Ashes of the Firebird (The Firebird Fairytales Book 2)

by Kuivalainen, Amy

  “My issue is that going out with Mychal anywhere is going to get you or him killed. They are demons! He might be able to fight them, you can’t. Before I met him I wouldn’t have believed anyone could fight them.”

  “It’s not like I’m going to become his hunting partner or anything. Christ, Katya, if you would have seen what we did last night, you wouldn’t be feeling so great so I’m going to ask you to back the fuck off,” Aleksandra hissed.

  “You have been told,” Izrayl came in on the tail end. Katya glared at him. “Don’t worry, Aleki, she is just jealous she wasn’t invited.”

  “I am not!”

  “Yes you are. Here, drink your coffee and shut up for a minute.” Izrayl gave her a cup and she sat down in a huff. He handed a cup to Aleksandra and she smiled weakly at him.

  “She can’t figure out what is going on and it’s frustrating for the little firecracker. I must admit I’m curious too. Mychal doesn’t strike me as the sleep over type. Or sociable. Sociopath maybe. “

  “I know how it must have looked this morning, but I assure you it was innocent. We got in late last night and both dozed off while talking. It happens. He has been trying to find a way to get rid of the demon marks and finding things to help deflect them away from me. He didn’t have to do any of that. He didn’t even have to talk to me again so please be polite and don’t push him away,” Aleksandra said directly to Katya. “I’m trying to convince him to come to America with us. Admit it, we can use all the help we can get and he is amazing. He could help us a lot. “

  “He could. Katya is jealous of his skills and that he won’t talk to her,” teased Izrayl.

  “I’m going to punch you in the face in a minute,” threatened Katya.

  “Maybe the reason he won’t talk to you is the fact that he is shy. He barely talks to me. He is damaged and it will take time for him to get used to us all. We are all big personalities to deal with. I beg you, Katya, don’t get confrontational with him.”

  “Would I do that?”

  “Yes,” Aleksandra and Izrayl said in unison.

  “Fine. Whatever. I know he is good but I don’t know why you want to bring him along.”

  “Because I’m frightened! When I’m with him, I feel safe. Maybe that’s selfish of me but it’s true.”

  “I can protect-”

  “No you can’t. No one can but him. I can’t leave him in Budapest. The demons that attacked the church were after him. The whole city is. Not only are demons after him, but Ragana and possibly Vasilli. You saw him at the church yourself this morning. If the police find records of Mychal being there, they will suspect him for murder as well. I’m not leaving him behind. Not that it’s up to you anyway.”

  “Don’t get defensive, Aleki. You both have been so mysterious about the whole thing,” said Katya, “I wish you would have come to me or Isabelle that’s all.”

  “It’s okay, Katya, behave yourself around him. He is ready to bolt at any minute. I’m going to go and try to get some more sleep. Last night was…was bad.”

  “I’m sorry,” Katya squirmed, “For being a bitch.”

  “Jealous bitch,” Izrayl coughed.

  “A jealous bitch,” Katya corrected.

  “Don’t be jealous of missing a massacre. It’s not something you would want to see.” Aleksandra cringed inwardly, knowing it would be a long time before she slept soundly again.

  ***

  Anya was dreaming again. Instead of waking in the forest, she woke outside the gate to Yanka’s house. Yanka wasn’t surprised to see her. She had been pacing the kitchen when Anya had arrived out of nowhere.

  “Great granddaughter, I see you’re making your visits more regular,” she said as she stopped pacing. “You’re looking pale.”

  “I have had some problems staying sober. Aramis sends his greetings again,” Anya changed the subject, “I think he is a little apprehensive about seeing you. He has thought you dead for a long time.”

  “He should be apprehensive. He should’ve known I wasn’t dead.”

  “Don’t be hard on him. Rescuing you has been the only thing he has focused on for months. I wonder if you could wake yourself up.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They have put you in a coma, like a deep sleep, with drugs. When I was kidnapped in Paris my magic burned the drugs out of my system, maybe you could try doing the same.”

