by Riley LaShea
“Did it start after Jeremiah?” Cain asked.
“No,” Haydn returned quickly, not wanting to be reminded of the lost, the first of her own she let die, or the fact that Cain held such knowledge of her failures simply by virtue of his position. Then, giving the subject more rational consideration, she realized it wasn’t true. Slade’s crew always had been skilled at finding them whenever they came to a mainland, but never so good that they had to watch for bolts at every turn. Not until the past few months. “Yes,” she amended. “It’s a new development.”
“Well, if you got your hands on the body of an enemy that’s nearly impossible to kill, what would you do? A bit of research, I imagine,” Cain said. “It could be they’ve found a way to track your pheromones. You do secrete them in droves when you’re on the streets hungry. For blood, or other things.”
Circle fully formed, Haydn heard the brush dip back into the ink.
“If these past decades have proven anything, it’s that, while they may be a boon to humanity, science and technology are a curse upon daemonry. On a more pleasant note.” Going rigid as Cain slashed the brush through the circle on her back, Haydn knew the target was complete. “I may have some good news for you.”
Slipping out the door without further explanation, Cain rustled papers in his main office. When at last he returned, he tossed a newspaper, one particular article up, next to the clay candle, and Haydn was undeniably shocked as she picked the paper up from the floor.
“This doesn’t happen to be your Slade, does it?”
Staring at the face in the mug shot, Haydn couldn’t believe she could actually recognize him without his usual arrogant smirk, or that stupid shiny tooth. If she were to put a term to Slade’s expression, she might even say he looked forsaken.
“Well now…” There was even more of interest once she got past the striking image of Slade as she never expected to see him. “He killed that Neanderthal of a friend? Last time I saw them, they were thick as thieves.”
“So, he is your hunter then,” Cain verified.
“Oh, he’s mine.” Fingers going reflexively to her chest, Haydn felt the evidence of just how close she and Slade had come to being linked in a much more profound, eternal way.
“This was him personally?” Cain asked.
“Mm,” Haydn hummed.
“This must be rather satisfying for you then.”
“You have no idea.” Newspaper rolling in her hands, she watched with satisfaction as Slade’s face crinkled into oblivion. “This isn’t just good news, Cain. It’s the best news I’ve had in a while.” Giving her a moment’s pause, Haydn considered it might be a sign, that she didn’t need to do this, to see Lilith at all. Then, remembering the reality that Slade was only half her problem, she held the paper out to Cain. “Use this. Make it symbolic.”
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Cain paused before pulling a match across the matchbook’s strike strip.
“Do you want me to go see Lilith?” Haydn returned, and, match flaring in response, Cain took the newspaper from her hand to set it aflame.
Touching it to the canister to her left, the invisible gas within began to burn, sending a thin wisp of smoke into the air that jumpstarted Haydn’s senses. The liquid to her right set fire, and Cain paused again, before relinquishing to Haydn’s determined gaze and lighting the earthen candle before her. His part done, he stepped away, dropping the burning newspaper into the metal trashcan at his feet.
Sporadic, at first, each flame its own, they slowly flickered into unison. Growing in height with every droplet that formed at the edges of the canisters, they rose taller than Haydn. Completely unready, Haydn watched the flames gravitate together, braiding themselves into a rope of fire, knowing it was as ready as she would ever be. Rope licking toward her, she felt a frisson of fear after all, remembering the pain, the wrenching sensation that would dislodge her soul from her body. As the rope began to twine around her, it charred her skin. It would take months for the lines to fade completely. She remembered that too.
Flames spreading, becoming something greater, they moved off her torso. Haydn could feel the presence of the sylph, fully embodied, coming into form at her back. The first time, it had appeared in front of her, the massive figure in flames, and, watching Cain stare in fright over her head, Haydn realized it was better not to see. Eyes closing, she waited for it, the sudden, intense pressure as the sylph hit its target, pushing through her like a hurricane, whisking her away from Cain’s back room into the nothing and the everything.
