The Talon & the Blade

by Jasmine Silvera

  The Talon & the Blade

  Grace Bloods Book Three

  Jasmine Silvera

  About The Talon & the Blade

  Grace Bloods #3

  Azrael’s Black Blade meets his match…

  * * *

  Over two hundred years, Gregor Schwarz earned his brutal notoriety. As the necromancer Azrael’s pitiless enforcer, few—living or dead—dare to cross him. But when he’s sent to Los Angeles to satisfy one of his boss’s debts, Gregor encounters a powerful and intriguing woman who is utterly unimpressed by his fearsome reputation.

  * * *

  … in the Nightfeather’s Talons.

  Trained by samurai, her skills honed to perfection through a quest for vengeance, Ana Gozen serves as judge, jury, and executioner for Raymond Nightfeather, the necromancer of North America. Ana is exquisitely proficient and certainly needs no help from an outsider—especially a trigger-happy immortal with a reputation for lunacy.

  But when a plot to overthrow Raymond comes to light, Ana is ordered to work with Gregor to hunt down and destroy a grace-blooded monster responsible for a series of vicious attacks. If these two solitary warriors can surmount the pain of their separate pasts, they just might prevent total chaos—and capture a future together.

  To Oliver

  I’m your huckleberry, Schnuckiputzi

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Glossary

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks For Reading

  About the Author

  Also by Jasmine Silvera

  Chapter One

  Having spent the past two hundred years protecting a necromancer named for the angel of death from demons and rivals, little surprised Gregor Schwarz. When the sound of the doorbell interrupted his perusal of the small armory behind his rollaway bookshelf, he decided that the novelty of surprise was overrated.

  He kept a residence in Malá Strana south of Prague Castle, close enough to respond swiftly to a summons. The flat, in the narrow building above the winding streets, earned its designation as a penthouse merely by being on the top floor. Aside from impressive views of the red-tiled roofs and the Vltava River, it was an austere clean slate. Unlike his predecessor, Lysippe, he felt no need to fill an entire building with a thousand years of Schnickschnack collected while following said necromancer around the world. The building’s other residents never saw him coming or going—a cleverly worded geas made sure of that—aware only that a businessman who kept odd hours and traveled often occupied the top floor. The intrusion would not be a neighbor then.

  The rest of the Aegis, the necromancer Azrael’s oath-bound warriors, would have called first, and even they knew not to bother him when he was packing for an assignment.

  The supernatural blade that had been imbedded in his spine in exchange for his soul didn’t solidify as it would have if facing a threat.

  Still, he palmed his favorite Glock, slid the magazine home, and slipped it into the holster over his pressed dress shirt.

  “Enter.” With his verbal permission, the wards that reinforced the door lock released.

  Isela Vogel rounded the corner, the angle of her chin proud and casually imperious as only a professional dancer could be. Six months ago that’s all she had been—a name and a career he followed at a distance, the same as all the others who preceded her.

  Now, with her being Azrael’s consort, Gregor was doomed to have her as both charge and mistress.

  If not for a few fading bruises, he wouldn’t have thought her the same woman he’d faced off against in the arena a few hours ago. She’d been in fitted black combat gear then, rather than the baggy cashmere sweater over leggings and ankle boots she wore now, no doubt from a high-end boutique. She still dressed the part of her former career, at least. The simple elegance implied expense, making her seem untouchable and aloof. Though when she’d died helping Azrael, Gregor had seen firsthand how fragile she was. Something stronger than vows bound her to Azrael. And her willingness to sacrifice herself for it had made her more than human. Even resurrected as the chosen vessel of a god, her immortality was fresh enough to leave her vulnerable.

  Gregor had almost convinced himself that his concern for Azrael was why he trained her so hard, bent on turning the discipline and muscle memory of dance into a weapon. Losing her once had shattered Azrael. Gregor didn’t care to think about the effect on himself.

  In the arena she had been more killer than dancer—a blade in each fist and a grin turned into rictus by the blood in her teeth and splatters of red across her cheek. The blood in her mouth was her own. But the spray on her face and blade had come from his jugular. Her training was coming along well.

  He fought the urge to touch the now nonexistent mark on his neck. Lysippe would take over in his absence. She could be in no better hands than a 1,500-year-old warrior descended from Amazons.

  He needed to focus on his assignment. He knew only that the North American necromancer, having once warned Azrael of an attack, had called in his favor. On obliging, Azrael wanted Gregor to determine the possibility for a more stable accord between them. The responsibility revealed Azrael’s confidence in him, and Gregor couldn’t afford this distraction. What was she doing here?

  “Consort.” Gregor sketched a bow.

  He’d made it clear he wanted nothing to do with her outside the training ring. This had been his sanctuary. Now that she had been in it, he’d have to find another apartment. He was going to miss this view.

