Serpent's Kiss

  Passive technologies, like composting toilets, hypocaust systems, Melitta coffee filters, modern crossbow and compound bow designs, or designs that utilized solar heat worked just fine in Other lands. An oxygen tank was simply a vessel of compressed air that was released through a tube in a slow, controlled fashion. Filling an oxygen tank required a compressor, which would not work in an Other land, but the tank itself would be safe to use throughout the passage until it ran out of its supply.

  Rune considered. “How long is the underwater passageway?”

  Duncan told him, “I can swim it in just over ten minutes.”

  “I don’t need the tank,” said Rune. “I’ll be fine.” He bent to pick up his duffle. “I could use something watertight to put this in, though. It isn’t much, a couple of changes of clothes, toothbrush and razor, Stephen King novel, yadda yadda.” Along with an iPod, iPhone, a few more PowerBars, Glock and ammo, knives, a garotte, some throwing stars. Yadda yadda. The Glock, phone and iPod would travel fine as long as he didn’t try to use them until he got back.

  “We’ve got something you can use,” Duncan said.

  Rune took a half turn toward the door and regarded the Vampyre with an expectant expression. Moving along, here. Next phase. Gotta show up for my first day of work on time. I’ll be trimming the lawn with a pair of manicure scissors. Trimming the whole island with a pair of manicure scissors? That’s a thousand years right there, baby.

  Duncan was staring at the tips of his polished shoes and frowning.

  Perhaps a human might have seen a man deep in thought. Rune was a predator and far older than the human race. His focus narrowed. He watched how the Vampyre took a deep breath in an old habit he had not needed in over a hundred and twenty years. He noted the miniscule tightening around Duncan’s pleasant, dark eyes, and the shift in the near invisible sheen on Duncan’s silk tie as he swallowed.

  Rune had earned his place as Dragos’s First many centuries ago for a host of Powerful reasons. But there were other reasons why Rune was Dragos’s First, and they had nothing to do with Power. Rune said in a quiet voice, “You got something you want to tell me, son?”

  Duncan’s gaze lifted quickly. “I have many things I want to tell you. I find that, for one reason or another, I am constrained.”

  “Attorney-client privilege?” Rune asked.

  “That, and also there are constraints from my maker.”

  “Who is your maker?” Rune asked, although he was pretty sure he already knew the answer.

  “Carling.” Duncan gave him a self-conscious lopsided smile that was unexpectedly endearing. “I am her youngest.”

  Seriously, awww.

  “Well, Duncan,” Rune said. “Is there anything you want to tell me that you actually can tell me?”

  Duncan’s smile faded, and in that moment he didn’t look young at all. He looked old, grieving, and more than a little frightened.

  “Please be careful,” Duncan said.

  Carling unfolded a well-worn piece of paper and laid it on the polished granite countertop near the stove. She consulted the handwritten instructions that had been prepared for her by a human attendant.

  Step one, make sure the wood stove has been lit and the burner is hot. Yes. Did she place the skillet on the burner for step two? She checked the list. No. Step two, spray the skillet with PAM. She did and then she set the skillet on the burner. Now add a few ounces of raw meat to the skillet. Stir with implement. She picked up the implement and considered. What is this thing called again? Ah yes, it is a spatula.

  A sunny morning shone outside. The kitchen where Carling worked was a large foreign-feeling stone-walled area, with long wooden tables and granite counters, industrial-sized sinks, and a fireplace that was big enough to roast a pig in. Bright yellow sunshine spilled in from metal-paned windows. The kitchen was a peaceful quiet place without chattering sycophants populating it. She liked it much better now that it was nearly empty.

  A small dog whined at Carling’s feet. Rhoswen sulked nearby, well away from the spill of sunshine. “I don’t understand why you insist on doing this,” Rhoswen grumbled. “We have cans of dog food that it loves. Quite good, expensive premium dog food. I checked personally with its vet.”

  “I do not require you to understand,” murmured Carling. She peered at the organic material in the skillet. It had started to sizzle. The red flesh was turning white. “What are we cooking again?”

