Cymbeline rang the bell and no more than ten seconds later the door flew open. A tall, skinny man with gray hair and hollow cheeks stared back at her. He knew who she was. She’d made herself known in Irisi’s life one time before, when she’d first met him and his wife after getting to know Irisi. She knew at the time she saw at least affection for the girl, but that all disappeared with his wife’s death. It was clear as day now that any love he felt were for his Gods alone and she would need to leave a more lasting impression than a simple warning to curb his abusive habits. But that would come later, when Irisi was safe with Kerrick at The Mansion.
“I’m taking Iri away from here,” she said bluntly, staring him down. “You are going to go for a two-hour walk. I’m going to get her things and you will never see her again.”
The man took a brave step forward and Cimby nearly gagged at the scent of the sickness in his soul. There was no goodness left in him. “You have no right!”
She let her eyes go black, a precursor to shifting that humans were rather wary of. “I know you have no love for her. So I will say this once more. Leave, don’t come back for two hours, and you will never see either of us again.” She couldn’t promise not to kill him, no matter how many rules she’d be breaking if she did. An Incendiary wasn’t allowed to kill discriminately, only those they were ordered to hunt.
“She is my daughter. She may be a demon bitch like you, but she is still mine.” That was enough. Cymbeline grabbed the fool by the throat and pushed him into the house, lifting him off his feet and squeezing down on his air pipe. She let her Wolf seep into her being. Teeth elongated and claws sharpened.
“You’re the bitch here, daddy dear.” She growled, giving him a sharp-toothed grin, and concealing her surprise that he knew what Irisi was.
The man tried to sputter a curse at her and she compressed his airway tighter.
“Your mind has sickened since the moment your wife died. I’m sorry for your loss, but it’s no excuse to take your grief out on an innocent child.”
“Not—not a child,” he rasped as she let up on his air a bit.
“Yes. I know what she is,” Cymbeline hissed. “I know how old she actually is. I know it must be something you did to her to make her stop growing. And if I find out you did have something to do with it…” She lowered him back to the floor, bringing her teeth down to his neck and biting hard enough to make him bleed. “I’ll come back for you. Now go take a walk while we get her things.”
He stared at her as she released him, terror in his eyes and the stench of fear-induced piss infusing the air as it leaked onto the floor. He grabbed his keys and ran down the steps. Cimby watched the man glare at Irisi in the car as he walked past, waiting for him to try something. But he obeyed with a final sneer at his adopted daughter and kept on walking. Once he turned the corner, Cimby waited a moment, listening to the sounds of his footsteps fading into the quiet night before waving for Irisi to shut the car off and come join her on the stoop.
For the next half hour they moved efficiently through the house, grabbing the items Irisi had described to Cymbeline earlier in the day. They were random things: a picture, a jewelry box, some clothes, an iPod—sentimental items a girl facing a major upheaval in her life would want to keep. Irisi kept moving but that bad feeling continued to ride the edge of Cimby’s senses. She wanted to get them out of there as fast as possible.
“You done, kid?” she asked after a thorough combing through the small but clean house. No wonder not a soul had ever made a complaint after inquiring after Irisi’s wellbeing. If they had, all they would have seen was a pleasant-looking home with all the comforts and modern conveniences any other normal residence would have. If Cymbeline had not been trained to detect lingering traces of emotions, she would never have recognized the stench of fear and magic that had been infused into the furniture, coating the home with a dark and forbidding aura. She was amazed, yet again, that Irisi had retained her strength of character while living in this weary home.
Along with that pride compounded regret that she had not stolen the girl away from this man earlier in her life. It wasn’t only for Irisi’s safety Cymbeline had denied Irisi’s request to come with her. Cymbeline had been so convinced her mere association with the child would have affected her performance as the Incendiary, her trainers’ voices a relentless chorus in her mind instructing her what she could and could not do. At some point, she would have to stop judging herself through the eyes of men and women who no longer controlled her life. Yes, she had a job to do, an important job, but that did not mean she was not allowed to develop a personality or step away from the bounds of what was required of her. Her main purpose as Incendiary was to protect the innocents. Irisi helped her see she could do this in more ways than just being an emotionless assassin.
