by Cristy Rey
Sunday unbuttoned her shorts and pushed them down her hips. They pooled at her feet. One-by-one she plucked the buttons of her shirt and unfastened them until it lay open revealing the white lace bra underneath. Cyrus watched her, standing motionless, both unable and unwilling to stop her from undressing. When she was down to nothing but her bra and panties, Sunday knelt upright on the bed, facing Cyrus. Placing her hands on his hips, she grabbed him and pulled him against her. His throbbing erection pushed into the softness of her belly. Cyrus’ arms fell limply to his sides. He refused his wolf’s raging desire to touch her.
“Let me tell you what’s going to happen, Cyrus,” Sunday said, looking up at him with full determination. Her face was hard with intensity and her eyes locked with Cyrus’ in a hard stare. “I’m going to unhook my bra, and I’m going to let it fall off my body. Then, I’m going to take your hand, and I’m going to let you feel how wet I am for you. You’re going to feel it, and you’re going to tell yourself that not trusting me now will mean leaving me like this, leaving you like this. Then you’re going to decide for yourself what it is I want, and what you’re going to do about it.”
Sunday did as promised, pulling his body into hers as she brought his hand to her damp, clothed mound. He ran his fingertips over it, nudging his thumb over her swollen clit. Sunday reached up to Cyrus’ neck and dug her fingers into his hair. She looked into his eyes, the cool honey he’d seen in them before now brimming with the heat of her intense arousal. Behind those eyes, some plan was hatching. He could see her plotting as all things fell into place. Before he could think to stop it, she pulled his mouth onto hers and drowned him in a long, passionate kiss. As Sunday’s tongue massaged his, she drove him deeper and deeper into a mind-numbing swell of passion.
The air crackled around them and the pressure in the room dropped. Cyrus’ spirit lifted in his chest and he felt lightless.
You’re going to show me, Cyrus, her voice whispered in his mind. You’re going to show me what I need to know, and you’re going to do it truthfully. You have no choice.
What do you want? he begged. I’ll give you anything…please…just don’t let go.
Reasoning to wriggle from the trance of Sunday’s spell was a far reality that Cyrus didn’t even stopped to consider. All he wanted was to hold her there so that she could continue kissing him, caressing, and digging her nails into his scalp while she feasted on his mouth and let him feast on hers. Cyrus slid his hand down to his throbbing shaft and grabbed it, squeezing it even more erect than it had been. He pressed his body closer to Sunday’s until he his head dug into the hot vee between her legs. A thin sheath of cotton was all that stood between his body becoming a part of hers.
She groaned with a mixture of arousal and protest, pulling herself deeper into the kiss while her nails dug into his shoulder. Cyrus’ hand slid up her waist to her breast. He found her nipple and rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger. Sunday moaned again, this time redirecting her response to strengthen the beckoning of her will.
Show me everything, Cyrus, she willed as a soft moan escaped her throat. Show me all the things you’re hiding from me. Tell me what you really want. Make me trust you.
Take it, he pleaded. Take it all.
In the wake of his condescension to her will, Sunday delved into his psyche. He’d given her free range over his memories, his thoughts, and his emotions. So entranced was he by her spell and so rapt in her seduction, that he didn’t even try to censor himself. The gut-wrenching pain of his first transformation, the thrill of the hunt as a wolf bearing down on his four-legged prey, the image of her at fourteen, scowling in the backseat of a car looking ahead of her to the motel where the wolves had taken her after her first abduction, the all-consuming torment that the Incarnate had given rise to, the endless traveling through the badlands thinking only when he would eventually find her, the unexpected calm that resonated through every molecule of his being when they’d first locked eyes at the club, the rising desire to protect her from the other wolves and the external forces that sought to recapture her… Every bit of Cyrus flowed into Sunday’s mind, soaking into her innermost parts, drawing with it too much intensity and too much power. She struggled to maintain control.
