Yanking on one of her wrists, he latched onto one finger and shoved it close to her face.
“This is your power. You are a Green Man, use that. Shove this through your opponent—this is what makes you a true force to be reckoned with, this and your Sword of Truth. But only when it chooses to appear to you. The blade is a sentient being that can choose when and where, but your claws will never fail you.”
She stared at the bloom, at the black pistil full of powder and some sticky substance that seemed to leak off its tip. The blade was alive? Why did that not surprise her?
“So this was a test?”
Yanking her up, he dusted off his pants and shrugged. “Your opponents will come at you in ways you might not imagine. You must be prepared for all eventualities. I’ve heard you are fast.”
Crossing her arms over her chest, she wasn’t sure whether she should be worried that he knew so much about her or not.
“I guess I am. I don’t know. Maybe not compared to you guys.”
“You may only be a halfling, but you’ve got the blood of royals running through your veins. There is more to you than meets the eye.”
“Yeah, it would be super to surprise my foes”—she finger quoted—“and get all kung fu panda on them, but if you know I’m royal, so will they. So what does it matter if I can do more?”
“Because they won’t always know.”
That wasn’t confusing at all.
“Am I battling the same person each time?”
“Maybe. I don’t know. The Ciardah has set the rules.”
“Super.” She rolled her eyes. This was beginning to feel more and more impossible in the light of day. She still burned with the desire to save Abel, but it was a fist to the gut to realize just how strong Idris was, that no matter how easily she’d tossed him around, he’d actually been playing possum.
It wasn’t fun to realize he could have taken her all along. What if her real opponent was just like that? Or… she swallowed hard, staring at him with wide eyes.
“Am I going to have to fight you?”
“As consort, I am taken out of play. But there are others far more cruel than me in this world, darkling. And I will prepare you as best I can for all possibilities.”
Well that was a relief. Sort of.
“Second thing you need to know,” he said, and then he was gone, just gone.
She twirled on her heel, only to gasp when he reached his arm around her waist and yanked her tight to him. For a second she thought he was feeling her up; his palm was cupping just below the level of her breast, but actually he’d tugged on a scrap of fabric. The sound of it tearing sounded loud in her ears.
“Never lose what is yours.”
“What?” She gulped, completely discombobulated by his speed and nearness, clasping her hands to the now-gaping hole in her robe as she tried her best to maintain some sense of dignity.
This training wasn’t at all what she’d been expecting.
“To lose any part of yourself here means you remain here. Forever. Or until you can reacquire what was lost.”
Crystal had said the same thing.
And then he turned and ran, becoming nothing but a streaky blur as he sprinted between the rows of dark flowers.
“What the eff!” She snarled, irritated and annoyed. “This isn’t training, you bastard. This is like school yard bullying.”
The echo of his laughter was like sandpaper to her ears. With a growl, she forgot about trying to keep her robes together and ran.
Ran as fast as her legs could carry her, which was impressively fast. Faster than anything she’d done before in fact. Now she became a blur while the world around her held absolutely motionless.
Idris’s laughter was like a trail for her to follow. He’d taunt her just enough to keep her moving in whatever direction he determined, sailing like a whirling dervish from here to there.
Back in the carnival, she’d have been dizzy with exhaustion from this speed, but not here. Here it was like the land beneath her feet was superpumped on roids. She was siphoning energy up through her heels like a lightning rod.
She could run for days. And just as she’d catch sight of Idris, he’d run a little bit faster, keeping constantly out of arm’s reach.
The garden wasn’t what she’d thought at first either. It was massive, seeming to stretch on into eternity.
It was amazing to her as she pumped her arms and legs that she wasn’t tiring out. Only problem was, she wasn’t nearly quick enough to catch him.
Which meant she’d have to outsmart him.
Idris seemed very smart. But she’d bet her last dollar that he’d never played catch the way she and her dad used to play catch.
Frank DeLuca was many things, but he’d always been a big kid at heart. Growing up, he’d devise inventive games between sets.
They were constantly on the move, constantly going from one state to another to another, but one thing had always remained the same.
The trees.
Idris had told her that she controlled what she saw in this world. She hoped he was right.
Focusing her mind on her surroundings, she thought about how much she wanted to see the beautiful trees of upstate NY again. The tall, magnificent oaks and elms with fall-colored leaves—rusted oranges, flaming reds, and calming yellows. Then, shutting off all other thoughts but the parks and fields that’d surrounded their circus six years ago, she projected her memories outward and nearly whooped with joy when the scene changed and she was once more back in the place full of fond memories.
Idris didn’t slow his pace, but he didn’t need to because now she had the upper hand. She knew exactly where they were and what was coming.
Taking a detour but careful to keep Idris in sight, Flint climbed up the tall trunk of an oak.
The park had been amazing. She remembered as a child gaping up in awe at the trees that were over fifty years old, the idyllic scene where she and her father had played tag what felt like a lifetime ago.
She’d always been faster than her father, but he’d been more wily and cunning.
It’d been her first time at Grands Park, but not Frank’s.
