“Why?” I stared at it. I didn’t want to touch the book.
“I want to check something. It won’t bite. It’s a book.” He shoved it into my hands.
Three inches thick and bound in brown leather, it was a heavy one. Gilded letters in a different language scrolled down the binding. I was about to tell him to take it back, when I felt it. A slight tingle in my hands, where they touched the book. In seconds, my entire arms and torso were vibrating. Words whispered through my mind, in a melodic chant. My mouth opened and the chant rolled off my tongue of its own volition.
The book popped open with an audible snap. I jerked back in the chair. “What the…?”
Teryl whooped and pumped a fist in the air. “I knew it. That’s amazing. Elle, you’re a ward thief.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. I’m pretty sure that meant “Elle just got more freaky, creepy, and messed up.”
He grabbed his pen and scribbled on the paper. I bet he was taking notes on me.
Jax and MacLean looked like they weren’t sure what Teryl meant, either.
Teryl finished writing, then grabbed the book from me and studied it, his grin growing wider. “This is freaking amazing. You have no idea what this means.”
“No, I don’t. So why don’t you tell me?” I couldn’t keep the bite of sarcasm from my tone.
“Check your wrist.”
I pulled my left sleeve back. Nothing.
“Your other one.”
I slowly slid my right sleeve back. “See? Nothing.”
He smirked. MacLean made a noise between a growl and a groan. Jax was silent.
I barely repressed a groan. On the inside of my wrist was a small tattoo, no bigger than a pencil eraser. It looked like a medallion or insignia. I didn’t want to look too closely.
Of all the things that had happened in my lifetime, that little tattoo scared me the most. It felt like a brand.
“You shamed your father today,” Luke sneered. “You are a disgrace to the shadow elves.”
I stared straight ahead, refusing to acknowledge him. The more I reacted, the more he enjoyed it. Sick, perverted ass. I was almost seventeen. When would this end?
I sat in a chair in the middle of the room. Luke’s torture chamber, as I thought of it. He loomed over me. He liked to do that. I ignored him with all the disdain I could hold onto. Luke seemed to sense it, and he smiled.
I gritted my teeth, but kept my face impassive. Or tried to.
“Princess, shall we play?”
I heard the soft hiss of his dagger as he pulled it from its sheath. I curled my hands into fists, hoping to quell the shaking. This would be the last time, I promised myself. Never, ever again.
Next time, I would turn that dagger on him. Princess. He’d named it that in my honor, or so he’d told me. One day, I dreamed of killing him with it. I would be doing the world a favor.
And he’d never use it on me again.
Luke circled and stood behind me. He leaned in close, to whisper in my ear. “I want you to carry my mark. Forever. To remind you of your place. And our good times.” He leaned back and laughed at his joke.
I shuddered and closed my eyes. Oh God, oh God, oh God.
He cut the back of my shirt, from my neck to mid-back. I bit my lip to hold in the shriek that was forming. Once I started, I doubted I could stop. So far, he hadn’t touched my skin. Maybe, this one time…
“I think you father would appreciate it.”
I tried to think of happy things. My mother. MacLean. Never seeing my father or Luke again. Shopping. Puppies.
Nothing worked. I could hear Luke’s breathing become heavy. Bile rose in my throat. I could feel him close to my back. Foul heat rolled off him in sickening waves. Inside, the icy cold grew until it enveloped me. It would be over soon. That was the lie I told myself. I refused to think about my secret fear. The fear that one day, he wouldn’t stop. And I died without ever having a chance to say goodbye to my mother, and I love you to MacLean.
“Oh, Princess. It’s been too long,” Luke breathed on my neck.
I gagged. Tears leaked, slow and hot, from behind my eye lids.
“Six months since you’ve been to see us. Six long months. Princess and I were lonely.”
I knew the length of time that had passed. I’d counted the days until my visit. With dread and growing horror.