  “Did Aramis put you up to this?” Yanka folded her arms.

  “No,” Anya lied. “Try it. You never know; it could work.”

  “I will later, when you are gone,” Yanka said dismissively. Anya liked Yanka but sometimes she really drove her crazy. She noticed the fresh cuts on her arms and knew it was better not to mention it.

  ***

  Fox’s computer started screaming. She had become frustrated searching through the loopholes in the security systems at Legba’s Ladies and had fallen asleep on the old velvet sofa. She woke up with a start and got back into her computer chair.

  She had organised her own special kind of surveillance on the facility holding Yanka. There was a huge commotion happening. Fox watched little glowing figures coming in from the perimeter, rushing into the building.

  “Oh, my God, what the hell is going on?”

  ***

  Look inside the concrete building and see the place in panic. Alarms are screaming and armed guards are crashing through the swinging doors. Nurses and doctors are yelling at each other.

  “What is happening?” The chief of security grabs a figure in scrubs and shakes them.

  “We don’t know! Everything was normal then the monitors started going crazy. She is waking up and it’s impossible!”

  “Then give her more drugs.”

  “We are already giving her highly concentrated doses.”

  “Then double it! We can’t run the risk of this bitch waking up, understand? She will fucking kill the lot of us, so do it.” The security guards stand by and watch as the doctors fill her with drugs, breathing a sigh of relief as the monitors go back to normal.

  ***

  “I don’t know what happened,” Fox told Isabelle. “It was like all the alarms went off and armed men rushed in. Something is going down, something big.”

  “I will have to ask Anya. She might know something. Keep me posted if you learn anything.”

  “Of course.” Fox hung up without saying goodbye. Not a minute too soon because Hamish crashed through her bedroom door.

  “What’s this about you pashing Silvian?” he shouted.

  “I didn’t pash him you idiot! I asked him to look into the attack on Harley and he asked for a kiss in payment.”

  “Jesus! He is a fucking incubus; he could’ve sucked you dry.” He was furious and Isabelle couldn’t blame him. If she caught him kissing anyone, she would rip them both apart.

  “I wanted to see if I had a soul,” she snapped angrily. That shut him up. Hamish looked at her confused for a moment then groaned.

  “Of course you have a soul! What made you think you didn’t?”

  “I don’t know; something to do with having demon stigmata!”

  “That’s not really the point is it? You kissed another man,” he said sulkily.

  “I don’t think giving Silvian a peck on the lips can really be counted as cheating.”

  “If you’re sleeping with me then yeah it kind of is.” Isabelle felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. She was going to kill Silvian for not keeping his mouth shut.

  “I’m sorry,” she said quietly, “I needed to know for my own personal reasons. I didn’t do it to hurt you or because I was interested in him.” Hamish studied her carefully as if he was trying to sniff out the lie. Isabelle tried to hold his gaze and couldn’t. She had never been able to. He was the one of the only people that could make her feel truly terrible about something.

  Hamish knelt down before her and lifted her chin up, “I don’t like that you felt you had to lie to me about it.”

  “I did
n’t lie. I just didn’t tell you.”

  “That still counts as lying to me.”

  “I didn’t tell you because I knew you would jump to the wrong conclusion, which you did anyway.”

  “I have a right to. You are my girl and I don’t share.” Isabelle leaned forward and kissed his lips softly.

  “I’m still yours, except now I feel like I have actually something to offer.”

  “You really are a nutcase, Belle,” Hamish sighed as he rested his cheek against hers.

  “I know. Why do you put up with me?” That really was something she had always wondered about.

  “You’re an awesome shag that’s why,” Hamish said playfully.

  “Ass.”

  “Give me a kiss.” Her lips found his hard and fast. She loved his lips and all the interesting things that they could do.

  “I hope you didn’t kiss Silvian like that,” he said when they pulled apart.

  “Silvian got a press of the lips only. The kiss I gave you is yours alone.”

  “Good! Let’s keep it that way.”

