Bound by Darkness

by Annette McCleave

  But even as she rejoiced over that small success, her shield took a potent hit from an unexpected source: Carlos had fallen to his knees, his hands clawing at his face, and another wave of dark heat rippled off him, undulating over the dunes and out into the night.

  At first, Lena thought a fireball had hit him, but then she caught a glimpse of his eyes through his fingers. They glowed a hot, furious red, like deep-seated embers fanned by a breeze. A vicious curl of dread settled in her belly. Unmitigated disaster lived in those eyes.

  “No,” cried a hoarse female voice. Emily.

  The girl had left the relative safety of the helicopter and run to the fallen Gatherer. She cradled his head in her hands, taking a fireball in the upper arm. Brian surged toward her, but Emily ignored the flames and the black, writhing flesh of her shoulder and flung her arms around Carlos. A second later, they were both gone.

  Evaporated.

  All that remained was a thin ribbon of white smoke.

  But Lena didn’t have time to think about what had just happened. Brian’s attempt to rescue Emily had opened him to a series of fiery missiles and he went down under the barrage. The thrall attempting to curse Uriel completed his spell and opened his hands to reveal a glowing black fragment, not unlike a piece of unholy mirror.

  Uriel flew backward, smashing into the side of the Land Cruiser with enough force to crumple the door and jar the roof rack loose. The archangel’s divine luminosity flickered and dimmed to a low incandescence. He fell to the sand, limp, and the car’s side mirror landed atop his head.

  The attention of all three demons turned to Brian.

  Although he’d already regained his feet, Lena feared the worst. The triplets were no ordinary foes and in a focused attack they could blast him into oblivion. Instinct tugged a fresh spate of words to her lips, a rapid tumble of archaic Egyptian: “Great goddess Sekhmet, one before whom all evil trembles, wrathful avenger of wrongs, arm me with the tools of war. Lady of the Night, lioness of the desert, lend me the power granted to you by the Eye of Ra, and allow me to meet fire with fire.”

  They were words she rarely dared to utter, sonants that carried a weighty consequence. But with the bitter taste of this debacle on her tongue, they were the only words that came to mind.

  And they delivered.

  The earth trembled, turbulent clouds formed overhead, and a sparkling silver longbow appeared in her left hand. On her back, a quiver of arrows shimmered into existence, and when she drew the first one, the pointed tip burst into flame. Inside her chest, just beneath her breastbone, a bead of rich white power burst into life, delicate as a drift of lace at first, then with increasing strength.

  Buoyed by the spell, she lifted the heavy bow with ease, her arm steady. With swift, seamless motions she nocked an arrow, aimed, and shot. Again and again. Her arrows met every fireball launched by the demons, detonating them in midair.

  Brian took advantage of the cover her shooting offered, pressing in close and swinging his sword with a speed that made the air hum. With repeated hits, he was able to break through the demons’ shields and strike hard. The demons’ ruthless focus finally wavered. They began to pitch their fireballs with more desperation and less efficiency. Several balls spit into the dunes and slammed the four-by-fours instead of Brian’s shield.

  Every arrow Lena pulled from her quiver was replaced by another. And another. Her back remained straight and her arm strong despite repeated forceful pulls on the bowstring.

  But her stance was not perfect: a livid bruise blossomed on her inner arm as the string slapped the tender flesh on release. Archery was not her forte, and she’d used this particular spell too few times to have developed real mastery.

  Later she would feel numerous pains and aches, but not now. Now all she felt was the subtle pulse of white power in her chest that accompanied the spell and told her the magic was still strong.

  As time progressed and the demons’ efforts continued to be thwarted, angry grimaces twisted their faces and snarls of rage rent the night air. Those responses should have lifted her spirits with the promise of success. Instead they slowed her heartbeat to a somber march of dread.

  Angry demons would surely take their frustration out on a helpless girl.

  Taking up arms against the thralls had not been wise when they had the power to harm Heather. Not that her thoughts could have won out over her emotions in that moment. Watching Brian fall and seeing their full attention turn on him had evoked a purely visceral reaction: to save him.

