The Chosen

by Theresa Meyers

  “Let me do this for you. It’s one of the only things I can do to help.”

  “I don’t like it, but I also don’t see how we have much choice. There’s barely a week until the new moon rises.” He kissed her fiercely. “You are the bravest woman I know. If there were such a thing as female Hunters, you’d be one.”

  She gave him a weak smile. “If I were a female Hunter, then I wouldn’t be Darkin, and I wouldn’t have the direct connection to Rathe that might make this shortcut possible.” She reached out and touched his cheek. “I’ll always find my way back to you. Trust me.”

  China finished dressing as best she could. Nothing fit; it was all far too large and made for a man, but that was fine with her. It didn’t need to fit for where she was going. She reached beneath the baggy shirt that smelled of Remington’s Bay Rum and placed the tip of her middle finger on the center of her brand and let the sluggish, sticky sensation wriggle and creep through her veins. She hadn’t wanted Remington, or anyone else for that matter, to touch the scar for a good reason. It was one surefire way to locate Rathe, anytime, anywhere. A direct line to her father, not something to be tampered with lightly or even by accident. Not something she wanted.

  Normal Darkin could only transport to places they’d been before, but because she was marked by Rathe, she could return not just to a place she’d been before, but to a person with whom she shared a connection. Her body began to fall apart, but not in the same way it did when she shifted. Instead of the welcome rush of heat and the sparkling sensation that filled her, this was cold, sticky, and vile like congealed blood. Dark particles consumed her from the feet up, turning her into nothing but smoke and ash as she transported to Rathe’s’s hall of horrors.

  She’d been there twice before. Once as a terrified six-year-old to watch her mother die and to receive her brand then be held against her will for six months before he cast her out into the world, and once when he’d ensured she had her virginity taken by force by one of his incubi. China couldn’t breathe; the suffocating sensation made her lungs and nose burn, then just as suddenly dissipated.

  Without opening her eyes she could smell the stench of burnt flesh and decay in this place. Beneath her hands was something hard and cold, the familiar black marble floor on which she’d broken her first bone. The light from the lava on which the floor floated glowed red through her eyelids. Still she hesitated to open her eyes, knowing that Rathe sitting upon his monstrosity of gleaming glass-like obsidian, would be waiting to greet her.

  “I see the prodigal child has come home.” The sound of his voice, unctuous and superior all at once, grated on her nerves and made her palms instantly damp. Her heart pounded out a mad tattoo, like it was as desperate as she was to leave this place.

  China lifted her head and glared at the archdemon from Hell who’d sired her, locking her gaze on him as she slowly stood, bare feet braced wide apart. The deathly pallor of his face picked up the reddish glow from the lava that lit the edges of the enormous rock cavern that was his throne room. It was really a torture chamber as far as China was concerned. She could hear the clink of the rusty chains and massive hooks overhead that disappeared into the infinite darkness above them.

  He was dressed like a dapper Englishman, all spanking clean and pressed, from the crease in his pinstriped trousers to his matching vest and coat, and crisp, high-collared, snowy shirt. In many ways he wasn’t dressed all that differently from Remington on the first time she’d seen him. The big difference was while it looked good on Remington, it made Rathe appear overdone and gaudy—like a whore trying too hard to look like she’d risen above her profession and become respectable. The bloodred silk tie was overkill. So was the golden watch chain strewn with the shrunken, gilded heads of his enemies.

  China refused to let her body shudder. She’d deliberately waited a moment to answer him back. “It’s not as though you’ve put out the welcome mat,” she answered tartly.

  The reddish slash in his face that passed for a mouth flattened into a grim line. “I see your manners have not improved.” The fingernails on his hands changed, elongating and sharpening into black talons, like those on a bald eagle.

  China had tried to shift into a bald eagle once. The feel of talons, that big and that long, extending from her fingertips had made her think too much of being like Rathe, and she’d never done it again.

  “Didn’t feel there was anybody here I needed to impress.”

