One of his feet drew up along her calf, and she felt a shiver—there was just something so intimate about a gesture like that, but it felt right. Her reply was to slide her hand up around his waist, very carefully finding the hem of his shirt and letting just her fingertips touch the skin beneath.
“What are we going to do?” she asked in a whisper.
“I don’t know.”
She closed her eyes and listened to his heartbeat. “I missed you so much.”
“And I you, though I wouldn’t have admitted it. So often I wished for just this…just knowing someone cared who wouldn’t judge me or cast me aside. Even as I railed against all of you for refusing to give up on me, I was desperately grateful that no one did.”
She lifted her head so she could look down into his face. “Look, I know everything’s not just magically fixed, and that’s okay — let’s just not lose this again. It’s too important.”
He smiled gently. “I agree.”
“Good. You don’t have to be the same you as before—even if that’s possible. And whatever you you’re going to be, it takes as long as it takes. I won’t try to push you back to who you were, or anywhere — just don’t shut me out again. Deal?”
The smile broadened ever so slightly. “Deal.”
Miranda grinned and kissed him lightly, intending just to seal the deal, but…
Between one breath and the next, without a single thought, she had clamped her mouth on his. He made a faint noise of surprise, but didn’t push her away — in fact, he kissed her back, and pulled her even harder against him, the hand on her hip sliding around to the small of her back.
She knew she should stop, knew it would be a very very bad idea to dig her nails into his neck—
“Whoa!” Deven jerked his lips from hers as if she’d electrocuted him. They were both breathing hard. “Jesus, woman, what is it about you?”
“Sorry,” she managed. “The last few days have been awful, I guess we’re confused about what we want—”
He snorted. “I know perfectly well what I want, Miranda.” As an illustration, he took hold of her hips and rocked them forward. When she realized what he meant she felt herself turning scarlet. “What I want to know is why.”
In spite of her embarrassment, she grinned. “Oh, you mean cleavage like mine isn’t enough to make a 700 year old gay man want a piece of this?”
They stared at each other a second, then both started laughing.
“Were I to shag a woman, I’d be more than happy for it to be you. I’m just a little leery for a number of reasons I’m sure you can understand.”
“You think David would react badly?”
Deven rolled his eyes. “I think he’d ask to be included. But aren’t you at all concerned why this keeps happening?”
“Not really. But then, you’re a boy, I’m a heterosexual girl, you’re unspeakably hot, my best friend, and good God, have you ever seen you fight? If that’s not foreplay I don’t know what is.”
Her not being troubled was apparently troubling. “So you’re saying you want to go for it right here, right now.”
She sobered, sighing. “It’s not that, sweetie, it’s…you think I should take it more seriously, but I think you’re taking it too seriously. So unusual for you, I know. Like David told me, we’ve all got odd energetic links galore because of the Circle—most of them are wobbly because we don’t know what they’re for. Not to mention you’re in a rough state and have all that power moving around with nowhere to go, and I’m antsy as hell what with the murder charge and all. If you don’t want me to kiss you again, that’s totally fine. I don’t want to make you even more uncomfortable than you are just by waking up. But really, don’t catastrophize one of the few things that isn’t a catastrophe. We make out, we don’t make out, the world doesn’t end either way.”
After a moment of watching her, he commented, “You really have changed in the last two years.”
“My priorities might have shifted a little, yeah.”
“You’re even entertaining the idea of an affair with Kai. I would never have expected that, even with David carrying on with Nico.”
Miranda shrugged and settled back against his shoulder, carefully not touching anywhere that might be considered inappropriate. “I don’t know,” she said, and it was the first time she’d ever managed to get the foundation of her thoughts out loud. “I like the flirty stuff, but more than that…I don’t think so, to be honest. I care about him a lot. But I look at David and Nico, the way they were before things went to hell, and they made sense to me. Not once did I ever question the way David felt—I kind of liked watching them get closer. I don’t know what the difference is. When I think about actually sleeping with him, it doesn’t feel wrong, but just doesn’t feel right either.”
“It’s a bit of a leap, from flirting to shagging,” Deven replied. “You’ve got a complicated history in that department.”
“Maybe that’s it. Maybe I’m just tired of everything being so goddamned complicated.”
They were quiet for a minute before Deven asked, almost sounding afraid to hear the answer, “How does it feel when you think about sleeping with me?”
Miranda thought about it for a moment, toying with the button at his collar. “I think it sounds amazing,” she confessed. “But I’d also be terrified.”
“Terrified?”
“I’d be your first woman,” she pointed out. “And more than likely your only one. That’s a big deal.”
“On the other hand I’d have nothing to compare it to,” he reminded her. “I don’t know if you’ve figured this out about men, but for the most part, if we get to stick our dicks in something that doesn’t bite them off, we’re happy.”
It was Miranda’s turn to snort. She burrowed closer, pulling the blanket up over her shoulders. “I only hope I could live up to such high standards.”
They were both sleepy—it was hard to keep up enough energy these days for all the night-to-night issues of Signet life plus the added layers of drama.
