Fire Kissed (31 page)
“I couldn’t heal while trying to hold back all that Shadow,” he said. “Those ward stones are powerful, just like the Brand line.”
She blushed. Powerful. She might have the fire, but he of all people had to know she was faking her swagger among the others. “Feeling better now?”
She could see he was. It was she who was quivering, though she had no idea why. He was beside her. She had nothing to fear.
A slow grin spread across his face. “Yes. Much. Every second. As we build higher, the Shadow should thin, so I’ll hardly notice it when I go in and out.”
Her blood rushed at the thought of a future of him around her every day, safe, of him in her every night, so dangerous. She was scared. She concentrated harder on the road to hide her response. And changed the subject. “So the, um, Order, is now building my house?”
“Yes.” He stroked her with his voice, patient, as if he was humoring her and this turn in conversation.
“And that’s okay with everyone?”
Maybe she was anxious because by now Grey had to know that she wasn’t coming back. He’d be planning some retribution like his sister, Zelda, to make it clear that he thought Brand wasn’t good enough for Grey. Zelda had set a wraith on her when Kaye had refused the marriage. What would Ferro do?
Bastian cocked his head forward to see her better. “Is it okay with you that The Order should build a mage house?”
She glanced over at her angel, bright and terrible. She didn’t know what Grey would do to her. Or worse, to him. That wasn’t why she was nervous.
“I’m both honored and scared at what that means. But you’ll have to help me find a way to thank them.” She could barely wrap her mind around this turn of events, how things could get better when they should be at their worst.
“You’re missing the point. There’s no need to thank them,” Bastian said. “I, on the other hand ...” Want rolled off him in great cracking waves, like lightning to dry tinder.
She drew a ragged breath. No, it was something about that look he was giving her that made her jumpy. All day long she’d sent quick glances his way—glimpsed the flex of his jaw, his big shoulders rolling with his exertion, his taut expression of concentration, the knowing in his green-flecked gaze when he’d caught her staring. His able hands. Sweet Shadow, his hands.
Bastian chuckled, reading her mind again. Had to be.
But the last man to touch her had been Grey. Though she’d chosen the course herself, she couldn’t quite move beyond the fact that he’d been inside her and preyed upon her during the intimacy. He’d weakened her. She felt used. She’d hurt Bastian the same way. She wasn’t altogether easy about jumping into bed now, even if it was with the man she loved. She had to get past what had gone before, but she didn’t know how.
The inn was lit up with activity when she pulled into the parking lot. Upon entering, Kaye could hear Adam’s voice beyond the far double doors where she’d met with the group that morning. She started in his direction to apologize for what had happened, and see how he was, but Bastian caught her firmly around the waist and altered her trajectory toward the stairs. “He’s fine.”
Her heart beat harder.
He hurried her next to him as they topped the stairs and started down a long hallway. His expression had taken on that stern glower of endurance—that he’d held on just about as long as he could.
“Maybe you should eat something.” Their history was mostly bad. Could they really build something together? An old, familiar instinct was kicking in, telling her to run.
Suddenly he was bracing her up against a wall, his hard body molding to hers, trapping her. Arms caging her at either side of her head. “You promised me. Forever,” he said.
She begged into his eyes. “But—”
She’d had sex with men before, much of it heartless. Everything had been different since she’d met him.
She could feel how perfectly they fit together. How her body recognized and fitted back, while another part of her clamored in distress. She arched for breath, but he stole it with his mouth. He tasted her, rubbed her tongue with his, and she yearned to be filled with him and shaken to pieces at the same time.
He drew back a little, his free hand working at the handle of a door. Open. He shifted one side of his body to block her escape, the other side, near the door, pulling back to show her the way to go. Shadow help her, she entered. Of course the place would have a four-poster of dark, spindly carved wood. Patchwork quilt. At least there was a fireplace, which exploded into flame.