  “Chicken,” Rhoswen said. “We are cooking chicken for incomprehensible reasons.”

  “Yes,” Carling said.

  She nudged the flesh around in the skillet. This is food. A warm scent filled the air. She sniffed it. Living creatures consider this scent aromatic, appetizing. They salivate, and their stomachs rumble.

  The small dog barked.

  Yes, and some of them yap.

  The chicken must become white all the way through. It is okay if the outside becomes brown. In fact many creatures prefer it that way. With a sense of satisfaction, Carling removed the skillet from the heat. She used the implement to scrape the steaming material onto a plate for a tiny living creature.

  She regarded the dog. It regarded her in return. She remembered the details from the vet’s report. The dog was a six-pound Orange Sable Pomeranian. It had an exploding puffball double coat of hair that was brown and sable, with a touch of cream in its ludicrous curl of a tail. It had bright button-black eyes and a foxy narrow muzzle with a button-black nose. When she gave it her attention, it stood on its hind legs and twirled. Such happiness and excitement over a thing called breakfast.

  She checked the last step on her list of instructions. Wait until the meat is cool enough to consume safely before placing the plate on the floor.

  She looked at the steaming material on the plate. She looked back at the dog. It gave her a thrilled canine grin, pink tongue lolling to one side as it hopped on hind legs and pawed at the air. She spoke a word filled with Power. For a moment the air around the chicken shimmered. When she touched a finger to the meat, it was perfectly cool. Ah, that was much better.

  A bell tolled on the ocean side of the sprawling stone house.

  Both she and Rhoswen lifted their heads to look toward the sound. She told Rhoswen, “Go let the sentinel in.”

  The younger blonde Vampyre inclined her head and left the kitchen.

  Carling twitched aside the hem of her black Egyptian cotton caftan as she crouched to set the plate of chicken in front of the dog. The next bit always puzzled her. She had witnessed many forms of greed over the centuries. But no matter how much the smell of the cooking chicken sent him into frenzy, when she set the plate of food in front of the dog, he always paused first to look at her before he fell on his meal to gobble it down.

  Carling was a succubus, a Vampyre who could sense and feed off of emotions from living creatures. The little dog had emotions. They were bright colorful sparks that winked like fireflies. She knew what he felt when he gave her that look.

  It was passionate gratitude.

  Rhoswen returned after a few minutes. Carling looked up from the dog. He had finished his meal and draped himself across her bare feet. Rhoswen told her, “The Wyr is awaiting an audience with you in the great hall.”

  Carling nodded. She nudged the sleepy animal off her feet and pushed through the kitchen’s double-swing doors before the dog could follow. Ignoring its complaining bark, she walked along the large silent flagstone-floored corridor to the great hall, the only sound a whisper of cloth as her caftan swirled around her ankles.

  The house followed the general pattern of a medieval manor, with the kitchen, buttery and pantry off to one side, the two-story great hall with a massive six-foot-tall fireplace and its carved stone overmantel and more private apartments and rooms branching off the other side. Unlike a medieval manor, the great hall and the other oceanside rooms had floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the bluff upon which the house sat.

  The house was bordered with a waist-high fieldstone
wall that followed the furthermost periphery along the edge of the bluff. The land within the walls was cultivated with a dense profusion of flowers, yellow goldenstars, scarlet mariposa lilies, coast sunflowers, stream orchids, seaside daisies and island snapdragons. Climbing roses swarmed up a trellis that framed the front doors, their immense blooms drenched in fragrance.

  The island itself was kidney-shaped and over four miles long. The house on the bluff was located in the inner curve of the kidney. A narrow path zigzagged down the side of the bluff to a wide beach where a couple of sailboats were moored. There were several other, smaller houses that dotted the area around the large stone manor house, but currently those stood empty. A redwood forest towered on the farthest end of the island, the gigantic trees thousands of years old, their upper heights fed from the mists that rolled in off the ocean. Shy, secretive winged creatures lived in the uppermost branches of those ancient redwoods. They hid whenever other creatures came near.

  Carling felt the Wyr before she stepped into the hall and laid eyes on him. She paused at the kitchen entrance to the hall to absorb the shock of his presence.

