by Jory Strong
Eight
REBEKKA turned, thinking only to escape. Her escort blocked her, fingers imprisoning her upper arms, forcing her forward and then turning her to face the priest and the general.
“There is no reason to fear,” Enzo said.
Rebekka only barely smothered a hysterical laugh. In running from the man in the silver car, she’d fled right into the grasp of the person the witches claimed was responsible for her being hunted.
Terror beat at her, threatening to turn her into true prey, to replace the ability to think with only the need to fight if she couldn’t flee.
Her breathing was ragged, her heart a wild pounding in her chest and ears.
The hands on her arms dropped away but the solid mass of the guardsman continued to block her escape.
Her fingers curled around the witches’ token in her pocket. It was an unconscious gesture and yet the feel of it against her palm reminded her that she’d dared to use it, triggering a spell placed on it by the Wainwrights and summoning Aziel—a being from the ghostlands—in order to escape the Iberá estate.
Enzo had witnessed it. He’d heard Aziel’s order to free her and his warning to cease searching for Tir or every man, woman, and child bearing the Iberá name would be killed. He’d heard Aziel tell the patriarch, “Your fate is now bound to the healer’s.”
Rebekka stiffened her spine and fought to make her voice sound confident as her gaze met Enzo’s. “There is every reason to fear. The Church is still hunting me.”
Standing next to Enzo, Father Ursu smoothed a hand over the material of his robes. “You are mistaken.”
“I am not mistaken. Twice I’ve only barely managed to escape. Once last night. The other just a short while ago.”
“What happened?” Enzo asked, his expression and sharp question making Rebekka believe he had no knowledge of her pursuers.
Rebekka told him about seeing the street boys and how both times it was followed almost immediately by the appearance of the man with the birthmark staining his face. She didn’t mention Levi and the others, claimed instead that she’d managed to get away by finding a hiding place and waiting until it was safe to leave it.
By the end of her recitation, Enzo was frowning deeply. He turned to the priest.
Father Ursu opened his arms at waist height in a graceful sweeping motion. “I was drawn into this matter on behalf of the Iberás and by their request. The patriarch’s dictate that the Church no longer concern itself with it has been honored.”
The priest’s gaze went to where the amulet lay hidden against Rebekka’s skin. “There is more of the witches’ evil on her than when I first encountered her. She is mistaken about the source of her troubles.”
Doubt crept into Rebekka, allowed an opening by her desire to deny the matriarch’s claim that her father was a demon. She hadn’t told them about the memory and dream of the urchin, but the gift of the amulet hinted they knew of them.
They were the ones to tell her the Church was involved and to offer an intercession in exchange for a promised favor. But what if they were behind the attacks?
She released the token, her palms damp, her heart beating erratically. She didn’t know who to trust. Not with her secrets. Not with her doubts and fears for her soul and her gift. But her purpose for coming here hadn’t changed, despite the priest’s presence. She couldn’t go back to the brothel and risk calling disease-borne plague to her. She didn’t dare go to either her homesteaded house or to the Wainwrights.
She needed shelter for the night. And if the patriarch, The Iberá, was willing to provide it, transportation to where the Barrens bordered the forests so she could go to the Fellowship of the Sign and speak to her mother.
“I need a safe place to stay tonight,” she told Enzo. “Will you take me to the Iberá estate?”
More than once he’d argued with the patriarch in favor of turning her over to the Church. His voice was brusque as he said, “We need to leave now.”
The drive to the Iberá estate was made in wary silence. Rebekka because there was nothing she would volunteer about her life to a general in the guard. Enzo because he remembered too well the rent in reality caused by her summoning and the shrouded figure who’d stepped through it, carrying a sigil-inscribed staff and bringing with him the promise of a retribution that meant the death of every man, woman, and child bearing the Iberá name.
Enzo’s driver entered the estate through heavy gates bearing the heraldic crest of the Iberás, delivering them to the front entrance where the butler stood waiting to escort Rebekka to the room that had served as a luxurious prison only days ago.
