Maddie came awake slowly, groggy and confused by a rich smell around her. Roses?
Blinking, she pushed to one elbow and glanced around her. Damask wing chairs flanked a mahogany chest. Roses of a dozen colors were arranged in silver vases beneath fine oil paintings. Where was she?
Abruptly the night’s memories returned in a searing rush. Maddie fell back on the bed with a gasp of anger and confusion. It couldn’t—shouldn’t be true.
And yet it was. All of it. The truth of the night whispered in her blood and burned at the skin of her palms, where even now she could feel the odd, restless prickling of the spirals of light. The marks were moving, almost alive as if they called her to do something—something Maddie couldn’t understand.
Or maybe she didn’t want to understand.
She sat up slowly, grim and focused. She had to check in. The last time she had spoken to Izzy had been hours ago. For all she knew, he had already called out the local police to find her and take her in to custody.
Except he wouldn’t know where to look.
Where was her wretched phone?
She pulled on her jacket and jeans and padded to the small adjoining room. She hadn’t slept long, because it was still dark outside. If she hurried, she could catch Izzy before he did something rash.
Like contact Interpol, the CIA, or the FBI.
But her phone was nowhere to be seen. Her backpack was gone too. Maddie glared at the beautiful room, vainly searching for any way to communicate with the outside world. No phones anywhere. “Don’t the people in this mansion believe in modern conveniences?”
She dug a hand through her hair, frowning as the floor seemed to tilt. Dizziness hit her in a crippling wave and she bent double, staggering. “S-stop spinning,” she gasped.
And just like that the spinning stopped. No more waves. No more dizziness. Maddie opened her eyes and put one hand on the ornate mahogany side table, thinking about what she had said. And about what had happened next.
“Start spinning,” she whispered.
Dizziness slammed over her. The floor tilted and she gasped with nausea and total wonder.
“Stop spinning,” she ordered sharply.
The room went still, utterly still. Command—and result.
“Okay, this is spiking crazy high on my weirdness meter, Toto. I guess we’re not in Kansas anymore.”
Maddie stared around her, searching for answers. And then she gave a cocky grin. “I need my phone,” she said very clearly.
Nothing happened.
She ran a hand through her hair and thought about what she had said. And what she had not said.
She thought next about what Lyon had explained to her earlier. Something about her … powers?
She tried again. “Make my phone ring.”
Brrring. The sound cut through the air to her left, low vibrations that came from inside a beautiful cherry bureau. Maddie followed the vibration. When she opened the drawer she found the sleek unit Izzy had given her at the museum moving in tight little circles right next to her backpack.
Total weirdness.
But it still could be a coincidence. Maddie watched the marks shift over her hands and tried to believe that all of it was a coincidence. She threw all her wanting into that thought, desperate to be normal again, playing music in her grimy little studio apartment and reading a computer manual while she gulped down her usual ulcerously strong espresso brew.
She didn’t want this, whatever it was, and she didn’t want to change and she didn’t want to make choices and she definitely didn’t want to think about Lyon’s callused hands when they had kept her from stumbling on the ridge, and how he had touched her hair and then slid his jacket around her shoulders when she had shivered and then thrown up. Those things made her body tighten and feel oddly restless.
Okay face the truth, she thought.
The man is smoking hot. How can you not think about him? And he’s somewhere thinking about you too, because you saw the way he looked, dangerous and hard, his jaw set in a tense line when you reached up to grab his shoulder.
Something was going on here.
Maddie closed her eyes, remembering how her breasts had pressed against his hand and how she had wanted to kiss him hard. No, she hadn’t imagined his dark look or the wave of hunger that had filled his eyes while neither of them had breathed for what felt like a few centuries. If she hadn’t gotten sick to her stomach, there was no telling what might have happened next …
So let’s forget this rubbish about you two not being hot for each other. When you’re in the same room the air pretty much goes radioactive.
No point in denying it.
Maddie gripped her phone, fighting those hot memories. She had to call Izzy ASAP before she became a face on police posters on at least two continents. Then she would get back to work on the question of what he had been doing at the museum in London. At least that would be easier than trying to untangle the rest of her chaotic and dysfunctional life.
When Maddie turned on the phone, she saw fifteen missed calls. Frowning, she hit redial, turning to watch dawn touch the eastern sky.
Izzy answered on the first ring. “Acme Repair Shop.”
Maddie shook her head. “Very funny, Teague. And before you start yelling, none of this was my fault. I got—sick and then they took me here.”
“Maddie, where are you! Damn, I’ve been calling you for three hours. Why didn’t you answer the phone? And what do you mean by sick?”
“It’s all been very…confusing. Then I lost the phone. But I found it. That’s why I’m calling.”
“First, are you okay? Really okay?”
“I’m fine. Sort of.” She wasn’t of course, but Maddie didn’t know where to start and besides there was no possible way that Izzy would believe any of what happened. So she would hold off on the details until she could explain to him face-to-face. Having Aeryx nearby would be a big help.
“So you’re not sick right now?”
“No. I’m not.” Assuming that you didn’t count the marks of light that wouldn’t stop moving around her, the sudden waves of nausea and things that did what she commanded them to do. How was she going to explain all that? “Did you get what you needed at the museum?”
