Deliver Me from Chaos

by Tes Hilaire

  Mia nibbled her lip, glancing briefly at the fading light from the passageway behind her. She felt a little bad for the blond haired man. He was determined not to fail this time. And somehow, she knew that her running away from him would make him think he had, even if he hadn’t.

  But this is what had to happen.

  The man with the maybe-blue eyes was about to get lost. And she had to be there to show him her first dream with all its colors so he’d know how to find his way back out of the dark.

  It was really very simple after all.

  All she had to do now was find him before it was too late.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  “Come on. I need you to step away.”

  That man, Logan, was trying to pull her away again. But Katrina wouldn’t go. She clung to Mike, refusing to let go. Poisoned. The black blade was like a poison to the soul and now that poison was running through Mike’s veins.

  “I’m not leaving him.”

  Logan swore. But he let her shoulder go. “Gabby, I need you and Valin to go get Alex. He might be able to drain enough of Mike’s energy to knock him out. Once we’re at Haven we can try and figure this out.”

  Oh, Mike definitely didn’t like that idea. He growled again, his eyelids fluttering. His eyes rolled back and he let out an inhuman scream.

  “No, Mike. Fight it!”

  “Katrina, move back, now!” Logan tried pulling her away again.

  Mike’s hands snaked out, grabbed onto Kat’s arms, his grip bruising. She gasped as his eyes opened again, their black oily depths staring at her with stark hunger.

  No. This couldn’t be right. Those eyes, it was like looking into the gaze of hell’s blackest souls.

  Mike leapt up, dragging her with him and spinning her away from the others. As if he were still trying to protect her. As if there was still a bit of her Mike left.

  Either that or he wants privacy while he rapes, kills, and eats you.

  “I’m sorry. So sorry,” she told him, and she meant it, too. “I should have never gotten you into this.”

  She’d known Mike’s soul could be in danger if he came down here, yet she’d let him anyway. It was all her fault. If she hadn’t convinced him to help her, if she hadn’t of been greedy and tried to have it all…

  He tilted his head, narrowing his eyes.

  Over his shoulder Jessica inched closer, her brow furrowed as she met Kat’s gaze. “Keep talking. He seems to be listening.”

  Mike jerked his head to the side, a low warning growl emitting from his throat. Kat grabbed his face, turning his attention back on her.

  “But if I hadn’t asked for your help, we wouldn’t have saved her.” She stroked his cheek with her thumb, smiling at him. “We saved her, Mike. Mia is safe. Thanks to you. I can’t tell you how much that means.”

  Behind his shoulder she watched Logan sidle up to Jessica’s side. He leaned over, mumbling something to her. Jessica nodded, spinning her finger at Kat in a keep-going motion.

  Kat drew a deep breath, audience or not, it was time to bare her soul. “I love you, Mike. I know, in your soul, you already know that. I know you also think I didn’t say it before because I was afraid. Afraid of being hurt. Afraid that I was only reacting to this crazy-ass bond your weird Paladin genes forced on us. Afraid that maybe it was all some trick of my own hell-born genetics. But I know it’s not. What we have is real.

  “I may not have fallen as quickly as you, but I did fall.” She slid her hand along his face, wiping a trickle of blood from the side of his eye as she met his black-eyed gaze. “I watched you. All the time. First because I told myself I needed to so I could get away. Then it was so I could read you and find a way to win you over. But as I watched, I was surprised to find a man who was not only good and honorable, but one that was passionate, selfless, and understanding as well.”

  She swallowed, went on. “Even as I made that first bargain, it didn’t sit right. I didn’t want to admit it then, but when I offered you my body, there was a part of me that hoped you would take me up on it simply because you wanted me for me.”

  Mike twitched, his body tensing. No wonder, Logan had moved behind Mike, the warrior’s palm glowing with the cleansing light that made her heart skip with both hope and fear. Could Logan purge the poison with that heavenly light?

  “I love you, Mike. I started falling with the first kiss. And was completely gone when you held me in your arms and let me bare my soul. I love you, heart, body, soul.”

