The scorpion-shaped charm at Sajia’s neck felt warm against the cold of the moment and the icy precipice she stood on. Her shirt clung to her skin as her nightgown had earlier. And her heart beat furiously against her chest.
They would smell her fear, hear the thundering race of her pulse, but they would also expect it. Though she had nothing to do with Corinne’s disappearance, she wouldn’t escape punishment because of it. As bajaran she was responsible for Corinne’s well-being. It remained her duty to know Corinne well enough to anticipate her actions and keep her safe from the impulses and ill-conceived plans of youth.
Like prey transfixed by a serpent’s stare, Sajia continued to meet The Master’s gaze. A subtle shift, perception rather than true movement, told her the danger of having her mind invaded had passed. Taking a bajaran’s oath protected her from it unless there was reason to suspect betrayal. But he was The Master and no one would challenge his actions.
He steepled his hands and rested them on his chest, letting the tension build until it once again became evident that guilt or fear wouldn’t compel her to offer additional information. Finally he acknowledged, “Corinne is missing. She was taken to Oakland, though all that remained in the memory of the fisherman who piloted the boat is Corinne’s face and a vague recollection of a charm he passed to her before she hid herself under his nets.”
At the flexing of The Master’s fingers, the wall of vampires near the doorway parted to reveal the naked form of a man. The skin on his face and hands was deeply tanned from spending his days on the water.
It took only a glance for Sajia to know he was dead, drained of blood. The bite marks on his flesh were ragged and unhealed.
He’d been questioned and killed elsewhere. His body washed to rid it of the urine and feces that had come at death, if not before, so as not to offend The Master when the corpse was brought into his presence.
Sajia allowed no pity to show, though she felt a glimmer of it. Only a man driven to desperation would come to San Francisco on business not sanctioned by the vampires. Or a greedy fool.
She looked away from the corpse. Understanding it for the message it was, that it could just as easily be her, or one of her family members.
“With your permission,” she said, “I’ll leave to begin searching for Corinne.”
ADDAI STOOD NAKED on a snowy ledge high in the Sierras. White wings spread out on either side of him as if to catch the howling, frigid wind and use it to lift upward in glorious flight. Long black hair streamed and whipped at his back like a satin cape.
He was impervious to the temperature, uncaring of air traveling fast enough to become a multitude of icy needles. What was cold to a being with origins in the dark of endless space and unfathomable universe? To a being who was the essence of light, born of the essence of power? A favored creation until the one humans named a god decided to breathe life into mud and lay claim to this planet.
And so it had begun.
The defeat of the Djinn who’d called this world theirs.
The birth of envy and betrayal. Of temptation, and lust grown into love.
Lucifer’s challenge and the casting out of his followers.
A second angelic fall.
The slaughter of mortal and Djinn wives, of angel-sired children.
Followed by the deluge, a flood to further cleanse the world, though such a cleansing proved an impossible feat.
All of it spanning his existence, though in thousands of years he had become something different than he once was, the reason for the change embodied in a name.
Sajia.
Djinn. Long-ago enemy.
He’d found her drawing water from a village well, her family in the distance, loading trade goods onto camels. He’d meant to kill her first and move on to the others, but instead it was his own sense of purpose that had died in the face of her fear, in the mirror she became as she backed away, water jugs shattering as they fell from trembling fingers, her soul calling to his, weeping and making his own cry at the thought of her loss.
In the desert they’d become lovers, husband and wife. His fear of becoming Fallen had kept him from tying his fate to hers and irrevocably making this world his own.
A fist of pain formed around his heart as he remembered sharing a last, lingering kiss before lifting her onto a camel’s back, and how he’d fought the urge to go after her as she rode away with her family, all of them answering the summons of The Prince who ruled them.
He’d turned away, not yet ready to bind himself so thoroughly to her that the gathered Djinn would accept him among them as ally and not enemy. But some part of her spirit already lived in him. He’d felt the moment of her death in a searing blaze of agony that opened a chasm of emptiness in his soul. One that filled with terrible rage and hate when he went to the place where the Djinn had gathered and found Sajia’s lifeless body among those of her family members.
With a sweep of snowy wings he shook off the nightmares of the past, forging the emotion they brought with them into formidable determination. After thousands of years she was reborn, and soon she would be returned to him.
Iyar en Batrael, the most powerful Djinn of the Raven House, had gone to the fiery birthplace of his kind and called Sajia’s name. Though she would hold no memories of her previous life, it didn’t matter to Addai. She was his to love and possess, to forever protect from harm and keep safe even as a new war loomed—one heralding the return of the Djinn from their prison-paradise deep in the ghostlands.
Addai looked down at the chalet built when humans still possessed the technology to achieve such a feat, in the time before what they called The Last War. Then beyond it, at a sweeping vista of desolation.
Not the ruins caused by bombs, but the harsh lands given birth by Earth itself. Rugged, barren mountains covered in snow. And at their base, flatlands where water was scarce and survival a challenge, even in the days when humans ruled the world.
