Christian smiled at him, and Ember would have sworn under oath she’d never seen anything so frightening in her entire life.
In a voice low and infinitely dark, his gaze never once wavering from Asher’s face, Christian said, “No one has ever threatened me like that and lived to tell about it, but considering you’re acting as a guard dog on behalf of someone I care about, I’m going to let that go. A word of advice, however: never do it again. Or you’ll be missing much more than your baby-maker, friend. Now piss off. Ember and I need to talk.”
Before the jumping muscle in Asher’s jaw translated into another round of hurled threats, Ember broke in. “Please, Ash. Please, it’s okay.”
Asher looked back and forth between her and Christian, his gaze clearly disbelieving, anger still evident in every feature on his face. Finally he said, “Since no one will tell me exactly what’s going on here, this is what I’m going to do.” He pointed to the door. “I’m going to sit on the sofa in the living room for ten minutes; that’s enough time for you to say whatever it is you have to say, and for my girl to listen. During that time, I will be listening for any noise or indication whatsoever that she is afraid, angry, or even the slightest bit miffed. If I hear anything out of the ordinary, I’ll call the police, and then I’ll be back in this room with the entire set of kitchen knives, whether she likes it or not. Capisce?”
One corner of Christian’s mouth twitched. He stared at Asher for just longer than was comfortable, then said, “Capisce, Pacino.”
Asher looked at Ember, then looked at the knife on the dresser he’d just put down. He picked it up again, gave the two of them a tight smile. He said, “You kids won’t be needing this,” turned, and sailed from the room.
Christian shut the door behind him. It closed with what seemed a deadly soft scrape of wood on wood.
She couldn’t look at him. She looked at her feet instead, still clad in her wet shoes, hanging over the edge of the bed.
“Well. That was a first. I’ve never been threatened with bodily injury by a drag queen before.”
He hadn’t moved from the door. His voice was less frightening than when he’d spoken to Asher, but there was still a hard edge to it, though she sensed he was trying to control himself for her sake.
“He’s not a drag queen, he’s gay,” she said, feeling miserable and confused and exhausted. “And he used to be in the Marines. Gay Marines are the toughest people on earth.”
“He’s wearing fluffy slippers, September. And women’s pajamas.”
Faintly, Ember protested, “Those are Gaultier.”
Ignoring that, Christian said, “You’re still wet.” He sounded mad about it.
Following his tactic, she sidestepped his comment. “Say what you have to say, Christian. Then leave. Please. I can’t digest all this in the span of one night. Especially with you here—like that.”
She made a vague gesture with her hand to indicate his lack of a shirt, which up until now she had been doing a very good job of not focusing on. He hovered enticingly in her peripheral vision, however—bare chest and golden skin and sculpted muscles—so she turned her eyes to the opposite wall, letting them rest on an oil painting in a hideous gilt frame her father had bought for her on a whim at the same flea market where he’d bought her divan. It depicted a litter of sleeping kittens curled together on a knitted blanket in a basket, which at the moment seemed incredibly sinister.
“Oh? Do you find the sight of my body distracting?”
His voice sent a shiver through her. It had changed from dangerous to soft, a liquid sensuality like warmed honey sliding over her skin. She closed her eyes against it and said, “Just say what you came here to say.”
There was silence, then a sigh. Then, without warning, his arms wrapped around her.
“Ten minutes,” he whispered when she tried to push him away. “Ten minutes and then if you still want me to, I’ll walk out that door and I swear you’ll never see me again.”
He was on his knees at the bedside and she was curled into his chest, her face in her hands, shaking. She tried to swallow around the fist in her throat, but couldn’t, and her breath caught.
“I can’t…I can’t…”
He pushed her weak protests aside, lifted her in his arms, and deposited them both back onto the bed. He pulled her up against his body and buried his face into her neck. “Ten minutes. Ember. Just ten minutes.”
