The Opal Blade (The Ashen Touch Trilogy Book 1)

by Kristy Nicolle

  I ascend the spiral staircase to Luce’s chamber, knocking three times on her door as I exhale, knowing I’m in for some kind of scolding. Cerb stirs at my side, sitting and cocking his head as we wait patiently together. I wonder if he knows what’s going on.

  The door opens after a long few minutes as I stand, looking down at my feet and feeling anxiety creep into the forefront of my mind. I want to be back in her bed, back in her arms, and yet I am here. Here because I cannot continue to feel guilty about an act I am so helpless to resist.

  “Xion?” Luce’s voice reaches me as I look up and find her standing in the doorway, dressed in a scarlet silk floor length night gown, rubbing her eyes and wrapping a long, black, kimono-style robe around her waist with a silk tie.

  “I’m sorry it’s so late…” I apologise as she gives a yawn, a black silk eye mask that reads Wake at your own peril slid up on her forehead.

  “It’s fine. I’ve been listening to Haedes spanking Dolly for the last three hours. I swear to Christ, if she yells harder one more time, I’m gonna go over there and show her damn harder. I’ll spank her off the top of that freaking tower,” she grumbles, opening the door so I can step inside. Cerb makes himself right at home in front of the fireplace, but I feel awkward, knowing this is necessary but wondering why everything in my life is so damn complicated.

  “What is it?” she demands.

  I look through to the bedroom, where from within the crumpled black velvet of the bedsheets, a pair of yellow eyes burn out into the dark. Beelz blinks once, then twice, before going back to sleep.

  Luce follows my gaze. “Thane isn’t here. She got sick of the yelling too. Went on a flight to check on the Demon Lords.” She gives another yawn.

  “Coffee?” she asks me, and I nod, feeling a chill as she brushes past me.

  “That would be great.” I reply, and she takes a second to stare at me.

  “You look tired. Not much rest for you either?” she asks, and I can’t stop myself from smiling.

  I straighten my expression quickly as she looks at me curiously, images of the last few hours flickering through my mind.

  “No, not much,” I express, coy.

  “Sit,” she commands me, so I do, her bare feet poking out from beneath the scarlet of her silken nightwear as she treads across the floor like a pixie or something equally as nimble. She begins to bustle through the kitchen, getting out two novelty coffee mugs and setting the coffee maker up.

  “So, what are you doing here?” she asks me, and I sigh.

  “Well, I came to ask you for a potion actually,” I admit, and her face goes part excited, part judgemental.

  “I’m not a magical milkshake bar, Xion. If you can’t sleep, I suggest a gin and tonic. Or a mallet to the head. You can take it; you have a rather thick skull, after all.” She’s not amused, but I refuse to drop my gaze as my face remains relaxed in expression. I need to keep my cool,

  “No. Nothing so simple. I want…” I begin, but I can’t say the words.

  “What? What is it? Spit it out? I don’t have all night,” she barks, impatient.

  God, she’s so cranky when she’s kept up all night.

  “Alright look, I’m going to level with you. I want you to sterilise me, alright?” I spit it out, feeling better once the words hit the air.

  “Excuse me?” Her eyes widen in alarm.

  Rounding the dark crystal of the kitchen island and moving over to me as the coffee maker begins to drip into a glass pot, she drops down onto the sofa, getting close to me so I can see her pale eyes are visibly concerned.

  “I want you to sterilise me. You know, make it so I can’t have any children. Not a vasectomy; that’s not fool proof enough, not with my magical genetic history. I want something permanent,” I explain, and she cocks her head.

  “What, you want me to make you… like a eunuch? I’m not following.” She’s still confused.

  “I slept with her. With Sephy, and… I plan on doing it again. A lot in fact. I can’t have that stupid prophecy getting in the way,” I explain, and her eyes widen.

  “You did what?!” she yells, putting her hands on her hips in outrage.

  “I slept with…” I begin, but she hurls herself forward, picking up a black throw pillow and smacking me over the head with it.

