City In Embers

by Stacey Marie Brown

  The taste of his blood sang through my veins, reminding me of another time in my life—another Zoey. Fighting always made me feel alive, especially dirty fighting. It was one of those fetishes I kept from Daniel. He liked clean combat. He played by the rules and took it seriously. Not only did I not like playing by the rules, but I enjoyed the fire breaking them put in my belly. Many times I would let him throw me on the mat only to feel him on me, but he never let that line get crossed. Ever. He kept it very clear. He was my teacher, and we were training. I felt embarrassed at how many times I imagined us tearing off each other’s clothes and doing it right there on the mats. He was rigid when it came to training or anything he considered not appropriate for a situation. If he had only known most of me was inappropriate, especially when it came to him.

  “And you call me a beast.” Ryker shook his hand, looking at me in disgust.

  My eyes stayed on him, observing his every move.

  He watched me in return.

  “Lady, unless it’s an herb I can smoke, get it away from me.” A familiar voice came from my bag, and a head poked out. “Wait... what?” Sprig’s head twisted around. “This doesn’t look like a diner.” Sprig wrinkled his nose. He had fallen asleep before we even left the café, and I placed him carefully in the bottom of my carrier. “Where are we? And why does this bag smell like a hippie’s van?” The pills Elthia gave me did stink.

  Sprig’s appearance broke the heated stare of hate between Ryker and me.

  “Daniel’s.” I peered at the monkey.

  “Oh, right.” He nodded then paused. “Why again?”

  “Because you said you knew him, and he was involved with whatever was going on.”

  “Yeah, of course.” He looked at Ryker and shook his head.

  I sighed, then turned to the door. It was probably locked, but I still twisted the knob. It rolled in my hand, the door creaking open. Alarms went off in my gut. My head swung back to Ryker. He seemed to have the same reaction. He drew his blade. I pulled up my pant leg and yanked the knife Ryker gave me the night before. The Wanderer shoved me behind him as he softly pushed the door wider, his blade ready to strike.

  Chairs were toppled every which way, and everything in Daniel’s cupboards was spread across the floor.

  “Don’t think we are the first here.” Ryker kicked a chair from his path.

  No. We definitely weren’t.

  “Not to be rude, but your friend is messy.” Sprig hopped off my shoulder to a leg of a fallen chair and bounded to the sofa.

  “Someone broke in, Sprig.”

  “Good thing he was untidy. The robbers wouldn’t be able to find a damn thing in this mess.” I was about to respond, then decided against it. No point.

  “This was not simply a robbery. Whoever did this had been looking for something. Thieves aren’t this wasteful of their time. They go for the valued objects and get out.” Ryker spoke from experience, and I nodded in confirmation. “This was done to look like he had been robbed. How long did this guy work for DMG?” Ryker made his way deeper in the room.

  “Twelve years.” I followed him through the living room. “He was their top hunter and trainer.”

  “They still didn’t trust him. Why ransack his place if they thought he had nothing to hide?”

  I had little doubt DMG had done this. The coincidence he had merely been robbed was far too remote on the twenty-fourth floor. DMG had been looking for something. But what? What did Daniel have they wanted? They waited till he was dead to search for it. What would make them destroy a residence to get it back? A dead man couldn’t spill secrets, but something he had could.

  “Sprig, will you stay here and keep watch? Let us know if anyone is coming.” I spun in a circle searching for the monkey. “Sprig?”

  “Yes?” His little head popped out of the cupboard where Daniel stored chips and crackers. “I was thinking. Why don’t I stay here and keep watch?”

  “Excellent idea, Sprig,” I said and proceeded along the hallway.

  The destruction continued throughout Daniel’s office. The group had ripped the backs off every chair, flipped through every book, tossing them on the ground haphazardly. The room was a mess.

