Chapter 4
Lucy’s Parents’ Lake, Immortal Realm
Lucy’s nerves were frayed by the time she reformed at her rock by the lake. Her heart was beating nearly out of her chest when she laid eyes on Rykr. Every thought bled away at the sight of him in the flesh after so long. His power was so close she could feel it sliding tantalizingly over her skin. The images she’d seen over the years hadn’t truly captured his beauty, and he had never been shirtless in them. She hadn’t seen all the dips and valleys of beautiful sculpted muscle covered only in tattoos and worn jeans. No, he looked like a dark fantasy instead of a near-God with glowing sapphire eyes. The moonlit lake at his back didn’t hold a candle to his raw beauty or the midnight wings flexing at his back.
Her mate.
His brilliant eyes heated with such intensity that it felt as if they were devouring her body. His wings stretched out more as all the raw need in his gaze ate up the markings on her arm before igniting with a wild possessiveness that made her entire body tighten. She couldn’t think, couldn’t speak. Couldn’t remember why she was there. It was as if the decade of silence and pent-up need stretched out to suffocate her. The compulsion to touch him made her fingers flex and her nipples ache, but he was yards away.
Why the distance? It wasn’t right. She fought for some kind of focus, but she was close to drowning in sensory overload instead. Her mind wasn’t processing right.
“Lucy.” His voice was deeper, a seductive near-rumble that ran over her skin. Every nerve in her body responded as if the word were vibrating over her, through her. The second the cool breeze shifted, her knees nearly buckled and she moaned deeply. His seductive masculine scent filled her lungs, riling the beast inside her body. It reared up inside her mind, and her body responded with arousal so harsh and demanding that she was forced to fight for air, only to have more of his delicious scent inside her. Twenty feet away with open skies wasn’t enough distance. Not when she felt the frenzy lashing out, trying to suck her in.
Touch.
With impossible speed, he was gone. “This was a bad idea.” He growled deep from the opposite direction, and she spun around to face him again. He was out of the flow of air, but it was too late. He was inside her now, in her lungs. A pulse of warmth flickered in her very soul. The sensation was forced from her thoughts as she realized that he’d distanced himself once again.
This was all wrong. “You knew this would happen.” Her voice was a rough rasp. When his father said Rykr wanted to meet her here, she’d been half irritated because she thought he was finally going to claim her only to protect her from some still unknown threat. She’d almost told Pothos to tell his son to screw off and pick a time when he actually wanted her for her. The only reason she hadn’t done exactly that was because his father’s mental voice held a sense of urgency that chilled her to the bone. What if he’d been in trouble? What if that had been the reason for a secret emergency meeting?
Seeing him whole and unharmed destroyed that theory. Those logical thoughts allowed her to grip onto a small thread of sanity. “Why call me here, Rykr? What’s going on? You obviously aren’t interested in completing the bond.”
It hurt to say. She was warring with her beast while fighting her own relentless need, and it was making every emotion more intense.
“There are things you need to know, Lucy.” Was he as flushed as she felt? His fists were flexing at his sides as if he wanted to grab her. So why hadn’t he? The decade was nearly up.
“Tell me.” The disappointment she felt only added to her overall misery.
His voice was guttural. “You smell too fucking good. Your nipples…” He bit off the last on a curse and ran a hand over his face.
She was a mass of sensation with no apparent outlet, and the distance between them wasn’t helping. Swallowing, she forced her eyes closed, just for a minute. Even with them closed, her mind lingered on the etched muscle arrowing down to his straining jeans. Her beast wouldn’t stop rearing up in her mind, demanding touch, demanding Lucy go to him. But pride rooted her in place.
He swore. “I was cursed.”
She opened her eyes as her mouth gaped, finding it impossible to make sense out of those three words.
He continued, a harshness in his tone. “The demon souls that were freed at the end of the world are attached to me.”
Her spine stiffened at his words even as her head shook in denial. “What are you talking about?” She would have heard this if it were true. Someone would have told her if her mate was in trouble.
“It happened before I turned twenty, and I’ve been trying to fix it since,” he snapped. Even with the distance between them, she could see the muscles of his shoulders rippling.
Cursed? Demons?
