Exquisite Captive

by Heather Demetrios

  “I brought us some wine,” she said, crossing over to the table. “I made it myself. Well, not the wine, but I added spices so that it tastes like the kind we have in Arjinna.”

  She handed him the glass with the blue stem, then took up her own.

  Malek smiled. “Since when are you domestic?”

  Fear bit into her and she took a long sip of the wine, then brought her mouth close to his. “Since you left me all alone.”

  The cloves and cinnamon and nutmeg were spicy on her tongue and Malek looked at her wine-red lips and took the glass out of her hand, setting them both on the table. Panic erupted in her chest like wildfire, but then he leaned down and brought his lips to Nalia’s, tasting her. His tongue in her mouth, his hands roaming across her back, in her hair, pressing her against him.

  “Delicious,” he said, and Nalia’s blood froze, hearing Haran’s words.

  They weren’t so different, she realized, the ghoul and her master. Both wanted to consume her, to take everything she was and leave nothing left to call her own. She pulled away from Malek and affected a pout.

  “You didn’t even taste my wine!”

  Malek grinned, his eyes glazed with want. “Sure I did.”

  Nalia slipped out of his hands and picked up the wine glasses. “Tell me this isn’t the most amazing thing you’ve ever tasted—better than your absinthe.”

  He took one sip and rolled it around in his mouth. “It reminds me of you,” he said.

  “Of me? Why?”

  He put his hands on her hips. “It’s warm.” He kissed her forehead. “Smells wonderful.” He kissed her neck. “And it makes me want more.” Kissed her lips.

  He took another sip and Nalia leaned forward and pressed her mouth against his shoulder, wiping her wine-soaked lips on his skin. If the sleeping powder worked on her, the whole endeavor would be pointless.

  “Come,” he said, pulling her behind him and down the stairs, back into the pool.

  Nalia prayed Malek wouldn’t fall asleep in it. She dreaded having to drag him out and risk waking him in the process. She watched his eyes for any sign of sleepiness, but they were alive, bright. Drinking her in.

  The stars glittered faintly above them, diamonds set against an obsidian sky. The mosaic on the pool’s floor shimmered in the pool lights, like abandoned treasure. Nalia floated on her back, gazing at the constellations. How many nights had she done just this, but alone and desolate, believing she might never escape Earth? She felt the water gently roll as Malek floated beside her. He reached out and grasped her hand, and they stayed like that for a long time, listening to the waterfall, watching the planes flying into LAX. Her eyes grew heavy. It’d been hours since she’d used the medicines the healer had left beside her bed, and Nalia’s body was beginning to shut down.

  She didn’t realize she’d fallen asleep until she felt the cold air. Her eyes flew open and she gasped, disoriented by the weightlessness of her body, but Malek held her tight as he carried her out of the water and laid her down on the futon.

  “You’re all right,” he said. “You just fell asleep.”

  She saw the glasses and the bottle and it all came rushing back. After he set her down, Malek crossed to the table and picked up his glass of wine. He sipped it, his eyes on the shadows that danced around the pool in the flickering candlelight. They stretched their fingers toward the makeshift bed. Nalia longed to cover herself up; all this skin, out in the open. For sale.

  That’s the point, she reminded herself.

  This is what had become of Arjinna: the rightful empress, nothing more than a scantily clad slave. It would have been the saddest story she’d ever heard, if someone had told it to her.

  “Before you came, I was so alone,” Malek said, his voice soft. “I’d spent years amassing my fortune, telling myself I didn’t need anyone.” He sat on the edge of the futon and fixed his eyes on her.

  “I was horrible to you at first, I know. Atrocious.” He took a long sip—the glass was nearly finished and he set it on the floor and sat back against one of the futon’s pillars, keeping a distance between them.

  “You made me so angry, wanting to escape.” He shook his head. “We were like two snakes, circling one another all the time. You were much too young, and I was thoroughly unaccustomed to having someone thumb their nose at me.”

  Nalia sat up, bracing herself with her palms against the mattress. “Then what happened?” she asked.

