by Anya Bast
SARAFINA WOKE THE SAME WAY SHE’D GONE TO sleep — aching for Theo. She craved the feel of his body against hers, his tongue on her skin, his hands on her body. Being with him, having him inside her, was the only time she truly felt safe anymore.
Her eyelids fluttered open and she moaned, stretching under the sheet that covered her. Theo was no longer in the chair. Actually, he was no longer in the room. That was strange since he rarely let her out of his sight.
She rose, not bothering to cover herself. “Theo?” No answer.
She navigated the room in the predawn, headed to the hallway, and hit her shin on the bed frame. “Ow!” She hopped on one foot toward the living room, hand to her shin. “Theo?” “I’m here.” A warm body pressed against hers, crowding her back against the wall.
“Theo,” she murmured, smiling. The dawn light just barely kissed the edges of his hair and bleached the color from his normally well-tanned skin. Shadows played over his face, obscuring his eyes. She reached up and let his long hair curl through her fingers. “I was worried you’d left me.” “Of course not.”
But he would. Eventually, he would leave her. He’d push her away because he didn’t feel worthy of her. The pain that Theo had had to endure all his life — goodness, it had started at birth — had shaped him that way. Too damaged for love. His life had molded him in such a way that he felt unworthy of anyone’s kindness, anyone’s total commitment.
And, damn it, she’d fallen in love with him. Didn’t bode well for her, did it?
“I—” She snapped her mouth closed and swallowed hard. The darkness closed around them like a smaller room within the room. “I want you, Theo,” she whispered against his lips. “I need to have you inside me. I want to feel close to you, as close as I can get.” He turned her toward the wall and pushed her hair to the side, his fingers running over the skin of her shoulder in a sensual sweep. His hands slipped over her bare breasts, caressing her nipples as his lips and teeth caught her earlobe and nipped.
A shiver ran through her and goose bumps erupted over her skin. Her sex plumped, excited, eager.
“Dally with the aeamon now for I’ll be coming for you soon.” Bai’s voice.
She stiffened and opened her eyes, all her excitement was gone in a rush of cold fear. She turned. Bai stood there, not Theo. His eyes glowed red and when he parted his lips, his teeth were pointed and sharp as knives.
Sarafina screamed.
TWENTY-FIVE
“SARAFINA!”
She lunged forward in bed, the sheets a tangle around her legs. Bright daylight streamed in through the bedroom window. Theo caught her in his arms and she fought him for a moment, not certain who he really was.
“Shhh, it’s okay now, you’re safe.” He pressed her head to his shoulder and wrapped his arms around her to keep her from thrashing.
Sarafina closed her eyes and whispered, “God, it was so real.” She shuddered, shaking and cold from the memory of Bai’s breath on her skin.
Theo pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “It was just a dream.” She pushed away from him a little so she could see his face. Theo, yes, it was Theo. “No. No, that was no dream. I could feel everything. Oh, God, I thought he was you. He touched me.” The words came out a horrified whisper. “I thought it was you, but it was Bai.” “It wasn’t real. It was a mind-fuck, Sarafina.” She shook her head and flipped the sheets away to expose her shin. “I hit my leg on the bed. I can still feel the pain.” There was no bruise there, at least not yet.
Theo pulled her close. As his embrace tightened she closed her eyes, letting out a breath of tension. She was safe now, safe.
After a moment, he pulled her away from him so he could look into her eyes. “He’s playing with you. The Atrika like to stalk and they like their prey scared. It excites them. He entered your subconscious as you dreamed and he woke your sense of self. It was like a lucid dream, understand? He can’t hurt you physically there, he can only scare you. If you allow him to scare you, he wins.” “But I hit my shin!” She shuddered. “And I felt his hands on me. . his breath.” “He can make it seem real, as real as waking reality.” Theo let out a slow breath. “Making you afraid, it’s like foreplay to him.” Bitterness rose to sting the back of her throat at the thought. She swallowed it down. “Yes, I get it. I understand. Don’t let him see how terrified he makes me and I win. Otherwise it. . excites him.” “Exactly. Come here.” He pulled her still trembling body closer against his and stroked her hair.
