by Julie Kenner
“Did she help him?”
“Who?”
“The soldier?” Viktor answered, remembering the instant respect he’d felt for the man who’d ended up in Bonnie’s bed. His wounds ran deep, and yet he faced the world with the humor and sense of adventure worthy of any Romani. “Her gift was one I’d never seen, except in a chovihano my grandfather once knew. A true healer.”
“I don’t know if she helped him,” Eve answered, clearly perplexed, and if he didn’t mistake the slight tilt of her head, curious. “I can find out.”
Viktor slid into the chair where the old woman had sat earlier. Her presence had been a great surprise to him. The Romani people had many rituals to ensure that their dead crossed to the Otherworld and as far as Viktor had been taught, gypsies were not apt to haunt the living, though they could be contacted by those with the gift. In all these years, he’d guessed he was the only Romani spirit trapped here. He longed to hear the story of the old woman and the others she’d mentioned, but that would wait. Now, he had more pressing interests.
He folded his hands in front of him casually, denying the urge that pushed him to attempt to touch Eve again. When he had this morning, he’d dispersed, shocked out of organized form, at least for a moment or two. The effect had been disorienting, and despite a century of captivity, he hadn’t adapted to not being in control. He wasn’t sure what had happened, but until he knew, he wasn’t prepared to take another risk.
Still, the ache to touch her, to inch his fingers across the tabletop nearly made him forget the direction of their conversation.
“No need—I believe she achieved her goal. And after one hundred years of captivity, I’m more interested in my own future. There are so many possibilities now that you’ve broken the witch’s hex.” At her questioning look, he explained, “At the moment of my death, she cast a spell that trapped the essence of who I was, who I am, in that cursed bottle.”
Eve’s lips parted in a tiny gasp. Was it his imagination or did her slight intake of breath seem to sap the air around him?
She combed both hands through her hair, tugging hard enough on the roots for Viktor to realize the gesture was out of frustration more than from a quest to tame the wild strands.
“How? Such magic—”
“—is real. You know. You can speak to the dead.”
She smirked again. “Wasn’t much of a two-way conversation last night, Viktor.”
With a strange sense of familiarity fueling her humor, Viktor matched her sardonic smile. And he so enjoyed the sound of his name on her lips. He’d liked it last night, and even more so now, spoken with such comfortable confidence. The woman inspired an admiration he’d never known before. She showed so little fear and faced unknowns with directness and humor. She was indeed the very woman who could beat the curse into submission, once he figured out how.
“Believe me, Evonne Baptiste, if I could have taken form, touched you, whispered so my breath curled around your ear, I would have.”
Practically of their own accord, his fingers inched toward hers again. She sat back in her chair, but her hands remained flat against the tabletop. When they were nearly fingertip to fingertip, the urgent sound in her voice stopped his forward motion.
“How did you die?”
He flashed his gaze at her, then dropped his stare back to her fingers. Her nails were short, clean and polished with a rich gloss. Her fingers were long, lean and delicate. Her skin looked so warm, so inviting, he could practically feel his mouth watering in anticipation of her taste.
“How else does a man like me die?” he asked, his voice sounding far away and dreamy, as if spoken by someone else. He knew he shouldn’t take the chance, but the connection forged between them last night was too powerful to resist.
He concentrated all of his force into his hands, then grabbed her. The magic held. She gasped, but unlike this morning, he didn’t vanish. He remained at the table, her hands clutched in his.
“I died at the hand of a beautiful woman, a woman very much like you.”
CHAPTER SIX
EVE KNEW SHE SHOULD feel afraid, but no emotion stood a chance against the swarm of intense desire shooting through her every vein, her every nerve, her every sense. Need became a scent swirling around her nose, peppery and enticing, like a spicy exotic dish cooked over an open fire. Her eyelids drifted down against a smoky backdraft and instantly, flames formed in front of her. Night sounds rushed her ears. Crickets, music. A jovial accordion, perhaps a weeping violin. The instant she registered how her mouth had dried, the tingle of rich, sweet wine blossomed on her tongue.