He would bring her here first. He, who could allow a millennium to pass without clothing himself in flesh, who could close his eyes in rest and wake to the dawning of a new era, now counted the hours, the days. Chafed in impatience at the demands of heart and soul to be reunited with Sajia, at the demands of the body to have her beneath him, legs splayed and arms clasping him to her as she welcomed him deep inside her.
His eyelids lowered as images of the past returned. Despite bearing the mark of the Scorpion House on her skin, she’d been so very, very submissive. He had but to walk into the tent and she would kneel before him, naked as he’d demanded she be in the privacy of their quarters.
Head bowed and long tresses a silky curtain flowing over her breasts, she’d been the picture of perfection. She’d enticed him with the feminine line of her spine and the sweet curve of her buttocks, her thighs parted slightly in subtle invitation, in subtle defiance. The sight of her that way never failed to harden him instantly, even when it was one held only in his memory.
Desire coursed through Addai and he took himself in hand. He would bring her here first and tend to her every need himself.
In the future, after they were bound by the incantations of his kind and the spirit-sharing of hers, then if she desired it he would surround her with servants to do her bidding, except in the most private part of their home. There she would wear nothing against her skin and be seen only by him.
He would guard her as he’d been unable to do in their previous life together. Perhaps insist that outside the home she wear abaya and niqāb so no man could look on her figure or her face and see what was his alone.
Addai’s hand tightened around his hardened cock with thoughts of covering Sajia’s body with his own. Desire burned through him, fire in veins of ice, scorching heat in a being capable of delivering merciless punishment and eternal agony.
There would be no physical release until Sajia was returned to him. Not with a woman and not by his own hand. Only she would satisfy him. No other.
He let himself imagine their first m
eeting. It was a favorite fantasy of his.
There’d be fear when she saw him, as there had been before. Instinctual on her part, especially if she’d been raised in this world instead of the Djinn kingdom and hadn’t been told she was his reward, the price for his doing the things he’d done on behalf of her kind.
Some part of her would recognize him as her natural enemy even with his wings hidden and his essence wrapped in the flesh of a mortal. But that fear would soon become an erotic one. And the desire to flee would yield to an addiction to the forbidden, to a craving for carnal punishment and complete surrender.
She would soon hasten into his presence, growing wet and ready as she went to her knees before him, hands clasped behind her back, long black hair caressing smooth buttocks as she looked up at him, offering a silent pleading for him to allow her to worship him with her mouth.
A shudder of need went through Addai, a measure of control was lost. The fingers wrapped around his cock moved up and down, delivering pleasure until the psychic touch of the creation bond announced the imminent arrival of one of his brothers.
With a thought Addai clothed himself in black pants, leaving his feet and torso bare. He leapt from the precipice, wings slicing through the wind as though it didn’t exist, allowing the cold air to do what his will could not, subdue the hard evidence of desire and hide the nature of his contemplations.
He landed on a snow-covered balcony. An instant later Tir appeared and the reason for his presence became obvious when the Djinn, Irial, materialized next to him. Though they were allied, without Tir to serve as guide, Irial wouldn’t easily have found the chalet.
Addai’s heart pounded in anticipation at seeing the eldest son and favored messenger of Iyar en Batrael. Every muscle tightened as pride warred with the desperate desire to ask the question never far from his mind. Where is she?
Irial wore the mark of the Raven House on his cheek like a stylized tattoo. Wings and talons outstretched, the bird was a symbol of what Irial and those like him were capable of—guiding a Djinn soul back for rebirth.
The snow melted beneath Irial’s feet in a slowly widening circle, a showy reminder that the Djinn were creatures of fire. Wicked amusement danced in the Raven prince’s eyes like a wild flame set in the midst of a green forest, setting Addai’s teeth on edge and making him struggle against lifting his hand and calling his sword from its sheath of air and hidden reality.
Irial’s teeth flashed white in his deeply tanned face, goading Addai, daring him to break the silence and ask what message he’d brought.
“Tell me,” Addai said, willing to cede that much of a victory to Irial, satisfied in knowing the prince of the Raven House would one day be brought to his knees by a match arranged for him to serve the purpose of seeing the Djinn returned to Earth.
“My father sends word. He wants you to know the reward promised is now yours to claim. He says you will recognize it when you see it, but cautions you to remember all things are part of the weave, including this.”
“Where?” Addai asked, refusing to name Sajia it or to reveal her existence to either Irial or Tir.
“Your prize is in San Francisco. Or will be shortly. In the occult shop protected by the Tassone sigil.”
TWO
Sajia girded herself to approach the threshold of the occult shop. No other description of the effort fit as well.
It’d been like this from the very first visit she’d made with Corinne. Not just a sensitivity to magic, but a deep aversion to it.
Sweat ran down her back. And already her stomach roiled, leaving her fighting to suppress a violent spew of vomit, as if her soul would flee any way it could.
She smoothed slick palms over her pants and forced herself forward.
A step.
Two.
Her lungs constricted, as if squeezed by a giant fist to force the air out. She barely stifled a gasp. Another step and the Tassone mark was clearly visible, etched in the glass next to the door: a serpent with an apple in its mouth, the three segments of its S-shaped body impaled by an arrow that ran from a point behind the head to just before the tip of its tail.
