My Soul to Take

by C. J. Archer

  I poured myself another cup of tea and waited. We all waited. The others talked quietly among themselves, but I didn't participate. I was worried about what Quin would find in Purgatory upon his return. Chaos? Answers? Would he be allowed to come back?

  Time dragged. Every tick of the clock on the mantel sounded loud, every creak of the house had me casting my eye to the door.

  "Uh, Cara?" Sylvia cleared her throat. "Do you know if we must summon him again for him to reappear?"

  "I…I'm not sure." I felt somewhat foolish. There was so much of Quin's past and current existence that I knew nothing about. If I'd been giving myself advice, I would have told myself not to fall in love with such a mysterious man. It seemed like something only foolish girls would do and I hated to think of myself as silly.

  Just then he reappeared, causing me to jump. Sylvia gasped but covered it with a cough.

  "Well?" Langley barked.

  "Myer was taken to Purgatory from one of the demon realms and requested the administrators' help."

  "Help with what?" I asked.

  "They would not say."

  "And they gave him help in the form of de Mordaunt?"

  "They offered all the spirits the chance to accept the task and use it as a trial. Pass the trial and crossover to a contented afterlife. Fail and be damned forever. De Mordaunt was the first to take up the offer. The administrators gave him a solid form for the task."

  "Why did de Mordaunt accept it if he hasn't accepted any other trials in all this time?" Jack asked.

  "I don't know."

  From the way Quin's eyes flashed, I wondered if de Mordaunt's reason had something to do with him, his presence here and the connection we had with Myer. "I will see you again," de Mordaunt had said before he left. There was something between Quin and de Mordaunt. Perhaps de Mordaunt saw this as an opportunity to get at Quin.

  "I see the administrators allowed you to return," Langley said.

  Quin gave a curt nod. "They asked me to watch and intervene if something goes wrong."

  "It seems they don't trust de Mordaunt either," I muttered.

  Sylvia threw up her hands. "Then why did they let him come at all?"

  "Because every spirit deserves the chance to redeem himself," I told her. "Even sinful ones. It is only the purely evil that are sent to the dark place."

  "I don't like that they're testing de Mordaunt's soul here, on us."

  "Nor do I," Quin murmured. "Does anyone have a suggestion for where Myer would have taken de Mordaunt?"

  "My guess is London," Jack said. "He's not someone who has ventured far in his lifetime, except to come here and the portal from time to time."

  "Then that's where I'm going." Quin strode toward the door.

  I sprang up and went after him. "It's late. If they ride all the way, they won't reach London until tomorrow evening. You can rest here overnight and catch the train in the morning and still beat them."

  He stared at me a long time, steely resolve glinting in his eyes. All previous softness toward me had vanished. He was worried. He finally nodded. "I will stay here tonight."

  Good. Because I planned to speak to him alone. And tomorrow, I would go with him to London.

  CHAPTER 4

  Dinner was a somber affair, during which few words were exchanged. I had the distinct feeling that everyone had many questions to ask of Quin, but refrained. Knowing he was from Purgatory had changed their attitude toward him. It wasn't that they seemed to fear him now, but rather their manners didn't allow them to ask the questions on their lips—whom did you kill and why was it a mistake?

  Perhaps I was ruder, or perhaps my closer connection to Quin gave me greater allowance, but I decided to confront him on the issue again. Later. Alone.

  "The train departs at nine," Sylvia said, breaking through the silence. "Are you going with him, Jack?"

  Hannah's fingers tightened around her knife and fork, but she did not tell her husband he couldn't go. Jack opened his mouth to speak, but Quin got in first. "I don't need assistance. I will travel to London alone."

  "I'm coming," I said.

  That earned me glares, but only Quin spoke. "No, you're not."

  "Not to help you send back de Mordaunt," I assured him. "I have people to see in the city. I was leaving Frakingham tomorrow anyway."

  Hannah snorted softly.

  "Who?" Sylvia asked, a challenge in her voice. "Emily and Jacob aren't even there."