“I’ll fill you in when I see you. We’re on our way. Are you near the hotel?”
Maddie wasn’t sure where she was, but she knew the name of this place. “No. I—we went farther than I realized last night. There were a lot of police near the hotel after a fire across the street. But this place is safe. It’s in the middle of some kind of big estate.”
“How did you end up at a private home? No, forget it. Just give me the location. We’ll pick you on the way to the abbey.”
“What abbey?”
“Draycott Abbey. We can work there. A friend of mine owns it.”
Maddie walked to the balcony and stared outside. “Is it a looming gray building with towers and carvings and those weird old glass windows made up of little pieces?”
“Mullions. That’s what they’re called. And yes, it is.”
“Does it have a moat with four swans?”
“I guess that sounds about right. But how—”
“Because I’m there right now, Izzy.” Maddie turned away as the door opened. Lyon’s face appeared, etched with exhaustion. His eyes were unreadable. “That’s the place where they took me after I got sick,” she continued.
“Who took you? Did they force you to go? Maddie, I need answers.”
Lyon walked across the room, listening to every word she said, and the force of his concentration was almost like a physical touch.
“Force me? Well, it wasn’t my choice to come here. So you could say I was forced. I got sick – then everything happened too fast.”
“Who took you there, Maddie? Damn it, make some sense. Are you safe?”
“No, I’m not safe,” she said slowly. “I don’t think I’ll ever be safe again. I have these …marks, and they keep changing.”
; “Marks? Sorry, Maddie, but none of this makes sense.”
Lyon made a rough sound and pulled the cell phone from her hand. Frowning, he turned it off and tossed it back into the drawer. “You were not forced. Be very clear about that. I did only what was necessary to guard your life.”
Maddie glared back at him. “But I can’t go back. And that means I’m bound. It wasn’t my choice, none of it.”
“We are both bound. But despite that, our right of choice remains. Mark what I say.” Anger darkened his eyes. “And you will not speak of this to anyone. It is not safe.”
Maddie blew out an angry breath. “He’s my boss—sort of. I have to explain to him where I am. And since you brought it up, let me remind you that I didn’t ask you to save me and I didn’t ask you to bring me here. I take care of myself. I always have and that’s never going to change.”
“So now you throw this back in my face? That is your fear talking.”
“And what exactly am I supposed to be afraid of?”
“This,” Lyon whispered, pinning her to the cold glass doors of the balcony. His hands curved over her shoulders and tightened. “This,” he repeated with his lips against hers. “My body—how you feel now. How it makes you feel when our skin burns together,” he said harshly. “The way you affect me, with just a look. Even without your marks, the pull between us was strong. Now it is almost too great to control.”
“Speak for yourself,” Maddie muttered, even though every one of his words had been true. Her marks were rising now, spinning around his hands, bright and eager as they came to rest on his face. Maddie frowned as she saw his muscles tighten below the sleeves of his black turtleneck. “Wait.” She caught his arm when he would have pulled away.
A jagged line snaked along the inside of his arm. It looked freshly made. “Did that happen when you brought me here?” Her throat felt raw. “Did…I do that with my nails?”
“No, you did not.” Lyon caught back an oath as her fingers traced the wound gently.
Maddie hated the thought that she had caused him pain, possibly while she had struggled. She leaned closer and brushed the red line with her mouth, shocked at the wave of tenderness that engulfed her. “You need to be careful.”
Lyon didn’t answer, motionless and silent Maddie. She rose slowly, drawn by emotions she could not name, sliding her arms around his neck to draw him closer. Her marks flared out, spiraling slowly around their bodies as her mouth settled on his and her senses burst to life, restless and eager.
The kiss pulled her out of her normal world, out of her normal body. The light at her hands glowed right through skin and bone. And though it made absolutely no sense, touching Lyon made her feel safe, beautiful. Loved for the first time in her life.
The old Maddie, the cynical and arrogant girl who had grown up too fast and seen betrayal too often, seemed to slide away like a shed skin. A new Maddie looked at the man who held her so gently. The man to whom she owed her life.
“You wanted the truth? Fine. Here it is. I don’t understand any of this. All I know right now is that when you touch me, I feel like I’m breathing for the very first time. My body feels alive and everything around me looks different. Somehow you’ve made me different.”
Maddie saw him flinch as silver spirals left long trails along his arms. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
Lyon took a slow, rough breath. “I…feel your marks, Maddie. They are not comfortable. But they are not meant to comfort, of course.”
“What are they meant to do?” She forced out the question, almost afraid to hear his answer. “Tell me the truth.”
“You did not want the truth before.”
“Now I do.”
“Very well. Your marks serve you and they serve your will.”
But that was only part of the truth, Maddie sensed. She tried to think, but the awareness of Lyon’s muscled body left her mouth dry and her blood pounding. “What else?”
“They are searching for a place to rest. A place where they can stay to grow stronger.”
Maddie tilted her head up, studying his face. “And that involves you.” She read the confirmation in his eyes. “Somehow that wound on your arm is connected too?”
Lyon nodded slowly.
