Darkness Unbound (6 page)

“Yet, I avoid the part where I get to be your whore forever.”

“Until I am with child, of course. In exchange you get a period of freedom in the Human Realm.”

So, this was about conception. Again. Loathing flared. He crossed his arms in front of his chest.

She stepped into him; her breasts bumped his crossed arms. Her hands roamed his body as if that would activate sensation. “Maybe in a few days you’ll change your mind.”

He trapped her hands in his, stopping their southern trek. “Stop.” He pushed her away from him and stepped backwards again.

Panic flashed through her eyes. “You will go to the underworld. To the executioner who will slice your body and shred your flesh. Forever. There’s no
Mesquet
reincarnation chamber awaiting you.”

“I apologize, but I...I cannot do this.” He shook his head. “It never worked when we were together for years. I know the only reason Min had you marry me was to get you with child. It did not work then, and it probably will not work now. Is there not another that can father your child? Why cannot Min give you this desired child?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Was this all some sort of game to humiliate me? You know he wants you to be the father.”

Zannis sighed. “My decision is not about you. I thought I wanted time in the Human Realm. Now, I cannot do this.” Beyond his distaste for his ex-wife, he pitied her. Softly he asked, “Do you love him, Ibioni? Enough that all this…all the
duties
he requests of you make what he gives you worthwhile?”

Her hand shot to her throat. Emotion drifted through her eyes.

“Are you a slave like the rest of us?” he asked.

She glanced around as if Min watched her. She whispered, “You never pleased me, Zannis. Not like he can.” Her eyes shifted away from direct contact, indicating otherwise.

“You lie.”

She hissed, “Only a god can grant us a divorce, which you will never get. You will remain mine forever. Eventually, I will get what I need. I hope you enjoy real hell.” She disappeared.

His townhouse prison vanished.

Chapter Four

“Wake up, Astrid!”

Astrid’s brain throbbed inside her skull. She fought alcohol-induced lethargy to bat at the hand gripping her arm. “Quit.” Her lids drooped closed. Ah, relief.

“Come on. Wake the fuck up.”

She managed a clumsy sit and blinked from the car’s backseat into the dark driver’s seat at Christian. “Whaaat?” she slurred. “My head hurts.” She massaged her temple with one hand. The motion sent the world around her into a slow spin.

“Shit. Stay awake. Stay in the car. Do not get out of the car. Did you hear me? Do not get out of the car. Nod if you understand.” Christian’s head snapped to stare out the windshield into the black night, and then popped back to her. Worry pinched his features.

“I’ll just doze here.” She leaned her head against the window.

“Just stay in the car. No matter what you see out there. You can’t handle this thing, at least not your condition.”

“What’s going on?” She squinted at him, but he was already exiting. The car door’s slam ricocheted like a gunshot through her head. She massaged her forehead. Instinct demanded she disregard the temptation to doze.
Stay alert
.

Shadows moved in front of the car through the darkness beyond the light cast by a solo streetlight. Even that dim light hurt her retinas, but she forced herself to squint through the pain. Khyan flew from the darkness. He landed butt first onto the sedan’s hood with a long curved sword in hand. He jumped up like a superhero as if not even bruised, leaving a body-sized dent in his wake. He charged back into the dark.

The car jolted forward, smacking Astrid’s cheek against the back of the front seat and tossing her onto the floor. She pulled herself off the floor mat to glance out the rear view. With a screech she braced for the SUV’s next strike. She crashed back onto the floor. Screw Christian’s dictate. She had to get out of this car. Now.

Another hit came from the passenger side. Her head whacked against the driver’s side door. She blinked slowly until the world stopped its spin. Then, she tugged at the door handle, but it wouldn’t open. Outside, the door was tight against the concrete edge of an overpass. Two more successive hits, and the car broke through the concrete guardrail. It teetered at the edge. Interstate traffic whizzed below. She shuffled to the passenger side of the car too late.

The car rocked into free fall.

****

Had someone whacked her mid-forehead with a sledgehammer? Astrid cracked her eyelids, which resisted as if swollen. An overhead fluorescent light burned her retinas. She slammed her lids shut with a groan. Why did her ribs and legs ache?

