Pyromancist (12 page)

“Any chance of finding Erwan on our own,
without using the girl?”

“The team’s on it. We’re using all the
technology at our disposal, but Erwan has a lot playing in his
favor. He grew up here. He knows the woods, the islands, and the
sea like the back of his hand. There are a million places to hide.
The fishermen said he left on a trawler for a few months. Mayor
confirmed the story. Only, we’ve had the trawler intercepted.
There’s no one by the name of Erwan d’Ambois on board, and no one
fitting his description. I’m willing to bet my life that the
captain is lying through his teeth, saying he took the old man
aboard but left him in Port Navalo. Erwan made it up. He couldn’t
have gone far. He’s too old, too weak. He’s here. He’s watching,
waiting. Sooner or later, he’s going to know we’ve got his
granddaughter. Then we’ll learn the truth.” Josselin studied Cain.
“What do you know about this Lupien?”

“All I know is that he’s a European
male.”

“We don’t even know the cause of these fires
yet. It may still have a logical explanation.”

Cain chuckled. “No. My intuition is never
wrong. This is a pyromancist’s work. We may have a new firestarter
in Larmor, or an old one looking for a new one. Do you get what I’m
saying?”

“No.”

“If there is a dormant pyromancist in your
village, the only way for Lupien to awaken that person’s art would
be by practicing it, severely and fiercely.”

“You’re saying it’s possible that Lupien is
starting fires to draw out whoever the firestarter is whose power
he wants to steal?”

“Something like that.”

“Then my mission has changed. You’re no
longer asking me to find out who is destroying the village. You’re
asking me to catch a firestarter. Are you’re asking me to go on a
witch hunt for Lupien, or for his victim?”

Cain smiled coldly. “Preferably both.”

“If Clelia leads us to Erwan, will you let
her go?”

“The girl is a pawn,” Cain said, his voice
carrying a warning.

“So you want Lupien destroyed. And once you
get your dormant pyromancist, are you planning on saving him, or
eliminating him?”

“Our enemy is growing stronger by the day.
He’s recruiting. I can’t allow him to take more power.”

“You’re asking me to kill a possibly innocent
dormant firestarter.”

“We have to eliminate him before Lupien gets
his hands on him. It seems the only one who holds the answers is
Erwan. We need to get to the old man no matter how you have to use
the girl. She’s the strongest weapon we’ve got.”

Josselin lifted his barriers, trying to
shield his emotions. He had been right to hide Clelia. He wasn’t
wrong about Cain’s intentions. He would be unscrupulous in using
her as bait. An overwhelming desire to protect Clelia made him say,
“She’s an innocent.”

“Life is not always fair, Josselin. Remember
your training when emotions cloud your heart.”

Josselin pursed his lips. She was his. He
wouldn’t let her go. The strange thought came to his mind from
nowhere, the words a whisper in his ears. Too late to filter it
from Cain. He saw comprehension in his commander’s eyes. He was in
a hell of a predicament, torn between an unjustifiable
protectiveness for his witch, and a loyalty to the organization to
which he had pledged his life. He stared at Cain as the confusion
grew in him.

“She’s an innocent,” Josselin said again, the
statement sounding more than a plea.

“Bring her in, Josselin.”

“Let me bring in Erwan d’Ambois my way.”
Josselin looked at Cain intensely. “I’ve never asked for anything.
I’ve given you my soul and my life to use for your cause without
asking questions. Just let me do this.”

Cain wrapped his fist around the diamond the
size of a golf ball on his cane. “You’re like a brother to me,
Josselin. Don’t screw this up.”

Josselin knew what Cain was saying. He had a
special affection for Josselin, stronger than what he felt for any
of the others. Josselin’s capacity to lead had won him the position
in his team, but an unspoken bond had secured a concrete connection
between him and Cain. However, Cain was dedicated to the greater
good of their mission, and he wouldn’t hesitate, not blink an eye,
if he had to eliminate Josselin.

Josselin’s muscles tensed further. “I will do
what’s right.”

Cain gave him another knowing smile. “That’s
a word that doesn’t exist in your vocabulary, Josselin.”

“Strangely, it’s just found its way in.”

