Private Demon

Thierry laid Jema on the bed and jumped from there to the balcony. Outside, he vaulted over the edge, where he hung from the frost-covered stone by one hand.



"Jema, it's freezing in here." The old doctor coughed as he turned on the light. "Did you break a bottle of perfume?"



Thierry kept his head down as he heard Bradford walk over to shut the balcony window and pull the curtains closed. Ice and stone cracked as he dug his fingers in, praying the edge would hold. When Bradford's footsteps moved across the floor, Thierry pulled himself back up and looked through a gap in the curtains on the other side of the window.



Dr. Bradford was covering Jema with her quilt and calling to her. He took her pulse, frowned, and turned away, moving out of Thierry's sight. When he returned, he held a needle in his hand, which he used to inject Jema. Then he sat with his fingers pressed to her wrist, looking down at her face. He sat in that manner for five minutes, and then nodded and gently placed her hand on the bed before turning out the light and departing.



Thierry waited a long time before he went back into the room. He had to be sure he hadn't harmed her and performed his own examination. Jema was in a deep sleep, but her pulse was strong, and she moved restlessly when he said her name. Had she been enraptured, she would not have had the ability to move at all.



He hadn't killed her. She would live another day.



Leaving her tore at him, but Thierry moved back out onto the balcony, where he watched the snow fall around him. He had not fed before coming to Shaw House. She had been awake and reading when he had arrived, and so he had stayed in the shadows, waiting for her to fall asleep.



The long hours, the cold, and lack of blood had instead sent Thierry into a troubled sleep.



How had she slipped into his nightmare? Humans did not have talent; she could not enter the dream realm by her own will. Yet somehow she had—or he had lured her in. He had been a fool not to realize it was Jema's mind, not his fantasy of Jema, in the charnel-house nightmare. No, he had been too busy relishing the chance to tell her everything.



So he had told her. He'd told her of his dead wife, his ruined faith, the Kyn curse under which he lived—his name; he had told her his name. Everything that she was not to know about him had come out of his mouth. Thierry was surprised he hadn't given her the numbers to all the bank accounts he kept around the world.



Sometime during the dream his sleeping body had left the balcony and gone into her room. That was when the dream changed, and the feeding lust came over him. He had taken her blood again, almost draining her. It was only blind luck that Bradford had come in when he had.



Thierry left the balcony the usual way and went back to the Nelsons' home, but only to gather his weapons and belongings. He had gone too far with Jema this time, and he could not go back. He could not trust himself anymore. Not when his feelings for her had nearly resulted in her death.



He had fallen in love with her. So much so that it had nearly put him in thrall to her.



Five hundred years ago, these feelings would have tempted Thierry to change Jema with his blood into his sygkenis—something he had never been able to do with Angelica, as she had risen to walk as Kyn, as he had—but the curse only killed humans now.



How had she done this? Jema had won his heart in the strangest fashion. Not in the midst of passion, but in the face of his anger, when he had displayed every secret, revolting part of himself in the blood dreams, and she had not turned away. She had embraced him. She had offered herself to him. She had even laughed at him. Yet when he had tried to give her some comfort in return, when he had told her that he wouldn't let her die alone, only then had she rejected him.



If that was not love, then Thierry did not want to know what it was.



Their hands, entwined, bleeding together. He looked down at his fingers, turning his hand over, expecting to see the mark of her blood on it. He didn't understand what it meant—it may have meant nothing at all—but it had felt like sanctification. As if something greater than him and Jema had given a blessing to their love.



What sort of God gave a dying woman to a cursed demon? Was it punishment for him, or for her? That God would do such a thing to her made him wish he could challenge the Almighty himself. Whatever Thierry had earned for his mortal sins, Jema Shaw was an innocent. She had not earned him.



There was a certain irony to it. Thierry had always wanted love. Within the heart of the warrior was a desperate need for peace, and gentleness, and kindness. A life lived to its fullest, with a lady at his side. A lady like Jema. He had wasted his love on a woman who had used it to destroy him, to drive him mad. He had nearly destroyed the woman who had brought him out of madness, who would have kept his love safe.



Thierry had no answers, no thought of how to cope with this new torment. He knew only that he could not stay away from her. He could protect Jema and follow her, and watch over her, and assure that nothing and no one harmed her.



He could not stay away from her, but last night would have to last him a lifetime. The risk of thrall and rapture was too great; he might not be able to leave the blood dreams a second time.