Scenes from his life, perhaps? Maybe…the night of his death?
“What are you showing me?” she asked.
“What you wish to see.”
“You can’t read minds,” she insisted, not entirely certain that her claim was true.
“You know who I was, Evonne Baptiste. The grandson of Jacques Savitch, the powerful chovihano. I can tap into the mysteries of the Otherworld, if I’m so inclined.”
She swallowed. According to stories, Jacques Savitch had controlled his unruly tribe with magic for nearly forty years. A true shaman healer, he reportedly anchored his family to Romani traditions so tightly, he spread peace and tranquility to all who sought his counsel. But neither his son nor his daughter had shown talent for the arts of the ancients, and without someone to pass the gifts to, all could have been lost. Luckily, his grandson, Viktor, had shown great promise. But according to legend, Viktor never achieved chovihano status and even after he returned to his clan, never again attempted the shaman arts. So why now?
“Did Jacques teach you to use your gift for seduction?” she asked. She hadn’t opened her eyes, but she felt his essence shift, as if her question unnerved him. Served him right. Though she hadn’t moved from her spot at the kitchen table, she could feel cool grass and rich earth beneath her feet.
“I was young when he died,” Viktor answered curtly. “He claimed to have sent me to the gaujo so that I understood their threat to our traditions.” He shrugged. “I do not know. Yet by the time I returned to lead my clan, I was very different.”
Her eyes flashed open. He watched her without blinking, his expression solid as stone. His chin was square and rugged and his skin, though gleaming with an ethereal light, retained his swarthy gypsy pigment. His nose gave his face just the right dash of angular sharpness, but his eyes truly set him apart. Deep-set and hypnotic, his irises flashed with blue flame. The regret in his voice, spoken through generous lips, clashed with the need in his gaze. He wanted her. Again.
Like last night, only this time, he’d give her more.
“You used your magic to seduce me. Powerful stuff. Why couldn’t you use your magic to set yourself free?”
Again, her eyelids filled with lead and drifted down, blocking out his see-through image and replacing it with a very solid, breathtaking representation of the man he’d been on the night he died. He was dressed in sleek black pants, boots and a dark blue shirt that captured the rich color of his eyes. His vest, embroidered with a rainbow of threads, glittered in the firelight. He wore a frown that made his eyes stormy and his lips were drawn into a tight line. A man, dressed similarly, had just whispered something in his ear.
Eve swallowed thickly. “Where are we?”
“New Forest, just outside Southampton and Bournemouth. My clan had traveled there for a festival. We had craftsmen among our numbers, but the storytellers, seers and musicians were our stock and trade.”
She nodded, certain he was showing her the night of his death. Legend placed Viktor’s last appearance in New Forest in southern England.
“Is this a memory?” she asked, her voice a hoarse whisper.
“I’m showing you what happened that night.”
In her mind, she watched him march through the encampment, joy and celebration all around him, and yet, she could hear the sounds echo as if the happiness was miles away. His scowl dominated the scene, which s
uddenly went black the minute he stepped into the leafy darkness on the forest’s edge.
“Were you attacked?” she asked with a gasp, but after a moment, the scene refocused. He’d traveled some distance, to a single dark vardo, a traditional Romani wagon. A fire crackled outside, but no one sat near. Anticipation and fear, muted as if her ears were stuffed with cotton, made the scene painful to watch. Was he walking into an ambush? Did he know his attackers? Did he die slowly? By someone’s hand or by magic?
Suddenly, she heard his footsteps crunching over the dried leaves and twigs beneath his boots. That was the only sound, until the wagon door swung open and a woman glided down.
She was dark-skinned, like Viktor, and her hair, black as the night, draped her shoulders like a shawl. The minute she spotted Viktor, she rushed him. Eve braced for the impact.
She felt only a slight shudder.
“Viktor! Why have you come?”
“I will not make the marriage, Iliana.”
The woman’s black eyes, lined with kohl, widened to rival the shape of the full moon. “You can’t mean it, Viktor. You made the promise.”
