White Fire: Timewalker Chronicles, Book 5 (6 page)

He didn’t move, just watched her like a frozen statue. She knew she was baiting a bear, but she just couldn’t resist.

“Eat.” She reached across the small space and nudged his fork a bit closer to him. “Go ahead. It’s not poisoned, I promise.” She took a bite and rolled it around on her tongue before swallowing. “It’s good.”

She ignored him again after that, content to focus her complete attention on the masterpiece on her plate. She’d perfected the recipe years ago. It was her go-to favorite when she was stressed out or too tired to make a big meal. Although, she usually had some kind of fruit with it, and some toast.

The giant moved. He picked up his fork and took a bite. She kept her head down and smiled.

Her happy glow lasted all of three seconds.

“Are you Bran’s Marked Mate?”

Her fork froze halfway to her mouth and she kept her face down to try to hide the blush of heat she felt spreading up her neck to her cheeks. Damn Immortals and their hearing.

“No.”

“Then to what did you refer when you said you saved yourself for him?”

Emma chewed her eggs slowly. Swallowed. Took a drink of orange juice. Was she really going to have this conversation with him?

No. She wasn’t. As of a few minutes ago, the status of her virginity, or lack thereof, was none of his business and never would be.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll call Bran as soon as we’re done eating. He can take you wherever you need to go. He can lock you up and chop off your head, if that’s what you need him to do. I can’t do it.” She looked up, held his gaze and allowed the sad truth to shine in her eyes. “I can barely lift your sword to start with, and…I. I just can’t do it.”

His plate was empty. The orange juice, gone. He sat like a sad stone statue with his fisted hands resting on top of her tiny table. A King at a child’s tea party. It was impossible for her to gauge his reaction, any subtle ticks in his facial expressions were lost in the stone-like appearance of his flesh.

But she could imagine his pain. He was in bad shape, and he was trying to do something about it. She got that. She just couldn’t do what he wanted her to do. And his poor Angeline? What of his Marked Mate? Bran had told her nothing about the Queen. Hell, this was the first time she’d heart that this woman existed. Was she truly lost to Ajax, as in dead? Or just lost somewhere in time? Lost somewhere Ajax couldn’t find her? And did it matter which, when his heart was so obviously broken?

She reached across the table to place her hand over his. “I’m sorry.”

Energy shot up her arm where their skin touched, like she’d just grabbed a live electrical wire and the flow of electrons was crisping her insides in one hot flash.

Lightning striking her flesh.

Emma fell from her chair and crumbled onto the floor, aware that convulsions racked her body but unable to stop them.

She couldn’t wait for the phone. Her telepathic scream was aimed at the one male she knew would hear her, a male who’d been as much a father to her as her own.

Bran!

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Heat burned through his flesh at her touch, not the heat of burning wood or the sun on his face, but scalding pain, as if his entire body had just been dropped in boiling water. And Emma? She was in convulsions on the floor, her mind screaming Bran’s name so loudly every Immortal on the continent would hear her.

What was happening to him? Was this how she’d killed the other Hunters? This pain in his flesh?

No. If she’d wished him dead, she could have used his sword. He would not have resisted. She’d have gone with him to his prison and cut off his head, not cooked for him, fed him, talked to him without fear.

“I can’t stop it. I can’t hold it in.” She was whispering now, tears streaming down her face to splash on the floor as she looked at him, her head flat on its side, her cheek pressed to the cool wood. “I can’t hold it.”

Ajax slid to the floor and crossed to her on his hands and knees. When he reached out to touch her, she recoiled.

“Let me help you. What can I do?” He was still in pain, but he had centuries of experience coping with it. She, evidently, did not. Her pain bothered him, made him feel helpless and lost, like he was losing Angeline all over again and could no nothing but watch. “Emma. I beg of you. What can I do?”

“Run.”

“I don’t run.” He reached out and took her hand in his, relieved when she didn’t pull away. Even more relieved that whatever reaction her touch had caused the first time, did not repeat.

Then her hand started to burn in his, a strange white fire the danced over her flesh and jumped to his.

She sobbed, her eyes glued to the vision of their linked flesh. “God. I’m sorry. I tried to tell you.”

The small whispers of flame rose in a flash, then spread to cover her entire body as if he’d poured fuel on her skin. But she didn’t burn, her flesh did not wrinkle and shrink, did not turn black or become ash. She simply burned, like a wick in a lamp, the instrument, not the fuel.

He was the fuel. The dark souls that normally raged within him whimpered in fear and fled from the power that flowed into his veins from their joined hands. The fire chased them inside his body, roared through his cells like a blowtorch, devouring them one by one, consuming their power, their energy, their existence.

Would there be nothing left of him?

The flames leapt and danced, nearly reaching the ceiling of her kitchen.

This was how she’d destroyed the Hunters. This was the reason Eli hadn’t dared to touch her. This white fire was the reason she stood before three monsters without fear.

She was a goddess incarnate, a Mater Mortis in truth, and not because an Immortal mother had transferred a weapon to her hand, but because she was the weapon. Every cell in her body created the fire, directed it, and controlled it. She was death for the forbidden sons, for Droghan and his entire army. For every Triscani who walked in the dark.

A human.

No wonder they wanted her.

He lay down on the floor beside her, his face inches from hers, their hands entwined, and he bled power, let her fire burn the darkness from within him without resistance. He was vaguely aware of a portal opening, of Bran steeping through with his sword drawn. Ajax ignored him and remained on the floor, staring into bright blue eyes, glazed and filled with regret and pain.

I’m sorry
. Her soft apology entered his mind as she continued to burn, continued to devour him with her flames.

