“I had to find you,” Dante said softly. “Whatever it took.” His shaded gaze shifted to the arched entry. “You and Lucien get the hell outta here, catin, and head home. I’ll catch up. Tell Von—”
Anger prickled cold and hollow in the pit of Heather’s belly. “Screw that. I don’t know about De Noir, but I’m going to be standing right here beside you. You ditched me earlier tonight in that fight with Mauvais’s nightkind. You’re not doing it again.”
“I didn’t ditch you, dammit. I wanted to keep you outta their fucking hands.”
“You could’ve followed me over that cemetery gate.”
“Aw, shit,” Dante muttered, trailing both hands in frustration through his hair. Tiny flames skipped along his black tresses like blue fireflies in the wake of his pale fingers. “Now? We’re going to fucking discuss this now?”
Heather sucked in a deep breath and looked up. The incandescent wheel circled ever closer, strobing the terrace and its occupants with alternating bands of dark-side-of-the-moon shadow and blinding light.
“No, we’re not. Not now,” Heather admitted, voice tight. “But get this through your head—I’m not leaving your side.”
“And you call me pigheaded?”
“By all that’s holy, are you both mad?” De Noir growled, voice a deep rumble. He stepped in front of Dante, a furious light burning in his black eyes, his wings flexing. “You can’t stay. They will chain you up—heart, mind, and soul. I’ll carry you out if I have to. Both of you!”
Heather liked that idea. She had no objections to De Noir tossing Dante over his brawny shoulder and carting him out of Gehenna—if necessary. But …
She noticed that the wounds in each of De Noir’s pectoral muscles were only half-healed—pink and raw and ringed with dried blood—despite his Fallen regenerative abilities, and he looked drained, almost nightkind-pale. She had a feeling his flight from the pit to the terrace had used up all of his strength and that he’d be lucky if he could walk himself out of Gehenna.
“I ain’t running, Lucien. Ain’t hiding. And you still ain’t got no say in my …” Dante’s words trailed off as if he’d suddenly lost his train of thought.
Pain stabbed into Heather’s mind, a red-hot splinter burning through the filter of Dante’s exhausted, weakening shields. She caught a glimpse of a steel hook hanging from the ceiling of a blood-splashed room. Her heart constricted.
I know this. I saw it on the Bad Seed disk.
The room where Chloe had died. Where Moore had ordered Dante—twelve or thirteen years old and savage with grief—strapped into a nightkind-proof straitjacket and hoisted up by his chain-wrapped ankles to hang upside-down above the little girl’s body.
White light strobed at the edges of Heather’s vision, then vanished, taking the pain and nightmarish peek into Dante’s past along with it. She stumbled forward a step and sucked in a deep breath of ozone-charged air.
“Fuck,” Dante whispered. He touched shaking fingers to his left temple. “Focus, goddammit. Focus.”
Dread dropped like a cold brick into Heather’s belly. How could he focus past pain that intense? How could he even keep on his feet? He was hurting and exhausted—on all levels.
“Stay now, Baptiste. Stay with me.” She grabbed him by both biceps, the muscles hard as steel under her fingers. Fevered heat baked through his cotton and mesh sleeves and into her palms. “Stay here.”
A shudder traveled the length of Dante’s body, his muscles knotting, his breath catching in his throat. “J’su ici, chérie,” he said, voice ragged.
Rotating light from the wheel above strobed incandescent along the lenses of Dante’s sunglasses. The thunderstorm smell of ozone crackled through the air. Heather’s scalp prickled as her hair started to lift.
Time was running out.
“Your control is slipping, child. You can’t stay,” De Noir said, dark brows knitted together. “Where’s your gate?”
Dante nodded at the arched doorway. “Inside. But I ain’t—”
“He’s right, you know,” Heather said, releasing her hold on Dante’s arms. “You’re in no shape to face anyone down, let alone a bunch of ambitious Fallen determined to bind you.”
A wry smile tilted Dante’s lips. “Von said the same thing.”