He could never permit himself to touch her again.



"The trail ends here." Falco rose from his crouch and looked down both sides of the street. "He is not Kyn, not from his scent. He is human, in one of these buildings."



Cyprien regarded the row houses, tenements, and condemned buildings that made up the neighborhood. Unlike Falco, he had been unable to pick up any scent, Kyn or human. Tracking was not something Michael did well when there were too many other odors to distract him. Here trash peppered the walks and gutters. A cat wandered out of a garbage can on its side, the head of a rat in its mouth. It reminded him of a district in London where Tremayne liked to hunt. The hopeless were here; the only thing missing was the whores.



A faded sign above the largest building read the haven. Cyprien remembered what Tremayne had said about John Keller, but it seemed far too convenient.



"What do you know about that place?" He pointed to the Haven's sign.



"Young ones who have no family or home go there," Jaus's seneschal told him. "The man who runs it is troublesome. The Kyn avoid it."



"Alexandra's brother works there now," he told Falco. "Can we enter the building without being seen?"



The seneschal gave the entrance a negligent glance. "Does it matter if we are?"



Cyprien wanted the man who had hurt Alexandra more than he desired absolute discretion. "No. Come."



The Haven's front doors were secured from the inside, but posed no challenge to Falco, who with one jerk tore the door panel off its hinges. He set it aside and strode in, his hand on the hilt of the sword under his coat. Cyprien followed, trying to catch the scent of Kyn on the air. The smell of body odor, waste, cleaner, and cigarette smoke was decades old in this place, along with a more acrid, less definable scent.



Human sweat, Cyprien decided as they swept through the rooms on the first floor. Tainted with fear and anguish. Tremayne would have inhaled it like the bouquet of a fine wine. But no scent of Kyn.



The administration offices were empty, but they heard voices in the kitchen and followed them.



"You have to use a medium-low heat," John Keller said. "Or the marshmallow burns."



A young female voice answered him. "That's why mine never turned out so good."



"Did your mother teach you how to cook?"



"No. She didn't know how to cook. I read the directions on the side of the box."



Cyprien motioned for Falco to stay in the corridor and walked in. A warm, sugary odor scented the outdated kitchen. "May I have a word with you?"



John looked up from the pot in which he was cooking, and handed the wooden spoon to the tall, fair-haired girl hovering beside him.



"Keep stirring it until the marshmallow is completely melted," he said, his tone void of emotion, "and then add the cereal."



"Might we have a word?" Cyprien asked.



The girl looked up, surprised. "Who are you?"



"Friends of mine, Pure." John pointed to a door on the other side of the kitchen. "We'll talk in there."



Cyprien followed him into the room, which was a large storage room being used as a pantry. He closed the door behind him. "Pure?"



"The opposite of Kyn." Keller positioned himself with his back to a wall. "Why are you here, Cyprien?"



"Someone tried to kill me tonight. Your sister pushed me out of the way and took a crossbow bolt in the chest." He watched the other man's shoulders jerk, as if his words had had the same effect on him. "Should I thank your friends, the Brethren, or will you do the honors the next time you see Archbishop Hightower?"



"Is Alexandra alive?" John demanded.



"She is Darkyn," Cyprien reminded him. "She cannot be killed so easily. Although if the bolt had pierced her heart…" He picked up a meat cleaver that had been left on a shelf. "Was it you, Keller? Did you harm her, trying to kill me? Was my life the price the Brethren demanded in exchange for yours?"



"No. I didn't do this. I'm not involved with the Brethren any longer. I've left the priesthood." John eyed the cleaver. "Are you planning to use that on me?"



"Your demise would solve many problems for me and your sister." Cyprien twirled the heavy blade through his fingers, making a show of it.



"Most of the children in this place have seen enough ugliness for five lifetimes," Keller said. He sounded afraid but resolved. "If you're going to kill me, take me away from here first."



"I would enjoy that." Cyprien threw the cleaver, the blade burying itself in the nearest wall. He noted the flinch Keller gave at the sound. "Regrettably, I have promised Alexandra that I would not harm you."



"I'm not interested in any favors, Cyprien." Still afraid, Alexandra's brother was, but more resolved now than when he faced death. "From you, my sister, or the Darkyn."



"You shouldn't expect any." Before Cyprien could say more, Falco came through the door with his sword drawn. "What is it?"