Oh yeah. The car had swan dived off an overpass. So much for Christian’s promise to protect her, if she got drunk.

The steady beep-beep of nearby electrical equipment set off a metronome of rhythmic spiking pain in her brain. Artificially fresh disinfectant tickled her nose with a smell she knew only too well after years of gone-to-shit ops and from the weeks after Zannis skewered her. A hospital. She pushed her mind beyond the drugged drowning sensation and gasped for breath.
You will not lose it right now. Pull it together and get your bearings.

A second eye open didn’t hurt quite so much. She took in her hospital bed, digital monitoring equipment, and IV pole.

Her stomach lurched with a red-alert warning. When she attempted to sit, restraints around her wrists and ankles prohibited more than a pitiful abdominal crunch move. She twisted, but couldn’t break free. Crap, she was going to vomit on herself.

The restraints miraculously unlatched at the moment her stomach lurched. She rolled to the edge of the bed. A trashcan appeared beneath her head. A hand held her hair as her stomach emptied copious amounts of foul fluid.

She wiped her mouth with the moist washcloth handed to her, and fell back against the pillow. Her savior glowed. Actually, only his hair glimmered as its long blue strands traveled a wavy path to his mid-back. Blue? That punk style had gone out decades ago. A woven gold, blue, and red beaded collar lay over his darkly tanned, naked neck and sculpted, smooth chest. And he wore a sarong-style skirt. Maybe she was finally dead, and he was an angel or god or something.

But who vomited when dead?

“You are not dead, Astrid.”

He could read minds. And knew her name. That weirded her out.

He chuckled.

“Where am I?” Her voice came out scratchy, and her throat burned as if she’d had a breathing tube. Surgery? She didn’t think the magi’s healer needed much more than her magik touch. She scanned her surroundings. The Spartan too-worn furniture screamed authentic hospital decor. No person with even a hint of taste would choose that saccharine green color for a chair.

In his deep, singsong tone, the glowing being announced, “They will arrive soon for you. But that is not why I am here.”

“Who’s coming? The magi?”

He nodded.

“Who are you?”

“Amun-Ra.”

“Should I know you?” Based on his glower, she guessed so. “You’re glowing.”
And I’m hallucinating.
“That means you must have something to do with
them
.”

“I request you not discuss this visit with anyone, especially them. Or him.”

“Him as in Zannis?” Astrid threw a hand over her eyes. “I’m dreaming. Why can’t I just be allowed to finally die in peace?”

Amun-Ra pulled her hand off her eyes. “Look at me.”

She stared into his shimmering gold eyes, mesmerized and unable to break free of his gaze.

“You must trust the energy within you.”

“What are you talking about?” Astrid demanded her eyes moved away from his, but they refused to respond.

“The power that enables you to open portals.” He released her arm and broke their ocular connection.

As if she’d ever fully trust herself with that ability since the three times she’d accidentally opened a doorway, it led to
him.
Her gaze dropped to the deity’s right forearm. A small blade handle protruded. The blade was embedded to the hilt. Yet the skin was smooth as if healed around it. Without thinking she reached for the handle. When her hand encircled it, he sharply inhaled. She released. Her gaze darted to his. “Sorry. I probably shouldn’t have touched. It just didn’t seem like it should be there.”

“Did you experience any discomfort when you touched the blade?” His eyebrows rose.

She shook her head.

“Then, do it. Attempt to remove it.”

She reached for the blade again and smoothly pulled it from his skin, which instantly healed around the site. She held out the blade for him.

He ran a hand over the area on his forearm. His golden eyes swam with surprise when they met hers. He closed her palm around the blade. “Keep this. You can use the blade once. None can take it from you, and you cannot gift it to another. This is yours alone to command. It will destroy whatever being you choose to use it upon.”

She palmed the small knife, wondering why it had been embedded in his arm.

He flicked his wrist and an intricate gold chain linked itself to the end of the now-sheathed blade. “Wear it,” he ordered.

She traced the golden chain with a finger, but didn’t place it around her neck. “Thank you. Why do you care what happens to me?”

A tragic expression transformed his face. Overwhelmed by a bizarre need to comfort him, she squeezed his hand.

His expression morphed into deadly. “Those who have hurt you… their time is at an end.”

