Dark Swan Bundle

by Richelle Mead

  “What’s that like anyway?”

  “What’s what like?”

  “Being a fox. Is it weird?”

  “I don’t know. I’ve always been that way. It’s the only thing I know.”

  “Yeah, but…why not just stay human all the time?”

  “I’m stronger as a fox. Comes in handy in a fight.”

  “You’re not too shabby as a human.”

  “Women think foxes are cute.”

  “Not that cute,” I grumbled. I could sense his smile.

  “It’s a good way to let your instincts take over.”

  “Which instincts?”

  In one movement, he had me flipped onto my back. His hands held mine down while his body pressed against the rest of me. Those lips hovered a few breaths from mine.

  “All of them,” he growled.

  My breath was coming out in rapid bursts, and a voice in the back of my head was yelling, Hey! Remember how you don’t want to be involved with Otherworldly people? I knew that voice was right, but it was kind of hard to pay attention when my body was melting against his and one of his hands had slid down to the side of a breast.

  “I don’t think friends are supposed to lay like this.”

  “I know,” he said.

  “Or bodyguards.”

  “I know.”

  “Or veterinarians.”

  “That I disagree with.”

  He crushed his mouth to mine, and it was powerful and ravenous and furious and wonderful. I couldn’t think or do anything coherent in that moment, only let him keep kissing me and kissing me.

  At last he broke away. He sat up, and I could see his body tremble. The look in his eyes was still hungry and yearning, and there was a visible struggle within him, a warring of two halves. One must have won, because he took a deep breath, and that animal need faded—slightly—from him.

  “I need to go,” he said at last. “I’ve got to work in two hours.”

  “Okay.”

  We stared at each other for a long time. I pulled a sheet up, letting it cover part of me. A grin lit his features.

  “Thanks. That helps.” He stood up and moved toward the door. “Hey, would you mind meeting Maiwenn? She wants to talk to you in person, see what you’re like.”

  “You seem pretty chummy with her,” I said. The words came out sharper than I’d intended, but he looked unfazed.

  “She’s a good friend. And I believe in her philosophies. She wants both our worlds left intact. So do I. She can be a good friend to you too.”

  “Is she strong enough to come over here?” He nodded. “If she’ll do it, I’ll meet her. I’m not really keen on going over there anytime soon.”

  “I’ll tell her.”

  He took a few steps out the door, and this time I called to him. “Hey…Kiyo.”

  “Yeah?”

  “All these people and…things are coming after me because they think I’m going to be Damien’s mother or something…but seriously, do you actually think any of it’s true? Do you really believe this prophecy could happen? Roland—my stepdad—says prophecies are a dime a dozen in the Otherworld.”

  “They are,” Kiyo said slowly, a slight wrinkle between his eyes as he thought. “And most don’t come true. But a lot do, a lot more than you’d think growing up here. The thing about prophecies is…well, people sometimes read the wrong things into them. Or, in trying to avert them, they only make the prophecy come true.”

  I shivered, half-wishing he would have just said prophecies were a bunch of crap. “You mean like Oedipus? How his father got rid of him to beat that prophecy?”

  “Exactly. Doing that only ended up making it happen.” Seeing my dark look, he smiled. “Hey, don’t worry about it. I told you most don’t come true. And besides, you’re not trying to have kids, so there’s nothing to worry about. Concentrate on the now.”

  I gave him a faltering smile back, hoping he was right. “Thanks.”

  He held my eyes for a few seconds before stepping out of the room, only to return a moment later with my burnt mirror. He set it on the dresser, regarding it with displeasure. “Sorry I wasn’t here sooner.”

  “Hey,” I said, mustering some bravado, “I told you I can take care of myself.”

  Those dark eyes flashed. “I know. You’re a dangerous woman.”

  I wasn’t entirely sure if he referred to my fighting abilities or something else.

  When he was gone, I lay back in bed with a sigh, thinking I might not move for a week. Things just got weirder and weirder around here.

