The Nightwind's Woman (7 page)

She belonged body and soul to Randon Kayle,
the Nightwind demon who was now her master.

* * * * *

“I can hear you thinking,” he told her. “You
have a question?”

She glanced up at him as he lay there with
her in his arms. His face was dotted with perspiration and damp strands of his
dark hair hung attractively over his closed eyes.

Kenzi hid a yawn against his shoulder. “The
last one you guys showed me…?”

“The
wendigo
.”

“Yeah, him.”

“What of him?”

“Was he just showing off or was he trying
to scare the bejesus out of me?”

He opened his eyes. “What did you see when
you looked at the vid-com?”

“Before or after the Supervisor stepped up
to the screen?”

“What does that mean?”

“He changed from—”

“Not possible,” he stated with a shake of
his head. “He doesn’t have the ability to shape shift within the confines of
that cell.”

“Well, maybe you should tell him that
because he did,” she said.

The muscle in Randon’s shoulder tensed and
he scooted up in the bed so fast it startled her. He looked down at her with
such a hard glower it made her uneasy. “Describe to me what you saw,” he
ordered.

She frowned.

“Tell me!”

“All right,” she snapped. “He looked like
Declan Brady when I first saw him. After that, he was vile-looking with ragged
reddish-brown fur, fangs and a purple tongue.”

“Declan Brady,” he said. “The movie star?”

“Yes.”

“The twit who was named the sexiest man
alive last year?”

She grunted. “I’m surprised you know that.”

He clenched his jaw. “Is that the one?”

“Yes.”

His face was rigid as flint, his eyes cold
as ice as he stared at her. When he spoke, she thought she caught a glimpse of
fangs behind his full lips.

“He should not have had the ability to
change inside an iron-clad cell,” he said. “If he changed from a humanoid to a
beast he is something other than a
wendigo
. Something far more dangerous
and unpredictable and uncontrollable.” He moved his arm from around her, swung
his legs from the bed and stood. “When we brought him to ground, he bore the
appearance of that kind of demon. We had no reason to believe he was anything
other than what he presented.” He snatched his pants from the chair. “Obviously
he played us.”

“Then what is he?” she asked, drawing her
knees up, encircling them with her arms to hide her nakedness.

“I don’t know but I’m gods-be-damned sure
going to find out,” he snapped as he picked up his shirt and stalked barefoot
to the door.

“Where are you going?”

“To talk to the Supervisor then I’m going
to down to question whatever the hell it is that’s in that cell!”

The demon lifted his head as the Nightwind
left the female’s room. He smiled nastily for he knew the incubus would be
going straight to the Ridge Lord. It was only a matter of time before the two
of them came down to interrogate him.

His smile widened for he had a surprise for
the bastards. One that would wipe the smugness from their faces.

Threading his fingers together, he put them
behind his head and stared up at the matte finish of the titanium ceiling above
him. He could almost make out his likeness in the surface. Idly he wondered if
he should keep that image—for it was his true reflection—though no one save the
beautiful woman who had visited him earlier had ever seen that representation
of him in over two thousand years.

He’d surprised himself by showing himself
to her as he truly was.

“McKenzi,” he said softly.

She was a beautiful woman and though the
incubus believed he had Marked her as entirely his own, the demon knew better.
The Nightwind was as chaff in the wind. He was as insignificant as a being could
be and was about to be shown just how unimportant he really was.

As for the Ridge Lord…

Pricks of that Super Lord distinction
believed themselves nearly omnipotent. To them had been given great power—such
as being able to send the supreme evil of the Nikkeson back into its Megaversal
prison—but their power was limited.

They—Shadowlords, Deathlords, Ridge Lords
and the lone Gravelord—had very limited power compared to his own and he was
going to bring that home to them in a way they would never forget.

“Enjoy your innocence while you can,
assholes,” he whispered. “You have no idea what is about to come crashing down
upon your pointed little heads.”

* * * * *

“You’d better have a damn good reason for
barging into my office, Kayle!” the Supervisor snarled.

“He’s not a
wendigo
,” Randon said.

The Ridge Lord looked past Randon and
nodded at his assistant. The woman cast the Nightwind an annoyed glare then
left the two of them alone, closing the door behind her.

Alexandru Hesar—the man all but a handful knew
only as the Supervisor of Tearmann—tossed his pen to the desk top and leaned
back in his chair. “All right. If he’s not a
wendigo
, what is he?” he
questioned.

“I don’t know but we’d gods-be-damned well
better find out before all hell breaks loose!”

“Calm yourself,” the Supervisor said. “He’s
locked in an iron-clad cell, Kayle. He cannot escape and he cannot cause
trouble.”

Randon stomped to the desk, put his doubled
fists on the top and leaned toward the man for whom he worked on this plane of
existence. “I thought about it on the way down here,” he said. “We caught him
way too easily. I’m thinking he let us capture him.”