“There’s one more thing on my list, I can’t find it though,” Irisi said, face red from stress and turning in a circle, casting her gaze about frantically as if she’d spot the final item lying at her feet.
“What is the item?” Cymbeline asked, placing her hands on the girl’s shoulders to keep her from spinning in place and passing out.
“It’s a necklace.”
Cymbeline opened her mouth to reply when a sliver of awareness trickled down her back, putting her on alert. She peeked through the curtain covering the window overlooking the front lawn to see if the man had come back. Nothing was out there, all was quiet but the magic in the air felt even heavier than it had earlier. The sooner they got out of there the better. “Do you really need it?”
“It was my mom’s…my real mom’s. I usually keep it in my jewelry box but it’s not there. I do need it. Please help me find it.” Irisi’s bottom lip began to quiver but instead of giving into hysteria, she bit her lip and fisted her hands, taking deep breaths to work through the panic. This necklace was important to the girl. They could stay a few more minutes.
“Okay, kid. We will find it but we need to hurry.” They searched Irisi’s room and bathroom first, but Cimby knew if this was something Irisi had considered important they would most likely have to go into her father’s room to find it. Irisi hated the room, said it had too many creepy religious relics and symbols. Cymbeline volunteered to give it a cursory glance first, not even sparing a thought on letting Irisi enter.
They came up to the dark wooden door at the end of the hall. It was bathed in an ominous shadow that seemed to reflect the very nature of the man who slept in the room beyond it. Cymbeline placed her hand on the wood to feel for magic, but the thing was inert. She slowly pushed the door open, listening beyond the creak of the hinges, when the oddest sensation rushed over her body. The dark room was a magical vacuum that nothing of power could penetrate. She couldn’t smell a thing, which was bizarre as Irisi often complained about the incense he frequently burned in the room. Irisi stuck her head around the doorframe, peeking in to look around the murky room without stepping inside.
The shadows in the room were dark, even for Cymbeline’s preternatural eyesight, and the rest of her senses were all but cut off due to the magical black hole. Thinking back on it, she would scold herself that she should have seen him coming, should have noticed the instant he stepped back into the house and activated whatever was blocking her senses. She’d been too focused on Irisi, trying to get out of the damned house as fast as possible to really notice what was happening around them. A magical blocker—and since her senses as a shifter came from the magic within her Wolf spirit, they were all but rendered useless by it.
Cymbeline pulled Irisi out of the open doorway, shoving the small girl behind her with such force she could hear her slam against the floor. Something clear and liquid flashed in the remaining light from the hallway. Cymbeline smelled the acrid scent before it hit her face, burning and peeling her flesh away in rapid agony. The excruciating pain encompassed the left side of her face. The liquid fire marked and scorched her skin like lava and
she could hear her flesh crackling like burning firewood. She screamed.
Cymbeline lost herself. Her precious control and the cage she kept her rage and fury in snapped with all the resistance of a twig. Her fangs descended and she attacked the old man without a second thought, reveling in the taste of his blood and the smell of his fear. This time it wasn’t just the Wolf inside who loved the way skin popped every time her fangs ripped him open. It wasn’t just her shifter nature that thought the exhale of his dying breath sweeter than any symphony she had ever heard. This was who she was deep down. This was why she hid from the world. This was what the Weres chose to train to protect their innocents. A beast who craved the taste of blood and sounds of screams.
A high-pitched sound to her right made her pull back from the decimated corpse and train her heightened focus on the doorway. Her claws, protruding from human fingers as she had surprisingly remained in her human form, were soaked with blood. She could sense the magic blocker attempting to dampen her senses but there were few magics that could tamper with her maddening rage. She inhaled another sweet scent. It was lighter than the flesh she’d just feasted on but still tainted by fear…and sickness. Sickness. She knew that scent. Irisi. Irisi. Iri was in the doorway and had watched as Cimby ate her adopted father.