“Why didn’t you tell me? How did this happen?” Too many questions all fought to get out. “Are they hurting you?”
The second his flashing eyes pinned her, she felt the searing heat to her bones. He wanted her; he wanted the bond. He was also fighting it with everything he was.
“Don’t. I’m not one of your animals or a Hell beast. Worry less about me and more about what being near me can do to you.” His furious words cut deep.
He was trying to push her away. She could feel it. She knew him too well. Even compromised with lust, she saw everything he tried to hide. There was longing and frustration hidden in the anger.
He growled. “A male I’m hunting showed up at Slake tonight. When you were there. A male with the mark of my curse. He got close to you, Lucy. To my family. You will stay away from me and stay away from all of this until I know what I’m dealing with.”
His autocratic tone was pissing her off, but she focused on getting more information. “What is he?”
His answer was clipped. “He teleported.” Only one Immortal race could teleport—the Kairos. Unless the male was something else. All Guardians, Gods and Demi-Gods were accounted for. All the magic in the world had been changing what humans and even Immortals could do, so who knew. He was demon marked, but the fiends had never been able to teleport using a human body, and they’d never been able to sustain a possession. She pinched the bridge of her nose. Trying to focus was nearly impossible when she was wet and her body ached for the male in front of her.
Shooting her a hard look, he demanded, “Lucy, go back to the manor so I can take care of this.”
She staggered, anger filling her, dampening some of the harsh need. “You don’t get to dismiss me, Rykr. Why even summon me? To be an asshole so I won’t want you? So I won’t try to help you?”
That was exactly what he’d planned. Guilt flashed in his eyes for the briefest of moments. Only someone who’d known him since birth would have recognized it.
His voice rumbled. “It was my responsibility to tell you.”
“Now. Because everyone else is finding out? Since you’re obviously alive, the demons can’t be deadly to me as your mate. So what do you think you’re protecting me from?”
“That evil will never get near you, Lucy.” There was a deadly promise seething in his words, a sentiment mirrored in the dangerous glint to his eyes.
Her eyes narrowed. “You’re not evil. I can see that. Feel it.”
His jaw clenched tight.
Mated pairs shared power. They became stronger together. She wondered why he didn’t want her power to help fight his curse.
“They’re hurting you, aren’t they? And you’re worried they’ll hurt me, too.”
“They dole out more than pain, Lucy! You’d be in fucking agony.”
She was furious. He didn’t look like he was in agony. “You want me. I can see it. Are you really going to deny our bond because of some pain? You’ve been stalking me for years. You should have told me.” She could feel that he was angry and frustrated, but he wasn’t talking. She could see him trying to find the words to make her run away, but it wouldn’t work.
She changed tactics. “Don’t pretend you don’t want me. Or that my tattoos aren’t driving you wild right now, because you keep staring at them like they hold your salvation.”
An animalistic sound slipped from his lips, and he was suddenly a little closer.
“Yes, I put them there for you.” Lucy’s voice lowered and turned smoky. “And they aren’t just on my arm, Rykr.”
His eyes flashed, and then he was mere feet from her. The shifting air was the only sign he’d moved. His body was so close that she felt his heat, could see his tense shoulders vibrating with the same raw need that echoed in her soul. Her animal reveled in the fact that he hadn’t been able to stay away.
His voice came out as a guttural rasp. “My soul isn’t fucking free, Lucy. I can’t give it to you now. Stop trying to force my hand. I only wanted you to hear this from me.” He growled the rest. “You need to leave, now. Don’t seek me out. I will find a way to end this, and then I will come for you.”
The second the last word was out, he was far away again, glaring at her. She clenched her teeth. He’d called her out for trying to tempt him into touching her.
She wanted to snarl at him. He was being an asshole, yet she kept seeing small hidden glimpses of the male she’d once known. He’d never been able to hide anything from her. His eyes had always told her the truth.
Damn him. Neither of them were thinking clearly. It wasn’t even possible with all the sensations whirling through them. Even now, she wanted to kiss him as much as she wanted to snap him in two.
Maybe he really did have a way out of this on his own, but she didn’t want him to be alone. She sucked in a breath. He wasn’t alone, really. He had his father and his family to help him. But the need to protect him was raging out of control.