  Suddenly I felt a faint pressure build in the room. I sat up straight. Red eyes peered at me from a dim corner.

  “Volusian? I didn’t summon you.”

  “You gave us permission to come if we acquired information.”

  “Yeah. I suppose I did. I didn’t really think any of you would actually listen to me. What’s up?”

  “I’ve come to tell you Otherworldly interest in you has increased.”

  I stared at him stupidly a moment, then pointed to the bloody athame I’d used on the Gray Man. “Gee, you think?”

  He shook his head. “More than these scattered attacks. Before, others were interested in you simply because of your heritage. Now, after seeing you…some are more excited still. They find you…attractive.” I could tell the concept baffled him.

  “Great. Now I’m fertile and hot. So what’s this mean? Should I be expecting daily attacks?”

  “More like…organized attacks.”

  “Groups?”

  “Worse.”

  “Worse than a group of guys trying to have sex with me? How?”

  “For now, only creatures and gentry who can cross over in physical or elemental form will try. But we are weeks from Beltane, mistress. When the doors open…”

  “Jesus,” I breathed. “Everything with a dick is going to come looking for me.”

  He didn’t bother with a response. But when I said nothing more, he asked, “What will you do?”

  “What do you think? The same as I’ve been doing. I’ll fight them off.”

  He stayed quiet, but I could feel his disapproval.

  “What else do you expect me to do? Submit?”

  “I expect you to not sit around and wait for the inevitable. You might as well be from one of the bride-by-capture societies. Always being on the defensive will get you nowhere; eventually someone will overpower you.”

  I laughed without really finding anything funny. “So, what, I go on the offensive? Head over and just start taking on random gentry and spirits?”

  “No. You start claiming your heritage. They attack you because you let them, because you kick at one and then wait for the next. You make yourself a victim, yet you are Storm King’s daughter. In his day, his rule stretched farther than any of the current monarchs’. His kingdom may be gone now, but his legacy makes you royalty. If you acted like it, they wouldn’t attack you so brazenly.”

  “I doubt they’d give up wanting to father Storm King’s heir just because I started calling myself a queen or a princess.”

  “Oh, they’d still want you, but they would go about it differently. They’d approach you with respect. They would try to woo you. Now they only treat you with disdain. They treat you like the victim—the piece of flesh—that you have let yourself become.”

  I didn’t really like the thought of a bunch of gentry bringing me flowers and chocolate, but I liked it better than rape.

  “Yeah, but joking aside, I can’t just go in there and say, ‘Hey, I’m Storm King’s daughter, treat me with respect.’”

  “Well,” he said dryly, “it would be a start. However, you will drive home your connection to him most when you stop relying on those.” He pointed at my weapons. “They make you human.”

  “I am human.”

  “You are half-human. If you want them to respect you as one of the gentry, you need to remind them of who you are. You need to draw on the power within you, on your father’s lega
cy.”

  I thought about what Roland had said, about how he had purposely buried my power. Faint flickers of the vision came back to me, how I’d reached for power just before it ended. “No. I won’t use gentry magic.”

  Volusian sighed. He pointed to the burnt mirror. “Mistress, why did you use that as a weapon?”

  “Because a Gray Man caught me unarmed.”

  “Had you been in full control of your magic, you would have needed no weapons. You could have destroyed him as soon as he crossed your threshold.”

  I tugged the sheet up and wrapped my arms around myself. The thought of power like that terrified me…and yet deep down, I saw its appeal. I didn’t like being defenseless at twenty-six any more than I had at twelve. Volusian sensed this.

  “Your true nature knows I am right. It longs to be realized.”

  “If I give in to this nature, I’ll become gentry.”

  “You’ll never be fully gentry or human. That you must accept. You must simply take the best of each.”

  “Even if I wanted to do this”—I swallowed, still uncertain if I wanted the kind of power he was talking about—“I wouldn’t know the first thing about tapping it. Roland can’t teach me about gentry magic.”

