Microsoft Word - 1606017438-Of-Night-and-Desire-Bailey.doc (41 page)

“Because Adelaide was born seventh-generation Wicca. In her own right, she would have powers beyond those of mortal men. And when coupled with my own, Luka would not be able to carry out his nefarious plans to destroy the Immortals. He decided to destroy her as a child, leaving me without hope of claiming my life mate. I would either commit the Final

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Sacrifice or turn Vampyre. He had hoped I would turn Vampyre and join him.”

“You were able to survive all those years alone because you knew Adelaide was in America,” Valya surmised.

“Yes. I began searching for her in her eighteenth year. I didn’t want to know where she was before then. I didn’t want Luka to find her through me.”

“And then.”

Nicolae stood and walked to the balcony. He stared up at the moon, full of promise for some and mocking the pain of others.

“I was too late. She had already wed another.”

“But Richelle…”

“I went to her. I knew I shouldn’t have, but I needed to know.”

“Know what?”

Nicolae turned. Valya could have sworn there were tears in his eyes.

“That she had found a life for herself…that she was happy.”

“Was she?”

Nicolae shook his head as he walked back toward the bed and sat down.

“She wasn’t unhappy. They were friends, husband and wife. But the love between them was not the love she would have had with her life mate.

With me.”

“What happened?”

“She recognized me,” Nicolae stated with a tinge of pride in his voice.

“So far from each other, so long. And still, she recognized me. She ran into my arms and embraced me, weeping.”

“Weeping?”

“She wept because she knew there was a missing part of her out there somewhere and now she had found it. She wept because she had already married another, and there was nothing she could do about it.”

“They could have divorced! She could have completed the ritual with you!” Valya heatedly asserted, but Nicolae sadly shook his head.

“She had pledged her life to another, a friend, and she would not hurt him. And even if she would, I wouldn’t have allowed her to.”

“And yet, you took her to bed and impregnated her!”

“Yes.” No explanation, no excuses. Just yes.

“Why!” Valya demanded.

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“She was my life mate, the one I had searched for all these centuries. I knew she would not be mine, but I had to lie with her. If only for one time before I left for home…to prepare for my death. When I returned home there was a telegram waiting for me. She was pregnant…with my child. I rushed back to the States, but again I was too late. They had left. I tried to find her, but I was always one step behind.”

“Is that why you sent me here, for Richelle?”

“You are a Guardian, sworn to protect mankind from evil. Luka is Evil Incarnate. When he had been told of Richelle, he decided rather than kill her, he would take her as his life mate, taking her power as his own in order to destroy me and the Immortals. I sent you here to bring Luka to justice. I only hoped you would find Richelle, to protect her. And prayed to the Gods my visions were true that
you
were her life mate.”

Valya covered his eyes with his forearm and groaned. Now he knew how Richelle felt when he first told her about the ritual. It was all too much to comprehend. Why had all this been concealed from him?

“It wasn’t concealed,” Nicolae said. “It just wasn’t revealed until it was necessary.”

“I’m a Guardian! I do not operate on a need-to-know basis! I should
have been told.”

“There was too much risk, too much to lose. As it was, Luka had been informed of Adelaide. And Richelle. I was hoping you would have completed the ritual by now and Luka would have been foiled.”

“I still should have been informed,”
Valya fumed. Had he known, he wouldn’t have taken her out into the open. He would have completed the bonding and Luka wouldn’t have her now. But there was still a portion missing in this equation.

“Luka’s powers are no more than mine, a shadow of the powers of the Great One. How did he learn of Adelaide and her daughter?”

“His mother, Selene. She read the cards and told him of them. How to use them to destroy me.”

“And who is this Selene?”

“An Immortal, gone from us now. In our youth, she believed me to be her intended. When I explained to her she was mistaken, she refused to relinquish her claim. She seduced me to her bed and tried to trick me into

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completing the ritual. As a member of the Council serving the Triad, I banished her. This was her way to take revenge on me.”

