“It’s not about that. I’ve stayed out of the fight too long. There are demons to slay. I’ve let Wys and Tell handle it alone too often without any help.”
No matter what he said, she knew the ember of anger over Wystan’s marrying Rhia still smoldered in his heart. She didn’t need Tell’s special knowledge to sense it. Eban’s behavior was straying toward destruction. He didn’t care if he lived or died, because he knew his chances of leaving Berner were small.
“You’ve changed, Eban. Your demon side is trying to come out—can’t you feel it? You’re not sharpening your saber to help anyone. I’m right about what that marking means, aren’t I?”
His eyes flared red. “It isn’t your concern.”
Hurt, she shrank away from him. “I’m your friend.”
He slipped off the bed, then picked up his saber, sliding it into the sheath. “Not my wife. I’ll come and go as I please, taking out demons or leaving them where I see fit. I didn’t ask you to come here. You stayed because you have nowhere else to go.”
Shock, anger and sorrow warred inside her head. “Go to hell.”
So angry that tears wouldn’t come, she scrambled off the bed and ran. He could have caught her, if he’d cared, or if he’d wanted to take his words back, but she left the clinic alone. The sun was beginning to set, beaming on buildings that cast long shadows in the streets. With a sob stuck in her throat, she struggled for breath.
How dare he? Right after he’d declared her healthy, she’d talked about leaving the clinic. Eban had assured her that she wasn’t a bother and he liked the company. They shared meals together, companionable silences, talked about the world and the places they wanted to visit someday. He’d never suggested she was a hindrance.
It hadn’t been her idea to stay there. If he wanted her gone, he could have found a gentler way to suggest it. She wouldn’t have refused.
She hadn’t run in a long while and felt winded before she’d gone more than a few blocks. Abandoned buildings stood all over Berner and she let herself into an old barber shop with a faded blue-and-red-striped pole out front. Eban had told her it was to signal barbers were capable of doing some doctoring, but he was no good at cutting hair, and the building wasn’t big enough to suit his needs.
Beryl dropped into one of the chairs. Tears came, blurring her vision, hot as they rolled down her cheeks. She knew Rhia and Wystan would welcome her, but the embarrassment was too great. If she went over there crying, Wystan might confront Eban. She couldn’t bear the thought.
A dusty mirror mounted on the wall across from her showed her reflection, splotchy from crying and running, eyes puffy and red, shoulders slumped, hair a mess. Not a very appealing picture. Drawing her knees up, she folded her arms on top of them. Maybe she’d stay in this building until she died. The Mad Woman of the Barber Shop. Wouldn’t that make a lovely story for the parents to tell their children? A woman in love with a man who could never love her in return, driven insane by the knowledge. She could take up carrying a razor and haunting shadows to make the tale scarier.
She rested her cheek on her hands. “It’s time to go. There’s nothing here.”
Santa Fe might hold some prospects, although she had no references, no money to live on once she arrived and she didn’t know a soul.
Over her own heavy breathing, she heard laughter. When she held her breath, she listened for it again. It was there, faint, and all around her. Beryl sat up straight, looking out the plate glass window for demons strolling past.
There were none.
“Hello?” she whispered.
“Beryl.”
Unmistakably her name, though it was no louder than a thought. “Who’s there? Eliakim?”
“Not quite, my dear.”
“Who then? I’m not in the mood for games.” There weren’t any footprints besides hers in the dust coating the floor, no signs suggesting someone else had been in the building recently.
“You’ve been asking for me long enough. They call me Rosemar, though my real name is not suitable for human tongues. I know what transpired between you and Eban. I know the pain you must be feeling.”
Beryl blinked. Rosemar. Communicating in whispers, or in the same manner as Eliakim. And she knew about Eban. A fresh wave of misery rolled over her.
“You’re a demon.”
“Correct. I can help you. Together we’ll make him fall in love with you. His eyes will never stray toward another woman. All you need to do is ask.”
Beryl’s muscles tensed. “How?”