Janita, the young maid who’d been assigned to Rebekka before, stood just inside the entrance, nervously twisting her hands. She smiled tentatively, seemingly caught between trepidation and happiness at seeing Rebekka again. “I’ve drawn your bath,” she said. “The patriarch sent several dresses for you to choose from. You’re expected at dinner.”
Rebekka returned Janita’s smile as she went to where the dresses were laid out on the bed. They were exquisitely crafted, made of the finest material and accompanied by matching jewelry.
“This one,” she said, choosing a solid blue dress with a design allowing her to wear the amulet without revealing it.
“You will look beautiful in it,” Janita said. “I will iron it then return.”
There wasn’t a wrinkle to be seen but Rebekka didn’t protest. This was the pattern they’d worked out earlier.
Nakedness in others didn’t bother Rebekka. Witnessing sexual acts had no power to shock or embarrasses her. But even if she hadn’t required privacy because of the tattoo, the thought of someone assisting her with her bath, helping her bathe and washing her hair, was too intimate, too personal.
In the doorway Janita hesitated, half turning toward Rebekka long enough to say, “The patriarch has sworn me to secrecy about what I saw. I will never speak of it.”
She left, closing the door firmly behind her. Rebekka took advantage of the hot water and scented soap.
It was impossible to hold on to either tension or fear in the comfort of the tub. She was safe, at least for the moment.
In the past she’d wondered what it would be like to live among those who didn’t worry about food or shelter or even the law. To be surrounded by beauty and opportunity instead of horror and hopelessness. Now she knew.
You could choose to remain here, the voice of temptation whispered into her mind.
And those very words were echoed by the Iberá patriarch hours later after a formal dinner around a table laden with abundance.
She stood next to his motorized wheelchair on a walkway built on top of the estate’s interior walls. Beneath them a pride of captive lions grew restless in anticipation of being fed.
The male lifted his head and roared. His challenge was answered by a male in a different enclosure.
Worry for Levi crept into Rebekka. She wondered if he and Cyrin and Canino had reached Lion lands yet.
“I spoke with Father Ursu after Enzo called to say he was bringing you to the estate,” The Iberá said. “Derrick assures me the Church is respecting my wishes you be left alone. Without evidence to the contrary, I must accept what he says as true.”
A door at the base of the wall opened. A small herd of deer bounded through it, their coats the same shade of brown as Feliss’s furred back. When they saw the waiting predators they bolted.
The lions spread out, the females ranging ahead of the male, well versed in cornering and capturing prey in an environment they knew every inch of.
Rebekka turned away from the unfolding hunt. The patriarch said, “The deer are domestically raised, not wild caught.”
The hum of the wheelchair preceded his repositioning it so he could address her directly. “What would it take to convince you to remain here, where your safety can be assured? I am prepared to offer anything within reason.”
She saw him with the eyes of a healer. Beneath the expensive materi
al of his trousers and shirt, the muscles in his legs and left arm were atrophied by what she thought was Lou Gehrig’s disease. His limbs twitched involuntarily but his pride kept him upright, daring even disease to try to defeat his indomitable will.
Behind him was the estate. It would have been considered a mansion in the days before The Last War as well as in the present. There was beauty in every direction she looked. Well-tended lawns, elaborate gardens. Benches placed beneath perfectly balanced trees. Statues that would have seemed equally at home in an art museum.
“I can see that you’re kept busy with work,” The Iberá said, “if it’s the thought of idleness that bothers you. My last offer stands. The quarters set aside for the veterinarian would be yours. Janita would also be assigned exclusively to you, or another, if you prefer a different servant. You would be free to build a clientele and travel to see them as you need to, escorted by my private guard, with all fees yours to keep. If there’s something more you require, name your price.”
It had been easy to turn away from the patriarch’s offer the last time she was here. She’d had Levi to consider, and to a lesser extent Araña and Tir.
