Unholy Cravings

by Suzanne Rock

  Soren had heart, but he was never going to defeat Nergal. He might have taken the elder deahman by surprise, but Nergal was stronger and faster. Even now, the master was gaining the upper hand.

  Their only chance for survival was to escape and find Darien. Donar looked around and wished he knew how to drive a boat. How did one start one of these things? He spotted a doorway and went inside. Immediately to his right was a stairway to what he assumed as sleeping quarters. A large wheel stood in front of him. To the left of the wheel was a control panel. Fuck, how did one drive one of these things?

  On the floor under the control panel was a toolbox filled with wrenches, hammers, pliers and the like. He grabbed a wrench and looked at the control panel. A key had been inserted into the part closest to the wheel. He turned it.

  The motor started to putter. Donar ran back outside and undid the ropes until only a single line held the boat tethered to the dock. Then he went to help his friend.

  His inner deahman grew, feeding on the smell of blood and violence.

  Help Soren, Donar commanded.

  Mine! Donar’s deahman took control once more and jumped into the thick of the fight, his arms swinging.

  “Soren, the boat!” He yelled as he swung the wrench. It hit nothing but air. Nergal picked up Soren and threw him at Donar. They both went down in a crash. The air left Donar’s lungs as his back hit the wharf. He dropped the wrench. Soren scrambled back and stood. Then he charged Nergal once more before Donar could stop him.

  The man was insane.

  Donar jumped into the fray and tried to help his twin. Nergal evaded the attack and lunged for the wrench. Donar dove after him, but he was too slow. Nergal grabbed the wrench and turned his body. Donar saw the wrench coming for him but couldn’t move away in time. It hit him hard on the side of his head and for the moment he saw stars. He lessened his grip and fell to the dock as pain exploded across his skull.

  “Get back here, you little whelp. That’s mine!” Nergal’s voice rose up from the chaos.

  Donar heard footsteps running away. He turned toward the boat as Nergal punched him in the jaw. Donar tasted blood. The world around him began to dip and sway.

  Donar dragged himself to his feet and threw a punch, but he was worn from the strain of resisting Nergal’s influence on his deahman and in far too much pain. He hit Nergal in the stomach. The elder deahman grunted and Donar turned and sprinted for the boat. With each step, his head pounded like a son-of-a-bitch. Just a few more steps…

  “Come on!” Soren shouted from the wheel.

  “Cut the rope!” Donar called back.

  “What?”

  “Cut the rope!”

  “I’m not leaving without you.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  Something grabbed his ankle and Donar went down onto the hard wood. He rolled as Nergal’s fist swung down. Thankfully, the elder deahman hit the dock instead of his skull. Donar scrambled to his feet and kept running.

  The boat started pulling away from the dock. He had only a few more feet to go and he’d be safe.

  Nergal began to chant in that old Celtic language he used for his spells. Donar glanced over his shoulder and saw the deahman standing on the dock, holding out his hand toward him.

  “Fuck!” Soren said. “Hurry, he’s casting a spell!”

  Suddenly the compulsion to obey Nergal overwhelmed Donar’s senses. His steps slowed and his deahman cried out in despair.

  Must obey.

  No! Donar shouted back at his deahman.

  Master.

  For Tara. Donar’s words struck a chord with his deahman. The darkness inside him wavered and he forced himself to move the last few steps to the dock’s edge and jump into the air. He hovered over the water for a brief second before landing in a heap at the bottom of the boat.

  Soren pushed down on the throttle and they raced away from the dock, leaving giant waves in their wake.

  “Get back here, you little thieves!”

  Donar turned to Soren. “Thieves?”

  Soren grinned and pulled the shard out of his pocket. “It’s technically not thieving if I’m taking back what was mine to begin with.”

  Donar laughed as Soren stuffed the shard back into his pocket. “Good job.”

  “I thought so. Now we just need to find Darien.”

  Donar could feel Nergal’s magic weakening the farther they got from him. Good. Hopefully the distance would help both he and Soren clear their heads.

  Donar looked up from his position on the floor. “Where did you learn to drive the boat?”

  “Venom.”

  Donar blinked at the familiar name. Venom was the assassin group both he and Soren used to belong to. It was where they had gotten their matching snake tattoos and earrings.

  Their membership in the group was also why Darien valued their loyalty. Soren and Donar used to kill people for a living. There wasn’t much difference between killing a human and killing a deahman. With a deahman, you just had to make sure that the head was separated from the body, otherwise the dark creature might come back to life. Donar had seen it happen once. It wasn’t a pretty sight.

  “Why did Venom teach you to drive a boat and not me?” Donar asked.

  Soren shrugged. “You knew that the group was cutting costs. They probably assumed that we’d always be together, so only one of us needed to know how to drive a boat.”

  Donar frowned as Soren averted his gaze to fiddle with something on the control panel. He didn’t need to read Soren’s emotions to know his twin was hiding something, but what?

  “Perhaps, but cutting back on training of their personnel doesn’t sound like something that they’d do,” Donar said.

