Life Cycle

Page 9

He went down a small corridor to the large rock he’d hidden her things behind. He hadn’t anticipated her coming out to the caves. No one came here as a volunteer, and surely she could sense the anger and pain of the place. After this, he would put her stuff in a pod, something only he could open. He should have taken the extra precaution to begin with. She could probably curse him without tools as long as she had that mouth on her. But he had other uses for that mouth, so cutting out her tongue seemed extreme.
He returned a few minutes later with her bags of magical supplies, not sure what she’d need to do what he asked. When he tossed them to her, she just stared.
“You’re serious. You really want me to do magic? After you’ve spazzed out about it like you have?”
The demon glared and tossed her the bag with the scroll in it.
“What’s this?” She unzipped it and pulled out the parchment. When she saw what was on it, she dropped it like it was a bag of live snakes, hissing and waiting to strike.
She looked up, real fear in her eyes this time. It was a reaction he couldn’t seem to inspire. Yeah, it wounded his evil pride a bit. What was so bad about this other guy that Cain couldn’t match?
“Please, you have to kill me. If he’s back to these games, he knows where the other one is. He may even know where I am. I know him.”
Cain shook his head. “He can’t know where you are. And even if he did, he can’t get here. He has no access.”
She still hadn’t put on her clothes. Now that he knew, he could never forget how old she was. It hadn’t occurred to her to be embarrassed, even after being rebuffed. She stood and moved toward him, determination in her eyes. Her arms went around his neck, her lips crashing against his mouth.
This was new and intriguing. It was rare for a woman to be this aggressive with him without demon thrall involved. And he wasn’t even in his super-pretty form. The fact that she knew what he was and was still throwing herself at him, even with a death wish, was almost too novel to cope with.
As offended as he was that she didn’t seem scared of him, another part didn’t want to kill her. It was hard to kill an equal you were growing to respect. If he succeeded and she begged him to keep her, would he? Of course not. She was a new flavor of candy. She’d be stale within a week, just like the others.
Tam slid her hand down his pants while her mouth tangled with his. She pulled away, her eyes glittering with dark promise. “Come on, I’m so tired from all the magic I’ve done. I’m not fully recharged yet. It wouldn’t take that much work to kill me.”
At least one part of him was listening to her, standing at attention, ready to make good on the promise of death. But he pushed her away, his hands gripping her shoulders to keep her at arm’s length. “Put some clothes on.”
She pouted. “But why? Is this much naked flesh upsetting you? Why should you deny yourself? I mean nothing to you. Forget your stupid plan. I won’t ever beg you to keep me. Let’s get this over with.”
He wanted to shake the life out of her, but then he’d be left with a much younger Tam in her place, a prospect that was less than appealing. “Look at the parchment again.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Look at it!” he growled. Even as he gripped her, he was shifting into his demon form. With every form but his true form shed, he gave off every negative emotion in existence. Tam shrank back from the force of it, and he smiled.
“I’ve never successfully fed in this form, so it’s pointless for you to taunt me—not that you would. I’m sure you don’t want to sleep with this.”
She met his gaze, getting her bravery back as she got used to the new energy around him. “Eh. I’ve seen worse.”
He released her shoulders and took a step back. If she kept surprising him, he might make it his mission in life to keep her alive forever.
She glanced down and giggled. It wasn’t the response a man was ever looking for, but when she spoke, he realized why.
“You must have seven hundred pairs of pants.”
In the shift, he’d ripped them. Again. Like some fledgling demon who didn’t yet understand the size disparity between man and monster. She unnerved him too much to be concerned with wardrobe malfunctions.
“I need you to look at the bigger picture,” he said. “Things are going to get ugly with Anthony after this. He’ll use this to push his control further—in the name of safety. I’ve seen humans do it a thousand times, and vampires are no different when it comes to this. I might need you in a war. You promised you’d fight with me. If you do this spell, it might help us find The Cycler. If we destroy him, there’s no reason for you to die.”
Tears welled in her eyes. The moment of vulnerability took him aback, and he had to fight the urge to comfort her. Where in the hell had that urge come from?
“It’s not just that. I’m TIRED, Cain. I’m so tired, I can’t think straight. I can’t stand this eternal cycle. It’s so lonely. Every time I cycle, I have to hide and go somewhere different, uproot my whole life, meet new people. Everyone I meet, I know I’m going to lose. I can’t live like this anymore. I just want to be normal again. I just want to be happily oblivious to the truth. The only way out is Jack or you. Forgive me if I prefer your methods. I don’t want him to win, you’re right. But I don’t want me to win, either. I need out of this. I thought if I could get away from him, that I could do it. I thought if Anna became immortal I could do it, but it’s not enough. I just want out.”
Given her suicidal kick, if Cain managed to get her to beg him to keep her, to even want her life back, it would be a miracle. And then what was he going to do? Kill her anyway? He should. Even if she’d be beneficial in a war, the temptation to get her out of her death wish and only then deliver it was the kind of temptation he was rarely successful at fighting. There was a reason he was who and what he was, after all.
He punched the cave wall, causing a mini-avalanche of little rocks in the space where he’d cracked it. “I’ve had the same form for eight thousand years. You think I don’t get how hard it is? But I don’t get an exit ramp. Why should I give you one?”
“Forget it. If you’re not going to do something useful, just leave me alone.”
Cain picked up the scroll and held it out to her. “No. I need you to do this spell.”
“What spell?” she said, her voice rising in irritation.
“Look at the scroll again.”
***
Reluctantly, she took the parchment from his hands and unrolled it, looking down the list of names she’d tried not to look at before. Blood. In the little hearts beside her name. A lump formed in her throat at the most recent name that had been crossed out. Naomi. Her sister. She still remembered standing beside her in the cavern, agreeing about not adding their own blood to the potion. It had been a smart gut instinct. Why hadn’t she listened?