Deafening silence pounded in Valya’s ears. This was like something from a bad daytime soap opera—tragic love affairs, illegitimate children, and sadistic revenge. But he had to get beyond that and focus. He would not let Richelle become the hapless victim of a badly written melodrama.

“Where do we go from here?”

“Luka contacted the Triad to behold his victory as he enslaves Richelle in the same manner he intends to enslave mankind.”

Nicolae reached down and gripped Valya’s hand in a warrior’s hold, his body and words as hard as tempered steel.

“We must not allow Luka to carry out his malevolent design for domination. He must be destroyed, no matter what the price.”

There was no room for doubt as their eyes met. Valya would rather take Richelle and face the dawn together than allow Luka to win this battle. He vowed Richelle would never endure the antipathy of the Living Death, and he nodded to Nicolae in agreement.

“No matter what the price.”

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Preacher climbed the stairs slowly, leading a processional of

Vampyresses bearing gifts, resembling a twisted Magi, he thought dryly.

The moon had not risen yet, the sun barely asleep beneath the horizon when Luka summoned him. He lolled in bed, the room reeking of blood and sex while he dismissed the females who had lain with him to go with Preacher and prepare Richelle for the Beltane Feast.

Preacher kept a tight lid on the revulsion he felt as the three Vampyresses left. Luka stretched, not bothering to cover his nudity or open his eyes as he gave his commands.

Nor did he hide the fact he had spent the night with three lovely seductresses, all the while declaring that Richelle was his destined life mate and that he planned on completing the bonding ritual as part of the festivities of the feast. The Vampyresses tittered as he averted his eyes from their nakedness, refusing to look at them until they clothed themselves. Of course, the flimsy layers of silk did little to hide their bodies. They even taunted Preacher, flaunting their nipples and pussies, daring him to look as they seduced him.

Preacher was sickened by them and at Luka’s idea of his
destined love,
Richelle. Luka’s preferred ways of expressing his
love
were repugnant to Preacher.

Love
. Luka didn’t know the meaning of the word and of what love truly was, Preacher thought. Not that he knew any better what love was anymore.

In the dark recesses of his memory, he had a vague recollection of love.

He had loved mankind, his congregation. God. But years of watching mankind deteriorate, becoming more and more amoral, a race with no conscience or compassion, had drained him of his hope and faith until all that remained of his belief in God had faded away like an unfulfilled Christmas wish, leaving him bitter and cynical.

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It was then, when his despair and despondency had left him wallowing in a pool of misery with thoughts of suicide, that Luka had approached him.

Luka was a strong and shining beacon, a light in the darkness of his life. He prophesized about a new world, where the wicked and unjust would be destroyed and a new race would rise to bring order to the world. Preacher willingly pledged his allegiance to Luka in the hopes of saving mankind.

Little did he know that rather than saving mankind, he was damning them.

Luka’s vision
did
include destroying the wicked and unjust. What Preacher didn’t know was that Luka considered
all
humans wicked and unjust. The new race Luka spoke of would be his prodigy, who would annihilate the Immortals who opposed him, leaving him the omnipotent ruler of those who remained.

By the time Preacher realized his mistake it was too late—too late to save mankind and too late to save his soul. He had sold his soul to the Devil.

So whether he lived or died, it made no difference. He was in Hell, damned beyond all redemption at his folly of a perfect world comparable to that of idyllic Eden.

He followed Luka’s commands, not because of some higher ideal but because he was a coward—afraid of Luka, afraid of Luka’s wrath, afraid to live, and afraid to die. As much as he hated his master, he hated himself more.

Without knocking, he opened the door and was taken aback by the picture Richelle made lying in the majestic bed. The red satin sheets framed her porcelain skin. Her hair cascaded over the pillows as one hand rested lightly against her forehead and her other arm lay draped over her stomach.

