Finally, I heard him mutter, “Fuck it.”
I smiled to the wall as I heard the jingle of keys and then the bars slide open.
I sat up. “I’m glad you changed your mind.” I didn’t have to pretend to look eager as I pushed off the cot and approached him.
“Lana,” Brad said, “Asher can’t know about this. Please don’t make me regret—”
My hand snapped out, my palm shoving up against his nose with all the force I could manage. He cursed and stumbled back as something crunched. I almost sighed as his blood began to flow. I converted it while it was still on his face. Wispy, iridescent flames burned it up. I took my first deep breath in a long time when I felt the magic hit my bloodstream. I made use of it immediately.
My body thickened and lengthened, my clothes stretching with it, until I was the largest, scariest Infernarus I’d ever come across.
Brad took one look at me, and, “Aw, fu—”
My fist slammed into his temple before he could finish. Brad’s eyes rolled up into his head and then his body collapsed on itself. Blood still poured from his nose, enough that I didn’t have to give him a fresh wound to cull the amount I needed.
Quickly I shrugged out of my clothes. Great Mother above and sprites below, it was fucking cold.
I turned to Brad.
He wouldn’t like it when he woke.
I stripped him of his boxers, studying his naked body. It was lovely, but that’s not why I was looking. I needed to make sure I got every detail right.
I stepped into his boxers as my magic pulsed through me, shortening my hair and contorting my body until I was a mirror image of the man sprawled at my feet. It took only several more seconds to pull the magic from what was left of his blood.
Then I was ready.
I muttered a quick prayer to the Great Mother on Brad’s behalf, then spared him one last glance. His nose was horribly crooked. As a parting gift, I knelt near his face and reset it.
Then I left the cell and headed to the other side of the building. Right where I knew Asher would be.
Asher
My eyelids sprang open. A hulking figure loomed over me, silhouetted against the near pitch black of the underground bedroom, lit only by the glowing LEDs on my laptop.
Wide awake, I lunged for the cord dangling from my desk lamp and flicked it on, kicking up a flurry of blankets.
My eyes adjusted to the glare, and I almost laughed out loud.
Wearing only boxers, Brad shielded his eyes from the light, one leg raised like he’d been about to climb onto my bed . . . onto me. He froze like a deer caught in headlights.
“Uh . . . what the hell, dude?” I raised an eyebrow.
“I, mmh . . . hello, Asher.” His voice sounded strained.
With both of us in only boxers, he had some explaining to do. “Leg off my bed, please.”
He seemed to finally realize, and he lowered his leg to the floor, shuffling awkwardly. Yeah, you better feel awkward.
My eyes narrowed. “You sleepwalking? What? What is this? What do you want?”
He stared down at his empty palms. “I, well . . . I wanted to . . . check on you and see how you were doing?” His gaze lifted to my torso, and then—very conspicuously—traveled down my abs and paused on my tight boxer briefs. He bit his lower lip.
Okay, I did not just see that.
His eyes snapped back to mine, and I could have sworn I saw him blush. “You seem to be doing just fine,” he said, his voice oddly stilted. “I’ll just go . . . you go back to sleep . . . please.”
“What do you want, Brad? You coming out of the closet? What is this?”
“I didn’t come out of the closet,” he said, putting his hands on his hips. “I came in through the door . . . obviously.”
I sat up and woke my smartphone, rubbing my eyes to focus. “The hell’s wrong with you? Are you high?”
1:09 a.m.
In my periphery, he edged closer. Ah, he was up making his rounds. “So you checked on the demon?”
“It’s Infernar—” Brad clamped his mouth shut.
I peered sideways at him, my eyebrow notching up even higher.
“Demon,” he agreed, nodding too enthusiastically. “Yep, she’s definitely a demon . . . a terrible, wretched demon.” He avoided my gaze.
Now I started worrying. “Is this about her? She hex you?”
“She doesn’t hex people,” he said hotly. “She’s a healer, and she’s completely innocent, and she’s actually a really caring, loyal creature, and you should go back to sleep . . . you monster.” Seeing my disbelieving look, he quickly added, “She didn’t hex me. You’re not a monster.”
“Then snap the fuck out of it.” I seized my water cup and chucked it at him, dousing him in liquid.
He flinched and covered his torso, breaking into a fit of shivering. Glaring at me, he resembled a dripping wet cat. Not my tough-as-nails best friend.
Something was wrong with him.
All down the back of my neck, the hairs were standing on end.
I leapt to my feet, my heart thudding at the base of my throat. “Talk to me, Bradley. What’d she do to you?” I swiped a flashlight off the desk and aimed it in his eyes.
For an instant, they flashed red . . . before he shrank back like a cornered animal.
It could have been a trick of the light.
“Shh, go back to sleep, Jame Asher.” He backed toward the door, gaze shifting from side to side. “I’m just going to go.”
“Don’t you move a fucking inch,” I barked, shoving past him. The cage holding Lana came into view at the end of the corridor. “Whatever she did to you, she’s going to pay—”
The words died in my throat.