“Oh, don’t worry,” he murmured, eyes already closed. “As beautifully as we nap together I’m sure we’ll be magnificent lovers someday. Today, more napping.”
Miranda couldn’t stop smiling—not even as she fell asleep. I have you back…you’re here with me…please don’t go away again…I need you and you need me and it’s just so, so good to be here.
A light, gentle voice touched the back of her mind. I’m not going anywhere…now rest, my Queen, just rest.
Chapter Twelve
“All right, now that we have him open, I’d like tissue samples of all the organs.”
“…fascinating, the size difference in some of these. Sir, would it be all right if we kept an entire kidney? Even a human can live with just one.”
“I don’t see why not.”
Gloved fingers closing around something inside his body cavity, the cold steel of a clamp and then—
Nico flailed his way out of sleep, just barely keeping hold on the screams that had built throughout the dream—he turned on his side, curling up, biting down on his forearm to silence cries he knew would summon the guards outside his room.
How he wanted to strike out at the source of those voices…but he already had. With a single exception, they were dead, by his hand, the violence of their ending as much a part of his nightmares as what they had done to him. Tearing a dozen humans apart and reveling in their fear was not the behavior of an Elf…it wasn’t even the behavior of most vampires.
And one day…one day he’d do the same to the Prophet. He didn’t have any way of hunting the human down, but he knew it had to be part of Persephone’s plan, and as soon as they found him…Nico’s few satisfying dreams were of standing over the Prophet in his final moments, hoping that, while his own belief in an afterlife was dwindling as quickly as his belief in the inherent goodness of Deity, for this human, at least this once, there was a Hell.
&nbs
p; He clung to the rage and hatred as hard as he could because he knew they were all that was left. If he stood still, if he let his anger lose momentum, his armor would slide off, and the whole world would see…he would see…that there was nothing left beneath. The Prophet, whether as part of some greater design or just for pleasure, had brutalized the Weaver to death. What remained was made up of teeth and blood.
He remembered his words to the humans. I am not an Elf anymore.
The thought sent a hollow, desolate sob through his body. He pulled the pillow down over his head, hands fisting in the softness that was more comfort than he deserved, and lay shaking for a while until he could breathe again.
He had a sudden mental image of himself: a trembling, pathetic mess, craven and weak.
The anger flared again. He shoved the pillow and blankets aside and forced himself out of bed, numb hands seeking the nearest clothes. He had to get out of here. His insides felt like they were crusted with sand — he needed blood.
Two birds, one stone, as they said. Drawing power up around himself, reaching through space, he easily combined the magic he’d used to build portals from Earth to Avilon and the birthright of the Signets: Misting.
In a matter of breaths, he was in the city.
The others thought they had him contained; as long as they gave him relative freedom in the Haven he wouldn’t wreak havoc on the mortals of Austin. But all he had promised was not to go on a killing spree. And what good was that promise anyway? They lived by stealing the life from other creatures, and since when was there honor among thieves?
Downtown Austin rose up all around him, but he had to ignore the towering buildings or panic would set in. He could feel them closing in if he stood still too long. He had spent his entire life among tall trees and the gentle rhythm of the seasons in a dream of peace; this place was built on violence and fear. Its inhabitants were frightened little children clinging to the surface of a planet that spun too fast for their lives to matter.
Nico moved out of the traffic path so he could evaluate the humans around him. It was a typical street corner, busy even this late, moreso tonight because of the line of storms that had come through early in the evening. There was another on the way; the humans were therefore in a hurry to finish their business and get home.
He knew there were several hunting styles among vampires. Most of the truly powerful went for the quick and efficient hit; they sought out a clean, strong specimen and isolated them, afterward making sure the human’s memory of the event was blurry or blank. David had said once that he’d often had sex with his prey to infuse the blood with pleasure and strength, but there were thorny issues of consent surrounding such a habit; Nico knew he’d had very firm rules about not influencing their minds until afterward, but the truth was, if the human was made to forget, any conceit a vampire made to the free will of his food was purely to make himself feel like more than a monster. There were plenty of vampires who would take what they wanted and leave whatever trauma they caused without a second thought.
In a way, the vampires the Signets looked down on—those who killed when they didn’t have to—were more honest. They didn’t have pretensions of civility. The Signets liked to think they were above those who indulged in their animal instincts, as if putting dinner in a wine glass somehow made it other than the lifeblood of a human being.
A young woman jogging across the street caught his eye. He focused his senses on her, and could almost hear her heartbeat—strong, steady, filling her blood with oxygen. She was healthy and bright-eyed. Perfect.
Nico tapped on her mind and pulled at her consciousness, causing her to veer from her original trajectory and turn right at the light, heading right toward him. He moved back into the alley; it wasn’t one of those creepy dark areas, but was still empty, as humans from the surrounding restaurants used it to dump their garbage in a large metal bin. The amount of refuse these creatures produced was remarkable.
The girl came around the corner and skidded to a stop. She yanked the earbuds from her ears; he could hear the faint strains of some kind of dance music.
