Tempting the Dark

by Michele Hauf

  “Got it on the first guess. This is not one of my favorite rooms.” CJ led him toward the Bibliodaemon, the Book of All Demons. “The witch room is comforting to me. And, not surprisingly, the unicorn room is fascinating.”

  “Unicorns exist?”

  “Everything fucking exists. Don’t you know that by now?” The dark witch wandered ahead.

  Savin could but shrug. He knew all the myths and legends did exist, but he hadn’t seen them all. He’d love to see a dragon soaring through the clouds. And hell, he wouldn’t mind throwing those much-desired punches at a troll. But for some reason the unicorn still challenged his sense of reality and fantasy. Couldn’t there be one legend that really was made-up? A fantasy that people could entertain and not have ruined by reality.

  “If you tell me unicorns are assholes, you’re going to shatter a childhood fantasy,” Savin said as he joined CJ before a large book on a dais.

  “Never met one. They are fierce, is what I know. There are always assholes in every species, most especially humans, yes?”

  “True enough. So what have we got here?”

  CJ stepped onto the steel dais and, using two hands to grip the thick leather cover, opened the book randomly. The tome was massive, stretching about three feet long and two feet wide, and it was a good two feet thick.

  “The Bibliodaemon.” CJ rubbed his hands together with more eagerness than his dislike of the room should have warranted. “This is the book that records all demonic happenings, spells, hexes, possessions and exorcisms, heritage, and breeds. Most species have such a book.”

  “What about us reckoners?”

  “You’re not exactly a species, more a rare tradesman. And humans have enough books recording their antics, do they not?”

  “Most history books are often proved inaccurate.”

  “Perspective,” CJ said. “It changes as we grow and learn, and uncover and disprove the falsehoods that were generated by the past.” The witch threaded his fingers from both hands together before him and flexed them outward. “Now, what are we looking for?”

  “Information about the queen of Daemonia.”

  “There are many.”

  “Yes, but the one from the particular legion where the rift opened up. Is that possible to locate? An identification can only help to catch and send her back.”

  But would a search show Jett’s face? What Savin wanted to find was the former queen who had taken him and Jett, who had also ruled over the same legion. This was going to be a tricky search, no matter the outcome.

  “I’ll take a look.” CJ closed his eyes and held his hands, fingers spread, over the book as he murmured in Latin. The thin pages began to slowly turn, whispering across one another, then picked up speed. CJ said over the flicking pages, “It’s like an internet search. Only, you know...”

  “The old-fashioned way.” Savin leaned against the dais, the sweep of the pages brushing his face with a cool breeze. “What part of Daemonia did you, uh, visit?” he asked, just for conversation. But also, if the dark witch had been there when Jett was queen...

  “Probably this same area we’re searching now. I didn’t mark down the territory. It was...eh, a spur-of-the-moment decision to do some reckless magic. I paid for it. In spades.”

  CJ had told him that he’d been possessed by a dozen demons upon his return to the mortal realm. One had been a pain demon and, upon his return, had forced CJ to harm himself. That hadn’t been nearly so terrible as the grief demon, though. Savin couldn’t imagine. Well, he could. He didn’t know what kind of demon lived inside him, but for the most part she was quiet. Unless, of course, he kissed another demon.

  Was that it? Could the Other be jealous? It didn’t make sense. It wasn’t as though he and the Other could be intimate in any way. More intimate than him wearing her inside him, that was. Whew!

  He really wanted to unload her, but there didn’t seem to be a way to do it. Not without a supreme sacrifice. That was something he had never wanted to face, and would not.

  “Here’s something.” CJ leaned over the book and read while Savin peered over the edge of the page. The dark witch’s long black hair fell over the paper, and his fingers, heavily tattooed with all sorts of spells, drew a line down the page as he silently took in the information. Finally, he stood and tapped his lower lip. “It seems one queen disappeared a while back and was replaced with a half-breed. That’s the one who is currently missing, the half-breed by the name of Jettendra.”

