Vowed in Shadows

by Jessa Slade

  Maybe that was why she was here. . . . No, she shouldn’t be thinking she’d somehow been specially chosen to—what?—show the ascetic talyan how to be selfish and extravagant hedonists? She really doubted Jonah would go for that.

  Except the missionary’s touch had been about more than the mission. She wasn’t deluding herself about that.

  A door ahead of her opened, and the blond woman, Sera, peered out. “I thought I told you. . . . Oh, Nim, it’s you. I figured Liam was still skulking around after I told him to get some rest before the night rush. Come in, will you?”

  Nim chewed at the inside of her lip. These girl-on-girl scenes usually made better fantasies than reality, but . . . She stepped inside.

  Jilly sat up in bed, her chest swathed in bandages up to her armpits, her jaw set off-kilter in a mutinous slant. She scowled at Sera. “If you think you can keep me quiet by telling bedtime stories to the new kid on the block . . .”

  Sera crossed her arms. “Do you want me to call Liam instead?”

  Jilly huffed. “He’ll wrap the gauze over my head.”

  “I like the stories where the evil stepsister gets eaten,” Nim offered.

  Jilly gave her a narrow-eyed stare, as if she suspected who the evil stepsister might be; then she grinned. “Sorry, I don’t do well when I’m stuck in bed.”

  “I do some of my best work there,” Nim said. “Maybe I can give you some pointers.”

  Jilly’s grin upended, and Sera laughed. “You fit right in here, Nim.”

  Nim considered. “Have you ever had someone who didn’t?”

  Sera shrugged. “From what I’ve read, the league was never big enough to take its members for granted.”

  “Except when it decided to evict its female half,” Jilly said.

  “And yet here we are again,” Nim said.

  They stared at one another, three women who’d never have found one another in the big city, except for the demons that bound them.

  Nim went to grab a chair. The stuffed wingback sprouted a few loose threads, and the desk beside it was missing all its drawers, but the room was cozier than Jonah’s, even with the massive hammer hanging beside the door. Nim decided it was the extra pillows that softened all the hard edges. Certainly Jilly was no gentling influence, not with the twin crescent knives hanging next to the hammer.

  She dragged the chair closer to the bed to prop her feet on the carved footboard. “So here we are. Sisters in arms.”

  “Which reminds me,” Jilly said. “You need a weapon.”

  “Besides my apparent ability to dazzle unwary demons and wayward souls?”

  “Sometimes it’s nice to have a pointy thing too,” Sera said. She settled at the foot of the bed and hummed thoughtfully. “Doesn’t it seem providential that between us—the lure, the trap, and the end”—she pointed at Nim, then Jilly, then herself in turn—“we are some particularly heavy armament?”

  Jilly snorted. “Love the league-speak. Did Archer call us that? But if by ‘providential,’ you’re using the definition ‘supplied by God,’ then no, I don’t think it’s providence.”

  “Considering the whole demon-possession thing,” Nim agreed.

  “But the teshuva fight evil,” Sera said. “Which puts them on God’s side. Theoretically, at least.”

  “And we know how you like your theories.” Jilly’s teasing tone took the sting out of the words. “But we also know God hasn’t claimed the teshuva. That’s why they’re still fighting.”

  Nim curled her toes around the plump butt of an ugly winged kewpie carved into the bed. “I figured out a while ago that hanging your self-worth on the approval of a distant father figure is a really bad idea.”

  Jilly nodded vigorously, but Sera sighed. “Still, it seems to me that us coming together is an opportunity the league hasn’t had before.”

  “The league did have female talyan before,” Jilly reminded her. “And kicked us out.”

  “We won’t be letting them do that again,” Nim said.

  “When I first showed up,” Sera said, “Jonah was adamantly against female talyan.”

  Jilly harrumphed. “Self-righteous bastard. As if the choice was his.”

  Sera tsked. “It’s obviously not conceit. I think he holds women in too high esteem to believe they—we—should be vulnerable to possession.”

  Nim slouched lower in the chair. “Not a problem with me. The esteem thing, I mean. That’s how he ended up with me. To teach him a lesson.”