  My shoe stepped on something soft, and I withdrew my foot to see a tiny stuffed goat on the floor. Plucking it off the carpet, I cuddled it to my chest. I gave the figure to Daniel for his birthday. He was a Capricorn and true to their traits, like self-discipline and responsibility. I teased him relentlessly about being stubborn, methodical, and bossy but unbelievably kind, loyal, and patient. The stuffed animal had been a joke, something he could toss in a drawer and forget. The fact he had held on to it—

  I took in a shaky breath and jammed the goat into my bag, returning my notice to the room. Normally, his bookcase was alphabetically lined with chunky hardbacks and pristine volumes of history through the ages. He also had medical dictionaries and fiction publications of military stories and leaders. Very Daniel. Only three picture frames had broken the repetition of books but were now lying discarded on the floor, shattered.

  I squatted, reaching for the first photo. It was of Daniel, his father, mother, and younger brother. The two sons looked proud and dashing in their military uniforms. The strong jawline and bright blue eyes connected all three men. The obvious family gene ran strong in the men of the family. His brother, David, had been killed in combat when he was only nineteen. Daniel didn’t talk about him much. The pain even twelve years later had been very raw for him. It was the main reason he left the military and came to work for DMG. He had lost his mother five years ago to lung cancer. Daniel mentioned his father, Daniel Senior, was in north Seattle in a residential care facility, slowly dying of Alzheimer’s. All I knew of his father was he had been an exceptionally high-ranking medical doctor in the military before he got sick. Daniel was silent about his family. He was never close to them. It was sad to think his father would never know or remember his only living son had joined his other boy and wife.

  The next picture was a group shot of the collectors, hunters, and a few doctors at Kate’s last birthday party. It was a quick gathering in the meeting room. We could never go in public together for security reasons, so we had gatherings at the DMG. Daniel and I had finished a training session and popped over to celebrate. It was a photo I had never seen. I had a version of this one on my phone, but in this one, his arms were tight around me as we all huddled around Kate. The happiness on my face was obvious. His eyes were not on the camera but on me. In the print I had, his one arm was around my shoulders, and he was looking forward. I had been to his place several times since this picture was taken, and I had never really looked at it, thinking it was the one I had. How did I not notice this? Why would he have this picture instead of the other Kate had sent?

  The truth, or my conclusion, ripped at the feeble bandages crossing my heart. My face wrinkled in agony. I looked away, grabbing for the third frame. My fingers trailed over his face. The photograph showed him with six other military guys geared for a mission. One of them was Peter. A huge smile creased and wrinkled the corners of Daniel’s eyes and mouth. I bit my bottom lip, swallowing back the lump in my throat. God, I loved him. So much. The ache in my chest swallowed me whole. A drop of liquid splashed on the glass, and my hand instantly brushed away the subsequent tears. It was like inhaling knives as I sucked in a huge breath, my hands shaking.

  “There is nothing in here. Not useful anyway.” Ryker slammed the bottom desk drawer, turning his search to the files poured on the floor. “There is a good chance they already got what they were looking for.” He flipped through papers and then threw them over his shoulder.

  My gaze flitted across the room as I straightened my legs, standing. My head automatically negated his sentiment. “No, Daniel would not make it easy. He was black ops. He was trained to keep secrets.”

  “Sounds like the DMG does as well.”

  “Daniel was better.” Why I felt so sure, I didn’t know, but I was certain if Da
niel were hiding something, he would make it almost impossible to find. You could only locate it if you truly knew him and how his mind worked.

  Absently, I rubbed at my temples. I probably understood Daniel best. He had let me in the furthest, but I still was at a loss. I closed my eyes and let the room sink in. Where would Daniel hide his secrets? He could have concealed them so well not even the best trained eye would find it. If so, there was no way I would be able to. In the movies there would be an obvious clue, which somehow the guys who broke in missed. Real life wasn’t like the movies. I had no idea where to start—or even if there was anything to find.

