The Secret

by Elizabeth Hunter

  Blinding color filled the institutional room. It was as if he walked in an impressionist painting. Swirling seas and mountain crests. An achingly brilliant sunset covered one entire wall. On the opposite side, a blood-red eclipse hung, surrounded by black night and whorls of stars. Flowers filled one corner. Bones filled another. Twisted roots and looming trees. Layer after layer, the paintings filled the space, even crawling up the ceiling.

  And in the corner, a woman sat, huddled on Jaron’s lap.

  Beautiful was too soft a word.

  Her eyes were closed, and her cheek was pressed to Jaron’s chest. When her breath stirred, the raised glyphs on the angel’s skin glowed with a bronze light. Her hair was streaked with red and gold, her skin a dusky echo of the angel who held her. And on Jaron’s face, an expression of such familiar tenderness that Malachi knew immediately why Jaron had been shadowing his mate her entire life.

  “Come in,” Jaron said in a voice touched with despair. “Come, Ava, and meet my daughter.”

  Chapter Twelve

  “DAUGHTER,” AVA WHISPERED, knowing immediately it was true. It had been there all along. Jaron’s strange protectiveness. Watching her. Guarding her in his own way. And Ava’s magic, far too powerful for someone completely untrained.

  Of course she was strong. Her great-grandfather was an archangel.

  She stepped closer, reaching for Malachi’s hand to anchor her in the beautiful, frightening room. “She’s my grandmother. But… she’s too—”

  “She stopped aging soon after she bore your father,” Jaron said, stroking the hair of the woman on his lap. “Like our sons, our daughters do not age as humans do.”

  Ava stepped past Malachi, no fear in her heart. The frightening intensity that had bombarded her in the hall had leveled off the moment Jaron entered the room. “She’s so beautiful.”

  “Once, she was the most beautiful creature to walk the earth. Her beauty rivaled the children of heaven.”

  A wave of longing washed over her. She wanted to touch. Wanted to hug. She was drawn to this strange woman her father had named her after, but she was also afraid. And Jaron showed no sign of letting his child go.

  “Ava?” she whispered, crouching down across from her.

  There was no furniture in the room except a bed bolted to one wall and a small table attached to the opposite wall. No mirrors. No windows. Plastic pots of vivid paint were lined on the table in precise color order.

  Ava looked up and wondered how she had reached the tops of the walls and ceiling.

  “I have no idea,” Jaron said, guessing her question. “I’ve wondered that myself.”

  Ava looked back to him, surprised by the gentle amusement in his voice. “Does she know I’m here?”

  Jaron pressed a palm over his daughter’s temple. “She’s aware, but she’s resting right now. The only real peace she has is when I am able to visit her. Otherwise, she’s quite mad.”

  “Why?” Malachi asked. “Is it because she has your blood? The woman we met in Sofia—Kostas’s sister—wasn’t like this.”

  “Why do you care, Scribe? She’s the daughter of your enemy.”

  Malachi ignored the taunt and knelt down next to Ava, his eyes on the trembling woman in Jaron’s arms.

  “I have seen trauma like this before, Jaron, usually on the faces of Grigori victims. Who hurt this woman?”

  Ava reached for his hand, strangely comforted by the anger in her mate’s voice. The thought of someone hurting a stranger might not have roused another man’s protective instincts, but Malachi wasn’t other men. Even the daughter of a Fallen angel was someone to be protected.

  He brushed a kiss over her temple and waited for Jaron to answer.

  Jaron said, “Yes, she has been hurt. In ways you cannot imagine.”

  Her grandmother—it was hard to think of her as a grandmother when she looked the same age as Ava—twisted in her father’s arms. Her mouth opened in a wordless groan.

  “Who hurt her?” Malachi asked.

  Jaron raised his eyes to meet hers, and Ava saw the truth in the rage and betrayal in his gaze.

  “It was one of the Fallen,” she said. “One of the others. Who else would be able to hurt your daughter?”

