Bone Hunter

by Thea Atkinson

  CHAPTER 34

  My foot spasmed in reflex. My palms felt as though they'd been set alight as the spear chaffed them in its haste to fly from my grip.

  For a second, I thought I was done for.

  But then he froze and made a sound of surprise. He stared ahead in pensive thought and then leveled that gaze to mine. Something sparked in his gaze that reminded me of a campfire flaring up in the dark of a starless sky.

  My body sagged in release and I fell to my side, relieved of the heavy weight. My muscles quivered with exhaustion.

  The spear had sought a home in his thigh. It jutted out so close to me I knew I could touch it with my toe if I'd had the strength to lift my leg. Then a sharp whistle cut through the air. I watched horrified as it flung out a dozen more barbs and they caught in his skin.

  He didn't yell out in pain. Instead, he stopped short, looking down at himself in wonder. His gaze tracked the length of the spear to the dozen offshoots of barbs that were stuck in his neck, his arms, torso and legs. Three of them caught directly in his belly, and I watched as steam emitted from the wounds.

  I scooched backwards, worming my way toward the wall as fast as I could.

  In a mortal man, I would've expected his knees to buckle, but Lucifer took several more steps toward me, his movements jerky as though he was trying to run through thick liquid.

  Black and viscous fluid ran from the wounds and caught fire as they met the air. He didn't try to pat them out, rather he gripped the main shaft of the spear with both of his hands and yanked on it.

  His skin stretched out obscenely as he yanked on the hilt. He grunted as though he thought sheer power could dislodge the barbs from his flesh. When he eased up on the pressure, it appeared as though each shaft dug further in. The grimace on his face told me I was right.

  He sucked in a deep breath and I had he feeling he was hurt.

  Hurt and angry.

  He was three feet away from me and no more when he dropped his head back and roared toward the ceiling. The shaft vibrated in the air with each movement. Watching it was like staring at a hypnotist's watch.

  "You might think you've won," he growled as he swung that black gaze to mine. "But you still have no way out. And I have nothing but time."

  He was right and we both knew it. My panic had made me stupid. Now instead of a lecherous psychopath, I had an angry one. I clutched my stomach, feeling as though I would vomit.

  "Let me help you with it," I said, trying to find a way to make this awfulness better. "Let me remove it."

  His head snapped up. "And what?" He said. "Send you home?" He laughed under his breath. "Stupid human. You still haven't figured out that you're stuck here. Mine for all eternity. The Lilith stone is gone with the Morrigan. There is no way out for you."

  He pulled at the shaft again. "It's nothing but an intermission, this."

  He trod toward me. The shaft of the spear quaked with each step, echoing the quivering of my stomach. I wished I could vomit up the fear or drown out the sound of my heart pounding in my ears. The hangover of terror was deafening.

  "Let me help," I squeaked out. I crawled on my forearms toward a knife that had spilled in the crash.

  He held my eye with his. "I don't need help from a mortal. Watch and learn what sort of god you serve."

  He grabbed the Ripper's knife from a peg, one of the only artifacts to still remain in its place. With it he sliced through his skin. He had to go deep, and it looked painful.

  I could see glistening organs and dark, viscous fluid gaping out around the entry wounds. He sent fingers rummaging into the injuries one by one to extricate the barbs from his tangles of flesh.

  Loud sucking sounds accompanied the liberation of each one and I did vomit, finally, leaning over onto my side and letting go a stream of bile that wrenched my gallbladder. I sagged against the glassy tiles when it was over, looking at my reflection and feeling as though I was a wet and wrung out rag. I'd been kidding myself to think I might get out of this.

  There was no escape.

  Maybe all I could do now was lie motionless, a limp doll with her stuffing coming out of the seams. I laid my forehead against the glass floor, wishing it wasn't so hot. I was drenched in sweat and thirsty. So thirsty.

  My belly quivered against the glass floor. I could feel it touching down like a moth and then lifting off again. I'd be stuck here for eternity, dressed in a vinyl mermaid's tail and metal studded bra, servicing the Lord of darkness in painful and torturous ways until he finally tired of me.

