“If you don’t read it,” Phoenix said in a low, throaty voice, “you’re chicken. Look, I’m going to close my eyes and you can pretend I’m not here.”
“Impossible. You’re huge.”
“Please.”
I cleared my throat and began to read. He’d lied because he didn’t close his eyes. He stared at me the whole time, and I fumbled and stuttered and it was just awful.
He reached over, plucked the book from my hands, then sat back and read it aloud to me. I closed my eyes and listened to the deep timbre of his voice and felt too warm.
When the scene was over, he stopped reading. I heard the tick of the grandfather clock, the crackle of the fire, the ping of cutlery from the dining room as Deacon set the table for lunch. I kept my eyes closed, childishly hoping he’d think I’d fallen asleep.
“I get it now.”
I made no reply. I honestly couldn’t speak, too nervous and embarrassed to even open my eyes. I wished more than anything that I’d refused to read the book to him. Why had I believed he’d let me skip over the sexy bits? He was a guy, and they were all obsessed with sex. I decided I hated him. I would open my eyes, get up, snatch my book away from him and leave the library. I’d go to my room, with Olga, and ask Mathilda to bring my lunch. I’d stay there until—
“He kind of had to be a putz in the beginning so he could grow as a character and deserve the painter. And she had to back off from feeling like somebody less-than because she came from peasant stock. The story is good, but it’s really all about the characters, isn’t it? Are all romance novels like this?”
“I don’t know. This is only my second.”
“Do you want me to read the rest, or do you want to?”
“Go ahead,” I said, opening my eyes to stare at the fire.
He did, and just like the bad earl-good earl story, everyone was happy in the end.
“It’s the ultimate escapism,” he said as he closed the book. “They figuratively ride off into the sunset and live happily ever after. They never fight over money, or whose turn it is to change diapers, or which minivan to buy.”
“Prince Rupert is rich, so they’ll have a nanny, and it’s in the olden days before they invented cars.”
“There are other things to argue about, but these two will see eye to eye until they die. I guess that’s appealing to people who like romance novels.”
“That’s not what appeals to me.”
“What is it, then? Do you like that she’s not a beauty and Prince Handsome falls in love with her anyway?”
“Well, that is nice, but no, that’s not why I enjoyed the book.”
“It’s that they triumphed over the bad guy.”
“You have to admit it’s very satisfying.”
“True, but most commercial fiction is some derivative of good winning over evil. What is it about romance novels in particular that you like?”
Did he seriously think I would answer?
Silence fell again and my eyes were drawn upward, to Mirabelle in her beautiful dress. I wondered what her story was. How had the Mephisto found her? What did they say to convince her to become a Lumina? Was she with someone? Had she been with someone when they found her? Andres had painted a twinkle in her eyes and a soft, playful smile on her mouth.
“I’m just as clueless as you are, Mariah.”
I didn’t pretend to not know what he was talking about. Still staring at Mirabelle, I said, “You’ve been alive a thousand years, and I know how you’ve spent the past hundred years, but I’m also certain of how you spent the nine hundred before those.”
“It’s true I’ve had a lot of meaningless hook-ups with girls I barely knew and never saw again. What I mean is that I don’t know what it’d be like with someone I know well and care about.”
Finally, I looked at him. “What about the other girl?”
“Why won’t you say her name?”
“I say her name.”
“No, you always call her ‘the other girl.’ Why?”
“I don’t want to talk about her. I don’t like comparing, or being held up to her standard. She was sweetness and light, someone fine and beautiful. I’d prefer to ignore her. As for how you felt about her, I know you didn’t love her, but you felt something for her. So you’re I’m clueless line is a lie, and you said we wouldn’t lie to each other.”
“Yes, I felt something for her, but it was . . .” Now he was the one staring up at Mirabelle. “We had sex once, and it was a mistake. It was too soon, too rushed. We both knew it, but I didn’t realize just how big of a mistake it was until . . . anyway, what I’ve experienced is nothing like what’s in this book.”
