by Becca Andre
“Doug, please,” Elysia said. Now that the immediate threat was gone, she was so weary, she could barely force the words from her throat.
“Yeah, man,” James added. “The odor of vomit won’t enhance this experience.”
She glanced over at James, and he shrugged. She couldn’t decide if his comment amused or annoyed her.
Doug managed to contain himself without making a mess, but he remained doubled over, his head almost touching his knees. It took Elysia a moment to realize he was crying. Stunned, she stared at him. Doug, with all his arrogance and swagger, was the last person she’d ever expect to breakdown. There was a time that she believed he wasn’t even capable.
She pushed up to her feet, her head and hand thumping in unison, and made her way over to him. “Doug?” She knelt beside him, laying her left hand on his shoulder.
He covered his face with his hands and didn’t acknowledge her.
James frowned, but he didn’t comment. Instead, he bent and picked up Neil’s discarded robe. He curled his lip when he saw what it was, but pulled it on, anyway. He noticed her watching.
“What? My ass was cold.”
She snorted. “What is it Addie says? The full moon: the bane of the shapeshifter.”
“Oh not you, too.” James gazed down at himself in the brown robe. “This is so wrong.” The robe fit him fine, but Elysia suspected it wasn’t the fit that was the problem.
“You look like a necromancer,” Elysia said, throwing his earlier words back at him.
“Ha ha.” He walked over to join them. He eyed Doug for a moment, his brow wrinkling, but it wasn’t in anger. Even so, unease churned Elysia’s stomach when he squatted beside them.
“You about done?” James asked Doug. “You can feel sorry for yourself later.”
“James,” Elysia whispered.
A pause, and Doug sat up. His cheeks were wet, but anger burned in his eyes. “He made me cut off her finger,” he spoke between clenched teeth.
James shrugged one shoulder. “Neil made me kill my brother.”
Doug frowned.
“Your aunt once commanded me to rip out Rowan’s soul.”
“Clarissa?” Doug sat up a little straighter. “How did you avoid—”
“Addie. She threw herself in my path.” James stopped, then continued in a softer tone. “I never told her how close she came to dying that day.”
Doug’s brow wrinkled, but he didn’t speak.
“It gets worse. Clarissa once stuck her hand down my pants and commanded me to enjoy it.”
“How can you command—” Elysia stopped when James lifted a brow. “Never mind.”
“I get what you’re saying,” Doug said to James. “But it doesn’t make me feel any better about what I did.”
“But you didn’t do it,” Elysia said.
Doug studied his hands. A moment of silence, then he looked up at James. “How do you live like this?”
“Live?” James lips twisted into a wry smile that wasn’t a smile at all.
“You know what I mean.” Exasperation entered Doug’s tone. He was starting to sound like himself. “How can you stand it, knowing that someone can take your will at any time and make it their own.”
“No one takes my will. That is one thing that is always my own. When I am taken, I become an object, a tool. That isn’t me. The real me is inside watching, waiting, and when I get the opportunity, I make them pay.”
James held Doug’s gaze, and though the glow was absent, the predator was on full display. Doug felt it, too. Elysia could tell by the way he kept shifting his position. Though to Doug’s credit, he didn’t look away.
“Okay,” Doug said. “How do we make him pay?”
This time, James’s smile was genuine and maybe a touch blood thirsty.
Elysia sighed. “How about we focus on doing what we came here to do?”
“You mean—” James began.
“Shh.” She lifted her right hand, intending to press a finger to his lips, but quickly lowered her hand. “Doug and I are compromised.”
“He can’t hear or see through you unless he’s actively controlling you,” Doug said. “I asked Father about it once.”
James gave him a frown before turning back to Elysia. “You were supposed to be immune.”
“I guess we were wrong.”
“What about the solvent Addie gave you?”
“Neil confiscated that.”
James ran a hand through his dark hair. “Addie can fix it later, but it will make the current situation more difficult.”
“Well, you are an alchemist in training, so impossible should be in your repertoire.”
“Hey, I’ve got to work up to impossible. I’m still at the grunt work stage.” His voice dropped to a whisper as he continued. “I smell fresh blood. Show me your hand.”
“It’s still bleeding?” Doug asked. “Let me see. I don’t have anything to work with here, but as you told our sadistic ancestor, I did go to medical school.”
“Were you going to be a doctor?” James asked.
“No, it was part of my training to become a forensic pathologist.”
“Intense.”
“Yes.” Doug slipped his hand beneath her forearm. “Relax,” he whispered to her.
It didn’t faze her to help Grams embalm bodies at the funeral home, but this was different. This was her. She didn’t want to look.
“What did you major in?” Doug asked James.
Elysia couldn’t imagine that he was all that interested. She suspected he kept the conversation going to distract her.
“Chemistry. And it’s present tense,” James said. “I started my first semester in January.”
