by Mary Calmes
“You’ve been here, dead, a week, warder.”
A week.
“I can’t wait. I have to go. The wolf says when the hunter comes that I can’t be here.”
He lifted to go, but I reached for him. It took all the strength I had, but I did it.
“Thank you,” I said, my voice broken and full of sand.
“If we cross paths again, you’ll remember this, yes, warder?”
I nodded.
His face was smeared with dirt; his clothes looked sturdy but old. He reminded me of the pictures in the textbooks of the people on the road during the Great Depression. He looked like he belonged to another time, human and in need of help. All except his eyes. His eyes were solid black, no iris, nothing.
“We’re brothers now, warder, yes?”
Again I nodded, giving him my promise.
“The hunter’s coming. I’m sorry to run, but there’s only me and the wolf, and we have far to go. I hope you live, warder.”
I did too.
“I think if you rise from this ring, from Nebo, you’ll die, warder. Just rest, regain your strength, and maybe follow me.” He pointed, and I saw the dirt road that cut through the grass. “If I see you on your feet, you may join us.”
I stared at his eyes.
“The wolf said to kill you, eat you, take our sustenance, but I said no. I will be a man someday, warder. Men don’t eat other men.”
“No.”
He rose then, hand on the wolf’s ruff, and I watched them walk away. They didn’t look back, and when they walked around a small bend, I lost sight of them. The wind, I realized, was slowly rising, making it impossible to hear anything.
I closed my eyes.
The hunter was coming.
Christ.
I just hoped it would be fast. I didn’t… want… to….
Joe.
My body jolted painfully, and I realized that broken did not cover it. I doubted that I could move at all.
I had fallen through a warder void. I must have killed racers on the way down, and so the hole opened and this time instead of me stepping aside to drop a dead demon in, I had been sucked in. But Tarin, the fake warder, the doppelganger, had seen me fall. He and the wolf. They had dragged me away from the racers and put me beside the fire.
A week.
And from one level of hell to the other, time moved differently. There was no way of telling how long I had been there, what I had missed.
From what he said, I was broken, had been dead. Maybe there wasn’t enough to look at. Maybe I couldn’t pass for human anymore. Maybe Joe couldn’t love what was left.
There were no tears; I had nothing to make them with. I could only lie there, limp and lifeless, and wait.
I closed my eyes.
IT WAS dark in a way that I could not see my hand in front of my face, and with the fire gone, it was cold. But I had been colder in a tent in Yosemite. I had been in more pain when I had fought at Jael’s side when we cleared a nest of creed demons and a tusk had been driven through my back. I had been more scared when I thought Malic was going to die in my arms. There were worse things, so I concentrated on my own breath. In and out, rise and fall. I just needed to get up. I would either die or I would sit. One or the other would happen. That was just logical. Leith would have been so proud.
THERE WAS no mistaking the sound of footsteps, and as frightened as I was—I didn’t want to be devoured, it hadn’t been any fun the first time—I was really only focused on how empty my stomach was.
“Marcus!” came the scream, and I could hear the fury in it, the anger, the hopelessness, and the pain.
I could not imagine a better sound.
“Marcus!”
I had to swallow hard, had to get my voice to work, to rise.
The hunter was there.
In the predawn, the gunmetal-colored sky, I saw huge black feathered wings, felt the stirring of the stagnant air, the breeze on my face.
Only a whisper the first time, all I could do.
“Marcus!” he called again in frustration, the sound rising to a shriek, the struggle to hold onto the very last desperate shred of something.
I waited, gathered myself, breathed out, in, and used my voice for the second most important time in my life, the first being when I said I do to Joe.
“Raphael!” I called and just for a second I thought he was a fallen angel and so was I.
The darkness was like rain clouds over me, and then they parted, and an enormous black feather was caught between falling and floating before it drifted down, down, and came to rest beside me. And so did he.
Looking up, I found myself swallowed in smoky topaz, glittering and dark. I smiled slowly. “Wings?”
He cleared his throat. “Don’t tell Jackson.”
“I think,” I whispered, “he’d love them.”
He was squinting, working hard not to break down. Big, badass demon hunter, he shouldn’t have cried.
“Can you take me home?”
He nodded as the tears rolled down his cheeks.
I would have reached for him, comforted him, but I had done so much already. I had to rest.
He told me to.
IT FELT like being dropped into the deep end of a pool. I hit, went under, and was swallowed in liquid. When my eyes finally fluttered open, I saw Jael.
“Don’t drown me,” I groaned, knowing instantly where I was.
The bathtub in the castle masquerading as a house that he had in Sausalito, in the master bedroom; it could pass for a small pool. The man had me submerged, and he was purifying the water, pulling God knew what out of me.
I growled.
You would have thought I gave him a million dollars the way he smiled, dropped to his knees beside the tub, and put his hands on my face.
“Son of a bitch,” he barked.
I grunted.
“Marot.”
I shook my head. Not today.
“Marcus,” he exhaled, hands so gentle on my skin, holding me like I was fragile. “You are an extraordinary man.”
