Possessed by the Fallen

by Sharon Ashwood

  He carried her through a garden entrance and up a set of stairs. Once on the second floor, Jack turned down a side hallway that appeared to be used mostly by servants. A few passed by, but there were too many injured limping here and there in the chaos for Lark and Jack to stand out. Finally, they reached the end of a dim corridor and he moved to set her down. She twisted in his arms, sliding down his body until her feet touched the floor. She indulged in another few seconds of contact before unwinding her arms from his neck.

  “Can you stand on your own?” he asked, holding her elbow until he was sure.

  “I think so,” she said, though she braced one hand against the wall. “Where are we?”

  “Someplace safe.” He unlocked a narrow door that might have led to a broom closet. Once inside, he locked the door behind them. When he turned on the light, she expected mops and buckets. Instead, the overhead glow revealed a small sitting room with simple but tasteful furniture. Through interior doorways, she could see a bedroom and bathroom. There were no windows, but that was a plus for the undead.

  “Whose rooms are these?” she asked. “Yours?”

  Jack shrugged. “The king keeps this apartment for Company use. So did his father and grandfather. The place isn’t exactly a home away from home, but even spies and dead men need a place to sleep and take a shower.”

  Though an agent, Lark had never been assigned to the palace, so she’d never known the rooms existed. Still, she was slightly annoyed that she hadn’t sniffed out all of Jack’s lairs. The man had more bolt-holes than a fox.

  She tried to frame an answer, but the afterglow of being carried in his arms scrambled her thoughts. She caught the faint scent of him, an exotic aroma as if he’d walked through a spice merchant’s stall in some desert market. It wasn’t a cologne or soap—it was just one more enigmatic quality that made up Jack Anderson.

  Be careful, she told herself. He’s slipping more and more toward his demon side, and that means he’s unpredictable. All the same, his attraction held a dark edge that made her mouth water and her brain turn to mush. Yes, this was Jack—but he had her alone, in a hidden apartment with only one exit and no windows, and he had a demon on board. There was good reason to be wary, even if he was all solicitude.

  His hooded eyes, with their long lashes, held her pinned where she stood. The room was too small, as if the walls were sucked inward by the tension between them. She raised her hands, palms out, in a gesture of self-defense. They almost prickled from the force of Jack’s presence.

  “I’m covered in blood. I need to wash it off,” she said. “It must be driving you crazy.”

  The corner of his mouth quirked, and he gestured toward the bathroom door. “Please.”

  Lark took a first step, every instinct telling her not to turn her back. His mouth might be smiling, but she could see the tips of his fangs. Once a vampire’s hunger was roused, it didn’t fade until he was fed. Surrender to a vampire’s bite brought ecstasy, but it also made one utterly vulnerable to their every whim.

  Good sense told Lark to lock herself in the bathroom ASAP. Still, there were things she had to know immediately. The answer would decide what she did next. “Are you locking me up here?”

  “I’m going to let you recover here.”

  That wasn’t quite an answer. “I’ll help you if you stop trying to put me in chains. You saw what’s out there. We need to work together.”

  He gave a slow, reluctant nod. “For now. Until you give me a reason not to.”

  It wasn’t much, but she’d take that crumb of trust—and push for one more. “You still have my guns, plus the one I borrowed from Princess Amelie’s guard.”

  With a rustle of leather, Jack produced the weapons one by one and set them on the tiny hall table, and then set her clips next to the small arsenal. “Go wash up. I’m going to check in with the guards. Maybe they’ve uncovered something of interest.”

  There was nothing more to say. Lark forced herself to pretend she didn’t notice the drowning black of his pupils as they dilated to take in prey. Fear tickled the back of her neck like a feather of ice, and once she reached the bathroom, she locked the door. That wouldn’t necessarily keep him out, but it made her feel much better. Sort of. Desire and fear spiraled together like crazy DNA.

