Tempting the Dark

by Michele Hauf

  “Your get-out-of-death-free card!” Jett declared.

  She grabbed his wrists and pressed his palms together, and Savin smiled as he was thankful he’d told her about this. Would it work? Jett held his palms together tightly. His palms heated and flames formed. Jett swore but did not let go of his hands.

  It felt as if the sides of his hands fused together, burning, yet without flames. The moth wings fluttered and peeled away from his skin to take flight.

  Savin gasped in a choking breath as if he were rising from the depths of a molten lava pool. Had she done the same after falling over the cliff?

  “Stay with me,” Jett said in a voice that defied him to stay. To not make the leap. To be brave enough to stand at her side and face whatever the future would push at them.

  The moth landed on his chest, right over his heart, and then it danced off and into the darkness.

  “Yes,” he murmured. The vibrations began to undulate and his muscles twitched. He could lift his hand and landed it at Jett’s hip. And the flash behind his eyes brightened like the sun. He sat up abruptly. She slid down his legs, observing him with those eyes that were swiftly growing brown.

  “Jett, I love you,” he said.

  She held up her hand and he slapped his other hand into hers. And her energy, her vita, flowed up his arm and into his heart. He watched her hair drip away the blue color and shine richly onyx. And just as he reached to touch the horn that curled over her ear, it dropped away from her skull and, glittering madly, diffused and scattered to dust as it spilled over his leg and the floor.

  Jett hushed out a heavy exhale and bowed her head against his shoulder. Her body relaxed against his and she curled up her legs. He embraced her and kissed her forehead. He wasn’t going to die this day.

  Chapter 31

  Days later

  The life force Jett infused into Savin saved him from death. And in that moment, he in turn had taken from her all that was demonic, and she became as human as she had been that day long ago when fate lured them to the edge of the lavender field. Which wasn’t entirely human, thanks to her paternity.

  They confirmed these things with the help of Certainly Jones, who read their auras. But as well, now when Savin looked into Jett’s eyes, all he saw was her. The woman he loved, sans red gloss to her brown irises.

  Jett, on the other hand, wasn’t ready to completely mark herself off as human. She had lived in Daemonia for a long time. The entitlement that had come to her by sitting the throne lingered. And while she would never wish for the return of horns, she sensed there were tendrils within her that would ever remind her of those dark days. She didn’t say that to Savin. He didn’t need to know a bit of the queen yet lingered. In her blood would always flow Drav’s legacy. Like it or not.

  With the rift sealed, the city of Paris returned to as normal as it could be with the paranormal species walking its streets and existing alongside humans. Demons would always be a part of the population. And the smart ones knew how to survive and blend in. Ed Thrash continued to police his kind. And Savin was ever on call for another reckoning.

  He would not give up his job. Because the call to reckon demons had not changed. And yet now he didn’t feel it was so much a curse as a privilege to be able to keep his fellow humans safe from the dangers they must never know lurked so close.

  The day was bright and Jett laughed as sunshine hit her face. Savin clasped her hand and led her toward the cemetery, where they both felt comfortable. It was their place now. It didn’t remind them of death and misery, but rather, it honored the parts of themselves they’d allowed to pass on.

  Skipping down a narrow stone lane ahead of him, Jett glanced over her shoulder. Her smile was so bright. And that blue dress with the flowers all over it was like summer in the autumn. He couldn’t imagine being happier.

  Actually, he could. If all went well.

  Jett stopped at the sarcophagus that they favored for afternoon picnics and sat on the edge, waiting for him to catch up to her. As he arrived before her, Savin knelt on one knee and took Jett’s hand. Her look told him she had no idea what he was up to, and it pleased him that he could surprise her.

  He wanted to fill her life with only the best surprises from now on. For good or for ill, he would be there for her.

  “I love you, Jett,” he said.

  “I love you, too. Why are you kneeling?”

  “It’s what a guy is supposed to do.”

  “What do you mean—Oh.” Her eyes glinted. “Really?”

  “I’ve done a lot of growing up over the years, but I think I’ve done the most the past days you’ve been back in my life. And I’ve kissed you, so...I can finally ask you the important question.”

  Jett pressed her fingers to her lips, beaming.

  “Will you marry me?”

  She plunged forward to wrap her arms about him, and Savin stood, taking her with him as her legs hooked behind his hips. Their kiss was filled with wonder and joy. Heartbeats fluttered and raced. And finally, their future looked bright.

  * * * * *

  I hope you enjoyed this story. The paranormal romance stories I have written for Nocturne are set in my world of Beautiful Creatures. Some of the secondary characters have their own stories that can be found at your favorite online retailer.

