Mortal Kiss (20 page)

He’d expected that it would be just his room that was cold, but the rest of the house was freezing too. He walked toward the landing that overhung the central staircase, feeling his toes getting colder and colder with every step. The heat must have gone off, and maybe the power. That would explain why all the lights were out. Ballard usually left at least one on each floor. Lucas crept forward, feeling a twinge in his shoulder from the bruise he’d gotten in the fight with Finn. Lucas rotated his arm slowly, trying to ease the muscle.

Reaching the balcony, he looked over the railing and noticed a faint glow coming through the half-open door of the living room. Maybe his mother had told Ballard to light a fire; she always was a light sleeper, and the cold had probably woken her up as well.

Lucas hesitated, torn. He liked the idea of sitting in front of a roaring fire right now, but if it meant having to be in the same room as his mother, and possibly Ballard, even though Lucas had been waiting to talk to
him
all evening … Lucas wanted to know where Ballard had rushed off to and why he hadn’t stayed to make sure Lucas was all right, for a start. He also wanted his guitar back—the last he’d
seen of it was Ballard carrying it to the car. But Lucas had waited up for hours, and there’d been no sign of Ballard returning home.

If they were down there now together, Lucas had no doubt that Ballard would have told Mercy about the incident at school earlier. His mother hated him drawing attention to them, despite the fact that she herself was endlessly photographed in all the celebrity gossip magazines. He suspected she just didn’t like people to be reminded that she was old enough to have a son. Sometimes Lucas thought Mercy would have preferred not to have a child at all.

On the other hand, his feet were beginning to ache with the cold, and the warmth would help his sore shoulder.

He’d gotten halfway down the stairs when he heard a muffled but horrible scream. It came from the living room. Lucas froze, hanging on to the railing. The scream was followed by a loud, angry voice. It was his mother’s.

“How dare you?” Mercy shouted. “You fool. You could have ruined everything! Do you know how long this has taken to plan and execute? Do you?
DO YOU?
”

There was another scream, as if his mother’s words were causing somebody physical pain. Lucas’s heart pounded in his chest with fear, but he kept going down the stairs, overtaken by a compulsion to see what was happening. The temperature dropped even further, the air getting colder still as he crept across the entrance hall.

“This is unacceptable,” Mercy raged. “This is one too many mistakes!”

Lucas had heard Mercy angry before, but never anything like this. The sound of her fury chilled the blood in his veins. He wanted to see who she was shouting at, but the door of the living room wasn’t open quite far enough. He reached out, intending to push it open just a little bit more. His fingers touched the handle, but he immediately jerked them back. It was icy cold—no, it was colder than cold. It was
freezing, a cold so deep that it was painful to touch. He looked at his hand, shocked to see that his fingers were marked where he had touched the handle, tiny pieces of his skin torn off by the cold metal.

“Do you have anything to say?” his mother’s voice barked, and Lucas ducked down behind the door. Had she seen him? Through the keyhole, he saw a familiar figure kneeling on the floor in front of his mother, trembling hands clasped together.

“Please … please, my lady … I am sorry.… It won’t happen again. It was just … the boy, Finn … I thought … he is determined, this time. The girl … she is too much like … like her. If he would join us willingly …”

It was Ballard. He was groveling at her feet. Lucas felt his mouth drop open in surprise. What did that biker guy have to do with Ballard and his mother?

“Silence!” Mercy screamed, raising her hand.

Ballard jerked up as if held by an invisible rope, his chin quivering as his head snapped back on his neck. He whimpered in pain.

“You miserable, disgusting worm,” Mercy sneered. “I have
allowed
you to serve me, and this is how you repay me? You could have ripped asunder everything I have worked to achieve.”

“Please, my lady,” Ballard begged again. “I thought—”

“Enough!” she roared. “That girl is marked, as is Finn. You knew that. That’s all you needed to know!” Mercy turned her hand as she spoke, and Lucas watched as Ballard twisted in agony. “Now you must pay for your stupidity.”

“No, no!” Ballard pleaded. “I’ve learned my lesson.… Please … don’t—”

“Stop sniveling, Ballard. Rejoice that you may still serve me.”

