Once again locked in the tiny cell while Baalberith meted out punishment to a servant beast, Swift projected all his energy toward Niall. If the screams from some nearby cell were any indication, he didn’t have much time.
Frankly, all his time was about to run out. His energy verged on depleted, and he’d not managed to be rescued or stumble upon his wicked little sis. Not that he wanted to find her. He wondered what his good old demon-dad would do if he simply keeled over from the strain of trying.
In less than a minute, Niall materialized. His milky hologram, wavering like smoke in a draft, only confirmed Swift’s suspicions.
His luck bucket had been upended.
“Any word?”
“The oracle has arrived,” Niall replied, his voice distant and tinny as though he spoke through a metal tube. “Hours away from meeting with me.”
Swift held back a sigh of relief. “So she’s agreed to meld with you so she can zero in on my location?”
“To a lesser extent, yes.”
“Lesser extent? What the fuck does that mean?” Anxiety caused his link to fade, and he tamped back all he could to focus on the shade. “Sorry. I didn’t hear what you said.”
“She agreed to help,” Niall said, “but is unaware of the procedure.”
“No good. Why didn’t Zane tell her?”
“Because Prudence didn’t tell him.”
“Dammit. That wasn’t her call.” He hated being at the mercy of others. He wanted to scream and beat the stone wall to gravel bits with his knuckles. Of course, if he could that, he wouldn’t need their help.
Linked as they were, the shade felt his frustration and chided him. “Losing your temper will alert Baalberith to your communications with me. Bad for us both. Trust, my boy. Prudence is intelligent and intuitive. She’s used her empathetic gift to read the oracle. Fear swirls constantly, but her heart is pure and much stronger than her apprehension. Prudence believes advance warning is like arming the enemy. Under the stress of an impulse choice, as in battle, the oracle will follow her good nature and not her fear. Like Zane, her inclination is to put others first.”
He nodded, agreeing with the logic but wishing he felt more reassured. “Fine. But if you hear from her, tell her—”
“Tell her what?” The big voice boomed from the doorway. Baalberith stormed into the cell just as Niall disintegrated.
Fuck. In his state of meditation, he’d stopped listening for the screams.
His old man bore down on him. “Who were you talking to?”
Only one way out of this one. And only if Demon-Dad had not heard the whole conversation.
“Luciana,” he lied. “I feel her. Finally.”
“I don’t care if you feel her. I need to know where she is. I want my things back.”
Adept at spinning bullshit, Swift shook his head. “I don’t know the location.”
Baalberith fisted the front of Swift’s filthy shirt in one hand and lifted him off the knobby stone floor.
The collar strangled him, and then his back hit the wall hard enough to knock the wind from his chest. Stars exploded over his eyes, but air flooded his lungs. Support at his back loosened his collar enough for him to breathe. Weak, his head lolled to the side, but his brain churned like a computer. If he kept up the lie in his weakened state, Baalberith would have to believe him.
“You weren’t talking to Luciana. It was someone else because you asked that person to tell her something. Who. Was. It.” His foul breath coursed up Swift’s nose, and he was certain the cilia burned off the lining.
“It was Luciana.” Swift swallowed a mouthful of air laced with heat and dust. If he didn’t get out soon, he’d lose his shit, all for a glass of water. He sent up a silent prayer for salvation he doubted would come. “I didn’t get a chance to finish what I was saying.”
“Then finish it for me.”
“I wanted her to tell mom I miss her.”
“Your mother?”
He nodded. “That’s where she’s been. With mom.”
The grip holding him up disappeared.
Swift tumbled to the floor, landing on his hands and knees. He coughed and choked. When he got his wind, he looked up at his demon-dad with wide-eyed innocence. “We’ve been looking in the wrong place, Pop. All this time, Luciana’s been hiding in Heaven.”
»»•««
Seated and holding hands with Zane and her mother, the ability to let her mind drift came easier to Delphine. Not so much because she’d gained experience as much as her desire to leave the real world behind.
Had her mother shown any sign of recognition, even the slightest pressure from her limp hand, Delphine might have insisted they put off the soul tap. Might have tried to connect with her mother in the conscious world.