Jumping onto a massive branch, Flint moved like greased lightning from one limb to another, no longer lost or unsure. She purposely let Idris stay ahead of her because she was no longer chasing him. She was corralling him.
Making loud noises and yelling the occasional curse, she let him believe that she was struggling, but she knew something he didn’t.
Grands Park was famous for one thing. A massive sinkhole that spanned a football field in width and length.
She shook tree limbs, pretended to trip and stumble as she slowly but surely guided him toward her trap. And just like her father had done to her six years ago, she now did to Idris.
By the time he realized where he was headed, it was far too late. He was hemmed in by thickets with large thorns. Even if he turned back, she’d catch him.
Dropping down the ten feet from the tree limb, she whooped as she cornered him and held out her arms.
He was barely breathing heavily, but he was coated in sweat. In his hand was a scrap of white fabric.
Smiling proudly, he nodded. “Very smart, darkling.”
Hair clung to the corners of her face and neck, but she didn’t care. Flint felt alive and free. If only Cain could see her now, he’d be so proud.
“Well?” She gave him a cocky grin. “How’d I do?”
Walking forward, he laid the scrap in her hand. She curled her fingers around it, then shoved it against the hole in her robe and was shocked when an unseen force ripped the cloth out of her hand and, just like a puzzle piece would, the fabric locked back into the tear, fixing itself instantly so that there was no longer even a seam.
Gasping in wonder, she ran her fingers along the spot where the damage had been, then looked back at Idris.
“The fabric, the sword, anything that touches you,” he said, “is a part of you in this worl
d. Leave any bit of it behind and you will stay. And a very clever trap, darkling, but next time you won’t be so lucky.”
She laughed and planted her hands on her hips in a cocky pose. “Pft. Bring it on, zombie boy.”
59
Cain
Another month had passed since Flint’s visit, and life in the cave had settled into a rhythm of sorts. Training by day and studying by night.
Grace was crawling out of the worst of the aftereffects. Her face still drooped, but she had a firmer handle on her speech and hardly slurred at all.
She was now wheelchair bound, but that setback didn’t dampen her spirit much. She was a woman possessed, directing them from one shelf to another, demanding this book or that book, staying up till all hours of the night, reading until she passed out from exhaustion.
Each day the pattern repeated until now it simply was the way of things.
Currently it was well past four in the morning and Grace, as usual, sat at the foot of the desk using a magnifying glass as she pored over her latest tome.
Rubbing the grit from his eyes, Cain was seriously considering saying his good-nights and going the way of the rest of them. Even Adam had left over an hour ago.
The only thing holding Cain back was that the moment his head hit the pillow, he suddenly couldn’t sleep. His mind whirled with one nightmare vision after another.
He rubbed his chest, soothing himself by focusing on the warmth of Flint’s pulse beating strongly against his own.
“You can go to bed, you know,” Grace said in a creaky voice. She was tired too. But she was driven by her own demons.
Cain didn’t need to ask to know that time was running out for all of them.
He shook his head. “I should stay. Try to help.”
Finally she looked up. He’d grown used to her new face. Grace had changed, but her intelligent eyes had remained the same.
“Then hand me that book on trees.”
Lifting a brow, he looked at said book. “Trees, Grace?”
He wanted to demand just what in the hell trees could teach them, show them. It was getting harder and harder to hide his discontent, the feeling that they were doing nothing more than running in an endless circle that had no end in sight.
She heard the unspoken words and shrugged. “Do you propose we give up?”
The room was hushed; only the metrical ticks of a clock broke up the silence. The warm red glow of rock added a surreality to their surroundings.
Cain could almost imagine they were locked in some giant labyrinth with no entrance or exit, where it was just the two of them left in the world, surrounded by nothing but useless books.
He clenched his jaw.
“We look,” she said simply. “And we keep looking until we find something.”
“But how will we know when we find it? None of this makes sense. I should be out there, looking for Layla, trying to follow any clues that might—”
“It’s the Triad, Cain. What clues do you think you’ll find?”
“Triad?” he mouthed, then frowned. He’d heard of the Triad, a group of three high-caste demon lords consumed with escaping their prison—Hell. “They’re behind this?”
She nodded slowly, brushing a frizzy curl of silver hair out of her eyes. “Aye. All of it. They’re the whole reason why Layla did what she did. They own her. Don’t ye see? This is bigger than just finding your mother, Cain. This is the end of the world. And at the heart of it all is your aunt.”
“Pandora?” Confused now more than ever, he scrubbed his jaw with his thumb and forefinger. “What does she have to do with this? I haven’t heard from her in forever.”
Her eyes turned sad. “No one has. Word reached me of a kidnapping. She was taken, turned. I don’t know. I don’t understand all of this either.”
Shocked, Cain tried to deny it. “But Adam didn’t say anything about—”
“Because I asked him not to,” she snapped, then looked back down at her book, turning the page as she slowly studied it. “Because until I know for sure what we’re dealing with, I don’t want this to turn into idle gossip and tittle-tattle. This world is dangerous, me boy. And only becoming more so. As to my granddaughter”—she looked up and her eyebrow rose—“she is exactly where she is supposed to be.”
