Locked in Silence: Grimm's Circle, Book 5 (18 page)

Finn frowned.

“Hey, wait!”

But Will was already gone.

Silence whipped both axes up, crossed them over his head to block the downward stroke of a sword just before it would have split his head open.

A trap that wasn’t a trap.

That’s what this was.

The succubae had used their more
obvious
presence to hide others, something neither Silence nor Will had realized until it was too late.

Will had to get the humans out, though, and not just out of the building, but
away
. If there were both succubae and orin here, they were in a world of trouble. Succubae, incubae, they weren’t thinkers—save for the king or queen. But put the king or queen together with even
one
of the orin and there were problems.

The soul-suckers were deadly, and there were two of them in here.

Well, one now. The other had one of Silence’s throwing axes buried in his skull. The human body it inhabited couldn’t survive
that
.

He swiped out with his smaller axe, barely missed the orin’s throat. The orin backed away, twirling his sword with the ease of one who knew how to use it. Silence felt the power in that thing, the age. He’d been around awhile. Sucking up too much power, too many souls, and he’d learned how to hide himself too, Silence suspected.

“I saw you here last night with your little whore,” the orin said, panting. “Tell me something, Grimm. How come you all get to do all that fornicating, but it’s frowned upon when
we
do it?”

Silence brandished his axe—saw the demon’s gaze skip to it. That was when he moved forward, kicked the thing square in the chest. As he flew back, Silence advanced.

Two of the succubae flew at him, their nails curled into claws.

“It’s a shame, you know. I bet she was a good little fuck,” the orin said, smirking. “I’ll be sure to ask.”

Ask…

Silence narrowed his eyes, unsure what game the thing played.

“I had one of my boys go to that hotel. We’ve got the owner’s son, you know. That’s why he’s so hungry for money. He wants out of town, away from here before my boy comes back looking for him. Which was…
today
.”

Lies,
he told himself.

Just lies.

It must be, because if there was truth in those words…if there was an orin lying in wait at the hotel—

It was a distraction on the demon’s part.

Silence knew it.

And it was the most effective one available. Because now he couldn’t think anything but ending this and getting out—he had to check on Vanya. If he’d gone after
her
instead…

Will had to spend precious time undoing damage, restoring the minds of the mortals he’d been able to save.

There were two he couldn’t help. They’d given in to the lure of the succubae and already their minds were polluted with the demon taint, too twisted now, and they weren’t fighting it at all. The poison was too deeply embedded.

But those he could save, he was doing everything he could to remove the stain—

Not just healing their bodies but
undoing
.

What was done became undone.

It took longer, it drained him.

It was necessary, though—they shouldn’t have those memories or those wounds.

He left them there, in a storage building behind the club. Their minds were blank after they’d entered the club. He didn’t like that because he knew that often the
lack
of knowledge was as traumatic as knowing what had happened. But they couldn’t know what they’d been subjected to—they’d seen enough to realize something
not
right was going on, and that had been before their attacks. Glowing eyes, abnormal strength—no, the Grimm definitely couldn’t leave that knowledge in the hands of police. Too much depended on it.

Weariness plagued him as he built his doorway.

“Back into the trenches,” he muttered, a grim smile on his mouth.

It faded a second later as the thick miasma of blood, gore and death all but choked him. Three succubae rushed him and he flung a hand at them. Light, pure and burning, tore through them—it left no mark as it killed them, sending the demons back to the netherplains and leaving empty human husks on the floor.

There were bodies everywhere. Too many. There hadn’t been this many—

A hot, burning sensation pierced his mind.

Death
—

He saw it unfolding in his, even saw himself—his back.

Spinning around, he saw Silence, watched as he swung with his axe.

Saw the succubae behind him. Saw her lift the sword even as the orin in front of Silence hefted his own blade.

It was a blood-curdling scream, one that would haunt Finn’s nights. She’d been limp in the seat, bleeding all over the good leather while he drove and mentally bitched. Abruptly her eyes flew open and she started to scream—back arched, hands clawing at her chest, her entire body shaking.

