by Jory Strong
Ilka and Felipe wore red again, only tonight it was the color of old blood. Aisling could feel the attention of those gathered on the first floor shift away from the street outside and sharpen with predatory interest on her and Zurael.
Titters of anticipation formed an undertone to clinking glass and murmured conversation. A few spared glances at Ilka and Felipe.
As they’d done on their previous visit, Aisling and Zurael moved to the bay window. She settled against him, her back to his chest.
His arms went around her. His lips trailed tender kisses along her neck.
The sight of them captured so intimately in the glass mesmerized Aisling. It blocked out the noise, the presence of others.
Something had changed between them in The Barrens, after the fight with the angel. But she was too much of a coward to speak to him about the future. She was too afraid of learning she’d followed in her mother’s footsteps and, in taking a demon for a lover, had been granted a place in hell.
A shudder went through her before she could stop it. Zurael’s arms tightened. “We can abandon this plan and make another,” he whispered, misinterpreting the source of her anxiety.
“No,” she managed, seeing Ilka’s and Felipe’s approaching images in the glass.
“You’re back,” Ilka purred, eyes bright, gleaming, as if the danger of confronting someone she’d led the vote against, someone who’d survived what waited in the darkness, excited her sexually.
She leaned forward, offering a glimpse of cleavage, a hint of a nipple. Her fingernails were long, painted red to match her outfit and lipstick. They hovered in the air then slowly descended toward Zurael’s arm.
Against Aisling’s back he vibrated with suppressed fury, making her think of the steady, unmistakable sound of a rattlesnake before striking. But Zurael allowed Ilka’s hand to settle on him as they’d agreed upon in The Barrens, and Aisling hated the sight of another woman touching him.
“So this time you’re interested in playing,” Felipe said, following his wife’s lead, leaning forward, stripping Aisling with his eyes.
It was all she could do to tolerate his nearness. Every cell screamed in protest when he ran his fingers down the line of buttons on her shirt.
Bile rose in her throat. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t utter the words necessary.
“You might say we couldn’t stay away,” Zurael said, his voice low, dangerous, his hand moving lower on Aisling’s belly, his touch possessive, blatantly sexual. “But we don’t intend to be entertainment tonight.”
Ilka’s laugh was a husky trill of victory. “Everyone’s entertainment here. See and be seen, though I guess you weren’t here long enough last time to understand the fun of Sinners.”
Her hand slid upward. Her fingers curled around Zurael’s biceps as Felipe’s returned to the top buttons of Aisling’s shirt and freed them, exposing the upper slopes of her breasts.
“Not here,” Zurael growled, grabbing Felipe’s wrist with snake-like quickness.
“Somewhere private,” Aisling said, finally managing to break through the paralysis of her revulsion.
“Hmmm,” Ilka said, shifting her attention to Aisling for the first time and leaning forward so their lips nearly touched. “Privacy is possible, for some. Have you ever been with a woman?”
“No.” It was barely a whisper.
“Then I’ll tell you a little secret. It drives men crazy. Turns them into stallions.” She ran her tongue along the seam of Aisling’s mouth as her hand cupped Aisling’s breast. “But you already know what it’s like to be mounted by a stallion, don’t you?”
“Yes,” Aisling said, fighting to accept Ilka’s touch, blanking her mind to it.
“Not here,” Zurael said, seeming to prove Ilka’s claim by knocking her hand away, then possessively capturing Aisling’s nipple with his fingers, tormenting it until a small moan of pleasure escaped despite their audience.
Ilka licked her lips. “Ummm, delicious. We’re going to enjoy playing together.”
“I think privacy is in order,” Felipe said. “At least to begin with. Some treasures aren’t meant to be shared-at first.”
They pushed away from the bay window with perfectly synchronized grace. Felipe offered his arm and Ilka took it. Neither looked back as they walked away, their footsteps unhurried, the crowd parting in front of them as if they were royalty.