  But now? With twelve of the Judas coins in her pocket, she could walk away. Malumos would not be entirely content, but he would be temporarily satisfied. The threat to Heather would ease significantly. But walking away would mean leaving Brian to fight alone.

  And the odds of his survival would be low.

  She couldn’t leave him.

  Her arrows regained their furious pace. Perhaps it was a response to the renewed commitment in her bow arm, but the demons suddenly broke apart with an eerie howl. Two swarmed Brian with lethal intent and one crowded her, forcing her back against the hood of the car with a flurry of fireballs. Her attacker, almost assuredly Malumos, absorbed every arrow she shot, ignoring the flames licking up his clothing. Although his shoulders were not particularly wide, he successfully blocked her view of Brian, and all she could do was pray that her fierce warrior was holding his own.

  Her Horus shield spell kept the blue smoke at bay.

  She whipped arrow after arrow into the demon’s arms and legs, knowing that with his separation from his brothers, his ability to keep a dead body moving was limited. Each burning wound drained him of fortitude. But time worked against her. Even as Malumos displayed the first signs of weakness, Sekhmet’s battle spell began to run dry. Her aim remained true, but the bead of power in her chest shrank a little and the flame at each arrow tip burned a little less hot.

  It became a question of who would fall first.

  Then, just as her arm trembled with the weight of her bow, the air grew tight and suddenly popped. The scent of hot soot scorched the inside of her nose, and a bitter snarl of rage resonated in her ears.

  Fear leapt into her throat.

  More demons?

  The leader of the demon trio pulled back sharply and spun around, his eyes wide. He ceased to pitch fireballs at her and instead tossed them at someone or something else.

  Her gaze jumped over his shoulder and latched onto the black-clad figure dealing chaos. Carlos. An angry hurricane of Carlos, slicing and parrying and stabbing in defense of Brian, his long black coat and inky black hair smoking. He made a very impressive sight.

  And he gave Brian the moment of grace he needed.

  Swiftly and decisively, every muscle in his body an instrument of gladiatorial precision, Brian attacked. With an agile twist and a whistling swing of his blade, he breached the demons’ shields. His sharp blade sliced cleanly through bone and sinew, separating hand from limb, and the dark fragment snapped in two, falling to the ground.

  The unholy spell was broken.

  The demons immediately recognized their advantage was lost. The one-handed demon scooped up the fragment closest to him; then, in a brilliant flare of red light, all three bodies fell limply to the sand, empty and depleted. Only seconds after Carlos reappeared, the thralls were gone.

  Rivulets of sweat trickled down Brian’s face and his chest heaved with the labored breath of lengthy exertion, but somehow he found the energy to say to the young man, “Believe me when I say I’m glad to see you, pal. But where the fuck is Emily?”

  Frankly, the smoke wafting off Carlos’s coat scared the crap out of Brian. It was all too easy to picture the crater the young Gatherer had made of the tennis courts. And the kid’s inability to meet his eyes didn’t reassure him one bit.

  “Carlos,” he implored softly, “please tell me Emily is okay.”

  The young man’s sword arm lowered, along with his dark brown gaze. “I can’t.”

  Overc
ome by a dozen graphic images, none of them pleasant, Brian grabbed the front of Carlos’s coat in his fist, twisted it tight, and yanked them face-to-face. “What the hell did you do?”

  “Brian,” coughed out a deep voice. “She’s ... fine.”

  Brian glanced at Uriel, who was dragging himself up off the ground. “Are you sure?”

  The archangel rubbed the back of his neck. “She can’t die, remember?”

  “There a huge difference between being alive and being fine,” Brian reminded him grimly, his gaze returning to Carlos’s bleak expression. “Where is she?”

  “She knew I was going to blow,” Carlos said. “She could sense it. She took me out into the sand dunes where I couldn’t hurt anything.”

  “Except her.”

  Carlos winced. “I pushed her away. At least, I tried to.” His eyes met Brian’s. “You know I’d never hurt her on purpose.”

  With a walnut-sized lump in his throat, Brian made himself ask, “How bad is it?”

