THIRTY-TWO
I admire your optimism, but she trounced you.” Rune hit that flask again. “She amused herself with you.”
“Our next matchup will be different,” Jo assured him. “I’m ready for it.”
“You are a very, very young vampire who should never pick a fight with a primordial.”
“Relative to you, the big bang is young. And what’s a primordial?”
“Don’t know that either, Forbearer? It’s the firstborn of a particular species, or at least the oldest one living.”
“Are you the primordial dark fey?”
A shadow flashed across his face. “I may never know.”
“Whatever she is—I’ve got this.”
“Say you could somehow prevail over her, why would I give up my kill?”
“Is it personal?” Jo asked.
“It’s important. She’s been playing with forces she’s too young and confused to understand, forces that can throw the entire universe into chaos. She flirts with an apocalypse. I happen to be one among a group that opposes her.”
“What did Nïx mean when she talked of the Møriør?”
“That’s the name of my alliance. I’m a Møriør.”
“But you’re not a nightmare made flesh.” Not a Bringer of Doom. Jo figured Rune would need to keep it in his pants for more than a hot minute to be a doom bringer.
“And you’re not a bomb,” he said. “Can we agree that Nïx alleged ridiculous things?”
The Valkyrie had said she’d kept her eye on Jo and Thad: her nuclear weapons. “Do you share a castle with monsters?”
He ran his hand over his chin. “That part is true. But not material.”
“The hell?” Her potential guy lived with monsters? Girlfriend/roommate issues would take on a whole new level.
“We’re speaking about Nïx.”
“Fine.” Jo would address his monsters in the future. “What does she intend with me?” With Thad?
“Depends on what you are. Nïx said you were rare. You’re half vampire, so what’s your other half? The first time we met, you cut me off as soon as I asked you what you are—as if I’d reached the limits of my usefulness. But you do know?” Whatever he saw in her expression made his lips part. “How could you not know? If you were raised by one parent, were you told nothing about the other? You said you were all by your lonesome. The generation before you is gone?”
Jo couldn’t bring herself to share her story yet. If he’d given her just one good reason to trust him . . .
“I’ll have your secrets soon enough, Josephine.”
The second time he’d said that. Why was he so confident?
“Since you can stomach my poison, you could be one of the mystical species,” he said, “like the Sorceri or Wiccae. It’s possible you could be fey. Most fey have magicks in them.”
She recalled her dream of Rune’s first kill. “Maybe you’re enemies with the Wiccae or Sorceri. You’re half fey, but you still might not be a fey fan.” She wondered if he would admit to hating them.
“I despise the fey, but I wouldn’t make you my enemy just because you possessed fey blood. As for the Wiccae, I’ve sworn allegiance to a witch. She’s one of the Møriør. I don’t care about the Sorceri either way.” He took another swig from his flask, his mind on this mystery. “Vampire hybrids are uncommon, but would any of those combinations be enough to attract the attention of a primordial Valkyrie?” He met her gaze. “When I kill Nïx, this information might go to the grave.”
Never to know? “As long as Thad is safe, I don’t care.”
“Then let me deal with her. As I told you, I’m an assassin by trade and have been for thousands of years.”
“I need to make sure you don’t accidentally off my brother. I will be watching over him. Either we go together, or I go alone.”
He leaned his shoulder against the hearth mantel, examining his black claws. His silver rings shone in the firelight. “Then I’ll keep you trapped in here.”
“Asshole! So I’m back to being a prisoner? And you wonder why I don’t trust you with more information about myself?”
“You need to clean up this mess. And more . . .” He traced away for a split second, returning with a weighty book. He dropped it on his fireside chair. “You can read this and learn about the Lore.”
Lemme get right on that. “What’s in the book?”
“Everything you ever wanted to know about immortals.”
She pursed her lips. Of course it is. The treasure trove she needed most. “No dice, Rune. Nothing matters more to me than keeping my brother safe.”
He smirked. “I’ll do my best not to make him a collateral casualty.”
So arrogant! Rune seemed to take those vows to the Lore seriously. Why not try one? He loved it when she drank from him, so . . . “If we aren’t partners in killing Nïx, if I don’t go everywhere you go when involved in that mission, then I vow to the Lore I won’t drink blood.”
“You did not just say that.” He actually reeled a little. “You will be bound by that vow, compelled by it, even if you later decide differently. You gave few qualifiers—and no time limit.”
“What’s the big deal?”
“Say I returned here in five seconds with the Valkyrie’s head and your brother safely in tow. All your problems would be solved. Yet because you didn’t accompany me, you wouldn’t be able to drink blood—ever. The vow would prevent you from ingesting it. You’d be incapable of it!”
He had to be overreacting. No way a few words were so powerful.