Mercy clapped her hands together, and the servant collapsed in a heap on the floor. He howled once and then dissolved into pathetic, whimpering sobs. Lucas
watched as his mother took a step backward and then held up her hands. The sight of them filled Lucas with terror.

Mercy’s fingers were
growing
. He heard knuckle-cracking pops as each digit stretched until they looked twice their normal length. His mother’s nails became talons, cruel and sharp.

Then, as Ballard lay moaning on the rug in front of the fireplace, Mercy began to chant.

“To-than-dek, par-than-dek, kan-than-dek …”

It was no language Lucas had ever heard before, but it made his skin crawl. He was so scared that he couldn’t move and stayed there, crouching beside the door, watching through the keyhole. His mother repeated the phrase, over and over, her voice becoming louder and louder. She slowly raised her unnatural hands, chanting all the time, until they were held high above her head. On the floor, Ballard was writhing, screaming, hands over his ears as if trying to block out the words. Lucas, crouched outside the door, felt the floor begin to shake beneath his bare feet. He wanted to run, but something made him keep still. If his mother saw him now, if she heard him running away …

The furniture in the entrance hall began to rattle as if an earthquake were building below the mansion. Lucas could feel the tremor deep in his chest.

He heard a sound behind him and glanced over his shoulder, but the second his head was turned there came an almighty scream, so soaked in terror that Lucas was almost sick with fear. The living room door snapped shut, but he could still hear the scream. It felt as if it would go on forever, but as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Just as quickly, the quake ceased. Silence fell.

Lucas tried to calm his frantic heart. Footsteps echoed from inside the living room. Scrambling to his feet, Lucas leaped behind one of the hallway’s large chairs. Mercy threw open the door. Her lips were set in a line, and her eyes were still full of fury. She swept to the front door and flung it open, stepping out into the cold night. The door slammed behind her with a resounding bang.

When it seemed safe, Lucas got up from his hiding place and moved slowly into the living room. It was empty. Ballard was nowhere to be seen. There was no other way out of the room, and Lucas had not seen him leave. Apart from that, everything seemed normal. Nothing had moved. The temperature was rising again, thanks to the fire crackling peacefully in the grate.

Lucas walked over and stared into the fire, trying to makes sense of what had just happened. Something made him look up. There, on the old glass, were two large handprints, as if their owner had pressed his hands to the mirror.

Faye stared at Joe Crowley in shock. She and Liz were sitting beside the roaring campfire. Liz was holding Jimmy’s hand anxiously.

“Mercy Morrow?” Faye repeated. “No way.”

Joe nodded. “It’s true. She’s why we’re here. And she’s the one causing havoc in Winter Mill, not the bikers.”

“But you’re the ones who are werewolves,” Faye boldly pointed out. Her fear had lessened—sitting here beside the fire, she didn’t feel that she was in danger. There was something about Joe that was reassuring, not scary. And as for Finn … Faye looked at him now and couldn’t imagine ever having been afraid of him.

Joe took a clean cloth and a bowl and filled the bowl with water from a pan that had been heating over the fire. Faye watched as he prepared to tend to his son’s injuries, and something inside her trembled as she saw Finn wince in pain. She remembered that moment in the Old Mill. Even when Finn was a wolf, Faye had thought she had known what he was thinking.

“I can do that,” she found herself saying, standing up. “You can tell us your story.”

Joe glanced up at her, then back at Finn, apparently reluctant. In the end, though, he stood and held out the bowl of water and the cloth.

“Are you sure you’re ready to hear it?” the big biker asked. “It’s not pretty, and it won’t be easy. But whatever Mercy has planned, we’re going to need all the help we can get.” Joe glanced over Faye’s shoulder at Liz and Jimmy. “And I’m beginning to think that means the three of you.”

Faye looked at Liz, who was still holding on to Jimmy’s hand. Her friend shrugged. “Maybe knowing what’s going on will let us help Jimmy,” Liz said softly.

“We want to know,” Faye told Joe. “After everything that’s happened, everything we’ve seen, we
need
to know.”

The biker looked at her for another moment before nodding slowly. “All right. In that case, I’m going to make some coffee and find you all some blankets. I think you’ll need both.”

Joe disappeared into one of the tents as Faye knelt down beside Finn. He was bruised and bloodied, a nasty cut running from his shoulder to his chest.