Do not apologize. This is better than cutting off my head.

She smiled, a tiny smile, a nearly imperceptible lift of one corner of her mouth.
Are you making jokes right now?

Yes.

While I’m killing you?

He stared into her eyes, all levity gone.
I am not so easy to kill.

She sighed as the flames lowered from the rafters to just a light glow around both of their bodies. Were they finished with him? Or resting for round two?

He looked at their joined hands, at the fire that danced over his flesh, surprised to see that his skin tone had returned to that of a normal male’s, their entwined fingers a sight that fascinated him and held his gaze.

The fire began to recede. He felt its departure like a lover’s caress as it moved from his feet, trailed up his legs and hips, teased his cock and rode higher, like a horse heading for the barn. The closer it got to going home, to her, the more earnest its effort to return to its master.

As the last lingering lights danced from his hand back to hers, a strange burning remained on his ankle. He ignored it, content to lie still and stare in wonder at the female who had just saved his life.

The dark souls were gone, his own soul cleansed by her power. He could rise and function. He could search for Angeline. He could challenge the Itaran Queen’s reign and take his rightful place among his people.

All because of a human female.

The last fire went out and she lay, panting and stunned, her hand clenched his in an iron grip, almost as if she sought comfort from him.

He looked into eyes as blue as sapphires and raised her hands to his lips. A kiss of gratitude all he could think to bestow upon her at the moment.

Emma watched him, allowed his lips to touch her hand. Her whispered questions music in his mind.
Why aren’t you dead?

Honestly, he did not know, but he didn’t worry overlong about an answer. Her eyes closed and she lost consciousness.

Bran cleared his throat and Ajax looked up at his old friend.

“Bran. Why did she call for you? What are you doing here?”

“Waiting to see if she killed you.”

“She did not.”

“I can see that.” Bran put his sword away and sank into a crouch at Emma’s back. “By the gods, she’s a mess.”

“Is she yours?” Ajax knew he shouldn’t care. He had to find Angeline. Return to his throne, to his people, to his destiny. But the thought of Bran touching Emma was like daggers inside his skull.

“Eight hundred years old, and you’re still a fool.”

“Is she yours? Have you claimed her? She cried out for you when she was afraid. Thought of you when she faced the Triscani Hunters.” Ajax pushed up from the floor to sit, but did not move farther from her. He did not let go of her hand.

“Hunters?” Bran reached out to brush stray locks of hair off her face. Ajax gritted his teeth and swallowed the envy he felt at Bran’s easy familiarity with her as his old friend continued. “I knew it. Damn female. Always has been as stubborn as gravity.”

“Is she yours or not?”

“She’s like a daughter to me.”

“Then who does she belong to? Her power is too great to remain unclaimed.”

Bran studied him for a minute, his eyebrow raised. “We need to get out of here. I’m sure the Seattle Triad will have half-bloods crawling all over this place any minute. That scream could’ve been heard on Itara.”

“I know.” Ajax lifted Emma in his arms, reluctant to let Bran have her yet. “She has a bag of things next to her bed, things that I sensed were important to her.”

“I’ll get it.” Bran returned with Emma’s bag and opened a portal. He looked Ajax’s half-naked body up and down. “You going like that? Or do you want to put some clothes on first?”

“I will not wear their ash while I carry her.” No Triscani remains would taint the goddess in his arms. It was blasphemy. “Why do you refuse to answer my question? Does she have a Marked Mate or not?”

“You’re the only one who knows the answer to that.” Bran stepped through the portal without explanation and Ajax had no choice but to follow.

Chapter Five

Emma sipped a glass of lemonade and leaned against the kitchen counter. Bran had taken them to Florida, to a house on the beach where she’d met another Earth girl named Katherine, and Katherine’s Marked Mate, a giant warrior named Teagh.

Emma and Ajax were now additional house guests of the couple, joining Aron and his Marked Mate, Zoey, a human girl from Denver whose house had been destroyed by the Triscani just a couple of weeks ago. Aron was Ajax’s identical twin brother, and the similarity of their features disturbed her almost as much as the fact that she didn’t have a bit of trouble telling them apart. One look, and she knew which brother she faced.

She didn’t remember much, but apparently she’d slept for a day, been seen by a healer, and been watched over by her dark angel the entire time she’d been out.

A shower, a dress, and the beach had done wonders for her mood when she’d woken up. Now all the men, Teagh, Bran, Ajax, Aron and their neighbor, another half Immortal named Raiden, stood on the beach discussing strategy, or women, or God only knew what.

“The testosterone level on that beach might be strong enough to kill a few fish.” Mari spoke up from her perch at the table, her own half-empty glass of lemonade in front of her. She was pretty and curvy, the perfect candidate for a spot as a sexy salsa dancer. She also had a wicked sense of humor and a serious obsession with science fiction movies.

Katherine, the tall, willowy mistress of the house, tugged on the end of her dark braid where it hung over her shoulder, and laughed. “This is nothing. You should have been here last week, when all the Darkwalkers were here.”

“What’s a Darkwalker?” Timewalkers Emma had heard of. Never a Darkwalker.

Aron’s Mate, Zoey, answered. “My man.”

Mari agreed. “Mine, too. Thank God.”

Zoey, a no-nonsense former reporter and total spitfire, grabbed a cookie off the tray in the center of the kitchen table. Her hair was a hundred different shades from blonde to brown, and wild with curls. “Amen to that.”

“What is a Darkwalker?” Emma had taken lessons from Bran her entire life, sat at his knee and listened to stories about Itaran and Earthen history. She’d never even heard the term.

Katherine took pity on her. “They are Immortal or half-blood sons of the Queen’s line.”