“You guys are practically indestructible, right?”
“Exactly.”
Ava still had smoke in her nose when they pulled up to the modest carpet shop on the other side of the bridge. It was dark from the outside, but Ava could see a light glowing dimly on the second floor.
“Stay here,” he said, pulling the car into a deserted alley.
Malachi got out and walked around the corner, returning after only a few minutes with a set of keys and a determined expression. He opened the back door and started to ease Leo out of the seat. The young man winced and Ava saw the blood start seeping from the wound again, black and thick.
“Help me,” Malachi grunted. “You’ll need to get the door.” He tossed her a set of keys and Ava rushed to pick them up.
A few minutes later, the three were climbing a narrow staircase next to the rug shop. Ava opened the door to a deserted apartment with a small sitting room and a kitchenette.
“There’s a bedroom in back.” Malachi was carrying Leo, the tall man cradled like a child in his arms. Considering Leo was the tallest in the house, Ava wasn’t quite sure how Malachi was even standing, but she didn’t question it. She opened the door to the back to see a bed, narrow but clean. She knocked off the pillows and stripped off the covers, clearing the bed for the wounded man. Malachi laid him down gently, and Leo immediately curled to the side. Ava saw him bite his lip so hard that it bled.
“Rhys?” she asked.
“I lost my mobile. Do you have yours?”
“In my purse in the car.”
“I’ll get it. Stay with him and stay away from the windows.”
“Can I turn on some lights?” The house wasn’t pitch-black, but close. The windows let in light from the street lamp on the corner, but other than that, the low light in the front room was all that shone in the small apartment.
“Wait for now. There are more in the rooms upstairs and the windows are blacked out on that floor.”
He ducked out of the room, and Ava heard him on the stairs as she sat next to Leo and stroked his forehead. His skin was starting to burn with fever, so she got up and looked for a washcloth or rag to cool him. She found a towel in the kitchen and returned to him, placing it on his forehead as he relaxed under her touch.
For the first time all day, Ava tried to gather her thoughts.
Jaron had been protecting her; she was almost sure of it. He might be evil—and nothing about their conversation had convinced her otherwise—but he had been protecting her for some reason.
Something very bad was happening among the fallen angels and the Grigori, and something in the city had shifted. Was it a coup like Maxim had predicted? If so, any protection Jaron had offered her was gone. There seemed to be countless Grigori in Istanbul, and they were bold enough to have burned the scribe house.
Ava had no idea where they would go. Did they have other safe houses? Should she go back to Los Angeles and take shelter in Carl’s fortress of a house? Somehow, she doubted even her stepfather’s hired guns could get her out of this mess. Besides, the thought of leaving Malachi was unthinkable at this point.
Reshon. She was the one saying it this time. The vision Jaron had given her only confirmed it.
I show you what has been. What will be. And what could be.
“What could be…,” she whispered, still holding the cool rag to Leo’s forehead.
They were her children. Hers and his. With her dark curls and Malachi’s grey eyes.
“Do not fear the darkness.”
Jaron’s words caused her to shiver, even in the over-warm room. What had he shown her? Was it his vision or hers? And why had she seen her childhood? Had he been watching her since then?
Questions still swirled in her head as she heard Malachi climbing the stairs, talking quietly on the phone. He was just hanging up as he entered the room.
“Well?”
“Rhys is on his way. No car, so he’s going to have to walk. They won’t let him on a tram carrying coals in a clay cooking pot he stole from a restaurant, but they should last until he gets here and can stoke the fire again.”
She heard Leo mutter something that sounded like relief.
“And that will heal him?”
Malachi winced, but his eyes did seem less strained. “How good are you at sewing?”
“Horrible.”
Malachi opened the small closet and pulled out a black bag that he tossed on the end of the bed. “You can hold him down or sew him up. Sounds like our stitching’s about the same. Leo, you have a preference?”
“I’ll hold still,” he muttered. “You do it, Mal. I’d rather curse at you than Ava.”
