The Slayer

by Brenda Huber

  “You do not leave this building without me,” he commanded imperiously. Direfully.

  She offered him a loaded smile. “I was hoping you’d say that.”

  Stolas brushed ash from his chair, calmly took a seat, and waved a hand toward the chair at the other end of his table. Agares, hands clasped behind his back, his expression wary, nodded and crossed the hall. He flipped his long, red dreadlocks over his shoulder and sat.

  “To what do I owe the pleasure of your unexpected invitation?” Agares nodded to the Charocté hovering nearby, granting the servant permission to fill his goblet. As soon as the servant was finished, he bowed, backed away, and then vanished.

  Instead of addressing Agares, Stolas turned his deadened stare to Dimiezlo. “You are excused.”

  Head bowed, the minion thwapped his fists to his shoulders and he, too, disappeared.

  One of Agares’s finely arched brows rose. “Doesn’t he belong to Ronové?”

  Pointedly ignoring the question, drumming his claws upon the table, Stolas leaned back to survey his guest. Agares displayed a good bit of discretion, staring blandly back, showing none of the burning questions that must be bouncing around inside his head.

  “As to your earlier question, you are a duke. Nobility. A distant cousin, if you will. Why should I not invite you into my hall?”

  “You have not done so in all these millennia. What has changed?”

  He stared long and hard at the demon before him. He’d followed Agares’s work from afar, kept tabs on him as he did with many others. Gauging his loyalty to Lucifer, and his discontent. Noted his successes. Analyzed his failures, and those were few and far between.

  Stolas spun a slim metallic device on the table before him. Attached to the contraption were long cords that ended in little spongy bumps. Bumps that, when the metallic device was activated, emitted the most interesting sounds. This—and others just like it—numbered among his favorite offerings. Unfortunately, iPod, he’d sadly discovered, only worked for a certain length of time. And then it would simply stop making the sounds. Music, he belatedly remembered it was called. It would stop creating the music. So far, he’d not been able to figure out why they’d stopped working. He’d torn one apart once, but the inner workings baffled him, one tiny component looking too much like all the rest. He’d been forced to rely on luck that one of his minions would stumble upon another iPod and bring it back to him.

  His attention lingered on the small pile on the table on the dais. So far his luck was holding. Soon, he hoped, he’d be able to obtain iPod for himself some day, rather than being forced to rely on his minions for the luxury.

  “What is that thing? I’d heard rumors you amuse yourself with earthen objects.” Agares’s expression finished the rest of his thoughts for him. Clearly, he hadn’t believed the rumor. Clearly, he could not fathom the attraction, found it distasteful.

  “I did not—” He’d been about to say summon, until he recalled with whom he spoke. This was no lowly servant, not some uncivilized mercenary. Agares was nobility. Nearly—but not quite—his equal, and so he politely amended. “Request your presence to discuss my collection.”

  “Why then?”

  “I, too, have heard rumors, Agares.”

  Agares tensed in his seat.

  “Rumors of unrest.” He watched Agares shift in his seat, savored the other demon’s discomfort. Fed off his poorly concealed panic. “Rumors of rebellion.”

  “Your grandfather—”

  “Is not privy to my sources.” He paused for a long, meaningful moment. “Or my information.”

  Agares frowned.

  Good. Keep him guessing.

  “What if I told you there were others interested in a new regime?” He tested the waters, deliberately stirring the pot.

  “Lucifer is invincible. His reign unchallenged since the Great Battle.”

  “What if I told you Lucifer can, in fact, be defeated?”

  “You speak of sedition.” Interest had definitely sparked to life in Agares’s eyes, but he accused, “Is this some kind of trick? Some trap set up by the Dark Prince to ferret out dissidence?”

  “You will not find Scathé lurking in my hall,” he snapped, referring to Lucifer’s personal guard. “I speak of the Prophesy.”

  “Myth,” his guest jeered, leaning back in his seat. And yet he remained alert. Watchful.

  “Fact,” he countered, pleased when Agares’s nostrils flared and the muscle along his jaw began to tick.

