The Damned

by L. A. Banks

  Damali was partially blinded by the combination of white smoke and sulfuric plumes, but could hear her Carlos gagging. His body hit the ground, she heard bones snap, and this time he didn’t move. She swung wildly, saw Carlos open his eyes where he lay, his eyes intermittently flickering red and silver. Then he sat up. She paused for a beat. He should have been dead. Which one was it? Shit. Carlos leapt up. The other one could have taken on his clothes to cause confusion. Illusion. Both now stood facing each other, dressed exactly the same.

  “Do him,” they both said in unison, breathing hard.

  One Carlos looked at the other. “Your biggest mistake was messing with my woman!”

  She saw a dark current exit both bodies. Both Carloses bulked to master-vampire stature with Council-level powers as the link continued to connect them. Both had fangs. Both had red eyes. Both swiped at each other in a mirror image, ripping away black fatigues. Both turned and reached for her blade. One had a hint of silver in the red of his eyes…. One had a tattoo lit on the side of his neck…. Only one had her brand over his heart.

  Damali swung, still half-seeing, aiming for the dark Carlos, the Isis ringing as it connected to the Chairman’s neck. The blow sent vibrations of satisfaction up her forearm, into her biceps, into her shoulder as her throat released a warrior’s battle cry. A thud sounded, a head rolled at her feet. The Chairman’s body exploded, sending ash and cinders into the air. Tears stung her eyes; she’d missed. The blinding smoke … She watched the wrong Carlos expand, get taller, and begin to crush the Adam’s apple within her man’s throat. A dark book burned inside the cavern of his barrel chest, creating a red outline, pushing against his scaled skin from the inside out, the crest on it living and moving as his laugh thundered.

  The evil, stronger Carlos threw its head back and laughed harder. Life began to slide away from her man. As her blade was about to leave her hand in a desperation toss to the dying Carlos, instinct held it to her. A power grab would take it midair. But the strangling Carlos opened his hand and it was there. Just as the growing entity looked up, for a split second their eyes met, her Carlos smiled a half smile, swung, and the dark one’s head rolled.

  Her Carlos fell to the ground clutching his throat, coughing from being strangled. A duplicate of his head rolled to Damali’s feet and stared at her glassy-eyed. A dead ram’s head replaced the Carlos look-alike and turned to ash that blew away.

  Cinders made the team hack and cough as Damali rushed to the surviving Carlos’s side. A beam of white light opened in the sky, a heavy breeze blew the smoke away, and they watched in awe as the writhing ashes of the dark entity exposed a burning book cradled in the middle of its rib cage.

  Heaven lit; the book lifted and vanished. Meteors fell in a natural fireworks display. Carlos flung a golden shield away from his body like a discus and covered Yonnie and Tara beneath it. Holy water rain blessed with angel tears poured down to wash the foul earth. Damali sat on the ground in the mud as her Carlos slowly pushed himself up to sit beside her. The team gathered around within the blue white circle of light that bathed them. Yonnie and Tara’s eyes shone from deep within the forest behind a protective globe. A torrent of clean rain became a curtain around them. Harpies squealed, crackled, and burned trying to escape the Light.

  The earth sucked in a pair of shackles with charred sections of skeletal remains crumbling and breaking apart as ash while the wounded earth resealed itself. Trees righted, time stopped for a moment, two choppers approached, and everything went back to the way it had been. A pair of friends nodded in the darkness and vanished as Carlos’s shield lifted.

  Carlos and Damali looked skyward with the team.

  “You weren’t supposed to throw me your sword. I was supposed to earn the right to borrow it.”

  “I know,” she whispered. “Baby, I know.”

  EPILOGUE

  Two weeks later Malibu, California—Cliffside Mansion.

