Altered: A Beyond the Brothel Walls Novel

by Ryans, Rae Z.

  I had no need of magic. The answer was simple. The ability to read situations hadn’t failed me until Cain, and the power failed only with him. Why does everything revolve around him? A sigh tickled my chest, and I prayed for Father to listen, to end this already.

  In a soft voice unlike him, Markos said, “What if the answer is love? Father preached it to us as well as the humans.”

  “Cut the crap, Mark.” I groaned, shimmied into a sitting position, and ran a hand over my face. The stench of myself almost knocked me out, even War’s nose curled. His well-being wasn’t my concern, though, and he could deal with my stink or leave.

  “You know I care not for the ways of others.” He did, though; Mark hid it better than the rest of us, but only a moron would miss the way his eyes lit whenever Belletrist entered the room. “Okay, so she matters. But you’ve already forbade me.” Pain laced through his tone.

  My head squeezed and ached unlike ever before. “Leave Cain and Belles alone,” I pointed my finger, “that’s an order.”

  Red eyes sparkled and bore into me. A reflection of me, but Markos was taller and more muscled. Some might have said intimidating, but his tactics didn’t work on me. I saw the truth, the lies, and rumors he’d made up to keep everyone away, in his gaze. We went hand-in-hand, yet we were opposites as much as we were alike. I gave into carnal pleasure, whereas my brother had been celibate since meeting Belle. On his asking, I’d maintained his façade of whips, whores, and chains, partly assuming there had always been a little truth.

  Studying him, I didn’t believe a word of it. “Bastard. Why didn’t you tell me, Mark?”

  Markos curled his fist and shook it in the air again. “You are blind and a fool. Father should never have chosen you to lead us. You punish us. You choose them over your own brethren.” His voice lowered. “I love you, Brother, but I love her too. I’ve loved her enough to change, to be the type of man she deserves because making her happy, seeing her smile, brightens my world. You had that and wanted to destroy it.”

  I rolled my eyes and groaned. “We’ve established that.”

  Voices filtered from downstairs through the old ventilation ducts. The Old Norman-French accent I recognized straight away, belonging to Tomas. I strained, waiting to hear Cain’s southern draw, but the others were alien to my ears.

  “Good, because you have visitors, but take a shower unless you’d rather make them enemies.” Markos said nothing else, rose from my bed, and departed.

  I flung myself over, back onto the bed, and winced as my head rattled and throbbed. A deep breath brought hints of Cain’s scent. The slight smolder and spice had attached itself to my pillows, sheets, and blanket and refused to vacate. My bed became a prison, a warm and memory filled cell of the man I had let go. I wasn’t like Markos; I couldn’t simply change for another person.

  Cain haunted my thoughts once again. At times, I even searched for his caramel eyes in the shadows of my room. Over the past week, I had tried to venture downstairs. When I had managed to, the walls closed in on me as soon as the remnants of Cain caught my attention. Piled neatly on my office chair were his clothes. He must’ve taken his boots, but Belle had moved the rest. Forgetting proved to be another story, a story that would not have a successful conclusion.

  In my absence, Belle had followed standard protocol and contacted the vampires, ABDA again, and as I had requested, the Arcadian council. Daily, she had made her reports.

  She knocked on the open door Markos had failed to close. “Cain’s missing according to Tomas,” Belle said in a somber tone. “No note.”

  I blinked at her. “Bloody fucking hell.” I yanked the covers away. Rarely did I say bloody hell anymore. Pain surged through my brain once again from the motion. I attempted to focus and grasped my dresser for support. His disappearance was my fault. She didn’t need to say the words. My hand tore through my hair, and Belle made a face, curling her nose in disgust. What had Markos said about Cain?

  “Shite.” What if my brother was wrong? No, I would take no chances.

  Belle cleared her throat. “You need a shower, and you look like shit frozen over, boss.”

  No one else would ever dare speak down to Death, but Belle and my fellow Horsemen. Even the ABDA chose their words wisely, but I cared little about jabs or empty words.

  Belle shoved me away from the dresser. “Get your skanky ass in the shower. Damn it, Dorian, you’re being such a pussy.”

  I smirked as she pushed me, this time toward the bathroom. My hands flew into the air. “Alight. Damn it, I’m going.”