Rosemar laughed again. “This is my task. I make men and women fall in and out of love all the time. My first master gave me special privilege. I saw to the population of Earth when it was young, I saw to the tragic death of lovers, to women straying from their husbands’ beds. I’ve created and broken some of the most powerful couples in the world. Antony and Cleopatra. Paris and Helen of Troy. Cupid and Persephone. Albert and Victoria. Poor Mr. Lincoln and Mary Todd.”
“Why would you let me and Eban remain happy?” It frightened her a little that she was considering Rosemar’s help. Especially when she couldn’t see the demon.
“I like you, Beryl. I’ve watched you and I know you’re good at heart. The type of woman Ebanezeer needs. More importantly, he’s part of the key to locking the Pit forever and Seere needs him. But there’s no reason you and he can’t be happy forever.”
Beryl clutched the chair arms. “I’m not sure talking to you is a good idea. The others talk about you. I mean, they’ve mentioned you but won’t explain who you are, which makes me think I shouldn’t be listening.”
“Aren’t you wise?” Rosemar sounded impressed. “You value your friends’ opinions. The trouble with that is, none of them want to see you with Eban. They say they don’t want him to go, but as long as the Pit is closed for good, they couldn’t care less what he does. We both know your past isn’t wholesome and that your future looks bleak without a respectable husband. The Heckmasters might dally with girls who have backgrounds like yours, but they’re from an old, proud demon family. Not one of them would be caught marrying a lady of the night. Bad enough their father Seneca married a human. To marry a whore? Unthinkable among powerful demons.”
Beryl shrank back in the chair.
“It doesn’t have to be that way. We can change that. You belong with Eban. You weren’t always gutter trash, were you?”
She stared at her reflection in the dusty, tarnished mirror. “I did this to myself.”
“Yes.”
“I defied my father by refusing to marry the man he picked out for me. I ran away and I let men touch me for money. Men who were worse than the one Father wanted me to marry, but I wasn’t anyone’s property.” Except she’d been everyone’s property when she let man after man come to her. Her stomach clenched as she remembered the night Ernie saved her from a drunkard in Kansas. He’d been kind at first, winning her trust with a smile and buying her a meal. He was starting a brothel in Dakota Territory and if she played her cards right, he promised she’d be madam of her own place in a year or two.
Beryl had believed him and then he’d dumped her in an alley like refuse.
“But you came from good stock, even if your rebellious nature ripped you from them. With a respectable husband—a doctor—you could stroll back into your parents’ house any day of your choosing.”
“They’d know. They would take one look at me and know what I’d been doing all these years.”
“Not with my help.”
As she looked at herself, the image in the mirror changed. Her hair twisted into curls and a silk dress replaced the one Rhia had bought her. Her complexion turned rosy and her face filled out a little more. Her lips smiled, even though she knew she wasn’t. She looked happy, fulfilled, excited.
“What did you do?” she whispered. The image in the mirror spoke too, like a puppet, mo
uthing words it couldn’t understand.
“This is an illusion, but I can make it reality.”
Eban appeared behind her, resting his hand on her shoulder and smiling broadly. His suit was as fine as the one Wystan had worn home from Santa Fe. She felt Eban’s hand, warm and light against the silk on her shoulder. Beryl turned her head, expecting to see him there, but the shop was empty.
“You can think about it if you like, but you mustn’t tell anyone. One word of this passes through your lips and the deal is void.”
Rosemar sounded harsh.
“O-okay. Let me think about it.” She already knew she had to say no. As much comfort as it would be to have Eban fall instantly in love with her, to have the life she’d left behind when she was only a little older than Sylvie sounded too good to be true.
“Till we meet again, Beryl.”
Chapter Eleven
Eliakim stared at Eban, piercing silver eyes ablaze. “Rosemar is plotting against you.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
Heat rolled out of the Pit, giving off a noxious sulfuric smell that made Eban’s eyes water. There was no place he hated more than the wide gaping hole in the desert that led to Hell. Astaroth had opened it long before Eban was born and his father became the territorial chief of New Mexico. Why in God’s name some fool human decided to build a town a few miles from it was beyond him.
