by Linda Welch
The intensity of Sauvageau’s gaze pins River to the chair. He opens his mouth as if struggling for words, then closes it and swallows. Yet, when he speaks, his tone is chill, implacable. “I’ll put every resource at my disposal to finding her. If any person has harmed her, they’ll suffer. Be assured of that. Rain is dear to me.”
Is she now? If Alain indeed cares for Rain, nothing in his voice reflects his feelings. River stands, pushing the chair with the backs of his knees to give him space. “As she is to me.”
“Where can I find you, if I learn anything?”
River means to keep to the streets, searching, asking after Rain. He can periodically check in at Rain’s apartment but he doesn’t know the address or telephone number. “I live with Rain. If I’m not there, you can leave a message on her machine, or a note under the door.”
Sauvageau stands and stares at him. Just stares, face blank, eyes unblinking. In the following silence, River experiences the weirdest sensation, one he’s pretty damn sure he’s never felt before, as though electricity crackles through the room. Every hair on his body stands at attention. Static lifts the hair from his scalp.
His breath lodges in his windpipe. Every nerve end shrieks he should get the hell out. But he’s not helpless. If the man comes at him, he’ll disappear. It’ll leave him naked but the move will surprise Sauvageau, giving River time to get his pistol.
But Sauvageau spins on his heel and gives River his back. “Very well. You will be the first to know when I learn anything.”
Someone clears their throat. River looks over his shoulder at the tall female vampire.
“Capucine will show you out,” Sauvageau says.
River quits the enclave with more questions, though not about Rain. It would be easy to think Sauvageau turned his back to regain control over his emotions. Yet apart from one small lapse, the guy seemed emotionless. Alain turned away to hide something he was not supposed to see.
Rain said, “Rumor says those who cross him have a habit of disappearing.”
He should watch his back.
*
River roams the streets from Sauvageau’s house to the high walls and tenements of the dock district and the river, from there up the hill to where palatial homes behind high railings surround paved squares, back down into mazes of shops and boutiques, bistros and beauty parlors. He barely notices the strange creatures he passes. Should he return to Rain’s apartment? Nah. He knows, gut-deep, she won’t be there. And Angelina has gathered her wits by now; he doesn’t want to run into her because his promise to kill her was an empty threat. Although she nearly destroyed him, he’ll dream about what they did together.
A memory intrudes as he walks along Kings Way and he wants to kick himself for forgetting the one person who might be able to tell him where Rain is.
*
Chapter Twenty-One
Alain’s stance is one of controlled violence. The muscles in his arms and shoulders bulge, his jaw is rigid and his fingers curve like talons. His mouth opens and his lips curl tightly over his teeth; his face darkens as if blood boils beneath the skin. The inner corners of his eyes are red, not the bright red of burst blood vessels, but greasy carmine which bleeds into the whites.
He swallows his anger. But fear for Rain addles his thoughts and threatens his control when he needs a clear head.
“Capucine!”
The door whines on its hinges as Capucine slams it open. She hurries to Alain. “Alain, what is it? What did the kid do? Shall I go hurt him?” She circles Alain’s shoulders with her arms.
As always, the vampire’s chill proximity smothers Alain’s heat. He stays in her arms until firmly in control again, and touches her shoulder. “Thank you. No, leave the boy, he’s harmless.” He shifts, and Capucine drops her arms and moves back. “Really, I’m fine, my dear.”
He summons a smile he doesn’t feel. “Get Clide in here.”
As Capucine leaves, her face creased with concern, he resumes his seat at the desk and analyzes the past half hour, what the wraith told him and his own response. He’s furious he let River’s simple statement rip the leash off his emotions. I live with Rain. A dozen scenarios rioted through his mind, Rain and River together, sharing what she denies him.
Sharing her life.
He can put the words into perspective. Rain brought the new wraith Downside only recently and is his sponsor, therefore naturally he’s at her apartment. Yet the beast had roused; deep, bitter, primitive envy and the need to possess and dominate overwhelmed his humanity. She is mine!
