His Soul To Keep (Dark Knights of Heaven Book 1) (10 page)

Chapter Fifteen

Two hours in the shower and Cassidy still wasn’t sure she’d gotten all the sand out of places sand should never be.

Note to self: no more sex on the beach. There are unpleasant consequences.

Sand, literally, was a pain in the ass.

Wincing, she stepped out of the shower, dried off, and pulled on a t-shirt she’d borrowed from Rail’s closet.

He hadn’t said three words to her on the walk back. The minute they got upstairs, he’d put her in his room without asking if that was what she wanted.

It was, but only if he were with her.

Instead, Rail left, still clad in nothing but a towel, to go find the others.

With a resigned sigh, Cassidy lay on the big bed covered in russet and dark chocolate-brown silk and snuggled into the pillows. They smelled great, like Rail. Sultry and exotic, smoky wood burning during a spring rain, but with a hint of spice and hot chocolate.

How had things become so complicated?

Oh yeah. They’d had sex.

She’d had sex with a man she hardly knew and yet felt she’d known him all her life.

It wasn’t like she hadn’t wanted to. Lord knew she’d been thinking about it since the parting kiss Rail had planted on her, but somehow she felt cheated. Oh, she enjoyed the rough and tumble, no thinking aspect to what they had shared, but she wanted more, well, tenderness.

Hopefully round two would be slower so she could spend more time exploring Rail's body.

Her heart flipped. Would there be a round two?

A soft knock on the door made her bolt upright. "Yes?"

The door opened slowly to reveal Rail, freshly showered and sporting a pair of sweatpants. "Can I come in?"

"It’s your room." Cassidy slid back against the headboard as he joined her on the bed.

"Yes." Rail exhaled the word with a touch of sadness. "It is."

Cassidy took in the sparse furnishings consisting of a bureau, side tables with lamps, a recliner, and a reading lamp surrounding the king size bed. Except for the huge walk-in closet, it was just like his quarters on the barge. All functionality and little personality. No, that wasn’t right. The room was like Rail, dark and strong, but there was nothing
personal
about it. At the very least she had expected a display of ancient weapons, yet the walls were blank. Not even a single piece of artwork and that was just sad considering he lived in a veritable museum.

To Cassidy, the lack of beauty spoke of loneliness. An unwillingness to set down roots, but she couldn’t pinpoint why.

"Cassidy?"

Rail's quiet voice washed over her like a warm breeze and roused her from her musings. "Yes?"

Moving slowly—as if he were approaching a frightened animal—Rail leaned in, framed Cassidy’s face with his large hands, and gently kissed her. "I’m sorry I scared you," he whispered, resting his forehead against hers.

"I know."

"I would never hurt you."

"I know that too." She placed her hands over his.

"You trust me?" He seemed surprised.

"You said you couldn’t lie to me. Unless that in itself was a lie."

He shook his head, causing his damp hair to caress her shoulders. "No, I didn’t lie. But I have omitted truths."

"I get it. Really, I do." Cassidy sat back so she could look at him. "You look tired."

"I am. And I’m not." He shrugged carelessly. "I talked to the others."

Cassidy blushed. "So, what did they say?"

"Apparently, while we were making love, there was a massive surge of energy. And when I say massive, I mean it was like a bomb burst over the island setting off every supernatural alarm we have on the barrier protecting this place from Lucifer and his minions."

Did he just say made love?
Maybe there would be a second time, and a third…Cassidy derailed that train of thought before it went any further. "And?"

"And Kaz thinks we caused it."

Suddenly more than uncomfortable, Cassidy tucked her legs under her butt. "So, I’m guessing that’s not normal?"

"If that happened every time one of us made love to our
Aktura
, Boomer would have brought the place down long ago."

"Point taken." Cassidy chewed her bottom lip. "I think something else happened while we were, well…She took a deep breath to calm the butterflies doing acrobatics in her chest. "I can see colors around you now."

Rail didn’t react the way she expected. He didn’t laugh or call her crazy. Instead, he gave a quizzical look. "Colors?"

"Yeah and I can kind of feel your moods. In here." She tapped her chest. "Like right now you’re a little worried and a little scared. The colors are changing. Getting darker, moving around you faster in swirls and ripples like water over stones in a stream. I see it now, the more anxious you get the faster they move.” Curious, Cassidy reached out to touch something in front of his face. "They tingle."

"You can see my aura and feel my emotions?" worry colored his voice.

"I'm guessing I shouldn’t be able to?"

