The humped moon above glazed the stones, Jude’s hair and sharp profile in silver. I didn’t understand what he was telling me, so I waited. And listened.
“When I came to this land as a slave, I was raised into a warrior. This I’ve told you before. I lived a simple life, growing stronger and fighting for my clan. One day, after I’d grown, a man came to our village. A foreigner.” A derisive laugh escaped him as he remembered. “I had no idea how foreign he was. He was a fine, noble man, a Roman he looked to us—black hair, pale skin, fine clothes.”
“Damas,” I whispered.
Jude untucked his hands from his pockets and crossed his arms. “Damas. At the time, I knew nothing of this world of Light and Dark, only my very earthly existence. This man, who claimed his name was Titus, brought news from my home in France. He said that he’d been sent to find me by my grandfather, who’d been on his deathbed when he’d left. I doubted his words, of course, for my grandfather was an old peasant just as I was. What would this nobleman have to do with an old beggar? For that’s surely what he’d become without the aid of my father or me to support him. He was my father’s father and had lived with us before Octavius had come into our lives and ruined us all. Octavius, a grand name for the grand man he thought himself to be.”
“I’m sorry. Who is Octavius?”
Jude dropped his chin and hunched his shoulder. “You know him by another name. Danté. I remember him as Octavius, the great Roman prefect who came and took over our village after the Romans had conquered our land. After my parents’ death, my grandfather could do nothing to save me, an old man with little power and few friends once Oct—I mean, Danté had sunk his claws into the villagers. They’d all stood by and watched when Danté sold me to the Campbell clan.”
“So your grandfather was still alive when you were taken away. Was Damas telling the truth?”
“Damas only ever tells the truth as it suits him. Why he’d targeted me, I’ll never know. But he told me of how Danté had risen high, remaking our town into a Roman settlement, had had a son from the girl I—”
He cut himself off, glancing across the moor into the dark of his memory.
“What girl?” My stomach twisted with a new truth. That Jude had loved someone before me. “You loved her?”
“No. It wasn’t love. I was still only twelve when I left. Melisende was fifteen. Beautiful brown hair, fair skin, lovely eyes. All the village boys wanted her. But she had chosen me to become her favorite friend, or so I’d thought. I would tell her of my troubles, of my family. How my father had become angry with my mother. How my mother wept at night, especially after Danté had made a round through the village. For every time he did so, he paid particular attention to her, offering her a position as a servant in his house. We all knew what that meant. For a peasant girl to serve in the prefect’s house was as good as enslavement. I never knew my mother was a Vessel, not until Uriel made me into a hunter years later. Danté had wanted her from the first, knowing who and what she was. There would be no end to his torment of my family as he attempted to seduce her to his will.”
I knew firsthand the agonizing torture of Danté’s amorous attentions. I couldn’t imagine having a husband who must stand by and watch a nobleman lust after his wife.
“Melisende comforted me with whispers that I could tell her anything, that she was my friend. And so I told her…” He paused, shaking his head at the memory. “I told her that we planned to leave, that the prefect was forcing us to run away and start a new life somewhere else. I actually wept in her lap, because I thought I loved the girl, and up to that point, leaving her was the greatest pain my young heart had known.”
I ached for the young, brokenhearted Jude. I could see him, lying in the pretty girl’s lap, weeping for what would never be as Melisende brushed his dark hair through her fair fingers.
Jude continued on. “I didn’t know that she’d already become his lover with the promise of being his wife. She was a peasant girl, you see. To become the wife of a Roman prefect would elevate her beyond any good marriage she could make among the villagers.
“But her worst betrayal was yet to come. One of the servants in the house of Danté told us that afternoon that he’d overheard Melisende telling their master this news and that Danté had ordered men to our home to retrieve my mother. My parents knew what would happen next. He’d kill my father and take my mother as a slave, which he’d been promising to do since the moment he stepped into our village. So…” Jude’s gaze settled back on me. “You know how that story ends.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. “Your father bound your mother and drowned her in a pool, then killed himself. And you were sold into slavery.”