  My legs bent under the weight of my despair, and I plunked heavily onto the floor. I placed my head in my hands and rubbed my face. The knot in my throat swelled, packing the airway till it hurt to swallow. Come back to me, Daniel. My heart screamed. Smelling him and seeing his things burned at the raw ends of my torn soul. Please!

  “Why are you sitting there?” Ryker’s unhappy tone shot into my back. “This is your thing, not mine.”

  My head snapped around fast. I had to reach for the floor so I wouldn’t fall. “Could you back off for a second? I know fae have the sensitivity of a rock, but I lost the man I love and my sister in the same day. I’m sorry I’m not dealing with it as well as you’d like.”

  Ryker’s white eyes flared with an inner glow. “You think you’re the only one who lost people? Try everyone in your family in a matter of minutes,” he growled. Standing, he stomped to the door. “There is nothing here. I’ll give you two minutes.” He turned and left, his boots scuffing the wood as he moved down the hallway.

  Most fae were awful, but dammit I had to be stuck with the biggest horse’s ass of them all. A deep sigh fell from my lips. I knew I would never return here. It was no longer where the man I loved resided; it was not my future home.

  My hand drifted back to the picture of the two of us in the group shot. The backing fell as I tore the photo from its frame. The fact he had this picture on his shelf meant it was important to him. It now meant even more to me.

  The image clenched in my palm, I rose. “Goodbye, Daniel.” My voice was low and thick. I turned to leave, my foot kicking an object from under the clutter. A book skidded across the space and knocked into an overturned chair. The Art of War. The title stretched across the small handbook in gold letters. My stomach dipped. It was Daniel’s favorite. He tried to get me to read it, but I fell asleep after the first page. Instead, he instilled the lessons in the book by making me recite them as we practiced our drills.

  I remembered when he first gave it to me. It was only a month after I started DMG. I had yet to go in the field and truly understand the threats. I didn’t take Daniel’s lectures or training as seriously as I should have.

  I laid on the mat, sprawled out, the wind knocked from me.

  Daniel came into view, leaning over me. “What was the lesson in Chapter Three?”

  “Uh. Don’t let your ass get handed to you?”

  Furrowed lines dented Daniel’s forehead, his mouth pursed. “Did you read any of the book I gave you yesterday?”

  “The art of falling asleep?” I sat, letting him help me stand. I wiped at the sweat pouring down my face.

  “Zoey, this is serious.”

  “I tried, Daniel. I tried four times.” A complete lie. I tried once, then decided to put my earphones on and listen to music. Even my need to please Daniel couldn’t compel me to read the dry, dull literature.

  “You will try again. You’ll read the entire book by this weekend, or you’ll run drills until you do. I will quiz you every day.”

  Daniel’s drills were not something you wanted to do. Ever. He was trained in special ops in the military and had learned torture by running till you threw up and obstacle training till your body gave up. I had done them twice and quit every time. They made me whimper merely thinking about them.

  I strained not to let my sigh become audible. “Why is this book important?”

  “The lesson you missed today was to not let yourself become sidetracked by things going on around you. You need to be fully aware and not become distracted. Keep your focus. Otherwise, you will get killed. You let your guard slip for a moment, and your enemy won’t hesitate to use the opportunity to strike.” He stepped closer, his shirt clinging to him from the morning exercise. His cologne caused me to be utterly defenseless. “And why is it important?” He looked at me, his voice low but steady. “Because we are at war. The day will come when the human race will have to fight. And I want you ready for it.”

  I bent and grabbed the book and put it against my chest, holding it tightly. It was like having a piece of Daniel with me, as if he lived in between the lines. I could keep him locked safe between the pages, forever living in the typed print.

  “Can I have her?” A stuffed goat popped over the lip of my bag, whirling around, as if it were possessed by a ghost.

  I snapped the present I gave Daniel into my hand. “No.”

  “But Pam says she likes me,” Sprig whined.

  “Pam?”

  “It’s her name.”

  “You named the goat Pam?”

  “It seemed to fit.”