  Mike’s vocal chords made a noise somewhere between a growl and a low rumble, his black gaze narrowing.

  Logan took the last step forward, one hand locking down on Mike’s shoulder as his other glowing palm pressed hard against the blackened wound.

  Mike roared, lurching forward and slamming Kat into the wall.

  Pain blinded her, the force of the hit reawakening every ache, every bruise in her body. Her biceps screamed under the pressure of Mike’s bruising grip, only despite how firm it was, she could feel the trembling in his hands.

  Mike’s head hung, his breath wheezing in and out of his lungs as he shook. Was it working? Was it driving the poison away?

  “You can’t get rid of the bad that way. The black just swallows the light.”

  Katrina’s gut clenched in horror. Mia stood less than five feet from them. Mia who wasn’t looking at her, couldn’t see the small shake of Kat’s head, couldn’t see the silent message to go, to run.

  “How the hell did she get here?” Logan snapped, straining to keep his palm tight against Mike’s side.

  Mia’s mouth pulled down, lips trembling as she looked at Mike. “He’s all dark, like the really, really bad man. If you could burn it, there would be nothing left.”

  Hopelessness engulfed Kat at her daughter’s words. Mia was always talking about what color people looked like to her and she’d never called anyone, not even the slimy landlord, black. Sickly yellow, brown with rusty red spots, the angry kind of red, but never black.

  “Hey, Mia, right?” Jessica took a step toward Mia.

  Mike roared, making both Logan and Katrina flinch and Jessica stop in her tracks. And that was enough. Mia scooted by Jessica and came up beside Mike, laying a hand on his elbow.

  Mike looked down at Mia, a growl rising in his throat.

  And this was it. This was the moment Katrina lost it all. Maybe their bond had stopped Mike from outright killing her, but would it stop him from hurting Mia?

  Kat couldn’t stop the tears that ran down her face, her gaze imploring as she looked over Mike’s shoulder to Jessica. “Take her. Please take her.”

  Jessica started forward, but Mike tensed and Logan shook his head. “Wait…”

  Mia’s little hand reached out and clasped Katrina’s hand. Katrina’s arm was so numb she couldn’t even squeeze it back.

  “Don’t cry, mommy.” She smiled up at her. “Everyone has good in them. You told me so, remember?”

  Hysterical laugher bubbled up in Kat’s throat, escaping in a strange mix of hiccups and sobs. Everyone had good in them. If only that were true. And even now Mike’s goodness was being eaten by the poison consuming him. Turning him into a monster right here, right now, before her eyes. She was losing him. Losing everything.

  Mia had dropped her hand and was standing on her tiptoes so she could reach Mike’s chin. Mike growled again, but that didn’t stop Mia. No, she just stretched up further, that silly innocent smile still on her face as she looked into the eyes of a monster. “I had a good dream. A very good one. Want to see?”

  She didn’t wait for Mike to answer, but smiled, her hazel eyes swirling. And because Kat was looking into Mia’s eyes too, she caught the brush of images.

  She and Mike were walking, swinging Mia between them. Such love. And though the setting was too hazy to make out, they weren’t. Mike was smiling, his core glowing with a soft blue color, Kat was more a rosy red, and Mia, she laughed, and when she did she burst with the yellow of the sun. That sun burne
d, not in a bad way, but a good one. It burned through the haziness that surrounded them, turning the grey world into one of color and wonder.

  Mike roared, his hands crushing Kat’s bones as he began to convulse. Kat screamed, sure he was going to snap her arms like twigs.

  As if he realized what he is doing, he shifted his grip, his arms sliding around her back as he clung to her, his eyes desperate.

 

  She sucked in a breath. Please what? End his torture? By stopping Mia’s dream? By telling Jessica to use her blade on him?

  Wait, his eyes. They weren’t just black anymore. There were other colors swirling around in the oily darkness.

  “Mike?”

  “You can do your thing now,” Mia said, to whom, Kat wasn’t sure, she was too busy watching the colors dance in Mike’s eyes. Little spots of the rainbow that burst and sparkled amongst the darkness.

