Demon's Kiss (25 page)

The night she had first taken Ciarran’s magic.

The night Asag had come.

She struck out, gathering what remnants of strength she had, and a bright shaft burst from her to coil around Asag’s wrist and slice through gray demon hide with a sizzling hiss. Snarling viciously, the demon gave one final brutal swipe at Ciarran’s shoulder, tearing open his skin, and then spun away, back toward her.

“Let him go? I think not. He will pay the price for the entire Compact of Sorcerers, pay with his torment and his blood. Endure the suffering as I was forced to endure.” Asag caught a fistful of her hair. Yanking her head back, he shoved his face close to hers. The stink of decay was nearly overpowering.

She was aware of Ciarran’s rage, of the sound of clanking chains and the roar of his fury.

Asag’s teeth raked her cheek, her throat, and bile rose, burning inside of her, nausea churning so viciously she thought she would be sick.

“Let me tell you of his fate,” he whispered against her ear. “
Immortal
. You understand that your sorcerer is immortal?”

He paused, letting the import of his words reach her. “And that is the best part of all. He
cannot
die. He can only
suffer
. Endless torment. Do you see?”

Immortal.

Of course.

Somehow, she had known that. He would live forever. And she would die at the end of a mortal life.

Then let her die here, now, in his place. Her life was finite; his was not. Let him live to fight, to protect mankind.

Asag drew back, studied her face. “I see I have failed to surprise you. I had hoped for a stronger reaction. Ah, but there is more.” Laughing, he ran the tip of one gray talon along her lower lip. Clea gagged, jerking against the grip he had on her hair, desperate to be free. “Immortal. A word you cannot conceive. He cannot die. Not ever. Forever.
No matter how heinous a wound he receives
.”

Pausing, Asag drew back and studied her, watching her face. “Actually, there
are
ways to terminate a sorcerer’s life, but they’ll prefer him alive. And suffering.”

She could hear Ciarran fighting and struggling, jerking against the bonds of the dark chains that held him.

“When I send him through the portal, they will be waiting for him. A thousand demons, with their talons and teeth. They will rip the skin from his body, tear his muscle, break his bones.” Asag smiled, a tight drawing of his lips that bared hideous rows of jagged teeth. “A human would die in a glorious blaze of suffering. But not your sorcerer, Clea. Your sorcerer will live through it, know every second of his pain. And then he will live it again. And again.”

“Oh, God.” The horror of it overwhelmed her.

Crazy thoughts swirled through her mind, snatches of conversation and half-understood words. She swallowed against the heavy knot that tightened her chest. Asag used her magic to tear down the wall, to open the portal.

It was her power that opened the breach.

Perhaps her power could hold it shut.

If there was no door, then Ciarran could not be cast through it.

She focused on that possibility, desperately willing it to be true. Her skin tingled, and again that bright burst of light shimmered forth. With all her frantic intent, she tried to focus it, channel it. Close the portal. Save Ciarran. Save the world.

Sick comprehension crawled through her as the twisted patch of night sky writhed and grew ever larger.
Worse
. Her efforts were only making it worse.

“A good attempt. How sad that it bore no fruit.” Asag clapped his distorted hands together, a parody of applause. “And you, my dear, with your freshly gained power. You, too, will survive a long, long while as my personal plaything.”

“Clea . . .” Ciarran spoke her name on a breath.

Where was his brotherhood now? she wondered once more. His Compact of Sorcerers? His brothers had not come. He was alone, his magic drawn to the thinnest point.

She felt him opening to her in a last desperate effort to give her enough power to keep herself safe. At his own peril. He would have nothing left for his own defense. She sensed that he kept back only the barest minimum he needed to hold his demon parasite at bay. His sacrifice was in vain, because instead of offering her protection, his power channeled through her and funneled to open the gate.

She knew the instant he reached the same conclusion as she had, the instant he pulled back on the flow of magic. With her heart breaking, she met his gaze, and it was all there for her to see. The love. The desperation.