She clenched her fists at her sides.
“The meeting is ending. Go back to the manor, Lucy.”
She gritted her teeth against the order. She wasn’t done with him. “I will go. Because I need to think. How do I contact you?”
A muscle in his jaw twitched. “I have a cell phone. Niall has the number.”
He wouldn’t leave until she did. His own protective instincts were driving him. She knew for a fact that was why he kept ordering her away. For some reason, it only made her want to stay and force him to tell her what the hell he was hiding.
“I will call,” she promised with a glare as she pointed a finger at him. “You’d better stay safe.” Then she left him there.
Seconds later, she reformed on an empty balcony of the Guardian manor. She tilted her head back as she commanded the winds around her. Her body was on fire.
Ophelia was still covering for her inside.
She sucked in a deep, cleansing breath and worked hard to calm her rattled nerves, hoping the arousal would ease up soon. It was frustrating as hell, but she wasn’t going inside until she got herself together. There were far too many people in there with enhanced senses, and she had absolutely no desire to embarrass herself.
She set a hand over her stomach. There was a soft warmth there. She’d felt it earlier and convinced herself it was the liquor, but now she wasn’t so sure. Hope was a scary thing, but it definitely felt like a slight echo of her old power.
She stilled, afraid it was just lust or something else. Over ten years had passed without it. Could that little glimmer of light mean it was coming back?
Had it seemed to strengthen while she was with Rykr?
The doors opening behind her made her tense until she turned. She breathed deeply, thankful it wasn’t her younger brother while she was still fighting the lingering lust.
Gefn, Rykr’s golden-haired Goddess mother, stood in the doorway in body-hugging leather pants and a matching vest. “The others, including your mother and father, are telling the children about Eirykr’s curse. I asked to spend some time with you. I was sure you’d need a moment.”
“Yes, thank you.” Lucy deeply appreciated the other female giving her more time to get her body under control. Not only that, but she had so many questions she hoped Rykr’s mother would answer.
The gorgeous female swept through the air to stand at the railing with her. As a Goddess of Thule, she had such incredible elemental skills. They were far more graceful and ethereal than Lucy’s own abilities. It was peaceful to be around her.
A surge of raw power crackled in the air as Gefn’s giant black felines appeared at her side. Spa and Velspar greeted Lucy with soft purrs as their golden pointed ears turned to her. Their appearance was majestic and deceptive. These were no ordinary beasts. They were the magical Guardians of Thule. The felines might not be able to speak, but their golden eyes sparked with ancient intelligence far beyond Lucy’s.
She narrowed her eyes at them. They chuffed as if understanding her frustration. They’d known Rykr was in pain, yet they hadn’t taken her to him. The beasts had visited her every damned week for her entire life, and even more frequently when she’d been a child.
Gefn’s voice slipped through the air. “We were all sworn to secrecy.” The beasts obviously weren’t the only ones to interpret her upset.
Lucy’s pale-green eyes met the sympathetic emerald gaze of the Goddess.
She nodded and sighed. Loyalty to family ran deep. “He told me about the demons and about the threat at Slake. How did it happen? How exactly was he cursed?” She hadn’t been thinking clearly enough to ask the right questions of Rykr, and he’d been too bent on driving her away for her own damned good. She shook her head. She knew exactly how alpha-male minds worked. She’d been surrounded by the ultimate examples her entire life. Her own father wrote the book on over-the-top protectiveness.
“Eirykr was in Hell Realm when it happened. He has always had far too much power and ability. As a boy, he learned to hide his location from us.” Gefn’s smile was part sadness and part pride. Telepathic bonds existed between parents, children, and siblings. Those bonds were also a kind of beacon to everyone’s locations unless they were blocked.
Gefn continued. “We felt his pain that day.” Those emerald eyes flickered. It had to have been terrible for it to break his mental block with his parents. “Pothos and I went to him immediately, but at the time, he wouldn’t or couldn’t tell us what happened. We called Hades and the healers. He hurt, but refused to tell us exactly what happened until we vowed to keep it secret.”
A secret from Lucy, of course, but that went unspoken. “How old was he?”