Back then it hadn’t been much more than a rift in the craggy desert rocks. It hadn’t opened to this state until Astaroth found out Seneca Heckmaster was betraying him. The battle that ensued reshaped this part of the desert, leaving it bare except for scrub brush, cedars and thorny bushes. Mass piles of demon bones were buried in the broken mountains, evidence of the legions Astaroth had sent to destroy Eban’s father.
Although they were far from nobility, Seneca had been a strong demon in his own right. It wasn’t until Astaroth himself emerged that things started going downhill for the Heckmaster family.
“You are lost in thought and open for attack,” Eliakim pointed out. “What are you looking for out here?”
A fight, but he didn’t want to say that. “Nothing in particular. You know, I don’t feel like you’ve ever passed on that angelic wisdom I asked for when I called you down here.”
“What do you wish to know?” Eliakim walked the edge of the Pit, peering down at the barrier. “I carry the memories of thousands of lifetimes. There are many things I can teach you.”
“Why does God let innocent women get possessed?”
Eliakim looked up sharply. “You must believe in destiny.”
“That’s not an answer.” Eban removed his saber from its sheath, then twirled it through the air, loosening his shoulders and back as he moved. “I can’t protect her forever.”
“I don’t believe anyone would ask that of you. You’re not strong enough or considerate enough to care for a woman of Beryl Brookshier’s importance.” Eliakim bent and picked up a rock. He studied it before he threw it out over the Pit. It fell through the barrier without a sound.
Eban’s arm went limp and he almost lost his grip on the saber. “I beg your pardon?”
“She’s strong enough to carry a demon without breaking. Most human women would have succumbed to death’s embrace long ago. She doesn’t need protection, not yours.”
Eban bristled. “Just as well she ran off then. Someone else can watch after her.”
Eliakim’s blank face turned disbelieving. “You’ve made an error.”
“She left. I didn’t make her.” Except he had, by acting like a bastard. He’d been angry when she accused him of being so weak, his demon side was surfacing. “No one asked you to come with me either.”
“You’re lost.” Something like compassion creased Eliakim’s face.
Eban looked away, ignoring the truth behind those two words.
“I know right where I am—the mouth of Hell, waiting for a demon or two to show their ugly faces.” He kicked a rock, watched as it bounced until it settled close to the Pit’s edge, but didn’t fall. Sometimes Wystan brought the decapitated bodies of the demons he and Tell slew and threw them into the Pit to remind Astaroth they were still alive and fighting.
“You’re waiting for one.” Eliakim nodded at the Pit. “You plan to slay it.”
“Yes.” The sigil on his chest would appeal to them. Barghests and changesteeds would sense the marking. Once they caught sight of him, they wouldn’t be able to resist the lure of easy prey.
“This is a fruitless task.”
“I didn’t ask you to come,” he repeated.
When he led his horse out of the stables, the angel had been waiting in the street. Eliakim hadn’t asked to join him, just followed along, keeping up with the horse’s pace without difficulty.
The green filmy barrier over the pit rose like a soap bubble about to burst. Eban lifted his saber, muscles tense as he watched the Pit’s edge.
“You’re going to die.”
“Everyone does.”
He was afraid and felt sure Eliakim knew, but the saber didn’t tremble. Steam rose from the Pit, obscuring his vision. The sulfuric stench heightened and a strange cackle filled his ears.
“Changesteed.” He bent his knees slightly, waiting for the creature’s appearance.
“You don’t need the weapon, Ebaneezer. I won’t hurt you.” Gloria Heckmaster’s voice rose out of the fog. “I’ve missed you.”
Unexpected tears burned his eyes. He hadn’t heard her voice since he was a child. The saber slipped in his grip. Her voice sounded like water rippling over stones, cool and soothing.