  I wasn't so sure I liked this forthright Sylvia anymore. She seemed to enjoy saying what she thought a little too much. "People who are not Emily and Jacob."

  "The only other person who has written to you here has been Mr. Faraday."

  Quin stilled beside me.

  "Yes, well." I cleared my throat. "I've decided to pay him a visit. He may have remembered something helpful from the time he was possessed. It happens, you know. Sometimes victims can recall pieces from their memories. Their minds are not always completely overtaken by the spirit. Perhaps he can tell us the name of the medium who helped the ghost of Holloway possess him." I bit my lip to stem my rambling, despite warming to my excuse. Nathaniel Faraday might have something more to tell me. But best of all, I could spend several hours with Quin as we traveled to the city together.

  "You will not put yourself in danger," he said in that tone of voice that invited no argument.

  "Not on purpose, no."

  "You never do it on purpose, Cara, yet danger seems to find you nevertheless."

  I met his narrowed gaze with my own, then tossed him my most dazzling smile to disarm him. "That is hardly my fault."

  His eyes crinkled at the corners and a smile tugged at his mouth. "You're a mischievous imp," he whispered when the chatter resumed around the table.

  A mischievous imp who wasn't giving up.

  I retired early and listened for his footsteps along the corridor. He was only a few minutes after me. I waited a little longer before treading softly toward his room. I knocked on his door and he opened it, not a flicker of surprise on his face at seeing me there.

  He crossed his arms and presented a solid wall of man to block my entry. "You should not have come."

  "I couldn't help it. It's what we mischievous imps do."

  He scowled again but did not move aside. I stood on my tiptoes, reached behind his head, and pulled him down for a kiss. His resistance melted away and he kissed me back, circling his arms around my waist.

  Then I was suddenly jerked inside. He broke the kiss, but I was pleased to see that his face was flushed and his breathing ragged, like my own. "Anyone walking past could have seen," he growled.

  I refrained from once more telling him that I didn't care about my reputation nowadays. He seemed not to be hearing the message and I didn't want to argue with him tonight.

  I shut the door. His scowl resumed and he crossed his arms again. I advanced on him and he backed away. His forehead smoothed and he looked decidedly more anxious.

  "Stay there," he said, sounding like a medieval knight not used to his command being disobeyed.

  I blinked innocently. "Afraid of me, Warrior?"

  "Aye," he said on a breath. "And afraid of my reaction to you if you draw nearer."

  I continued my advance. Every step toward him sent him one step back, as if I were a cat and he my prey. He bumped into the bed and promptly sat on the mattress.

  "I'm not afraid of you," I told him.

  His gaze shifted away. I caught his chin and forced him to look at me again.

  "I'm not afraid of you," I said again, more serious this time.

  His Adam's apple jerked with his hard swallow.

  "Nor will I think you anything but a good man when you tell me what you did to land yourself in Purgatory."

  "I did tell you. I killed…a man who didn't deserve to die by my hand."

  The hesitation wasn't lost on me. "Who did you kill?"

  His jaw tightened beneath my fingers. I softened my grip and stroked the tension away until
I felt him relax again. He placed his hand over mine but did not try to remove it.

  "Was it your wife?" I whispered.

  His wide gaze locked with mine. My breath caught. My heart stopped. For one dreaded moment I thought I'd said too much, crossed a line that he'd drawn for himself.

  "Do you…think that of me?"

  "Of course not, but you've given me so little information. Aside from de Mordaunt, she is the only one you've spoken about with any sourness in your voice." I sat beside him and folded his hand on my knee. "Whenever you speak of her, you don't sound as if you liked her very much. But I thought if you had…killed her, then it must have been a terrible accident, because I know you wouldn't hurt a woman on purpose. Tell me about her."

  I thought he would brush me off again, like he always did when I asked too many questions about his past. But this time he gave a single nod. "It's time you knew."

  I let him gather his thoughts and waited for him to begin.

  "I loved her, at first. She was beautiful, and I was young and naive. I believed she loved me in return. I learned before my death that she hadn't been faithful to me throughout the entire marriage."