The absence of hope.

He was bound by demonic chains, weakened by her proximity and her steady draw on his power. In his gaze, she read the truth.

He could not save them.

“Know that I love you,” he rasped, wanting to give her that, knowing it was little enough.

Asag chortled, enjoying their misery, watching their interaction with rabid fascination.

“Let me kiss him good-bye.” Clea grabbed Asag’s wrist, a desperate action that made the demon turn and study her with a calculating gaze. “I beg you”—her voice broke—“one last kiss.”

Ciarran gritted his teeth, stifling the urge to rage at hearing her beg the demon for anything. He wanted it too badly, that one last kiss, that memory that he would carry with him to the demon realm, the feel of her in his arms, the scent of her skin. Maybe it would be enough to keep him sane through the millennia of torture the demons would inflict.

His fury and black despair fed the thing inside him. The parasite roared, sensing Clea, wanting her; the beast was barely restrained.

Suddenly, he recalled the way she had looked in his bed, her eyes intent as she told him her story. He heard her words as though she spoke them now.
Do you know what Gram said? That there is both great goodness and vast evil in all sentient beings and that we can choose our path, not by stifling the evil, but by accepting its existence. Accepting and choosing. Do you understand?

Accepting. What would happen if he stopped the struggle, the fight, if he accepted the darkness, let it breach his wards and barriers? It would take his body, his soul, twist him into something warped and foreign.

The darkest sorcery.

But the demon seed had protected her before, would protect her now. In that instant, Ciarran saw his path, the one slender thread of hope.

Darkness to fight the darkness. If he let go, then it would be free. There would be no way to call it to heel. So his life was forfeit, but Clea could be saved.

She had opened her mind and her heart, called to him, every part of him, the light, the darkness. The hell-and-brimstone demon that was part of his soul.

Part of him.

His proud and valiant Clea
begged
for him.
Christe.

Asag smiled a sly, dreadful smile, and seeing it, Clea dropped her hold on him and stumbled back a step.

“Oh, I like that . . . the sound of you pleading,” the demon purred. “Do you know that if you touch him, you will draw yet more of his magic?” He glanced at the shimmering oval of night sky, at the distorted backdrop of stars, the twisted halo that carried the threat of destruction. “You will be stronger, open the gate more quickly. And your sorcerer will be weaker, more susceptible to the cruelty of the demon realm.” Asag stalked her, moving close enough to press his face against her cheek. She shuddered violently but held her place as he inhaled noisily. “Yes. By all means. Kiss him. And then kiss me.”

He motioned to the
hybrids,
and they dragged Ciarran closer. The chains twined and shifted, wrenching his wrists so tightly together he could not move them, biting into flesh—a spike of agony.

“I love you,” Clea whispered. With a sob, she leaned against him, raised her lips to his. Ciarran could hear Asag laughing and the
hybrids
cackling in unison.

“Clea mine.” He tasted the salt of her tears, felt the wild cadence of her pulse. “The glove. Take the glove,” he murmured for her ears alone. “Free the beast. It is the only way.”

She took a gasping breath. Her gaze snapped to his, wide, terrified. He could feel the hard drumming of her heart, one beat, two. And then she smiled, a tiny quirk of her lips as her hands slid around behind him, and her fingers curled under the edge of his glove, leather and alloy caught in her grasp. With a hard tug, she pulled it halfway free, baring his palm.

An icy smear of darkness oozed free, and Ciarran breathed with the pain, forcing himself to forgo the training of decades, to remain passive, to erect no barriers in the thing’s path.

Asag leaped forward, the back of his hand coming hard against Clea’s cheek as he knocked her aside. She fell, her momentum pulling the leather and alloy free of Ciarran’s fingers. The glove fell to the ground as the prison cracked open, the cage door fully released.

In that instant, he felt the darkness, a thick, oily sludge, so powerful he could taste it, feel it touch every part of him. He threw back his head, called to it, embraced the pain.

