Howler's Night (6 page)

“So you know how this ends?”

“Not really. Reading the future doesn’t mean shit. In fact, I hate dealing in what hasn’t happened because there are so many variables to take into account. For instance, I see your death in one. I see hers too, but in another I see you and her remaining partners in crime for many millennia more. Then there’s a third one where she...” He made a cutting motion across his throat and grinned. “Like I said, a million different factors. Only as the threads converge and the time draws nigh for the future to become the present can I make an absolute determination on how things will go.”

“Makes sense. But you haven’t answered my question.”

He shrugged. “Creatus is the Triad’s den of inequity. It’s where they take those things they deem significant. The one they have here in the Catskills ain’t their only one either. That network is extensive and vast, and woe to any caught in that spiderweb.”

I knew they wanted Pandora—Grace had as much as told us that already. I shrugged. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

“Okay, she’s the first one to ever walk out of there alive.”

“Wait.” I held up my hand. “You sent someone in after her?”

“Hannah. Level ten witch, yeah.” He scratched his jaw. “She had to be powerful enough to attract their attention. She was good people.”

My eyes narrowed as my blood ran cold. I was a killer; death didn’t turn me squeamish, but I’d never talked about it in such blasé terms either. “You sent her there knowing she’d die?”

“Yeah.” He sighed. “It was either her or her brother. I will never understand the vagaries of love. She could have opted out, but instead she chose to take his place. Whatever.” Dean shook his head slowly, and finally I could see the cold-hearted killer beneath the mask. Death meant nothing to him. “The plan was the same. Give her the journal, so that she could remember.”

“Remember what?”

“The truth. Your demon’s been brainwashed to within an inch of her life. The Triad wants you dead, boy, and they figured the easiest way to ensure it happened was to make your little spitfire the one to pull the trigger.”

I didn’t look at anything in particular as I tapped my fingers absentmindedly on the countertop. The only person in the world I would ever let my guard down with is Pandora. “Why do they want me dead?”

The list of reasons was long, I was sure. My soul was still not my own, I was a rogue Priest, I was in bed with the enemy... far too many reasons. But if he could help me narrow it down, it would help.

“Cause you picked your side, King, and it wasn’t theirs.”

“So the Triad is part of the Order, an enterprise built to defend humankind, and yet they’re actively trying to bring about the end of the world. Why?”

I knew the answer to that question, what I wanted to know was if
he
knew the answer to that question. Just how much could I trust him?

His smile was secretive. “Not gonna make it that easy on you, bub. Trust me, or don’t. But I’m only here to take a couple pawns off the board, nothing more.”

“Then tell me something you
can
say.”

His grin grew wide. “Ask me about her book.”

“Where’s her book?”

Dean punched me on the shoulder; I glanced down at the spot and shook my head. This guy had been among humans too long. He was completely off his rocker, but there was something about him I liked even though I knew he was about as docile and tame as a high caste demon lord.

“Where she needs it most.”

“And that is?”

“Her cage, of course. You see, I just reset the game board, Priest. Checkmate.”

***

Pandora

I
slowly came to myself, feeling as though I’d just had another black out. But this time, instead of the haze of half-remembered memories, I saw a picture in my mind of the man with brown eyes.

My heart rate ratcheted up as I thought of him, and I grabbed my chest. The memory of it broke me out in a wash of need even while I felt a smothering sense of murderous rage.

I bit down on my lip and covered my ears with my hands, trying to shake the strange images loose. Then I noticed a book. I stared at it, feeling as though I’d seen it before.

It was a buff suede color, and some stenciling adorned the front. When I reached out to grab it, a miniature spark of lightning jumped from the stenciled words into the palm of my hand.

Hissing, I yanked my hand back and hugged it tight to my chest. I turned my face aside, but after a minute I caught myself looking back at it.

There was a compulsion burning inside me to open it.

I rocked on my butt and stared at it, growing more and more mesmerized with each second that ticked by.