  I still can’t believe how they put a totally untrue spin on everything,” Damali said, leaning up to peek at the news. “That is pure propaganda! How in the world can they say it was civil unrest and rioting over gas prices that blew L.A. up like that? Not to mention, all those eyewitnesses, and—”

  Carlos leaned up and kissed her, clicking off the plasma screen TV across the room, and stopping her words with his tongue at the same time. He stroked her hair as she returned her head to his chest. He sighed with utter contentment as she curled up near him in their most favorite place in the whole wide world—next to each other in bed.

  “But then how do you discount landslides, avalanches, meteor showers, freakin’ sand storms in Arizona? Is it me, or am I crazy?” Damali sat up, waving her arms in the middle of the king-size bed as she spoke. “People are crazy, Carlos. They don’t know how close they came to the big one. There’s still stuff out there, some of that mess on the streets got away and sunk beneath the earth. How can people go back to business as usual after a major catastrophe? We still have crime, global warming, ecological damage, economic problems, war … Really, this just makes me wanna scream. They aren’t tapped into what’s going on, what’s important.”

  His gaze slowly raked her. He loved the way the white silk sheets moved when she moved, caressing her skin as they fell away from her body. Seeing that always did something to him. He was just glad that she didn’t have a problem with him having a little bad boy still in him. “Yeah, baby, I know,” he murmured, thoroughly enjoying the sheen that post-lovemaking perspiration and sun left on her buttery soft skin.

  “We have to do something. Be involved. Take a stand. Speak out about how the story wasn’t told right and the world governments covered it all up—they are altering history, and the real stuff going on behind the scenes should be documented and chronicled.”

  He just watched her naked breasts sway as she got herself worked up about things beyond their control. She had beautiful nipples.

  “It’s probably being written in one of the big books as we speak,” he said stroking her hip. “Marlene’s got it.” The news be damned. It was what it was; the struggle between good and evil wouldn’t be over until the last days … which were not today. At least not at the moment, while he was in bed with this gorgeous, sexy woman he loved. Priorities. Everything was a matter of perspective.

  “You’re not fazed at all, are you?” she said shaking her head and reaching for the remote.

  He smiled and held it away. She opened her hand and had it.

  “Aw, girl,” he said rolling over on his side to capture her. “You have to be nice; I’m still going through changes.” He smiled and showed her a hint of fang, knowing what that did to her. “I can’t do stress right through here while I’m still apexing.”

  She chuckled and dropped the remote on the floor, then kissed the bridge of his nose, and watched his dark lashes lower, hiding a hint of silver flickering with a little red in his irises. Well, maybe she wouldn’t worry about all that at the moment … not while sunlight bathed him, and just like everyone else, only gave him a rich, golden tan. It seemed like he’d beaten the system again, coming out holding aces … seeming more like a daywalker than a Neteru, but who was she to judge?

  This sexy, incorrigible hunk wouldn’t live forever, either. So why waste precious time? She kissed him again more slowly, appreciating this vast natural resource she held in her arms, who was her best friend, an excellent lover, an in-the-trenches partner, but was also more mortal than anything else, just like she was. Guaranteed, mortal or not, he’d be around working the system for a very long time, just like she had a very long time to collect the rest of the stones she was supposed to have.

  What he was, exactly, she just wasn’t sure, but she had given up trying to figure it out … just like the powers that he had finally given up trying to understand. Her man defied definition, didn’t fit into a nice, neat category. He had pulled a little of his old self back into him to beat the worst of what he was … but not too much, just enough to give him a littl
e edge … and a nice hint of fang when he was in a particularly amorous mood. But she could deal. He worried both sides, the Dark and the Light, though, on account of the fact that he had a little of both all up in his DNA. He made the governments crazy and didn’t show up on their radar—did wonderful work for them when absolutely necessary, but always on his own terms. He had shown her how to hide in plain sight … very cool. Still a master of the game who had his good days and bad days, like anyone else, he was the last brother on the planet you wanted to find in a foul mood.

  She laughed and just gave up as his kisses trailed down her neck. Tell him no? How? It was a stalemate, always, and they both won when the shoutin’ was over. Damali sighed.