  She meant to sound snarky, and Jilly chuckled as intended, but Sera just gave her a long look. “The demons do resonate, with us and with one another, but for once, it’s not meant as punishment.”

  Nim shrugged and held on to her dismissive tone. “You’d have to ask him about that.”

  This time, Jilly didn’t laugh. “Liam said he’s never understood how Jonah was possessed. Oh, he’s pieced together the spider story over the decades, but it doesn’t explain why a demon chose him. He had a job and a wife he loved. He was involved in his community. Such connections usually offer protection against possession.”

  “Maybe he wasn’t as connected as he’d want us to think,” Nim said. When the other two women stared at her, she shrugged. “Just a guess.”

  “You’d know,” Sera said.

  “No, I wouldn’t.” Despite her best effort, Nim couldn’t bury the bitter note. She’d woken up alone, after all.

  “Regardless,” Sera said soothingly. “We’re all in the same place now.”

  “Right. Somewhere between doomed and fucked,” Jilly mused.

  Nim snickered when Sera frowned. “You sound like Archer.”

  “Your mate’s a clever fellow.”

  “Tell me that again when you find out he masterminded an end run around Liam’s decision to wait on finding Corvus.”

  Jilly shrugged. “They’re both big boys. Emphasis on the ‘big.’ ”

  “That’s what I’m worried about.”

  “They’ll work it out.” Jilly shook her finger at Sera. “And I think you’re unfair to rat on him. Especially when I suspect you have plans of your own, to go with your theories.”

  Sera’s blush was bright on her pale skin, and Nim murmured, “Busted.”

  Sera shot her a look and shifted uneasily on the bed. “Well, there’s no point in them risking their lives and their souls for no good reason.”

  “How about an evil reason?” Nim asked.

  “I propose a training run before we tangle with Corvus,” Sera said. “The three of us and our teshuva, of course. The lure, the trap, the end. Let’s give the demons a chance to make us what they intended us to be.”

  “A weapon,” Jilly said.

  “An end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it weapon,” Sera confirmed. “But we’ll start smaller. I know Ecco will help us round up a few malice. We can handle those individually with minimal danger. If together we are something more, it’ll be obvious against the poor malice.”

  Nim snorted. “Poor monsters.”

  Jilly sighed. “She feels bad because she hears them screaming when she seals them behind the Veil again.”

  Sera wrinkled her nose. “Will you do it?”

  “It gets me out of this bed.”

  Sera stood. “Tonight, then. When Liam takes his crew out hunting, I’ll send Ecco to catch a few malice. One quick and easy test and then we’ll take our findings to the males. That’s when we’ll go after Corvus.”

  “Set it up,” Jilly said. “I’ll be done bleeding by then. And Nim will have some clothes that fit.”

  Nim plucked at the oversized T-shirt. “You’re letting me go through your closet? We must be BFFs.”

  “I just don’t think any woman should have to face death and damnation in sweatpants.”

  Sera headed for the door. “I’ll let you know when and where.”

  Jilly waved her off. “I’ll be here,” she said sourly. She turned to Nim. “I’m shorter than you and got more bootie, but if you don’t mind hip-huggers . . .
”

  In the end, Nim found everything except shoes. Jilly wore a half size smaller and her tastes ran to thick-soled boots.

  “Not sexy to dance in,” Nim said as she backed out of the closet.

  “But damn good for feralis stomping.”

  “Ah, a career-minded girl.”

  Jilly gave her a look in the mirror as Nim zipped her new black capri pants. “In some ways, this was an easy transition, both for me and Sera. We already had a history of helping others.”

  Nim adjusted the straps on the tank top. No support, really, but she was used to that. On several levels. “Oh, I was in the service industry too.” She turned away from the mirror. “Don’t worry. I might not have been a dogooder like you two, but I’ve always been a survivor. If this is what I have to do to survive, then this is what I’ll do.”

  Jilly’s frown didn’t abate. “And I thought Jonah’s zeal was unnerving.”

  “It is. That’s where we match. Or not so much match as fit together. Missing puzzle pieces.” Nim studied the other woman. “Would you have chosen Liam? If the demon hadn’t done it for you, I mean.”