She plucked her hand from his. “You’re here to protect me from Zannis?”

His face screwed up with confusion
.
“He sent me to you.” Then, he disappeared.

Within seconds she passed out.

****

“Astrid. Astrid Scarre!” a woman screamed.

Astrid’s teeth clicked together when someone shook her. Who screamed her name? All she wanted was to snuggle deeper into this warmth for just a while longer.

“Give her more of the reversal,” a dictatorial female ordered.

“Ma’am, she’s had enough. She needs that pain relief. She’s scheduled for surgery in an hour,” a male replied.

“Give it!”

Throbbing pain jolted her to abrupt consciousness. She bowed against arm and ankle restraints in a failed attempt to sit up. Her head swirled like someone spun her on a carousel. With a lurch her stomach warned.

“Don’t you dare puke. Astrid, I need to know where you’ve been. Who tried to kill you?”

Astrid struggled past the pain haze. A woman loomed into her visual field. She squinted making out brunette hair cut into a neat bob surrounding a face that was
my-way-or-no-way
tough. Her old boss, Colonel Holly Greene, director of operations at the Company. Had she dreamed up magi and the guy with glowing blue hair?

That bar scene had seemed so real. She also remembered the ripping pain of bullets searing her body when she rescued that kid, Cy, from the Hashishin compound a few days ago. Maybe she’d dreamed everything that occurred after she rescued Cy, and was in the hospital from those wounds.

The skin tats from magikal healing would confirm the magi as reality. But a few ineffective tugs against the arm and leg restraints proved glimpsing her skin a futile endeavor, at least for the moment.

“Where’s Kane?” Colonel Greene demanded.

Even through the fog of pain and dizziness, a soul-deep protective instinct pushed her to silence. The Company didn’t need to know about magi. If she mentioned them or the guy with glowing blue hair, they’d no doubt invite a shrink to visit her.

She wished all of it to be real. As an outsider for most of her life with the bizarre doorway-opening problem and then having a wall-banging one-nighter with a supernatural guy from the past, she longed to find someone that might understand. With those magi she might’ve found a group that accepted magikal weirdness without judging her to be several cards shy of a full deck.

Her right fist closed tight around something sharp. The knife from Amun-Ra’s arm. Relief whooshed through her.
You’re not crazy. It’s not a dream.

Then logic hit. Why wasn’t the colonel disarming her? Maybe she couldn’t see the blade.

The world shifted eerily, and her stomach rendered a final warning. “Gonna puke.” Seconds later stomach contents coated her and the colonel.

“Damn it,” the colonel complained, swiping debris from her face. She gripped Astrid’s chin and lowered her face close. “Lieutenant Scarre. Focus. Where is Langford?”

Kane? Ingrained military submissive behavior had her replying, “Don’t know.” Technically, that was correct even though a vision of the magi estate flashed through her mind.

The room teetered. Her stomach clenched again.

“All right. That’s enough!”

She recognized the voice. She squinted through complaining eyes to see the too good-looking blond in green scrubs and a surgery cap.

Christian’s gaze swung to hers. He pushed a pair of wireframes up his nose. With a disdainful sigh he said, “My God, what is this hospital coming to? Where’s the nurse? I demand to know who allowed my patient to sit in her own vomit.”

“I don’t know who you think you are, but this is my operation. Get out,” Colonel Greene ordered.

“No. You’re done here. She is
my
surgical patient. Now she has to get a bath before prep. Christ, I hate being behind schedule.” He rolled his watch and drama huffed.

The colonel closed in on him.

Christian squared off. “Don’t make me call hospital security on you, ma’am. I’ll have you and your cohorts locked out of this room faster than you can say don’t-you-dare.” Softly he said, “Please, leave Ms. Scarre’s room. All of you.”

To Astrid’s shock the colonel nodded, and all evac-ed.

Christian pulled a smart phone from his scrubs’ shirt pocket. His fingers flew over the keys for a few seconds. He waited for the phone’s soft ding indicating a reply before addressing her.

He approached with his back to the viewing door, where she glimpsed a too-avid audience. He wiped at the puke coating her with a towel and whispered, “I’m sorry about all of this, especially about how shitty you probably feel right now. And smell. Damn, you’re ripe. What a clusterfuck.”