“All”—I coughed to get my voice working—“all warders are.”
He shook his head. “No, Marcus, you have strength that I’ve never seen. There are reserves in you I didn’t know a warder could have. You saved us all: you put us all before yourself, and then you lived on top of it.”
The big question. “How long was I gone?”
“Six months.”
Jesus.
“Everything will be all right,” he promised, which was not even logical.
“Joe,” I said.
“Joe is well, we check on him.”
“You don’t see him?”
“He doesn’t want to see us. It’s been very painful for him. He knows you’re alive because the house is still sealed, the branding touch hasn’t left him, but the not knowing….”
That would have been hardest for Joe, the uncertainty and the fact that I had put others before him. Because I could have reached him, could have been safe, could have left and gotten home. But I had placed Malic before him. Jackson and Leith before him. Ryan. How could I ever say that he was all there was… when he had not been.
“Did you tell him you found me?”
“No, I wanted you to tell him when you were ready. Or I can go get him right—”
“I’m disfigured, right?”
He frowned.
“Just tell me.”
“No, but why would that matter? Joe loves the man, not the wrapping.”
“You think just because Joe’s blind that he doesn’t care what I feel like when he touches me?”
His smile was warm as he rose and left the room. He returned with a hand-held mirror, and when he turned it on me, without warning, I realized instantly that I was looking at my own face.
I looked like me. My wide-set dark-brown eyes, and my long, straight nose, full lips, high cheekbones, and thick eyebrows were familiar, and it was a relief. I could look down at my own body and see
the gouges, the scars, the tears, and the bruises. It would take time, but I would be perfect before I laid eyes on Joseph Locke again.
“We should call him now, Marcus.”
I shook my head. I didn’t even have the strength to protect him. What use was I to him?
“You’re wrong,” was all Jael said.
But I didn’t want to fight. My life had to wait until I was ready.
VII
I TALKED to Jael, but I wasn’t ready to see anyone else. Even Raphael, who I had already seen, I didn’t want to visit me again.
Jael and I walked his property with his Irish wolfhounds, and after two weeks I could throw a stick for the dogs, and after one more I could run with them. Food, water, exercise—it took time, but I built back up.
Malic had done an amazing thing and gone to Helene Kessler and told her that I needed an extended leave of absence. When she had asked for particulars, he told her only that I was missing. Would she accept that? Apparently she had. He would update her when he knew anything. There was nothing she could do. All the appropriate authorities had been contacted, and that was all. Her willingness to take his word and wait had impressed him, Jael told me. Helene Kessler, Jael thought, could handle the truth when I was ready. She already had faith in me; he felt that was an excellent foundation to build on. She was quite a woman, quite a human being, period. I was betting on her being able to handle the truth.
The demon base in Lexington, Breka’s home, and everything that happened that night had been covered up under the umbrella of a gas leak, and everyone had bought it. What else could it have possibly been?
Jael spent time catching me up, and it seemed odd, but his company, though not welcome, was all I could seem to accept. Just the thought of talking about it all made me not want to see anyone. And Joe, especially, what could I say about my weakness, my inability to get back to him? What rationale could I give? I was supposed to protect him and his family, and I had instead disappeared, not been there. The failure was great.
“You’re insane, you know,” Jael told me as I stood on the back deck of his guesthouse, staring out at the bay. “If you just let them, they would all tell you what you did.”
“But I just want it to all go away,” I said, breathing in the warm summer air. It was August now, and I had left them all before Christmas. I had been gone six months and had been holed up at Jael’s for another two. It was so strange.
“Can you return, Marcus? Would you prefer to start over somewhere else? Go where no one knows you? I’m sure it would be easy to do at work, and I can recommend you to another sentinel.”
Start over.
“Maybe,” I exhaled, finally faced with the reality.
“But Joe,” Jael said softly.
I had to see him. “If he’s waiting, I’ll see.”
“You don’t throw away six years, Marcus.” He didn’t understand. “Explain what you’re thinking.”
“What happened to Deidre?” I asked suddenly, desperate to change the subject.
“Nothing happened; she was here three months ago. It’s my turn to visit her next.”
“She’s not going to move here?”
He cleared his throat. “She’s not ready to give up being a sentinel, and neither am I. It was boorish of me to think that because she’s a woman that it would be her sacrifice to make.”
I studied his face. “So quit and go to her.”
“You say the same idiotic things as Jaka. One doesn’t just leave.”
“I think one does.” I smiled, sighing. “If you love her.”
“Love is complicated, isn’t it?” He had brought me right back around to my problem. It was clever. “Talk to me.”
“Just—”
“Marcus—”
“You know, that’s weird already,” I cut him off. “Coming from you, it’s…. Just go back to Marot.”
“Fine, Marot.” He took a breath. “I want to hear what you’re thinking.”
“About what?”
“About Joe!” I could hear the frustration in his voice. “Please.”
“I just… why would he want me anymore? I’m supposed to protect him, and I didn’t, and he’s supposed to be my whole life and then what—I just forgot him? What he means? He must hate me. I would hate me if I were him.”
