by Sarah Piper
“I’ve got a meeting, Reggie,” she said. “But I’ll be back before you know it. Be good, okay?” She stretched up on her toes and kissed his cheek, barely resisting the urge to pat his head.
Gabriel tightened his hold on her wrist, his whisper so soft she nearly missed it. “Watch yourself, witch. First sign of trouble, I’m taking you out of here.”
“Second sign,” she whispered back. “The first sign will just be me, setting the mood.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“We’ve been expecting you, witch.” The hooded mage stood before the open door and bowed as if he’d been waiting for her. He didn’t even ask to see her card.
“You have?” Jaci asked, putting a little smolder into her voice. It was just as she’d hoped—the loose-lipped demon had already spread the word.
“The Dark Priestess granted us a shared vision. We saw your arrival some days ago.”
Dark Priestess? Shared vision? The scent of bullshit was so strong she nearly wrinkled her nose, but Jaci kept her smile firmly in place, nodding a silent acknowledgment as she followed him into the room.
It was nothing special—the kind of meeting room you’d expect in a hotel or restaurant, a long conference table at the center, a whiteboard on one end. Just beyond the uninspiring beige walls, the ocean roared against the shore, but unlike in the main room, there were no windows here to let in the stunning view.
Eleven mages sat around the table, not a witch among them. All of them wore the same black hooded robes, faces hidden mostly in shadow, only their grim mouths showing.
Jaci fought off a shiver. Cults always gave her the fucking creeps.
Two empty chairs waited at the head of the table, and the mage who’d met her at the door directed her to take one. He took the other.
No one spoke.
“So, um, hi. I’m… Demetria,” she said, blurting out the first name that came to mind. Sitting there among the somber hooded mages, she felt like an over-caffeinated bimbo in her red dress, her voice too high, her gestures too jittery.
So much for wise and experienced…
“I’m not really sure how this works,” she continued, barreling on and hoping like hell something logical would eventually fall out of her mouth. “My friend thought I might be able to find work here.”
“Why have you not found work elsewhere?” the head mage asked.
Jaci blew out a sigh of frustration. “Ever since the royal vampires made their power play, it’s almost impossible for a girl with my talents to find work.”
“What sort of talents?” he asked, his hood falling back to reveal pale gray eyes shining with a dark malevolence—a malevolence she was counting on.
His interest bolstered Jaci’s confidence, setting her back on track.
With a sly grin, she shrugged and said, “The kind that would cause a love-and-light mage to run scurrying for the nearest purification bath.”
He laughed, then looked at each of the others in turn. They nodded, one at a time.
The cult-vibes crawled across her skin again, and Jaci rubbed her arms.
“You’ve come to the right place,” the mage said. “Why don’t you tell me more about the sort of work you’re interested in?”
“But… here? With… everyone?” Jaci made a show of looking nervous and mistrustful.
Gray-Eyes nodded sagely. Compassionately. Resting a hand on her shoulder, he said, “None who carry the Dark Flame would betray the trust of a fellow mage. Or, in your case, a witch.” He laughed again, his fingers tracing soft circles on her shoulder.
She bit back a gag and forced a grateful smile. “Well, I’m not the biggest fan of the royals, as you might’ve gathered. I’d heard there might be some… alternative groups working to set things right? To part the veils, rebalance the scales, so to speak?” She held his gaze, hoping he got the metaphor. She was the stranger here—coming out swinging with “Hey, I’m a necromancer and I hear Renault Duchanes is a hell of a guy” was probably a little too ballsy, but that was the message she wanted to get across.
Again, Gray-Eyes took the bait. “There’s a vampire working on some new methods. He might be able to use your expertise.”
Jackpot.
“A vampire?” Not wanting to seem too eager, she shrugged and wrinkled her nose. “I was hoping to connect with some mages or witches.”
“You don’t like vampires?”