He narrowed his eyes. “I didn’t say anything about Flint.”
“Well, you didn’t need to, did you? Your truth is written all over your face.”
Leaning back in his chair, Cain crossed his hands over his stomach and toyed with his thumbs. “What exactly are we talking about here, Grace?”
She never even hesitated. “The end of days, boy. Now hand me that book.”
He did as she’d commanded and then, mumbling a hasty goodnight, got up and went to his room, his thoughts heavy and more serious than ever.
Deep down Cain knew things were bad, and had even suspected it was this level of bad. But hearing it confirmed shook him to his core.
All of Dean’s midnight visits suddenly made so much sense. The heavy, pensive moods Adam would go through… It’d been more than just Abel being gone or Layla having betrayed them.
All of his suspicions were now confirmed.
Back in his room, he stripped off his shirt and tossed it to the floor. After toeing off his boots, he was too lazy to bother with his jeans and plopped onto the bed, weary down to his bones. Crossing his arms behind his head, he stared blankly up at the ceiling.
He was powerful, a berserker, a monster who could raze a town without breaking a sweat. But he’d never felt more helpless in his life.
Minutes later, he grew aware of someone standing in his room.
She stood at the foot of his bed again, bathed in moonlight and magic. Her hair was a swirl of fire around her head, but Flint’s eyes were hooded and dark.
Sighing, she drifted closer to his mattress and gingerly sat. “I would give anything to be able to cuddle into you,” she whispered.
“It’s been a month,” was all he could say.
She winced. “That long?”
Needing her comfort as much as she seemed to need his, he nodded and curled up into a sitting position. He made to reach for his T-shirt, but she shook her head.
“No, don’t. I like looking at you.”
His lips twitched. She reached out her hand and though he couldn’t feel the touch of her skin to his, he felt an electrical current that sparked through his bicep where her fingers glided along his shredded-moth’s-wing marking.
“I felt you today,” he admitted softly, admiring the way beams of moonlight danced upon her skin, making its already healthy glow grow more radiant, looking like sunlight dappling between the leaves of a tree to the forest floor.
Cain tapped his chest.
“I miss you so bad, Cain.”
She sounded sad, and it bothered him. Part of their bonding meant that the need to protect her, to keep her from harm, was a constant and ever-present desire inside him. But she was beyond him, in a place he couldn’t reach, and it killed him.
“Lie down,” she commanded.
His brows twitched, but he obeyed and lay down on the twin-sized mattress of his bed. When Flint came home, he was going to have to see about getting a larger bed since there was no way in hell they wouldn’t be sharing one.
“Scoot in a little bit.” She flicked her wrist toward the wall.
Chuckling to himself, he did as asked. “You thinking about cuddling me, princess?”
Never in a million years would he have thought he’d utter those words, but doing it made him feel content.
“Something like that.” She grinned impishly back at him and then proceeded to crawl along the mattress toward him.
If he closed his eyes, he could almost imagine her there. Imagine the feel of her tantalizingly smooth legs running along his much larger ones. Her feet toying with the hairs on the backs of his calves and her fingers splaying wide on his chest as she claimed him in a silent gesture of possession.
She sighed, and he ached to run his fingers through the strands of her crimson hair. To inhale her sweet scent of flowers deep inside himself. Flint had always smelled amazing to him.
“Where are you, Flint? Where’s my brother?” he asked once she’d settled down against him.
Big, beautiful eyes stared intently back at him. “We’re not beneath the earth anymore, Cain,” she finally said after a lengthy pause. “It was a trick of The Ciardah, aka Grandpappy dearest. We’re actually in fae land, in the dark court.”
He frowned. Cain knew next to nothing of the fae, but that didn’t bring him even a measure of peace. “Why? When are you coming back?”
She shook her head, closed her eyes, and rubbed her brow. The gesture was so familiar to him, one he’d seen her do many times when she grew stressed, that it brought a pang to his heart. He needed her here with him more than he cared to admit.
It wasn’t easy being without his compass, but their bonding had done one thing for him. Cain no longer lost control of his rage. All he needed to do was fix his mind on her, and always he was able to breathe through the fury.
Flint meant everything to him.
Everything.
He brushed his fingers along the spot where her upper arm rested upon the mattress. His hand slipped right through her, but the caressing motion (even if he was only rubbing the sheets) was soothing.
“Yeah, about that”—she looked up at the ceiling of the trailer without blinking—“I can’t come back until I get Abel back.”
“Abel back?” He almost jerked to a seated position but then remembered she wasn’t really here, and he didn’t want to disturb her tenuous hold on her spirit-walking. He was just grateful she seemed to have better control of it tonight than she had last time. “Where is he?”
“They’ve got him.” She gave a laugh that didn’t at all sound humorous. “Yeah, they basically have me hostage too. And before you ask—”
The Complete Tempted Series Page 69