“Smart man, that nomad,” Heather said. “You should listen to him. Look, I get why you want to face them, I do, but you’re exhausted. This isn’t the time to make a stand. There’s no shame in retreating long enough to regain your strength, your focus—”
The searing white light disappeared. The lenses of Dante’s shades went dark.
Heather blinked rapidly in the sudden darkness, trying to clear her vision of the white, orange, and black retinal ghosts haunting it. Behind her, she heard a rush of wings, the soft slide of silk against flesh, the scuff of sandals upon marble.
“Shit,” she sighed. “They’re here, aren’t they?”
“Yup.” Dante wiped blood from his nose with a swipe of his mesh sleeve as he eyed the Seven over her shoulder. “Definitely not a Christian rock band.”
“Whatever you do, don’t give the Morningstar one gram of trust,” De Noir said, voice pitched just above a whisper. “And don’t let any of them mark you with their blood.” He pulled his healing body erect, rolled back his tight-muscled shoulders. His hair rippled between his wings like a banner of black silk.
“Je t’entends.”
Mark you with their blood. A chill traced the length of Heather’s spine as she recalled what the Morningstar had said in the cemetery about De Noir. Gabriel used a blood-spell to bind him to Gehenna’s fate.
Dante slid his shades to the top of his head. He looked at Heather from beneath his black lashes, his dilated pupils rimmed with molten-gold. Blue light and dark emotion flickered in their depths. Shadows bruised the skin beneath them. “Let’s do this and go home, catin.”
“Sounds good to me.” Heather tightened her grip on the Browning. “It’s almost our bedtime, anyway,” she added with a full-of-promise wink.
Dante laughed, and some of the tension drained from his face and shoulders, just as Heather had hoped. “Then we’d better hurry.”
“Damn straight.” Heather swiveled on the ball of one foot to face the so-called Celestial Seven.
They stood Fallen-tall and proud in front of the arched, brazier-lit entry leading into the Royal Aerie. But only five—three males and two females in flowing gowns, silken kilts, veils, simple torques, and—in one case—what sure as hell looked like a priest’s white collar and black, leather-belted cassock.
Adrenaline pumped through Heather’s veins, flooding her mind with a diamond-edged focus and crystal awareness. Her gaze ticked across each Celestial face, noting details in a split-second.
Celestial One: Gold wings, hair a cap of tight black curls, ebony skin etched with graceful, gold-inked glyphs, gold light fades from his eyes, revealing irises the dark purple-black of ripe plums; his full lips twist into a calculating smile; a purple kilt flecked with silver stars is double-belted at his muscular waist.
Celestial Two: Deep red wings, a spill of winter-wheat pale hair, honey-colored eyes, the brooding face of a Romantic poet; a Highlander’s belted blue plaid tartan falls to his knees above black leather boots, a silver torque twists around his throat.
Celestial Three: Black wings, a veil of shifting aurora borealis color drapes her from head to shoulders, hiding her features except for the black cherry-red tendrils of hair snaking and twisting from beneath the veil; a burgundy gown clings to her curves, its corseted bodice providing a display shelf for her smooth and rounded cleavage.
Celestial Four: White wings; glossy chocolate-brown hair cascades to her shoulders in long curls; golden-brown skin, proud nose, eyes black as the night and glittering with gold flecks; her flawless complexion, bee-stung lips, and voluptuous figure in its demure flowing silver and pale blue gown a Renaissance artist’s wet dream.
Celestial Five: No visible wings, olive-
skinned, short black hair curls against his temples, introspective summer evening–blue eyes above a straight Roman nose, he wears a priest’s collar and cassock, a beaded rosary wrapped around the knuckles of one hand.
All radiated a cool poise, their body language one of anticipation and curiosity as their gazes caressed Dante, lingering on his pale face, tracing the length of his hard body.
Seeing lust flare in more than one pair of moonlight-sparked eyes, a cold smile touched Heather’s lips. If they think he’s a just a plaything to tumble between the sheets, they’re going to be in for one helluva rude surprise.