Zurael’s lips found Aisling’s ear. “Do it quickly. I can’t tolerate them touching you.”
Speculative, appraising glances followed them as they trailed Felipe and Ilka up the stairs and down a hallway that had no doors, until they turned a corner.
Felipe stopped in front of the only room possessing a door and produced a key. An anticipatory smile formed on Ilka’s dark red lips. Her eyes traveled to the front of Zurael’s pants. “It’s little more than a closet. But I think it’ll be perfect for getting better acquainted.”
The door swung open. Aisling trembled and felt Zurael’s fingernails sharpen and curl in a hint of the deadly talons they could become. He leaned in, brushed a kiss across her cheek and ear, whispered, “Release me from my agreement, Aisling. Let me do what needs to be done.”
“No,” she said, and they entered the room.
It was small, confining. A bed and two chairs took up much of the floor space.
One of the walls resembled a tack room. It was lined with ropes and leather straps, riding crops and other things Aisling couldn’t identify. Restraints were bolted to a second wall and on the bed frame as well.
Aisling’s thoughts flashed to when Zurael had tethered her wrists to the bed, to the pleasure she’d found. She met his eyes, saw the hot desire in them, the promise.
Heat gave way to icy chill when Ilka and Felipe stepped into the room and locked the door behind them. Dark red fingernails settled over Zurael’s heart. “You I think we need to chain to the wall.”
“No, please. I want him on the bed with us,” Aisling whispered, letting them hear her fear, using it to her advantage as she endured Felipe unbuttoning the front of her shirt.
Ilka’s attention shifted. Her eyes traveled over the length of Aisling’s bared skin. She licked her lips and reached for a wooden rod studded with metal, pulled it from its place on the wall. “Only if he behaves. Only if you both behave.”
Felipe’s hands went to Aisling’s shoulders. He started to slide the jacket off so the shirt could follow.
Her heart tripled its beat. Her breath grew short.
“I’ll do it,” she said, turning her back to them in a seemingly shy gesture.
“Delicious,” Ilka purred.
Aisling’s hands shook as she slipped the small, coffinlike tin from her pocket and tucked it in to her breast band. She shrugged out of her jacket and shirt, baring her upper body except for the fetish pouch and the wide strip of cloth she used to bind her breasts.
“How quaint and old-fashioned,” Ilka said. “What a lovely blindfold that’ll make. Or maybe we’ll use it as a gag.”
Aisling carefully unwound the breast band, making sure the Ghost container remained pressed to her skin until the last moment, when both ends of the binding cloth touched her knees. Fear knotted her stomach, but it didn’t stop her from opening the tin and dipping the first two fingers of both hands into the gray substance, then silently calling the names of the entities who’d witnessed when this task was set before her in the spiritlands.
She let the container and cloth fall to the floor as she turned. She took advantage of Ilka’s and Felipe’s attention being drawn to her exposed flesh, paused only long enough to ensure that Zurael was free of their touch before stepping in to them and grabbing their wrists.
Understanding flashed in their eyes in the instant the wild rush of the spirit winds jerked their souls from their bodies and hurled them into a swirling, dense fog. Aisling knew her guardians had come to her aid when the gray mist held Ilka and Felipe in unseen restraints.
Fury and murderous rage gave way to
cunning speculation and they stopped struggling. “Aren’t you the clever one,” Ilka said. “It’s rare someone bests us, but apparently we’re your prisoners, for the moment. What do you want? Revenge? No I think you’re far too intelligent to waste such a luscious opportunity on something like that. We can offer so much more.”
“I want to know if you’re responsible for creating Ghost.”
Ilka laughed, and her laugh held the supreme confidence of someone who’d always had the security of power and the protection of wealth, who’d believed since birth that the city was her playground and she could do anything she wanted in it.
Felipe chuckled. “I told my dear wife it was a mistake to vote you out of Sinners. Ilka found it hard to believe we’d been so easily manipulated into doing something not in our best interests. It looks like I’ve been proven right.”
