. His foot clipped a pew. He continued toward the exit, his body on a strange autopilot as he walked, dazed, down the aisle like a jilted groom. He wasn’t dead yet. Why wasn’t he dead yet?
“You will leave your family today and serve me.”
He thought back to what he’d seen while hiding beneath the table, the flame springing from his pre-powered palm, the fire belligerent and blue. His father’s mantle had broken free, settling inside him for but a second, long enough to say hello, look around, feel at home. Again, the air around him cleared, and he knew.
The ring and his father’s power protected him.
His father had known it would—in case the worst happened.
He stopped. Turned. Stared up the aisle at the ash pile in front of the altar.
“Go fuck yourself,” he heard himself say, aware he was being a fool but unable to care.
He yanked the ring from inside his clothes, gripped it like he could squeeze the power free, and stormed up the aisle. Close enough to slug the motherfucker’s face, he stopped. “You want your precious power? Take it all. Take your best friend’s Alpha mantle.” He locked his gaze with Seanair’s stunning ice-blue eyes. “Never forget how you got it.”
A smile with the slightest sliver of white broke over Seanair’s face.
“I’d hoped he’d introduced you to his Alpha veil. I never imagined he’d relinquish it to you. Your father was smart in some ways, naïve in others.”
“Take it,” Aleron ordered again, hoping he could strike a bargain. “Take it and leave my family alone.”
“I cannot take your father’s power. Once you come of age, it will only work for you. Unless you want your family to go the way of your father, you will listen and learn and be the strongest Alpha Fire I’ve ever had in my command, or…” Seanair raised a hand and snapped his fingers, a brutal punctuation on how quickly he could end…anyone.
How could their leader stand there—in front of the altar in his crisp, white, Ralph fucking Lauren shirt and his pressed slacks and spit-polished shoes, with his tanned, aristocratic face—and act like nothing had happened?
Part of him wanted to end it all right now—charge Seanair and sucker-punch the fucker and die a bloody mess. His gut kicked. Once. Hard. A solid no-go.
The idea of waiting formed. Waiting and keeping his family safe. Waiting and planning and destroying…everything Seanair loved.
“Think, Aleron, about what I’m commanding and the choice you’re about to make.”
There was no thinking, only doing.
“If you swear an oath to leave my family alone, I will agree to be the best weapon you’ve ever had.” A thought returned, filling his head: payback.
The weapon who will end you.
“With two Alpha veils instead of just one, you’ll be unstoppable.” A gleam sparked in Seanair’s eyes.
Aleron’s gaze cut to the floor, and his heart bottomed out like an anchor striking rock. The shakes started in his hands, traveled up his arms, and took a full tour of his insides. He caught the glimmer of gold in the gray ash. A fresh fog pushed into his brain again, as if clouding all thought. His father was gone.
Gone.
He wanted to puke. He wanted to scream. But his brain stalled out on the why.
He faced Seanair and willed himself to stillness.
“The most valuable lessons are the hard ones,” Seanair said, his tone that of an erudite professor. “You’ve just witnessed the very best of Fire. Here’s Air.”
The doors ripped open. Shutters whipped wide. A frigid gust tore into the room, stirring up the pile of ash into an angry dust cloud. In a blink, the tiny tornado twirled up and away, carrying what was left of his dad into the night.
Poof.
Gone.
A tinkling sound caught his attention. His father’s wedding ring had fallen to the stone and now spun like Aleron’s thoughts, dizzying and incomplete. When the ring wobbled and fell onto its side, everything else just stopped with it. Everything but the evil in front of him. An evil that wouldn’t stop…unless Aleron stopped him.
He widened his stance, folded his arms, and looked the fucker dead in the eye. “Do we have a deal? I work for you for the rest of my life, and you’ll leave my family alone.”
“You are most definitely a Foussé.” A knowing smile pulled across Seanair’s face.
<
br /> “Yes or no?”
Seanair stepped toward him. An aura ignited around Seanair, a haze deepening from orange to red to a brilliant, obliterating blue. He raised a hand, his eyes wide and wild with the promise of death. “On second thought, I don’t think your anger is worth the risk. I’ve changed my mind.”
A slash of pain sliced along Aleron’s jaw. Hot, thick liquid spilled down his neck. His knees buckled, and he caught himself on the stairs leading to the altar.