"Not unless you already had a talent for doing so. I’m sure if Gina could see Boomer’s aura, she’d have mentioned it."

"Maybe whatever happened with that energy burst woke it up," she offered hopefully. "Can you feel me?"

"I’ve been able to feel you since I first touched you in the parking lot. Although at the time, I didn’t realize that we had such a strong connection because you were my
Aktura
."

"Why not?"

"I was a wee bit focused on keeping you alive at the time." He smiled slightly, showing some embarrassment. "I thought it was part of the resonance we all feel around soul-keepers, heightened by the situation. I didn’t think to consider the strength of what I was feeling. We’re all new to this. We’ve never met our soul-keepers before. And until today, I could only truly feel your emotions when you were broadcasting them. Like when you were surprised by Norc, you were emotionally screaming. But the emotional link is getting stronger."

That perked up Cassidy’s interest. "How so?"

"Now I can feel everything. Every layer, every nuance. Every emotional beat."

Cassidy released her tension with a long breath. "I’m not sure I like this."

"Why not?"

"It’s invasive."

"There’ll be no secrets between us," Rail countered.

"Exactly. It’s too, well, intimate."

Now he laughed, nearly throwing himself off the bed. "We made love, sweetheart. I think we’re past worrying about intimacy."

Cassidy met his eyes, almost daring him to lie. "Did we? Really?"

"What?"

"Make love? I mean, did it mean something or was it just sex?" She twisted the hem of her shirt. What would she do if he admitted that it was just sex and nothing else? "It’s okay if that's all it was. I wanted to be with you."

Rail moved away to sit on the edge of the bed. "It meant something to me."

"What?" she asked, not sure she’d heard him correctly.

"It meant something, being with you. I’m just not sure what yet."

Cassidy slid up behind Rail and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, leaning against his back, taking in his warmth. Had he just admitted to feeling something more than lust? She smiled and lazily traced her fingers down his back over the tattoos. "Tell me about these."

"The ink is like a cloak to keep my wings hidden."

"Do you all have these?"

"Everyone has a symbol or picture that acts as their cloak." He leaned back into her slightly and shivered.

Cassidy’s fingers moved over a line of symbols running up the back of his ribs to his left shoulder. "What about these? Are they special too?"

"Every tattoo I have means something in my life. Some are spells of protection or strength, others are memorials."

"Who did these?”

"Zach."

She laughed. "Seriously? Zach is so uptight. I can’t picture him as a tattoo artist."

"Yeah. Well, our natural healing ability erases them over time. So, when I first met Zach and he said he could concoct these inks infused old magic that would be permanent, I gave him a chance. After I saw he had a real talent, I had him redo all the old tats I’d lost, my wings, and everything since."

"How long ago was that?" Cassidy tipped her head to the side, studying one of the tattoos.

"I met Zach in the late eighteen hundreds."

"Talk about good timing. The tattoo iron was invented around, what, eighteen-ninety?" When Rail stared at her in disbelief, she added, "History Channel. I know lots of useless trivia. I also know that’s a lot of time under the needle."

"Piece of cake considering how it used to be done." He tapped the tip of her nose. "A single needle and a mallet. I’ll let your imagination fill in the details."

She dismissed the image with a wave of her hand and reminded him, "History Channel."

Twisting, Rail wrapped an arm around her waist and moved Cassidy to his lap. He placed Cassidy’s hand on his chest over his left pectoral. "Your tattoo will go here when I decide what it will be."

Cassidy kissed the spot with a sigh. "Are you sure you want the reminder after I’m gone?"

"Where are you going?"

"Please, Rail." She rolled her eyes. "One day I’m going to die and you’ll have to see that tattoo every day. It's sad."

Rail gave his head a slight shake. "I know, but I don’t want to forget you. And I don’t want to talk about the future now." With a few careful twists, he laid them out on the sheets. "After all, I’m going to die many more times than you."

"But Seraphina said that you come back…" A chill crept over her. Rail's voice echoed in her head,
"You’re the only reason I came back."

"Oh, my God! You died!"

"Yes. Three days ago."

Cassidy rolled away from his embrace and off the bed. "I knew it. I knew it. I knew it," she mumbled as she paced. "I knew something was wrong."

"Cass…"

"No. I got sick three days ago and only started feeling better this morning. And then you showed up…why didn’t you tell me?"

"We were a little busy."

"Rail!" She stomped her foot, fists parking themselves on her hips. "You could have warned me ahead of time."

A bit of guilt flashed across his face. "I was hoping you wouldn’t know. That you would never feel it."

"Would you have ever told me?"