  “Then you’ll have to find a gentry teacher.”

  “Where will I find one who won’t try to rape me first? I don’t really have any friends over there.”

  “Don’t you?” He looked at me expectantly.

  “You mean Dorian.”

  “Of all the rulers in the Otherworld right now, only he has ordered his people to leave you alone.”

  “Seriously? But why? He told me himself he wants to see Storm King’s invasion happen.”

  “Most believe he gave the order simply because he wants you for himself. I, however, suspect he also probably acts out of some ridiculous sense of altruism—and his own pride. Of course, some of his people won’t heed the warning, but you will find less of them attacking you than others. Like Aeson and his followers, for example.” Apparently Aeson was alive after all. I’d forgotten to ask Kiyo about that in the wake of all the other drama.

  “Still…Dorian made the attempt, huh?” I thought back to my encounter with him. Of all the gentry, he had been the one I almost felt comfortable with, which was startling, considering how odd he was. And he had helped me. “But I know he wants to have sex with me too. He didn’t really make that a secret.”

  “Of course he does. Which is why he’ll help you. He’ll help you because he thinks it’ll bring you to his bed. And because being close to you will impress his rivals and allies alike. They’ll think you’re lovers, even if you aren’t. He’ll like that.”

  You’ll return to me. You won’t be able to help yourself.

  I shivered, and Volusian continued: “You’ll benefit as well. Go to him as an equal, and he will treat you as one. His attitude will go a long way to influence others.”

  “If I do this, I’ll have come a long way from being feared by the gentry to cozying up with one for political reasons. That’s quite a leap.”

  “Not really. Not if you consider how far you’ve come since your trip to Aeson’s.”

  “That’s an understatement.” I rubbed my eyes. “I don’t know, Volusian. I still don’t know if I’m ready to approach Dorian. I need to think about it.”

  “As my mistress wishes. But I would advise you to think fast. Decide before Beltane. Siding with Dorian will offer both magical and political benefits.”

  “Noted. Thanks for the update. And the advice.”

  He bowed, and I stood up to send him back. Before I did, I couldn’t help messing with him. I was still naked, after all.

  “Hey, Volusian, you haven’t been checking me out, have you?”

  He gave me his trademark bland stare. “I assure you, mistress, the only allure your bare flesh has for me is to remind me how easy it will be to slice open.”

  I laughed. If not for the fact he was actually serious, he’d be so much fun.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I saw Kiyo a few times in the next week. One of those times I was out on a job, doing an exorcism that turned out to be a setup. The house I’d gone into had no spirit but rather an asag: a demonic creature that literally had a rocklike body. Kiyo had shown up in the midst of the fight, and while I’d thought I had things well in hand, his help sure expedited matters. He didn’t use any weapons like I did; he was all body and physical force. Watching him move was almost hypnotic, like admiring a dancer.

  His other appearances were similar, showing up when needed and then retreating if I wanted. Once, I reluctantly agreed to lunch after a fight. He watched me with those hungry eyes the entire time, but everything else was friendly and easy between us. It was like when we’d met in the bar, all breezy banter and connection—underscored with simmering sexual tension.

  All the other times I saw him, he trailed me around as a fox. And, as much as I hated to admit it…he was right. He was pretty cute.

  Life was busy now. Whereas before I’d had maybe only one or two jobs a week, I now had at least one every day. Apparently the gentry and other creatures hoping to get a piece of me realized they no longer had to seek me out; I would come to them if they bothered the right human. It was annoying, to say the least—and exhausting. Of course, since these fights occurred through clients and contracted jobs, I got paid for them. It became a very rich few weeks, though I felt a little bad since my clients never would have needed to pay in the first place if not for me.

  I woke up a couple weeks before Beltane, aching and exhausted. I’d had two jobs and an “unscheduled” fight last night. Staring at my ceiling, at the way the late morning sun filtered into funny shapes through my blinds, I drowsily wondered if I was going to be able to keep this up. I’d lose to the Otherworld not through any one encounter, but simply via my own fatigue.

