by Nora Roberts
Glenna held the poppet over the cauldron, and releasing it, left it suspended on will and air.
“Take his hand,” she said to Moira. “And hold on.”
When Moira’s hand clasped his, Cian didn’t go through the door. He exploded through it. Flying through a dark even his eyes couldn’t conquer, he felt Moira’s hand tighten strong on his. In his mind, he heard her voice, cool and calm.
“We’re with you. We won’t let go.”
There was moonlight, sprinkling through the dark to bring blurry smears of shape and shadow. There were scents, flowers and earth, water and woman.
Humans.
There was heat. Temperature meant little to him, but he could feel the shift of it from the damp chill he’d left behind. A baking heat, eased only a little by a breeze off the water.
Sea, he corrected. It was an ocean with waves lapping at the sugar of sand. And there were hills rising up from the beach. Olive trees spread over the terraces of those hills. And on one of the rises—the highest—stood a temple, white as the moonlight with its marble columns overlooking that ocean, the trees, gardens and pools.
Overlooking, too, the man and woman who lay together on a white blanket edged in gold on the sparkling sand near the play of white foam.
He heard the woman’s laugh—the husky sound of a roused woman. And knew it was Lilith, knew it was Lilith’s memory, or her dream he’d fallen into. So he stood apart, and watched as the man slid the white robe from her shoulders, and bent his head to her breasts.
Sweet, so sweet, his mouth on her. Everything inside her ebbed and flowed, as the tide. How could it be forbidden, the beauty of this? Her body was meant for his. Her spirit, her mind, her soul had been created by the gods as the mate for his.
She arched, offering, with her fingers combing gently through his sun-kissed hair. He smelled of the olive trees, and the sunlight that ripened their fruit.
Her love, her only. She murmured it to him as their lips met again. And again, with a hunger that built beyond bearing.
Her eyes were full of him when at last his body joined with hers. The pleasure of it brought tears glimmering, turned her sighs to helpless gasps.
Love swarmed through her, pounded in her heart, a thousand silken fists. She held him closer, closer, crying out her joy with an abandon that dared even the gods to hear.
“Cirio, Cirio.” She cradled his head on her breast. “My heart. My love.”
He lifted his head, brushing at her gilded hair. “Even the moon pales against your beauty. Lilia, my queen of the night.”
“The nights are ours, but I want the sun with you—the sun that gilds your hair and skin, that touches you when I cannot. I want to walk beside you, proud and free.”
He only rolled onto his back. “Look at the stars. They’re our torches tonight. We should swim under them. Bathe this heat away in the sea.”
Instantly pique hardened the sleepy joy from her face. “Why won’t you speak of it?”
“It’s too hot a night for talk and trouble.” He spoke carelessly as he sifted sand through his fingers. “Come. We’ll be dolphins and play.”
But when he took her hands to pull her up she drew them away with a sharp, sulky jerk. “But we must talk. We must plan.”
“My sweet, we have so little time left tonight.”
“We could have forever, every night. We have only to leave, to run away together. I could be your wife, give you children.”
“Leave? Run away?” He threw back his head with a laugh. “What foolishness is this? Come now, come, I have only an hour left. Let’s swim awhile, and I’ll ride you on the waves.”
“It’s not foolishness.” This time she slapped his hand away. “We could sail from here, to anywhere we wished. Be together openly, in the sunlight. I want more than a few hours in the dark with you, Cirio. You promised me more.”
“Sail away, like thieves? My home is here, my family. My duty.”
“Your coffers,” she said viciously. “Or your father’s.”
“And what of it? Do you think I would smear my family name by running away with a temple priestess, living like paupers in some strange land?”
“You said you could live on my love alone.”
“Words are easy in the heat. Be sensible.” His tone cajoling, he skimmed a finger down her bare breast. “We give each other pleasure. Why does there need to be more?”
“I want more. I love you. I broke my vows for you.”
“Willingly,” he reminded her.
“For love.”
“Love doesn’t feed the belly, Lilia, or spend in the marketplace. Don’t be sad now. I’ll buy you a gift. Something gold like your hair.”