  And then the tunnel was bathed in light. Mike roared again, the veins of his neck standing out, his teeth grit, as pain wracked his body.

  Katrina wept against the dual pain. Hers, his, she couldn’t find the line that separated them. She squeezed his face, pressing her lips against his. He latched on to the offering, his grip punishing as he devoured her mouth.

  And his eyes. The colors were growing, or perhaps it was that the black oil was being burned away.

  The light was so bright around them now she couldn’t see a thing. She closed her eyes, letting him consume her as she basked in the unrestrained passion of his kiss. She thought she might explode. Either that or die, the moment was that intense. And then his body slumped against her, the only thing keeping them up, the wall behind her.

  For a second, she thought it was over. That they’d won, that with Mia’s and Logan’s help, Mike had banished the poison, but as she tried to take his face between her hands and kiss him once more she realized a horrible truth: Mike wasn’t breathing.

  “No, no, no, no, no, you can’t go!” Katrina cried out the denial, even as Mike slid down onto the ground. She followed him down, her fingers pressing against his neck, searching for a pulse. “Don’t do this to me, Mike. I said I love you!”

  She looked around frantically, her eyes catching on Logan’s tortured face. Jessica wasn’t any help either, her face all but blank as she sunk to the ground on her knees. But there was Mia, her brow pulled down in a frown as she gave Katrina her you-just-don’t-understand-mommy look.

  “Mia? What do I do?”

  “Show him the way, mommy. Show him your dream.”

  Her dream? Her dream was impossible. She wanted it all. Him. Mia. A family. A home. She wanted to be his partner. His lover. The woman he trusted with the little pieces of his soul.

  She loved him.

  Mike had seen past all the darkness staining her to the bit of light in her that mattered. She wanted to embrace that light. She wanted to be a good mother. A good wife. A good partner. She wanted to be good. She wanted to fight alongside Mike, Gabby, Valin and all their misfit warriors for the sake of all that was good and right. And she needed both him and Mia to stay the path.

  That was her dream. Though she had no idea how to show Mike that.

  Mia clapped, all but bouncing with happiness. “You did perfect, Mommy! Look!”

  Beneath her hands Mike took a shuddering breath. Katrina took one of her own, grabbing his hand. “Mike?”

  “Kat…” His voice cracked as he said something else.

  Holding her breath Kat leaned close, her heart pounding with a mix of dread and hope as he weakly squeezed her hand. His eyes cracked open, blue, pure blue and not a trace of black in them at all.

  His lips quirked up in a weak smile. “Nice dream. But I hope you’re not really planning on being too good, are you, beauty?”

  Kat laughed, grabbing his face and kissing him for all she was worth. And oh, yes, she definitely still had a little bit of bad left in her for her bad boy and his beast.

  Epilogue

  Damon groaned, lifting his hands to his pounding head. Only he couldn’t seem to lift both hands. His left arm was pinned out away from his body. It was too dark to see anything, but the familiar angle of his arm made him think he was strapped to his dad’s table, but then he realized he couldn’t move anything from his chest down. Was he paralyzed?

  Panic squeezed his throat at the thought. Could a merker be paralyzed?

  He used his right hand to feel around him, trying to determine what held him. And, alright, he wasn’t on the table exactly. More like he was beneath it. His left arm was pinned between it and the stone floor.

  It was something else covering him from the mid-torso down. Cold, uneven edges. Hard and sharp. Stone. The ceiling? He tried to pry one of the broken chunks free, succeeded in making it roll off his left shoulder.

  The movement kicked up a cloud of dust and he went into a coughing fit. Only he couldn’t truly cough, not while half his ribcage was crushed beneath the weight of the rock. He tried to shift, agony tore through him.

  Okay, then. So wiggling free wasn’t happening.

  What had happened? Last thing he remembered was playing his little hide and seek game with daddy. Obviously he’d lost.

  Vaguely he remembered being dragged back down the stairs to the torture chamber. Ganelon had stopped, taking in the empty room. And then nothing. He didn’t remember a thing after that.

