First And Last

by Stacey Kennedy

  “You are,” Azar answered. “Lady Nexi and Lord Kyden, may I present to you your Guard.” He waved out to Tyde and Quinney.

  They bowed.

  “Oh for Christ sake’s, how many times do I have to say it,” I snapped. “Stop doing that. And by the way,” I looked to both Tyde and Quinney, and included Misa in the glare. “No one needs to protect me. Got it?”

  Each of them exchanged a confused glance, then looked back to me. “You don’t want us to protect you?” Tyde asked, his tone incredulous.

  “You heard it right! If I’m out on assignment, none of you better show up and kill for me. I’ll be so entirely pissed.” I gave my foot a stomp to show just how much I meant it. “And you do not want to see me angry.”

  They all bowed respectfully, even though I had just told them to stop their ridiculous behavior. When was anyone going to listen to me?

  Little flickers of pride and love drifted over me. I glanced back at the source. “Well said.” Kyden smiled.

  Without hesitation, I flung myself at him. He caught me in his arms easily.

  “Take me to your bed, my Lord.”

  Chapter Six

  A couple of uneventful nights passed.

  I was glad that life seemed to be return to normal. Well, my kind of normal, that is.

  What made me even happier was the Council had agreed to send Kyden and I out on an assignment in New York City. “Who knew going to kill a guy would be such a breath of fresh air,” I said to Haven as we descended upon a home that was well away from the busy part of town. Middle class house in the rural part of New York City. The only thing that made it stand out at all was the large backyard. Simple home, but great land.

  Haven giggled. “This seems easy now, doesn’t it?”

  “I’d say.” Considering what I’d been up against these past couple weeks, this was actually quite refreshing, and it felt wonderful to be back in my element.

  Just as we approached the backyard, I could see a man with his back to us, bent down as he examined the ground. As we drew closer, he stood and turned toward us. “Nice to see ya again,” Detective Foley said.

  The Weretiger looked exactly as he did the last time I saw him, sometime before Lazarus. Lordy, that seemed like a thousand years ago. Foley’s everything a Weretiger should be—scary. Built to the hilt, with his shaved bald head and grayish blue eyes, he was definitely a force to be reckoned with.

  “Likewise,” I replied. He offered his hand. I took it and gave it a firm shake.

  After a few more niceties between us, Kyden glanced around, then back to Foley with a curious look. “There is nobody here?”

  “Very observant of you.” Foley guffawed.

  Kyden snorted something close to annoyance, but before he could put a voice to it, Foley continued. “We were contacted and told if we came to this scene we’d find that a murder happened here.”

  Just as Kyden stepped forward to examine the ground, a loud squish came from beneath his foot. “Bloody apples.” He shook his foot to get the sticky mess off, then nudged Haven’s arm. “Time’s a wasting, let’s see what happened here.”

  She raised her hands, and in seconds, the scene was before us thanks to her gift from the Earth Element. She can manipulate time to recreate past events. Cool, right?

  Once the scene was before us though, my pride about Haven completely vanished as I sighed in total exasperation. “Oh, just fucking wonderful.”

  A Demon, yeah I recognized one, was doing some kind of ritual. He drew a rune on the ground with black ash, and to my horror, used human blood as well. The rune was a simple pentagram, but on each point of the star was a tribal symbol, looked almost like music symbols, but just different and evil.

  The man who lay dead in the center had a deep cut in his stomach, and the demon kept dipping his hand into it, then slowly walked around the circle to let the blood drip into the ash.

  The worst part was that the human’s face was frozen in a state of deadly shock. Mouth wide open, eyes terrified—complete yuckiness! Like, never get the image out of your head, icky.

  After a final drop of blood landed on the ash, the Demon shimmied into a black ghostly nothing and they vanished into a black puff of smoke. All that remained was the pentagram.

  The vision froze and we all just stared at each other. I’d never seen anything like this, nor heard of it for that matter.

  “This is peculiar,” Kyden finally said.

  I laughed. “Peculiar? You’re kidding right?”

  “Right alarming, does that suit you better?”

  “Yes, much better,” I said aloud, which earned me an odd glance from Foley.

  “A demon.” Foley bent down and examined the pentagram on the ground, which still sat before us. “We were contacted by an anonymous source who told us of this incident. Nothing about demonic forces was mentioned. Leads me to wonder who would’ve known about this?”

  Yeah, I wondered that myself. I glanced down at the pentagram and noticed an image in the center that appeared to be just a fancy pitchfork, and looked tribal. My gaze snapped back to Foley. “Dark ones, that’s who.”

  “What do we do?” Haven asked. “I’ve never seen anything like this before. What the heck was that demon doing?” She pulled back her magic and the rune vanished before our eyes. Apparently, whoever had called it in, had taken the time to clear the ground of the ritual that had been started.