Her eyes rolled back into her skull and she started to convulse—Finn recognized it, but he hadn’t ever seen that sort of thing from
their
kind. A Grimm having a seizure?

Reaching up, he gripped his pendant. “Will? There’s something really freaky happening with your baby Grimm here…”

He wasn’t sure if he’d get an answer.

He did, and it was a loud, furious snarl.
I’m not surprised, but you’ll have to deal with her on your own—her man’s about ready to die and I can’t help you if I’m supposed to save him too.

“Her man?” Finn echoed blankly. Then, shaking his head, he pulled the car over. Didn’t matter—none of it mattered.

She was still twitching, her body jerking when he put the car in park. But as he turned to her, she stiffened, one fisted hand pressed to her chest. A long, tortured moan escaped her lips. “Silence…”

“Silence?” Finn closed his eyes. Damn. Somebody had really decided to do a number on this girl if they’d paired her with
that
one.

Then, as he stared at her, tears began to seep out from under her closed eyes. Guilt struck him in the heart, hard and fast. He winced. So the guy was freakishly scary—had a way of staring at you that made a man feel like he could see right through you. So the guy barely seemed to be
of
this world—even for one of them. If this girl had fallen for him, well…that was what mattered. She obviously didn’t lack for guts and she couldn’t be a bad sort, right?

For that matter, neither could Silence.

Even if he was decidedly strange.

She was still crying silently in her sleep. Unable to ignore it, Finn awkwardly hugged her and stared out the window. He wanted to reach out to Will, ask him what he should tell her when she woke up.

But maybe it was best that he not know anything yet.

Chapter Ten

She woke to smell the sea.

Licking her lips, Vanya sat up and found herself the focus of a pair of dark brown eyes. A woman sat at the foot of the bed, her legs folded. She had a delicate, almost ethereal beauty. Her strawberry-blonde hair was pulled into a stubby ponytail, leaving the fine bones of her face unframed.

The woman cocked her head and asked, “How do you feel?”

Vanya blinked and just stared at her.

Her mind clamored with about ten bajillion questions—starting with
Where in the hell am I
? Second question was—
Where was
Silence…
?

But she was afraid to think much more than that because, for some reason, just thinking of his name left her eyes stinging with tears and her heart aching something fierce. It wasn’t just that argument, either—something had happened. Something bad. The nightmares that had chased her while she slept hinted at it, but she’d never fully
seen
anything.

Taking a deep, slow breath, she swallowed. Her throat was horribly dry. “Tired. Confused. Who are you?”

“I’m Perci.” She smiled. “I can’t blame you on the confused thing—you’ve had a rough start, I think.”

“Rough start?” Vanya echoed.
 

Perci grinned and pulled on a silver chain, revealing the pendant that had lain tucked under her white tank top. “Relax. You’re with friends.”

Even though the woman seemed nice enough, Vanya didn’t know her. Shaking her head, she said, “Wearing that isn’t enough to make you my friend, Red.”

“Ouch.”

Now
that
voice at least sounded a little familiar. Looking over, she saw a man in the doorway. Yes, familiar—no name, though. He had a friendly, appealing face, with a smattering of freckles across his nose, coppery-golden eyes and coppery-golden hair. She could remember thinking he looked like he’d be the kind to smile a lot. And he was smiling now, although it was a tired one, strained.

“I know you,” she said absently.

“Yeah. You kind of got between me and an orin I was after.” His mouth twisted in a grimace. “He messed you up pretty bad—those things aren’t easy for a baby Grimm to handle.”

Vanya narrowed her eyes at him. “I wasn’t exactly lying down and making it a piece of cake for him.”

“No.” He shook his head. “You did a number on him, that’s a fact. But he worked you over too. You’ve been under almost a week while your body healed itself.”

A week
—

She blinked, shaking her head. “Did…did you say a week?”
 

“Yeah.”

Okay…she licked her lips again, but her tongue was so dry, it didn’t do any good. “Could I get some water?”