  I trudged to the kitchen and found no morning offering from Tim. He must have stayed the night with one of his groupies. Forced to make my own breakfast, I put two chocolate Pop-Tarts in the toaster and fixed coffee while they cooked. Glancing at the table, I saw that my cell phone displayed four missed calls. I’d taken to turning it off, because the calls were always from Lara, and I didn’t feel like hearing them anymore. She’d either want to offer me a new job or tell me that Wil Delaney had left yet another message.

  I was halfway through my second Pop-Tart when my mom showed up. I hadn’t seen her since the confrontation. For a moment, I considered not letting her in, but I promptly dismissed the thought.

  She was my mom, after all. She loved me. No matter what had happened, I couldn’t let go of that intrinsic truth. She was the one who’d doused my scratches with antiseptic when I was little—and not so little—and tried unsuccessfully to interest me in shopping and makeup as a teenager. She’d tried to protect me from the ugly truths that everyone has to discover growing up. She’d tried to protect me from the path Roland had set me on. And now it seemed she’d tried to protect me from my own past.

  Looking back, I tried to piece together things she’d said on the rare occasions I could get her to acknowledge my biological father. You’re better off without him. He wasn’t the kind of man anyone could count on. We didn’t have a healthy relationship when we were together. There was a lot of emotion, a lot of intensity…but it ending was for the best. He’s gone—just accept he’ll never be a part of your life.

  She’d never exactly lied, I realized, but I’d interpreted the story in a completely different way. I’d read it as a whirlwind affair, one in which her emotions blinded her. With all the bad things she’d implied about his character, I’d just figured he’d up and left one day, unable to handle the responsibilities involved with taking care of me. Little did I know he’d desperately wanted me back.

  I offered her a seat at the table, handing her a cup of coffee at the same time. She held it with both hands, lacing her fingers in a nervous gesture. Her hair was braided down her back today, and she wore a
red blouse.

  “You look tired,” she said after a long stretch of silence.

  I smiled. It was such a mom thing to say. “Yeah. It’s been a busy week.”

  “Are you sleeping enough?”

  “I’m sleeping. Sort of. I’m just too busy when I’m awake, that’s the problem.”

  She looked up, nervously meeting my eyes as though afraid of what she might find. “Busy…because of…?”

  “Yeah,” I said, knowing what she meant.

  She looked back down. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry about all of this.”

  I dunked a piece of Pop-Tart into my coffee. “It’s not your fault. You didn’t decide to go to the Otherworld.”

  “No…but you were right the other day. I was wrong to keep it from you.”

  “I was too harsh then.”

  “No.” Her eyes met mine, wide and sad. “I think I thought…that if I kept it from you, maybe I could make it go away. Like pretending enough would make it so that it had never happened. I could forget too.”

  I didn’t like to see my mom sad. I don’t think anyone does unless they’re trying to take revenge for some traumatic childhood wrong. Maybe I had been wronged to a certain extent, but in reflection, it probably couldn’t compare to what had happened to her. I knew she had been older when abducted, but in my mind’s eye, I could see my mother looking like Jasmine, young and scared. Based on the stories I’d heard before the Storm King paternity news, I’d always envisioned my conception as the result of a torrid affair my scumbag father later walked out on. But that wasn’t it at all. The truth was worse. I was a child of rape, born from violence and domination.

  “Every time you see me…do I remind you of him? Of what happened?”

  Compassion washed over her face. “Oh, baby, no. You’re the best thing in my life. Don’t think like that.”

  “Do I look like him at all? Everyone says I take after you.”

  She studied me as though seeking out the answer, but I knew she already had to know. “Your hair, a little. But mostly…in the eyes. You got those from him. His eyes were like…” She had to clear her throat to go on. “They always changed. They ran every shade of blue and gray you can imagine, depending on his mood. Sky blue when he was happy. Midnight blue when troubled. Deep gray when he was angry and about to fight.”