TravelersKiss

by Sherri L. King

  An abrupt silence descended. It seemed to go on forever but in reality lasted only a few short seconds.

  “The Realms are breached. To arms, to arms. We fight or we die. The Realms are breached.”

  Raine turned to the fireplace and shouted, “I know!”

  The fireplace exploded as if it has been flooded with napalm. Flame erupted into the room, belched into the chamber as if a dragon had opened its maw and let loose in a rage. There wasn’t time for Raine to duck or run. The fire was faster than any action movie could have prepared her for—she was going to be burned alive.

  There wasn’t time to reconcile herself with defeat.

  To accept her fate with grace or even close her eyes to this grisly, ignoble end.

  Yet there was.

  Because when the flames hit her, when they swallowed her whole, she became a part of that conflagration. The fire blinded her, heating the blood in her eyes until she imagined they might burst and run a molten river down her cheeks. But she checked herself and there was no pain.

  And she began to laugh as the madness that had become her reality finally started to make some weird sort of sense.

  At last she had her answer. Finally she understood something about herself. In knowing herself, Raine believed she might actually know something no one else had figured out yet.

  She flashed on that first moment when she’d awakened in this room, in front of this very hearth, before flickering flames. How mesmerized she had been by them. So eager to touch those coals. She’d known all along, deep inside her subconscious, how it must be. To starve the flame one must first smother it down to the coals.

  Raine was the great taproot of this conflagration.

  Raine was a coal, the true danger in the heat.

  Daemon, too, was a coal. Coals would last. They endured. If tended, they would never die. It was a simple immortality that came with a price, a steep price. If one coal escaped, one tiny shimmer of heat could reshape the landscape of entire cities—or in their case, as with the Leviathan, one shimmer of heat, one stupid mistake made in a moment of weakness could lead to a million more mistakes that inevitably reshaped the entire course of world history.

  Such raw, untapped power in those coals. Beings like Tryton and Daemon, Grimm and even Raine were few and far between, they were rare for a reason. They could either bring about change for the better or destroy everything they touched.

  Raine didn’t want to be a destroyer of worlds. She wanted to be like Grimm. She wanted to be a good little coal.

  But thus far things hadn’t worked out that way. She destroyed everything she touched. No matter her motives, good or bad, she seemed unable to do anything but bring about ruin. Perhaps now that she knew her own nature, things could be better…

  The fire swallowed her and she let it. Raine walked to the hearth and looked up. She’d always wondered where the soot, ash and smoke went in these things—this massive city was miles underground, yet this was a chimney. But these flames were not normal. They were flames created at the hands of Incinerators, Shikar magic she would never understand yet could use and shape at will because Daemons that she had helped create—it didn’t matter that they had been created against her will—had devoured many Incinerators during their lifetimes. Raine inherited her knowledge from the kills of her creations. She absorbed knowledge and skill like a sponge. She could do a lot of interesting things.

  She vowed never to forget that fact again—no matter how much of her memory was lost, she must never forget that.

  “People of the Alliance…” She let her voice sing through the flames, knowing every Shikar alive would hear her words in this time of crisis, wherever these flames lived. “The veil between our world and that of another grows thin—but it is not yet in ruins.” She tried to sound confident, tried to use the parlance of Grimm’s people. It felt strange, but she thought she might be doing a decent job of it. “You must hold to hope. I am Raine. My mate, Grimm, is not dead, as many of you may have heard. He lives, and he fights for us in the realm beyond, holding the Leviathan at bay, standing sentinel at the rift to keep us safe. But he needs our help now.”

  How could they help him, she wondered? Who could cross the threshold of the Gray Land and keep their physical form? She thought perhaps the Leviathan might have taken care of that problem for her. If the rift allowed the monster through to this world, perhaps it worked both ways.

  “I think I know a way to stop this. But I can’t do it alone and I must take some precious time to gather the right weapons to see this battle to its final end. Please, warriors, form your teams,” she sang out. “Let your Travelers take you through the veil so that you can help Grimm. Help The Traveler. Become a part of his legend. Save our home. Save our world. Fight and live forever as heroes.”

  Please, she thought. Help him. Hold that bitch off for just a little while, please.

  The flames died as the last word left her lips and the sudden darkness blinded her so that she stumbled, blinking hard until her eyes adjusted. She raced out of the hearth, the detritus of the demolished room no impediment to her speed as she easily passed through the stone and earth. Without effort or thought, Raine moved like a ghost through solid objects, through walls, back to the bedroom where she dug up what she hoped was suitable attire for a war.

  Raine was relieved to discover that there was an abundant amount of clothing in her size. All of it finely made, painstakingly measured to fit her from head to toe. It was strange to see it all, to know that she belonged here, that she had a life here in this wonderful world and yet had so little memory of it.

  The best part of that life was missing, but she wouldn’t allow herself time to think about Grimm now. She had to focus on each moment as it unfolded before her. He needed her to be strong. They all did. Emily, Steffy, everyone she cared about—they were all in danger now. So Raine would be the strongest, toughest, most badass warrior the Shikars had ever seen.

