Ghostland (24 page)

Still, hope settled in Aisling’s heart. If what Davida said was true, and the gifted took care of their own, then she would find a home for the child if she had to visit every house in the area set aside for those with otherworldly talents.

“What are your names?” Aisling asked, careful not to show a particular interest in any of the children though she tried to memorize every distinguishing feature of the undiscovered witch.

Zurael crouched next to her, studying the children intently as one by one they gave their names. The little girl was Anya.

Curiosity made Aisling turn to him and say, “You seem fascinated by them.”

His eyes met hers and her breath caught at the burning fury in them. His arm made a sweeping gesture encompassing the children not only in the sandbox but in the building and manning the fishing poles along the water. “In the place I call home, the birth of a single child is call for a kingdom’s celebration. And here—it is wasted on those created of mud. Like the earth they walk on and the air they breathe, they aren’t worthy of what they’ve gained.”

Davida appeared in the doorway before Aisling could think of anything to say. Rather than linger with the children and risk revealing her interest in Anya, Aisling rose to her feet.

“Sorry for the interruption,” Davida said. “Let me finish showing you around.”

Workrooms followed. Then crowded dormitory rooms and a kitchen connected to a dining area.

As they walked back to the front door, Aisling said, “In Stockton, lawbreakers are tattooed, but since coming to Oakland I’ve seen both a man and a woman branded with the sign of the cross. What are they guilty of?”

Davida laughed. “Only of being devout in their faith. They belong to the Fellowship of the Sign. Its members have carved out a community in The Barrens, or beyond. Several I thought lost eventually found their way to God when they were taken in by the Fellowship. They come back to help occasionally. And when the number of adults in the community expands, they offer a home for some of the children.”

“You’ve visited their community?” Aisling asked.

“No. I’ve had to act on faith that I’m doing what’s right for the children.”

They reached the front door and were ushered out.

The worst of Zurael’s rage faded as they distanced themselves from The Mission. It cooled with the need to remain vigilant.

“You did well in drawing her out,” he said as they passed the clusters of houses separated by remnants of destruction and nature’s reclaiming of the land.

Aisling glanced up at him, her eyes troubled. “I didn’t ask about Ghost or whether people have gone missing in this area, too.”

“I doubt Davida would have anything to offer about either. It’s better you left those questions unasked and didn’t alert her to your true interest in the Fellowship of the Sign.”

“How are we going to find their community or get there without trusting Father Ursu or Elena?”

Zurael chuckled. His hand curled around her arm and he stopped walking, turning her to him as he did. “Do you think the wings I’ve worn in your presence are useless except for show and defense? Do you think I’m limited to only the forms you’ve seen so far? If necessary we’ll search The Barrens and beyond.”

“You can fly?” she asked, making him groan when her hand settled on his chest.

“Of course, but first we’ll try to get a better idea of where to look for the Fellowship’s compound. And tonight, I will do a preliminary search of The Barrens.”

Zurael covered her hand with his and tormented himself by guiding it beneath his shirt to a male nipple hardened by the desire that needed only a touch, a look from her to flare to life. He closed his eyes when she rubbed her palm over puckered, sensitive flesh. He knew he had no one to blame but himself for the throbbing ache in his cock and the fiery need coursing through his bloodstream.

“Aisling.” It was warning and plea, curse and benediction.

A soft feminine mouth pressed to his, shocking him, tempting him nearly beyond reason. He jerked away, stepped back. Only the deeply ingrained training that came with being his father’s son, a prince in the House of the Serpent, kept him from responding to her overture, from parting his lips, taking what she offered and returning it, sharing breath and spirit with her.

She pulled away from him and resumed walking, but not before he saw the hurt in her eyes, the tremble of pain that spiked through her the same way it did him when he witnessed it. He wanted to grab her arm and haul her back into his, to finish what she’d unknowingly started, or if not, then to explain how dangerously he already cared for her.