This was it. His life was over. Eighteen and done, and his own fucking fault.
A blinding beam, like sunlight reflected in a mirror, lit the room. Arm outstretched, he lunged toward his father’s wedding band and closed his hand around it. An invisible force pressed him flat against the stone, the weight firm and unyielding.
He turned his head to see Seanair’s face angled toward the rafters, a reverent grin on his face, as if Mother Nature herself had shown up.
His mind blanked. His eyes closed. He couldn’t feel the stone beneath him. Like his senses were being yanked one by one.
“Don’t do this.” He deserved to die. He couldn’t save his father. He probably couldn’t save his family. He didn’t want to face them and tell them that he’d gotten his father killed. There were no words for what he’d done.
But he couldn’t give up. His dad wouldn’t have. His dad would have fought to the death. His dad had fought to the death.
“Goddess, please don’t kill me.”
And the female voice in his head whispered, I’m here.
Savannah, GA
One year later
Aleron pulled back the black velvet curtain and peered out the window, catching what he could of the front yard and street through the massive wreath covering much of the panes. Red bows hung along the black iron fence at the edge of the yard. Pine laced the air like it was either being pumped through the vents, or Seanair had turned the first floor of his antebellum home into a tree farm.
A massive canopied bed took up much of the bedroom, all the heavy fabric and claw-foot furniture looking as if some decorator had vomited gilt and gothic everywhere. He’d sleep on spikes before he’d get in that thing.
A knock sounded at the door.
He turned, taking in the luxury of his antique-furnished prison. No, guest room. That’s right. He was Seanair’s “guest.”
“Come in,” he said, knowing exactly who’d walk through the door.
“Good evening, Mr. Foussé. Seanair requests that you join him for dinner. Casual attire,” the butler said, his craggy face and scratchy voice more Halloween than Christmas. Hands behind his back, the butler stood scarecrow-still.
“I’ll take my meal up here.”
“No. The period of mourning for your father is over. It’s been a year, and your exemplary performance and early graduation from the Elite One Conservatory are cause for celebration. You won’t be returning to the campus.”
Thank the Goddess. A top-secret school for indentured Naturas with cells for dorms hadn’t done shit for moving his plans along.
Aleron gave a nod. “I’ll be down in fifteen minutes,” he replied, not about to thank the butler, who was little more than some Beta Fire spewing false pleasantries.
Seanair could take his tutors and trainers and his Elite One Conservatory and shove them up his Dual ass. Of course, he kept that traitorous thought to himself and stuffed it down beside his darkest secret.
“Now that you’re on an accelerated track, you’ll be introduced to an Elite One team on Thursday in preparation for an upcoming mission.”
“I won’t be much use to them without power.”
The butler gave a trite smile. “Seanair’s men are in need of a pre-powered lookout with experience. Oh, and Christmas Eve dinner will be at six sharp tomorrow.”
Experience. Was that what his father’s death was? Grief shoved at his insides. The ways he wanted to release it wouldn’t get him what he wanted.
“I didn’t realize Seanair celebrated human holidays.” Decorations were one thing, dinners another.
“Blending in has been key to keeping our race secret. You missed last year’s extravaganza. Seanair’s grandchildren still talk about last Christmas. They’re on a skiing holiday in Europe and will return Christmas Day. Otherwise, you’d meet them.”
Grandchildren? He wouldn’t trust Seanair to parent a plant. And he wanted nothing to do with a bunch of spoiled-rotten brats. But hey, if Seanair wanted to fool himself into believing Aleron would forgive and forget, he’d let the man cling to his delusions.
“I need to dress,” he said, swallowing the clog building in his throat.
“Ten minutes. Don’t be late.” The butler gave his trademark bow, treating him like a Lennox and not a Foussé.
Until the day Aleron’s Fire returned to the eternal fold, he’d never trust a Lennox.
The door snicked shut and brought back his blessed silence. He shucked off his clothes and rushed to the shower, flipping the knob, and stepping into the insta-hot spray. Grief plowed over him like a car barreling through a red light.
No warning. No horn. Just…bam.
A head-on collision with gut-wrenching sorrow.
In his mourning, he hadn’t allowed himself to cry, but he’d become one helluva puker. The heaves hit. He braced his hands on the walls and endured his body’s purge of its anguish, guilt, and remaining bits of lunch.
