My heart sinking, I braced a hand on the wooden bannister, polished to a high gleam. “How many?”
“One. But it was Abyzou, the psycho spawn. She’d cornered a pregnant woman in a parking lot and was working her evil mojo to cause a miscarriage.” He held up his hand at the anxious eep I emitted. “Breeder and fetus are fine.”
“Is Ari okay?”
“Your twin is untouched. I, on the other hand?” He tapped his wound. “My perfection is marred.” He’d heal quickly like all Rasha did, but Kane loved his dramatic flare.
I exhaled hard, then trotted down the stairs, gesturing at his temple. “Did Abyzou do that?”
“Yep. Compounded by your idiot brother. He clocked me when I stopped him from getting involved.” Kane’s jaw tightened. “If I hadn’t been worried about protecting his ass, I might have taken Abyzou down. As it was, she got away.”
A faint sheen of purple iridescence on his forearm caught the light, indicating his arms were still coated in traces of the salt-based poison that was his magic power. Toxic to demons.
Toxic to humans, too. I couldn’t touch him until he’d showered.
“What about the pregnant woman?”
“She thought it was some crazy person attacking. Ari and I distracted the demon enough for the breeder to get into her minivan and bolt.” Kane took a steadying breath, clearly trying to get his anger under control. “I can’t keep babysitting him.”
“I know.” My stomach knotted itself up. Ever since Ari had been abducted and tortured by a powerful demon a few weeks back, my heroically-inclined twin had become a one-man, monster-slaying vigilante. Sure, he’d trained his whole life for this, but since his Rasha ceremony had gone horribly wrong–inducting me instead of him in the surprise of the century–he hadn’t yet been officially made a hunter and therefore, didn’t have any magic power. Without that magic, Ari could wound but not kill.
Though he could piss the demons off enough to end up a tragic statistic himself.
In a rare display of cold calculation, my brother was exploiting Kane’s feelings for him, dysfunctional as they were. With or without backup, Ari wasn’t stopping and Kane was able to make the killing strikes. Payback had twisted my usually rational twin and I was terrified for his well-being.
Kane stomped up the stairs.
I rubbed my temples, sympathetic to Kane’s frustration.
“Navela.” Rabbi Abrams, Ari’s mentor for his entire life, touched my shoulder.
“You heard Kane?”
He nodded, motioning me into the kitchen. Rain hit the windows, wind scattering leaves off the trees.
I took a seat at the island, knowing from previous conversations that he’d speak in his own time. True to form, the rabbi boiled water for his pot of Darjeeling in silence.
The rabbi reached for a large mug. Slowly. No surprise since the guy was ancient. More wrinkles than anything else, he was clad in one of his many black suits, a kippah perched on his thinning white hair. He’d trimmed his beard, which was good since it had been straying into ZZ Top territory.
The only thing that ever seemed to radically change about Rabbi Abrams was his scent, ranging from mothballs to lavender and today… I surreptitiously sniffed him. Lemon candy drops.
“Ready for Prague?” he asked.
“You bet.” Ever my helpful self, I retrieved the honey kept in his special cabinet of “rabbi-only” cups, kettle, and kosher tea supplies.
He raised a shaggy eyebrow at me. I was growing on him.
“My mitzvah for the day,” I said, referring to the Hebrew word for a good deed. Like certain Hebrew words, it probably had some other literal meaning.
The kettle clicked off. Rabbi Abrams poured the hot water over the tea diffuser in his cup, his hands strong and steady despite his age. “A mitzvah should not come with expectation of reciprocity.”
“Then consider my next question totally unrelated. When will you be inducting Ari?”
After a ton of begging and my capitulation to mild blackmail, Rabbi Abrams had confirmed that yes, Ari did indeed still have initiate status. Thing is, re-running the traditional induction ceremony on Ari after I’d been inducted hadn’t worked. That’s why the Brotherhood believed they’d made a mistake about Ari’s status in the first place. With each passing day that my brother remained an initiate and not a full Rasha, the greater the risk that Ari got seriously hurt.
