Her body insisted it needed to suck in some air. She fought and lost a battle with control, and took a breath, all of her senses thrumming with his hot vivid presence. The light brush of his hard chest against her nipples ignited sensations that were so long dormant, they should have remained dead and buried.
This was a wicked madness. He caused her to feel too much. It had gone beyond a dangerous, useless distraction and was fast approaching obsession. She couldn’t cope with all of it, both his emotions and hers. Coping with simple hope and fear were hard enough.
She tore her gaze away from his compelling face. Her hands shot out. She fisted them in his black T-shirt. “Did you finish reading?”
His sensual amusement faded. “Yes, just before I came in here.”
She concentrated her gaze on her fists as they rested against the hard plate of his breastbone. “And?”
He cupped her shoulders. “And, I don’t know. Your work is brilliant, but then you knew that. Something bothers me, and I haven’t been able to pinpoint what it is. It’s like trying to say that word that’s sitting on the tip of your tongue. You know the word is there and you’ve used it many times before, but you can’t quite think to say it.”
“Try harder.”
His fingers tightened. “What’s wrong?”
She tried to smile. It came out all twisted and wrong. “I’m starting to feel my Vegas again.”
He took a deep breath and pulled her into his arms. “That’s okay,” he said. His voice was as rock-steady as his gaze had been earlier. His cheek came down on the top of her head. “We knew it was coming. We’ll go through it together and we’ll learn more.”
She forced the words out. “That’s what I’ve been telling myself.”
Damn him, he stroked her hair, and then there were more feelings, traitorous feelings accompanied by weakening thoughts.
What would it hurt if she relaxed her rigid spine just once, just for a little bit? She tried it and found herself leaning against him. He guided her head so that it rested in the hollow of his shoulder. Her head seemed to fit there so flawlessly, the realization felt like it bruised her. Strength coursed through his long massive body, an inexhaustible well of Power that surrounded her with warmth. He wrapped his arms around her and somehow her arms found their way around his waist, and then they held on to each other tight.
Her eyes prickled again. They filled with burning liquid and spilled over. It had been so long since she had cried it took her several moments to identify the wetness.
He had done this to her. He opened doors in her that never should have been opened again. He was a sirocco that blasted through the topography of her mind and soul until they shifted like desert sands, and he forced her to confront feelings she had thought she would never feel again, wonder and desire, hope and fear.
Then he taught her how to feel new things, things that were so fresh and fragile and crushable, she was afraid they might break her. Fight to live, he said to her, and it was such a hard thing to do, because she couldn’t rouse herself to care enough to fight without also feeling afraid. Before he came, she thought she would only lose her life. She had distanced herself so she could witness her own end with detachment. Now she felt like she might lose something else just as valuable: her understanding of who she was.
She whispered, “Sometimes I think I hate you.”
He rubbed his cheek in her hair. “Why is that, darling?”
Her lips parted. Hadn’t he called her that once, so very long ago . . . or at least what seemed to her so very long ago? Only she hadn’t known what the word meant or understood what he was saying. She had thought he was a strange and beautiful god, calling her by a sacred name . . .
Rune cradled her close as he felt his T-shirt grow wet. He could smell a trace of frankincense in her hair, along with the clean fresh scent of lavender. Underneath that was her lush womanly fragrance, and she was so utterly perfect that bewilderment and outrage roared through him again at the thought of her dying.
Wait. His breath hissed. There it was, the word on the tip of his tongue, only it wasn’t a word but a concept. A premise, not a conclusion.
He buried his face in the slender crook of her neck, crushing her to him. She stirred and murmured either a protest or a question. He muttered, “Hold on just a minute.”
He wrapped his Power around her and opened his Wyr senses wide, and inhaled Carling’s fragrance again.
Wyr, especially the older and more Powerful Wyr, could sense disease in a way that animals could. They could taste when food was tainted, which made them extremely difficult to poison. They could smell when injuries became infected, or when illness was exuded in a person’s sweat glands.