“Maybe the author got that wrong like she got kissing wrong.”
“Maybe.” He dropped his head and looked at me. “I guess I’ll never know.”
“And I will?”
“Perhaps. If you stay, you’ll be here for a very long time. There could be someone, sometime – another Lumina.”
“How do you know there won’t be another Anabo for you?”
“It wouldn’t matter if there were a hundred more. I’m never going to be with anybody.”
“Was it so bad that you have to punish yourself for the rest of eternity?”
He stood, came close, and handed me the book. “Yes.” Turning, he walked out of the library.
Seconds later, Deacon’s solemn voice came across the intercom speaker above the open library doors “Lunch is served. Allah is good.”
Chapter 9
Phoenix missed lunch again, but today I wasn’t surprised. He’d been upset when he left the library, so I suspected he’d chosen to eat in his room. Or maybe he went somewhere else. I was halfway glad, because I still felt insanely awkward after the book reading and subsequent conversation.
He wasn’t sitting at the table with his usual quiet scowl, but there was a pall over everyone, an odd undercurrent flowing through the dining room that I couldn’t pin down. Even Jax and Sasha were quiet and more focused on their plates than each other.
As soon as everyone finished, they left without goodbye. After Sasha was gone, it was just me, finishing my apple dumpling. Deacon said as he picked up my dessert plate, “There has been an omen.”
“What does that mean?”
“Mathilda found the omen in your coat pocket.”
“An omen from a Chinese fortune cookie?”
He stepped back from the table and stared out the windows at the world of white. “You did not know what this fortune foretold?”
“It was in English. And it wasn’t my fortune cookie.” I remembered it flying through the air and landing at my feet on the small terrace outside the attic. “The slip of paper was on . . . it was on the ground and I picked it up.”
“The omen came to you, the only human on the mountain. You are the messenger.”
I dabbed my mouth with my napkin and laid it on the table. I was not a superstitious person, or given to believing in omens, but asked anyway, “What does it say?”
He looked me right in the eye, which was so unusual, I stiffened. “The Mephisto will suffer a great loss by straying from the path.”
“What does it mean? What kind of loss? In a takedown?”
He looked away and said to the windows, “The loss of a Mephisto.”
“But they can’t die.”
“They can be lost. They can go to the dark side and join Eryx. They can die. To stand on holy ground is to die by fire.”
I remembered then that Phoenix had told me none of them could go in a church or any other spiritual haven without burning to death. Except Jax, because he’d been redeemed by his love for Sasha. As for joining Eryx, I thought about what Jax told me yesterday. Kyros still felt something for his brother besides hate. Would he abandon his younger brothers and a thousand years on this side of the war to join Eryx? Impossible. He was crazy for Viorica, and leaving the Mephisto meant leaving her.
No, the omen must mean one of them would die. No wond
er they were so solemn and quiet. “Who sent it?”
“Lucifer.”
The hair at the base of my scalp raised, and I pushed back from the table, taking my time before I stood to get my reaction under control. When I faced Deacon, I was outwardly calm. “Do they blame me for the omen?”
“They do not. Their concern is for Kyros and his Mephisto, who are exposed. Until they are here within the security of the Mephisto Mountain, they are in extreme danger.” He gave a slight bow of his head, then disappeared.
His Mephisto. Viorica was one of them now. She could be the one foretold to die.
But no, Phoenix had said that as much as she was now Mephisto, she was still Anabo, still able to stand on holy ground. She could never die. Neither could Sasha. The omen must be about Kyros.
Leaving the dining room, I made my way upstairs with a heavy heart.
In my room, Mathilda was there with a young, pretty dark-haired Lumina named Mercy who had a French accent and a multitude of bags from different stores, bulging with clothes and shoes. “So this is why you took my coat,” I said to Mathilda.
“’Tisn’t warm enough for this mountain. Come along and try these clothes and see what ye like.”
