by Michele Hauf
“Of course he is,” Lily replied.
A fissure had begun to open up from the sipapu. She gasped, more concerned at the destruction of the kiva than she was over what the fissure signified...until daemons began to climb from the widening portal.
“Complete your ritual,” Michael yelled over the grinding of crumbling earth.
But frankly, she was too busy deflecting the daemon blade that aimed for the back of Michael’s neck. He fell back as her sword clashed, metal against metal, and sparks flew. Several Rogues had climbed from the sipapu, but several more had come from the shadows and the smoke. Half a dozen daemons attacked. Michael fought with his bare hands and his hellhound’s crushing bite. She fought alongside them until she realized they didn’t need her help. For now. The widening fissure was the threat if it allowed more of the Rogue daemons to join in the fray.
Her traditional kachinas were already in place. She raised the flute to her lips and called the spirits to life with the song her mother had taught her. It didn’t matter that her mother had considered it nothing but tradition and a comfort during the difficult times following her father’s death. Lily’s affinity brought the old ways to life. The song came from her flute, but it also came from the affinity in her heart and the Hopi blood in her veins. She could feel Michael’s gaze on her as she moved. She’d never done the ritual with an audience. For the first time, distraction threatened. She struggled to block the daemon prince from her mind, but hadn’t he somehow always been there? The hidden kachina in her backpack was one of her earliest memories. It had fascinated her forever. While her mother’s kachinas were masked and carved with blocked shapes, the one with wings had been rendered with meticulously lifelike features. She hadn’t known how meticulously until moments ago when Michael Turov had walked into the kiva.
The earth calmed as she played. The fissure shrank, and then closed. The sipapu became filled in to the point of being a shallow, symbolic hole the size of a melon. There was a pause as the kachina spirits quieted and the universe accepted her interference. She’d run away from her refuge in hell in just this way by widening a sipapu portal with the kachinas’ help. Even though it had been three months, she still couldn’t believe that the daemon king hadn’t retrieved her.
In the lantern’s glow, motes of ancient desert dust hung in the air before they began to float and fall again.
Lily fell, too, her energy completely spent. But instead of the hard-packed soil she expected, her body was caught by strong, muscular arms.
* * *
Michael quickly carried his slight burden up out of the earth. Grim helped without being asked. Walking a short distance ahead, he led Michael and the woman he carried through pathways only he could find. Michael was used to walking through the chill of an otherworldly portal. He was used to dematerializing in one place and reappearing in another. He laid the woman on a smooth patch of ground and shrugged out of his jacket to roll it up and cushion her head. Then he forced himself away to start a fire beneath the rising moon and sleepy stars winking awake in the night sky. The desert sky wasn’t black. It was a midnight blue so deep and lush it reminded him of velvet. But the night would grow cold and the young woman, no matter how ferociously she’d fought, didn’t have Brimstone in her blood to keep her warm.
The fire kindled easily while she murmured in her sleep.
He approached her after the fire was built. She drew him with a powerful pull—like the moon to his sea—and damned if he didn’t feel like waves crested and crashed inside of his chest with every heartbeat. She didn’t seem hurt, only drained. Sleep was probably what she needed to recover. She was petite, but athletic, and obviously used to fighting daemons. He touched her face when a particularly loud whimper escaped from her rosy lips. It was a mistake. The scars that tracked along his arms flared to life with a red glow. The sudden ignition startled him into stumbling backwards to cradle his tingling fingers against his chest.
The tempest in his chest was shocked into stillness.
Her affinity was stronger than any he’d felt before. And it called the Brimstone in his blood to roaring life in spite of a lifetime of practice at tamping it down. After that touch, he took a seat well away from the young woman. He put the fire between them. Not because the flare had hurt him. It hadn’t.
It had been a pure pleasurable jolt of heat akin to desire.
