Hotter Than Hell

by Kim Harrison

  “This is not a request. Jorge will come, and if you leave this place it will be with him. If you do anything foolish I will be vexed.” Even his breath was warm against her hair. Does he breathe because he knows it makes me a little more comfortable? I suppose he has to breathe to talk, doesn’t he? I should ask.

  Exhaustion crept in. If she fell asleep now she might be able to get a few hours of rest before…no. The fatigue blurred everything, made it difficult to think.

  “Vex all you want, Nik,” she said, and his fingers tapped against her belly once, twice. Then he stopped. “I’m not your servant. I don’t take your orders.”

  Yeah, Selene. If you lie often enough, you might even be able to halfway believe it.

  He made a low sound against her hair, and Selene’s entire body leapt. The medallion gave one scorching burst of heat. “Of course, if Jorge is incompetent enough to lose you, I suppose he will need punishment.”

  You bastard. I should have known. “You wouldn’t.”

  “I would, Selene. I would also make you watch.” He sounded calm as if he was discussing a grocery list. “I dislike the thought of damage to you. I will take steps to avoid it.”

  Everyone knows I’m your little pet. Nobody messes with me anymore, you jerk. I might even be able to use that to find out who killed Danny. “Nothing’s going to happen to me.”

  “Especially not with Jorge watching over you.” He sounded pleased to have painted her into a logical corner.

  “Fine,” she said. “I’ll wait for him. I’ll be a good little girl. Now go away and leave me alone.” So I can cry in peace. Leave me that, at least. Just leave me alone so I can cry.

  Nikolai rolled away from her, his arm sliding out from beneath her head. She heard him moving, getting into his clothes. She could imagine him getting dressed, pulling his jeans up, pulling his t-shirt back over his head, running his fingers back through his hair to push it back out of his face. Then his coat. She heard the sound of the heavy wool moving.

  Best of both worlds. He has to go home before dawn. Can’t stay to make things sticky. And he’s so fucking careful not to damage me. Though I can take it, can’t I? It’s hard to kill me. With sex, at least.

  He leaned over the bed to pull the sheet and the blankets up, tucking her in gently and efficiently. Finally, when the covers were smoothed, he settled on the side of the bed and touched her hair. Ran his fingers through the heavy mass, lifting it slightly, and gathering it all up, pulling it back from her face. He stroked her cheek with his fingertips, delicately. His claws didn’t prickle, but she knew they were there.

  Go away. I have to cry first, then I will figure out what to do. Oh, God. Danny. Selene kept her eyes shut. Her breathing evened out. She hugged the pillow. Her right hand was under the covers, and she made a fist, her nails biting into her palm. Squeezed. Tighter. Tighter.

  Finally, Nikolai touched the corner of her mouth with a fingertip. Selene didn’t open her eyes—but she did peek out through her lashes. Under the bedroom window shade, a faint grayness showed. Dawn was coming.

  There was a slight sound—a breath of air. A cold breeze touched Selene’s cheek.

  Nikolai was gone.

  Selene drove her fingernails into her palms and took in a shuddering breath.

  Now, at last, she could cry.

  (LIKE A) VIRGIN OF THE SPRING

  Susan Sizemore and Denise Little

  GINGER WAS CERTAIN THAT THERE HAD BEEN A time in her life when she found public fornication shocking. That time was long behind her. Now, crossing the courtyard between the baths and the sanctuary of the sacred spring, she barely glanced at the naked couple coupling on the altar at the center.

  What the pair was doing was a sacred rite meant to please the gods. She did take a moment to glance their way, and observed that the lad had a truly fine ass. The way his broad back narrowed down to his waist was a work of art. But the offering to the gods being shared out there with such energy was business, not pleasure—for her, at least.

  It was spring, festival time, and people were crowding in to the stronghold from all over the countryside of southern Britain. It was a joyful season for most people, one that embraced relief at surviving the winter, appreciation of the new life emerging in field and flock, and enthusiastic participation in the fertility rites so important to the gods.

