“We should be leaving,” Creed finally said. His voice rumbled in his throat beneath her cheek.
“I can’t leave Desert’s End.” She had to wait for the slavers to return.
Creed sighed. He extricated himself and pushed to his feet, looking down at her as she sat on the edge of the bed. His next words dropped like pebbles into unbroken water. “The slavers you’re searching for aren’t coming.”
They had to come. They were the only known link she had to her son.
“I don’t understand.”
“I found the remains of a burned out wagon train a half day’s ride from here.”
She did not want to believe him. He had to be mistaken. Her stomach burned with anxiety now, not desire.
“You can’t know it was them for certain.”
He did not answer, but watched her with a kind of pity that convinced her more than any words could have done.
Yet she did not sink into the same despair she might have only a few short hours ago. A year had passed. Even if Creed had stumbled upon the slavers’ remains, as he believed, Ash would not have been with them. Her baby was out there somewhere, waiting for her.
While she was willing to trust Creed with her own safety, she did not dare rely solely on anyone else to secure Ash’s. She tried to think of what to do, or to say. Going back to the ranch would not help. Staying with Creed would at least give her a broader area in which to search, and protection while she did.
But if she stayed with him she would, in effect, belong to him. There would be expectations.
It did not matter. She would do anything to locate Asher.
“Will you help me find my son?”
She could not look away from his eyes but tried to read his thoughts through them.
He chose his words with particular care. “I’ll help you look for him. But I need you to understand that I’m making no promises to you. My own work comes first. And we may never be able to find him.”
She could ask for nothing more from him. She did not know what she would do if she never found Ash, only that it would not matter. Nothing would.
They left the hotel unnoticed. Nieve stood beside him as he claimed his hross from the stable. No one paid any attention to her when she was with him.
Out on the silent street, in the chill morning air, Creed lifted her into the saddle, then swung up in front of her. She rested her hands on his hips to steady herself. It had been a long time since she’d ridden a hross. It felt awkward, and yet familiar.
The sun was beginning to rise in the east as they rode out of Desert’s End. Hope, once lost, again lightened her heart. For several miles she stared at what appeared to be the head of a phoenix covering the back of Creed’s shaved skull. Otherwise, his skin was golden and perfect.
“Your tattoo is quite distinctive,” she said. “Why is it I’ve never really noticed it before?”
She had seen it, of course, but paid no real attention to it. If asked to describe him, she doubted if she would have thought to include it. Now she could not seem to look away.
He glanced back over his shoulder at her. A smile filled his striking blue eyes. “It symbolizes rebirth. I received it when the demons were banished. To me it means that the world has been given a new start, and I have a duty to help it recover. I guess you weren’t meant to see it until now.”
His words, although uttered in jest, slapped her instead, reminding her again of what he was. The spell broke and she found herself frowning at the back of his coat. Creed could make people see what he wanted them to see. Whether he admitted to it or not, that was a demon trait.
Ash, too, had a talent for going unnoticed and deflecting unwanted attention, something she hoped had saved his life.
But would his talent also make Asher impossible for her to find?
…
Two days after the wagon train burned, shortly before midday in a darkening sky that threatened rain, Willow walked back into the small camp outside of Desert’s End where her children awaited. Scruffy and dirty, and reeking of neglect, seven of them rushed to greet her. They ranged in age from six or seven years to twelve.
The enthusiasm of their greeting warmed her. Willow had wintered in a burned out village in the Godseeker Mountains with three of these children as her sole companions. All three were males, and quite feral. One of them, more mortal in appearance, was only now beginning to speak. The other two were physically deformed, retaining demon-like features that they could not shift. Willow guessed they all had either been abandoned by their families when it was obvious they were half demon, or that their mothers had not survived their births. Either way, the children had managed to forage for what they needed in order to survive on their own.
Now they were hers to love and protect.
Once spring had arrived, she’d moved them out of the mountains. Of the five additional children she had rescued along the way, swelling her family’s numbers to nine, Stone was the oldest and most difficult to manage. He was also the one who needed her least, and yet she needed the most.
And he was nowhere to be seen.
Willow’s lips thinned even as she hugged the smallest ones to her. Stone was a problem, and difficult to control, but his talent would no doubt prove useful to her in the Borderlands. She had to get past the Demon Slayer in order to get to Airie.
She also had to find the woman the demon sought. Willow had no intention of simply turning her over to it. As soon as she did that, it would forget its promises to her. Willow would have to get what she wanted from it first, and arrange some sort of trade, but she had to be careful.
She’d been given a name, a physical description, and a location in which to begin the search. She would send Imp into the boundary, where the girl could travel long distances in the shortest amounts of time, to search for the demon’s woman. Once Imp found her, Willow could decide how best to proceed.
A pretty girl of twelve stood apart from the others. Her name was Thistle and she had golden brown, curly hair, and eyes that appeared purple depending on her mood and the lighting. With a smile that could soften the hardest of hearts she was easy to love, but not nearly as easy to trust. All three of her siblings had died of crib death as infants. Her stepfather had suspected that the crib deaths were not natural. Then Thistle had overheard him talking of selling her, and her mother had not tried to dissuade him. Thistle had run away from home when she sensed Willow’s presence nearby, because that was one of Thistle’s talents—an ability to sense others like her, and over significant distances.