  Isela paused in the doorway. Tiny flecks of gold shone in her ashen eyes today. He did his best to ignore the way her gaze made the hair on the back of his neck rise.

  He should offer her a drink or a place to sit. He didn’t. Instead of taking the hint, she roamed the room, clasping her hands behind her back but staring at everything.

  He turned back to his armory, considering taking the whole lot of it. It might be overkill, but he liked to be prepared. He had no idea what he would find, but based on his last trip to the Americas, he should count on more surprises. A lot could change in two hundred years, he reminded himself, and Los Angeles was thousands of miles from the ruins of the Eastern Seaboard. Bitterness and relief mingled at the thought that he would not be confronted with his past. At least no more so than by the woman standing in his living room.

  A slow anxiety built in him as the soft click of her heels on the floor grew closer. His hands slowed, picking his weapons of choice and sliding them into their assigned places in his travel bag.

  She stopped a few feet away. “Lysippe said you like to focus before a mission. Your meditation, she said.”

  Lysippe talked far too much. Of course, he had the sinking suspicion that the Amazon was delighted to have another woman in Azrael’s inner circle. There had been lovers, but Azrael was discreet
and never retained one woman for too long. He’d never taken a consort before Isela.

  The two women had taken to having movie nights—“girl time,” Isela called it. Consort bonds were rare, but Gregor was certain there should be more formality involved. Particularly with Ito who, as Azrael’s head of intelligence, knew far too much about everything that happened in Azrael’s retinue.

  The Amazon wasn’t the only one in Azrael’s Aegis to allow their responsibility to protect her grow into something more familiar. Much like her group of cohorts from the Praha Dance Academy, Isela drew people and formed bonds that had nothing to do with vows or blood. Maybe it was the witch in her, or the wolf—after all, both were pack animals. As the leader of Azrael’s Aegis, Gregor could stop all this fraternizing. She was a responsibility, no more. He would not allow more.

  “Dory called you an ascetic,” she mused, taking in the sparse furnishings. “He wasn’t wrong.”

  Dory also talked too much. Of course, Dory was now bound to her, as he and Lysippe were to Azrael. There was nothing she could ask that he would not answer. The start of her own Aegis, on the nascence of her immortality. One more reason Gregor’s concern for her training was becoming more obsessive than functional. Perhaps time away would do him good, give him a chance to sort out this mess he was in and gain some distance.

  Testing the suspicion that she had been making specific inquiries about him, he asked after the most tight-lipped of Azrael’s Aegis. “What did Aleifr say?”

  “That you can be a right asshole when you want to be,” she chirped. “But Lysippe’s still the only one who can beat you in a fight. Pretty amazing, what with you being the youngest member of Azrael’s Aegis.”

  That did it. The six-and-a-half-foot-tall Viking who rarely expressed himself beyond grunts and the odd raised eyebrow was now doling out whole sentences. Gregor was going to have a word with all of them about how to conduct themselves around the consort.

  “I also heard you’re headed to California.” She smiled. “Azrael told me that.”

  His teeth snugged together so he wouldn’t be tempted to reveal his opinion of Azrael’s current mental state. Gregor had witnessed the importance of strategy and calculation for surviving in a world full of powerful immortals. Even the consort bond was considered a more tactical alliance than an entanglement of this kind. Gregor feared this thing between Azrael and Isela was the first indication of a creeping madness. She was a twenty-nine-year-old, recently mortal human. Her foolish need to form connections and willingness to sacrifice herself for them was going to get them all killed.

  He secured his armory bag and added it to the garment bag by the door. He needed his weekender. If he was lucky, he would be gone a week or less. But in any case, he’d gotten packing light down to a science. He could make do for a month or more if required. He almost swore when he realized he’d left the bag in the bedroom and retrieving it meant passing close to her. She’d showered after their match, and a clean, damp smell drifted from her braided hair. He wondered if he would ever stop seeing her as delicate, childlike, vulnerable.

  She called after him. “I have a favor to ask.”

  He walked faster.

  “Won’t you just… stop… for a minute,” she said on his way back, “and look at me.”

  He paused, his eyes drawn up obediently.

  She realized with horror what she’d done and stepped back. “I forgot you’re compelled.”

  “I accepted my vow, Consort.”

  She shook her head, her mouth twisting down. Her eyes flickered from gray to gold and back again—a warning sign of the god power within her. The color still fluctuated with her mood until she regained control. Another liability of emotion.

  “You never address me by my name,” she said, voice tight. “Just a title. Dancer. Consort.”

  “Should I call you little bird, then?”

  Little bird. The shock of recognition still stung him. He called her by her title so that he never forgot. Slipping up just once would be catastrophic. Already these few moments in her presence made him feel anxious and out of breath. He wanted to punch something.