10
Journey taking an eternity and no time at all, Haydn had both to give.
Becoming one with the air, then the earth, she felt close to consumed in its fiery core, before being cooled by the sea as she emerged in the shallow waters of a long-departed shore. Body not her own, it took the shape of her own, the feel of her own, and, finding her footing in the shifting sand, Haydn marched from the cerulean waters, shimmering silver in the moonlight, and onto the island’s rocky coastline, jagged beneath her borrowed feet.
Consciousness lagging, the voices materialized slowly through the trees, most likely those of Lilith’s sires, reveling beneath the cover of darkness on the western pebble beach. Aware, but not as aware as she would be soon, she knew she had to keep going forward before her mind caught up and reminded her there was an easy way back.
Skin shedding the properties of the water as she moved through the forest, toward the house at its center, it adopted those of the trees, so, by the time Haydn stepped through the open gate in the ancient wall that surrounded Lilith’s estate, she was almost dry.
No light falling on the ornamental garden - perfectly manicured, despite being largely out of season - Haydn could still see the members of Lilith’s coven scattered about its landscape. And they could see her. Gazes relentless, they judged her return like an inquisitorial squad assigned to decide her fate. Determining no one in charge of her fate but her, and owing them no explanation, Haydn strode past the unwelcoming committee to the doors of Lilith’s palace, standing so grand, even in darkness, it made The Rock seem humble by comparison.
When she pressed the handle, the door swung wide - no one locked in or out - and Haydn slunk inside like a burglar, pushing the door closed at her back, and looking up as footsteps came to a sudden stop in the foyer.
“Justine.” The flicker of a smile came to Haydn’s face before the hostility had a chance to appear on Justine’s.
Snuffing it quickly out, Haydn remembered she wasn’t welcome there. Not by anyone. Whatever she still felt, her former sires were not going to be happy to see her. She abandoned them, and they suffered it. Most likely, they had paid for it for her. Somewhere, buried beneath her longing to get away, Haydn had to have known someone would. Lilith never was one to let defiance go unpunished.
The feel of one set of eyes giving way to a throng of glares, Haydn glanced to the open French doors of the study, finding a dozen familiar faces staring out at her, some more painful to see than others. Outnumbered, as she had been since the moment she stepped foot on the island, it was evident by the icy stares, but lack of physical contest, that they all knew better than to lay a hand on her - a blessing, considering what such a fight would cost - so Haydn felt no concern as Aramen, her eldest, made a path through the onlookers.
Shrugging out of his long, tailored jacket, he held it out to Haydn in offering, jaw tense as he too endured the hard looks, knowing the small act of decency wouldn’t go unanswered. Arms sliding into the jacket’s sleeves, Haydn clasped it closed at her chest, reminded of the reality of the situation when she reached out in appreciation, and Aramen avoided her touch and the taint it carried with it within these walls.
Forced to accept that she had no allies left amongst Lilith’s clan, not even those once closest to her, and that, perhaps, she didn’t deserve any, Haydn started for the stairs, wanting nothing more than to get the meeting over with and back to her own world as quickly as she could.
>
The banister on which her hand slid redone in sleek black, old wooden staircase replaced by frosted glass, everything she passed was the picture of modernity, upgraded or altered since last she was there. And still, it felt like walking through a relic. Hallways and doorways filled with memories more than three hundred years old, it was a past so far removed Haydn could scarcely believe she was standing back inside of it. Even if she wasn’t quite herself, and the circumstances demanded it.
Without answers, her clan would die. It was a fact she couldn’t ignore, nor stew on, for long without grave consequence.
As she reached the top floor and started down the long hallway toward the room Lilith called her sanctuary, though it was really a sanctuary dedicated to her, a throne room in which she was meant to be attended and worshipped, Haydn watched the guards exchange glances. No interest in begging permission for entry, she realized it had already been granted as she slipped between them without interference, pushing on the door as if the place was still her dominion.