  “And wash behind your ears.” She slammed the door.

  My reflection loomed before me. I resembled a lumberjack more than Death. Twenty minutes later, clean and trimmed, I had redressed and stood at the top of the stairs.

  “Get a grip.” I smacked myself and trembled from head to toe. Every step became a rollercoaster rushing downward, and pins and needles pricked throughout my body.

  Firelight bathed my large office in an orange glow. I didn’t know the day or time and frankly, I didn’t care.

  “Dorian.” Tomas leaned against his cane. His pale blue eyes studied me, squinting behind ridiculous, orange-tinted goggles. He pushed them upward and left them on top of his straw colored hair.

  Out of respect, I bowed, and Duc Tomas Artois reciprocated.

  A longhaired man stood at his side by the fireplace, his hair obscuring him; he was wearing an outdated pantsuit, complete with long tails.

  They need to stop raiding the theater. A loud ruckus rose from outside. Two voices shouted. The male held a thick British accent, as he said, “Angelica, we don’t have time to waste on toffers and twits. My brother…”

  A woman said, “Your brother? What about mine? And stop calling me Angelica—she is dead!”

  Two Elioud crashed through my front door and stumbled into my office.

  “You are Angelica…” The redheaded male trailed, his amber eyes meeting mine.

  I cocked my head. On a second take, the tiny—midget seemed more fitting—dark-haired Angelica was an Elioud vampire, like Tomas. More so, though, she strongly resembled Cain’s sister, the one he’d told me not to worry about, except the woman barely came to my waist. The one in the tintype had been taller. I tilted my head to the left.

  Grasping her arm, the ginger-haired man could have passed for Nephilim, even an Archangel. Power radiated from his center and jumped with his heartbeat. He swallowed hard and composed himself, his energy waning.

  “I am neither a toffer,” my lips twitched at his whorish reference, “nor a twit.”

  “Right you are, Dorian,” Tomas said. “On both accounts, now, let me introduce my friends, Veric, Angelica, and Nicolai.”

  Ginger man scoffed at his ‘friends’ reference, but the pixie vampire beamed as she grasped my hands. My brow rose. Tomas introduced his cousin, Korrigan, not Angelica or Angel, but he supplied no last name.

  Nikolai von Baron, the former human, turned demonic horse but turned back to human, bowed to me. He said, “Sir,” before turning around again.

  ABDA Special Agent Veric Garland, the elusive Elioud who supposedly headed my division, although no one had met him, tweaked his lips. “Charmed,” he said. “Now, let’s get on it blokes and madams. We’re wasting our bloody time.”

  I eased behind my desk, noting it thoroughly ransacked, and frowned. My siblings remained upstairs, and I cursed them out within my mind, praying the meddlesome pricks listened.

  Tomas ignored my mental outburst and asked, “You accepted a case involving an Elioud witch named Lily Westcott?”

  ”Yes.” I offered them seats.

  Belle dragged in extra chairs, but the human shook his head. Tomas and Korri slipped into the leather seats, and Veric paced behind them, his hands folded behind his back. Boss or not, this was my office and my operation.

  “Cain,” I whispered, and the sound of his name off my own lips squeezed my heart. I coughed to disguise the twisting of my face. �
��Cain Westcott brought the case to me.”

  Belle scooted her chair across the wooden floor, pulling up beside Korrigan.

  Tomas said, “Two months ago, we attacked a string of brothels in Delphia owned by the demon Jules Garland.”

  “We? I know of Jules.”

  Belle shrugged and shook her head. I hadn’t known Jules was a Garland. We didn’t have this intel, and I scribbled the new notes down on a piece of paper.

  Veric replied, “Knew mate, my father is dead.”

  Tomas held up his hand, and Veric flashed me a crooked grin. Despite the red hair, he resembled his brother, Boric, the self-proclaimed King of Garland. Jules was their father? Why would he not have been the king?

  “We meaning Petre and I.”

  Laughter rippled through me, and I shook my head, scratching the words into the precious paper.

  “Surely, it’s not that unbelievable.” Tomas crossed his legs and pretended offense, but a small smile played on his lips.

  My elbows rested on my desk, and tears pricked my eyes. The pompous Duc raided a brothel?

