Blood of the Sorceress (20 page)

Holding the phone out to her, coughing so hard he could barely speak, he managed, “Sid. Gus.”

“Nine-one-one first?”

“No, the security system will already have notified them.”

Nodding, and moving to the edge of the balcony, she quickly scrolled to his phone book, cursing her slow fingers but finally hitting the entry marked Sid.

It rang and rang.

She switched to the entry for Gus, praying, while Demetrius took out the blade and strapped its hand-tooled leather sheath and belt around his waist. Neither of them took their eyes from the closed glass doors for long. The room beyond them was black with smoke by now.

Demetrius took the old book from her and added it to the satchel. Then held out his hand. “Give me the phone. We have to go.”

“Just one more minute.”

Gus’s phone rang endlessly. She shook her head. “Gus, please... Answer, dammit.”

His face was grim. “We can’t get to them from here. The stairway’s engulfed.” Then he took the phone from her hand and put it into the satchel, buckled it up and tossed it over the railing.

Lilia watched it fall into the hedges near the house.

“Jump out as far as you can, aim for the pool,” he told her.

She stared down. Three stories, and the pool was far too shallow. She would recover, but it was going to hurt like hell.

“Come on, we don’t have a choice.”

She looked down at the dizzying distance and stepped backward. She’d had no fear up on Bell Rock. But she hadn’t been about to jump off it, either. Her history with falling from high places was not good. “I...I can’t.”

“We have to save Sid and Gus. Go.”

She nodded and, bracing one hand on his shoulder, got up on the railing. Then, with a deep breath and a silent prayer, she jumped. She screamed all the way down—a distance that took about three seconds to descend—and hit the water feetfirst, shooting like a missile all the way to the bottom. Her feet hit, her knees bent, and she absorbed the impact. It was just that easy. It didn’t even hurt all that much. She pushed herself toward the surface and emerged spluttering. Demetrius was already splashing down into the pool beside her. Then he surfaced, shook the water from his head and looked at her. “You okay?”

“Yes. Fine. You?” She pushed her wet hair back from her face.

“I’m fine, too.” Then he looked back at the house, and his eyes went frantic. They swam to the edge. He climbed out, then reached down to pull her up beside him, grabbed her arm and drew her away from the heat. A window exploded, and flames licked out the opening.

He pointed. “Get the satchel. See it there? In the bushes? Get it, and then go open the gate. Do it fast. Don’t wait for me.”

“Demetrius—”

He strode back toward the house, and she went after him and gripped his shoulder. “It’s possible you might have accepted the final piece of your soul already and not even be aware of it, because you asked subconsciously, not out loud. And if that happened, then you could be mortal right now and not even know it.”

“Get the satchel and get out of the way, Lilia.”

He pulled free, but she lunged after him again, still trying to stop him.

This time he turned on her fiercely. “Dammit, Gus is my best friend. And Sid’s barely more than a kid.” Angrily, he aimed a forefinger at the satchel in the shrubs near the house and then swung his arm toward her. The satchel launched like a rocket, landing at her feet. He still had powers. He wasn’t mortal, then. She bent automatically, picked up the satchel and held it to her chest. Demetrius was jogging away before she even managed get the strap over her shoulder.

“If your body burns, it’s over, Demetrius! Please!”

He ran right up to the front door, and she knew it had to be searing hot that close to the fire. She could feel the heat from here. Yanking the dagger from its sheath, he blasted the doors open, and then he was gone, vanishing into the flames and smoke.

“Demetrius!” she cried.

Sirens wailed. The gate closed. She had to let the firemen in. They were her love’s best hope now. She carried the satchel to the gate and tucked it behind one of the pillars, out of sight. Then, as the fire trucks rolled nearer, she pressed the keypad and let them in.

The trucks rumbled through, rolling toward the house, and Lilia ran behind them. By the time she caught up, the fire crews were already pouring from their vehicles and swarming over the lawns of the once-beautiful home.