Luke pressed the blade between my shoulders. Not hard enough to draw blood, but I could feel the prick of the tip against my flesh. I flinched. He laughed, and I silently cursed myself. Stupid, stupid, stupid. He loved it when I showed fear.
“You need to learn your place. Your behavior tonight was not befitting your station.”
I shook with fear, but my mind rebelled. I hadn’t done anything wrong! Cian was our dinner guest. He and my father were discussing business. Imports and other boring things. I had asked Cian about MacLean. That’s it. My awful “transgression,” as my father called it.
The instant after I’d asked, I’d known it was the wrong thing to do. My father’s eyes had flicked to me, icy and full of disgust. Cian had smiled and answered with a pat on my hand. I could sense my father’s growing fury. I was to be seen, not heard. And now, I’d pay the price.
“Behind your heart,” Luke murmured, lost in thought, but drawing me back to the present. “I’ll put it behind your heart.”
Inside, I screamed. Before I felt the prick of the blade. Before he began to whisper in a high, excited tone. I screamed inside the dark recesses of my mind. I didn’t hear Luke’s words. I didn’t want to. His heavy breath burned the back of my neck. His blade dug into the skin above my left shoulder blade.
And pretty soon, I screamed out loud. Blood trickled down my back, hot and sticky as he carved.
When Luke stopped to admire his handiwork, I choked back sobs. I didn’t bother to strain against the rope he’d tied me with. I couldn’t escape. We both knew it.
“Ah, Princess. It’s beautiful.” Luke’s voice came out as a low, breathy whisper.
Freak. He was a goddamned freak of nature. Rage, loathing, and fear made my tears flow faster, but I stopped screaming.
“Now you carry my family symbol.” He laughed, like it was a joke.
I couldn’t speak. The words burning in my throat would only cause me more agony. I bit them back and stared at the floor. I would burn the damn thing off first chance I got.
“We’re forever linked. Just you and me.”
My mind cracked, and I tried to speak. “No, I…”
He hit me so hard, the chair rocked to one side and fell over. I crashed down, hitting my head against the stone floor. His laughter chased me into oblivion.
I dropped back into reality with a jarring thud. I blinked and stared at Teryl, who knelt before me.
“Elle? Oh, thank God, you’re back. What in the hell happened?”
“Memory,” I spit out, between my chattering teeth. When did it get so cold in here? I brought a hand to my face and felt tears. I quickly wiped them away. I wanted no reminder of that memory.
MacLean picked up his jacket from the back of a chair and draped it around my shoulders. I clutched it tightly, because I was so damned cold.
“Teryl,” I managed to mumble. “What is a ward thief?”
“It means when you encounter a ward, not only can you get through, you can also absorb them.”
“Like e. coli?” My skin crawled, which was a wholly unpleasant sensation, considering how freaked out I already was.
“Gross. No. You absorb the magic. The ward becomes a part of you, so you can use it later.”
I looked down at the small mark on my wrist, trying to decipher the tiny pattern. “What is it?”
“That one is a simple cloaking spell. If anyone but my family tried to read that book, the words would be missing. Cloaked.” He pointed at the mark. “You can now use that. If you need to hide yourself, use the ward. If you need to hide something, like words in a book, a room, a car, you can use the ward.
Think of it like an invisibility cloak for whatever you need.”
“How is that different than shadowing?”
Teryl thought about it for a second. “It is and it isn’t. It’s more difficult for you to shadow in the daytime. So the cloaking ward would come in handy. Also, if we find out you can only shadow for five minutes, the ward would work when your shadowing magic ran out. The nice thing about wards is they have their own magic, so it won’t drain yours. This particular ward is just a bonus to the shadowing. Think of it as a backup.”
I shivered and pulled MacLean’s coat tight around me. His scent wrapped around me, too. It combated the chill, which surprised me.
“What’s the catch? Why wouldn’t I want to use the ward?”
A hint of a smile played at the corners of Teryl’s mouth. “No catch. It’s perfect, because now you can shadow and cloak yourself.”
“But, how does that help me with the Library of Shadows?”