Carling’s research had taken the path of modern medicine. She had followed closely the research done by Louis Pasteur and Emile Roux. She had chronicled how she had corresponded with the two doctors in the 1880s, asking detailed questions about their development of a vaccine for rabies. In turn the two scientists had studied Vampyrism with fascination.
Vampyrism had all the characteristics of a blood-borne pathogen. It was found in blood and certain other bodily fluids and had a 98. 9 percent infection rate when a direct blood exchange had occurred. It could not be transmitted through air, and intact skin acted as an effective barrier. The conviction that Vampyrism was an infectious disease had become so well-entrenched in modern thought, it was no longer questioned. Now in the twenty-first century, virtually all medical and scientific research on Vampyrism was based on that premise.
But every instinct Rune had was telling him Carling’s energy was robust. She did not smell diseased. He thought of the woman he had passed just outside the Bureau of Nightkind Immigration. That woman’s sickness had been evident. The taint had lingered on her skin underneath the scent of lilacs.
Carling smelled sexy and feminine with the tantalizing sultriness of her own Power, and the faint metallic tinge that all Vampyres shared.
In fact, to Rune she smelled perfectly healthy.
“I’ve got it, I figured out what bothers me,” he said. He straightened and pulled her away as he talked. Her arms fell loose to her sides. “What if everything you tried didn’t work because Vampyrism is not a disease?”
Grinning, he looked down into that haunting, beautiful face of hers that had grown on him like an addiction. Her expression was blank, those long almond-shaped eyes of hers fixed on something only she could see.
His stomach clenched. He guided her over to her office chair and nudged her to sit. She went without a protest, as passive as a doll.
A ripple went through the office. Then the scene changed. He relaxed and let it take him.
It was time to hit Vegas again, baby.
EIGHT
He didn’t walk a path this time, but the shift in energies felt just like a crossover again, a crossover that somehow turned, was bent in some fundamental way. It was like taking a flight of stairs that doubled back on itself, or turning a corner and discovering a different landscape than expected. He tried to hold on to the feeling so he could examine it more closely. He had the sense of almost grasping it, but then the feeling flowed past him and was gone.
Carling’s office faded, and a hot, humid evening enfolded him. Disoriented, he stood still and soaked in impressions.
Somewhere nearby there was the hoarse rhythmic bellow of bullfrogs. He looked up. The shadowed, spiked tops of palm groves dotted the edges of the night sky, which was brilliant with stars in a way that modern cities with their light pollution never saw anymore.
He stood in the shadows of a columned building built of granite blocks, close by other, larger buildings. Indirect torch-light flickered in various places. The air was pungent with the fetid smell of the nearby river, and the lingering odor of rich food. He smelled yeasty things, beer and bread, along with spiced fish and meat. The evening must still be fairly young.
He also smelled people, and he heard raised voices. A man, shouting in rage. A lighter
, younger feminine voice, spilling out a desperate-sounding patter of rapid words. Too accustomed to modern languages, his mind felt rusty as it tried to switch gears and make sense of what he heard.
There was no mistaking the meaty sound of a blow, and a sharp pained cry that was cut short. Nor the sound of a whip as it sliced through air.
A whip.
Fucking hell.
Moving on panic and instinct, Rune lunged forward. He slammed into a wall and sprang off it, and hurtled up wide carved stairs, following the projection of echo back to its source.
Come on. Kick up the speed, goddamn it. He moved faster than he could ever remember moving in his life, but the flat wicked slice of the whip tore through the air in a second stroke, and the sound flayed him alive.
He exploded into a large, luxurious room. Arranged for a seduction, it had become the scene of a torture. Metal braziers lit the space with an abundance of flickering light. The room was open on three sides to a simple balcony and the night air, and framed with gauze hangings that kept out the river insects. There was artfully arranged bedding, untouched. A low table held a feast of meat, fish, spiced vegetables, beer, bread and honey.