  “I heard what you said! I just can’t believe you’d be that stupid! Xion! Didn’t I teach you to keep blood flowing in the upward direction? Didn’t I?!” she yells, hitting me again and again with the pillow. I laugh, unable to let my good mood break under her faux abuse.

  “Yes! Alright, yes! You did. But you don’t understand. She keeps me grounded, Luce. She has The Eternal Flame… it kind of, placates the demon half of me,” I continue, and she stops hitting me for a second, pondering this.

  “Stupid. Stupid. Stupid!” She thwacks me three more times, her words a staccato of irritation before she collapses next to me on the sofa again, out of breath.

  “It was good?” she asks me, curious now with a reserved gleam of mischief in her eye.

  “The best night of my life,” I admit, feeling guilty even still.

  “Well then, I guess I might be able to help. But it won’t be easy, Xion. That kind of potion requires some rare ingredients, and I’ve already brewed one potent draft as of late, as you might recall.” She looks wary, and I frown. I know the dark arts are addictive. I know it’s a risk, but she doesn’t understand.

  “Haedes fired me. I’m going to live out my life with her as a mortal and die, Luce. I can’t not sleep with her. I just can’t. You know I’m as restrained… more so perhaps, than any other man that you’ll ever meet. But with her, I just can’t. She makes me crazy.” I’m rambling now, and Luce rolls her eyes.

  “Alright, alright. Fine. I’ll help you get your freak on! Stop with all the confessions of love,” she complains, and I feel my heart still in my chest.

  “It’s a little soon to be saying that word; let’s not push the boat out quite yet.” I glare at her, and she looks infuriated.

  “So, let me get this straight. You want me to help sterilise you, like actually make you infertile, just so you can get your bone on with a girl you’re not in love with?” She reaches round for the pillow again, and I raise my hands up, ready to defend myself as she sighs.

  “You’re freaking impossible,” she curses me, and I shrug.

  “Sorry,” I mumble, and she gets to her feet, moving to the kitchen to pour the coffee that has now brewed.

  “So, why did Haedes fire you?” She changes the subject, and I shrug.

  “Actually, I kind of quit. He threatened me, so I took myself out of the equation,” I admit, and she looks surprised yet again.

  “You want me to talk to him? You know what he’s like; he says one thing when drunk and then another when sober. I’m sure it’s just a misunderstanding.” She looks hopeful, but I smile, shaking my head.

  “Actually, I think I’m good. I think… I think I might actually have a good life waiting for me,” I confess, and she smiles.

  “I was afraid you might say that.” She looks sad despite the curve of her lips, and I know I’ll miss her.

  “I’ll miss you.” I express the thought without pause, and she nods.

  “You’re always welcome in my home; you know that, right? I don’t care if I have to beat Haedes to a bloody blue pulp,” she states, and I let my expression transform into one of gratitude.

  “I know,” I say as she moves forward and hands me a coffee cup, taking a seat beside me and looking into the fire in front of us, not making eye contact with me. The coffee in the cup’s depths is black, just the way I don’t like it.

  I take a sip, glad for the caffeine in spite of the vile taste as Luce sips her own steaming brew and tucks her feet up under her.

  “I’m happy for you,” she announces finally, and I smirk.

  “Liar,” I accuse her, and she scowls, running her long dark fingernails over the red silk of her sheath skirt.


  “Is it that obvious?” she demands, and I look her deeply in the eyes.

  “Just a bit,” I admit, unable to keep the grin off my face.

  “We need good men around here, and you, Xion, are a good man, despite your own beliefs. Sephy knows it too,” she compliments me, and I put my hand atop hers, relaxing into the hold of the sofa.

  “Thanks, Luce,” I whisper, becoming choked up, almost as if the sex I’ve just experienced has broken some emotional dam inside my chest, and now the flood waters are rushing through me in every direction.

  We stare into the crackling of the fire, silence falling over us as we sip bitter coffee, and I cast my mind back to who on earth I would be if Luce hadn’t saved me all those years ago.

  I might not always believe I am a good man, but I know now, for certain, that I am a lucky one.

