“We need to talk,” he bit out, still staring straight ahead. It was clear to even Cynnia that he was talking to me. I looked up and met his blue gaze in the rearview mirror. This wasn’t going to be pretty. I opened my mouth to argue that we still needed to see to Cynnia when he snapped, “Now!” There was no avoiding this confrontation.
“Shelly, take Cynnia inside. Get her something to eat and drink,” Danaus directed in a hard voice that left no room for argument, but that didn’t stop me from hissing at the back of his head. I didn’t want the naturi to feel as if she were suddenly a guest in my house when she was really a prisoner.
While Shelly escorted Cynnia inside to the comfort of my home, Danaus and I walked across the street to one of the many small parks that dotted the city. For the first time in more than month, I didn’t glance over my shoulder, looking for a naturi ready to put a knife in my back. For a brief time they were gone and my city was safe again. I just had to deal with Danaus’s anger over what I had convinced him to do.
“You lied to me!” he snarled. “You were so desperate to convince me that nightwalkers aren’t evil, and you lied to me. You destroyed their souls.”
“Don’t put this all on me. You knew what was happening. You could have stopped at any time, but you didn’t because we were desperate,” I argued, taking a couple steps away from the hunter. We were both still armed. I didn’t want to be the one to throw the first punch, but I would be ready if it came to that.
“You said we wouldn’t destroy their souls. The goal was to kill them!” he ranted, pacing away from me and back again.
“I didn’t want to. I tried. Couldn’t you tell? You were in my brain. You’ve got the power to control me. Can’t you tell that I tried?” A sickening feeling grew in the pit of my stomach as I replayed in my head that brief moment of panicked indecision. I had been left with an ugly choice of destroying the naturi souls or the chance that Danaus would destroy me if I fought him. Or worse still, he could have withdrawn his powers before killing our opponents, leaving us both weak and vulnerable.
But Danaus was right in his outrage. The decision to destroy their souls was growing too easy. There had been too little hesitation on my part when my attempt to burn their hearts failed, and no hesitation to reach out into Savannah and kill all those within my domain.
“This has to stop!” he proclaimed.
“I know,” I said in a wavering voice. I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep shuddering breath. “But what if there’s more that we can do if we only learn to control this?”
“Control this?” Danaus stepped forward and grabbed both of my shoulders. “There’s no controlling this, Mira! It’s a curse from Hell. I’m trying to save my soul, not damn myself further.”
“You’re not going to Hell because of what you are,” I snapped, knocking his hands off me and walking away from him.
“Prove it.”
I couldn’t, but that didn’t matter. I believed you didn’t get marked for Hell when you were born. You were marked for the choices you made, and we had made some really bad decisions so far.
“We had no choice,” I said in a low steady voice, desperate to convince myself as much as I was trying to convince him. “If we hadn’t done what we did, we would be dead right now. No one would be able to stop Rowe at Machu Picchu in a few nights, and the naturi would be walking free once again.”
“We shouldn’t have gone there in the first place!” he shouted, pointing back toward the south and the marshlands. “We knew it was a trap and we nearly got ourselves killed in the process. To make matters worse, we’re paving our way to our own private section of Hell with convenient phrases like we had no choice.’”
“Don’t talk to me about choices,” I snarled, standing on the tips of my toes so I could clearly look him in the eye. “You didn’t have to go. You’re not the one that made a promise to Amanda to protect her. I did, and I was not about to abandon her to the naturi because it was inconvenient to our plans.”
“You left me with no choice. If I had let you go without me, you would have gotten yourself killed and then we’d all be screwed!”
“I refuse to regret what we did tonight!” I screamed at him, the last of my composure cracking like an eggshell under his boot. “You don’t know what it’s like being held by them.
Night after night, the endless pain and torture. And then never knowing if anyone is going to come for you, wondering if anyone even knows how to find you. Until you’re no longer sure why you are even trying to survive.”
Bloody tears streaked down my face, but I couldn’t bring myself to wipe them away.
Rage and old feelings of complete helplessness boiled up inside of me, leaving me clenching my shaking fists at my sides. I hated myself for losing my composure in front of Danaus. I hated him for seeing me in this moment of weakness when I needed to always be strong in front of him, in front of all the others who looked to me for some kind of direction in this moving disaster.
To my surprise, Danaus wrapped his arms around me and pulled me against his chest, breaking down the last of the walls that surrounded the memories of my captivity with the naturi. In all the long years, I had never allowed myself to cry. Not when Jabari saved me on that distant mountain or during the long centuries that passed. But now I buried my face in his strong chest and let the tears slip unchecked from my clenched eyes. I opened my fists and held onto his sides when my legs no longer wanted to support me under the weight of the memories that danced through my mind. Too many nights spent under the knife with Nerian, too many blank spaces in my mind that either I couldn’t or didn’t want to remember—the horrible things that happened to me.
“I hate them,” I groaned past the fist-sized lump in my throat. “I hate them all so much. I hate them for what they did to me. I hate them for what they are doing to my people.”