  Obviously there had been some sort of cave in. And judging by the lack of light, it was pretty vast.

  How much air did he have? How badly was he actually wounded? Was he destined to die in this hellhole?

  He could be trapped, blinded by the dark, bleeding from internal injuries, suffocating as the oxygen disappeared.

  Oh wait, he couldn’t die that way, though an eternity of suffocation didn’t sound much more appealing.

  He laughed. He’d always known he was destined to die on his dad’s torture table. Funny that it would be the thing to save him, because as he shifted another rock, he realized something else: though he might be buried, the table had created the gap that had saved his skull from being crushed in.

  Voices came from out of the darkness, halting Damon’s hysterics. He sucked in a breath, straining to hear what they were saying. They didn’t seem to be so much worried for their own state as searching for survivors.

  A cold thought entered his mind: Ganelon could be under all this rock, alive and raring for a chance to punish his son for his second bout of insubordination—but not if Damon can get out of here first.

  Tentatively he called out, then louder. This time someone answered.

  Damon began to dig.

  Prologue

  August 11th 2104: 1752 EST

  Aria struggled across the floor. Push with her good leg, pull with her good arm. She slithered, dragged, and whimpered her way toward the bookshelves. That was where Garret had fallen, and if she was right, where he still lay. She didn’t know what was happening outside, didn’t know who had shown up, whether they would be able to help or not, but that wasn’t her immediate concern. She had to find out how badly Garret was wounded.

  At least one of them had to make it out of this alive. Teigan would fall apart if they both died.

  Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die.

  Chanting the mantra like a prayer, she made her way through a minefield of tossed pillows, overturned end tables, scattered porcelain, and chipped safety glass. More cuts, more bruises; didn’t matter. Agony already burned her alive from the inside out.

  Don’t have much time left. The broken bones wouldn’t kill her, but internal bleeding would. After shooting Garret, Bryon had turned back to her. His iron fists smashing into her until she was sure the next hit would kill her. Then he’d stopped; just walked away. Why?

  Please let it be help, please…

  She bumped against a chair that had been shoved out of position and stopped to get her bearings. “Garret?” she asked tentatively.

  No answer.

  “Damn it
!” She rolled to get around the obstacle. Fire lanced from her side across her chest and a searing wall of pain blocked all sensation below her knee. She bit down on the moan. Too much. Too much. Too much…

  “No!” She locked onto the denial, drawing up the image she’d formed of Teigan in her mind. God, Teigan. She would never be with Teigan again. Would never hear his voice. Would never feel his touch…

  But I can give him this. I can save Garret.

  She pressed on. Her world narrowed to the tips of her fingers, each milestone measured in the texture of the oriental flowers on the area rug, the individual grooves spacing the hardwood planks of the floor. It seemed an eternity later that her fumbling fingers found the bottom of Garret’s booted foot.

  “Garret?” She grasped on, shaking his ankle. Dead weight.

  With a choked sob, she pulled her way up his limp body lying slumped against the shelves. Mud crusted fatigues, empty utility belt—her palms squished into his sopping wet shirt—blood. No, no, no. Frantically, her hand raced over his chest, tracking the thick liquid, following the increase in heat until she found the source of sticky blood oozing from a hole in his upper chest, right side. “No, no, no…”

  He still breathed, though it sounded like he was blowing bubbles with his own blood, and there was a heartbeat, but it was weak and thready.

  What to use, what to use?

  Screaming in agony, she yanked her T-shirt off past her cracked ribs, over her head, down her smashed elbow. Taking a handful of shallow breaths to recover, she climbed back over him and pressed the fabric against the wound with her good hand. “Hold on, Garret. Help’s on the way.”

  Inside she still screamed, Don’t die. Don’t die. Don’t die.

  She didn’t know how long she lay on him, using her bodyweight to put pressure on the wound. From outside, sounds began to drift in and out of her consciousness. The heavy crack of the antiquated revolver, a helicopter, circling, a sharp bark. Frodo?

  So cold…

  The commotion drew closer. A man shouted something. Through the shattered door, scents drifted in.