  Malek closed his eyes. “You made me laugh.” His lips turned up. “It was at one of my parties, maybe six months ago. I was miserable—the kind of mood that makes you start a world war. There was a man there who was making an ass of himself—had far too much to drink. And he’d been walking around, grabbing women’s backsides. I was about to call security when I saw you in a corner, watching him. Your lips were moving and you did something with your hand, and then—”

  “His pants disappeared,” she finished. Nalia hadn’t been able to resist.

  Malek chuckled. “You had this smile on your face, so self-

  satisfied, like a cat with a mouse. I think it was the first time I’d laughed in . . . I don’t even remember.”

  He opened his eyes and looked at her. “I realized you were good for me. That whenever I was around you I felt more awake, more alive than I had in decades. That night, it felt like I’d finally seen you and once I had, I couldn’t stop looking.”

  Nalia’s eyes snagged on his and she held his gaze. This Malek was so different from the man who had ruled her life these past three years. She’d seen a side of her master she hadn’t known could possibly exist, a gentleness that held her after nightmares, a starved passion that called to her, a siren song. Something inside him—something fundamental—had changed.

  But he’s still a slave owner.

  “Malek,” she whispered, reaching out her hand. She couldn’t bring herself to lie during his heartfelt confession, to say that, yes, he was good for her, that she needed him, too. She hoped saying his name was enough, that it was all he needed to hear.

  It was.

  Malek moved toward her across the thick mattress, the wood creaking gently under his weight. His eyes were warm, more brown than black, and the wind had dried his hair so that he looked less polished, more like a man and less like a god. Somehow that made her feel better.

  His lips fell on hers, kisses full of a yearning so deep she knew it was impossible to fill, even if she’d wanted to. He was in no hurry, his fingers trailing across her skin in slow loops and swirls. She could almost forget he was her master, with his bare chest free of the bottle, and the way he touched her, as if she were priceless. Each caress asking permission to be closer.

  His lips left hers for a moment and he looked down, his eyes intent. “Nalia.”

  “Yes?” she breathed. His lids were heavy, she could see him fighting the sleep that was stealing over him.

  “I love you,” he said. “More than anything else in the world.”

  She opened her mouth, knew she was supposed to say it too, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t. Because she only wanted to say those words if she meant them. Because she couldn’t bear to say them, then let him wake up alone, tricked and drugged. She didn’t want that untruth stinging her lips, poisoning the moment when she said them for real, to someone else.

  His love made her hate impotent. It sagged before his adoration like a wilted flower.

  “You don’t have to say it back yet,” he said, his eyes growing heavier. “I’ll earn it. Hayati—my life—”

  Malek’s eyes closed and he slumped onto the pillows. For a moment, Nalia just stared. The candlelight threw bits of gold onto him, like offerings from pilgrims come to see a slain legend. Regret whispered in her ear, settled between her ribs. Regret for the man he might have been, had he not been half Ifrit. So much gentleness and violence warred under that skin.

  “Malek,” she whispered. He didn’t move, his face peaceful and relaxed. After a few minutes, his breathing settle
d into a regular rhythm.

  Nalia’s body trembled as she sat up. Slowly, slowly. She eased off the futon, moving her limbs back across the mattress until she felt the patio under her feet. Then she stood and walked silently to her bottle. It sat innocently on the table, waiting for her. She took the chain between two fingers, so light for a thing that had weighed so heavily on her. The antique gold and jewels that studded the outside of the bottle glinted in the warm candlelight. She slipped the necklace into a small leather coin purse she’d hidden behind the futon, careful not to touch the bottle itself. One touch and she’d be inside, right back where she started. She glanced around guiltily, then grabbed Malek’s white shirt and threw it on over her bathing suit.

  Nalia looked back at the futon. He still lay there, nestled among the colorful pillows. Pity and something else, the echo of what she shared with Raif, spilled over her. She walked over to her master, her captor, and she leaned over and pressed her lips against his, a silent apology for breaking his heart.

  Then she ran away without a backward glance.

