Taste the Dark

by Tibby Armstrong

  Chewing his lip, thoughtful, Akito sat, cross legged, on the stone floor. He couldn’t feel the surface, nor the heat of the blaze at his back. Lyandros must have endured an eternity of nights like this. Watching the world go by, unable to feel what others felt.

  Unseen…unheard.

  Old demons reasserted themselves. Resting his face in his palms, Akito leaned forward to contemplate his fate. If the only thing he could be was a shadow, a tribute, or someone’s recruit, then wasn’t that at least better than being dead? He’d have his friends, his lover, and the possibility of redemption. Even if he failed, he’d at least be given the opportunity to try.

  “But, I don’t want to be a sidekick anymore,” Akito whispered, hoarse. “I want to be a hero.”

  Life meant pain and vulnerability. Death, however? That meant permanent separation from everything and everyone he loved. He’d be able to see Lyandros, Benjamin, and Nyx, but not touch or speak to them. In Faerie, he’d had the opportunity to taste life again. In death, he would see the seasons change—the snowfall and the blooming of the apple blossoms on the Common—but always be apart from the experience.

  “Gods.” He spoke into his hands before dropping them to his lap. “I’m so fucking scared.”

  There. He’d admitted it.

  He hadn’t felt so frightened since the plane carrying him and his parents had plummeted into Boston Harbor. Until now, he’d forgotten the murky water that had quickly flooded the cockpit where his father had let him sit as they’d flown from their summer home in the Hamptons. How the gray tide had seemed to want to suck him under as he’d tried desperately to wake his father.

  Daddy! Wake up! Daddy! Daddy!

  He’d unbuckled himself from his seat. Superhuman strength would have been required to do the same for his father. Or his mother. Their buckles had jammed and they were unconscious. Thinking he might be able to save them if he opened the airplane door and let in more air, he had pulled and tugged and shoved until with a creaking heave the metal had been torn from his hands on an unseen current. The plane was sucked down, and somehow, Akito was propelled to the surface. A miracle, the rescue crew had said when they’d found him clutching to a piece of debris.

  Long forgotten, the memories surfaced, one after the other. Sights of rescue lights, the whine of the engine as the plane plummeted. A whooshing sound filled his ears along with his own screams. He’d abandoned his parents to their deaths—perhaps caused their deaths by opening the door. Guilt poured itself into his middle, an emotional ballast that weighed him down. The room appeared to shimmer around him, and he lifted his head.

  At first, he thought perhaps he had unknowingly begun to cry. Except ghosts didn’t cry. Peering into the semi-darkness, he sought out Lyandros. His gaze landed on a series of blinking lights instead. The whooshing sound, he identified now as the respirator that kept his frail body alive. As if a thread connected him to his body, he was drawn forward until he floated above himself. The universe posed a question of him for which he had no answer. Did he want to fight to live? Or did he want to die? If he chose the former, then Lyandros would need to arrive quickly, because his body wasn’t going to make it after all. It had decided it was time to let go.

  Chapter 27

  As he slept, Lyandros held himself apart from dreams that should have been filled with the sights and sounds of his homecoming. Seas, dark and turbulent, transfixed him. Akito called for help repeatedly, and Lyandros tossed and turned, fitfully attempting to eject the tribute so he could sleep. The fire popped, yanking him to the surface of sleep. He rolled over, pulling the blanket around his shoulders and stared into the flames. Slowly, muzzy awareness took over sleep numbed haze, and he realized that Akito’s voice still rang in his head.

  He sat up with a start and took in the room. Tzadkiel slept in the shadows of a four-poster bed, his arm around his consort’s naked torso. The hunter, Benjamin Fuller slept with him. Lyandros frowned at the man—now a vampire—who had been of the lineage that had caused the mora and the Dragoumanos family so much strife. He didn’t understand his brother’s attraction to the man, but he also knew it wasn’t his place to question his choice in the matter. At one time, he might have had a say, but the decision had been made when he had been dead.

