“The neph won’t break,” Ambrosius said in my ear.
My hand tightened on the sofa arm and my stomach sank. Not worth it. I switched to aether-sight and located Ambrosius standing by the sofa to my left. His eyes were bright in the swirling gray and blue aether. He looked ... shaken.
Oh, man. What had he seen? “You actually went down and checked up on him?”
Ambrosius nodded. “You were worried, so I snuck down into the lair and peeked in on him.” He squeezed his eyes shut. “If we don’t intervene, there will be nothing left of the neph to question.”
It was like last time. The Mind Reaper was having fun and forgetting about what we needed. “Bane. We need to do something.”
“I may be able to help.” Adam, Dorian’s right-hand man, strode into the room.
He wasn’t alone. There were other Sanguinata with him. Their clothes were bedraggled and they looked as if they could do with a hot shower, but their eyes gleamed with triumph.
“You left Dorian.” I strode over to him and yanked him into a hug before he could respond. He tensed for a moment and then returned the embrace. “I knew you wouldn’t stand for his shit for much longer.”
“I wouldn’t agree to ally with the shades, and so he locked me up. But there were others who agreed with me, and they let me out. We escaped and went to Gregory for sanctuary.” He pulled back. “If it’s information you need extracted, then I may be able to help.”
Of course, the Sanguinata had the ability to both play and extract memories. “Can you extract memories from someone who isn’t Sanguinata?”
“I can.”
“Come with me.” I grabbed his wrist and headed for the door.
***
The door to the corridor leading to Rivers’s secret torture room was ajar, and my pulse fluttered with nerves. Adam stepped into the cell room behind me, but I propelled him back into the lab.
“Wait here.” I pressed a palm to Adam’s chest. “It might spook him if we both go in.”
Adam raised a skeptical brow. “Are you sure? I’ve heard tales of the Mind Reaper ... I don’t feel good about you going in alone.”
A few weeks ago, I’d have felt the same, especially since the last time I’d crossed paths with the Reaper he’d tried to throttle me. But the more I’d thought on it, the more I’d realized that if he’d really wanted me dead, he could have snapped my neck in a second. Instead, he’d played with me until Rivers had resurfaced.
Still, the possibility that my assessment was wrong made my throat tight with anxiety. “I’ll be fine. Trust me. If I need you, I’ll scream.”
“I’d rather it not get to that stage,” Adam said.
“It won’t. Just please stay here until I call you in, okay?”
He sighed. “Fine, but hurry. There’s blood.” His nostrils flared. “A lot of blood.”
Of course there was. “Give me a few minutes.”
Leaving Adam in the main lab, I stepped back into the cell room and slipped down the corridor leading to the hidden torture room. The door was closed, with only the access panel to allow entry. Only one way to get inside, and that was courtesy of Rivers or the Reaper. I hammered on the metal and waited, mentally preparing myself for whatever lay beyond. Ambrosius’s bright-eyed horror came to mind. Please don’t let it be as bad as last time. Please.
Long seconds passed and then the door opened with a click. The coppery stench of blood hit me full force and déjà vu assaulted me. Here we were again. Back on the fucking merry-go-round with Rivers standing over the bloody dismembered body of our neph. He’d taken a foot and a hand so far, cut neatly through the ankle and wrist. Runes had been cruelly cut into every inch of the neph’s flesh and they glowed dully, green and red. The neph was blissfully unconscious. Yeah, Reaper was in the house. He raised his bone saw and pointed it at the neph’s other hand.
Resisting the urge to gag, and tearing my gaze away from the butchery, I focused on Rivers’s back. “Step away from him, Reaper.”
Reaper turned to face me, his face smeared with crimson, eyes clear, bright and accusatory. “What is your problem?”
“My problem is that you’re supposed to be extracting information, not body parts.”
Reaper glanced back at the unconscious neph. “He’ll live for as long as I need him to.”
