My Immortal Assassin (14 page)

“I touched her only for a moment, but it was enough. You are correct. She wasn’t whole in her mind. There are… anomalies. Christophe, or someone like him, has altered her memories.”

“He’s going to find out. He’ll know I saw her.”

“Gray,” he said softly. “It’s unlikely he’ll harm her.”

“You don’t know Christophe. What if he’s doing to her what he couldn’t do to me? What if he goes after my parents? What if he’s already done that?”

Durian grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her to face him. She didn’t want to feel this kind of emotional pain but she couldn’t seem to turn off her feelings this time. “Is your family still in the East Bay?”

She nodded. “I can’t see them.”

“Why not?”

“Because my father will know what I am. He isn’t going to be okay with that.”

“Your father is a mage?” She felt Durian stiffen when she nodded. She moved away from him. He drew her back. “Given your sister’s abilities, it stands to reason one of your parents is magekind.”

“He doesn’t practice anymore, but he helped Emily when it turned out she had magic. He was disappointed I wasn’t talented, too. He thinks I don’t know, but I heard him talking to Emily about it. Not to mention she told me anyway. He’s going to think I’ve gone over to the enemy. It was just as well I was dancing.” She glanced at him. “I moved to New York when I was fifteen. So I wasn’t around much anyway.” She licked her lower lip. “Emily never shut me out, though.”

Durian took her hand in his and slowly unclenched her fist so he could twine his fingers with hers. “Your sister said she was Christophe’s wife.”

“Maybe he just told her that.”

“She was with a mageheld.” He lowered his voice. “You know as well as I do that he was not insignificant. Christophe has one of his more powerful magehelds protecting her. He would not do that for just anyone.”

She leaned against him, and he kept his arms around her. Emily was alive, and no matter the circumstances that was better than believing she’d died. Gray watched the ocean as they crossed the Golden Gate Bridge. “Where are we going?”

“To see Nikodemus.”

CHAPTER 16

About an hour later. Tiburon, California. Primary residence of the Warlord Nikodemus

E
ven before she entered the house, Gray’s head started buzzing. She stubbed her toe on the first step and stopped, one hand pressed to her temple. Her arm hurt, too.

“What is it?” Durian asked.

She looked up, scanning the windows. Dread unfurled in her chest, shadows of uncertainty about whether Durian would be safe going inside. One of the things in there—creatures, monsters, fiends—weighed her down, as if he was deliberately making the air heavier. There was another one inside the house that was almost as bad. “How many are in there?”

“Fifteen. Including Nikodemus.” Durian didn’t seem to be affected. Not the way she was.

The awareness of so many separate minds buzzed in her head and made her dizzy even without making a connection to them. Durian put a hand to her back, but her feet refused to move.

“I don’t want to go in there.”

He kept his hand on her back, but didn’t urge her forward. “What you’re feeling is how we know our standing with respect to other kin. It’s normal. You will become accustomed to it.” His mouth twitched. “It’s useful to know when you’re outranked and when you are not.”

“Jesus.” She rubbed the outside of her arms.

“You may be assured, Gray, that you outrank more than a few of the kin inside.”

“Not Nikodemus.” And not all of them.

“No,” he said. His palm pressed into the small of her back, pushing her forward.

They climbed the rest of the stairs without her sense of dread going away in the slightest. Any minute, she thought, they’d be attacked. Ripped to shreds and what was left of their bodies strewn about to rot in the sun. At the door, she slapped away Durian’s hand before he could open it. “Me first.”

For half a second, Durian looked like he was going to tell her to get out of his way, but he didn’t. She stayed in front of the door, driven by a compulsion she didn’t understand. No way was she letting Durian go inside before she knew it was safe. “Sorry,” she said.

She didn’t mean it, and he knew it. He leaned a shoulder against the side of the house. Perfectly calm. Like this sort of thing was an everyday occurrence for him. Maybe it was. For him. “With respect to your magic, trust your instincts. You will do fine in that case.”

“I don’t know shit, and you know it.” Hell. She’d completely messed up with Emily. Now she was going to meet Nikodemus and what if she messed that up, too?

“You are inexperienced. If, when we are inside, something should go awry, allow me to act as I see fit.”

“Does that mean you think something will go wrong?”

He actually smiled, and it did a lot to relieve his stern looks. He reached for the doorknob. “It means Nikodemus is a warlord and is not pleased with me.”

“Because of me.” He didn’t say anything in response. “Kynan is a warlord, and he doesn’t feel like this.”

“Kynan does not yet choose to exercise his abilities. When he does—”

She stuck a hand on the doorjamb, blocking his way. “Maybe we should leave.”

Durian’s expression didn’t change. “That would be unwise. Nikodemus knows we are here. We cannot leave now. Not without paying our respects.”

She kept her hand across the doorway. “And you getting your head taken off because of me.”