Unlike in Oakland, the city across the bay, there were no bars covering the glass, no shutters of solid wood or steel to keep someone from breaking in during the day, or guard against the things that roamed the night. The Tassone symbol alone was enough protection.
Sajia resisted the urge to touch the knives she wore at her hips. Except in practice she’d never had to pull them since becoming bajaran. The recently carved symbols on her arm served as a deterrent to trouble.
She wondered if that would remain true when she crossed to Oakland. Unlike San Francisco, that city was controlled by humans, many of whom would gladly rid the world of anything touched by the supernatural.
Those humans with gifts were required to live in a certain area of town, outside of the one patrolled by guardsmen and police. Their houses were marked, identifying the nature of their talents.
Beyond the area set aside for them lay the red zone, a place where vice thrived and the lords who controlled it enforced their own set of laws. Brothels lined the streets, human as well as the ones housing shapeshifters not welcome in the lands controlled by the Were. Gambling clubs and opium dens were common, as were private gathering places where humans could indulge in whatever amused them.
Oakland was a port city. But even without the visiting sailors and merchants, there was plenty of business for the red zone. And that’s where Sajia feared she’d find Corinne. She couldn’t imagine one of the gifted sheltering a vampire scion, or one of the law-abiding.
Given the fisherman’s corpse, she didn’t think she’d find Corinne’s trail by going to the docks. Which left the occult shop as a starting point.
Forcing air into lungs that fought against expanding sent a spasm of pain through Sajia’s chest as she opened the door and stepped into the shop. It smelled of books and incense, scents she usually found pleasing, relaxing.
Not today. And never here.
She made her way to the counter. The man behind it looked up at her approach.
He was a stranger to her, gray-skinned and balding, cadaverous in appearance. His fingertips and lips blackened from ink.
Choice stood in front of her. Honor played a role in vampire society, and with it came the concept of saving face.
She could ask about Corinne directly, inquiring as to what, if anything, he might have seen while her charge was in the shop. The scarring on her arm gave her the right to those answers. Or she could ask about the token, hoping that finding its source might lead to where Corinne was hiding. She couldn’t do both.
If she survived this and found Corinne unharmed from her adventure, she’d prefer not to suffer additional punishment because she’d confirmed, by use of a name, that a scion had slipped away from the Tucci estate, in all likelihood because of a betrothal.
Sajia chose the latter, and though she’d been raised in a vampire-controlled city, the word master still tasted vile on her tongue. She forced herself to use it anyway, to evoke what courtesy might be extended to the Tucci family.
“I’m inquiring on behalf of one of my masters,” she said, “trying to find out the name of someone skilled enough in the use of magic to create a token allowing a human with blood obligations to hide.”
The clerk’s lips pulled back. Smile or grimace or show of distaste, it tightened his skin and accentuated the shape of his skull. “Visit the Wainwright witches for that answer. You’ll find them in Oakland. But be prepared to pay for the information. Nothing comes without cost where they’re concerned.”
Sajia thanked him and turned away from the counter just as a man entered the shop. At the sight of him her heart flip-flopped in her chest, seeming to stop and then race forward in wild abandon, torn between fear and desire.
He was mesmerizing. The face of a god—
Or a fallen angel like those painted on canvas, created in the imaginations of artists who’d l
ived well before mankind developed the technology to destroy the world.
Black hair and equally black irises. Carved perfection and carnal sin.
She wet her lips without being aware of it until his gaze dropped to them, hungry and fierce and commanding.
“Sajia,” he said, her name turned into a caress, into images of naked bodies stretched out on silky sheets, lips and hands exploring without inhibition, mesmerizing her until she forced the erotic pictures from her mind.
How he knew her name, she didn’t know. But unless he’d been sent by The Master to assist her, she had no time for him.
He blocked her exit, leaving her no choice other than to approach him. Sajia stepped forward, fear and desire both trying to cloud her thoughts and narrow her reality until it contained only him.
The rush of emotion nearly drove Addai to his knees. Thousands of years hadn’t prepared him for the reality of this moment.
Sajia. It was as though she’d stepped out of the past, her form and face exactly as he remembered them, her soul calling to his in haunting song and the promise of ecstasy.
How the Djinn had managed it, he didn’t know and didn’t care. All that mattered was that she’d been returned to him.
Despite his fantasies of their first meeting, he felt no disappointment at the quick pass of fear from her eyes. The desire he saw in her expression, and sensed like a heated stroke along the length of his body, more than satisfied him.
His thoughts flashed ahead, mentally enfolding her in arms and wings and willing them to the mountain home he’d prepared for her. He reached out, expecting her to take his hand. “Come.”
Denial flashed through her eyes, exciting him until fantasy and reality collided with a single question. “Did The Master send you?”
A blink. A full opening of his senses and Addai recoiled in horror. She was human. Worse if the purposeful scarring of her arm read true. A servant bound to vampires.
Rage whipped through him at the betrayal—the same black abyss of fury that had once led him to send his brother into a slavery lasting thousands of years. And yet even in his fury, desire overrode revulsion and the call of her spirit to his had him grabbing her bare wrist and jerking her closer.
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