* * * *

Josselin left the yacht with Cain’s grant of
another couple of days to secure Erwan. After that, he had to hand
Clelia over and let Cain do it his way. If Cain had to tie her to a
tree in the middle of the woods to bring out the wolves, he would,
and Josselin had to find the old man before that happened. It was
only a matter of time before they’d sniff him out. He just prayed
to whatever gods existed that he’d be the one to do it. If Erwan
got hurt, Clelia would never forgive him, and she’d be lost to him.
Again, that foreign claim. That urge to make her his. To bind her
to him. He shook his head. The job and the town were getting to
him. The past was too much. Last night he was ready to give up, to
take his life, to put an end to the suffering. Today, he knew he
had to stay alive to fight for her. Was he finally going even
crazier than what he already was? By God, yes. He was a lunatic
stalking his home territory, and he only prayed to hold the madness
at bay for long enough to free an innocent witch.

* * * *

Josselin walked faster as he got closer to
the house of his childhood. She was alone, frightened. He could
feel her fear as he approached. It wrapped around him like a cloak.
It had grown dark. He had stayed away too long, but it couldn’t be
helped. His expert eyes were trained on the environment, ensuring
that he hadn’t been followed, although the special device he
carried in his pocket would have alarmed him, as the sensors he had
implanted on all the windows and doors would have warned him if
someone had tried to break in.

He paused on the dark steps of the porch to
inhale the energy of the house. It was as tainted as he was. The
old memories assaulted him anew, whipping around him like the ivy
tentacles that strangled the walls. It was the one safe place that
no one would dare to come, but then a frightening thought entered
his mind. Only evil would not be repulsed by this place. Only evil
would search out this birth ground of the devil, and he had an
angel tied up inside as bait.

Yes, his plan wasn’t so ingenious, but it was
the only one he had. He didn’t know if it was evil or good that
would come for her first, his own or Lupien’s people. But he had no
doubt someone would come. It was inevitable. He knew it with a new
surety he had never felt before. He didn’t admit it to Cain, but in
his gut, he felt the truth of the words his boss had uttered. It
had started. It was a pebble in the pond, and the waves had to
follow. He flinched at the thoughts that rooted in his mind, as if
a magic seed had been sown many years ago, only to sprout now,
after years of watering had matured it for this moment. He tasted
the memory of Clelia’s blood on his pallet as he unlocked and
secured the door behind him and hastened up the stairs.

He had left the lights on for her when he
left. Before he entered the room, he heard her sobs. It drew him
like the call of a siren. He dropped the bags in the hallway and
rushed inside. She was turned to the wall, drawn into herself, her
dark hair covering her face. Josselin rushed to her side and knelt
beside the bed. He unlocked the handcuffs and lowered her arms. He
massaged her wrists, anger flaring inside of him when he saw the
raw skin.

He clicked his tongue. “I told you not to
struggle, witch.”

She refused to look at him. She tried to keep
her tears in, but he could see them shaking her body.

“Come,” he said, pulling her into a sitting
position. “Do you need the bathroom?”

She didn’t answer, so he put her on her feet
and moved her in that direction, closing the door behind her for
privacy. He waited a good few minutes before he knocked, got the
silence he expected, and opened the door. She sat on the closed lid
of the toilet, her head hung low, in his clothes that were so big
he could fold them around her like a blanket. A renewed sense of
protection overwhelmed and confused him.

“I brought food,” he said. “You need to
eat.”

She didn’t move, and that didn’t surprise him
either. He took her shoulders and guided her back to the room,
making her sit on the bed while he went back into the hallway and
collected the bags. He unpacked sandwiches and bottles of water
onto the desk and left the bag with her clothes on her bed.

“I fetched some of your own things,” he said.
“You can dress later. It’ll make you feel better.”

He reached for a sandwich and held it to her,
but she shook her head. “How are my animals?”

The small zoo had surprised Josselin. The
dogs had stalked, would have attacked, if he hadn’t had the power
to stare them down.

“Your wolves almost ripped me apart,” he
said, chuckling.

She lifted her head quickly. “Are they all
right?”

“Don’t worry. I didn’t harm them. I merely
showed them who their new alpha is.”

“They’re my family,” she said, and he
understood.

