Ashes (The Slayer Chronicles Book 3)

by Val St. Crowe

  “What?” said Naelen. “What did he do?”

  Riley got up and began to pace. “I was horrified. Disgusted. But he was so proud of himself, and when he showed me those bodies, all cut into pieces there in the woods, the wings discarded in a pile, I thought I’d been transported to some terrible other nightmare world.”

  “Wings?” said Naelen. “You said it wasn’t dragon.”

  “Our gargoyles,” said Riley. “He had killed…” He choked up and couldn’t continue for a moment. “We had a gargoyle nanny growing up. Sweetest woman you ever met. I loved her like a mother.” He dashed tears away from his eyes.

  None of us did anything. We waited.

  And then Riley began to speak again, the words tumbling over each other faster and faster. “And that wasn’t all. He was handsome, my brother, and he would flirt with some of younger female gargoyles. They’re not at all particular about taking men to bed, you know, not like human women. They think it’s nothing, because there’s no expectation of monogamy in their culture, and I thought my brother was only taking advantage of that, but he was luring them to their deaths, and when I saw, I threw myself on him, and I hit him and hit him and—” He paused. “But it didn’t matter. He was so powerful then. He had done the darkest, deepest magics, and he flung me away from him as if I was nothing more than a rag doll. He laughed at me. Called me weak. Said he wanted to share the power with me, but that I wasn’t worthy of it.”

  More silence.

  Riley settled down on the floor, put his face in his hands.

  I went to him, knelt down and tentatively reached out to touch him.

  He waved me away. He drew in a shaking breath. “Well, that’s when I told my father about it, and my father took away the texts and put a binding spell on my brother. But my brother got out of the binding spell. And he did all sorts of awful things. Spells to get magic and women and money and status. And eventually, my father called in a council of mages and they stripped him of everything and wiped his memory and sent him off. If he’s back now, he must know that I’m the one who betrayed him. And he would want revenge against me.”

  Naelen, Logan, and I exchanged a look.

  “Well,” I said, “if he’s out there, we definitely need protection.”

  Riley nodded. “I might be able to help, actually. I haven’t done magic in years, not since before my brother was sent away, but I might know of a way to put some wards on the house, keep us safe inside its walls.”

  “Good,” said Logan. “Let’s do that.”

  * * *

  Placing wards meant putting a talisman at every door or window and whispering some words in a foreign language over them. After showing us how to do it, Riley had loaded us all up with talismans and sent us each off on our own to do a floor of the house. I’d been working on the third floor, but I was finished now. As I emerged onto the big staircase in the foyer, I ran into Riley.

  “All done,” I told him.

  “Good,” he said. “I hope they’ll hold against my brother.”

  “Me too,” I said. “Um… what about the attic? Should we put wards up there?”

  Riley furrowed his brow. “I hardly think anyone’s coming in through the attic.”

  “Well, there are windows up there.”

  “You seem awfully familiar with the attic.”

  “Uh… actually, I wanted to ask you about something. I happened to see a painting of a woman and man with a cup—”

  “You went into the attic?” said Riley, his face turning red. “When did you do that?”

  “I didn’t make it very far,” I said. “Frederick was up there. He made me leave.”

  “Thank goodness for that.” Riley put his finger in my face. “The attic is off limits, you understand?”

  “Why?” I said. “What if the cup’s up there?”

  “It’s not.”

  “Who was that woman in the painting?”

  “She’s dead,” said Riley. “I don’t see that it matters much who she was. And it’s not an easy subject for me to discuss. Why don’t you leave it at that?”

  “Okay,” I said. “Sorry. Uh… do you know anything about gouge marks on the door of my room?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Like someone had been locked up in there and trying to claw their way out. Maybe your brother, when your father was trying to keep him bound?”

  “No one has been locked in a room for so long that they needed to claw out,” said Riley. “Honestly, I don’t understand what it is that you’re trying to unearth here, but you’re only here to find a cup, nothing more.”