  Ginger normally would have been overseeing the celebrations. But her knowledge of the darkness moving ever closer toward them overwhelmed her interest in this seasonal festival.

  As priestess of the spring, she had responsibilities that ran far beyond the rites taking place on the altar. She already knew that the next few days were going to be hard on her, and she was certain that her talent as a seeress was going to be called upon on this day when she was supposed to be resting up for the festival.

  The future was hers to see and to interpret for others. And now it seemed the gathering storm had managed to alarm even the highest power in this land. The Lord of Ched had called for his senior advisors to gather before him at the sanctuary. Lord Ched was there when she arrived, a big man going to fat, his grizzled gray hair cut short in the Roman manner. Despite being near to fifty, a great age, he was still handsome. It was obvious where his daughter Morga got her beauty.

  Morga was chosen of the Mother and she and the Year King should have been here with her father, bracing for the coming storm, instead of outside worshiping on the altar. Ginger wondered at the exclusion, but it wasn’t just a warning from her extrasensory perception that twisted her belly with apprehension. She hadn’t always been the priestess of the well. At one time she’d been a student of history, a collector of the great stories from the past. She’d studied the manipulation of power by men strong enough to seize and keep it. Their names lived on in tales long after they died—Phillip of Macedonia, his son Alexander the Great, Caesar Augustus, Claudius, Constantius, even the cursed Vortigern, whose ill-fated dealings with the Saxons had torn Britannia apart less than a century ago.

  The machinations of power and politics were as much a part of her original world as science and psychic research. But that world had changed forever when she’d decided to put her knowledge to good use. Traveling back in time hadn’t made her life any simpler. Of course, back home she’d been more of an observer than a player. She was well aware of the irony that the disaster of a time transfer gone wrong had turned her from the observer she was supposed to be into a person of importance in this time and place.

  Not much importance, thank goodness. She wasn’t trying to change history—she wasn’t even sure what history was supposed to look like here. The sixth century in Britain was notorious for its lack of reliable documentation. Sources like the monks Gildas and Venerable Bede were great tellers of tales, but short on reliable details.

  So now she was trying to survive in a dangerous, alien world where her psychic gift gave her a small edge. Or, to be more precise, a job. The seeress gig put a roof over her head and two meals a day in her belly, and gave her the protection of the most powerful person in the region. But all that could change soon if the invaders, who she knew were coming thanks to both her studies of history and her gift, moved inland from their raids on the coast. Not today. Not even tomorrow. But one day soon, death would be beating a path to the walls of this sanctuary.

  It could only mean war.

  War seemed a certainty, really. Her existence could be hanging by a thread—along with that of every person in this room. She needed to know which side to foster, which army to influence, if she was to survive. Her recent visions had shown her fire and death, but no clear images of who the victors would be.

  The steward of the manor followed Ginger into the sanctuary. After him came the harried-looking commander of the guard. The bishop visiting from Wales came inside as well. It was not a large space, though the entrance was wide and open to the courtyard. The four of them gathered around the tiled basin into which the waters of the sacred spring trickled from the back of the san
ctuary. Ginger made up a quick prayer to the goddess of the water and to the new God of the cross and when she was done with the blessing they got down to business.

  The guardsman did not wait for his Lord to speak. “Can we make this quick? With the crowds coming in—”

  “We need a new war leader,” Lord Ched cut him off. He looked around the gathering, his expression hard, daring them to argue. “Right now. This very day would be good. Do you want the job?” he demanded of the guardsman.

  A scar ran over the empty socket of the guard’s left eye. He glanced toward the courtyard with his one good eye. They all followed his gaze. The couple was still busy on the altar. Morga’s thighs were wrapped tightly around the Year King’s slender waist and the beautiful young man was pistoning away with hard, swift strokes. He was covered with a glowing sheen of sweat, his muscles bulging.