“I want nothing you can buy. Only freedom. I would be your wife.”
“You cannot. If we attempted such madness and were caught, we’d be put to death.”
“I would rather die with you than live without you.”
“I value my life more, it seems, than you value either of ours.” He nearly yawned, so lazy was his voice. “I can give you pleasure, and the freedom of that. But as for a wife, you know one has already been chosen for me.”
“You chose me. You said—”
“Enough, enough!” He threw up his hands, but seemed more bored by the conversation than angry. “I chose you for this, as you chose me. You were hungry to be touched. I saw it in your eyes. If you’ve spun a web of fantasy where we sail off, it’s your own doing.”
“You pledged yourself to me.”
“My body. And you’ve had good use of it.” He belted on his robes as he rose. “I would have kept you as mistress, happily. But I have no time or patience for ridiculous demands from a temple harlot.”
“Harlot.” The angry flush drained, leaving her face white as the marble columns on the hillside. “You took my innocence.”
“You gave it.”
“You can’t mean these things.” She knelt, clasping her hands like a woman at prayer. “You’re angry because I pushed you. We’ll speak no more of it tonight. We’ll swim, as you said and forget all these hard words.”
“It’s too late for that. Do you think I can’t read what’s in your mind now? You’ll nag me to death over what can never be. Just as well. We’ve challenged the gods long enough.”
“You can’t mean to leave me. I love you. If you leave me, I’ll go to your family. I’ll tell—”
“Speak of this, and I’ll swear you lie. You’ll burn for it, Lilia.” He bent down, ran a finger over the curve of her shoulder. “And your skin is too soft, too sweet for the fire.”
“Don’t, don’t turn from me. It will all be as you say, as you like. I’ll never speak of leaving again. Don’t leave me.”
“Begging only spoils your beauty.”
She called out to him in shock, in terrible grief, but he strode away as if he couldn’t hear her.
She threw herself down on the blanket, wildly weeping, pounding her fists. The pain of it was like the fire he’d spoken of, burning through her so that her bones seemed to turn to ash. How could she live with the pain?
Love had betrayed her, and used her and cast her aside. Love had made her a fool. And still her heart was full of it.
She would cast herself into the sea and drown. She would climb to the top of the temple and fling herself off. She would simply die here, from the shame and the pain.
“Kill him first,” she choked out as she raged. “I’ll kill him first, then myself. Blood, his and mine together. That is the price of love and betrayal.”
She heard a movement, just a whisper on the sand, and flung herself up with the joy. He’d come back to her! “My love.”
“Yes. I will be.”
His hair was black, flowing past his shoulders. He wore long robes the color of the night. His eyes were the same, so black they seemed to shine.
She grabbed up her toga, held it to her breasts. “I am a priestess of this temple. You have no leave to walk here.”
“I walk
where I will. So young,” he murmured as those black eyes traveled over her. “So fresh.”
“You will leave here.”
“In my time. I’ve watched you these past three nights, Lilia, you and the boy you waste yourself on.”
“How dare you.”
“You gave him love, he gave you lies. Both are precious. Tell me, how would you like to repay him for his gift to you?”
She felt something stir in her, the first juices of vengeance. “He deserves nothing from me, neither he nor any man.”
“How true. So you’ll give to me what no man deserves.”
Fear rushed in, and she ran with it. But somehow he was standing in front of her, smiling that cold smile.
“What are you?”
“Ah, insight. I knew I’d chosen well. I am what was before your weak and rutting gods were belched out of the heavens.”
She ran again, a scream locked in her throat. But he was there, blocking her way. Her fear had jumped to terror. “It’s death to touch a temple priestess.”
“And death is such a fascinating beginning. I seek a companion, a lover, a woman, a student. You are she. I have a gift for you, Lilia.”
This time when she ran, he laughed. Laughed still when he plucked her off her feet, tossed her sobbing to the ground.
She fought, scratching, biting, begging, but he was too strong. Now it was his mouth on her breast, and she wept with the shame of it even as she raked her nails down his cheek.
