The Demon Creed (A Demon Outlaws Novel) (Entangled Edge) (7 page)

It was stuffy and dirty, but more in a neglected way than a truly untidy one, although the floor was piled high with well-thumbed books. The room had no shelves on which to store them.

She’d had no idea that Bear enjoyed reading.

A wide, overstuffed chair with curved, threadbare arms sat near the window. Its fabric might once have been white. Now, it was gray and somewhat yellowed. A solid, ornately carved desk flanked the other side of the window, although it was obvious that Bear never sat there. It had been shoved against the wall so that the matching chair was pinned behind it. A pen and ledger lay on the outer edge of the desktop, not the inside.

Three filing cabinets overflowed with papers crammed so tight inside the drawers that they could no longer fully close.

She surveyed the room with growing dismay. It was clear that she had considerable work ahead of her, when a foolish part of her had expected to ride out this same day, on the assassin’s heels.

…

Hours later, with the angle of the sun shining through the window indicating it was at least midday, she heard steps outside the closed door, then a soft knock and her name.

“Nieve?”

She sat on the round, braided rug in the middle of the floor, suddenly conscious of the frenetic chaos she had created, and the papers strewn haphazardly in every direction around her. She went very still, praying that if she did not answer, he might go away.

Instead, the door inched open. He peered around it, first at her, then at the mass of papers she could not hope to hide, before pushing it farther. The bottom of the door caught on some of the sheaves, dragging them across the rug and crumpling their edges, and she stifled a sharp cry of dismay because she’d not yet had a chance to examine them.

He stooped and gathered them, smoothing them against his muscular thigh with the palm of one hand while he continued to regard her with a thoughtful frown.

“I found a few weapons and some ammunition in Bear’s storage room that you should find easy enough to use,” he said. “I’ve also got a small handgun that I thought I might leave behind. Do you know how to use a gun?”

She’d never had any reason to learn. It was not something she’d had to know growing up, and certainly not anything Bear would want to teach her. Bullets were expensive and difficult to obtain. He would not have wasted them.

“Of course,” she lied. “Most women do.”

“No,” he said. “Most women do not.” His mouth twitched into a faint almost-smile. The creases it created at the corners of his lips surprised her because they suggested he smiled often, or at least he had at one time. He held out the papers and she took them, adding them to the unread pile on the floor beside her. “Why don’t you come with me for a few moments and I’ll give you a quick lesson in the yard? Just to ease my conscience about leaving you here alone?” he added, before she could object. He looked at the papers. A dark eyebrow lifted. “Unless you’d like me to help you find whatever it is you’re looking for in here?”

She could think of nothing she wanted less. “You don’t need to worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

“But I will worry. You can either convince me you know how to fire a gun, or you can let me give you a quick lesson. I’m not leaving until I’ve seen evidence that you can protect yourself.”

She did not want his concern. Neither did she care to be in the close proximity to him that such a lesson would require. She did not trust him, or the troubled warmth in his eyes no doubt meant to lull her into a false sense of security, because inside, and from past experience, she knew she should be screaming.

Yet she did not dare let him see how afraid of him she was. Demons fed on fear. Standing strong against him was her best defense. She would show him that she could, indeed, protect herself.

For Ash, she would do what she had to.

“Very well.” As she stood she kept her head down, pre-tending not to see the hand he extended to help her. She would not let him touch her again.

His hand dropped to his side. He stepped out of the doorway, giving her plenty of room to walk past him.

…

Creed did not care to contemplate her aversion for him. He did not want to know anything about her anymore, other than that she would be safe.

Because what he did know was that his demon half was far too attracted to her, making it difficult for him to control, and that was not good.

Not for anyone.

He followed her past the parlor and out the front door, into the yard, where he had set up a few targets for her to practice on. A row of tin cans crested the top of a rough wooden sawhorse he’d found in an outbuilding. She would need to be able to use Bear’s rifle from a reasonable pace in case wolven came prowling around. She would not want to let them get too close. His handgun, conversely, would be more useful to her at a closer range, because she could not shoot a man from any great distance and call it self-defense. It was a small, single-shot pistol with a pearl grip, and she could hide it in her skirt.

First, he taught her how to load each weapon. Then he showed her how to hold the rifle.

“Not into your shoulder,” he said. “The kickback’s too much for a woman your size. Prop it on top. Like this.”