“Come on,” he said, close behind her. The feel of his warmth and breath over her shoulder sent a wave of something exquisite down her body to beat at her sex. He must have felt it too because he gathered her close, his strong arms around her waist, and pressed his mouth—she loved his mouth—up and down the column of her neck. She could feel how much he wanted her at the small of her back. His embrace tightened, the night scruff of his face on her skin.
She couldn’t get away. She didn’t want to. Trouble was, and she got it now, she’d compartmentalized what had happened with Grey, a very handy trick ... until it wasn’t. She’d separated what she wanted from what needed to be done. Her heart from her mind, her body from both of those. And Bastian, the bastard, her safe place, would not settle for parts. She was pretty sure he wanted all of her at once. But things were going to get bad, ugly, when everything mixed together.
“Shower,” he said, moving them forward again. He bypassed the bed, kicked the bathroom door open, and set her on the sink counter, her legs straddling his hips.
He left her cold for half a sec, then was back by the time the shower water burst from the head. Thick clouds of steam wafted out from the claw-footed tub.
Her clumsy fingers unfastened his pants. He was deft at her blouse’s buttons, slipping the silk from her shoulders, and efficient at the side zipper of her slacks. He pulled her off the counter, and slid her underwear and slacks to the floor. She climbed inside the tub, his hands low at her waist keeping her steady. The water scalded her skin, and she had just enough time to tilt her head back, to wet her hair out of her face before he was with her, his mouth on her shoulder, his hand slicking between her legs.
As a rule, Jack didn’t like the modern world’s conveniences, but showers were a genius that even he couldn’t deny. And the way the water made her skin so slippery, erotic, made his arousal that much more acute, a blood beat that was earthy and wild with chaotic sensation. He’d never get used to it.
He roughed his mouth over her shoulder. Her skin was hot to the tongue, yet sweet to taste. He stroked her heat and she leaned against him, her back to his chest, a whimper in her throat.
She trembled, an emotion surfacing. “I’m so sorry—”
The hot water pounded down. “I’ll make it better,” he promised, knowing what she had to have endured at Grey’s hands. “Let me make it better.”
A sob broke out of her, and she braced herself, a hand to the wall. He knew the fear of the past days had shaken her. She’d carried it all, braved the darkness. She must have been terrified to feel herself growing weaker, yet know she was powerless to do anything about it. She must have been frantic to be at the mercy of the man who’d ripped her life apart more than once.
They’d betrayed each other. He’d set her on a terrible path, more ruthless than any mage, and she’d walked it even after they’d agreed on a different course. He wouldn’t debate the ends and means. He would simply make it right. He’d reach deep and make it right.
She turned in his arms to face him, black eyes full of dark thoughts. “Please,” she said. “I don’t know how... .”
He drew her into a kiss, the water hissing as it hit her skin. Again he thrust with his tongue to fill her mouth, to share one breath between them, syncing the drumbeat of his heart to the double flutter of hers. She twined her fingers in his hair and clung to his back to bring him close. He could do better, so he lifted her up, reveling that his strength could be used for this too, and fitted her to him. She cried out but wrapped her legs around, rolling her hips to stroke and clench.
His control strained against the swell of immediate gratification. He knew he could bear down on the desire, find the iron rod of his resolve. But that would not serve either of them now. He went with impulse, with reckless desire. He intended to exact revenge for her betrayal on her body. When he was finished, every nerve in her body would know him, every inch of silken curve punished with pleasure. And then the assignment would be behind them.
He braced an arm against the tile and took her, pounding deep to reach her core, that umbra of her mage power, and stoked it to a blaze. Burn him, burn them both, he didn’t care, as long as nothing of the past was left.
Her mouth snagged his ear, teeth grazed his cheek, lips shaped the words of a spell against his jaw. Magic, clashing, crashing. Passion. She was a star inside, flames within flame, the primal elements churning together. When the first shock wave moved through her, he couldn’t stop the roar that ripped out of his throat. It was a supernova of Shadow and soul, exactly how new worlds were made.
Chapter 16
“I have no clothes,” Kaye said. She lifted the ruined silk of her blouse in one hand, the crush of her slacks in the other. She could locate only one shoe. “I can’t meet my father in a robe.”