  If he ever tired of me.

  Maybe it was my fate, after all. To belong to someone else. To live at their whim. Do their bidding and lose myself, my soul in the process.

  Thankfully, my arms were still free, and I lay them out at my sides, palms down like a supplicant in front of the cross. I sobbed as I did so, letting the hot tears drop one by one onto the floor and pool beneath my mouth. Surrender, I told myself. That's what I was meant for. That's all I was good for. Painful, eventual surrender.

  Had I really ever had a choice?

  I felt almost serene.

  A grunt sounded from behind me the spear struck the floor with a clatter. It skittered across the tiles to rest within my view but out of my reach. Of course out of reach.

  I squeezed my eyes closed in defeat. I'd done my best.

  "I presume you'd like to try that again," he said from behind me. "But be warned; this is just foreplay for me. And the delay does nothing but whet my appetite."

  I craned my neck to peer over my shoulder. The Lord of Hell loomed over me, his chest glistening with blood and sweat and his face swathed in lust.

  He kicked the spear toward me with a wry grin. It sailed across the tiles and butted into the heel of my hand.

  He thought me weak.

  Powerless.

  He didn't think I would use it. He was taunting me. Arrogant and entitled, he wanted me to try and fail again. Goading me into taking the chance that would lead to failure yet again, so I could hope and lose and then loathe myself for being a failure.

  I felt my lips curl in rage and hatred. He'd almost tricked me. But like most men, he underestimated me. The moment I had run from Scottie, was the moment I had truly been reborn. I wasn't the same person. I would never be the same person. No man would control me. Not Scottie, not Lucifer himself.

  If he wanted me, he'd have to take me kicking and screaming and biting.

  I rolled over, grappling for the spear even as it tried to skitter out of my reach.

  Lucifer lumbered toward me from behind. I could hear his bare feet pounding on the tiles.

  But I had it. It was in my hand. All I had to do was heft it. I had to find the strength. If I had to dig deep a thousand times in this eternity, I had to find the strength.

  I might have found it; I'd never know.

  Because even as he reached down to pluck me from the floor, the entire chamber shook.

  Lucifer staggered on his feet, falling backwards and upending into a pile of the relics he loved so much.

  He swung his gaze to mine as though it was something I was making happen. I knew I wasn't. I eyed the spear, thinking for a moment that perhaps it had some special powers neither of us was aware of. I almost expected it to be lit from within or buzzing or a different color.

  It lay inert in my palm and an unearthly screech cut through the air and I knew it wasn't the spear doing any of it.

  Something else, maybe something more fearsome than Lucifer himself had entered his realm and by the look on his face, he was enraged.

  I gripped the hilt of the spear tightly. Whatever was coming, I'd fight to the last.

  CHAPTER 35

  "Morrigan," Lucifer hissed and struggled to get to his feet. He kicked aside the items he'd been so proud of before and strode to face her.

  She took an elegant and languid step toward him. Over her arm was slung a tattered green silk swath of material that looked like it was covered in blood. My dress.

>   The Morrigan, I realized. Whole and hale with all three parts of her godliness merged together again. Somewhere in the depths of her expression, I recognized Kassie the teenager. But it was a remote resemblance at best. This Morrigan was regal and statuesque. Even her deportment gave the impression of magnificence. She was calm and collected even in the face of Lucifer's glower.

  She had nothing to fear from him.

  Next to her stood a quaking brunette. Slim and average sized, she clung to the Morrigan like a child about to get a spanking.

  "I have something that belongs to you," the Morrigan said. "Something I think you will be happy to have returned."

  She gave a gentle shove to the woman clutching at her. Ismé, I realized. The woman who had betrayed Kassie and sold her to Gio so that she could regain her freedom.

  "A vampire," he said with disgust. "I have thousands of them."

  "Not just a vampire," the Morrigan said. "Look again."

  He canted her head his head as he slid his black gaze over Ismé's quaking form. "One with the soul," he said with a gasp of pleasure.