“I don’t like them, I don’t trust them, and I don’t appreciate their smug sense of superiority.” She furrowed her brow, pretending to mull it over. “I’m willing to compromise for the right opportunity, but the biggest challenge I’ve found with vampires is they’re so damn limiting.”
“How do you mean?” he asked.
“Most of the vampires I’ve worked with over the years have extremely restrictive views on witches. On what we can do for them. My talents are wasted on magical tattoos and the occasional hex. I’m looking for something a bit more…” She flashed a dark grin. “Challenging.”
“Renault Duchanes is not your typical bloodsucker. His needs are as exceptional as his vision.”
Renault? A visionary?
Wow, this guy is really drinking the Kool-Aid…
“Renault Duchanes?” she said, letting her genuine revulsion shine through. “I thought he took the coward’s way out after the attack on his old club.”
“He’s simply gathering new assets. Re-assessing. Rebuilding. He just purchased a warehouse property in Newark,” the mage said proudly, defensively, as if he couldn’t bear the thought of anyone thinking his friend Renault was a cowardly loser who’d run away screaming at the first sight of enemy fire.
“And you think I can help with this… rebuilding effort?” she asked, pretending to consider it in earnest.
“Oh, I know you can.” Those gray eyes assessed her. Dissected her. There was death in those eyes, she realized suddenly. An emptiness she hadn’t noticed before.
“In fact,” he said, and the rest of the mages rose as one, slowly closing ranks around her. “You can help all of us, witch-demon.”
Witch-demon…
It was just like the demons outside the hospital that night.
How the fuck did they know?
The mage laughed—a greasy, throaty sound that slithered down her spine, settling in her stomach with cold dread.
She bolted to her feet, but there was nowhere to go. The mages surrounded her, terrifying in their hoods and shadows.
Fuck staying calm. Fuck staying in character. It was time to roast those motherfuckers.
Jaci lifted her hands, calling up her hellfire.
Nothing happened.
She took a deep breath, visualized the fire, the smokey taste in her lungs, the heat, the sparks.
Still, nothing fucking happened.
“Save your energy, witch-demon. You’re going to need it.” Gray-Eyes dangled a talisman before her eyes, a small silk pouch full of herbs and stones.
Jaci didn’t have to ask what was inside. Likely a lock of her hair, stolen from the demon who’d been chatting her up. She knew a proximal binding spell when she saw one.
Shit. It didn’t matter that she was half demon. Witch magic, hell magic… whatever spell they’d concocted, it fucking neutered her.
Dread turned to rage, lighting her up inside in a way her neutered hellfire did not.
The mages had fucking played her. The demon had played her. And she’d walked right into it.
Devil’s balls, that vampire was making her soft. Stupid.
“Need it for what?” she asked, though she suspected she already knew the answer. Group of deranged men, secret rooms, trapped witch. What the fuck else could it be?
The mages only stared at her.
“Seriously, boys?” She folded her arms across her chest and rolled her eyes, as if the weapons of wit and sarcasm were just as effective as hellfire. “Does this whole D&D charade actually work? This is a bar, for fuck’s sake! If you’re looking for some action, I�
�m sure there are plenty of witches out there just dying to throw a drink in your face.”
“We’re not interested in tainting ourselves with your flesh, witch-demon. It’s your blood we’re after.” Gray-Eyes hit a button on the wall, and the conference table—which she now saw was built on a platform attached to a mechanized track—slid forward, revealing a dark stairwell that smelled like seaweed and dead fish and undoubtedly led to some dank, unnameable hell Jaci had no interest in exploring.
“Well, thanks for the offer,” she said, “but that’s a hard pass. I—”
He shoved her down the stairs, the others crowding in close behind. She’d just gotten her footing when the conference table slid back into place, blotting out the last of the light from above, sealing her in a fucking tomb.
