Haunted by the King of Death Page 20

  She vowed that once they had dealt with the demon, she would spend every waking and sleeping minute close to him until their bond was strong enough to stop them both from fading.

  Right now, she had a demon to fight though.

  She kicked off, twisting around at the same time, her right boot skidding on the thick gathering of pine needles at the base of the tree, and darted towards the blaze.

  The forest began to thin as she caught up with Grave and her eyes darted around to take in the scene.

  It was a mansion. The one she had seen through Grave’s eyes.

  The entire pale stone building was ablaze, the inferno so intense that it heated her skin even though she was still more than four hundred metres from the house.

  Grave skidded to a halt on the dewy grass as the right wing of the mansion collapsed, hurling a tempest of sparks high into the dark sky and showering the land around it with dust and rubble.

  “Night!” Grave yelled and launched himself forwards, little more than a blur as he shot towards the house, the blade he wore strapped to his waist bouncing with each long stride.

  Isla knew that Night was apparently his brother, a fact that was new to her together with the discovery that he had cousins, but she was damned if she was going to allow Grave to get himself killed by rushing into the building in search of him. Pain beat fiercely in his heart, echoing in hers, telling her how desperately he needed to find him though, warning he was liable to do something stupid if she didn’t stop him.

  She sprinted after him and managed to catch him close to a hundred metres from the house, snagging his arm and dragging him to a halt. He snarled and lashed out at her, his right hand slamming hard into her forearm, knocking it away from him. Fire and lightning zinged along her bones and she grunted as she staggered backwards.

  His crimson eyes shot to her face and the darkness in them lifted for a heartbeat, replaced by a tender light that bore an apology.

  She rubbed her arm, easing the pain, and looked towards the house. He could apologise for striking her later, once they were alone.

  Snow ground to a halt on the other side of her, his blue eyes darting over the mansion.

  “There’s no one inside. No trace of vampire blood in the air either.” His voice was little more than a deep growl in the night, laced with the anger etched on his face, slowly turning his eyes scarlet. Those eyes leaped off to the right, to a point beyond Grave, and he grunted, “Company.”

  Grave was moving before Isla had even spotted the five demons emerging from the shadows, slowly walking into the sphere of golden light surrounding the blazing house. That light shone along their black ram-like horns as they advanced on her group, long muscular black-metal-clad legs eating up the distance between them.

  Which was the leader?

  She scanned each of them from head to toe as she ran towards them, her right hand reaching for her remaining blade. As she looked them over, something dawned on her, something that made her blood burn as fiercely as the building to her left.

  The sensation of dark power she had felt when they had arrived in the area was gone.

  The demon prince had left, leaving them with five of his minions.

  Grave clashed with the one furthest to the right of the group, a male with only one black horn curling from his shorn head, slamming hard into him and driving him back as he began to attack, slashing at the demon with his claws.

  Isla targeted the one next to him, a bare-chested male with wild black hair and blazing gold elliptical pupils.

  She had met demons from the Devil’s domain before, and had quickly learned it was best to avoid them. They were taller than she was, easily seven foot in height, and all muscle, power that was beyond what she could tackle and hope to defeat in her corporeal form, and every single one of them had been trained for combat, honed in the art of war. Warriors. Powerful, dangerous, and deadly. Befitting of the Devil.

  And here she was rushing one.

  He smirked and a black broadsword appeared in his left hand. His black eyes narrowed on her, their gold pupils seeming to glow brighter as he hefted his sword and swung it at her.

  Isla hurled herself forwards feet first, sliding across the golden gravel beneath his blade as it sliced through the air where her body would have been. She snarled and lashed out with her small curved blade, catching the brute across his shin, leaving a long groove in the metal plate of his armour. She huffed. It seemed she needed to attack somewhere a little softer if she was going to take him down.

  He roared, twisted at the waist and stabbed at her.

  She let out a gasp as she rolled swiftly out of the way, narrowly avoiding being skewered, and came to her feet behind him.

  Snow and Payne reached the fight, taking on two of the demons together, working as a team to battle them.

  She had never experienced that sort of solidarity in battle. It was beautiful to her. A phantom led a lonely existence, even if they had family as she had. It was a solitary life, but she had never thought she was missing anything, not until she had become corporeal and had been accepted into that world by her brother-in-law and Frey, and then by Grave.

  Her senses blared a warning and she turned on a pinhead towards the source of it. A blade zoomed towards her, a dark blur as it cut through the air. Another blade struck it before she could get her head together and find the will to move, the silver katana knocking it off course, sending it swinging back the way it had come.

  “Pay attention,” Grave snapped and then roared as he grasped his blade in both hands and slashed upwards, attacking the demon who had come close to cutting her down.

  The male staggered backwards, blocking each fierce strike of Grave’s blade with his own, on the defensive.

  The demon Grave had been fighting snarled and picked himself up off the floor, and Isla ran at him. She swept her leg around, slammed the heel of her boot into his face and knocked him back down onto the gravel. He grunted and flashed fangs as he shook his head, but she didn’t give him a chance to recover.