“Tell me the rest,” Maddie ordered. “I need to understand this.”
Heat filled Lyon’s eyes. “Be very, very sure of what you ask.”
Maddie didn’t flinch. “I am sure. Now tell me all of it.”
“Very well. Wherever you touch me, your power binds me. And that physical binding burns.”
Maddie lifted his arm gently and studied the wound. “So my—-marks did this?” She felt a little sick at the thought that she could harm him without knowing it.
“No,” Lyon said sharply.
“Then what?”
His fingers locked on her hair for a moment. Then he pushed away, striding through the silver light of dawn and opening the door to the balcony.
Maddie’s marks followed him. They flared out in circles around him, restless and bright.
“Why do they follow you?”
“It is too soon.” Lyon’s voice was harsh with need and yet Maddie heard its tenderness. He moved outside and gripped the metal rail of the ornate balcony, staring east where dawn burned against the horizon.
Maddie moved beside him and rested her hand on the angry line of his shoulder. “Explain the rest. Please, Lyon.”
His eyes locked on the distant ridge. “You cannot understand.”
Over their heads dark wings arrowed through the air, and then plummeted toward the moat’s edge. Aeryx settled on a rock, his eyes like flame against the last gray remnant of night. “I will explain. You are his to bind, but he will not. And every second you are near, the Guardian burns with greatest pain, needing your touch and full joining. Because you are his home. That is by both Law and prophecy.”
Maddie had a sharp image of Lyon’s body, strong and muscled, driving deep against hers in desire. Was that what Aeryx meant?
“So…what you’re saying is these marks—this bond between us—it’s just about sex?” The words felt awkward.
Lyon glared at the dark figure settled on the rock below them. “No. The bond is far more than that. Once chosen, there are dangers. Added to that, the bond cannot be revoked.”
“Not good for divorce lawyers, I guess.” But Maddie found herself wondering what it would be like to have Lyon beside her every night, their bodies hot and intimate, their lives entwined. On some deep level she already knew that she could trust him. His actions had proved that to her more than once. And yet…it was so hard for her to trust. Everyone in her life had lied or left or betrayed her.
“I still don’t understand what happened to your arm.”
“You give him power with the touch of your marks.” Once again it was Aeryx who spoke. “And yet that same power will overwhelm him if it is not tempered. So he draws the power away. Pain is how he keeps himself sane.”
“Aeryx, no,” Lyon said harshly.
“I must, Guardian of Acre and the Lands of the North. She must understand the power of her marks and her body. He burns because of you, Rose. His pain and only that will balance his need, which is enflamed by your bright energy. But your transformation has been speeded up, just as time itself has been speeded up. Soon…you will have to chose.”
“Chose what?” Maddie felt sick at the thought that Lyon must feel such pain. How much more had he hidden from her?
Aeryx’s amber eyes locked on her face. “They will come for you and the Guardian. It is a mere question of time. They must sense your awakening and it will stir their darkest hungers. It would be safest if you and the Guardian are blood-bound before that happens. But as he told you, this bond cannot be changed or revoked. It is forever.”
Lyon growled at Aeryx in a language Maddie did not understand, and the great figure blew out in a sound of anger.
“And if I…chose not to do this?” Maddie asked softly.
&nb
sp; “Then he will gain power from you again and again until it overcomes his control, his honor and finally his sanity. A Guardian searches the centuries for his Rose. Once he finds her, he must bond. This is for your need as much as his.”
Maddie’s hands felt damp. “Go on.”
“As your energies grow, you too will lose your balance. Those energies will push you to madness just as they do your Guardian.”
Madness. Okay, that was definitely bad.
“And…I take it we’re not talking about holding hands or saying a few quick wedding vows? Because I can do that.”
“It will take far more than words.” Lyon turned stiffly and Maddie felt the force of his angry gaze. “You face danger and madness—perhaps even death. And now you make a joke of it. But understand this. I have searched for you and it was my life’s duty and honor over the centuries. Now that you are here, you can no longer be a child. It is time for you to grow up, Maddie. You have to choose who you are and who you can become, and you must do all of this now, before the Walkers find you.”
She swallowed uneasily at his words. “You mean those…people back in London?”
Lyon nodded. “Except they are no longer people. Their souls are long gone, consumed to ash and angry dreams. Their bodies are all that remain. They would do the same to you,” he said grimly.
“Why? Who are they?”
“Their battle is as long as time. They hate all life. Where they come from we do not know. They came on air and thought and dark wings and their only joy is to consume and destroy whatever lives. Their hunger is infinite.” A muscle tightened at Lyon’s jaw. “Because of the light you carry, you are a rare prize and they will track you without end. If you are not afraid of that, then you should be.”
“I’m getting afraid really fast,” Maddie whispered, glad to feel his strong arm, glad for the warmth of his body near hers.
“Do not mock or underestimate them. But do not underestimate yourself either.” His eyes filled with longing. “You are still too young, though I have waited and wanted you for the ages.” His hands moved gently over her hair. “You have been betrayed. You have lost your dreams so young. But I promise you this. We will make new dreams—if you can trust me.” His thumb traced the curve of her cheek.
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