Dreams of a Dark Warrior (12 page)

look at the Valkyrie. She was sitting on the floor of her cel in front of the glass, resting her forehead and hands against it, as if she expected the door to open at any time.

Instead of feeling satisfaction to see her like this, he suffered more of that inexplicable conflict within him.

He’d done his duty with her. So why this … guilt? He clasped his aching forehead.

Why do I feel like I’m going mad?
If so, then it’d been a long time coming.

He’d always known he wasn’t a perfect soldier, had known he was fucked up. How could he not be? His

days of torment had left him emotional y stunted, unclean. But he got the bloody job done, control ing his eccentricities and deviations with exhausting training regimens.

Every day, he worked out in his room, lifting weights with a punishing intensity, then he ran at least forty miles—half the width of the island. He ate only enough food to stave off the worst of his hunger.

Anything to weaken himself, to help him appear normal.

And for years, his injections had rendered him an automaton, mindlessly carrying out the Order’s

agenda. Those years had been the most satisfying in his entire life.

Clearly, he just needed stronger doses to get back to that state. Tonight he’d begin doubling up. It would help him ignore his new prisoner and final y get some sleep.

Decided, he stripped off his clothes, then snagged the case. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he plucked

a needle from its cradle, using it to extract the clear contents from two glass vials.

a needle from its cradle, using it to extract the clear contents from two glass vials.

He rested his elbow on his knee and squeezed his right fist, readying one track-marked inner arm.

A hungry vein answered the cal .
Kill the tension and pain, let me rest.
He pressed the plunger …

exhaling with pleasure as his heartbeat grew plodding, his breaths slowing. The higher dosage confirmed

his suspicions.

Oh, aye, Dixon had been adding something il icit.
Bless her.

The strain eased, the pain of old battle wounds lessening until he could lie back—but he kept the

monitor in sight.

His lids grew heavy as he watched the Valkyrie, until he eventual y fel asleep.

Yet instead of the oblivion he’d expected, he dreamed of a night in Belfast when he was just seventeen,

the night his life changed forever.

SEVEN

D
eclan rol ed off the chit onto his back, staring up at the rotting warehouse ceiling above his mattress.

Maybe he wouldn’t have it this time.
That feelin’ in the pit of me gut, in me chest.

Waiting …

The girl—he didn’t remember her name—slurred, “Ah, Dekko, that was just grand.”

Bullshite.

She was some loose bird who hung with the junkie gang he’d fal en in with three years ago. Their city

was unforgiving. Since then, half had died. The other half were like him: hankering for the next score,

fleecing anything and anyone.

“Though for a spel ,” she muttered, “I thought ye weren’t to come a’tal . …” Then she passed out.

Declan yanked off his empty condom.
I didn’t.
Already anticipating the misery to fol ow, he’d gnashed his teeth, struggling to finish like a man. And couldn’t.

He gazed over at her, feeling the strain build.
Wrong.
Wrong girl beside him, wrong time, wrong place.

He rubbed the medal ion hanging from his neck, frantical y circling his thumb over it—

He shot upright, shoving his fist against his mouth to hold down whatever meager slop he’d forced

himself to eat during the day. Chil s seized him, his muscles shaking.

He felt this way every time he was with a woman.

Hel , he felt a measure of the strain constantly. Whenever Declan woke, his anxiety was worse than

the day before, as if acid seethed in his bel y and barbed wire cinched around his heart.

Tracks lined his arms; he could take or leave food even though he was stil growing like a weed; bouts

of nightmares plagued him.

For as long as he could remember, he’d had a frenzied sense that he was supposed to be
doing

something. No matter where he was, he felt like he was supposed to be
some-where else
.

And that strain was kil ing him.

After sex, it grew stronger, like a beast lived inside him, clawing at his insides to get free. Though only seventeen, he was ready to give up women altogether.

For now, he’d numb the feeling the only way he knew how. He reached toward the battered crate

beside his mattress on the floor and plucked up the syringe that lay ready.

Why did he always expect to feel different after sex? When he knew better?

Because, Dekko, ye’re not ready to admit ye’re done as a man.

He frowned at the weight of the syringe in his hand. He’d been shooting heroin for three years, and

knew it was too light. Dread seized him as he gazed down. Empty.

Rage building, he hurled the syringe across the room, then turned on the girl. Jostling her awake, he

yel ed, “Ye feckin’ slag! Ye stoled it?” That was al he’d had. No money to buy more.

She woke, mumbling, “Needed a wee bump—”

“Get out!” he roared, shoving her up and out on her arse, tossing her clothes at her before slamming

the door in her face.

He punched the wal , moldy plaster exploding. Tonight he’d have the nightmares again. A monster at his

back. Burning pain slicing through his chest. A woman’s grief-stricken screams.

Those screams …

Desperate to avoid those dreams, to numb the strain, he yanked on his pants and threw on a jacket,

readying to leave. On his way out, he passed the bitch in the hal way, spat in her direction.

Half an hour later, he pleaded his case to his dealer: “Just a couple of quid’s worth. Give me the shite

now, and I’l fleece ye some of me mam’s jewelry if I have to.” Would he actual y steal from his own

mother?

Oh, aye.
But it’d take time to get to his parents’ house and back.

The verdict: “Cash first, Dekko.”

Declan would need even more time to fence the jewelry. Might take him a day to get back here with the

scratch. He didn’t have that long.