  Judging by the way the lights flickered as her eyes went gold again, the feeling was mutual. Isela took a deep breath and regained control. Then she surprised him. Again.

  “I wanted to thank you.” Earthy gray eyes met his even as gold shot through the irises. “The night after the crash, when Tariq and I were ambushed, it was your voice I heard in the fighting. Everything you’ve taught me saved my life. It made me capable of holding my own. I thought you were trying to break me down. But you made me stronger.”

  Gregor exhaled, wanting to look anywhere but into the witch eyes boring into him. The way the gold and silver mixed made them almost hazel. She turned to face the window again. The regality of her bearing, the long line of her nose. Would he ever stop searching for the echo of something familiar in her?

  “It was the responsibility I was given.” He started for the kitchen, needing to put distance between them. Once he’d reached it, he found nothing to distract him. Not a dish out of place, not a spoon in the sink.

  He had been careful to be circumspect. Keep them all safe, keep them at a distance. Not this. Never this. Dryness scored his throat. He contemplated a glass of water, but that would mean he’d have to offer her one. Have to fill it and bear proximity again to bring it to her. Better his tongue dry up and fall out of his mouth. Pain was nothing new. Survival in this world made enduring it necessary.

  “It’s more than that.”

  He paused.

  “All this time I thought you hated me for being Azrael’s weakness, for the way he’s willing to protect me even if I’m not worthy of it… But that’s not it, is it?”

  He registered the flinch in her gaze at the coldness in his. He would never be her confidant. Could never hope that in the light of the truth she would feel anything for him but resentment.

  He found his tongue and made a guess as to why she had come to him, unannounced and alone. “You require something of me, Consort?”

  She sighed and watched pigeons rise from the cobblestone street to settle in the eaves of a neighboring building. Aha, so this was the crux of it. She wanted him to do something for her. Something she couldn’t ask Dory. Perhaps murder a former lover who wanted to use her proximity to Azrael to curry some favor. Or the journalist who kept requesting a follow-up interview. He checked his watch. His flight wasn’t until six. He could probably squeeze something in.

  “Shoes,” she announced. “For my brothers and the kids. Converse, to be exact. I’ll provide a list of sizes and colors.”

  He stopped himself from asking why she didn’t just use her considerable pull as the consort of a necromancer to get one pair in every size and every color shipped to her. Cost was no issue. No, she wanted him to get them for her.

  The gleam of satisfied amusement in her eyes gave it away—this was payback. One he’d earned. He’d only made it worse by being taciturn. Now she was enjoying it.

  He shrugged on his jacket, head bowed. “From your pen to my hand.”

  “You’re not going to argue?”

  “Would it do any good?”

  “No, but—”

  His phone chimed.

  “Then I’ll spare myself the trouble,” he finished, searching the nearby surfaces for the familiar shape.

  She glared at him, arms folded over her chest. But she wasn’t angry. Worse. She was smiling at him.

  “Where is that infernal device?” He patted his pockets as it chimed again.

  He hunted around the apartment. A quick search covered the bedroom, bath, and kitchen in less than a minute.

  “I don’t get you, Gregor,” she said. “But I like you.”

  For a moment he couldn’t draw a breath. Like him? If she knew the truth, she’d never forgive him. But he didn’t need her to like him as he did everything in his power to keep her alive. And it was far too late for forgiveness.

 
When he turned back, she extended one hand, holding a slim black rectangle. It chimed again. She waggled it at him. After a moment’s hesitation he snagged it without touching her and glanced at the screen.

  “You’re growing on me.” An inscrutable expression lit her eyes, matching the amused curve of her mouth. “Like a mold.”

  He grabbed his duffel. “This has been enlightening, but I’m afraid I have a flight to catch.”

  Before he could reach his garment bag, she grabbed it and folded it over her arm. “I’ll walk you to the garage.”

  “That isn’t—”

  But she was already moving toward the door. Swearing under his breath, he caught up in a few steps and held it open. She thanked him with a little grin.

  “I suspect, this secret mission of yours aside, we’re going to be spending a lot of time together,” she mused as they headed toward the elevator. “Might as well try to make the best of it, don’t you think?”

  The thought froze the blood in his veins. He wasn’t sure how he would bear it.

  Chapter Two

  My name is Ana Gozen, but that is a lie.

  The mantra circled her head as the familiar repetition of strike drills flowed with her breath. She moved over the solid, burlap-covered training mat, raised slightly from the bare main floor of the training room. She no longer felt the weight of the blades in her hands any more than she would feel her wrists or her fingers. The air passing over edges that had been honed until they sang registered as if on her own skin. Words lied. The blades could not be manipulated, tainted with emotion, or made soft around the edges by the passage of time. They spoke of her true identity, beyond names and history.