I spent the next hour in and out of the closet, trying on everything from bras to jeans to sweaters to dresses. There were boots and shoes and socks and mittens, cosmetics and perfume and hair clips and jewelry. It was all beautiful, made of the finest materials, bought from stores I’d never been in, would never have dreamed of visiting. It was everything I’d never had. I asked Mercy, “How can all of this fit so well?”
She grinned at me. “We are the same size, even height, so I tried on, and if it fit, I bought it.”
At half past two, Mathilda left and came back with tea, and Sasha arrived just in time to share. She seemed less gloomy than she’d been at lunch and when I asked about the omen, she waved it away. “Lucifer does this every once in a while, and it’s not so much an omen of what will happen as a warning of what can happen if we don’t walk the straight and narrow. The Mephisto are fairly autonomous, but there are rules we can’t break, and suggestions we’re expected to listen to.”
“Is Kyros doing something Lucifer would consider straying from the path?”
“I don’t think so, but things in Washington are weird. Eryx is acting extremely out of character and it has everyone spooked. Probably none more than Lucifer.”
“What’s he doing that’s so out of character?”
“Just being in the real world is strange. He’s very reclusive and usually stays at his home in Romania. He goes out only rarely, and then to find Skia recruits. He moves them around to strategic locations and they’re the ones who find people willing to pledge their souls. But ever since Jordan was discovered in London and had to go back to Washington, Eryx has been there, pretending to be a regular guy, a new student at her school.”
“Brody says Eryx is going out with Jordan’s best friend,” Mercy said. “They eat lunch at the same table, are in a lot of the same classes, and he’s constantly staring at Jordan. Brody says it’s creepy.”
“What does he hope to gain?” I asked. “Jordan will never give him what he wants.”
Sasha slumped back in the chair by the fire. “That’s why everyone’s freaked out. We’re sure he’s planning something.” She widened her eyes. “I hope you’re keeping that dress. It’s marvelous and you look beautiful in black.”
I looked in the long mirror Mathilda had pulled from the closet. “I never wear dresses. It feels weird.”
“Put those black boots on,” Sasha said.
After I did, Mercy clapped. “Oui! Perfect!”
Mathilda nodded. “Very fetching, Miss Mariah.”
They were all three caught up in dressing me and we didn’t talk of the omen or Eryx again, but as soon as they left my room, Mercy and Mathilda carting off what didn’t work and what needed to be washed before wearing, I dressed in a new pair of jeans and a pale blue sweater and the boots and went downstairs to find Phoenix. I had no idea which of the six suites on the second floor was his, so I knocked on the first door I came to, which I knew already was Zee’s because the floor was vibrating and I could hear the low thump of a bass guitar.
I was amazed he’d heard my knock, but within a few seconds, the door swung wide and he jerked a thumb, indicating I should come inside. He was dressed only in black leather pants, and I was taken aback by the expanse of his chest, of his hard body and muscled arms. He had a beautiful tat of the Mephisto M on his right bicep. “Have a seat and I’ll be out as soon as I’m dressed.” He took off through a doorway that led to a bathroom, and I saw him pass through another doorway into a large closet.
I looked around and decided his room was exactly as I’d have imagined. It was huge, furnished with warm and worn antiques, a beautiful rug, and pale green silk on the colossal bed. On the wall with the bathroom door was a black marble fireplace with a portrait of the brothers hanging above it. They stood in front of a beautiful house with onion domes and intricate woodwork, each of them dressed in seventeenth century clothing, Ty with a mastiff, Kyros with long hair, and Phoenix holding the reins of a horse. Zee, Ajax, and Denys sat at a small table on the lawn. Below the painting, on the right side of the mantel, was a small bronze of a nude woman sitting on a delicate chair, playing a violin, her metal hair flowing to her waist. When Zee found an Anabo, I hoped she liked music.
