by Zoe Forward
Her eyes popped open into the darkness of Ashor’s bedroom. Just a dream. But it had seemed so real. After a few deep breaths to slow her rapid respirations, she focused to call to him. Ashor. Where are you?
His reply was a blast of fury, followed by skull thudding pain.
She gasped and massaged her forehead. He was close, and in trouble.
Kira limped as fast as possible down the two flights of stairs to the lower floor and hung a left toward where she sensed his essence. Javen pushed into the third room down on the right. She grabbed the door before it closed.
She gawked as the door slammed behind her. There had to be a thousand weapons of varying types on the cavernous walls—swords, maces, axes, knives, and scary sharp things she couldn’t identify. The walls and floor were hacked, divoted, and cracked.
Eric shouted, “Ouch! You son-of-a-bitch. He just tried to bite off my thumb.”
V grunted as he dropped Ashor onto the floor. Ashor’s arms and ankles were double banded with thick steel restraints. “You’d think with as many holes as he’s got from that daemon, he’d lose enough blood to pass out.”
“He’s too stubborn to die on his own. Shit, I could’ve sworn Kira was his senariai. How could he Turn?”
“Maybe she’s just a hot chick that’s the akhrian. Lucky us,” said V.
“Javen, I think it might be time to…” Eric’s voice trailed off when he noticed Kira.
V’s cheeks turned scarlet.
Javen scowled. He moved to block her from Ashor. “I’m sorry, old friend, that it must end this way. It is with honor that I fulfill my pact to you.” He carried a gigantic, curved, black-bladed sword as he approached Ashor.
Kira yelled, “Get away from him!” She moved as fast as her injured leg would allow to stand between Javen and Ashor.
A feral, guttural noise rose from Ashor behind her. His fury beat at her in waves. He refused to answer her mental summons. She feared that dark part of him, the one he battled, that now ruled. Beneath the darkness, though, he was in pain. She wondered if he was trapped within the nightmare she’d just escaped. He needed her.
Javen ordered, “Move. He’s Turned. There’s no helping him at this point. His soul is gone. All that is left is base rage. He has become a monster that needs to be sent from this life into the next.”
“Don’t touch him.” Kira held out her hand to push against Javen as he approached.
Javen grabbed the offending hand and pulled Kira close, “He’s gone, honey. This is the only way.”
Kira felt herself airborne to land with a solid thud against the wall. She rolled and crawled toward Ashor with tears screaming down her face. “Don’t hurt him. Ashor, snap out of it!”
A glint of reason entered Ashor’s eyes as he watched Kira. The rage now had a focus. With a roar of fury that shook the walls, Ashor jumped to his feet. His muscles pulsed and rippled against the restraints. With a groan and crack, the metal snapped.
Javen raised his sword. “Kira, he’s not the Ashor you remember. Get out.” Javen turned to Ashor. “Let us do this with honor, old friend. Leave her alone.”
Kira detected the threat pulsing from Ashor and knew what he planned. She stopped her crawl and said quietly, “Javen, get out of here. All of you get out of here. He’s going to kill you. He won’t hurt me.”
“Are you willing to bet your life on that? In here?” Javen’s eyes darted to the weapons walls.
“Yes. Get out,” Kira choked out. You’re in there, Ashor. You have to be. Answer me!
Javen sheathed his sword and with hands raised, slowly backed out the door. “If he crosses the threshold in this state, I’ll kill him.”
Kira launched herself at Ashor and wrapped her body around him. She tried reaching him mentally again, but ran up against dark, empty rage. It owned him and it wanted. Fury changed to desire. A wave of potent lust channeled through her so powerfully that Kira arched against him and cried out.
She hugged herself to him. Relying on instinct, she whispered, “Don’t fight what’s between us anymore. It’s a part of you and I trust every part of you never to hurt me.”
She pulled his mouth to hers and kissed him. Come back to me. Her hand skimmed down his stomach, and beneath the waistline of his pants. She caressed his erection.
He groaned, but not a feral, inhuman noise. It was that of a man in need.