It had been so long since they’d sat face to face. Longer still since her mother held her hand or hugged her.
Somehow, warning Mom of the impending intrusion seemed like the right thing to do.
But Gabrielle Claudel insisted on being difficult, even when she was going to be rescued.
Zane squeezed their entwined fingers, the pressure reassuring. If all went as planned, he’d be joining her at their destination. Apparently, a meld between two people could be shared as long as there was consent.
Consent. That word kept cropping up.
And she kept giving consent to Zane.
“Float,” Zane whispered, so low she almost didn’t hear him. “You should feel her pull.”
Unlike the clarity of her dream rake, the terrain before her remained ambiguous and dark. Surrounded by fog, her mind couldn’t focus on any particular direction.
“Float,” he repeated, his voice reaching her ears from some unknown source.
She turned in a circle. “Where are you?”
“Look up.”
Dizzying darkness above the same as below. “Can’t see you.”
A screech, high-pitched like a knife dragged over a whetstone, filled the formless space. A flash of brightness answered his caw. Longer and starker than lightning, the glow radiated enough for her to get a decent glimpse. Above her a hawk glided, cutting the fog into ribbons of curlicues against a red sky.
“Let go of reality.” His voice, stronger this time, filled her head.
Comforted by his presence, she did as he asked and bounced on the balls of her feet while imagining the ground falling away.
Magically, she rose and drifted forward. “We have lift off.”
“Perfect.”
The bird lowered to glide beside her. Close up, she could see one of its eyes.
Blue, not golden brown.
Typical Zane. The stickler for details.
To her dismay, the fog remained. “Where’s Mom? Why don’t I see her?”
“All this is a cover. Limbo to disguise the entrance to your mother’s consciousness. Reach out with your feelings. Fan them out over the expanse. You’re her daughter. She’ll pull you in even if she wants to shut you out. I’ll help. I can boost what you project, but you have to lead.”
I’ll help. Cowboy had more than gotten under her skin or in her bed. Now he shared her consciousness. Not as intrusive as she’d expected, and reassuring.
As he directed, she focused her desperate desire to find her mother and her joy at the prospect of seeing her again. A few minutes of silence gave way to an incessant buzzing.
Suddenly, the low clouds pulled back like the ocean from the shore. Ahead, more light shattered against the black.
Licks of fire painted the landscape the color of her nightmares.
Alarm lit every nerve with a charge of warning. If she’d felt terror when asleep, how could she classify this new, overwhelming emotion?
Whatever state of mind projected her travel, ceased. She felt suspended in an atmosphere of thick, black gelatin, unable to run while the flames ate up the space around her. Would burning alive in her mind kill her? Or leave her in a permanent catatonic state?
The briefest glimpse
of movement ahead thrust her heart into her throat. Unclear at first, her mind processed the actions. Instinct overrode thought. The flames shooting up from an unseen source no longer concerned her.
“Mom! No, Mom. Don’t!”
Her feet kicked out behind her as she tried swimming forward in the blaze. Panic fueled her metaphysical force. She swam nearly as fast as Zane flew. They cleared the flames unscathed, still suspended in an atmosphere of charcoal gray, and she noticed a dim light in the distance.
She swam forward with less strain than before. The lighted area began to take vague shape. A hospital hallway bereft of staff or patients.
Except for one, standing with her shoulders squared and chin up.
Mom.
Instead of beckoning her forward, Mom shouted something indiscernible and then ducked behind double doors of glass and trimmed in steel.
“Wait!” Delphine kicked harder, faster, willing her conscious to breach the distance. The doors began a slow close.
The hawk raced ahead, his wings pumping the hot air into her face. Angled for a dive, he pulled his wings back and dove beak first through the narrow split. Once inside, he fluttered a quick turn and then wedged into the slot.
The doors reversed and began to reopen.
She floated through the opening into cool blackness and projected her thoughts. “I don’t know how you did that. But I’m seriously impressed.”
“Sheer will. Imagine. And do.” With that advice, he took to the air again, hovering and waiting for her to pick up the lead.
Imagine and do.
