Ties That Bind: A Muse Urban Fantasy (The Veil Series Book 5) (16 page)

I touched Dawn’s face. “It’s okay.” A quick glance confirmed we were alone in the woods. “It will be okay. I won’t be gone long.” Shrugging off my coat—I spread it over her, tucked her in tight, and turned toward the dance of firelight and ice.

S
now banked
up over the Institute facility, burying cars and scattering the enforcers into hiding. Fire burned the barricade of trees behind Mammon. In the storm of elements, Mammon and Stefan clashed. Stefan moved like spilled diamonds, fast and light. He twisted and sidestepped, dashed and parried. Two handprint scars burned his glacial brilliance but didn’t appear to impede him. When his strikes got through, the twin ice-blades cut into Mammon’s obsidian black flesh, spilling fire in great liquid arcs.

Mammon wielded the elemental blade. Wings ablaze, he summoned the heat of the earth from beneath our feet and poured it over Stefan. Fire ate ice. Ice pierced flame. I froze, trapped between the two.

Mammon swung the blade at Stefan. Stefan skipped back, wings streaming water. He snarled and lunged. Blades clashed, elements spat. Stefan seemed so small compared to Mammon, but his strength held. His blades didn’t. They shattered. Mammon lunged, and cracked his fist into Stefan’s chest, throwing him back.

Enough.
Stepping from the forest, I reached into Mammon’s fiery soul, latched on, and pulled. Mammon’s horned head whipped around. His molten eyes fixed on me. His nostrils flared, and he let loose a demon bellow that the netherworld surely heard. In my demon skin, I planted my feet, spread my hands at my sides and drank his power in. “Destruction doesn’t take prisoners.”

“I am fire,” he growled. “I am immortal.” He pointed a claw-tipped finger at me. “Your little Dawn is not.” He swept his hand toward the trees. Fire poured forth, washed through the canopy, and licked into the rainclouds. Superheated wind rushed behind it, pushing the flames on.
Wildfire.
Dawn was in there. He knew I couldn’t have taken her far.

I freed my hold on his firestone center and turned my attention toward the burning forest. The fire raged—Mammon’s fury made flame. It fought against my hold and slipped from my grasp. The fire was a fierce, terrible thing. I tried again and again to corral the flames, but they slipped free and surged around my efforts. The wind tore past me, pushing the flames on while I pulled them back. “No! You can’t have her!”

The wind dropped as suddenly as it had arrived, and finally the flames heeded my control.

When I turned back to the battle, Mammon sensed my gaze on him and cast a wave of fire into the trees once more. I drew it all in, swallowed it down.
More and more.

Stefan twirled a lance of ice and bore down on Mammon. His cuts and jabs came hard and fast. This moment had been coming since they’d first locked horns, long before I knew Stefan. Their hatred had swelled during their shared sentence in the netherworld. Only one would walk away from this. Murder gleamed in Stefan’s boreal eyes, and this time, I wouldn’t stop him. While I kept the flames away from Dawn, Stefan’s blurred stokes penetrated Mammon’s blocks. The Prince of Greed’s growls confirmed it. They turned and parried in an eerie dance of devil and angel, fire and ice. As often as the elemental blade shattered Stefan’s blades, he rebuilt them with a gesture and began his razor-edged assault all over again.

The veil rippled above, torn open by the chaos energies lashing the air. I could reach inside Mammon, tear out his fire, and send it through the veil. I’d survive. Would he? With half my attention divided by the forest fire, I wove my ethereal touch around Mammon and surged it inside. He staggered. Stefan plunged a sword of ice into Mammon’s thigh and tore a wide arc through one of Mammon’s wings. With a strangled roar, Mammon fell to a knee in the mud
. I can do this. I have to do this.
I sank mental claws inside Mammon’s center. This might not kill him, but it would ruin him. Worse than before. He might never be prince again. He deserved it. For the lies. For Dawn. For the betrayal.

Mammon turned his head and fixed me in his demon glare. The scent of clove and cinnamon laced my throat, tugging on memories.
Akil.
No, I could do this. He was using my feelings for Akil to distract me. Akil was gone… Mammon was
just demon
. He’d proven it. He didn’t want the veil restored. I had to end this.
I can’t.
Stefan plunged a jagged blade of ice through Mammon’s chest. In a blink, the blade vaporized, but the wound remained. The elemental blade slipped from Mammon’s grip and vanished before it hit the ground. Stefan plunged a second, shorter blade into Mammon’s chest. The Prince of Greed bowed backward. His wings twitched. Fire dripped from their edges. He slumped forward, bracing himself against the ground. Stefan backed up, breathing hard, wings limp and melting. He stumbled but stayed upright.

