Immortal Need (17 page)

“This one is mine. You had your chance. She carries Nila’s soul, but you cannot have her. She is not meant for you. This one…this one, you will protect until the day she will die. And she will become a Watcher. In one week she will die. And she will be mine.”

“Please.”
Ayah saw Sevani beg, his beautiful face contorted with pain, his blue-gray eyes sparking with torment.

“No, she will die. You will kill the man who is to kill her. And then you will take your blade, lift it high, and cleave her head from her shoulders. You, my Watcher, will give Nila back to me.”

The vision faded with Sevani being told to go to the woman he was supposed to kill. Freya removed her hands but didn’t say anything immediately. As she stood, thoughts flashed through Ayah’s head. Sevani couldn’t have been tasked to kill her. He would have told her. After everything they’d shared, he wouldn’t have kept that from her. He couldn’t. She thought back. She’d asked him how was she supposed to die after he saved her life. He had told her that she would meet her natural destiny, as it was foretold, and he had no idea how that would be. He’d told her that after pleasuring her against her door in her room, after making her wish to have him in his life. He’d already had a taste of her. Why would he lie? As the old adage went, he was already getting the milk for free, no need to buy the cow. Why lie then? He couldn’t have. Freya was a cruel woman, trying her best to keep them apart.

But why would she need to? If she already could control Sevani, then why would she need to take Ayah from him? Was Ayah nothing more than a momentary lapse in his mission? Had Sevani, for a few days, wanted to remember a time when he had Nila at his side? She remembered then asking him if he’d kissed her because of Nila or because he’d wanted her, and he’d hesitated to answer. They’d been interrupted shortly after, but he had enough time to say no. He could have said no. But, he’d made love to her. He’d taken her so many times into the night, calling out
her
name. He’d told her, when she’d said he would leave, that he never would, that Ayah was his. And Ayah had claimed her with her heart just as surely. She’d thought she was simply falling for him, but she had gone long past that. In just a couple of days, she had learned what love, passion, and desire meant.

“No, impossible,” Ayah said then. “I asked him. He told me he didn’t know how I was supposed to die. You’re a liar. You would do anything to keep him with you. He gave himself to me.”

“No, my child, he gave himself to a woman who looked like Nila, to a woman who had her soul. He said your name even as he thought of her. Look,” Freya said then.

She pointed to her left, and Ayah looked, unable to stop herself. She saw the same vision of Sevani entering his home that fateful day, as she’d seen when they’d made love. Now, though, that her mind wasn’t clouded by passion, she really looked at Nila. Her hair was to her waist, curling around her naked body. She was fleshy like Ayah, but had a narrow waist, a tighter tone. Her breasts were slightly smaller, her face more full, so that her eyes appeared luminous instead of nearly too big. Her lips were full and swollen from a lover’s kiss. Such small differences, but enough to make one beautiful and the other pretty. Ayah saw Sevani’s agony now as something different. Oh, how he had been torn at the death of Nila at his own hands. How he must have agonized over his mistake. She could see it in his face when he realized it too late. Ayah could see it all, and it broke her heart. Shattered it into a million pieces.

She had given everything she was to him, had trusted him to protect her, to love her, too, one day. He had never given her the words, though. He had never said that she was the one he wanted. Ayah had let herself be taken away by his touch, his magnetism, her first real taste of pure passion. It had clouded her vision. Maybe, just maybe, Freya was right. She may be a witch, may be vicious, but she wasn’t telling Ayah anything that she didn’t already think herself, outside of Sevani being tasked to kill her. What if she was right? What if Freya was giving Ayah a kindness by showing her the truth? It didn’t mean that the goddess still didn’t want Ayah dead to be one of her warriors. It just meant that she was showing her the truth before she was killed. Oddly, it would fit everything that Ayah had learned about her. Freya would love the pain that she was putting Ayah through just before her death. It would entertain her to torture her newest warrior, just as she had tortured the Watchers. Ayah was crying by the time the vision cleared, and she looked back at Freya.

