He dug it out of his pants pocket and held it to his ear while he blocked the other ear with his hand in an effort to hear better. “Gregory… what? Speak up.” Artemis started walking back toward the dressing rooms. “Say that again?”
Ammon chose that moment to appear, gazing at him solemnly. “You will miss the finale if you stay here. It is something you must see.”
Artemis nodded, listening to a tech at the lab they used to run DNA saying, “It’s a match. The samples you provided match. Get that?”
Ice water ran through Artemis’s veins. “Got it. Thanks.” He ended the call and turned to Ammon. “I’m going back now.”
This time Ammon stayed at his side, hands linked behind his back. Artemis ignored him, watching Talis gyrate his lean hips to heavy bass and felt desire for him, a longing he now knew he would never indulge. The DNA matched. Evidence is still circumstantial, but holy shit, he fucked those young men right before they died. Any good lawyer could bring in a guilty verdict. Artemis glared at the singer, planning to arrest him the instant he walked off stage. They’d run the polygraph first thing in the morning.
The sun had sunk far enough that stage lights were required, but now they were suddenly turned down. Shadows thickened and swam as the audience quieted, their concentration on the stage intensifying.
Talis stood in a circle of light while the rest of the band faded into darkness. He began to sing a cappella, his voice soft but commanding. The audience calmed further, straining to hear him. Artemis’s eyes were locked on to Talis as a piano began to accompany him. In the second verse, bass and drums were added, and in the third, chimes rang and a mandolin started to play. Talis’s voice gained in strength, cresting the wave of music as the final verse began.
I was born of fire, and to the flames I will return. I have lived one thousand years.
I am legend.
I am myth.
I am your dreams and secret desires.
I am a promise you keep deep inside your dark heart. I am the Phoenix.
Talis tossed the microphone aside and spread his arms.
His eyes closed as he threw his head back. Artemis saw every beautiful line of his body, limned in glittering light, and despite his knowledge that the man was most likely a murderer, he wanted Talis so badly in that moment that his balls hurt and his heart twisted with yearning.
The audience gasped. Artemis blinked. Red and gold feathers sprouted from Talis’s body as he began to change. Arms became giant wings, his torso rounded and flowed into legs that thinned but looked no less powerful, and his head changed from human to bird. Shreds of material that had once been a shirt and pants floated to the ground, rent and discarded.
Artemis swallowed, feeling dizzy. It was a wonderful illusion, complete in every respect from the top of his magnificently crested head to the bottoms of his three-toed, clawed feet. Artemis stared, amazed.
“Incredible,” he said aloud, even as the illusion turned and looked straight at him with amethyst-colored eyes. An icy shiver went through him.
Massive wings beat the air, the sound they made very loud in the sudden hush, and the illusion rose gracefully off the stage, hovering ten feet above it without effort.
“I am the Phoenix,” the bird said clearly in a resonant voice unlike that belonging to Talis, and burst into flames. The music played on for a few measures and then stopped.
There was a moment of complete silence, and then the audience was on its feet, screaming and clapping and shouting their approval as the Phoenix burned, bright embers flying out around him in a golden shower.
Artemis took a frantic step forward. “Is that real? Jesus, it’s not real!”
Ammon’s hand was on his arm, stopping him. “Wait.”
The Phoenix moved its wings enough to remain suspended in space, even as the fire consumed it. There was one long harsh cry from its burning throat, and then it was gone, vanishing into nothingness.
The audience applauded and yelled for another five minutes before realizing the show was over and there would be no encore. What could possibly follow such a thing?
Artemis turned to Ammon. “Take me to him. Now.”
“He awaits you.”
Ammon gestured for Artemis to precede him, and the detective immediately headed for the dressing room, Talis’s PA trailing behind him. However the illusion had been produced, its effect had been stunning. Artemis could still hear the thundering waves of excitement out front.
As he reached Talis’s dressing room, he felt a sharp prick at the back of his neck. His hand instantly went to the spot, cupping the abused skin. What the?
