by Mia Taylor
“You cannot believe anything that Ashur says!” he yelped. “He is a murderer! You know that! You saw what he did to Michele!”
“Shut your lying mouth!” Ashur snarled, advancing on him again. “Can you not see that they know about you finally? The truth always prevails, no matter how long it takes.”
Johann turned to give Ashur a look filled with deep apology.
“His Grace would like me to extend an apology to you, Ashur,” Johann muttered. “But you should not have stayed silent and let this charade continue. The results could have been more catastrophic than it already is.”
Ashur sneered.
“Is it my job to do your job for you now?” he snapped back with uncharacteristic sarcasm. Jayce’s eyes widened to study his brother in disbelief. He had never heard Ash sound so confident—or furious.
Johann cleared his throat and looked down at his bare paws with unease.
“Well, it is a team effort,” he grumbled. Abruptly, he whipped his head up and looked at Jayce, who tried to inch away, sight unseen.
“Needless to say, Jayce, you have been banished, never to return to the bright otherworld.”
Desperately, Jayce looked toward the Commodore, who smirked openly at the messenger. Johann did everything in his power to avoid meeting the dark ruler’s eyes.
“I-I will stay here, then?” he asked the Commodore hopefully. The Commodore’s laughter ricocheted through the room, wind whistling the shattered windows as if Jayce had spoken the most hysterical words.
“Of course not,” the Commodore snorted. “You will return with me to the dark otherworld.”
“No!” Jayce screamed. “I did what you asked, Com! I—”
“You do not call me Com! You are a failure and moreover, you have belonged in my realm for two centuries, which you managed to evade. We are not going to be friends.”
For a strange moment, Jayce thought the dark ruler gave Ashur a wistful look.
“Ashur! Ashur, speak for me! Do not let them do this!” he begged, loathing the sound of his voice as he spoke, but his options were nil.
His brother turned away, the contempt on his face apparent, but to Jayce’s shock, Ashur began to nod.
“He does not deserve to go with you,” Ashur said emotionlessly to the Commodore. Jayce felt as if a dam of relief had exploded inside him.
“Oh, thank you, brother, thank—”
“That is not a fitting enough punishment for him,” Ash continued as if his brother was not in the middle of a sentence. “If there were a worse place to send him, I would suggest it.”
The Commodore chuckled.
“You really screwed things up this time, Jayce,” he laughed. “Even Ashur has finally had enough of your crap. That is an accomplishment.”
The Commodore turned and gave Ash a somewhat sympathetic look.
“I wish I could honor your request,” he said honestly. “But unfortunately, the dark otherworld is as good as it gets. Rest assured, I have very special plans for him.”
Jayce was suddenly swept up in a sea of confusion and contrition and again he tried to beg for mercy.
“No, please, no! I will do anything—”
“What will happen to me now?” Ashur asked as if Jayce was not in the process of begging for his eternal soul.
The Commodore and Johann exchanged a glance.
“You will return to the bright afterworld where you belong,” the messenger explained. “Is that not what you wanted?”
Jayce could read the clear dismay on his sibling’s face. Ashur turned to the Commodore and met his eyes.
“I daresay he has no respect for the way you run your business,” the Commodore chuckled in Ash’s defense. “How can he be sure that the same thing will not happen again?”
Johann seemed offended but Jayce was too busy blubbering to fully heed the conversation around him.
“That was a terrible tragedy,” Johann explained. “It would—”
“The deeds he committed whilst taking refuge in the dark world were not deserving of a place on the bright side,” the Commodore interrupted and Jayce’s head jerked up to listen.
“What are you saying?” Johann snapped, his furry face twisting in annoyance.
“I am saying he was the worst kind of sinner in the dark otherworld—debaucheries like you would not believe. I think he even strung someone up on the eternity pole once. Isn’t that right, Ashur?”
Ash eyed the Commodore but did not speak.
“Well… I am sure that the gods will consider the circumstances behind those indiscretions and forgive them—”
“I would not if I were him,” the Commodore sighed. “I mean, the darkness is already in him and while he does not belong among us, I would just leave him here on earth and let him roam around in this cesspool for eternity. It is certainly not the beautiful place it once was, that is for sure.”
Johann looked uncomfortable at the suggestion.
“Well, it does seem like a proper solution,” the old sentry guard muttered. “I should clear it with—”
“There is nothing to clear, little sheep. It is done. Run along now, Ashur. Our business is concluded here.”
Jayce ambled to his feet, not realizing he had crumpled to his knees in resignation. He stared after his brother with sorrowful grey eyes, willing him to look back at him, to have mercy.
You cannot leave me here to burn! he tried to scream. I am your brother, your flesh and blood!
But Ashur did not cast a final look at anyone in the room, the knowledge that he was done there enough for him. He was gone, leaving the Commodore to laugh at Jayce wildly inside his head.
“Playing the family card, are you?” the Commodore chuckled. “Is there no end to your ridiculousness?”
He openly leered at Jayce, his mouth curled grotesquely, but Jayce was still staring after Ashur, knowing exactly where he was heading. There was no doubt in his mind that Ashur was going to find Serafina.
