“Nope.” He kept walking, his eyes constantly scanning for danger. “Came with my dermoire when I was twenty. First person I touched was Sin, and it didn’t affect her. Second person dropped dead. I thought it was a heart attack or something. Not that I cared. I was crazed at the time.”
“Crazed?”
He paused, head up, black eyes scanning, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood at attention. “Along with the dermoire came an uncontrollable lust and that fun rage.” He started moving again, as if he’d never stopped.
“It all happened suddenly?”
“Yeah.” His voice was gruff. “Sin and I shared our grandparents’ house for a year after they died. One morning we both were struck with this massive pain. Went on for hours. When it was over we had new tats, and I was a raging monster.” He kicked at a steaming, softball-sized stone. “I scared her pretty bad. Tore up the house. I guess I took off, was gone for days. I don’t remember much of it, except bits and pieces I wish I didn’t remember.”
She started to reach for him, but dropped her hand to her side at the last second, unsure if he’d appreciate a comforting gesture. “I’m sorry.”
“Whatever. It was a long time ago.”
Maybe, but it was obviously still painful. “What happened to Sin? I mean, if you went nuts, did she?”
“I don’t know.” He launched a morning star in a smooth motion that barely registered until a winged demon fell out of the air in front of them, the blade bull’s-eyed in the center of its third eye. This place was going to give her a heart attack. He, on the other hand, was acting as if they were strolling through a park. “We’ve never talked about it.”
Never talked about it? Idess and Rami had discussed everything. Nothing was off-limits for them. Granted, they’d spent centuries together, and Sin and Lore had only a fraction of that, but it still seemed odd, given how protective they were of each other.
She watched him fetch his weapon and wipe it clean on the creature’s leathery skin. “What did she say when you finally went home?”
Tucking the star into a leather hip housing, he picked up the pace. “We’re almost there.”
“Lore,” she said, catching up to him, “what did she say?”
He patted down his jacket and cursed. “I forgot my claw darts.” Silence stretched as he kept walking. Finally, a long, drawn-out sigh came from him. “I betrayed and abandoned her. It’s ugly, and I don’t like going back there.”
She grabbed his arm and forced him to stop. “Tell me you’ve apologized.”
He frowned down at her. “What’s it matter to you?”
“It’s just… if you don’t, you might never get the chance. And you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.”
“You sound like you know something about that,” he murmured, but somehow she heard him over the growling earth and bone-chilling shrieks that came at them from all sides.
“I do.”
His eyes were in constant motion, alert and seeking out potential threats, but he also seemed to be making a conscious effort to not look at her. “She knows I’m sorry.”
“Are you sure about that?”
His frown deepened. “I’m paying for what I did every day of my life.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“Trust me, it is.” Something screeched nearby, making her jump. “She knows.”
“How?”
“God, you’re persistent,” he muttered. She crossed her arms over her chest and started to tap her foot, but when the ground protested with a bark, she froze and decided she might make Lore carry her the rest of the way. “I’m an assassin because of her, okay? She got herself into trouble with Detharu thirty years ago, and she came to me. We hadn’t seen each other in about seventy-five years, which should tell you how desperate she was. He was planning to sell her into service at a blood gallery.”
Idess’s stomach turned over. Oh, sweet Jesus. She’d never been to what was a demon version of an opium denslash-whorehouse, but she’d heard enough about them to understand Sin’s fear. Some humans and demons participated willingly, but others were forced. They would be given drugs and then turned into the “pits,” where blood-feeders like vampires could drink and get high while using the humans for sex. Each gallery had different rules governing the treatment of the humans, but even in the strict establishments, accidents and overdoses happened. In the worst places, the humans were disposable, rarely surviving more than a day, or even beyond one customer.
“What did you do?” she asked hoarsely.
“Tried to find a way out of the assassin bond. When we couldn’t, I went to him and offered myself as an assassin in trade for her life. And now her life is on the line again.”
“I don’t understand.”
“She’s why I have to knock off Kynan.” His voice became so deep and ominous that it vibrated. “If I do it, we both go free. If I don’t, she dies.”
Idess’s hands went white-knuckled on her weapon and somehow she managed to speak past the swelling lump of panic in her throat. “Lore? If your master wasn’t holding Sin’s life over you, would you still want to kill Kynan?”
“Want to? Yeah.” He laughed bitterly. “But would I? No.”
“Why not?”
He looked off into the distance, his gaze going somewhere she couldn’t follow. “Because my brothers might be assholes, but they’ll be good for Sin. And I kinda hoped… I mean, they’re immune to my touch… but whatever. Killing Kynan is going to polarize everyone. It already has.”
Emotion joined the lump of panic that clogged Idess’s throat, as he started walking again. Lore had wanted some kind of relationship with his brothers, and he might have had a chance if he hadn’t been set against them… she stumbled to a halt. Lore turned around.
“What now? I’ve already told you more than I should have.”
“It’s not that,” she said. “Listen… all along I’ve believed that the hits put out on my Primori were about me. But what if this isn’t about me at all? What if it’s about you?”
“Ah… why would it be about me?”
“Well, you or your brothers. I mean, what are the odds that you were chosen to kill Kynan? Don’t you think it’s quite the coincidence that he happens to be related by marriage to your brother? And look what the job is doing to you and them. It’s tearing everyone apart. So what if this is about getting to you guys?”
Lore whistled through his teeth. “Wouldn’t be the first time. I was originally hired to kill them by our own brother. But why sic Sin on one of your other Primori? The warg didn’t have anything to do with me or my brothers.”
“That is the one kink in my theory.” She shook her head. “And wait, did you say you were hired to kill your brothers? By your brother?”