  Dead…

  Heat warming him on one side, subterranean damp casting an icy chill over his other, he contemplated the unlikeliness of his corporeal existence. Nyx hadn’t told him that he might regain his body when he crossed back to Boston. Lyandros doubted that the fae would have allowed him to return without knowledge of this possibility. Which meant his existence, now, was a fluke. Doubt ate at him. Magic was fragile and unpredictable when not wielded by a skilled practitioner. If his existence was an unintended consequence of his return, his body might disappear as suddenly as it had been bestowed. Of course, he should tell Tzadkiel of this possibility. Tonight, however, hadn’t seemed the time. His return to the mora had been overwhelming enough.

  He had entered the theatre and a sentry had recognized him. Thirty or so vampires had gathered, and upon Dryas’s command, fallen to their knees before him and Tzadkiel. They had chanted in unison their allegiance to the mora’s archon while their Justice Giver had looked on. Then, and only then, had Tzadkiel given way to jubilation. Lyandros couldn’t recall his brother succumbing to such a blatant public display of happy emotion at any other time. To tell his brother that all this might be ripped away once more seemed unkind. And then, the moment of joyous homecoming had been disrupted with talk of Akito, and Tzadkiel’s mood had turned.

  Gods, but the War King could be stubborn. A good thing and a bad thing, he supposed, when it came to ruling a band of immortals such as the mora. Blowing out a breath, Lyandros laid back again, and pulled the blanket up to his chin. No wonder he hadn’t been able to sleep. As his eyes drifted closed, Akito’s voice came to the fore once more. A faint cry for help that was one-half man and one-half boy. Frowning, Lyandros opened one eye and gazed at the fire. Was the sound only part of his dreams?

  No… There it was again.

  He sat up, drawing to himself the xiphos Tzadkiel bestowed on him during the ceremonies to replace the one he’d lost at his death. He donned the leather jacket over his harness and seal, sheathing the weapon at his back. Somewhere out there, Akito was in trouble. He was sure of it. What he could do to aid his tribute in the spirit realm, he didn’t know; however, he had to try. Unsure whether his brother would rule that he was not allowed to leave, Lyandros moved as silently as possible toward the door. Floorboards creaked under his feet and he froze.

  “Leaving so soon?” Sardonic humor edged Benjamin’s sleepy question.

  Next to the hunter, Tzadkiel stirred, and sat up.

  Lyandros made a mental note to aid Tzadkiel should he ever wish to have the hunter held down for arcane ritual torture. “Akito is in trouble.”

  At this news, the hunter swung his bare legs over the side of the bed and reached for his pants. “Then I’m coming with you.”

  “I do not require your help.” Lyandros turned his back, and approached the door.

  “Hold.” Tzadkiel issued the command.

  If it came down to it, Lyandros, for the first time in his life, was unsure whether his War King or his heart would hold sway.

  Shoulders stiff, Lyandros faced his brother. “Do not make me choose duty and loyalty to the mora over my tribute, Tzadkiel.”

  A dark brow arched. “Is it not your sworn duty to protect your tribute?”

  Words Lyandros had uttered earlier in the evening were tossed back to him so blithely that Lyandros almost missed their deadly calm. He swallowed, seeing that even if Tzadkiel had not asked him to make a choice—would likely not press his brother’s back to that wall—he expected Lyandros to swear his fealty to the mora over his duty to Akito. Technically, legally, historically…the War King was right. There was no legal precedent for choosing the safety of a tribute over that of the mora.

  Meeting his brot
her’s gaze, Lyandros bent one knee and lowered his head. Tzadkiel came to stand before him. Forearm across his knee, Lyandros opened his mouth to reassert the oath that had been handed down to him from his uncle. Instead, what came out, surprised even him.

  “I love him, sire. Please do not require me to choose.” Lyandros lifted his head and pleaded with a shocked Tzadkiel. “Cutting him out of my life would be to cut out my heart.”

  Benjamin whistled low from his perch on the bed. “Well, I’ll be Zeused. Hard for you to argue with that one, Tzad.”

  Tzadkiel’s expression closed off, and a stone dropped from Lyandros’s chest to his midsection. Of course, the War King would force him to swear allegiance to the mora above his tribute. If push came to shove, Tzadkiel himself would have given up Benjamin to fulfil his own oaths to Pollux.