Where had this woman gotten an affinity so strong that it tempted him to loose his Brimstone burn? He had inherited affinity from his own mother, Victoria D’Arcy. Affinity for daemons had been passed to his grandmother, Elizabeth, by a monk named Samuel. She had passed it to her daughters and, in turn, it had come to him. But each passing had diluted the affinity’s strength.
He was used to its almost musical call. He wasn’t used to this. The woman’s affinity was nearly pure and so powerful that he could feel it calling the Brimstone blood he’d inherited from his biological father even though he had a lifetime of experience guarding against it.
He hadn’t trusted his daemon blood since it had almost killed him as a child.
He hunted daemons. He refused to accept that he was nearly one himself. But hunting Rogue daemons wasn’t the only family business and the daemon king wasn’t their only concern.
The Turov estate was one of the largest in Sonoma, California with thousands of acres of vines. His stepfather had established it right after the Russian Revolution when he’d brought his parents to America and he’d had many years to bring it to lush, thriving success.
Brimstone wasn’t all bad. It had extended Adam Turov’s life and allowed him to help Michael’s mother after Michael’s real father had died. Turov had helped Victoria defeat the Order of Samuel when they’d kidnapped Michael as a small child. Then, Turov had married Victoria and raised Michael as his own.
The Brimstone in Michael’s blood had almost killed him when it had first flamed high during his rescue. He’d never trusted it since.
He reached for his guitar to keep himself from standing and going to the woman again. Her restless murmurs drew him as much as her affinity. She was distressed. What worried this amazing woman who had used her affinity and her dolls to call Fire, Water, Wind and Earth to defeat the Rogues that stalked her? Were more daemons on their way? He could see Grim silhouetted on a rise just outside of the fire’s light. The hellhound was alert and watching for trouble, but Michael still felt every protective instinct he possessed on high alert as well.
The fire’s glow was gentle in comparison to the glare that had come from his scars. It helped to filter the woman’s murmurs and sounds through a soft haze of smoke. By all accounts, his grandmother had been a remarkable woman, too. She’d loved the daemon king before he was a king. He’d loved her as well. So much so that he’d “adopted” her human children after her death. Unfortunately, his devotion to the D’Arcy family shadowed Michael’s future.
And now it would shadow this woman’s future as well.
He was in the fight of his life against more than the Brimstone in his veins. He fought against the daemon king’s expectations. Ezekiel had proclaimed Michael the heir to the throne of hell. But Michael’s scars were a constant reminder why that could never happen. They didn’t glow anymore. He’d succeeded in extinguishing the flare. He always would. He refused to acknowledge his daemon heritage, now or ever. He’d seen the harm his own blood could do. He’d grown up knowing that daemons couldn’t be trusted. He refused to accept a position that might make it impossible for him to protect others from the power in his blood.
His guitar came to life in his hands as the elements had come to life for the woman. She’d used a flute and the dolls to channel her affinity. He used the guitar’s strings. But he wasn’t calling anything. He played to drown out her affinity’s call. He played to control the Brimstone in his veins. If he also soothed her distress, so be it. He would give her peace before he sha
ttered her peace completely.
Because in spite of needing to keep his distance from the woman who obviously tempted his burn, he needed her help to find the one thing his “grandfather” the daemon king wanted more than Michael—Lucifer’s wings.
* * *
Guitar music woke her. Classical Spanish guitar expertly played and accompanied by flawless singing. It was a song about a desert flower she’d heard before, but for some reason the lyrics romanticizing a woman as a beautiful, hardy bloom made her flush. She hadn’t told him her name. If he asked now she might say “Jane.” Anything but allow him to see that the sound of her name from his lips as he sang caused a rush of response she’d never felt before.
“You have a powerful gift. I’ve never seen anything like that...and I’ve seen more than most.” He stopped singing to speak, but he continued to play.