Danaus said nothing as I stood trembling in his arms. He didn’t have to. He had held Nerian captive for roughly a week, and the naturi had been happy to regale him with stories of all that he’d done to me. The hunter knew how long I had been held and how I was tortured.
The hunter knew more of my horrible past than any other living creature on the planet, had even seen the scars carved into my back. With Danaus, there was no hiding for me.
After several minutes I finally stepped out of his warm embrace and walked a few feet away from him as I wiped the tears from my face. I could smell his scent on me now, the scent of sea and the sun. Clean and clear and peaceful. Some of the weight that I had been carrying for more than five hundred years finally lifted from my shoulders and the ball of anger in my chest had diminished somewhat.
“What are you going to do with her?” he softly asked when I finally had my wits about me again.
It was on the tip of my tongue to say that I was going to do to her what they did to me, but I couldn’t utter the words because I knew it wasn’t the truth. Torture was a dark path I had left behind me some years ago. Now, when I killed something, it was a quick and merciless action. There was no torture, certainly not like what I endured. I liked to think that I no longer had the stomach for it.
“I plan to see if she has any useful information to give us and then I’m going to kill her.
Nothing more,” I said, turning back around to face the hunter. However, I couldn’t quite meet his gaze. I simply shoved my hands into my pockets and stared at the sidewalk in front of me.
“I can’t imagine that she can honestly be used as a bargaining chip with the naturi.”
Danaus placed his hand under my chin, forcing me to raise my eyes to meet his piercing gaze. “What if she truly doesn’t know anything at all?”
“Then she’ll die a quick death.”
“And if she is what she says she is, a traitor to the naturi?”
“Then we might finally have something interesting on our hands,” I said, forcing a smile onto my lips. I slowly took a step backward, removing my chin from his light touch. “Watch her for a whi
le. I need to see to something.”
“Will you be back tonight?”
I glanced up to the night sky, catching glimpses of starlight as the dark clouds floated by.
We still had a few hours until sunrise. “I honestly don’t know.”
Danaus nodded and stepped aside so I could walk past him to the car. As I reached it, he handed me the keys, a worried look passing over his stony features. It felt as if something was hanging unsaid in the air. I didn’t know what it was that he wanted to say to me, but he never spoke a word as he climbed the front stairs and entered the town house.
Heaving a soft sigh, I got into my car and drove quickly to my home just outside the city limits, where I knew Tristan would be waiting for me. I had only to briefly touch his mind to realize that the night was not going well for the young nightwalker.
As I pulled into the garage, I opened my mind and followed the path back to him. He was standing in front of one of the windows on the second floor looking out on the front yard, his emotions a mass of pain, anger, and confusion. The naturi might have taken only Amanda, but they had hurt Tristan as well.
The only light in the room poured through the window, giving his pale skin a faint glow.
His arms were crossed over his chest and his shoulders were rigid as tension hummed through his entire body.
Frowning, I watched the young night she on walker in silence. I couldn’t leave him brooding over whatever dark thoughts plagued him. Since coming to my domain, I had yet to see him actually happy. Sarcastic, bitter, worried, and melancholy were the emotions he seemed to be limited to despite my efforts to make him feel welcome. Yet, it was understandable. He was still dealing with his new position in Savannah, as well as his past with our maker, Sadira. We all had ghosts that haunted us in some manner, and most were not that easy to eradicate.
“How is Amanda?” I asked, knowing she was somehow at the root of his dark mood.
“I have no idea. You would need to ask her or Knox.” He refused to look at me as he spoke.
“What happened?” I stepped farther into the room, to stand beside the large king-size bed that had never been slept in.
“The naturi happened,” he snarled at me. “I’ve gone from having Sadira ruin my life to having the naturi mucking up this too-long existence.”
“What did she say?” I pressed, inwardly dreading the response.
“She won’t come near me,” he said. Tristan whirled around to face me, his blue eyes glowing in the darkness. “She would allow only Knox to help her; only Knox could touch her.
“She’s been through a lot, Tristan. Knox is familiar to her,” I coaxed, trying to calm him down.
“No! It’s because I failed to protect her from the naturi and the shifters. When they attacked, I should have been able to handle the situation and stop the naturi. But I couldn’t. I failed her and she was taken.”
He picked up a delicate snow globe from the end table near him and hurled it across the room, aiming to smash it against the far wall. I took a quick step to my left and caught it awkwardly before dropping it safely to the bed.
“Sadira kept me weak,” he continued to rage, his hand shaking before him.
“You’re still young,” I countered.
“I’m weak for someone my age. Don’t deny it!” he said, pinning me with his angry gaze.
“I won’t deny it,” I replied with a shrug. “You are weak for a nightwalker of your years.
But that’s not your fault. That’s Sadira’s doing. She wanted to keep you weak because she got burned by me.”
Tristan shoved both his hands through his shoulder-length brown hair and turned back toward the window. “I’m useless,” he murmured. “She made me useless.”
“Stop it!” My voice cracked across his shoulders like a whip, causing him to flinch.
“That’s nonsense and you know it. You’re not useless. I don’t waste my time with useless creatures.”
“Why?” he said with a shake of his head as he turned back toward me. “Why did you save me from Sadira? I’ve never understood it.”
