"Thank you," she said, unfolding her legs and standing up. "I'm looking forward to working with you."
"Likewise," he told her warmly. "I'll see you Monday, then."
She picked her way back across the courtyard, along the paths that wound among the herbs and a few early-growing vegetables. She knew, just by looking, who'd planted them, and the thought cheered her that she was going to get to spend so much time with the Elf. His presence was soothing, his kindness a welcome relief after so much that was clinical and ruthlessly efficient.
She could still sense a lot of sorrow beneath that kindness, and some instinct--maybe her empathy, actually--made her wish she could do something about it. Regardless…Sara definitely knew whose file she was reading next time she had an hour to herself.
The question still remained, as she returned to her quarters: was she really going to do this? SA-7 had been right to doubt her when it came to the violence of the job. So many of the case files she'd read had been aftermaths--the Agency had responded to an emergency after the deed was already done and the child sacrifice or explosion or whatever had already occurred. Did they ever actually save anyone, or prevent any crimes, or was it all cleanup? What would she have to offer such a group?
Pensive, she passed by her door and went to the staff lounge to sit and think for a while. There was hardly anyone there, but as always there was coffee and baked goods, so she scored a muffin and sat down, wishing Rowan were here this time too. He could tell her a lot more about what she was getting into, and if it was what she really wanted.
Her whole life she'd sort of drifted from one thing to another, going where the wind blew her, but now she had a chance to really make a choice. Granted it was a weird choice, one that could permanently sever her life outside the borders of this world she hovered at the edges of right now. But still, it was her choice.
Everything pivoted on the central question: did she want to be a Shadow Agent? Beyond the thought of having the coolest job on the planet, and beyond the thought of belonging to such an elite group of creatures, beyond the idea of saving people if that's what she'd be doing…was it what she, Sara Larson, wanted to do with her life?
That question continued to plague her throughout the weekend, all day Monday, and right up until her meeting with SA-7 where she was supposed to tell him the answer.
She stared at his desk, trying to hammer her thoughts into some sort of shape, and he watched her, silent, waiting.
Finally, he sat back in his chair, hands folded, and said, "Let me tell you a story."
"Oh, okay. Sure."
"About twelve years ago I was SA-3 at the branch in California, operating out of Sacramento. We received intelligence of a large Artifact trafficking ring in Los Angeles, run by some fairly nasty characters. After the standard recon, I was sent with three other Agents to raid the warehouse and bring the operation down, preserving as much evidence as possible."
Sara nodded, "Right."
"So we got to the warehouse, broke in, and the suspects opened fire on us. Two of my team were killed, a third injured, and I took a bullet to the arm. I took out all three suspects. While we waited for the med-evac team and reinforcements to arrive I took a look around the place. My thinking was that they were awfully jumpy for men who were just supposed to be dealing stolen crystal balls and grimoires. That was when I found the hidden door."
He paused, took a sip of his coffee, and went on. "The warehouse was a front for the Artifact trafficking, but the Artifacts were a front for something else--a whorehouse. This woman, one we'd been trying to get behind bars for decades but never could get enough concrete evidence against, was running a buffet of dirty delights for all races and all tastes. Her most popular…employees…were children, especially children of other races or humans with psychic abilities. Her people had some fairly sophisticated tech that allowed them to control their slaves using neurotoxins injected via an implant in the skin."
Sara felt a bit nauseated at that, thinking back to the file she'd read about the little girl whose heart had been fed to a demon. "God."
"Ah, but it gets even better. I broke down the door to the whorehouse, and what do I find? A slaughter. One of the slaves had gotten free, somehow gotten his hands on a gun, and shot the old woman dead along with all her henchmen."
"Good for him."
"No, it really wasn't." His face took on the slightest haunted quality as he said, "The slave was an Elf. Elves are pacifists; they abhor bloodshed. This one had been tortured and abused for so long, and poisoned for years by that toxin, that he had completely lost control of his powers, lost himself. He no longer even really knew who he was, just that he was not going to take it anymore. He had the gun to his head when I got there. I stopped him, got the medic in. Then he started screaming--he lost his hold completely. He just screamed, and screamed…I'll never forget that sound. It was like the wailing of the damned. They had to sedate him so deeply that he nearly died. As they were waiting for the helicopter to come airlift him out, I sat by him and held his hand, did what I could."
"So…what happened to him?"
"Dr. Nava, who works here now, was in California at the time. She's an expert on Elven physiology, but there are better facilities here, so she brought the Elf here to treat him. It took months, and in a lot of ways he's still badly damaged, but he survived. The SA rescued him from that hell and gave him another chance. This is what we do, Sara. We shut down people like that woman who think that just because someone isn't human they have no rights and no free will. We keep people from hurting each other when they can't tell the difference between Harry Potter and the real thing. We stop people like your old coven who believe power is an end in itself regardless of the consequences. We bring the consequences. And we find members of the Elder Races, other beings who've shared this planet with humanity since they first climbed out of the trees, and let them know that the human race isn't hopeless, that we can work together."
