Angel's Assassin (33 page)

The thunderous pounding in Damien’s head, the
roar of the angry flames all about him, prevented him from hearing
what came out. The fire throbbed and surged forward, consuming Roke
in its unrelenting hunger. Damien’s former master, his tormenter,
disappeared in a sudden violent burst of flames. The eruption of
heat singed the hairs on Damien’s arms and the scorching warmth
flashed across his face. Using his last bit of strength, he turned
away from the incredible inferno and the gruesome sight. The black
veil again descended across his vision.

Aurora.

He blinked his eyes, forcing the dark curtain
away. He had to get to her. He had to save her. He willed his body
up, but it would not comply. He lay on the floor, seeing the fire
blazing all around him. He could no longer hear its hellish roar,
nor feel its scathing heat. Above him, the flames rolled across the
ceiling like living clouds. Damien knew he wouldn’t reach Aurora.
His strength was gone. He was using sheer willpower alone to stay
conscious. She was safe. At least, Aurora was safe. Roke was
gone.

And then Damien saw the silhouette of a
shadow coming toward him through the flames. Panic and disbelief
welled inside him. Roke was alive! How could that be? The fire
swallowed him up!

In the next instant, Damien knew it was
something more powerful, something more beautiful. An angelic
figure floated through the hot firestorm. The flames flickered, but
did not extinguish. Damien’s heart pounded. His eyes welled with
tears. He must have died because she came to him through the molten
flames, right through the middle of the raging blaze. She did not
flinch from the heat; her skin did not darken and char. Aurora came
to him, untouched. An angel.

His angel.

Then darkness descended over him.

A
urora stared
at Damien as he lay stretched out in her bed at Castle
Acquitaine.

When she had returned to Castle Acquitaine,
she discovered her father had jumped from the highest tower and was
dead. She mourned his loss and buried him in the family crypt. She
prayed every night for him, and for Alexander, and hoped her
father’s troubled soul would finally be able to rest. She kept the
happy memories of their times together close to her heart.

Now she focused on Damien. He had been
unconscious for almost three full days. Alexander and her father
were already gone. She couldn’t lose Damien, too.

Her heart ached and she clutched Damien’s
limp hand tightly, refusing to let him go. For every second he did
not open his eyes, for every moment he lay without nourishment, the
chances of his recovery grew increasingly distant.

How could she have ever doubted him? Damien
always protected her. It was difficult and painful to think he
killed her mother. But she understood why. He believed he had no
choice. Roke had manipulated him. Roke had tortured him. Roke held
his freedom and used it against him. Damien had not been strong
enough to resist him.

Now he was. Damien defeated Roke.

It shouldn’t be enough to forgive him for
killing her mother. Taking a life was a mortal sin. But he was not
the same man he had been. And she wanted to forgive him. Because
she needed him. She needed him at her side. She needed him with her
always. So that she could love him.

And she did. Lord help her, but she loved
him. She loved him enough to forgive him. She prayed to God to give
her the chance to tell him.

She kissed his hand. “Do not do this, Damien.
You are stronger than this,” she whispered. “I will not know what
to do without you.” Tears filled her eyes again. And then, she must
have drifted off, for he stood before her, the gates of heaven at
his back.

She took a step toward him, holding her hand
out. “Don’t go.”

He did not even look at the gates. His gaze
rested on her, only on her. Those black, black eyes, mistaken by
many to be emotionless and cold. But she knew what rested in his
soul; she had always known.

“Damien,” she called, pleaded, begged.

Something heavy rested on her head. Something
pulled her away. She didn’t want to leave him.

“Aurora.”

She fought to remain asleep, fought against
the tug of wakefulness. Someone shook her gently. She opened her
eyes, afraid Damien would be gone, afraid she had lost him. She
lifted her head, angry and fearful.

His eyes were open, gazing at her with
concern.

Aurora gasped through a sudden onrush of
tears. She dropped to her knees at his bedside, touched his face.
“Damien,” she wept. “Damien.”

“I could not leave you,” he admitted,
stroking her cheek with the same anguished concern that rumbled
through her.