  How could a wife not be faithful to a man like Quin? He was kind and handsome, strong and capable. Why would she want to look at other men when she had him in her bed? It wasn't something I felt comfortable telling him, so I simply squeezed his hand and hoped he understood.

  He gave me a flat, grim smile. "I didn't kill her when I discovered the name of her most recent lover." He removed his hand to scrub it through his hair. "I killed him."

  "Who?"

  "My brother, Guy."

  Dear God. It was no wonder he was wracked with guilt. And no wonder he didn't think himself worthy of moving on from Purgatory. Killing one's own kin was a sin indeed and brothers were particularly close. In Medieval times, a brother was a man's greatest ally in battle, a staunch supporter in uncertain, violent times. Or he ought to have been. Guy had betrayed Quin by sleeping with his wife, and Quin had dealt him the ultimate punishment.

  "Go on," I urged him.

  Deep shadows haunted eyes that watched me closely. "You do not look at me as if you think my crime a heinous one."

  "I have the feeling there is much more to this story."

  "It's long and twisted." He blew out a long, slow breath. "I should have known there was something wrong. We were about to head into battle in the Holy Land. We stood together that morning, our squires dressing us in our mail shirts and preparing our weapons. He was very quiet. We all knew the battle would be difficult and we would likely be defeated. When I asked him if he was considering what lay ahead, he confessed instead. He said he'd always loved Maria, but she'd always spurned him, mocking him with her conquests of me and other men. It was just like her to use her beauty to manipulate and I had no reason to disbelieve him. Usually she merely teased him, but the night before we left England, she took him to her bed for the first time. He claimed he was too weak to resist.

  "I was angry. At the time I thought Maria faithful, despite her flirtations. I didn't think she'd ever taken another to her bed…and…my own brother…" He cleared his throat. "I was angry at them both when he told me, but she wasn't there, so I took all my anger out on Guy. We fought in our own camp, without weapons. The king himself broke us apart. No one else dared come near."

  "Did de Mordaunt see all this?"

  "Aye. He relished our fighting. I should have known then that he had a part in it." I was about to ask for an explanation when he put up his hand. "I'm leaping ahead. The fight. The king separated us then we had to go into battle. It was difficult and we lost many good men to the infidels. It was becoming obvious that we needed to withdraw. As I waited for the order to be given, Guy fought his way to me. We'd both lost our horses by then. He apologized and begged forgiveness, but I refused to give it. I was furious. With the battle frenzy upon me, my anger was too powerful for me to overcome. I turned my sword on Guy. He defended the first blow. As I went to strike him a second time, he lowered his sword. He died instantly." He jerked his head to the side, as if turning away from the memory.

  "You weren't expecting his capitulation," I whispered.

  He closed his eyes. "It was his way to make amends."

  "Oh, Quin. I'm sorry for you. No man should have to bear his brother's death on his shoulders. But it was an accident. You know that, right? You never meant to kill him."

  His nod was slight but it was there.

  "Is that what you meant when you said it was a mistake? That you hadn't meant to kill him, only fight, but the administrators in the waiting area didn't quite know what to do about it?"

  He shook his head. "It's more complicated than that. Guy's death is not considered a mistake, but the event that led me to kill him was. Guy only thought it was my wife he'd bedded. Her body was taken over by a shape-shifting demon who seduced him."

  I gawped at him. The startling twist in the tale had rendered me speechless.

  "It wasn't actually my wife," he clarified, mistaking my silence for confusion. "The demon shifted into her form, thereby killing her."

  "Edward De Mordaunt," I managed to whisper.

  He nodded. "He witnessed Guy's death on the battlefield but had been too far away to stop me. He came to me, screaming like a madman, accusing me of being a murderer. I was already feeling guilt and loss, and I didn't disagree with him. I must have told him why I'd done it; I don't recall. He explained that Guy hadn't betrayed me, that I'd killed him for nothing. I didn't really understand what he was telling me, so he decided to prove it. He changed into the shape of the nearest infidel to show me what he could do.