  Twin spots of color flagged Jilly’s wan cheeks. “I’ve never met a better man.”

  “That wasn’t an answer, was it?”

  “Then let me be clearer. Yes, I would have chosen him. It wouldn’t have mattered even if my mother had been the one to introduce us. I wanted him. I think I was waiting for him and no other.”

  Nim shrugged. “Then if it was meant to be, how can we lose?” She waited a moment, knowing Jilly wouldn’t speak. “Oh, right,” she answered herself softly. “Because love doesn’t conquer all. It just seems that way because it’s your whole world falling apart. I’m going to go see how my shoes are drying.”

  “We’ll call you when it’s time.”

  As she let herself out of the room, Nim wondered how she’d gotten on board with Team Double X. At least she could be sure Sera and Jilly wouldn’t steal her eyeliner.

  In the sterile hall, she leaned her back against the wall and sank to her haunches. Who was she kidding? The fantasy had gotten more violent and otherworldly, but still she was just another weapon, to be nailed to the wall when not in use.

  She didn’t like having nothing to do. Idle hands were the devil’s tool, or so she’d heard. Maybe that explained Jonah’s excessive goodness; having only one hand kept him too busy for naughtiness. She’d always kept herself busy with stripper intrigues and shopping. Now . . .

  Well, she could still go shopping. Jonah had left his wallet in the room. And he owed her for that first lap dance.

  “. . . But when I woke up, I tried the door, and it was unlocked, so I got the hell out.” Andre finished his tale in a rush. One hand clutched his slipping pants; the other he held fisted above his heart, as if only his white-knuckled grip kept him from falling apart.

  Behind him, the lake glittered like a broken bottle, the smooth blue-green spiked with light sharp enough to pierce the eyes.

  “Just walked out of the league stronghold, eh?” Corvus sprawled in his chair, the hinge of his jaw cradled in his palm as he studied the young man. He tapped one finger thoughtfully against the dent in the back of his skull. “And with your soul. Lucky you.”

  Lucky too the cloying heat had chased most of the late-afternoon crowds into the air-conditioned comforts of the Navy Pier shops, and only the two of them remained in the overheated wrought-iron tables. Andre’s voice had risen exponentially as he’d detailed how the female talya had tried to steal his soul.

  Corvus squinted against a closer glare, and he looked down. A glass orb had appeared in his hand while he was distracted; something the djinni had been toying with outside his conscious awareness. He fumbled it in surprise and only djinni reflexes saved him. Fury limned the world in bilious yellow. Was the djinni angry at Andre or at him? “You realize if you didn’t tell the talyan what they wanted to know—as you swear you didn’t—they’ll have you followed.”

  “I doubled back through a tenebrae infestation like you showed me,” Andre said quickly. He leaned away from the glass orb nestled in Corvus’s palm. “The demon waste will throw off any teshuva.”

  “Not forever.” When the youth flinched, Corvus waved his hand. “But I can’t wait that long.”

  Andre blinked. “You want them to come?”

  Corvus found himself stroking the chain around his wrist. The flesh under the tight links had bruised where the djinni was lax about repairing the damage. The memory of manacles made his skin creep, and a thin stream of demon venom trickled down his arms. His flesh smoldered with an acrid stink that wrung tears from his eyes. From his one eye, anyway. “I need them to finish what they started.” Pain laced the words into a long slur.

  Andre’s gaze flickered over him, and Corvus felt each pause like a thrown stone: the drifting eye, his crushed skull, the filthy sleeves stained in the djinni’s poison pus.

  But of course the youth could not understand. Corvus didn’t blame him. Even the ancient evil inside him failed to grasp the conviction, and they had been bound together for centuries.

  As if annoyed at his recriminations, the djinni yanked him to his feet. His voice cleared, his tongue suddenly agile again as he heard himself say, “Not finish. This is only the beginning. Come, Andre. Walk with me down the pier.”

  His hand tossed the delicate ball into the air. Against the hot sky, movement swirled within the glass, like a frantic wave from the other side of a dirty window. Corvus’s focused eye tracked the motion with avaricious delight, but his wayward eye noted Andre’s wary, hunched shoulders.

