by Nadine Mutas
She stood frozen, staring at him, and nodded, though her face had lost all color and her aura was subdued by her shock. He was about to take a step toward her when she flinched and screamed, “Rhun! Watch out!”
But before she’d even finished her warning, the other demon lunged at him again, catching him off-guard. And this time he attacked Rhun mentally with such a devastating blast of power that he broke through his defenses and paralyzed him. Unable to soften the fall, Rhun crashed down with the demon on top of him, his head making harsh acquaintance with the concrete.
The world erupted in white-hot explosions of pain. Rhun’s vision blurred. A brutal foreign force held his mind, incapacitating him while flushing his system with waves of pain. Every vein, every cell in his body roared with agony. Still, he fought, struggled against the choking mind control, fought with every breath he had left. Only it wouldn’t be enough…
Unexpected, the waves of pain stopped as if a switch had been flipped. The mind control snapped like a severed wire. Rhun was free. His vision returned, and he blinked at the thrashing, screaming demon lying next to him—and at the fire-haired witch standing at the demon’s feet, power curling around her, her face ashen as she watched the attacker wail in pain.
When the demon jerked with a last rattling breath and lay still, Merle abruptly inhaled, closed her eyes briefly and then looked at Rhun. Something inside him cringed at the haunted expression on her face. Stiffly dropping to her knees beside him, she touched his head, checked his sides, her hands trembling.
“You’re hurt.” Her voice was so, so hollow.
“Merle.”
“I’ve got it.” She muttered a simple healing spell, keeping her eyes averted from his, her hands on his wounds. Her face had gotten even paler, every freckle standing out starkly against the white of her skin. Her breathing was as erratic as the pattern of her aura.
“Merle.” He grabbed one of her hands. It was ice-cold. “Look at me.”
She stopped casting the spell, clenched her other hand to a fist. Pressing her lips together, she raised her eyes to meet his. There was something broken in the blue of her gaze, deep within, a painful twist striking him hard.
“Was this the first time you took a life?” he asked softly.
If he hadn’t held her hand, he might have missed the infinitesimal shudder that coursed through her body. He tightened his hold on her. Silently, she nodded.
Just as silently, he sat up and pulled her into his arms. His still broken ribs screamed in protest at the movement, but he didn’t so much as wince. As he held her, Merle’s tense body softened bit by bit.
“He’d have killed you.” The barest whisper, close to his ear.
“But he didn’t. You stopped him.” He rubbed his cheek against hers.
“I turned it on him.” There was a hitch in her voice, echoing the broken glint in her eyes. “What he did to you. I turned it back on him.”
For a moment he was silent, breathing with her in the quiet of the night, feeling her torment. He’d been young once, and there’d been a time before he had taken his first life, a time—however short—when his soul had been untainted by spilled blood. A part of him remembered, and mourned.
“It’s all right, little witch.” He brushed his powers along her senses, a reassuring mental embrace. “You’ll be all right. You’re still good.”
“I don’t feel good,” she whispered, so low he barely heard it.
“Such innocence.” He stroked her hair. “The very fact that you regret the loss of the life you took, even your enemy’s, shows how good you still are, Merle mine. When you start dropping bodies without thinking twice, then you should fear for your soul.”
He held her tighter, his witch with her soft heart, and she let him, allowing his power to soothe her. Taking a deep breath, she put her arms around him and pressed him to her. Pain shot through him as she squeezed his ribs. His aura quivered with the slightest sign of discomfort.
She picked up on it even though he’d tried to hide it. “Oh gods, you’re still hurt—and I’m crushing you! Let me up.”
He decided not to point out it would take a lot more than a witch of one-hundred-thirty pounds to crush him, and instead let her disentangle herself from him to resume the healing spell while he watched her expression with alert eyes. Inside him, his ribs knotted back together, tissue merged again, wounds closed. His kind healed quickly by nature, so it only took a little incentive by Merle’s magic to fix him up completely.
When she was done, she nodded at him and got up. “Let’s go.”
She started turning away, but he was on his feet and in front of her before she could really move.
Cupping her cheek, he studied her closely. “Are you okay?”
She answered with a shaky smile. “I will be. Eventually.”
And when she leaned into his palm, something inside him hurt far more than his broken ribs had done. But this pain, it was bitter-sweet.
His thumb stroked over her cheek, traced the line of her lower lip. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
He gave her a duh-look. “For saving me.”
A violent ripple sliced through her energy pattern, and for the tiniest moment, he thought he glimpsed an emotion so true, so shatteringly honest and warm, it made his heart stop. Then, she closed up as if she’d pulled the shutters down, her eyes turning cold, distant.
“Yeah, well,” she said, an edge in her voice, “you can’t really help me when you’re dead, can you?”
And with that, she walked away toward the car, leaving him staring after her with a new kind of pain inside, laced with anger that had nowhere to go.
They got in the car and drove in silence for quite a while, all things unspoken between them a quiet yet deafening force. When Merle finally said something, it startled him to hear her voice.
“So what was that all about? The attack on you.”
He kept his eyes on the road. “I guess that’s what I get for showing my face around in a demon bar.”