I was worried that my existence had screwed things up, magically speaking, and now the Brotherhood had no clue how to make my twin a hunter.
I leaned on the counter fidgeting, but the rabbi waited for his tea to steep before answering me. “I am not sure that official permission to try alternate methods of inducting Ari as Rasha will be forthcoming,” he said.
“You’re picking your words rather carefully there.” I frowned. “Please. Be straight with me. Did you ask the Executive?”
“It would not be a good idea at this time to seek authorization on this matter.” He blew on the steaming liquid before taking a sip.
Clamping my lips shut against my first impulse to shout, “Why the fuck not?” I took a deep breath, forcing myself to lay out my argument in a calm, logical form. “Ari won’t be deterred and this won’t end well.”
The rabbi took another sip. “There is someone I want you to meet in Prague.”
Huh? “Who?”
“Dr. Esther Gelman. She’s attending an environmental physics conference there.” He waved at the miscellaneous drawer across the room. “Get me a pen.”
Biddable me, I did as I was told.
He scribbled down Dr. Gelman’s name and email but held on to the paper a moment longer. “Send her this message. ‘Golem. Alea iacta est.’” He added that to the paper.
I took it from him. “What does it mean?”
“‘The die is cast.’ Request a meeting. Do not let her say no.”
I stuffed the paper in my pocket. “Uh. Okay. Why am I emailing a scientist about a fictional clay monster? Why don’t you do it?”
“She doesn’t like the Brotherhood.” Well, we had that in common. “This isn’t about the folkloric version of the golem,” he said. “It’s the meaning as it appears in the Tehilim. Psalms 139:16. An unformed body.”
Like Ari in regards to being Rasha. Rabbi Abrams wasn’t ignoring me. He was investigating a way to induct my twin that would not be sanctioned by the Brotherhood. “Way to work the loophole, Rabbi.”
He gave me an enigmatic smile. “Ari remains my responsibility. I do not take that lightly,” he said. “Get Esther to meet. She will know if there is a way.”
“Who is she?”
“That is not for me to share.” He pulled a tiny glass bottle out of his pocket, like one used for aromatherapy oils. It was half-full of some brown liquid. “I need your ring.”
I held out my right hand with my Rasha ring worn on my index finger. It was a fat gold band with an engraving of a hamsa, a palm-shaped design with two symmetrical thumbs meant to ward off the evil eye. The single open eye etched into the middle of the design boasted a tiny blue sapphire iris. Standard issue. Trust an all-male Brotherhood to ignore the opportunity for a variety of gemstones that could be accessorized at will.
As a hunter, I was incapable of removing the ring. Believe me, I’d tried.
The first night I’d met Rohan, his identical ring had been the only proof that he wasn’t a demon. Though if demon power was based on arrogance alone, Rohan would hands down be one of the most dangerous beings to ever live.
Rabbi Abrams unscrewed the cap, flipping the bottle upside down against the pad of his index finger. I tried not to flinch at the feel of his giant old man knuckles as he took my hand and smeared the liquid around my ring, speaking a couple words in Hebrew. The scent of cloves filled the air.
The gold warmed against my skin and from one blink to the next, the rich color leeched to a hard titanium. The hamsa engraving and sapphire iris disappeared, replaced by tiny diamonds encircling the band. “
Can I touch it?”
He nodded so I brushed my thumb across the band. There was no sense of any of the diamonds, though I felt the hamsa and iris.
“You glamoured it,” I said.
He returned the bottle to his pocket. “You need to be able to get close to Samson without him seeing the true ring. Just make sure he doesn’t touch it. Anyone who does will see through the illusion.”
“Got it. Is there a time limit on the glamour?”
“No. I’ll remove it once you return from Prague.” He picked up his tea, indicating our meeting was at an end. “And Nava?”
I paused at the doorway, half turning back. “Yes?”
“Do as Rohan and Drio command. Show the Brotherhood how well you fit in.”
I had to unclench my teeth to answer him in the affirmative. Playing nice meant accepting the role of groupie that I’d been designated and that power dynamic did not sit well with me. But if the alternative would cause any trouble in terms of seeing Ari become Rasha, what choice did I have?