“Fifteen.”
She closed her eyes as her gut churned. He’d said it happened before he turned twenty. She knew he’d been hiding something. He’d been cursed right after she rejected him. The guilt and pain nearly choked her.
How much more had he kept from her?
The cats rubbed their massive heads against her stomach, attempting to offer comfort she didn’t deserve.
“It’s no one’s fault, Lucy.” Gefn’s voice held some steel to it. “He worried you would think it was somehow your fault, but it was no one’s.”
Taking a deep breath, Lucy said, “Please tell me everything.”
The other female nodded. “Hades attempted to destroy the demons, as he’d done before, but they always came back more furious, and their clawing just increased.”
She clenched her fists at her sides. “He still feels that pain, that ‘clawing,’ now?”
Gefn was silent for a moment. “Yes. He acts as if he doesn’t, and maybe he’s grown used to it to some degree, but when he was a boy, it was terrible. The only reprieve he’d get was when he learned to command the entities to a task.”
“What tasks?”
“When a threat is identified here on Earth, he is the one sent to take care of it.”
At one time, demons were sent out by evil Deities to possess the worst of humanity. The fiends were only able to get inside a mortal if the human’s soul was dark, and their presence in the body destroyed the mortal from the inside out.
Lucy closed her eyes for a moment, imagining the darkness of Rykr’s life. Sending demons to destroy any would-be terrorists would be effective. They could only get inside those whose souls were tainted. They couldn’t get into a body otherwise.
Her mind was reeling with all the implications. How did Rykr feel about all of that? Would he think the curse only worked on him because he had some evil in him? She pinched her nose. As a boy, he might have thought exactly that, and the image of him as a broken-hearted teenager with demons clawing at his soul squeezed her heart in a vise grip.
It took her a minute to get it together. “So he unleashes the demons, and then what happens? Doesn’t it take time for them to destroy the human?” They used to cause havoc in the mortal Realm. The way she understood it, the possessed tormented the good.
“Not as long as it once did,” Gefn replied with a sigh. “With all the magic unleashed to save Earth, everything in your world increased in power, even evil. The demons seem to drain a human life in a matter of hours. Eirykr rounds them up into metal cells until that happens.”
She absently ran a hand over her tattoo. “You said they’re hurting him, but his soul is okay?”
“Yes. Eirykr’s body was marked with powerful protection runes to ensure they couldn’t damage it.”
Runes. He had tattoos all over him, but runes were usually jagged ancient Norse symbols of power. Perhaps he had covered the protection spells with the artwork she wished she’d had time to study.
His mother took in a deep breath. “We have tried spells to break their hold, and Eirykr has learned all he can about the demons’ origin, but up until a couple of years ago, there weren’t any other clues.”
Lucy had so many questions, but all she wanted was to find him. It felt wrong being at the manor. Her instincts were roaring for her to go to her mate.
She firmed her lips. “What if our connection held the power to stop this all along?”
Gefn shook her head. “No one knows. The healers, and even Hades with his power over souls, couldn’t say if finishing your mating would somehow free him from the creatures.” The Goddess sighed. “If you link with him, and it doesn’t release the curse, you could easily share in his pain. It would be permanent until we found a way to free you both, and there are no guarantees we ever will. You would feel the same soul-deep agony when they claw for freedom. He refused to risk it.”
Lucy gritted her teeth. “That wasn’t his choice to make.” She tilted her head back, trying not to curse. Soul-deep pain would be awful, she didn’t doubt that for a second, but he’d borne that agony for nearly a decade. If he survived it, she could as well. Mated pairs were always stronger together, and he damned well knew that.
She felt the fluttering of her light; the renewing flicker was definitely a trickle of her old ability. Was it fate that it reappeared tonight after being completely gone for over a decade? Her fingers went to her stomach, willing the power to stay with her.
“Will you help me if this male he’s looking for doesn’t have any answers?” She would give him time to hunt this being on his own, but that was it. After that, she was going to help him whether he liked it or not.
Gefn was silent for a moment, but there was power all around the Goddess. “To help my son, I would do anything.”
Piercing emerald eyes met Lucy’s as they came to a silent agreement.