She lowered her head, pulled her hair over her face. Avoiding ghostly beings was never her specialty. But it would be nice for once to walk into an old building and not be overwhelmed by its past.
She forced her mind to shift focus, concentrated on the floor, counted the small, gray diamond shaped tiles set in between the larger black and white glossy marble ones. Anything to keep from showing that she was aware of the ethereal entities swirling around Wolfsden.
Bane’s castle must have witnessed some amazing encounters during its centuries of existence. What she’d give to have been one of its immortal residents, but eternity was not a gift the gods had granted her. Not that immortality had done her father any good. Being a wolf-shifter brought him enemies, enemies who had eventually put a silver bullet through his heart.
Pain stabbed at her chest.
Don’t go there, Leila.
“Are you all right?”
Vidar’s voice centered her thoughts. She raised her head and met him square in the eyes. Thank the gods he’d said something or she wouldn’t have realized he’d stopped walking and turned around. Imagine bumping into the man? It was bad enough he’d smacked up against her during the castle’s earlier little temper tantrum. Another round of body-slammed-against-body and she’d be in real trouble. And not just because she’d probably start feeding off the dark essence Vidar harbored, but a small part of her very mortal self was starting to doubt she could fend off her possible attraction to the guy. Why else was she finding him so annoying? God, but this was so not what she had planned for her life.
Maybe it was just lust. Yes, it had to be that, after all since she hadn’t had a date in at least a year now. And Vidar was attractive. Not necessarily eternal mate attractive, but probably at least holiday fling attractive.
Oh who was she kidding? The dude was drop-dead, take me for life and make me yours for all eternity, attractive.
She was so going to get Bane pissed at her. A Viking was not a Highland Scot. “Yeah. I’m fine. Why?”
He quirked an eyebrow. “If I didn’t know better, I’d swear you’d seen a ghost.”
“Is big bad wolf scared of ghosts?”
“Only one.” Vidar turned around and started back down the hallway.
She remained glued in her spot. What the heck did the man mean by that? What ghost lingered in Vidar’s life? The sin-eater in her wanted to know. But that wasn’t exactly a question she could ask of someone who didn’t like her much. The man hardly ever spoke to her, today’s conversation being the most words he’d ever graced her with. Maybe spending time with the guy was a good thing. If nothing else she was starting to think he was intriguing. He stimulated her mind’s insatiable curiosity and as long as she was feeding her thoughts, she wasn’t feeding her sin-eater. And that was a damn good thing. But she did want to know about that dark aura pulling from Vidar’s body.
“Don’t linger too long or Wolfsden might not like it.”
Then again, he was a bit bossy. “The castle can’t make me do or not do anything.”
The floor shook.
“You really should try listening to me. It might benefit you.”
As if she was ever going to take orders from Vidar. She scooted down the corridor. “So, what gives with the ghost?”
“I don’t talk about it.”
That was so not something you tell a woman who garnished her meals with a side dish of evil. “Is it in your house? I can evict it for you.”
“How?” He stepped into a small alcove that framed a blue door, and then he just stared at her.
For the first time in her life, she was tongue-tied. Her sin-eater soul wasn’t something she’d ever openly discussed with anyone before, but Vidar made it almost too easy. And spilling her guts could prove disastrous. Especially if in the middle of that conversation such an event actually happened. The darkness she’d been consuming and then carrying around all these years, couldn’t be trusted to stay put. Her Pandora’s-like box didn’t bear a lock. “You know, on second thought, you don’t have to share.”
Vidar didn’t comment.
“Is this the playroom?” Thank goodness the guy didn’t push the issue. She craned her neck and pretended to be interested in the vibrant blue door behind her Viking. Maybe he’d drop the subject, forget she even asked him about his stupid ghost. It was none of her business, anyway.
“Yes, this is the playroom.” He opened the door with a slight shove.
Once inside, he set her suitcase in the corner before walking over to the lime green and white striped chair against the far wall and unfolded it. “It’s not the best bed, but it will do.”
She remained in the doorway, partly because she liked looking at the Viking, and partly because she didn’t want the greedy little sin-eater hungering in her soul to get too close to the man. “I’ve rarely spent Christmas with my uncle. My dad preferred opening his house to stray wolves for the holidays, those who had no pack. He did great by many of them. But I have to admit, I did wish, especially as a kid, to have family over for Christmas. It was a sore spot with my dad and Bane. They never discussed the holidays and I never asked why. Still don’t know the reason for their distance on that single issue. They were very close about everything else. Do you come here for the holidays often?”
“No. This is my first year, but I’ve come for other visits. Bane is very good to me, makes me feel as if I’m one of the family.”
Her uncle’s hospitality didn’t come as a surprise, the man always welcomed guests at his New Orleans home. “That’s understandable. He’s very close to your sister and her husband.”