  Pulling herself together, Lark looked around. The room was basic and stark white, but it was spotless. She stood in front of the sink and confronted the mirror. She was filthy, her hair matted and her coat stained where she’d lain on the grass. Blood had dripped down her collar and sleeve and smeared her forehead and cheek. With a mental apology to whoever cleaned the floor, she shed her garments one by one and let them fall, planning to deal with them when she wasn’t covered with blood and dirt.

  When she finally stood naked, she considered her reflection. She looked as she always had, pale skin over muscles toned with training. That was, and was not, the truth. Fey healed quickly and well, but without magical intervention it would have been a very long time, if ever, before the scars from the fire in New York had faded away.

  She’d been told to simply use a glamour to cover the ruined mass of skin and muscle that stretched from her collarbone to her knees. The Light Fey were too weak to waste power, even on the only Company-trained agent the Light Court had. The warrior in her had understood and even prized the scars, but the woman in her had mourned her beauty. And appearance aside, what no glamour could cover was the pain. She was healed enough to power through the excruciating injuries, but anything that didn’t hurt was numb and clumsy from the damage.

  The Light had wanted her back in the field, and Lark wasn’t one to shirk duty, even through acute discomfort—and a haze of painkillers. But on her way out of the Light Fey territories, Lark stopped at the library of her old school. There, half remembered from her studies, she had found the Dark Fey spell that would heal her.

  Such magic was forbidden to the Light, so she’d traveled well away from her home before she’d used it. It had taken a sacrifice of her blood—something a convalescent couldn’t spare—but it had worked. Overnight, she had become whole again, as sleek and healthy and pain-free as before. Of course the Light Court would find out eventually, but under the circumstances, Lark was prepared to sin first and beg forgiveness later. She’d always been the odd one out in the family—the orphan, the one who tried a little too hard, the one left uninvited if there was a more interesting guest. Lark had learned early to provide for herself.

  But Drusella Blackthorn’s words returned to her. For those first few days after you arrived, your flirtation with the Dark made you incredibly easy to follow. The spell that had ended her pain had also left a residue that made it possible for the Dark Fey to track her.

  Lark’s body tightened with frustrated anger. She leaned on the sink, hanging her head. I should have known better. Dark Fey magic always comes with a price. She should have realized Dark Fey could follow the stink of their spells long after they faded for everyone else. The fact that she had been full of pain, drugs and remorse for what she had done to Jack didn’t make it any less stupid.

  She tried to remember everywhere she’d been since she’d arrived, but her thoughts scattered like startled birds. Should she tell Jack? But how could she explain what she’d done and why, when he was so much a part of her reasons? He’d just take this as one more sign not to trust her.

  She shivered, her exhausted emotions at their limits. Jack was on the other side of the flimsy door. If she lingered in here for too long, he’d know something was amiss. Lark stepped into the shower. Her head ached and stung as she washed the blood from her hair, but getting clean made her feel better. She washed quickly, gathering her wits so she could decide her next move.

  Lark turned off the water and reached for a towel. As she stepped out of the tub, she froze, one foot a few inches from the thick white mat. Her clothes were gone from the
floor. On the back of the door, a thick white robe hung on the hook. Jack had been in there while she showered. It was so like him to assume control of her personal space without asking.

  She thought of the drowning darkness in Jack’s eyes as his hunger rose, and her pulse galloped. She pulled on the terry-cloth robe and was glad to see it covered her from neck to ankles. Some men should only be confronted when both parties were fully dressed. Lark cinched the waist of the robe and went to retrieve her clothes.

  Jack was sitting in the tiny kitchen nook, hunched over the counter. The posture showed the width of his shoulders and the clean lines of his profile. His cheeks looked slightly pink, as if he’d fed. Lark felt a pang of jealousy completely out of sync with the rest of her mood.

  He was scrolling through the messages on his phone. “I still can’t get a signal.”

  “For how long?”

  “Since I lost it while driving to Company HQ.” He tossed the device to the countertop in disgust. “I was talking to Kenyon.”