She started toward the house, but three men rushed over to her, the apparent leader clasping her shoulders and shouting questions over the roar of the flames, the whoosh of the hoses, the rumbling motors, and the shouting of the firefighters. The trucks’ flashing lights hurt her eyes.

“Are you hurt?”

“No, no, but—”

“Is anyone inside?”

She nodded. “Three men. One of them is older. Gus. Please, I have to help—”

“We’ve got this, ma’am.” He nodded to one of his subordinates, who took her arm and kept her from running back toward the house as the chief jogged toward the others shouting, “We have three adult males inside! Let’s do this!”

Meanwhile, her captor was tugging her toward an ambulance. “Were you inside?” he was asking. “How did you get all wet?”

She couldn’t drag her eyes from that inferno as the flames grew fiercer, hotter. God, where was Demetrius? Yes, he was immortal, and yes, he would recover from any injuries with rapid speed, but what if his body was destroyed? And what about Gus and Sid? God, had Sindar murdered more innocents today? Had her attempt to reclaim the life he’d stolen from her only brought about more death?

“Ma’am?”

She shook herself. “We were upstairs. We jumped from the balcony into the pool.”

“We?”

“Demetrius and I. He went back inside after Sid and Gus.”

“Did you inhale any smoke, ma’am?” He pressed her to sit on the back edge of the open ambulance.

In seconds an EMT was leaning over her and pressing a stethoscope to her chest. “Take a deep breath for me,” he said, as the firefighter raced back toward the blaze.

“I’m fine.” She pushed his hands away, rising as something moved behind one of the second-floor windows, a shadow in front of the eerie red-orange backlighting. “Is that—”

The shadow smashed through the window, plunging into the hedges and vanishing. But she’d seen enough to know it was Demetrius, with one or maybe both of the other men entangled in his arms.

She lunged forward, but the paramedic blocked her. “Ma’am, you really can’t—”

“You really don’t want to get in between me and the man I love,” she said. Her eyes met his, and she willed him to move. And he did, his face going as blank as a sleepwalker’s.

She raced toward the hedges where firefighters were already pulling the men free. It was hot this close to the fire, so hot it seared her face. Demetrius emerged at last, nearly falling to his knees before she reached him, grabbed him and, pulling his arm around her shoulders, half carried him away from the danger. The firefighters followed with the other men.

When she reached the far side of the pool she eased Demetrius onto the grass and knelt over him, cradling his head in her hands. His face was sooty, his eyes watering as he stared up at her, and then he looked back toward the rescuers who were tending to his friends. She followed that gaze and saw that neither Sid nor Gus were conscious.

“They were trapped in the game room on the second floor,” he said. “They didn’t have a chance. I tried....”

Then his eyes fell closed and there was only the sound of his lungs, wheezing with every breath.

The medics closed in, and Lilia had the presence of mind to slide the blade from its sheath and beneath her skirt, away from prying eyes, before they shoved her out of the way and she lost sight of her love.

11

W
hen Demetrius came around again he was in a hospital bed. He’d been bathed and no longer stank of smoke, and he was wearing a clean blue hospital gown and was resting between crisp white sheets.

As memory returned, his eyes widened and he sat up with a sudden start and a grunt of horror.

Soft hands pressed him gently back onto the mattress. He knew that touch. And the voice that came with it. “It’s all right. It’s over. We’re safe.”

He blinked away the nightmare images of Gus, of Sid, slumping in the corner of the game room, coughing, barely breathing, as he blasted through a wall to get to them. And then so limp, so lifeless, as he’d carried them to the closest window and launched the three of them through it.

“What about the guys?” he asked softly, his eyes searching hers. So blue. So beautiful. So very sad.

“Gus has some burns on his hands and arms, but it was mostly smoke inhalation. But he’s going to be all right.”

He blinked slowly, knowing already that he didn’t want to hear the answer to his next question, yet asking it all the same. “Sid?”