The crown of her head skimmed the underside of his chin as he shifted the butt of the rifle into a better position for her. His nearness made her nervous. He sensed it in the same way he smelled the soap she used and felt the hot sun on his skin. His demon rampaged inside him, tortured to have her so close and yet be forced to maintain a distance.

She lifted those wide green eyes, casting him a look of anxious suspicion as if she sensed the internal battle he fought. He forced his attention away from her and onto the target.

She crooked a stray length of white-blond hair behind her ear with a slender finger, bit her lip in concentration, took aim, and fired the rifle. The barrel shot skyward on the recoil, and he grabbed for the butt to keep it from sliding backward off her shoulder. The bullet missed the target entirely.

It was not long before she had better control of the weapon, and he decided she could manage to practice with it on her own.

He picked up the small gun. It looked like a toy in his hand.

“All you really need to know with this weapon is how to pull the trigger,” he said. “Always keep it well hidden, because it’s something you don’t want your opponent to see. The aim is poor and it’s unlikely to kill a man from any real distance. Even up close, it will probably do nothing more than wound him.”

With his mind more focused on the demonstration now, he took her hand in his and placed the gun in her palm. He pressed her fingers around the grip. Then, as the sun beat with relentless heat against the back of his neck, his gaze brushed against hers.

She froze, her wariness of him unwavering, but beneath it there existed a thin layer of curiosity. The attraction between them might be unwanted by her, but it was not unnoticed. He could not seem to read her true wishes. They were jumbled and complex, and he would have to untangle them in a more traditional way. He lowered his head, giving her plenty of warning so that she could avoid him if she wished, and while she did not make any move to encourage him, neither did she pull away.

After another second’s hesitation, he covered her mouth with his.

The barrage of sensations left him weak at the knees. She tasted delicate and soft, and the feminine scent of her warm skin bombarded his thoughts so that nothing mattered to him but this splintering effect she had on his senses. That switch clicked again in his head, releasing a truth he had not been more fully aware of last night because the timing had not been right.

He belonged with this woman. He was hers.

He slid his free hand to the small of her back and drew her against him, deepening the kiss. His demon growled with satisfaction, possession, and a rising, impatient desire.

Creed must have responded in kind, because with a gasp, she broke off the kiss. Time crawled to a standstill, then shifted to a sprint. Nieve shoved the gun lodged between them into his ribs. His hand still covered hers, and with the well-trained instincts of an assassin, he jerked the gun to the side so that the bullet she fired embedded into the ground, kicking up dirt, and not in his heart.

Shock roared in his ears.

“I’m sorry,” she gasped.

For what, he could only imagine. For trying to kill him? Or for allowing him to kiss her?

His face felt wooden. Immobile. Time slowed again as he stared into those beautiful, terror-filled eyes. Her fear washed over him.

All at once, the very sight of her infuriated and frustrated him. He had not compelled her, or threatened her in any way. He’d been nothing but kind. He had not earned her fear of him, but instead, kept his demon well in command.

At least now he knew she could shoot a man if she wanted. It made it far easier for him to leave. A stupid part of him had begun to worry that he might end up neglecting his duty in favor of her well-being. Sooner or later he would have resented that, and then her, regardless of what his demon wanted.

“I’m sorry, too,” he said, and went off to the stable to gather his belongings.

A short while later he rode from the yard. As he passed through the gates, he did not look back.

…

Some distance away, in the Borderlands at the far edge of the desert, a blond-headed child sat on the top rail of a wooden corral where his friend Hunter was training an unbroken hross.

He swung his legs, kicking his heels against the next railing down. Hunter and Airie called him Scratch, but that wasn’t his name. His real name was Asher—Ash, for short—but he kept that to himself. His mother was coming for him, and until she did, he had to be careful. Names had power, and he didn’t want the mean woman, the one who could summon demons from the demon boundary, to know his. If she had it she might try to summon him, too, when he traveled the boundary.

But the big man—the one who was different, like Ash and Airie—had gone to the ranch where Ash used to live, and now his mother remembered him again, and she was going to come for him. The big man would help her. Ash had protected his mother for as long as he could, and kept her hidden from demons, but now the mean woman was following her. She’d be coming here, too.

And she didn’t like Airie.