  Venom was a group of elite undercover assassins for the US government. Five years ago, in an attempt to balance the budget, the group was disbanded and the members scattered through other divisions within the FBI and CIA. He, Soren and a third man, known as Sparrow, went to work for Darien. He didn’t know what happened to the rest.

  Soren laughed as he steadied the wheel. “You think Venom’s financial troubles began the year they disbanded? No, it started long before that.”

  Donar didn’t doubt it, but that wasn’t the whole story. Soren was hiding something, he was sure of it. Donar didn’t like being out of the loop, particularly when the discussion was about Venom. Those bastards had put both him and Soren through hell, but it was worth every scar, every strain. Donar loved that job, and felt a little betrayed that Soren was part of something that he wasn’t.

  “Keep driving,” he told Soren. It was pointless to argue the past now. Venom was disbanded and behind them. It was better to leave the past in the past.

  “Where should we go?” Soren asked.

  “I don’t care. Pull it out far from land and let it drift for a while. I need to think.” He pushed aside his thoughts of Venom, scrambled to the back of the boat and sat beside Tara. The woman hadn’t stirred during his whole conversation with Soren.

  Fuck. He had failed her. Hell, he had failed both of them. Donar could feel Soren’s dependence on him. It ran deeper than his need to follow orders. There was a special connection there that made them brothers in more than blood. He had hoped that one day he’d share that same connection with Tara too. Donar liked feeling needed. It gave him purpose and made him feel complete. To have Tara look up to him the way Soren did…well, that would be like heaven on earth.

  How could this precious woman grow to depend on him when he couldn’t protect her? A sense of hopelessness surrounded him. Donar fought back tears as he brushed his fingers along the side of her cheek. She felt so soft, so smooth. She deserved so much better than a possessed soul like himself.

  Tara opened her eyes and touched his wrist. “Where am I?”

  “Safe.”

  “Nergal?”

  “We left him behind on the dock. He can’t get to us unless he hires another boat, and that could take hours.”

  “We’re on the water?
” Tara started to sit up and Donar eased her back down.

  “Yes.”

  “We can’t be on the water, we can’t.”

  Donar frowned at the panic he felt from her. “What do you mean, we can’t? We just did it.”

  “No, no, no, no.” Tara huddled in a ball and rocked herself. “No water. No water.”

  “Is she all right?” Soren poked his head out from behind the wheel.

  Donar glanced up at his brother, unsure of how much to tell him. He thought about the closeness that the Soren and Tara shared, and how he craved that for his own. He wanted Tara to turn to him like she turned to Soren back in the cab. No, he’d take care of this on his own.

  “She’s fine.”

  “Are you sure? I thought I heard her moan. Is she in pain?”

  “She just needs some rest. Keep steering, I’m going to bring her down below to one of the beds.”

  “Good idea. I found a map of the area in the tool box. I think I can take us somewhere reasonably safe for a while.”

  “Good. I’ll call if I need anything.”

  “Yes, master.”

  Donar’s inner deahman purred at Soren’s easy obedience. What would he do without his twin? Donar didn’t want to think about it. He cradled Tara in his arms and brought her down below deck. She had been through a lot in the past twenty-four hours. They all had. After a little rest, she’d be as good as new. He hoped.

  Tara shivered as Donar brought her downstairs. She was on a boat, but that was impossible. She hated water. How did they manage to get her over the edge of the dock? Just the thought of going near the water made her sick with anxiety.

  She caught a glimpse of the bay as Donar brought her downstairs. Fear rose up inside of her and made her chest tighten. She struggled in Donar’s arms. She had to get off the boat and onto land. Oh for the love of goddess, she had to get out of there…

  Donar stopped at the bottom of the stairs and pressed his lips to her forehead. “Shhh… it’s over now. You’re safe.”

  “No, it’s not over.” He didn’t understand. Tara buried her head in his chest and tried to will the fear away. “It won’t ever be over.” Images flashed through her mind—the explosion, the boat sinking, the screams of her family as they all fell into the water…

  No, nothing would be all right until she got off this boat.

  “It’s over, at least the worst of it. You have nothing to fear from Nergal or Urian now.”

  “No, it’s not that. It’s…” How did she tell him of her greatest weakness? Her biggest fear?

  He set her down on the bed. “Relax. I’ll protect you.”

  Donar eased back and she glanced around the room. The stairway opened up into a small living space, complete with a sitting area, a small kitchenette and a large, king-sized bed. The dark-blue carpet on the floor covered most of the hardwood, and the furniture looked modern and serviceable. Everything was clean and tidy, as if it hadn’t been used in a long time, if ever.

  Donar rose from the bed and went to the top of the stairs to close the door. Tara hugged her middle and watched as he blocked the wind and water from view. She felt slightly better not having to look at her surroundings, but the gentle rocking and hum of the motor still gave her anxiety. She tucked her chin in between her knees and began to rock with the boat, hoping that this nightmare would end as quickly as possible.

  When Donar came back down, his gaze focused on her. “Why are you so afraid?”

  “Afraid? I’m not afraid.” Tara sat up and fought the uneasiness in her gut. She wasn’t one to get seasick, but the memories were still too strong, her fear too great. What if the boat capsized? They could all drown.