  “The hunter is correct,” Tzadkiel said, quietly.

  Lyandros’s chin whipped up. “He is?”

  “I chose him over the mora. I cannot ask you to do any different when it comes to your heart.” Shoulders dropping, Tzadkiel approached the wardrobe to retrieve his coat. “Hypocrites are as bad as liars in the eyes of the gods.”

  Standing, Lyandros watched, awestruck, as Tzadkiel lifted the kylix from a safe and spun the dial to relock the door.

  “You would do this? For me?”

  Tzadkiel faced him, regard steady. “That, and much more.”

  “I—” Lyandros felt himself color, embarrassed to have been given so much when he had begrudged his brother his fealty. “I am ashamed that I doubted… I am loyal to the mora.”

  Benjamin, who had moved to Tzadkiel’s side, slipped an arm around his partner’s waist and leaned in for a brief kiss. The hunter withdrew to dress. Tzadkiel watched him for a moment with open affection before returning his attention to Lyandros.

  “Then you are more loyal than I was in my decision.” Tzadkiel, withdrawing his dagger from its sheath, focused on the blade, inspecting it by sight and delicate touch. “If the mora had not voted in Benjamin’s favor, I would have moved on with him to Gemini.”

  Palms flat on the scarred wood of the nearby dining table, Lyandros gaped at his brother. “You would have died?”

  Gaze meaningful, Tzadkiel looked up from the blade, his lingering touch producing a droplet of blood on his thumb. He sheathed the dagger without comment and took up his xiphos, repeating the inspection process before stowing the weapon at his back.

  Lyandros glanced to the hunter, who had donned a white, flowing shirt and the mora’s customary black leather trousers. The sturdy clothing served many purposes, not the least of which was acting as a uniform of sorts. Lyandros smiled, noting that the pair Benjamin wore appeared older than the nine months he surmised Benjamin had been with the mora. The hunter fit in with his chosen family as well as the men who had belonged to it for millennia.

  Catching Lyandros staring, Benjamin donned his sunglasses with insouciant swagger. “Let’s go give Akito his birthday present.”

  “Birthday present?” Lyandros asked, trailing the hunter and his brother out of the room. “You are not saying Akito was born this day, are you?”

  While the chances were one in three-hundred and sixty-five, Lyandros intuited that this was not Benjamin’s meaning. And what was this gift he spoke of?

  “I think of the day Tzadkiel revived me as my birthday now.” Benjamin climbed the theatre stairs two at a time. “And his turning me was my present.”

  Tzadkiel harrumphed next to him, clearly pleased though embarrassed at the affectionate tone the conversation had taken. Would Akito truly view the return to his body as a gift, however? Remembering the moment when his newly dead tribute had attempted to dislodge the machines that kept his body alive, Lyandros had his doubts.

  “I do not think he will greet the return to life as joyously as you imagine,” Lyandros surmised aloud. “The Morgan will still need to be dealt with.”

  At street level, they pushed through the doors to Boylston. The night air swirled with a fine mist that seemed to cling to the Common’s globe lights. Benjamin paused on the sidewalk to regard him.

  “Hm. You could be right.”

  “I think, from what you told me,” Tzadkiel interjected, scanning the greenspace with hawkish intensity for visible threats, “that he might view his return to this life more favorably with the addition of the strength and powers the change affords.”

  Though every man had a different response to the change, all gained some measure of magic. It was true that the transformation might make fighting off the Morgan’s influence easier for Akito. Indeed, it might erase the witch’s hold over him altogether.

  Heartened, Lyandros nodded. “Then we are right to make this decision for him.”

  “Let’s hope,” Benjamin muttered, his booted footfalls echoing down Boylston as they skirted around the Common. “The bastard is the one who taught me to fight. I’m not exactly relishing the thought of being on the losing side of an argument with him.”

  “He will not touch you if he wishes to live,” Tzadkiel growled.

  “Oh, shut up,” Benjamin said, though he clearly preened at the War King’s display of possessive protection.