  “I’m really gonna pay for all of this swearing, even if it is mostly in my head,” she mumbled, rooting around for suitable “armor”. “Just please, please, universe, let my dues come after this big powwow is over.”

  She chose to dress in a zippered sky-blue hoodie, a loose pair of gray cotton trousers that thankfully laced at the waist—her midsection seemed to be growing faster now that she was aware of her pregnancy—and suede, navy, shin-height boots that fit as comfortably as if she’d worn them a thousand times. Perhaps she had. Raine pulled her hood low over her face and cast one final look around the bedroom, her eyes lingering over the bed with a wretched ache of longing.

  Raine approached it haltingly, her heart in her throat. She lifted one of the pillows and held it to her nose. She inhaled. Grimm’s scent unfurled in her head like a blooming flower, filling her with emotions so complex she couldn’t tell one apart from the other, but soon she was sobbing into the pillow, her heart a mortal wound in her chest.

  How could she go on, knowing that every second might be the one that ended him? How could she hope to function with that fear, let alone do what she knew had to be done?

  Then she felt it.

  So faint. Yet so alive.

  It was the baby. Moving inside her. Grimm’s child. Their child was reminding her to stay focused, to be present in the moment and allow the future to come when it must, as it must, but not a moment before.

  “I can do this,” Raine said aloud. She felt the baby move again. There was no more nausea—that was why she’d been so tender these past few days, it had been morning sickness—now there was only a fluttering sensation. A reassurance that yes, their child was with her. Safe inside her, nestled beneath her heart.

  Raine put the pillow back on the bed and gently placed her hands over her stomach. “We can do this,” she amended.

  Something moved under her fingers. Looking down, she saw with a gasp the tiniest shimmer, the faintest glow…a cord that connected her to the tiny soul growing inside her. It was nothing like the others. It wa
s untainted. Innocent and pure. She had to look away. It terrified her—what if she failed this wonderful creature she and Grimm had made? What if she wasn’t good enough? She might be a terrible mother, she couldn’t even keep her memories straight. What if—

  “Ooof!” That one hurt. Okay. She got it. No more negative thoughts. Raine almost laughed aloud—the little one was already strong-willed like its father. Opinionated like her and unafraid to voice said opinions. Her heart swelled and her flagging strength returned twofold. “All right then. Let’s do this thing.”

  As if her resolve finally opened her up to the world around her, she became aware of a rumbling noise outside. She listened tentatively at first, worried it might be a return of the Leviathan. Soon, however, she came to realize that the cacophony was coming from every corner of the city.

  It was a war cry.

  The Shikars were going to war.

  And Grimm’s name was the word on everyone’s lips.

  Raine had never been more grateful to hear a single word spoken in her life.

  Grimm’s name grew to a deafening chant. It rang out from the voice of every warrior. All Council members who had grown up with the legend of The Traveler guiding them on the path of what was good and selfless in their world cried out the name of their great hero. Every female who had daydreamed of growing up to mate with a warrior half as brave and cunning as the legendary Traveler cheered his name. Every Shikar child yearning to strive for greatness and honor screamed Grimm’s name with excitement. Everyone was ready to fight for the chance to support the greatest living legend among their people. To fight and even die, to do what was right to save their world and each other.

  Raine heard this call to arms from the hearts of the Shikar people, but in her mind it was a battle hymn and it carried with it the sound of hope, which resonated throughout her bones.

  “Hang on, Grimm, just hang on. We’re coming to get you.” Raine focused on the onyxian cord that tied her to the most dangerous being in existence…and Traveled to his side.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Raine landed in the underground temple, dust exploding at her feet. The antechamber where the jaunt had taken her was cast in pitch darkness. The lighting—the lack thereof—whether by chance or design, did not deter her. Why should it? They were both creatures of darkness. She understood that now. Raine could see Daemon just fine in any setting, light or no light.

  He was reclining on a divan, staring off into the distance at some object she couldn’t or wasn’t meant to see. If he was aware of her presence, as surely he must be, he gave no indication of it by stirring. Daemon was as still and quiet as the ancient air and would only stir when—if—he chose to.

  “I have your answer.” Her voice fell flat in the stale, arid atmosphere. If her senses did not lie, she knew they were deep under a desert land. But not as deep as the Shikar city, which was safely behind a dimensional veil that separated them from human discovery. Here, humans could and may one day yet find this lost temple buried beneath the sand.

  Daemon skirted danger wherever he went, she realized. He was always under threat of discovery…he quite simply didn’t care.

  When he didn’t respond, either by movement or sound, Raine was compelled to study him. To really look at him in the pressing darkness, in his strange, arrested state. Could he really not know she was there, or was this some eloquent trap meant to unnerve her?

  Because that was certainly working.

  “Daemon?”

  He was so still he could have been a statue, not even his chest stirred with his breathing—if indeed he breathed at all. Raine stared, transfixed. There were the tiniest particles of dust gathering, even now, on his open eyes. How long had he been like this? How long would he stay this way?

  She needed his attention and she needed it now. But how did you make a millennia-old psychic master of the elements pay attention to you if he didn’t want to? Raine thought furiously.

  You slap him in the face with a storm of elements, that’s what you do.