  “And to save you from compelled human supremacist bikers,” I said.

  He clenched his hands into fists.

  “Just saying.” I took a step back.

  “Maybe you should stop saying things,” he said, stalking away from me down the staircase. “Tell your companions that I won’t be able to join you all for dinner, but that you should all be in the dining room at nine o’clock sharp. Frederick doesn’t like it when there’s any delay.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Dinner was even stranger without Riley around to keep up any kind of conversation. The guys and I didn’t feel comfortable talking in front of the gargoyle staff, who were all staring down over us as if they didn’t approve of our presence.

  It might have been all right, anyway, if Naelen would have spoken, but he was quiet. He kept looking at Logan and then at me, and I wondered if he was thinking about the fact that I wouldn’t be with him tonight, but instead would be with Logan. I wondered if it was bothering him.

  In the face of his penetrating, brooding gaze, I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  And Logan was quiet most of the time anyway.

  So, we ate in relative silence.

  Since the gargoyles served dinner after the sun went down, by the time we were done, it was fairly late. After the day we’d had, we could all stand to rest. We went down the hallway, and Naelen went into his room.

  Logan and I continued down the hallway to my room.

  Logan opened the door for me. I went in first. He came behind me and closed the door. Then he went over to my bed, sat down on it, and pulled me down next to him. He didn’t say anything, but he started to kiss me. His kisses were soft but insistent, and his fingers moved expertly at my clothes, undressing me, stroking me, working me up to a fervor.

  We made love in a gasping frenzy, our lips barely leaving the other’s as he moved within me, as I wrapped myself around him.

  I sought connection this time. I opened myself entirely and tried to let him in—all the way in, like I did with Naelen. I wanted to be as close to Logan as I could get. I wanted to be joined.

  But no matter what I did, it was as if there was a barrier between us. He felt good. He felt wonderful. He made me sigh with pleasure and moan with goodness. He brought me to the apex of my pleasure more than once, and I fell to pieces in his arms.

  But we weren’t one. We were two. Logan. Clarke.

  When it was done, he pulled me close into his arms, and he told me he loved me, and I said it too, and it wasn’t a lie. I did love him. I adored him. He was my sweet, wonderful Logan. He was beautiful and devoted and he adored me.

  I wondered why I even had to reassure myself of this.

  Of course I loved Logan. Of course I did. If I hadn’t, none of this would have ever happened. When he’d shown up on my doorstep all those months ago and asked me to run away with him, I would have said that I didn’t love him anymore, and that it would never work between us, and I would have sent him away. And this whole new, strange existence we found ourselves in would never have happened, because Logan would have been gone, and Cunningham would never have gotten the stupid idea in his head that I wanted them both.

  But I did want them both.

  No. No, I didn’t understand anything.

  How could I want them both? That wasn’t right. That wasn’t what a decent, good person did. Stringing
along two men, making them deal with all that jealousy? I was a horrible slut, that’s what I was.

  And then I put my face into his chest, and tried not to cry, and waited for him to go to sleep.

  But he never did.

  Finally, I rolled away from him.

  “Hey,” he whispered. “You okay?”

  “Fine,” I said. “Just getting comfortable. You go to sleep.”

  “I can’t.”

  I rolled back over to face him. “Why? Is something wrong?”

  “I don’t sleep,” he said. “I used to turn to stone, but I never slept. And now that I don’t turn to stone…” He shrugged. “I thought you knew.”

  “No, I didn’t have any idea. I guess I just assumed you were falling asleep when we were.”

  “No,” he said.

  “So, you were awake all the time when were in that room?” I reached out and stroked his cheek. “Oh, Logan.”

  “It’s all right. Mostly it’s mind-numbingly boring.”

  I laughed a little.