His vision darkened at the edges and weakness made his knees tremble, and he realized he’d been injected with something. Ammon had drugged him.
His last thought before he passed out: I’m dead.
Part Two Travels
Chapter One Artemis
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.
—Francis Bacon HE HAD to struggle to regain consciousness, fighting his way up through layer after layer of cloying darkness, and when he finally managed it, he was exhausted. He took stock of his body first. A fierce headache pounded behind his eyes, and his bladder was full to bursting. His stomach ached, but the cause of that couldn’t yet be determined. Carefully, slowly moving his limbs, he opened his eyes and sat up.
He was in a canopied bed in a luxurious room lit with candles on stands. The flickering flames worsened his headache substantially. Groaning, he held his head.
“That will pass,” Talis said. Artemis swiveled his head, moaning as pain shot up the back of his neck. Talis sat in a brocaded chair, one leg crossed over the other, watching him closely. He wore a black shirt and black pants, and he was barefoot. His pale hair glowed in the golden light.
Artemis had many questions, but they would have to wait. “Bathroom.” His voice rasped from a dry throat.
Talis pointed.
Taking a steadying breath, Artemis rose and made his way to the toilet as quickly as he could manage, pushing the door shut behind him. Candles burned here, too: on the sink, back of the toilet, and around the tub. Fumbling at his zipper, he hurriedly pulled his dick out and pissed. This seemed to last forever, with him weaving slightly in front of the bowl, and he sighed with relief. Never had draining the plumbing felt so good.
He flushed, washed his hands, rinsed his face, and leaned forward to gaze at himself in the bathroom mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, and his face looked drawn. Patting himself down revealed his gun was gone, but his cell was still in a back pocket. He took it out and checked for signal, disappointed when there was none, but accepting; he wouldn’t have been allowed to keep it otherwise.
His shoes had been removed. Stepping into the tub in stocking feet, he looked out the window and saw mountains. A few lights were scattered across their slopes. There were people around, though apparently not close. A gibbous moon rode low in the sky, adding definition to the landscape while wisps of cloud floated languidly across its face. Higher, stars shone. He recognized the Little Dipper in the northern sky, but he wasn’t much for constellations. The light pollution in New York City was too pervasive for the stars to be seen.
Time to get some answers.
He returned to the bedroom, where the smell of sandalwood incense wafted past his nostrils. Talis had not moved. Artemis sat on the edge of the bed, hands dangling between his knees, staring at him.
“I was drugged.” His throat was so dry, it hurt to speak. He tried to clear it and only caused himself more pain.
“Yes.” Talis nodded at the nightstand. “There’s water in the carafe.”
Artemis poured into the waiting glass, pleased to see his arm responding as it should, and with very little shake. After drinking cautiously, he said, “Why?”
“To bring you here.”
“Where is ‘here’?”
“We are very near Kathmandu,Nepal.”
What the fuck. Nepal
?“Is Rachel okay?”
“I did not need her.”
Artemis sipped again, watching Talis with narrowed eyes, turning over the words in his head. What the hell did that mean? Talis was still, calm, in total control. One thing he’d noticed about the man; he didn’t fidget. Artemis, on the other hand, felt anxiety churning in his gut and maybe a bit of fear twisting his intestines. “She’s safe, then? She’s still in New York?”
“I didn’t touch her.”
Artemis wasn’t sure he believed him, but there was nothing he could do about it at present. “But you need me?”
“More than you know.”
So Artemis wasn’t without power here. Good to know. “If I tried to leave, would you stop me?”
Talis drew in a shallow breath. “Please don’t make me do that.”
Artemis drank once more, set the glass aside, and leaned forward. “Start talking, or I’m walking out of here, and nothing you can do will stop me.”
They stared at each other for long moments, neither blinking nor looking away, until Talis finally held out a hand to him, turning it palm up. Feathers began to extrude all along his arm, which started to lengthen and change shape.