  “There was a disturbance with Yanka’s facility.” Isabelle said as she barged into Anya’s room where Yvan had been attempting to teach her how to play chess. She was laughing and arguing with him in Russian.

  “What?” she asked, switching back to English.

  “Fox has the place under satellite surveillance and it was in an uproar. She hacked into the head of security’s email account and found a report about the incident. Yanka was waking up and they panicked. They have her on enough drugs to kill her.”

  “It’s my fault. I told her that my magic burnt through the drugs in my system when I was kidnapped. I told her to try. I can’t believe she almost did it.”

  “If she wakes up and we are not there she might very well kill them all,” Yvan said. “She will be disorientated, confused and very angry.”

  “I think you need to go to Aramis and convince him that we need to go to America now,” Isabelle suggested. “If Yanka tries it again the guards will be doubled or tripled and it will be too hard for us to try to get in there.”

  “That’s true. Vasilli is in the city and it’s making me nervous. I need to get out of Budapest before he figures out where we are. I will find Aramis and try to talk him into leaving in the next few days.”

  “You know that you’re the only one he listens to,” Isabelle pointed out.

  “Oh, Belle, please don’t start,” Anya groaned. Yvan gave a snort that could’ve meant anything. Both of them had mentioned at different times that they didn’t like the way Aramis looked at her.

  “I’m not starting anything and I don’t really see him as suspicious anymore but we all know that you are his favourite.”

  “Only because of Yanka.”

  “I’m going to have to disagree with you there. I’m sure she is part of it. I think the way your magic acts towards him it intrigues him. He turned Rogue to keep you safe. That is a big deal anyway you look at it.”

  “Whatever the reason it doesn’t matter. We are all stuck with each other now. I will go tell Aramis. It was his idea to tell her to try to wake up.”

  ***

  “Excuse me, madam,” a tall man dressed in a tweed suit walked into Vasya Melenko’s office. It overlooked the Thames River but she had no appreciation of it.

  “What do you want?” she asked as she looked up from the reports she had been reviewing.

  “That special project that you’re interested in. Well, there was a problem at the facility.”

  “What?” she hissed as she slammed down her pen. “What the hell happened?”

  “We aren’t sure exactly. The patient started to wake up. After sixty years of being in a coma, it makes no sense.”

  “What did they do?”

  “They administered more of the drug, madam. The patient seemed to fall back into the coma. The doctors are stumped how she even came to start to wake.”

  “Anyanka,” Vasya Melenko hissed, “Find her. Find her now! That bitch knows. She has been dream walking.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four- Connecting

  Aramis had told Izrayl that he was going out for a walk so now Anya was battling the cold breeze to try to find him in the gardens.

  Aramis was sitting cross-legged under a tree with his eyes closed and his hands palms down on the ground. The snow didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest even though he was only dressed in a dark pair of jeans and a light grey t-shirt. He wasn’t even wearing shoes which surprised her most of all. When they had gone into the forest, he had been as rugged up as she was.

  Anya was about to call out to him, hesitating as her magic bubbled up in excitement. She felt the touch of his magic flow over her.

  At first, nothing happened and then she felt a light, tingling rumble rise from the ground and move up towards him. The snow around him began to melt and green grass rose up in its place. The tree that he was sitting under began to tremble and its low hanging branches reached down to touch him, the leaves stroking his arms and hair. Summer flowers sprouted in graceful arcs filling the area with scent and colour.

  Anya found herself laughing in astonishment. Aramis opened his eyes and smiled warmly before beckoning her over. She rushed over unable to contain her joy.

  “This is amazing,” she said as she sat on the grass next to him. He took her hand casually and smiled at the delicate ribbons of power that drifted out of her to stroke him.

  “I was tired of seeing the snow,” he said as he picked a flower and passed it to her. “How are you feeling?”

  “Hurt, but Trajan is keeping his distance. I’m not sure that seeing him less makes me feel better or worse. I think we should go.”