The horrifying thought snapped her awareness back into a human state, retracting her claws and fangs until all that was left was her human shell. She’d been so close to leaping out that door and attacking Irisi. But she’d kept it together. She wasn’t gone yet. Her trainers had warned her if she allowed the berserker form to emerge often, it would become harder and harder to rein it back in.
Cymbeline inhaled and almost gagged at the overwhelming smell of blood on her breath. It was all over her and, Gods, her face throbbed. She whimpered. The salt of her rage-filled tears crawling down her face stung like knife wounds.
Cymbeline stood on her knees with all the strength she had left and crawled out of the room. She couldn’t let Irisi go in there. Couldn’t let her see up close what she’d done. Once past the threshold she collapsed, rolling onto her back and gasping for air, trying to breathe through the pain.
“Cimby! No, Cimby I’m so sorry. I’m sorry.” Irisi was there, touching her shoulders and looking in horror at her face. Just another day, just another scar, right? Cymbeline couldn’t decide whether or not Irisi’s horrified expression was from the burns or her father’s blood.
The pain overwhelmed Cymbeline and she moaned, wanting to cover her face but knowing the simplest touch would be like setting fire to her already burning skin. Footsteps and a small hand taking her by the elbow forced her eyes open. Irisi helped her sit up without a word and wrapped an arm around her waist, tugging her to stand and leading her into the hallway bathroom.
Irisi pushed Cimby’s hips so she could lean on the counter. Cimby refused to turn and look at herself in the mirror. She must look like something out of Irisi’s darkest nightmares. She could feel the skin peeling off her face.
Kerrick would never lust for her again after getting a good look at her. Mating problem solved. She put that thought away for now, looking down at her bloody hands. She needed to wash the blood off and bandage up her face before they headed out.
Irisi seemed to know what she needed as she began to help Cimby strip and take a shower, a very cold shower. Her skin couldn’t take any heat. The shower was fast and Irisi was gentle, not commenting on whose blood she was washing off of Cymbeline’s skin. She dressed in clothes Irisi found in the attic that her adopted mother had stored when she was still alive. They were dusty and dated but at least they were blood free.
Impressed beyond belief by Irisi’s fortitude, the trooper helped Cimby put a tincture meant to heal burns on what she now knew were acid burns, and bandaged them up as good as any battlefield dressing. If the poor girl didn’t need therapy before, she most definitely would now. There was no way Irisi did not at least hear what was happening while Cymbeline had been, Lords, eating her father.
The thought made her stagger against the wall as they made their way from the hallway bathroom towards the stairs.
“Cimby?” Irisi asked, the first thing she’d said since finding her burned and covered in blood on the floor.
“It’s Okay,” Cimby grunted. She could barely move her lips on her left side to speak. “I’m good. Did you get the necklace? Get the necklace and let’s go.”
“I can’t go in there with him…I can’t.”
“Right. Yeah, all right.” It hurt but she moved slowly back into the stinking room. The stench of rotting flesh was putrid and made her stomach rumble, a stark contrast to just an hour ago when she’d craved the taste of it. She sighed and began to search for what Irisi had described as a small, velvet jewelry box holding her birth mother’s pearl necklace. She found it, sitting on some sort of alter that had been converted from a dresser.
Dozens of low-burning candles and hundreds of what looked like Egyptian hieroglyphics and tokens littered the altar. Gold coins and four bowls of jewelry covered the base. One gold, chipped and burnt necklace seemed to be the focus on the table, a strange cross-topped with an oval, that one looked familiar. An ankh. But the wall beyond it was covered with one symbol repeating over and over. Two small stick-like images joined together to form an X. How had she not seen the candles through the darkness before? Whatever curse or spell he had woven to block her senses had been frighteningly powerful. A human couldn’t use this much power on his own without corrupting his soul.