  Savin muttered the name, thinking it could easily be an elongated form of Jett. She’d not told him that. Not that she would. “And the former queen’s name?”

  “Fuum.”

  “Fuum? Sounds like a bad rash.”

  CJ chuckled. “Apparently, Fuum went missing and the half-breed was left in her place, already designated to take the throne.”

  Savin knew that much from what Jett had told him. “So where is the former queen?”

  “Why? Shouldn’t we be focused on Jettendra? It says she escaped recently to the mortal realm, but there are no dates. It always takes these books a while to update the details, but when they do, they are incredibly accurate. I wonder if it was the night the rift first opened.”

  It had been. And hell. “But why veer focus from the former queen? I mean, it’s always good to have options. More choices will ultimately make it easier for us, yes?”

  CJ studied Savin with such a delving gaze, Savin felt sure the witch was tapping into his soul. Something witches could do without a guy even knowing it had happened. He crossed his arms over his chest and met CJ’s gaze with as sure a stare as he could manage, though he wasn’t feeling at all confident with the stuff he was not telling CJ.

  “You know something,” CJ finally said. “And I need to hear it.”

  * * *

  A knock at the door lifted Jett up from her inspection of the diddley bow Savin used for musicomancy. She didn’t dare to touch it but wondered how easy it might be to cut the string.

  Another knock sounded. Had Savin forgotten his keys? He would have told her if he’d expected company, and surely he wouldn’t have left her to greet that company on her own.

  From outside the front door a woman called Savin’s name.

  Company? Jett hustled out to the kitchen. She’d donned black leggings and a silky red sleeveless shirt that hung below her hips and sported a few rhinestones decorating the low-cut scoop neckline. She looked presentable. And the wards were loose enough that she could leave and return on her own, so she was good.

  Gripping the doorknob, she tried to get a sense for who—or what—could be on the other side of the door, but her senses didn’t twitch.

  Opening the door, she was surprised to find an older, glamorous blonde woman holding a plate of something that was wrapped with cling plastic.

  “Oh?” The woman peered beyond Jett, searching the kitchen. “Savin isn’t home?”

  “I’m afraid not. You’ve missed him.”

  “Oh, but you must be Jett.”

  “I...” Jett narrowed her gaze, wondering who the woman was.

  “I’m Gloriana Thorne, darling. Savin’s mother. And you have been away a very long time.”

  Chapter 21

  Savin stepped back from the steel dais and turned about, taking a moment to weigh his options. He could walk out the door, but he never ran away from a threat. And CJ was no threat. The witch simply wanted the truth. Which Savin had and should share with him. But...could he trust the dark witch wouldn’t go to Ed with the information? Why keep the info from Ed? Perhaps if he told him everything, the corax demon would agree that Jett should be protected and not sent back to the Place of All Demons.

  Like that was going to happen.

  “Thorne?” CJ prompted. He jumped down from the dais, his bare feet landing on the cool limestone floor. The witch stood as tall as Savi
n and was formidable, but Savin knew, were it a battle of might and muscle—without magic—he could take the witch. With ease.

  “I guessed right, didn’t I?” CJ said. “There’s something you haven’t told me. Has it to do with the rift and the demons?”

  “It does,” Savin finally said. “I didn’t think telling you and Ed what I knew was necessary. Initially. And I’ve been protecting her...”

  “Her? Protecting who?”

  Savin toed the base of the dais. He had to be honest with Certainly. His loyalties to his friends were paramount to him. “You know all about me being kidnapped to Daemonia when I was a kid.”

  “Yes.”

  “Remember I told you about the girl who was with me?”

  “You said she died. Fell over a cliff into some sort of lava falls?”