  "Yes. You gave her release in exchange for information on me. You know how that turned out," the Morrrigan said. "But what you don't know is that when she returned to the ninth world, that soul of hers jumped into a vulnerable female. And she let a vampire turn her."

  She looked at Ismé with disgust and revulsion. "She's sociopathic. A perfect fit for you."

  He narrowed his gaze as he squinted at the Morgan. "So I'm not bound by the Lilith stone?" he asked. "She has no time limit?"

  The Morrigan inclined her head in a nod. "She's as good as a living mortal but without the constraints of time here in your dead world."

  "What do you want in return?"

  She swung her gaze to me. "My blood is joined to this human," she said. "You have no rights to her."

  That made him furious. "That's not true. She is mine. I won her. You abandoned her."

  She canted her head at him. "I didn't abandon her. I needed to return to myself, to gather myself together. Now I'm here and I want to bring her back where she belongs."

  "You can't have her."

  She shook her head. "Unfortunately, you have no say. Take the gift I've offered and be glad of it."

  She reached her hand out to me and though I was loath to let go of the spear, I gripped her fingers with my free one.

  The next thing I knew I felt as though every particle of my body was squeezing down into one small compressed molecule. Some part of me prayed that I wouldn't end up in a lake somewhere in the human world, drowning the way I had when I'd arrived at Lucifer's tub.

  But the time passed quickly this time and instead of feeling as though I was between worlds, I felt like I stepped over a threshold.

  It took a second to realize I was back in my apartment, standing next to the sofa and clutching Kassie's hand so tightly that my knuckles were white. When she peeled her hand away from mine my fingers stayed curled in a fist.

  Except it wasn't Kassie of course. It was the Morrigan. Her hair swept the bottom of her back and now that we were in a world with regular lighting, I could see the last inch of her hair was the deepest shade of red, as though it had been trailing in pools of blood.

  Of course, it probably had. I remembered her washing my dress, the puddle she had knelt over in Fayed's alley. The adrenaline soaking my tissues left all at once and my vision dimmed.

  I was going to faint. I reached out for something to catch me and realized I was still holding onto the spear.

  I dropped it as I weaved on my feet. It made a dull thudding sound where it struck the mat. I eyed it with an odd sense of detachment. It was still covered in tissues and black blood and it stank of smoke and vomit.

  My stomach heaved, and I buckled over. For some reason, I felt wobbly, unable to move my legs. They felt glued together.

  Delicate hands caught me and smoothed my back as I struggled to keep my stomach lining from exiting through my nose.

  Shivers ran the length of my spine as I shuddered and twisted to look up at her. She smiled and ran her hand down my hair.

  "My warrior," she said. "I knew you could do it."

  Somewhere in my befuddled mind I registered her words. I knew you could do it. As though she had set me up. As though she had known all along that I would end up going to hell to reclaim her. As though she were entitled to such a thing.

  No word of concern for my welfare, of gratitude for what I'd endured on her behalf. I was fodder for their playground. A relic like the one Lucifer collected. I'd cared about her. Worried for her safety. It didn't matter that she had retrieved me from hell, saved me from God knows what. It was bad enough that she was the reason I was there in the first place.

  I pushed away from her, sick of being used by the supernatural creatures who felt entitled to exploit my vulnerability.

  No better than Scottie. Any of them.

  I found the couch with my palm and ran a trembling hand along it to be sure it was really there. That it was soft and solid and would hold me when I fell onto it because I most definitely was going to fall. My knees wouldn't bend right. I tried to take a step and I did fall. Onto the floor beside the sofa.

  My hand met resistance, and then a shadow I'd not seen shifted.

  The sidhe warlord. Sitting there, watching it all and staying silent.

  CHAPTER 36

  "Fuck," I said before I could stop it. I yanked my hand back and pinwheeled away from both of them. Of course, I fell on my backside because I still couldn't move my feet independently.

  She stood like the goddess she was, regal and straight. He lounged on the sofa with one leg over the other, crossed at the knee. His foot was bobbing up and down as he fidgeted.

