Zauran

by Poppet

  Zauran

  Book 3 in the Pravus Series

  by

  Poppet

  Copyright 2012 Author Poppet

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine or journal.

  Ebook First Edition

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Chapter 1

  Zauran:

  After lock up, I am just starting up the car when I spot her.

  Killing the engine, I survey the slender wraith with a waist so tiny you could use her as a toothpick. Winding down the window I rest my arm on the top of the opening, taking the opportunity to lean my head out and inhale deeply.

  Neuri don't have acute sense of smell, we have acute sense of spirit; and I can smell hers from here. It's how we track, making us the most sought after bounty hunters on the planet. We catch the escaped convict every time.

  Watching her make her way to the doors and read the closed notice, she runs a fingertip over glass to the opening and closing times. The wind picks up across the dawn, billowing her skirt into rising and clawing her hair.

  She turns from the wide red doors fighting down the skirt, losing the battle with the flimsy scarf and staring at it when it kites away in the gust. Long black hair falls heavy to her waist with its escape, and her disappointed expression finally aims the deepest sea blue eyes at me.

  God help me, there are three of them.

  Three identical women, which shouldn't be possible.

  I knew it. I know that scent, my libido recognizes it just fine.

  Backlit with a sky so red it looks like cranberry syrup, she tiptoes her way between debris in my direction.

  Stepping out of the vehicle, I square my shoulders, wishing I was on the bike this morning.

  “Can I help you?” I say, when she reaches me.

  “Hello. I hope you can. I'm looking for Darise.”

  “Why?”

  “Oh, um, it's a bit personal.”

  She sucks her swollen and sexy bottom lip in, staring up at me with dewy sensuality, and I'm sorely tempted to misbehave. This is like being with Zaria; she smells, walks, talks, and smolders like Zaria.

  Reining back the impulse to shove her up onto the hood and bring her into the new day the orgasmic way, I manage to say pretty smooth and charismatic, “He's left already, come back tonight and he'll be here.”

  “I don't suppose you have a number for him?”

  “Yeah, matter of fact I do.” Zaria is going to kill me, but I think this one is worth the risk. I release my power, knowing she's now staring at my black eyes covered with color. Delving deep, I ask, “What's your name?”

  “Božena,” she says in a thick husky voice, licking her lips and releasing sexual images through her eyes into mine.

  Wow, Darise has been a busy boy.

  “What do you want with him?” I probe.

  “I moved away, we were dating. I'm back now and was hoping he still worked here.” Her voice is soft, her breathing labored. It's provocative.

  Withdrawing my power, I offer her the slip of paper I used to scrawl his number down while she was enthralled. He never did deserve to claim Zaria as his own anyway. This woman is a walking gift from an interfering God.

  “Who are you?” she smiles, with lust coating her tone into deep and demure as she looks me over.

  “Zauran.”

  *

  Zaria:

  A neuri blocks my path as I stare up the steps to Pravus' front doors. The bouncers don't seem to give a damn either, their inky demonic eyes are trained on me as if to see what I'm going to do about the stranger in ebony, looming over me in bold intimidation.

  I recognize the feeling now, of having him infiltrate my mind with his own. He's reading me – assessing me.

  He's rifling through the chambers of my heart, looking for secrets and dreams. He looks like the kind of pirate who searches for chests of shame, so he knows how to emotionally blackmail you. I have no such treasure, he's wasting his time.

  The doors are double and spacious, and yet he fills them. Impossibly, his shoulders are so wide he manages to leave two inches of space on either side. It was built for the supernatural men and demons who come here, and for that he has the gods to thank there is a place a man that large can come for a drink.

  Finally he moves, twisting around me like a wicked shadow caught in a gust, to wisp his way around obstacles. It shrieks sensation from my nape to across my muscles, bunching tension in an odious ripple all the way down my spine.

  I sense him behind me. I'm listening with pure paranoia when he inhales so hard and deep it sounds like wind whistling a haunting wail through pine needles.

  “You are one mysterious creature,” he says in a low whisper.

  His voice is the most unique I've heard. It's like a god whispering through the strings of a harp, prisming it into segments and sending it out in several different tones at once. It reverberates, strumming magma into my blood, scalding all the way to my eyebrows and back down to my toes, circulating with every panicked beat of my heart.

  Swallowing fear, I take the steps to the doors, needing to escape, now.

  “Zaria!” calls after me. It's deep, dangerous, clandestine, and sinful. It's wrath with angelic wings.

  So, he found my name while he was in my head.

  Pivoting, I look at him, not even gaining height advantage from the top of the four steps, “Yes?”

  “Tell Zauran, Ryan is in town.”

  I look him up and down, doing my best to clutch tight to my obstinate streak. “Are you Ryan?”

  Tilting his head to captivate me in midnight mystery and long black eyelashes; untidy thick straight obsidian hair masks his eyes. He shoves hands into the pockets of his black jeans and the button up shirt goes so taut over his arms I expect to hear fabric tear. Black boots tipped in silver catch the light as he takes a step closer, to stare his primordial darkness into my soul.