It is not fair! I deserve better than this! I deserve better than Ashur!
“No, you do not,” the Commodore reassured him from within his head. “But soon you will get precisely what you deserve.”
The Commodore shook his head reprovingly, making a clucking noise with his tongue.
“Trying to steal your brother’s woman. What kind of monster are you, anyway?” This question was voiced aloud and for Johann’s benefit.
There was no chance for Jayce to reply.
Heat filled the room and in moments, Jayce was consumed in flames, his terrified screams rising but not loud enough to cover the Commodore’s mocking words in his ear.
“Welcome to the dark side! Poker night is every second Thursday!”
Chapter Twelve
Getting Out of Dodge
Summer was a much more pleasant experience in Detroit but Ashur was certain his future with Sera was not in the heart of the rundown city. If anything, he had been eager to leave since the moment he had arrived.
They had not spoken too much of the events that had led him directly into Sera’s arms but that didn’t stop her from bringing it up at least on occasion, even if she didn’t push the issue. Ash wondered if she was half afraid of what she might learn.
Sometimes it is better not to look a gift horse in its mouth, Ash thought wryly.
“One of these days,” Sera chirped in his ear, “you are going to have to explain what happened that day.”
“What day?” he asked innocently, squeezing her hand firmly in his. Of course he knew precisely of what she spoke, but that didn’t stop him from playing coy against her queries.
She grunted and punched him in the arm.
“You’re just full of mysteries, aren’t you?”
“Not any longer,” Ash replied truthfully, encircling his arm around her waist to pull her near. “I am exactly what you see.”
And he meant it. Gone were all his powers and the Commodore’s voice in his head. He was suddenly merely a wolf again, one without the abi
lities he’d possessed in the dark otherworld but Ash didn’t miss them in the least.
He was able to experience the world as a living immortal once again and his senses were on fire.
I won a bet against the Commodore. I wish that was a story I could tell our children.
Yet even as he thought it, Ash knew it was one that he would take to his grave—if it should ever befall him again. He vowed to be extra careful, unsure if he was able to die again or if he had already paid that price. Even Sera knew nothing about the truth of what had happened. As far as she could remember, there had been an altercation with a client who had gotten a little too close. The details of the day were fuzzy to her but Ashur was grateful for small favors. How could he explain who he really was now?
He was glad he did not need to figure it out. His only hope was that Sera’s memory didn’t return. He had no idea what he might say if it did.
I suppose I could always tell her the truth, he reasoned, but in the deepest part of his heart, he wished that she would never pursue the matter. All that was important now was that he and Sera could be together as mates without any distraction. Jayce was gone, the Commodore no longer a threat. The world was exactly the way he wanted it to be.
“Ash?” Sera called out and he realized he had slipped into a slight daydream.
“Yes?”
“You are coming with me?” she asked, and he nodded, grinning, blinking away the remnants of any dark thoughts.
“Do you believe I would miss this?” he asked. “I am likely more enamored with the idea than you.”
Sera laughed and tugged on his hand gently.
“Sadist,” she teased, as they entered the unkempt lobby of the office building.
Someone had been very generous to Ashur after the terrible evening in the hotel, but he was not sure who. He couldn’t determine if it was the gods’ guilt or the Commodore’s which had set him up in a way he hadn’t stopped to consider before.
Two months after the fiasco at the Hilton, Ashur had been staying with his mate at her dingy apartment. The shock of what had occurred had finally melted away and Ash had been thinking about his next step for his and Sera’s future.
He knew his lover wasn’t happy either in Detroit or at her job, but what could he possibly offer her? He had no land, no job, and certainly no prospects in this new world. Learning the computer had proven to be an insurmountable task and Sera continued to laugh at the way he held a cell phone, not that Ash had anyone to call.
After Sera left for work that morning, Ash found himself pondering those very thoughts when an envelope was slipped under the apartment door. By the time he opened the door and peered down the hallway to see who had sent it, there was no one there, but Ash’s heightened senses told him that it was someone he had known, although at what capacity, he could not say.
Instead, he turned his attention back to the envelope and what it contained.
It was addressed to Ash in a hand which he did not recognize and when he opened it, there were a set of keys and directions to a house… in California.
“It is yours if you should ever need it,” the note read. “Ask the girl how to use this.”
A small rectangular card made of hard material fell into his hand. It bore numbers and he ran it through his hands until Sera returned home to find him playing with it.
“What have you got there?” she asked curiously, noting the hard plastic in his hand. He shrugged and handed it to her.
“I do not know.”
Sera’s eyes widened and she snorted.
“You really are from another planet, aren’t you? It’s a bank card!”
He looked at her blankly. He understood the concept of a bank but the plastic still made no sense to him. Sera had laughed, leading him to a building where she explained how to use it.
“You need a PIN number. Do you have one?” she asked, but he could tell she already knew the answer. Suddenly, he remembered the note he’d received and he pulled it from the depth of his pocket, scanning it in confusion.