  The angel nodded and let out a heavy breath, more human in that moment than Ava had ever seen him. “Unlike my brothers, I doted on my daughter with no thought of hiding it. I’d only ever had sons, then after she was born… I indulged her. She was quite spoiled.”

  Her grandmother’s features twisted in pain before Jaron put a hand on her forehead and she settled again.

  “Her mother was a lover I held in some regard. Atefah was descended from royalty. Beautiful. Spirited. A worthy lover for me. She survived the birth, mostly because I forced her to let my older sons care for their new sister. No princess was ever more pampered. Unfortunately, Ava’s mother did not survive a second child. She died giving birth to a son.”

  “Did you love her?” Ava asked.

  “Love?” Jaron frowned. “No. The Fallen are not capable of love. Atefah loved me. Quite desperately. I should have sent her away, but Ava was attached to her mother. So she stayed and died, along with the child. She was the last human lover I took and the only one who gave me a daughter.”

  “And that’s why you care about Ava,” Malachi said. “You may not call it love, Fallen, but I can see your regard.”

  “As others did,” Jaron said grimly. “It was my own failing. Ava was the first being in thousands of years I held some… affection for. She amused me. If I have a personality in this realm, she reflected it. Perhaps that is why I care for her still.” He looked up with sardonic eyes. “Everything is vanity, after all.”

  Vanity, maybe, but Jaron appeared to be fiercely protective. What idiot would have risked his wrath to hurt her?

  “Volund,” Jaron said, reading her frown.

  Ava’s eyes grew wide. “Volund?”

  Jaron’s daughter jerked in his arms.

  Malachi picked up the connection immediately. “This is because of your damned rivalry? That was why he targeted my Ava. Why he killed me.”

  “It’s about power.” The gold fire in Jaron’s eyes was a banked rage. “Everything is about power in our world. Volund was expanding his territory. He had eliminated his competition in Northern Europe. My allies. He had ambitions to hurt me, though I was a far more difficult target. He hurt my daughter to make a point. She was nothing more to him than a political maneuver.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Malachi’s voice was low. “This was more than political.”

  “Perhaps it is more correct to say it began as a political move.” Jaron’s hand tightened on his daughter’s back. “But he became… curious.”

  A knot formed at the pit of Ava’s stomach.

  Malachi asked, “About?”

  “It was the Irin who gave him the idea.”

  “What idea?”

  Jaron shook his head. “Volund—”

  “Nooooo!” A shriek from the formerly silent woman startled them all. Even Jaron.

  She shouted and scrambled away from her father, huddling in a corner, her eyes sweeping the room. She was frantic. Ava wasn’t sure her grandmother saw anything more than the demons in her mind.

  “Stop!” she shrieked. “Stop it. Don’t speak his name.” The words poured out of her, a river of tormented pleas. “Please, Bâbâ, no!”

  “Ava—”

  “Bâbâ, Bâbâ, no.” A torrent of what sounded like Farsi poured from her lips. Ava wasn’t fluent enough to decipher it. But the strange energy pouring from her grandmother was familiar. Ava knew she could reach her if she could only catch her attention.

  Ava crawled forward, ignoring Jaron’s warning to crack open the door in her mind.

  “Grandmother?” she said. “Ava.”

  Their eyes connected.

  Jaron’s daughter held a trembling finger over blood-red lips. “Shhhh.”

  Ava listened, but the only thing she
heard was a twisted cacophony of pain.

  Her grandmother stared at her, gold eyes transfixed on Ava’s face.

  “It’s a secret,” she whispered. “Like me. You can’t tell a secret.”

  “You can tell me.”

  The tormented woman tore at the shining hair that fell over her face and shook her head. “Demons play tricks,” she muttered. “Don’t. Can’t hide. Not even in my mind.” A haunting singsong voice. “My mind, my mind.” A bitter laugh. “If I lose myself, not even he can find me. Hide in the woods—don’t dream! Don’t sleep. He can’t see the visions I keep.” A high, keening laugh. “Bâbâ…”

  “I’m here, Ava.” But Jaron stayed in place, as if touching his child might hurt her. A low hum filled the air, and Ava’s grandmother rocked back and forth, hitting her head against the wall.