He caught Sara's gaze and held it. "Now. Do you think that sounds like something you'd like to do with your life?"
She couldn't help it--she started to laugh, a strange kind of dark joy bubbling up from within her. She practically beamed at the vampire as she answered, "Oh, hell yes."
He smiled back and slid a piece of paper across his desk to her. "Then sign here, and let's get started."
The Healer
When he walked into the file room and saw what Sara was doing, she immediately closed the window on her computer screen and blushed deeply.
"Mine?" he asked with a slight smile.
She bit her lip, and then nodded.
"I'm not going to ask how you got access to the Personnel files." He went to the A-B cabinet, quickly retrieved the folder he'd come after. "As far as I know, you're here after hours catching up because we had such a busy day."
"I'm sorry," she began, her lush, full lower lip almost trembling. "I didn't mean to pry, I just…" She gestured helplessly at the computer. "I can't believe anyone would…I mean…"
For all her wit and sarcasm, she was a genuinely kind person, and he couldn't be angry at her—besides, with the complete known records of every Agent at her fingertips, who could blame her for wanting to know more about the strange creatures and unusual people that surrounded her?
"All I'll say is that if you keep looking in there you're going to learn a lot of things you'll regret knowing, and not just about me. We all have our ghosts."
"I just never expected…” Her expression turned angry. "You're the most amazing person I've ever met, Rowan. The thought that anyone could…do those things…to you…I can't believe it."
He managed to smile at her again. "Think about this place a moment. Think about the sort of person who would choose to live here, to work here, to have so little contact with the outside world, except as an outsider themselves. That sort of person has very little to lose."
She shook her head, and her eyes were shining, their smoky hazel full of tears of compassion. Yes,
her empathic gift was getting stronger, working with him; he made a mental note to start incorporating more exercises for it in their next session. Ness wanted her telepathy trained first so she could learn to use the Ears, and Sara wanted to learn more uses for her psychometry, but it was the empathy that was going to get her into trouble. Sara didn't know everything the Agency had in store for her, but Rowan knew quite well. It had, after all, been his idea.
"I'm sorry," she said softly, lowering her eyes. She had such long lashes, dark and thick like her hair, and her eyes were large and almost innocent-looking. Here, in the archives off the clock, her tailored jacket was slung over the chair, and she had on a low-cut pullover the color of a ripe raspberry. Her breasts, as full as her lower lip, pressed round and creamy against the fabric. Rowan closed his eyes—not now.
"Is this why you're celibate?" she asked, and the echo of where his thoughts were headed was too close for comfort.
"Yes," he replied. "It's also why I can't shield properly. The…I was forced to use my skills, and when I tried to block them, the implant—you saw the scar in the photographs—released a neurotoxin into my blood as a punishment. Over time the nerve damage became permanent."
She was trying even harder not to cry. "I'm so sorry."
"Thank you." He turned to leave, adding, "I trust you not to share anything you see in those files. They're a matter of official record and national security, as well as being deeply personal."
Sara took a deep breath. "I'm done. I don't want to know any more."
Rowan smiled, this time with actual humor. "Oh, I don't know—you might have a look at Beck's first. Hers is pretty entertaining."
He left the archive, and was halfway down the hall before he remembered the file in his hand—he could barely even feel himself gripping it, and his fingers were white with strain. So now, besides Dr. Nava and selected members of the medical staff, there were two people at the Agency who knew: Ness, who was aware of every Agent's history, and Sara, who already wished her curiosity hadn't gotten the better of her.
He knew why she'd done it, obviously: Jason. She was a bit smitten with the vampire, even knowing he would never reciprocate. Jason was like that, though. The looks, the immortal allure, the attitude—irresistible. People either hated him, lusted after him, or were simply fascinated. Rowan understood that better than most. Beck, even with her 180-degree divergence in personality, commanded attention the same way.
Beck was different, though. She was straightforward in what she wanted. She never took "no" for an answer, not that anyone ever said "no." She liked it rough, liked being shoved back against the wall, mouth and thighs pried open, tight leather skirt pushed up over her hips. Her nails dug in, leaving half-moons of blood in his shoulders, as she sucked hard on his tongue, the kitten-claw prick of her teeth a reminder that she was always in control. Her clever hands had his zipper down between one heartbeat and the next, and her smile was wicked, even feral. Her muscles clamped around him, legs latching on, and she lowered herself, grinning wickedly, taking one inch at a time. He could feel her thighs engaging as she raised herself, then lowered, teasing, every muscle in her body taut, worked to perfection from hours and hours of fighting and fucking. Her luminous blue eyes, so like her brother's, locked on his, and there was darkness in them, the insatiable need of the hunter. Quick as a snake, her head darted forward, and pain shot through his neck as the blood flowed…
Rowan sagged back against the hallway wall, shaking his head in a vain attempt to clear it. Damn it. He was more tired than he'd thought, if it was starting already. Thankfully it was night, the offices closed; he could avoid people, avoid losing control.
