Dark Swan Bundle (5 page)

Technically, however, it was just one of the gentry. Some of them could not pass physically into our world, just as some shamans could not cross physically into theirs. Gentry not wanting to come in spirit but lacking the strength to come over with bodies intact would sometimes cross in an altered, flawed form. An elemental form.

Of course, the thing was, any gentry not strong enough to come physically was not even close to being as strong as me. I could kick any elemental's ass easily. Well, if I had the right tools, of course.

At the moment, all I had—aside from my own physical strength—was my jewelry, which was more defensive than offensive. All of my weapons had been left at home, save my wand, which was in my purse. Unfortunately, my purse still sat over by the door where it had been dropped immediately upon entering the room, lest it hinder Kiyo and me ripping each other's clothes off.

A dilemma, truly. But the ice elemental could see we were awake now, and a cold smile—seriously—crossed its face.

Screw this. I was going to have to make a move for the door and hope I was faster than it. I started to tell Kiyo just to stay still, but suddenly he leapt from his lounging position and nailed the elemental squarely with a kick straight to the solar plexus.

The elemental flew backward, hitting the wall, and for a moment, I could only stare. I'd barely seen Kiyo move. One minute he was with me, the next he was on the elemental. And was he on it! I mean, I was stronger than a lot of people, but I could not have landed that blow. I knew of few who could. It was my will or weapons that fought a creature like this in the end, not my body. How had Kiyo done that? I stared at him incredulously, then realized I was missing my window here.

I sprang from the bed, slipping out of Kiyo's reach. “No, Eugenie! Stay away!”

I made it to the door, but the elemental was getting up. Its eyes focused on me, and my stomach lurched, knowing I had attracted this creature here and possibly put Kiyo at risk. The elemental gave a tinny laugh as it watched me empty out the purse onto the floor.

“Yes, Eugenie Markham, stay away. Stay away, little swan.” It took a step toward me.

Frantically, I searched for the wand. Where had all this shit in my purse come from?

“How do you know my name?” I asked, hoping to distract it. Gentry, no matter their form, loved to hear themselves talk.

“Everyone knows your name. And everyone wants you.” I'd never thought a walking chunk of ice could look lascivious, but this one pulled it off. I shuddered and not from the cold. “But I see someone has already tasted you tonight. No matter. I don't mind following in another's wake, nor will I be the last to spread those soft legs—”

The creature was so fixated on me and what it wanted to do to me that it'd forgotten about Kiyo. Kiyo had surveyed the room during the exchange, and I'd seen his eyes rest on a tall, wrought-iron lamp. His eyes glittered with a dark heat, almost frightening in its ferocity. With the elemental distracted, Kiyo dashed for the lamp, again moving with incredible speed, and then in one motion, swung it at the elemental, hitting it with the force of a tank.

A large chunk of ice broke from the elemental's body, and it roared in agony. Iron or steel will always hurt the gentry, regardless of which world they walk. I wondered if Kiyo had known that. The elemental lunged at him, and the two of them wrestled on the floor, rolling over and over as they struggled to land a hit. Kiyo fought savagely, and each time he dug his fingers into the monster, it would hiss in pain.

I had my wand now and advanced toward the two of them. I thrust it out, making it an extension of my arm. With alcohol still metabolizing in my body, as well as me being physically exhausted, I knew I couldn't destroy the elemental, but I could sure as hell send it back to the Otherworld.

The air tingled around me, and again I smelled ozone. The elemental realized what I was doing and released Kiyo, trying to stop me. Kiyo did not let his prey go so easily, however, and moved forward, his foot again connecting with the creature—this time on the back. The weakened elemental stumbled to its knees.

I could usually do expulsions on my own, but tonight I needed a little divine help. “By Hecate's grace, I cast you from this world. In Hecate's name, I return you to your own realm.” The elemental screamed its fury, but it was already dissolving. “Leave here, and return no more, you fucking bastard.
Go.”

The elemental shattered in an explosion of ice. Some of the crystals grazed my skin, cutting it. An onlooker might have thought it had been destroyed, but I had only damaged its elemental manifestation. It had gone to the Otherworld in its own body.