He could finish Mammon. He
would
finish him. Stefan knew what had to be done.

Wings draped either side of him, Mammon breathed hard and with great effort. He was beaten. Lava blood pooled from his torn wing. His veins throbbed with dying embers. It was over.

Glistening obsidian muscle and skin twisted, warped, and dissolved, leaving a slumped and breathless Akil in its place. Stefan shook off his demon guise, snatched Akil by the throat, and pressed the Desert Eagle hard against Akil’s temple. I expected the shot to come in the next second. My heart stuttered. The shout to stop lodged in my throat.

I clung to Akil’s heat, even as my feet carried me forward. Even now, I didn’t trust him. I would never trust him again. This Akil was a stranger to me.

Akil said something to Stefan too lightly for me to hear above the hissing and cracking of the many fires and melting ice. Whatever it was, Stefan’s face twisted with alarm. He spoke too softly for me to hear, and then he let Akil go. Just like that—released him and staggered back. In my next step, Akil vanished, and the hole in the fragile veil knitted together, sealing itself shut.

“Stefan, what…what happened? Why did you let him go?”

Stefan stumbled and reached for me. I caught his arm, and let him lean into me. Cuts marred his face, and blood stained his clothes. He hadn’t escaped unscathed. But his eyes were bright, even if his lips were twisted in a gaunt line. “Where’s Dawn?”

“In the woods... I stopped Mammon’s fire before it got too close.” I helped him move forward and glanced back at the silent Institute. “Are they—”

“The enforcers are fine. They retreated inside. Mammon didn’t want them.” He flinched and hissed in a breath.

“Stefan… You let him go?”

“He was done. Forget him. We have to get Dawn.”

Stefan wouldn’t have stopped. He’d have killed Akil. He’d wanted to pull that trigger more than anything in this world, so why hadn’t he? He could have beaten Akil into oblivion. Something stopped him. “What did he say?” Stefan leaned on me as we trudged into the cool forest shadows. Embers rained over us. The canopy above had burned to skeletal branches. “Stefan?”

“Nothing. It was nothing.”

“I thought we were done with lies?” He flinched. “Whatever he said, I saw your face. It meant something to you.” I waited for my explanation as we trudged through leaf mulch and smoldering branches.

“You trust me, right?” He winced.

“You’re hurt.”

“I’ll be fine. Listen.” He stopped, drew in a breath, and peered down at me. “I will tell you everything, but not yet. Just…just trust me.” Behind the haggard expression of pain, his eyes beseeched, practically begged me not to pursue this.

I did trust him. Clearly there was a reason he couldn’t tell me, and I trusted his judgment. “But you will tell me? Eventually?”

“Yes.” He waited, unblinking.

“Okay.”

Dawn lay where I’d left her, still asleep. Stefan slumped against the bank. “We have to get her to Jerry. We have to end this.”

“We either go through the veil here, and take Dawn to Jerry in the netherworld. Or I know where Jerry’s sanctuary overlaps Boston. We’ll need a car, but I can get us there, so we hop through the veil right on top of him.” The girl still slept as though the world didn’t revolve around her.

“We go there this side of the veil first. I’m not strong enough to fend off lesser demons.” He raked a trembling hand through his hair. His skittish gaze settled on Dawn once more. “Neither is she.”

W
e left
Adam with Ryder and advised they both stay behind anti-elemental symbols if Adam wanted to avoid Yukki and live beyond the night. Ryder offered to keep an unbiased eye on him. He couldn’t help us take Dawn into the netherworld. His time was better spent guarding Adam. We might still need him. Borrowing Ryder’s beat-up Mustang, Stefan and I turned tail and headed back toward Boston. Sitting in the back of the car, I chewed on my lip and peered through the rain-streaked windows while Boston’s outskirts blurred by. Dawn’s head rested in my lap. I twirled one of her ringlets around my finger.

It didn’t make sense.
Akil
didn’t make sense.

Why did he betray us? He’d said it was because he was greed, and he wanted the veil down for good to suit his own greedy desires, but I didn’t believe that. I couldn’t. If I believed that, then I had to believe the Akil I’d known had died over a week ago on the battlefield, and he wasn’t coming back. Ever. That couldn’t be. That slippery son of a bitch would survive when all the worlds were dust. Or perhaps it was worse than that. Perhaps Akil had always been like this. He’d bound his soul to mine to save his ass. Maybe everything he’d done had been about him.

“You okay?” Stefan glanced in the rearview mirror.