She turned in the seat. “What’s that supposed to mean? You’re one of them. Why would they attack you?”
“Well,” he hedged, still focused on the street, “let’s put it this way—I wouldn’t exactly win a popularity contest among demonkind.”
She banged her head back against the seat and uttered a cute sound of frustration. “Gods, getting some straight info out of you is like pulling teeth. What did you do to piss off your own kind?”
“Must be my stunning good looks. They just can’t take the combined force of my gorgeousness.”
Even without looking, he knew she glared at him. It made him want to laugh.
“Spill it already, Mr. Self-Absorbed!”
“All right, all right,” he whined, “I’m telling! Just please, please don’t witch-slap me.” Putting a hand up as if to shield his head from a blow, he gave a mock sob.
The Merle-glare intensified, and he grinned, slanting a glance at her.
“What I’m doing for you now…Well, I used to do that for a living.”
“Annoying the hell out of people?”
He chuckled at that. “I like your sense of humor, little witch. But no, annoying my fellow beings does not get me paid. Unfortunately so—that would be the best job ever.” Sighing, he dreamily stared ahead.
Merle cleared her throat.
“Hm?” He snapped out of his reverie. “Oh. Right.” Shrugging one shoulder, he said, “I used to hunt down and eliminate rogue demons.”
“You were a bounty hunter?”
“Of sorts.”
Silence.
Then, “Why did you do it?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re demon. Yet you chose to hunt your own kind. Why?”
He snorted. “The money, of course. What else?”
She regarded him silently for a minute, and he got the distinct feeling she was putting too much together in that clever witch head of hers.
“Who did you
hunt them down for?” she finally asked.
Now he was silent for a moment. “Witches,” was his quiet answer.
There was a small intake of breath. “That’s the work you did for my grandmother, isn’t it?”
He nodded. No reason to deny it.
More silence, this time charged in a way that made him edgy.
“You didn’t really do it for the money.”
He stared at the road, remaining quiet.
“I know for a fact,” Merle went on relentlessly, “that the witch community does not have extensive funds, so whatever they paid you can’t have been much. You could have gotten a better-paying job than that, easily, if you only cared about money.” Her gaze bored into him. “But you didn’t, did you? Why, then?” After a moment, quietly, “Was it because of her?”
He gritted his teeth, shot a dark look at her. “To make this clear, little witch, not everything I did was for Rowan.”
“Oh?” She raised her brows, and he didn’t like the glint in her eyes one bit. “There was another motivation? What was it?”
This damn witch was nothing if not persistent. A stubborn pain in his ass. Ignoring her would get him nowhere.
Keeping his eyes on the traffic, he said, “Whether you believe it or not, there are some things I consider morally inexcusable.”
“Like what?”
His stomach knotted together into a ball of hurt. His hands tightened on the steering wheel until his knuckles flashed white. “Eating children, for example.”
That earned him a shocked silence. Merle swallowed audibly.
“There are laws,” he went on. “Boundaries. Things you do and things you don’t do. But in the world you and I live in, my little witch, there are few who care about where to draw the line. And there are even fewer who care enough to keep it drawn.”
In the ensuing silence, he chanced a glimpse at her, and frowned at the unexpected grin on her face.
“What?” He flicked his gaze from her to the traffic and back to her. That grin of hers made him twitchy. “What’s so funny?”
She slowly shook her head, still ominously amused. “I don’t believe it.”
“What?”
“You were a demon cop!”
He winced, and the car swerved precariously on the road before he caught himself. Grimacing, he gave her a pained look. “Do not ever say that again. That is just hurtful.”
“Officer Rhun,” she said musingly, the corners of her mouth twitching up, “to protect and to serve.”
“Merle.”
“Did you wear a uniform?”
All right, that’s it. “If I say yes, will that thought make you wet?”
That effectively shut her up, and while she blushed a gorgeous shade of red, he took his turn grinning.
After a few more minutes they reached Bahram’s apartment, set in a turn-of-the-century house in downtown, which had been—by the looks of it—renovated since Rhun had last been here. It now boasted the splendor of the original façade from when it had been built a hundred years ago, a fact Rhun knew because he’d been around at the time.
The apartment itself—a spacious two-bedroom suite—had been redone, too, with new hardwood floors, state-of-the-art kitchen and modern bathroom appliances. Some of the old furniture was still in place, though, and even a few other items Rhun recognized.
Grazing his fingers over the smooth black leather of his favorite armchair, he smirked and muttered, “Stored, my ass.” Seemed more like his friend had enjoyed some of Rhun’s old belongings very personally. Not that he could blame Bahram, when there had been no indication of him ever coming back from the Shadows.
While he checked the armchair for scratches and stains—knowing the incubus, he’d probably enjoyed the chair together with a female at some point—Merle put her duffel bag down next to the couch. Having finished her tour of the apartment as well, she slumped down with a sigh and took out her grimoire.