  “You are afraid. I can feel it.” Donar closed the distance between them and sat on the edge of the bed. “Are you afraid of Urian?”

  “What? No.”

  “Good.” Some of the tension left his face. “Is it Nergal?”

  “No.” She shook her head. Dealing with a thousand deahmans was better than dealing with this.

  “Then what scares you?”

  Tara sensed his determination, his stubbornness. She sighed, knowing that he wasn’t going to be satisfied until he got a truthful answer. She wrapped her arms around her legs, as if hugging herself could keep the bad memories at bay. “It happened a long time ago.”

  Silence stretched as she wondered how best to proceed. It was still so difficult to talk about, even decades after the fact.

  “I’m listening,” Donar said.

  She shivered and focused on a piece of thread that had come undone on the large, nautical-themed comforter. “My family and I were coming over here from Europe—Ireland, to be exact. We were to meet up with others here, make a better life for ourselves.”

  “You didn’t have a good life in Ireland?”

  “Not really. We got by, but my parents wanted more for us kids than to work the land for the rest of our lives. They decided to make a fresh start in a new country.”

  “I see.”

  “We had booked passage across the Atlantic on one of those passenger ships—this had happened before there were commercial flights.”

  “Before commercial flights? How old are you?”

  Tara hesitated before responding. “Ninety-six.”

  Donar’s eyes widened. “Of course, Iatros have extended lifespan.”

  “Yes, as do our mates.”

  He nodded. “Continue.”

  Tara tried to gather her thoughts. “The first day went well, even the second. My sister and I played on the ship’s deck in the sun while my mother read and my father networked with the other businessmen on the ship.”

  “But?” Donar asked after a moment.

  “But…but then something happened—I don’t know what. The ship’s navigator made a mistake, the maps were incorrect, who knows? We hit rocks and hit them hard. Dawn was breaking and there was a chill in the air. I can remember hearing the water rushing…” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “The ship sank.”

  “Weren’t there life boats?”

  “Yes, there were, but before the crash, earlier that day, my sister and I were fighting. We always fought. I got a little carried away and showed my wings in public.”

  “So?”

  “So don’t you see? Humans aren’t used to seeing people grow wings, let alone using magic.” She shrugged. “I broke one of the cardinal rules of being an Iatros—never let the humans know who you are.”

  “What happened?”

  “The humans were scared of us and we became outsiders. There was nothing that my father could do to change their minds, not by himself. When the ship went down, everyone was too scared to have us in the lifeboats with them. My parents knew that if we went in a boat, hundreds of people would die because no one wanted to go with us. They thought that we would be able to fly to find land.”

  “Did you?”

  She hesitated as the words stuck in her throat. “No,” she whispered. “We flew for hours and hours. We could see the land in the distance, but it looked much closer than it really was. My sister was the first to tire, then me. My parents did their best to carry us, but their magic could only hold out for so long.”

  “What happened?”

  “We decided to rest in the water and hope that someone would come for us. It was so cold.” Tara shivered as she remembered that fateful day. “We were all freezing. My sister, she was so small. She didn’t make it.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “By the time help arrived, my parents and I were all freezing and half dead.”

  “So the water killed your parents then?”

  “No. We were brought onto a rescue boat, but the people didn’t understand or accept our magic. When they found out we weren’t human, they killed my parents and then kept me in a cage. They thought to sell me as some freak to a circus or something. Luckily, the local Iatros in Boston had heard of the plight and rescued me. They didn’t make it in time to save my parents, however.”
/>   “I’m sorry.”

  “Ever since that time, I’ve had this…fear of water, the open ocean in particular.”

  Donar reached out and she let him gather her to him. She liked how strong his arms felt around her, how his heat and scent pushed the bad memories from her mind.

  “I had no idea,” he said.

  “No one does, except the Iatros elders. I’ve lived with them ever since.”

  “Did you ever find your extended family?”

  “No. I didn’t know how to contact them and had no way of finding out. The Iatros clan here is my family now.”

  Silence stretched, and after a few moments, Tara felt the need to fill the silence. “Every time I go out on the water, I think of that hard time and my family’s death.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to keep you distracted while we are out here, then.”

  How was he going to do that? All Tara could think about was how much water surrounded her. If anything should happen to the boat…

  “Tell me more about this binding ritual.”

  “The binding ritual?”

  “The ritual that forms a bond between yourself and your spirit-mate.”

  She shrugged. “There isn’t much to tell. An Iatros’ magic will know their spirit-mate upon sight. It’s instant attraction. When they have sex the first time, they can read each other’s emotions.”

  “One in body.”

  “Yes. A tattoo begins to form, signifying the first step in the process.”

  “The heart.”

  “Yes, how did you know?”

  “You bear two hearts, one at the base of your neck, the other on your upper arm.” He smiled. “I noticed them as I moved you downstairs. I thought it odd that I hadn’t noticed them before.”

  “You didn’t notice them before because they weren’t there.”

  He nodded. “And the next step of this ritual?”

  “The second time is the blending of minds, the third, of souls. Once the process begins, it can’t be undone.”

  “So what we have shared cannot be torn apart?”

  “No. We will always be able to feel each other’s emotions, but only over short distances.”