Zurael remembered too well standing in the Hall of History, then taking tea in the House of the Spider, unable to hide the lust she’d inspired in him from those he was with. Fear permeated every cell when he thought about an assassin from the House of the Scorpion being sent for Aisling after the tablet was reclaimed. He could keep her safe from the Djinn if Malahel and Iyar stood with him, if The Prince agreed. But if they knew how thoroughly she’d ensnared him . . .

Zurael allowed her to put physical and emotional distance between them. It wouldn’t last. Just as he’d catch up to her once they reached the bus stop, the wall of hurt separating them would fall under the onslaught of passion as soon as they touched again.

Aisling pulled the silence around her like a protective blanket. She willed herself to concentrate on the scenery she passed as she walked to the bus stop, on the tasks in front of her as she got onto the bus, anything but Zurael.

How often had she told herself to deny the desire? To fight the attraction? It was a mistake to accept more than his protection and aid, to continue allowing him access to her body.

For comfort she plucked Aziel from her shoulder and cuddled him against her chest. “As soon as we get back to the house, I’ll see what I can do about finding a place for Anya,” she said, rubbing her cheek against his soft fur before restoring him to his usual spot.

She sighed in relief when the bus stopped in front of the library and she escaped the close confinement. Zurael followed her into the building, seemed content to let her take the lead. But then this was her world, not his.

Some of the tension eased from Aisling as she looked around. Surprise made her gape when she saw the row of computers against one wall, each one claimed by a citizen sitting on a stool.

The entire space labeled “library” was hardly bigger than the shaman’s house she now called home. It held few books; those she could easily see were set aside in an area enclosed by short walls so children could be contained and kept away from the racks of magazines and newspapers.

Aisling browsed the magazines on her way to the newspapers. Most were about cooking or construction, salvage and reclamation of the land, crafts and gardening, practical topics, though a few dealt with beauty and fashion, sports and the pleasures only the rich could afford.

The newspapers were all local. Oakland. San Francisco. San Jose. There were editions going back several weeks. She spared a glance at Zurael. “Can you read them?”

His expression became one of dark amusement. “Of course.” And despite the fact that he was the one who’d shunned her touch and sent pain crashing through her, he leaned forward and lightly scraped his fingernails against her neck in a subtle reminder of his talons. “I don’t spend all of my time lost in fantasies of retribution.”

She looked away from him. Knew he wouldn’t miss the tight points of her nipples against her shirt. But she refused to let him see desire in her eyes. “We should start with the Oakland papers. I’ll take today’s.”

Aisling didn’t wait for him to answer. She rummaged through the papers on a table and quickly found what she was looking for, then retreated to a chair away from the other patrons.

Within minutes she felt chilled to the core at what she’d discovered. A touch to Zurael’s thigh and he leaned over to read the article about a body found in an area plagued with violence.

Final Judgment For Another Sinner!
the story caption proclaimed above a picture of a partially savaged man lying among rubble. A smaller insert showed the brands on his hands.

The damage done to him by nighttime predators was severe enough to make cause of death unclear, but then that wasn’t of interest and the reporter made no apologies. It was the brands that fascinated, that provided shock value and titillation for the reader.

Aisling shivered as she looked at the insert of the hands and overlaid them with the symbols Elena had traced on the coffee table in tea, the ones she’d drawn for Aubrey the previous night at the occult shop. They were the same. And the punishment brands burned into his flesh were for a crime she was equally guilty of, for summoning a demon, for lying with one.

Zurael’s lips against her ear distracted her from the downward spiral of her thoughts. “I will kill anyone who threatens you,” he said, the heat of his breath no match against the deep chill inside her, his promise feeding her fear of punishment, not reducing it.

Aziel made his presence known. He slid from her shoulder far enough for his front feet to find the pouch hidden underneath her shirt. His weight pressed the fetishes against her chest in a reminder she had powerful allies.

Aisling closed her eyes. She forced the fear away. If she was going to save her family, she couldn’t worry about her own fate.