A slow nod and heavy sigh. “And so Damas brings news that my grandfather died, and his dying wish was that I might avenge him for the wrongs done to our family.” Jude laughed and shook his head. “Damas couldn’t have said anything more tempting to a young warrior with bloody revenge on his heart. I didn’t ask how he knew my grandfather. I didn’t care. I wanted to kill. I wanted to slaughter everyone I ever knew from my past. No one had tried to save us. No one had tried to protect me from being sold like a dog. The entire village had trembled in fear and bowed down to the almighty Octavius.” He combed a hand through his hair. “My clan brother Lauchlan and I set off with a band of warriors. My adoptive father understood and let us go.”
“And Damas traveled with you?” I shivered from the cold, my teeth chattering when I spoke.
“Oh yes. Of course. He wanted to see me stir up trouble for his estranged demon brother, Danté.”
Jude shoved away from the stone and stood in front of me, pulling me into the warmth of his embrace. I burrowed my head under his chin.
“I wanted to come here, to remember in this place that reminded me of my clan. But you’re too cold. Best get you home.”
I didn’t argue as he held me tight and sifted us home.
Chapter Twenty-Three
From her nest on top of the cabinet, Mira turned her orange-eyed gaze on us when we entered the cottage. She ruffled her tail feathers, then resettled and closed her eyes.
“The fire has gone down,” I said, standing on the hearth, still shivering.
“No matter. I can take care of that.”
Jude stacked fresh kindling on the coals, then rubbed the pads of his fingers against his thumb three times, making static electricity snap in the air. He gestured as if he tossed something onto the kindling, though his hands were empty. Instantly, a yellow flame ignited there. He knelt down and added a peat log. I’d always wondered how he could conjure fire. Now was the time to finally ask.
“Where did you get that power?” I settled on the sofa. “From Damas?”
“No.” He sat next to me. “From Uriel.”
That served me right to depend on stereotypes, thinking the demon had given him the power to conjure fire.
“Why?” I asked.
He shrugged. “It happened in the making, the initial transformation. Neither one of us knows why. One of those side effects, I suppose.”
“Yeah. Just one of those side effects of becoming a kickass demon hunter. Happens all the time, I’m sure.”
He smiled at my sarcasm.
I smiled back.
“I’m glad you’re not mad at me.”
He reached over and pulled me into his lap, just like he used to do before he’d been taken from me. My heart clenched. My Jude was truly, fully back.
“I didn’t get to finish my story.”
His expression was fixed in tight lines. This story had no happy ending, yet he needed to tell it. I would listen with no judgment at all, only open ears and open arms. So I wrapped my arms around his shoulder and snuggled close, both of us gazing into the fire as we often did on our honeymoon here.
“Tell me, Jude.”
One of his hands sat gently atop my thigh. “On the journey to my village, I’d noticed that Damas wore a bronze cuff. It was beautifully made
with intricate designs. At the center stood a fierce dragon. Of course, I didn’t know it was a symbol of strength in his demon world. I’d admired it often, till one day while we were both abovedeck on the ship as it approached the shores of France, he removed the cuff and handed it to me. He said, ‘A gift for you in the hope your inner dragon will defeat his foe.’ It was a generous gift. We hadn’t its equal in fine metal or craftsmanship in the clan.”
Jude shifted beneath me so that I was perfectly cradled against him. He played with the loose strands of hair falling down my back.
“That first night I wore the cuff, I dreamed of Damas. An intimate dream.” His tone fell to a guttural timbre. “I’d never dreamed or even thought of a man in such a way. I was disturbed that I might lust after a man. I couldn’t know that Damas wasn’t a man at all, but a demon.”
I bit my lip to keep from screaming the rage roiling inside of me. Damas had targeted Jude as a lover, just as he had done to me and Kat.
“But by the light of day, all was well. Normal. Even though my bond with Damas strengthened, I didn’t have such feelings toward him. It puzzled me. Of course, then, I knew nothing of demons or their spawn or essence. You can guess now that he’d poured his black essence into the bronze cuff, planning on seducing me to his will. And so he did.