“Aren’t you scared of me?” Finn asked gruffly after a moment.

Faye shook her head but found she couldn’t quite manage to look him in the eye. “Back there—I was, just a little,” she admitted. “But that night in the woods—you told me I didn’t need to be afraid with you around. And I … still believe you.”

Finn’s neck still bore the burn mark where Ballard had pressed his silver knuckles hard against his flesh. Faye reached out, tracing her fingers over the edge of the damaged skin. Finn flinched slightly and she jumped, pulling her hand back.

“Sorry,” she whispered. “I—”

Finn grabbed her hand and held it tightly. Faye looked at him for the first time and felt her heart jump at the pain in his dark eyes.

“Don’t be,” he told her softly. “Faye, I …” He trailed off before starting again. “You came after me. I can’t believe you came after me. It was so dangerous, but—thank you.”

Faye looked at her fingers, tangled with his. Could she really have seen what she’d seen in that old building? The boy sitting before her now was so perfect, so … beautiful, even. How could he have such an ugly creature inside him, ready to spring out at any moment?

She pulled her fingers away gently and dipped the cloth in the warm water before pressing it to his cut. She concentrated on what she was doing. Neither of them said anything, but she could feel Finn’s heated gaze on her face.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispered eventually. “About … about what you are?”

Finn shook his head. “How could I? It’s not the sort of thing that comes up in normal conversation. And …”

He stopped. She looked up at him. “And
what
?”

It was Finn’s turn to reach out, and Faye held her breath as he lifted one finger to gently trace the curve of her jaw. He shook his head again. “I didn’t want you to know. With you … I just wanted to be
this
me. Not … some awful creature, something that would scare you—or disgust you.” He dropped his hand and looked away with a frown. “I’m sorry.”

Faye watched the sadness in his face and felt tears well up in her eyes. She blinked and brushed her hand over his chest. Finn turned to look at her, and she tried to smile.

“I’m not disgusted,” she whispered. “It’s just … going to take a bit of getting used to.”

Finn’s eyes grew even darker, and for a moment Faye thought he was going to say something else. But then the crunch of footsteps told them that his father was returning.

Joe handed out blankets and poured coffee before settling down beside them. Then he took a deep breath and began to speak.

“My story begins about three hundred years ago,” he said, staring into the fire. “My family were Romany Gypsies, from Eastern Europe. We lived on the road,
traveling from place to place. I’ve always been an expert with wood—I can carve it, whittle it, build with it.” He looked at his son. “It’s one of the good things that Finn has inherited from me. In those days, wherever we went, townsfolk would flock to buy my furniture or to ask me to get their houses ready for winter. That’s how I met Mercy Morrow. She came to my caravan. She’d heard I could carve the likeness of any animal, and she wanted a figure of a wolf.” Joe looked down at his huge black boots. “She was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen in my life. She still is. And her beauty is a curse on all mankind.”

Faye stared at Joe in disbelief. “Three hundred years ago?” She looked at Finn, who didn’t meet her eye. If his dad was three hundred, what did that make him? Faye turned back to Joe, not sure she believed what he’d said. Sure, his face was lined, but he didn’t look much older than her dad. Joe’s eyes, though … now that Faye looked at them, they seemed older than the rest of his face somehow. They looked as if they had witnessed much, but told nothing.

“I fell in love with her,” Joe continued slowly. “Right there and then. That was my first mistake. My second was to follow her home and enter her house.”

“What happened?” asked Liz, who had been listening, wide-eyed.

The biker gave a grim smile. “She enchanted me. Not just me, but my family. Mercy Morrow enslaved us all, taking part of our humanity and replacing it with the wolf. We became part-men, part-beasts, bound to do her will and to obey her orders. Those were terrible years of bloodshed, hunger and pain.”

“I don’t understand,” said Liz. “Why did Mercy want you as werewolves? What did she want you to do?”

“We hunted for her.” Joe sighed. “We were part of her wolf pack. In fact, I was the leader. You see, Mercy Morrow is far older than the oldest thing you can
imagine. She has stalked the countries of the world for thousands of years, always keeping her beautiful human form, and she has no intention of passing on. She and her kind spent all their time finding ways of cheating death and extending their youth and beauty.”