  Who does he think he is, the mafia? Yes, black makes him look good, but this much black is simply overkill.

  No, overkill is when I rip my chest open to show you my scorched heart matches your shadow, and I'll always be that close to you.

  “Yes, I am Ryan,” he says, as if he didn't just drop a threat into my mind.

  He offers me a card, snapping it impatiently with two fingers, “Get him to call me.”

  “It's rude to read my mind without my permission. Neuri know better than that. Pravus is a step toward harmony, not discord. Please don't do it again.” I take the card, aiming my attention back at him, and freeze with cold familiarity when his eclectic eyes gloss with a violet haze.

  The compulsion is like paralysis, and I hate it. His exotic voice filters through my head, Your spirit smells... mmmm... intoxicating. Did he drink from you?

  I shake my head to indicate the negative, caught in the rapture of misting amethyst and indigo shadows slipping across his eyes. It's a phenomenon that feels so wrong, and yet so erotic, it leaves my soul splintering like an image over broken glass.

  He steps closer, so I'm forced to stare at the opening of his shirt, hovering in stasis as my eyes drink in the view of a neck so strong it could bend lightning.

  Did he... fuck you?

  I shake my head again.

  His mental laughter vibrates through my veins, chasing pyre flares into my blood.

  Good. See you soon, Zaria.

  And with that he swivels, taking hostile strides over the abrasive rasp of gravel, to a large motorcycle vaguely glinting in a pock
et of raven-dark evil.

  Released from his claim on my mind, the card in my fingers crinkles with an impulsive crunch. I hate that we can't lie to them under compulsion. I hate it!

  Angry, I twist back to the carnal red doors of Pravus and stomp my way inside. Zauran's going to have to speak to these bouncers about protecting women from compulsion. This isn't on!

  Who needs Rohypnol when you can simply swirl your eyes with alchemical iridescence and she'll do whatever you tell her to.

  Taking the corner into the strobing red light inside Pravus, looking for Darise, I halt, my heart hammering uncomfortably in my ears.

  I don't believe this.

  This is not happening.

  My fallen angel has his hand in a woman's hair as she dips her head, and flirtatious laughter scythes through the music straight to me - with stabbing clarity. She lifts eyes sparkling with happiness, before returning her captivated gaze to his.

  His smile says it all.

  How long has that bastard been cheating on me? With another woman who looks exactly like me! The touch he runs over her cheek with his thumb whispers of familiarity and seduction.

  Stuff you!

  My heart is jamming my pulse and I can't breathe. Forced to retreat, I manage to make it back to the doors to lean heavily against the cast iron frame, asthmatically sucking in cold night air.

  “You okay?” says Zarak, from his bouncer post on the left.

  “Like you give a damn,” I grind out, glaring at the huge demon.

  I'm not asthmatic, but shock has a strange way of constricting airways. These guards at the doors are super-beings. They are by far the most imposing walls of muscle I've ever seen, and they seem benevolent even though I think they're wicked incarnate.

  Standing upright again, I give him the 'back away' stare, willing my pulse to calm down and not show any of them I'm weak.

  You never know what they know, or what they are after. I'm in treacherous territory, without a map, and if I have an ounce of common sense I should leave, asap.

  The demons make me uncomfortable with their pupilless eyes. That, and I don't believe a demon is capable of caring.

  Racing down the stairs to my car, I flee the scene of the crime with bitter chills running their nails into my skin. It may be spring, but the nights are still damp and desolate.

  It's a relief to be in the safety of the car, and I immediately lock the doors out of habit. As I'm flicking the heater on, a shadow falls over the window, blocking out the slither of faint moonlight with an omen of dread.

  Glancing up, my heart skipping back into a voodoo drumbeat, danger beckons in every shadow and breeze, moving through boughs heavy with night veils.

  Seeing nothing to fear, I glance at the rearview mirror with apprehensive instinct. A slipping silhouette of menace slides out of view, and I twist to stare out the back window, trying to catch a glimpse of what is lurking out there.

  The night is a yawning chasm of welted shadows, and the moon dips behind a cloud as if helping the harbinger of my doom.

  I need to get out of here.

  Starting the car, I get out my phone and tuck it between my legs. I'm going to do the one thing Darise told me not to do. I'm going to see Zauran, alone.

  Chapter 2

  Zaria:

  Heading out of Novi Belgrade I take Brankova Rd over the river, driving away from Pravus back toward Stari Grad.

  It's usually a stress free route meandering along these arteries carved into Serbian territory, traveling out along

  Višnjica to the open country in the direction of Slanci – usually.

  Except all I can think about is Darise and that woman.

  What are the odds that because of the vampyres in my life, I've now seen not one, but two, women who are identical to me. We could be sisters, except I've never seen any of them before Darise introduced us.

  Okay, he didn't introduce the woman tonight, but still, she was with him wasn't she? Definitely freaking with him.

  How many of us are there, and why are they targeting us? Is Darise collecting us? Why? What for?

  How is it even possible? His brother Seithe has Phoebe, who looks just like me, and he is married to my doppelganger. Darise is in a relationship with me. And now a third look-alike joins their brotherhood, so how come Darise gets two of us?

