The Red Queen (18 page)

Lucienne had laughed unkindly at his speculation. And she’d spat on Seraphen before his demise. “No one can erase time. You’re absolutely crazy!”

But Seraphen had insisted that Ashburn and Lucienne’s union would change earth forever, and Ashburn hadn’t found Seraphen to be wrong in the past. Troubled, he broke into a run to blow off some steams. This infinite realm has no end and no illusion of an end.

All the questions in his mind were like a snake biting its tail. They went in circles without offering answers, partly due to his insufficient database. Would he be able to find all the answers and the antidote for Lucienne once his TimeDust reached full power? He would have to merge with the Eye of Time. Ashburn shivered at the mere thought of being possessed by the ancient entity, but at the same time, he had to put great effort into repressing TimeDust’s desperate longing to link to its source.

It had never stopped challenging Ashburn’s will, but as long as he had breath, he wouldn’t let it overpower him.

As all sorts of dark thoughts flitted through his mind, even in his sanctuary, Ashburn turned to Lucienne’s images from his own memories to seek comfort. He loved to watch sunlight fall into her remarkable eyes.
She was light to him, the only light amid the massive darkness and noise of the human collective consciousness. Her pink lips were delicious and enticing beyond words. Fantasizing about kissing her full lips, his mind wandered to the one time when he’d
almost taken advantage of her.

Even when she was lost to her insanity, he still couldn’t resist her.

It wasn’t just the Lure, no matter how much he wanted to blame his lack of self-control on that seducing force.
Over and over, he’d indulged his own need for her. It didn’t matter which Lucienne surfaced—the sane or the insane—she remained his weakness.

Sadly, she laid bare her feelings for him only when touched by insanity. The mad Lucienne chose him. The uninhibited Lucienne was full of passion, drawn to him like a pin to a magnet, but the sane one stubbornly chose Blazek every time. When she returned to her normal self, she turned aloof toward Ashburn. The shift was instant. With her usual mask in place, she was the steely Siren queen, who had no idea how close Ashburn had come to ripping the mask off her face.

Did he prefer the wicked-but-fun Lucienne? If she kept that side, she wouldn’t need to carry burdens, grief, and responsibilities. She could be free, and she could be his. Instantly,
Ashburn felt sick with himself. How could he wish that for her?
Without regaining her sound mind, she’d never be whole. The fear of losing her to Blazek had eventually turned him into someone he truly despised.

D
arkness had taken a root in him. The old Ashburn wasn’t a brooding, calculating, and selfish jerk.
He couldn’t fully bring himself to blame the Lure for his lust for Lucienne.

However convenient for him, he couldn’t let her stay unhinged. If he didn’t find a cure in time—and no one knew how long she had—she’d die. Her insanity was the transitional gray area that had bought her time, but time was running out. The idea that he’d continue on without her and have her only in memories chilled him to the bone. 

He shook off the unbearable picture of a bleak future and treaded back toward the invisible elevator. At the sight of a faint, floating glow in the distance amid the void, a sudden panic came over him. How long had he been in here? Time didn’t exist in the Rabbit Hole. This realm of infinity was cut off from the real world, from the world that afflicted Lucienne.

He wanted to go back to her world to see her, hear her, feel her, but he also dreaded watching her suffer—and it was all Blazek’s fault.

Hatred burned in Ashburn. He hadn’t hated
anyone like this, not even the King of Nirvana or Prince Felix, who tortured him and made him and his family second-class citizens.

He didn’t want this black hate to dwell in him. He knew how hard and how far a man could fall when driven by it. Nevertheless, he hated Lucienne’s ancient enemies for poisoning her, and he hated that stupid Czech even more. That
despicable man
caused Lucienne’s misery, yet still competed for her affection.
His rival would never give up clinging to the girl Ashburn loved.