“I’m okay. It was just thinking he was you and then. . having it not be.” She frowned at the daylight and pushed away from him. “How long have I been sleeping?” “Stefan’s awake and Thomas is back. They’re questioning him. No sign of any Atrika yet. I let you sleep as long as you wanted since you needed it.” She raised an eyebrow. “And you? You don’t need sleep?” “I’m fine.”
“Bullshit. Lie down and take a nap, big guy. It’s my turn to watch over you.” She pushed him backward onto the bed, but he grabbed her by the arms and pulled her down on top of him.
Sarafina gave a yelp of surprise and found herself rolled beneath his body in one second flat, his mouth on hers.
Just as Sarafina was starting to relax a little and shake off the horror of her most recent encounter with Bai, Theo’s cell phone rang. He fumbled for it, took one look at the interface, and said, “We have to get to Gribben.”
GRIBBEN LOOKED LIKE A WAR ZONE. NOT UNLIKE THE one they’d left behind in Kentucky. Theo was getting sick of the carnage.
Theo lost his breath and Sarafina her step as soon as they crossed the threshold of the prison, but it didn’t slow them down for more than a heartbeat. The guards were away from their posts and the series of gates leading into the heart of the prison were flung open to allow Coven reinforcements to enter. All the prisoners were in lockdown and as they passed, they could see faces peeking from behind the small square windows in their heavy metal doors.
The prisoners were all smiling, laughing, pounding on their walls. They knew exactly what was happening — their Coven captors were getting their asses handed to them by daaeman.
So what else was new?
They made their way down into the bowels of the prison, where they’d put Stefan. The Atrika had either finally deduced where the Coven witches had taken their fearless leader, or they’d performed some kind of locator spell to find him. Either way, they were here now and locked in a battle with Thomas and the others.
The problem was both simple and profound: the Coven witches had no power here and the Atrika did.
It made for bad odds, all in all.
The sounds of the battle grew louder the closer they got. An Atrika blocked the open steel door they needed to get past in order to get to where Thomas and the others were, filling the frame like a freight train jamming the mouth of a tunnel.
They came to a skidding halt. Theo reached back for his sword and held it between himself and the monster who stood snarling in front of them. Sarafina held her sword in hand, too. Without magick to wield, Theo felt vulnerable as a newborn babe and he was certain Sarafina felt the same. A copper blade just wasn’t the same as magick.
The Atrika raised power. It crackled through the air like a spark finding dry tinder. Just as the creature threw it, he and Sarafina parted, each leaping to the side. The bolt of magick went straight past them, exploding against one of the prisoner’s doors where it made a big black smoking crater. That was one warlock who probably wasn’t celebrating anymore.
Before the creature could raise more power or focus on Sarafina, Theo lunged forward and sliced deeply into the thigh of the daaeman. The creature roared and lunged toward Theo, who only narrowly dodged his grip and rolled away to avoid being hit with any blood. The blood splashed, smoking, on the wall, and the demon’s wound popped and snapped from the copper.
Sarafina came up from behind and hefted her sword, driving it into the side of the Atrika. More daaeman blood gushed and they both danced to avoid it.
The Atrika let out a battle cry that seemed more animal than anything resembling human and turned toward Sarafina, who had backed away, holding her sword up. The creature raised another bolt, making Theo’s ear pop from the pressure.
“Sarafina, watch out!” he yelled.
She barely had time to duck the flare of magick that probably would have taken her head clean off. She rolled on the floor, sword tight in her hand, just like he’d taught her.
Theo swung toward the daaeman and caught him in the shoulder. Again the creature roared and lashed out magickally. This time Theo took a sideswipe bolt to his sword arm. Pain flared vibrantly through his body, making him drop his blade. The flesh of his upper arm was open and glistening — badly burned.
The daaeman charged him, but Sarafina was on his back in a moment, slashing at him as hard as she could to draw him away. She cried out as droplets of blood from the Atrika spattered her and ate right through her clothes.