Celestial One suddenly dipped one gold wing tip and song rang into the air, a beautiful hundredfold song pealing and harmonizing like cathedral bells, loud enough to fill the night. Each joyous crystalline note resonated through the air.
“Shit. Too goddamned many … “
Fear curled through Heather at the strain and desperation edging Dante’s voice. He stood, head bowed, fists clenched, body coiled and muscles trembling, and she realized that he was hearing the song inside as well, not just with his ears—and not just as a single choir. She suspected that each individual voice was a mental hammer battering against his shields.
Shoving her Browning into a pocket in her trench coat, Heather stepped in front of him and cupped his burning, blood-smeared face between her hands. “You’re not alone,” she whispered, looking into his dazed gold-and-blue-flame eyes. “Let me in, so I can help. I don’t give a damn about the pain.”
“I know you don’t, chérie, all heart and steel, you,” Dante murmured. “But not yet. Not until this headache’s gone. I ain’t sharing it. It’s too … hungry.”
“Sharing might make it easier to bear.”
“Not this. I ain’t letting it have you.” Lowering his head, Dante grazed his fevered lips against Heather’s before gently pulling free of her hands. “I’m gonna tell ’em all to back the fuck off, so keep close, d’accord?”
“Ditto, Baptiste.” Squaring her shoulders, Heather turned around once more.
Dante’s song stabbed into the air in response, a scorching and defiant aria aflame with power that challenged the symphonic greeting, demanded space. Refused to play games. Each exquisite note of his song, dark and savage and heartbreaking, pierced Heather to the core. He was making a stand, but the ledge was crumbling beneath his feet.
I think he’s had all he can take, doll …
And as Heather scanned the attractive faces of the five not-turned-to-stone members of the Seven, their expressions enthralled, eyes gleaming with captured moonlight, hungry and confident, and fixed on Dante, a dark realization threaded through her: they knew Dante was teetering on the edge too, about to lose his balance.
About to fall.
All he needed was a nudge. And they planned to supply it.
Heather slipped her hands into the pockets of her trench. Not if she could help it. Her fingers found the smooth shape of the morphine-filled syringe in one pocket, the Browning’s grip in the other. She would do whatever was necessary to protect him.
Even from his own damaged psyche.
The choir’s chiming and crystalline song trailed away as Dante’s fierce aria claimed the night. A woman’s reverent voice lifted into the air, husky and trembling, “Holy, holy, holy. The Maker’s song shapes us all.”
A soft chorus of “Amen” trailed her words.
Celestial Four sashayed forward, her silver and blue gown rippling like water over her rounded curves. A smile graced her lips. She stopped a cautious yard or so from Dante. She flicked a glance at Heather, then away, dismissing her.
“Quiet the song, young creawdwr, and douse the fire,” she said, her voice a rich, warm curl of caramel. “I am Astarte and, speaking for all of Gehenna, I am pleased to welcome you home, Dante.”
“I only dropped in to do a prison-pit snatch-and-grab, jolie,” Dante said, his song still pulsing molten into the night. Blue flames licked out from around his fingers. “This ain’t home, and I ain’t staying.”
11
A PROMISE IN BLOOD AND FIRE
GEHENNA
THE ROYAL AERIE
The Night of March 27–28
EROS’S HAIR RIPPLED AS though caught in a breeze as he and the other members of the Seven faced the creawdwr, but the night held still, the thick smoke-and-saffron reek of Uriel’s extinguished wheel blanketing the motionless air.
Power, wild and deadly and barely controlled, pulsated from the creawdwr—Dante, according to the Morningstar and Gabriel—crackled like lightning through the air. Pain fragmented his golden aura with jagged red lines, exhaustion smudged it nearly black. Blood trickled from his nose, blood he smeared across his white skin with absent-minded swipes of his sleeve.
Not mad, this young and untrained creawdwr, not yet, despite Gabriel’s incensed and bitter claims. But hurting intensely. And striding the abyss’s crumbling edge.
The lovely little redhead with the tantalizing curves Eros had only caught glimpses of from beneath her wretched black trench coat had soothed Dante with a touch, a kiss, and a few murmured words. Heat had shimmered between them, sparked white-hot.