  Rathe steepled his fingers, the talons clacking against one another. “Then, if not for a social call, why are you here, daughter? Surely you didn’t hope to receive a matching brand for the one you already have.”

  China flinched before she could stop herself. “I came about the Chosen.”

  “Ah, the Chosen. One of my more favorite topics of conversation as of late. And how are they, my dear?”

  “I wouldn’t know. I’ve only been tagging along with the middle Jackson brother since the younger one left me buried in adobe brick and rotting in jail.”

  Rathe leaned forward. “And did Remington Addicus Jackson recover the final piece of the Book of Legend?”

  China gave one curt nod. “Thanks only to me,” she replied.

  “You didn’t expect me to make it easy, did you? I wanted them to feel a sense of accomplishment before I snatch it all away and open the Gates of Nyx wide to the rest of my brethren, and bring about a new world order.”

  Her heart clutched in her chest. The age-old wound broke open deep within. She’d wished he cared even a fraction of that much for her. But the days of seeking his approval were over. “Why do you care if they have a sense of accomplishment?”

  His ice-blue eyes turned yellow and hungry like living flame. Only the vertical slit remained the same, and even that widened with anticipation. “The more accomplished they feel, the more agony they will endure when I take it all away and they realize all their sacrifice, all their lives, and those of their ancestors have been in vain. Worthless. A waste.”

  He was one sick, cold, evil demon. But then, that wasn’t anything new. She just hated being reminded of how ruthless and sadistic Rathe could be and how heavily she’d relied on him, feeling helpless and hopeless when he’d branded and discarded her.

  China swallowed down the bitter bile tainting the back of her tongue and searing her throat. She hoped like hell this touching family reunion was worth it. As long as she could find out the location to the Gates of Nyx, she could return with her head held high.

  Rathe rose from his throne and stepped down from the dais, moving slowly toward her like a pit viper. “Do you know how all this began—Darkin and Hunters, the prophecy of the Chosen?”

  He was close enough now that the reek of dead things coming off of him made her eyes burn. “You were all bored to tears and decided to screw up the world for entertainment?”

  He slapped her full force, making her neck snap as her head swung with the blow. China had been hit before, but not like that. Never anything that made her face go numb from the pain and started to swell her eye shut instantly.

  “Insolent child. I never should have let your mother keep you.”

  Least she never laid a hand on me, China thought bitterly. She would have spit out the words, but she still couldn’t feel her jaw, and the blood collecting in her mouth was choking her.

  I heard that, my pet.

  Joy. She hadn’t let anyone in for so long, she’d forgotten powerful Darkin could read one another’s thoughts. And there was none more powerful than Rathe.

  His yellow gaze bored into her, the vertical slits in his eyes widening like a cat’s the instant it scented prey. I’ve a plan for you. You are going to help me annihilate the Chosen.

  And why should I? You’re going to kill me anyway.

  His mouth, if it truly could be called a mouth, stretched slightly, a dark, lipless maw in his pale, waxy, dead-looking skin. The sharp points of his teeth just barely visible. “You can either serve me or be destroyed; that is true. But if
you serve me, the end will be far less painful for you.”

  So the choices are die, or die painfully?

  The vertical slits in his eyes narrowed. “You are not afraid to die, are you?”

  China refocused her gaze, letting it rest on the spot just behind Rathe. She didn’t want to see his face. Didn’t want to be reminded that this Darkin had branded her skin when she was a defenseless, frightened child. The searing smell of human flesh and the blinding black pain had been equally branded on her memory.

  “But you do value the lives of the Chosen. Do you not?”

  It took everything within her not to flinch, not to change the pace of her breath. She looked Rathe straight in his dead yellow eyes, gathered all her power to shield her thoughts from him, and lied.

  “What happens to them is none of my business. I only look out for one person since you killed my mother—me.” It was really more of a past truth than an outright lie. Up until she and Remington had been pulled together by their journey to the center of the earth and back, she’d not known a man could be so kind, so tender and loving, while at the same time strong and decisive.

