Soulless (Maiden of Time Book 2) (28 page)

Fifty-Six

Fear

So many. So many dead.

Kiren lifted Alexia against his shoulder to keep her from seeing and clenched his teeth. Blood clung to the strands of her hair and dotted her clothing.

Blood.

On her hands.

No matter what he did, he could never wash it off.

This was going to crush her. His angel.

His angel of death.

He would never escape the vision of her standing over a heap of corpses, the blur of motion as her broken weapon gleamed, the deadly precision and determination in her eye. He could only imagine how she would struggle to reconcile.

Kiren turned his gaze up, away from the bodies. He did not want to recognize friends from ages past, for it was enough that she’d saved him—saved them both. He would not burden her with his depression.

He rose, taking her with him. Her arms wrapped feebly around his shoulders, her face pressed into his neck. She shook.

“Shh,” he encouraged.
He
was supposed to protect
her
, to shield her from this sort of heartache. He had failed.

Her sadness pierced into him like the fabric of her heart had been shredded and set free on the lapping waves of a torrid sea. She was drifting apart, and no matter how he held her, he couldn’t keep her whole.

Carefully, he stepped over the prostrate bodies.  

And why hadn’t the necklace worked?

It didn’t sit right. The weight was off. It was empty. No power. No connection. Only emptiness.

A counterfeit?

Or was the counterfeit somehow himself? Was it possible that entering the Soulless consciousness had altered him?

Lucian would know. They needed to get back to the inn, to the heart of the Passionate, to safety. But there was no safety. Not from this. Not anymore.

Fifty-Seven

Torment

The steady rhythm of the horse’s hooves vibrated through Alexia until they resonated in her head, a constant drumming to exasperate her growing headache. Each shock sent pain lancing up her neck, and she just wanted it to end. Kiren’s stony grip held her firm, anchoring her. Her heart should be fluttering out of control, her entire soul warmed by his presence, but a dark cloud hung over her.

They were dead, all of them. There must have been fifty.

Fifty like John.

Or Sarah.

She could barely breathe around the knowledge of what she’d done.

But she had saved Kiren.

Was his life worth so many of theirs?

Of course it was! How many Passionate had he saved? How many more would he save?

After an hour of riding, he pulled into the quiet of someone’s barn and slid from the beast. Starlight spilled through gaps in the wood, dappling the ground in patches of silver. He took her elbow and aided her down. She landed and stumbled. He caught her and she stood chest to chest, face to face, his breath curling over her lips.

Alexia couldn’t look at him. She knew what she would see: disappointment, disgust, guilt. Part of her wanted him to kiss her, to tell her he was not repulsed by her actions, although she knew he must be. She wanted him—no needed him!

But she didn’t deserve him.

Alexia turned away and dropped into the straw.

He stood over her, not moving. Once or twice his breath hitched like he might speak, but what would he say? Reprimand her for so blatant an abuse of her power? Thank her for saving his life while his tone thrummed with accusation?

Slayer thudded in the straw next to her. She scooted away from it, wishing he’d left it behind.

Kiren cleared his throat, clearly waiting for something. Her fingers bit into her legs. She started visually tracing pieces of straw, unable to summon the power to lift her head. She curled in on herself, locking her arms around her legs. He would never be able to look on her the same way, but he lived. Her mother had warned there would be a price. Well, she’d paid it. Would there be any coming back from this?

Kiren exited the barn, leaving her alone.

The knotted rafters reminded her of Father’s stables, though she’d rarely been out to them. Her nanny had often warned about the unbecoming things which came of noble young women consorting with men in such places.

Her nanny who was dead at the hands of the Soulless.

She brushed a hand over the straw. Tears trickled down her cheeks. She had lived such a simple life then. Perhaps Kiren had been right to insist she stay safely within the human world. At least then he would have still had use of his pendant.

Alexia shuddered.

He returned, a sloshing bucket clenched in his fingers. He knelt before her, pulled the handkerchief from his jacket, and began washing the filth from her neck and hair. She still couldn’t meet his gaze.

The water chilled her, but his fingers grazed her skin, leaving a simmering trail of desire. He set the cloth aside and caressed her chin.

She blinked up at him.

“There you are.” The words were tender, his lips curving gently.

She bit down on the insides of her lips. Kiren slid closer, cupping her face. Her heart sped. His breath warmed her lips.

He was going to kiss her, to kiss the lips of a woman who had knowingly and intentionally killed and killed again. He didn’t deserve anything so tainted!

Uncontrollable tears burst through.

“Alexia.” He wrapped her in his arms and kissed the top of her head. His lips traveled to her brow, warming the skin. He kissed her cheeks, her nose, and finally her mouth.

She wept and kissed him back, yanking him closer, needing more of him. He kissed her more fiercely. She grabbed his waistcoat, pulling him over her as she laid back. He leaned in, his breath swirling across her bare neck, fingers caressing her sides.

Everything else disappeared while she was buried in him. He could heal this, heal anything, save her from herself. She didn’t want to think about anything but him.

She groaned hungrily and rolled over top of him. Night light streaked across his face, whitening his eyelashes. His stare cut her to the very center: so hungry, so vulnerable, like the crimson pupils of the creatures she’d slain.

She fumbled off him, heart thundering.

He sat up, brows squeezed together. “What is wrong?”