Right on cue, the pain flared up, and he bit back a whimper; he needed to get back to his quarters. His pills were there, and if this got worse, he would need them.
Blame it on Sara, he thought with an inward smile, imagining what she would think every time she saw him now. She had suffered under the popular notion that Elves were pure beings of white light, sitting on mushrooms and teaching squirrels to talk. Despite her attraction to him—yes, he was aware of that too, he couldn't help but be—she still expected him to be some sort of saint. He was a healer, yes, but not the kind she had expected. The word in his tongue, rethla, had no English equivalent—the closest words were all used as insults, almost always against women by a society that feared and hated the feminine.
Once, humans had treated their sexuality differently. They too had had sacred prostitutes, those who healed through the sexual arts, channeling divine power through their bodies. There were still vestiges of those arts in the East, bastardized by long-haired Westerners with bad hygiene and worse boundaries, but in this world, there was no way to describe what he was, no way for a human to fully understand.
What he was, past tense. No more. It was just as well there was no place for him here as rethla—he, once the most sought-after of his entire Clan, was little more than a shadow of the priest he had been. The slave traders had broken him; the mortals who had bought him had shattered him. His abilities had been twisted into a perversion of the beauty and grace they once were. As far as anyone here knew, he was an Elf, nothing more.
Only the medical staff, which had kept him alive those first weeks after the Agency had raided the brothel and found him half-dead, filthy and starving and unable to control his power, knew better. He'd been kept isolated until strong enough to block off the energy, after a nurse had come to check his vitals and ended up climbing over the machines and fucking him in his sleep, the act nearly killing him. She had disappeared, and he hadn't asked after her. He'd been too busy trying not to throw down and rape every orderly who entered the room.
That had been twelve years ago. Now, the power itself was at bay, and he refused all but the most casual of touches—a hand here and there, but no hugs, and certainly nothing more. He could stop it from leaking out, unless he was exhausted or injured, but he couldn't stop from absorbing knowledge about others, from knowing intuitively just how to touch them, just where to apply pressure with his teeth, to have them dissolve into an orgasmic puddle at his feet. It wasn't arrogance. It was what he was born for.
Male, female, old, young, human, otherwise, it didn't matter. He had never actually had sex with Beck, never even kissed her, but he knew what she would want, and if she were to demand it, to fasten her heart-shaped mouth to his, he would have no choice.
There had been a choice once, before the humans destroyed his home and took him and the two other rethla of the Clan as slaves. He had been a legend among his kind. No one here knew that, either.
He had told Sara they all had ghosts. He hadn't told her he was a ghost. His true identity had been brutally murdered, slowly, by dozens of humans, for years. Each human who shuddered to a climax that his power amplified against his will, each pair of meaty hands clenching his hips, each thick, graceless human cock forced into his body, had killed him a little more, and a little more, until there was nothing left but Rowan, a tree growing alone in the pale light of morning, an Elf who had forgotten his own name.
Yet, perhaps as a testament to the depth and beauty of what had been killed, he still felt it stirring, still wanted. He pushed himself off the wall and made his way to his quarters, forgetting about the file and his intention of researching the Dulaney case. Once in, and the door locked, he was safe, and everyone else was safe; he didn't have to fight it so hard.
Sara's lip intruded on his whirling thoughts again, and he considered: she was human, and a traditionalist when it came to sex. To truly bring her out would take hours of foreplay—slow, easy caresses along her skin, preferably by the light of her altar candles. She was body-shy, being rounder and softer than the idiotic American ideal of beauty, but he'd always liked the feel of human women who were made like her—Elven women were as slender as the men, without much in the way of breast and belly. Sara had both, and that lovely porcelain skin, set off even more by her dark brown hair.
Kisses, first. She
would taste like a baked peach with cinnamon and brown sugar. She would not be shy with her mouth, not while her clothes were still on. She would slide a hand around the back of his neck, and he would shift her onto his lap, arms moving around her. She would need to feel safe, not because of a traumatic past, but because she did not value herself very highly. Feeling secure she would be able to accept what he would whisper to her, the way her body responded as his hands moved up under her shirt, palms encircling the line of her generous breasts beneath their restraint of lace and elastic.
He closed his eyes, smiling, and in his mind lifted the shirt over her head, leaning in to taste the exposed skin. She would enjoy being devoured, one mouthful at a time, and his mouth had always been prized by his partners—while his hands finished undressing her, he would trace spirals on her belly with his tongue, dipping into her navel where she was just ticklish enough that a shudder would run through her. She would need contact, body to body, at least the first time; no athletics, just the sweetness of skin over skin, her legs wrapping around his waist, the two of them moving in perfect concert, one long undulation so slow it would leave her sobbing into his chest.
The Agency, Volume I Page 9