“Move.” Gray-Eyes—at least, she thought it was him—pushed her down a long hallway, nothing but bare rock walls slick with condensation. The fish smell grew stronger, the sound of the sea louder. After a few twists and turns, they arrived at the mouth of another chamber, no more than a small cave, the interior lit with hundreds of black candles tucked into its grooves and hollows. The floor was bare save for a sigil painted in red and surrounded by a circle of salt.
Pure, undiluted fear shot through her body, turning her legs to Jell-O.
Jaci knew the sight of a ritual sacrifice when she saw one.
And worse, she knew the sigil of hell’s oldest succubus.
Her fucking sister.
The other mages filed in behind her, each one choosing a candle, then gathering around the circle. Hoods drawn low, they began to chant in Latin, too softly for Jaci to make out the words.
“What the hell is this?” she breathed, her voice a shaky whisper.
Gray-Eyes shoved her to her knees and fisted her hair, yanking her head backward. Then, pressing an athame to her throat, he said, “Viansa, Dark Priestess of the realms, She Who Carries the Dark Flame, She For Whom the Gates Will Fall, sends her regards.”
Chapter Thirty
Over the bloody awful taste of his third vodka tonic, Gabriel nearly missed the scent of trouble. When it finally hit him, he knew it wasn’t the mood-setting sort, but the deadly one.
It was his witch. Her blood. Her fear.
Gabriel didn’t think twice about breaking his glamour. Didn’t spare a single fuck for the bartender, the servers, the other witnesses.
The moment that scent reached his nose, he was gone, blurring past the windows, crashing through the third door on the left, shocked to find the room empty.
Yet she was there. Somewhere. The scent of her fear was unmistakable. Sharp and metallic, crashing over him in hot waves.
He felt along the walls in search of another door, snatched the whiteboard from its mount, only to realize the scent was coming from… the conference table?
He tried to flip it. Noticed it was attached to some sort of platform. Wrenched it from the bloody tracks, revealing a dark stairwell beneath. He blurred down it, leaving the tittering mages behind him in the dust, no thought for what he might find there, only that it had better be his witch—alive and fucking unmarred.
No one followed.
The images came to him in flashes.
Hundreds of candles.
Hooded monsters.
His woman on her knees.
Red dress in the dirt.
The gleam of a blade against her pale throat.
And that was the last thing Gabriel consciously processed before everything turned red.
The taste of blood filled his mouth, warm and salty, divine retribution as he tore out the mage’s throat with his fangs. The others charged at him, throwing their useless candles, calling up ancient spells, praying to their demons, but Gabriel was too fast for all of them, nothing but a blur of broken spines and severed heads, bodies cleaved, rivers of blood washing away the salt, washing away the sigil, washing away the sin.
Unlike vampires, mages didn’t turn to ash and blow away. They died like men, bleeding and shitting, a carcass of rot and ruin left to mark their passing.
When the last one uttered his final cry, Gabriel knelt before his witch on the blood-slick floor. Her glamour had shattered, but once again she wore a mask of blood and violence. One he’d put upon them both.
Wordlessly he picked her up and rose above the filth, carrying her out of that death chamber, holding her tight against his chest as he marched up the stairwell, steadying himself with the rhythmic beat of her heart.
Still gathered in the conference room, the bartender and other staff members gaped, muttering about calling the authorities, calling an exorcist. Gabriel had no idea if they’d known about the cave, known that they were harboring a sacrificial cult. He didn’t care. Right now, there was only his witch.
Jacinda trembled in his arms, but it wasn’t fear Gabriel sensed. It was rage. So much of it swirling through her, he marveled she could even contain it.
“Tell me what you need, little moonflower,” he whispered into her blood-drenched hair. “Name it.”
“The… the beach.”
He nodded and carried her toward the exit, past the windows stretched out before the sea, past the bar where she’d called him Reggie.
Outside Shimmer, he tightened his hold on her, taking a deep breath of ocean air.
“Prince.” She dug her nails into his arms, her eyes full of fire, magic crackling all around her. “Hurry.”