Hunter’s wide-brimmed hat had fallen in the dirt. Now, sun-bleached hair hung in his eyes and he flipped it back with an absent toss of his head, his attention on the young hross on the end of the long lunge line. The nervous animal reared onto its hind legs, giant hooves pawing at the air inches from Hunter’s face, but he did not seem concerned, so Ash wasn’t either.

Airie, however, was another matter. As if sensing danger to him, she came out of the log house across the yard and carefully descended the wide plank steps. She always moved more slowly these days. The heavy weight of the baby she carried in her stomach disrupted her balance.

Airie was tall and very pretty, and Ash would not mind having her for his mother if he didn’t already have one he loved. He loved Airie, too, but his mother needed him whereas Airie did not. Not in the same way.

She came to stand beside Ash as he sat on the fence. She slipped an arm around him and gave him a hug, although her eyes were on Hunter, but she knew better than to distract him when he was working.

When Hunter was finished he released the hross from the lunge line, picked up his hat, and came over.

“It’s lunchtime,” Airie said. She said nothing to him about being worried. Hunter always knew without being told.

He climbed over the fence, lifted Ash from the top railing to the ground, then turned to give Airie a kiss. Ash placed a hand on her stomach and the baby inside rolled over in her sleep. Airie said the baby would be born in a few months, but Ash knew she was going to be several weeks longer than that. Hunter was worried the baby might be a monster, and that she would be born in a demon form that might hurt Airie, but Ash also knew he was worrying for nothing.

Ash knew lots of things that he kept to himself. As he followed Airie and Hunter into the house, he glanced over his shoulder at the road winding back to the desert. Right now, he knew that his mother was coming.

But so was trouble.

Chapter Five

Willow waited in a rocky cleft at the base of a broad mesa for the wagon train of slavers Imp had assured her was coming.

The little girl had a talent for travel over vast distances, and could cover many miles by flitting in and out of the boundary between this world and the one where demons existed. She said that time had less meaning there.

But Imp did not like to travel the boundary now that demons had returned to it. She told Willow that if she hesitated too long within it they searched for her, and if they should ever manage to find her, she could not protect herself from them.

Of course Imp could not. She was only a child, barely eight years of age. Even Willow used caution when she reached into that boundary to summon her fire.

But no matter how hard Willow tried, she could not physically cross into the demon boundary as the little girl did. Imp would have to continue to travel and simply be as cautious about it as possible.

You are half demon
, Willow had reminded her.
You do not show fear. They smell it on you. That’s how they find you.

A cloud of dust and a shimmering wave of heat, low in the sky beneath the ragged edge of the horizon, warned Willow of the approaching wagon train. Satisfaction filled her. It was as Imp had predicted.

She stifled her thoughts. Her talent for demon fire had grown to breathtaking proportions after the Demon Lord’s murder. She had used it against the last slavers to own her, buying her freedom, but it required complete concentration. While burning, it was nearly limitless. Afterward, it took her several days to recover. During that period she was almost completely defenseless. She sometimes wondered how great her talent for demon fire might have been if she did not have to share it with the Demon Lord’s other daughter, the traitorous one who lived in the Borderlands.

There was one additional risk. Her increasing talent for fire had come with an extra component. When she reached into the demon boundary for fire, she could also summon demons. The last one she’d brought to the mortal world had escaped her, and she was warier now. Demons disliked the feel of the sun on their flesh. Bringing one forward while it was still daylight, when the demon was not at full strength, would be safest.

All around her the desert held a collective breath, as if in wary anticipation of what was coming. A kettle of vultures circled high in the blue sky, then settled like sentinels on the lip of the mesa. Fire tingled at the tips of her fingers while she waited.

The wagons rumbled into view, their spoked wheels jouncing over the rough trail. Willow remembered all too well how it felt to rattle around inside one of them until her entire body was bruised and aching.

Willow hated slavers.

She counted only five wagons in the train. She stepped into the trail to halt the first of them, forcing the teamster to rein his hross in as he yanked on the brake lever by his knee. She saw the speculation in his eyes as they settled on her after he’d looked around and decided she must be alone.

She did not wait to see what he planned to do about it. She did not want him to approach her, which would place him outside the ring of fire she was about to release.

Willow stretched her thoughts into the demon boundary, calling for fire. She captured it as the slaver leaped from the footrest to the ground. It danced from her fingertips to her palms, where it grew into great balls of red and gold flame. She juggled them briefly before tossing them to the ground. They dashed down either side of the approaching train, left and right, to connect in a complete circle behind the last wagon.