I had no idea what to do. Betray my principles or betray my brother? Either my gut-level certainty about what was best for my well-being or that of what was best for my twin’s was in jeopardy. I had no idea how to win on both fronts.
I trudged down the hallway, passing airy open rooms with detailed crown molding and gleaming inlaid wood floors. Rohan and Drio were probably stewing in the library waiting for my tardy self to arrive. The faintest hint of furniture polish scented the air, lending a bright note to the decidedly bleak choice I had to make.
Ari had held my hair out of my face the first time I’d thrown up, covered for me when I’d snuck out, and before this Rasha mix-up, never once cut me out of his confidences. I may not have always been the perfect sibling, but I’d lucked into having someone who was always on my side.
Now that the tables had turned, could I really throw Ari to the wolves?
3
Lost in thought, I missed most of Drio’s complaint about me taking my sweet time, even though the men were still in the TV room. Though I caught his sneered, “You look… sparkly,” as he waved a hand at the glittery silver letters on my shirt.
“I exude sparkly, thank you very much. But in a deadly way.”
Rohan cocked his head to read my shirt. “Fifty percent seems generous, Lolita. I’d say more thirty/seventy.”
Lolita was the nickname Rohan had bestowed on me the night we met, when he’d learned I wrote self-insert fanfic in my teens about his band. Not him, mind you. Just the rest of them. It hurt Snowflake’s terribly fragile ego that he wasn’t included, and since those boys were a whopping three years older than me, Rohan had chosen the pet name he thought most likely to piss me off.
I clapped my hands over my boobs as if protecting their delicate sensibilities from his cruelty. “I’ll cop to a forty-five, fifty-five spread. And for that insult, you can forget handling these fine representations of womanhood ever again.”
Rohan leaned forward and said, nowhere near soft enough for only me to hear, “Tonight.”
“Will you do it?” Drio asked Rohan in his Italian-accented English.
“Of course not,” I said hotly. “And you’re dead wrong if you don’t think I get a say.”
Drio paused and arched a single elegant eyebrow.
Rohan stifled a laugh. “He means Child’s Play.” The massive rock concert slated to happen in London next month to raise funds for war orphans.
Ah.
Drio kicked my chair like an obnoxious ten-year-old, which was several years higher than his actual emotional age.
“You got invited?” I swayed at the thought of being backstage with all that rock royalty, since I’d be happy to accompany Rohan as his groupie on that jaunt. My mental list of which rock stars I wanted to meet–and screw–was assembled at light speed. A brief fun escape from more serious matters.
Rohan reached out to steady me with one hand. “Never gonna happen.” Spoilsport. “Forrest hoped I’d premiere the theme song there, but it won’t be ready.”
I’d once read in a years-old interview that when Rohan Mitra got inspired the song flowed out of him all at once. He’d race to write the words down and then he’d tap out beats and hum strings to himself until he had a skeleton he could share with the band to build off of. It’d happen in a day, like a spirit being raised from the dead or lightning being channeled from the heavens, something so powerful you had to do it all at once to do it well.
Given the flatness in his eyes, there was more to his refusal to premiere it than its lack of completion. “You don’t want to get back into things at that level, do you?”
He didn’t answer. He’d eschewed the musical spotlight once he’d become Rasha. Fame and his own rock star ego had done a number on him, and when his beloved cousin had needed him, he’d failed to save her from demons. Enter his own inner ones. Or rather, more of his inner demons given the lyrics to some of his songs. To the point that he’d tattooed a heart on his left bicep as a reminder of his failure and of his character shortcomings whilst famous.
The tattoo lay directly in line with where his outline blade snicked out. Every time he used his power, the heart got slashed. Even that metaphor wasn’t enough. Nope, in further penance, he’d stopped singing. Yet, a week ago, Rohan had stepped back into the rock star role for the sake of the mission.
At my request.
I wiped my damp palms on my jeans.
