A burst of light launched from the sky, reaching in three different pronged directions, veins of luminescence. Lightning. One stream zipped toward her.
She tripped backwards on her iron-like skirts and the world lurched into real time. Whiteness blinded her.
Crash!
Energy sizzled through the ground as she flailed backward, smacking into someone. Her ears rang, nerves thrumming.
Alexia rubbed her eyes. She blinked. The world was white, nothing but white.
She turned, fingers exploring. They brushed over a man’s waist-coated chest, up to his collar as a heavy necklace dropped across her skin. The metal buzzed, vibrating into her bones.
He pulled her searching grasp away and a palm landed against her cheek. Heat surged through her skin. She gasped, shivered, and looked into Kiren’s brilliant face. He searched her gaze a second before nodding.
She swallowed and nodded back. She could not be too grateful for his healing gift.
The dwarf who’d attacked lay silently on the ground, blackened earth starring out around his prone form.
Had the lightning struck him? Who had called the lightning—another of the Passionate?
Bellezza clambered onto her knees, holding her head. Kiren’s arm rounded Alexia, dragging her toward the dark of the woods. The determined set of his jaw halted her questions.
He stopped over Ethel. She lay on her stomach, unmoving. He crouched down and touched both sides of her brow, focusing.
A shadow stepped from the trees, a woman with long, auburn hair and ghostly-pale skin. She smirked wickedly at Alexia before turning her attention to Kiren. She rubbed her temples.
Kiren shuddered. The woman glared at him. He grabbed his head with one hand, toppling onto an elbow.
Alexia stepped forward. The woman’s face slackened, hands dropping.
Bellezza leapt between them, her hideous snarl turned to the attacker. “Only a coward fights from the shadows. I hate cowards.” Her chin lifted toward Alexia. “Cover your ears!”
Alexia obeyed but the girl’s shriek pierced through her fingers. Her heart clenched and ceased beating. Red lines zipped across her vision. She landed on her hip, begging for Bellezza to stop. The sting of pollen haunted her nose, like the sick perfume of soon-to-be decay.
Silence.
Her heart thudded again. Alexia’s head snapped up.
The deadly child crouched, muscles tight, head turned—as if listening to something behind her. Their attacker was gone.
Alexia twisted.
The estate sat on the shoulders of thick blackness. At least a hundred red eyes pierced through the darkness, a blanket of ragged pitch writhing across the yard.
The Soulless.
Seven
Hazy
Alexia couldn’t breathe. Eternal misery sped toward her, and all she could think about was the fulfillment promised in their hungry eyes.
Bellezza cursed behind her. Fog billowed up around them, solid mist. The world, Alexia’s friends, everything disappeared behind a wall of white. Fingers latched about her arm. She tried to jerk free, but the grip tightened, her captor lost in the haze. Her body lifted off the ground like a feather caught on the wind. She swung her legs, seeking a solid perch, and met only air.
A tempest screeched across her ears and whirled her skirts, whipping her hair free. Damp white particles crawled down her arms, raising the flesh—the probing touch of a self-aware element. They plumed about her like a great living cloud. She covered her mouth and nose, keeping them out.
Bellezza. It had to be. She’d whisked Alexia somewhere within the mist once before.
The airstream died down. Fog melted away. Darkness and the rustle of leaves trembled about her, vapor retreating into a ghostly silhouette. Her knees crushed into blanketing moss, full weight returning, but the solid hand of her near-murderess remained about her arm.
Bellezza released her.
Alexia twirled. Giant sable trees drooped over her, ancient branches dangling with lacy vines and closed blossoms. Two of them wrapped about one another at the center of the grove like a lovers embrace. Swaths of light littered the moss like tiny stars, the reverse of the heavens hidden behind the canopy.
Alexia scrambled to her feet, tilting with the unexpected weight in her aching head. She stumbled and steadied.
“Did the ride addle your brain?” Bellezza gave her a wicked wink.