“What can I say? I got caught up in the moment, as one does at Sinners. Afterwards I regretted it of course, but there was nothing I could do.”
“True, but I think we can strike a bargain with the shamaness. She’s got a family of sorts, sharecroppers on a farm outside of Stockton I believe my captain said in his report. I suspect she’d like to know they’re not only safe but have the security that comes with owning their own land. Between the guardsmen I control and the real estate your family owns, we can come to a satisfactory arrangement.”
“You’re getting ahead of yourself, Felipe. It’s possible this is her way of getting rid of the competition and taking over the trade in Ghost herself.”
“True. But somehow I don’t think she intends to eliminate us. I have to go with the situation as I see it.” Felipe made a point of examining Aisling’s nakedness then his own and his wife’s. “I believe play is on the agenda for the night, once we can reach an agreement. And I will point out, even before Aisling’s trip to the library, I did tell you it was a mistake to use those snake-handling religious fanatics to distribute Ghost. It was only a matter of time before someone made the connection and found their way to the Fellowship.”
Felipe smiled but there was only calculation in his eyes. “For the record, Aisling, I had nothing to do with the bloodhounds being sent after you last night. It was a routine search, even if Father Ursu initiated it. I wasn’t in the office and it didn’t need my approval.”
Their complete lack of conscience sickened Aisling. Their lack of fear worried her.
She could feel the spirit winds thickening, buffeting against her as if being pushed back by something fighting to get through the gray barrier forming a protective cocoon around them.
“Where’s Aziel?” Aisling asked.
“Aziel?” Felipe’s puzzlement seemed genuine.
“My pet. The ferret I brought with me to Oakland.”
“I don’t know.”
Pain slid through her heart like a knife’s blade. But she believed him. He had little reason to lie and had already demonstrated a complete confidence that he would bargain his way out of a situation that would have left most cringing in terror.
“Are you responsible for creating Ghost?”
Ilka’s smile was sly. “We’ve got a silent partner. But you must have already guessed that. Otherwise you wouldn’t have dared use Ghost on us. If we give you his name, will you kill him?” She laughed. “Not that I blame you. Not that Felipe and I would object. We could sell so much more than our partner produces. And you’ll find it’s easier to gather the necessary ingredients with guardsmen helping-especially when some of the ingredients need to be brought in alive. Even in Oakland, where there are plenty of poor and destitute, it’s not all that easy to make someone disappear.”
Aisling’s stomach lurched and roiled. “Who’s your partner?”
“Can’t you guess?” Ilka said. A silky taunt.
And playing back the things they’d said, what had happened the first time she and Zurael visited Sinners, what they’d learned since then, Aisling could.
It was a mistake to vote you out of Sinners. Ilka found it hard to believe we’d been so easily manipulated into doing something not in our best interests.
You’ll find it far more entertaining to vote her out with the others. She’s a shamaness.
An interesting piece of information, Peter.
“Peter Germaine,” Aisling said, naming the mayor’s brother, the deputy police chief who was no friend to any human with supernatural gifts.
Almost as soon as she’d spoken, Aisling thought she must be wrong because he’d have to be gifted to make Ghost. But before the doubt could settle in, Ilka’s expression offered confirmation, and Felipe echoed it by asking, “Now what?”
The gray wall of fog parted and Elena’s brother stepped through to stand next to Aisling. “Felipe! Ilka! You can’t imagine how glad I am you’re finally here. I should have guessed you had something to do with Ghost.”
John rubbed his fingers over the cable around his neck as if stroking a dog’s collar. He leaned in so his face was inches away from Felipe’s, but the other man didn’t blink, didn’t seem to see Elena’s brother.
“Still under Ilka’s thumb?” John asked. “Still letting her call the shots? I’m curious. Did she order my death? Or did you resent losing business to me? A pathetic reason either way. I hardly made any profit supplying entertainment for your guardsmen, not by the time I shaved my rates to undercut yours. But then dear Ilka never did like me, did she? And if I remember correctly, she absolutely loathed my sister-not that I blame her there. I wish dear Elena could join us, it’s the only thing that would make this show better, but I’m still going to enjoy it immensely.”
