Ultimate Warriors (9 page)

     
Sickness
welled inside of Nari as a vision of her mother’s broken, bleeding body rose in
her mind. "She was attacked."

     
Shayne
had left Nari with her own morbid thoughts after that, refusing to discuss the
matter further until they’d reached her apartment. Nariko hadn’t really prodded
him, embroiled as she was in her own thoughts. She had doubts that he could
really shed any light on the mystery in any case. It only seemed to deepen the
more she learned, not to become
more clear
.

     
She was
accepting a lot on faith, of course. The truth was, no matter how companionable
she felt about Shayne, she really didn’t know him that well and she didn’t know
how much trust she could place in her own instincts considering the distress
she was under.

     
In her
heart, she felt like she could trust him, but how much of that was dependence?
How much was based solely on her attraction to him?

     
He knew
her. She suspected he knew a lot more about her than he’d revealed. But she
knew almost nothing about him.

     
She
found by the time they’d reached her apartment once more than she really didn’t
want to deal with anything else at the moment. She was weary to her soul, not
just physically. As ridiculous as it might seem to anyone else, she mourned the
loss of her mother and that sense of loss was magnified by the horrible way her
mother had died.

     
All she
really wanted to do was to escape to her room to mourn in private and think
things through for herself.

     
Shayne,
however, insisted that the matter was something that needed to be discussed
then, not put off until later.

     
She
settled on the couch, feeling resentment slowly overtaking her confusion and
sorrow as she watched Shayne pace her living room.

     
"I
don’t see why this can’t wait until tomorrow," she said finally when he
showed no indication of being forthcoming anytime soon.

     
Shayne
ceased pacing and turned to study her speculatively for several moments.
"I don’t think it’s something that can, or should, be put off. I think
you’re in danger."

     
Nari’s
heart skipped a beat, remembering that pervasive feeling of being followed …
hunted. "Why? How?
From whom?"

     
He
frowned, seemed to wrestle with his thoughts for several moments. "Have
you considered the possibility that your mother actually was impregnated by a
demon?"

     
"That’s
insane!" Nariko snapped, jumping to her feet. In a moment of weakness, she
had toyed with the possibility, but she knew damned well there was no such
thing and to consider it was to slide a little deeper toward the madness that
had consumed her mother.

     
"You’re
that certain?"

     
Nariko
stared at him, wondering yet again if he was entirely sane himself. He seemed
perfectly lucid, and yet he’d done a lot of things that were certainly rash for
a man in his position. "I don’t believe in ghosts, or goblins, or things
that go bump in the night!" she said irritably.

     
He
looked away from her and began pacing once more. "Humor me, then. Let’s,
just for a moment, consider it as a possibility.

     
"According
to the records, your mother wasn’t committed. She went into the sanitarium
voluntarily, and I believe she did it because she was hiding … or hoping to
hide. I think she placed you in the orphanage to keep you safe and then
committed herself, hoping they wouldn’t find her."

     
"Hoping
who wouldn’t find her?"

     
"The demons looking for the child … you.
But they did
find her. Maybe they killed her trying to find out where you were.

     
"Maybe
they managed to get the information out of her before she died."

     
Nari
glared at him angrily. "You’re saying I haven’t been dreaming? That the
demons have found me? And they want me, why? Why would they have any interest
in me at all?"

     
"Because you’re half demon."

     
Nariko’s
anger boiled over. "Get out! You’re as crazy as she was!"

     
He
stopped, his lips tightening angrily. "Be reasonable. You could be in
danger."

     
"I
think I am. I think you’re crazy and I want you out of my house! Leave now, or
I’ll call the cops!"

     
He took
a step toward her and Nariko skipped aside, putting the coffee table between
them--insubstantial as it was as a barrier. He stopped.

     
"I
have to go if you’re determined to send me away, but I’m asking you to
reconsider. You need protection. You haven’t found your powers."

     
"I’m
not a demon!" Nariko shouted at him.
"Half or
otherwise!
I’m not evil!"

     
"I
didn’t say you were," Shayne said tightly. "Your father wasn’t.
Everything in nature has a balance, a dark side and a light side. Not all
demons are evil."

     
Nariko
gaped at him. "You’re trying to say you knew my father?"

     
"I
did."

     
Nariko
leapt toward her phone. Grabbing it up, she punched the numbers with a shaking
finger.

     
"911.
What’s your emergency?" said a feminine voice on the other end of the
line.

     
Nariko
glanced at Shayne. "There’s a man in my house."

     
He
glared at her furiously for several moments and finally strode out, slamming
the door behind him. Nariko depressed the button on the phone, threw it down
and ran to bolt her door.

     
She
might be confused, but she damned well wasn’t so nuts that she was going to
take advice from somebody that was crazier than she was!

     
****

     
Nariko
hadn’t expected to sleep. She had hoped she would be able to compose herself
for rest. She had tried a hot, soothing bath. She had read for a while in bed.
She had finally gotten up, put on an exercise video and worked out until she’d
begun to feel like she would drop in her tracks, but physical exhaustion wasn’t
enough to overcome her distress, her anger, or her uneasiness once she was
alone in the apartment.