  30

  RAIF FROWNED AT THE NIGHT SKY THROUGH THE windows in Malek’s loft. He could see his reflection in them, haggard, too old for his nineteen years. Ever since Nalia had driven away, he couldn’t stop thinking about what she would have to do to get the bottle. That sense of powerlessness rose up in him, burned like fire. Why would she want to be with him, when he couldn’t protect her from anything? All he was good for was this one spell, the unbinding magic. Once she was free, Nalia would be even more powerful than she already was. Raif—he could fight and pretend he knew what the hell he was doing as a leader, but nothing more. And how would he explain his feelings for Nalia to his tavrai, when he couldn’t understand them himself? They’d think he’d lost his mind. Maybe he had.

  Raif pressed his knuckles against the windowsill, chips of dirty white paint sticking to his skin. He was closer than ever before to getting the sigil, and it should have been the only thing he cared about, but everything had become so complicated. This was why he’d stayed away from Shirin, his second-in-

  command, even though there were nights when he’d had to use all his willpower to say no to her arms and lips and the solace of another body close to his own. His feelings for Nalia weren’t just a distraction, they were a game changer. He’d nearly died trying to save someone who’d been trained to kill him. And when she lay in his arms, the fever high and deadly, he’d poured himself into her, every last ounce of his chiaan, knowing that if Nalia didn’t survive, it wouldn’t matter whether the revolution succeeded or not.

  And he hated himself for it.

  “You need to relax. You won’t be strong enough to do the unbinding,” said Zanari. Her light tone seemed forced. She was sitting against one of the concrete pillars, her eyes closed, surrounded by a circle of earth.

  Raif snorted. “I hope you’re joking.”

  Zanari opened one eye. “Maybe a little.”

  He stepped away from the window and crossed to where his sister sat. “What do you see?”

  “Calar’s too protected—I can’t see anything around her. There’s a lot of movement near the portal. Voices, feet kicking up dust. They must know Haran is dead. They’re coming.”

  “How many?”

  “I’ve counted twenty so far.”

  After what he’d seen Nalia do on the beach, Raif knew she could put up a good fight, but twenty against three was a lot.

  He leaned against a pillar. “Do you think Haran told Calar where Nalia is?”

  Zanari shrugged. “I have no idea. Whenever I was connected to him, he seemed to be operating in his own little world. But I’m sure he must have told her something.”

  “Come on,” he whispered under his breath. He wished he could grab Nalia and make a run for it. Screw the bottle, her master, the sigil. Just go as far as they could.

  He should have stayed at the mansion. He could have disguised himself, fought Malek if he tried to put her in the bottle. But Nalia had insisted on being alone.

  Probably didn’t want me to see what was going to happen.

  He looked at his scuffed boots, afraid his sister would take one glance at his face and be able to read everything he was thinking. He hated the waiting, the inaction of it. In Arjinna, Raif was always surrounded by his tavrai, issuing orders, leading missions, killing Ifrit. He was necessary. Here, he had less power than a half-Ifrit skag who was, at this very moment, kissing his rohifsa. The word came to him, unasked for, unannounced. It scared him, how it popped into his head so naturally. But it was true. Nalia was his rohifsa: the song of his heart, his soulmate.

  In Malek’s bed. His hands all over her. Kissing her, touching—

  Stop it, he thought. He could still feel Nalia’s kiss on his lips; it was something outside of Malek and Arjinna. Outside of the world and all its constraints. That moment—and so many others like it—that was their truth. He tried to hold on to it, felt it slipping from his grasp. He needed her here, to remind him of it. Of them.

  “How long are we going to wait?” his sister asked, after another silent hour had passed.

  “As long as it takes.”

  But he knew he couldn’t do that. Nalia had been very clear: he was to go on without her. If Malek put her in the bottle, it could be months. Years, even. As long as Malek took Nalia out of the bottle every now and then in order to replenish her chiaan, he could keep her in the prison he wore around his neck indefinitely.

  Another hour.

  Raif checked the time on the cell phone Jordif had given him when he’d first arrived earlier this week. It’d been hours since Nalia had kissed him good-bye.