His voice now was barely audible, but she didn’t miss the pleading tone. It was dizzying, his switch from deadly predator to sweet suitor, and maddening, too.
How on earth was she supposed to deal with this? With him?
“Don’t get mad,” he warned. Which, naturally, made her mad.
“I can’t help being upset! Put yourself in my shoes for a second!”
His arms tightened around her back. “I’m only saying that so I won’t get sliced to ribbons by a knife-wielding drag queen—” when she stiffened, he quickly amended that to, “Gay ex-Marine. If he hears you getting mad, I’ll be neutered, remember?”
Ember pressed her lips together to stifle the hysterical laugh that threatened to bubble up from her throat. The thought of Asher getting the drop on Christian was impossibly funny. She figured he’d just turn to a raincloud or a wisp of smoke to avoid Asher’s lunge.
Because she wasn’t in a rational state of mind, Ember relented. “Fine,” she whispered. “Ten minutes.”
He pressed a fleeting kiss to her throat, warm and soft, and before she could protest he’d sat up, bringing her along with him. “Good answer. Now, let’s get you out of these wet clothes. Where do you keep your nightgowns?”
Ember wrinkled her nose. “What am I, ninety? I don’t own nightgowns.”
“Okay, then. What do you wear to bed?”
She pressed her lips together, but he’d already guessed. His lips curved to a smile.
“Really? In the buff? What an enticing thought.” His smile grew larger as her face reddened.
“Can we not make this any harder for me? Please?” She stood and marched over to her dresser, pulled out a pair of cotton pajamas Asher had bought her for Christmas two years ago, crossed the room to the attached bathroom, and shut the door. Christian watched her every move as if expecting her to bolt at any moment.
Safe behind the closed bathroom door, Ember sagged against the sink. She looked at herself in the mirror—damp and bedraggled, wild-eyed as a cornered animal—and dragged her hands over her face.
All animals are created equal, she thought. Remembering how Christian’s eyes had changed, how he’d appeared from thin air, she added, Yeah, but some are more equal than others.
Once dried and dressed, her hair combed, her face washed, her teeth brushed, she re-emerged from the bathroom and stood looking at him. Even though she was clothed, she felt naked, almost unbearably shy. And yet, she couldn’t look away from him.
He was propped up against the pillows on the bed, one leg stretched out, one bent at the knee, barefoot and bare-chested, looking tense and so beautiful she wished she had the talent of drawing. He lifted a hand and held it out in a silent invitation, and because her body was a traitor where he was concerned, her feet automatically moved her to him as if summoned by a spell.
He didn’t give her a decision about where she was going; he pulled her gently down onto the bed with him, curled one arm around her chest, slid one beneath her head, then nestled himself against her back so they were spooned together with his legs drawn up behind hers and their heads resting on a shared pillow.
“Your sense of humor is questionable, little firecracker,” Christian murmured into her hair.
The pajamas Asher had given her were decorated with tiny pictures of cats chasing dogs. On the front of the shirt was a big picture of a terrified Chihuahua standing frozen while a nasty-looking black cat with slitted eyes slunk up on it from behind. The caption read, “It’s behind me…isn’t it?”
She closed her eyes and muttered, “It seemed apropo
s.”
They lay like that in silence for several moments, until the tension in her body relaxed and it began to feel a little more natural having him there. So close she smelled the heady, exotic musk of his skin, felt the heat of his body warming hers. Naturally he sensed her easing tension, and a sigh of what might have been relief slipped from his lips.
“I hate it that you’re afraid of me,” he whispered.
“I’m not…at the moment. But you have to admit, Christian, it’s a lot to take in.”
“I know. Believe me, I know.” He paused, thinking, then said, “Thank you for letting me be here.”
That struck her as incredibly sweet. “You’re welcome.”
“Okay,” he said, “ten minutes.” Then there was another pause as if he were gathering his thoughts. Finally he said, “Do you know the story behind the Sphinx?”