  "Nice outfit," he said. "Going to a party?"

  I looked down at myself. The vinyl sheathing that stretched across my legs sent my mind streaking back to Lucifer's boudoir.

  I sobbed in spite of myself. I was still wearing that awful garb. I tried to tear it off, digging my nails in as I searched for laces or zippers.

  It was the Morrigan who stopped me. She slipped a thin nail into a crease and slid her finger downward. The vinyl split without a sound.

  The spear lay at the Morrigan's feet. She tracked my gaze as it landed on the hilt. She bent to retrieve the spear from the floor and handed it to Colin, hilt and first.

  "Perhaps this will repay the debt," she said.

  He looked at it for a long time before he stood and wrapped his fingers around the hilt. They stared at each other for long moments.

  "Eons of immortality I didn't want," he said, sounding less than grateful. "A death I didn't deserve at an age far too young, a week in hell defending my honour."

  He pulled the spear from her grip and wiped it on his arm. The blood that had coated the tip and now was smeared over his perfectly tailored shirt turned blue. "Small things, really, in the grand scheme of things."

  He stared at her. "This will grant my forgiveness," he said. "But the debt remains." His jaw set into a hard line that made him look more the warrior he must have been in his days as a mortal.

  Even I could see that she looked crestfallen at his response. I felt cheated that this was the way it was going to end up.

  "You've got to be kidding," I said. "Do you know what I went through down there?"

  He swung that prismic gaze to mine. "Technically, down is not where you went, but yes. I have a very good idea."

  I shifted uncomfortably under that gaze. He had suffered as I had suffered. Perhaps more so. I should understand that gratitude for being alive didn't necessarily wipe out the sense of injustice in the first place.

  The Morrigan clenched her fists at her side.

  "I will endure another century as a broken thing if it will satisfy you," she said. I heard in her voice the longing of a lover, one spurned but not yet ready to concede defeat.

  I was uncomfortable with the look on the Fae's face. He wasn't willing to give in. He fel
t as though a debt was still owed even after all she had gone through, even after what he'd put me through to retrieve her from Lucifer.

  I wasn't angry that he'd elected to send me instead of himself. I understood that. Having been there, having seen what Lucifer would do to those things he considered his property, I couldn't blame him. I could be angry about having to go through it, and I could be sad that all of those creatures below, those ethereals as he'd called them, would be acting as his playthings for the next eternity, but I could not blame Chu Chulain for wanting to avoid the terror of that place.

  So, he had wanted someone to risk it for this woman he didn't love. This powerful goddess who was willing to give him everything.

  There had to be a reason.

  What did he want if he didn't want her to repay her debt and find absolution from him.

  And then it occurred to me. He hadn't sent me to rescue her at all. He'd just wanted his weapon back. I thought of the creatures in the Shadow Bazaar and how they tried to help Kassie when the fae assassin held her. I thought of Maddox's explanation that they wanted to curry favor. Someday she might feel inclined to intervene for them.

  He knew that too.

  He wanted the spear. He knew the Morrigan would want to repay her debt if he found a way to extract her from Lucifer. He knew he'd left it behind in Hell and that Gio had bartered Kassie's flesh for his soul.

  "It was a perfect storm," I said. "A mortal who owed you. A mortal who cared about a vulnerable teenager not knowing she was the physical aspect of a god who betrayed you. That's why you gave me that talisman; you knew Lucifer would be unable to resist living flesh."

  "The Lilith Stone should have got you out too," he said. "I'm not a monster. It had enough power to transport you both."

  His eyes glowed blue, as though he dared me to believe he was lying.

  The truth was, I believed he was sincere. But it was hard to see sentiment in the blood coating his sleeve, at the way he held onto the spear as though he planned to put it to use with zeal. A warrior. To his core, although he was sidhe now and might never need it to do harm.

  "But I couldn't use the talisman because he held me back," I said, and I remembered the feeling of wanting one of us safe after all that. "One of us had the chance to use it. I gave it to her."