She closed her eyes, but a tear squeezed through anyway. “Sid was gone before you hit the ground. He had an undiagnosed heart condition, they said. The smoke was just too much. They tried to revive him, but—”

“Dammit!” He sat up in bed, and no amount of pressure from those tender hands stopped him this time. “I need clothes.”

“Demetrius, wait.”

“I need my damn clothes. I’m going after that bastard who calls himself a priest, and when I find him—”

“You’ll do what?” she demanded.

He went still, staring into her tear-filled eyes.

“You’ll do what?” she asked again, her voice softer now. “Act like the demon he tried to force you to become?”

He stared at her. She was clean, too, wearing a dress someone must have donated, because it was a size too big and not her usual style, green, with a tank-style top and flared skirt. Flip-flops on her feet.

“It would be poetic, wouldn’t it?” he asked her slowly. “If I murdered that animal because of what he made me?”

“It wouldn’t hurt him a bit, Demetrius. Death is an illusion. No more than a release from the constraints of the physical body. You know there is life beyond it. You know this.”

He sat there with his legs over the side of the bed, feet on the floor, itching to get out of there and wanting to argue with Lilia’s calm logic. But it was true, what she said. It was true, and he knew it.

She was still talking. “If you kill him, all you do is release him into wholeness and oneness and bliss, and he can then process what has happened and perhaps, return a better man. While you? You stain your soul with the mark of murder. What good would killing him do?”

“Maybe keep him from hurting anyone else,” he said. “Maybe avenge that kid who befriended me when I had only one friend in the world. He would have taken a bullet for me, you know.”

“I know.” A tear slipped down her cheek. “I know. But Sid is fine, I promise you. He had a few minutes of fear, then he closed his eyes, and when he opened them again it was to a world of beauty and understanding the likes of which he had never even imagined.”

“That’s not what the afterlife was like for me.”

“You were in a realm created by hatred and dark magic. That wasn’t the afterlife. It was something altogether different, completely unnatural. And I think you know that.”

He sighed. “I’m still going after Sindar.”

She nodded. “I know you are. And I’m going with you. Would you like to see Gus first?”

Grunting, he nodded. “If you would please get me some clothes.”

She picked up a plastic bag from the floor. He looked up, sending her a question with his eyes. “The hospital found something for me to wear and provided these for you. Right now these are the only clothes you have.”

Then he lowered his head. “How bad?”

“The house is a total loss. The garage survived, and the limo and the Jeep are all right. But everything else is gone.”

“How long have I been out of it?”

“Three days. You missed the funeral, I’m afraid.”

Heaving a deep breath, he blew it out slowly. “I’m really sorry about that,” he said.

“He knows you are.”

Blinking slowly, Demetrius tried to take stock. His life had turned upside down in the space of an hour, it seemed. “So I’m back where I started. Homeless.”

“Your home,” she whispered, taking his hand and laying it over her heart, “is right here.”

Oddly, he believed her. The feel of her heart beating gently beneath his palm filled him with...something. Something he’d been determined not to feel. Something he knew he could feel a lot more powerfully if his soul were intact.

But if he accepted her offer he would lose his powers. He wouldn’t be able to fight the powerful high priest who’d somehow take up residence in the body of a comatose old man after thousands of years. He could not fight the powerful, maybe immortal, dark magician without his powers. So he couldn’t let Lilia restore the final piece of his soul. Not yet. And if he didn’t succeed in his mission to subdue Sindar in time, maybe never.

And yet Lilia had made a very good point. What good was vengeance going to do any of them?

“We can return to my sisters,” she said softly. “They’ll give us a place to stay for now. We can be there in time to spend Beltane with them.”

Beltane. The deadline for his decision to be made. One more day, he realized. Nodding slowly, he got to his feet. “I’ll get dressed. Will you let them know I’m discharging myself, get the forms I need to sign so we can get all their arguing over with and be on our way?”