A girl child sprawled on the floor, her narrow honey-colored back split and bleeding with whip lashes. A dark man stood over her. He wore a shenti, tooled sandals, and a collar made of beaten copper, and he had a close-clipped beard and a gaze glittering with fury. The man pulled back his arm and shook out his whip.
Rational thought vaporized in an internal nuclear explosion. What was left was a murderous beast. Claws sprang out. The gravelly roar that burst out of his chest split the night with the force of a rocket launcher.
The beast leaped. With a single swipe of his paw, he nearly split the man into four pieces. The whip fell discarded. The man was dead before he hit the floor.
The killing had happened too soon to assuage the beast’s rage. He roared again, scooped up the corpse and flung it. Blood sprayed through the air. The corpse hit the wall. Bones cracked audibly upon impact. The broken body left a wet smear of crimson as it slid down along the wall.
Utter stillness filled the night. Even the bullfrogs and night insects fell silent in the presence of an apex predator. It seemed the whole world held its breath.
Except for the whimpering gasps at the feet of the beast.
He looked down, breathing hard. The girl child cowered into the floor, digging at it with the nails of both hands as if she would tear the stones open and disappear if she could. She wore the shreds of some filmy garment, along with a necklace made of copper and lapis lazuli, and bracelets of carved bone. Her delicate rib cage shuddered, the skin of her back torn and bleeding.
Whimper-gasp.
The beast became Rune again. “Poor baby,” he whispered. He bent down to touch her shoulder.
She cried out and cringed, and his beast resurfaced just enough to claw at him from the inside. He came around to kneel at her head. She was older than the seven-year-old he had met, but not by much, maybe by five or six years. Her emerging beauty had been carefully emphasized, those long eyes lined in kohl and green malachite, and her shapely mouth painted with red ochre. The malachite and kohl streaked her tear-stained face, and the red paint was smeared. Underneath the extravagant wreckage of color, the normal honeyed warmth of her skin was pallid with shock.
His stomach roiled. It did no good to tell himself that this was a much more primitive time and that girls were often married by the time they were twelve. She still looked like the victim of child porn. For a few scorching moments his sanity slipped. He did not know what he would have done if the smell of sex had been in the room.
She was in too much of a panic. At a loss, he hesitated then he did the only thing he could think of to do. He lay down on his stomach beside her and put his head on the floor, face toward her, so he was down at her level. Then he began to talk in a quiet, soothing patter of noise.
“Khepri, my name is Rune. We met once a few years ago. Do you remember me? I remember you very well. I was flying overhead when I saw you watching me, so I came down to talk to you. You had been working to harvest grain from the field.”
Did the blind panic in her young face ease just a little, or was that his imagination? Her shaking lips struggled to form a word. She whispered, “A-Atum.”
Rune’s eyes grew damp. “Yes,” he murmured as softly as he could. “You thought I was Atum, and I told you I wasn’t. Do you remember that?”
Her overbright gaze focused on him. She gave him a jerky nod.
Dimly he was aware of other people running into the room. The beast was still roused and tracked their movements with cold precision. If they had come an inch too close, they would have died, but they stopped at the edge of the room. After exclaiming to each other, they prostrated themselves on the floor.
That was well enough. To them he was, after all, a god, and this time he did not try to deny it.
He smiled at Khepri. “Please, darling, don’t be afraid of me. The man who was hurting you can’t hurt you any longer.”
She lifted her head. Her gaze tracked left toward the shredded corpse that lay in a crumpled heap by the wall. He shifted to hold his hand as a shield between her and the sight, not quite touching her cheek. She whispered, “Is he dead?”
This was no modern sheltered child. He knew she had already seen death before. He said, “Yes. He injured you. It made me very angry, and I killed him.”