“Now you understand,” Freya said. “Sevani will come for you. And he will kill you. Now that you know, I think it will be easier for him. You won’t beg to live. You won’t try to make him remember what you’ve shared. He won’t have to go through the awkwardness of explaining it to you, and I will have my Watcher back for the next mission. He has done this for thousands of years. Why would you think you would matter?”

Why indeed. Ayah slumped in her bonds, not moving when the goddess walked to the door. Ayah barely heard the door open and close behind Freya’s exit. She didn’t care. Her heart had turned to dust. Tears, like silent rain, fell down her cheeks. She was going to die, and there was nothing she could do about it. But part of her thought it would be better this way. She would rather die than live knowing that she’d meant nothing to the man she loved. She would rather be gone than know that she’d made a complete fool of herself. Perhaps her father’s death, the stress, the years of taking care of someone else had made her softer for Sevani’s kind of lies. She hadn’t fought very hard from the moment that she laid eyes on him. All she had known was that she wanted him, wanted him to want her. She’d thrown herself into the fantasy of having a lover who would stop at nothing to have her, an alpha male, sexier than Adonis and stronger than any man, to claim her. She’d fed into the ideal of a driving romance that would change her life. Add to it a life-and-death situation, and she’d been easy pickings.

Blood still seeped, slower now, from her wrists, but she didn’t care. Her body was heavy, her head hanging low. She would wait. Soon enough Sevani would come through that door and kill her. When he did, she would welcome the blade—and curse him as he struck.

Chapter Twelve

“So Ayah’s uncle wanted her dead?” Valerie asked, lounging, or at least attempting to, on the couch in Ayah’s living room. The screams coming from the parlor had been terrifying, even to a seasoned warrior. Sevani had been in rare form. By the time the man began shouting that he was paid by Ronald Miller to kill Ayah, and hadn’t known who the blond woman was who came with reinforcements, even Lei had been cringing. But it was Alexander who’d gotten up, walked into the other room with his garrote ready, and stopped the screams. His face had been pale, and Valerie didn’t want to know what Sevani had done in that room. They’d fought with everything they had to keep Ayah safe, only to have Freya take her after torturing Alexander. Sevani had needed an outlet. He’d at least been able to find out who wanted to kill Ayah in this world, even if he had failed to keep her safe.

She knew the big guy. He didn’t like to fail under any circumstances. After killing Nila, he’d been inconsolable. The devastation he had done to himself, and the others around him, the first hundred years was eclipsed only by Alexander. The two were so very similar, growing up in similar times in history. She, perhaps, had coddled them the most, feeling their pain. Alexander never had a chance, truly, to live any sort of life. His upbringing had been nothing but pain and terror. Sevani, at least, had grown to be a man in happiness, but he had learned a fateful mistake could turn one’s life around. Of all the Watchers, she hoped for their happiness the most.

And that was selfish of her.

She did want to see Lei happy. She just wanted it to be with her. But she knew they weren’t going to be as lucky as Sevani and Ayah to bond. Valerie was a goddess, even if a minor one, who belonged to the other gods and goddesses. For a goddess to love a human meant to enrapture one, make him her servant. She didn’t want Lei to be tied to her because of that. She had thought about it, of course, over the years. At times she’d thought she would be willing to have him even like that. But she loved him too much to allow it to happen. He wouldn’t be Lei anymore. Well, he would, just not her Lei. His first thought would be to please her, to put his life on the line for hers, if necessary. She wanted those feelings to be real. It didn’t matter that she sensed that he wanted something to be between them. It didn’t matter that even the other Watchers could tell there were emotions brewing between them. All that mattered was that she was willing to put her love on hold, to give Lei a chance. Perhaps he would find a woman who could love him, who could give him his soul. It would break her whenever it happened, but she would wish him the best. They all deserved happiness, her boys who had nothing. They deserved a chance to find love, to find freedom. She would never be free, and she knew it.

“We’re leaving you guys behind,” Sevani said then, breaking her from her thoughts, and Valerie jumped to her feet.

“You can’t be serious. We’ll go with you. We can go take care of Ayah’s uncle quickly and then head to Folkvangr,” Valerie said. Lei was strangely silent, staring at her.

“No. You have something you need to do here,” Sevani answered, packing a small bag with weapons. “Alexander is going with me. We’ll leave as soon as I get cleaned up. I think I have some of that man under my nails.”