Chapter Thirty-One
Jaci was a ticking time bomb.
Magic and emotion roiled inside her, none of it hers, all of it looking for a way out. If she didn’t get to the shore in thirty seconds, a lot more than a dozen crooked mages would be dying tonight.
“Prince,” she demanded, clutching his arm. “Hurry.”
Without another word, he blurred them to the moonlit beach. She leaped out of his arms, and then she was off, charging straight into the icy water. She sensed her vampire behind her, but she had no time to turn around, no time to warn him.
The sea turned darker than midnight, frothing mad at her intrusion. Waves crashed over her feet, her calves, her thighs, her waist, and still she trudged in deeper, the water so cold it stole the breath from her lungs. But she hadn’t gone far enough. Not yet.
“Jacinda! Wait!” Gabriel waded in after her, the wild waves having little effect on his vampire strength. But when it came to his safety, it wasn’t the water she was worried about.
It was her.
She was up to her neck now, water sloshing into her mouth, already tugging at her. Clawing.
The darkness inside her churned and bubbled.
“Jacinda!” he cried out for her, his voice a million miles away, even though he’d waded so close she could see those green eyes flashing, so close she could reach out and touch him.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Then Jaci lifted her arms, tilted her head up toward the moon, and opened her mouth.
A vicious roar clawed its way from the depths of her soul, exploding out of her with all that stolen rage, all that darkness. The sea swirled into a vortex, trapping her and Gabriel inside, rising above them in an endless funnel that stretched up toward the stars, suspending them in a tiny circle of calm.
Lightning crackled across the sky, flickering in Gabriel’s eyes, one bolt after another chased by thunder so deafening it seemed as if the sky itself would shatter. The ocean continued to churn around them, Jaci’s arms trembling with the effort of holding it at bay.
If she let go for even a moment, she and her vampire would be swept out to sea.
Gabriel reached for her face, closer than she realized, fingers skimming her cheeks. “Come with me,” he whispered, almost begging. “I can protect you.”
But he didn’t understand. She wasn’t the one in danger. She held the power of the sea at her command, a tempest that swirled around her, for her, crackling with energy and black magic and fury and wrath, all the darkness unleashed by the slaughter of the mages channeled directly into h
er soul.
She’d never felt so fucking powerful.
But it was too much. Magic, rage, lust, all of it still coursing through her blood, feeding the angry ocean just as the ocean fed it right back to her.
As powerful as it made her feel, she couldn’t contain it. She was losing control, arms trembling, her body close to giving out.
Jaci opened her mouth to warn him, but he was already there. Right there, drawing her close, holding her against his chest, steadying her.
“Let it go,” he murmured in her ear. “Whatever happens, I’m with you. Let it go.”
“Gabriel!” she shouted, and all at once her body broke, like a rubber band stretched too far and finally snapping. The water crashed down around them, the sound like the end of all things, the force of it sucking and tearing, demanding, claiming.
But somehow, Gabriel was stronger.
He blurred them out of the tempest, out of the angry sea, a massive tidal wave forming in their wake. They stopped to catch their breath on the shore, rain pelting them, lightning blasting across the sky, and still the vicious water chased them, the wave cresting so high it cast a shadow over the beach.
They saw it at the same time—a rickety structure set off in the distance, no more than an old boathouse perched at the end of an ancient pier. Gabriel swept her into his arms, and the world spun out of focus, the sudden weightlessness making her dizzy. When she opened her eyes again, they were inside the boathouse.
Gabriel pushed her against the wall, shielding her body as the tidal wave crashed over the top, spilling through the cracks, shaking the foundations, calling to the darkness still festering inside her, seeking her, chasing her. The wind howled against the walls, wave after wave crashing, smashing, tearing.
Then, just as quickly as it had risen, the magic inside her fizzled out and the vengeful black water receded, slowly crawling back out to sea.
Gabriel stepped back, taking her face in his hands. “Are you all right?”