Again, he smothers rage as one banks a fire, safe for now but easily ignited. Trying to own Rain in the way the beast craves will send her running in the opposite direction and he couldn’t bear that.
He feels the passion in her, the need, yet she pushes him away. Why can he not get through to her, make her believe she’s more than a passing fancy? Doesn’t she understand passing fancies are just that, they don’t cling for years? His fleeting affairs make her believe he’s incapable of commitment, but would she rather he had serious long-term relationships with other women? No, because she’ll think him unable to maintain any relationship. The infamous catch-22, he can’t win either way.
Alain vigorously rubs his forehead and tries to concentrate on what really matters. The boy and what he roused is unimportant; his message is.
There is absolutely no reason for the wraith to concoct a tale of Castle’s return as a spirit. The spirit’s message terrifies Alain.
Clide arrives before another minute passes. “You wanted me, Alain?”
“Clide, Rain is in difficulty. I want everyone you can spare combing the streets, making inquiries. Find her.”
“How do you know this, boss?”
“In a few words, the new wraith had a visitation, none other than Castle, who told him Rain’s life is at risk.”
“Well I’ll be.” Clide digs a fang into his lower lip. “You sure he’s not jumping at shadows? Maybe your little lady is on a solo job and the kid doesn’t understand she can take care of herself.”
“No, I believe him. He didn’t know Castle, yet described him. Whatever Rain is involved in, it’s bad enough to rouse Castle from the grave.”
“Yeah, well - ”
Alain has never demanded unquestioning obedience, yet now, seething with dread and impatience, Clide tossing questions when he should be instructing the staff astonishes him. His skin grows hot and darkens as blood surges to the surface. “Clide,” he interrupts in a grinding voice with a savage edge. “Why are you still here?”
Clide hurries to stand behind Alain and press cold hands on his shoulders. “Alain, easy now.”
As the vampire’s icy aura washes over him, Alain is appalled. He’s kept his temper when his patience was tested to the nth degree, when he wanted to rip off limbs and see blood flow, but his control is slipping now and dangerously close to failing altogether. He clamps his lips together, rubs his hand down his face. “Thank you. Please accept my apology, my friend. You think I’m overreacting, yet consider the magnitude of Castle rising from the netherworld to deliver his message. Rain’s situation must be dire.”
Clide squeezes Alain’s shoulders. “Forget it. I’m already gone.” He goes to the door and pauses there. “Are you okay now?”
Alain closes his eyes. “Yes. I have to be.”
Alain can’t keep still after Clide leaves. He paces the small room, sits at his desk, jumps up, paces. His men and women can scour the length and breadth of Gettaholt and learn nothing. He looks into the fireplace until the smoldering embers fill his eyes. He will kill any person who hurts Rain.
He can’t lose Rain. He’ll be half a man without her. And the other half … if his other half is let loose on Gettaholt, every man, woman and child will regret the day.
He leaves his office and hurries to his bedroom on the mansion’s top floor. The circular room abuts the compound wall, the single small window is protected by iron bars set deep in the stonework. His
bed covers are turned back, his robe laid across the foot of the bed, a glass and decanter wait on a small table next to his armchair. He opens his closet. Parting the clothes on the rail, he pushes an all but invisible button on the back wall and a narrow panel silently swings open.
He doesn’t want bodyguards where he is going.
Alain carries his dark mood through Gettaholt. Pedestrians skitter from his approach. Shadows ooze over the sidewalk to fawn around his feet and lamps flicker as he passes beneath them. Cars screech to a stop when he steps into the street and strides across looking neither left nor right, yet not one horn honks in protest.
He’s surprised to spot River’s dark head in the crowd. Alain hangs back and watches. River is questing back and forth across the street, pausing to eye side streets and alleys, and check the skyline as though he has a destination but isn’t sure how to reach it. Alain follows far enough behind he can duck in a doorway should River look back. They seem to be going in the same direction.