How could she not
see the truth of it?
Ashburn thought in dismay.
Ironically, she saw the truth only in her insanity. The mad Lucienne loathed the Czech prince, but that didn’t give Ashburn much satisfaction. He didn’t want intense affection from the insane Lucienne. He wanted her love when she was her complete, unbroken, and undivided self.

Speaking of the devil, what was that no-good prince doing now? Was he scheming to have Lucienne all to himself and trap her deeper in his net of devotion and deception? Ashburn gritted his teeth. He was going to find out. His heart sank at the promise of seeing Lucienne and Blazek together.

He stepped onto the invisible lift and commanded it to take him all the way up to the rooftop. As soon as he walked out of the domain of the Rabbit Hole, billions of collective memories screamed at him.

Ashburn grabbed his head and stumbled back. He could never get used to this—the horrible sensation when his databank went online. He could feel his facial muscles distort from the onslaught. He immediately wanted to return to the Rabbit Hole, his safe haven, and never come out again. But he stood his ground. Torrents of memories bombarded his mind mercilessly, as bad as a hurricane battering a lone glass house. When the storm passed, Ashburn let go of his head and harshly executed commands, brushing aside memories of the living and the dead. He didn’t care about them, any of them. He wanted only Lucienne.

He followed Aida, Kian, Ziyi, and Lucienne’s guards’ memories. Pain sliced into his head. TimeDust didn’t want him focusing on an individual’s memories. It didn’t want him developing empathy or growing attached to anyone except Lucienne. It was trying to rob him of his humanity. Ashburn withstood the agony and located Lucienne through
McQuillen’s memories
.

She was inside
Valkyrie
with
an injured McQuillen.

“There’s always hope, of course.” she beamed. “I haven’t had a lapse for thirteen days.”

Thirteen days? Ashburn’s heart sank. He felt the passing of only a few hours inside the Rabbit Hole. He must bear in mind that time flowed differently in the two worlds. He’d be doomed if he loitered in the Rabbit Hole too long and Lucienne’s world passed him by, and she’d become but a spark of memory.

Then his heart lightened at her improved condition.

“
The poison might have run its course,” Lucienne continued, voicing Ashburn’s hope, then she stretched her hand toward Kian and stuttered,
“Kian, I—”

His chest tightened as red rings formed in her eyes, claiming her.

With a renewed hatred for Blazek,
Ashburn picked through the Czech’s recent memories. A vindictive smile rose to Ashburn’s lips. His opponent hadn’t had a good time either.

Blazek had left Sphinxes because he couldn’t bear to watch Lucienne miss Ashburn. Gratitude and satisfaction swelled in Ashburn’s heart as he realized that the sane Lucienne actually wanted him.

The severe pain in his head at poking into Blazek’s memories was all worth it.

Wait!
What was that devil doing in
Samye monastery?

Ashburn narrowed his eyes.
Blazek was looking for a cure! Ashburn shook his head in disgust. If there was an antidote in Tibet, Ashburn would have been there first before anyone. Fury rose in him. The Czech was wasting time. Shouldn’t he stay at Lucienne’s side and make himself useful?
Then he caught his own logical flaw. Hadn’t he wanted his rival to stay away from the girl he desired? He now realized that he loved her enough that a part of him had accepted that she also needed Blazek, at least temporarily.

Ashburn looked deeper into Blazek’s memories to collect the evidence of his rival’s idiocy and uselessness.

Blazek was in the middle of an ancient ritual that hadn’t been practiced for two thousand years. He lay nude on a stone bed made of thorn-covered vines. Amber-colored herbal water flowed from seven bamboo pipes and filled a pool until it reached him. The stream washed away the blood seeping from his back, and the tiny wounds the thorns created as they punctured his flesh absorbed the herbal ingredients into his body.

Blazek stared up at the cloudy sky. Ashburn knew this was the only time of day the Czech could come out of his dark room and see light. He was in seclusion for two weeks now, repeating the arduous ritual bath every morning.

The ancient ritual was preparing the mind and body of a healer.

Blazek was turning himself into the antidote.