“You mean the statue in Egypt?”
“Yes.”
“Well…not really, no.”
“It’s one of the world’s largest and oldest statues, its origins lost in the mists of time. Popular theory has it the Sphinx was built in approximately 2500 BC by the pharaoh Khafra as part of the funerary complex of the great pyramids at Giza. The commonly used name ‘Sphinx’ was given to it in antiquity—long after it was built—in reference to the Greek mythological beast with a lion’s body, a woman’s head and the wings of an eagle. Its real name has never been discovered because it was built so long ago, but the modern Egyptian Arabic name for the statue is The Terrifying One.”
Though she didn’t know why, that struck Ember as important: The Terrifying One. A little shiver went up her spine.
As Christian continued, his voice dropped to a spare, lilting murmur. “But that statue wasn’t built by Khafra in 2500 BC. And though it was named the Sphinx, it doesn’t have the body of a lion.”
The air seemed suddenly to crackle with static. “No?” Ember whispered.
“No. It was built a thousand years before, by worshippers of a queen the humans at that time considered a divinity who lived among them. And like the divinity they worshipped, the statue is part human…and part panther.”
The breath left Ember’s body in a small, soundless rush. He went on, and all the tiny hairs on her body began, one by one, to stand on end.
“My kind has been here since the beginning of everything. Native to the darkest heart of the African rainforest, we were predators who excelled at that most necessary of animal survival techniques: camouflage. We could change form to match any environment or mimic any prey, we could even dissolve completely into the mist that was a constant of the rainforest. We lived in a perfect, peaceful bubble for thousands upon thousands of years, co-existing with all the other creatures of the land.”
His voice darkened. “Until one day a different sort of creature appeared. It crawled from the mud, gasping air into amphibious lungs. That little muddy fish would change our fates forever.”
Ember had a moment of confusion, then in a flash of clarity realized he was talking about people. “Fish?” she repeated, disgusted. “You’re telling me I’m descended from a fish?”
“You’d rather it was a monkey?” he asked, his voice dry. “And if it makes you feel better, you’re not descended from a fish—your ancient ancestors were.”
Neither of those answers seemed satisfactory, so Ember remained silent. Christian’s arm tightened around her, and he began to speak again.
“The new arrivals evolved quickly. Once they’d advanced to the point where they had fire, stone tools, and the first, raw grasp of language, we made ourselves known to them. Which turned out to be a colossal mistake.”
Ember whispered, “Why?”
“Think about it. Even now the human world is a hard place to live if you’re different. Think about your friend Asher. What do you think life has been like for him?”
Hard. His life—until he learned to accept himself and found a soulmate in Sebastian—had been hard. And then after Sebastian had died—harder. Ember knew it was part of the reason the two of them got along so well; they had both suffered for years.
Misery loves company.
“So we were hunted. Because humans bred like rabbits, there were many, many more of them than there were of us, and we were almost driven extinct. That’s when we learned our most clever disguise of all.”
Ember turned her head and looked at him over her shoulder. Christian smiled down at her, dazzling in all his perfection. He touched a finger to her nose. “We learned how to look like you.”
Her mouth dropped open.
“We built human homes, raised human crops, hunted with human spears, and kept very quietly to ourselves. Eventually, after lifetimes of hiding and pretending, there was a truce. And lifetimes after that, we were once again living in the open with humans. So successfully it looked as if we might actually be able to live in the open, forever.” His voice grew dry. “Until Cleopatra, of course.”
Ember blinked, confused. “What—the Cleopatra?”
“The very same. She was one of us, one of the most powerful Queens our kind has ever seen. Cunning, too, that one. And, unfortunately, ambitious.”
He sighed, and Ember waited breathlessly.