  “That’s what I thought. Until I found her wandering the roadside that night we first closed the rift. She’d been living in Daemonia all this time, CJ. Has done everything she possibly could to survive until she had the opportunity to escape. Her name is Jett Montfort. She was my friend then, and she is now. She hasn’t lived in the mortal realm for twenty years. She has nowhere to go, no one to care for her. I’ve taken her in.”

  CJ blew out a breath and hooked his thumbs at his pants pockets. “Wow. For a human to survive so long in Daemonia...” Then he met Savin’s gaze. “She must have become demon. At least part.”

  Savin nodded. “She has. I’m not sure how much. I know she’s still human. But demon, too. Except she can pull on a sheen even I can’t detect.”

  “That’s a powerful demon.” CJ’s gaze grew more discerning. “I’ve been there. I can’t imagine surviving so long. And I’m a dark witch. How did she, a mere human, manage such a feat? A ten-year-old girl? All alone?”

  “She was nine. And...she still hasn’t given me all the details. I haven’t pressed her for information. She’s been through a lot. She did what she had to do to survive.”

  CJ nodded. “Smart girl. But what you’re telling me raises a lot of questions.”

  “I know. But I don’t think it’s fair to treat her like a criminal or even a target that needs to be sent back to Daemonia. She doesn’t belong there, CJ.”

  “She didn’t belong there. When you were kids.”

  That comment bit. Hard. Where did Jett belong now? Was she more demon than human? Could she exist as a mere human now?

  “So now she’s back in the mortal realm,” CJ said. “And she’s living with a demon reckoner.”

  “I probably wouldn’t have been her first choice for a roommate, but it’s how things played out. I was there at the right time. I have to believe we were meant to find each other.”

  “There are no coincidences. The universe knows exactly what it is doing.” CJ nodded. “Yes, you were meant to help her. Or, at the very least, to have her in your sight so she was accounted for.”

  Savin winced at that explanation. He didn’t like CJ’s manner of seeing things in more than one way. And not always the best way, either.

  “So...you didn’t tell Ed and me because you thought she wasn’t a problem. She’s not a threat to humans.”

  “She’s not. Jett wants to live a normal life. But there’s something else you need to know. She just told me. It changes things. I don’t want it to change things. And maybe it doesn’t have to if everyone involved has all the information and we look at all the options rationally and with Jett’s best interests in mind.”

  The dark witch lifted his chin. “And that is the ‘something else’ I need to know?”

  Savin pressed his lips together and squeezed his eyelids shut. This was not a betrayal against Jett. It couldn’t be. He only wanted to help her.

  He opened his eyes and said, “Jett is the missing queen.”

  * * *

  Gloriana Thorne strolled into the kitchen and set the plate she was carrying on the counter. She turned and, with an assessing summation, took in Jett from head to toe. Jett remembered Savin’s mother as always smiling and friendly to a fault. She’d eaten over at their house often and had even stayed some nights when she and Savin would watch a movie, popcorn in hand, and fall asleep on the couch.

  “You’ve grown up,” Gloriana finally said. “You’re beautiful, Jett.”

  “Thank you.” She lifted her chin. The darkness within loved to be complimented. “You haven’t changed at all. Very glamorous. Savin always called you his movie-star mama. Did he...” She worried her lower lip, but again, her darkness would not allow her to cower or feel less-than. She was who she was, and damned proud of it. “Did Savin tell you everything?”

  “He did.”

  “Even about...”

  “The demon place?” Gloriana sat on a stool and patted the stool next to her, which Jett slid onto. “I always took everything Savin said about demons and such with a huge grain of salt. But I’ve watched him over the years. He was not a boy, nor is he now a man, who lies with any sort of ease. I can’t imagine he made it all up. Even knowing how he loved to play those silly make-believe games about dragons when you two were young.”

  “He didn’t make anything up. I swear it to you.”

  Gloriana shook her head. “I believe you. Because for you to suddenly appear after twenty years? There’s something to all those tales Savin told me. I’ve known it since he first told me when he was a child. Here.” She shoved the plate toward Jett and peeled back the plastic wrap to reveal delicate fan-shaped madeleine cakes. “We have a lot to talk about.”