  Chapter Thirty Two

  Every Breath You Take

  SEPHY

  I’ve left the room blazing with almost fifty candles, lit by my power over The Eternal Flame. I’m dressed in white silk pyjamas, snuggled under the sheets as I continue to inhale the scent of pomegranates that Xion has left behind. I drift slowly, closing my eyes and relaxing into sweet dreams of his return, when he’ll undress me again, and we’ll spend the next week in bed, shirking our responsibilities and the outside world. Maybe I’ll take him away somewhere… on vacation; maybe we can just become sex hermits together.

  These are the dreams and thoughts I become lost in as sleep takes me, and I surrender to the exhaustion for which I’m so grateful. It would seem that everything in my world is changing for the better, and unbelievably, at last, I feel like I’ve found some semblance of peace.

  I awaken, eyes still closed and barely conscious, to the sound of the door opening. My heart swells.

  He came back, just like he promised.

  The candles are still burning, and the night outside continues to fall, deep and blanketing, whilst only dim crescent moonlight bathes the world outside. I’m ecstatic as I roll over, ready to be in his heated clutch again, ready to lose myself to some amazing sex and then have more amazing sleep right afterwards.

  What’s come over me? I wonder, feeling my heart flutter with anticipation.

  It was never like this before, never this enjoyable, never this… real. Everything about this is fragile, delicate almost in its realism, as if one wrong move from me or him and the illusion of actual happiness may shatter. I don’t want to open my eyes, don’t want to leave this room ever again, as long as it keeps this dream alive, before it will all undoubtedly come crashing down, or fade slowly into nothingness over time.

  The thought depresses me as I feel his weight hit the mattress, climbing up from the foot of the bed and over me. I stretch upward; willing to let him ravage me all over again. Opening my eyes, I smile, ready to take in his face, to recharge the happy glow that has taken over me.

  I open my mouth to scream, but his hand comes down to stop any and all sound escaping my lips as I feel a sharp serrated edge push into my throat. My eyes widen.

  It’s not Xion.

  Brad?

  It’s the man who I slept with all those weeks ago, the one who Xion had punched that night in Retropolitan. I struggle under his weight, but as soon as I move an inch, the blade threatens me with its bite.

  Terror fills my head, no cognitive thought able to make any kind of linear sense as Brad’s cold voice fills my ear. He bends down to me, kissing my forehead before he whispers.

  “You’re a bitch, Sinclair. And a whore. What do whores get?” he asks me. I watch him raise the knife, fury so unmistakable on my face that it’s as if it’s wearing him as a mask and not the other way around. The knife comes down in my chest, the crack of my ribs and the puncturing of my lungs causing me to scream out. I raise a hand to fight back, to summon some form of The Eternal Flame, but nothing comes to me, and soon I see why. As he rips the knife from my body, it’s bloody blade catches the light, scarlet but unmistakably opalescent in the stark glow from the crescent moon outside the window.

  How did you get that? Is the only thought I can form as the scent of my own blood fills my nostrils and my attacker’s eyes gleam with pure malice. I struggle, my heart frantic and wounded in my chest as the knife comes down again, straight into my gut this time. I wriggle, feeling the blade turn in my stomach as he wrenches it out yet again.

  I scream, but his weight is too much for me to fight. His rage has made him too strong. The candles around us extinguish, and I know that my magic is gone, my power is gone. I lean back, eyes filling with tears as I realise only too late that I’ve been careless with my heart. Careless with this life.

  He takes his good time, not slitting my throat until the very end. Every time the knife makes a new dive for my flesh, he twists it, looking at me and watching as I writhe in agony. He smiles, getting off on my pain, on his revenge.

  Dismounting me, he cuts off a single lock of my hair before he goes, bringing it up to his nostrils and inhaling deeply. I lie among the white sheets, which are stained burgundy through and through. He stares at me, no trace of guilt in his eyes as his lips form the word bitch before he leaves the room, his tread softer than Xion’s by far.