“Where did you find such a pack of vicious
wolves?”

“They’re not wolves, they’re hybrids. Their
mother was shot by hunters. I found them as I was taking a shortcut
to work one day. I had to take them, or they would have died.”

“You take a lot of helpless beings in, don’t
you?” She didn’t reply, so he said, “I’m just glad you had
protection roaming the woods. I’m sure they would have kept any
potential Iwigs at bay.”

Clelia flushed a very bright red. “You
remember,” she said, sounding horrified.

Her embarrassment puzzled him. “You rather
hoped I wouldn’t?”

“I didn’t spy on you,” she said, and then he
understood, in a way that almost gladdened his heart. Almost. He
wouldn’t let it bloom into joy. Never would he take happiness from
her interest in him. He was too dark, too twisted, too ruined.

“Those girls meant nothing,” he said,
nevertheless. Why he said it, he didn’t know. It was just something
he needed to say.

“Then you used them,” she said, sounding
sad.

“Yes. I regret that I did. Sex was a coping
mechanism. I was young and ignorant. But I’ve made my peace. I’ve
apologized to each and every one of them, albeit a few years late.
I’m not proud of what I was.”

“Meaning you’ve changed?” Now she sounded
bitter.

“In some ways. If you’re referring to sex, I
no longer use it as a means of forgetting.”

“Forgetting your past?”

“Who I am. What I am.” He studied her, the
big, round eyes, the beautiful pout of her lips, the delicate shape
of her face. “The question is who are you? Who was your mother,
Clelia? Has Erwan ever shared anything about your mother with you
that could be connected to the fires?”

“I need to go home.” Her voice quivered. “I
need to take care of my animals.”

“You know you can’t go home.” When her bottom
lip started to tremble and tears brimmed in her eyes, he said,
“I’ll feed them. They won’t starve.”

She looked at her hands, her tears hidden
behind her cascade of hair.

He brushed her hair behind her ear and
trailed his thumb over the path of her tears.

“It must be hard for you not to fear me.”

Suddenly it was very important for him to
know if she saw him as the monster he was.

Instead of commenting on his statement, she
said, “Erwan will never come for me.”

“Never is a very long time.”

“You don’t understand. I’m not one of them,
of you. You belong here. You’ve always belonged here. Me, I’m just
an unfortunate product of rape. I’m not worth coming for.”

Shock made Josselin’s breath catch, anger
made him clench his jaw, and compassion made his throat tight.

“You mustn’t say that. Your mother had a love
affair. The bastard left her, but you must think of their union as
something good.”

“No, Josselin. I’m the bastard. Erwan told me
the truth. My father was a rapist. He raped my mother. How she must
have hated me all nine months she carried me. Then I went and took
her away from Erwan by making her die to give life to me. No, he
won’t come back for me.”

Josselin’s head jerked as if he had received
a fist on the jaw. He was engulfed by the enormity of her
confession, and wanted to wrap his arms around her, but he also
recognized the deceit in her revelation as much as he saw the truth
in it. She wanted him to believe that Erwan wouldn’t return for
her, but he knew he would. She was worth coming back for.

“Don’t speak like that. It wasn’t your fault.
You didn’t choose the nature of your conception or your birth. He
will come,” he said, and then he got up and walked to the shuttered
window, so as not to come undone for her sake, for her pain, right
there at her feet.

“Eat,” he said with his back to her, and when
he didn’t hear her move, he simply sighed and turned away from the
window to walk back to the bed. He felt weary from a long night’s
drinking, the unwelcome shooting action, and little sleep. His
eyelids were heavy. Defying his body’s needs, he knew he should
stay awake, guarding, waiting, but he was weak.

“Do you want to change?” he said, hovering
over her.

She nodded.

“You have two minutes.”

She picked up the bag he had packed and
dragged it to the bathroom, closing the door softly behind her.
When she came back, she wore white shorts and a T-shirt. She was
barefoot, and her hair hung loose around her face. She looked at
him, almost as if she was waiting for a cue, and when he nodded
toward the bed, she obeyed without argument. His heart clenched
when she held her wrists out to him. God knows, he didn’t want to
cuff her again, but he could feel his strength slipping and
couldn’t risk her escaping if he dozed.