“Selfish bastard,” Drio said. But he didn’t push it. He was fiercely loyal to Rohan, but not out of friendship’s sake alone. It was the kind of loyalty that stemmed from something else, something dark and volatile. I wasn’t sure what the deal between them was yet, because I’d been busy killing demons and saving Ari and stuff, but mark my words, I was going to find out.
“Now that I’m going to Prague, what’s the next step?” I asked. Was there any other way I could help bring down Samson?
“We need hard proof that King is a demon,” Drio began.
“I know. Either catching him in the act of using his demon influence or getting him to reveal his true form. Yes, Drio, I’ve been paying attention at our meetings the past few days.”
He peered at me. “Hard to tell how much functioning intelligence is in there.”
I kicked at his leg but he moved it before I got near and I ended up smacking my toes on the wooden leg of the chair that he now sat on.
“I still think our best bet is to discover Samson’s true name,” Rohan said. “We could use that to force the reveal of his demon self.”
The way Drio’s eyes lit up at that possibility convinced me that method would be incredibly painful for Samson.
“What’s the other way?” I asked, massaging my bruised foot.
Rohan snapped the TV off, taking the pearly white smile of some schmo in a coffee ad with it. “Depending on his demon type, he might revert back to his original form under extreme emotion.”
“Like Josh before he came.” Josh was the first demon I’d ever killed, and boy, finding out his true nature had been a shocker. For him, literally.
Rohan looked at me, his gold eyes sparking with amusement. Damn. Really needed to think before I said the quiet part loud.
Drio mimed jerking off at me. “Feel free to use that technique again.”
“Regret you can’t get close to Samson that way?”
He shrugged and I blinked. What was his deal? Bi or balls-deep dedication to demon killing?
“That won’t be happening.” Rohan’s tone about my up-close-and-personal involvement brooked no argument.
His voice broke me out of the fantasies I was spinning about Drio getting hot and heavy with other Rasha. Like Rohan. Could that be their weird shared history? My clit, Cuntessa de Spluge, throbbed her vote for “please yes.”
“Sure it will. If that’s what it takes.” Drio’s voice was just as hard. He tipped his chair back on to two legs, one foot braced on the arm of the nearest couch. “She’s Rasha. Let her do her job.�
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“Actually,” I said, “maybe I could be a member of your entourage without being a groupie.”
Both the men laughed outright.
I planted my hands on my hips. “Is it such a stretch that a straight, breathing female with an iota of a sex drive might not want to be servicing Mr. Rock God on a regular basis?”
Shut up, Nava, because they’re laughing harder and you’re not making your case.
I eyed Drio’s wobbling chair, so tempted to upend him. “I’m sure there are lots of other options that would still allow me to Mata Hari my way into Samson’s life.”
Drio’s feet thudded onto the floor. He pinned me in his gaze, his green eyes hard emeralds. “You’re there for one reason. Bait. Get Samson interested and get him to work his demon mojo on you so we have proof. That’s it. We go with the simplest explanation for your presence and you play that part.” He looked at Rohan as if daring him to disagree.
Rohan gave a tight nod. He pushed his sleeves up, revealing the fat silver bracelet with what looked like a stylized “30” inlaid in onyx. He’d been wearing it ever since he’d gone back into his rock star persona. It was supposed to be some kind of talisman, something he’d received before his first tour. At least according to the Fugue State Five message board I’d researched it on.
“Straightforward is best,” he said. “You don’t reveal yourself. No deaths on this one, okay?”
“Not on my agenda.”
Drio tossed me some photos from the coffee table. Given his leer, this did not bode well. “Coloring, looks, build, you’re what Samson likes. Mold your undercover persona to that.”
Since I needed to go to Prague to meet Dr. Gelman, I pasted a smile on my face and thought “team player.” I studied the photos. Drio was right. I did fit the bill. “Luckily for you, you’ve got just the badass sexpot for the job.”
“Sexpot.” Drio raked a skeptical gaze over my T-shirt and jeans. “Got anything sluttier?”
Electricity sparked out of my eyes. “Not skanky enough for you, am I?”
Rohan tapped the photos. “It’s not us. It’s Samson. He prefers short and tight.”
The Unlikeable Demon Hunter_Sting Page 3