“By the time we reached the village of my home, I was glutted with malice and wrath, burning to kill and to slaughter. And so I did. Anyone who crossed my path was a dead man. Or woman.” He paused. The memory of his former self was a heavy burden. “I killed Melisende. I killed her son by Danté, and I tried to kill the man, the demon, who’d started me on this path toward hatred. But of course, I didn’t. I wasn’t quite the swordsman I am now.”
I lifted my head, remembering what he’d said about becoming a Dominus Daemonum. “You were mortally wounded.”
“Yes. I would have been one of Damas’s creatures in truth had Uriel and George not arrived that night.”
“But you were the first hunter. Why did they come that night?”
“The Flamma of Light had begun to watch Danté and knew he’d gotten out of hand. Uriel, even then, was one of the few who interfered in mortal affairs. George had died a martyr and had been a warrior against evil in his life on earth. The two had paired up to monitor the demons, discovering their activities had extended well beyond the margin of Flamma rules. So that night, when I returned to my former home, the presence of two demon lords, bloody carnage and a burning inferno was enough to attract their attention.”
I gazed up at Jude. “I saw this vision of you attacking the village.”
He turned his attention from the fire to me, his expression solemn. “You saw?” Vulnerability was written in every tight line of his face. “And yet…you don’t cringe away.” He shook his head. “How can you—”
“What the hell did you think? That I’d reject you with this story? That I’d leave you because you were seduced by evil?”
“Quite frankly, I thought you might.”
“Jude Delacroix. I know the temptation of the Dark. I nearly fell to it myself.”
That night of The Phantom of the Opera, when Damas had me in his clutches, burning me up with desire, I yearned for him. I nearly slipped over. I almost let him take me. The truth that I’d been so close to the edge of the cliff was horrifying. Even now as I sat here in the lap of the one I loved most in the world, the thought that I could’ve been trapped, like Kat, sent a bone-chilling shiver down my spine.
He brushed a strand of hair behind my ear with a gentle hand. As always, his slightest touch warmed me to the core. “I know you did, Genevieve. That is why I told you my story. When you said his essence was in the pendant, I understood your struggle to resist. No need to tell me the sordid details. I can’t be angry with you for falling prey to the same demon I did. What I can’t forgive was my own blindness.” He clamped his jaw tight. A log shifted and popped in the grate. “You told me your visitor was your guardian angel, Thomas, and I believed you.”
“Why wouldn’t you? George confirmed that I had a guardian named Thomas. At one time.” A pain throbbed in my chest for the angel I’d never met and who was now in Erebus somewhere, solely because he was the guardian for the wrong human.
“Yes, but knowing Thomas had severed ties with his superiors should’ve been a warning something was awry.”
“Jude, you’re too hard on yourself. If you recall, you demanded, in strict Jude fashion mind you, that I not entertain Thomas alone again.”
He slid his fingers along my jaw and into my hairline, resting his palm against my cheek. “And you did it anyway.”
No need to answer. When I’d sensed him at the theatre, I should’ve resisted. But I couldn’t. I wanted the power to sift, and I wanted…him. There was no denying that anymore. Now, I just wanted to kill him. For what he’d done to Jude, to Kat, and to me. I owed Acheron payment, and I knew exactly whose soul I’d be feeding him come the Blood Moon.
I sat up straighter on his lap. “If you can forgive me, I can forgive you.”
“There is nothing to forgive, my heart. I’m no priest or confessor.” He chuckled. “Not even close.”
No, he certainly wasn’t a man of God, but he was a good man. I didn’t like his self-deprecating tone, the way he diminished himself, his worth. He had no idea what he truly meant to me.
I stood from his lap and reached out my hand. “Come. Let’s go to bed.”
He held me in his dark gaze for a moment, then took my hand. I guided him to the bedroom, where I’d spent most my hours since he’d been gone. He stepped into the bathroom. I went about getting undressed.