Then, with her thoughts, she retraced the fire’s path into the boundary in search of a demon.

It emerged within the circle of fire, three times the size of any ordinary man. Horns curled from its ugly head. Rather than flesh, thick red bone plating protected its body. Two humps formed on its back over the shoulder blades that contained its set of furled wings. Massive thighs bore its weight as it paced inside the circle. The flames would contain it, too, but would not harm it. While the fire burned, the demon would play with the mortals trapped with it.

And demons despised mortal men.

Pandemonium broke out. Rearing hross snapped their harnesses, flipping the wagons and dashing them to pieces. Women’s screams mingled with the shouts of the men. Willow had no pity for the slaves within. If they were half demon, they could reveal themselves and she would save them. If not, they would die. Mortal lives had no value to her.

Maintaining the wall of fire was not the most difficult part of this endeavor for her. A slender young man darted from one of the wagons and ran at the flaming barricade, trying to break through, and within seconds was completely engulfed. High-pitched shrieks of terror and pain threatened to distract Willow. She loved this part. But even the slightest shift of her attention could free the demon, so she closed her eyes and ears, and her thoughts, to the carnage.

The sun had significantly lowered by the time the fire burned itself low, leaving only the demon behind for her to contend with. Willow was exhausted inside, yet knew better than to reveal any weakness. She held the last of the fire in its circle. As long as the flames remained, so did her strength.

Chest heaving, the demon watched her with hungry, feral eyes.

Elation overrode her own fatigue. She’d trapped it, leaving it subject to the same limitations of this mortal world as she was. It had no more strength than she did. When the fire died away, fading back to the demon boundary, the demon would be dragged with it.

But nighttime was coming. The demon’s strength would increase.

It shifted to man form, one easier for it to maintain beneath the glare of the mortal world’s sun.

She sucked in a breath at his beauty. He was tall, broad-shouldered, and narrow-hipped. Long brown hair, tied in a braid as thick as her wrist, hung down his back to his buttocks. He was naked, and from all she could see, perfectly formed.

Magnificent blue eyes caught hers and held them. The smoldering look he cast over her burned as hot as any demon fire.

She could not look away.

“Tell me. What is your name, pretty lady?” he asked. His voice was like music. It lulled her, dulling her thoughts.

“Willow.”

“Well. I’ve done what you wished for, Willow,” he said to her. He extended a hand. Long, elegant fingers beckoned for her to come closer. “Now. A favor for a favor. I have something I’d like from you in return.”

Willow had not freed herself from slavery to mortal men to become one to a demon. She deserved better.

But she had made a mistake with this one just now, and she was uncertain as to what she’d done wrong. She moved closer, but stopped well away from the flames. He might be beautiful, but his were the eyes of a reptile. Dark. Soulless.

Willow was fascinated by him in spite of the danger. Or perhaps because of it.

“It depends on the favor.”

He chuckled softly. “I want you to find someone for me.”

Her brows lifted. Demons hated mortal men, yet she sensed no hostility in the request. “A woman, then.”

She saw by the faint tightening of displeasure around his lips that she was correct. There was only one woman a demon would seek. She’d be someone he’d claimed—who he believed was his reason for existence—and therefore, of infinite value to him.

Willow pushed aside a niggling worm of concern that she’d made some mistake. Delight filled her instead. This wasn’t a small favor he asked. It would leave him indebted to her.

“I think we need to talk more about what I want,” Willow said.

He shifted his weight, folding his arms and cocking his head to the side as he studied her. The tip of the thick braid of hair swept, pendulum-like and hypnotic, along the curve of one naked hip.

“I know what you want. I can feel it, every time you draw demon fire from the boundary. You want to crush mortals. You want to claim their world as your own. You want demon power.” He leaned forward, as if imparting a great secret. “I can give that to you.”

He did not know everything. She wanted demon power, but specifically, she wanted that of her Demon Lord father. With it, the world would be hers.

As would the demons he’d once commanded.

“But can you give me the Demon Lord’s daughter?” Willow asked. “Because I want the one they call Airie.”

…

Creed slouched in his saddle, deep in thought, ignorant of the passing miles.