  He stood hipshot in front of the windows, with the kind of ease that came from someone who had everything going for him and nothing to prove. His back was to her, his hands in the rear pockets of torn faded jeans as he looked out toward the ocean. His hair tumbled damp and tousled to broad shoulders. She caught the smell of brine and the warm virile scent of a healthy Wyr male. Thousands of years ago he had towered over humans, a strange gigantic, fierce god. Even now he stood taller than most men, the long strong lines of his body epitomizing masculine strength and grace.

  More than just the impact of the physical, however, was the punch of the aetheric force around him. Even standing at rest, he radiated a ferocious vitality. Energy and Power boiled off of him in a corona of rippling waves that were invisible to most people, but she could see them pouring off of him like heat waves rising from a sun-baked highway in the desert. All of the immortal Wyr that had come into being at the time the earth was formed had this same primal life force. They carried within them sparks of creation’s first fire.

  Carling took a deep breath, an anachronistic throwback to an ancient time. She took note of her body’s involuntary response to the onslaught of Rune’s presence, even as his head cocked to one side at the small telltale sound. He turned to face her.

  Then there was the other shock to the system as she looked upon the strong, bold clean lines of his face. His facial bone structure had a refinement that was echoed in the frame of his body, a masculine elegance that caught at the eye and tugged at the heart. He had a beautiful mouth, with sensually carved, mobile lips, but his capstone feature was his worldly, knowledgeable lion’s gaze.

  Those breathtaking eyes were smiling at her now. They pulled her across the room toward him.

  “You’ve got an awesome crib here,” said Rune. “Way to be all-over gothic, Carling. What happens if you sail away from the island?”

  “Eventually after you lose sight of the island, you end up sailing back toward land. This is just a small pocket of Other land with only the one underwater crossover point. There is nothing else here but the island and ocean.”

  “Sweet.”

  She prowled toward him, this male who radiated like a sun. The Power of his presence prickled along her skin. Each step she took brought her closer to him and made her feel more alive. Compared to his full-blown Technicolor-rich emotions, all the many other creatures she had sensed and fed from were weak and pastel, like watered milk. Rune was a rich and fluid fountain of nourishment like the deepest ruby claret. She felt a ghost of something that must have once been hunger. His blood would taste spectacular, as burning and as intense as the rarest liqueur.

  The expression in his eyes changed as she approached. His smile became sharper, deeper, and showed a hint of even white teeth. His emotional palette shifted too, the ruby claret flowing with enticing and inexplicable complexities.

  She came toe-to-toe with him. At five-foot-six, she had once been a tall woman. Now she was considered an average height. She had to tilt back her head to look full-bore and unblinking into that lion’s gaze. She noted how his breathing deepened and his eyes dilated. What was that emotion she sensed from him? A ghost of elusive memory drifted through the back of her mind. She had felt it once, long ago. It had made her drunken and impetuous, vivid with reckless laughter.

  She turned and stalked around him, considering. He pivoted backward in a slow circle that met her pace. He angled his head to match the tilt of hers and came close so that they were nose-to-nose with each other, two predators mature in Power and engaged in a sizing-up showdown.

  Unafraid? Yes, he was unafraid, but that was not the emotion she sensed that tugged at her memory. Fascination? Yes, he felt that too, but that was not what she tried so hard to remember.

  This gryphon called himself Rune Ainissesthai. Rune for glyph, a sigil that was a stroke on a page, but more than that, rune for mystery, magic. Ainissesthai was old Greek for speaking in riddles. The mysterious magical riddle.

  “Rune Ainissesthai,” she whispered. “What is the riddle?”

  His expression flared with electric light. Oh, I’ve got your attention now, don’t I, Wyr? She smiled. Did you think everyone had forgotten the meaning of your name?

  “You know better than to ask a question like that,” Rune said. His voice had dropped to a low gravelly murmur that prowled across her skin.

  “Rune Ainissesthai,” she whispered a second time, and the Power she wielded made the sound of his name reverberate between them like the singing of a Chinese Buddhist bowl. “Why do you come to me?”