  “Sometimes, when I’ve been doing a lot of exerting activity, I like to lie down with my eyes closed and rest my muscles and my body, and I think it helps me feel more refreshed later. But I’m always aware. I can’t switch off. It’s funny, because I used to hate being stone, especially in summer, when I would only get about ten hours a day to move around and be alive. But now, I miss it.”

  “I wish you could sleep,” I said. “I wish I could help you relax.”

  He smiled. “It’s nicer when I’m with you. When I have to spend the night alone, I sometimes feel like I’m losing it. But I could be happy holding you all night. If it isn’t comfortable, then maybe I could be the big spoon.”

  I yawned. “That sounds nice.” I turned over on my side.

  He fitted himself against me from behind. He kissed my neck.

  I snuggled into him. Well, if he wasn’t going to sleep, then I wasn’t going to be able to sneak out of the room and go exploring again, I guessed. I might as well just let myself drift off.

  Later in the night, though, I woke up, and he wasn’t with me. He was up in my room, sitting on the floor, holding something glittering in his hand.

  I sat up in bed. “Are you going through my stuff, Logan?”

  He jumped, startled. “Sorry. Do you have things in here you don’t want me to see?”

  Not really, but it was the principle of the thing. I squinted. “What do you have there?”

  “I don’t know.” He held it aloft. “It’s like a little piece of glass with a chain attached to it.”

  “Oh,” I said. “That’s the monocle I got when I was saving Santa. Dasher gave it to me. Said it was for a wish I haven’t had yet, so that I can ‘see what needs to be undone.’”

  “I can’t believe you met reindeer,” he muttered.

  “Yeah, it was utterly surreal,” I said.

  “So, what is it?”

  “It’s a monocle. Like glasses, but only for one eye.”

  He nodded slowly, putting the monocle up to his own eye. “You think it’s magic?”

  “I have no idea,” I said. “Maybe it was all a big joke. But I kept it in case it ever came in handy.”

  “Is it okay if I try some things with it, use the talisman, see if I can get any magical responses out of it?”

  “Fine with me,” I said, rolling over and pulling the covers tight up to my chin. I was back asleep in seconds.

  * * *

  The next day, we were back to looking for the cup, toiling through piles and piles of trinkets and junk in the rooms in the top floor of the house. It was still hot that day, but it wasn’t sunny, so it was gray and humid and miserable. I didn’t know whether or not to hope for rain or not. Sometimes, on a humid day like that, a rain storm would clear the air and make the night cool and clear. Other times, it would only make everything worse.

  We weren’t having any luck finding the cup, but then Logan was adamant that we weren’t going to leave Riley alone until we were sure his brother was taken care of. We couldn’t leave this guy defenseless.

  We all agreed that Riley himself was a pretty good guy. Sure, his family seemed as if they were either crazy or jerks, but he couldn’t help his heritage. Well, Logan and I agreed this. Naelen seemed a little annoyed with the whole idea, but when we asked him if he would abandon Riley once we found the cup, he grudgingly agreed to help.

  Sometime in the middle of the afternoon, I decided to switch to a different room, just for the illusion of doing something different. It wasn’t actually different, because all the rooms were filled with the same stuff, but I deluded myself into thinking that maybe the problem we were having was trying to find the cup in one room when it was actually somewhere else.

  Riley stayed in the room we’d been working in, but he said it was fine if we wanted to spread out.

  So, Naelen and I went to a different room. Logan went to the one across the hall from Riley. There was an entrance at the end of that room that connected to our room, but we couldn’t see Logan through the doorway.

  I started attacking a trunk full of stuff and found that it was actually full of old photo albums. I started to close it. I’d tell Riley it was here so he could figure out what he wanted to do with it, but it wasn’t my business to go through his personal family photos.

  Then I saw the woman from the painting.

  She was in a white wedding dress peeking through the oval frame of a white lacy album. A wedding album.

  I pulled the thing out. There was the man from the painting too.

  So, they were married, huh?

  I opened the album. June 13th. Sigmund Eric Chapman and Ella Marie Grace Chapman.