  Certainly Jones’s story is

  This Wicked Magic

  Edamite Thrash’s story is

  Captivating the Witch

  Ethan Pierce’s story is

  An American Witch in Paris

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Legendary Wolf by Barbara J. Hancock

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  Legendary Wolf

  by Barbara J. Hancock

  Chapter 1

  The thick evergreen wood was nearly impenetrable save for the hollowed-out paths that wound through the snarled low-hanging branches and twisted tree trunks. Wild animals had made the paths—the deer headed for clearings where grass and water could be found, and the predators, who naturally followed in the deer’s footsteps, hungry for hot blood.

  Anna was neither predator nor prey, although she was on the hunt.

  It was dawn and a cool, damp mist rose around her and the gnarled spruce trunks as the sunrise heated the mountain air. The white fog curling down the same pathways she tried to traverse contributed to the forest’s shadows. It would disperse eventually. It was autumn and the temperature would rise high enough to dry the air, even in the Carpathian Mountains of Romania, where
the chill of winter settled in earlier than elsewhere.

  But it wasn’t warm yet.

  Her breath, quickened by the uncertainty of low visibility, came from her parted lips in visible puffs. The hood of her scarlet cloak protected her hair from the damp, but the cool misty air still managed to brush her face and encroach with fingerlike tendrils on her neck and chest. Her hands were encased in long black leather gloves. They kept her fingers warm...although that was merely a side benefit.

  She might be forced to take them off.

  She dreaded taking them off here, of all places, but she would if she had to.

  There were wolves in these woods. Natural ones that posed a certain amount of danger and the deadly unnatural ones she sought. Those were the ones that made her dread taking off her gloves while possibly making their removal necessary all at the same time.

  She clenched her hands into fists at the thought of using her newfound Volkhvy abilities at all, but against one legendary wolf in particular.

  The forest was silent around her.

  No birds called. No breeze stirred the evergreen needles. Only the silent mist swirled and eddied as if it was caught in the maze created by massive trees and winding pathways. Anna felt trapped, too, but it was a familiar feeling. One she was well used to accepting and persisting through. She’d been trapped in a cursed castle for centuries. This ancient wood was nothing in comparison.

  Or, at least, it would be nothing in comparison, if she weren’t here to find Soren Romanov.

  Her connection to the Romanov wolves—and the red Romanov wolf in particular—was a decidedly tortuous entrapment. She’d wanted to avoid Soren for the rest of her life after they’d discovered that her mother was the Light Volkhvy queen, Vasilisa, who had cursed the Romanovs for centuries.

  The Volkhvy were a race of witches that drew their power from the Ether, an invisible plane that surrounded the earth with energy. But the Ether was like a black hole. Its vacuum expelled energy and, at the same time, it took. Light witches managed this hunger carefully, most of the time. Dark witches...didn’t. And sometimes even a Light Volkhvy could be consumed by the Ether’s Darkness.

  Her mother was a powerful witch who had made Dark decisions and her actions had cost Anna and the Romanovs tremendous pain and sacrifice. Elena Pavlova and Ivan Romanov’s love had defied the Light Volkhvy queen’s rage. They had broken Vasilisa’s curse six months ago.

  But all was not forgiven.

  Soren’s rejection of Anna following the revelation of her blood when the curse was broken would haunt her forever—and witches, like legendary wolves, lived a very long time.

  She had embraced her new name and accepted her position as the Light Volkhvy princess because this was her life now. There was no place for her with the Romanovs.

  If she could stay far away from the red wolf who had once been her most loyal companion, she might be able to recover. She might be able to come to grips with the power in her blood and maybe even learn to control it. She might forget Soren...eventually.

  But the emerald sword had other ideas.

  Even now, with her chest rising and falling too quickly in almost-panicked respiration, the sword’s Call couldn’t be ignored.

  Her mother had created the legendary Romanov shifters as champions of the Light Volkhvy. With her magic, she had crafted three enchanted swords for the warrior women who would eventually become the enchanted shifters’ wives. The sapphire sword had Called Soren’s brother’s mate from across impossible time and distance to fight by his side. Elena was a human, but she had risked her life to find Bronwal and the legendary black wolf so he could help her defeat an evil witchblood prince who stalked her. She and Ivan had then worked together to break Vasilisa’s curse.

  It was cruel irony that the red wolf’s sword would decide to Call the one woman who would prefer to stay as far away from the Romanovs as possible.

  Her.

  They had been her friends and companions. The red wolf had helped her survive a curse that had trapped her at Bronwal. The curse had threatened her life and her sanity for hundreds of years. Waiting to see Soren Romanov’s human face again had helped her endure.

  Only to have him turn away from her in his wolf form and desert her once the curse was broken—because as the curse broke, it was revealed that Vasilisa was her mother.