“Of course. I’ve already phoned my sisters—your phone, not mine. Mine burned with the house.”

That reminded him of his magical tools.

“They’re safe,” she said, before he could even speak, and then she nodded toward the chair in the corner, where the satchel sat undisturbed. “The blade, the chalice and even your amulet are in there.”

She’d taken care of his most cherished possessions. She’d made sure he had something to wear. She was trying to take care of him. Had been, he realized, for thirty-five-hundred years. Had anyone ever been that devoted to anyone before?

* * *

Gus lay in his hospital bed looking pale and pain-racked. He wore mittens of gauze and padding that reached to his elbows, and his ankle was in a cast and elevated in a sling. IVs pumped him full of drugs and fluids, but if pain meds were part of the mix, there were clearly not enough of them.

Demetrius sat in the chair beside the bed, feeling for his friend. Hurting for him. And certain his empathy would be far worse if he had an intact soul. Yet another mark on the con side of that decision. “I phoned Ned Nelson before I came in,” he said. “He’s been here, but I was still too out of it to talk then. Anyway, he’s going to have his lawyers handle everything for me.”

“What’s to handle?” Gus asked, searching Demetrius’s face.

“I’m selling enough stock to take care of Sid’s family. It’s the least I can do.”

Gus nodded. “He was a good kid. Damn good kid. Should’ve been me dying in those flames, but I guess I’m...not done yet. There’s still something I need to do.”

“There are a lot of things you still need to do, my friend.” Demetrius moved to pat Gus’s hand, then stopped, because they were so thickly mittened.

“You saved my life,” Gus said softly.

“You would have done the same for me.”

The old man’s lips thinned, and he looked away. There were tears in his eyes. “We had a good run, you and I.”

“Don’t talk like you’re going anywhere soon, old man. You were right just now. You
do
have more to do.” Demetrius found a spot to touch, Gus’s shoulder. “I’m keeping enough to live on for a while, but I’m signing the bulk of the stock and what’s left of the property over to you.”

Gus’s pale blue eyes widened, and he moved as if to sit up but only managed to raise his head from the pillows a couple of inches before it fell back down again.

“The house is a total loss. But the property is still a prime piece of real estate. Worth several million, given that location. And there’s the limo, the garage, all still intact. I’m taking the Jeep.”

“But—”

“It’s the least I can do. I’m the cause of this, Gus. I cost a young man his life and nearly got you killed.”

“No. No, listen, D-man, Lilia says Sid was ready to go or he wouldn’t have gone. And that I wasn’t, or I
would
have. She told me about that priest. It’s
his
fault, not
yours.
”

“Lilia is wise about many things, but not everything, Gus. I let that old priest in. I listened to his lies, agreed to keep his presence secret. I trusted him, a stranger, more than I trusted Lilia, or Sid, or you—
you,
Gus, my best friend. I betrayed you and almost got you killed.”

It hit him then that he’d done this before. Betrayed his best friend by his secret love for Lilia. That time his best friend had been a king, and the betrayal had led Demetrius to kill his friend with his own hands. For a moment he sat there awash in a sense of déjà vu that was almost dizzying. And then it passed, though he was left shaken in its wake.

Gus saw that he was upset and changed the subject. “Who was that old priest, anyway? Why would he want to do something like that to you? To us?”

Averting his eyes, Demetrius shrugged. “I think he was deluded, and for some reason he chose me to obsess over, and it got worse when Lilia appeared. It was just...random.”

“That little witch of yours,” Gus said, “She says nothing is random. She knows things, D-dog. You should listen to her.”

“I’ve figured that out already. That’s why I’m going home with her. Back East. She’s got family in New York state, near Ithaca. Once—”

“You’re leaving me?” Gus whispered. “But, D, we’ve been together for—”

“You didn’t let me finish. As soon as you’re well enough to travel, I’m bringing you out there, too. If you want to come.”

“Damn straight I do.”