Iliana had whispered, but the power of the desperate fury behind the words echoed like a shout.
“I cannot honor my words. It was wrong of me to make that pledge. I will not condemn Yuri. I will not bring your bengesko yak into my family.”
Eve knew the word. The evil eye. And this was not an accusation gypsies tossed around lightly. She remembered the crest on the wooden box where she’d found Viktor’s bottle—the mark of the Dulas, a family reputed to have culled great skill in the dark magical arts. Was this Iliana one of them?
“We are powerful, Viktor, but with me, your power will be infinite. Once I wed Yuri, you will have a mighty ally. Your wayward family will stay together. That’s what you want, isn’t it? What you crave?”
In the background, Eve heard Viktor’s voice, muted and far away. It took her a moment to realize he was speaking to her from her world in the present time, not to Iliana in this strange half-memory, half-dream.
“Yuri was my cousin. The eldest of six boys, each more desperate to leave the clan than the other. Yuri was a widower, and the next in line to rule. He held sway over the part of the family I was having the most trouble controlling.”
With a rapid succession of blinks, Eve returned to the present and watched Viktor’s face harden with anger.
“Sounds very political,” she said. “There was dissent among your clan. Since you had gone to live with the gaujo, you weren’t entirely trusted by the men in your family. Not everyone agreed you should rule them. Many wanted to leave.”
Viktor nodded. “The family was large, extended. Some had already left, others wanted to turn from the old life and embrace the gaujo way. They’d lost the magic of the ancients and it had been replaced by greed for possessions. I had to keep them together. I owed it to my grandfather.”
Eve’s eyes drifted closed and she watched Iliana fling her arms around Viktor and rub suggestively against his body. He tried to push her away, but she persisted, begged. Made lewd promises that jarred even Eve’s sexually liberated ears.
“Had you seduced her first, before you betrothed her to Yuri?” she asked.
“Not in the sense you mean,” he answered. “I charmed her. Led her to believe she was the most beautiful woman I’d ever met—that gifting her to my cousin in marriage was a great honor. I knew even Yuri could not resist her and that her power would help hold my family together. This, she knew. And yet, she misunderstood my personal attention.”
Eve bit her lip, trying to fight the urge to watch as Iliana tore Viktor’s vest from his chest and forced her hands into his shirt.
She distracted herself from the scene with more questions, knowing she had to fill in the blanks of the legend of Viktor Savitch. “She wasn’t the only one, either, was she?”
“The others understood. The others took the passions I inflamed to their marriage beds. Satisfied husbands do not wish for more than they have. If I’d learned one useful thing during my exile, I learned that while women possessed no political power, they wielded great influence with their mates, particularly in the bedroom. The best way to ensure the cohesive continuation of my clan was to arrange strong gypsy marriages for the young men, the ones who burned most to break away from centuries of tradition.”
In the dream, Viktor pushed Iliana away, this time with decisive force. Suddenly, a fog blocked out the action, though Eve could have sworn she saw movement behind them, as if a crowd had approached before Viktor’s thoughts turned away from that scene.
“So you charmed young girls and then married them off to your clansmen?”
He chuckled, but the sound lacked humor. “Hardly young girls, Evonne. Widows, wives abandoned by their husbands with children to feed and protect. Women who knew the pleasures of the flesh. They didn’t need me to show them, just to remind them of their beauty and innate feminine power.”
“But Iliana—”
He interrupted her question with a flash of light that threw her back into the phantom scene. Viktor struggled against the arms and legs of four huge men, one gripping each of his arms and legs. A fifth wrangled a rope around his neck. A sixth man approached, just as burly and dark as the others, and placed the stump of a tree into the space between Viktor’s legs.
“Don’t be a fool, Iliana. You have the power to kill me, but nothing more,” Viktor spat.
Iliana Dulas grinned at him, showing teeth that seemed a tad too sharp around the edges.
“You are correct, Viktor. I do not have the power to curse you as you deserve. So I will steal some magic from you.”