Ava’s stomach began to churn as Malachi stripped off Leo’s shirt, peeling the cloth away from the clotted wound. “Can’t we wait for Rhys?”
“He’s bringing the fire to cauterize it,” Malachi said. “We’ll stitch it up, and Rhys will seal it. Has to be done, Ava.”
“Just get it over with,” Leo said. “If I’m lucky, I’ll pass out again.”
Malachi and Ava were as pale as Leo by the time Rhys showed up. The wound was over eight inches in length, and it seemed like it took Malachi forever to stitch it after Ava had helped clear the blood as much as she could. According to Malachi, infection wouldn’t be a problem. Once the fire cleansed the wound, Leo’s own magic would heal him, and having Ava’s hands on Leo during the stitches would boost his energy, since she was Irina.
“Irina are the best healers,” Leo said, gritting his teeth as Rhys placed glowing coals on the mottled skin at his side. “My father said my m…mother could heal any wound. She studied medicine at university, even.” A tight smile. “She dressed like a man so she could go. My father said he laughed and laughed, but really, he liked her wearing pants.”
Malachi smiled, brushing back the young man’s hair. “That’s a good story, Leo. When did your father find you?”
“When Max and I were seven, he just showed up.” He closed his eyes as a growl of pain rumbled from his chest. After another gasping breath, he said, “He didn’t know we’d survived the Rending. He’d been in Russia killing Grigori. He was… a bit mad, to tell the truth. But he got better eventually.”
“Ava, put your palm on his neck,” Rhys said, grabbing her hand and placing it over Leo’s rapid pulse. “Hold it there.”
“What else can I do?” she asked, tears threatening. She felt helpless in the face of the young scribe’s pain.
Rhys shook his head, singed hair falling in his eyes. “I don’t know how it works. Think about making him well, maybe? I don’t know Irina magic.”
“There’s a song,” Leo said, his voice sounding dazed. “My father sang it when we were young. A song to make you feel better…” He started mumbling under his breath as his eyes drifted closed.
“She can’t sing it yet,” Malachi murmured. “Not yet, Leo. Soon she’ll know the words. It’s too dangerous for her now.”
Too dangerous because she couldn’t control her magic. For the first time, Ava felt the sting of resentment. Maybe if the Irina hadn’t run away, she would know. If they hadn’t run away, Leo wouldn’t be suffering as much. Maybe she wouldn’t have spent years thinking she was a freak for hearing voices. A bitter seed took root in her heart as she thought about all the Irin had lost.
“Ava,” Malachi whispered, pulling her hand away. “He’s sleeping now. Enough. You need to save your strength, too.”
She was feeling it. For the first time since her night in Cappadocia with Malachi, the voices around her were completely silent. She must have expended far more energy than she realized, helping Leo to heal.
“Take her upstairs to rest,” Rhys said. “I’ll stay with Leo and keep the fire burning.”
“Have we heard from Damien and Max yet?”
“Not yet. I’ll keep Ava’s phone, if that’s all right. Hers is the only one working.”
She nodded and let Malachi lead her up the stairs to a tiny bedroom with a small lamp. He
turned it on and began to peel off her clothes as she sank into the mattress. She felt Malachi lay behind her as she curled on her side.
“Sleep, my love. Leo will be fine, and you need rest.”
“Sleep with me,” she said, half asleep before her head hit the pillow. “Reshon.”
Chapter Nineteen
Reshon.
She called him reshon, and his heart soared. Despite the fear. Despite the loss. She called him “reshon,” and he was content. Malachi slept a few hours by her side, hand planted firmly on her soft skin, drawing and offering strength as she rested. But by the time he woke, he couldn’t ignore the words Jaron had whispered in the Old Language before he shimmered out of sight.
“Thousands of you, Scribe. One of her. Remember.”
Remember? How could he forget? The angel’s meaning had been clear: Protect the Irina at all costs.