  “I come to pay my debt,” said Rune, and the cry of the eagle echoed in his reply.

  “Rune Ainissesthai,” she whispered for the third time. “Will you do my bidding for the measure of one favor to pay that debt?”

  “You know I will,” the gryphon replied, and the growl of the lion was in his voice.

  She struck the reverberation between them a single blow with her Power so that it rang like a gong against the stone walls of the great hall, and the magic writ was cast. She smiled. “The bargain has been struck, and answered.”

  Now he was bound and he truly had no choice but to do her bidding. You are mine, she said silently to his tall strong form. Mine to do with as I wish. For this moment in time, I own you. And what shall I have you do, you easygoing, proud, insouciant alpha male? What task shall you complete before you take your leave from me and go back to your unending life?

  What did someone who was dying do with a rare and extravagant gift such as this?

  The smile faded from her lips. The predatory impulses in her darkened and grew invisible fangs. Her dark eyes glittered with a carapace like obsidian glass, and the line of her mouth hardened.

  She said, “Kneel.”

  She felt his surprise as her command jolted through him.

  But then he did a thing that surprised her in return. He raised his eyebrows, gave her that easygoing insouciant grin of his and said, “Okey-dokey.”

  With a flourish he went gracefully down on one knee in front of her.

  What was this? He was down on the floor, his powerful broad shoulders dipped in subjugation. He even bowed his head. He gave every appearance of submission, and performed flawlessly to the letter of her order, but . . .

  Deep in the axis of that fierce remarkable soul, the alpha male still reigned. She circled behind him and stepped close to his broad shoulders to put her lips near his ear. She whispered, “You’re not really kneeling inside.”

  He cocked his head to look at her over one shoulder. His reckless gaze laughed at her. He whispered back, “You didn’t order me to do that. It would require an entirely different bargain for me to really kneel to you.”

  Caught in the unknown riddle, she asked, “What bargain would that require?”

  He gave her a slow smile. “You must give me a kiss.”

&nb
sp; The sleek arch of her eyebrows lifted. “Just a kiss?”

  “Just that.”

  “The bargain is struck,” she said.

  “And answered,” he growled.

  Carling put a hand onto his shoulder as she prowled to stand in front of him. Then she slid her hands along the warm sun-bronzed skin of his jaw. She tilted his handsome wild face up to hers and he let her. Then she bent to place her cool lips on his hot carved lips.

  Her body moved in the impulse to breathe again, and she allowed it. His masculine Power enveloped her, and it was spiced with sensuality and warmth as it caressed her like a sun-filled breeze.

  She lifted her head and stared down at him. She narrowed her eyes. She said, “You’re still not really kneeling inside.”

  Tap, tap, went her bare foot.

  He cocked an eyebrow.

  “What else did you expect, Carling?” he replied. “That wasn’t a real kiss.”

  THREE

  Her eyes narrowed further. “What do you mean, that wasn’t a real kiss?”

  Rune drew back a few inches to consider her more closely. She had to know, didn’t she? She was far too old and sophisticated not to. She had, after all, spent her youth in human-kind’s earthy past. She must have taken countless lovers. The lion in him bared its teeth and hissed at the thought.

  Sparks of temper had begun to flicker in those long almond-shaped Egyptian eyes of hers. Rune widened his own gaze. He was greedy to suck in every detail of this gorgeous deadly woman. He didn’t want to blink and miss a moment.

  Somehow Carling managed to make the concepts of beauty and perfection seem mundane. He took in the long glossy dark hair that swung free to her slender waist. It had rich auburn glints in the sun, as though she burned with a deep internal fire. He contemplated the graceful length of her neck, plunging as it did to curvaceous collarbones that spread outward toward shapely shoulders like the wings on a dove. He sensed the ripe fullness of her unbound breasts moving underneath the loose black caftan, and snap, the shutter in his mind took him back to the river when he had stared at those bare round voluptuous globes, striped with white scars and crowned with dark nipples standing erotically erect, and when he had looked at her, he had felt a need so stark it had become a physical pain and a spiritual torment.