“Haydn.”
Unable to deny the instantaneous pull, Haydn looked to the strained voice. Gaze skimming over the woman face down on the marble altar at the room’s center, hands clasped at the base of her back as Haydn’s once-brother Trayon pummeled her from behind, it at last landed up the seven steps on Lilith’s throne.
Lounging back in the plush velvet, Lilith was completely disheveled and somehow utterly perfect at the same time. Dark red hair loosed from the clip that typically held it in a stern updo to fall in soft tendrils around her face, ample breasts straining against her low-cut green bodice, one leg rested over a muscled shoulder, as the other foot balanced on the edge of her seat.
Chain snaking beneath the hem of her skirt, she held the leash with just enough slack that the man attached to it could burrow his head between her thighs, and, blue eyes locked on Haydn’s, Lilith pressed her heel between his shoulder blades, forcing the man deeper and moaning unabashedly as pleasure flushed her cheeks.
Breaking the gaze with some effort, Haydn fumbled at the buttons on the jacket she’d buttoned on the way up the stairs, making sure she wasn’t more an inadvertent part of the orgy than she had already become. Not exactly surprising - she did have seven centuries of participating in Lilith’s particular brand of entertainment, after all - there was something unusual about the display. Too caught up in her own reaction to seeing Lilith coming undone, and the necessity of shaking it off, it took Haydn longer than it should have to pick up the scent of human perspiration, to hear the ragged gasps for air.
Glancing once more to the woman on the table, she watched as the rapid exhalations fell from her lips, returning her eyes to the throne with reluctance when Lilith at last pushed her pleasurer aside, letting his leash fall to the arm of the throne and her skirt fall back around her legs.
“Haydn,” Lilith more softly uttered as she descended from her throne, and, sound slipping through her like liquid, Haydn tried to deaden her senses. What she felt as Lilith came closer, she couldn’t let herself feel, but she also couldn’t help but feel. It was in her to belong to Lilith, part of her always would, and that part, she was learning, still craved Lilith with a vengeance.
Fingertips brushing her cheeks, Lilith’s lips pressed to Haydn’s own, highlighting the dilemma in an instant. Just the ghost of a kiss, it was enough to make the body that wasn’t Haydn’s tremble, to tempt her to seize more. Perhaps, that was the real reason she had been so compelled to leave her body behind. The possibility of Lilith holding her captive was a worthwhile concern, but so was Lilith’s hold over her.
“You couldn’t even come in body?” Lilith’s warmth dipped to chilly as she pulled away. “Makes sense. You may have made yourself elusive, but I did think I would sense you if you were ever here. You can go.” Turning to take her frustration out on Trayon and his human fuck toy, Lilith stopped them unfinished and, looking her way, Trayon filled with the same contempt for Haydn everyone else in the household seemed to possess toward her.
Freeing the woman’s wrists, he slid down off the table, lifting his naked, glazed-over partner to the floor as if she were no more than a doll at his disposal, and edging her toward the door. Shroud clear on the woman’s face as she came nearer, Haydn watched Trayon’s enchantment over her break. Suddenly aware of the new spectator, and her total nudity, the woman’s hands crossed over her chest, covering what they could, and so much shame filled her eyes Haydn would have given up the jacket if she didn’t think it would provide Lilith far too many ideas.
“You’re keeping slaves now?” Haydn’s gaze moved to the man kneeling obediently next to Lilith’s throne as Trayon and the woman went out the door. Tailor-fitted black pants giving way to a bare torso, the human stared straight ahead, the chain of the leash dangling against his shoulder. It wasn’t like Lilith had been above subjugation of humans in the past, but Haydn did recall a time she could talk her out of it.
“Slaves, Haydn? Really,” Lilith tsked. Returning to the head of the room, and back up the steps of her stage, she caressed the face of the man, who fell instantly under her spell. “I think of them more as pets. You want to be here, don’t you, Darling?”