He traveled at a steady but leisurely pace, skirting the edges of what had once been the beginnings of demon territory. This isolated route cut all the way to the Borderlands. It was a very old road, little used for the past three hundred years, but now that demons no longer patrolled it, it was safe enough for an assassin to travel. In some places broken bits of asphalt could still be found, thrust up through grass and dirt. In others, it peeked through desert sand in long stretches that came and went with the scattering effects of the winds. He expected to pick up Willow’s trail in the sparse towns and villages along the way. She had to be hiding somewhere. And someone would have seen her. A woman traveling alone, or possibly accompanied by children—at least one of whom was misshapen and feral—would have been noted.

Creed had stopped in Desert’s End the previous night to tell the sheriff about Bear. Fledge had seemed neither surprised nor concerned by the news.

“The old man was tough, but no match for an assassin. He rubbed any number of people the wrong way,” was all he had said on the matter. “I may get around to writing a report on it.” He coughed, then spit bloody phlegm into a can. He cast Creed a rueful smile. “Or I may not.”

As for Nieve, the sheriff had been more troubled. “There’s not much I can do about it except maybe drop a word to someone who might be willing to take her in.” He correctly interpreted the doubt on Creed’s face. “And who’d be kind to her,” he added. “There are plenty of good men around here, Assassin. They aren’t all like Bear. Most people aren’t without sympathy for her circumstances.”

Even so, Creed had not felt good about the sheriff’s solution, or his part in it, when he’d left Desert’s End the next morning, but he had already decided that he would not be returning for her. Despite his best efforts, he despaired of her ever learning to trust him. He certainly could never trust her again after she had tried to kill him.

Not even his demon could make him forgive her for that.

A half day’s ride on the other side of Desert’s End, and well away from Nieve and the ranch, Creed came across the burned remains of a small wagon train at the base of a tall, lopsided mesa.

The ashes were cold. He could not tell what kind of train it had been or the goods it had carried, if any. The devastation was that great. He did estimate that there had been five wagons in it. He dismounted, wrapping the reins around the horn of his hross’s saddle, knowing the well-trained animal would remain steadfast despite its obvious nervousness.

Given the remote location, he could think of no adequate explanation for this attack. The fire had burned around the wagons in an enormous circle, then moved in to consume them in a controlled pattern, which suggested demon fire.

While Willow had this particular talent, that did not mean she was the only one. Creed rubbed the back of his neck. He wondered what trade goods the wagon train had been transporting, because what motive could there be to burn it out so completely other than to hide robbery?

Unless this was simply random destruction, and the train had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, which was a talent of Willow’s as well.

That last thought was particularly disquieting. It spoke of an utter lack of conscience, as well as a high level of unpredictability. And danger.

Creed walked the length of the decimated train, examining the circle of scorched earth around it. Then he sifted through one of the piles of ash near the center of the fire. He found no traces of human remains. He moved to the next pile and found none there either. In the third, he uncovered what might have been the charred remains of a human thigh bone, the thickest in a man’s body and most difficult to destroy.

He nudged it with the toe of his boot. Bodies, human or hross, did not burn easily or so completely. Not in a normal fire.

He had no idea if this was Willow’s work. He widened his search, taking it outward now, but could find no tracks to tell him anything as to who was responsible, only that nothing had escaped.

The presence of spawn in the world could no longer be ignored or denied. He glanced at the sky, still clear and blue beyond the ragged bluff of the mesa above him. Although he should take this news to Desert’s End, he did not wish to turn back. The temptation to return for Nieve was too great, and made his demon difficult to manage. But his conscience would not allow him to proceed on his journey without at least trying to warn the sheriff that what everyone feared, but no one wished to acknowledge, was upon them.

He would get in and out as quickly as possible.

His pace was not so leisurely this time. He arrived in Desert’s End around suppertime and went straight to the jailhouse, but the door was locked and there was no sign of Fledge. A few questions confirmed that the man had passed away shortly after Creed left him. So far, there was no replacement.

Creed had ridden back for nothing. To tell anyone else of what he had found would be to induce panic.

He stood on the boardwalk, his enormous hross tied to the hitching post, and debated how long he dared linger in town. There was little point in riding back into the desert tonight.

Neither was he riding out to the ranch to see Nieve.

He stopped first at the stable to lodge his hross for the night. The animal took a half-hearted nip at one of the young stable hands with its long, yellow teeth before settling into a nosebag of feed.