Once they erased any evidence of them being in the house, staging it like a break in, Cimby called a local law enforcement shifter who owed her a favor. He didn’t know she was the Incendiary but she’d saved his ass during a takedown she’d happened to be in the neighborhood for a few years back. He promised he would be the first on the scene and make it look like Irisi had either never existed or run away a long time ago. Shifters were good at making people disappear.
Cimby could barely see through her left eye but that would have to be enough for the moment. She’d stop at an apothecary before getting on the main highway to buy an average numbing potion to control the pain. Anything stronger would make her pass out and then how would they get back to California? Irisi may be older than she looked but she didn’t know how to drive a car yet, nor were her legs long enough to reach the pedals.
No, she needed her wits about her. For Irisi and for the damn forty-five-hour drive they had ahead of them.
“Ready, kid?” she said, putting on a brave smile for Irisi.
“Don’t talk, Cimby,” Irisi said, reaching her hand up and tinkering with the tape sealing the bandages to her face. Gods, she must look horrid to put that expression on Irisi’s face. “It’s okay,” Irisi whispered. “I’m okay. Just try not to pass out at the wheel.” She gave a half-hearted smile.
“Will do.” Cimby nodded, taking Irisi’s hand and walking away from that forsaken house of nightmares. Looking back at the quaint house, Cimby swore to herself Irisi would never suffer pain or want for anything ever again. She knew, deep down within the confines of her soul, that Kerrick would take care of Irisi. He would make sure she was safe and loved, no matter where Cimby’s Incendiary duties took her.
“Cimby?” Irisi tugged on her hand.
“Yes?”
“Thank you for saving me. Again.” The slip of a girl looked up at her with wide yellow-green eyes full of tears she rarely let herself shed. “Thank you for killing him so I wouldn’t have to.” Cimby pulled her into a hug so tight she could have suffocated the girl. But she needed that affection as much as she wanted to give it. It had been a rough week.
“You never need to thank me, and I would never have let you do that, sweetheart. I’ll always be here to slay your demons. I promise.”
“I know.”
Chapter Thirteen
“I do not like risking any more of your people, Leah,” Ke
rrick said as he watched the two Gator shifters gear up for their reconnaissance mission. “Cristoff’s people are equally suited for this task.”
“You won’t convince me, Alphar,” Leah said, her hands clasped behind her back. “They were my pack and my people will be a part of this. They know the dangers they face.”
“There are so few of you already.”
“And whose fault was that?” She snorted, her shoulder-length dreadlocks dancing as she shook her head. “My people refused to mate with other species of shifters, refused to touch humans, and now we’re all but extinct. The old ones may have been dumb hicks but they taught us a thing or two about lying in wait for our prey to forget we’re even there, and then snap!” She clapped her hands loudly, startling Zach into jumping as he walked up to the Gators. “They’re in our jaws and sliding down our gullets.” Her unnerving Gator eyes, emerald green with a single slit of black down the middle, focused in Zach’s direction. One side of her mouth tripped up in a primal grin. “We love all kinds of white meat.”
Zach growled deep in his throat and Kerrick could feel the Coyote side rousing to the fore, wanting to cause a bit of mischief. Kerrick nodded Zach off, telling him with a look to stand down.
“Try not to piss off my Magic Tech, Leah.”
“And why is that, cher?” Leah asked, the endearment trained in Zach’s direction. One facet Kerrick never would of thought to assume of a Gator’s nature was their inherit sensuality. As the scaled beasts could dance and glide across the top of water, Leah did so on land. Her curvaceous hips, Cajun accent, and dark, flawless skin brought to mind hot, humid nights in Louisiana. Most shifters caved to the temptation she offered, but few could handle the reality of her dominant sensuality. Kerrick, for some reason, had never given in to her invitations, preferring to laugh at those who trailed in her wake like lost puppies. The woman was more a black widow than a ferocious Gator.
To Mate an Assassin: The Lost Alphars Series, Book 1 Page 17