  Ava moved closer.

  Malachi said, “Canım, be careful.”

  “She’s hurting herself.”

  The woman stopped rocking. Her eyes rose to Ava’s.

  She stared at her, and for a brief moment, Ava knew her grandmother was completely sane.

  “Be careful,” she said, her voice low and calm. “I cannot force him out. Do you understand?”

  “I have your blood,” Ava said. “Don’t tell me. Show me.”

  Ava caught the dark flicker in her grandmother’s eyes a moment before her vision went black. Her body froze and her muscles locked as her mind raced through the vision Ava sent her.

  A lively street market in Beirut. A boy with seductive eyes.

  Temptation.

  “Just for the night. My father…”

  Ropes. He had tied her. Why had he—?

  Bâbâ!

  Gone.

  Where were her brothers? They were gone. Her father…

  Why couldn’t she feel her father? She could always feel her father.

  “Let me see her.”

  A darker, deeper power hovered over her, blocking her from the light.

  “Beautiful child…”

  Such darkness.

  Anger.

  Pain.

  “Mine.”

  NO!

  It ripped through her. The tearing of innocence and hope and light and nothing—

  Nothing would be light again.

  He was in her.

  In her body. Her mind.

  The darkness trampled over the flowers of her soul and crushed them with his power and everything…

  “Everything is dark.”

  “Ava.”

  No.

  Violation was only the beginning.

  “Ava.”

  Her dreams a torment. She ran but could not escape.

  “Ava.”

  Hissing laughter bruised her mind.

  The dark angel had marked her.

  His laugher twisted as he called her mate.

  He came again when she closed her eyes. Every night. Every day. Even when her body was taken back to her brothers, he was there. When the child was born, he was there.

  His power lived in the child who bore the face of her nightmare.

  Love and hate and light and darkness.

  “You’ll hurt him, Ava.”

  Take him away…

  “Ava.”

  There was no escape.

  Ava rocked back, gasping. Hoarse cries broke from her throat. She could feel Malachi’s arms around her, holding her steady as she trembled.

  “Ava!”

  The sound of her name only made her sob.

  “Oh God!” She clung to Malachi. “It can’t… she can’t…”

  Jaron pulled his daughter’s shaking body into his arms. Her eyes were closed again, her mind shut down to anything but her sire’s touch. And Ava knew from looking into her grandmother’s mind that Jaron’s presence was the only thing that gave her any kind of peace.

  Because her dreams were nightmares she couldn’t escape.

  “Ava, what was that?” Malachi held her tightly, his arms almost crushing her ribs. “I couldn’t see. You have to tell me.”

  “Mate,” she whispered. A connection so deep and profound that had been utterly twisted by pure evil. “Volund didn’t just attack her, Malachi. He took her. He wanted to know… He raped her. And he marked her.”

  His hands froze. “No.”

  “He wanted to know if it was possible for an angel to mate with one of the kareshta. He was curious. So he marked her with his power and bound her to him.” Ava choked. “He’s in her dreams, Malachi.”

  “She dream-walks with the Fallen who raped her?” he whispered.

  “She can’t escape. He’s there every time she closes her eyes.”

  There was dread in Malachi’s voice when he asked, “Your father?”

  “He’s Volund’s child. She tried, but she couldn’t bear it. Jasper looks like Volund did when he took her.”

  The room had grown deathly quiet. Ava could only watch her grandmother, a woman locked in the torment of her own mind. She had sensed the darkness there as well. Volund’s touch had marked her in more ways than one. There was violence and a burgeoning rage belied by the woman’s still form. Jaron, she knew, could sense it. His eyes met hers as he held his child. He bent down to whisper something in her ear and Ava relaxed completely.

  “She needs sleep,” Jaron said. “She only truly rests when I am here.”

  “Why can’t you help her?” Ava asked. “Heal her? Keep Volund from torturing her every time she closes her eyes!”

