Blood Stained Tranquility (26 page)

“Like I said. We need to speed this up. I know it hurts, but you can handle it.”

No sympathy. None. Not even when Eve cried out, her back arching as pure energy detonated inside her skull.

The last thing she heard was Ismini crying her name.

Then nothing
. Again
.

Chapter 19

Her knees scraped across the jagged stone floor. She was beyond weak. Pieces of the stone seemed hungry for her flesh, biting bits off. Her bent legs left a trail of red behind.

No, not
her
legs. She was having another vision. She was stuck in another replay of Zen’s past. Eve knew he’d been beaten again. She felt the wounds along his back and chest. His chained arms burned. Whatever was being fed into his system kept him bound.

Pain hit his synapses, but inside his mind Zeniel . . . wasn’t there. There was nothing but darkness—a complete absence of thought. His nervous system functioned, but his mind was gone. There was no reaction to anything, not even a spark of awareness.

His body was dumped in front of a wall. Stone grated against stone, the sound unbearable as the wall slid open.

A jolt, one single thought, so weak it was barely a whisper through Zeniel’s mind.

Not in there. Cold. No light.

The demons that had control of Zen lifted him. They flung him into the cell, weakening him further. The floor bit into his back when he landed, leaving new abrasions behind.

The door to the cell closed. Right before it did, Eve was able to catch a glimpse of the two demons that had hurt her male. Then, darkness surrounded Zen, leaving just the sound of his shallow pants. The flare of consciousness remained. Almost as if Zeniel was fighting to keep it with him.

His consciousness spread, his mind slowly catching up with his broken body.

Pain.

Everything hurt and blood continued to trickle from him, hot against the stone floor.

A voice drifted to him.

“Mavrak.”

Rage exploded in the back of his mind, trying to escape once more. He knew this. Knew this burn. Knew the feeling that reminded him of his heart breaking. The need to lash out clawed at him.

No. No. Cannot allow it . . . silence. Need the silence . . .

He groaned, turning onto his side and curling into himself. He couldn’t breathe. All he could feel was the searing pain of his internal and external wounds, and the scraping of the thing inside him.

He recalled the name Mavrak, but had no real idea who it was. Who
he
was. He tried to focus to get through the pain, but found he had no idea
what
he was either. All he had were the memories of the things he had done. And the roar in his head.

There was no way in hell he could ever forget that.

He desperately needed to keep hold of the quiet that he’d had upon waking. The physical wounds he could deal with. He could deal with a million more as long as his mind stayed quiet; as long as the roar remained silent.

“Mavrak?”

“No!” Tears leaked out of his injured eyes, making the gashes in his lids burn. “No more.”

A faint, prismatic light shone in the dark. “It has begun.”

Zeniel squeezed his eyes shut, trying to block out all the light, but the colors still shone around him: pink, hazel, aqua and light blue.

Someone knelt next to him. His panic receded, and his headache began to as well. He basked in the calmness that seeped from the creature before him. His starved psyche sucked it in, easing everything.

A hand caressed his forehead. Zeniel didn’t feel skin; he felt only a shock of energy in the shape of fingers. His back arched, the energy shooting down his spine.

And still, he was calm. Nothing hurt, all he felt was peace.

Then, that name left her mouth again.

“You do not wish to be called Mavrak anymore, do you?” Her tone was laced with sympathy, the words a whisper.

“No!” Zeniel cried, lashing out.

His arm encountered more of that shimmering energy, and when he opened his tortured eyes, he saw it passed through her form. Her transparent form.

The expression on her face was one of regret. “You cannot separate yourself entirely from him. I will not stop you if you decide to try, but I beg you not to.”

Zeniel shook his head, turning away from her. Just thinking about the being inside him made him sick. He didn’t understand it, but knew what it had done.

He despised it.

Visions of it tormented him; guilt blossomed and spread.

“Very well.” The female sighed and ran a hand down his back. He twitched. His wounds began to heal. “How about Zeniel? Would you prefer that?”

His breathing slowed. He moved and turned his head, his eyes focusing on the brunette apparition.

“I . . . yes. Zeniel.” Relief overtook his tone.

She smiled. “Your eyes. They have changed.” She stood, the edge of her skirt floating like smoke around her feet. “It is time. I shall send Dyletri for you. It is time we get you out of this forsaken place.”

He didn’t know who Dyletri was, but that wasn’t who he wanted. His mind rushed back to the vision he’d had right before he was taken out of the cell. Shaking his head, he sat up, the sudden movement making his visitor step back in surprise.

“Not him. N-need her . . .”

The transparent face burst into a delighted smile. “You remember what I showed you.”

“Called me . . . forth. Brown eyes. Need—”

“Understand this Zeniel, in order to be what she will need, you cannot shut your other half out. Not completely. You will lose her if you cannot accept what’s inside you.”