CHAPTER 16

RITUAL

Through the memories of one of the seven observing monks, Ashburn watched the Czech prince strive to contain his pain, but the muscles on his jaw twitched and twisted. Blazek was playing Lucienne’s image in his head—her beaming at him and bantering with him—to expel his agony. Annoyingly, he replayed a romantic fencing scene with Lucienne several months ago, over and over, relishing every detail.

Lucienne parried Blazek. They matched in every way, their sabers crashing in perfect arcs.

“We know each other’s weaknesses and strengths too well,” he sighed. “We can go on like this forever until one lies down.”

“Then you lie down, pretty boy,” she purred with a husky voice, gazing at him through her thick lashes. Her rich, brown eyes became expressive, turning all honey and wine, and only for him.

He appeared smitten. Seizing the advantage, she struck. The tip of her saber found an opening in his heart, but before she could claim victory, he’d moved, of course, with his usual, incredible speed. The opening was a feint. In the next heartbeat, he disarmed her, holding her saber in his hand. “The Lam lioness always knows how to take advantage of her opponent’s weakness. I fell once, but never twice.”

Their faces were inches apart, and she pulled back and punched him. He threw up his hand to cover his eye, stunned. She kicked the saber out of his hand, caught it, and tossed it to the ground with her gloves. She swung her long leg toward him. “But I hoped you’d always fall,” she said. “Maybe it’s just a silly girl’s fantasy.”

He turned his palm vertically and blocked her vicious kick. “I’ll fall for you a thousand times, if that’s what you want. And I’m still falling for you, but does it matter to you? You’re not here anymore.”

“I’m here.”

“Your body is here.”

“And what isn’t?”

“Your heart.”

“How can you assume where my heart stays, or where it belongs?” Furious, she tried to slap him.

He caught her wrist, and she tripped him. He dragged her down with him. She fell on top of him, but he moved his hips to pin her under him. She maneuvered her hips and legs, countering his moves and fighting to stay on top. At last, she straddled him after he let her.

Ashburn gritted his teeth. This scene was intolerable! The Czech distorted the reality to make it fit into his bad taste. Containing his temper, Ashburn kept riffling through the rest of Blazek’s memories.

“I saw how you looked at Ashburn Fury,” the Czech prince said, his eyes spitting sparks of dark fire. “All I wanted was to strangle the life out of him with my bare hands!”

“And I want to snuff out your miserable, useless, harmful life,” Ashburn shot back, even though his opponent couldn’t hear him.

“Ashburn’s my asset, just like the Eye of Time. That’s all,” Lucienne said.

That hurt. Ashburn shut his eyes. Even though he knew she hadn’t meant it, hearing it from her mouth, even through Blazek’s memories, still cut him deeply. Ashburn was openly cursing the Czech as he watched his rival move on top of Lucienne, thick desire filling his hazel, animal-like eyes.

The Czech felt Lucienne’s every curve and savored them frame by frame.

Blazek gazed into Lucienne’s wine-colored eyes that burned with fire and desire. She wrapped her legs around his thighs. Her fingers moved underneath his clothes, tracing the hard lines on his firm abdomen and then further down ....

Ashburn spat in fury. The Czech was now mixing reality with fantasy. He was fantasizing about exploring Lucienne’s body. Could anyone be more despicable than that? If Blazek were in front of him, Ashburn would surely deliver a punch and knock out a tooth before throwing a black lightning bolt at the Czech.

On the thorn bed, Blazek murmured, “I’d rather die than lose you.”

And in the Czech’s mind, Lucienne thumbed his Z-shaped scar above his left eyebrow. He got it from a forbidden kiss two years ago. Lucienne’s lips dropped him from his black horse in the Red Mansion’s forest.

Lucienne could kiss no man except Ashburn.

Yet Blazek and Lucienne both challenged fate.

“
You’re mine, Vladimir Blazek,
”
she said.

“Yours forever,” Blazek answered on the thorn bed.