  “What do you think?” I asked Kyden. I was at a complete loss. My familiarity with demons was only what I’d seen so far. Runes and such were very much not in my knowledge base.

  Kyden sighed. “I’ve never seen anything like this. We need to discuss this with Misa. Of anyone, she should know what this is all about.”

  “Just what I want to do,” I sighed. “Take another trip down under.”

  * * * *

  The moment I stepped foot in the spectacular glass home, a horrible feeling in my gut formed. Misa’s home once belonged to Magnus. Being back here was a big fat reminder of him and quivers shot straight down my spine.

  “It’s all right, Álainn.” Kyden leaned down and kissed my lips softly.

  It settled the tremors, but I still didn’t like being in the house. It only solidified my need to get on with this.

  Three times, I had repeated the story of what we saw, and Misa was having a hard time processing it. She stood, mouth wide open. With an action that looked forced, she clamped it shut, but the bemused expression never left her face.

  We all stayed that way for a total of fifty breaths—I counted.

  “Soooo…” I finally said. “Are you going to say something?”

  Misa’s mouth slowly parted, then to my annoyance, she repeated, “You saw what?”

  “Please do not make me repeat it.” I rubbed my temples. For Christ sakes, did I really need to go over this again? The story had run dry and to me it didn’t seem all that bad anymore probably because I’d told it for the umpteenth time.

  Kyden chuckled.

  Misa gave her head a little shake, I suspected to clear her surprise. “Let me get this straight. A human was in the center of a pentagram. There was a tribal-looking design in the center with other symbols at each point. The demon used the human’s blood along the pentagram, then poof, the human and demon disappeared. Is that right?”

  I gave a tired nod. “To put it simply, yes.”

  She stood from the couch we sat on and began to pace. Her expression tight, her jaw even clenched a few times.

  Oh, this was so not good. Suddenly, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to know what all this was about. If a demon was worried, shit was about to go down. I mean really, what could a demon be worried about?

  “What does it mean?” Kyden demanded.

  Misa stopped pacing and glanced back to us. “I have no idea. I’ve never in my time heard of a human and demon who just poofed into nothing.”

  “You haven’t?” I gasped.

 
; She shook her head, very slow. “It’s not a normal occurrence. We drain life forces, not kill the human entirely. It’s not a normal thing for a demon to do a ritual. Warlocks, yes. Witches, yes. But demons don’t need to.” She spun on her heels and headed for the front door. “Let’s go to Quinney. She is older and may know what this is about.”

  Kyden and I quickly jumped up to follow her. I just wanted the hell out of this house. Returning here, with no good memories, was still too new. The moment we stepped out into the night, I inhaled deeply and sent all those memories back to the place I never go to. Hidden deep within.

  Kyden took my hand, smiled down to me and a blast of love coursed through me. Ah yes, happy memories, those were the ones to focus on.

  As we walked past the houses, it was still hard to accept that it resembled a gated community, but in a large pentagram. Demons glanced out their windows at us and bowed as we walked by. My body shivered. It still gave me the hebejebes at just how normal this all appeared.

  The homes however were fantastic. The American dream.

  Quinney’s home was no exception, with its white limestone walls, cast-iron gates, limestone arches, massive courtyard and sculptured fountains.

  Before we could even reach the door to knock, the door opened. “My Lady. My Lord.” Quinney bowed.

  “Hello, Quinney. It’s nice to see you again and you don’t need to do that.” Someday I’d get to stop the repeated instruction, but for now I let it go.

  She gave a kind smile and waved us through. “Please do come in.”

  Tonight her angled bob hair looked even redder and glossier. She’d either dyed it or opted for a brighter look. Whatever it was—it looked damn good. Not like I’d tell her, it was neither the time, nor appropriate, I thought.

  As we entered, Tyde stepped through a doorway just off to the right and gestured for us to enter.

  I followed Quinney into the sitting room. The room was elegantly designed with simple black microfiber fabric couches, red walls, and flowers in tall vases everywhere. The scents in the air were inviting and soothing, to say the least. Not really the décor to expect from a demon, but these weren’t just any demons. These were good demons. Insane, but true nonetheless.

  Quinney motioned us to the couches, and we sat. She and Tyde, however, stood in front of us. It was awkward. “You can take a seat you know.”

  “As you wish, Nexi.” Quinney and Tyde sat opposite us in the loveseat.

  Immediately, I took notice of the way they sat close together and angled their legs together. There was a closeness between them that couldn’t be missed. “Are you two a couple?” I asked them.

  Quinney smiled. “Yes, Nexi.”

  Okay that was just annoying. Now that I told her not to call me My Lady she was just replacing it with Nexi. It still felt ridiculous. “Well that’s nice. How long have you been together?” I wanted to get to know them a little. If we were going to be around them a lot, it only felt right to do so.

