Burning Ember (11 page)

Poe nodded and flashed a smile. “Blood is currency in the vampire court. My blood is of the purest, therefore the most valuable.”

Scarlet opened her mouth to ask why Poe’s blood was so pure.

“Poe is the crown prince of the Vampires.” Zane supplied.

Scarlet closed her mouth as Poe buttoned up his shirt again and sat.

“Consider it a debt owed.” Archer gritted his teeth in guilt.

“As you saw, the information I got was costly, even if it was vague and—in my opinion—useless.”

“Can the death sentence be lifted?” Scarlet asked.

“The answer on that is unclear.” Poe held up his hand as they all started to question him at once. “Everyone tells me that it can’t be lifted. That there is no power save that of the hidden God that can lift it—that’s the useless part—but…” he paused with a small smile. “I think I’ve found a way for you to at least try and get it lifted in another way. I had a
conversation
,” Poe stressed the word, “With one of our court seers.”

“How can we try and get it lifted?” Archer asked.

Scarlet could feel the tension coming off him in waves.

“The Unnamed Oracle.” Poe closed his lips as if waiting for a reaction, and he got one so strong, Scarlet was startled by its intensity.

“You’ve gone insane, right?” Archer shot to his feet. “All the blood you drink has made you nuts.”

Poe took the storm of Archer’s anger without flinching. “My sanguine addiction aside, it’s the only other way.”

“Completely, fucking insane. No one that tries to find the Unnamed Oracle makes it back alive.”

Scarlet watched the scene with wide eyes. She was starting to detest being the newbie in this group of Eternals.

“I’ve got the map—stole it, actually. So, I’m in deep shit when I go back to court and my father gets hold of me.” Poe got up and walked to the back of the room, then returned with a rolled parchment, which he tossed at Zane. “Can you make a copy of that, please?”

“You really do want to piss your father off, don’t you?” Zane shook his head.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Poe said with a naughty glint in his eye. “Am I not supposed to copy an ancient secret map? My bad.”

Zane shook his head again and got up to go make a Photostat of the map. “If I get implicated, they’ll make me get a suntan, you know that, right?”

“You never saw the map, Zane, Poe never brought it here. We will all vow it,” Archer assured him.

Zane sighed and left the room.

“This is a suicide mission,” Archer said.

“Yes, but think how much fun you’ll have before you die. How long did you think you could keep the pyro hidden here?” Poe arched a brow. “Before they find a powerful witch to reverse our protection, or Scarlet burns the place down while we’re sleeping?”

Archer turned his face to Scarlet. “He has a point.” He stood and looked at his wristwatch. “You have an hour to pack,
Belan
, then we get going.”

“We are going to look for this nameless oracle?”

“Unnamed Oracle, and yes, we are. I’ve never been one to wait for the fight come to me.”

Scarlet rose to her feet and started to walk out before turning to both men, “Did it occur to anyone to ask me my opinion? I’m not a child, and I’m no one’s property.”

She understood why Archer felt compelled to help her, even though she wasn’t the pyro in his vision, and she thought he was being a bit over enthusiastic. It still grated her that no one had even asked her opinion. Not that she could voice much of one. She was like a baby in their world, still needing to learn a lot.

“Don’t be a drama queen, Scarlet,” Poe said, “we have your best interests at heart.”

“Do you have a heart, Poe? I mean one that beats,” she spat, and then turned and left the room.

“Ouch, you wound me, pyro…you wound me deep.”

The sound of a snort came from the hallway, and Poe grinned.

“Why do you keep taunting her?” Archer asked.

Poe shrugged. “She intrigues me.” He turned his eyes to the door. “I’d like to get to know her better.”

“Lose that idea in a hurry.” Archer’s voice was low, a growl.

Poe’s head snapped back so he could raise an eyebrow in question.

“My beast says she’s my
She,
” Archer admitted with a resigned look on his face.

“No, that’s not possible, she’s not Lycan. Hell, she’s not a Thrope at all.”