"If you asked, I wouldn’t be able to lie."

"So, no, you wouldn’t have told me." Frustrated, she swept his belongings off the dresser. "Damn it, Rail. I didn’t want to believe you could die. I wanted to believe you were invincible."

"We are. Sort of." He gave another careless shrug.

Cassidy stopped pacing and stared at him for a moment, then turned on her heel and stormed out. Her slamming door echoed down the hall.

* * *

After three hours of pacing and no appearance by Rail, Cassidy screamed in frustration. It wasn’t like she expected him to follow her, begging for forgiveness or even wanted him to, but she had expected him to barge in and make a big speech to justify why he hadn’t told her he’d died. Or explain what she might feel in the event of his death, however temporary it was.

Then again, he was right; they hadn’t done much talking when he’d appeared on the beach. Starting with, "Hi, honey. I missed you and by the way, I’ve been dead for a couple of days," wasn’t the most romantic line.

Feeling guilty for how she’d treated him, Cassidy put on a clean shirt and went in search of her fallen angel.

Chapter Sixteen

There’s no place like Hell. One could just as easily be killed for delivering good news as for delivering bad.

Skrath hesitated as he lifted his hand to his master's door. He was not delivering good news, but it wasn’t bad either. Which meant Lucifer would probably kill him just for being a pest. He could only hope his master was in a good enough mood to make his death quick rather than draw it out for a few hundred years. The demon steeled himself for what was to come. Death was death whether it happened in a few seconds or took an eternity.

Pulling his shriveled wings tight against his back, Skrath dropped to his knees, knocked once, and waited.

Several minutes later, the doors parted of their own accord and Skrath crawled in.

"What news?" The voice boomed through the opulently-appointed chamber. To the uneducated demon, it looked rather like his impression of a Renaissance bordello—not counting the blood on the gilded wall—but then, what did he know?

"The enemy survived the ambush in Peru and blocked the portal."

"Tell me something I do not know." Lucifer stepped out from behind a red silk curtain, his voice dripping boredom like venom.

"My spy reports that something extraordinary happened at the enemy compound."

"And that would be?" Lucifer arched an elegant black eyebrow, pouring himself a goblet of blood-wine.

"A shift in energy within their compound.”

"I knew that already."

"Of course, master, but…" Skrath bit his tongue, awaiting the death blow. “It frightened the worthless worms such that they thought we…um…you, that you, great Lord, were attacking them personally."

Lucifer turned and faced the creature. "Anything else?"

"The most recent human they brought to the compound, another female, is causing trouble. Demanding changes."

"
Hmm…
" Lucifer drained his goblet and refilled it. "Leave me." He dismissed the demon with a wave. "And summon the seer to me."

"Yes, Master. Immediately." Skrath backed out until he ran into the wall on the opposite side of the hallway, thanking The Great Darkness his existence would continue for another day. Popping to his feet when the doors closed in front of him, the demon raced down the hall heading for the Lakes of Fire and the seer.

* * *

Lucifer lowered himself onto his throne, ignoring the length of jet-black hair falling across his right eye. So the bastards had another
Aktura
in their possession. Lucifer smirked. If she were a troublemaker, unhappy with her situation, maybe the spy could work on those negative emotions and open the bitch up to the Darkness.

Lucifer swirled the wine in his goblet and gazed into the crimson fluid. The only useful bit of information that idiotic spy had supplied in ages was the arrival of
Aktura
to the Knights compound.

He’d thought it a lie when the first report had been brought to him. Now they had five.

Five!

They should not be able to find one soul-keeper, let alone five! Lucifer ground his molars. It was a complication he needed to look into.

A thought occurred to him. To his knowledge, until this latest little "event," his enemy hadn’t even considered the possibility he could find their hiding place. What would they think if they knew how little time or effort it had taken him? Anyone with half a brain would know they were using spells to cloak their location and deter investigation by anyone who stumbled across the area.

All he had to do was look for a virtual hole in the mortal plane.

He knew exactly where they were and yet he couldn’t touch them. Couldn’t see them.

It made plotting against them the equivalent to an eon-long chess game. Lucifer let out a breath and watched ripples form in the wine. If only Hellabrand’s
Aktura
hadn’t perished in the maw of a
skratar.
He only had to wait a few more years for her to truly fall, to join him willingly. The intel she could have handed over would have been priceless.

He chuckled, wondering if the so-called Dark Knights of Heaven knew they were on the same path.

Unless…

Something tickled the edge of his memory.