“What do you need?” Bastian, on the other hand, sitting comfortably by the fire, looked magey in Shadow-gray jeans, a black slim sweatshirt, a black coat folded over his knee. He smiled with deep satisfaction. His angel light was stuffed down inside him.
She did an up-down gesture indicating her body. “Everything.”
“It’s a good look.”
“Bastian!”
“Good thing the world is wired,” Bastian said. “After the meeting between Grey and Segue I was hopeful you’d leave him, but knew the circumstances might be difficult. I wanted you comfortable, so I took the liberty of having your accounts accessed. I reordered as many of your recent purchases as possible, though, for the record, spending six hundred dollars on a single pair of shoes is obscene.”
The boxes were waiting outside their suite’s door. The red cashmere sweater would do, and she had to go uncharacteristically casual in jeans as well. The other pants needed hemming. And why he had ordered a gown was a mystery. Yes! Her gorgeous boots. She felt powerful again four inches taller.
“I’ve decided against telling my father about the house.” No makeup. Good thing she had backup mascara in her bag. “The most I’ll say about it is that I’m looking at some land.”
She waited for Bastian’s reaction. They’d talked about everything from the Lakatos key, now tucked in a dresser drawer, to her conversation with her maybe friend Gail. He seemed to be waiting for her to get around to the heart of the matter.
“Okay, I’ll mention Grey’s touch thing.” It didn’t scare her to say his name. She didn’t get that tight, no-breath feeling either. She only felt slightly ill at the thought of herself at his mercy at the age of fifteen. “I need to know if my father is aware that Grey can do that. I need to know if my father knew back then, or if the marriage contract was simply a business arrangement that they rushed because of infighting among the Council members.”
“If he asks, how will you introduce me?” It was a practical question.
But Kaye went warm all over again inside. “As mine.”
Jack had kept his mind closed for privacy, so he was surprised to meet Khan, composed like a crow in a black seethe of Shadow, at the bottom of the stairs in the inn’s main entrance. Why hadn’t the others there—Adam or Laurence—warned him of the mage’s presence?
Jack felt Kaye’s arm slip around his waist, her body fitted to his, and enjoyed Khan’s none too subtle glower.
“I’m going with you to meet these mages,” Khan said. He looked displeased with his angelic company, then shifted his gaze to Kaye. “I’d like to meet this Mason, who made a false wraith, and your father, who seems little better than Grey.”
Jack felt Kaye’s hold on him grow tighter. She asked, “Why?”
“I won’t aid The Order, but if Grey shook the earth, then he will do worse. And it’s my fault he has the Shadow in the first place to make his mischief. This other faction may be better. We will see.”
So
now
he thought to become involved? Jack wasn’t so sure. “Our aim is to organize the chaos that is coming, not stir up more contention among them.”
now
he thought to become involved? Jack wasn’t so sure. “Our aim is to organize the chaos that is coming, not stir up more contention among them.”
“Organize,” Khan sneered. “Smacks of Order. And Order does not comprehend Shadow. Never has.”
Jack almost laughed. “You can use
comprehend
and
Shadow
in the same sentence?”
comprehend
and
Shadow
in the same sentence?”
“Look.” Kaye raised a hand, which Jack guessed was to shut them up. “This is my meeting. My business. I say what goes, and nobody else. Got it?”
Khan’s eyes narrowed dangerously, but he said, “Understood.”
“Bastian?” She wanted his agreement too.
“Yes.”
They stopped in to say good-bye to Adam, who still looked a little worse for wear, but was working as usual.
“Adam,” Kaye said. “Set aside some square footage in the house for you and your family. You never know when you may need a warded refuge.”
Adam looked at her for a long moment, then he nodded, short, with feeling. “Thank you.”
Then they headed out. The drive was a couple of hours, around the Beltway and back out into farmland on the other side. The chatter on the radio was now broken by music as the shock of the simultaneous earthquakes became old, though still frightening, news. The tone remained dark, given to rumor and conspiracy, as though the radio announcers also felt that worse was coming.