  Lark froze. She knew the names of all the Horsemen, though she’d only ever met Mark Winspear, who was a friend as well as fellow agent. “Where was Kenyon?”

  “At a restaurant, I think. He said Ralston and Winspear are out of town.” Jack rubbed his face, his voice constricted. “Odds are the Horsemen escaped the blast. That’s the only thing keeping me sane right now. But I can’t get anyone. I don’t know who else made it.”

  Lark bit her lip. Faces flashed through her mind—friends, teachers, even the cooks who fed the few nonvampires in the tiny cafeteria. One more second and she would go to pieces—and that wasn’t going to do a thing to stop the next attack. She forced herself onward. “It’s all the magic pinging around. That’s how I popped that electronic lock. Spells wreak havoc with the tech.”

  Jack dropped his hands from his face. He looked weary. “Yeah, I figured as much.”

  “Where are my clothes?”

  His eyes swept over her, taking in the huge robe wrapped around her slender frame. The corner of his mouth twitched, almost a smile. “I got rid of them. The palace staff are bringing something in your size.”

  “Aren’t we supposed to be saving the world right now? I could wait for fresh socks.”

  “Your clothes smelled like your blood. I couldn’t afford the distraction.”

  Her breath caught, remembering the tension just before she’d gone to shower. “Ah.”

  The lines around his mouth tightened. “Yeah.”

  “Did you talk to the guards?”

  “Not yet. There’s no landline in this suite and the cell phones are down. I only left you here long enough to find a staff member.”

  “Why wait here? You could have left a note.”

  A possessive look flashed through his gaze. “I had to make sure you didn’t pass out in the shower. You have a head injury. You need to rest.”

  Lark grimaced. “I don’t need to rest. I need to kill Drusella Blackthorn.”

  “All in good time. Now sit down and let me look at your wound.”

  Grumpy now, Lark obeyed and pulled herself up onto the high stool at the counter. It wasn’t an easy move in the robe.

  Even at that height, Jack stood tall enough to check her scalp. “You’ve got a nice bump, but the cut’s not deep. I could stitch it, but it’s not really necessary.”

  “Good. Don’t bother. We’ve got better things to do. If the fire was a distraction, it was obviously meant to spread the remaining security thin. With the Company disabled and the human guards running like headless chickens, what’s been left unprotected?”

  “Don’t forget the police and fire were called in, too. The target—if there was one—might have been in the city. With the wedding so close, there are all kinds of dignitaries in town. Also banks. Casinos. Museums.”

  Jack was behind her, hands resting on her shoulders, when he paused. For a long moment he remained as still as only a vampire could be, and then one finger traced her neck, following the line until it disappeared into the collar of the voluminous robe. It tickled and, reflexively, she pulled the thick terry cloth tighter. Then she realized the collar had gapped when she’d climbed the stool, and he could see her shoulder. She suddenly felt far more exposed than she actually was.

  “You said you were burned,” Jack said softly, a faint note of distrust edging the words. “You look fine.”

  “Healing magic,” Lark replied, her voice cool. She didn’t need to say what kind. “I’ve only been back on my feet the past few months.”

  He touched her neck again, his fingers lingering at the side of her throat. Then he bent and kissed the spot, his lips soft and cool. “I’ve always admired your ability to survive. I saw what was left of the building.”

  “Came to dance on my grave?”

  She heard the hitch of his breath and cursed herself.

  “What happened that night?” he asked.

  Lark slid off the stool, needing to move. She couldn’t stand still while thinking about the fire, as if her fight-or-flight response confused memory with the here and now.

  Jack wasn’t asking about the moment she’d stabbed him, but her mind went there first. The dagger had been spelled to steal Jack’s secrets. She’d expected to learn of an amulet or a charm that gave him his extraordinary strength. She’d been utterly unprepared for what had happened next.