“Yes. Yes. It’s better when they fight. You’ll learn. Their fear is perfume; their screams music.” He caught her face in his hand, forced her to look at him.
“Now, into my eyes. Into them.”
He drove himself into her. Her body shuddered, quaked, bucked, from the shock. And the unspeakable thrill.
“Did he take you so high?”
“No. No.” The tears began to dry on her cheeks. Instead of clawing, beating, her hands dug into the sand searching for purchase. Trapped in his eyes, her body began to move with his.
“Take more. You want more,” he said. “Pain is so…arousing.”
He plunged harder, so deep she feared she might rend in two. But still her body matched his pace, still her eyes were trapped by his.
When his went red, her heart leaped with fresh fear, and yet that fear was squeezed in a fist of terrible excitement. He was so beautiful. Her human lover pale beside this dark, damning beauty.
“I give you the instrument of your revenge. I give you your beginning. You have only to ask me for it. Ask me for my gift.”
“Yes. Give me your gift. Give me revenge. Give me—”
Her body convulsed when his fangs struck. And every pleasure she had known or imagined diminished beside what rushed into her. Here, here was the glory she’d never found in the temple, the burgeoning black power she’d always known stretched just beyond her fingertips.
Here was the forbidden she’d longed for.
It was she, writhing in that pleasure and power, that brought him to climax. And she, without being told, reared up to drink the blood she’d scored from his cheek.
Smiling through bloody lips, she died.
And woke in her bed two thousand years after the dream.
Her body felt bruised, tender, her mind muddled. Where was the sea? Where was the temple?
“Cirio?”
“A romantic? Who would have guessed.” Cian stepped out of the shadows. “To call out for the lover who spurned and betrayed you.”
“Jarl?” It was the name she’d called her maker. But as dream separated from reality, she saw it was Cian. “So, you’ve come after all. My offer…” But it wasn’t quite clear.
“What became of the boy?” As if settling in for a cozy chat, Cian sat on the side of the bed.
“What boy? Davey?”
“No, no, not the whelp you made. Your lover, the one you had in life.”
Her lips trembled as she understood. “So you toy with my dreams? What does that matter to me?” But she was shaken, down to the pit of her. “He was called Cirio. What do you think became of him?”
“I think your master arranged for him to be your first kill.”
She smiled with one of her sweetest memories. “He pissed himself as Jarl held him out to me, and he sniveled like a child as he begged for his life. I was new, and still had the control to keep him alive for hours—long after he begged for his death. I’ll do better with you. I’ll give you years of pain.”
She swiped out, cursed when her raking nails passed through him.
“Entertaining, isn’t it? And Jarl? How long before you did for him.”
She sat back, sulking a little. Then shrugged. “Nearly three hundred years. I had a lot to learn from him. He began to fear me because my power grew and grew. I could smell his fear of me. He would have ended me, if I hadn’t ended him first.”
“You were called Lilia—Lily.”
“The pitiful human I was, yes. He named me Lilith when I woke.” She twirled a lock of her hair around her finger as she studied Cian. “Do you have some foolish hope that by learning my beginning you’ll find my end?”
She tossed the covers aside, rose to walk naked to a silver pitcher.
When she poured the blood into a cup, her hands trembled again.
“Let’s speak frankly here,” Cian suggested. “It’s only you and I—which is odd. You don’t sleep with Lora or the boy, or some other choice today?”
“Even I, occasionally, seek solitude.”
“All right. So, to be frank. It’s strange, isn’t it, disorienting, to go back even in dreams to human? To see your own end, own beginning as if it just happened. To feel human again, or as best we can remember it feels to be human.”
Almost as an afterthought, she shrugged into a robe. “I would go back to being human.”
His brows lifted. “You? Now you surprise me.”
“To have that moment of death and rebirth. The wonderful, staggering thrill of it. I’d go back to being weak and blind, just to experience the gift again.”
“Of course. You remain predictable.” He got to his feet. “Know this. If you and your wizard steer my dreams again, I’ll return the favor, threefold. You’ll have no rest from me, or from yourself.”
He faded away, but he didn’t go back. Though he could feel the tugs from Moira’s mind, from Glenna’s will, he lingered.