Inside the cell lay Brad’s naked, unconscious body, next to her discarded jumpsuit . . . shed like a snake skin.
No Lana.
“Shit,” I muttered.
I felt the creature’s hot breath on the back of my neck. Before I could turn around, something heavy and blunt slammed into my head.
Searing pain shot through my skull, then blackness.
Chapter 7
Lana
Asher’s body dropped to the ground with a dull thunk. I stood there for several seconds, shifting my weight.
Now was when I killed him.
A sick feeling curdled my stomach at the thought.
Daggers. I needed my daggers. Forged from steel mined from the deepest of our caverns and crafted by a weapons master specifically for my grip, the knives were my weapon of choice. I scoured Asher’s room, pushing aside the scattered papers he had lying about.
I didn’t see them anywhere.
I did, however, find a gun. I turned the human weapon over and over in my hands, then looked uncertainly at Asher. Already, I could see him starting to stir.
The gun felt foreign in my hand. Heavy. Dirty. Wrong.
Do it.
I hesitated. I didn’t even know how to use the weapon I held.
Asher groaned.
Do it now. Before he wakes.
He spared my life once.
It was the honorable thing, to reciprocate.
Stop lying to yourself. This has nothing to do with honor and everything to do with your weak, weak heart.
Still holding the gun, I rubbed my forehead.
It was rare for an Infernarus to be reluctant to kill. Rare but not unheard of, and when it came to the art of death, I always choked. It made me weak. It had also saved my life.
So many others like me had been put to the blade. I’d been spared.
Spare the weak, kill the strong.
I lowered myself until I straddled Asher’s back. I threaded my fingers through his hair. Everything about this
was intimate. And Asher couldn’t fight back. There was no honor in that. It wouldn’t be a victory in the heat of battle, it would be a cold-blooded execution.
I pressed the barrel of the gun against his temple and breathed in and out of my nose.
Pull the trigger, I ordered myself. He’s not an Infernarus. He wants you and all others like you dead.
Still, I hesitated.
He hadn’t yet killed me. This man I was about to execute, someone somewhere at some point in time cared for him. Even the coldhearted humans loved.
I hung my head.
Gods above, I couldn’t.
I wanted to scream. I was weak, weak and cowardly.
I pulled my arm back and slammed the butt of the gun against his temple. Then I threw the weapon far away.
He wouldn’t know how close he came to death.
I grimaced and released Asher’s head. It banged against the floor. I stood, still in Brad’s skin and his boxers.
Another will kill him.
I backed away from Asher. And then I ran.
Brad’s body was heavy.
I discovered this as I sprinted away from the house Asher kept me in, my bare feet digging into the wet grass. Most men’s bodies were. All that upper body strength bore down on his legs as I ran. Still, the guy was fast. Faster than me, and that was saying something.
I could feel the night in my bones. The cold wind bit against my skin and threaded through my short hair.
Night was not kind here.
But it didn’t bother me nearly as much as it should have. A heady mixture of excitement and fear coursed through my veins. I wasn’t yet free, thanks to the fact that I didn’t kill the one man I needed to, and there were so many steps I had to take to get home, now that one of the two gateways I knew of had been destroyed. The other was located a continent away. That meant folding myself into more human machines. Ones that flew.
My stomach dropped.
Coward. Coward. Coward.
My feet hit the pavement, and I pushed this body harder, faster.
I heard the roar of an engine in the distance.
No.
I showed Asher mercy. Surely he realized that.
My stride became frantic, jerky.
I hadn’t yet seen another house, but if I followed this road for long enough, surely I would. And when I did, I could break in just like I broke out of Asher’s. Inside there would be phones. I’d painstakingly memorized the numbers of several Infernari who spent much of their time topside. I could place a few calls. Expedite my return. Or at least leave them some information about where I was, who I was with, and the threat looming over all of our heads.
Jame Asher.
He wasn’t just hunting Infernari. He was also destroying portals.
That was very, very bad. It took dozens of generations of portal masters to construct a single one, and then they had to be maintained. If we lost our gateways, we might never get them back.
All the more reason why Asher needed to die, why I felt so wretched for being unable to do this simple thing.
I heard the engine accelerate in the distance. It was coming for me.
I pushed my legs faster.
These humans loved their buildings, and yet I saw none. Naturally I was cursed to be held hostage with the one human who lived away from his people.
And now that infernal metal beast he drove was quickly gaining on me. I could hear it as the tires squealed and the engine roared. Abominable thing.
Far ahead I finally caught a glimpse of a house. There was no chance I’d make there before Asher caught up to me.
I threw a glance over my shoulder.
A mistake.
Asher’s vehicle was eating up distance at a frightening rate.
Jerking my head forward, I laid on the speed and sprinted with everything I had.
I still never made it.
Roaring, the vehicle swerved around me and squealed to a stop.