“What do you do with all your money? Put it under your mattress?” she demanded, laughing. She stopped abruptly, her eyebrows raising with interest when he didn’t smile.
“Do you?” she asked again.
“I have no money,” he replied, and she snickered again, glancing at the note which accompanied the card.
“You never seem to be short when I’m around,” she reminded him but Ash didn’t have the heart to tell her that those days were over. He no longer had the Commodore’s backing. There was no horde of cash from which he could draw.
“Never mind,” Sera said, guiding him to a machine he had never seen before. She popped the card inside and punched numbers into a keypad as Ash watched her with awe.
She is going to teach me so much, he thought, a now familiar blast of heat rising through him as he realized how good their life was going to be together. He couldn’t overcome his constant surprise at everything Sera was and provided for him.
Sera whipped her head around and gaped at him.
“You have no money?” she choked, pointing at the screen. “You have no money?”
He looked to where she was pointing, his jaw falling slack as he read the impossible amount of numbers on the screen.
What number is that? he asked himself. Do numbers go that high?
“Who are you?” she demanded. “Have you been lying to me? Are you really an illegal alien because in this America, aliens with money are very easily made legal? I don’t think you’re telling me the entire truth, Ash.”
Ash shrugged and nodded, unsure of what else to say. It was the easiest way he knew how to explain it to her, especially since she had brought up the idea herself.
“Where has all this money come from, Ash?” she asked, her eyes nearly bugging out of her face. “I mean—”
“It is family money,” he explained, cringing at the fib. He had vowed to stop lying to her but it was so difficult to explain the truth. “I inherited it.”
I suppose that is the closest thing to the truth that there is, he mused.
She gaped at him, a strange look in her eyes. He could tell she didn’t believe him but he didn’t offer any more of an explanation. He was learning that silence was sometimes the best truth he could provide.
“Oh,” she whispered, retrieving the card and handing it back to him. “That’s nice.”
There was a deep sadness in her that he didn’t immediately understand but when Sera turned away, he suddenly got it.
Ash grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her back to look into her face.
“It is your money too,” he told her gently. “Everything I have is yours.”
She stared at him, shaking her head firmly.
“I don’t want your money,” she growled defensively, but Ash could hear the wistfulness in her tone. “I have always made my own way.”
“You can still make your own way,” he replied. “With a partner. With your mate.”
Hope overcame the uncertainty in her eyes but Ash had known then that she believed him, fully and truly.
That was how they found themselves climbing the dank stairwell to the third-floor offices. At the doorway, Sera paused to give him a half-smile.
“Here we go,” she mumbled, pulling open the metal fire door, and Ash followed behind her.
“Sera! Where have you been?” an overeager man gushed as they pushed through the dilapidated door. “I’ve been texting you all day! We were worried sick about you!”
The man barely seemed to breathe in between sentences but Sera only waved a hand dismissively.
“Down, Barry,” she snapped, striding past him without pausing. “I don’t answer to you, in case you’ve forgotten.”
Ash swallowed a smile as he followed her toward the back of the office space. He wondered if he would ever get used to the idea of women in power but he admitted to himself that it was a turn-on watching his mate in action.
She threw open a closed d
oor and a stout, balding man looked up in shock as he saw her.
“I have been calling your goddamn—oh, hello.” The older man caught himself as he noticed Ashur standing in the doorway, ending what was sure to be a full-on diatribe. “Who might you be?”
“Ashur,” he replied simply, and Jacob jumped from his chair, hurrying toward the man, but Sera stood in his path.
“Keep your tongue in your mouth,” she instructed. “He’s not a potential victim of yours. He’s with me.”
The phony smile slipped off Jacob’s porcine face and he scowled, sinking back into his chair and baring his yellowing teeth angrily.
“Is he the reason you’ve been acting like such a flake lately?” the man demanded. “Because I’m getting sick of your shit, Serafina.”
Sera looked at Ash, perhaps sensing his mounting anger. She shook her auburn waves almost imperceivably as if to say she didn’t want him interfering.
“I quit, Jacob,” she told him, turning back to her boss. “I’m out of here.”
He gaped at her before a smirk fell on his lips. The attorney glanced at Ashur leeringly.
“Oh, you finally found a man to take care of you, huh?” he jeered. “You’ll be back here in a week begging for your job.”
Ashur felt a flash of defensiveness shoot through his body and before he could stop himself, he spoke, knowing that Sera wouldn’t approve.
“No,” Ashur said evenly. “She will not.”
Jacob snorted and rolled his eyes, eyeing Serafina with mild contempt. Ash wondered if the fat man didn’t feel envy oozing from his pores.
He is enamored with her, he realized. A combination of pity and annoyance coursed through him.
“You don’t know this type,” the lawyer snickered at him. “But trust me, the novelty of having her in bed will wear off on you and when it does—”
He did not have a chance to finish his sentence before a blow to his face sent him into the far wall behind his desk, blood spraying the walls indiscriminately. Ash did not shift but the urge was strong. He could feel Serafina willing him to remain calm.
We will be gone soon, she seemed to say to him. It isn’t worth it to show yourself when we are so close to leaving.