Artemis gasped. “It wasn’t an illusion! You on the stage. Jesus!” He watched the transformation of Talis to giant bird, mouth agape. This close, the change was overwhelming. Heart pounding, all his police training forgotten, he instinctively scrambled back, away from the creature, pressing against the bed’s headboard as if willing himself into the wall. This can’t be real. I must still be drugged, or dreaming.
The bird was as tall as Talis, and perched on the chair with its clawed feet neatly tucked beneath it, massive wings folded against its slender but powerful-looking body. The crested head tilted, gazing at him with amethyst-colored eyes that showed a remarkable level of intelligence. The clothing it had been wearing lay around it, ripped to pieces.
Crouched at the head of the bed, Artemis almost panted in shock. “Not an illusion,” he said again.
“Correct, although bursting into flames was a magic trick. That won’t happen until I die,” the bird said clearly. “I am the Phoenix.”
“What, the mythological bird born of fire?” Artemis laughed harshly. “I must still be drugged. You’re a hallucination.”
“I am real.”
“But… you talk.”
“So do parrots, and like them, I live a long life.”
Artemis wrapped his arms around drawn-up knees. “How long?”
“One thousand years.”
“That’s a hell of a long time.” He frowned. “And then what? You die and are reborn?” He didn’t remember the story of the phoenix well.
“And then… I die. Whether or not I am reborn depends on you.”
It was amazing to see a beak enunciating so well. “Me? I’m just a cop. I’m nothing special.”
“But you are special, to me.” The Phoenix moved, stepping from the chair to the bed. Artemis shrank back, but it only fluffed its feathers before settling over its folded legs once more. “Do you know who your parents were?”
The question was unexpected and annoying. “My parents were Jan and Thomas Gregory.”
“Your real parents were Darius Massri and Masika Ayoubi. They were Egyptian, and unmarried. When Masika became pregnant, she did not tell Darius. Instead, she told her parents and was sent to the States to stay with her mother’s aunt, who lived in Michigan with her American husband. The child was duly born and put up for adoption. Masika returned to Egypt. She lives there even now, married and with two grown children.” The Phoenix’s crest rose and then fell. “In your blood runs that of the ancient pharaohs.”
Artemis pursed his lips. It was anticlimactic, hearing who they were after all these years of assiduously avoiding the knowledge. “Well, whoop-de-doo. That and a buck will get me a cheap cup of coffee.” His thigh muscles were starting to scream, so he sat flat on his ass, keeping his knees up but sliding his legs forward a few inches for relief. He became aware of a light, pleasant scent and realized it was coming from Phoenix.
“The pharaohs created me,” Phoenix said solemnly, tilting his head the other way. “They brought me to life and imbued me with magic and power. Show some respect.”
“You mean like the kind you showed me when you drugged and transported me around the world to a country I’ve never been to before?”
Apparently a Phoenix could smile. It wasn’t accomplished in the usual way, but by lifting certain muscles beside the beak, a genial expression was relayed. It was odd as hell. “I apologize, but I’m rather short on time and there was no other way to accomplish what needs doing before it runs out.”
“And what might that be?” Artemis was surprised at how quickly he’d accepted talking to a bird, albeit one as big as himself who spoke perfect English. Maybe humans really weren’t as far removed from mythology and magic as they liked to think.
Ammon chose that moment to enter the room, pushing a cart in front of him loaded with food and drink. He barely gave Phoenix a glance as he rolled it up next to the bed and straightened, linking his hands behind his back.
“You will be in need of sustenance,” the PA said.
Artemis realized Ammon was right. The ache in his gut was due to hunger. “I hope there’s liquor on that cart.”
Ammon handed him a green bottle labeled “Stella.” “Egyptian beer. Also available is a bottle of Omar Khayyam, a dry wine served at room temperature.”
“If you guys are so fond of everything Egyptian, why aren’t we there instead of in Nepal?” Artemis popped the top off the beer and slugged down a few healthy swallows. The resulting throat burn was welcome, and it hit his stomach just right.