  She lunged at him with her blade.

  Someone grabbed her from behind, hauling her up into the air. Her legs flailed for a moment as she got her bearings and then she lashed out at the bastard with her elbow, driving it hard into the side of his head. The other demon finally found his feet and grinned as he advanced on her.

  Isla gritted her teeth and narrowed her eyes on him as she kicked with both feet, pummelling him as he attempted to get to her. He tried to grab her legs and she fought harder, a wild thing as she battled both the male who held her and the one trying to get hold of her.

  That male managed to snag one of her legs and pain shot up it as he twisted it hard. She bit down on her tongue to stop herself from crying out and narrowed her eyes on him, fury pouring through her veins as he fought to catch hold of her other ankle. She kicked him hard in the face, knocking him back, but he kept hold of her leg.

  The male behind her chuckled into her ear.

  It was the last straw.

  She cursed her corporeal form. Weak. Pathetic. It inhibited her phantom powers too much.

  Cold crawled through her, slowly at first, creeping up from her feet and her hands. It travelled faster as the demon finally grabbed her other leg, engulfing her and wiping the smirk off his face as the iciness reached the surface of her skin, chilling his hands. The male behind her grunted and she called on more of her power, let it wash over her and through her, coaxed it until it built inside her and destroyed the last of the warmth, leaving only frigid cold behind.

  Hunger rose within her, a fierce craving that consumed her.

  With an unholy snarl, she locked her feet around the second demon’s neck and dragged him up to her. His wide eyes met hers as they came face to face, a split second of him staring at her as if she was his worst nightmare, and then he screamed as she clutched both sides of his head and pulled him closer still, until their mouths were only inches apart.

  Light and heat rushed through he
r, energy that crackled and burned, flooded her tired body and renewed her strength. She moaned as she devoured it, sought more of it and found it as she pressed her lips to his, and devoured that too, savouring every drop she could get as it filled the space that had been inside her, satisfying the gnawing hunger.

  The male slumped and she pressed her feet into his body as he fell and kicked off, using the momentum to flip over the head of the other demon. She looped her arms around his neck and whipped around from his back to his front, coming to face him. He didn’t have a chance to block her.

  He didn’t have a chance to even blink.

  No sound left his lips as hers pressed against them and more light and heat flowed into her, making her head spin and body tingle. Gods, she had never felt such a rush. She wanted to laugh as her entire being came alive, seemed filled to the brim with so much power that she couldn’t contain it.

  She needed more.

  She turned cold eyes on another male, one whose white hair and blue eyes matched hers. Powerful. Strong. She wanted to devour him too.

  “Isla!”

  That name, spoken in a familiar male voice, snapped her back to the world and she looked over her shoulder at the owner of it.

  His pale blue eyes held hers, his dark hair and sculpted face splattered with the glistening blood of his foes, and the sight of him stole her breath away.

  Her mate.

  Her fierce, beautiful mate.

  She reached for him and stilled when her hand came into view, not the one she had grown to love seeing, but a ghostly white form that shimmered in the golden light from the blaze. The cold inside her increased, a chill skating over her body as she swallowed hard and looked down at it.

  Looked through it.

  No.

  She floated above the floor, the ragged hem of her corseted white dress ending almost two foot from the gravel. She shook her head, tears burning her eyes even though none could fall when she was like this.

  A true phantom.

  Her eyes sought Grave again.

  She screamed as he shimmered right before her and she could see through his entire body for a moment, no sound leaving her lips as she poured out her fear and her pain.

  It was her fault.

  He turned solid again, but his skin seemed paler, his complexion drawn and gaunt as he stared at his hands and then at her.

  It was her fault.

  She had allowed her phantom nature to consume her and it had given it more power over her, and in turn over Grave, accelerating his demise.

  The secret tears in her eyes burned hotter as she tried to shed her phantom form but found she couldn’t, no matter how hard she fought it. Her limbs tingled each time, felt as if they would go solid again, but then the cold returned, driving back the warmth.

  She fought her rising panic but fear that she would never turn back ran through her, too fierce to deny or control.

  “Isla,” Grave whispered and advanced a step towards her, and then another.

  As he drew closer, the tingling in her limbs returned, stronger this time, and she focused on them, willing her body to shift back from the phantom world and into the mortal one. Warmth teased her fingers and she felt her toes as she wriggled them, and the tears that burned in her eyes fell onto her cheeks as she looked down and saw her blue leathers and boots.

  Grave reached for her.

  She backed off a step.

  He lowered his hand to his side and she wanted to say something to explain her actions, but she wasn’t sure what to say. She was afraid that if he touched her, it would sway her from the path she knew she needed to take, one that was going to hurt but that was necessary.

  She had to save him.

  It was clear to her now that she couldn’t fight the demon prince. Her phantom nature would devour her again, the drive to have her revenge allowing it to consume her as she sought enough power to defeat him.

  In turn, the phantom world would devour Grave, and she wasn’t sure he would come back from it next time.