Even though he was my husband and had seen me naked a number of times now, I was still shy. I wasn’t one of those women who could prance around nude in front of her man. But I planned to make him forget all his worries tonight. I planned to show him that my love was unconditional, that his sins couldn’t push me away.
Reaching into the back of my panties drawer, I pulled out the emerald silk nightie I’d bought on a whim back in New Orleans. In the days leading up to my descent into the underworld, I’d gathered all the necessities here to help Jude recover. Food, water, bandages, antiseptic. I knew his recovery would be slow. But I also hoped for the day he’d be fully healed, the day I’d want to show him how much I missed him.
He was still in the bathroom, the door ajar. I hurried and stripped, then slipped the nightie over my head, pulling the spaghetti straps into place. It hugged my breasts and fell mid-thigh. I thought I’d slide into bed and wait, but I could see Jude standing in front of the mirror. I stepped up to the bathroom and peered inside. He stood shirtless, staring at his reflection, tracing the line of the thickest scar across his chest. Danté had lashed him good there. Repeatedly. The skin puckered in a diagonal slash across his pectoral, marring the once-perfect Celtic cross.
He stared at the wound, his face a mask to hide his thoughts. “He did a good job on me. I’m rather ugly now, aren’t I?”
It dawned on me that this might’ve been Danté’s very plan—to destroy Jude’s beauty. But there was nothing, no whip or weapon of any kind that could erase the noble man he was or the love I had for him. Tears stung my eyes. His steady examination of the marks on his flesh revealed a wounded man, soul-deep. It wasn’t just the physical pain he endured while in the hands of Danté that had put this self-doubt in his voice, in his eyes. It was the enslavement, the humiliation, the breaking down of his spirit that had placed this expression of hopelessness where it didn’t belong.
I stood behind him and brushed my hands over his broad shoulders. He shivered. I peered over one shoulder at his reflection.
“You are the most beautiful man I’ve ever known, Jude. Then. Now. Ever.”
He said nothing, his silence telling me he couldn’t or wouldn’t believe me. I lifted my hand to the most gruesome mark and skimmed it with the pad of my index finger. He winced, watching our reflections.
“Do you know what this mean
s?”
I trailed my fingers to the smaller marks nicked across his abdomen. He clamped his jaw tight. The ridges of his abdomen flexed under my touch.
“Every one of these is a reminder of your sacrifice…of your love for me. It should’ve been me taken by Lethe. It should’ve been me dragged into that abyss.”
“I would never have let—” His voice was gravel and sand.
“I know,” I interrupted him. “I know you would’ve never let me go into that darkness. So you went instead. You endured—” My throat caught on the word. I swallowed hard. “You endured torture so that I wouldn’t. Every mark on your body is beautiful. It is sacrifice. It is love. So I forbid you to look down on yourself. If anything, I am the one who should be ashamed.”
He turned, taking in the gift I’d bought and worn for him. Sliding his arms around my waist, he pulled me against his hard body, growing harder by the second. With his face buried in my neck, he whispered, “Don’t be ashamed. I would do it again. I told you once I’d go to hell for you.”
“I know,” I said with a shaky smile. “So you did. And I went to bring you back.” I wrapped my arms around his neck, molding my body to his. “I love you, Jude.” I pressed a soft kiss to his lower neck. “Let me show you.”
Backing out of his embrace, I tugged him by the hand toward the bed. He followed, gaze dark. He let me push him back onto the bed. Never a brazen one when it came to my sexuality, I had to force my anxiety away. I knelt over him and unbelted and unzipped his jeans. He helped me work them off. There was no need for me to be stressed. His desire for me was more than evident. Yet he remained still, waiting for me to make my move, to take control. I sensed his need to feel wanted, cherished, adored. And I planned to show him.
“Lie on your stomach.”
His mouth ticked up on one side. He apparently remembered giving me the same command on our wedding night. He obeyed and rolled over. Even with the cross-hatching of scars, his physique was lovely. Perhaps I was biased, but he truly was an extraordinary specimen of man. Perhaps the scars made him even more endearing to me.
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