     
She had
finally decided that she would lie down anyway and close her eyes. Even if she
couldn’t sleep, surely doing that much would rest her at least a little so that
she could face the next day.

     
Despite
her angry dismissal, however, Shayne’s words assaulted her. Every time she
closed her eyes her mind went round and round with the argument. It was going
on three AM when her mind finally began to wind down. Bits and pieces of
nightmares began to batter at her almost the moment she drifted away, however,
and she found herself starting into wakefulness each time she sank toward
slumber.

     
She
thought when first she sensed the presence at the foot of her bed that she was
still sleeping. The nightmares had become so real to her that she’d begun to
have difficulty sorting dream from reality at times.

     
The
moment Onyx grabbed her and hauled her from her bed, however, she knew
absolutely that this was no dream. Before she could scream, or even put up much
of a fight, he’d captured her so tightly against his hulking frame that she
could barely even squirm. She struggled anyway, trying to wiggle free of his
grip.

     
"The
time has come," he said in his deep, rumbling voice.

     
Nariko
definitely didn’t like the sound of that. "What time?"

     
"Tonight
you will help me open the doorway so that I can achieve my full powers,"
he said in the same growling voice.

     
"Like
hell I will!" Nariko snapped angrily.

     
"You
will. And you will enjoy it as much as I," he promised.

     
He
lifted her free of the floor then, launching the two of them upward with such
force Nariko cringed, expecting momentarily to collide with the ceiling.
Instead, she discovered when she opened her eyes that the Earth was far below
them. Her heart slammed into her chest wall like a caged bird trying to beat
its way out of a trap.

     
This
could not be real. It had to be one of the nightmares!

     
She was
afraid to struggle now, however, and realized she wasn’t so convinced that it
was a dream that she was willing to risk breaking free and falling to her
death. Instead, she drew in a deep breath to scream for Xalen to come to her.

     
Onyx
silenced her before she’d managed to emit more than a squeaking syllable. She
wasn’t certain how he’d silenced her when he held her firmly gripped in both
arms, but she felt as if her mouth were covered tightly. She couldn’t open her
mouth. She couldn’t breathe.

     
The fear
of suffocation very quickly ousted every other thought from her mind, even her
fear of falling to her death. She fought frantically to free herself, to drag
air into her lungs, but absolute blackness began to swim around her within
moments. The stars dimmed and one by one winked out.

     
Cold was
the first sensation that filtered through her mind when she swam upward toward
consciousness once more. Light flickered through the thin skin of her eye lids
and she stirred. Realizing she couldn’t move, Nariko opened her eyes at last
and found that she was staring up into the darkness of a cavernous ceiling.

     
The
light she’d seen, she discovered, was the flickering fire of torches set into
sconces on the dark stone walls that surrounded her.

     
It
looked rough hewn, crude--she was in a cavern, she realized finally.

     
She
couldn’t move because she was pinned by the manacles around her wrists and
ankles.

     
With
cold terror washing over her, she lifted her head.

     
Almost
as if they’d been waiting for her to do so, as if it was a signal to them to
commence, shadowy figures clothed in dark, hooded cloaks stepped from the
darkness and surrounded the stone altar where she lay.

     
Low, so
low it was more like muttering than chants at first, they began to speak words
she’d never heard before. Gradually, their voices became louder, the words
falling faster from their lips.

     
She
sensed Onyx’s presence before she felt his touch on her leg.

     
He meant
to take her and this time there would be no escaping him.

     
She
screamed then, as loudly as she could, summoning Xalen to her aid. No one was
more surprised than she was that she actually managed to break the hold that
had sealed her lips before, but the chanting was so loud by that time that she
despaired that she had made herself heard above it.

     
And she
was in a cavern, far below the Earth. How could he hear her?
she
thought despairingly.

     
The
thought had no sooner occurred to her than she realized how totally irrational
it was. If Xalen was "real" then he was a demon. It shouldn’t matter
where she was … unless this cavern shielded the cult from the other demons, the
good demons?

     
The
skate of Onyx’s hand along her thigh jerked Nari abruptly back to her
situation. Straining, she lifted her head to look down at him just as he curled
his fingers into her mound. She jerked as she felt his finger parting the
flesh, probing her.

     
His gaze
moved up her body and locked with hers. He was frowning. Slowly, he climbed
onto the altar, licking a path all the way up her belly as he moved. Nari
squeezed her eyes shut, trying to ignore the leap of her flesh beneath that
damp, heated caress. To her relief, he withdrew the tortuous tongue from her.
When she opened her eyes, she saw that he was studying her almost curiously.

     
"I
can give you pleasure," he said in his deep, rumbling voice.

     
Nari
gritted her teeth. "Only in your conceited mind!" she snapped.

     
He
frowned, but more thoughtfully than angrily. "I am so repulsive to
you?"