Demetrius nodded. “I’d stay until then, but we need to find that priest, before he hurts someone else. And Lilia thinks her sisters can help us do that. You just get well, Gus. And let me know if you need anything.” Demetrius reached for the notepad near the phone on Gus’s nightstand, which, he thought, was rather ironic, since the man would have had to dial with his nose. After jotting a number, he set the pad down again. “That’s Lilia’s sister’s number. That’s where I’m heading. And I’ve still got my cell phone. You remember that number?”

Gus made a face. “My new cell’s in the drawer. Lilia bought it for me. Don’t know where she got the scratch, but—”

“One of her brothers-in-law is nearly as wealthy as Ned Nelson.”

“That must be it, then,” Gus said. “So, do you mind programming the numbers into that new phone for me?” He held up his hands and shrugged sheepishly. “Kinda hard with my fingers all wrapped up like boxing gloves.”

Demetrius found the phone and turned it on. “It takes vocal commands,” he said as he entered both numbers.

“That Lilia. She thought of everything.” Gus sighed. “I’ll be on my way to you two just as fast as I can, D-dog. You better believe it.”

Demetrius smiled. “I’ll hold you to that, Gus.”

* * *

After Demetrius left the room, Gus sat up in the bed and began unwrapping the gauze from his hands. He wasn’t healed yet. Not completely. But nearly. His friend had been right. He did have things to do. He’d only just come to realize—to remember—what things when he’d been overcome by the smoke. It was all coming back to him now, though.

* * *

It didn’t taken Sindar long to track down the witches. Like so many other things, such as the language and customs of this time and place, the location of Lilia’s sisters had been waiting for him in the memory of the old priest whose body he wore like a suit.

A cheap and ill-fitting suit, at first. But it was changing rapidly to reflect the soul it now held. For someone with his abilities, bodies were mutable, and he was enjoying the sensation of familiarity his newly changed body aroused.

Indira and her husband, the fallen priest Tomas, had been with Father Dom at the end, when he’d fallen to his death. Well, “fallen” wasn’t precisely the right word. He’d been pushed. Not by the witch or her consort, but by the demon Demetrius himself. He’d been using wildlife as his eyes and ears to keep tabs on the witch while he’d still been imprisoned in the Underworld. When a wolf had appeared, attacked Father Dom and sent him tumbling from the cliff in a beautifully ironic repetition of the way the witches had died so long ago, the old priest had never doubted that Demetrius had been behind it.

Demetrius probably didn’t even remember saving that witch’s life, but Sindar knew, because he still had access to Dom’s memories.

Not that it mattered. However, something about the poetry of Dom’s end appealed to Sindar, and he began to alter his plan to make room for something similarly fitting. Full circle. Yes, that was the way it had to be.

He was going to give Demetrius a reason to refuse to accept his humanity a little bit longer, then kill him. He intended to kill the witch first, though. She would die as Beltane, the deadline, began, just as the clock ticked the hour, so that she would not return. And if she died with the piece of Demetrius’s soul still inside her, he would be destroyed utterly. No afterlife, no heaven, no chance to live again. It had to be very precisely timed. And before he killed Lilia, he would take as much from her as he could. Like the skin of a snake or the feathers of certain birds, the blood of a witch had power. Power he could use.

But first he needed to bait the trap.

He’d stolen a car, then switched its license plates with a set taken from a broken-down relic at a junkyard. Driving had been exceedingly difficult at first, even with Father Dom’s muscle memory mostly intact. However, by the time he’d driven the thing all the way from Arizona to the Finger Lakes region he’d mastered it.

He had a cell phone he’d taken from Lilia’s room on his way out of the burning mansion. He had cash, picked from an old man’s pocket at a highway rest stop. And he had a detailed geological map of the entire area around Milbury, which had allowed him to choose the perfect spot to execute the rest of his plan. The army he intended to raise would wait a few more hours. In the meantime...