Partial naked came quickly. She knew there would be no beauty to this. No gentle loving beneath the glow of mood lighting and soft music. This was about merging. It was about bringing Ashor back to her.
He lifted her body and balanced her against the only smooth wall. The stark need mixed with intensity in his face was simultaneously terrifying and beautiful. She placed a hand on his cheek.
Immediately, he jackknifed into her, burying himself to the hilt. An incapacitating energy coursed through both their bodies simultaneously at the union. The energy tore the breath from her lungs. She threw her head back, giving in to the command of this power.
The force of the energy caused Ashor to stumble backward. Yet, he didn’t release her.
One of his hands remained at her hip to hold her in place. He buried his head in her neck as the power continued to tear through their bodies. In seconds her back was against the smooth wall again.
Her body had been initially shocked with the intrusion, but as she adjusted, she writhed. She tugged his mouth to hers and bit his lip.
Yet, he remained still.
She dug her nails into his shoulders in frustration and impatience at his forced immobility. In response, he lifted her and pumped wildly. He seemed to know instinctively how to please her as he thrust. She clutched his shoulders through each rough plunge. Pulses of energy from his body sizzled through her nerves.
She needed more. She placed the forefinger of one hand over the triangular tattoo on his chest and focused a small burst of healing energy. A torrent of power surged backward into her body from the connection. She screamed as the explosion of her orgasm ripped through her.
Ashor cried out as the detonation raked through his body. He forcefully pounded into her for a few seconds before the explosion of his own climax overtook him.
Sanity hit like a bomb in his mind. In the aftermath…silence. No kem-seki pushing for control. No injury pain. In fact, no pain at all, anywhere.
All he heard was the throb of his pulse through his inner ear and her rapid breaths.
Shit. Kira. What had he done? “Oh, gods…did I?”
She grabbed his face. And smiled. “I’m fine. I was so afraid Javen was going to kill you.”
“But he didn’t. It’s over now.”
“I don’t want to see you crazy like that again.”
“You won’t have to.”
The smile she gave him was as radiant as the noonday sun.
The room spun. Standing with her wrapped around him, although perfect, was about to end in an ass-to-floor kiss. He pulled her tight to his chest and stumbled down.
She collapsed onto his chest.
He ran his hand along her chinline and whispered, “Thank you.” And passed out.
****
Kira used an exercise towel, dampened at the water dispenser, to wipe blood from him while he slept. There wasn’t as much on him as she’d expected. The one major wound into his upper back was now entirely healed.
Weird. She didn’t remember focusing any healing energy into him.
She traced her finger along a serpentine, non-tattooed scar that traveled down his left shoulder to mid-spine. No one had healed this monster laceration. How many times had he just sucked it up?
She wanted to be there for future injuries. So he didn’t have to suffer alone.
What? Sex once and now you’re open to the idea of being the magi’s doctor? Somehow, all her old fears seemed to have floated away in the mush of post-sex wow.
Yet, with him there was no need to hide. He accepted all of her and made her feel special because of her peculiarities instead
of being intimidated or repulsed, as most men would be. His body accepted and embraced the mysterious energy within her, as probably no other could. And that was why intimacy with other men had always been unsatisfying and sadly disappointing.
Ashor’s eyes opened as she traced the scar beneath his left eye. The deep hazel color of his irises reflected back. No oily sludge. No black swirling. Beautiful coherent clarity gazed at her.
Kira jumped and then smiled, feeling her face flush. Caught gawking. “I think I found the secret to clearing your eyes.”
She shifted and looked at her shoulder, baffled. The sutures were in place, but the gash was healed. And didn’t hurt. She probed her thigh sutures.
“Do they bother you?” Ashor asked.
“No. They’re completely healed. There must’ve been more to that energy surge we shared than just…feeling good.”
He smiled mysteriously and wound a hand in her hair. Gently, he pulled her head toward his and captured her mouth.