“What’s been done can’t be undone,” she murmured, stroking Aziel’s soft fur then repositioning him on her shoulder before resuming her search through the newspapers.

It was Zurael who found the next item of interest. Aisling immediately recognized the man pictured, just as she remembered his words at Sinners.
You’ll find it far more entertaining to vote her out with the others. She’s a shamaness.

Her stomach knotted when she learned Peter Germaine was a man of power—a deputy police chief, the brother of the mayor—and no friend to any human who’d been graced with otherworldly abilities.

“Interesting,” Zurael said. “Did he want you dead because he knew you located his brother’s lover? Or did he influence the others because he hates and fears those with gifts he doesn’t have? Perhaps my curiosity will get the better of me and I’ll hesitate long enough to ask him before I mete out the punishment he deserves.”

There was no heat in Zurael’s voice, no passion. He might have been talking about plans to weed a garden or clean livestock stalls.

Aisling opened her mouth to protest his casualness, to argue against what he planned, but the words remained trapped in her throat. The images Elena’s brother had conjured in the spiritlands drifted into her thoughts on icy winds—the hollow-eyed Ghosters standing in front of Sinners, their attention focused on her, their faces undamaged though their bodies were ripped, torn so organs hung and wet bones gleamed.

Your work? I’m sure they had it coming to them, but what a way to go,
John had mocked. And she couldn’t bring herself to tell Zurael she didn’t want him to kill the man who’d so casually suggested she be put out into the predator-filled night.

She shivered. The icy winds settled around her heart like heavy weights as she worried about the corruption of her soul, the ease in which she accepted the slaughter of a human unable to protect himself against a being like Zurael.

Did it prove she was half demon? Her father’s daughter? Or did it only mean that in summoning Zurael, in coupling with him, in coming to—care for him—that the humanity to be measured and judged when she entered the spiritlands the final time was leaching away?

Aisling ducked her head and resumed looking through the paper on her lap. She filled her mind with information as she scanned articles about her new city.

Geneva and the farm seemed a lifetime away. A world away. And by the time she came across a picture of the man and woman in red, Aisling wondered if she could truly return to a place where her gift had to be hidden.

Like Peter Germaine, Felipe Glass, the man in red, was involved in law enforcement. He was in charge of the guardsmen, powerful in his own right but also wealthy. Aisling wouldn’t have been surprised to learn the woman in red was a mistress, but found she was Felipe’s wife, Ilka, the daughter of a founding family.

It helped having names for those faces at Sinners. Aisling doubted they had anything to do with Ghost or the black masses, but she felt better knowing who they were, even if it only confirmed a belief she’d held all her life: The police and the guardsmen couldn’t be trusted.

She passed the newspaper to Zurael without comment and continued through those remaining. There was no mention of Ghost, no mention of the Fellowship of the Sign in any of them.

“You’re tired and hungry,” Zurael said when they’d reached the end of the stack. His voice was as caressing as the knuckles he stroked across her cheek. “Let’s get something to eat.”

There were restaurants and food stalls across the street. Aisling touched her pocket and felt the folded money there. The craving for fresh fruit, for bread and cheese, rose and made her mouth water. She fought it, told herself not to waste the money, but an internal voice overrode her long-ingrained frugality. It reminded her that some of the bills in her pocket had probably been paid to her assailant to bring about death, whispered that she should use it to sustain life.

They were nearing the door when one of the patrons left his spot in front of a computer. Aisling slowed. She looked longingly at the machines capable of housing huge libraries of information, and which had once been so commonplace even children owned and used them.

“Do you know how to use one?” she asked Zurael.

“No. There is no power to run technology such as this in the place I call home.”

Aisling rubbed her palms against her pants and approached the available machine. In the days before The Last War there’d been satellites and land networks allowing for instant communication using computers. Children no longer used books in school, and rarely used pencil and paper, just as the majority of people paid for everything through accounts accessed by magnetic cards like the one she’d used on the bus, instead of using cash.