She had blinked open her eyes and lifted her torso from the ground. From her propped position, she could see his fingers deftly flying over the strings. The calluses she’d felt on each digit were explained by his swift, experienced manipulations. He wasn’t a casual player. He played often and long, enough to cause permanent ridges. He plucked, strummed and slid his hand on the neck as easily as another man would breathe.
The guitar was a rockabilly beauty complete with inlaid turquoise and silver panels. The color was brilliant against his black t-shirt and faded denim.
Nearby, a tiny fire crackled. It had been built with the kind of foraging only an experienced desert camper could accomplish—brush, twigs, dung—all patiently scavenged from the barren landscape. The fire held back the night with a soft wavering circle of light, which only served to make the vast expanse of blue-black sky above them seem limitless and cold. There, bright diamond bits of stars twinkled while down below a daemon prince bent over his strings and the flash of glimmering polished maple. A vintage motorcycle was parked near the outer reaches of the light. Farther out still, her dusty SUV was exactly where she’d left it before night fell.
She didn’t believe in coincidence. A ward of the daemon king learned early and well to notice every tweak, every manipulation to the universe around them. The daemon king hadn’t retrieved her and now his grandson appeared. What trickery was this?
“The kachinas. I need to pack them properly,” Lily said, suddenly appalled that she hadn’t thought of the sacred dolls right away. She was light-headed, but she rose to her feet and made for the pack that had been placed near the fire.
“Easy does it. You went down hard,” the daemon prince said. Michael. His name was Michael. She’d been sheltered in a secluded wing of the palace. Kept away from others because of her affinity. But she knew all the D’Arcy family by name. They were the daemon king’s beloveds and Michael’s sudden appearance in her life was cause for concern. He continued to play his guitar, but he’d tensed. He watched her as if she might faint into the fire.
“I’m fine. Summoning takes a lot of energy. Like a marathon. I could run ten more miles if I had to. Just need carbs and water,” Lily said.
She rummaged through her bag for a protein bar and a bottle of water. As she ate and hydrated, she repacked the dolls in their burlap wraps. She was relieved to note that Michael had been careful with the kachinas. None were busted or broken. He’d also placed her flute back in its velveteen pouch. The special kachina that bore a remarkable likeness to the daemon prince was still wrapped and undisturbed.
Her relief lasted only as long as it took for her to realize her father’s sword was missing. It hadn’t been returned to the sheath that rested between her shoulder blades beneath her shirt and it wasn’t in the specially altered side pocket of her backpack that ran the length of the bag. Only the top of the hilt showed when it was in her backpack, but she was used to the weight and balance of the bag when the sword was hidden within it. Her father’s sword was gone.
Slowly, Lily stood. The pack dropped at her feet as she flexed her arms out at her sides. The daemon prince’s fingers stilled on his strings. He watched her rise. He met her accusing gaze. The flickering fire made mysteries of his dark-rimmed eyes. She couldn’t read them or guess what his intentions might be.
Daemons couldn’t be trusted. Surely, a daemon prince least of all.
“I need your help. Normally, I rely on Grim to guide me to Rogues over pathways that aren’t fully a part of this world. But he’s a hellhound and he can’t guide me to where I need to go this time,” Michael said.
He shifted to place his guitar on the ground beside him and then rose so gracefully that he seemed to be standing before her between one blink and the next. His movements echoed with the grace of the rhythm and blues he played as did his voice. But there was another quality to his voice—a smokiness that hinted at pain. Lily swallowed because his grace and his pain were alluring. She had heard of him. Of course she had. She knew he was the heir to the throne of hell and she knew he wasn’t happy about it. She was suddenly afraid that she knew why the daemon king had allowed her to run away. The music of this daemon prince was as seductive as the fire in his veins. Her affinity must have brought him to her. Had the daemon king planned it that way?
“I’ve been searching for a guide. Someone who can help me retrieve my grandfather’s crown. It isn’t an actual crown, but a symbol of his right to rule the hell dimension. He sacrificed it years ago to save my father’s life. It’s my duty to get it—them—back,” Michael said.