With a howl of glee, the demon in Ciarran’s soul slid free.

Demonic power surged inside him as he flung Asag’s chains from his body. Two decades of battling the darkness in his soul, and now, as it spilled through him, the sensation so heavy, so fulsome, he wondered why he had denied it. The lure of the demon.
Christe
. Such temptation. He wanted to embrace the darkness, to welcome it, to let the energy swell and take him. Cold and pure, the feeling was indescribable.

He had sampled it—a small sip—the night the killing mist and black blades had come upon him as he battled the
hybrids
outside Clea’s apartment. Secretly, darkly thrilled, he had delighted in the weapons, in the feeling of invincibility, so much stronger than he had ever known as a light sorcerer.

That night, it had been all he could manage to pull it back, drag the demon to its cage and hold safe the barrier that surrounded it. Tonight, he would not even try.

Looking down, he flexed his fingers, stared at his ruined hand. The skin was a different shade than the rest of his body, a silvery gray, and the look of the thing was uncommonly strange.

Not human. Not sorcerer. Not demon, either.

Something far different.

He studied the tattooed wards that circled his wrist. They were strong, but not strong enough to hold the beast back on their own. The glove was gone, the alloy prison gone, and he knew the barrier could never return. The darkness was free, roaring through his veins, through sinew and muscle, making him powerful. So unbelievably powerful.

Even his dragon tattoo was changed, darker, shimmering with malice, the eyes glowing bright with unconcealed threat. The speed of the transformation shocked him.

He brought his healthy hand to press against the damaged one, two halves of the whole, a strange and peculiar balance.

Asag scrabbled away. Facing a chained and weakened sorcerer was one thing. Facing the strength of a demon quite another.

A
hybrid
lunged for Clea, and Ciarran spun to face him. He offered no warning, no reprieve. Extending his arm, he let the black blades tear through his skin, a sharp pain. They lengthened, spanning the distance to skewer the
hybrid
through the chest. Blood poured from the wounds, rivulets that merged into a glistening stream. The demon part of him celebrated the sight.

“How—?” Asag stumbled back a step, his gaze locked on the discarded chains, his eyes wide with shock. “That isn’t possible. No sorcerer could cast off demon-hewn chains. Only a demon—”

“Ciarran!” Clea cried, her gaze fixed on a point behind him.

He turned, already knowing what she saw. He could feel the shimmer of magic, the terrible rift in the
continuum,
the pull of the portal that the demon had summoned.

Asag had used Clea’s magic. Ciarran’s magic. Light to beckon the darkness.

Ciarran felt his new power swell and throb. He would give Asag darkness. He would feed it to him until he choked on it.

Within the endless terrain of starry sky, the flickering oval had grown to the size of a man in a matter of minutes. Light refracted from the surface of the rift in the dimensional wall, a warped, twisted thing, tearing the fabric of worlds, building a bridge where none should be.

Some dimensions were never meant to know a link.

With a snarl, Ciarran caught one of the
hybrids
as it lunged for him, snapping its spine and tossing it aside like a broken twig. Power. The power was indescribable. Far greater than light or darkness alone. This was a melding of the two, a strange alliance.

His gaze sought Clea. Shivering, she stood next to a concrete block, her leg shackled. The sight of the chain that held her sparked a burgeoning rage, sending it to coil deep in his gut. The darkness slid through him, riding the remnants of his light magic, blending with it, twisting it.

With a sharp slash of his hand, he sent the black blades through the chain that bound her, setting her free. She stumbled, righted herself, and he felt her willing her magic toward him.

Torn. He was torn by the dual urge to take all she offered, use it to subdue the darkness within, to tether it beyond reach, beyond temptation. At the same time, he wanted to give the demon in his soul free rein. Let it shred the
hybrids
in a whirling frenzy of flesh and blood, let it tear Asag’s limbs from his body, let it destroy anything that threatened that which he loved.

Clea
.