Whatever Jaron had showed her, Malachi hadn’t seen. But clearly he’d been communicating with his mate in some way. The scene in the office flashed back to him. Jaron’s transformation. Ava’s awe. Their locked gazes held a secret that teased the edge of his mind. There was something…
“I didn’t know. I didn’t know…”
What had Jaron told her? Why had he been protecting her? There had to be a reason, but Malachi couldn’t see what it was. As always, the motivations of the Fallen were incomprehensible. He wished Damien were here to counsel him, but he knew if the Watcher still lived after battling Brage’s angelic sword, he was probably in a different safe house. It was better that they weren’t all in one place. Had Damien already contacted Vienna? Did the Council know what was going on?
He had to get Ava out of Istanbul. He could drive across the country to Cappadocia, but getting her to Vienna would be better. He wished he knew where Sari was hiding. There was no fiercer Irina than Damien’s mate. She would help him protect Ava; he knew it. Would Damien take them to Sari? Malachi felt like he was wandering in the dark forest of his dreams, stumbling through the fog and chasing answers to questions he didn’t know. The house was utterly silent, but his mind was filled with disturbing and conflicting thoughts.
Ava stirred beside him.
“I can hear you thinking,” she murmured. “Go back to sleep.”
“Can’t.”
She pulled his hand up to her breast. “Then do something more entertaining than brooding.”
Despite everything, she still made him smile. He bent down, kissing along her neck and caressing the skin of her breast, toying with her as his energy built.
Reshon.
A thought occurred to him. Ava wasn’t in control of her magic, but there was a way to make her stronger. To lend her his own. She wouldn’t be able to perform her half of the ritual—she didn’t know the songs—but he could perform his half, lending her his power and protection. She would heal faster. She wouldn’t tire. Her mind would be clearer and her sight better. If they were attacked again, it could mean the difference between life and death for her.
But not for you…, a small voice whispered. It would weaken him, because Ava couldn’t lend her own magic.
Thousands of you, Scribe. One of her.
She turned to him, lifting her face for a kiss. He met her mouth with eager lips, delving in to taste and tease. She responded by pulling him closer, melding her body to his in the small bed as his skin sang where she touched it. More. He had to have more of her. Malachi pulled off his shirt and hers until their bodies were pressed together. He’d never felt more whole. More alive.
Reshon.
He pulled away with a gasp. Protecting Ava was imperative. He knew she was the key. And as her mate, Malachi was the only one who could offer her the strength.
“Malachi?” She sat up, her hair spilling over her shoulders in the low light.
“Wait here. I’ll be right back.” He whispered a kiss across her mouth before he stood and walked downstairs, all the way to the old rug shop. He walked past the showroom, looking into the back room where they stored the new pieces for shipment and also the tools to do repairs.
There, on the workbench, he found what he was looking for. He grabbed the dye and then looked for a brush but couldn’t find one. Just then, he spied a child’s painting in the corner, sitting on top of a small wooden box. Opening it, he saw a mess of watercolor paints and… He smiled. A brush. Not the best quality to touch his mate’s skin, but it would have to do. Someday, they would complete the ritual, then he would brush her skin with sable and decorate her from head to toe. The mental image was unspeakably arousing, so he grabbed the vegetable dye and the child’s brush before he headed back upstairs.
When he entered their small room, Ava was sitting in bed with a frown on her face.
“Where did you go?”
He placed the brush and dye on the side table and knelt beside her. “I wish we were not here. I wish we were someplace beautiful where I could stand with you before my mother and father and speak the old vows declaring you mine.”
Her eyes filled with tears, but they didn’t look sad. “Malachi—”
“I can’t do that, Ava. But I want you to know, I would. I will, someday. And before another hour passes, I want to say the words I can. Words that will mark you as my mate.” He ran the tips of his fingers up her bare spine. “Write on your skin the spells that will bind us together.” His fingers reached the nape of her neck as he bowed his face and kissed over her heart. “Will you let me, reshon? Will you take me, wholly and completely?”
“Tonight?”