  Raine got right in his face and yelled, “I said I have your answer for you, jerk head!” At the same time she drew up an image of a storm of sand blasting him in the face, the wind as blazing hot as a flame. She composed in her mind the banshee wail of a summer gale, a parched desert storm, howling with all the rage of spurned Amun, the Egyptian wind god.

  Daemon’s flaxen hair flew back from his face as the very thing she’d summoned immediately manifested and descended upon him with a vengeance. The edge of the barely contained windstorm hit her and almost knocked her off her feet, compelling her to hastily stumble backward, eyes wide, as nature took form and shape in the chamber with them. Sand formed a small cloud, whirling and writhing, bits of it glancing off her skin, leaving cuts behind that bled as if she’d taken razor-sharp pieces of glass to her own flesh in a frenzy, until her clothes were ragged tatters like clumps of Spanish moss hanging off her limbs.

  Suddenly Daemon was animated, roaring to brilliant life, surging to his feet, his arms flung up in front of his face. The storm broke around him like a river around a rock and fell into stark silence.

  A smile broke over her face and Raine knew it wasn’t a pleasant look for her—it must have further infuriated Daemon because he grabbed her arms, lifted her off her feet and threw her down on the divan. It groaned under the blow of her weight being thrust so furiously upon it and skidded upon the floor, tangling in the rugs that covered the sandstone tiles in layers of color.

  The wind, heat and sand had disappeared, leaving her skin cool. The tiny wounds on her flesh healed immediately, the tiny beads of blood drying into hard crusts that smelled of sharp-edged pennies.

  Daemon straddled her, holding her wrists in a bruising grip. “What? What is it?” He blinked as if dazed; his questions and the way he asked them were almost comical. His manner suggested he could have just been awakened from a nap, grumpy to have been disturbed from his rest, irritated enough to wonder what was so important that it require him to bother with it.

  Raine made a disgusted noise and tried to throw him off her. “Are you seriously so oblivious that you don’t know what’s going on?”

  There was a rumbling in the distance, like that of an oncoming thunderstorm, but Raine knew it was no storm. It was the sound of the Gray Land breaking through the barriers of reality—fainter here so close to the surface world, but how long would that hold true, she wondered. Raine felt the pressure of time weighing heavily upon her.

  “Woman, you are trying my patience.” Daemon paused suddenly, his entire body going still over hers.

  Raine had once read that at absolute zero, should such a theoretical temperature be attainable, all matter would cease its motion. It was a wonder that Daemon’s body temperature wasn’t far colder than it was. It should have been ice cold then, he was so still.

  After a long moment, ever so slowly, he leaned down and put his face in her throat.

  He nuzzled her skin, striking fear into the heart of her, and he…sniffed her.

  Raine gasped, mortified. She freed herself of his hold and slapped at him, all fear gone in an instant. “What are you doing? Get off me!”

  He caught her again, his casual strength, his blinding speed horrifying.

  “You smell like him.” He reared back, looking absolutely livid. “How is it you smell like a dead Traveler?”

  Abruptly Raine was terrified of him again. Daemon’s face had contorted into a mask of rage that made her bite back a scream. Her skin was hot where he touched her, but cold everywhere else. “He’s n-not dead. I told you,” she stammered, heart hammering in her throat.

  He regained his hold on her wrists, bruising her, and jerked her upright against him. He bent his head, his breath frigid on her face. “How did you do it?”

  Raine frowned, not understanding his question.

  His eyes blazed with fury. “How did you resurrect him? How was it done?”

  Raine felt her bottom lip trembling and fought ag
ainst biting to keep it still. She was afraid of the predatory music in his voice that warned he was waiting for any invitation to pounce. Afraid of his close proximity that invaded her personal space. Afraid of the gleam in his eyes that calculated everything, missed nothing. He was an alien being through and through, a ruthless apex predator—she had forgotten; stupid, foolish mistake, but she would not forget again.

  “I didn’t resurrect him, Daemon. He never died.”

  “You lie,” he said through gritted teeth. He jerked her closer. “Don’t. Lie. To me.”

  Raine opened her hands above her imprisoned wrists, a gesture of supplication. “I promise you, he never died. I caught him in the Gray Land before he passed and I kept him alive. Litha is there too.”

  Something in his face, a passing shadow perhaps, inspired her to add, “But you knew that, didn’t you?” She fisted her hands now and pressed back against him, fighting his hold. “It’s why those plans in your head changed when you offered me your ‘deal’ earlier—only they didn’t. Not really. Just some finite details, enough to throw me off, enough to surprise me. You knew she was in the Gray Land before I did, so you needed me to be willing to help, right? You couldn’t get there without me. I had to take you—the whole time thinking we were going to kill her, when we were really going there to save her.” Raine scoffed. “Again.”

  His eyes darkened. It was the only response he offered, the only one she needed. They both knew the score—there were no secrets left between them, it seemed.

  “What I don’t understand is how you planned to save her. You admitted you knew her soul is practically unsalvageable—” She stopped, her gaze falling into his, their link opening like a television channel, revealing all he’d planned. “Oh…eff.”