Tir and Araña were gone. Either dead in freeing Abijah, or, more likely, they’d taken Araña’s boat and left Oakland.
With the maze destroyed and the Weres healed she’d kept her promise to Levi to help him liberate his brother. If she stayed here, she could use the money she earned to help him buy out Feliss’s contract. She could do the same for the other Weres she considered her friends.
Behind her the lions made a kill. Rebekka flinched in reaction, not at the natural relationship between prey and predator, but with the knowledge that if she remained in the red zone, eventually she would lose her life there.
Allende’s protection didn’t extend beyond the brothels, and she knew too well how dangerous it was to be a female in the red zone, especially one bearing the tattoo of a prostitute. At sixteen she’d been dragged into an alley and nearly raped.
Only a stranger’s intercession had saved her. He’d come out of nowhere, a sharp-faced Were outcast whose fingers ended in deadly talons and whose hair was plaited into a hundred braids adorned with black and red beads.
He’d eviscerated the two men holding her pinned and opened. Pulled the man lying on top of her away and castrated him, letting him scream for long moments before ending it in a spray of blood and ripped-out throat.
Shaking, nearly in shock despite having spent a lifetime witnessing the violence men were capable of doing to women—and to male prostitutes—Rebekka had allowed the stranger to help her to her feet and tug her clothing back into place.
Without thinking she’d healed a small cut on his arm, and the words he’d spoken afterward had changed her life. “Visit Dorrit. She’s madam of one of Allende’s brothels. Your gift is a strong one. She’ll take you on as a healer.”
Now even Allende’s protection wasn’t enough. Not unless the brothel became a self-imposed prison. Someone still hunted her.
As if sensing a weakening in Rebekka’s resolve, the patriarch repeated himself. “Name your price.”
Her price? The things she wanted most weren’t his to buy.
Offering a dowry wasn’t an uncommon practice. But a husband bought by money or a chance to gain an important position wouldn’t be the kind of man who would love her and remain faithful. And beyond that, the dream catcher-like amulet against her chest served as a reminder. A warning.
She needed to know the truth about herself and her gift. About the father the matriarch claimed was a demon and the urchin whose breath tasted of disease and whose touch brought remembered nightmares of plague and death.
“I can’t accept your offer,” Rebekka said, her voice little more than a whisper.
The Iberá gave a barely perceptible shrug. “As long as I’m alive you may change your mind at any time. Will you accept a detail of guards to assure your safety?”
Rebekka nearly smiled at that, imagining men in pressed, black uniforms bearing the Iberá crest and trailing behind her as she went from brothel to brothel. “No. But I would accept transportation through the Barrens.”
She paused, then decided to trust him with a truth few people knew. “My mother belongs to the Fellowship of the Sign. I need to visit her as soon as possible.”
“I will arrange for you to be taken there tomorrow morning.”
Addai
THE morning sun kissed Addai’s back through the window as he was greeted by the sound of soft moans and the subtle slide of flesh against flesh, by the sight of a delicate feminine spine and the play of muscle underneath deeply tanned skin as the woman rose so the man she straddled followed in a desperate lift of hips off the mattress lest his cock be cast from the hot, wet heaven it was buried in.
Black wings spread across the bed, trembling in pleasure. Black hair spread across the pillow, a match to the woman’s.
Another might have turned away. Another might have left and reappeared after moans gave way to the sharp cry of release.
Addai remained.
He waited for the hate that had once festered to come. For the rage that had been his daily companion to return. Remembered well the consuming fury that had led him to the Djinn Abijah and the betrayal of the brother he now watched taking pleasure.
Thousands of years of being enslaved and at the mercy of humans had seemed a fair price for Tir to pay for what he’d done. But as Addai saw Araña and his brother making love, it was anticipation that stirred inside him, not to join them on the bed but to have once again what they had now.