“Right now.”
“Your… mate?” She still hesitated at the word, but Malachi smiled.
“Yes.”
“Forever?”
He looked up. “Forever. No turning away until death parts us.”
A tentative smile crossed her lips. “I thought you guys were immortal.”
He kissed her. “We’re all immortal, Ava, as long as our stories are told.” A small frown creased between her eyebrows, so he kissed her again. “Say yes.”
“Yes.”
“Yes?” He smiled.
“Yes, reshon.” She placed her hands on his cheeks, stroking them despite the rasp of stubble. “You’re mine. I knew it weeks ago. So yes.”
Desire roared to life, but Malachi clamped down on it and said, “Take off your clothes. All of them.”
“Every stitch?” The teasing light came back.
“Every. Single. Stitch.” He pulled back the cover and reached for the jar of dye.
“What is that?” she asked as she pulled off her underthings.
“Henna dye. It’s actually what we’ve always used, but I apologize for the brush.” He shook up the dye and then uncapped it, dipping the rough brush into the jar before he looked up. “It should be much nicer than this.”
“What do I do?” she asked, her voice tentative in the silence.
“Turn around,” Malachi said. “Hold still. And let me mark you.”
Ava pulled up her legs and turned her back to him. Malachi sat on the edge of the bed and took a deep breath. He’d dreamed of this moment for hundreds of years. Granted, the surroundings were usually a little more luxurious, but the sight before him…
Ava’s smooth back, pale and glowing in the lamplight. The fine bones of her spine guiding him from the base of her skull to the swell of her buttocks. She was more than he’d dreamt. More than he deserved.
Malachi leaned forward, whispering the ancient vows against her skin, and his breath cast a golden glow as the magic took hold. He lifted the brush and began.
He wrote the spells across her body, the dye taking hold as the magic did. And though the henna would fade with time, the magic would remain, imbued in her skin. Protecting her. Strengthening her. For the rest of her life, his words would mark her. He took care as he wrote, hundreds of years of practice suddenly making sense. Countless hours of instruction. No mistakes were allowed in this; it was the most important talesm he would ever scribe.
Protective spel
ls formed down her back. Whispered aloud as he felt the magic leave his body and enter hers. His lips trailed after his brush, kissing along her backbone as her heart raced beneath his mouth.
“Is it…” She arched her back when she felt the brush trail low. “Is it supposed to feel like this?”
He couldn’t stop the smile of satisfaction. “This is the ritual performed on the mating night. Does it please you?”
She gasped as the brush moved over the base of her spine. She said, “That would be a yes.”
Ava’s scent bloomed and Malachi had to pause, breathing deeply as his forehead rested on her shoulder. “Reshon. Ava…”
“Keep going,” she said, desire lacing her voice. “Don’t stop.”
Minutes turned to hours. She turned when he told her, baring the front of her body when her back and neck where covered with spells.
The spells for longevity were next, arching along her fine collarbone. Malachi groaned when he saw the golden flush across her throat. Her breasts. Her belly. The brush dipped and traced over and over, the ink darkening and drying as the magic glowed beneath it. She appeared lit from within. He bent his head and let his mouth suckle her breast, giving in to the arousal that had become almost unbearable.
She moaned and leaned back. “Malachi?”
“Almost done.”
Spells for increased strength along her arms. Speed on her thighs. Spells for healing across her breasts and belly. He felt the magic leave him, knew he was giving almost dangerously of his own power, but he couldn’t stop.
Her energy spilled over, and he felt the hum begin to build in the air.
“Soon?” She panted.
“Soon.”
The last spells were over her heart, circling around as he pledged himself to her. He dipped in the dye again, then the brush met her skin as Malachi marked her as his mate. The balance of his soul. The bearer of his young. No other would mark her like this. No one but him. The possessive instinct swamped him as he finished the last stroke of the mating ritual. He braced himself over her, allowing the ink to dry as he drank from her lips. Over and over, she met him, as hungry for him as he was for her.
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