Alexia shivered and leaned on a tree. She shoved the heels of her hands into her eyes. “Take me back.” She stepped toward Bellezza. “We need to go back for him.”
“Naïve infant.” The girl rolled her eyes. “Who do you think sent us away?”
Of course he sent her away. She was too weak to battle the Soulless, and people were suffering and about to be taken by the enemy. Kiren didn’t need her there to distract him.
Alexia deflated. “You should return and help him.”
Bellezza snorted. “And risk his wrath for leaving you?” She tapped a finger to her chin. “Hm. That sounds like fun, now that you suggest it.”
Alexia smiled, despite herself. “Why do you enjoy tormenting others?”
“Why do you enjoy breathing?”
She crossed her arms.
The girl huffed. “I like your ring.” Her lip twitched, threatening to break into a scowl. “Although it would look better on me.”
Alexia glanced down at her diamonds. They were the cause of so much turmoil. If she’d turned Kiren away, her existence would still be a secret. The Passionate would not be at war.
She eyed Bellezza. Or perhaps they would, but she wouldn’t be around to cripple their leader and expose his weaknesses. Again she studied the diamonds and whispered, “I am not certain you would like its weight.”
“Too true.” Bellezza sat on a stump, skirt wide, arms clasped in her lap. “I will never be like you, Alexia, promised to a good man,” she growled the words as if they hurt her to utter, “or happily settled in marriage.”
“Clearly—as you are too busy sending the Passionate to their doom.” She couldn’t keep the bitterness from her tone.
“I am a tool of vengeance.” The girl lifted her chin with dignity. “What I do is evil, but it must be done for the betterment of our kind.”
Alexia’s muscles stiffened. “Like destroying Sarah?”
Bellezza waved a hand. “She chose that path the moment she married one of the Soulless.”
“And you had to bury her in it?” She was shaking, ready to launch herself at the girl the same way Bellezza had attacked Lester but moments ago.
Bellezza’s lips twitched upward. “Ah, you do understand.”
Losing control was exactly what the demon child wanted, a viable excuse to defend herself and possibly terminate Alexia in the process. She bit down on the sides of her tongue.
“That pain you are experiencing?” Bellezza trilled, “Magnify it a hundredfold. Allow it to simmer for a decade and you will recognize the gift I have given you.”
“Rage?” Alexia couldn’t believe she was rising to the bait. “A lack of control like the way you attacked Lester?”
The girl growled. “Lester deserves the ladle as badly as Galedrew ever did.”
Alexia stiffened. She’d spent two years trying to forget the night Kiren stole Bellezza away to rot in that terrible prison for her crimes. Alexia could still see Baron Galedrew’s blank eyes as he lay in the grand entry of his estate, blood seeping around the ladle thrust through his chest by a vicious child.
“I have always liked you, Alexia.” Her nose wrinkled. “But as no one else seems capable, allow me to tell you the truth.”
The last time Bellezza had said those words, she’d destroyed Alexia’s world by revealing she was one of the Passionate. Part of her wanted to hear every word Bellezza would utter, all the secret truths Kiren withheld, while another part ached to stop the girl and keep what little innocence remained.
“Do you know what the baron did to me?” The girl’s voice shook, but
not with fury. A tear streaked down her porcelain skin.
Alexia shook her head, too shocked to speak, not wanting to know.
Bellezza’s eyes squeezed, her mouth tightening at the corners. “He belonged to a gentleman’s club, an elite group of acquirers.”
“Acquirers?”
“Humans who seek and then imprison our kind.” She pulled absently at the folds of her skirt, flattening them in random swirls. “I had just found my freedom when he discovered me.”
“Your freedom from what?”
Bellezza’s eyebrows lowered. “Iron shackles. He put me in iron shackles.”
Alexia had never experience the burn that made pure blood run chill—because she was half human—but it had scarred others, charred their flesh permanently.
“And that was the least of his crimes,”Bellezza hissed between her teeth. “Do you know why these gentlemen collect their prizes?”
Alexia shook her head.
“Because they can bond one of our kind to them and command their slave’s loyalty forever.”