“Because I saw in you the potential to be something great and I wanted that person on my side,” I admitted, with a cocky smile lifting one corner of my mouth. I thought he had great potential if he could finally escape Sadira’s long reach. But we were all damaged in our own unique ways. Tristan had to find a way to use that damage to his advantage.
“What about Amanda?” he asked. The glow had faded from his eyes, and his shoulders slumped under the weight of his concerns. The rage was gone for now.
“Give her time. The naturi are still haunting her thoughts,” I said, sitting down on the edge of the bed.
“And if she can’t forgive me?”
A heavy sigh slipped past my lips as I looked down at my empty hands. It was a possibility. “If she understands you that little, then she doesn’t deserve to have you in the first place, and you’re both better off.”
“I hope you’re wrong.”
“So do I, because if I’m not, it means I sorely misjudged her.”
Tristan gazed back out the window, the fingers of his right hand pressed to the glass. The only sound for several minutes was the gentle hum of the air conditioner pumping cold air through the house. Both of us settled into our own thoughts.
I could understand why Amanda was so important to him. It was more than finally meeting a creature that was interested in him and he was interested in as well. It was the ability to make that choice to pursue or walk away. It was the excitement of slowly developing an emotional bond with someone over time. Sadira had directed all of his interactions—told him who to kiss, touch, and sleep with. In the end even our relationship had been forced upon him. Amanda represented his first choice as an individual in more than a century. I could understand why he didn’t want to lose his chance at that.
“Did you kill it?” he suddenly asked, crashing into my thoughts. It took me several seconds to realize he was talking about the naturi we had found captive with Amanda.
“No, not yet,” I said, shaking my head. Laying my left hand on the bed comforter, my fingers aimlessly traced over the pattern.
Tristan turned away from the window, his brow furrowed in confusion. “You’re kidding, right? How could you have not killed it?”
“She’s a potential source of information. She may be able to tell us something about the naturi’s plans.”
Taking a few steps closer to me, he leaned forward, bracing his hands against the back of a chair that stood between us. “You expect her to tell you the truth?”
“Not really.” I admitted with a slight shrug.
“Then why take her? Why risk the naturi coming after her?” I smiled at him, finally bringing a snort of laughter from the young nightwalker. “Bait.”
“The naturi aren’t the only ones who know how to set a trap,” I said. “Danaus and I cleared the area of naturi tonight. We’ve got a small window of time to use her as bait to draw out Rowe or simply kill her.”
“You expected him already, didn’t you?”
My smile faded into a frown as my eyes returned to the blue and gray comforter. I had expected the one-eyed naturi more than a month ago. I expected him to be hounding my every step. Instead he sent a small army to harry my every waking moment, destroy the local werewolf pack, and winnow down the number of nightwalkers within my domain. Rather than attacking me personally, he was trying to turn my allies against me. Soon I would have no safe haven within this world, and I believe that was his ultimate goal.
“Rowe’s not coming here. Not without a little added incentive like my new captive,” I replied.
“That’s assuming he wants her back.”
“True,” I sighed as I pushed to my feet again. “Did Amanda say anything about the naturi?”
“No, not really. She asked if you were going to kill it. I told her yes. Are you going to prove me wrong?”
“I wasn’t planning on it. How did Amanda react to the
news of the naturi’s imminent demise?”
“She didn’t. Just stared straight ahead. She might have nodded. What are you thinking?”
“The water naturi at the island wasn’t the leader,” I slowly said, mostly thinking out loud. “She might have ordered the attack while we were in the water, but she wasn’t shouting orders once we got to the shore. No one was.”
“What are you thinking?”
“What if we have their leader?”
“The naturi? The one held with Amanda? Their leader? Are you thinking they turned on her?” Tristan said, straightening from his leaning position.
“No, I’m thinking she’s a spy. I need to check on Danaus and Shelly. If you talk to Amanda before I return, ask her if she knows anything about the naturi that was being held with her,” I said, heading toward the door.
“What do you want to know?” Tristan asked, following me out of the room.
“How was she treated? Who was giving the orders on the island?”
“If I see her, I’ll ask,” he called as I rushed down the stairs.
Around me, I could feel the night decaying, showing its age, and I was growing tired.
After the fight on the island, I needed to feed, but there wasn’t time. I pushed down my rising hunger and tried to ignore the fatigue gnawing at my limbs. I had to get back to Danaus and Shelly.
Thirteen
As I reached the ground floor and turned toward the back door and the garage, I sensed someone walking up the front stairs to the house. I paused in the rarely used kitchen and cocked my head to the side as my senses probed farther from my body. It was Amanda.
Jogging through the house, I jerked open the front door as she raised her hand to knock.
Tristan had sensed her as well because he was now standing at the bottom of the curved staircase, his emotions a ball of tensed anxiety.
The young nightwalker stood alone on my front porch in a clean change of clothes, but she had yet to bathe. Her blond hair was still dirty and matted from her ordeal, while dirt smudged both of her cheeks as well as her bare arms. There was no expression on her pale face, as she seemed to stare blankly through me.
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