I could hear the blood pounding in my ears, adrenaline surging through me. Another creature had known my name. And like the keres, it had seemed terribly interested in me in a…Biblical way. Bleh.

But I had more pressing problems. Slowly I turned to stare at Kiyo who was watching me with equal caution, taking in my posture and the charged wand in my hand.

Kiyo.

Dark, sexy Kiyo, who had wooed me in the bar and just given me the best sex of my life.

The same Kiyo who had just fought an elemental with more strength and speed than I ever could have mustered—more than any human could have mustered. He had also not turned into a blabbering, shocked idiot like most humans would have—
should have
—around an elemental. He had seen one before. He knew what it was, just as he knew what my wand and incantations were.

What had earlier seemed like a passionate encounter for me suddenly had a vile edge. Fear traced my spine as we stared at each other, neither of us certain what to do. The words were on my lips, but he asked them first.

“What are you?”

The fact that we were having a standoff while completely naked might have been hilarious under ordinary circumstances. But these were not ordinary circumstances, and even my twisted sense of humor had its limitations.

“Me?” I demanded. “What about you? You're not a veterinarian. Veterinarians give dogs rabies vaccines. They don't throw elementals around.”

Kiyo regarded me levelly. “And Web designers don't banish elementals to the Otherworld.”

“Yeah, well, sometimes I moonlight.”

The faintest ghost of a smile flickered across his face. He relaxed a little, found his pants, and pulled them on. Not me. I stayed rigid and ready to strike. I was also trying very hard to think of him only as a potential threat, not as the man I'd just slept with. Because if I thought about that, I might falter. Worse, I might have to face the fact that I had just let a creature of the Otherworld—

His pants now on, he approached me. “We need to talk about this—”

“No. Don't get any closer.” If I could have cocked the wand like a gun, I would have.

“What are you going to do? You can't cast me out. It won't work.”

I hesitated, wondering about that. He seemed so human. He had felt human. I hadn't sensed anything from him like I would one of the gentry, yet his speed and strength had been superhuman. And that wasn't even counting his unholy stamina. That should have been a dead giveaway right there.

“What do you want from me? Why did you bring me back here?”

His eyebrows rose. “I thought it was obvious. I wanted to have sex with you.”

“No, damn it! There's more to it. What's going on? What are you trying to get from me?” My cool demeanor was plunging rapidly. “Did someone send you?”

“Look, Eugenie, just put the wand down. We'll talk. We'll figure this out.”

“I thought you couldn't be cast out,” I reminded him. “Why are you afraid of the wand? Maybe the Otherworld couldn't hurt you…but what about the Underworld?”

He didn't answer. I sent my will into the wand and felt the air crackle with power. Fear crossed Kiyo's face. So. He was afraid. That was all I needed to know. The words were on my lips to send him to the crossroads, but suddenly he moved with that rapid speed I'd seen earlier. He backed up toward the sliding glass door, opened it up, and then ran out and over the edge of the balcony.

A small scream escaped me in spite of myself. We were three floors up. I dropped the wand and dashed off to the balcony, peering around on the ground for him. No way could he have survived that uninjured.

Yet, there was no sign of him. A few bats flew up over the eaves of the building, and around the far side of it, I saw the flicker of headlights. A coyote howled from far out in the desert, and a cat slunk into the shadows. There was life out here but not the kind I sought. With a lot of maneuvering, I hung over the side of the balcony, making sure he wasn't hiding under it like escaping people often did in movies. Nope. Nothing.

I gazed back over the desert, wondering what had happened to him. It was possible he could have “jumped” figuratively to the Otherworld. He'd have to be a very powerful gentry to do that without a thin spot nearby, but similarly, a strong gentry would have also been able to hold a perfect physical shape in this world. I supposed it was also possible someone so powerful could pass themselves off as human. I hadn't encountered any who were that strong.