  Damn, but that boy had stamina!

  “He’s perfect,” the guard said. “How could I take his place?”

  “He’s not perfect,” Lord Ched said. “He’s an idiot, a fool, and a braggart. He pleases my daughter and her belly’s already swelling with a second brat, but he’s useless for anything else.”

  “In normal times that would be enough,” the steward spoke up. He rubbed his jaw, the tough stubble on his cheeks making scratching sounds. “I suppose we could go back to the old ways. We could sacrifice him come the Planting Ceremony instead of just letting the lads wrestle for rights to Morga this year. The gods might like that. The crowd certainly would.”

  “Morga would not,” Ginger said.

  “Nor would I,” added the bishop.

  They were both ignored.

  “Even if we return to the old ways,” the lord said. “We need someone to replace the Year King first. Someone who can fight. Someone who can lead. I’m too old. Morga’s son is still with the wetnurse. Tradition dictates that the Year King lead us into battle. A battle is coming, and that boy out there isn’t up to the job.”

  All Ginger had wanted when she took on this role was a little peace and quiet while she tried to find a way home, but the invaders marching up from the coast weren’t likely to leave anyone in peace. Or even alive, if the rumors they’d been hearing proved to be true. The whole point of returning to the Dark Ages was to find out what happened, to fill in the holes left by Bede and Gildas. Her simple research project had instead left her stuck in the very Dark Ages where she didn’t know what happened.

  At least on a grand, historical scale. Here and now, in this little corner of the world, she knew too much. She was a board-certified psychic. She knew trouble was coming soon, marching here as fast as the old Roman roads would allow. But her gift only went so far, in certain directions, and after that she was as on her own as anyone else here.

  Her worried musings were interrupted by Lord Ched. “What shall we do, priestess? Look into the water and tell us what the gods say.”

  So her Sight was supposed to save them.

  As she had suspected would be the case. She always tried to tell the truth of what she saw in the water, but divination was one thing and politics was another.

  What she Saw might not be enough to help them.

  Ginger sighed, but didn’t argue about her duty. She owed the Lord of the manor her life, and she understood his concerns. His world was threatening to fall apart, and the people he was sworn to protect were in danger. As one of those people, she applauded his take-charge attitude.

  She gestured for the men to stand back. They moved fast, obviously delighted the decision was in her hands and not theirs. If things turned out wrong later they could always claim that the priestess read the signs incorrectly.

  Pin the blame on the psychic—it was a game that never went out of style. She had no doubt that back in the lab she’d come from in the distant future, they were playing it still. Somehow, they’d undoubtedly decided her team’s failure to return from the past was all her fault.

  She knelt by the pool.

  Ginger brushed away the bitterness she felt at their willingness to let her be the savior or the scapegoat. In fact, she put the men out of her mind altogether. She’d had years of practice honing her abilities, learning to ignore every possible kind of distraction. She looked into the crystal clear water, her awareness going far deeper than the eight-inch depth of the pool. As always, she was amazed at how quickly her perceptions attuned to the energies present at this energy nexus.

  From a long way away she heard herself ask, “Question?”

  From even farther away the Lord’s voice came to her in an echoing whisper, “Who shall lead my people to war?”

  Almost instantly a face appeared on the surface of the pool, though Ginger was the only one who could see it. A pair of piercing green eyes caught hers and she gasped, for she was certain that he could see her as clearly as she saw him. Nothing like this had ever happened to her before.

  “I see visions, I don’t make contact,” she told the face.

  “That’s not my fault, is it?” His rough, deep voice answered. “Who are you? Where are you?” he demanded.

  His gaze enveloped her, but all she could do was continue to stare. She wanted to fall into the vision, into him, wanted him to fall into her. She wanted him the way a woman wanted a man. That had never happened before, either.

  She shook off the desire that threatened to swamp her and concentrated on the task at hand. He was as handsome as any Year King should be, but for a small scar on one cheek. He couldn’t be the man the lord wanted, then, for a Year King must be perfect.