  Gods. She looked into his blue eyes and fought to hold his gaze, to put the love that showed in his to memory so she could cherish it and would have the strength to do the right thing.

  She loved him, with every drop of her blood, and that meant she had to do what she could to save him and give him the strength to protect his family from the demon prince. She would do that for him, and entrust him with her own vengeance, allowing him to carry it out for her.

  She would stop them both from fading.

  She had wanted to do things her sister’s way, but there wasn’t time. They had been close, intimate recently, but it hadn’t stopped her from turning phantom or Grave from turning incorporeal. Restoring their bond through intimacy was going to take too long.

  The demon prince was closing in on his family, might have captured the one who had lived in the mansion already. She had to act now. No matter how much it hurt her.

  “Isla,” Grave whispered, half plea and half warning.

  She drifted to him, cupped both of his cheeks in her palms and pressed a soft kiss to his lips.

  He wrapped his arms around her and pulled back when they slipped straight through her, a frown marring his handsome face as he looked at her ghostly form and then into her eyes.

  “Do not,” he snapped but it was too late.

  She glanced off into the forest and disappeared, reappearing in a clearing in the trees. Pain spread across her back, so fierce she couldn’t breathe, and the sound of his roar tore apart the night, sending birds from their roosts above her.

  Isla looked back towards the house, towards Grave, aching to go to him.

  He had to know she wanted nothing more than being with him, that she loved him, and so he had to know why she was doing this and that it wasn’t goodbye forever.

  It was only goodbye for now.

  She would return to him.

  Once she had made things right.

  Once she had saved him.

  CHAPTER 19

  Gods, Isla hoped she was doing the right thing.

  She was still over two hundred metres from the black tower where it reached high into the dark grey sky of Hell and already her skin was crawling with insects. The thought of placing herself at the mercy of the mage turned her stomach. It had been churning since she had chosen this path, and she had been close to throwing up more than once.

  The mage wanted one night with her.

  She had been close to going through with it before. Her nerve wouldn’t fail her this time. One moment with the mage was a price she could pay in exchange for giving Grave the strength he needed to defeat the demon prince, and stop them both from fading. Once it was over, maybe they could find a way to move past what she had done. She hoped.

  The thought of sleeping with any male other than Grave repulsed her, but she had spent her entire journey to the tower thinking of alternatives and nothing had come to her. They didn’t have time to strengthen their bond, so the only way of fixing their problem was the mage, and he had already set the price for his services.

  It was only one night.

  She blew out her breath as she neared the tower.

  The gates creaked and began to ease open ahead of her.

  Isla bravely walked forwards, her eyes fixed on the arched doorway of the tower as it was revealed to her. She could do this. Grave would forgive her.

  She marched into the black tower and followed the twisted staircase upwards to the next floor. The sensation of insects under her skin grew stronger but she didn’t allow it to frighten her or shatter her resolve. She turned at the top of the steps and strode across the curving corridor and into the central circular room, her eyes never straying from the mage where he lounged on his throne, his pale skin a sickly hue under the light of the green crystals growing from the black stone walls.

  “You have returned,” he drawled, the left corner of his mouth curving into a wicked smile and his green eyes raking over her. He sighed and skimmed the palm of h
is right hand down his bare chest. “As beautiful as ever. What do you want with me this time?”

  “We had a deal,” she said, not allowing her rising nerves to show in her voice. He would detect them in her, and she was damned if she would give him any power over her.

  She was a warrior.

  A phantom.

  If anything, he should be frightened of her.

  His smile stretched wider but darkness shimmered in his eyes. “We did, but I recall someone breaking that deal.”

  “It was not my choice to leave.” Hopefully he would buy that, because she hadn’t exactly fought Grave when he had saved her from the mage’s bedroom.

  She sidled closer to the wretch as he perused her, his gaze lingering on her chest and then her hips before slowly returning to her face.

  “I want to remain corporeal.” She dropped her voice to a whisper, ran her eyes over him in return and played up to his ego by teasing her lower lip with her teeth, as if she felt attracted to him. Wanted him. She wanted to retch. That was what she wanted.

  He leaned back a little more, looked down at himself and then back at her, his green eyes gaining an interested edge. “We can work something out.”

  “So the deal is still on?” Hope soared, despite what she would have to do to fulfil her side of it. “One night for one century?”

  He shot that hope out of the sky with a slow shake of his head.

  “I want more… you… bound to me.”

  Her first instinct was to step back and tell him where to go, but she somehow managed to remain rooted to the spot, her face a mask of pleasantness as her insides churned with a dark need to lash out at him and shove him away.

  “You want me bound to you?” She couldn’t quite bring herself to believe she had heard him right. “But I am bound to the vampire… so I cannot bind myself to you.”

  The way he smiled at her again made her skin crawl and the look in his eyes said he didn’t view her bond with Grave as a problem.

  He was going to break it to forge one of his own with her.

  The thought of shattering her bond to Grave left her feeling as if it was shattering her heart right that minute, tearing it to pieces inside her chest. The mark on her back shimmered with heat and she clung to it, afraid of losing it and her connection to Grave.