“It is a trap.” Eliakim moved forward, pulling his broadsword out so quickly the steel rang. “I will dispatch it.”
“Get away. I’ll handle it.” He shouldered past the angel.
The steam parted and hooves clattered on the rocks. The changesteed had a mouthful of sharp teeth. Its dark, gray-striped hide looked greenish in the light from the Pit.
“My, how you’ve grown up, my son. I’ve missed you.”
The creature’s mouth moved, its voice a perfect imitation of his mother. Eerie, and designed to throw him off his guard. He didn’t wait for it to approach. Weeks of anger propelled him forward, his saber lowered. The changesteed lunged, opening its mouth, prepared to rip the blade away and devour another soul.
He kept the blade razor sharp, though he seldom drew it. Wind whistled around it before it bit into demon flesh. The changesteed howled, rearing on its hind legs, lashing out with sharp hooves. Eban stepped back. It roared past him and he slashed its shoulder with the blade. A low growl left its throat as it spun to face him again. Slobber flew from its jowls in long strings as it rushed at him. Its snake-like pupils constricted and muscles bunched as it galloped. Brownish blood oozed from the wounds. Something inside him pulsed with the pleasure of causing it misery.
He let it get near him, making little cuts on its chest and neck, causing the changesteed to back away and squeal with each slash. It whirled and kicked at him, but he slapped it across the rump with the flat of his saber. Toying with it, letting it grow fearful eased some of his anger. The changesteed galloped around him and charged again. It bared jagged teeth, snapping at his right arm, dodging another blow from the saber. On its next circle, he drove the saber into its chest. It fell, shrieking and spewing brown fluid from the wounds.
With one swift motion, Eban severed its head from its neck.
“Impressive.” Eliakim didn’t put his sword away, but sauntered over to examine the beast’s remains. He laid a hand on its neck, sifting his fingers through the long, stiff hairs.
Eban kicked the head closer to the body. “What are you doing?”
A pale blue shimmer ran over the changesteed. Its frame jerked, legs stiffening. Eban pointed the saber at it. The cloven hooves grew together to form a single pie
ce. The head twitched, rejoining the body. The neck shortened, the snout elongated, the fur changed to dapple gray. Eban blinked. It wasn’t a changesteed anymore, but a magnificent horse. It climbed to its feet and shook itself.
“How did you do that?” Eban asked.
“There is majesty in every beast. One only has to ask to see it.”
Eliakim ran his hand over the horse’s nose, smiling for the first time since Eban had known him. A snarl sounded behind them and the horse reared, snorting with fear. Before Eban turned, Eliakim had pierced the second changesteed on his broadsword. It didn’t make a sound as it slouched on the silver blade. Eliakim pulled it free, muttering in his deep voice.
“More are coming. You should smudge the sigil.”
“They already know I’m here. It wouldn’t do any good.”
Energy surged through his veins. The horse Eliakim had created danced nervously. The angel whispered in its ear and it galloped away as he pulled his sword free of the changesteed.
Eban swept his hair off his forehead. “What are you going do with a horse?”
“One may need a fine steed to ride into battle when the day comes.” Eliakim stared at the Pit. “Something bigger is coming. Something that will not allow you to toy with it for long.”
“Good.” He tightened his grip on the saber.
Eliakim eyed him. “Demons spat from Hell are never ‘good’, my friend.”
“We’ll see.”
The bubble over the hole expanded again. Fumes burned Eban’s nose and stung his eyes. With the seals weakened, there wasn’t any way to know what might come out. The sigil on his chest was meant to draw any demon fearless enough to risk burning up in the barrier.
Something dark with wide leathery wings exploded from the Pit with an ear-shattering scream. Divine fire burned holes into its flesh. It flew around them in a circle, scratching at the air with long claws. A whip-like tail sliced through the air as it landed in front of Eban and Eliakim. Its scaly brown hide shone in the light. It took a swipe at Eban, hissing as it passed Eliakim in a blur.
Eban Page 11