When Kaye pulled into a wide meadow of dead grass, Jack was glad they had Khan with them. Several cars were arranged in a wide semicircle facing them, doors opening as Kaye came to a stop.
“I thought this was just going to be you, Mason, and your father,” Jack said.
“Me too.”
They got out of the car, but instead of walking at Kaye’s side, as he’d intended when he met her father for the first time, Jack walked a pace behind, sending a different kind of message of support. And God help him, when Khan took up the other part of the triangle, also behind Kaye, Jack resolved to like Death, in spite of everything that had gone before.
Kaye walked before them, tall, confident, unafraid.
The waiting group began to murmur, connecting the rumor of Khan to the vicious, black-haired pureblood beside Jack. Jack recognized a few in the group, including one from the meeting Segue had had with Grey. And there was that Marcell Lakatos, whom he’d beaten in the sculpture garden. His nose wasn’t going to heal straight. And almost concealed, but visible to Jack’s practiced eye, a woman in the back shifted her arm, her hand loose, ready to draw some sort of weapon. Not everyone was a friend here. Maybe none of them.
The mage who had to be Mason—Jack was unfamiliar with both the name and face—came forward. A terribly scarred old man stood beside him, hairless, his skin like molded and pocked putty—someone who’d been in a fire. He could only be Kaye’s father, Aidan Brand, who didn’t have anywhere near the Shadow Kaye had within her to protect him from their element. Still, he’d lived, while everyone else had perished as Brand House burned down.
“Hello, Dad,” Kaye said. She sounded tired.
“My daughter walks with the pureblood.” The burned man pivoted slightly to the group. He was proud of her. “That’s why she left Grey.”
“Don’t think you know me,” Kaye said. “You know nothing about me or my allies.”
“I like what I see,” Aidan answered back. “I always said Shadow flowed thick for Brand. We’ll rebuild our House together.”
Jack tried very hard to remind himself that Aidan had attempted to scare the Little Match Girl so that she wouldn’t be caught up in the intrigue and danger. He’d saved the ward stones for her. And, according to Kaye, there was a moment when he’d even tried to protect her from the wraith attack when she was fifteen. No one was all bad; he loved his daughter in his own magey way.
“Why Grey in the first place, Dad?” Kaye had kept her tone light, but Jack knew the turmoil underneath. “What did he want with a fifteen-year-old when he could’ve had anyone? Why me when back then I had so little Shadow to show for myself ?”
Jack didn’t like the mage woman with the weapon. Though she stood among the group in front of them, something about her made him want to look over his shoulder.
“Brand is an old and strong family,” her father answered. “You had every promise—”
Kaye cut him short. “No, I didn’t. Back then you said I was born to ‘breed power,’ which I understood to mean bear his children.”
Aidan frowned. “That’s the primary purpose of a marriage contract. Alliance first, then offspring of the mingled Shadow. A blood bond means safety and strength for both Houses.”
“Did you know then that he draws Shadow out of every mage he touches?” Her question was barbed with longtime pain.
But Jack knew to keep his focus elsewhere. The mage woman in the crowd seemed to inhale slightly and his memory sped back through the ages, recalling other mage attacks. She flung a blade, aimed straight at Kaye’s heart, but Jack trusted his instinct. This was a mage trick of perception. He reached, angel quick,
behind
Kaye, and caught the blade midair. The metal cut into his skin and blood dripped to the frozen ground. He was so angry, he didn’t feel it at all.
behind
Kaye, and caught the blade midair. The metal cut into his skin and blood dripped to the frozen ground. He was so angry, he didn’t feel it at all.
“Bastian?” Kaye turned, her gaze flicking from the knife to his expression to understand. The group went silent as Jack wiped the blade on his pants. He was shaking with rage. Mages. Never a head-on attack, just a knife in the back. If he hadn’t had the thousand years’ experience fighting them ...