  Jack’s eyes had transformed first, somehow growing dark and bright at once until they were as piercing as a sun and as cold as a star. Lark had frozen, not understanding what was going on. But then Jack had howled with pain, and the blue zigzags of power had burst from his skin, blazing so bright the afterimages had rendered her blind. The energy had come at her in hot waves, lifting her hair as if the winds of hell had risen. And all of it had been focused on her and the crime of her betrayal.

  She’d discovered a demon.

  Instantly, he’d slid a hand around her throat. His power had beat through her, crushing her pounding heart like a fist. Somehow she’d known that, with a thought, he could have squeezed it to pulp.

  “Why did you do that?” The voice had not been Jack’s, but an utterance of the abyss.

  After that, her memory of the night shredded to nothing, as if the sheer voltage of his power had blown away her synapses. She’d come to her senses hours later, stretched out on her office couch, an afghan drawn over her like a blanket. Jack was gone. The wedding dress was gone—just like always, he had kept his word.

  The detail of the afghan had haunted her ever since. She’d never been able to make up her mind if his gesture had been made with affection or irony.

  She turned to him now, uncertain. “After you left, it was quiet. When I came to and finally opened my office door, everyone had gone. I was...I wasn’t myself, as if parts of me were still unconscious. I was having a hard time stringing thoughts together. I started to walk around the place, not sure what to do next—and they jumped me. They were only human and I gave as good as I got, but there were too many.”

  Jack’s face was hard to read. “I’m sorry.”

  His attack had made her vulnerable, but she had provoked it. “Don’t be.”

  “Did you identify them?”

  Lark shook her head. “They were Knights of Vidon—a handful of the crazy ones who want to keep the war with Marcari going—but it didn’t take long to figure out from their conversation that they had some connection to the Dark Fey. I’d given my assistant, Bree, the case notes I wanted to protect and you had the dress, so they didn’t find what they were after.”

  “But they tried to make you give it up anyway,” Jack said, making it a statement more than a question.

  “Yes,” she said. “They left me for dead, set the fire and left. No doubt they intended to hide any evidence of a murder.”

  Jack’s eyes narrowed, hi
s jaw flexing as if he clenched his teeth.

  Lark forced herself to finish. “I tried to crawl out, but the ceiling collapsed before I reached the stairs. The Light Fey carry a contact amulet, a kind of in-case-of-emergency spell. The local fey were able to get me out before the humans found me. You know the rest.”

  He turned his face away, making a noise of regret and anger deep in his chest. “That night should never have happened. Any of it.”

  She folded her arms across her chest, hugging herself. “I’m sorry, Jack. I’m sorry about so much.”

  Unexpectedly, he smiled, giving her a sidelong look. “You know you turned Mark Winspear’s life upside down when you gave that notebook to Bree. They had quite the adventure over it.”

  The change of subject felt like a white flag of truce, and she seized it. “I heard that story. I’m really glad they found each other. I’m fond of them both, and Bree’s boy. He was nearly born on the floor of my atelier.”

  “I remember.” Lightly, he put a hand to her cheek. “Keep the good memories of the atelier. It was a happy place.”

  Lark hauled in a breath. Remembering the good times—and everything she’d lost—was too bittersweet to bear. She’d thrown it all away and had still not helped her people. All those hopes were pinned on Amelie’s wedding now.

  She put her hand over Jack’s where he touched her face. “Do you think you and I can work together now? Can you forgive me enough for that?”

  He withdrew his hand, his expression growing hard. “I’ll say this once. You could have asked me for what you needed back then. You chose betrayal instead. That’s harder to forgive than any wound.”

  “That’s true,” she said. “But I can’t take it back. I wish I could.”

  His nostrils flared, a mix of emotions passing over his face more quickly than Lark could read them. The skin of her arms prickled with the brush of his demon power. “Jack?” she asked softly.

  “The devil of it is, I still want you. I can control so much of myself, but never that.” He tilted her chin up with his finger. Their noses bumped slightly, and then his mouth was on hers. The faint tingle of power became a rush of sensation that engulfed her whole body. His hands rose to cup her cheeks, holding her as gently as a flower, but that delicacy concealed fearsome might.