Tossing his goblet aside, he stalked to the locked bookcase hidden in the back of his private library and released the magical wards. Inside were ancient scrolls, clay tablets, and early books. Histories written by the angels. There was also a prophecy.

A prophecy hinting to a way out of Hell for those who had truly fallen. A divination brought to him by one of the angels expelled from Heaven for siding with him.

If that angel had not been one of the three Seers, he would have never considered the validity behind the prediction.

A tap on the door interrupted his search.

Lucifer hesitated to respond, second-guessing his decision to let Idras, Fallen Angel and Seer of Hell, into his private chambers. She was almost as powerful and intelligent as him. By decree of the Great Darkness itself, the Seer could not be punished by anyone but Satan, meaning the scheming, power-thirsty bitch could attack Lucifer, steal his power, and take his place with Lord Satan’s blessing.

Blessing! Ha!
To be second in command to the seven hell plains they ruled was only one step above being the Great Lord’s personal bitch.

One step up was better than two steps down.

How far he truly had fallen, he mused. Once he had been the very Light-bringer, teacher, historian—the basis for the Prometheus mythology. Beloved. He alone had raised mankind up from babbling animals to the path of intelligence. And here he was in Hell for taking pride in his work.

Finally deciding he’d made the bitch wait long enough, Lucifer bellowed, "Enter!"

Idras sauntered into the chamber wearing a diaphanous gown, swaying her hips seductively. The fabric parted slightly to reveal shapely thighs and a hint of the treasure between them. In her angelic form, as she was now, Idras appeared to be an innocent wisp-like creature, but appearances were deceiving. In truth, it was a game, an illusion, a lure. Idras was sex on two legs, part naïve schoolgirl and part pin-up porn star. In her demon form, she was just as sexy and twice as deadly.

Sweeping his waist-length hair back over his shoulder, Lucifer nodded in welcome. Catching a glimmer of lust in the Seer’s eye made him wonder if perhaps he shouldn’t have covered up before letting her enter.

Damn the female for making him second-guess himself.

Nudity was a human hang-up. He was proud of his muscular body, bronzed skin, and virility—covering up would be a sign of vulnerability.

"Seer, I need to know if there is a storm coming," he demanded.

"A storm?" she asked impishly.

"You know what I mean," he snapped, not willing to play games. The growing need to throttle her twisted like a serpent in his belly.

Idras laughed and moved around the chamber before finally dropping carelessly onto a fourteenth century chaise lounge covered in blood red brocade. "Are those troublesome Knights bothering you again?" She fluffed her silver-white curls.

Lucifer avoided looking at the female. If anyone could tempt him into disaster, it would be her. "When are they not bothering me?" He stalked around the room, projecting calm annoyance when all he wanted to do was destroy something.

"
Aww
." Idras pouted. "I take it that those nasty
skratars
are
not doing their job?"

"Bah, the
skratars
are almost as much trouble. Their random kills are causing the human authorities to take notice." Lucifer glared at her. "And given half a chance, they’ll turn on us."

"I’m sure," she said, plucking at her sleeve hem, a little purr in her voice, "but that is only one of the many possibilities."

Now they were on the right track. "Tell me what you’ve seen."

"So demanding," she said with a flirty lilt, leaning forward, and pursing her lips. "I’ve seen many things. Far too many to give you a conclusive answer."

Lucifer snatched a statue from the table next to him and hurled it against the wall. "Tell me, witch. What do you see in respects to our cause?"

"And which cause would that be? Escaping Hell, taking over Earth, or destroying the Knights?"

"Idras." His warning growl should have had her begging for mercy. Instead, she laughed, the sound not unlike a rain of glass hitting stone.

"I told you…"

At the end of his patience, Lucifer lunged at the Seer, pinning her arms back. "Do not tease me, Idras! Are we on the right path?"

"But I so love to tease you," she answered, lifting her hips to rub against his thigh.

Disgusted with his body’s unwanted, but all too automatic response, Lucifer released her and walked away. "Get out if you have no useful information."

"I know you’re looking for a prophecy I once gave you."

Lucifer turned to face the infuriating female. "Good. Then, you tell me what it said."

"That I cannot do. There are rules to be followed. And I’m bound more tightly to them than you."

"What rules? We are the rule breakers. That’s what put us here."

Idras lifted her shoulders in a careless shrug. "Universal rules that neither the Light nor the Dark can breach. You’ll either have to find the prophecy or you’ll have to be patient and see how things play out without interfering."

Lucifer stabbed her with a stare that would drop a lesser demon. "Patience is not a virtue I can afford, my sweet."