by Aja James
“Then maybe we should find allies beyond the Dark race, if indeed the other races do exist, in order to combat her and the enemies within,” Devlin said.
“At least our queen gave us a head start with the Pure Ones.”
Ana quirked her mouth.
“Hmph. You could say she gave us a head start or dug us a deep hole, depending on how you look at it. It’s because she’s allied with the Pure Ones that she’s at risk of losing the throne now.”
Maximus shook his head.
“If not her alliance with the Pure Ones, Medusa would have found something else to stir unrest within our Hive and others. I support her decision.”
He paused.
“Though I don’t think she made it strategically. I think she simply wanted… so she took.”
Everyone was silent for a while to ponder the queen’s actions.
Jade never took a step without thorough consideration. But in the case of the Pure Ones’ Consul, she’d clearly been driven to rash decisions based on lust and short-term gratification rather than longer-term objectives related to the strength of her rule.
“If our queen were serious about combating Medusa, her next move should be to take a Consort or Mate. The Dark nobles are right about that,” Ryu said quietly.
“I agree.”
Everyone turned in unison as Ramses entered the conference room, back from his trip overseas.
“Does she have any candidates in mind?”
Chapter Fourteen
He didn’t have five more days, Seth thought, as he forced himself to stay awake while Jade slept, tangled in his arms, his body still clutched tightly within hers.
He’d lied to her again.
Tenderly, he brushed silken strands of hair from her face and caressed her cheek with his palm, rubbing his thumb across her swollen mouth.
She was tucked into his body seamlessly, her voluptuous curves fitting his hard angles. She looked so innocent and childlike in slumber, not at all the mighty queen she played during her waking hours.
He might love this side of her the best.
But no, he loved all sides of her.
The dark, the bright, the good, the bad.
He loved her strength, her weakness, her passion, her insouciance.
He loved her even when she hurt him, when she shattered his body, his heart, his soul.
He couldn’t seem to help himself.
She murmured softly in her sleep, snuggling closer, trying to burrow under his skin, her core clenching around him, pulling hungrily at his sex.
He gritted his teeth to brace himself before letting his orgasm crash through him, emptying himself into her just as she commanded, albeit unconsciously.
Ruthlessly, he bit back a shout at the undiluted, ravaging pain that followed immediately on the heels of his release, the punishment for giving his life force to a female who didn’t or couldn’t reciprocate.
But he couldn’t contain the guttural groan that rumbled through his chest, the harsh gasps in the aftermath to catch his breath, to claw his way back to the living, to pin his soul to his body for a little while longer.
For her.
In her sleep, despite the euphoric Nourishment his seed provided, she frowned as if she felt his pain, and the tears that came with her dreams trailed down her cheeks…
800 AD, Hangzhou, China. Tang Dynasty.
Women whispered, huddled together in small flocks, like geese, as Jade walked down one of the long corridors within the Pure Healer’s base.
She thrust out her chest just a little more proudly as she passed the clusters of female inhabitants of the Jade Lotus Society, and straightened her backbone.
How ironic, that her name should be Jade also, but the society had nothing to do with her. She no more belonged here than anywhere else in the world.
Well, tough, she thought as she slid a sly smile at one of the older women who frowned ferociously at her blatant disrespect.
She was here on invitation from Rain, the Pure Ones’ Healer. She was here to learn the healing arts just like everyone else.
And she was damn good at it too.
Learning how to manipulate living beings’ energy was something that came naturally to Jade. Even Rain noticed it, and often encouraged Jade to consider becoming a handmaiden, and perhaps one day, when Rain’s time was done, become the Healer of the Race.
Jade had no such ambitions.
She’d been a Pure One for hundreds of years now, living mostly alone, wandering from province to province whenever her eternal youth started to raise questions about what she was.
She didn’t really understand what she was, to be honest.
It wasn’t as if the Goddess, or whatever being had appeared before her when she was quite certain she’d breathed her last, explained anything in detail about her new existence.
She’d simply been “resurrected,” her body cleansed of stains and wounds, made fresh and new again as if the events that led to her death had been merely her imagination.
But she never forgot.
She hadn’t imagined anything.
She recalled every lesson she learned from her human life:
Never trust anyone but herself.
There was no such a thing as “love,” and she should immediately mistrust anyone who claimed to know it.
Never share herself with anyone.
Not really. Not unless she got more than she gave in return.
And even then, she’d only share her body, which was apparently her greatest currency to get by in the world.
Too bad she wasn’t allowed to use it as a Pure One.
However, if she understood the rules correctly, she’d only suffer nasty consequences if she gave herself in love to some bastard who didn’t love her back. Well then, she should be able to fuck whoever she wanted to climb back to the top of the world since she didn’t do love.
Jade smiled a sinister smile to herself.
If love ever had the audacity to show itself to her, she’d beat it into the ground. She’d crush it beneath her heel.
Love was for weaklings.
She would never be weak again.