“Not if he bleeds out, he won’t. This isn’t a fucking shade-infected neph that can heal himself.” My voice had risen, betraying my true emotions. Shit, I needed to control my temper.
“I know what this is.” His eyes narrowed. “I know what I’m doing. I’ve been doing it forever. This is all I do. This is who I am.”
Was that a hint of desperation in his tone? “Well, you can stop now. We have another way to get the information we need, so you’re ...” What? “Relieved of duty?” I hated that the last bit came out as a question, and he pounced on it.
“Relieved of duty? You think I work for you? That you control me?” He let out a bark of mirthless, brittle laughter. “You know nothing.” He paused and lifted his chin, inhaling sharply before looking over my head at the door. “You brought a filthy blood feeder with you?”
How could he know? “Adam is a Sanguinata, and he can extract the information we need without—”
“What? Cutting? Stabbing? Making the target bleed?” His lip curled. “Now, where is the fun in that?” His tone dripped with sarcasm, but his eyes were flat and emotionless. His eyes said that this wasn’t fun. This was ... necessary.
My anger ebbed. “You can stop now. Let Rivers back up.”
My softer tone seemed to throw him. He blinked and took a step back. “This is what I do.”
“I know. But you don’t need to do it right now. Please, give Rivers back.”
The mention of Rivers’s name had his expression hardening into razor-sharp angles. “Rivers? That sniveling, whining, pathetic creature? You’d rather have him than me after everything I’ve done? After every time I’ve fought alongside you?” He paused, and the irritation melted from his features to be replaced with a knowing smile. He pressed a finger to that smile. “You’d choose him over me after what we shared.”
What we shared? A cold chill pricked my skin. “What are you talking about?”
His tongue flicked out to lick his lips. “I’m talking about my mouth on your cunt.”
Heat climbed up my chest and burned in my cheeks. What. The. Fuck. “No.”
He grinned sadistically. “Oh, yes. You think Rivers would have the balls to take what he wanted? I had to do it for him, just like I’ve had to do everything else. Who do you think was there to shield him when Ryker’s sister was killed? Who took the driver’s seat and watched the carnage? Who unleashed the power of our siren call? Who fought back to back with you in the warehouse when The Breed attacked?” He thumped his chest. “Me. It was me, and I’ll do it again, because without me, Rivers is nothing.”
His words were like physical blows pushing me back until I was up against the wall. He was on me in an instant, his bloody face too close, too invasive, with the brutal scent of him making me dizzy.
“In the warehouse, you tasted like a wicked storm,” he said. “I wonder what you’ll taste like right now?”
My stomach clenched, part revulsion, part desire. No. He was testing me, trying to throw me off balance, trying to hide his insecurities, because I could see the glimmer of sorrow and loneliness in his crazy eyes. He was hiding it beneath his crude words and his invasive actions.
I cupped his cheek. “You’re not dispensable, Reaper. You’re a part of Rivers, and you belong. But right now, I need Rivers back. Please.”
He frowned, drinking me in, and then he leaned in and pressed his lips to mine. The kiss was brief, almost angry, and then he pulled back and opened his eyes. The crazy was gone.
Rivers was back.
***
Adam finished mind probing the neph and slowly lowered the body to the ground. “He’s dead.”
Rivers strode out of
the room, his boots echoing down the corridor. He’d barely said a word since resurfacing. He wouldn’t even look at me. How much of what the Mind Reaper had said had Rivers heard? Fuck, how must he be feeling right now? He needed a moment to gather himself. So, resisting the urge to follow him, I focused on Adam and the dead neph.
“Did you manage to get any information?”
“Yes, a few landmarks, a hatch and a metal door marked with a strange symbol and the word Genesis. I saw him insert some kind of chip into a slot in the wall.” He dug through the neph’s pockets and extracted a small rectangular object. “I think this is how we get inside. We need to search east of The Deep along the coast. The place is definitely underground. Somewhere by the old watermill.”
“Okay, so we get over there, and we sweep the area.”