She slowed her breathing, closing her eyes. She couldn’t do it, couldn’t be with him knowing what she’d become for his sake.

Warm fingers brushed a curl of hair behind her ear. “Love?”

She turned away. “Am I a horrible person?”

“Why would you think that?”

She met his eyes, unable to stave the tears. “Only this morning I believed you lost to me, forever.”

He stroked her jaw. “And was I truly lost to you?”

She hesitated and nodded, more tears escaping. He pulled her against his chest, brushing her curls. “You dreamed it?”

Alexia shook her head. “I jumped back through time, Kiren. I came to stop them from killing you.”

His fingers froze.

She pressed a hand against his chest, searching for the rhythm that gave her a valid reason for drawing air. “And I did. I stopped them. All of them.” She blinked up at him. “Is it wrong that I should value your life above so many others?”

Kiren brushed the hair back from her face. “It should have been me.”

She shivered and he wrapped himself more closely about her. What was he saying? That he should have been the one to die?

He groaned. “I should have stopped them.”

“Would it be any less horrid?” She choked on the last word. “Are we so much better that we deserve to live and they deserve to suffer?”

“Love, they are set free.”

“Who am I, Kiren? I am not God. I am not the one who should decide it is their time!” The last word struck her. Time. Wasn’t that her gift?
Was
she intended then to decide such things—the beginning and ending of things? Why else did she have this gift? And what kind of merciful God would place so great a burden upon her?

His nose nuzzled her ear. “I believe these creatures are allowed to suffer, and I believe their merciful release is acceptable.”

“Then why does it feel like murder?” She faced him.

Light glistened across his pupils, but they were turned thoughtfully down.

She clutched his coat. “How have you survived it all these years?
Setting them free?
Tell me the secret, Kiren. I need to know!”

He pried her fingers from digging into his skin, lashes lifting. “There is no secret.”

She swallowed in horror.

“I do what I do for the right reasons, to preserve a nation that would otherwise cease to exist.” He stood. “Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps we should have faded from existence long ago.”

She couldn’t believe that was the right answer.

“Or perhaps God puts people in places at specific times because he knows how they will act.” His eyes drifted shut. “Perhaps he places his trust in us to act with the information or power with which we’ve been entrusted.”

She rose and pulled him close, wishing she could comfort him. How could she marvel at her own actions and not recognize the guilt he must bear for so many difficult moments? Her hand landed over the bulge of his necklace. Had it failed to function because she pulled it away from proper time? Had she damned them all by bringing it with her? “Why do you think it did not work?” she asked quietly.

He tugged the links from beneath his collar and lifted it into the light. A scowl curled the corners of his mouth down. He squinted closer. “That is not right.” He stepped to the barn door and shoved it open, scrubbing his fingers across the pendant’s surface. “This rune, here. It should curl on the end.”

“It is a fake?” She could barely believe it.

His jaw muscles flexed. “It seems perhaps the Soulless are more cunning than we had anticipated.”

Hisses carried through the night air.

Kiren retrieved the horse.

Fifty-Eight

Fate

Charles shivered, despite his layers. His estate home was chilly with no servants to light the fires, and it almost felt haunted now in his weapon gallery. He latched a rapier across his hip and stowed his powder horn carefully in his satchel.

After Bellezza’s disappearance a week and a half ago, he spent three days waiting for her return, the damnable imp, then made his way home. He now believed her interview had led to more trouble than she’d anticipated. Not that he cared. About her.

And yet he worried. Why had he remained in the house if not to receive the child?

“Bewitched,” he grumbled.

Still, he had come to believe her words, that a society of Collectors existed and that he had the power to infiltrate and dismantle them, something he anticipated with a surprising mix of excitement and dread.

Movement caught the corner of his eye. His muscles tensed. He slid his hands around the pistols lodged in his belt. Shadows shifted. He hooked fingers around the triggers.

The cold weighed around him, silent and still, like death.

He whirled, aiming.

A shadowy shroud stood in the doorway. Crimson eyes glowed at the heart of shifting blackness, as though all the light immediately around the being had been sucked out of the world.

He fired.

Sparks exploded out the back of one weapon. The ball launched into the blackness and it rent, crackling into a haze.

Charles hastily reloaded the pistol, seized his shotgun, and latched another one over his back. Hefting his satchel over one shoulder, he sprinted out the door.

It had been a mistake to come back here. They didn’t want him, but they certainly wanted the leverage he would offer when dealing with his daughter and her terribly-important fiancé.

A creature launched out of the darkness. He fired.

Three more shots and he’d be down to his rapier and the dagger hidden in his boot. His own footfalls echoed ominously as he thundered down the back stairs and out the door.

Heavy clouds obscured the stars, blocking even hope from view. Veering into the stable, he snatched a saddle and rope and returned to the night.

A shriek. He shot around. A wraith glided across the yard, arms outstretched. He lifted his shotgun.

Boom
!

Gunpowder perfumed the night. A horse whinnied and stamping hooves pulled him forward. Charles hurdled the pasture fence.

Two skittish animals butted at the gate, their eyes wide.

“Steady now.” He looped the rope around the larger steed’s neck and tied it down to the fence while saddling it, watching for the enemy. Mounting quickly, he kicked off into the night. It was time to seek out the Passionate the only place he knew, the place this whole mess began.