Butter yellow silk draperies were open and afforded a sweeping view of the mountains. Just in front of the windows was a shiny black grand piano. On the wall opposite the fireplace was a sound system that took up the entire wall, stacked within beautiful mahogany shelves. A rock song I vaguely recognized was playing at the moment, so loud I could feel my bones vibrating. I liked it. The room was Louis XVI does Led Zeppelin.
Zee came out of the bathroom fully dressed in a black T, heavy black boots and a black leather trench coat that reached his ankles. Walking to the opposite wall, he turned off the music and faced me. “What’s up?”
“I’m looking for Phoenix.”
“He’s gone. Didn’t say where.”
My disappointment must have shown.
“You want to tell me about it?”
I eyed his clothes. “You’re about to leave. I don’t want to keep you.”
He shrugged. “You can go with me. Probably do you good to get out of here for a while, and besides, if you’re going to be one of us, you need to see how we do things.”
“I’m not going to be—”
“I’m not going to argue about it. Just go with me, you can tell me what’s up, and after I’m done, I’ll take you for coffee.” He smiled. “And cake.”
“I’m not supposed to leave the mountain. Kyros worries Eryx will take me and use me for leverage to get Jordan to do what he wants.”
“He probably would if he knew where you were, but he won’t. He’s not thinking about you at all right now. The crazy bastard is crazy obsessed with your sister.”
“That’s what I wanted to talk to Phoenix about.”
He came toward me. “Hold my hand and don’t let go.”
I took his hand. “Do I need a coat?”
Instantly, we were in my room, and he said, “Get one.”
As soon as I’d shrugged into the wool pea coat Mercy had brought, he took my hand again. “Where are we going?”
“Moscow.”
Seconds later, we stood on a snow-covered sidewalk several meters away from a corner streetlamp. Zee pulled me beneath the overhang of a building, into the shadows. It was just after one in the morning in Moscow, and patrons were leaving the nightclub across the narrow road from where we stood. Every time the door opened, I could hear the loud beat of techno music and see flashing colored lights. “Are we going in?”
“No, it’s unnecessary, which is good because there are things in there you’d rather not see. We’re waiting for a guy and his posse to leave, and we’re going to follow to see where they go.
He’ll have some hopefuls with him, and I want to know where he takes them because it might lead us to more lost souls. He’s a Skia who’s flown under the radar for over twenty years.”
“How do you know someone is Skia or a lost soul?”
“They have a shadow across their eyes. Skia means shadow in Greek. Skia shadows are so dark, it’s hard to see their eyes. The lost souls also have a shadow, but it’s way less intense. You won’t be able to see shadows until you’re Mephisto.”
I didn’t want to argue the point, so I asked if Luminas could see the shadows.
He nodded. “There are some Luminas whose only job is popping all over the world to look for lost souls and Skia. When they find them, it’s my job to do reconnaissance. I give what I discover to Phoenix, who plans a takedown, and when we do it, Jax commands.”
I felt a chill and when I looked at Zee, he was ghostly, almost transparent. “What just happened?”
“I put us under a cloak so no one can see us, with the exception of the Skia, whose name is Viktor. We’re going to walk far enough behind him to not be obvious, but close enough that we don’t lose him. If he turns around for any reason, I’ll pretend to kiss you so he won’t see my face. Got it?”
“As long as you don’t actually kiss me.”
“I’d never kiss you, Mariah. It’d be like kissing my sister. Like kissing Sasha.” He made a face. “She’s like a brother. Except she’s a girl.” He huffed out a breath. “Trust me, I’d never kiss you like that.”
I was supposed to be pretending I didn’t know I was Anabo or that I was intended for Phoenix, but Zee appeared to know I was aware, so I said, “This must go with the scent thing.”
“If an Anabo was available to any of us, we’d kill each other fighting for her. Except we can’t die, so we’d take each other out, over and over, and never catch any Skia or lost souls. And I’m sure the Anabo would be so disgusted with the lot of us, she’d take off and never come back. The smell thing is weird, I guess, but God had to make an end-run around what we are. Lucifer made it so we’re not remotely attracted to an Anabo whose scent we don’t know.”