His cock hardened as another scene overlaid the one in front of him. As a different woman took Araña’s place and black feathers became the snowy white of his own wings.
Soft, teasing laughter replaced murmurs and Addai’s heart swelled, ached, as in his mind he looked into the face of a woman who had been dead before the birth of Jesus of Nazareth and Mohammed and a thousand other prophets and saints.
Sajia. A single instance of indecision had cost him the one whose soul completed his own.
He’d found her alone, drawing water from a village well in preparation of leaving as the rest of her family packed their trade goods onto camels. Djinn. Long-ago enemy. Sloe-eyed and gentle-spirited. He’d been hers from the instant she became aware of his presence.
Her fear had ripped through him. Shredding his sense of purpose as she backed away from him, water jugs shattering as they fell from trembling fingers.
How could he kill her? How could he see her enslaved, her will bent to that of the human priests who were given the captive Djinn?
He couldn’t. Not when he wanted to possess her himself.
In the desert they’d become lovers. Husband and wife, mates, though his fear of becoming Fallen had kept him from saying the binding words, from tying his fate to hers and irrevocably making this world his own.
Addai’s chest grew tight, his throat constricting against tears as he remembered the last time he’d seen her. The kiss they’d shared before he lifted her onto the back of a camel and watched her go, heat rising in shimmering waves off the sand as the caravan headed toward the distant mountains.
They went not to trade, but at the calling of the Djinn by The Prince who ruled them.
He’d fought the urge to go after her, not yet ready to say the necessary words so the gathered Djinn would accept him among them as ally and not enemy. He’d turned away, but even so, some part of her spirit already lived in him.
He’d felt the moment of her death. It was a searing blaze of pain across his soul. A chasm of emptiness that filled with terrible rage and hate when he went to the place where her body lay among others in a scene of devastation.
Tents burned and goats bleated in terror.
Camels ran through the encampment, freed from hobbles and ropes.
Angels bound captured Djinn in sigil-inscribed shackles or urns.
And amidst the carnage Tir stood with blood on his hands, thin
king himself righteous. Glorious in victory.
A flash of movement, the rush of power over his skin brought Addai back to the present. To the sight of Tir in front of him, sword held ready, Araña only a step behind him with her knives.
“What brings you here?” Tir asked.
Addai’s smile was as sharp as the weapon in his brother’s hand. “The priest, Ursu. He continues to hunt for the healer in the hopes she will lead him to you. It’s time you paid him a visit to show him you are now beyond his reach, and to make him cease his attempts to have Rebekka found and brought to the Church.”
“Kill him?” The question held the anticipation of pure pleasure.
“No. His life still serves us.”
The sword in Tir’s hand disappeared, returned to the cold pocket of light and air that was its sheath. “I’ll ask again in the future.”
Addai looked to Araña, his gaze lingering on the spider-shaped mark riding her shoulder, proclaiming the nature of her Djinn soul and the House she was called to. “Neither you nor Tir may directly help the healer now. But she might have need of your boat. Will you leave it in Oakland for a while?”
“It can remain there for as long as it’s needed.”
Addai bowed slightly in acknowledgment, his attention returning to Tir. “Speak with Ursu.”
“Should I strike a deal with Rimmon for Rebekka’s protection while she’s on the Constellation?”
“No. Let your previous bargain stand. Only the boat is to be guarded. When the time is right, the healer can learn she has access to it, and that the threat presented by the Church is over. I’ll let you know when that time arrives. You can serve as messenger since you are familiar to her and to the werelion Levi.”
“I’ll leave now.”
Addai’s gaze dropped to the tattoolike spider above Tir’s heart, the mark he’d gained by having the courage to speak the forbidden incantation and willingly bind himself to Araña. For an instant the past reached into the present, bringing with it memories of a different mark, a different choice. But the festering hate, the rage that had once accompanied those memories didn’t come. Only anticipation filled Addai, and a desire hot enough to burn through eternity.