With a snarl, Asag grabbed her, shoving her before him, his lips peeled back, his teeth snapping at her. She struggled in his hold, kicking him, tearing at his thick, gray hide with her nails, magic sparking from her fingertips, leaving the demon’s flesh singed and smoking.

Cold fury thrummed like a chant in Ciarran’s veins, calling him to vengeance. Sensing a
hybrid
at his back, he released the killing mist, smiling menacingly as he heard the creature’s death cry, which was abruptly stilled as the
hybrid
melted into nothing.

One step and another, Ciarran moved forward, stalking Asag, his eyes locked on the demon’s, never wavering.

“Set her free,” Ciarran said. Asag shifted, and shifted again, keeping Clea’s body in front of him, a living shield. “Set her free, and I will kill you. A boon for your cooperation. Make me take her from you, and I promise you no such kindness. I will return you to the demon realm, to the fate you had intended for me. An eternity of torment, Asag. Think on it, but think quickly.”

Asag’s eyes rolled about in frenzied desperation as his well-laid plans fell to dust around him. The
hybrids
were deserting him, running like rats.

“The Solitary comes,” he hissed. “Tonight he comes. Tonight I free him, and tonight I regain my power, my lost power, my ability to unleash plague and suffering upon the mortal races. Death. I can taste it, so delicious.”

He paused, his lips pulling back from rows of jagged yellow teeth as he pushed Clea before him. She struggled in his hold.

“Help me,” Asag cajoled, his gaze locking wildly on Ciarran. “Become my ally. You are demon now. You are darkness. Embrace it, and let it embrace you. Let it take you.” His talons clutched at Clea, tangling in her hair. Words tumbled from his mouth, fast and frenzied. “You can have her. We will use her blood to open the portal, mingle the realms. Just a bit of her blood. A cup. Only a cup. And then you can have her. She is unharmed. See?” Cackling wildly, he shoved her forward again. Her body arched back, her head tethered by his rigid grip on her hair. “Unharmed. I took only a bit of blood. And I want only a bit more.”

Ciarran felt the darkness, rearing wild and fierce inside him, tempted, so tempted by Asag’s words. He could save Clea. He could have her for eternity.
Yes,
the darkness slithered through him, coiling about his thoughts. So easy to agree. To save both her and himself.

Horror erupted, a geyser of self-loathing. Already, the thing inside him was stealing all that he was, bit by bit, turning aside his morals, his history, making a thousand years of guardianship into nothing, ashes on the wind. How long until he was purely demon?

The parasite in his soul would take him, all of him, if it could.

If he let it.

Did he have a choice?

Glancing about, Ciarran saw the
hybrids
running, their shadowy shapes sliding down the low hill, across the grass, illuminated by the moon as they ran, helter-skelter, fleeing. Not from Asag. From him.

From what he had become.

Clea cried out, struggling to keep her balance, stumbling as again Asag pulled on her hair, yanked her head back. She righted herself, another low cry torn from her lips.

A deep shudder shook Ciarran’s frame. Lethal rage rose inside him, a thick smear of darkness, obliterating the light. Looking up, he found Clea watching him, her eyes luminous, her love, her faith in him a shining beacon.

“I love you.” Her gaze burned into his. “Remember what my Gram said.”

He remembered. ’Twas her story that had shown him the only way to free himself from Asag’s demonic chains.
We can choose our path, not by stifling the evil, but by accepting its existence.

Choice. Free will.

Certainty came to him in a rush. To kill a demon he must
become
a demon, accept that part of himself, fully and without reservation. Only then could he hope to best Asag. He chose the darkness, forfeiting all that he had been, and as he shot a glance at Clea, he knew that in this choice he had found a way to save her, save the world.

He could not summon even a whisper of regret.

The portal was enormous now, the center of it tearing open, a gaping hole, devoid of all light, all form. There it was, the terrible doorway to a dimension of pure evil, a stinking pit of brimstone and malice, open now. Almost large enough to let a demon through.