He stepped closer as he gazed, mesmerized by her lovely face, slightly blemished with dark circles under her eyes. Reaching out, he picked up one of the tendrils of her hair and rubbed it between his fingers before abruptly releasing the strand and letting it fall back on the pillow. If he still believed in them, he would believe she was an angel.

Richelle’s eyes fluttered as she woke slowly. Preacher expected her to be startled by his nearness, at the very least be upset by his presence, but she merely looked at him with an expectant expression.
Ah yes
, he remembered.

Second blood.
That would work in his favor.

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“Good morning, madam,” he bid in a patrician tone. “Did you sleep well?”

Slowly she sat up, covering herself with the sheet and looking over her surroundings with an expression of puzzlement.

“I said, did you sleep well, m’lady?”

“I, um…I’m sorry,” she replied absently as she raised a hand to brush her hair away from her forehead. Her fingertips strayed to lightly rub her temples. “I don’t seem to… Do I know you?”

Preacher chuckled. Yes, this would work very well.

“Yes, m’lady. I am the major-domo at Tower of the Red Dragon. You may call me…Victor.”

“Victor?”

“Yes, m’lady.”

* * * *

She looked around slowly, trying to remember, but it was like trying to catch raindrops with a sieve. If not remembering who or where she was wasn’t distressing enough, the leers she was getting from the three women giggling in the shadows behind Victor completely intimidated her. She pulled the sheet up, wrapping it around her tighter as she watched the women from beneath hooded eyes, their giggling more pronounced at her modesty.

One thing was certain. She had a strange feeling of déjà vu. She had gone through something like this before. Her brows furrowed and she tried to remember.

“I…didn’t sleep very well. I don’t seem to remember…”

“That is understandable, m’lady. You were up rather late…celebrating.”

“Celebrating?”

“Yes. The entire household was celebrating late into the evening. Master would let you sleep longer, but then there would be no time to prepare.”

“Prepare?”
I sound like a dimwitted parrot.

“For your wedding.”

“My wedding?”

“Yes, you and Master are to be wed this evening at the Beltane Feast. It is no wonder you didn’t sleep well with the excitement of your nuptials.”

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“No. It was the dreams.”

“Dreams, m’lady?”

“Yes. I kept having these dreams, and they kept waking me. There was a red haze and people coming in and out of the mist. They kept reaching out to me but disappeared into a fog. And then there was…him.”

“Him?” Preacher questioned, his face impassive.

“He was so…so…I couldn’t see his face as he kept calling to me,
Richelle
,
Richelle
… Richelle! My name is Richelle!”

“Go on,” Preacher urged, his voice calm. “Who was he?”

“I don’t know,” Richelle replied, shaking her head. “I never saw his face. I only heard him calling my name over and over again.” She rubbed her temples, trying to remember more, but everything was cast in darkness.

She could make out his shadow, large and steady. His muscular frame swaggered from the mist with the grace of a panther.

Although she couldn’t see him, she could
feel
him. She could feel his intensity, hear the need in his voice. She was drawn to him like a moth to a flame. And when he stood before her, his face shrouded by the murky miasma, his dark eyes raked over her through the darkness. She should have been afraid, but she wasn’t. Instead she felt alive with an exhilaration that resonated a chord embedded deep within her soul and wanted to make her heart sing.

“I couldn’t see him, but I
knew
him.” The memory of his dark gaze bore into her brain. No matter what else she couldn’t remember, she would never forget those eyes.

“Well, that explains it, m’lady. The master is a very handsome man indeed.”

“The master?”

“Luka cel Rau. He is the master here at Tower of the Red Dragon. It’s no wonder you would be having dreams before your wedding. The two of you are very much in love.”

“We are?”

“Yes.” The three women sniggered from across the room. They stopped when he shot them an icy glare before turning back to her. “You two have been nearly inseparable since your arrival here.”

Richelle eyed Preacher suspiciously and then the three women. They stiffened at her gaze, but were unable to maintain a stoic expression as they

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smirked and whispered among themselves. Richelle’s gaze returned to Preacher.