  “Whatcha got there?” called Naelen.

  I took the album over to him. “These are the people I saw in the painting.”

  “Sigmund Chapman?” said Naelen. “That’s Riley’s father.”

  “Oh,” I said. “But this album is so old. I guess Sigmund must have used magic to halt his aging.”

  Naelen made a face. “Bastard.”

  “Oh, come on,” I said. “You once told me that we’d use magic to halt my aging.”

  “And we will,” he said, suddenly serious. “I’m not losing you.” Dragons lived for hundreds of years. Naelen would outlive me.

  I bit down on my lip. “What about Logan?”

  Naelen looked away. “Yeah, I think he’d want to see the album.”

  Which wasn’t what I’d meant at all. But what was the point of getting into that, anyway? We were all young still. There was no reason to worry about the future. We could deal with that later.

  I went over to the door that connected our room to Logan’s, and I called him over.

  He waded through boxes to get to us. “What’s up?”

  “This is the woman and the man that I saw in the painting with the cup.” I handed the album over. “Naelen says it’s Riley’s father.”

  “So, this woman is his mother, then?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “He did say she was dead, and I guess it would make sense for him not to want to talk about his dead mother.”

  “Yeah, but in other ways, he’s such an open book,” said Naelen. “He told us everything about his sister. And his brother.”

  “He didn’t want to tell us about his brother,” said Logan.

  “True,” said Naelen. “So, maybe he is trying to be private. We can’t be sure.”

  “And maybe he’s hiding something,” I said.

  * * *

  I put the album back and we went back to categorizing junk. Naelen and I worked near to each other, and I felt more comfortable starting up a conversation with him since we were alone.

  “So,” I said, “you got something against Riley?”

  “You’re the one who thinks he’s hiding something,” said Naelen.

  “Can’t be that much of anything,” I said. “You are being awfully polite to someone who’s practically a mage. I remember how you feel about mages.
You were really rude to my friend Robin.”

  He sighed. “That was when we’d first met. I wasn’t even used to being in this world. I’d never met a mage before.”

  “Yeah, but you hated her,” I said. “And this guy is worse. These talismans that we’re categorizing?” I picked one up. “These very well could have come from a dragon that was killed for profit. That’s not boiling your blood?”

  He sucked in breath. “Maybe. But I told myself when I brought us here that I was just going to have to ignore that so that we could do our job and find that cup. It’s the most important thing. We have to keep it away from Cunningham. He’s bad now, but imagine if he gets all the objects and he channels that ancient guy he wants to channel. He’ll be unstoppable. So, it’s all a matter of perspective.”

  “Okay,” I said. “That makes sense.”

  “You think I’m being too hard on Riley anyway, don’t you? Not wanting to help save him from his brother?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I mean, if anyone has a reason to hate him and his family, it’s Logan. Because he and his family created the gargoyles.”

  “Well, that’s a slippery slope, right?” said Naelen. “I mean, on the one hand, they doomed his people to centuries of servitude. On the other hand, he wouldn’t exist if they hadn’t.”

  “I’ve never quite understood what they did. They merged human and dragon somehow? Merged it with stone?”

  “I have no idea,” said Naelen. “You’d know more about it than me. Maybe you should ask Logan.”

  “I can’t just bring that up to him,” I said.

  Naelen shrugged.

  We sorted in silence for a bit.

  I kept hoping that the next thing that I uncovered would reveal the cup beneath it, lying there waiting to be discovered.

  But it never was.

  Naelen stood up straight and stretched.

  I was sitting next to him, tugging trinket after trinket out of a cardboard box.

  He pulled me to my feet and kissed me.

  I kissed back for a second and then pulled away. “What are you doing?”

  “Um, I think it’s my night,” said Naelen. “It’s been my night since you left your bedroom this morning, and I have kept my hands to myself and now you’re right here, and I don’t think I can stop myself.”