The crowd thins as they leave the commercial district and enter a rundown area of slums and small dowdy shops. When River turns down the next street, Alain knows they are making for the same destination.
*
River climbs the winding staircase to the angel’s loft. If as Rain says, it knows everything, it knows he’s coming, yet a heavy silence waits above. No song, no bottle flying past his head. Only an ominous silence. Is the angel angry because he came here? He’ll know soon. He doesn’t feel brave, quite the opposite. Mournful, inebriated, the angelic being is still monumentally powerful and destroys buildings on a drunken whim.
The alabaster angel stands with wings spread when River’s head pokes through the trapdoor. Its voice sings a warbling tremolo. “What you in your ivory tower, deceit and death and gloom?”
River clambers through the trapdoor. “You said that before. I didn’t understand then, I still don’t. Even Rain didn’t get it.”
Hands, held together, extend to him in a gesture which seems to beg for understanding. “I stand in grave’s sight and find you here.”
Standing, River is dwarfed by the angel’s size. It looks taller and bulkier than before.
“Nope. Not a word.” He moves from the trapdoor but not too far, in case he has to dive through it. “Listen, I need help. I can’t find Rain and I’m sure she’s in trouble. You know where she is.”
It stares at him for a moment before collapsing into a crouch. Its face slaps into its palms. River takes that for an angel version of rolling eyes, as if it can’t believe he doesn’t understand.
When it lifts its head, its faceted crystal eyes are level with River’s.
If it indeed shares its frustration, then River’s emotions are identical. He looks into those eyes hoping to find something human, but nothing he can understand stares back. “You know where she is and what’s happening to her. If you care for her, why don’t you help her?”
Does he imagine the crystal gaze sharpening in anger? River steps back and his heel hits the edge of the trapdoor.
Does something, some divine overlord, shackle it and stop it from aiding anyone? Were it me, I’d be angry when a guy rages at me for what I can’t help.
River tries another tack. “You can fly. Why don’t you lead me to Rain? I’ll follow on the ground. That’s all you have to do, show me where, I’ll do the rest.”
Its head turns to the huge gap in the slanting ceiling, then it covers its face with its hands again.
It isn’t going to help.
“If Rain dies, you’ll be alone again.” River can’t contain his anger. “Damn you! You won’t even help people who befriend you. If I were your god, I’d cast you out, too.”
Oh, that does it. Or does something. It surges upright and is over River in one long stride. Its features writhe. Its wings curve overhead.
River forgets he can lose substance and escape the angel. He is a dead man. One of those razor-edged wings will carve his head from his shoulders.
But it shunts back and hunkers down. With a last searing look, its wings curl over its body until all River sees is a great ball of feathers.
Cursing, he lets himself through the trapdoor and blunders down the steps.
*
Alain steps from behind the staircase as River strides through the shrine in a direct path, kicking glass and wood out of his way. Alain lets him go.
River didn’t understand the angel’s message, but some of it gives Alain hope. He knows where to look first. He could question the angel but the creature will likely ignore him out of spite. There is no love lost between them.
He hurries from the shrine, through the abandoned square and along streets where the crowds are thinning.
Inside Alain’s head, the angel’s voice is deep and powerful. “Return to your lair, monster.”
Alain keeps going. “Who is the monster? I, or you who know the evil committed in this fair city and do nothing?”
“You could have found the woman yet refused to open your eyes. Why?”
It means Rain. This wretched thing speaks of Rain. “You know what I must become to use my Sight.”
“You would be as I am, all-seeing, all-knowing, cursed to feel their pain and despair yet never daring to intervene lest you bring about your doom. You are a coward and a hypocrite.”
Forcing him to stop, the angel settles in front of him in a flurry of feathers.
“Get out of my way.” Alain’s nails dig into his palms. “Don’t waste my time.”
“You are too late, she is lost to you.”
Alain’s barely controlled rage pools in his belly like magma. “You don’t know that. You cannot look into the future.”