She broke away to kiss down his sculpted body. She bit gently at each stylized tattoo as they criss-crossed his chest and abdomen. Each one indicated some deep injury that she had not been there to repair. Each reflected strength and courage, not to mention remarkable resilience to tolerate such injury and survive. She wished she’d been there to mark him after every injury. The newest tat, the one she had created, on his mid-abdomen called to her. Proud she had placed this permanent mark on his body, she spent an extra bit of time in this area. With this mark, he could never forget her.
As she kissed lower on his abdomen, she skimmed her hands along his hipbones.
A hiss escaped his lips.
She smiled and cocked an eyebrow. She wanted him to lose control.
Need burned in his gaze as well as an endearing insecurity. From fantasy, she remembered he didn’t like losing control, but wondered if that was the sole source of his anxiety.
She continued her downward glide.
Ashor knew he should stop this madness, but, goddamn, if each of her little kisses and nips weren’t driving him insane. Never had a woman treated his body with such admiration. They usually skidded around the scars and odd inking, likely assuming he was a pain addict.
The gods would send him to hell for this. Them to hell. Remember, visualize her burning to ashes…Christ, did her mouth just go there? His hips rolled as she gathered momentum. He gasped and groaned. Where’d she learn to do that? The roof of her mouth massaged him as her hand stroked simultaneously. Faster. More pressure. His chest bowed out. He cursed with an explosion of breath.
This was the express bus to hell, but he didn’t care.
He ran his hands down her spine and encircled her waist. With an alligator roll, he changed their positions. Her hands stroked his hips and clenched the strong muscles of his backside.
He captured her mouth asking for open mouth access. And got it.
He felt the slickness of her sex as it slid against his erection.
She whispered, “Please.”
He dropped his head into the hollow of her neck. A hiss escaped him as her heat burned him, slowly enveloping. Sweat broke out across his shoulders and ran down his spine.
“Stop teasing. I need all of you. Now,” she whispered. She shifted and he slid home.
Fuck. “Hold on tight.”
She locked her legs around him and gripped hard onto his biceps as he pistoned. And then slowed.
The first time…before…had been hard and fast. Purely physical. This time was all about her. It was the savory shit from chick flicks, but goddamn if he didn’t wish they could be like this forever.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“What did Javen mean when he said you’d Turned?” Kira asked from her position tucked tight against him.
“The kem-seki took over. It won.”
“What’s that?”
“Means ‘black destruction’ in ancient Egyptian. Fighting daemons damages us. Their evil erodes our souls. As the soul dies, we lose our moral compass…dark destruction. The reality is the longer we fight, the stronger the kem-seki becomes. This is hard to explain. But when its insanity rules and we cannot find our way back then we’ve Turned.”
“I don’t think you were entirely Turned.”
“You were foolish to trust me in that state. Even so, I’m glad not to have seen the skewering end of Javen’s blade.”
“It wasn’t your time to die. What about the eye sludge?”
“The Stain signals the kem-seki’s strength.”
Silence rested between them.
Kira said, “I never got the details of my rescue from you yet. I’m sorry I passed out and missed seeing you ass-kick that guy holding a knife to my throat. You probably scared the crap out of Vance. He was already about to pee his pants after that bald Hashishin cut his wrist.”
Ashor shifted to stare at her. How could she happily chat about her boyfriend right now, after what they just did? If Vance was to be believed, she was actually engaged to the prick, even though she’d denied it once. He didn’t feel an ounce of guilt for ending her relationship with that asswipe. And it was over.
She asked, “Did he properly pass on the message I told him to tell you right before I passed out?”
“What was he supposed to say?”
“I told him to tell you I needed a blood transfusion. I was going to tell you directly, but that Hashishin slapped me while I was trying.”
“That Hashishin paid for that. Only thing Vance said was that you and he are engaged.” A vision of Vance touching her slid through his mind. He planned to slice off each piece of Vance’s body that had dared to touch what was his. That way he’d be dead and she couldn’t be engaged to a corpse.