Jade turned the corner and entered one of the healing chambers where patients from far and wide, men and women, were housed to await Rain’s magic touch. This chamber was for humans. A separate chamber was reserved for Pure Ones.
She approached one of the beds upon which a young man lay, naked but for a blanket across his legs and waist.
Immediately, she saw that he suffered some sort of fever, his skin flushed, but there was no perspiration. He must be burning up inside.
Rain was already there, drawing out the bad humors from his body with her zhen—the living strands of her hair that inserted into a patient’s pores like acupuncture needles.
When she raised her eyes to note Jade’s attendance, she said, “Would you like to try?”
Jade shrugged.
Sure, why not.
The man looked close enough to the edge of death that she probably couldn’t do him too much harm. And if she pushed him over the edge, well, one less human in the world wasn’t so bad in the grand scheme of things.
As if she knew what Jade was thinking, Rain gave her a stern look.
Jade took a deep breath and sighed.
It never ceased to amaze her the way the dainty Healer could command the respect of hundreds and thousands of followers across China without even trying. The way just one look from her could make Jade feel two feet tall.
Jade cracked the knuckles of her hands and stretched them over the man’s torso, right above his heart and lungs. She concentrated on what Rain had taught her, how to harness the energy of the body to fix itself.
She didn’t even have to concentrate very hard, and the man began to breathe more easily, the fever that blotched his skin subsiding rapidly.
“Impressive, Jade,” Rain said with a smile.
“You are a natural born healer. One day, if you keep honing your craft
, your powers could become stronger than my own.”
The Healer said this with awe and pleasure in her voice, as if she had high hopes for Jade. As if she didn’t care at all that some other female could usurp her position within the Race.
Jade didn’t understand it.
If she had Rain’s clout, she’d want to make sure she never lost it.
“Um, Jade, perhaps you should stop now.”
Jade focused her attention back on the man she was half-heartedly trying to heal.
Why would she stop? He was still a bit short of breath. She should at least—
And then she noticed what Rain was staring at.
Oh. That.
The blanket was tented below the man’s waist by his extremely healthy erection, though he remained otherwise insensible.
It was a side effect of Jade’s healing powers that she often caused her patients embarrassing arousals, for her technique was to harness the energies for pleasure to dilute and envelop the pain, so that the patient’s own body could focus on fighting back whatever wounds or infections or diseases that plagued it, instead of being distracted by the pain.
Sexual pleasure, especially, released some sort of agent within the body that made it stronger, more resilient.
Jade didn’t understand the whys and wherefores, but she understood the male and female body quite well. She just tried to provide and enhance whatever the body needed to heal itself.
She eyed the man’s erection with just a little bit of disappointment.
That such a nice, long staff should go to waste. Even though there were dozens of women within the compound who could probably make good use of it.
If Pure Ones let themselves live a little, that was.
“Jade…”
Rain’s subtle rebuke broke through Jade’s trance, and she lowered her hands, though the man’s penis remained stiff in its happy salute.
Rain was shaking her head as she led Jade away from the bed, to walk into an adjoining room.
“It’s not like I do it on purpose,” Jade muttered beneath her breath.
Some Pure Ones had a Gift, some didn’t. Hers happened to be sexual in nature.
It wasn’t her fault the Goddess or whoever gave her these powers. In her opinion, given the Pure Ones’ Cardinal Rule, the Gift was sorely wasted on her.
“What are you thinking, Jade?”
She looked up at Rain.
They were seated across a medicine table from each other, their fingers working industriously on herbs and roots, the routine of grinding medicine powder so familiar to them both, they could do it with their eyes closed.
“I’m thinking there’s no real reason for Pure Ones to live like monks and nuns,” Jade answered directly.
“It’s not like everyone we’d want to fuck is someone we ‘love’.”
She said the word derisively, as if it left a bad taste in her mouth.
Rain shook her head in admonishment, whether at Jade’s crudity or the idea she was espousing, Jade didn’t know.
“If that is what you believe, why are you living like a nun?” Rain asked with a straight face, though Jade knew her well enough by now to suspect she might be teasing.
Jade shrugged.
After the way she’d died as a human, she needed a few hundred years to purge her body of the horrific memories of violence and violation.
She stayed away from people as a rule, but especially people with a penis, unless they were unconscious or too sick or wounded to be a threat. Even though she was stronger than humans as a Pure One, she knew her own weaknesses well.
If any male came near her at full strength, she’d freeze like a deer caught in headlights. Strength or no strength, she’d be a sitting duck.
“The act itself isn’t worth the risk,” Jade reported. “I’ve had more than my fair share in my human life, so I’m hoping my impeccable behavior now will dilute my sins.”
Rain looked at her with a placid expression, though Jade could see twinkles of humor in her eyes.
“Why don’t you come and live with us?” Rain asked for the umpteenth time, though she was never pushy about it.