Willow suspected the only reason Thistle had not yet harmed the younger children in their group was because they were so wild and skittish. It was difficult to get close to them, even when they were asleep.
“Where is Stone?” Willow asked her.
The girl shrugged. “Not far. He left the morning after you did. He said he’d be back before you.”
Stone, as it turned out, was a compulsive thief. The greater the risk, the more he enjoyed it. He had gone off to steal, and undoubtedly from someone he should not.
Thistle tugged on her sleeve. Willow smiled at her, lifting her eyebrows in an unspoken question. The girl required a lot of devotion, and a great deal of patience, and Willow was willing to provide both since her mortal mother had failed her so miserably.
“There’s a man coming,” Thistle said. She raised one arm well above her head to indicate a great size. “He’s big. His head is smooth-shaven. There’s a tattoo of some kind of bird all over his back.”
Willow’s smile faded. For Thistle to know this, the man who approached had to be half demon. The description was vague, but also familiar. Willow struggled to place it, her instincts warning her that it was important. It took her a few moments, but when she did, it came as a shock.
There had been an assassin matching the man Thistle described in the mountains the night Willow had unleashed a demon on Raven, and he had not been on Willow’s side. He had come to the defense of a Godseeker.
But, if he was the man Thistle had sensed, then the assassin was more than he seemed.
While she had known the Godseekers would send an assassin after her, this would make him a bigger problem than she’d expected.
She needed to get the children away from the reach of the Godseekers, and this assassin in particular. She wasn’t yet ready to fight—not him, and not the Demon Slayer—but it was a long road to the Borderlands. There would be time enough for her to prepare.
There would also be time to find the woman the demon wanted. Willow wanted to know where she was, but did not want to put her within the reach of the demon too soon.
She regarded eight-year-old Imp, who always managed to lose herself among the other children, with thoughtful eyes. Willow had a fondness for her. The girl was shy, but also sweet-natured and eager to please. At first glance she appeared plain, but it was an illusion the child had created. All half demons were beautiful, even the ones in their monster forms. It was a matter of recognizing that beauty.
Imp’s talent for deflecting attention from herself protected her very well. More time in the demon boundary would do her no harm, and in fact, some good. The girl was too soft and gentle.
“I have a special task for you, darling,” Willow said to her. “I want you to find someone for me.”
“You mean through the demon boundary?” Imp asked. Uncertainty had her plucking at the skirt of a dress that no longer covered her knees.
Willow frowned. Imp had grown in the past month and needed new clothes, and Willow didn’t like that she hadn’t noticed it before now. She wondered if Imp had been deflecting her attention.
She also did not care for the child’s obvious reluctance to follow instructions, and her tone hardened. “You are half demon, and you are strong. Nothing can touch you as long as you believe in your abilities. You can do this. Don’t disappoint me.”
Imp nodded. She listened carefully to Willow’s in-structions. Then, she disappeared.
A streak of lightning split the sky in half, followed almost at once by a deep rumble of thunder.
“Come along,” Willow said to the other children. “A storm is coming. Once it passes we’ll pack our belongings, and tomorrow, we’ll be off on a new adventure.”
Chapter Seven
Although Creed remained hyper aware of Nieve as she sat behind him on the massive hross, overall, she was not a difficult companion. If anything, as the morning wore on, he found her too quiet.
He had no way of knowing if she was comfortable, hungry, tired, or thirsty. She did not complain. Right now the inside of her thighs had to chafe where they rubbed against his denim-clad hips, which was awkward for both of them, and yet she said nothing. The skirt of her dress was not intended for riding astride, and hiked up to expose a great deal of bare skin to the heat and rays of the sun. Creed’s solution was to drape a blanket over her legs to keep them from burning. He could do nothing about the distraction caused by her proximity, or the way it made his demon hum with a low buzz of pleasure. Not even ignore it, although he tried his best by thinking of other things.
He had finally pieced together what it was about her story that he had been missing. She’d had a demon lover. Therefore the child Bear had sold was most likely not his but a demon’s, and Creed did not believe their search would end well. Young children were peddled into brothels with a specific sort of clientele. Any child would be damaged—mentally, physically, or both—after a year in such slavery. If they did find her son, and he was in any way dangerous because of the damage done to him, Creed would have no choice but to hand him over to the Godseekers.
He had also seen what happened to mixed-blood children abandoned and left to die, but who possessed enough demon traits and skills to somehow fend for themselves. Cold and extreme heat did not affect them. They could survive on very little. He would never forget the horror he had witnessed in the Godseeker Mountains when a feral demon child, at the command of Willow, had slaughtered several men.
That child had been failed by everyone—mortal, immortal, and spawn alike. Creed hoped he never encountered such a sad situation again. He certainly had no wish for Nieve to see it.
