Sentinel's Hunger (9 page)

Nahemah glanced at the medal around Alex’s neck, a brief pang of guilt stabbing her heart as she thought of his dead mother.

She could not change what had happened to her granddaughter Kalika or Xevera’s mother Sala, but she could make sure that Xevera did not suffer a similar fate.

“That is not necessary, Alex.”

“You weren’t there when we left her, Nahemah. She wasn’t well.”

Alex turned to his wife. “Tell her, Gen.”

“He is correct, Highest. She was debilitated. I do not know how long she will last in the Great Above in her current condition.”

“She is a former—a sentinel and a trained soldier. I am sure that she can survive another eighteen hours on her own.”

Alex frowned. “Nahemah, is there some reason that you don’t want us to go in?”

“I am all for you going in. I just do not think it wise for you to circumvent the portal system. It is there for a reason, after all.”

“Is there something you’re not telling us, Gee-Gee?”

Nahemah couldn’t help but grin at her great-grandson’s pet name for her, but before she could answer him, Genesis put in, “We cannot help, Nahemah, if we do not know the entire story.”

How could she make them understand that Xevera needed to be in the human world on her own and for a minimum of two dawns in
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order to find the cure for her illness, without first divulging that Xevera was ill?

The advantage of being Highest, of course, made it unnecessary for her to justify her actions to anyone outside of the assembly. Regret at not confiding in her beloved great-grandson and his helpmate was not nearly enough to abdicate that privilege.

“I appreciate your concerns, Alex and Genesis, but I have made a decision. We will not open the portal prematurely and we will not risk a retrieval team before it is time.”

Nahemah hoped that Xevera was making good use of the time that she was granting her with a delay. She hoped that the younger woman had sufficient time to achieve fulfillment, but more importantly, find her cure.

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Florence Knowles’s seventy-eight-year-old instincts were on high alert and telling her that something was not only foul in Denmark but also in Michael Constantine’s apartment.

She hated invading his privacy, but assured herself it was for a good reason as she unlocked the door with her copy of his apartment key. She wasn’t a snoop, despite what her husband Albert said. She was just a concerned neighbor.

And if that woman Michael brought home was in as bad a shape as she looked last night, she would probably appreciate some of Florence’s nice homemade chicken soup and special hangover remedy to settle her stomach and head.

She’d been young once and hadn’t been above going a little overboard once or twice, so she knew from personal experience that her preparations worked.

Florence felt a slight twinge of guilt when she stepped into the apartment, especially when she remembered the firm, chastising look Michael had given her before he’d left, but she quickly squelched it with thoughts of helping someone in need.

She walked across the plush carpeting, frowning when she noticed the thick chain leading from a pipe in the living room through the apartment.

Curious and almost forgetting why she’d come, she followed the chain from the living room to the bedroom where she paused on the threshold.

Florence didn’t know what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t the long-legged black woman sprawled face down across
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Michael’s king-size bed snoring like a buzz saw with the chain in question attached to one ankle.

She put a hand to her chest and gaped. Either the woman had a bad hangover or was deeply exhausted, unless there was more than just alcohol involved in her condition.

Florence was relieved the woman was at least alive, but she still felt uneasy about Michael having her chained in his apartment.

Just to be on the safe side she stepped into the room, intending to make sure everything was okay, when the woman suddenly stretched and turned from her side to her back.

Surprised at the sudden action, Florence froze, caught a flash of the gorgeous, high-cheek-boned face, and turned tail to run.

She hurried back the way she had come, flung open the door and slammed it shut behind her. Nervous at her close call, she still had the foresight to stop and lock the door before she ran into her apartment gasping for breath. “Albert, I think Michael is harboring a fugitive!”

“What kind of trouble are you causing now, Florence?” Her husband shuffled out of the kitchen and met her halfway as she rushed into the living room.

She grabbed his arm, led him to their country floral overstuffed sofa and sat him down. “He has a woman chained in his apartment and I think it’s that alien cat woman they’ve been talking about on the news.”

“You
think?
” He arched a brow in that half-chiding half-indulgent way that never failed to put her on the defensive and coincidentally reminded her of Michael’s earlier look.

Did all men perfect that cool, doubtful expression or was it just her imagination?

“Well, I didn’t get a very good look at her,” she admitted.

Truthfully, she’d barely gotten a look at all. She’d been too anxious to try. But there was definitely something askew about the woman, not to mention that chain around her ankle.

Michael must have thought she was dangerous to keep her
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chained like that, but why was he keeping her at all and not turning her in to the authorities?

“If you didn’t get a good look, isn’t it possible you’re mistaken?”

“Of course it’s possible, it’s just that—”

“What, Florence?”

“She had a chain locked around her ankle, Albert. A chain!”

“Uh-huh.”

“Don’t you think that’s a little strange? Not to mention I would think that sort of thing wouldn’t appeal to someone like Michael.”

“An EMT?”

“No! An African-American, silly!”

“That sort of thing? You mean kinky bondage games?”

She closed her eyes, the image of a black ankle in chains sending shivers through her. She got the same sort of shivers whenever she caught sight of the serial number branded on her husband’s arm, a souvenir from the Holocaust. “It just seems so…wrong.”

“It’s a
game
, Florence. Role playing.”

“I
know
. But why do
you
sound like such an expert on the subject?”

“I watch cable just like you do.”

“Hmm, more specifically the Playboy Channel,” she grumbled.

“Do I complain when you watch
Sex in the City
?”

“At least that show has a plot!”

“We’re getting off the subject, Florence.”

She flopped down on the sofa beside her husband and Albert took her hand and squeezed it as she turned to him. “Do you think I should report what I saw to the police?”