The dual showerheads washed away the evidence of his shame. Had it been a year? If so, time hadn’t healed shit. He could call up that fateful day and its glorious gore with ease and relive every damned second.
Weird, though, as once he’d baked the blame for his fuckup deep into his heart, he’d found a nugget of something buried beneath his conscience. An ember of determination glimmered and stayed aglow even in his darkest moments. The sensation grew stronger, awakening, smoldering, burning a hole through his remorse to reveal his constitution, as his dad had called it.
His mettle. His true nature.
His buck-the-fuck up.
He’d clung to the little nugget of hope and tended its tiny flame so it wouldn’t burn out.
It’d taken a solid twelve months in that “school,” but he’d rebuilt. His body. His mind. His commitment.
He reached for the soap, lathered up, and rinsed away any doubt. The rings hanging from the black leather string right over his heart danced in the water’s hot spray. He pulled his father’s wedding band and his mother’s vessel ring to his mouth. Held them there.
Remembered. Regretted. And fucking recommitted.
He shut off the water, stepped from the shower, and grabbed a black towel from its hook.
Right now, he had a role.
Repentant Boy.
Who’d dare not be late for dinner.
Towel tucked around his waist, he walked over to his duffel bag and pulled out his top-shelf, Elite One wardrobe. Rich punk threads. He tossed the towel back toward the bathroom and pulled on the cotton boxer briefs and undershirt. Tailored wool slacks. Thick, cashmere V-neck sweater. Loafers softer than butter. All black.
Like the eternal darkness Elite One wrought.
At the academy, he’d learned the extent to which his father had killed people on the regular, for a living. His grandpa had done the same for Seanair. Turned out, Foussés had a rep for threat elimination with a 100 percent success rate.
And Aleron was set to follow in his dad’s footsteps in eight-hundred-dollar shoes.
He left the guest room, headed down one side of the curved staircase, and paused in the dining room’s doorframe.
“Welcome,” Seanair said. “Take the seat to my left.”
Aleron set aside the welcome he’d prefer to extend and walked into the rectangular room. A massive painting hung over the buffet. Ensconced candles lit the room’s edges. Three candelabras lined a long dining table. Seanair sat in an oversize armchair at the far end. Flames roared behind him in a massive fireplace.
Fire, fire everywhere, but it
was Seanair’s Air energy he’d heed.
He filled his mind with repentance, gratitude, and a tad of anticipation. Seanair would read his exhalations—a sneaky, up-the-nose Air trick—and find Aleron nothing but Christmas-morning eager.
Aleron walked the length of the room, past the windows overlooking the front lawn, wreaths hung outside each one, and pulled out his assigned chair. Red-and-green plaid fabric covered the seat, back, and sides. The Lennox tartan.
“Good evening, sir,” he said, making the first move.
“Indeed, it is.” Seanair took the napkin from the center of his plate and set it in his lap. “See the map on the wall?”
Aleron’s wrecking ball of grief returned at the full place setting in front of him and the gold flatware. His gaze snagged on the forks. Salad. Dinner. Dessert. All the forks his mother had taught him to use. His mother, who was raising her three youngest boys alone and had publicly disowned her oldest.
“The map of the continents. It’s beautiful,” Aleron replied, studying the massive painting taking up the wall opposite the windows, its ornate gold frame at least a foot thick.
“It’s three hundred years old. My family received it as a gift when they arrived in the States. Seven continents. Seven leaders.” Seanair tugged at the sleeves of his dinner jacket. A wide, gold cuff peeked from beneath the sleeve of his white shirt. “Until your power arrives, you’ll learn our politics and both my allies and enemies.” He turned his head, giving Aleron his classic can’t-be-bothered expression. “I know you hate me, but you have a job to do and a promise to keep to secure the continued safety of your family.”
“Yes, sir.” Yes, sir, he fuckin’ did have a J-O-B. Listen. Learn. Finish what his father started.
His gaze shifted to Seanair’s wrist. One day, Aleron would remove that ancient cuff, preferably while inflicting pain.
“Unlike your father, you will not marry. Your family is lost to you. Your brother Emeric petitioned to have you removed from the Foussé family records in our database, so you exist now only to me. Once you’re fully powered, women will be a way to recharge your element and nothing more. Do you understand?”
Cait came to his mind and then disappeared.
The Beginning: A Natura Elementals Novella Duology Page 5