  “Sprig, you can’t have the goat.”

  “She doesn’t like being called goat. Her name is Pam.”

  “You know she’s not real, right? Like Sussanna.”

  Silence.

  “You are not talking to me anymore, huh?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, thank the gods.” Ryker let his head fall back. His gaze darted to me. “Now, if only you would shut up as well, my day would be immensely better.” We had been walking for a while. It felt pointless. We had nowhere to go or anything we could do. It felt like we were in purgatory—stuck between action and nothing. Ryker seemed to have run into a dead end with getting his powers and Amara back. I was latched to him with no place to go and no family. The DMG was on my ass, and the mystery of what Daniel had been doing was growing

  “Making your day pleasant is not something I strive for.” Sprig’s head came up.

  “I thought you weren’t talking?” Ryker moaned.

  “To her.” He pointed at me. “I am going to talk to you all day long. I can’t get enough of chatting with my favorite Viking.”

  Ryker rubbed at the tension between his eyes.

  “So... what’s your favorite color? Mine’s yellow. It’s such a happy color. And no, it’s not because it’s a color of a banana. I actually hate them. Icky fruit. Honey is yellow. I love honey. What is your favorite food?”

  Ryker whipped around so quickly I almost smacked into him. He bared his teeth. “If you don’t shut it up, I will do it for you. Permanently.”

  The mood he was in, he wasn’t joking. “Here, Sprig. You can have the stuffed animal.”

  “Pam.” He yanked her from my hands. “Her name is Pam.” He then dragged her back into my bag.

  “Something crawl up your ass today?” I returned my gaze on Ryker. He was always a jerk, but in the last hour he was being especially douchey.

  “Leave it.”

  “No.” I held his icy stare. I would not back down. “I won’t. I will nag and nag till you tell me what your problem is.”

  He huffed and circled. His strides large and heavy.

  “Ryker.” I said his name in warning. I would scratch at the scab till he relented. Or actually killed me.

  He stopped. His finger rubbed at his eyes and then rubbed his beard. “Elthia told me she couldn’t find anyone who can help me.”

  “Told you? When? How?” I’d been with him every stinking moment, and not once had Elthia come.

  “About five miles back. There was a code on a building.”

  “A code?” All the buildings, the ones standing or not, were tagged with gang symbols.

  “Yeah. It was the way we used to communicate with each other when we had to.”

  “And it happened to be on a building we passed?”

  “We
had four places. She would tag all the places with the same code. I purposely took us this way to see.”

  Now I understood his bad mood.

  “What did it say?”

  “Tipota. It’s Greek for nothing.”

  “Maybe she meant nothing could be done for now.”

  “No.” He scowled. “It means no one can help me.”

  His frustration grew with every step. I kept my distance and tried to stay quiet. He needed to work through it. Hearing my voice only seemed to grate on his nerves.

  Our travels brought us near a Red Cross shelter. The smell of food wafted to me, and my stomach growled in response.

  “You need a muzzle for that thing.” He indicated my stomach.

  “Sorry. I can’t control my hunger,” I snapped.

  “We’ll go there for supplies. If I feel it’s safe, we’ll get something to eat.”

  “Yes, your majesty. Simply say the word.”

  “Dammit,” he bellowed. “Can’t you obey me one time without some kind of comment or challenge?”

  I dampened my lip with my tongue, trying to think through my words before speaking. Anger wanted to control my mouth, but I shoved my temper back. Keeping my voice like glass, I got close to his face. “I am not some mindless, daft girl who will fall at your feet. I don’t actually like you or trust you. I think I’ve been doing really well at guarding what I say. But if you demand I obey you again, then you and I will have a lot more problems than me being a good little girl.” My anger was cool and calm and far scarier than if I threw a tantrum.

  Without letting him respond, I went around him and proceeded to the shelter. A little monkey hand came from my bag, high-fiving me. Sprig snickered and softly said, “You go, bhean.”