  The end of the pier looked scalded in the heat, with the concrete, water, and sky all charred to white ash. Nothing moved except for the endless waves and the frantic churning within the glass.

  Andre peered at the globe. “What’s in that ball?”

  “My freedom,” Corvus tried to say, but his tongue tripped as the djinni rose like vomit in his throat. “Our freedom.”

  The demon rummaged through his pockets, quick as a thief, and withdrew another glass ball. The djinni tossed the clear orb to Andre.

  The youth’s eyes widened, and the globe fell into his warding hands. His brows furrowed. “It’s empty.”

  The djinni smiled, and when his lips cracked and sulfur stained his breath, Corvus remembered why they weren’t doing that anymore. “It’s for you.”

  CHAPTER 14

  When Nim stepped out of Water Tower Place, the sun had fallen behind the buildings but heat still shimmered on the concrete. She raised her hand for a cab, and three large shopping bags slipped to the crook of her arm, already sweaty.

  The cabbie started the meter. “Where to?”

  She thought for a moment. Shopping, done. Couldn’t go to the club. Couldn’t go to her apartment. Where else did people stay out of trouble? She’d always been curious about those kinds of people. Okay, not always. But lately.

  She gave him the address on the outskirts of town.

  The lot beside the church was empty except for a staid minivan with the side door standing open. Apparently, the owner expected everyone to stay out of trouble.

  Or maybe trouble had already been here.

  The cab pulled away, and Nim felt her skin prickle with a sudden chill, despite the humid press of air. She yanked the bags up over her shoulder to free her hands. In case she had to grapple something. Damn it, if she lost another pair of shoes—the cutest Jimmy Choos, on sale too—before she even had a chance to wear them . . .

  A woman—her red hair frizzed from its tidy French twist and contrasting unfortunately with her limp orange jumper—backed out of the church doors, leading a vacant-eyed zombie by the hand. “This way,” she was saying. “Be careful you don’t trip—Oh, my.”

  The woman stumbled when she saw Nim and had to grab her companion to steady herself. The zombie didn’t falter.

  “Hi,” Nim said. “You must be Nanette. I’m Nim.”

  “Oh, dear. Another female
talya. This is becoming quite the coven.”

  Nim jerked her chin back with a snort. “Does three even count as a coven? I figured we’d need at least thirteen or some other unholy number.”

  Nanette smoothed a hand over her hair. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say you were a witch. It’s not a word I would’ve chosen.”

  “I’ve been called worse. Mostly by your good buddy Jonah.”

  “He left a message saying he’d been by. Is he here?” Nanette’s eyes brightened as she peered past Nim. “I could use his help. I need to move these haints before my husband finishes his sermon and wants his dinner.”

  Nim shook her head. “I left Jonah at home while I went shopping.”

  “More tenebrae repellent and Chinese throwing stars? Jilly brought me some a while ago, but I’m almost out.”

  “Uh, no.” Nim tried to imagine what the somewhat plump and obviously uncoordinated preacher’s wife did with throwing stars. “But I got sexy sandals and a party pack in black from Frederick’s of Hollywood.”

  Nanette blinked at her.

  Nim rattled her shopping bags. “Now you know why I don’t object to witch.”

  The other woman blew out a breath that puffed a wayward strand of red out of her eyes. “Sometimes I understand why the mighty of the angelic host refuse to believe that demons can repent.”

  Nim almost felt bad for her. No wonder Jonah had taken her under his one wing. He was drawn to women in need.

  The thought rankled, and she caught herself up short. She was just being bitchy. That thought stuttered inside her too. Since when had being bitchy become a bad thing? She started to triple-guess herself, and in her distraction realized words were coming out of her mouth. “I’ll help you move the zombies out.”

  “Haints,” Nanette said.

  “Do they care what I call them?”

  “Maybe not, but I do.”

  Nim gave a mental shrug. The woman had bust out with “witch” quick enough. But she was curious about the life Jonah had abandoned. “Do you want help or not?”