“No.
Protect
—”

She cut him off again, her face flashing with annoyance. “You stubborn male, I am trying to tell you. In order to protect her, you will need
all
of you.”

Zeniel shook his head. With a growl, he slammed his fist into the floor. His strength had begun to return; the stone beneath his fist cracked upon impact. “No. It is . . . a monster. Undeserving. Need her.
Now.
”

She placed her hands on her hips and sighed. “Fine. We shall do this your way. For now you are nothing but Zeniel. If the lie helps you stay calm, enjoy it. In the future, do not come to me and tell me I did not warn you. Your ‘Brown Eyes’ is thousands of years from being born. You are going to have to wait. And now . . . I am off to get Fertility, as in denial as he now is about his designation.”

The creature—Nylicia, he remembered her name was Nylicia—disappeared. Thankfully, her faint light remained long after she was gone.

What didn’t remain was the calmness she afforded him.

He almost doubled over as the noise threatened to start in his head again. Lying back on the cold floor, he focused on the dust particles floating in the remaining light. He forced his mind to visualize those brown eyes, and only those eyes. He needed to keep it together. He needed to get through this.

The memory disappeared instantly. One moment she had been trapped in it. The next, her eyes were wide open and she had sprung into a sitting position.

Evesse came eye-to-eye with white irises surrounded by a black rim. She blinked. Lids framed with navy blue eyelashes—unfairly thick, damn it—mimicked her. Recognition flared, and she went flying into the headboard.

It collapsed around her, leaving her blowing dust out of her face as she grabbed the nearest pillow and flung it at Ianthen. “The fuck is wrong with you? You scared me!”

From behind a floating cloud of feathers, Ianthen glared at her. “Was that necessary?”

Eve panted, her thoughts racing.

Ianthen leaned toward her. “Evesse, are you all right?”

From the corner of her eye, she saw the pieces of the pillow reconnecting, the feathers finding their way back inside. Even the ones on the floor floated back home as if magnetized. She rested her head against the reformed headboard, having one of those moments where her raised-human brain wondered how much more weirdness it could process.

You’re immortal now. You apparently have powers. Oh, and you’re having visions about your mate’s past. That’s how much more weirdness.

“Eve? Eve!”

“What the hell, dude?” she cried, destroying another pillow with his face.

“I don’t know whether to take you up on this blatant pillow fight invite you’ve extended me, or not. Then again, Zeniel would kill me. Give me the creepy red eye, and have my dick cut off.” With a mulish expression, Ianthen plucked a small feather off his eyelash and dropped it into the trail of pillows floating past them.

Eve stared at him. “You cut your hair,” was all she could come up with.

Ian raised a hand and ran it through his now short hair. The front was longer, styled in a small fauxhawk, but the rest was nothing more than a navy blue fade.

It gave him a rougher look. A dangerous one. As big as he was, and as animalistic as his presence could be, that haircut made him look like a hot brawler ready to beat down. And remembering what Soleria had said in the main hall about the ex-Viking
Sesengt
, Eve knew why he’d done it.

Sol . . . I pity you.

“Yeah,” Ian said, lowering his hand with a rueful smirk. “Do you think she’ll like it?”

He caught what he said too late, a scowl settling on his face. There was no need to ask who the “she” in question was.

“Ianthen, of course she’s gonna love it. Hell, if she doesn’t ride your face the moment she sees you, I will personally consider her insane. And will tell her so, too.”

Ian gave her a huge smile, his frustration mollified.

Good deed for the day done.

“Why are you here?”

“Because there was no one else to watch over you.”

Oh, great. Now she needed round the clock nannies? “And where is everyone?”

“Dyletri is with Ismini in their room. She’s fluctuating, bad—real bad.”

Reminded of what had just happened to her friend, Eve sat up, panic racing through her. “How is she? How bad is it? How long have I been out?”

Ianthen held up a hand. “Easy there. You were out for two days. Health wise Ismini’s all right. It’s her powers that are all over the place. Her room and anyone that comes near it . . . well, that’s the bad part. Everything keeps either changing color or into a different material altogether. Dyletri seems to be helping her control it some, though, so Vedlyl and Nylicia have advised that everyone else stay clear.”

“And Soleria? Where is she?”

Ianthen’s jaw twitched. He looked like he’d swallowed a bitter tasting rock and was in the process of forcing it down his throat. “She’s fine. She’s . . . consoling . . . Cyake.”

Oh.

Fuck.

“‘Consoling’ Cyake? And what exactly is wrong with him?” She wondered if it had to do with him being out of whack, and the old lady he claimed was haunting him.

Ian shrugged, turning his head. “I have no idea. I didn’t even know something was wrong with him.”

The statement had an echo the size of an atomic blast behind it. Two sentences, a million things left unsaid, and enough resentment behind them for Eve to clue in to what was happening.