Aurora embraced him, kissing the warm skin of
his neck, his jaw, his cheek. His lips.

“Are you hurt?”

His question startled her and she pulled back
to look at him lying in the thick covers of her bed. The irony was
not lost on her. He always protected her. Now, it was her turn to
heal him. Her gaze fluttered over his face, touching every scratch
and every cut. “No,” she answered sincerely.

He looked around the room. “Where are we?”
His body stiffened. “Where’s Roke?”

Aurora soothed and calmed him with gentle
touches of her fingertips over his strong shoulders. “He is
dead.”

Damien looked at her with an intense, direct
stare. “You saw his body?”

Aurora nodded. “Charred black by the fire. As
black as his soul.”

“You’re sure it was him?”

Aurora looked into Damien’s concerned eyes
and nodded. “I have no doubt. He still wore the ring with his
heraldry on it.”

Damien’s eyes slid over her face. “Did he
hurt you?”

Her heart ached with tenderness. “Hurt me?”
All the years of his life he spent as Roke’s prisoner, all those
years living under Roke’s rule and Damien was worried about the one
day she spent with him.

“Did he touch you?”

Aurora shook her head. “He never laid a hand
upon me.” Her fingers found the white scar from a whip on his upper
arm. “What you must have endured…” She shook her head.

Damien did not deny her words.

Her heart lurched for him. It was time he was
given what he deserved. She lifted her chin to meet his gaze.
“Sometimes, even good people must do bad things to overcome
evil.”

Damien’s hand dropped from her shoulders.

It took Aurora a moment to realize he thought
she was condemning him for his actions. “You are the bravest man I
have ever known. And the most admirable. Forgive me for ever
doubting you.”

Damien did not move for a long moment. “No,
Aurora,” he whispered. “Forgive me. Forgive me for all this evil I
have brought to you.” His throat closed around his words. “From the
very beginning, you believed in me, despite my warnings. You knew
who I was from the beginning and you had faith in me.” He lifted
both of her hands and pressed kisses against her knuckles. “It was
your undying loyalty that made me this strong. You never doubted
me. You called to me and guided me into the light. You are my
salvation. You are… everything to me. Please forgive me for what I
have done to you.”

Aurora lifted her hands to frame his face. “I
know now you were following orders when you killed my mother. But
even then, you could not hurt me. It was you I have been searching
for all these years. We were meant to be together. I love you.”

Damien’s world erupted in joy. His fear
washed away in the light of her forgiveness. He leaned forward and
tasted her lips, relishing the feeling of her. She was his. Despite
all that was between them, and maybe, just maybe, because of all
that was between them, she loved him anyway. Damien smiled beneath
her kiss. As the fact that this glorious woman had chosen him above
all others sunk in, Damien leaned his head back and laughed in
elation for the first time since his childhood. He pulled her
close, holding her. Then slowly, a slight scowl crossed his brow.
“There is one thing. How did we get back here?”

Aurora stood up and walked to the door,
opening it.

Gawyn stepped into the room, his usual
mocking grin etched in the curve of his lips. “Hello, brother,” he
greeted. “I knew the flames of Hell wouldn’t keep you from your
angel.”

Aurora sat on the bed beside Damien. She
collected his hand into hers. “With the room in flames, it was
Gawyn who came in. He saved you, Damien. He saved us.”

Shocked, Damien’s brows rose.

Gawyn smiled. “It was my one chance at
redemption and I wasn’t going to pass it up. I was not going to
leave you this time.”

Damien’s stoic stare softened to acceptance
and true gratitude. He held his hand out to his brother. “This
time, I won’t miss my chance either.”

Gawyn clasped Damien’s hand tightly.

“You worthless, contemptible dog,” the
taskmaster screamed. He pulled his hand back to slap the young boy
hard across his face.

“All hail Lord of Acquitaine!” The
proclamation filtered through the floorboards of the
Redemption.

Otis grumbled and shoved the boy back from
him. What the devil was a lord doing aboard the Redemption? He had
been taskmaster of the ship for twenty years. Not once did any lord
come aboard this dirty ship.