“Please move, Gray.”

The compulsion in his words tugged at her. “Against my advice, assassin.”

“Duly noted.” When she moved, he opened the door but held back so she could go in first. She did. Looking for threats in every corner, too. There weren’t any. That she could tell. The other kin in the house didn’t come downstairs, but she knew they were there and aware of her and Durian.

They found Nikodemus in the living room. He was alone, sitting on a black couch wearing jeans and a green T-shirt that said
Without me it’s just Aweso
.

This was a warlord? Given the way his magic shook her, she’d expected fangs. Bodies heaped about him and eyes like fire. Kynan Aijan looked scarier than him.

Durian walked to within five feet of Nikodemus and touched his fingers to his bowed forehead. “Warlord.”

She followed him. She didn’t have any choice. Electricity zipped through her. Nikodemus looked like the boy next door who grew up into the hot man you wished you’d paid more attention to before he was out of your league. Bronzed brown hair, a bit shaggy, and piercing blue-gray eyes. Gorgeous man with an open, inviting smile. Except his magic flat out scared her silly.

Like Durian, she pressed her fingertips to her forehead. It seemed like the thing to do.

Nikodemus made an impatient gesture with one hand. “What the eff, Durian? Seriously.” He wasn’t smiling. “What the effing eff?”

Gray stayed where she was. The impact of his magic at such close range made her knees wobble. Durian rose and started walking toward him. She forced herself to match Durian’s stride, heart in her mouth the whole way.

Without more, Durian told Nikodemus who she was and what had happened with Tigran and Christophe. He gave a broad-strokes picture that left out a lot. When he got to the part about the mage’s intention that Gray be forced to conceive and how she and Tigran had found a way to circumvent the commands, Nikodemus bared his teeth at them in one of the scariest smiles she’d ever seen. Her skin rippled with gooseflesh. He gave an evil smile when Durian got to the part of her ending up with some of Christophe’s magic, but then Durian started in on her taking her oath of fealty, and the warlord lost all hint of his previous amusement.

The warlord slouched on his chair looking more and more pissed off. Her head vibrated with the growing conviction that this encounter was going to end badly. She didn’t like the way the warlord watched Durian; looking at him from under half-lidded eyes. The markings on her arm swirled and buzzed underneath her skin. She moved closer to Durian until her left shoulder was in front of his chest.

By the time Durian finished with the part about meeting Emily, the warlord looked ready to spit nails. At her.

“What’s your story?” The warlord looked at her without a drop of friendliness. A star ruby in his ear caught the light and she caught a glimpse of a perfect star in the cabochon.

“Pretty much what he said.”

Nikodemus gave her a searing glare. The back of her knees jellied, but she was damned if she was going to let on. She clamped down on her thoughts. The warlord could go to hell. He wasn’t going to get so much as a hint to her thoughts or mental state.

“There’s a few things that didn’t get mentioned in that little recitation.”

“Like what?” She hoped her phony surprise was enough to fool him.

The warlord reached out to her psychically, and she blocked herself in self-defense. “Not wise,” Nikodemus said, and not in a nice voice. “Makes me think you have something to hide.”

“Spoken like a tyrant, warlord.”

Nikodemus got up and strode toward her, but Durian made a low sound and that made him pull up, barely. The mood turned distinctly menacing. “Nikodemus. She did not know her sister was alive.”

Nikodemus pointed at Gray without taking his eyes from Durian. Her tracings zipped around enough to make her skin burn. He had enough magic on tap to fry her to a crisp. “So? The fact is,” he said in a black voice, “her sister not only lives with Christophe dit Menart, she’s fucking married to him.”

She took a step forward. “Less than an hour ago, I thought my sister was dead.”

“I know every mage or witch in my territory.” Nikodemus stalked to her. He came to a halt much too close to her but she refused to give him the satisfaction of backing up. “Out of the blue, this self-trained witch marries Christophe dit Menart. About a year and a half ago. No magehelds of her own but not without some power.”

“You knew?”

“What the fuck do I care if some mage gets married? I didn’t know she was anybody’s sister.” He looked at Durian. “If this one hadn’t been hiding you from me, I might have put two and two together. I’ve met your sister. Making sure she understood the agreement we have going here.”

“I saw her die.” She struggled to regulate her breathing, but everything was jamming up in her throat, and she was shaking again. She clenched her hands into fists. Durian touched her shoulder. “There was so much blood.”

“You look a lot like her.” He tilted his head to one side. “If you didn’t have red hair. She’s not as skinny as you, and, no offense, even better looking. A little more up top, too, but then she’s about to have a kid. You’re not bad, honey, but she got the looks. No wonder Christophe got the hots for her.”

“What if he kills her?”

“Why would he kill his wife?” the warlord shot back.