  “Merde, Dorian, I know. Surprised me too.”

  “Sorry.” The laughter refused to leave my body. “You had possession of Lily, then?”

  Veric mumbled, “Not by choice,” under his breath, and Korrigan swatted him without so much as a glance behind her.

  Something more was going on here. What were they trying to hide? “What do you mean not by choice? Did you or didn’t you have her?” I stared directly at Veric.

  “We, meaning Angelica and I, didn’t know until now that the woman we’d rescued was most likely her sister.” He leaned and looked down at Korrigan. “Tomas knew but as usual, he failed to relay the information in a timely fashion.”

  Tomas ignored him and recounted the raids, elaborating where he thought it necessary to prove himself capable. “It’s true. I kept her identity a secret.”

  I stretched and cracked my back. “Why?”

  “Because I didn’t want to hurt anyone…What happened before…It’s too late now, but I’m almost 100 percent positive.” Tomas lowered his head.

  My hands pressed against the top of my desk. “So you and Petre raided brothels in Delphia and freed women, men, and children.” I cracked a small smile. “I’m impressed. But how did Garland find you?” Sounded as if Petre did most of the dirty work.

  “Jules had stolen me,” Korrigan whispered. “Petre bought me from him, and Jules knew where he lived.”

  “We’re not exactly unknown up here,” Tomas added and leaned forward on his cane.

  What I waited for Tomas to explain was how the demon horse had become human, but it didn’t arrive. My eyes locked with Veric’s amber glower. “We have a common enemy, then. Your brother has something in his possession, and I’d like her back.” For Cain. “And if she isn’t Lily, I’ll keep looking and looking and looking.”

  Korrigan rose from the chair and cleared her throat. A light shined in her amber colored eyes, and I had to wonder if she wasn’t Heaven sent. The quiet strength she held made me pause and listen.

  Childlike in appearance, but her words flowed forth and reached beyond her years. “I know Lily. We grew up together in Hampshire House in Delphia. Jules had owned us both, but he called her Roxie.” Her bottom lip trembled, and her eyes glistened. “When Petre liberated them…” Her resolve faltered and her strength crumbled. “I’m sorry.”

  Footsteps carried overhead and trailed into the stairwell. Those who breathed held their breaths while the first tear leaked from Korrigan’s eye. Crying didn’t make her weak, though. Elioud and vampire combined, yet the woman before me appeared pure, and her reactions almost human. She loved. An aura, the light of her heart surrounded her.

  Hallo eased from the staircase and strolled forward. Her head nodded and she mouthed, “The queen.” She halted in the doorway of my office.

  Another misprint in history I hadn’t caught? I rubbed my chin. My sister nodded again.

  “She walks among us,” Fauna had said.

  Damned yet pure. The same light radiated from Cain, and the radiance spread, glowing from Tomas, even Belle. They were all descendants of Lucifer...puzzle pieces plopped into place. My brother may have been damned, but his kin were not.

  Veric gathered Korrigan into his arms and shushed her. He continued on her behalf, as she sobbed against his chest, “Some of the victims turned on us. Stockholm syndrome, or who the bloody hell knows. Garland led an airship and ransacked some of the safe houses too. The majority of Petre’s people are safe with the ABDA, but a ship captured Lily and those staying with Tomas. They may have taken Cain again. I don’t know.”

  My attention snapped up when he said again. Part of me suspected he had spent time in the brothels. Part of me hoped he’d been a labor slave, like Belle, not that her life had been any easier than those in the brothels. Cain never elaborated. I never pressed him either. The fire popped at the same time as my jaw, and my gaze darted to the floor.

  “You all right, mate?”

  My fists curled, nails scraping the papers strewn over the desk. No, I was not all right. Further from all right. Red tinted the edges of my vision, and heat spread over my neck. I palmed the sweaty surface, scratching deep into my flesh. The demons would pay. I would track and kill every one of them. Hunt them until the end of time itself if that was what it required. Wrong to shove Cain aside. My head hung in shame.

  Tomas clamped a cold hand on my shoulder. “You didn’t know, Dorian, did you?”

  I hadn’t noticed his movement. I shook my head and stormed through my desk. Papers flew and my hands blindly searched for the photo. “Why the fuck did you move my shite around. Do I call you up for a chat, visit, and move your shite?”