Teryl pursed his lips, as if searching for patience.
MacLean snapped his fingers. “I see where he’s going with it. If you use a ward to cloak, you should be able to get through the wards at the Library of Shadows. The magic of the ward will hide you, whereas shadowing won’t, not completely.”
My brain was too fuzzy. The mark looked fairly unremarkable, considering what it was supposed to do. “How do I know it will work?”
“You can try it. Later. Right now, you need a little more rest.”
I wasn’t going to argue. My stomach had food, now my body craved sleep. That memory had left a nasty taste in my mouth, and I wanted to curl up and sleep.
I stood. “Okay, wake me in four hours.”
Jax followed me into our room. “When you wake, we’ll talk.”
I nodded. The conversation about his past and our future was long overdue.
Chapter Sixteen
Jax gently shook me awake. “It’s time. We can speak while we get ready to move. The hunters will be here any time. Altair might have bought us some time with a few of them, but we still don’t know where your father is, and we need to go.”
And that was all it took to bring me awake in a painful jolt. Four hours had come too soon. I rubbed a hand across my face. “Jax,” I groaned. “Why can’t any of this be easy? Why can’t we have met under different circumstances?”
Well, hell. Might as well jump right in and blurt it all out. “And how did we start the bond?”
Jax sat on the bed next to me and smoothed my hair back. “Life is never easy. If it was, we’d all take it for granted. Death and destruction are meant to make us appreciate life and beauty.” He cupped my cheek and offered his slow smile.
My heart warmed against my better judgment. He still hadn’t answered my burning question about the bond, and I wasn’t going to let him seduce me out of an answer. This time. I didn’t pull away from the hand on my cheek, but I didn’t smile back at him, either.
He got the hint.
“We met before, but you don’t remember all of it. We are together now, and that’s all that matters. I won’t let your history with MacLean or the lack of memories affect us any more than it already has. The bond was created when you opened your mind to the possibility of us.”
Okay, that was hokey. “Opened my mind?”
“At my apartment. That night, you let yourself believe we were meant to be. You acknowledged you were mine. And you believed it.”
He was right; I remembered every word. But it seemed really too simple. Teenagers with hormones would be initiating bonds all the way through high school. “Isn’t there more to it than that?”
“Yes. That was only the start. The bond hasn’t been…completed.”
I noticed his slight hesitation. “Explain, please.”
“There is a ceremony. In order for us to complete the bond, we must exchange tokens—”
“What’s with the tokens?” I grumbled.
Jax smiled and continued, “We must exchange tokens and vows.”
Relief and trepidation flooded me. It was an odd combination. Relief, because I hadn’t taken the final step without knowing. Trepidation, because the thought of a serious commitment on top of everything else scared the hell out of me. “Like a wedding?”
“Yes.”
I wasn’t ready for that. There was too much standing between us. “Why didn’t you tell me you worked for my father when I was a teenager?”
He shifted on the bed as I got up and started scrounging for my boots.
“I work for you,” he said. “You are my mate.”
“And that’s an evasive answer.” I stamped my foot into my boot for emphasis. I wasn’t going to let him off the hook.
“There are things I can’t discuss. Not yet. Not now.”
Unease slithered through me. I grabbed my hairbrush and started a quick once-through. “What does that mean? You can’t or won’t discuss it?”
Jax didn’t answer.
“Aren’t mates supposed to know each other’s secrets?”
He remained silent.
I smacked the hairbrush down on the hotel dresser, ignoring the pain in my chest. I refused to call it heartache. “I guess we’ll talk about it later, then.”
Or maybe we wouldn’t. I left the room as I pushed it firmly from my mind.
I had a library to break into before the hunters caught up to us. Because I was a glutton for punishment.
I knocked on Teryl’s door. He opened it a split second later. “I think we figured it out. Are you packed and ready to go? The Library of Shadows is located outside of Edinburgh. We’ve got to get going.”