Surely, a soul tap rule and inapplicable to the dream rake.
If she was going to imagine, best to start from a joyful place and time. The blackboard clean again, she tapped into the few good years from her childhood. The days when Gabrielle dressed up for dates in high heels and short skirts. The days when she went to work every day and came home with her arms spread for a hug.
Instantly, a riptide whooshed up under her. At rocket speed, Delphine soared out of the gloom and into a winter forest as forbidding as the fire she left behind.
From nowhere, her mother appeared as she best remembered her. The hunter green dress with the low cut neckline she wore for Christmas Day twenty years before. Both hands raised, she indicated for Delphine to stop.
The supportive air dissipated, and Delphine dropped to her knees on the leaf-strewn ground. “Mom.” Relief held at bay for more than ten years flooded her system all at once. Practically high from the sensation, she tilted her head back and smiled.
The smile wasn’t returned.
“How did you get here?” Her eyes wild with fear, Mom stepped back, her high heels dragging in the heavy layer of dead leaves.
“It’s called a soul tap, an advanced form of meditation. And a whole lot of faith.” Delphine scrambled to her feet, reaching for her mother’s hand even before she’d gained her footing. “Come with me. I can—”
“You’ve joined them?” Mom scowled like the words tasted foul. “Solange promised to keep you away.”
Solange, not maman. A disrespect Delphine would never use on her own mother.
“Mamie has nothing to do with me coming here. It’s because of you. My visions won’t leave me alone, not until you’re safe.”
“No.” Gabrielle snatched her hands back and moved away. “You’re not supposed to be here. I left you behind for a reason.”
“You’ve been protecting me. I know that now. But you don’t have to protect me anymore.” She stepped toward her mother, but the woman she remembered so vividly in the Christmas dress dodged her touch.
“Leave.”
“Mom, listen to me. You can escape this prison. Together we can escape whatever’s trapped you.”
“The prison’s not for me. I built it around her.”
Minor chord laughter filled the space like a thunderclap, and a brisk wind whirled up , stirring the blanket of dead leaves.
“You’re a poor turnkey, Gabrielle,” a rich alto reverberated all around them.
Transfixed by the voice, Delphine couldn’t move. She’d heard that distinctive voice before.
In her nightmares.
Transfixed, she felt her body react to instant fear. The skin around the tiny hairs on her arms pebbled tight, and her heart ratcheted crazily, knocking around inside her chest.
She had to regain control or lose this opportunity.
A glance up and she caught sight of Zane, winging low circles. He’d not let anything bad happen to her. She trusted him. More than trusted him. When her journey ended, she would tell him exactly how she felt about him. Even if he still walked away, she no longer feared a broken heart.
She moved confidently toward her mother. “Come. Take my hand.”
Eyes wide and dark, Mom extended both her arms and turned flat palms to Delphine. “Leave. Before it’s too late.” She squeezed her eyes shut and ran at Delphine.
Delphine whipped to the side, but not of her own accord.
She swiveled, expecting to see Zane.
No one in sight.
The hawk screeched overhead.
If not Zane, then—
A thread of fear wormed through her anew. Out of nowhere the winter woods morphed into a bustling city. The aroma of fried foods swirled enticingly through the air. Horns blasted as cars inched by. Pedestrians dodged across the stunted traffic and rushed hurriedly along the sidewalks. The familiar cacophony should have been comforting, but with the dramatic contrast between the gray of the buildings and the brilliant colors of clothing, Delphine realized the distorted memory belonged to her mother.
Fuck. For some reason, she’d believed her rescue mission would be simple, despite the warnings.
“Mom,” she called at the top of her lungs. “Mom.”
She looked left then right, recognizing her location.
Fifth Avenue. Midtown near the Empire State Building.
“Delphine.” A muffled holler from behind her.
She swiveled and faced a glass-fronted store.
Her mother, still in her beautiful green dress, beat on the glass. “Run, mon lapin. Run. Run.”
She did run. Right up to the window. “Not without you. Get to the door. Now!” Like the old days, she ordered her mother as if she were a child. And like the old days, Mom simply shook her head.