“So I either have to partner with you or allow you to starve.” He pointed his finger at her. “Guess which way I’m leaning, vampire!” He was madder than he’d been about his stuff. “You shouldn’t throw those words around, much less so broadly! It was an immature move. Which is completely understandable given your age.”
“Look, I’ve never made a vow like that before I did with you, okay?”
“Yet you refuse to read the Book of Lore and educate yourself?”
Ugh! She wanted nothing more! “I’m having a hard time believing words could make me starve.”
He pulled that trinket from his pocket. “Vow to the Lore you’ll never take this talisman from me without my permission.”
“So it’s gone from trinket to talisman?” She stepped closer. “Tell me what that is.”
“Perhaps I will in time. If you make the vow.”
“Fine. I vow to the Lore I’ll never take that from you without your permission.”
He held it out to her.
When she reached for it, her hand veered to the right as if repelled by some invisible force. Brows drawn, she attempted again. Same result. She raised her chin. “Then my vow is bulletproof. Good. That means we’ll work together to kill Nïx.”
“I have done this by myself a time or two, vampire.”
“You’ve failed with her twice already. I botched your attempt from the roof—”
“Because I chose not to kill you.” He squared his shoulders, clearly unused to criticism about his skill. “In a nanosecond, I could have shot you and strung another arrow for the Valkyrie.”
“You couldn’t hit her when she attacked me. I assume you were trying?” When he’d been yelling for Jo.
He ground his fangs.
She had him! “Then that settles it. We’re partners in crime for this mission.”
“I’ll make sure it’s a very short mission.” He strode closer to her. “We begin now.”
“I need to get clothes from my place first.” She gestured at her bare feet.
“There’s more I want to say about your actions—my wrath is in no way appeased—but I’m curious about your home, since you found mine quaint.”
“After that, will we go to Nïx’s?” Jo tried to picture a mad Valkyrie’s crib. “Does she live in a different dimension?”
“She resides not far from New Orleans on a property called Val Hall. But there’s no need to go there. I have spies watching it every minute of the day. They’ll alert me if she returns there.”
“How?”
“This rune will glow.” He pointed to a band inked around his right wrist. “In any case, we hope she doesn’t. The wraiths guarding Val Hall make it the safest place for her.”
“Wraiths?”
“Spectral she-beings. They fly around the mansion, keeping intruders out.”
“How do you kill them?”
“You don’t; they’re already dead.” He took her arm. “It’d be best just to show you. But say nothing about what we intend. The nymphs concealed around Val Hall would overhear it.”
Concealed? “So?”
“So they’re there to help me for two reasons. One: I fucked them. Two: They believe I only want to sleep with Nïx. They can’t hear us arguing about how best to assassinate her.” He traced Jo to an overgrown stretch of misty bayou countryside.
Moss dangled from oaks. Fog draped the area. Lightning rods jutted all over the property, corralling repeated bolts.
“We’re in Valkyrie territory now. They give off lightning with emotion. Feed from it too.”
“Do they all control it like Nïx, making cages and blades?”
He shook his head. “As the primordial of her species, she must have learned to wield it.”
“This place looks like a mad scientist’s laboratory.”
“You haven’t seen the worst yet.”
As she and Rune approached a clearing, a sprawling, creepy mansion came into view. Against a background of lightning, ghostly females in ragged red garments flew through the air, circling the structure. “The wraiths?”
“Also known as the Ancient Scourge,” Rune said. “They’re as strong as Titanian steel, and even older than I am. You can’t tunnel under them, can’t fly over, can’t trace past. Overpowering them is impossible.”
She raised her face to scent the air. Thad was here! Behind their guard? She’d just tensed to do something when Rune clamped her forearm and traced her back to Tortua.
“Why’d you leave?” She flung her arm away. “Thad is inside! I can challenge Nïx. She might come out to fight me!”
“She’s not in Val Hall.”
“We can wait there until she shows up.”
“The other Valkyries wouldn’t tolerate it. I could keep you safe, but I couldn’t do anything for your brother until we handled the guard dogs. If you anger Val Hall’s inhabitants, they might take it out on him.”
Jo made a sound of frustration. Resigning herself to a wait, she said, “I can’t believe Thad’s in there.” At least she hadn’t scented his fear. He and Nïx had seemed chummy. “If Nïx isn’t there, who’s watching him?”
“Her Valkyrie sisters. They’re likely coddling him, convincing him to join their alliance.”
In other words, they were brainwashing her brother. “There has to be a way around those wraiths.” If tracing past them wouldn’t work, ghosting and walking right through them probably wasn’t an option.
“For now, our best bet is to hunt Nïx. You have to be patient.”
“Patient? Not my strong suit. You got a plan B?”
He gazed away and murmured, “Always.”
Why did that one word send a chill down her spine?