The angel’s head tilts, its crystal eyes blink once, slowly like an owl’s. “I see the present, the now, and I tell you her life can be counted in minutes.”
He doesn’t doubt the angel. “Then help her!”
“It is forbidden.”
“By a deity who condemned you to eternal torment in this place!” Alain cries.
“You rebuke me for not aiding her when you know the penalty. What of you? I do not see you leaping to her rescue. How far will you go for the mortal? How much does she mean to you?”
“Do not tempt me!” Alain roars.
“Then do not look upon me with scorn.”
The angel unfurls its wings and lifts skyward. Alain doesn’t watch it leave, his gaze is on the ground as the angel’s words echo in his mind and blight his soul.
How much does she mean to you?
He can’t get to Rain fast enough in this body. Alain lifts his head, looks up at the sky and laughs hollowly. “You bastard.”
He closes his eyes and faces parade through his mind. The women who left him. It was another age, another manifestation, long before he descended Downside. He took such care of them, but he cannot cure disease or stave off the death which comes at the end of a long life.
He couldn’t save them, but he can save Rain.
Entering an alley, he sees only Rain’s face and knows there is no choice. He has never disobeyed the edict; perhaps this small transgression will go unnoticed.
Hiding in shadows, Alain strips and drops his clothes on the ground. He has not tasted true freedom in an age and anticipation roars up his spine. Before it is too late, he concentrates on Rain and makes her his purpose. He still knows himself as chaos engulfs him, but fades into the background and allows the beast full reign. It knows what to do.
*
I drift in out and of consciousness, pain my companion, a bone-deep throb. Except if I move and my torn and shattered body screams. The elf is good at his job. My head and face pound, my body is bloody and shattered joints are swollen.
I’m broken
“He heard me,” Castle says in a rush.
I crack my eyes open.
“River.” Castle’s hands flash around. “He got away from the mermaid and talked to Sauvageau.”
I smile with torn lips. River escaped Angelina�
��s clutches and that takes some doing. “And?” I don’t care if Calla hears me. Let her think I’ve lost my mind.
“Sauvageau said he’ll do his damndest to find you.”
Hope expands in my chest and as quickly deflates. “He doesn’t know where to look.”
“Hang in there, babe. If anyone can track you down, it’s Sauvageau.”
Blayne and Phaedra exchange puzzled looks. No doubt about it, they think I’ve cracked.
Wool watches us. He sees Castle, hears us talk, but manages to keep his expression bland while Calla is in the room.
He speaks to Calla. “Lady, she would have told you by now.”
“I must be sure. We don’t know a wraith’s pain threshold. Do you? How much pain can you endure, Sylar?”
Terror flits through Wool’s eyes.
“He’s right,” Phaedra says. “She doesn’t know anything. This isn’t about information anymore. You are satisfying your sick appetites. End it.”
Calla taps her chin. “Oh, I don’t know, I think she can provide me with more … entertainment.”
Phaedra makes a sound of disgust.
“Oh, very well.” Calla flounces her shoulders. She flicks the fingers of one hand at the elf. “Cut her throat.”
I sag in my bonds. At least the knife has a razor edge, it will be over quickly.
“Castle?”
Castle squats in front of me. “I’m here, love.” His voice wells with compassion.
“Is she hallucinating?” Calla asks.
Wool cracks with a wail. “Don’t kill her!” A tear beads down his face. “He’s here. Castle is here. If you kill her, they’ll both haunt me.”
“Nonsense,” Calla says with a chuckle.
I don’t expect the deep, aching sadness. I mourn the familiar and all the lost opportunities. I experience myriad emotions in the space of a minute and foremost among them is regret.
Alain. Why was I so stubborn? We could have been together, if only for a short time, and maybe it would have been enough, a memory to look back on fondly in the years to come. Alain is passion, seduction and excitement. I will never again see his face, hear his voice, feel his hands on me. Funny, a wraith who shuns physical contact regrets its loss.