“I’m the choir, bro, doesn’t change the fact that my beast is adamant.” Archer sat forward and rested his elbows on his knees.

“Fair enough. I’ll keep my hands off, then, but what are
you
going to do about it?”

Archer lifted a hand to run it through his hair, and breathed out a sigh. “I don’t know.”

“You are going to have to do something.”

“I know that, Poe.” Archer clenched his teeth. “I don’t want to get romantic with someone who’s not even the same breed as I am. No matter how tempting.” The last was said in a mutter below his breath.

Poe gave him a knowing smile. “She’s hot. Even hotter all cleaned up. Let me know if you decide not to go for it.” He stood. “Because
I
will.”

Poe’s words sent Archer’s beast roaring to the font and he felt his fangs shoot in and his claws start to curl, but Archer fought it back. “Damn it, Poe, stop provoking my beast,” Archer half lisped.

Poe laughed and left the room.

Chapter Ten

Their departure from the building that housed
Outsiders Inc.
was an exercise in cloak and dagger. Scarlet half expected the theme music for
Mission Impossible
to start playing from hidden loud speakers.

As soon as she was packed, Archer bundled her down a passage, hidden behind an elaborate panel contraption that made her think of ancient haunted mansion.

The difference was that this one used retina scans and voice recognition to open, not hidden catches or bricks you had to depress in a specific order.

It seemed that the preternatural men she was stuck with were also geeks at heart.

They led her down the well-lit corridor and down several flights of stairs until they emerged in a closed-in underground parking garage.

Archer took her small bag from her and opened the trunk of a dark SUV. There was several military-type duffel bags in the trunk, and Scarlet’s little bag looked out of place.

“What is in those? We aren’t transporting dead bodies around, are we?”

Archer raised his brow and answered with a shrug of his big shoulders. “Weapons and supplies—we’ll re-evaluate the need to cart corpses around in the duffels later.”

“Ha ha, funny.” She kept her expression blank so her sarcasm would be clear.

“Who said I was joking?”

She wasn’t going to touch that. Instead, she looked around trying to find something familiar. “This isn’t the same parking garage we came in earlier.”

“No, it isn’t.” He slammed the lid down on the SUV, moved around to the passenger side, and opened the door in one smooth motion. “Let’s get going.”

Scarlet slipped past him to get into the SUV and tried not to breathe in that delicious scent that came off his skin. She needed to stay focused, and a lung-full of essence-of-Archer wasn’t going to help her keep a clear head.

He closed the door while Scarlet busied herself with putting on her seat belt. She looked up as he turned the key in the ignition.

“Where are we going?”

He looked over to her as he shifted the SUV into reverse then pulled out the parking bay. “West.”

“Wow.” Scarlet dropped her head back on the headrest, and turned her face to him, rolling her eyes.

“What?” He pulled forward and drove out the underground parking garage after stopping for another retinal scan on the way out.

“You need to look up the word
taciturn
.” Scarlet shrugged and looked out the window, wanting to memorize the route they were taking. They had not come in this way, since they were in a different parking garage, but then again, she’d been asleep, so she couldn’t be sure.

Duh, like I didn’t know that already. Points for being the queen of the obvious
, the annoying inner Scarlet pointed out.

“I know what taciturn means and I’m not taciturn.” Archer kept his eyes forward.

“”Puh-lease. You are the typical strong, silent type or a gambler, with your cards close to your chest. Pick your cliché.”

He looked over at her. “You think you are such a great judge of character?”

She shrugged. “With the life I’ve had, I learned to read people fast.”

“You learned to read humans,
belan
. You need to re-evaluate everything you’ve learned, because you are on a whole new playing field, now.”

Archer turned onto the freeway and started west, just as he’d said he would.

“Humans and—”

“Eternals,” Archer supplied.

“I knew that. There can’t be that big of a difference.” Scarlet was curious. If Archer was correct, he had taken away one of her greatest tools. She’d always used her ability to read people and their motives to her advantage. Surviving had honed the skill.