  A crowd of men suddenly appeared in the water behind the stranger’s wide shoulders. They were a rough and dangerous-looking lot, with travel-stained clothes and heavy packs.

  “Mercenaries,” she said, understanding at last what they were. He had to be their leader, the alpha among a pack of hungry wolves.

  “Wolves mate for life,” he said, clearly keying into her thoughts. He shook his head hard. It seemed his words made no more sense to him than they did to her.

  “What do you see?” Ched’s anxious voice came to her.

  The question drew her away from the vision, but a sense of urgency drew her to her feet. “He’s here,” she said. “Now. At the gate.”

  “What did you say, sir?”

  Bern felt the weight of Sergeant Kaye’s hand on his shoulder as the world came back into focus. “I hate when that happens,” he muttered. He frowned, and the sergeant stepped back. “Was I just talking to somebody, Kaye?”

  “You spoke,” Kaye answered. He glanced at the rest of the team, who were spread out across the road. “But you weren’t talking to any of us.”

  “I was afraid of that.”

  Bern’s rating on the psychic scale was a lowly little three, enough to get him transferred into the TTP’s security force but not high enough to really interfere with his leading a normal, sane life. Except—sometimes he heard voices, or had a flash of intuition. He’d learned to listen to the voices and trust his gut feelings. He’d just had one of those flashes, though he couldn’t remember all the details. Of course, some details demanded he pay attention to them. He loosened his belt and adjusted his tunic.

  “Something’s up,” he said. And in more ways than one.

  He studied the lay of the land while he got his reaction to the woman he’d heard in his mind under control. It was spring, very close to the major seasonal fertility festival, and the road they were on led to one of the holy sites scattered all over the southern part of the island. This particular temple to the local mother goddess was located on private property, and the pilgrims were camping out in cow pastures on either side of the road. The manor at the top of the hill had been built by a wealthy Roman colonist, but the local chieftain had taken over after the Romans abandoned all their foreign outposts a generation ago. Bern didn’t care about the festival, but it made a good cover for checking out the place.

  The locals were expecting travelers to congregate here.

  His holomap pinp
ointed this site as one of the nexus locations, and despite growing doubts that any of the sites they surveyed were going to provide enough energy to get them all home, it was his duty to check it out. Finding the right door back to the future was only the second half of his assignment. His first duty was to find and rescue the science team that had disappeared six months before his unit got the order to go back and look for them.

  In his opinion it had been stupid to send the eggheads back in time without a whole team of sensible people to keep them out of trouble. The mission had been fucked from the get-go. This was the farthest back anyone had tried to travel. The lost team had been sent without proper backup to a time period very little was known about. It was no wonder everything had gone wrong—twice.

  He and his men were now stuck here, too.

  He gestured toward the crudely built wooden palisade surrounding the estate buildings. “Let’s go see if we can get a look at what’s inside.”

  Ginger was used to the world around her going fuzzy and faded, but she realized the moment before she fainted that this time it was because she’d been holding her breath while standing behind the men waiting at the gate.

  When the gate opened, she simply blacked out, just as the man from her vision walked in. Their gazes met for a moment, and then everything went dark.

  It was ridiculous, and she was so embarrassed that she scrunched her eyes tightly closed when she woke up, not wanting the person holding her to know that she’d come around. Those strong arms were his, weren’t they? Her head rested against a broad, hard male chest. Warmth and the scent of him engulfed her. Awareness of him pooled deep in her belly. Her nipples stiffened, scraping against the cloth of her dress, and her breasts grew heavy.

  “Oh, my,” she whispered. Without making any conscious decision to move, her hand came up to stroke his strong, stubbly jaw.

  She could hear his heart rate pick up when she spoke, and the deep sound of his laugh rumbled through his chest. For a moment the arms around her tightened, pressing her body harder against him.