  He turned to Zanari. “I’m going over there.”

  “You can’t,” she said, her voice hard. “If Malek suspects anything, you know what he’ll do to her.”

  “It’s been six hours.”

  “These things take time,” she said softly.

  She wouldn’t look at him and he gave the wall a vicious kick.

  Ten minutes later, Raif pushed away from the window. “I’m going.”

  “Raif—”

  Tendrils of smoke were just beginning to curl around his feet when there was a furious pounding on the door. He threw it open, terror and joy and fury fighting inside him. Nalia stood there, barefoot and wearing nothing but a man’s white button-down shirt over a skimpy bathing suit. She fell into his arms and he held her close. She smelled strange, like the fake pond of water he’d seen in Malek’s backyard the night of the party, and under that he caught an unmistakably masculine scent.

  She’s here, he thought, fighting against the sheer awfulness of what Nalia had had to do. She’s okay.

  An image of Nalia in Malek’s arms flashed in his head. He let go of her and took a step back. If it weren’t for Draega’s Amulet, Raif would be killing Malek in his sleep right now.

  “Do you have it?” His voice sounded cold and far away. He wanted to comfort her, but the gentle words were lost under a mass of dark, heavy frustration.

  Nalia looked at him for a moment, her eyes searching his. Something like defeat settled over her lovely features and then she nodded, holding up a small bag that had been clutched in her fist. He was just now seeing the redness around her eyes, evidence of tears she’d be too ashamed to admit having shed, and he saw her struggle to master the shivering that wracked her body. Still, his arms wouldn’t move to hold her like he wanted to.

  “I don’t know how long he’ll be asleep—” she began.

  “We’d better hurry, then.”

  Everything in Raif strained toward the tremulous, beautiful girl in front of him, but he turned around and strode back to the window. He couldn’t touch her when she smelled like Malek, when she wore his shirt against her bare skin.

  “Zanari, why don’t you manifest some clothes for Nalia?”

  The request came out wrong, with implications and accusations swimming underneath it. He’d make it up to Nalia later, when Zanari wasn’t
around.

  When he wasn’t so angry.

  His sister frowned at him, but he ignored her. In the window’s reflection he could see Nalia looking at him, confusion and uncertainty spreading across her face. He wanted to tell her she was his rohifsa, that it was killing him that someone else had been close to her in a way he’d never been. He wanted to tell her how ashamed he was of waiting in a room across the city, letting her pay such a terrible price for her freedom.

  “Raif,” she said. Nalia crossed the room and put a hand on his arm, but he kept his eyes, unseeing, on the window.

  “Look at me,” she whispered.

  Look at her. Look at her, you stupid skag.

  He couldn’t.

  “We need to leave,” he said.

  Nalia’s hand dropped and she stepped away from him. The tenderness in her face vanished; in its place was the hard, resilient mask of a trained soldier. Someone who expected the worst and wasn’t surprised when it happened.

  Raif reached for her, but his hand grasped nothing but air; Nalia had already turned her back on him.

  The canyon was pitch black, inky like an underground cave. They’d chosen this location days ago. Raif needed a lot of earth to draw power from, and privacy. There wouldn’t be any humans hiking the canyon’s paths in the middle of the night, and there wasn’t a home or business for miles around. Just across the highway lay the sea, and the air was wet and salty. Nalia picked her way over fallen branches and rocks, the faint ball of light Raif had manifested bobbing in the air ahead of them. For a while Zanari babbled nervously whenever the silence became too loud. Now they were quiet again, each lost in their own thoughts. The fear was palpable. Malek could be waking at any minute, and Calar’s assassins—or, gods, Calar herself—might have already come through the portal.

  Nalia kept one hand clutched tightly around the coin purse containing the bottle. At the very least, Malek wouldn’t be able to summon her if he woke up. She still didn’t know how he’d been able to find her the first time she’d stolen the bottle, all those years ago. It left her unsettled, this one piece of the puzzle she couldn’t figure out.