“For the most part, I’d say you can read immortals the same way you’d read humans, but an immortal’s motives might be different.”

“Example?”

“Me, I’m not taciturn. I’m watchful.”

“Quiet is quiet.” She looked out the window again.

His voice dipped lower. “Don’t insult my intelligence, or your own. You know what I mean.”

“So, spell it out.” Scarlet was being obtuse on purpose. This whole situation had her itchy in her skin, and she wanted to share her discomfort. Spiteful, yes, but a woman should be able to be a bit spiteful every now and then.

“You think I’m being quiet because I don’t want to give you information and I want to keep you at a disadvantage.”

“Duh.”

“I’m being quiet because I need my senses focused on our surroundings. The minute we left the building, we became vulnerable, and I’m an eternal male in protection mode.”

“Protection mode, is it?” She threw his words back at him. “You can give me more of the plan and still protect me.”

He laughed without real humor. “
Belan,
you have a lot to learn about immortal males.”

His laughter caused her hackles to rise and Scarlet wanted to yell at him. She settled for a monotone. “So, educate me.”

“Males will do anything to protect their females.” He didn’t even pause before saying, “Now sleep—we have a long drive ahead of us.”

Her eyes flared at his words. No, she so wasn’t going to take those words to mean he considered her his.

She opened her mouth to question him some more.

He cut her off, leaned forward, and turned the radio on. Dubstep pumping through the speakers stopped her from saying any more.

Maybe that’s for the best,
she told herself as she leaned her head against the window and stared out at the passing scenery, watching the cityscape give way to fields.

They traveled through the night. The radio prevented any chance for conversation—or was that interrogation—so Scarlet watched him as he drove, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of the songs.

* * * *

When the first feint tinges of dawn painted the sky, Archer pulled the SUV into a motel truck stop combination.

He parked in a space at the entrance of the office building. A dilapidated sign proclaimed
Vacancies
in sporadic neon.

Archer felt like million buzzing insects were filling his body. The time in the car had been hell, her scent taunting his beast until he felt like the creature would go insane from wanting to take control of Archer. His damn inner wolf was restless because it was so close to the full moon, and he wanted to mark Scarlet as his. It had been an exercise in patience and calming to keep his beast in check.

The fact that she wasn’t marked was something his beast wasn’t prepared to accept, but it was something Archer was not prepared to do.

So the careful accord he and his inner monster had worked out all those years ago was teetering on the breaking point.

“Come,” he ordered, and got out of the door.

Scarlet’s eyebrow rose, but Archer ignored the expression. She should be damn glad she was getting ordered around instead of finding herself under him, filled with him and his name marking her collar bone, where he’d claimed her as his, for all to see.

He suppressed a groan when that image hit his mind.

“Are you sick or something?” Scarlet asked as she walked around the front of the SUV.

He shook his head.

“You just groaned and swayed…are you sure?”

“It’s close to the full moon.” He climbed the three steps and pushed open the door to the office, with Scarlet right behind him.

The old guy behind the counter stood and pushed his glasses up his nose while the TV blared in the background. “Good morning, and how can I help you?”

“Single, please.” Archer smiled and put cash down on the counter. “One day.”

“He means two rooms,” Scarlet told the old man.

“No. I mean one room, for one day,” he told her, and turned to the old guy again.

The old man looked from Archer to Scarlet, then to Archer again.

“One day, you say. Well, sure thing. Here you go, just put your name and details down in this book. I’ll get the keys for you.” The glasses slipped, and the old man slid them back up his nose again.

He turned and selected a key on a big paddle from the peg board behind him.

“Room Thirteen, one of our best.”

Archer suppressed the urge to snort. It was a flea bag motel, no matter which room you were in. He finished writing
Benicio Del Toro
into the book, then reached out to take the key from the guy and bumped into Scarlet, since she was leaning over him to read what he had written.

“Last door on the end.” The glasses were pushed up again, this time with a smile.