  His gentle, kind side didn’t make Remington weak; rather it made him even stronger. Something Rathe would never understand. Remington might have a weakness for always wanting to be right, but his strength was that he did the right thing, regardless of what it cost him. There were so many ways he was like Rathe and yet totally different. Her heart squeezed at the realization.

  “All I wanted to know was where I should be for the best view when the showdown happens.”

  Rathe’s golden gaze bored into her; the corner of the red slash that marred his skin as a mouth lifted in approval. “Well, that’s a change. Could it be that my spawn is finally willing to take up the mantel of her station as one of the noble among the Darkin?”

  China stiffened. She could do this. She had to do this.

  “The Gates of Nyx are never in one place long. They change their position at sundown. When the Book of Legend was torn apart, our forces poured forth in the north of the Island of Britain. But when we meet the Chosen?” He rolled one of the small gilded head fobs decorating his watch chain between his fingers, and it squealed in pain. The dark slash of a mouth widened, revealing the points of his teeth and a bit of black gums. “Who knows? It could be anywhere.”

  A sinking sensation filled her chest, making her feel as if she were drowning. Coming here had been for nothin’. He wasn’t going to tell her. She could hardly draw a breath.

  Rathe’s face changed, his perfectly sculpted black brows drawing down in the center, making his expression lurid and vile. “Go back to the Jackson brothers, my pet. Tell them to come to me.”

  She swallowed hard in order to force words past the thickness in her throat. “How?”

  “They will find another book, that of my once brother, the archangel Jezriel. In it they can find the means to locate the Gates of Nyx on the rise of the new moon.” He balled his hand into a fist. “And I will crush them and begin my reign as ruler of this world.”

  China still hadn’t returned. She’d disappeared in a swirl of dark particles. He’d long since passed worry and entered into the realm of panic. Where the hell was she? What if Rathe wouldn’t let her return? Deep down he knew he had to trust her. If anyone could escape Rathe’s grasp, it would be a thief of her caliber. But was it enough?

  The sun beat down, the air shimmering with the heat of it, as he walked his horse up the zigzagging dirt road to Marley’s house. It sat apart from the town on a bluff overlooking a deep gorge and was the strangest place Remington had ever seen. A large brass telescope, various cranes, and a few weather vanes Remington suspected were for attracting lightning during a thunderstorm, were among the objects that protruded from the roofline of Marley’s house. Some moved unexpectedly at odd intervals, giving one the sense it was not so much a building as an enormous living mechanical creature.

  Among the flora and fauna on Marley’s property were glints of metal. The mechanical spine-shooting cacti and mechanical eyes Marley had scattered throughout the landscape so he could both warn and then defend himself against unwanted visitors.

  Marley would know he was there before he ever reached the front door. Remington dismounted from his horse and moved to knock on the wooden front door, but it opened before he even touched his knuckles to it.

  “Remington!” Marley stuck out his hand in greeting, his brown eyes magnified to the size of dinner plates behind the special lenses of his unusual goggles. Cottony tufts of white hair blew about in the wind. He was a sight for sore eyes.

  “It’s good to see you, Marley.” Remington took Marley’s hand and instead of just shaking it, used it to pull the smaller man into a bear hug. “Damn, it’s good to see you.”

  He pulled back, and Marley looked a little dazed, but gave him a big smile, which pushed his goggles up a notch on his nose. “It’s good to see you in one piece. I had my doubts. Were you successful?”

  Remington held up the oilcloth that covered the precious pages. Marley’s eyes lit up like those of a kid on Christmas morning. “Brilliant!”

  “I just hope the others lived through it. I barely did,” Remington said.

  Marley’s dark brows drew together and disappeared behind the rim of his goggles. “I’ve heard from Winchester, but not from Colt. Things have gotten worse since you Jacksons have been gone.” Remy didn’t like the uneasy tremor underscoring Marley’s uneasy tone. Marley waved Remington inside and took a quick glance around outside before he shut the door. Inside he locked a series of padlocks and bolts that ran the length of the door. Some of it was new. If Marley was beefing up his security, then things had definitely gone from bad to worse.