  “Go where?” The smile hadn’t disappeared and there was a touch of amusement in his eyes. Anya was struck at how graceful his features were. She sometimes forgot how beautiful he was until she really stopped and looked.

  “To New Orleans where it is warm,” she said enthusiastically. “I did what you asked and told Yanka to try to wake up. She tried it and now they have had to pump her with more drugs. If we wait much longer they will double or triple the guard.”

  “We need to get her out of there before she manages to wake herself up,” Aramis said and looked nervous. “It was stupid of me to tell you to pass that on.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Yanka has always had a furious temper,” he said reluctantly. “If she wakes and we aren’t there she could kill everyone.”

  “That’s what Yvan said. Has she done that before?” Anya felt her arms get goose bumps. Aramis put an arm around her shoulder and she felt warmth pour through her.

  “I don’t think I should talk about it. It was a long time ago and it’s not really my story to tell.” He looked so sad that Anya dropped it.

  “Maybe you can tell me another time. Can we please leave Budapest?” She really needed a change of scenery. An ocean or two between her and Vasilli would be welcome. She must have looked really wretched because Aramis softened once more.

  “I don’t like the idea, but for you, I will do this.” Anya’s magic started to purr even more. It made Anya a little wary, especially after the conversation with Isabelle.

  “Why for me? Is it because I’m so much like Yanka?” She barely whispered it and she knew he had heard every word.

  “You look like her,” he lifted her chin a little, “but you’re not her. I do this because you never ask for anything from anyone.”

  “You all stay with me, which is more than enough. None of you has to. The least I can do is not complain.”

  “We do it because we love you, not because we have to,” he said softly and kissed her cheek. Anya’s power flared hot and began to weave and wrap around Aramis’s torso, bringing a surprised laugh from him. The ribbons changed from red to blue to purple and finally settled on a pearlescent white. Anya gasped as she felt Aramis’s own power slide along the ribbons and probe deep inside of her. It was filling her up w
ith light and energy making Aramis’s power feel as if it was stroking the very insides of her soul. It was seeking and filling the dark, hurting parts within her with warm, throbbing light. Tears began to trickle down the sides of her face from the sheer beauty of the moment.

  Aramis whispered something she didn’t understand and placed his cheek on the top of her head, his arms tightening around her. Anya’s heart was hammering and the pressure of their combined magic was building up inside of her. She cried out as she was knocked backwards onto the soft flowers. Aramis’s power retreated slowly and her own slipped lazily back inside of her.

  She looked dreamily at Aramis who was sprawled out on the grass beside her, his fingertips touching hers. He had a sleepy smile on his face. She had a warm glowing feeling oozing out of her.

  “What the hell is going on?” Yvan burst through the trees. “The firebird is going absolutely crazy.” Anya started to laugh and Aramis joined her. Yvan stared wide-eyed at the unnatural, blossoming beauty around them.

  “Are you two drunk?” He was looking at them both suspiciously.

  “No, I’m not. Are you drunk. Aramis?”

  “Not on alcohol.” Anya couldn’t seem to keep a straight face.

  “You two idiots! Vasilli would have felt that! Every magical being in Budapest would have!”

  “Oh no! Help me up, Prince Yvan! I seem to have misplaced your legs.” Anya waved her hands up at him. “I mean…my legs!” With an exasperated sigh, he bent down and scooped her up in his arms.

  “Do you need a hand as well, Aramis?”

  “No, I will be fine in a moment,” Aramis said in a faraway voice. “Tell everyone to start packing.” Yvan didn’t reply as he carried Anya back towards the mansion. She watched Aramis disappear through the trees and wondered what in God’s name had happened.

  ***

  Across the other side of the city, Vasilli felt the deep pulse of power roll over him like a tsunami wave. He staggered and managed to steady himself against the side of a wall in his apartment.

  It was a pure, white power that made the darkness in him shrink and cringe. The scars on his body began to ache. They had been created and almost destroyed by that power. Anyanka was somewhere in the city and he was going to find her. The search for Mychal, dealing with Ragana and even playing the obedient soldier to Ladislav could all be damned.