“I’m going to start working through this, and it’s going to take me a few hours…” She patted the thick tome with a look on her face that spoke volumes itself. “…so you might want to find something to pass the time. I saw the DVD box set of Lord of the Rings here on the shelf—it’s the extended version, too, so if you want to watch that, you’ll be thoroughly entertained for at least eleven hours.”
He stopped examining a chink in the leather and stared at her. “They made it into an eleven-hour movie?”
“Three movies. And good ones, too. I think Peter Jackson did a fantastic job. They shot it in New Zealand.” She all but bounced on the cushion with enthusiasm, her eyes gleaming. “Christopher Lee plays Saruman.”
“Well,” he said, rising to his feet. “Now that does sound like fun.” Though he had a feeling it would be even more fun to watch it with her—he could just imagine her telling him tidbits about the production and the actors during the movies, whispered explanations that would make her eyes glow with joy, and his chest tightened with how much he wanted that. It tightened even more because it was something he’d never have.
Merle had gotten up to pull out a large box from the shelf apparently accommodating Bahram’s movie collection, and she proceeded to put a disc looking like a CD into the player beneath the TV.
“I’ll go study the grimoire in the guest room, so you’ll have the living room with the TV all to yourself.”
He watched her set everything up, eyeing her luscious behind when she bent over. Damn if it didn’t look exquisitely strokable, the way her jeans molded to her curves…
“Enjoy,” she said with a smile, and handed him a remote control.
“Hmm. I will.”
After picking up her grimoire from the couch, she started for the door.
“Merle.”
She faced him, her eyebrows raised.
He studied her for a moment. “Tell me why you’re not a member of the Elders.”
Her face fell. She peered at her feet.
“You’re the head of your family,” he continued, watching her expression closely, noticing how, along with her aura, she seemed to withdraw into herself, stuffing whatever she felt deep inside. He wouldn’t let her get away with that. “By rights that makes you an Elder witch, too, doesn’t it?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t work that way.”
“Then how?”
Avoiding his eyes, she said in a quiet voice, “You have to claim your place among the other Elders.”
When she started to turn away, he stepped in front of her. “Claim how?” She wasn’t the only one who could be stubborn.
“You need to step up and declare you’re willing to take the position, privileges and obligations and all. There’s a ritual for that. A complicated one. You have to get it right or else you’re rejected.”
Gut churning with a mixture of inexplicable anger and disappointment, he regarded her for a minute. “You never claimed your place.”
She didn’t respond, just stared at her feet again.
“Why?” It came out harsher than he’d intended.
“I didn’t feel like it,” she muttered.
“You didn’t feel like it?”
“It’s a lot of responsibility,” she hedged.
“And it also gives you power! Gives you special rights, a say in how your own community is led. Influence among the very people who are hunting your ass right now. How could you pass on a chance like that? Why would you not claim privileges that are rightfully yours?”
He virtually saw when her patience snapped. Her gaze turned steely, her aura flared, and balling her hands to fists she shouted, “Because I’d have to live up to them!”
He took a breath, his lips twisting into a bitter smile. “You’re scared, little witch.”
“I’m not,” she spit out, but from the way her spine stiffened and her energy pattern wavered with resentment and fear, he knew he’d hit home.
“You’re scared you’re not strong enough,” he kept on. “You’re hiding behind your fear in
stead of stepping up to your destiny and accepting who you are.”
“I know damn well who I am, and I do accept it!”
“No, you don’t. You’re still wishing it was Moira instead of you.”
She jerked back as if he’d slapped her. All color left her face.
He wouldn’t give her an inch in this. Stepping even closer, he distinctly said, “You’re hung up about the fact that she and your mother died and left you to take their place. You’re thinking this is not your burden to bear, that you’re not meant to do this. Am I right?”
She glared at him, her pulse racing loud enough to ring in his ears.
“Am I right?”
“Yes! Yes, okay? It was never supposed to be me, it should have been my mom and then Moira. I was never meant to lead!” She trembled all over, hands still clenched tight, her face a rigid mask.
He leaned in until their noses almost touched. “But you are now, little witch, so deal with it.”
“I’m too young to be an Elder! You have to be wise and experienced and—and strong, dammit.” Her voice broke a little. “I’m none of that! I can’t even protect my own sister.” A sheen of tears glimmered on her eyes, and it tore him apart on the inside.
“You are strong enough,” he said, his voice sharp with the force it took him to restrain the confusing anger he felt, “and it fucking beats the shit out of me why you can’t see that.” He made a pause and took a calming breath, studying the lines of her face, those striking eyes of the clearest blue, now wide and so full of raw emotions. “You should claim your rightful place among the Elders. You’re already leading your line—I think it’s time you claimed the privileges that go along with it, too.”
And right there it hit him. Hit him so hard he almost staggered back. He shouldn’t care about whether or not she ever claimed what was due to her. There was absolutely no use in directing a tirade at her about becoming an Elder—because when he was done with her, she wouldn’t be able to claim anything with the Elders anymore. Ever.
He quickly turned away, fighting the painful twist in his heart. “Go study your grimoire, Merle.” His voice sounded as weary as he suddenly felt.
From behind him came the soft pads of feet moving away on hardwood floors. She left the room without saying another word.