Doug began unwrapping the strip of fabric he—or rather Alexander—had cut from his robe earlier and used as a makeshift bandage. “How old are you?” he asked James.
“Nineteen.”
Doug glanced up for a moment before turning his attention to her hand. “For some reason, I assumed you were older.”
Elysia didn’t say anything, but she knew it wasn’t his looks, but the way James acted. He was much more mature than most nineteen-year-olds.
The last of the bandage fell away, and she heard Doug take a quick breath. But she wasn’t watching him. It was James’s eyes she sought. It was stupid, but she feared she would see disgust on his features. His lips lifted away from his teeth, but it wasn’t disgust, it was fury.
“Here, let me,” James said, reaching for her arm.
“What are you going to do?” Doug asked.
“Heal her.”
“What?”
“Will it still work in that collar?” she asked.
“It should.”
“This is more than a scratch,” she whispered.
“We’re out nothing for trying.”
She held his gaze a moment, then nodded. This was going to hurt so much.
“How does this work?” Doug asked, letting James take her arm.
“Ever hear the old wives’ tale about wounds healing quicker if you let a dog lick them?”
“You’re going to lick it?”
“Yes.”
“That’s not very sanitary.”
“Just do it,” Elysia said, unable to bare the anticipation.
James looked up, his eyes meeting hers as he brought her hand to his mouth.
She closed her eyes, then clamped her teeth together at the first brush of his tongue. Pain radiated up her hand into her wrist, traveling all the way up her arm to her shoulder. As with every time he did this, she wondered if his saliva was made of acid. She had kissed him enough to know that wasn’t true, but there was clearly some reaction when he licked her open wounds.
His tongue lightly brushed across the raw stump of her finger a second time, and she gasped.
“Ely?” Doug sounded concerned.
“It hurts,” she breathed. “Like cleaning an open wound with acid.”
James stilled.
“But only at first,” she continued. She said it to reassure James, but it occurred to her that the pain had stopped shooting up her arm. “It’s already fading.”
Another brush of his warm tongue, and this time, it didn’t burn, though it still hurt. This pain was more like bumping a freshly scabbed injury. It was sore and tender, but no longer the oozing well of pain it had been.
She opened her eyes and found James watching her, her damaged finger between his lips.
“What are you doing?” Doug asked.
She glanced over and realized he was talking to her.
“What do you mean?”
“Your eyes are completely white, though oddly, I don’t feel any necromancy in use.”
This time, James ran his tongue along the side of her finger down to the V between her pinky and ring finger. She pulled in a breath as the muscles deep in her body tightened in the most pleasing way.
One corner of James’s mouth curled upward.
“Is it something he’s doing?” Doug asked, not catching her reaction.
“I don’t know.” Her voice was a breathy whisper.
“Are you still in pain,” Doug asked.
“No.”
James’s eyes glinted, and he ran his tongue along the same path. It was all she could do not to groan—and climb into his lap. She licked her dry lips, and he followed the movement with an intensity that made her squirm.
“May I?” Doug asked.
Elysia blinked, Doug’s voice a jarring reminder that he was still there. She thought he wanted to see her finger, then she became aware of his magic.
James growled around her finger, the sound soft and low in the back of his throat. Another tingle ran through her body, and she shivered.
“What the hell?” Doug withdrew, her sense of his magic vanishing. “I lost my grip on him. It was like trying to animate the…” Doug stared at James.
“The what?” Elysia prompted.
“The living.”
“What?” She pulled her finger from James’s mouth. The pain was completely gone, leaving only sensations she couldn’t act on with Doug present. She was also embarrassed to realize how much of her soul she had fed into James. Why hadn’t Doug sensed that?
“He feels, felt—” Doug frowned, and his eyes flickered white for an instant. “He’s dead again.”
James lifted a dark brow, but didn’t comment.
“You probably sensed me,” Elysia said, her cheeks heating. “I fed more of my soul into him than I realized.”
“You weren’t using necromancy.”
“Of course I was. You even pointed out that my eyes were white.”
“They were,” James agreed.
Doug glared at James. “Then it was you. What were you doing?” All of Doug’s earlier vulnerability was gone, and it seemed that he and James had reverted to their relationship of old.
“Licking her finger,” James answered. “Getting a little high on her blood, to be honest.” His eyes met hers, and he grinned.
Elysia’s cheeks heated even more.
“Her blood,” Doug repeated.
She glanced over at his solemn tone. “What is it?”
“Your blood gift.”
“Which one?” she asked, annoyed.
“The one that makes you a soul reaper.”
Chapter 7
“A soul reaper? Seriously?” James snorted, then grinned at her. “No wonder our magic is so compatible.”
She got to her feet, and both men did the same. “It’s more like manipulator.” She waved a hand, dismissing the question. “Blood gifts tend to favor dramatic names.”