She was going to be sick.
Bellezza smirked and studied the ground. “For years I rotted in his cellar, unable to escape my burning chains, unable to do anything but ache for him to violate me again.”
Alexia opened her mouth to refute the story. She had known the baron and he’d always been a kind old man. He couldn’t possibly...
“And yet after all that, Mister Almighty throws me in another prison!” Bellezza’s shoulders trembled. “He promised it would be for my good. He said I was needed in the upcoming war, and look at us!” She leapt to her feet. “We sit in the woods playing at life, hiding from the world, cowering because he does not have the courage to seize our true potential!”
Alexia pressed into rough bark.
Bellezza raised a fist. “I will not be controlled by another spineless male.” She threw her fist down. “He would rather delude himself into thinking everything is fine, paint his portraits, tend to his flowers, pretend at love.” A scathing look passed over Alexia. “He allows those about him to suffer rather than taking a stand.”
Alexia stepped forward. “And what would you have him do? Go to war with the Soulless and the humans?”
A single laugh escaped Bellezza. “Apparently he is incapable of either. Thus the reason he needs me.”
Alexia’s mouth flapped.
“A warning to you: he desires this war, but he is too noble to admit it.”
“He wants peace.”
“Is that what he told you, or what you believe?” Bellezza sneered. “You cannot climb inside his head. He does not let anyone in. Never has, never will. You will see.”
Alexia shook her head, but an inner part of her was shriveling. Even while professing his love, Kiren withheld so much—truths about their kind, about his own origin, about his plans for their future.
“He is a coward!” Bellezza spat, leaning forward. “Like all men. Like the Passionate fisherman, a pathetic nothing, who chanced upon my mother in a vulnerable state.”
Alexia half-listened, the quandary of Kiren’s silence staying her tongue.
“And of course she died in childbirth—not that it matters.” The girl shook. “She would have killed us both the instant she realized what a disappointment...” Her mouth froze, knuckles white and quivering, eyes burning. “He was a coward. The kind of coward who...who defiles his own flesh!” A new tear spilled over her wide cheeks.
Alexia wanted to back away, but she couldn’t move under Bellezza’s stare.
“Do you know why I am trapped like this—” She outlined her youthful figure. “—forever? Has he explained that to you?”
Goosebumps sprouted over Alexia’s flesh.
“Of course not,” Bellezza said. “Nothing so vile should enter the ears of his precious Alexia.”
Alexia forced her eyelids closed, unable to battle the mixture of pity and loathing swelling through her chest, unable to dim those odium-rich eyes, and desperate to escape this trance. Hairs stood up on her arms.
“When Passionate are touched prematurely—” The whisper originated within inches of her ear. “—they stop growing.”
Alexia choked on the news. “Stop growing?”
Bellezza rolled her eyes. “We are preserved in our ‘most desirable’ state, only precious little morsels like you don’t get forced into daddy’s bed at thirteen, do they?”
Alexia covered her mouth, shaking in horror.
“It is the highest crime to force another.” Bellezza thumped away. “For once taken, you will always desire the one who did the taking.” She snorted. “Unless that someone is dead.”
Dead. Her father was dead. She killed her own father who had... Alexia’s stomach clenched.
The girl straightened as though a great burden had been lifted. “And now you know.” She twirled away on a single foot, skirts swirling like the wings of a freed raven. “Men are weak. They are driven by their lusts.” She planted her other foot, facing Alexia, brows low, fabric curtaining around her like a folded flower. “I would save you from him if I could, but I know.” She nodded. “Yes, I know what it is to desire even when it means losing everything you love, even when it makes your skin crawl like it’s covered in maggots, even when it means damning your future!”
“But if your partner is killed—”
Bellezza bobbed back onto her toes and spun, twirling her arms overhead. “Then you are set free!”
“No, if your partner is killed, you die.”
“Not if you are the one who does the killing.” Bellezza’s lips lifted, pleating wickedly. “It is also our right under the law to break an eternal contract if it is not...by choice.”