A host of others swarmed around her. A young boy slammed a drum and a teenage girl shook a beribboned tambourine. Three old women, chanting, stood behind Iliana, who took a small pouch from one of the crones and tossed it into the fire. Sparks flashed and even over the distance of time, Eve nearly choked on the scent of burning sulfur.
The chanting grew louder as Iliana lent her voice to the song. She writhed in sensual undulations and the beating of the drum and quiver of the tambourine increased the cadence. With another flash, one of the old women stepped forward and placed a small wooden box on the tree stump in front of Viktor. She opened the casket and withdrew the intricately crafted bottle—the same one now sitting on Eve’s vanity table.
Eve gasped, but the sound died quickly when the third old woman produced a thick-bladed knife. The blade captured the firelight and Eve’s heart pounded as if she was there, afraid of what might happen—what she knew would happen.
She tried to close her eyes against the image, but realized her lids were squeezed tight. She didn’t want to see more. She didn’t want to see him die.
“Stop,” she said.
Viktor didn’t respond. Iliana sprang forward. Her eyes glowing with red-hot malice, she lifted the knife, chanting, swaying, chattering so that Eve thought she might lose her mind.
“Stop!”
The image popped out of her mind. Eve forced her eyes open and inhaled as if she never thought she’d breathe again.
Viktor leaned back into the chair, no longer touching her, his expression nearly inscrutable.
“Why so squeamish? You know what happened,” he reasoned.
Eve shook her head. “I don’t have to see your murder firsthand to understand the injustice. Was that your intention?”
He quirked a ghostly brow. “You are clever, Evonne.”
She rolled her eyes. Yeah, real clever. She’d spent her savings to buy an object brimming with evil and black magic, an object made powerful with the blood of the murdered man sitting so calmly across from her, the same man who’d brought her incredible pleasure the night before. All to satisfy an intellectual and physical obsession?
Clever? Not exactly the word she’d choose.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“SO SHE STABBED YOU?”
Viktor shifted, his ghostly leg creaking, spiking with p
ain from the past. The shock and revulsion in her voice, the horror in her eyes, touched a part of him he’d long set aside—the part of him that hoped someone, somewhere, had mourned his death.
“She bled me, like a hog for slaughter. She used the blood to feed her hex. My body died slowly, allowing her time to trap my essence. She then charmed the bottle by enclosing it in the box, which was also protected by black magic. I would have been imprisoned for all time, I believe, if not for you.”
Eve threaded her fingers into her hair, her palms pressing against her scalp, her head shaking back and forth involuntarily, as if she didn’t want to believe—but did.
“Viktor, that’s a horrible way to die. I’m very sorry.”
He snorted derisively. “I don’t want pity.”
She glared at him, clearly insulted. “I’m offering you compassion. But if you don’t want it…”
He glanced aside, suddenly needing to focus on anything but Eve. His eyes skimmed over the mismatched rugs she’d tossed all around her kitchen and the nicks in the polished wood floor. Viktor hadn’t expected such emotional empathy from her. Their existences had been separated by centuries. He never imagined that anyone in his own time had truly grieved for his absence or his exit as leader. If they’d attempted to avenge him, the act would have sprung more from duty than outrage. He’d broken tradition, spit in the face of the spirits with his manipulations and schemes. And worse, he’d known all along exactly what he was doing.
He’d often wished he could blame his actions on misguided loyalty and desperation for his clan—but the truth remained that he’d hatched his plans of seduction out of bitter stubbornness. He’d been angry that his family had sent him away and for the price of their betrayal, he would not let them have what they wanted most—freedom to choose a new life. Had it taken one hundred years for him to learn the error of his ways?
He moved out of the chair, away from the table, away from Eve’s soulful eyes. He drifted to the window, knowing the sunlight would mask his form as he looked out onto her expansive and verdant lawn. “I apologize,” he said after a long moment of yearning to feel the grass on his feet, the sun on his back. If he could go outside, would he feel anything? “Your compassion is more than I deserve.”
