The COMPLETE Witching Pen Series, Boxed Set (34 page)

She fought back the bile rising in her throat as he held her head still, drinking in every drop until she could feel that the cut was healing, and had stopped seeping blood. She knew her lip was bruised. This was his deranged way of marking her.

When he pulled back, his rage was still evident, but he seemed somewhat sated. “You are
mine
, and don't you ever forget it.”

A snarky comeback swam over her tongue – something about not being the wedded wife type – but she bit it back, and glared at him in what she hoped he'd interpret as 'drop dead, dickhead'.

“Even if your infidelity had never been a factor, I'd lost you anyway. That abyss was supposed to destroy you…”

He snaked a hand down the front of her neck, pressing into her skin with his fingers. He stopped over her beating heart. “But look what happened, Ymari, look what happened …
you became human.
At least in part. It seems that for you, the journey through that vacuum did not mean death, but rebirth. You entered the abyss an angel of darkness, you came out the other side as a human infant. I didn't know that would happen; that it even could. I wonder if God even knows. I doubt it … I would have heard of it by now. Your reincarnation is the reason you don't remember any of this.”

She'd always called herself a doorstep baby, but she knew that she'd been found in an alleyway in a basket. That much had been written on her records. Only now, after years of unfulfilled curiosity, she was finally being given … the truth? But the truth seemed ludicrous.

Her breathing was still erratic – his cruelty, his closeness, the waves of destructive emotion coming off him, the great big oaf of a bombshell he'd just dropped on her… “I
am
human,” she insisted, somewhat feebly, not willing to believe anything else.

“Only by a fraction. Humans aren't immune to fire,” he scoffed. “Haven't you ever wondered why you don't burn when you touch a naked flame?”

She blinked, bewildered. Of course she'd wondered. Her whole life she'd wondered, but having come up with no explanation at all, and not wanting to create enemies with her strangeness, she'd pushed it to the back of her mind and ignored it – just another crazy thing about her to file away in the ‘Mary’s A Weirdo’ pile. She remembered the flicker of confusion on Amy’s face when Elena’s building had exploded and she’d run away from it unscathed. She’d been secretly glad Amy hadn’t probed her about it…

“Angels are immune to fire?”

“No, just you and I, for we guard the Hell-fires. We feed it sins; we tend to the flames. It's why our wings look different – shinier, waxier – they're inflammable.”

“I don't have wings.”

“You did, and you will again.”

The transformation.
Ah. Now she was getting it, and she liked nothing of what she saw. “And my nightmares?” she asked weakly, unsure if she wanted to know.

Surprisingly, something that looked like regret registered in his eyes. “We are the guardians and purifiers of sin, Ymari. When sin is purged, we see it, feel it, smell it… Sin
is
pain. Not even angels can escape that. But it does get easier,” he added, almost sympathetically. “Over a few thousand years, the tearing agony lessens. And once you’ve shed your humanity, the sins that you see expunging before you, will no longer be subjugated to your dreams; they'll be waking visions.”

Waking visions?
Oh, hell, she didn’t want that. No wonder he was a loony-bin. He’d spent too many thousands of years as the cleansing vessel for everyone’s bad decisions. She’d never really known what she wanted to do for a career, but purger of sins was definitely not on the list. She looked him squarely in the eye with what felt like the last of her strength. “I'd rather keep my humanity, and all the pain that comes with it, than end up like you.”

He smirked. “How very noble. Heaven must have rubbed off on you – or maybe it was that whore of an angel who couldn't keep his hands to himself. Regardless, the transformation is not something you can avoid – you’re waking up. It’s due to happen, and it’ll do so with or without my interference … but I can ease the process for you.”

“How?”

“Bond with me, as you once were. Merge with
me
, and you shall have my strength, my blood, my bone … without me, you’ll fall into agony. It’s not just the transformation of human to angel, Ymari; it’s the change from being absolved of sin to carrying
all
of human sin upon you.” His shoulders seemed to sag at the thought. “Your nightmares will get worse, increase in length and ferocity – take me into you, and they’ll be nothing but a side show you don’t have to be immersed in.”