Alexia swallowed. “You killed...?”
“My father? Yes.” She curtsied. “The baron? Yes.” Again she dipped. “Several others?” Both hands came together in front of her, a picture of innocence, but darkness curled the corners of her mouth. “We are as powerful as we allow ourselves to become.”
Alexia hugged herself. “I am so sorry, Bel—”
“Do not feel sorry for me!” A finger flew forward. “Don’t you dare!” Her lips pulled back, teeth exposed. “Feel sorry for yourself, and when you look back twenty years from now and wonder if it was worth it, when you see the web of deception and propaganda, when you realize all you have sacrificed is for a lie—!” She huffed and backed away, nodding. “When that happens, you will understand why I came tonight. When that happens you too will break free. When that happens you will not pity me.”
Eight
Furies of Hell
Shadows sped across the estate yard, an army of crimson eyes promising a fate worse than death.
Cold swept across Kiren’s neck, the chill that witnessed Bellezza was gone. The Breeders had not been mistaken to seek Bellezza out. He questioned if he’d met any Passionate so powerful. Rarely. Very rarely.
His anxiety deflated, relieved Alexia would be safe, and straightened Ethel’s broken leg. He had perhaps a minute before the enemy was upon him, and Ethel must be whole before then. Power rippled through his fingertips and into the marrow of the mist maiden’s bone. It sealed the gap, cells multiplying, blood carrying away the damaged tissue.
He leaned his shoulder against a tree, forcing his ribs to expand and pull in air. That cost more than he’d expected.
“Have you left your back open to me intentionally?” a woman’s cadence drizzled with menace.
Kiren brushed a hand along Ethel’s bruised spine. “Hello, Elizabeth.” He thought she had fled. She should have. It was insanity to remain here while the empty creatures neared, even if she’d learned to defend herself against them.
“Do you believe your gifts against the Soulless will save you?” Worry hid beneath her indignant words. Of course she was insulted he hadn’t turned to face her—not that he needed to. He could envision her auburn locks just from hearing that sultry voice.
And he didn’t have time to humor her.
&nbs
p; He focused on Ethel’s upper-most vertebrae where nerves frayed into discord. “I believe my gifts will save you from the Soulless.” That was what she’d been asking after all, knowing their numbers were too great and she had no chance to flee. He glanced toward the threat closing off the horizon. Seconds remained. He poured energy into the severed nerves, quaking from the strain.
“Is it true what they say about Deiliey’s return?”
The name hit him with the force of a hammer. He didn’t have time for this conversation! “Deiliey is gone.”
A hole deep within opened up. The vaguest hope and fear had been growing since the first rumors three days ago: a mere mention of his old nemesis. Deiliey was the only other person who’d dared to stand against the Soulless, a natural leader. Would that he had such an ally now, but with the war against the Soulless, this was the perfect time to usurp power among the factions.
A chill seeped into the clearing, the ice of the Soulless.
“Run, Elizabeth!” He forced more energy into the mist maiden. If she didn’t recover, he was finished.
“We want Alexia.”
“You cannot have her, as you well know.”
Ethel gasped, hands fluttering into the air. Kiren caught the tree again, panting.
Ethel met his stare with wide eyes. “They are upon us.”
He threw his shoulders back, hiding the quivering of his insides. “Are you well enough to move?”
Her mouth quirked. “Are you?”
He couldn’t help a grin. Ethel didn’t miss a thing. “Take Elizabeth and Pint—” He motioned to the still midget, “—to safety. Quickly.”
“It will be done, sir.” She reached for Elizabeth.
The woman didn’t move, her brow wrinkled. “Why are you doing this?”
Kiren shook his head. After all these years of protecting her, whether she asked or not, she still didn’t understand.
Ethel exchanged a look with him. She had always approved of his tactics: winning his people over with compassion and love. It was why his enemies could gain no solid footing against him. Those who served under him shared his vision for a peaceful alliance.
Soulless (Maiden of Time Book 2) Page 4