The Phoenix spoke. “I have a home in Luxor, but I thought it would be quieter here. Also, while it is warm in Kathmandu, it is very hot in Egypt. I was thinking of your comfort, Artemis.”
“Um.” Artemis crab-walked over to the cart, picked up a plate, and helped himself to what looked like a meat pie. His taste buds exploded in ecstasy at the first bite. Clearly, being kidnapped and spirited away from everyone and everything familiar hadn’t affected his appetite, now that the drugs had worn off. Rachel was fine—hopefully—he was okay, and this bizarre situation would surely be resolved soon.
Ammon left, and Artemis was alone again with the bird. “Should I call you Talis?”
“That is my name when I’m human. You may call me Phoenix.”
A mythological being who insisted on formality. Quaint. Artemis continued to wolf down his food, interspersing it with beer. “How many hours was I out?”
“Approximately twenty-four. You were conveyed here in a private plane, but it is still a long flight.”
No wonder he’d had to piss like a racehorse and no surprise he was starving. He helped himself to a spicy shrimp and rice dish and a slice of stoneground bread. There was another beer on the cart, and he grabbed that, too. “So what’s the deal, Phoenix? Why am I here? What is it I can give you that no one else can?”
“I am the only one of my kind. To survive longer than one thousand years, I must find my soul mate, and that person must come to love me.” The lavender eyes fixed on Artemis. “Youmust love me.”
Artemis fought the urge to roll his eyes, but he was doing it mentally. “You can’t force someone to love you.”
“I agree. But if we spend time together, if you come to know me, perhaps you might.”
“I don’t believe in soul mates. I believe in compatibility.”
“Bullshit.” How odd to hear that word come out of a bird’s mouth. “Talis shook your hand and the exchange of energy almost knocked him out. Tell me you didn’t feel that.”
Artemis shook his head. He wasn’t going to admit to feeling anything other than an instant of overwhelming physical attraction. That happened all the time. It just didn’t happen to him, not until he'd met Talis. He finished the second beer and set the bottle on the cart. “Talis killed those men.” Phoenix d
idn’t respond, and Artemis glanced at him. “Didn’t he? Or was it you?” The vitality in the room changed as Phoenix morphed back into Talis. He was nude. “Jesus, you must go through a lot of clothes doing that.”
Talis moved to stand before Artemis. “Look at me.”
Artemis looked… and saw the most perfect body he’d ever laid eyes on. Wide shoulders and a lightly furred chest with beautifully defined pecs narrowed to slender hips and long, gorgeous legs. Below a flat abdomen and golden bush hung a thick, uncut cock that made his mouth water. One didn’t see many these days, and Artemis couldn’t stop staring. Suddenly Artemis was aware of that cock beginning to lengthen under his gaze, the head poking out of the foreskin, and he shifted uncomfortably as his dick responded in kind.
“Thisis what they died for,” Talis said, holding his arms out slightly from his body. “I can exist in this form only because of them, because they gave their essence to me.”
That drew Artemis’s attention. “Gave to you? What the hell are you talking about?”
“Phoenix could not find you unless he was human, and he could not be human unless they offered themselves to me.” Talis dropped his eyes. “Phoenix does what he has to do to survive. So would you. So would any being. Extinction sounds so sterile, but to become extinct, the last of a species has to die.” His shoulders abruptly tightened, underscoring the sharpness in his voice. “I have been looking for you a long time.”
Artemis said, “It is my duty to place you under arrest.” He repeated the Miranda warning by rote.
The purple eyes met his again. “You do not understand, and you’re out of your jurisdiction, Detective.”
“Then maybe you’d better send me home,and I’ll issue a warrant from there.” Artemis was not in the mood for games. “Or you can come with me.”
“The U.S. has no extradition treaty with Nepal.”
“It does with Egypt,” he shot back. “I’ll send it to your residence there.”
“I am here until the end, whether it’s to life or death.” As casually as if he were fully dressed, he strolled toward the door, opened it, and departed, banging it shut behind him.
Phoenix Rising Page 6