  Besides Cain’s clothes and my memories, the tintype was all I had of him. If the Horsemen would not let me end the world, I would destroy those who had harmed Cain.

  The two Elioud spoke in hushed tones, and the strange human said nothing to my outburst. My finger touched the cold, tin photograph. Pain seared through my aching heart. Their eyes reflected no pain, yet I had witnessed the yearning in his butterscotch gaze; the same reflected in Korri’s amber eyes now. A struggle had warred within him, but not the same as mine. What ghosts had chased him when he closed his eyes? When I’d kissed or made love to him? I glanced at Korrigan, shifting toward the photograph. Her gaze lifted as I said, “This is you…you…”

  “I’m not Lily,” she said.

  My finger flicked the older woman standing behind them. “Angelica Westcott.”

  “Garland,” Veric corrected. “Westcott-Garland.”

  She balled her tiny fists at her sides. “Korri Von Baron. Why can’t you get that through your thick skull?”

  A sudden urge to smack my head against my desk overtook my senses. The last name didn’t matter.

  “We were on our way to find Lily and the others, when we ran into rather unfortunate circumstances,” Tomas said. Nikolai snorted, but Tomas’ attention remained on me.

  My gaze fell and fixated on the photograph shaking in the air.

  “We lost Petre, then I heard your summons.”

  “I wasn’t going after her, yet. Cain had only brought me the case a week ago before we... parted.” Maybe longer depending on what day it was. Well not just her, I had to find the others, retrieve the keys for my siblings, and manage a way to control the south. But without a solid lead, I hadn’t known where to begin, and Cain had been trying to stop me from uncovering the truth. Why? So he had a past. So what. We all had one.

  Tomas frowned and shook his head. “I gave him Belle’s card seven months ago.”

  “Fuck,” the curse ripped through my lips, and my cheeks flushed at the memory.

  The Duc moved to his seat. “Cain went through a rough patch after his boyfriend cheated. He lost his job and almost his home.”

  I pressed on my throbbing temples. Shite was I an asshole. Do not think about it. They will all know the truth.
You broke Cain.

  Tomas’s hands folded, unfolded, reflecting a man deep in thought. “I assume you care for him.”

  Yes… maybe love…if my battered heart can love again…oh look who is lying now, you shoddy bastard. In hell and up a creek without a paddle, fuck me, I do love Cain.

  Veric’s foot tapped, and Korrigan’s brow rose. The pixie slid from his arms and sat beside Tomas again, wiping the puffy bags lining her porcelain face. She grasped the photograph, and my boss leaned over her. Tears sprang to his eyes.

  “He’s a good bloke.” Veric sniffled. “Went through hell and back with me after we left Garland, but I…lost him in Delphia, after an ambush.”

  Veric was Cain’s brother-in-law? I glanced from Veric to Korrigan, finally understanding. He was Angelica’s husband. Despite appearing as a miniature version of herself, Korrigan truly was Angelica, Cain’s older sister. Shite, and I thought my family had issues.

  Tomas leaned on the chair’s arm; his body twisted and he studied Veric. “You didn’t tell him you were alive? Salaud.”

  Veric shook his head, face beet red.

  “He escaped and traveled north,” Tomas said. “I found him, barely alive, nothing but skin and bones. It took une, deux, trois years to nurse him back to health.” The room fell silent. He sat there, chewing his lip, his face holding a hard scowl. His chair skidded across the floor as he drew himself closer. “You know what they do to the men like him in Garland?”

  Slavery varied in the south, but it wasn’t all-backbreaking labor. Homosexual and good-looking, Cain made a prime candidate as a sex slave. But was I any better than the swine for lusting after him?

  Veric averted his eyes. He knew something more about my Cain. My lips parted, preparing to ask.

  “The brothel changes us,” Korri interrupted, dark brown brows scrunched and her dainty legs swaying, knocking into my desk.

  My brows scrunched too; I wouldn’t have pegged her a former whore. She was too mouthy.

  “They break us, leave us to collect the pieces. Lily is strong, like me, but we each have our breaking points.” Korrigan stood and handed me the photograph. “This is Lily,” her finger flicked the picture, “I don’t recognize Cain, but I wouldn’t.” She touched her nose.