Eros had found himself wishing their kiss would continue, deepen. Found himself wishing to move closer for a better look, drawn like an arrow to an apple.
It seemed Gabriel had spoken the truth—the creawdwr had bonded a mortal. Another dangerous impossibility.
And at Dante’s left shoulder stood Samael—wait, he now calls himself Lucille or Lucifer or some such thing, Lucien, that’s it!—pale, drained of strength, the wounds created by the hooks still visible on his chest, but his back straight, his taloned hands resting easy at his sides.
Meeting Eros’s gaze, Lucien nodded, a contemptuous smile curling his lips.
A smile Eros returned along with a slow wink. Doing well for an aingeal who’d been blood-spelled and hanging from hooks just minutes before.
How was it that the slayer of one creawdwr should father the next? Eros shook his head. Given Dante’s blunt words to Astarte, his rejection of her welcome, Eros had no doubt Lucien had poisoned his son’s mind against the Elohim.
We must cleanse Dante of that poison.
The aingeals and nephilim thronging the terrace kept a healthy distance from Dante and his burning hands, from the fire smoldering in his eyes. They backed up to the balustrade, some taking to the air, wings snapping loud as canvas sails in the silence. But most stared, stunned by his words.
This ain’t home, and I ain’t staying.
And why should he? The mortal world was the only one Dante had ever known.
Thanks to Lucien.
This creawdwr was not what any of them had expected or even imagined. A Maker of mixed bloodlines—both pure and powerful—Fallen and True Blood. A Maker born and raised in the mortal world. Shaped by it. He was an impossibility. A dangerous impossibility. No one knew what he was capable of; within moments of his arrival in Gehenna, he’d managed to both disgrace and humiliate Gabriel.
Eros wondered how much longer Gabriel would rule the Elohim now that he’d been violently rejected by the creawdwr.
Dante’s crimson-edged black wings flared behind him, wings unlike any Eros had ever seen before. Starlight glimmered like ice along the designs—twisting ivy-like loops and delicate spirals—etched into their blue and purple undersides. His autumn scent—burning leaves and November frost—spiced the air.
Gabriel had claimed that the Maker’s wings had just been born, ripping free through the boy’s back shortly after he’d arrived in Gehenna. After he’d torn into Gabriel’s throat and feasted like a wild thing on his blood.
A wild thing, yes. But the creawdwr was also a heart-stopping, lust-fueling, thought-stealing beauty. Pale moonlight skimmed the steel ring of the collar buckled around Dante’s throat, glinted from the hoops rimming his ears, the rings on his flame-spiked thumbs and fingers.
Bewitching.
Eros’s gaze raked over the creawdwr?
??s lean, coiled length, drinking in his wing-shredded and bloodied mesh-sleeved T-shirt, low-slung leather pants and boots, his moonlight-radiant white skin, his mouth made for kissing, his hard-muscled body meant for all manner of pleasurable things, the black hair intended to entangle grasping fingers. Eros felt himself stir beneath his kilt.
he sent to Morrigan, casting her a sidelong glance.
Morrigan fingered the edge of her ever-shifting veil, and Eros wondered which face she currently wore beneath it. Her attention was riveted on the creawdwr and the flummoxed Astarte.
she sent,
Morrigan sighed. Her usual disdain percolated through her thought. But Eros wasn’t fooled. He smelled the musky pheromones thickening her brine, blood, and molten steel scent.
Eros agreed.
Astarte glanced at Eros from beneath dark lashes, expression perplexed as she fumbled for a reply to Dante’s unexpected response to her welcome.
Folding his arms over his chest, Eros shook his head. He couldn’t help but smile at Astarte’s unaccustomed speechlessness. Her boast to him—only ten minutes old—already proven false, her wager lost.
According to Gabriel, the Maker’s just a child.
A True Blood child, one born to violence and quick with his fangs.
He’s also Elohim. With Elohim instincts. So I shall accomplish what Gabriel obviously failed to do and charm him.