His eagerness to be at Lilith’s beck and call giving him an air of rather dog-like loyalty, indeed, Haydn cast her eyes from the pathetic sight.
“I find it rather hurtful you couldn’t even acknowledge our seven-hundred years together with your actual presence.” Lilith turned her way again, but maintained her position of superiority on the steps.
Haydn doubted it seriously. Insulting, more likely. And both gods and devils knew Lilith didn’t like to be insulted.
“I worried you wouldn’t acknowledge our three hundred years apart,” Haydn returned, and displeasure at the statement arched one of Lilith’s perfectly plucked eyebrows.
“If that’s what you choose to fixate on,” she uttered, “why did you come at all? Or, you know, as much as you’re actually here.”
‘I didn’t have a choice’ the wrong answer, Haydn took a moment to consider what the right one might be, and how much she wanted to reveal. The immediacy of the threat bearing down upon her clan didn’t negate the fact that Lilith also posed a danger. At least, to Haydn. Not exactly an adversary, she wasn’t on Haydn’s side either. Not without Haydn making compromises she wasn’t willing to make.
“My clan is under attack.” It was truth enough, the reason, at least, she was standing there when she would rather be anyplace else, with anyone else, so she could stop feeling the nearly unbearable enticement of Lilith entirely against her will.
“Under attack?” The topic was of interest enough to distract Lilith from her many irritations. “How so?”
“One dead of no apparent cause,” Haydn returned. “One taken in plain sight, presumed dead.”
“Two of eleven?” Lilith murmured. “Those are unfortunate odds.”
“How do you know how many were in my clan?” Haydn asked. Hairs rising on the back of her neck, she felt the crawl of Lilith’s gaze over her skin, sinking into places she no longer had the right to be.
“I do keep tabs on you, Haydn,” she uttered. “What tabs I can.”
Which meant Lilith had asked, and Cain had told her. No other way for Lilith to ‘keep tabs’, Haydn couldn’t wait to get back to Dublin to punch the weasel in one of his two faces.
“So, two dead,” Lilith said after a moment’s thought. “You’re hunted, I assume?”
Acknowledging the fact with a small nod, Haydn really revealed nothing. Hunted, all daemonry was. Where there were creatures, there were hunters. It was one of the most organic relationships in the universe.
“Well, it sounds as if your hunters have gained some capabilities,” Lilith declared.
“They have,” Haydn acknowledged. “But there’s more to it than that.”
“Oh?” Seeming to recognize the conversation was going to take some time, or requiring authority to fully function, Lilith went back to her position of
power, settling onto her throne and taking the human’s leash in hand. With a small tug, she drew his head into her lap, running her hand over his hair and turning his look of slight surprise into a purr of contentment. “So, to what do you owe this sudden upswing in their tally?”
“It has something to do with our innocents.”
“Your innocents?” When Lilith’s hand paused in its petting, the man’s eyes opened in longing before she stroked him into contentment once more.
“I take it, you know what that means,” Haydn said.
“I know the legend,” Lilith replied. “One soul tips toward vice, one must tip toward virtue. It makes sense. That’s how balance is maintained.”
“Everyone knows the legend.” The lack of solid information becoming increasingly maddening, Haydn looked to the walls of the throne room, and the mishmash of weaponry on exhibit. From ancient to modern, each piece had been used by Lilith personally to dispatch a hunter who came after her - her version of heads on pikes. Haydn noticed a few more had joined the display since she was last in the room. “Do you happen to know anything else?”
She couldn’t think about the last time she was there with Lilith. She knew then, that she was going to leave, that she couldn’t stay. She knew she could no longer tolerate the things that went on beneath that roof, as strange as it might have been.
“I know when one flame is extinguished,” Lilith returned, “its balancing fire must also go out.”
That new, and interesting, it was blessedly enough to push thoughts of the past from Haydn’s mind. Considering the law in regards to events she had already witnessed, unease settled in at the realization of how well the new information fit.
“So, if the hunters kill these innocents, we die too?” she uttered