  “One whole side of her body is black,” Carlos said hoarsely, his eyes closing, his knuckles white around the hilt of his sword. “I didn’t want to leave her, but I didn’t have a choice. She flung me here, insisting you guys needed my help.”

  The lump landed in his belly. “We need to find her.”

  “I don’t know how. I’m not sure where I left her. Dunes pretty much all look alike.”

  “I can locate her,” Uriel said firmly. “But I promise you, your worry is unnecessary. She’s fine.”

  “Only in heaven can burned be equated with fine,” Brian snapped. “Stop saying that.”

  “She can repair herself instantly,” the angel said gently. “She doesn’t need to heal like you or me.”

  “Are you telling me she didn’t feel any pain when Carlos seared her skin? Are you telling me she’s so adept at using her powers that she fixed herself at precisely the same moment the blast ripped off her flesh?”

  Uriel was silent.

  “No? Then she’s not fucking fine, Uriel.” Then, recalling the force with which the archangel had hit the car, he infused a more genial tone into his voice. “Are you okay? What was that thing they hit you with?”

  “A shard from the Shattered Halo.” Uriel rolled his shoulders, testing his strength. “Combined with a very potent primal spell, it vitiated my powers. I could barely breathe.”

  Brian bent and picked up the remaining fragment, turning it over in his hand. Not tremendously exciting now. It looked like a piece of a broken compact disc. “Shattered Halo? Would that be one from a fallen angel?”

  “Yes. The pieces of Lucifer’s halo were collected after he fell, but three were never found. It would seem that the demons located at least one.”

  “And these pieces act like angel kryptonite?”

  The archangel smiled faintly. “That’s a fair analogy.”

  “Is this a new discovery?”

  “No, but the spell required to salvage a halo’s lost divinity is very complicated,” Uriel said slowly. “And it’s been missing for centuries. To the best of my knowledge it’s never been used successfully until today.”

  “Hey, how ’bout that? Today is looking more special every minute.” And judging by that hint of pink on the horizon, they still had nineteen hours left before it was over. “What you’re really saying is that the demons now have a superweapon that can floor you guys on demand, right?”

  Uriel frowned. “I’m not certain what the ramifications are. I’ll need to consult with Michael.”

  “You do that.” Brian handed Uriel the piece of halo and, feeling the last of the battle tension ease from his muscles, he sheathed his sword. “But find Emily first.”

  The angel nodded, then winked away in a flash of blue.

  Taking a deep breath, Brian turned to Lena. She stood exactly the way he’d seen her before she disappeared behind the menacing shape of the arms-dealer demon—shoulders straight, bow extended.

  “You’ve been holding out on me,” he said softly. “You never told me you had that special voodoo up your sleeve.”

  She lowered her arm. “You never asked.”

  “Given how scathing you were about us using Romany magic, I didn’t think I had to. But it turns out you’re a hypocrite.”

  The bow in her hand gave one last shimmer, then vanished. Lena wiped her palm on her pants. “My Egyptian spells are not dark magic. They do not draw power from the soul.”

  “Not all Romany spells are void spells, either,” he pointed out. “The ones we use are entity spells, which are fueled only by our individual passion and commitment.”

  “True, but ...” She glanced at Carlos, who still reeked of smoke. “Romany spells are cascading curses, a connected set of three spells, each more potent than the last. There is a natural tendency to use stronger and stronger magic, especially when things aren’t going well. Eventually, almost all Romany sorcerers cross the line.”

  Her description was a little too close to his descent into addiction to be comfortable. “And the magic you performed just now was so much better?”

  She flushed. “I called upon the pagan deities—the elemental spirits, if you will. God does not approve of them, either. Mostly because they’re capricious and demand a steep price for their favors.”

  “What price did you pay for the mystical bow?”

  Her lips thinned. “That’s between me and Sekhmet.”

  “Damn it, Lena.” He raked a hand through his hair. Every time he thought he was getting to know this woman, she proved him wrong. Every layer he peeled away revealed another mystery. “Why does everything have to be a huge secret with you? For once, couldn’t you fess up and just tell me the truth?”