All of Cyrus’ terrible confusion and conflict created a wasteland of her senses. Before she could contain herself, her walls cracked. Immediately, Sunday shut down her spell and shoved Cyrus off of her. She tumbled off the bed and crawled to the corner of the room. She pushed herself tightly against the wall, clenched her eyes shut, and hugged her knees. Rocking herself back and forth, she drew her awareness into herself and slammed shut the doors of her perception. She couldn’t have possibly prepared herself enough to confront Cyrus’ raw soul. All of the life he had lived and all of the complexities of his nature exploded in her psyche. Whatever it was she had hoped to find, she had found it, and so much more that she couldn’t even being to process.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Bells and whistles rang in his head even after Sunday had disconnected from him and tucked herself into the corner to cry. He wasn’t even able to go to her as he had wanted and curl himself around her in a vain attempt to protect her from whatever she’d seen inside of him. He was immobilized by the searing pain of Sunday’s psychic excavation. They were both still reeling from the effects when Cyrus’ phone rang. He winced as the shrill ringing sliced into the air.
“You should get that.”
Sunday sniffled between her ragged breaths when the phone started ringing for a third time.
“It’s probably super important, you know.”
She tried to sound spiteful, but managed only to betray her attempted composure. The second she stopped speaking, her body uncontrollably released a flood of tears, and broken sobs scraped through her raw throat.
Dragging himself from the bed, Cyrus hunched, nearly limping, toward the sound of the phone hidden in the pocket of the jeans he’d tossed aside before showering. It was Marcus calling from the road, probably with an update on his surveillance of the vampires’ funeral home. Since they’d found and trapped the tourist vampire, Joshua, the previous night, Neal and Marcus had been stalking the vampire nest. Joshua, under no slight duress, had acknowledged the presence of a warlock in the community. A witch he could only identify as a female somehow connected to the Columbia nest.
Though tourists didn’t make a habit of associating closely with the more structured society of locally established nests, they kept their ears to the ground. Joshua admitted to the werewolves that he and Phillip heard rumors whispered in secret among the greater preternatural community in the city. These rumors told of a female warlock who was eager to raise a demon. Although they hadn’t been able to provide many details, only suspicions, they had speculated that the vampire community in Columbia had to have known about her plans as well. If they did, it was likely that they were involved, either directing or supporting the warlock in her endeavor.
Since their interrogation of tourist vamp, Neal and Marcus were aiding Angel in his surveillance of Constance and splitting up to follow the different vampires who they’d seen at the funeral home.
“How’s the girl?” Marcus asked.
Cyrus looked over his shoulder to Sunday in the corner. His stomach churned at the sight of her making herself as small as she could as she balled herself up in the corner, painfully sobbing. He sighed and replied that she was fine. How could he tell Marcus anything but? He knew the werewolf would be able to hear her crying in the background, but he had to let Marcus know to drop the subject.
“Tell me about the vamps,” Cyrus answered, voice pinched as he forced it.
“We’ve got two that we know of staying at the house where I’m stationed. Neal is still waiting for the rest of them to rise at their place of business. There’s still a couple of hours till sunset. At least another couple of them live full-time at the funeral home, probably holed up in some custom-made plush coffins in their storeroom,” he joked tensely, no
t a hint of entertainment in his tone.
“Anything new on the witch?”
“Just talked to Angel and he says she’s been staying at home. He thought he should creep up to the window and see what she’s been doing, but I think he’s just going to keep waiting her out. How ‘bout you all?”
“Sunday was just about to help me keep going through the stuff we found at the warehouse,” he answered.
As he spoke, Sunday raised her head and her eyes searched the room for the boxes they’d found at the warehouse. Constance’s stash had completely slipped her mind. When Cyrus ended the call after a few more queries, Sunday rose, and finding herself almost entirely undressed, walked over to where her shirt lay on the floor. She rebuttoned it and asked Cyrus as blankly as possible if he could retrieve a bag of clothes from the trunk of her car.