  Anna was a witch.

  She’d had to deal with the red wolf’s desertion, and at the same time she’d nearly been overcome by the horror of her true parentage. He had run. But, she’d had nowhere to run from the horrible truth and no one to run away with.

  Anna had come to a place in the forest where the path widened because it intersected with several other paths. Those trails led off in different directions, then disappeared as if the thick woods they tried to penetrate swallowed them.

  She flexed her leather-encased fingers. The gloves on her hands helped to focus and contain the fledgling powers she was only beginning to understand. She hadn’t had the luxury of rejecting who and what she truly was. Her Volkhvy heritage was in her blood. Once she knew, it couldn’t be ignored.

  She’d thought herself an orphan for too long.

  Soren’s father, Vladimir Romanov, had kidnapped her and kept her as insurance against the queen he planned to overthrow. Anna had grown up alongside his children as a foundling they called “Bell.” She’d been ignorant of her witch heritage. When her mother had learned of Vladimir’s part in destroying the village where her baby daughter had been hidden from the threat of the Dark Volkhvy, she had cursed Bronwal to punish Vladimir for “killing” her daughter. Anna had been caught up in the curse, as well.

  The knowledge that she was loved so much that her mother would weave a horrible curse as punishment for her supposed murder was a hot knot in her chest that was composed as much out of relief as it was of guilt.

  But she was also filled with fear. She wasn’t just any witch; she was the daughter of the most powerful witch in existence. How could she trust herself to use the power her own mother had abused?

  She forced the tingling in her fingers to ease off. She willed away the energy she inadvertently tried to channel because of her nerves. Before she’d discovered her identity, her powers had been dormant. Once her mother had begun her training, the power was always there, just beneath the surface of her skin, waiting to be released. It was entirely up to her to keep the energy she could channel in check. As she focused on control, the silence in the forest screamed a warning that roared deep in her ears along with the pounding of her heart.

  There were wolves in the quiet wood.

  She carefully picked her way down the path, heeding the warning that flared at the edges of her perceptions. She wasn’t alone. Ivan was busy at Bronwal. He and his new wife, Elena, were helping all the people who had survived the curse reclaim a modern life. She’d been there first and witnessed the construction, education and modernization that Vasilisa herself was helping to bring about as she tried to make amends.

  That left Anna alone in the woods with Ivan’s brothers, the red wolf...and the white.

  Coming back here was a mistake.

  Her pounding heart most dreaded seeing Soren again, but her head knew that Lev—the white wolf—posed the greatest danger. He was feral. Completely out of touch with the man he’d once been. If it wasn’t for Soren, she would already have her gloves off and her hands would be free in case the white wolf decided to go from stalking to attack.

  She could feel hungry eyes on her back. She’d tried to dismiss the feeling as imagination, but it persisted. Gooseflesh rose on the back of her neck, and it wasn’t the damp air that made her shiver. While she hunted for Soren, she was being stalked herself. Something was definitely out there, hiding in the trees and shadows. It might be the white wolf. Watching and waiting for the perfect moment to attack.

  At the castle, they had told her tha
t Soren was out looking for Lev. That he spent every waking moment trying to catch his wild twin brother and bring him back home. Coming into the woods after Soren Romanov had felt like a risk she had to take, but now she wasn’t so sure.

  Suddenly, a long ululating cry broke the silence.

  The howl came from far away, rising and falling in a weak, thready tone that she immediately pegged as coming from a natural wolf’s throat. She’d heard the Romanov wolves howl. Their shift from human form to wolf could shake the earth. Their vocalizations were much more powerful than this one. The weak howl fell away to nothing, and silence reigned once more.

  Mist swirled. Shadows lurked. Her ears strained to pick up the slightest sound.

  Every instinct she possessed screamed that she wasn’t alone, even as the hush deepened around her.

  The sudden howl had caused her to freeze. Adrenaline rushed to her extremities and, in spite of her cloak, she shivered again against its cool, familiar flow beneath her skin. Her fear had helped her survive Bronwal during the curse. Now it caused her to stand motionless for only a moment before she reached to remove a glove. She couldn’t afford to be frozen by fear. She had to be fueled by it.

  The long shafts of her leather gloves reached almost to her elbows. She pushed the left glove down to her wrist, but then another noise interrupted its removal.

  A step sounded behind her.

  A twig snapped.

  She registered the quality of the sound before she whirled to face her stalker.

  The snap had been caused by the tread of a boot, not a paw.

  Her fingers fell away from the loosened glove. She hadn’t fully removed it. It was abandoned in a bunch around her wrist. She forgot her intention to free her magic as her hands dropped to her sides. They fisted in response to a strange yet hauntingly familiar face as a man materialized from the shadowy path behind her.