  "I was stunned. I knew nothing of demons or the supernatural then. I thought he was the devil himself come to punish me for the crime I'd committed against my brother. De Mordaunt was stronger than a man ought to be, his movements too fast to be natural. I realized he must be telling the truth and that he'd dampened his speed and ferocity until that point to hide what he was."

  "Did he…love your brother? The way Bollard loves Mr. Langley?" My face flamed. It was one thing to think of Bollard and Mr. Langley as being more than friends, it was quite another to think of two men together in a sexual nature. It wasn't an image a respectable young woman was supposed to conjure.

  "I don't know if theirs was that kind of love. After his display, de Mordaunt changed back to his usual form again. He was still angry, but there was pain in his eyes too. He told me he loved Guy and wanted him to enjoy the object of his desire before going into battle—Maria. He said he knew of Guy's love for her and her spurning of him. On that last night in England, he came to Guy in the night, using her form."

  "That's cruel beyond words," I said. "To use her body to encourage a man to betray his own brother. That's not love, that's…madness."

  "Aye, de Mordaunt was—is—mad. I think Guy's death made him worse. He wanted me to suffer for killing him. He didn't know how much I was already suffering. It was he who told me of Maria's infidelities, in an attempt to prove to me that the seduction wasn't Guy's fault but hers. 'How can a man who loves a woman as deeply as he loved her turn that woman away when she offers herself to him?' That's what he told me."

  He'd been staring down at his hands, balled into fists on his knees, but now his gaze lifted to mine. "On that, I agree with him," he rasped. "It's nigh impossible."

  It was his way of telling me to stay away. I did not think losing my virtue to the man I loved was a sin, but he would, and he already carried enough guilt. I didn't want to add more.

  "You died in that battle," I prompted him.

  He nodded. "I lived a moment or two more after de Mordaunt confessed. I could not think clearly. With everything he'd said playing on my mind, and with my heart sore over what I'd done…my reactions slowed. An infidel cut me down from behind."

  That's how he'd got the two long scars on his back. I traced them through his shirt, but pulled my hand away when he drew in a shuddery breath of d
esire. I must not tempt him.

  "If your intention wasn't to kill Guy, why were you sent to Purgatory? Couldn't they see that your soul wasn't bad?"

  "The administrators in the waiting area couldn't overlook my crime. It was still a grave sin. They decided Purgatory would give me a chance to redeem my soul. Once there, I was asked if I wanted to perform a trial. I refused."

  "Because of the guilt you felt."

  He nodded. "I wanted to remain in the dungeons as punishment, but they assigned me warrior duties instead."

  "Because they didn't blame you for killing Guy. It wasn't really your fault, after all. It was de Mordaunt's."

  "And it was their fault that he was on our realm at all." At my arched brow, he added, "Edward's ancestor, Gilbert de Mordaunt, was a soul in Purgatory when he discovered a way to escape and come here, to this realm, and live again. Once here, the administrators could not get him back. There were no warriors then. Gilbert lived peacefully and had children; they had children and so on. Four generations later, Edward was born with strong shape-shifting powers."

  "So Edward's crime came about through their negligence," I finished for him.

  "It was a supernatural crime caused by the administrators' error. In light of that, I have been given special consideration and privileges. I can be a warrior forever."

  "That's remarkable. I had no idea the administrators could make errors. It sounds so…human." A thought occurred to me. "What happened to Edward de Mordaunt after your death? Why was he sent to the Purgatory dungeons? It seems like he ought to go straight to Hell for what he did to Guy and you. And Maria."

  "Despite his ancestry, and being in possession of Gilbert's book, Edward didn't know that shifting shape into another living person would kill them. He had never read the entire book. Nor did he seduce Guy out of maliciousness. It was born of love."

  "He was certainly malicious toward you! And Maria too."

  "Souls aren't sent to the dark place for ignorance or inconsiderateness. Only the blackest souls burn in Hell. His wasn't deemed black enough, but it wasn't pure enough to move onto a better afterlife either. So he was sent to Purgatory for the trials."