Vidar picked a speck of glitter off his jeans. “I can see why Bane likes Katya. She is easy to get along with and they have known each other for centuries.” His gaze drifted to the floor, where he bent and plucked a wood train from the carpet and then placed it in one of the room’s three overflowing toyboxes. “But Mortimer is of a different breed. He’s very difficult to be friends with, though I have learned to be civil to the man for my sister’s sake. Bane likes them both.”
Family situations weren’t always easy. The feud between the MacHendries and the O’Dooles—her mother’s family—was a classic example of dysfunctionality. Both clans blamed the other for something neither of them were responsible for. It never made sense to her, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it.
She glanced across the hall. “Now that’s an adorable mobile.” She titled her head, eyed the dancing fairies dangling from gold cords. “Too bad it’s missing a fairy.”
A huff escaped Vidar. “It would be better if it was missing all those damn fairies. I swear they are the reason I had nightmares last night.”
She turned back to face her hunky Viking, who was now standing next to her, his strong arms once again crossed over his broad chest. A slight gray shadow pulled from his shoulders. She ignored it. “That’s your room?”
Vidar frowned. “Not by choice. All the others were taken, so little Fiona had to give up her bed, though I don’t think she minded. As for the missing fairy, I was on my way to repair its wing when you showed up.”
Fiona. That was her cousin Ulrich’s daughter and her uncle Bane’s only granddaughter. “Do I even want to know how you broke the mobile?”
“Why do you assume I am responsible for the incident?”
She shrugged.
His lips didn’t budge from that damn frown. “The fairy got stuck in my hair when I stood up.”
The thought of Vidar standing next to the small bed, fairy in hair, made her laugh.
“It was not funny.”
Leila covered her mouth. Then dropped her hand. “I’m sorry. It’s just…well, a hunky Viking such as yourself doesn’t seem the sugar plum fairy type.”
“I’m glad you find the incident amusing. But believe me, it was not. As I said, the damn things gave me nightmares.”
“It couldn’t have been that bad. You survived.”
He rolled his eyes. “Barely. After
the first dream, I couldn’t go back to sleep because the children were up all night giggling like little imps. They spent most of their time in here.”
“You’re not much of a kid person, are you?”
“I like them very much. Just not when they misbehave.”
The man acted as if he’d never gotten into any mischief his entire life. “Let me guess, you were the perfect little boy.”
“Hardly. But I spent many years in my uncle Rorik’s camp. The man was a tyrant. If I stepped out of line, I was whipped or worse.” He paused, a severe look crossed his brow. “I learned to behave.”
She couldn’t imagine a punishment more severe than a whipping. Her childhood days were filled with laughter and learning, visiting museums, and taking trips around the world. Between the way her father and her uncle Bane both had doted on her, she had everything a girl could ever wish for, including unlimited dresses, shoes, dolls, even a whole collection of candy pink hair bows. Vidar deserved to have had a boy’s equivalent of her life.
“Will you be needing anything else?”
The gray gossamer mist that had seconds ago been pulling from Vidar’s shoulders, was now concentrated at his chest.
“No, thank you. But I don’t think you should leave just yet.”
A prickling sensation bit at her lips.
“Do you see that?” Reaching out, she placed her palm over Vidar’s heart.
He glanced down. “I see your hand.”
“No. I’m talking about that gray, ethereal aura emitting from your body. I believe it’s centered at your heart, though it appeared all around you when we were coming up the stairs and even pulled from your shoulders a few minutes ago.”
Vidar shook his head, but his gaze remained on her fingers. “I don’t see what you’re referring to.” He went for her arm, his large fingers wrapping gently around her small wrist.
Seeing him hold her in that manner sent a wave of comfort rolling over her soul. There was something to him exuding the sheer power of his size over her demurer statue. True, it was just his hand over her wrist, but being that he was this larger than life immortal Viking warrior, thoughts of being possessed by the man couldn’t be ignored.
Fear struck her nerves. She could not be falling for Vidar. At least not in this way, not in her thinking it would be nice and sexy to belong to him sort of way. Or in being his mate sort of way.
She cleared her head.
Going there was not a good thing.
“Your fingers are warm against my body,” Vidar said.
Thank God he spoke, broke the damn spell on her stupid mate wanting thoughts.
He stroked her inner wrist with the pad of his thumb. “The heat coming off you is incredible.”
She didn’t comment. Couldn’t. Not with the way his touch was setting off every nerve ending in her body.
Leila went full force in concentrating on the aura pulling from Vidar’s body. The dark vapor, the entity only she could see, floated toward her mouth.
She kept her lips firmly shut. If she dared speak now, that mist would be down her throat and snaking its way to her soul. And without knowing its cause, there was no telling what else would release with it. Dark auras had a knack for attracting and unleashing nearby cursed entities and if not managed correctly, they could jump from soul to soul, or from object to object and wreak all sorts of havoc. A well-trained sin-eater knew how to control the darkness they extracted. She didn’t.
The ethereal gray form reentered Vidar’s chest.
He gasped. “I felt that. What did you do?”
“Nothing…I think. But I’m not really sure because that has never happened before.”
“What has never happened?”