“I don’t want to bond, merge, or
anything
with you,” she said through gritted teeth.

“You seem to think I’m giving you a choice.”

“What about other types of blood? What if I bonded with another angel?”

Oooh, bad thing to say, Mary.

He zeroed in on her so fast, she wondered if it would be safer to meet a tornado head on.

“Are you thinking about
him
?!”

She shook her head. She didn’t even know who ‘him’ was – she was just trying to understand the logistics of angel-bonding. She hadn’t even known angels existed a month ago, much less that they ‘merged’ or whatever.

“No.
We
carry the sins of mankind. Me and
you
. That’s it. No other angel, no enlightened being strutting the gardens of Heaven, can diminish your pain—” 

But Gwain had, hadn’t he?

“—and your connection with
him
was torn apart! When I find out who he is, I’ll make sure the rest of him is ripped to shreds as well.”

She couldn’t hide her disbelief. “You don't know who I betrayed you with?” All this hatred for someone he couldn’t even name?

He shook his head slowly, clenching and unclenching his jaw. “You must have met him in Heaven. I know nothing of what happens in Heaven, just as God knows nothing of what happens in Hell – a consequence of duality I’m afraid. As soon as you entered God’s domain, I lost all vision of you. The only thing I had left was the connection through our mergence – I
felt
your betrayal the moment it happened because our own bond broke – something that should never even have been able to happen! You were bonded to me,
and
you were made from my very bones – that should have been stronger than …
thou shalt not commit adultery.
How the hell was I supposed to know you'd run off!”

He leaned into the crook of her neck, rubbed his nose along her skin and sniffed, then shook his head in either sadness or disgust. “Traces of his scent remain on you
.
Your human incarnation can’t have fully destroyed your tie to him – remnants of your betrayal still linger.”

He spun around, strode over to the far wall, and pulled something out from one of the nooks carved into it. When he came back towards her, he had a ceremonial dagger in one hand, and …
holy fuck!
… Gwain's tattered shirt in the other.

He brought it up to his face and breathed it in.

No way … was he thinking…? He could
not
be serious. This was just a misunderstanding … wasn't it? She could tell him; explain what had happened at the prison. But then, she didn't think the explanation would help – the Lord of the Underworld was clearly unhinged when it came to her.

Fury lit his eyes. “This shirt – this
man's
shirt – smells like
you
.”

Because I've been wearing it, O’Demented One.

“This,” he clenched the ruined garment so tightly his knuckles turned white, “is the scent your blood is tainted with.
This
belongs to the one you betrayed me with.”

“No,” Mary shook her head, although in all honesty, she didn't know what was true and what wasn't anymore.

“This is what's going to happen now,” he voiced, softly – too softly.

Mary cringed and tried to bury herself into the wall behind her.

He ran the edge of the blade along his wrist, never once taking his eyes off her. Blood, dark and red, seeped through the cut. When he next spoke, his tone was low, but as sharp as the dagger he held. “
You
are going to bond yourself to
me.
You're going to merge with me, and it will be
final
. My blood will trigger your transformation, and awaken your mind to everything you are.” He leaned into her, and rested the point of the dagger on the wound he'd inflicted on her lip. “And then, you're going to tell me who the bastard is you gave yourself to.”

Chapter Two

“It's in his nature to be jealous and possessive,” reasoned Karl. “To be honest, I think he's been nothing but understanding about the whole thing.”

Elena couldn't argue with that – the Dessec demon had surprised her. The way that he'd taken to Amy, and tucked her under his wing, so to speak, was … well, it was endearing. But it hadn't escaped her notice that every time she mentioned her grandfather – whether using the name Etienne or Paul – his jaw would clench and his left eye would twitch ever so slightly. Nor had it escaped her notice that Amy, although seemingly much happier since becoming reacquainted with her mother in the Cotswolds, often drifted off into some kind of daydream that had her looking sad and melancholy. Amy and Pueblo seemed tight together, but … something was off.