“You needn’t join the Society, you know. Any female is welcome to stay here. And it’s so much more comfortable than your…” the dainty Healer searched for the politest word to describe Jade’s shack on the outskirts of the village.
“My mud hut?” Jade supplied readily, and shrugged again.
“I have everything I need there. And I happen to like my solitude.”
Which was a lie.
She didn’t like being alone; she just felt safer that way.
“My lady, we must prepare for your journey ahead,” one of Rain’s handmaidens said as she bowed apologetically for intruding.
“You’re going on a trip?” Jade asked.
Rain nodded.
“There has been news of a plague toward the North. The man you just healed has recently returned from the Northern capital. I must see what I can do to help the villages that have been affected. I should return within the month. When I do, I hope we will pick this conversation back up. I won’t give up on convincing you to stay with us, Jade. You are among friends here. And only women. You can trust us.”
Jade shrugged and waved her off.
“Have a safe trip.”
After Rain departed, Jade immediately felt the extent of her unwelcome within the Society.
The women’s chatter grew louder, their looks of disdain and jealousy following Jade wherever she went.
Even here, in a Society where all women were welcome to seek refuge, where the Healer forbade anyone to be judged for their background, their birth, or their experiences, Pure Ones and humans alike weren’t above feeling envy, distrust, and prejudice against people who weren’t like them.
Jade was definitely not like them.
She was a lioness among antelopes, and they all felt it keenly.
They all resented her for it.
As she climbed the steps to exit the underground tunnels to one of the island pavilions above the West Lake, she felt as if she was being watched.
Abruptly, she looked behind her, attempting to catch the spy in the act, and thought she saw one of Rain’s new handmaidens standing almost entirely in the shadows along the wall.
Jade couldn’t recall her name. She’d only recently arrived.
The shadows prevented Jade from seeing the girl clearly, save two large eyes that seemed to glitter strangely, reminding Jade of the eyes of animals when they hunted at night.
She sent her own challenging glare back at the girl in the shadows, until the girl disappeared through a door that opened to the tunnel.
Whatever, Jade thought to herself.
She wasn’t here to make friends.
Friends were a luxury, not a necessity.
Shortly thereafter, Jade returned to her hut and laid out the herbs and medicines she’d acquired from the Society.
Rain provided the materials for free. Anyone could take whatever they needed from her store of supplies. Jade used the materials to supplement her own, picked painstakingly from the mountains and forests that surrounded the village.
She made a tidy living as a local medicine woman, sometimes selling her cures to traveling peddlers from other villages nearby. It wasn’t much, but she had a roof over her head, even if it sometimes leaked, and food to fill her belly, even though she was a terrible cook.
She did know how to boil water though. So at least her meat and vegetables weren’t raw.
It was a boring, unfulfilling existence, Jade sometimes thought in a bout of self-pity.
There was so much strength and power in a Pure One, especially one who was blessed with a Gift or Gifts, and yet there were so many rules and restraints. She felt stifled in her self-imposed isolation.
She was meant to be more.
She wanted more.
She just didn’t know what it was she wanted.
A few weeks later, a fierce storm almo
st blew the thatched roof off of Jade’s hut. As it was, she didn’t sleep a wink, trying to catch all the rain that filtered through in jars and pots so that they didn’t ruin her already thread-bare rug on the ground, while also trying to find a spot large enough to huddle in so she wouldn’t get drenched by the deluge.
The next morning, she was a veritable bear as far as her mood was concerned, so when she heard rustling and methodical pounding on her roof, she looked for the nearest object to bludgeon the disturbance into silence.
With a dagger-axe in hand, the one she used to climb mountains and dig out particularly stubborn roots for her medicines, she flew out of her hut like a shrew and backed up far enough to get a good look at whatever was picking at her roof.
A man knelt on the wooden stilts that held up her flimsy roof, hammer in hand, pounding fresh reams of reed bundles over and across the wooden beams, then overlaying it with thick straw.
Despite her fear and suspicion of the male species, her sleepless aggravation getting the better of her, Jade hollered, “What do you think you’re doing? Get off my damn roof!”
The man swiveled to look down at her and almost tumbled from his precarious perch. Just barely, he maintained his balance, shielded his eyes from the bright morning sun and smiled.
Straight white teeth flashed at Jade from a sun-bronzed face.
“Good morning, healer,” he greeted.
“I came by yesterday to give you my thanks for saving my life, but you were not in. I noticed that your roof could use some work, and since I fix houses for a living, I thought I would thank you by fixing your roof. A good thing too, for the storm really tore it up last night.”
“I don’t need your thanks or your help,” Jade grouched ungraciously.
“Get down here before you break your neck falling off my roof. There’s no way I’d be able to heal that.”
The smile grew wider. As if he took her words for a challenge, he proceeded to perform a series of rather breathtaking acrobatics before landing on the ground in a forward summersault not two feet in front of Jade.
“I am Ling, at your service, healer,” he said, his wide grin still blindingly bright on his tanned face.