“Them?” Lily asked. It was extremely dangerous to have a conversation with a daemon, but she had no choice. She wasn’t leaving without her father’s sword. She firmed her spine as if he was coming at her with weapons instead of words. Because daemons used words as weapons.
He’d stepped closer and closer to her as he spoke. His face bathed in the light from the dancing flames was hypnotic in its familiarity and the startling newness of seeing it animated, alive, life-size and so achingly appealing.
“Lucifer’s wings. When Rogues like the ones that just attacked us revolted, they cut them from his dead body and coated them in molten bronze. They hung above the Rogue Council until the council was defeated and driven from hell by my grandfather. He’s the king now. The wings rightfully belong to him,” Michael explained. “The only problem is that they’re currently in heaven.”
“Bronzed wings singed black by Brimstone,” Lily whispered. She’d seen them once or twice or a million times as a child, but the daemon king, Ezekiel, looked nothing like her doll. A daemon who looked exactly like her kachina searching for black wings caused an eerie awareness of destiny to prickle along her skin.
“Yes. I must retrieve them from heaven and deliver them to my grandfather in hell. It’s complicated...but doing so will complete a bargain between us,” Michael said.
“Lucifer’s wings are in heaven,” Lily repeated. She could easily imagine the kachina doll in her pack with its dark wings and Michael’s face.
“The elemental spirits you call might be able to guide us to find them,” Michael said as if he was certain of her abilities. More certain than she. He had no idea how unpredictable spirits could be. And he had no idea that she had her own obligation to his grandfather.
“It’s possible. It’s also possible they’ll refuse to help you. Sealing a portal to hell is one thing. Stealing from heaven another. Where is my sword?” Lily asked.
He had stopped very near her. The fire now backlit his features until they were entirely in shadow. Her chin lifted in response to his height and his nearness, but she could no better read his eyes in shadows than she could in firelight. In a way, she’d known him all her life, but in much more tangible ways he was mysterious, a threat to her and to her duty and possibly even her soul. He obviously denied his Brimstone blood. He refused to live in hell and his heat was tamped down so that someone without her level of affinity might not even detect it but his controlled burn seduced in ways that a more rampant fire n
ever had. It was a distant intrigue to her senses. One she had to work to resist.
“I’ll give you your sword and help you close the portals you promised your mother you would close. You’ll lead me to Lucifer’s wings,” Michael proposed.
Gone was the almost lyrical quality to his speech. He had spoken in a loud, clear voice as if a proclamation had been made.
Lily’s chest tightened. The air had gone thick and still around her. The dancing flames slowed. Her mother had warned her. Daemon deals were dangerous. They’d lived in hell for years because of a deal her father had forged with the daemon king before he died. But Lily couldn’t turn away. She was held in place by the universe pausing around her as it waited for her to accept or reject this daemon prince’s plea.
Because it was a plea. She could feel the tension in the man before her. He didn’t touch her, but he stood so close that his Brimstone heat caused her cheeks to flush. He’d said that retrieving the wings would cement a bargain between him and the daemon king. In her bag, the kachina doll had black wings that had been carved hundreds of years ago by a Hopi ancestor she’d never known.
Michael D’Arcy Turov should have wings.
Lily knew it. The dolls in her bag were wrapped and silent. She didn’t summon any spirit for guidance. It was her heart that whispered the truth.
“I’m Lily Santiago. Give me back my father’s sword and I’ll guide you to Lucifer’s wings,” she agreed.
The flickering flames halted. Sparks above them hung suspended in the air. Her lungs froze. Her heart paused, but after a moment of panic everything resumed as it should. The fire flickered. She breathed. Her heart pounded. And Michael Turov, the daemon prince, turned away. But not before she saw the flash of triumph in his suddenly illuminated eyes.
Copyright © 2017 by Barbara J. Hancock
ISBN-13: 9781488031281
The Witch’s Quest