  Like hers, his was a strange truce with the universe, and all sides had taken a pause to figure out what to do with him—or her, for that matter. In the meanwhile, if something went bump in the night and messed with an innocent, they handled it nice and smooth. At least the blood hunger didn’t rule him, except when he was particularly turned on … not that that was such a bad thing … oh, no, not the way he served a siphon. She had what he needed. It was all good, indeed.

  “The beach can wait,” he murmured with his eyes closed, reading her body, not her thoughts.

  “Ya think?” she said in a hot whisper near his ear, allowing her hand to slide farther down his belly. She chuckled. “Never mind. I have the answer to my own question.”

  “You just have to know the right ones to ask.” He smiled and lazily stroked her back with his eyes still closed. “You still gonna treat me this nice when I’m out of apex?”

  “No,” she snapped and laughed, making her voice approximate the Bonpo master’s. “That is not the right question. The question should be …”

  She ran her fingers through his hair, nuzzled his forehead, and kissed him there, opening his third eye so she could tell him more secrets and pour sensual images into his mind.

  “Oh, yeah, you know me,” he said on a shudder as she sent a wickedly delicious request into his senses. “Or a daylight-inspired V-point?” He laughed as she nipped his shoulder. “Maybe later. I like your idea better.”

  “Good, ’cause you don’t need permission to enter.” She breathed in deeply, inhaling hard against his neck, and then trailed her nose across his collarbone, loving how his tremors always released the fading hint of apex that she was surely going to miss until his next phase. “Standing invitation.”

  He flipped her on her back and pinned her, nudging her head to the side with his jaw so he could study her jugular. “Uhmmph, uhmmph, uhmmph … you gonna make me act a fool up in here today, girl.”

  “Like you already haven’t?” She laughed deep and sexy.

  “Yeah, but that was last night … do my best work when its dark, but might have to pull out all the stops this morning, if you keep making wicked mental suggestions like you just did.” He suckled the tender side of her neck.

  “It’s broad daylight,” she whispered with a sly grin. “And turn on your silver.”

  “You sure you want me to do that, or you wanna go au naturel?” He kissed her forehead. “Just once?”

  “With you, there is no, ‘just once,’ and you’re packing too much heat—and you know it.” She laughed as his smile widened and let her hands find the dip in his spine.

  “Umm-hmmm …” he said, opening the window from across the room without moving to let in the ocean breeze. “Can’t blame a brother for trying. But if the lady wants da silver to help her relax … hey.”

  Yes … the lady wants the silver,” she murmured, warming under his attention.

  “Just remind me when I get real close. I don’t think I wanna turn it on just yet. I like the way you feel without it.” He breathed her in and shuddered as his hands slipped under her backside.

  “Turn it on,” she whispered without resistance, and then gasped as his lips slowly found her breast. “Okay,” she finally breathed, “but how close?”

  He chuckled and rounded her taut nipple with his tongue. “When I’m falling.”

  She laughed and tried to push him away. “That’s too damned close.”

  “I know, but it makes things exciting.” He found her other breast and paid it tender attention.

  “You like living on the edge, don’t you?” Her murmur was so conflicted and what he was doing felt so good that she closed her eyes.

  “No,” he said in a hot breath, sending ripples of pleasure into her navel. “I like living over the edge … with you. Tumbling … falling … out of my mind,” he whispered kissing down her abdomen on each word, saving the last one to send as a heat-laden sensation against her mound. “Ain’t nothing like it,” he added, claiming her bud.

  She arched, unable to respond with anything coherent beyond a moan.

  “You know,” he whispered, his voice low-rolling thunder vibrations against the soft folds of her, “since we’re synced up … the next time you go into phase, I’ll be in apex.”

  She nodded as the crown of her head dug deeper into the pillow. “I know … no silver, then, all right?”