Finally the curiosity was too much to bear, and I snatched it up, fully expecting to be shocked once again, but I wasn’t. With fingers that couldn’t seem to stop shaking, I cracked it open to the first page and started reading.

All accounts in this story are true. I didn’t have much time to get it all down. They’re coming for me. Tonight it’s going to be electroshock therapy, and I’m not sure I can handle another session. I’m breaking, Luc, they’re breaking me...

I know this is a long shot, the hope that maybe someone might actually find this journal, but the witch across from my cell said this journal will go to the one who needs it most, so I have to assume it’s you. Because the truth of what’s going to happen to our people after they kill me is something you’ll need to know. You need to warn the others what the Triad has planned...

My God, I can’t believe this has really happened. I fought so hard, I thought I had time... thought we had time. I thought we’d figured it all out. But we were fooled, right to the very end.

All I can say is I love Asher. I know why he did what he did when he stabbed me, and I forgive him. Luc, if you’re reading this, you have to tell him that because I know they will wipe all of this from my mind. I’ve seen them do it to others. Soon I’m going to be nothing but a shell, a vessel they will use to try and destroy everything I love. Forgive the Priest, Luc, you have to, you have no choice. Without him by our side we can never succeed.

My God... I know it all now. It’s so much worse than what we thought, the truth of it all... it’s so much worse.

My pulse was pounding so hard by the time I finished reading that I had to slam the book shut. I’d barely even begun, but already I felt something dark and malevolent slink through me. Something foreign and unpleasant, and deep down I knew all the answers were in that book.

A book written by my hand.

A journal I couldn’t remember ever penning.

I gazed on in horror at it sitting undisturbed by my foot, staring at it like it was a wild animal ready to snatch me up in its deadly jaws and devour me whole.

I knew I wasn’t going to like what I read inside, and that night I just didn’t have the energy to try.

Asher

S
he was asleep, tossing and turning and crying out in her dreams, flinging her arms wide, and begging them to stop.

I sat on the cot and watched her with my heart trapped in my throat. I knew I couldn’t go to her. I’d tried earlier in the night, and the moment I’d opened the cage, she’d very nearly ripped my throat out with her claws.

Pandora was damaged, and I couldn’t help but remember Luc’s words. Even though she was right here with me, it felt like she was dead because this woman before me was nothing like the one I’d known all my life.

Dean had poked his head into the room hours earlier motioning for me and saying that maybe being back here with her was only making it worse, but I couldn’t leave. I still didn’t really trust him.

It seemed no matter where I turned everyone wanted a piece of Pandora. Dean could be on our side for now, but who could say what would happen tomorrow, or the next day, or the day after that, when a new player entered the game, changing the rules all over again and turning a temporary ally into a merciless enemy?

So I stayed back there with her, watching helplessly from the sidelines as she convulsed and screamed for them to stop cutting.

At one point she’d jerked so hard she’d exposed an angry and deep scar in her thigh, and it’d been all I could do not to demand Dean tell me where Creatus was so that I could kill every single bastard in there.

Not only had she not healed from the wounds, but she was covered in more scars than even I was. Scrubbing my jaw, I squeezed my eyes shut and laid back down on the bed. If she had to suffer, so would I.

“You will never be alone again, little demon. Never again.”

My whispered words seemed to enflame her rage as she slammed her body against the spelled cage over and over, reaching her arms out, desperately trying to get at me.

The only good thing that’d happened when I’d entered the cage earlier was that I’d managed to swipe up her journal before being forced to lock her up again.

Grabbing the book off the floor, I tugged on the chain attached to the dangling light bulb overhead. The power of strong magic rippled off the journal. It was benign magic, not meant to harm. There was a compulsion to read the book laced within its spell, which was probably Dean’s purpose in sending Hannah in there to begin with.

I spent the rest of the night reading through the massive book. It was her story, but it was also our story. I blinked the heat from my eyes as I read her words to me, how she loved me, how she would never give me up, and that no matter how many times they cut her open she would fight like hell to protect my whereabouts.