“Four men died in that takedown,” the
Supervisor reminded him with a sneer. “You think that was too easy? What?
Should more men have died?”

“I regret the loss of your men for the
sakes of the women who loved them but they knew what they were getting into
when they signed on to go after the creature. They knew their lives might be
forfeit, but think about it. Why did we not recover their bodies?”

“He consumed them,” the Supervisor stated. “That
is what
wendigos
do, Kayle. They eat human flesh.”

“
Wendigos
, aye, but what we have in
our prison is not one of that kind. Something isn’t tracking here,” Randon
stated. “He spoke to my woman. He called her by her name and told her he’d been
waiting for her.”

That got the Supervisor’s full attention.
He sat up. “And you’re just now telling me this?”

“I took her upstairs and claimed her,”
Randon said. “That was a priority.”

“For you, mayhap, but not for the
Consortium!” He got to his feet. “How the hell did he know her name?” he
demanded. “Or even know she was here?”

“Good question,” Randon said. “No one but
us has access to that level. Sustenance and food is sent down to the prisoners
via a one-way BlackMoon unit. There is no contact whatsoever between any staff
member and the inmate.”

“Which means if he knew about Delaney, he
got that information through psi powers that can bypass the iron prevention of
magic use.”

“Aye,” Randon agreed. “And that tells me he’s
got powers we can only guess at.”

* * * * *

“Powers you can neither predict nor
contain,” the demon said as he lay on his bunk listening to the conversation in
the Supervisor’s office as clearly as though the two asswipes were standing in
his cell. “Nor can you inhibit them.”

He made himself comfortable as he awaited
the arrival of the Ridge Lord and Nightwind. Although it would amuse him to
present himself to them as he had when he’d allowed them to capture him then
change, he knew his appearance as he really looked would unsettle them even
more.

He had a job to do on this plane and it was
a serious undertaking but there was—he mused—no reason why he couldn’t have a
bit of fun while he was doing what was needed.

He gave thought to the men who were
reportedly killed during his capture. He supposed he should bring them back
from the realm to which he’d sent them. It would be a measure of goodwill on
his part.

For there was the woman.

His woman, and he didn’t want her thinking
ill of him.

Well, his and the Nightwind’s, although he
doubted the incubus was going to see her as anything other than belonging solely
to him and him alone.

“Too bad,” he said aloud. “She is just as
much mine as she is yours.”

Nightwinds were not the sharing kind but
when it came to Blood-mates, that ancient concept took precedence over a mere
life-mate designation. In order to have the female at all, the incubi would
have no choice but to share her else lose her completely.

“And that’s going to really piss you off,
Kayle,” he said with a mean snort.

Her presence on Terra had been a very
pleasant surprise. He hadn’t expected to find her for another century or more.
That she was here at this time did not bode well for the inhabitants of the
backward little blue planet. Unless he pulled some necessary strings some
serious shit was going to go down and he wasn’t ready for it yet.

“Not a good time for you to be sprung on
me, McKenzi,” he stated. “Not a good time at all.”

He supposed he had his mother to thank. Generally
it was she and her vicious henchman who set such evil into play. If only the
quaint little two-legged animals strutting around this clueless world knew the
truth about what really lay behind what they called their religions…

He knew the exact moment the elevator
engaged on its downward glide to the lowest level. Not only could he sense the
two beings headed his way, he could smell them. Neither scent was agreeable to
his olfactory senses—the odors barely tolerable—but the stench let him know exactly
where they were at any given time.

Just as he knew where his woman was.

Her scent was as deliciously enjoyable as
the men’s odors were disgusting. The sweet smell of her perfume mixing with the
tang of her pheromones not only drew him like a moth to flame but sent coils of
unadulterated lust corkscrewing through him. From the moment he had sensed her
presence at Tearmann, he had wanted her with a desperation he was finding hard
to fight. She’d been near him for only a few hours but that time felt more like
years. Seeing her had been the single most gratifying moment of his long existence.

That he had frightened her—having had no
choice since the Ridge Lord had neared the viewing portal—saddened him. It had
been a necessary evil since he wasn’t quite ready for the Supervisor to know
who—and what—he was but it bothered him that he had caused McKenzi even a
moment of distress.

Ignoring the chatter between the incubi and
the Ridge Lord, he zeroed in on his female and smiled when he saw her sitting
in the oversized bathtub with a sponge lovingly being pressed across a pair of extraordinarily
beautiful breasts. The sight of the soap clinging to her taut nipples made his
mouth water and his cock leap.

“Soon, pretty lady,” he said, reluctantly
tearing his astral eyes from her luscious form for the elevator had arrived on
his level. He unhooked his fingers from behind his head and sat up slowly,
listening to the heavy tread of the incubi as his boot heels struck the
concrete floor.

So much unnecessary noise from an entity who
became a cat when he shifted.