“We’re not getting married. I had a feeling he wouldn’t come through. He seemed a bit shocky. Next time I get into trouble, I’ll try to tell you directly. Well, I would prefer never to taste that walmwilde poison again. That stuff tastes like boiled moldy leather and the side effects are horrendous, but you wouldn’t know, would you? Ah, the joy of being immune to that stuff. Thank God, Dad taught me about it. I’m babbling. Sorry.”
Relief that she confirmed she wasn’t engaged delayed his mind from processing the rest of her statement. His mind caught up. Surprised, he pushed up to looked down at her. “Your father taught you about dark-magik poison?”
“Some. He didn’t practice dark magik, at least not that I knew of. He often told me magi stories like you guys were comic book heroes. It’s strange that he never explained why I had to learn those things or how he knew them. He would say—” She put on a thick French accent. “—when you are older, ma petite cherie, we will speak more about it.” Then she continued in her normal voice. “But he disappeared, well, died, and we never had that chat. He never lived with us, but visited once in a blue moon. Honestly, I never understood that either. Mom wouldn’t tell me anything about their relationship. Once she said it wasn’t safe for all of us to live together. I always wondered if he was married and we were his dirty little secret.”
An alarming suspicion cramped Ashor’s gut. “Was your father Edmund Laroche?”
“How did you know that? Can you read my mind as well as speak in it? If so, stay out.”
Ashor fell back against the floor and threw a hand over his eyes. He mumbled mostly to himself, “You’re kidding. Edmund had a daughter. And he trained you.”
“How do you know my father?”
“I can’t read your mind. Your father was our last akhrian. This makes sense because it’s usually passed through family lines. Although you’d be the first woman that I’m aware of to be akhrian.” Shit, shit, shit. Further reminder of her destiny. And that they couldn’t be together.
“My father was your akhrian? Why wouldn’t he have told me? Why did he leave us alone out there right down the road from the Hashishin compound? He had to know about them. I wonder why he didn’t force my mother to move.”
Ashor shrugged. “I’ll bet you are the only family he ha
d. Sounds like he tried to teach you. It’s further evidence you’re now our healer.”
“Let’s not talk about the akhrian business right now. I’m still not interested in the job. What happened to my father?”
“Edmund died at the same time I was captured by the Hashishins.”
“How?”
Ashor stood and pulled on his pants but neglected to button them. They hung loosely around his hips. He stared sightlessly at the wall while long suppressed memories surfaced. He wasn’t particularly proud of what had happened.
Kira hugged him from behind. She rested her head in the small of his back. “Please, tell me.”
“Edmund came with us when we went to fight a daemon in New Orleans. I don’t know why. Our understanding had been he wait for us to return and then do what he could. But the man was bullheaded when he got his mind set on something. Once we took care of the daemon, Edmund convinced Javen to take Ethan to the plane. Said he needed time to heal me or something like that. Whacked plan in hindsight. It left the two of us as sitting ducks when Terek and his posse showed up.” Ashor sighed. “I failed to protect him from all of them. Edmund couldn’t do much for me without the amulet. No idea why he didn’t have it. Terek killed him and captured me.”
“Did Dad say anything to you before he died to let you know why he was there?”
Ashor shook his head. He remembered only hazy details of that day. The second Ethan and Javen departed Edmund had gripped his shirt, pulling him off the ground with surprising strength to say, “You must live. No matter what they do to you, you must hold on. Swear it to me.” Pretty suggestive that he had some info on what was going to happen. Maybe Navid had a vision, even though the guy swore he hadn’t.
“Why don’t you shower and rest,” Ashor suggested.
“Okay.”
He kept his distance on the way to the guest bedroom. If he touched her, he was a goner. He crossed his arms to avoid grabbing her as she sauntered past into the room. She shot him a join-me from beneath heavy lidded eyes. He caught himself before he groaned out a hell-yes, envisioning her naked with water on her skin.
Guilt and terror held him back. He’d so fucked this up. No matter how right it felt, this was wrong. Maybe if he ended it now, and then begged the gods at their next summoning, which would be as soon as they found the amulet, they’d leave her be.