“Mar—”
“Just thinking about how he’s going to look at me…. Why have that scene? Why not just spare us both?”
“You’re scared.”
“It’s more than that.” Simple fear would not have kept me from my hearth.
“You’re resigned.”
It was closer to the truth, probably a little of both. “I…. Jael?”
He looked strange, lost in thought, a million miles away.
“You okay?”
And I watched the light sort of turn on in his eyes. “I’m an idiot.”
“Jael,” I began. “You can’t fix—”
“To your mind,” he cut me off, “you were on that alternate plane a week but to your body and soul, the wear on both, the pain…. It was six months. And now you’ve been back two, and…. God, I’m really just so stupid.” He turned away from me, charging into the other room and slamming the door behind him.
I had no clue what was going on, so I left.
THE FIVE-MILE run up and down the hills of Sausalito felt good. My body would never be the same, there were scars in hard-to-reach places, but I was strong again, and I could feel my muscles respond when I asked.
When I got back, I took a long hot shower and had changed into basketball shorts and nothing else when I wandered into Jael’s kitchen for dinner.
“How dare you,” the cold, flat voice said.
My head snapped sideways, and I saw Joe standing by the dishwasher next to the sink. He didn’t look like himself, and I wasn’t sure why, and then it came to me. I had never seen the expression he had on his face before in my life.
I waited.
He trembled just slightly, and I restrained myself, stamped down the urge to go to him.
“Marcus Roth, explain yourself right fucking now.”
He looked thin, his coloring was off, and his hair was shorter. He was wearing thick black-framed Buddy Holly glasses with yellow lenses that made the blue of his eyes a strange lime green. It was odd.
“Marcus!” he barked.
I cleared my throat, holding onto the back of one of Jael’s barstools for dear life. It was easier to articulate as I had said it earlier to my sentinel. I wondered briefly if that had been the point. “When push came to shove, I didn’t think of you. You weren’t right there. The guys were there, and so I put them first. I sacrificed myself, and in so doing put you in jeopardy. I’m so sorry, Joe.” My voice bottomed out. “I let you down like I said I never would. I’m so sorry.”
He nodded, and I saw the clench of his jaw, heard him take a breath, saw the shiver run though his body.
“So you think that you’ve let me down.”
I nodded.
“Use your words, Marcus.”
“Yes,” I managed to get out, feeling my knees go weak, my power deserting me when I needed it most.
I did not expect the plate—and this was Jael’s house, so who knew what the damn thing cost—to narrowly miss me and shatter into a thousand pieces behind me.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
“You stupid ass!” he screamed as he began emptying the cupboard above him. The plates flew toward me, and I had no idea how, but he knew where I was, and he had great aim.
“Joseph.” I tried to calm him, tried to get closer at the same time.
“You idiot! This hurt me! You not coming for me the second you got home! You not sending for me the minute you could—that is fuckin’ killing me, not the rest of this self-serving martyr bullshit!”
Martyr? “Now wait!” I yelled, and then I saw that the plates were gone, and he moved to the next cupboard full of glassware.
“How dare you not send for me!”
“Shit,” I growled, coming around the island even as he retreated.
“Stay the fuck away from me!”
And it hit me—all the pain, all the longing, all my need, all of it. My hearth. I couldn’t breathe without him.
“Joe,” I gasped.
“No!” he roared, walking backward.
“I need you.”
But he was furious, and hot, angry tears were running down his cheeks as he unloaded on me, screaming, yelling, and calling me every name he could think of. Mostly I was a bastard. Over and over.
“Baby,” I soothed.
“Fuck you!” he railed. “You did what you had to do, Marcus! You didn’t just save me and my family, you saved Malic and Jacks and Ry and Leith and all the hearths too. We don’t work without our warders; do you even fucking get that? You did it all, Marcus, and then you’re gonna do what, punish us all, stay away from all of us—leave us?”
I inched closer to him.
“Fuck you, Marcus Roth! I fuckin’ hate you, and I’m gonna leave you like you left me, and I hope you cry yourself to sleep every night like I did and miss my smell on your sheets and my hands on your skin and just fucking rot!”
The crystal punch bowl missed me by inches. The matching ladle bounced off the copper pots hanging from the ceiling, but because he’d really flung it, put his back into it, he upset his balance just a little.
It was enough.
I moved fast, faster than he could or would ever be able to, reached him, and wrapped the man up tight in my arms.
“No,” he screamed.
I held on, squeezed tighter, and the flood of relief was overwhelming. All of it, everything was just done. Nothing mattered; I had Joseph Locke in my arms.
“I hate you, Marcus,” he sobbed, face pressed to my collarbone, hands flat on my bare chest. “I’m gonna leave you.”
I sighed as I rubbed my chin in his hair. It was so soft, his thick auburn hair, and it smelled so clean. He was shaking so hard, pressing into me so close, struggling now to free his arms.
“I thought you’d hate me, and I couldn’t bear to see that on your face.”