The footfalls from overhead headed toward the
stairs. And they did not stop there. The Captain’s voice could be
heard from above, calling to the Lord of Acquitaine. “You don’t
want to go down there. It’s dirty and—”

The top hatch whipped open, spilling sunlight
into the hold. Otis shielded his eyes from its brightness.

Suddenly, impeccably polished black boots
appeared at the top stair and proceeded down. The Lord of
Acquitaine was a tall man and had to duck beneath the hatch. He
stopped at the bottom of the ladder, straightening, his gaze taking
in the entire hold. Many young eyes stared back. Even the older men
gazed in awe at the lord who dared dirty his boots by coming into
the bowels of hell.

Maybe he came for a reason. Otis stepped up
to him. “Good day, m’lord,” he greeted. “We have tender young flesh
here, if that be yer liking.”

Fuming black eyes turned to meet his. Otis
shrank back from the fury burning there. And yet, an inkling of
familiarity tugged at the corners of his memory. Did he know this
lord? Otis bowed apologetically. “M’lord—”

“Damien,” the Lord of Acquitaine
corrected.

Damien. Otis replayed the name and a memory
of a child came to mind. He knew him. Damien! The only boy who ever
dared to fight him, the only boy who dared to defy him. But it
couldn’t be the same child! The Damien he knew had been beaten,
cowed, and sold into slavery.

The whispered name echoed in awe from lips in
the darkness like a soft breeze spreading through the room.

There was such animosity shining from those
black eyes that Otis stepped back.

“Free them,” Damien ordered and turned,
heading back up the stairs. “Free them all.”

Damien had not remembered how foul the stench
was below decks. Urine. Rotting decay. He had not remembered the
sense of hopelessness permeating the air. But he remembered the
fear.

Captain Blackmoore raced up to him. “Damien…
M’lord, you can’t—”

“I will take all of them,” Damien
announced.

The captain began to smile.

“And your ship.”

“My ship?” the captain echoed, blandly.

Damien strolled toward Rupert who awaited him
at the starboard side. “Burn it,” he commanded. “Burn it all to
hell.”

“Aye,” Rupert nodded solemnly.

Damien turned his back on the exclamations of
shock and disbelief sputtering from Captain Blackmoore and the
ogre. He scanned the dusty street where he told Aurora to wait.

She headed up the gangplank. He grimaced and
shook his head. She never listened to him. He quickly moved to her,
blocking her way onto the ship. “I told you not to come here.”

Aurora strained to see around him. “What is
it, Damien? What don’t you want me to see?”

A sudden coil of fear clamped down on his
heart. He didn’t want her soiled by the slave ship. He didn’t want
even a toe of her beautiful foot to land upon this ship of sin. “My
past,” he said and put a hand to her back, urging her down the
gangplank.

She resisted for a moment as she stared deep
into his eyes, searching.

Damien would never let her be tarnished by
his past. It was a part of him he wanted to put behind him, a part
he wanted to put a permanent end to. It was over and his life began
anew when he met Aurora. She turned, allowing him to escort her
from the ship.

A large garrison of soldiers waited for their
lord and lady in the street. Damien paused before Imp. He lifted
Aurora’s hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to her soft knuckles.
His fingers stroked her palm, fingering the new ring he had given
her. The gold band encircled her finger, a beautiful glimmering
angel on its front. A new family heirloom, he had told her.

Aurora looked at the ship. “What is this
ship?”

“The Redemption,” he answered, not bothering
to look at the cursed vessel.

Aurora swiveled her head to him then.

The slight furrow on her brow, the concern in
her bright eyes and the way she gripped his hand protectively, were
all indicators of her worry over his happiness.

Damien wiped away the lingering doubt with a
kiss to her brow. “You need not worry. Everything is as it should
be.”

She nodded and turned to mount Imp.

“Aurora,” Damien called.

She paused and looked at him.

Damien could only stare at her. She was the
loveliest woman in all creation. His light. His good. His
redemption. He nuzzled her temple and whispered in her ear, “I love
you.” The words came easily, effortlessly, earnestly.