Walking back inside, I sat on the bed cross-legged, wrapping my arms around me. The residual ice from the elemental had melted into small puddles. The bed smelled like Kiyo and sex, and I swallowed down the nausea building within me. Oh God. What had I done? Had I had sex with a monster? Had I had sex with the very kind of thing I hunted and hated and killed? Kiyo had spoken to me about honesty, yet it seemed to have all been a lie. At least it had been safe sex.

Worst of all, I had liked him. Really liked him. When was the last time that had happened? Dean and I had seemed to date and sleep together simply because neither of us had anything better to do. With Kiyo, I had started to feel a real connection. Real chemistry. His betrayal hurt me deeper than I liked to admit.

I opened my eyes, thinking. Most gentry were too technologically inept to function seamlessly in the human world, yet he had navigated it well. He'd had a car back at the bar, one we'd passed over in favor of letting me drive. He'd also had a wallet and cash to pay for drinks and the condoms. And if he was checked into a hotel, he had to have a credit card. Credit cards were traceable. If he had a dual life in our world, I should be able to find out something.

I picked up the phone and hit the button for the front desk.

“Good morning, Mr. Marquez,” a pleasant desk clerk answered.

Kiyo Marquez. It was a start.

“Um, actually this is Mrs. Marquez. I was wondering if you could tell me if my…husband already prepaid for the room?”

A pause while she looked it up. “Yes, he did upon check-in. He left the same card on file for incidentals.”

“Can you tell me the number on the card he used?”

A longer pause. “I'm sorry, I can't give that out to anyone but the cardholder. If you can put him on the phone, I can tell him.”

“Oh…I don't want to bother him. He's in the shower. I just wanted to make sure we weren't maxing out the wrong card.”

“Well…I can tell you it's a Visa ending in 3011.”

I sighed. That wouldn't do me much good, but I doubted I'd get more from this woman. “Okay. Thanks.”

“Is there anything else I can help with you?”

“Yeah…can you connect me to room service?”

I ordered breakfast on Kiyo and then showered while I waited for it to show. I needed to wash away the sweat, to wash away the scent of his body on mine. When the food arrived, I munched on toast and ransacked the room for some kind of evidence. Kiyo's wallet had been in his pants, so that was gone. He had no other personal possessions in the room, save the other discarded clothing from last night. I explored every drawer and nook, just in case he'd hidden something away.

The sun was well up over the horizon when I finally left the hotel. When I arrived back home, I called Lara and told her his name. I asked her to see what connections she could find to it, Phoenix, and vets. She excelled at that kind of thing, but I knew it might take a few days. Fortunately, a career in banishing and destroying is a great way to relieve frustration while waiting.

My first job the day after the Kiyo incident involved frisking a marid out of someone's bathroom. Marids are one of the djinn—genies to most Americans—and are tied to the element of water. Like the keres and most other djinn, marids tend to occupy some sort of physical object. Only, rather than a bottle or lamp, they prefer someplace wet—say, like, a sink pipe.

Annoyed at being troubled with such an idiotic task, I cast my circle in the large, black-tiled bathroom and used the wand to yank the marid out of the pipe. She materialized before me, looking very much like a human female, save for her death-pale skin and rippling blue hair. A silk dress hung from her body.

I saw her tense up, instinctively ready to lash out at me with her power. Then she did a double take, sizing me up from head to toe. A funny look came over her face, and moments later, she lit up with a schmoozing smile. She swept me a low bow.

“My lady,” she said grandly. “How may I serve you?”

“You can't,” I told her, holding up the wand.

She kept the smile, but there was tension in it. “Of course I can. I have the ability to conjure up riches and other wonders. I can make your dreams—”

“Stop it. I'm not falling for this.”

The myths about djinn granting wishes aren't entirely fabricated. She wasn't all-powerful, but she could definitely pull some tricks out of her hat. When faced with danger, a djinn's most common strategy is to try bargaining with the enemy. Unfortunately, the “wishes” they grant rarely turn out the way others expect.

Uneasily, she backed up toward the wall. She hit the edge of the circle first. Glancing around, she realized she was trapped. The smile slipped, replaced by true fear.

“Surely there's no need for violence,” she said. Her eyes widened. “Please.”