In the meantime, while Cyrus was collecting her things from outside, Sunday returned Sammy’s call. Again, not having heard from Sunday after an abrupt departure had her friends reeling with worry.
“Where have you been?” Sammy yelped. “I went to your house after you ran out of Vicky’s and you weren’t there. We’ve been calling you nonstop, and you haven’t answered.”
“I know, I’m sorry,” Sunday answered, sniffing loudly into the phone while she chewed on her lip and hugged herself.
“First Constance accuses us of doing something like a crazy person, and then you dash out after her?!” Sammy’s voice was pitchy with outrage and confusion. “What the hell is going on, Sunny?”
Over the phone, Sammy related the long argument that she and Kayla had about what had been troubling Sunday. They were concerned that it was more than the coven. She had grown unusually distant from them in the last week, and she behaved erratically around them. Sunday took account of the widening divide between her and her beloved friends. As much as she was certain that she’d never see them past the next couple of days, she had to reassure Sammy that she loved them, both of them, and that she would give anything for them.
“Sammy, you can’t know how much I love you and Kayla,” she whimpered, holding back her tears. “You two have been the only people I’ve cared about in so very long. I haven’t known anyone who’s taken me in the way you two have. You’ve trusted me, and I’ve done nothing to deserve it. You mean the world to me. If anything were to ever happen to you…” Sunday’s words cut off when she caught Sammy’s voice on the other end choking back tears of her own.
“Are you breaking up with us?” Sammy asked, her voice breaking. The crying she’d been trying to hide from Sunday was on full display now, and Sunday stayed on the line wishing there was something she could say to soothe her friend’s pain.
“Sammy, please, please, don’t think for a second that I’m not doing all of this for you.”
“What are you talking about, Sunny? What’s going on?”
“I’m so sorry, honey, but I can’t tell you. I want to so badly.” Sunday balled a chunk of her hair in her hand and she pulled on it so hard that it almost ripped out of her scalp. She swore.
“Dammit, Sam, there’s so much you don’t know, so much I can’t tell you. You just… you just have to believe me. Constance…” Sunday sputtered as she said the woman’s name. Her body shook as she tried to contain the eruption of the truth, “Constance is a–”
Just as she’d been about to reveal that Constance was a warlock, the motel room door swung open. Cyrus walked in from the parking lot, and realizing what she was about to say, grabbed the phone out of Sunday’s hand and ended the call. He threw the bag of clothes down at her feet and stood over her, glowering.
“What the hell did you think you were going to say to her?”
“She has to know, Cyrus,” Sunday whined. Bleary eyed, she looked up at him and clawed at her chest above the heart. “They have to know to stay away from her!”
“You can’t. You know that.”
“I wasn’t going to tell them about me. I was going to tell her about Constance.”
“No, kid,” he said, shaking his head more with pity than with any anger. His shoulders slumped, and he took a step toward her, extending his arm to grip her shoulder. “You want to tell them because you think that will explain why you’ve been missing for all these days. You think it will make them forgive you for running away if they know you’ve done them this huge favor.”
Cyrus paused and lowered himself to sit beside her on the bed. He turned her to face him, and cradled her cheek in his hand. He looked into her large, brilliant eyes now puddled with tears, and his heart shattered. His voice was soft as he spoke to her.
“You know that you can’t fix any of this by telling them. They’re mundane. They can’t know this shit exists. They play witches one day a week for an hour or two and they get to go back to their white picket fences and their nine-to-five jobs. That’s not your life, Sunday. It wasn’t your life two weeks ago and it’s not your life now.”
Cyrus placed his hands under Sunday’s shoulders, and he pulled her onto his lap, setting her legs on either side of his hips. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close in a warm, comforting embrace. Forgetting all the heat of passion and all the things she’d seen in his mind, Sunday collapsed against his chest and drew heaving sobs into it. Cyrus patted her head and combed through the short strands of her hair. He laid a kiss to her temple and squeezed her until their bodies melded into one.
