Nightwind (46 page)

He stared at her for a long moment, seeing her resolve, recognizing his defeat. “It does to me,” he

whispered.

It was his defense and his goodbye. With one last, longing look at her, he bowed his head and was

gone.

Lauren Fowler Cree’s heart felt as though it would break, but as the powerful hand of her new consort

gripped her own, she knew she had made the wisest decision in sending Syntian away. He was

dangerous and he would try to control her, despite the blood oath he had signed.

“I will do your biding, and your biding alone, my lady,” the powerful entity who had joined her spoke.

“Together,” she said, looking up into the face of her lover. “You and I will heal the pain. We will cure the

loneliness. We will give pleasure where there has always been hurt. Together, you and I, we will control

the NightWinds and bind them to me for all time.”

“Whatever you want,” her consort answered and his lips grazed her temple. “I am yours to command,

milady.”

Lauren felt his arms go around her, felt her child leap in her womb, then turned into her lover’s arms and

nestled against his chest.

“My demon,” she sighed. “My NightWind.”

His dark eyes glowed and he smiled. His manhood stirred against her belly.

“You didn’t hurt him, did you?” Lauren asked.

“No,” the NightWind answered. “He died quickly and well. It was much less of a challenge to take his

place than it was to take Jaborn’s. I am surprised Cree did not realize I had done so.”

Lauren pressed her cheek to her lover’s chest and sighed. Tomorrow would be soon enough to mourn

for Ben Hurlbert, the father of her child. The entity whose arms cradled her with tenderness bore Benny’s

image and he would take that man’s place in Lauren’s world.

Tonight, there were NightWinds to bring through. NightWinds to sigh gently over the lonely women of

the world.

She heard himcalling to her, one of thousands who begged each night. One of the Legion of hopeless,

lost entities whose souls had been damned, imprisoned in the Abyss. His name meant nothing to her;

names never would. It was his pitiful howling, his beseeching heart, his utter loneliness that caught, and

held, her attention. She listened closely, her mind reaching out across time and space and millennia. To

her, his entreaties were like cool, sweet wine: they tempted her thirst to further knowledge of the

NightWind race and filled her inquisitive mind with a multitude of possibilities.

The bright spark in her soul blazed.

His howling had ceased; his desolation, his emptiness called out to her, begged her, beckoned her,

needed her. The ache in his heart was a dying ember, filtering down from the heavens, slowly

disintegrating as it fell. It whispered in mournful whimpers of surrender to her, granting her powers,

promising her all, and its sound struck a chord deep in her woman’s heart.

She turned her gaze heavenward searching amongst all the demonic cries for help, the howls of need, the

whimpers of demonic helplessness and frustration and failure. Her keen intuition traveled swiftly from Pit

to Maelstrom, from Abaddon to Hell, from lair to lair. She strained to catch his unique voice just once

more. One minute, evaporating essence of his terrible grief. In the strident confusion of howls and groans

and lost whimpers, she probed; she explored the nether regions of demonic enslavement which called out

to her, searching for that one voice, that one cry which had garnered her attention. In the cacophony

drifting down to her, at last she heard his and her powers homed in on his pain.

She smiled.

She had found him.

And he would be hers.

Charlotte Boyett-Compo

CHARLOTTE ‘CHARLEE’ Boyett-Compo is the author of over 30 award-winning speculative fiction

novels. Married for 37 years to her high school sweetheart, Tom, she is the mother of two grown sons

and the grandmother of two. She is owned and operated by five demanding felines for whom she must

have a day job in order to buy catnip and cat litter. Her hobbies include reading, writing, and staying as

far away from arithmetic as space will allow.

Yet to Come in the

HellWind Trilogy

DemonWind

BaleWind