“Yup.” He ran his gloved hand down his face. “Sick bastard wanted revenge on them so badly that he arranged for their deaths even in the event of his own death.”
Idess considered that. “So he’s dead then? He couldn’t be the one who is behind this?”
“According to Shade, the guy is as good as dead.” They started walking again.
She blew out a breath. “Okay, so there has to be another answer. Your involvement in something that’s putting your brothers at odds is just too convenient.”
He shrugged. “I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough. The summoning area is just ahead.”
“Wait.” A screaming itch flared up between her shoulder blades. She wasn’t sure if she should be happy that her evil-detection system was working, or worried because it was. “Something’s wrong.”
Lightning quick, Lore’s hands were gripping blades. “The ground is silent.”
“Angel flesh is sweeeeet.”
Idess whirled around to see two demons of unknown species peel away from the stone ledges. Dark gray and about eight feet tall, they were thin, spindly, with pitted, crocodilelike snouts and sharp, pointed scales covering their bodies.
She heard a whisper of air, and then Lore’s blade punched through one of the demon’s chests. The thing laughed. The other one ripped a scale off its arm and launched it like a Frisbee. Idess threw herself to the ground, her breath hissing out of her at the sting as it grazed her cheek.
“Stay down!” Lore shouted, but if he thought she was going to cower while he fought, he was crazy.
Heart pounding, she leaped to her feet. Lore ducked a swipe from one of the creatures, its claws catching air. The second strike hit him in the face, and he catapulted backward, slamming into a rock ledge.
Enraged, Idess attacked, swinging her scythe at the closest creature and catching it by surprise. The blade lopped off its arm. Black sludge spewed from the wound and splatted on the shrieking ground. She swung again, but the second demon attacked, its jaws clamping down on Idess’s shoulder. Pain surged, and as her concentration broke, the summoned weapon shimmered out of existence.
The demon released her with a screech and crumpled to the ground. Lore stood behind it, his eyes swirling gold and crimson, his gloved hand flexing. That death thing he did was beyond frightening.
“Down!” he shouted, and Idess ducked, narrowly avoiding a Frisbee scale as she summoned another scythe. Two more scales whistled through the air, and she heard a grunt as Lore took one.
A clawed hand came out of nowhere and knocked her feet out from under her. The air whooshed from her lungs and her ears rang as she fought to reorient herself. Another demon, a newcomer, lunged at her. She rolled, swept her weapon up in a violent arc. Flesh ripped as she split the thing in half from its crotch to its neck. Entrails and blood poured down in a gruesome rain.
Idess scrambled to her feet to avoid being crushed by the dying demon as it fell. Lore, bleeding from a nasty gash in his chest, was engaged with the armless creature, his blade swiping at it as he tried to get closer. The demon had caught on, and it moved in blurs of motion as it avoided Lore’s killing arm.
Idess swung her scythe, but the blade struck only empty air. The thing danced around them, an odd, scratchy noise emanating from its chest.
“It’s calling more,” Lore panted. “We have to kill it. Now.”
Idess lunged, but once again, her scythe caught wind. Forcing herself to calm, she breathed deeply, studied her opponent the way Rami had taught her to do. Study the landscape. The air. Anything that could be used to her advantage.
The shadows… Idess frowned, and though she scarcely had time to pause, she watched the shadows form and fade… and, yes! Their sequence made sense now—they moved before the demon did.
The demon’s shadow flickered in range of her weapon. She swung with all her strength, and the creature’s head plopped to the ground.
Panting, Lore bent over, braced his hands on his knees, but he looked up at Idess, a grin splitting his handsome face. “You’re awesome, babe.” He straightened and grabbed her hand. “Come on. We have to get out of here before more of those things come for us.”
“You’re injured—”
“So are you. Our injuries will be gone in a minute. Hurry.”
She didn’t understand, but now wasn’t the time for twenty questions. They ran until they rounded a corner that opened up into a flat, steaming plain.
“This is the summoning area. It’s called the killbox.” He gestured to two brimstone pillars, around which opossumlike, eyeless creatures skittered. “Those are guardians. Anyone with deceptive thoughts is ripped apart. There’s the altar. You’ll need to offer your blood.”
Gingerly, Idess picked up the dagger lying atop a blood-stained, flat stone. She put the sharp edge to her skin, but he gripped her wrist.
“I would do it myself if I could.”
His stare was intense, full of a masculine promise that took her breath and made her heart race. And then, as though he hadn’t just sworn to endure the pain for her when he had every reason to wish her harm, he released her and stood back, a silent sentinel, all power and muscle and confidence. Idess was more than capable of taking care of herself, but for the first time since Rami had left her, someone had her back, and it felt good. Lore was ready to protect her, even if it meant risking himself.
He’d been so wrong when he said he was a terrible person.
Her hand shook as she drew the blade across her wrist and let her blood drip onto the stone. Once a pool the size of a coffee cup rim had formed, a ring of light flashed all around the wet puddle.
“It’s done.” Gently, Lore put pressure against the cut with the palm of his hand. “I wish I had Eidolon’s gift. I wish I could heal you.”
“I wish you could, too.” Only she wasn’t talking about a mere cut. Her heart and soul hurt, and the only cure could be found in Heaven.
A wet slurping noise preceded a dark-skinned, humanoid female who emerged from the sleek archway like toothpaste from a tube. Suppressing a shudder, Idess pulled away from Lore. She hated Sheoul… the smells, the sounds, the denizens. Everything here was warped.
Steam swirled around the female’s feet as she stopped before Idess. “Are you inquiring about a single killing? A mass killing? Is the victim human or demon? A quick death, or a painful one?”
Nice. “None of the above. I must meet with the Guild.”
The demon’s jaw dropped, revealing a forked, gray tongue. “You are either joking or are very, very stupid.”