“Uh-huh.” If Akil wanted us to fail, he could have broken Dawn’s neck in a heartbeat. He wanted her the way he wanted everything, but he knew she was capable of killing him all over again. She was a risk to his existence. The logical demon move was to kill her before she woke up. He hadn’t. Clearly. So this wasn’t about the restoration of the veil. He wanted Dawn alive…for a reason.

Wipers sloshed, and the car heater hummed. Stefan switched hands on the wheel, fingers clenching. “He deserved it.”

I flicked my gaze to his in the mirror. “He wasn’t Akil.”

“Yes.” Stefan’s ice-blue eyes hardened. “He was.”

“No, Stefan… I know Akil—”
If you think you know Ahkeel, you’re wrong.
Damn Jerry’s words.

“He was always like this.” Stefan said, softly. “You were too close to him to see the truth.”

I slid my gaze away. Stefan would believe that. I’d spent half my life with Akil, and once, I would have said he was a sly manipulative bastard—well, he’d always been that—but he was something else too. He wasn’t
just demon.
I refused to believe it. He was a man, a powerful, dangerous, clever man who drove me batshit crazy because he could. A demon could never touch my heart, my soul, the way Akil had. “Mammon either tricked me and couldn’t bring the original Akil back, or…or he did bring him back, and Akil has a plan.”

“Muse, he’s a liar. That’s all there is. He used you. Played the long game.”

That was true. He had used me as a carryall for his soul. “If he did have a plan, what could he hope to gain from behaving like this?”

“There isn’t a plan. He’s demon. A Prince of Hell. He’s just doing what comes naturally.”

“So are you.” I snapped back and then regretted it when Stefan flinched.

“You think that? After everything we’ve been through?”

“No, I’m sorry I said that. I’m…” I rubbed at my forehead. “I’m just so damn sick and tired of demons.”

“If all goes well, we’ll get Dawn to Jerry. Together, they’ll restore the veil. Everyone lives happily ever after.” He sounded about as convinced as me.

“Half bloods don’t get happy endings,” I mumbled.

“Who told you that?”

“Ryder.”

Stefan snorted a dry laugh. “He’s a terrible life coach.”

But he did have a degree in straight talking. The little girl asleep in my lap certainly wasn’t going to get a happy ending. Part of me hoped she didn’t wake up until we were already with Jerry. But a larger part wanted her to wake so I could at least attempt to explain why I had to hand her over to the netherworld. She’d probably try to turn me into confetti. Stefan had suggested we tie her up, but after one look at my glare, he hadn’t mentioned it again. I stroked a hand over her hair. She was such a tiny thing. How could she be Queen of the Netherworld? The Dark Court would chew her up and spit her out the second she let her guard down. She had a life of violence ahead of her. She wouldn’t get to see the beach and make sandcastles, eat more donuts, or go shopping. She wouldn’t date. She’d never find ‘the one’ because love didn’t exist in the netherworld. Nobody would love her there. Nobody would care for her. Her humanity would wilt and die. It wasn’t fair.

I brushed at the unexpected wetness on my face. Like me, she’d survived everything the netherworld had done to her and then survived the Institute. She’d survived it all. For what? So everyone she believed cared for her could turn her over to a nightmare life? I could tell her that her sacrifice was noble, it was the right thing to do, she’d be a hero, but she was nine years old. My words didn’t mean a damn thing. All she wanted was to be free. She was nine. She could get out. Hell knew, she deserved it. All I had to do was ask Stefan to turn around, and drive. And just keep on driving.

Veins of rain crept across the window. Alongside the coast road, gray seas churned and bubbled below dark skies.

“Stefan, pull over.”

He glanced back and without a word pulled over. I climbed out, scooped Dawn up, wrapped in my coat and tucking my head down, against the rain, I carried her onto the beach. My boots sank in the sand. A vicious wind snatched at my clothes. Pooling some extra heat into my body, I trudged closer to the surf. The hiss of rolling waves and the howl of the wind drowned out everything but the beat of my heart and Dawn’s soft breaths.

“We’re not far from Jerry’s sanctum, and I…” I dropped to my knees in the wet sand and cradled her against me. “I know it’s not much, but this might be the last time you’re in Boston.” The sea churned, and rain pummeled us both, but the embrace of my element kept the worst at bay.

“Muse…?”

I swallowed and looked into her sleep-heavy eyes. “Hey there.”

For a few moments, she huddled close, soaking up my warmth, drifting between awake and asleep. Warm and safe. Despite the angry seas and bitter rain, a peace settled around us. Nothing could penetrate that one special moment. “Is this a dream?” she asked.