Theo picked up his sword and forced himself to grip it. The Atrika was staggering a little, listing to the side as he chased Sarafina around the corridor, trying to corner her. It might have been a reaction to the copper blades slashing deeply into him, or perhaps it was from simple blood loss. Whatever was causing it, it was good.
Sarafina darted to avoid a blast of power and the daaeman feinted, managing to grab her by the arm and throw her up against the wall so hard she dropped her sword. He gathered power in a hard rush, clearly intending to drive it straight in the center of her while he pinned her there.
Anger and fear bubbled out of Theo, hot and bitter. He swung his sword with all his might, ignoring the searing agony of the movement. He aimed for the neck of the Atrika and caught him dead-on. The demon’s head separated from his shoulders and the body fell lifeless against the wall. Sarafina dove to the floor, just narrowly avoiding the spray of blood.
Theo grabbed her arm and helped her past the toxic gore. The floor and walls still smoked from the splattering of blood. She’d gone from sheet white to nauseated green, and he didn’t blame her. It was a gruesome sight.
Once they were far enough away, Theo went down on one knee, his wounded arm in shock at all the movement he’d made. It felt like someone had taken a blowtorch to his injured limb.
“Let me see.” Sarafina’s fingers were gentle as she angled his arm to take a look and whistled low. “It’s bad.” “I figured that,” he gritted out. “Better my arm than the center of my chest, though.” The crash and a bellow of Atrikan ire echoed through the open door. Theo lurched to his feet, gripped his sword, and charged through it with Sarafina right behind him.
Two more Atrika lay headless on the floor of the corridor where they’d stashed Stefan. A couple of witches lay on the floor, too, dead for sure. Another few lay wounded, their backs against the wall, breathing shallowly.
Stefan’s voice echoed from inside one of the cells and he and Sarafina ran toward it. Inside were Thomas, Isabelle, Claire, and Adam. Stefan stood surrounded by three Atrika. The head warlock’s skin was ashen and his shoulders were slumped. Gribben had taken its toll.
Sarafina had told Theo that Faucheux had said being imprisoned in Gribben — or at least, losing his magick — was the only thing that had ever come close to breaking him. Seeing Faucheux now, Theo believed it.
The head warlock fixed his gaze on Sarafina, hatred making his eyes bright and his face pinched, before he reached out, touched the Atrika nearest him, and they all jumped.
Gone.
The witches stood in silence for a moment. Theo could hear nothing but the moaning from the corridor.
Adam swore loudly. “And for the second fucking time Stefan escapes Gribben. The only person ever able to do that.” Isabelle threw her sword to the concrete floor with a clatter. “He didn’t escape. He was poofed. Don’t give him more credit than he deserves, which is none.” Thomas turned toward the door, throwing his sword down, too. “It’s done. Let’s tend the wounded.” He sounded as frustrated as Theo had ever heard him.
SARAFINA AND THE OTHERS FOLLOWED THOMAS OUT of the room, already finding Jack, Mira, Micah, and the other unharmed Coven witches helping the wounded and ensuring any injured daaeman were well and surely dead.
She was still shaking from their encounter in the hallway with the Atrika. Seeing Theo hit by daaeman power had nearly stopped her heart. He’d come close to being killed.
She couldn’t imagine a world without him in it.
As he walked toward her, she studied his open wound. “Let’s get out of Gribben so I can heal you up, Theo. You’re no good here until your arm is treated. After that’s done, we’ll come back and lend a hand with the injured.” He nodded and they made their way out of the prison. Stepping past the front gate and having the flush of her magick return to her was almost better than sex. They leaned against a stone wall outside and dragged in lungfuls of fresh air.
“Okay, come on,” she said almost immediately. They didn’t have time to burn.
He turned toward her, offering his arm for her inspection. She’d never tried to heal anything this extensive before and wasn’t sure she could do it.
“It’s all right if you can’t heal the whole thing, Sarafina.” He must have read the look on her face. “You’re the only fire witch I know who could even come close, who could even attempt it.” She let a faint smile flicker over her mouth. “My defensive skills might suck, but healing is something I can do.” “Your defensive skills looked pretty damn good to me just now. Ow!” “Sorry.”