Sevani would make sure to eliminate Ronald’s threat against Ayah. Valerie didn’t doubt it. The man was spoiling for a fight. Gods protect Ronald when Sevani got to him. Valerie was sure it would hurt Ayah to no end to find out that her uncle wanted her dead. Sevani, Valerie was sure, hadn’t explained to Ayah the extent of his curse. She wouldn’t know that it would have to be a brother, uncle, husband, or father who wanted her dead. They would have to explain to her what was going on. Sevani needed to fill her in as soon as he got to her. She would have to know why he killed her uncle, because there was no way Sevani was going to let Ronald live when he’d put a death sentence on Ayah.

“Sevani, you are going to need us when you face Freya. You know you will,” Valerie argued.

“Damn Freya,” Sevani roared. “I will kill her with my own hands. I will get Ayah back, but first we need to know if you can save Lei. When you’ve figured that out, then you follow. You know where we’re going.”

Lei still sat without saying a word. Valerie looked at him with beseeching eyes to help her get Sevani to see reason, but he said nothing. He stood slowly, stretching, and she was struck by the play of his muscles beneath his shirt. She had seen him only once without his shirt on, in the gym, and had run. The desire that had sparked through her at seeing his rippled muscles, narrow waist, and pierced nipples had driven her nearly insane. The temptation had been too much. She couldn’t risk even a touch. It wouldn’t be enough, and to bed him was to make him her servant.

“How did you and Ayah bond?” Valerie asked, trying to ignore Lei. Sevani looked uncomfortable for a moment.

“I bedded her,” he finally said curtly.

Valerie was afraid he’d say that. “Then Lei and I can’t try,” she rushed to say. “To bed me is to make him my slave. I won’t do that to him. We could find out too late that he’s not meant to bond with me. And then what?”

“You will hold my freedom in your hands,” Lei said finally. “It is better than Freya having it.”

“Not for me.”

“It’s not only your choice to make,” he growled then. He stepped up to her, and she could feel his heat even through her clothes. She sucked in a breath, taking his scent in with it. He always smelled of cashmere and sandalwood to her, a mixture that grunted a response from her treacherous body. Even now her nipples were hardened points under her shirt and bra. She clenched her teeth. She was
not
going to do this.

“No,” she whispered fiercely through her teeth. She wasn’t going to let these pigheaded, arrogant men play with Lei’s future. There was no way to break servitude to a goddess or god. If they were wrong, and he was not meant to bond with her, then his life would be forfeit forever. He would not have the chance to find the woman he was meant to have, and Valerie would live every day knowing that she was the cause. Anything she told him to do, he had to, other than killing her. A servant was incapable of physically hurting his master. She’d seen the devastation it had caused in Alexander to be ruled. She knew that Lei would hate it, deep inside.

She had seen other gods and goddesses take servants. Those they chose thought they loved their masters and that their masters returned their feelings. Valerie had known that wasn’t the case. She’d even seen a god force one of his servants to jump from a cliff to his death because he’d displeased him. There were several ways to make humans bond with gods. Sex was the easiest. Their power would overwhelm the humans and twist them inside until they could do nothing but please their masters. Gods and goddesses could also blood link with humans, allowing the humans to drink some of their blood so that they could control them from the inside. The last way, which rarely happened, was to feed a piece of a god’s aura to a human. None but the most powerful of gods could do such. The last god she’d heard doing that had been Loki. He’d enjoyed spreading his essence around. From giants to animals, the god really didn’t have any preference. Whatever Loki could do to cause mischief, he did. That was his place. Before he’d fought to take over, his antics had been naughty, but not cruel. That had changed quickly enough after the fall of Baldur. But none of that mattered. The point was Valerie didn’t want to risk having Lei counted among the lot of god servants. That was not the way she wanted to have him. Period.

“Go, Sevani. I’ll take care of this. We’ll meet you in Folkvangr. One way or another, we’re going to find out what Valerie can do for me,” Lei said then, and Valerie sat, wide-eyed, as Sevani turned and disappeared up the stairs. Alexander followed him quickly.