I stared. I rarely had Otherworldly creatures beg for mercy. I hesitated for a moment, then my Kiyo-induced bad mood took over. I poured my will into the wand, ready to push her through the gate.

She felt the power charge up in the air and kicked into true self-defense mode, now that she realized her wheeling and dealing wouldn't work. Her magic trickled into the circle. It reminded me of mist or fog, a soft dampness filling the air. I blinked in surprise. I didn't usually sense magic in this way. Most often, I felt Otherworldly power as a tingle or a pressure. This was tangible.

She saw my surprise. Her eyes widened with hope. “You see? You have no need to tear me apart. Like calls to like.”

Like?
I was puzzled but didn't hesitate to take advantage of her distraction. Her magic might be weaker in my world, but I still didn't want to fight it head-on. Far easier to deal with her this way.

A moment later, I had made my connection to the Underworld. She grew more pale when she realized I'd used my wand to ensnare her and begged me again for mercy. Gritting my teeth, I thought about the way Kiyo had used me and grew angrier. No. No quarter for Otherworldly creatures.

And yet…staring into her eyes, I recalled the brief feel of mist from her magic.
Like calls to like.
I didn't know what that meant, but it had struck me. At the last possible second, I decided to spare her after all—in a manner of speaking. There was no way I could allow her to stay in this world. Instead, I shifted my focus to the Otherworld and sent her over there in entirety, rather than giving her instant death via the Underworld.

When it was all over, I stared at the empty bathroom, wondering what had come over me. “Going soft,” I muttered.

It took Lara awhile, but she found something about Kiyo a few days later, the same day I decided to go see Roland and break the news that I was going to go after Jasmine. Something about that encounter with Kiyo and the elemental in the room had made me decide I couldn't leave that poor girl to the mercy of the Otherworld. Roland might not like it, but he couldn't stop me, not anymore. My powers had surpassed his awhile ago. I also intended to ask him about my newfound status as bachelorette of the year in the Otherworld.

At least in the few days since being with Kiyo, there had been no other attacks specifically targeted at me. Wil had left a million messages with Lara, but we'd been putting him off. I'd had only a handful of small jobs: one banishing and a couple of exorcisms. I could almost have said it was a slow week. Not much was happening while I waited.

What also wasn't happening was any healing of the scratches on my back. The blood had dried up and scabbed a little, but the marks didn't fade at all. They stayed red and angry-looking, although they didn't hurt. Every morning I would look at them, hoping they had disappeared. They never did.

I harbored a secret thought that if the scratches went away, so would my feelings about Kiyo. I couldn't stop thinking about him. I'd spend my days venting and fuming over him, and at night, scandalous dreams would play through my head, making me wake up hot and restless. I didn't know what was wrong with me. I'd never behaved this way, especially with a guy who represented everything I stood against.

“I finally turned up a Kiyo Marquez at a vet hospital in Phoenix,” Lara told me as I drove out to my mom's house. “I had to call around a lot. They say he doesn't work a full schedule there and is on vacation for the next two weeks. I couldn't get anything else. His address and phone number are unlisted.”

I thanked her and pondered this. So Kiyo hadn't completely lied. He had a job, a very human one. It still didn't mesh with what I'd observed or knew.

I saw my mom bent over in her garden when I arrived, requiring me to sneak inside quietly so I could speak with Roland in private. I found him in the kitchen, almost exactly in the same place as last time.

We exchanged greetings, and then I dove in, deciding to save the Jasmine thing for last.

“More of them know my name. I've fought with two now who knew me as more than Odile. I also heard about a third who knew who I was.”

“Were the attacks specifically targeted at you, then? Like revenge attacks?”

“One was. The other was part of a job. Why? Did they come looking for you when your name got out?”

“A little. Inconvenient, but not the end of the world.”

“The weird thing here…”

“Yes?”

“Well…they've also sort of been, like, soliciting me…”

He arched an eyebrow. “Like for sex?”

“Yeah.” Roland undoubtedly had done all sorts of sexual things in his life—most with my mother, God help me—but he was enough of a father figure that I didn't feel entirely comfortable discussing such things with him.