“Sure.” Perci gave a smile and rose off the bed, all long limbs and easy grace. She paused at the door, gave the man a strange, enigmatic look and then disappeared.

“Ah…so a week.”

“Yes.” He had his arms folded over his chest, and he watched her with a strange, shuttered look.

“Has…um, has anybody come looking for me? I…well, my trainer, maybe?”

He shook his head. “I sent word about you once I figured out how young you were. I was told you’re my responsibility for now.”

That was a dagger strike, straight to the heart. “You…you were
told
that?”

He gave a short, terse nod.

Feeling the burn of tears, she looked away.

She heard the soft fall of footsteps. “Here’s your water, Vanya.”

She waved toward the table. “I’ll drink it in a minute,” she mumbled. When she was a little less likely to puke it up.

“Were you told why I was placed with you?” she finally asked.

He hesitated for so long, she finally turned her head to look at him. Perci must have left the room again. He had a pained look on his face as he slowly said, “I wasn’t really told much of anything, Vanya. Just that I’d be the one dealing with you for a while.”

“Dealing with me,” she whispered. She blew out a breath and then nodded. “Okay, then. Since you’re dealing with me, I guess I should know your name.”

He gave her a faint smile. “Just call me Finn.”

“Finn.” She reached for the glass of water on the table. “If you don’t mind, I’m still very tired.”

“Of course.”

Perci found Finn out by the bay.

“You look pissed,” she noted. “I think I’ve seen you pissed off exactly three times in your life. I mean,
really
pissed.”

“She thinks Silence sent her away,” he growled. Stooping over, he picked up a rock and hurled it into water. It hit with enough force that the spray from its impact almost reach the shore. He slanted a look at her. “I felt like I’d punched her or something, seeing that look on her face.”

“I take it you’re not supposed to tell the truth—that Silence nearly died.”

“Shit.” He curled his lip. “Since when did I ever do what I was
supposed
to do?”

“Um…never?” She gave him a beatific smile.

When he looked back at her, she cocked a brow. “You’ve never listened to rules. Some of us do out of respect for Will. Some of us do because we were born in a time when we simply obeyed those in positions of authority. Others…like you…decide when you’ll obey rules, and when you won’t. If this is burning your ass so bad, why are you listening?”

“Because I hear her crying for him.” He looked away. “And something in my gut tells me there’s more to their story than what I know, which by the way is
nothing
. She’s a mess of pain, and there’s something seriously weird going on. Silence is a freaky bastard, but he wouldn’t have let her just trample off to face an orin on her own.”

“Easy answer there—he didn’t know about the orin,” Perci offered.

“Still.” Finn shook his head. “I don’t know what’s going on. I’m not going to go throwing out information that might make things worse for her.” Then he gave her a faint smile. “Of course, she’s awake now…maybe I can get some information out of her.”

But as the two of them started toward the house, the both grew aware of a new presence.

It wasn’t one Finn recognized.

Perci, though, did.

As she stepped into her house, her husband Jack was sitting at a table with a woman she knew—but didn’t care for.

Her name was Sina.

She was one of the older Grimm. Very old. Just looking into her eyes was unsettling. Something about her made Perci’s skin crawl, and it wasn’t just the fact that there was no love lost between them.

Jack shot Sina a narrow look. “I was out picking up some stuff at the store and this woman attached herself to my ass, wouldn’t leave. She said she needed to speak with our guest and it would be better if she came in with an escort, versus just strolling up.”

“Yeah.” Perci gave Sina a tight smile. “If she’d just strolled up, I probably would have told her to get the hell out.”

Sina sighed. “And to think I helped you reconcile with your true love.”

“And no doubt, you did that out of the goodness of your heart.”

Jack gave Perci a puzzled look, but she ignored it, still staring at the other Grimm.

“Why are you here, Sina?”

“To speak with the young one you’re sheltering,” Sina said, sipping from a glass of wine. “She doesn’t belong here with you.”

Finn smirked. “No? I was told she was my responsibility, and since I’m here, I figure she belongs where I am.”