She’d gripped Naomi’s hand in the moonlight that had shone down, not realizing what they were about to do or the events they would set in motion, all over the naïve belief that immortality in this place—in this human form—was a good thing.
Tears streamed down Tam’s face. She couldn’t hold them back anymore. She’d pushed her sister away so many times, trying to protect her from a brutal death at Jack’s hands, but it had still happened anyway. All that time lost.
“Tam?”
Her eyes met Cain’s. The fear and dread and hate and anger and all the scary emotions that swirled around his demon form had felt oppressive at first, but now she could get lost in them. She could pretend none of those feelings were her own. They were all the demon’s fault. There was a look in his eyes that she wasn’t sure how to classify. She didn’t trust that it was true concern, but he was making an admirable fake.
“That last name he just killed? It was my sister. I know what you need me to do, but I just can’t do it.” Jack had used her sister’s blood to make the little hearts around her name. Cain must have suspected the same thing.
Was Jack punishing her for leaving him? Would he have spared Naomi if she’d stayed? But at what cost? Her soul? Blood was the most powerful magic activator there was, especially the blood of a magical being, and Tam and all the other cyclers definitely qualified.
She could use the blood, even dried, to scry into the past and see everything her sister had seen in her last moments. She could see the moments even right after her sister’s death, because blood had its own life. What blood saw was sometimes more than what we saw.
“I need you to do the spell,” he said.
“No! I’m not going to look at that. I can’t look at it. It won’t help. I can tell you what he did. He overpowered her and killed her and cut her open and took out organs and probably fucking ate one because isn’t ingesting a part of your enemy the way to becoming a god? That’s what he wants. He thinks he can be a god if he kills us all like this. If you think I’m going to trance out and look into Jack’s eyes while he kills my sister, you’re insane. I won’t do it, and you can’t make me do it.”
She shook with rage over the idea. Maybe she could see something helpful, something that could let her know if he had any accomplices, something that could give them a location, but if the price was living her sister’s death vicariously and feeling all that pain and fear, she was just too selfish to go there.
“Okay. Okay. Calm down,” Cain said.
Before she knew what she was doing, she’d moved into the demon’s arms and laid her head against his chest. She didn’t care that he was in the demon form. At least he didn’t pretend he wasn’t what he was. At least he wasn’t ripping people up with knives. At least it was food, not sport or simply for power.
A moment later, his large hands stroked through her hair, his claws barely skimming her head. It was more comforting than it should have been. The scary feelings around him started to fade—either that or she was becoming more acclimated. What was it with her and monsters? At least this time she didn’t love one, and she knew going in what he was. But did that make any difference? She’d still slept with him and was prepared to do it again and again, no matter how many times was necessary to get from him what she needed: her freedom.
“Why did he put hearts beside your name?” Cain’s voice rumbled over her.
“Don’t be stupid. You know why.”
He sighed. “You were lovers. No wonder he’s saving you for last. It’s how I would do it.”
Tam cringed at that, but if the demon noticed, he didn’t say anything.
“I need to go to the meeting,” he said after a few minutes of standing like that. “I don’t know if Dayne can do the same magic, but I’ll take the scroll and we’ll find out. We might still be able to get what we need without your involvement.”
He gathered the magical bags and placed his hand over a spot on the cave wall that jutted out in the shape of an egg. It opened and he tossed her things in. “I’m sorry, but if you’re going to be in my caves, I have to up the security on your supplies.”
“You really think I’d go against you like that?”
“I don’t trust you. You don’t trust me. It’s what we have in common.” Even as he said it, Tam knew it wasn’t all they had in common. Besides Jack and the other cycler that was about to be history, Cain was one of the very few beings in existence who could really understand.
Chapter Five
Father Hadrian sat at the table, his expression blank of emotion. Anthony had started the meeting, and the demon leader was late again. Bringing Anthony down was the right thing to do. The vampire king’s increasing control was worse than the sacrifice of the humans finding out. The humans had known hundreds of years ago, and the world had survived. It would survive again, and the vampires with it. Anthony had to be stopped, or Hadrian’s race would end up slaves to their king.
“Father Hadrian?”
He looked up, not betraying his thoughts. “Yes?”
An impatient expression painted the king’s face. “What did you get from the old woman Luc brought in? Anything?”
Hadrian shook his head. “She remembered seeing a delivery man. It may have been The Cycler, but the details were too fuzzy. You know how fickle the memories of the elderly are. I erased her memory and sent her home.”
It was a lie. She’d seen Jack clearly. The rest, about erasing her memory and sending her home was true.
He would have had the old woman for dinner except she hadn’t done anything wrong. As a rule, he only fed from the guilty and then only killed the unrepentant. Everyone was repentant when their life was at stake, but Hadrian could see inside to their true feelings. He knew which ones to save and which to damn.
The vampire king nodded and went back to his presentation.
Hadrian had chatted with Cole while waiting for the meeting to start. The werewolf pack alpha was the key, the only person with a way into the demon dimension who wasn’t an actual demon.
The rooftop door banged against the brick wall as Cain made his fashionably late entrance again. He carried a plastic storage bag with something that looked like old paper in it.
“So glad you could join us,” Anthony said, “I was just about to ask for Luc’s report from your investigation.”
“Where’s the witness?” Cain asked.
“Father Hadrian couldn’t get a clear image of The Cycler’s face, so he erased her memory and sent her home.”
Hadrian held Cain’s gaze steadily even though he felt the demon’s suspicion. The guy was far too old to be tricked for long.
Cain broke eye contact first and put the scroll on the table, piercing the sorcerer with an intense look. “Dayne, can you do a spell on the memory of the blood?”