She took a deep, shuddering breath and let it out. Ferocity flashed in her eyes. For a moment she looked as feral as a tiger cub. “Good.”
Just like that, he fell head over heels in love with the child all over again. “May I help you now?”
The spark of ferocity vanished. Her lips trembled and her eyes swam with tears as she nodded again.
At that the beast threatened to take over again. He rose up on his hands and knees, and gathered her carefully in his arms, working to make sure he didn’t touch the wounds on her back. He carried her over to the bedding and eased her onto it so that she was lying facedown. Then he looked at the humans who remained prostrate before him. There were four, a woman, two men with spears, and another, older man. Judging by the ornamentation of his clothing, the older man was the most powerful of those present.
Rune restrained the urge to kick them. He said, “Get up.”
The humans peered at him, saw that he was talking to them and cautiously eased upright. They remained on their knees and stole glances at the bloody corpse and at each other. He said to the older man. “I want hot water, medicine and bandages, along with something clean for her to wear. Be quick.”
“Yes, my lord.” The man hissed at the woman, who backed out of the room. A moment later, Rune heard her running footsteps on the stairs.
He settled beside Khepri. She moved her head closer to put her cheek against his knee, and he stroked her hair as he struggled with his self-control. He said to her, “Beer would help with the pain. Would you like some?”
She nodded. He gestured to the older man, who sprang to his feet to bring two full goblets to him, the rich, heavy liquid shivering in his unsteady grip. Rune took one goblet, ignored the other, and helped Khepri to drink while the man knelt at his feet and awaited further commands. The beer would have a strong alcoholic content, but she had probably been drinking it since she was two or three. It was a wheat beer, and no doubt the grain had gotten a little moldy. That meant there would be tetracycline in the liquid, which was good. It would help to stave off any infection from the lash marks. He encouraged her to finish the goblet.
When the hectic brightness of her eyes began to glaze over, he said to the man, “Are you a priest?”
“Yes, my lord.”
He was unsurprised. Ancient Memphis had a surfeit of temples and necropoleis. He said, “Do you have authority?”
The man bowed his head. “Yes, my lord.”
“You will listen to me now and do as I say.”
“I live to serve you.”
The man dared to look up, the fanatical light of devotion in his dark eyes.
Rune’s lip curled. What the fuck ever. He thought for a moment, choosing and discarding things to say. There was so much that would simply make no sense to this man. Finally he said, “What happened here tonight is an abomination to me.”
The man said quickly, “My lord, I promise you, the slave was not being disciplined without reason. She failed in her duty to please another god who was here—”
Another god?
Rune’s eyes flared in quick, jealous reaction. He looked around, taking in again the feast that had been so carefully laid out, the scene of seduction that had not been enacted. The man cowered before him. Khepri’s fingers stole behind her head to touch his hand, and he realized belatedly that he had started growling.
He made himself stop. He took a deep breath then another, analyzing the many scents in the room, and he realized what panic and rage had not let him realize before: another Wyr had recently been in the room.
Gently, he curled his hand around Khepri’s fingers, as he leaned over the priest. “Look at me.” The priest looked up, eyes wide, and Rune bared his teeth in a show of naked aggression. “A god chooses to do what he will. How dare you place the responsibility of that onto the shoulders of a mere girl?”
The priest fell forward to prostrate himself again. “My lord, I am sorry! We did not know we transgressed. Forgive us!”
“This is my decree,” Rune said. “You will take this slave and treat her as your most favored daughter. You will educate her as well as any man, and protect her, and see she has the best life you can give her. You will do this, and no other. If you fail in the slightest to do this one thing, I will find you. I will pull out your entrails, and leave you to watch them bake in the noonday sun. Do you understand me?”
As the priest babbled his agreement, the woman returned, carrying medicines and a pile of linens under one arm. She was followed by two other women bearing urns of steaming water. They hesitated at the doorway, their eyes wide, until Rune gestured them forward impatiently.