James grunted. “I see. Soul reaper sounds much cooler than soul manipulator.”
She smiled before turning to Doug. “And the whole concept is a joke. There’s no such thing.”
“He said he was getting high on your blood,” Doug said. “You know what the legends say.”
“The legends say a lot of things, most of them are total fabrications.”
“I’m aware of that, but I couldn’t ignore the similarities. The blood of a soul reaper is supposed to be like a drug. It addicts you, puts you in their power and gives them access to your soul. My father told me years ago, when he was still grooming me to be Deacon, that if a child is suspected to have inherited that ability, I must never taste her blood.”
Elysia crossed her arms. “And your father is such a reliable source of information.”
“Your eyes were white, but you weren’t using your active power.”
“If I’m a soul reaper—and I’m not convinced of that—I manipulate souls. He doesn’t have one.” She glanced at James, expecting easy agreement, but a frown had replaced his grin. Did he believe what Doug was saying?
“On the mortal plane,” Doug said.
She frowned. “And…?”
Doug ran a hand over his face. “And I don’t know. I’m in uncharted waters here. A little insight would be helpful.”
“Don’t look at me. As everyone points out, I don’t know the first thing about my magic.” She threw her hands in the air.
“Dear God,” Doug said. His response threw her until he captured her right hand, then ran the fingers of his opposite hand along her damaged digit.
She glanced down at her hand resting against his open palm. The pain was completely gone, and flesh now covered the end of her amputated finger, the skin a healthy healing pink. It looked like she had lost the finger weeks ago, not hours. Even so, her stomach rolled over at the sight.
Doug frowned at her hand a moment before turning to James. “Can you do that for anyone?”
“I’ve never tried.”
She pulled her hand from Doug’s. “We can solve these mysteries later. We need to accomplish our goal while Neil and our demented ancestor are out doing rain dances.”
“There’s a mental image,” James said. “Any suggestions?”
Elysia glanced around the doorless room. “I should have forced Ian to teach me to travel. All he told me was that I send my soul into the veil to open a portal.”
Doug’s brows rose. “How do you send your soul into something that isn’t dead?”
“That’s what I asked. He then went on a rant about my lack of training.” She rolled her eyes.
“Which he compounded by not training you,” James said.
“Can’t you teach her?” Doug asked.
“If she could shift into a hellhound, sure.”
Doug sighed. Elysia knew how he felt.
“There are dead in that direction.” Doug gestured to the walls on their left. “My guess is that we’re at the end of a catacomb.”
Elysia reached out. He was right. There were dozens of dead, and not that far away. “What if we called them to us?”
He frowned at the far wall, his eyes fading to white as he studied the situation. “That might work.”
“I’m assuming Alexander has held necromancers here before,” James said. “Why didn’t they try to get out that way?”
“Because they wanted to be here?” Elysia suggested.
“And they didn’t have their psychotic cousin distracting the guy in charge,” Doug added.
“Good points.” James stopped beside Doug. “Before you begin, can I have your belt?” James nodded at the braided leather cord round Doug’s waist.
“Why?”
James shrugged. “I was going to bind your hands—in case he returns.”
“I don’t think you can beat the shit out of me. Unless you have some training I’m unaware of.”
“Um, no.”
“Watch her knees,” Doug warned James. “If my ability to reproduce wasn’t already suspect, she may have made it so.”
Elysia grimaced. “Sorry about that.”
“Your ability to reproduce?” James lifted a brow.
“He doesn’t have any kids,” Elysia clarified. “You know how much emphasis Alexander puts on that.” She glanced at Doug. “Is that why it’s taken Xander so long to make the heir selection official? Because you don’t have any kids?”
“Yes.” Doug turned to James. “Alexander won’t use me to physically control you; he’ll use my magic. Binding me won’t help you.”
“But I would enjoy it.” James smiled.
“Your dead man is a funny guy,” Doug said to her.
“Yes, he is.” Elysia met James’s eyes, and he grinned in response. She turned to Doug. “At some point, you need to show me how you sheathed the bond between James and me. I couldn’t get around that.”
“You’ll have all my secrets.”
She gave him a half-hearted chuckle, not sure what he meant by that.
“Shall we?” Doug nodded toward the wall.
“Ironically, Ian’s lessons are going to serve a purpose. Who knew I’d actually have to wrangle a horde of zombies?”
It was Doug’s turn to chuckle, then she felt him reach out. She closed her eyes and released her magic, seeking the dead beyond the walls. She exhaled as the pressure on her confined soul relaxed, to be replaced by the pleasure that only freeing her soul could bring.
Doug chuckled again, the sound soft and filled with understanding. When they had been dating, they had frequently snuck into the local cemetery to make out among the graves. He had picked up on how much she physically enjoyed using her magic, and though he enjoyed himself, he never seemed to get as lost in it as she did. She had always assumed it was just their difference in strength. Now she wondered.