“Well, you probably know the story. When Cleopatra seduced Mark Antony, she eventually managed to turn him against Caesar Augustus, the ruler of Rome, which was, at that time, the epicenter of the civilized world. She wanted to rule the entire planet, you see. She wanted the Ikati back on top of the food chain, so to speak. But the coup failed. The Queen and her lover died. And her Ikati kin—who by that time were being outright worshipped all over Egypt as gods—were hunted once again. We were declared witches, enemies of Caesar, and enemies of the state. We were driven from our homeland, nearly all of us were killed.
“The few who remained formed small, hidden colonies in wooded places around the world, places cloaked in silence and secrecy. We retreated to the old ways of pretending and lying, of keeping to ourselves. And that’s how it has remained…” His voice grew bitter. “Until one of us decided it was time to return to being worshipped by humans, instead of hiding from them.”
With that, Ember remembered in startling detail the video she’d seen, the scary, black-eyed man/not-man who’d killed all those people at the Vatican. Who’d killed the pope himself.
“Caesar,” she whispered.
“Ironic, isn’t it, that’s what he should be named?”
“Ironic,” Ember echoed quietly. She lay very still in his arms. Christian, probably sensing the tumult inside her, was still and silent as well. Waiting.
She mulled it over, assuming hysteria would take over again any moment. But the thing she kept returning to again and again—in spite of the logical side of her brain insisting she should really be focusing on what he’d done in that alley—was how truly incredible he was. She hated when people used the word “magical” to describe things they couldn’t or didn’t understand, but in this circumstance it seemed exactly the right word.
He—and the rest of his kind—were nothing short of magical. Beautiful, magical, and, without a doubt, deadly.
That’s when we learned our most clever disguise of all…
Curiosity getting the better of her anxiety and ambivalence, Ember tentatively asked, “So you can change to any shape you want?”
“No. We can’t, not anymore. We don’t know exactly why, but it might be because we’ve spent so many generations pretending to be human, living in human form. All of us can Shift into our animal form, but now only some of us can Shift to Vapor, as you saw me do. Although,” he chuckled, “you’re the only person who’s ever seen me do that. Even my family doesn’t know I have that particular Gift.”
“Why not?”
He sighed. “It’s complicated. Our Laws, well, let’s just say power has to be proven. And as I’m the younger brother of the leader—if the colony knew I had Vapor, like he does, his dominance would be called into question unless—”
“Unless you fought each other,” guessed Ember.
She guessed right because Christian’s voice darkened and he said, “Leander has already had to do enough terrible things to stay in control. It would kill him if he had to fight me—if he had to hurt me to keep his position. So I keep my secret to myself and everyone’s better off.”
“I wonder how many others are doing that, too?”
He murmured, “I can’t tell you how often I’ve wondered the exact same thing.”
They were silent for a while, then Ember asked, “So you can change to animal or mist, you have amazing speed, and heightened senses, you’re strong, and you heal fast…anything else?”
“There are as many different Gifts as there are grains of sand on a beach, some as unique as the pattern on a snowflake. There’s Suggestion, Sight, Passage, Elemental Control, Telepathy, Shielding, Invisibility—”
Ember gasped. “Invisibility!”
“And every once in a great while, a Skinwalker comes along—”
“Skinwalker? That sounds disgusting,” Ember interrupted again, now grimacing.
From behind her he laughed silently, shaking the bed. Once under control, he said, “It’s just a term we borrowed from the Navajo lexicon. A Skinwalker has all the Shifting abilities of the original Ikati. He can change to anything he wants: wind, fire, a dragon, a falcon. There’s only one of us now who can do that now.”
Astonished, Ember whispered, “A dragon?”
In a soft, oddly melancholy voice, Christian said, “Yes. Shimmering white and sinuous, with silver-tipped wings, spiked barbs along her powerful tail, and a silken ruff like a horse’s mane down her long neck.” His voice grew even softer, and he murmured, “She’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen.”
Sharp as scissors cutting through her heart, jealousy flared inside her.
Who was this beautiful creature that he—such a beautiful creature himself—sounded so enamored with? And why did it hurt so much?
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