“What the hell,” she said, blinking. “What am I doing here? I wasn’t coming this way.”
Nico didn’t bother answering. He seized her by the shoulders and shoved her against the wall, clamping one hand over her mouth, his teeth already extended. She struggled hard—very strong indeed—but pointlessly, as he had her pinned to the bricks. Her entire body went rigid when he bit her, and her scream was muffled under his palm.
David had tried to teach him to hunt back when he had first come to the Haven, but Nico had been too weak and too cowardly to take his lessons to heart. He remembered that there was a definite signal to stop: as soon as the human and the vampire’s heartbeats came into synch, it was time to let go, or within seconds there would be no return.
He’d managed not to kill anyone in the last few days since he’d been sneaking out to hunt. It wasn’t so much that he cared, but that he didn’t want to be as foolish as Miranda and get caught. She and David had no choice but to kill every month, but while David seemed able to handle it pretty easily, Miranda could not; that guilt she harbored had made her sloppy.
Tonight, as the girl’s struggles became more and more feeble, images of that night in the Prophet’s lair kept intruding, a frame at a time, flashes of his own struggles against the restraints, and then of the “doctor” begging for his life. He didn’t remember a point of no return that night—there was no return from any of it.
No return. No way back, not for him, not for this poor child—so young, so unaware of what was waiting in every shadow of the city where she felt safe enough to run, alone, her fragile human body in jeopardy every second she was alive.
Her blood tasted like youth and a rainy night, like coffee. He was inclined to let her walk away…until he took a breath and caught a faint scent under her shampoo and sweat, something…clinical…plastic, chemicals, sanitizing products…
He couldn’t stop the surge of explosive rage that took him. She probably worked at a hospital, or was a student, but all he could see was that ceiling, the sprinkler head he’d stared at for hours, the smell…metallic instruments clicking together…
Suddenly something took hold of his arm and hauled her off the girl, throwing him hard into the wall face-first. Nico managed to turn his head in time not to break anything, but the impact was enough to drop him to the ground, hands scrabbling against the bricks.
He snarled, his anger turning from the girl to his assailant, and lifted his head, taking in boots, long leather coat, sword, glowing emerald…pale lavender eyes that almost glowed themselves in the darkness.
“That’s enough,” Deven snapped. “Kill if you want, but keep your teeth off the innocent. There are lowlifes aplenty to satisfy your appetite if you aren’t too lazy to look.”
“I do not take orders from you,” Nico ground out, poison in every syllable. He started to get back to his feet.
A boot came down solidly on his neck.
“Yes. You. Do.”
Deven held him down for just a beat, then moved back to let Nico struggle to his feet. “If you choose to act like an animal you will be put on a leash like one.” Power mantled around the Prime like broad, black wings—he could almost hear them rustling, almost see their edges in the flash of headlights driving by. Nico remembered the Queen doing the same thing, months ago when the newly-vampire Elf had attacked Stella. It was a dominance display, pure and simple, but there was a reason the Signets ruled the Shadow World…it worked.
Nico’s resolve crumbled before the roiling cloud of darkness facing him. He might have tried to fight it—he was much stronger now than he had been that night with Miranda—but there was an added complication…he wasn’t just confronting a Prime…but his Prime. Deven was the one who had built the barrier between them, and that meant he had power over it; if he wanted Nico to cower before him, Nico would. He couldn’t stop himself.
>
He locked eyes with Deven for a long, wordless moment before slowly returning to his knees. The imperious, cold glare remained on him until he lowered his eyes first.
“Stay,” Deven ordered. Nico listened, unmoving, as the Prime moved to the girl’s side and he took quick inventory of her condition; Nico felt energy flowing into the human, healing the ragged tears in her throat and restoring her strength enough that she would easily survive the blood loss—Nico sensed he hadn’t signed the girl’s death warrant but it had been close. Deven murmured to her, telling her to return home and eat, and to call in sick for work.
Deven took a step back. Nico heard the girl’s shoes on the gritty concrete as she straightened. “Damn,” she muttered. “I don’t feel so good. Sorry…didn’t mean to run into you.”
“No problem, my dear,” the Prime told her. “You look like you might be coming down with something. You should take a cab home.”
“Yeah…I’m probably coming down with something. I think I’ll just take a cab home. Excuse me.”
Footsteps retreating.
Footsteps approaching. “What the hell are you doing?”
Nico looked up. “This is what we do,” he answered venomously. “It’s why we exist, isn’t it? To control their population?”
“How many have you killed since that night?” Deven demanded. “I know you’ve been slipping out of your room—” At Nico’s expression Deven made a dismissive noise. “Please, Nico, remember who you’re talking to. So are there bodies all over the city to be dealt with?”
A note of sullenness entered his voice. “No. I’ve let them all live. I didn’t want to deal with the inconvenience.”
He wasn’t sure Deven believed him at first, but the Prime merely said, “Get up.”
Nico obeyed.
A hint of emotion made its way through Deven’s impassive exterior. “Don’t let them do this to you,” he said quietly.
Shadowstorm (The Shadow World Book 6) Page 23