  * * *

  “Your Jett—the little girl you were once friends with—is the queen of Daemonia?” CJ leaned back against the dais, taking in that information. The witch looked flummoxed, and Savin could understand that feeling.

  He was still out of sorts about the whole thing, and yet not. He knew where his alliances stood, and they were with Jett. She needed him. End of story.

  Or was it a continuation of their story?

  “Then all we need do is send her back to Daemonia,” CJ said. “Close the rift, seal it and all is well. But I’m suspecting that is not your first choice in this problem-solving endeavor.”

  “I won’t reckon Jett. She escaped that place, CJ. She was taken there against her will and forced to survive. Now that she’s free I will do everything in my power to ensure that freedom.”

  The witch nodded, yet Savin did not release his clenched fists. He wasn’t angry; he was feeling his power. Let no man stand against him.

  “Then Paris will be overrun with demons,” CJ stated simply.

  “We can find another way. There’s another queen,” Savin said. “Jett told me that she—we—were taken by the queen and then that queen disappeared, leaving Jett behind to assume the throne. What was her name you read in the book?”

  “Fuum. You think that queen escaped to the mortal realm, as well?”

  “Possible. We have to search for her.”

  “How? Where? If Jett has been there twenty years, that means Fuum may have been here twenty years. She may no longer be in Paris. She might be dead. Who knows?”

  “It’s a long shot, but I owe Jett that much. I have to search for the other queen. You’ve got spells to track demons. I’ve seen you do it before.”

  “Yes, but to locate a specific one? Do we even know who she is?”

  “What does the book say about her?”

  “Right.” CJ returned to the Bibliodaemon and read aloud, “Fuum. It says she did escape to the mortal realm by transforming herself into an incorporeal demon. I would assume she’s taken on a human body since. But there’s nothing more on her after that.” CJ tapped the page. “Ed needs to know about this. He’s assembling troops as we speak, Savin. I don’t think it’ll be long before the humans notice demons, perhaps even get hurt by them. The influx is increasing.”

  “Then I’ve got my work cut out fo
r me. As do you. I need a tracking spell for the former queen. Can you fashion something using the info in that book?”

  “I...might be able to.” CJ jumped down again to stand before Savin, and this time his gaze wasn’t so much delving as compassionate. “Are you sure this woman is worth it?”

  “She’s my best friend, CJ.”

  “Is she really? She’s lived in the Place of All Demons for twenty years. Hell, a lot longer according to how time works there. Are you sure she’s the same person you once knew? You were kids then. And she is, at the very least, half demon now. If I were her, I’d use every trick in the book to maintain a rapport with the reckoner who rescued me. To keep him from reckoning me. And to stay under the radar until...”

  “Until? CJ, she’s one tiny human woman with an unfortunate past and a huge desire to step as far away from that past as possible. I promise you, she’s not a threat to anyone. I will personally take the blame if she does become a nuisance. And I can say that because I know and trust her.”

  CJ put up both hands in surrender. “Very well.”

  * * *

  Gloriana had suggested they go outside for a walk in the subdued fall sunshine while they talked. So, with a madeleine in each hand and sunglasses in place, they walked beneath the shade of chestnut trees creeping over the chain-link that surrounded a public garden.

  “You’re quite remarkable,” Gloriana offered. “To have survived what I can only imagine are incredible horrors. I never wanted to think too much about the place Savin described to me, but I confess it was difficult not to imagine...things. How are you, Jett? Here.” She tapped her temple.

  “I feel fine. I mean, I know I’m not fine. I know it’s called having baggage. And I have a lot. But all I want is to get back to normal. To be a regular woman and to forget all about that time away.” She finished off the last madeleine. “I’ve been thinking about contacting my mom, but I’m not so sure it’s the right thing to do. If she believes me dead, maybe that’s better.”