  If I hadn’t been so elated, so happy, perhaps I wouldn’t be here. Perhaps if I had sent Xion to bed in his own room and we’d never fallen into mine together, I would have had time to save my own life. Instead, this relative stranger has come into my home, a thief in the night, and stolen the thing from me which I have held for so long, but have only just recently found worth in.

  Silence falls over the room, just as darkness had when the candles flickered dead. I lie, waiting for death to take me, waiting for the end. Who knows, I might even see a familiar face.

  Drip, drip, drip. Red on white. The blood runs down, flowing from my slit carotid like merlot from a casket of 1947 Cheval Blanc let run. I gasp, clinging to life in these final moments, struggling against the ice-cold grasp of something after as I finally give in to terror.

  I have aged to maturity it would seem, becoming fine and rich in fragrance with a fiery kickback that no one can contain. Not even me. The fire had consumed Xion and me, but I had not cracked and flaked away at the imminent, self-appropriated, heat of his closeness. My fire had not consumed him either, turning him to ash, but rather we had walked into the flames together and arisen as a Phoenix, feeling unstoppable as we burned.

  I am not though, alas, invulnerable to the most mundane of human crimes. The most domestic of violations. The very pinnacle of mortal nature.

  Letting go of everything, of the hopes and dreams I’d had for my future and accepting the grim nature of my real fate, I exhale my final breath, and leave for something after.

  XION

  I emerge from The Hollow and into the new light of dawn, it’s a new day here in the mortal plain, and I’m more than a little sad the night is over. Cerb trots along at my side as we make our way through the copse of lusciously green trees, emerging on the edge of one of The Sinclair Estate’s many sprawling lawns, which are bathed in fresh morning dew and sunlight. The day seems brighter to me now, and I wonder if this is because I’m heading back to bed with a beautiful woman, or whether the seasons are changing and I just haven’t noticed.

  Cerb takes off in front of me as my feet hit the lush grass, bounding towards the main house without pause. He starts barking, excited clearly at the return home.

  I feel the weight of several dozen vials of temporary mystical contraceptive in my pocket. Luce hadn’t been able to offer me a permanent solution, for she does not have the ingredients, but had been able to give me something temporary so Sephy and I don’t have to restrain ourselves in the meantime.

  I smile to myself, relishing the memories of last night as I reach the stairs of the estate and climb, slipping inside the front doors, which are unlocked.

  I frown.

  Definitely need to start talking to Jules about locking up better. I muse. I mean, I know we have
an enormously long driveway and a gate at the end of it, but with demons having access to this dimension, we can at least pretend to care by locking the damn doors.

  I take step after step across the chequered marble floor, and then climb the staircase, anticipation building within my chest to the point where I wonder if I might stop breathing altogether. I haven’t felt emotion at this depth in a long time; not positive emotion, not happiness. I’ve let myself forget that life can be good, can be wonderful even.

  I tread along the corridor towards Sephy’s suite, heart racing as I hear Cerb barking. He’s probably woken her up, and she’s probably fuming. I know how her temper can be, so waking her up after the night we’ve just had is probably one of the least sensible thing in terms of self-preservation that you could try.

  I turn the corner into her room, my heartbeat so loud it’s audible in my ears and heat flooding me at the thought of climbing back into bed with her.

  The scene that greets me turns my very core cold, my heart to ice in my chest.

  Blood. Blood everywhere. Is all I can process as the smell of old rust hits me full force in the face. I feel my face drain of colour, my body become numb, as if I’ve left it temporarily and become a ghost. Cerb is nudging her cold lifeless body with his nose, whimpering, trying to wake her.

  I step forward, not able to speak, or let my breath calm me for even a second as I find the carpet stained red. The white sheets are scarlet and her skin is pale.

  I fall to my knees, the only sound I’m able to hear being my patella as they impact the floor. Her eyes stare out at me, lifeless, glazed and brown. The fire from the cognac of her irises has long since diminished, and her hair is strewn, a mess of matted auburn strands and clotted blood which has flooded from her carotid in a torrent.

  I let my eyes trace over her, the white silken pyjamas stained scarlet, ripped in places.