Adam frowned. “I have a bad feeling about this. When I scanned his mind I sensed fear, a lot of it. At first, I assumed it must be to do with the Reaper and what just happened, but it felt older than that. More residual in nature.”
“So, the neph was afraid of Asher. Nothing new there. That dude can be pretty scary.”
Adam sighed. “I guess so. Let’s just be extra wary when we go in.”
I grinned. “This is what we do, Adam. The MPD are trained for this shit.”
“Good to know.” He stood up and stepped carefully around the congealing pool of blood on the floor. “I need to warn you that Dorian has loaned Asher his elite Sanguinata fighters. Sanguinata like me. There aren’t many, but they’re well fed and they’re old enough to be powerful.”
“I figured as much. Does he really believe Asher will keep his word and give the Sanguinata free reign on all the humans?”
“Dorian’s sense of self-importance and arrogance makes him immune to the subtle nuances of political agenda. He can’t see that Asher doesn’t give a shit about anyone or anything but his own cause.”
“But he wasn’t always that way,” Xavier said from the doorway.
God, I couldn’t let him see what Rivers had done; no one needed to see this. I blocked his entrance and ushered him back into the corridor. Adam followed and we spotted Ryker by the door leading into the cell room.
“Let’s just head back. Please.” I gently steered Xavier down the corridor, but his wide eyes told me he’d seen the dismembered body.
Back in the lab, I rounded on Ryker. “What were you thinking bringing him down here?”
Ryker pressed his lips together. “We were worried about you, and Xavier is one of us now.”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “I didn’t mean it that way, I just ... it’s not a pretty sight in there.”
“You don’t have to protect me,” Xavier said softly. “I’ve seen many things in the heat of battle, many horrific things. The creatures our creator asked us to lock away did not all go easily—there was war, there was death, and there was much destruction. And through it all, Asher was our anchor. I saw him weep over the needless deaths of God’s creations, and toward the end, I saw the doubt in his eyes. This man who now commands the shades is not the Asher I knew. The Asher who led us back then is lost to us.”
Yeah, my thoughts precisely. “Adamah seems to think Asher can be saved.”
“If only that were true,” Xavier said. “I have looked into his eyes and seen the absence of the soul that made him the man he was. Our time in our prison burned the goodness out of him. It killed every ounce of compassion, leaving only vengeance and ambition.”
Asher and the shades were victims of a higher power’s reign. They’d been used and then discarded. They had every right to want vengeance against the god who’d done that to them, but that god was gone, and the winged couldn’t be held accountable for their creator’s decision, not when they couldn’t even remember imprisoning the shades.
“I’m sorry for what happened to you, but what Asher is doing is lashing out, and if he won’t see reason, then he needs to be stopped any way that we can.”
Xavier inclined his head. “I agree. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.”
“Then let’s get moving,” Adam said. “If one of the other neph saw us capture this one, then Asher will be mobilizing his forces to defend himself and this”—he held up the weird chip—“will be useless to us.”
“Even if we’ve lost the element of surprise,” Xavier said, “it doesn’t mean we can’t beat him. We’ll just have to be extra smart about our attack.”
I headed for the door. “Let’s gather the others and come up with a plan.”
***
Leaving Adam, Ryker, and Xavier to gather the others in the lounge, I headed to the second floor to search for Rivers. My soft knock received no response, but his presence beyond the door was like a warm glow. He was connected to me, and his pain manifested as a deep ache inside my chest. Pushing open the door, I stepped into the gloom illuminated only by the starlight streaming in through the French windows. Rivers stood with his back to me, silhouetted in moonlight.
“Sorry doesn’t seem to be enough,” he said.
“You don’t need to be sorry.”
“There is no other way to feel.” His fists clenched. “I hate this.”
“What?”
“Him.”
But his words held no fire, no spark that screamed revulsion. It was as if he’d told himself the same story so many times he’d become disconnected with it, able to reiterate it by rote without any real enthusiasm.