He considered turning around and taking her to Raven and Blade for safekeeping but dismissed the idea almost at once. He did not want to be parted from her, or have her away from his protection, and his demon concurred. Raven would have little patience for her. He also suspected that Nieve would not stay behind. She might be a mouse, but she was a more determined one than he had foreseen and he worried this search for her son would get her killed. If he kept close watch on her, that, at least, might be prevented.
As well, Creed had wasted enough time on detours already. He was going to seek out the Demon Slayer, as Blade had suggested, and pass on his message. Right now, that was more important even than hunting for spawn, because it was beginning to seem that it was a task too great for a single assassin.
The spring day was not unusually hot, but a swirling mass of gray that ate away at the horizon warned of an impending thunder and lightning storm. They passed beneath a sandstone bluff, following the same ancient and broken trail he had taken two days before. He planned to detour around the site of the burned out wagon train and move onto higher and safer ground. When this roadway was built hundreds of years ago, the lay of the land would have been different than it was now. Flash flooding could occur within minutes of a heavy rainfall, and he did not want them to be caught in this narrow depression of land that would act as a funnel. A nearby stand of green-leaved and healthy cottonwood trees confirmed his suspicions. They thrived in wet soil.
His tattoo itched between his shoulders, a sure signal of danger. He shifted his weight, his first thought for Nieve’s safety, and heard the report of a rifle at the same time he felt the bullet whistle below his left ear and tear through the fabric of his coat.
He reacted the way he’d been trained to do. As he tumbled from the saddle, away from the shooter, he reached behind him to seize Nieve by the arm and drag her with him.
Creed was close to six and a half feet tall, yet when standing, the top of his head barely came to his mount’s withers. That meant the drop from the back of the long-legged hross was a steep one. He did his best to protect Nieve from the worst of the fall, landing so that she was not underneath him, but he did not want her exposed to more gunfire either and tried to shield her with his body. He’d gotten his hand beneath the back of her head so it did not connect with the ground, but he could do nothing to save her shoulder and hip. A sharp inhalation and low, muffled groan were the only indicators that she’d hit the ground hard.
As the hross danced around in nervous anxiety, its heavy hooves presented another danger to them. A feathered fetlock stomped dangerously close to Creed’s face and the top of Nieve’s head. Then the hross galloped off, stirrups flailing.
Creed let it go. It was well-trained and would not go far once it got over its fright. Whoever had shot at them was a bigger problem. With the hross gone, they now had no cover at all.
Creed rolled to his feet, pulling Nieve up and in front of him so that his back was to the shooter. One of her feet got tangled in the blanket wrapped over her legs, and she stumbled. He scooped her up and, in a half-crouch, ran with her toward the safety of nearby rocks at the base of the bluff.
Another bullet chipped off a piece of the sandstone wall above their heads, showering fragments of dirt.
Nieve was shaking. His demon, already inflamed at the possibility she had been harmed, almost escaped Creed’s restraints as it scented her fear. His skin stretched taut across expanding bone, and he breathed deeply, in and out, as he fought to contain it. If he’d had any cause to doubt the threat half demons posed to the mortal world, he need look no farther than himself. It had grown stronger over the past months, with an increase in physical power that showed no signs of abating. Nieve’s presence, and the urge to defend her, amplified it yet again.
Several new shots rang out, kicking up more dirt
and rock. From their trajectories, Creed thought there were three shooters. It was possible a fourth man had gone off to try and capture the runaway hross.
“Are you hurt?” he asked Nieve.
While her green eyes reflected alarm and her cheeks had gone pale, he saw she was not about to become hysterical or faint. Life with Bear had toughened her up that much, at least.
“No,” she replied, her chest rising and falling. “Who are they?”
“Thieves.”
Ammunition was expensive. Honest people would never waste it by firing on someone who posed no threat. Therefore, they were planning to rob him. He had two things of value with him that someone would want to shoot him for. His hross and Nieve.
Creed would also bet money that they were mortal thieves and not spawn. He understood how half demon thought processes worked. They preferred to use demon talents over mortal weapons. Under other circumstances, so would he.
But not with Nieve watching. Right now, he’d trade all of his demon strength for the rifle in the sheath strapped to the packs on his fleeing hross.
The space where they were trapped between the rocks and the bluff was low and cramped. Creed sat so that Nieve was pinned between his knees, protected from gunfire by rock on the front, and with his arms and legs around her so that he defended her back from potential ricochets.
Thunder cracked on the far side of the bluff, a loud bang that made Nieve jump and the earth shake. The sky darkened as the black clouds of the approaching storm moved in. If it rained hard enough, they would be in far more serious trouble from flooding.
Their attackers would also be aware of that danger. Therefore, they would all have to act soon.
The shooting had already stopped. They would be moving in closer, attempting to trap them. Because Creed had not returned fire, they had to suspect he was unarmed. Which he was.
Nieve, however, was not.
“Do you still have that pistol I gave you?” he asked. He already hated the idea of leaving her here alone. He could not leave her defenseless, too.
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