“I’m beggin’.” He was about to vomit. The dealer clearly thought it was from withdrawal.
No, from

madness, more like.
He’d do anything to avoid what awaited him. Anything. Others in his gang had no problem giving to get. With that in mind, he said, “There’s got to be
something
I can give ye?”

His dealer’s eyes widened with surprise. He hadn’t known Declan Chase would suck for it.

I hadn’t either.
Could anything be worse than this feeling?

“Hie yer arse out o’ me sight, Dekko.” The man booted him in the back, sending him reeling out the

door.

Unsure whether he was relieved or not, Declan scuffed back out into the streets.

When a biting wind blew in from the sea, his chil s worsened until his teeth chattered. With a despairing

eye, he gazed around, tempted to break into a house right off the main strip, but everywhere he turned,

bars covered the windows.

No choice but to set off for his parents’ place. They were working-class; any jewelry of his mother’s

had been either handed down from her own mam or hard-earned by his da.

But she can’t need it like I do.

An hour into his journey, Declan passed the run-down cathedral where he’d been an altar boy. At

fourteen, he’d confessed his constant gut pains and tensions to the parish priest—a stern old codger

who’d told him to keep his ailment to himself and find a vocation.

Declan had found heroin instead. He’d never told another what he grappled with every day. Not even

his brother, Colm—not even before their fal ing-out.

His mam wouldn’t be the first family member Declan had stolen from.

By the time he reached his parents’ at three in the morning, he was quaking so hard his vision blurred.

He’d already vomited twice, laden with strain.
Those screams …

The front door was open, the house quiet. He eased inside, going straightaway to the kitchen, to the

bottle of whiskey he knew he’d find in one of the cabinets. Might help him get through the next couple of

hours. He lifted it, chugging—

He lowered the bottle, peering into the dark. In a murky corner of the kitchen, someone lay on the floor.

Was his brother passed out? “Jaysus, Colm. Ye’re too young. Ye want to end up like me?” Declan would

beat his arse for this. “Colm?” he demanded, striding over. “What the bloody—”

His brother’s sightless eyes were opened wide, fixed on the ceiling. His throat was slashed down to the

spine.

“C-Colm?” he rasped.
Dead?
Someone had murdered his little brother? He stared dumbly, tears

wel ing. Until muffled screams sounded from the living room.

Somebody’s hurting me parents too!
Fury ignited within him, burning away the tears. In a daze, Declan slipped into his parents’ bedroom, grabbed the bat propped by his da’s side of the bed.

When he entered the living room, he faltered, barely able to comprehend what he saw. Red-eyed

beings with fangs and claws fil ed the area. And those were the creatures with humanlike bodies. Others

were winged monsters with bulging eyes and limbs jutting out al over.

The winged ones had gagged and tied up his parents on the floor so they could … slowly feed. Their

deformed mouths peeled away one strip of flesh at a time—while his mam and da stil lived, screaming in

agony against their gags.

Me mind’s going to break, can’t do this, can’t believe this is happening.
But just when Declan thought he’d pass out from the crazy pounding of his heart, one monster’s head rose up from his da, and blood

dribbled from its mouth.

Da’s blood.

A mindless wrath overwhelmed Declan, and he attacked them. Al he could hear was his thundering

heart, his bel ows, the bat connecting with bone over and over. He didn’t know where this frantic strength was coming from, but he crumpled the metal bat against their skul s.

Yet as powerful as he was, they were more so. They kept coming and coming until they overpowered

him, pinning his thrashing body to the floor. Even as he flailed, he spied a glimpse of some eerie kind of intel igence in the hideous eyes of a winged monster, and Declan had an instant of clarity.

Colm was the lucky one. …

As ever, Declan’s mind wasn’t ready to relive what those creatures had done to him—the unimaginable

torment until he’d blacked out; twenty years later, his dream easily flickered past, picking up at the time when consciousness had trickled in once more. From outside his parents’ house, he’d heard voices, and

final y the blackness wavered.

He felt the biting tension on his bound wrists and ankles ease, nearly screaming as circulation coursed

to his hands and feet once more. How long ago had he been tied up?

Days. …

He was aware of a man’s voice tel ing him that he would live, that help was here. “Those things have

been slaughtered, son. They’l never hurt anyone again.”

“Da?” Declan rasped before the blackness took him once more.

In a kind of twilight, he felt his bones being set, his skin pierced again and again as his numerous

wounds were stitched.

When he woke, he was in a hospital, covered in bandages and casts. A tal , dark-haired man sat

beside his bed.

“I’m Commander Webb,” he said, his Yank accent marked. “You’re in a private hospital. You’re safe

now.”

Declan recognized the voice of the man who’d saved his life. He was middle-aged, his hair closely

cropped. He wore what looked like a military uniform, but Declan had never seen one like it. “Wh-what

happened?”

“I’m sure you’re in a state of shock right now. The docs are amazed you survived—”

“And me family?” He hated the way his voice broke.

“I’m sorry, Declan, but they’re al dead.”

He’d known, but he’d stil held out hope. “You’re the one who got me out of there?”

“My team and I did. I belong to an organization cal ed the Order, and it’s our job to protect people from

those miscreats. Unfortunately, our scouts didn’t locate this pack until too late.”

“Miscreats?
Pack?
” Declan pinched his forehead, wincing as the skin on the back of his hand pul ed tight under a bandage.

Webb nodded. “Miscreations. They’re immortal beings. Just about anything you thought was a myth is

out there walking the streets. Sometimes various species band together in leagues.”