“Oh, come on. We’re talking about Christophe dit Menart here.”

Nikodemus’s eyes turned solid black, which was scary even if she didn’t have a dose of his even scarier magic. She didn’t doubt for a minute that he would take her down with a smile on his face. He put his hands on his hips and stared down at her. “Shit. You really didn’t know, did you?”

“I don’t think the baby’s even his.”

His features softened in a way she was in no condition to analyze. “He wouldn’t have married her otherwise.”

“She doesn’t remember me. Or who she is.”

The warlord nodded. “You think she’d be happy and healthy the way you said she is if she knew the truth? There’s no way Christophe is going to let her remember what happened.” The warlord plopped down in an upholstered leather chair. “Durian, we have a problem.”

“Warlord?”

“It won’t be any surprise to either of you if I tell you Christophe has made a formal request to have Gray returned to his custody.”

“She isn’t going anywhere,” Durian said.

“I don’t give kin to mages.” He lifted a hand. In Durian’s direction, not hers. “I told him to fuck off.” He gave a quick grin to them both. “I was polite about it.”

“She isn’t sworn to you, Nikodemus.”

Nikodemus stretched out his legs and crossed them at the ankles. He didn’t say anything for a while. He just gazed at Durian. “We need to have a talk about that.”

“No.”

The tracings under her skin started moving faster. She watched the green lines on her arm form intricate loops and swirls and shivered when Durian’s magic seemed to practically dance into her head, down her spine and then under her skin.

The warlord’s eyes stayed on her face. “So, Gray, how loyal are you to my assassin? When the shit gets real, are you going to put him first?”

“Yes.”

“You better,” Nikodemus said. His eyes flashed from silver to black. “I need him.”

She straightened, not liking the way the magic was building up.

“You think I didn’t know the minute he took your oath?” He glanced at Durian then back to her. “He’s been through a lot lately, and I’ve been making allowances. The truth is I need him. I need him strong and focused. I need mages like Christophe dit Menart worried I might send my assassin after them. What I don’t need is dit Menart thinking he has something he can use against me. Like your sister. If they’re not afraid, no mage is going to so much as daydream about stopping anything. And my kin and the warlords sworn to me, they aren’t going to take me seriously if I don’t have Durian around to scare their fucking pants off.”

“You still have that,” she said.

“Do I?” He left his chair and strolled to her. “He has your fealty. Does he tell me what he did? Ask my permission? No. I get silence. He comes to see me, and the first thing I know before he’s even through the door, is that his loyalty is divided. When things get dire, and I promise you they will, who’s he going to attend to first? Me or you?”

Gray lifted her right arm and held it out, palm up. The markings underneath her skin writhed, reacting to the magic in the room. “He’s teaching me.” She touched her right temple. Her fingertips burned. “I think that’s to your advantage, don’t you?”

Nikodemus crossed his arms over his chest. “So?”

“You can’t trust Christophe,” Gray said.

“Hell, no.”

“Warlord, I think—”

“Stay out of this, Durian. This is between me and your girl, here.” His gaze burned into her. “You better be sure you understand the consequences of crossing me.”

The room went unnaturally silent and the quiet sent icy fingers skittering down her spine.

She thought about that. Her concern right now was keeping Durian out of trouble, and she was willing, she realized, to say anything that would solve the problems now. The hell with later on. They had to make it through this. “Maybe I don’t.”

“You screw me over, you screw him over.” He waited while she worked that out. It didn’t take long. She nodded. “I get that.”

The warlord’s mood settled down. “You watch out for him like you swore you would, and maybe we’ll be fine. Set him up, betray him in any way, and I will come after you when I’m done with him.” He smiled. “I promise
you
a painful death.”

“Understood.”

Nikodemus frowned, and Gray couldn’t tell if she’d averted disaster or not. “Tell me, Big Dog, is she any good at what you do?”

The warlord’s command to Durian was subtle, but she felt the imperative tug at her chest.

“Yes.”

“How good? As good as you?”

Durian’s face was absolutely unreadable. “Not yet.”

“But close. Am I right?”

He nodded.

“She needs to be bound over.”

When nobody said anything, Gray looked at them both. “What does that mean?”

“I won’t permit it,” Durian said.

Nikodemus’s reaction was far too calm. Gray didn’t trust it at all. “No?” he said.

Gray coughed. The fake kind. “Excuse me, Durian, but I think I can make up my own mind about this, if you don’t mind.” She met Nikodemus’s gaze without flinching. “I’ve already sworn fealty to him. Can I do that again? To someone else?”

“Not an oath of fealty, Gray,” Durian said. “He means to bind you with a different kind of oath. One that will prevent you from taking a life without a sanction except in defense of your own or another’s life. If you were bound by this oath, Nikodemus and only Nikodemus could give you a sanction. And if he did so, you would be required to carry it out.”