  The two walked ahead of Lyandros. He hung back, letting them gain distance. Droplets of water clung to the pair’s leathers, making them glisten in the lamplight, and the quiet murmur of intimate conversation reached Lyandros’s ears. It was a sight he’d never contemplated beholding.

  His brother. In love.

  Their bond forced Lyandros to consider his feelings for Akito. The man was his tribute, and Lyandors love him, true. Given the likely life-sentence, however, could he truly be anything more? The power inequality between Tzadkiel and Benjamin clearly caused the two conflict, and Benjamin had a larger measure of free will than Akito would have in his relationship with Lyandros.

  Deep in contemplation, it took Lyandros a moment longer than it might have otherwise to notice the unnatural shadows slithering in his peripheral vision. It looked like… He stared harder and shook his head to right his vision. No, it couldn’t be. A shade? The same one that had dogged both him and Akito on the Common some weeks ago, in fact.

  Fear was not a feeling Lyandros was accustomed to. Its eel-like presence slipped through his middle, leaving cold dread in its wake. “Tzadkiel,” he called. “Can you still see me?”

  Tzadkiel halted and turned, stopping across from Park Street Church. “Yes. Is there a problem?”

  Either whatever magic held Lyandros in his corporeal state was fading, or he had an unnatural connection with the spirit realm now that he had returned from the dead. Given that he hadn’t been able to see Akito upon their return to Boston, however, he would have laid money on the former.

  “I think…” Drawing near to Tzadkiel and the hunter, Lyandros cast a furtive glance toward the Common where more dark shapes lurked. “I do not have much time.”

  Tzadkiel frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I—” The light changed around him, fading in and out, as if the veil between life and death had already torn, and only waited for him to step through. “Promise me you will take care of Akito?”

  “Are you…” Benjamin, whose supernatural gift Lyandros understood allowed him to see auras, appeared to scan him. “Dying?”

  Lyandros felt an ironic smile lift his lips without his permission. “I am already dead. This is merely borrowed time.”

  He explained the enchantment he believed had been wrought upon his return through the portal. Sunlight and his shield had fashioned him a new body, but their combined magic would not last without something to bind it.

  Tzadkiel, searching Lyandros’s face, nodded gravely. “If you pass on, then meet me on the steps of Parkman Bandstand at the next new moon. The sky will be dark and I will be able to direct your spirit to Gemini.”

  Nostrils stinging, Lyandros jerked his head once, not trusting his voice. To have come this far and to lose Akito, to lose everything. It seemed so unfair. Yet,
the gods had granted his wish to see his brother and his mora again. Many things had been put right this day.

  “Thank you,” Lyandros said as they rounded the corner to the hospital where Akito’s body still lay.

  Staring straight ahead, Tzadkiel replied, “Follow my lead when we are inside. Promise me.”

  Lyandros frowned. “Of course. But what do you have planned?”

  “There is no time to explain.”

  Glass doors to the after-hours entrance whooshed open. Benjamin distracted the security guard, his extended cane brandished to make him appear in need of more assistance than his reality dictated.

  At Akito’s doorway, Lyandros paused. He felt Akito more strongly here. A team of doctors worked on his tribute’s body, attempting to bring it back from cardiac arrest. The paddles contacted Akito’s chest and his body arched. Horror clutched at Lyandros and he swept into the room. The line on the screen remained a flat, shrill indicator of the wreckage of the man’s mortal shell.

  “Fight, tribute,” Lyandros commanded. “Damn you.”

  But what if Akito did not wish to return? Then, Lyandros might move on to Gemini with him. Hope surged, to be replaced with bitter knowledge of the supreme selfishness of Lyandros’s desires. He would not wish death on his love, only to remain with him. Akito had friends and a future to live for.

  “Fight,” Lyandros ground again.

  Energy trilled through Lyandros. Akito’s life force. So close by he could almost reach out and touch him. Acquiescence flavored the connection, and Lyandros knew Akito would obey. A blip on the monitor had the staff scurrying to stabilize the minute signs of life until, finally, a weak but steady rhythm resulted. A young doctor wiped the back of his hand over his brow and noticed Lyandros and Tzadkiel for the first time.