  “I do not know how.” He took a deep breath. “In thousands of years, no angel has violated his brothers’ children the way that Volund did mine. She has even begged Death to come for her, but Azril will not. I do not know why.”

  “Why didn’t Volund kill her?” Malachi said. “After he’d attacked her, why didn’t he—”

  “Whether he likes it or not, Ava is his mate. When Volund bound himself to my daughter, he didn’t realize it would affect him too,” Jaron said. “Perhaps it is her only power now, but she became his curse. He would kill her if he could do it without harming himself. But he cannot.”

  “You hate my father.” Her instincts were screaming at her. “Because he’s Volund’s son.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you protect him.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s her son as well. She did not hate him. And… he has my blood.”

  “What is my father? Half Grigori. Half angel. How can he even exist?”

  “How do any of our children exist?” Jaron asked. “They are the will of the Creator. Though if my master has a purpose for your father, I have not discovered it yet. Perhaps Jasper’s only purpose was fathering you.”

  Ava tried to wrap her mind around it. “And Volund? Would he hurt my dad?”

  “At first, Volund was interested in your father. I had to hide them both. He thought the child of an angel and a kareshta would be even greater than the Irin. But the child was far too unstable. He had power, but no control. More damning, Jasper has free will. I cannot control him, just like I cannot control you. Volund lost interest when he found out he could not control Ava’s child.”

  “But he knows who I am.”

  “He learned when you came to Istanbul. He was watching me and found you. When you attacked his men in the cistern—”

  “All I did was scream.”

  Jaron gave her a look that made Ava feel like an ignorant child.

  “You unleashed power the Grigori had never experienced before,” he said. “Our children live in fear of their sisters, because their voices hold power the Grigori don’t understand. Volund’s sons didn’t know what you were. Your magic was dark like the children of the Fallen, but you were in the company of Irin scribes and they treated you as one of their own.”

  “So?”

  “You attracted his attention, Ava. It was easy enough for him to discover the connection when he started to look. You have his blood, after all.”

  She shivered, and Ma
lachi’s hands soothed the goose bumps from her skin. “That’s why he wants me.”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “I honestly don’t know. Nor do I care. He has become erratic.” Jaron stroked Ava’s temple. “Perhaps she torments him in his sleep as well. I can hope, but it does not matter. He cannot have you. Volund has taken enough of what is mine.”

  Malachi broke in. “Unbelievable. This is like two dogs fighting over a bone. Ava doesn’t belong to either of you.”

  “Why?” Jaron asked. “Because she belongs to you?”

  “She belongs to herself!”

  “Enough.” Ava stood and started pacing. “You can find me anywhere because I have your blood, can’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can Volund? He’s disgusting, but I am his granddaughter.”

  Jaron hesitated. “Unless I’m shielding you and you’re shielding yourself, Volund can find you. The Irina magic you learned has helped immeasurably.”

  “That’s why he couldn’t find me in Norway.”

  Jaron nodded. “Your magic and mine, combined with the old singer’s, made the haven the safest place for you.”

  “Until I left.”

  “The minute his Grigori spotted you, Sarihöfn became useless. I was the one who violated the wards there. You needed to leave.”

  She shook her head. “You’ve been playing me all along. And Malachi?”

  Jaron waved a careless hand. “I owe your Irin mate no protection. He is not mine.”

  “Do you know how—”

  “I have no idea how you were able to call him back. It was unexpected. But your blood holds the power of two archangels, and through your bond with this scribe, you were given the power of Mikhael’s line as well.” Jaron stared at her. “You are utterly unique, Ava. There are thousands of him, and only one of you. I do not care about him, but as long as his purpose helps mine, we are in accord.”

  Malachi said, “I would say the same of you, Fallen.”

  “Then we understand each other.”

  Ava rested against a flower-covered wall. “What is your purpose? What are you after?”

  Jaron said nothing.

  “I know,” Malachi said, leaning against the bed, his arms crossed over his knees. “He wants to kill Volund.”