“Do you hate him, Rivers? Or are you grateful for what he can do for you?” Yes, it sounded like I was advocating for the Reaper, and maybe that was the case, but it felt right.
He spun to face me. “How can you suggest such a thing?” Torment etched lines across his beautiful face. “How can you think that?” The final words were a whisper.
“I’ve spoken to him. Seen him in action, and I know you. You made the Reaper. You coaxed him into being because he was needed. Maybe you do hate the things he does, but you don’t hate him, because without him, it’d be you committing those acts.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. “I can hear him laughing, taunting me.”
“Only you can control him, Rivers, because he is you.”
For the first time since I’d known him, Rivers looked vulnerable. His cool facade cracked and gaped, allowing me a glimpse into his torment. It hit me in the solar plexus like a physical blow, and a sharp gasp escaped my lips.
There was more, something more he was hiding from me. It was a menacing shadow hanging over him, sucking any joy that dared to cling to him. “What? What is it? Rivers, what aren’t you telling me?”
“The thing is ... I’m not sure ...”
“Not sure about what?”
He swallowed hard. “I’m not sure who the real Rivers is anymore. Me or him.” He made to take a step toward me but checked himself. “What if I’m the construct? What if I’m the facade he created to show the world? What if I’m the normal face he wants to hide the killer behind?”
Is this what he’d feared all along? Is this why he’d been wound so tight all this time? He was questioning his very existence ...
No way could I allow that to continue, especially when every instinct in me told me he was wrong. “Stop it. Listen to me. I spoke to the Reaper and what he said confirms that you came first. He just happens to be the one who does the shit you can’t stand to do.”
He pressed the heel of his hand to his temple, his disconcertion evident. “You think I’m a coward.”
“No. I think you’re a sensitive soul who abhors unnecessary violence.”
He snorted, cracking a self-deprecating smile. “A damned handicap for someone in my line of work.”
“It’s not a handicap to care too much. It’s not a handicap to love.” I took a step toward him, but his hand shot up to ward me off, and the water in the jug on his bedside table surged up and spilled over onto the floor. It was rare to see him lose control of his elemental power and an indication of how off balance he was at that moment.
&
nbsp; “Shit.” He lowered his hand.
“It’s okay. It’s just water.”
He closed his eyes and breathed in and out until the furrow in his brow melted away. When he opened his eyes, they were as serene as a summer sea. “I’m damaged, Serenity. I don’t know if I’ll ever be the kind of man you deserve.”
There was no way for me to empathize with what he was going through. He’d literally split himself in two to survive. Whereas Drayton was sharing his body with an actual separate entity, Rivers had been fighting himself for decades. How did you gain the upper hand on someone who knew your every thought, want, and need? How exhausting must it be to remain in control day in, day out, and how frustrating for the dark side who worked to protect and was forever shunned and despised for it. It had to end now. It had to end, but the end would need to begin with acceptance.
I walked up to Rivers and cupped his face with my hands to stare deep into his pale eyes. “Does it look like I care?”
His lids fluttered closed. “I know you don’t. But what if I hurt you?”
“You won’t. I trust you. I trust you both.” I tilted my chin and kissed him lightly on the lips. “And I’m willing to wait for you, for as long as it takes.”
He pressed the side of his nose to mine. “I’m just afraid that day might never come.”
***
The lounge was crammed full of people: Gregory, Adam, the primary nephs, Abigor, Abbadon, Malphas, Ava, and Marika. We’d plan our strategy and then pass on the details to our troops. Asher had the Sanguinata, he had the shades, and he had way too many hosts at his disposal. This was war, and there was no skimping when it came to resources.
“Genesis?” Abbadon asked. “You saw that on the door?”
“Yes,” Adam said. “There was also a symbol of interlocking snakes.”
Abbadon’s face drained of color.
“What? What is it?” Cassie probed.
“It can’t be ...” Bane said.
“It must be,” Malphas replied. “We shut them down, but we obviously didn’t get all their facilities.”
Savior of Midnight_an Urban Fantasy Novel Page 13