He turned to Aisling. “Did you fantasize about me the way I did about you?”
“Why are you here?”
“To set the stage, my beautiful ang-” The steel cord pulled taut, his back arched, and the tattoos of a lawbreaker stood out in stark relief on his face.
John went down to his knees. The metal leash grew slack.
A hint of madness glittered in his eyes. He whispered, “I keep forgetting that where you’re concerned I have to be very, very careful not to offend.”
He reached for Aisling, as if he’d use her to pull himself to his feet. She stepped back, felt the rub of coarse fur against her bare skin and knew the entity represented by the bear fetish stood behind her.
John scrambled to his feet and began walking a circle. The thick strand of cable he’d hung from at his death trailed behind him. And as he paced out the design, the ghost fog thinned to reveal men, women and children by the dozens-all of them staring at Felipe and Ilka with feverish intensity-prevented from moving closer by the boundaries of the circle.
Aisling recognized four of the dead immediately. Their faces were undamaged though their bodies were ripped open. Organs hung by strands of muscle and sinew. Intestines looped to the ground through bloody, tattered clothing. They were the Ghosting men who’d died the night she and Zurael first went to Sinners.
Beside and beyond them were others who’d shared the same fate, men and women sent to their deaths when Felipe and Ilka led the vote. And intermixed with those were victims who’d been executed with shots to the head, who wore ropes or twisted wire around their necks. But they weren’t the most horrible of the dead.
Hollow-eyed children and young women stood with gaping chest cavities, their hearts extracted. And seeing them, Aisling knew this was what Ilka had meant when she said, Some of the ingredients need to be brought in alive.
She’d wondered how the spiritlands could be held open so the winds would flow over an earthly substance and create a doorway into the ghostlands. She’d known such a feat couldn’t be accomplished unless powerful forces in the spirit world were involved.
Those beings would demand death. They would devour innocence and enjoy the screams of terror that came with it. They would find it amusing to use the hearts of the sacrificed as bait for souls yet claimed.
“Do you judge your prisoners responsible for the creation of Ghost?” a deep,
masculine voice asked, and Aisling turned to face the entity whose name she’d called upon for protection.
She didn’t know whether it was his true form or the one he offered because her mind could accept it. But he was as she’d expected to find him-appearing like a shaman of old, a human form draped in the pelt of a bear.
His face was hidden from her though his eyes shone through the snarling headdress. His human arms disappeared into folds of fur, his hands and fingers becoming bear claws.
“They aren’t solely responsible,” Aisling said, “but they are guilty.”
“Then you must kill them or see them dead.”
A shudder went through Aisling. She’d been witness to so many deaths. The Ghosting men. Those Zurael and Irial struck down. The assailant she’d killed in her home. What were two more? Especially these? And yet she knew these two would leave her changed forever. That by killing them here, in the spiritlands-on a circular stage created by a soul she’d come to believe was in her father’s possession-she was being drawn deeper into a world belonging to Zurael’s enemy.
She looked past the circle at the silent, waiting dead. They would kill for her. She had only to break the circle John created with the cable linking him to his master, and they would rush in.
But the risk was great. She might be killed. If not by them, then by what would follow.
She felt the phantom weight of the athame she wore in a sheath at the middle of her back, but when she glanced down, the naked view of her skin was unbroken except for the fetish pouch around her neck.
The old shaman’s arm lifted, drawing her attention back to the savage headdress, the yellowed bear teeth and impenetrable eyes, the wrists disappearing into fur and claws.
Without warning he struck. Raked the sharp claws down her face.
Pain drove her to her knees, an agony that left her gasping, sobbing, unable even to scream as a thousand shards of ice sliced through her eyes, leaving her terrified that when she opened them she would be blind.