Amy had explained to them what had happened during her epic journey back to 1956. Elena's instinct was that she'd explained to them everything that was necessary to explain, and left out anything that wasn't.

Karl leaned into her on the crowded, Friday evening tube train, brushed a strand of her long, dark hair behind her ear, and gave her a peck on the cheek. “Now what are you thinking?” he asked, amused.

She shrugged, knowing that her musings were pointless. Her issues about the whole crazy thing were her own and had nothing to do with Amy. It irked her that Amy had known her grandfather better than she ever had. But then it freaked her out when she thought of
how
she knew him.

“Ugh, I don't know, Karl, the whole thing's just so messed up. I'll never understand how she could just forgive him.”

“Ah, so you
are
thinking about your grandfather.”

“He
took
her, for Christ's sake, when she was just a child. That's all kinds of wrong. He should be doing time behind bars.”

“Technically, you'll get no argument from me on that front, but … Amy's a compassionate person, and, well,” he hesitated, “maybe she saw a side of him none of us know.”

She raised her eyebrow at him. She didn't want to think about what sides of her grandfather Amy knew. Pueblo deserved a knighthood as far as she was concerned.

The tube train pulled up to their stop, and they both tumbled out with the rest of the commuters. Keeping up pace, Elena turned to Karl. “Anything new about Mary or Gwain?”

And now it was Karl's turn to look grim. “No.”

It had been two and a half weeks since Mary had disappeared – presumably through a portal of some kind – and Gwain had gone nutso and pulled a Houdini. Presumably he went after her, but none of them were sure – there was just lots of presuming, and no amount of magic that Elena possessed seemed able to find them … and this time, she'd even looked in the past.

Karl was clearly worried about Gwain, but hid it around an air of 'pissed off' whenever the topic came up.

“Hey, it's okay to be worried about Gwain, you know.”

“Gwain can take care of himself,” he shrugged.

“The way your dad could?”

He stopped in his stride, and looked at her, astonished, clearly not anticipating her words. About ten people piled into him.

“Ooomgh … sorry,” he mumbled to the mass of moving bodies as verbal expletives got thrown at him.

Elena grabbed his arm, and hauled him out of the way towards the stairs leading up to the exit. “I'm sorry, it's just … I know what you're thinking. It's obvious that Gwain's important to you.”

He sighed, shuffled her into a corner and pulled her in for a hug. “I meant it when I said that he can look after himself…”

“But…?”

He looked down at her and gave her a faint smile, his blue eyes, always so loving, sending a wave of warmth tumbling through her.

“How do you know me so well again?”

She grinned at him, but prodded his chest with a finger. “Don't change the subject.”

He shook his head as if to gather his thoughts. “I know he's all calm on the outside, but there's something about him that's reckless … not just that – there's something about him that
craves
recklessness. That's the bit – the
only
bit, I hasten to add – that reminds me of Dad. I know we all have our secrets—”

Elena grimaced. She had a newfound hatred of secrets.

“—but Gwain's been the most tight-lipped of all of us. He's been living on Earth for – what – about ten thousand years, which from what I've read tests the limits of even the strongest of angels; it demands a huge amount of control over the self. But the way he just disappears and reappears haphazardly, as if he wants to get caught doing it…” Karl exhaled in exasperation. “It's like he has this dichotomy of needing to be in control, and wanting to lose it at the same time.”

Elena stared at him, wide-eyed. “Wow, when did you get all good at psychoanalysing people?”

He grinned at her rhetorical question, then took her hand as they both raced up the stairs, at commuter speed, and headed out of Wimbledon station. “So, yeah, I'm worried about him – mainly worried that wherever he is, he'll do something stupid.”

“And Mary's
not
reckless? You don't think she's more likely to do something stupid?”

“Good point,” he mumbled.

“Well, I don't want to wait any longer to get Mum out of the Shanka world. I've already waited longer than I should have – Gwain was a big part of my plan. I've made new plans though, on the basis that they may never return.” Her throat constricted at the thought.