  “What’s happened?”

  Marley pulled the goggles from his head, leaving a red rim around his eyes and over the bridge of his nose. “Earthquakes for a start, then wildfires and dust storms, and that’s only the natural disasters. I was accosted in my own home by a shape-shifter disguised as Colt. Darkin have been found running amok in several cities all over the country, if my sources are correct.”

  Marley’s sources were always correct. Remington pulled off his hat and ran his fingers through his sweat-damp hair. “Rathe’s pushing open the Gates as far as he can. Crack only has to be a little bit wider to let even more Darkin through.”

  He looked for a place to sit down in Marley’s parlor, but everywhere was piled high with stacks of books and boxes of gears, wires, tubes, and glass piping. Marley was worse than a desert pack rat. He saw a use for everything.

  Remington picked up a bust of President Lincoln off the edge of the piano that looked like it had been exploded apart and glued back together with some sort of adhesive, giving the piece irregular golden lines all through it. “Did you research how to put the Book of Legend back together?” Not like this, Remy hoped.

  Marley nodded. He turned to a desk buried beneath stacked volumes of leather-bound books. He tapped his bottom lip with his thumb as he searched through the stacks. “Now where did I put that volume?”

  He picked out a particularly old book with a black satin ribbon marking a page and cracked the volume open to the marker. “I say, old chap, are you certain you are ready to go through with this?”

  Remy narrowed his eyes. “You say that like you’re asking if I’m ready to meet my Maker.” Which, if all of this didn’t work, would be exactly what would happen in a week.

  Marley bobbed his head in such a fashion that the white tuft of hair on his head waved wildly about. “Well, as much as I hate to say this, it’s distinctly possible.” He peered at the book, running his finger down the page. “All indications point to a blood sacrifice by the Chosen.”

  A long silence stretched out between them. Marley finally looked up.

  “A blood sacrifice? How much blood exactly are we talking about here, Marley?”

  Marley frowned. “That was difficult to pinpoint. We won’t be able to tell until the
pieces of the Book of Legend are all in one place, ready to be reunited. And once they are reunited, there is still the matter of finding exactly where the Gates of Nyx are located.” He waved his hand about in the air vaguely. “I’ve searched through every bit of Hunter lore I’ve been able to get my hands on and still haven’t been able to pinpoint where the Gates are located or determine how to go about closing them for good.”

  The knowledge that this last piece of information might be the final nail in the coffin of the free world made Remy’s stomach knot. He and his brothers had endured so much. He didn’t even know if Colt had found the other pieces of the Book, or if they were still searching. Was the mysterious, unknown location of the Gates what was going to make them lose the game at the eleventh hour? “Blast.”

  “I was hoping you or your brothers might have come across the information during your journeys.”

  Remington shook his head. “Nothing we came across gave us any clue. The codex Mendoza had only indicated the Gates wouldn’t be in the same location as one of the hidden pieces of the Book, which nixed it being in Bodie. But China is trying to find out where the Gates might be.”

  Marley worried his lip again, muttering to himself.

  “You have something else to tell me?”

  His old friend looked intently at him. “Are you certain, Remington, absolutely certain, that you and your brothers are the Chosen?”

  Remington gripped the edge of the table nearest him and the stacks of boxes teetered, but didn’t fall. He had doubted it for a long time, but there had been no doubt after the vision he’d seen in the scryvoyager in the temple. “There’s no need to guess. I know. We are the Chosen, Marley. We must defeat Rathe or the world will fall to him.”

  Chapter 22

  It was only a matter of time until his brothers arrived at Marley’s. It would take all of them, together, to bring down Rathe and seal the Gates of Nyx; he knew that now. And with China’s help they would know where the Gates were located. If China returned.