“Sunday,” he continued, gently pressing his cheek to her head, “you know as well as I do that telling your friend what’s really going on will put her in an impossible position. The only way to really protect your friends is to keep them in the dark and take care of this thing ourselves. I’ll be with you all the way and I won’t leave you alone when it’s finished.” He took her head in his hands and pulled it back so that look into one another’s eyes. “I promise you, Sunday. I promise to you that, for the rest of your life, you’ll never have to be alone again.”
Placing a tender kiss on her trembling lips, Cyrus cradled her in his arms. The watershed reality of her predicament was breaking her. Werewolves hunted her, a cult sought her, a demon-conjuring warlock was infringing on her friends’ coven, and too soon for comfort, she was abandoning the only life she’d ever wanted for herself for the only life she knew how to live. She was alone and frustrated. The whole world sat on her shoulders, threatening to roll off and shatter to pieces.
“We should get to work finding out what’s going on,” Cyrus eventually said. “I could use your eyes and your head on this with me. You’re much better at going through a witch’s belongings than this doofus werewolf is.”
Cyrus couldn’t see her face, but he could feel the smile forming on it against his chest. It warmed his heart to no end to know that he could give her that single, innocent pleasure by poking fun at himself and using her own words to do it.
Hours later, they were well into sifting through Constance’s collection when they came across a notebook containing verses and rituals painstakingly translated from an ancient text. Throughout the pages of the journal, Constance had inserted papers with shadings of traditional Indonesian artifacts and engravings. Recalling the pendant she’d lifted from the warehouse, Sunday sprung from the bed and ransacked the room to find it.
“What is it?” Cyrus watched expectantly as Sunday fumbled through her jacket pockets to retrieve the artifact.
“I don’t know,” she confessed. “Like I told you last night, it’s a Malay black magic pendant that Constance has been using as an amulet during her incantations. We didn’t have a clue about what she was using it for until… this.”
Sunday pointed to the sketch of a human form kneeling and raising his arms to another larger and equally simplistic humanoid figure. The figures were encircled by inscriptions in a language that neither she nor Cyrus could read. Beneath the image, Constance had highlighted the caption. It read “Crude illustration of nyani (evil spirits, Semai myth) ghost exalting personage identified as Dhajal (Deceiver).”
> “Look at this closely,” Sunday said, holding the pendant out to Cyrus. “It’s not exactly the same, obviously, but the Dhajal is posed in the same way and… look at that word there,” she pointed to a word in the inscription surrounding the figure drawings. “It’s the same word that’s engraved into the silver right there.”
Cyrus inspected both items and saw that she was right. The similarity between the drawing on the page and the relief on the pendant was undeniable, but it was impossible to tell if they were of the same person, or thing. The word was difficult to decipher, particularly since neither of them recognized the language, but it looked good that they were, if not the same word, then at least words shared similar characteristics.
“Do you have any idea what this could mean?” he asked Sunday.
“Not really.”
With the charm in her hand, she sank onto the bed and hunched her shoulders. “All I know about Dhajal, or whatever is that he’s, essentially, the Islamic equivalent to the Christian Devil. Beyond that, I’ve got nothing except that this copy gets us the closest to understanding the amulet of all the other things we’ve found among Constance’s things. I mean, we’re looking at the same culture or region, right? Malay, Malaysia…Dhajal is Islamic. I even traced the design of the relief to that area on a Google search, no less. It’s the only thing that doesn’t fit. Everything else we’ve gone through had been Celtic or centered on the island of Britain, and all of it predates Christ.
“This—this pendant, these notes—is the only stuff that’s different. It comes from a different tradition and from a different time. I can’t believe that she’s been studying for so long centered on one location and time period and suddenly becomes interested in Malay black magic unless the latter has to do with what she’s up to now. Maybe she’s failed for so long going down the one path that she sought out another, and through this last one, she’s finally been able to make some progress.”