She pulled her hand away from his chest, away from the grip he had on her wrist, and then wiggled her fingers, a tingling sensation raced up and down her arm. “The darkness in your heart wants out, but for some reason it has gone back inside, and I don’t know why. Darkness rarely returns to its source. At least none that I’ve ever extracted, though sometimes I’ve wished some of it had.”
“What do you mean you can remove darkness from a source? You’ve done this many times?”
“For years. Yes. It’s just something I can do. Like you being wolf.”
A slight, almost snarky laugh fell from Vidar’s mouth. “That is nothing like my wolf. How can you access the hex that has cursed me for centuries?”
She hesitated. It wasn’t easy talking about her preternatural ability, her natural-born vulnerability. But Vidar deserved to know. Especially since she had just disturbed whatever was harboring in his heart. “I’m not wolf. I take after my mother’s family who are mortals. They’re sin-eaters.”
Vidar inched back. “What is a sin-eater?”
She took a deep breath. “A preternatural who can extract darkness from a soul or from any inanimate object that houses such energy.”
His face went blank.
Her heart sank. Why did guys always have to give her that look when she told them she snacked on negativity? “Don’t worry. I won’t touch you again. Besides, it’s not as bad as being a feral animal like a wolf shifter. Most of your kind aren’t even housebroken.”
“I didn’t mean to insult you. It’s just…my wolf resides in my heart. Or at least its soul does. I was staked by my uncle Rorik more than a thousand years ago. In the process, he forced my wolf into my heart, then froze the organ. It can’t be thawed. My wolf is not capable of being healed. It’s pretty much dead.”
She disagreed. Once darkness was removed from an object, even from a cold heart, that object could be revived. She’d seen it happen many times. “I’m not so sure about that. Sin-eaters of my kind can extract the essence of curses from just about anything. Thawing your heart should be easy once the curse is lifted.”
An icy look crossed Vidar’s face. “I think you should get some rest. I have business to tend to, phone calls to make. If you require anything I’ll be downstairs in the storage room where Bane keeps the castle’s archives. It’s the room with the metal door that wouldn’t open earlier. If you haven’t had dinner, you’re free to join me when I eat. I’m making turkey tonight. Let me know if you’d like some.”
He was out of the room before she could answer.
Chapter Four
How could he allow Leila to mess with his heart? If she had managed to fully thaw that cursed block of frozen muscle, the thousand-year-old darkness he’d been harboring would have unleashed itself. And once that beast got loose, it would have had no choice but to kill the soul responsible for releasing it.
Keeping distance between him and Leila was the only way to insure the woman’s safety. He couldn’t let her die. Finding peace at someone else’s expense wasn’t worth it, even if it was the answer to ending his agony. Being trapped with a sin-eater could prove dangerous.
Damn Rorik. Even in death his vile uncle tormented him. Never being rid of the bastard was starting to seem like a real possibility. Not that he had ever really held out much hope of that happening, as living cursed for a thousand years ate away at his logical thinking. But before today he had a tiny bit of hope that at least he could have some peace, accept his fate, and be content with his life of solitude. Now he wanted something more. Now he wanted to feel again and that couldn’t happen. Not at Leila’s expense. And especially not since what he wanted to feel was the woman herself.
Damn him ten times over.
Turning the corner, Vidar started down the stairs.
He deserved his present agony. Doom was his the first time he’d taken a life. In fact, he owned that sin outright as he’d been a cold killer from the tender age of eight. And that had nothing to do with Rorik’s curse. The man’s hex was probably nothing more than an earth-born penance he was meant to suffer.
Half-way down the stairs, visions of that damned night rushed his mind, brought him back to his uncle’s camp, and back to the most agonizing hour of his life…
A burst of snow-filled
wind spun across the field.
Vidar gasped as the cold smacked him in the face, knocked the breath right out of him and buckled his legs.
His arse met with ice-covered ground.
Rorik’s witch must have cursed the stake in his heart to also puncture one of his lungs, because getting air in was a bitch, yet didn’t stifle his wolf.
A growl rose in his throat.
If only he could find some way to best Rorik because taking much more of the man’s torture was going to break him. But without his sword, he had nothing with which to fight.
He reminded himself he was doing this for Katya. He no longer trusted Rorik to keep his sister safe. The man was an evil, vile bastard. He needed to get to Mortimer so the vampire could send his clan to save Katya.
He inched forward, pain flaring anew in his wounded shoulder as his frozen fingers scraped at the ground, their raw tips canvasing a patch of earth covered in small rocks and shards of animal bone.
Flesh slipped from his bruised hands.
Ignoring the pin-pricks assaulting his fingers, Vidar concentrated on the corded off border at the edge of the field Mortimer had allowed Rorik to use as his own.
He needed only to cross that divide and he’d be on hallowed ground where the beast had no power. But that line might as well be miles away thanks to the stake lodged in his heart. At this pace, it would take him days to escape.
But he had to try because if he didn’t, then whatever fight he had left in him would die. And for Katya he refused to give that up.
Viking Wolf Page 4