Then Lucienne screamed. Blood tears streamed down her lovely face.

Ashburn had to stumble back, even though it was only a memory in Blazek’s mind.

His rival was now using Lucienne’s suffering to punish himself and enhance his will to finish the ritual because all he wanted was to return to Lucienne. Physical and emotional pain filled his mind, leaving no room for anything else.

The monastery’s bell finally chimed an hour’s time.

The seven monks stepped toward the throne bed and chanted. After the recitation, they retreated into the shadows, leaving the prince to his own device.

Blazek struggled off the thorn bed with an anguished yell and threw himself into the pool. He repeatedly gasped for air as he rose from the pink water, finally limping off without a word. He’d be in isolation for the rest of the day.

Through a monk’s eyes, Ashburn saw the Czech’s bloody back. Fresh wounds lay atop old ones. Blazek was notoriously vain, and now his back was completely ruined.

Ashburn left Vladimir’s world. Watching his rival’s ordeal hadn’t given him any gratification; instead, it drained him and made him even more sullen. Ashburn shut himself inside the outdoor elevator on the rooftop of the Ghost House and slumped against the cold glass.

He stared ahead at the ring of distant white mountains.

What wouldn’t they do for the girl they loved? Would Ashburn go through the same pain for her? Without a doubt. But he
couldn’t be her healer.

Whenever he touched her, he wanted more of her. The Lure enhanced his darkest lust, and the insane Lucienne was an irresistible seductress. One day it would strip off his self-control. If they slept with each other before they were ready, the consequence would be dire. Seraphen had said that their union would bring the apocalypse. Ashburn didn’t know exactly how and why, but his instincts agreed with Seraphen. And Lucienne would never forgive him if he took her virtue in her insanity.

Despite the drawbacks and the luring danger for them both, he’d tried to heal her in the beginning. He’d managed to push back the churning poison in her veins, but her madness always returned. It was an undying leech clinging to her. So unless her condition was severe, he had to stand by and watch her take hits after hits.

Ashburn lifted his gaze from the mountains that encased Nirvana. It was time to gather all the information he could regarding the ancient ritual. His databank opened a window—

The ritual had once made an effective healer five thousand years ago. However, there was no assurance the healing would work on Lucienne. Even if Blazek could dilute the poison in her, he couldn’t flush it out completely.
Without the ultimate cure, she’d still fade away like the last flame of a burning candle.
However, Blazek could buy
Lucienne time, and that was what Ashburn needed. If no antidote existed, he was going to create one.

But how?

He returned to the Rabbit Hole and wandered through the vast space like a lost soul before he stumbled onto something and almost fell on his face.

The silhouette of Seraphen’s body glowed faintly.

After Lucienne and her warriors had retreated from the Nirvana valley after the battle, Ashburn had brought Seraphen back to the Rabbit Hole, letting this plane be his resting place. Because she owed her life to Ashburn, Lucienne hadn’t insisted on taking Seraphen to Sphinxes for an autopsy, despite her scientists’ zealous requests.

Seraphen’s body didn’t decay like a mortal's. Ashburn’s eyes darted to the gaping hole in the man’s chest, then quickly looked away. The wound reminded Ashburn how he’d helped Lucienne kill his own protector.

If Seraphen were alive, he’d have information on the cure. Ashburn once suspected that Seraphen was the one who gave the ancient poison to the first Sealer, but that Sealer founder insisted a female angel granted him Blood Tear. However, her image was a shrouded memory as soon as it formed in that human’s mind.

If only Seraphen were alive—

An idea struck Ashburn like lightning. What if he could bring Seraphen back to life?

Seraphen wasn’t exactly human, so resurrection wasn’t completely impossible. But if Ashburn succeeded, Seraphen would pose a deadly threat to Lucienne again. His protector had been programmed to kill Lucienne and would never rest until he achieved that goal.

Lucienne was running out of time, and Ashburn was running out of option.

Ashburn sank beside Seraphen.