  “There is no proof to those old rumors—”

  “The Guardian of the scrolls has been located.” He leaned back in his seat, steepling his fingers before him. “Whomsoever controls the relics will defeat the Dark Prince.”

  “Located.” Agares settled more comfortably in his chair, crossing his arms. “But not recovered.”

  “Simply a matter of time.”

  Agares scoffed, toying with the stem of his chalice.

  And then he dropped the bomb. “The Sword of Kathnesh is already in my possession.”

  Agares’s gaze shot to Stolas’s face, his expression cold, calculating. His head tilted to the side. “Tell me of these relics.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Ducking her head to hide her smile, Kyanna tossed the plastic sack into the trunk of the Taurus beside the four cases of Pepsi Xander had insisted on buying. She really hadn’t needed to make quite so many stops. But the look on Xander’s face throughout the afternoon at each new person she’d introduced him to, had been too comical to forgo. Though, admittedly, this last stop at Walmart may have pushed him a bit too far. By the time they’d hit the checkouts, there was no doubt he was more than a little overwhelmed. Perspiration had beaded his forehead, and his darting gaze had gone glassy. Even leaving his supposed “relic” behind, unprotected by anything other than her paltry angelic enchantments, hadn’t elicited this level of anxiety.

  He stood beside her now, stalwart and alert, as she unloaded the shopping cart. As if every vehicle in the parking lot that roared to life intended to mow her down. As if every customer that poured from the store’s sliding glass doors might be a demon in disguise, come to slaughter her and steal away his precious relic if he should have even one moment of inattentiveness.

  She’d been so sure that Gina Taylor’s six-year-old twins would have chipped away at a little of the ice around Xander’s emotions. Gina was the local librarian, and while she swore those two little boys could drive a preacher to take up drinking, Kyanna had always had a soft spot for them. She could never resist dropping down to sit “pretzel-legged”—as they called it—on the floor to read with them.

  Today’s reading selection had been If You Give A Pig A Pancake, with Matt nestled in her lap and Mark taking up post hanging from one of her arms. Xander had stood near the window, angled slightly toward her, his legs braced apart, his arms crossed over his chest. She’d caught him watching her and the boys. He’d turned away quickly, but not before she’d seen the way the muscle in his jaw had clenched, or the way his eyes had flickered red for a moment.

  Even old Mr. Dobbs at the gas station, with his loose dentures and his knobby cane, couldn’t coax a full out smile from Xander. He’d garnered nothing more than that flattened lip. And that man knew more dirty jokes than Ron White, Larry the Cable Guy and Jeff Foxworthy rolled into one.

  “Have you finished yet?” had become Xander’s repetitive refrain.

  As if on cue, he heaved a gut deep sigh. “Are you finished yet?”

  His plaintive question as he glared around the parking lot sounded so put-upon, so tortured, that she very nearly conceded defeat. And that was what it would have been. Defeat, pure and simple. Not once had he shaken a single hand. Not once had he cracked a real smile. Getting him to talk to anyone had been all but impossible. At best, he’d uttered monosyllabic responses, at worst, he’d grunted his
answers. He flat out refused to hold a baby. And when eighty-three-year-old Kitty Davis needed help crossing the street and Kyanna had offered the use of Xander’s arm?

  Well, if looks could actually kill, she’d be pushing up daisies right about now.

  She was forced to stifle a chuckle as she remembered the way Xander had assisted the elderly woman. He was going to have to keep working on that Boy Scout badge. He’d hoisted the old lady up by her armpits, careful to hold her well away from his body. Then he’d stomped across the street and plopped her down on the sidewalk. As soon as her orthopedic soles hit pavement, he spun about and stalked back to Kyanna’s side without so much as a by-your-leave, glaring every step of the way.

  “One more stop to go.” After slamming the trunk closed, she pushed the shopping cart into the corral beside her car.

  He didn’t groan aloud, and his bland expression never faltered. She had to give him points for that. But then she did a double take. Had his left eyelid just twitched?