I didn’t slow. Rounding the car, I continued forward, my legs pumping. Sweat dripped down my brow from the exertion. I was no longer cold. Quite the opposite. I had one goal, and that was to reach the dimly lit house I made out in the distance.
Behind me, the car door opened, then slammed shut. I heard those heavy footfalls at my back.
Asher’s body would be even denser than Brad’s. All that muscle packed on his upper body should slow him down. And yet, the bastard was gaining on me. Fast.
I began to zigzag when I heard his heavy breathing no more than a few arm lengths behind me. Even this was futile.
He barreled into me, his arms wrapping around my torso, tackling me to the ground. I hit the road hard, my breath wheezing out as Asher fell on top of my body. I jerked my head back, cracking it into his skull.
“Fuck!” he roared, “Stop hitting me in the goddamn head!”
His hold didn’t loosen like I’d hoped it would. If anything, he tightened his grip.
I rolled us, trying to knock him off my back. He released one of his arms and clamped it around my neck. I wheezed, the strangled sound coming out of Brad’s voicebox.
He pulled me in close. “Thought you’d cut and run?” he whispered in my ear, and I felt the odd intimacy that comes with violence.
I jabbed my elbow up between our bodies, slamming it into his diaphragm. Asher’s breath left him in a whoosh. I flipped over him and drove my fist right into his temple. He grunted and gritted his teeth.
Perhaps I’d get another chance to kill him. I’d be able to live with his death if it was in self-defense.
But just as soon as I began laying into him, he flipped us once more, his legs straddling my hips. Asher’s fist slammed into my face, and it felt like an anvil. My vision instantly darkened, and my hold on Brad’s form dissolved. I tasted blood in my mouth, followed by the smoky taste of magic as it burned away.
“Doesn’t feel very fucking good, now does it?” he said.
My shoulders shrank, my waist narrowed, and my hips widened.
Suddenly I wasn’t a mostly naked Brad pinned under Asher, but a topless Lana.
The hunter hadn’t been prepared for that. Nor, for that matter, had I. There were two of us and a whole lot of skin, considering that Asher was still in just his boxer briefs. I felt my cheeks flush, pressed together as we were.
Asher reared back, getting an eyeful.
I growled and thrust my palm up against the cartilage of his nose. He cursed, reflexively releasing me.
I scrambled away from him, my skin scraping against the rocky pavement. Behind me I could hear him recovering.
A hand wrapped around my ankle. “Not so fast, demon.” I pulled my other foot back and kicked at his face. It glanced off of his cheekbone.
Ignoring my efforts, he began dragging me backwards. I clawed at the road, grappling for purchase. I felt one fingernail rip away. Then another. I suppressed my magic even as I cried out. No use healing something that would just reinjure.
“You should’ve killed me when you had the chance,” Asher gritted out.
He dragged me like that all the way back to his vehicle, scratching up the delicate skin of my stomach and chest. More fingernails ripped away. Still I fought him.
Utterly useless. He was at least two heads taller than me and twice my weight.
When we reached his vehicle, Asher pulled me roughly to my feet, and opened the car’s back doors. Once I saw where he intended to put me, I struggled anew.
I couldn’t go back into that cage. There weren’t even windows to look out of.
“Asher, please—”
He tossed me into the back of the car and slammed the doors in my face.
I cried out, less from the physical pain than from the distress
of being back in this cage. I could smell my earlier sickness, and it made my nausea rise.
For once I wished I could be hardened like the warrior class of Infernari. Or cold and crafty, like a human. If either were the case, Asher would be dead and I’d be on my way back home.
But I was somehow the worst of both worlds. My spirit too soft. My intentions too transparent.
And I was back in the monster’s clutches.
When Asher swung open the doors, I huddled in the corner of the cage, my knees pulled up against my breasts.
He folded his arms over his bare chest, and his dark eyes assessed me for several seconds. I glared back at him.
A muscle in Asher’s jaw ticked when he caught sight of my bloodied fingers.
“Why haven’t you healed yourself?” he demanded. I swore I caught the barest hint of concern in his voice.
“What do you care?” I continued to glare at him.
Finally, he broke the staring contest and reached in, wrapping a hand around my wrist.
“Don’t touch me!” I said, trying to jerk my wrist out of his grasp.
He ignored my protests and dragged me out, forcing my hands behind my back.
“I spared your life,” I cried.
“Your point?” he said, pushing me through his house.
I bit back a retort. Of course a human wouldn’t get it. Especially not the one at my back. Asher guided me back down into the subterranean floor of his house, and I was helpless to do anything but let him lead me on.
Brad glared at me from one of the couches. A moment later, he seemed to realize I was topless, his face transforming from annoyance to surprise. My lips thinned. He, I noticed, had found some clothes.
I passed Brad, and then I was led back into the cell. Back to the metal toilet and the rickety bed. Back to being trapped in a cage below the earth, deep in the enemy’s den.
Asher released my wrists. I swiveled around just as he stepped out of the cell and slammed the door shut.
Gods above, I was living a nightmare.
Blood and Sin (The Infernari Book 1) Page 8