As she worked, the others helped the wounded from the prison and brought out the dead. Once she was done, the wound looked as though he’d had a massive amount of stitches and a couple weeks of healing. It had taken a chunk out of her seat to do it, though.
He looked at the reddened, healing wound. “Amazing.” “Feel better?”
He cupped her chin and tilted her face toward his. “Amazing. ” They held each other’s gaze for a moment, then parted. It was time to go back in.
Ugh. She really didn’t want to enter Gribben again.
Together they descended into the depths of the prison, and then dove in, helping the others.
Theo started to turn away, to go down the opposite direction of the corridor, then stopped. “Thanks for the help in the hallway. We tag-teamed him pretty good.” A rare grin flashed across his mouth.
She smiled. “I keep telling you we work well together.
His grin faded and he turned away. “Be careful.” “Oh, stop nagging,” she muttered and turned to find someone she could aid. There were plenty to choose from.
She walked down the hallway toward where Adam and Claire were aiding the medics.
“I hope all this was worth it. Did Stefan tell you anything before the Atrika came for him?” Sarafina asked Claire, kneeling to check the pulse on a dark-haired male water witch. He had a nasty burn wound in his side, the material of his shirt seared onto the poor man’s skin.
Doing something like this — checking for someone’s pulse and half expecting not to find one — would have seemed inconceivable to her a month before. Hell, she probably would’ve tossed her cookies on viewing a wound like this one or having the scent of charred skin in her nose.
After all, that particular scent brought back some pretty bad memories.
But now not so much. She was finding out there were plenty of ways being a witch benefited her life. Still, this was not one of them. Luckily, the wounded witch still lived. He was only unconscious. Good thing for him, judging from the severity of his wound.
They needed to get these people beyond the prison walls so the fire witches could do their work.
Someone handed her a wet rag and she went on to the next victim, a small redheaded female earth witch, and wiped away some blood from a gash on her forehead.
“Yeah,” Adam answered for Claire, “get Stefan into Gribben and the sheer force of this place breaks him. That’s why we did it. We found out something really interesting.” Sarafina paused in he
r work to glance at him. “So, are you going to tell me?” Claire did it instead. Her voice was tight and her expression even tighter. Her voice was little more than a whisper. “Somehow, some way, Stefan got hold of the elium. That’s how he’s commanding the Atrika. He’s got it stashed somewhere, protected and hidden. The Atrika would do anything to get the elium, so they’re acting as Stefan’s personal army to gain it.” Sarafina noticed now that Claire’s face was pale. She didn’t think it had much to do with treating the dead and wounded, either.
The elium was a ball of daaeman magick that worked as a neutralizing agent against power. It was the nuclear bomb of magickal weapons. Whichever daaeman breed controlled the elium controlled Eudae. Last the witches had known, the Ytrayi had possessed the elium.
Sarafina frowned and went back to her work. The earth witch she treated was sliding in and out of consciousness, babbling incoherently. “The Cae of the Ytrayi holds the elium, though, right? It’s inside him, isn’t it?” Claire’s face twisted for a moment in anguish. “Yes, Rue holds the elium. Or he did, anyway.” Sarafina knew that Claire had served as Rue’s handmaiden from childhood up until the time the palace on Eudae had been attacked by Atrika and Rue had imbued her with the weapon to protect it. He’d sent her to Earth and slammed the doorway between the dimensions closed behind her, but not before two Atrika had dived in behind her. Claire managed to retain her freedom after much fighting, and Rue had been able to get the elium back.
Even though Claire had been, for all intents and purposes, Rue’s slave, she had tumultuous, conflicted feelings where he was concerned. Rue thought of her as his daughter. Most likely Claire was worried about him.
A medic came and scooped the unconscious earth witch into his arms. Sarafina rocked back on her heels and cast a worried gaze at Claire. “Do you know what happened to Rue?” she asked gently.
Claire shook her head and turned away, tending to another fallen witch.