  No, it couldn’t be.

  Wait, there it is again.

  She’d given him a nervous tick. Smothering a nearly uncontrollable jolt of laughter, she motioned for him to get into the car. The twitch in his eyelid seemed to grow stronger. There was something else she had to fight laughing over. His aversion to motor vehicles. He was an immortal. A demon. Fearless and dangerous. And yet he treated her car like a deathtrap. Granted, it wasn’t exactly showroom floor new. But it wasn’t the instrument of torture he was acting like.

  Taking the seat behind the wheel, she glanced over at him. His seatbelt was cinched so tight it had to be cutting off circulation to portions of his body that she had no business contemplating in the first place. He’d braced one hand on the dash, while the other white-knuckled the seat. He bowed his head, and his lips were silently moving.

  Praying again. She stifled a disgusted snort.

  Really?

  Un-freakin’-believable. What a baby!

  She might have taken offense about her driving abilities if he hadn’t ground out a terse, “Demons do not travel this way, Kyanna. This just isn’t natural,” when she’d asked him earlier what his problem was.

  “How do you travel then?”

  He’d simply given her one of his enigmatic stares and remained silent.

  Kyanna clicked her own seatbelt into place. Checking her mirrors, she started the car and eased them from the parking stall. Taking pity on him, she laid her hand on his and gently squeezed. He flipped his hand over and caught hers, locking his fingers around her hand like a lifeline. He’d caught her so by surprise, she nearly ran the stop sign. She twisted her hand a bit until she could lace her fingers more comfortably between his. His hand immediately engulfed hers. And he didn’t let go. Not until they pulled up in front of the Pizza Parlor.

  “We’re here.” Awkwardly turning off the engine with her left hand, she glanced over at him.

  Xander stared at the building in front of them as if shocked they’d made it there in one piece.

  “You have to let go of me now,” she prompted with a small smile. “But you can hold my hand again once we’re out of the car, if you like.”

  “It is no longer necessary. The automobile had come to a halt.”

  She blinked, frowning. Had he just insulted her driving after all?

  “Why would holding my hand be necessary?”

  “If your body had become placed in the way of imminent physical harm, I would have shimmered you from the vehicle.”

  “Shimmered?”

  He stared at her again, silent. She sat back and crossed her arms, determined not to move an inch until he finally answered at least one stinking question.

  Popping his jaw, he glared out the window. Lord, he acted as if he were revealing some devastating national secret. “A demon’s primary form of travel is shimmering. We focus on a destination—it must be someplace we can either see clearly or have already been—and, using the dark powers within, we can literally will ourselves there.”

  “Why must it be someplace you’ve already been, or someplace you can clearly see?”

  “Would you want to miscalculate and solidify halfway through a wall? Inside a mountain rather than atop it? Two feet beyond the edge of a cliff?”

  Good point.

  But really, did he have to make his lack of faith in her driving so obvious? And here she’d been willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  Without another word—or one of the grunts she was fast becoming familiar with—he climbed from the car. It was almost surprising he didn’t turn around and kick the door, for as much loathing as he’d expressed in his own way for the thing. The sidewalk they traversed was lined with small flowering shrubs, each bud a deep purple. Huge windows gleamed in the setting sun. The front of the restaurant was stucco, and designed like an Italian villa. A marble cherub pouring water from a bucket in the middle of a rock bed was the centerpiece of the small eating area to the side of the flat-roofed building. Wrought iron bistro sets peppered the mosaic-tiled patio at the side of the building. Nearly every seat was filled.

  As Xander opened the door for her, a cacophony of sound flooded over them. Dozens of voices all talking at once, and music playing softly in the background. Something classical and elegant. A symphony of smells hung heavy in the air—garlic and rich tomato sauces and yeasty breads—making her stomach clutch and growl in anticipation.

  “Hi, Gerald,” Kyanna greeted the tall, thin man behind the counter.

  “There ye be, lassie.” His heavy Irish brogue was thick tonight, as was often the case when the restaurant was hopping busy. “The missus and I’d begun to worry over the likes o’ you. Young Murphy’s been asking after you.”