He shook his head. “You shouldn’t have gone in there in the first place. It was an invasion of his privacy.”

“I only wanted to make sure everything was okay.”

“Florence, Michael’s a healthy, red-blooded young man who’s never brought a woman—or a man for that matter—back to his apartment since we’ve known him. I say it’s high time he got a little
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frisky and had some fun. Don’t you?”

“I guess you’re right,” she murmured.

He moved closer, wrapped an arm around her shoulder and gave her a peck on the cheek. “Know what else I say?”

“No, what else?”

“I say we should take a cue from our young tenant and get a little frisky ourselves.” Albert nibbled on her earlobe for emphasis.

Florence giggled and slapped his hand. “You old lecher.”

Albert chuckled and wrapped her in a bear hug as she melted against him.

Maybe he was right. She wouldn’t call the police, but she decided she would keep her eyes on the situation. If she noticed anything more untoward, she would call the authorities whether Albert thought it was the right thing to do or not.

* * * *

Xevera woke with a start, feeling something slightly out of kilter about her surroundings.

She had heard a door slam, but when she got up to investigate, she could not find anything amiss in the apartment. Perhaps she had been dreaming.

The feeling of being watched remained, however, even after she had checked all the rooms, the closets and behind the shower curtain in the bathroom.

Perhaps the intruder was not from the human world at all and
Quna
Nahemah had pinpointed her location.

Xevera had been shielding since initially waking in Michael’s apartment a little more than twelve hours ago, but between shielding against Michael’s constant incursions and trying to suppress her spirit signal against the Inanna tracking practice, Xevera was having a difficult time functioning at normal capacity.

It was well past time for her to get out of bed, anyway, and
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explore. Not to mention eat something, since her stomach was clamoring to be filled. At least her body was hungry for food and not desperate for
kundalini
. Not yet anyway. Thanks to Michael, she was well sated.

Xevera smiled, anticipating her next feeding.

She was more excited than she had ever been at the prospect of taking sustenance into her body and that was because of Michael.

She, of course, could not forget Nahemah’s hand in her current situation, and silently thanked her
Quna
for dismissing her from The Guard and allowing her to go on one last retrieval mission. Nahemah could not have helped Xevera more had she come to the Great Above herself and handpicked Michael Constantine for her former Sentinel-in-Command.

Xevera went to the kitchen now to find something to eat. She was still adjusting to walking around with the chain on her ankle but understood Michael’s reasons for keeping her thus. She just did not agreeing with them.

He did not have to keep her chained because she was not going anywhere. She could not leave him now even if she tried because he was her soul mate.

Xevera knew it the first time he claimed her lips with his and invaded her mouth with his strong forceful tongue. She knew it from the moment she tasted the potent effects of his spirit-boost and been sated beyond any Inanna’s comprehension.

Xevera took the dozen eggs and cup of margarine from the refrigerator, and the frozen breakfast sausages and French toast from the freezer, and dumped it on the counter. She felt in the mood for

‘breakfast food’ though it was well past lunchtime.

She missed her magic, could have waved her hands and whipped up a meal in seconds with her powers had they been available to her, but they were not.

She had tried to wield a spell since Michael had unchained her wrists, just to test her abilities, but failed. The alloys in the chain on
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her ankle were stronger than she had first surmised. Leave it to her Master to be so thorough.

Master? Where had that thought come from? Could it have been the fact that she saw him as a mentor and not that he held her in thrall with the commanding presence he wielded over all that she was?

Was it just her need that attracted her to him, or was it more?

Perhaps it was that she…

Xevera swallowed hard at the thought, though she could not deny it: she loved him.

In less than a day Michael had insinuated himself into her mind and soul, as well as her body. He had taken over her life as easily as telepathy and magic came to most Inanna, and she had enjoyed every minute of his seizure.

She belonged to him.

The sudden insight did not alarm her as it once might have. In fact, she rather enjoyed the concept of Michael’s ownership, as unusual as it was for an Inanna warrior to have an owner or master of any species, but especially one of the human variety.

Xevera had never belonged to an individual before. She had never needed or wanted to.

Since she had reached maturity, her primary loyalty belonged to The Guard and her
Quna
. Since the defection of her mother and father, her primary affections belonged to a rare circle of friends that included her
Quna
, Alex and Genesis, and Mateo and LaMia. For an Inanna in Emsharra where all Sisters and Brothers considered each member of the community kin, this was a rare circle indeed.

How could she convince Michael of all of this, that he meant more to her than just a means to sate her hunger?

Xevera collapsed into a chair at the kitchen table, mentally exhausted from the ambiguities that her life had accumulated. For someone unaccustomed to dealing with gray areas, especially someone with no room for emotionalizing or sensitivity, her current state of mind was more than a little confusing.

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She wished that the workday was over and that Michael was back.

Having him near was aesthetically and sensually pleasing, but also comforting. His strength and certainty reassured her, and at this moment, she needed comfort and reassurance more than she needed anything else, even his body and spirit-boost.

Xevera’s stomach grumbled as if in disagreement.

She laughed and got up to prepare her meal.

Even without her magic, she had the eggs scrambled, the sausages broiled and the French toast toasted in less than twenty minutes.

She was cheerfully sitting at the table, eating her meal and drinking orange juice, when she thought to reach out to Michael. She knew that to do so would expose herself to the Inanna tracking practice, but she was willing to risk it just to feel him with her.

Xevera closed her eyes and concentrated on her image of his face just before he had left—the beautiful lines of his strong jaw, the severity of his prominent cheekbones and cleft chin, the hypnotic effect of his slate eyes.

She took a deep breath as she opened the door to a room in her mind and stepped inside.