  He stopped what he was doing and set his chin on her belly, then smiled as she looked at him with a pained expression. “You serious? Is that a deal?”

  She laughed and tried to sit up, but he blanketed her and found her neck.

  “Stop messing with my mind, Carlos.”

  “I wasn’t. I was messing with your body.”

  She closed her eyes. “Then why’d you stop,” she whispered hard into his ear. “I was right there.”

  “Hmmm … because I thought I heard a tender offer. Maybe a sweet promise. Must be losing my touch,” he said, his smile fading slightly as he entered her slowly and closed his eyes.

  “You haven’t lost anything,” she said between a gasp and a moan. “What you’ve gained drives me crazy. Oh … God … You smell fantastic.” She dragged her nose up the side of his throat and teased his tattoo with her tongue until it lit in her mouth, coaxing his hips into a deeper thrust. “If you pull out, I’ll make the other one light up, too … if you want.”

  “No, baby … just don’t stop …” he said between his teeth, throwing his head back with his eyes closed as he moved against her with more force. “It’s already lit real, real good … you have no idea how damned good.” He dropped his burning forehead to hers. “Mali, it’s always so good.”

  She moved her hips in a lazy circle, dipping away from his slow thrusts. “Then you gonna stop messing with my mind?”

  “You win this round,” he murmured against her hair, and increased his grip around her waist. “But I ain’t never gonna stop messin’ with your mind … oh, baby, if it makes you do that … right there, oh, God … like that,” he said in a rush, wincing from pleasure as she brought him into her harder.

  “You, Carlos Rivera, are a dangerous combination of things,” she whispered on a quiet gasp as he nipped her neck and poised a passion-length fang over her jugular sweet spot.

  “I love the way you say my name when I’m inside you, corazon.” He gently knocked her jaw back with his.

  “You still worry me, though … got a lotta bad boy still in you.”

  “Yeah … you bring it out and that’s who I am, baby. Somewhat reformed but not completely recovered. Can you live with that?” he whispered hard against her throat, lowering himself to fully enter her before he bit her.

  She arched and found his jugular sweet spot. “Yeah, oh, yeah … Car … los … I think I can live with that.”

  Turn the page for a sneak peek at the next Vampire Huntress Legend novel.

  THE FORSAKEN

  COMING IN JULY 2006

  To beg her husband to relent was futile. His rage knew no bounds. Lilith stared at his large black glistening hooves as she huddled on the searing floor of his pit and waited for the stomping to begin again.

  “You allowed my son to be baited to his death by a Neteru! My son?” he bellowed, causing a thunderous wind to sweep across her exposed vertebrae an
d ignite them in flames. Vermin that had nested in her hair squeaked at the violation of their feast. “They took Dante’s head, Lilith! His head by an Isis, which means that even I cannot raise him from the Sea of Perpetual Agony!”

  She wailed from the excruciating pain and dissolved into sobs without tears, her will to survive fractured. His litany had been a monthlong refrain with each tail lash. The beast would not be appeased this time. In her mind she begged for him to turn her body over to the Harpies.

  “The Harpies shall not have you, for you have taken my greatest source of torture pleasure from me—Dante!”

  She covered her head with a remaining arm and immediately felt it ripped from her body; the dull thud of flesh striking the wall converged with the convulsions that jerked her limbless torso.

  “Husband, please. I swear to you—”

  “That you had been fucking my firstborn son for years was of no consequence to me. I enjoyed watching. That you would try to create another through a stolen half-vampire–half-Neteru embryo, I found delightful, sensually ruthless. . . . I wanted to see what it would become; the experiment was intriguing. But you failed.”

  “That’s why I did it, my love . . . for you,” she whispered, begging on a strangled swallow and choking on her own black blood. “Anything for you, everything for you, my all. I knew you would cherish the child since nothing like it had ever been created. It was a gift, a surprise for you, darling. Please let me make it up to you, my dark essence, please. . . . Just please stop the torture. I’ll do anything; just command it so.”