  Xander took one look around the crowded, noisy, pizza joint, and began backing from the restaurant. She grabbed hold of his arm before he could clear the doorway. His muscles were like tempered steel beneath her fingertips. His entire body tense.

  “Sorry,” she told Gerald as she tugged him closer to the counter. “We had a few extra stops to make this afternoon.”

  “You’re here now, then. You go on back and I’ll have Murphy bake up the usual.”

  “Better make it a jumbo this time. And toss in an order of breadsticks and two large Pepsi’s.”

  “You got it.” He winked, then turned to the long serving window. “Hey, Murphy. Kyanna’s here. And she brings with her a date.”

  Several heads popped up from the surrounding booths. Necks craned to see the man Kyanna had replaced Jack with. Heat rushed to her cheeks, but she brazened it out, smiling as she passed familiar faces as well as a few she didn’t recognize. At the back of the restaurant, Kyanna slipped into a darkened booth, one that was shielded for the most part from prying eyes. Xander folded himself into the opposite seat. Setting her purse down on the seat beside her, she pushed the laminated advertiser toward the back of the table.

  “So, what do you think of Isle?”

  Xander grunted, noncommittal, as he warily scanned the crowd.

  “Will you relax and just let yourself have a little fun for a change?”

  “To what end?”

  “How about fun for the sake of fun?”

  Heaving a sigh, determined not to let him ruin her Saturday night tradition, she leaned back when the waitress, a local high schooler, came over to place their drinks and the breadsticks on the table. He sniffed the glass suspiciously as the waitress sashayed away. Took a tentative sip. The miniscule lines around his eyes eased a bit as he gulped down the soda. Funny. She’d done everything she could think of to show him the world he’d worked so hard to save. Exerted every bit of hospitality she’d ever been taught. And had he relaxed? No. Had he loosened up even the slightest?

  Not one iota.

  Put a Pepsi in front of the guy and watch him become a Dr. Scholl’s Gellin’ commercial.
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br />   Well, almost.

  Snorting with self-deprecation, she pulled her own glass to her and sipped. When the pizza arrived, Murphy himself was carrying it. Tall, slim and Irish to the tips of his toes, he was the spitting image of his father. Only with more hair and less paunch.

  “So who’s the bounder that’s beat me out of a night of fine conversation with the fair Kyanna?” Murphy braced his forearm on the back of Kyanna’s booth, crossed his ankles.

  His grin was good-natured. His tone joking. But he was unmistakably curious, and more than a bit protective. Next to Summer, Murphy was the only true friend she had. Actually, he’d been like a big brother to her since her first week in town when her old Lumina had finally given up the good fight three miles from town. He’d been passing by, given her a lift to town, and put her in touch with a friend of a friend who happened to be selling a reliable Taurus.

  “Murphy, this is my…ah, friend, Xander. Xander, this handsome young devil is Murphy O’Shea.” Smiling up at the young man beside her, she offered a fair mimic of his lilting brogue. “’Tis Murphy’s fine dream to one day be takin’ o’r the family business. Teach these poor Italians the proper way to be makin’ a pizza pie.”

  Murphy chuckled. Xander stared at her, a blank slate. She seriously considered kicking him beneath the table just to see if he’d react.

  “How’s the car, wee Kyanna?”

  “Still running like a top. How’s the wife?”

  “Still running me ragged.” His eyes twinkled. Kyanna knew for a fact that he loved every moment of it.

  “So where be ye from, Xander?”

  Xander’s cold gaze lifted to Murphy. “Hell.”

  “Hel—ena,” Kyanna rushed to speak over him, shooting him a warning look. “Xander’s from Helena.”

  Murphy gave her a puzzled frown before turning back to Xander. “And what is it that you do in Helena?”

  “I kill things,” Xander replied solemnly.

  “Ah, he’s, ah, an exterminator,” Kyanna inserted, giving in to the urge to kick him under the table after all.