  This is just too weird.

  The ache in my arms makes me uncomfortably aware of how tightly I'm gripping the steering wheel. My palms are clammy with cold and nerves. I relax them, and force myself to focus back on the asphalt.

  Clenching my jaw, I'm wrestling back tears, desperate not to be that pathetic woman who falls to pieces when she finds her boyfriend cheating.

  So he's a philandering prick, get him back or get the heck over it. Big girls don't cry, they get even!

  Get even.... how? With who?

  Zauran is the obvious choice.

  I only went to Pravus to deposit the box of new aesthetic products in the shop; comprising creepy contact lenses in different shades and rainbow hues, and the vampire teeth. Plus, I have that box of new summer shirts printed with the Pravus emblem. They've been selling pretty darn well. I'm still waiting on the keychains and fake tattoos. Those are going to be a blast.

  Instead of dropping them off, I ran away because Darise is an asshole with way too much freedom. He needs a leash and a dungeon, but I'm never going to be that kind of girl. My man needs to love me and want to be with me. It's pretty darn clear he doesn't fall into either category.

  The mist is low tonight, sending vapor smoke across the road to bounce the funnels of the headlights back at me. Foreboding rides my intuition like a current spiking down a live wire.

  It's hard to see where I'm driving in this low cloud, which smells strongly of river and dark intent. The rubber of the tires is loud, like running over rubble, the noise almost insular as I creep the Clio closer to the turnoff to Zauran's secluded home.

  He lives deep in wooded territory, and for once I wish he was on duty tonight. It would have been easier to run to his office than drive out to his lair.

  Rolling down the window, inviting the crisp claws of mist to lick their way over my skin and into the car's interior, a growl makes me pause as I press my foot to the brake. Listening with sharp focus, I look behind me. It's difficult to discern over the thrum of the engine, but there's a distinct growl carrying on the wind.

  Sudden urgency propels my actions, forcing me to wrestle with the steering wheel as I squeal rubber over the slippery white line, down the wet earth drive to his home.

  It's a long drive, and with every aching inch feeling like a mile, I know with the supra-sense embedded in a woman's soul, I'm being watched – I'm being followed.

  Tracked like a runaway with a GPS chip embedded in an ankle monitor, terror grips my breath and begins to squeeze.

  Satan's cloak rolls thick over the landscape, obscuring everything in a dense fog which mutes even the faint light coming from the upstairs window, rolling out dragon's breath between the trunks of the trees, crowding the car into seclusion.

  It's spooky.

  Oh god, Zauran please be home.

  Leaving the merchandise in the car, not even bothering to lock it, I grip my phone with trembling fingers and sprint to his door, banging on the thick wood as if I'm about to be snared by the monster wheezing his nightmare from the depths of my worst dreams, chasing me for my soul.

  The growl comes again, closer, and a silver beam wavers faintly from afar; one cyclops eye lancing the white cloying veil which threatens to choke my final breath.

  The door opens, leaving me sagging with relief at the tall silhouette of the only neuri I can say I know.

  “Zaria?”

  Quaking as if I'm having a seizure, I wobble inside, yanking the door from his relaxed grasp and banging it closed, slamming the thick bolt across in a final shlick.

  “Petal? What is it? What the hell happened?”

  His warm fingers grasp my chin, trainin
g my face on his, while two opal black eyes fracture the light into flecks of petrol green and azure. He's solid, instant comfort, and an immediate haven. Tension exhales out of me as I stare into his magnificent neuri eyes.

  He scowls, the frown darkening his features like a clap of thunder from an angry Valkyrie. Those gentle caring eyes burn with the aqua hue of the aurora borealis. It shrouds their depths in the mystery of a powerful supernatural man who is forced to violate my mind the way he once violated my body.

  The aqua roils over his irises like a gathering storm ready to eclipse salvation.

  “Forgive me,” he grunts, his grip tightening and holding me fast.

  He pushes into my mind, and the vortex of his charisma pours into me like a lover licking the last drop of chocolate from a nipple. It relaxes me. Finally feeling safe I cherish the strength of his personality fusing with my own when he penetrates my body with magic.

  *

  Zauran:

  I have to know and I don't have the time to wait for explanations.

  Gleaning it from her mind is the easiest route, because urgency is coming off her in violent waves. It alarms me.

  Delving into her, raw sexuality hits my core; fear, wrath, her entire night unravels like a cloistered scroll written in hieroglyphs. Ryan is here, following her no doubt, and Darise just blew it. Thank you Božena for being an angel in my hour of need.

  I have to work fast.

  Pulling out of her mind, I wrap her close, leaning shivering flesh against mine while I gather her in for comfort.

  “I'm sorry to do that petal, it's the fastest way to get to information in an emergency.”

  Curving her neck, she stares up at me, radiating innocence and trust into my breath, mind, soul.

  She's so rare, if she could only see what I can.

  “He's...! I can't believe how stupid I've been. I was discontent and didn't know why, but I think I just discovered the reason,” she whispers; angry, afraid, and everything in between.