He wanted to see what Lilith would do next.
She heaved the cup and what was left of the blood in it against the wall. She smashed a trinket box, pounded holes into the wall with her fists until they bled.
Then she screamed for a guard.
“Bring that worthless wizard to me. Bring him in chains. Bring him—No, wait. Wait.” She turned away in an obvious fight for control. “I’ll kill him if he crosses paths with me now, then what good will he be to me? Bring me someone to eat.”
She whirled back. “A male. Young. Twenty or so. Blond if we have one. Go!”
Alone, she rubbed her temple. “I’ll kill him again,” she murmured. “I’ll feel better then. I’ll call him Cirio, and kill him again.”
She snatched her precious mirror from the bureau. And seeing her own face reminded her why she would keep Midir alive. He’d given her this gift.
“There I am,” she said softly. “So beautiful. The moon pales, yes, yes, it does. I’m right here. I’ll always be here. The rest is ghosts. And here I am.”
Picking up a brush, she began to groom her hair, and to sing. With tears in her eyes.
“Drink this.” Glenna pushed a cup to Cian’s lips, and immediately had it pushed aside.
“I’m fine. I’m not after drinking whiskey, or swooning on you without it.”
“You’re pale.”
His lips quirked. “Part of the whole undead package. Well. That was quite a ride.”
Since he refused it, Glenna took a sip of the whiskey herself, then passed it off to Moira. “E-ticket. She didn’t sense us,” she said to Moira. “I’d
like to think my blocks and binding were enough, but I think, in large part, she was just too caught up to feel us.”
“She was so young.” Moira sat now. “So young, and in love with that worthless prick of a man. I don’t know what language they were speaking. I could understand her, strangely enough, but I didn’t know the tongue.”
“Greek. She started out a priestess for some goddess. Virginity’s part of the job description.” Cian wished for blood, settled for water. “And save your pity. She was ripe for what happened.”
“As you were?” Moira shot back. “And don’t pretend you felt nothing for her. We were linked. I felt your pity. Her heart was broken, and moments later, she’s raped and taken by a demon. I can despise what Lilith is and feel pity for Lilia.”
“Lilia was already half mad,” he said flatly. “Maybe the change is what kept her relatively sane all this time.”
“I agree. I’m sorry,” Glenna said to Moira. “And I got no pleasure out of seeing what happened to her. But there was something in her eyes, in her tone—and God, in the way she ultimately responded to Jarl. She wasn’t quite right, Moira, even then.”
“Then she might have died by her own hand, or been executed for killing the man who used her. But she’d have died clean.” She sighed. “And we might not be here, discussing the matter. It all gives you a headache if you think about it hard enough. I have a delicate question, which is more for my own curiosity than anything else.”
She cleared her throat before asking Cian. “How she responded, as Glenna said. Is that not usual?”
“Most fight, or freeze with fear. She, on the other hand, participated after the…delicacy escapes me,” Cian admitted. “After she began to feel pleasure from the rape. It was rape, no mistake, and no sane woman gains pleasure from being brutalized and forced.”
“She was already his before the bite,” Moira murmured. “He knew she would be, recognized that in her. She knew what to do to change—to drink from him. Everything I’ve read has claimed the victim must be forced or told. It must be offered. She took. She understood, and she wanted.”
“We know more than we did, which is always useful,” Cian commented. “And the episode unnerved her, an added benefit. I’ll sleep better having accomplished that. Now it’s past my bedtime. Ladies.”
Moira watched him go. “He feels. Why do you think he goes to such lengths to pretend he doesn’t?”
“Feelings cause pain, a great deal of the time. I think when you’ve seen and done so much, feelings could be like a constant ache.” Glenna laid a hand on Moira’s shoulder. “Denial is just another form of survival.”
“Feelings loosed can be either balm or weapon.”
What would his be, she wondered, if fully freed?
Chapter 9
The rain slid into a soggy twilight that curled a smoky fog low over the ground. As night crept in, no moon, no stars could break through the gloom.
Moira waded through the river of fog over the courtyard to stand beside Glenna.