  “The truth wouldn’t change anything.”

  “It would go a long way toward building some trust.”

  She folded her arms over her chest and studied the sand.

  He sighed. This wasn’t going anywhere. In more ways than one. “Did we get all the coins?”

  “Almost. We got twelve.”

  “Collect the last one ASAP,” he said to Carlos. “I’d rather not be here when our friends come back for seconds.”

  As they crossed the sand toward the car, a large fork of blue electricity arched from the sky to the metal frame. The air dried and then snapped like a piece of Melba toast. On a lemon-scented breeze, Uriel appeared atop a nearby dune, with one arm around Emily’s shoulders.

  An Emily who was whole, and healthy, and pink skinned.

  But not the same Emily who’d left them a few minutes ago. This Emily had lost the baby fat that rounded her cheeks and no longer carried a defiant set to her shoulders. Her hair hung limply about her face and her eyes looked sunken and glassy. No teasing smile played around her lips. Whatever had happened to her out there in the desert had knocked the sweet teen right out of her.

  Uriel caught his eye. “It’s temporary. She needs to rest a while, that’s all.”

  Brian wanted to swallow Emily in a bear hug, comfort her, erase the lingering pain he saw in her eyes. Instead, he kept his distance. Apparently, when it came to teenage girls, he was the kiss of death. Melanie. The girl in New York. And now Emily. Hang around with him long enough and even immortal girls could get the life force kicked out of them.

  Brian dropped his gaze. A thin layer of dust and several deep scuff marks had obliterated the shine on his Gucci loafers.

  How had he let MacGregor convince him to do this? How had he fooled himself into believing, even for a second, that he was the kind of guy these women could rely on? Convenient memory loss, maybe. Because he wasn’t the savior type.

  Hero?

  Hell, no.

  Head case.

  16

  When her iPhone vibrated in her pocket, Lena knew it wasn’t good news. In fact, from the moment the demons vanished, she’d been expecting a reprisal. She slid the phone out, surreptitiously peering at the screen.

  It was blank.

  Yet even as she stared at it, t
he phone vibrated again.

  Confused, she glanced around the dark horizon.

  To the west, about a hundred yards distant, the wide slope of a dune glistened with a silvery image. The moon had finally broken from its bed of clouds, but no glowing orb was reflected in the mirage. Nor was the helicopter or the vast expanse of rippled sand. Instead, a close-up of Heather’s gaunt face shone pale and waxy against the dark sky.

  Blinking, Lena glanced around again—this time to see if anyone else had noticed the moon mirage. But apparently the image was only for her. Brian was talking quietly to Uriel, and Emily was attempting to coax a stone-faced Carlos into a conversation. No one noticed the flickering picture displayed on the dune.

  Bracing herself for the worst, she turned back to the image. The still picture became a video. A smile lifted the corners of Heather’s mouth, but went no farther than that. Her hazel eyes were flat and almost lifeless. The camera zoomed out.

  A street corner in a seedy neighborhood, early evening. Dressed in a short skirt and high heels, her bony hips readily apparent, Heather sauntered toward a parked car and leaned into the open window.

  Lena’s stomach clenched.

  It got worse. Suddenly she could hear the tinny words echoing inside her head, inescapable and cruel.

  “Want some company?” Heather said coyly to the man in the car.

  Nineteen. A college sophomore. Once a cheerleader and an honor-roll student. Now a drug addict and a hooker. Lena closed her eyes. Not that it saved her any anguish. The sound kept playing in her head.

  “How much?”

  “Fifty bucks.”

  “What do I get for that?”

  “Anything you want.”

  Mouth sour, she turned her back on the mirage—and she was thankful when the trembling rasp of Heather’s voice died away. The ugly part of demon possession was that the person being possessed remained aware of everything that happened. There was no blissful fugue state or period of unconsciousness. The whole point was to force the possessed person into unspeakable acts that would humiliate her and destroy her self-worth. Steer her down a path of no return, then watch her self-destruct. A corrupted soul was worth more than a pure one in Satan’s world, and thralls were second only to lure demons in their ability to drive good people over the edge.