  “We have been together for well over…” Tyde hesitated. “Ummm…”

  Quinney laughed softly and smacked his leg. “Two thousand years.”

  “You’re fucking kidding?” I gasped.

  Kyden laughed.

  “We are quite old.” Tyde responded.

  We sat quiet for a moment. I think they allowed me time to process that. Truthfully, I couldn’t. That’s damn old. Too old. Resigned that the thought was going to continue to shock me, I move on. “So, the reason we are here is because a demon killed a human.”

  Quinney did a double take. “What was that you said?”

  I sighed deep and threw my hands up in frustration. “It’s like I’m a friggin’ broken record.”

  “It is an unusual situation.” Kyden rubbed his thumb over the back of my hand. “This is to be expected.”

  He was right and all, but criminy, this was entirely frustrating. I took in a deep breath, an attempt not to smack my head against the wall and gave them the information they needed to help us here. “Yes, you heard me right. A demon was doing some bizarre ritual. You know with black ash and blood thing, then poof, they both disappeared.”

  Quinney and Tyde exchanged a curious look. I didn’t miss the implication. “You’ve never heard of this either?”

  “Never,” Quinney replied. “You say a demon was doing the ritual? Like an offering?”

  “How in the hell should I know.” I shrugged.

  “It looked like that,” Kyden offered.

  “Hmmm,” Tyde pondered. “Best we look to the Diabolus Somes for an answer.”

  “The what of the what?” I burst out.

  Amusement flickered through me. Obviously, Kyden was getting a rise out of my stupidity. I shot him the look at that one. The amusement grew.

  “It’s our history,” Quinney explained. “After you destroyed Magnus, Misa brought it here. Our status of superiors in the Underworld leaves us the best choice to watch over it—to keep it safe. It could be detrimental to the worlds if someone who wanted power obtained it.”

  Well, what in the hell were we waiting for? “All right, well go get the damn thing.”

  Tyde was off in a jiffy, back seconds later with a book that definitely looked like it dated back to the beginning of time.

  “Good lord, what is that thing made of.” I leaned forward to examine the thick book.

  Tyde handed it to Quinney and she ran her hand over the cover. “The cover is ultrathin sheepskin, but the inside is plain old paper.”

  She opened the book, and paper wasn’t quite the appropriate word. Maybe once it was paper. Now, it looked like newspaper—all crumply and worn.

  I glanced at the writing, annoyed to say the least when I couldn’t read a word of it. “What language is that?” It looked like scribble.

  “Latin,” Kyden answered.

  My gaze fell to his. I’d actually wondered this long ago, but with all the other shit going on, it just never came up. “Speaking of that, why do you know how to speak Latin?”

  “Immortals are old, Álainn. Latin was once the language spoken. Many vampires still to this day use it. You have heard them, have you not?”

  I thought back. The memory of the vampires that wanted to off me for killing Lazarus was a memory I chose to lock away in the vault. But they did use a language that night that I hadn’t recognized. “The Vampires at the lodge.”

  Kyden nodded. “You see why it would be important.”

  “I guess I do, but why haven’t I learned it?”

  Laughter came around.

  My irritation hit the roof. A bunch of demons, laugh at me? Oh, hell no! “What’s so damn funny?”

  “Nexi,” Tyde amused. “Do you honestly think if a vampire saw you he would care to even use words against you?”

  Misa snickered. “He’d probably just book it.”

  I waved away the compliment. I didn’t like being put in the spotlight, so I quickly moved along. “So, read it. What does it say?”

  “A thousand years ago, we took the original Diabolus Somes that was in the Kurdish language and transcribed it into Latin,” Tyde said with a little shrug. “It was easier to read.”

  Kurdish, Latin, it was all gibberish to me. Translating it into English would have been the best choice. Of course, why would anything be easy, it never was. My curiosity always did get the better of me. “Where is the other copy then?”

  “The humans have it,” Tyde answered. When he saw I needed more than that, he answered my next question. “Since we had this copy, there was never a need to get it back. Besides, they have it bunkered down. It won’t fall into the wrong hands.”

  My gaze fell upon Quinney as she began to read. “Darkness is glory—the truth lies before you.” She looked away from the book to meet my gaze. “Quote from Beelzebub.”

  “Lovely,” I exhaled.

  She gave a soft nod in agreement, then read some more. “I exist in all and subsist in the hidden.
” Our gazes met again. “Quote from Satan.”

  I exhaled deeply. “Even better.” Spookiness was all around, and my body reciprocated as such and shivers of fear ran through me.

  Kyden wrapped an arm around me and pulled me close. “There is nothing to fear here. They cannot hurt you. The ones she speaks of are gone.”

  “I know, it’s just spooky.”

  Quinney flipped through the book a while, and stopped as she ran a finger down the page. “Ahh…here it is. The rituals.” She glanced back up to Kyden and I. “Do you remember what the rune that was drawn looked like?”