Before the incubus reached the cell door, he
got one helluva nasty surprise. He found his way blocked by the spitting image
of the World’s Sexiest Man Alive. The look on the demon’s face was priceless as
he came to a skidding halt—amber eyes wide as saucers.

“Shit,” the Supervisor whispered as he too
became frozen in mid step, unable to move any of his limbs. He looked to the
Nightwind who was similarly immobile.

The prisoner the two men thought was locked
securely behind the titanium door was standing with his arms crossed over his
chest—legs spread wide—and the most evil smile either of them had ever seen on
his handsome face. Wearing only the prison-issued black cotton pajama bottoms
that allowed them to see the massive chest with its sharply defined and cut
abdominal muscles, the bulging biceps that rippled down from very broad
shoulders, he presented quite a roadblock.

“How did you get out of your cell?” the
Supervisor demanded.

“There is no cell capable of holding me,
Alexandru,” the prisoner replied. “Not even the one on Treigeilys.”

“That is absurd,” the Supervisor snapped. “Prysson
is—”

“He who holds the key secures the lock,”
the other man stated. “And the key is ever in my possession.”

The Supervisor’s eyes widened and his face
turned deathly pale. “You cannot be…”

Turning his gaze from the Supervisor to the
Nightwind, the prisoner grinned. “How fares it outside the Abyss, Randon Kayle?”
he asked. “A bit warmer and perhaps better smelling?”

Randon looked to the Supervisor. “Who is
this bastard?” He struggled to move forward but was held fast by some
undetectable barrier.

“You don’t know?” the prisoner queried. “You
are not as smart as I thought.”

The Nightwind whipped his head toward the
prisoner. “Get this hold off me and I’ll show you exactly what I am. I’ll fuck
your shit up!”

An infinitely slow, dangerous grin tugged
at the corners of the prisoner’s mouth. He uncrossed his arms and when he did,
the Nightwind stumbled forward, released from whatever was keeping him
immobile. The demon raised a hand and crooked his index and middle fingers at
Randon. “Come on, incubus,” he said. “Come fuck my shit up.”

Randon took two steps then went sailing
backward—all the way down the corridor—until his back slammed brutally into the
far wall and he slid to the floor.

“Wanna try that again?” the prisoner
inquired with an arched brow. He extended his hand then curled his fingers
together as though he were snagging them in the front of the Nightwind’s shirt
then pulled his arm toward him.

Randon left the floor—jerked up by an
invisible hand—and came flying toward the prisoner. He was drawn within a foot
of the man then was sent crashing back to the wall once more.

“Wanna try a third time, incubus?” the
prisoner asked with a laugh. “I can do this all day.”

“Leave him be,” the Supervisor said.

The prisoner cut his eyes to the
Supervisor. “Do you believe me now, Alexandru?”

“Why are you here?” the Supervisor
questioned.

Lowering his arm, the prisoner folded them
once more. “I let you bring me here.”

“And the men you slaughtered?”

The prisoner cocked his head to one side. “Did
you find their bodies?”

“You know fucking well we didn’t,” Randon
said. He was walking slowly, warily toward the man.

“That’s because they are alive and well. I’ll
bring them back to you without a single hair on their heads having been harmed.
I had no quarrel with them but it was necessary for me to perpetuate the ruse,
to have you believe me an infamous
wendigo
in order to be brought to
Tearmann.”

“Where you could not enter unless we
deactivated the Duaithníocht Seal to bring you in,” the Supervisor said. “At
least there is something that can thwart your powers.”

“I’m afraid you are wrong on that score,
Alexandru. The seal obscuring the building prevented me finding it, not
entering it. From now on, I can go and come as I please.”

“Who is this prick?” Randon demanded.

“Lord Kerreyder,” the Supervisor replied. “Lord
Kerreyder Abaddon, the archdemon who is the warden of Prysson. He who presides
over the punishment of those who rebel against Yn Drogh Spyrryd, the Evil of
Evils.”

“He who made it possible for you to be
removed from the Abyss,” Kerreyder stated. “Had it not been for me, Lilith could
not have removed you from my wardship.”

“I ask again. Why are you here?” the
Supervisor queried.

“You have creatures here and elsewhere on
Terra whom I have come to retrieve,” Kerreyder said. “Punishment awaits them in
the bowels of Prysson.”

“You mean torture awaits them,” Randon
snarled.

“Trust me, incubus,” Kerreyder said. “They
deserve what will be done to them once I have them under my authority.”

“To which creatures are you referring that
are here at Tearmann?” the Supervisor asked.

“Two of them are on this level,” was the
reply. “None with whom you need concern yourself at the moment. It is the three
not incarcerated here who need to be tracked down and taken back to Prysson.”

“And my woman?” Randon demanded. “Why did
you speak to her? And how the hell did you know her name?”

Kerreyder’s smile was purely evil. “You
mean my woman, don’t you?”