“We’re packed.” Jax stood behind me, both of our suitcases in hand. He must have packed them earlier, while I’d had my four hours of oblivion.
I turned back to Teryl. “Guess we’re set. How long of a drive to get to Edinburgh?”
“About three hours. Long enough to plan.” Teryl grinned at me.
I suspected he was having fun. More fun than the rest of us, at least.
“Guess we’d better get going.” I couldn’t drum up any enthusiasm. I could feel the chasm between Jax and me growing wider by the minute. Might as well add a little breaking and entering to the mix. I refrained from asking, “Are we having fun yet?” Barely.
MacLean was waiting with the car. Teryl and I loaded up as Jax checked us out.
Continuing my glutton for punishment theme, I asked Teryl, “How close are the hunters?”
“Falon is only a couple hours away. I would guess he’s flying.”
From the tone of his voice, I guessed Falon was the hunter we really wanted to avoid. “Is Falon worse than the others?”
The frown line on his forehead appeared. I was going to start using that as a warning sign. “It depends on what you mean by worse.”
“Don’t play games, Teryl. I’m not in the mood.”
He sighed. “Falon makes Luke seem sweet.”
I froze. My heart pounded out a painful rhythm. My voice came out a harsh whisper. “I doubt that very much.”
“He’s not sadistic. He’s completely psychotic. And he’s the most dedicated hunter the Council has. He takes every assignment personally. The others can be assholes, but Falon is crazy. And stubborn. He won’t give up until the Council calls him off. Or he finds you.”
Well, bully for me.
Jax emerged, and we loaded into the car. Jax and I in the back, and Teryl in the front, with MacLean driving. Road trips had never seemed so unappealing. Here I was, with three attractive men, and I wanted to jump out and run down the street in the opposite direction.
I leaned my head against the window instead. Breath in, breath out.
Teryl launched right into his idea. “Here’s a layout of the Library.” He turned and handed me a printout, tapping the paper. “You’re going to enter here. The fates are kept in different rooms according to the lines, and also your family. The shadow elf rooms are located in the lower levels.” He pointed to another spot on the sheet. “I’
m guessing your family line will be located in one of three rooms on the second lower level. Possibly the first level, but I’d start with the second and you could work your way back up. I’ve highlighted them.”
“You guess?”
“The wards work on my abilities, too, Elle,” he said quietly. “I’m doing the best I can, but those wards prevent me from locating a specific object in the building. I’ll get you as close as I can, but you need to understand, there’s no guarantee with this one.”
Chastised, but still frustrated, I nodded. “Okay, sorry. Keep going.”
“You’ll be cloaked from the wards, but still visible, so you’ll need to rely on your shadowing.”
“To avoid the guards?”
MacLean glanced at me in the rearview mirror. “The guards vary depending on the day and shift, but because we’ll hit it tonight, you’ll be dealing mostly with gargoyles and shadow elves. A few oracles are always on staff, but they hire other lines for protection.”
“If I get caught, what would a gargoyle or shadow elf be able to do?”
I saw a muscle under MacLean’s eye twitch. My last hope sank.
“Gargoyles will crush you. Literally crush you. Shadow elves will shadow, and the ones they’ll have guarding the library will have strong shadowing abilities. They’ll try to sneak up on you and use a weapon of some sort.”
“Dirty Harry? The Mighty Sword? Big Bang for a gun, maybe?” I hung on to my humor for dear life.
Teryl snickered. He was the only one who seemed to appreciate my sense of humor.
“Tell me more about being a ward thief. Am I going to break out in ward marks with this little visit?”
Teryl stared straight ahead. “Possibly.”
Oh goody. Somehow, I doubted they made an ointment for ward marks.
“But they’ll be as small as the one you have now.”
That didn’t make me feel better. “My ability of ward thief. Which line is that from? Shadow or light?”
All three men were silent. I waited them out.
“None,” Teryl finally replied. “It’s a trait of Laurre.”
“And she is…?”
Stone Cold Seduction Page 20