“Then I’ll come get you.” Delphine dashed down the sidewalk, eyes scanning the unending sheet of glass. In seconds, she realized why her mother shook her head. That’s what it was—a long window. No door.
Zane swooped low and circled close by. “Tell her to break it.” His steady voice filled her head. “Use a chair or a clothing pole. Anything. But hurry.”
Delphine dodged through the oncoming crowd of expressionless faces, back to where she’d seen her mother. “Break it,” she shouted. “Break the glass.”
But Gabrielle Claudel had disappeared.
“So like her. To run off and leave you hanging.” The alto voice echoed down the avenue.
She turned circles searching for the source. Easy to do. The crowd, the cars, the noise, and smells all evaporated.
Across the street, a young woman waved at her, the fingers of her pale hand tickling the air. At first glance, she appeared nothing more than a teenager pushing the boundaries of decency. A generous amount of cleavage showed from the top of her scanty black mid-drift. An equally black mini skirt, not much larger than her top, hugged her hips. Fishnet stockings started just above her knees and clung to her shapely calves before disappearing into a pair of clunky leather boots.
The girl began a slow sashay forward, the tight black skirt around her hips split over one bare thigh as she moved. Her boots clacked on the asphalt like a slow second hand on a clock. All the while, her gaze never left Delphine’s face. Three-quarters of the way across, she stopped, put a finger to her chin, and narrowed her eyes.
Now Delphine got a clear view of the young woman’s face.
Porcelain skin. Wide brown ey
es with irises the size of nickels and trimmed in heavy black lashes. Full lips painted beet red. Her short auburn hair stuck out all over in thin spines.
Suddenly, the girl squeezed her enormous eyes closed and struck a pose. She twisted her head and spread her lips into an open-mouth grimace. Petite horns grew up and out of her temples, tearing the flesh until blood seeped around the base of each.
Delphine froze, fighting the urge to drop to her knees. Had she melded with her mother before? Had she reached across the distance without understanding what was happening?
After only seconds, the girl relaxed her face. “Ah. I knew that would help you remember.” She resumed her slow approach.
All Delphine could do was watch as the full-length embodiment of the bust she’d sculpted approached the edge of the sidewalk, but she refused to step back. Refused to show any fear or even the slightest apprehension.
“Most people would have abandoned someone so disinterested in their well-being.” She stopped at the edge of the sidewalk, her purple grin full of mischief. “But you possess a strong sense of duty and goodness. It took me years and years to realize the truth.” She stepped closer and lowered her voice. “Gabrielle wasn’t the one I wanted. Wasn’t the one that let me in. Wasn’t the one that would make life—interesting.”
Let in. Fuck.
Worse than Delphine imagined. Her mother wasn’t tormented by visions that only seemed real. Visions Delphine thought she’d absorb like a sponge and clear away from her mother’s sick mind. No. Mom coexisted with a demon. A parasite that feed relentlessly.
Delphine felt her metaphysical state quaver.
“Shame I didn’t hunker down in that little embryo and bide my time. You’d have grown up under my control, and we’d both have lived richer lives. Better late than never.” The demon stroked Delphine’s cheek and grinned. “Mon lapin.”
Fury lunged up from her depths. Delphine slapped her hand away. “How dare you mock my mother? How dare you after all you’ve stolen from her.” She drew her shoulders back and fisted her hands at her sides. “All these years, Mom imprisoned you. Kept you from escaping. You don’t possess the power to leave, or you would.”
“But you want me out of her. And there’s only two ways that’s going to happen. Either she lets go, which she won’t, or you…” The demon grasped her by the shoulders, and she felt the effects in her body. Cold fingers dug deep into the flesh. “Invite me in.” The demon bore her seductive gaze into Delphine’s eyes and spoke in a haunting, hypnotic voice. “Think about it. We could do so much together. So much your mind and,” she licked her purple lips and her mouth curved up so her cheekbones popped, “body have never experienced. We’ll satisfy wants you never dreamed existed in that innocent head of yours. Plus, Gabrielle will be free. Isn’t that what you want more than anything?”
Dream Breakers, Oath Takers Page 26