Then came the day when her demons were stripped from her and she rejoiced at the loss of Pestilence but losing Lust made her cry for days on end. How everyday they would pump her name through her cell
—Ya-el, Ya-el, Ya-el—
until she was sure that Pandora was gone, transposed by the demon within.

Soon she began to speak of Wrath and how he must be saved from the tortures of Hell, how they must all be saved and bring the world into a new order of enlightment.

It wasn’t easy reading her words, feeling the desperation in them, watching her letters become more and more paranoid as time went on. Reading how she was unable, at one point, to remember whether I was real, or if I was some double agent sent to kill her when her guard was down.

Slowly but surely, her faith in me began to waver. Their indoctrination had completely taken hold, and by the end, the only words she could write were “Kill Asher” over and over. She cried out for Luc because he was the only true constant in her life, and the heart-shaped scar was the only thing saving the last of her sanity.

Taking a small break, I glanced over at her. She was finally sleeping soundly, with a fist pressed up beneath her cheek, reminding me of a tortured angel.

I knew this book would save her, but it could also hurt her. By the end of the journal, her brainwashing was so absolute that I feared reading these words would send her spiraling back into the lies.

Flipping back through the book, I looked for the spot where their lies began to supplant her true memories and attempted to rip those pages out, but they wouldn’t budge.

I couldn’t let her read those words; they were dangerous lies. Calling shadow to my palm, I tried to hide the final pages in impenetrable darkness, but the book’s spell was powerful and dumped the shadow off.

It’d been years since I’d spell cast. I’d learned the art centuries ago when I’d hunted down a rogue neph who’d dabbled in it. Walking back into the bar, I nodded at Dean, who was sitting by the door chatting with a were-panther who had half his face tattooed with tribal bands.

I still couldn’t fathom why Death would give us safe harbor, but I was also not fool enough to consider taking Pandora out of there as she was. Whatever cage Death had placed her in was powerful enough to withstand her attacks on it. At least in there I only had a handful of creatures to keep an eye on; on the outside I’d have a world to contend with.

Grabbing a pen and pad of paper, I turned without acknowledging him and headed once again to the pantry. Sitting back down on the cot, I closed my eyes and attempted to recall the spell.

I didn’t want to crack Hannah’s wards. It was a good spell that would eventually help Pandora weed through the lies in her head. What I wanted to do was force Hannah’s spell to recognize mine as friendly so that it would accept my shadow and not fight it.

It took me an hour of penning the words until I created one that I felt would be strong enough to slip through the ward.

Setting the pen aside, I brought the closed book to my lap, set my palm upon it, and took a calming breath, forcing all my fears, all my questions and anger, out. Spell casting was best done when the soul was at ease and the spirit calm.

“
Amicus sum, non hostem umbra tuas accipere.”
I spoke the Latin words with power, pushing all my will and desire into them. The palm of my hand heated with a gentle warmth that flowed through me.

Shoulders slumping with relief that the spell had opened itself to me, I smiled.

“Damned impressive there, Priest.”

I glanced up to note Dean standing just in front of me. It bothered me that I hadn’t heard him enter.

“Hannah was as powerful a witch as they came.”

Sighing, I leaned my head against the wall. “She was also human with human years. I’ve learned things in my life.”

Snorting, he crossed his arms and turned toward Dora. “You think hiding those words from her is the right answer?”

“What would you have me do? Feed her more of these lies?”

His lips twisted. “Just curious, I guess.”

“And if I hand her the lies, what happens?”

He shrugged. “Don’t know. Ball is still in her court. In the end the decision is hers.”

“So how am I supposed to get through to her?” I hated asking a stranger for advice, but in a case such as this, I didn’t have a clue what to do. My desperation to get her back as she’d been consumed me. Always a patient sort before, I found myself now at a crossroads emotionally.

“You asking what I would do?”

I flipped my hand out, silently acknowledging that I was.