The mage assassin took off into the forest, as if there were any place on Earth she could hide. No, that one was going to die. Jack could pursue and kill her, but he’d reveal himself as an angel. Luckily, he had an unexpected ally at his side. “Khan,” he said, with exquisite calmness. “If you will ... ?”
“Certainly,” Khan answered. “No one lives forever.” He raised his palm and black Shadow boiled into the frigid air, a compact tempest of death to throw at the fleeing figure. Shadow grumbled, rolling to a frenzied acceleration.
“Stop,” Kaye said. She put an arm out to her side, palm facing Khan, fire blooming in her palm and battering the pureblood’s Shadow back. Jack almost staggered with the realization that her firelight was a match for Khan’s despair. “She’s mine,” Kaye said. “She has to be mine. It’s the mage way.”
With one hand, Kaye held Khan’s Shadow back with her fire.
Khan hissed. “I know what you are now.”
But Jack didn’t think she was listening. Her head turned slightly to track the assassin’s progress through the woods. The running mage was getting farther, probably having that whizzy feeling of hope that she just might escape. Jack saw Kaye blink, and the assassin screamed as she went up in flames.
The gathered mages were loosening, backing to their cars. The few brave remained in place, to carry on the discussion. “She wasn’t one of ours,” Mason said. “I swear it.”
Kaye didn’t seem to think it important. She regarded her father again. “You were saying?”
Her dad looked flustered, so she helped him out. “Did you or didn’t you know that when Grey touches another mage, he draws on their Shadow? He weakens them and assumes their power, the strength of their umbra.”
Kaye was grateful for Bastian and Khan behind her because she was so furious, so hurt, the faraway screams so irritating, that all she could really concentrate on was her father stuttering for an answer in front of her.
“But even you just said you didn’t have much Shadow back then,” her father finally answered. “I didn’t think I was risking much in that regard, yet giving you safety and power. Grey wanted heirs, but none of his partners could conceive because of his touch. A young woman, just reaching maturity, full of vitality, might have a better chance.”
Kaye was going to be sick. “So you didn’t sell my Shadow, you sold my youth.”
“I paid for that decision,” her father said. “I pay for it every day. I wanted to protect you.”
A couple of cars were starting to pull out of the field, heading for the access road, mages who’d seen enough and didn’t want to stick around for more fireworks. Kaye was glad to see Gail remain behind, her maybe-friend, though she hadn’t expected to see her among this group.
Kaye raised her hands again—the mages flinched back. “Look at me, Dad. If you had waited just a little while longer, like, say, until I was seventeen ... if
you’d
kept me safe, none of this would have happened.”
you’d
kept me safe, none of this would have happened.”
“I know it,” he said. “That’s why I gave you the stones. I gave over Brand to you because of what happened. The power of our name, the bonds of our vassals, the mantle of our heritage. I gave it all to you.”
He might have done all that, but... “Yesterday I was told not to squander my position with Grey.”
“We had no idea you had made other friends.”
They were going around in circles, Brand-Kaye-Brand.
“This is not the reunion I was hoping for,” Mason said. “We don’t have time for family feuds. Can we come to an agreement?”
Kaye couldn’t stop looking at her dad. The scars from his burns were awful; the pain must’ve been excruciating. They were both scarred, father and daughter. But his eyes were the same. Same color, same set, though the shape of one was smudged. That night the wraith had charged at Zelda’s command, and her father had pushed her out of the way and stood between them.
“We can agree not to do business with Grey,” Kaye said. She wanted that final.
“Works for me,” said Mason. “It’s a good place to start. How about we take the next step, and you introduce me to your friends?”
The plural on the end of
friends
was what swayed her to agree. Mason wasn’t discounting Bastian, just because the big bad Khan was next to him. Of course, Bastian’s snatching a knife out of thin air suggested he was pretty special too, though Kaye wouldn’t be the one to tell Mason why.
friends
was what swayed her to agree. Mason wasn’t discounting Bastian, just because the big bad Khan was next to him. Of course, Bastian’s snatching a knife out of thin air suggested he was pretty special too, though Kaye wouldn’t be the one to tell Mason why.
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