“You won’t need to,” he says softly, his fingers caressing her face like she’s sacred or he’s mad.

  She pauses, gaze locked on his. “Yes, I will. I love you too much to allow you to become a devilish angel again, Nathaniel. I can feel your darkness rising from the underworld, freed, and that’s what your brother, the Regent, wanted all along. I won’t let it come to light, I’d rather go back to the underworld with you.”

  Nathaniel picks up on something outside, and his senses perk up.

  He turns around the moment the doors are being pushed open, but he senses the man with his hands on them isn’t there to fight him. The guy lifts his head, his aquiline features drawing to form a grin.

  “Well, well, well, the mighty and the low, sinning together.”

  Leona and Nathaniel are no longer entangled in a love position, but her legs are still wrapped around Nathaniel from behind. He’s buttoning up his pants, but his shirt is ripped open, revealing his chest that has savored his lover’s caresses and kisses only moments ago. Hector Varlam, now standing between the big doors facing the two of them on the altar, forces himself to keep grinning in order to avoid falling apart under the hurt he feels. Nathaniel senses his feelings swirling.

  “After all these years,” Nathaniel whispers as he takes in Hector’s emotions. “You still love her.”

  Varlam lets the doors fall shut behind him, staring at the lovers on the altar with hatred in his eyes. A change in his brain chemistry lets Nathaniel know he’s thinking about that night when he, Nathaniel, first met Leona Ignat—she was in bed with this man. She’d opened her legs for him, his hips were pressed to hers the moment she sensed Nathaniel’s dark presence in the room with them. She told Hector to stop trying to enter her, but in the heat of the moment the sleaze ignored her pleas. Nathaniel had to emanate a field of pressure from his body in order to make Hector realize they were, indeed, not alone. When the bastard turned to see Nathaniel big and dark in the shadow, his eyes popped out in dread, and he couldn’t get out of there fast enough. But now he’s thinking those lustful thoughts about Leona again.

  Nathaniel’s muscles span and, with a cry, he lunges forward to grab Varlam and finish him. It doesn’t even matter how the guy got here, where he’d been all along, hell, not even if he’s the shadow stalker and the killer—which, in a flash of probing his thoughts, Nathaniel realizes he’s not. He ignores Leona’s distant pleas behind him and he’s already strangling Varlam, forcing him to his knees, when he translates the next waves in his thoughts—Varlam knows who the stalker is, and he’s defying Nathaniel with the information, holding it right on top of his frontal lobe, out there for him to read it clearly. The killer’s identity, his face, light up in Nathaniel’s mind like on a screen.

  Nathaniel’s hands cover the hawk’s thick throat from base to jaw, but Varlam doesn’t even struggle. He’s there, on his knees, face with its deep dark eyes and penetrating features grinning up at Nathaniel, silently daring him to do it.

  “Come on, Viscount,” he pushes. “You know you want to do it. Yes, I wanted to fuck her, I still do, and you know what? Armando Gabor, the boy she almost fucked only a few hours ago, is on his way too, along with your Upgrades from the monastery, rushing over to save you from us. He’ll be lusting after her the way I am, too. I suggest you kill both of us tonight.” He grins provokingly.

  Nathaniel grimaces as he’s fighting the dark energy that threatens to break out of him. He can feel it swell inside his chest, filling and choking him.

  “What have I done?” he breathes, squeezing his eyes shut, struggling to hold the monster down.

  “Why do you fight it, Viscount?” Hector tempts. “Samael, the Dark Lord, has taken over you bit by bit anyway. Sometimes you even blacked out from his influence.”

  A deep female voice comes from behind Nathaniel like the whisper of an enchantress—calm, even, but threatening. “Shut up or I’ll bind your tongue, snake.”

  “Leona.” Hector says her name like a prayer, his eyelids falling, hooding his eyes. Nathaniel blocks her from sight, but he knows Hector is drunk on hearing her voice speaking for him for the first time in three years. Whatever hole he’d been hiding in, all he did all this time was brood over what happened, play out the Regent’s games and plans, and wait for the moment when he knew that she’ll be his to take again. The Regent has promised she’d be his the moment Nathaniel would be completely taken by the darkness. Reading the guy’s mind, Nathaniel flexes with rage, his hands squeezing his throat.

  “You can’t have her. You can’t want her.”

  Varlam surrenders with a grin, spreading his arms. His eyes roll up, his eyelids fluttering over the whites.

  “No,” Leona calls from behind. “You cannot kill for me, Nathaniel! It will seal the deal, the Dark Lord will take over you completely.”

  Nathaniel bursts into sick laughter, aware that it throws a cold shower of fear over Leona.

  “You ask me not to kill for you,” he says. “I already killed for you. I’ll always kill for you. So you know what happens if you as much as think about cheating on me. Also, if I ever feel you desire another man, I will kill him.” He looks at her over his shoulder. “Wife.”

  He returns his attention to Varlam, determined to rip his head off his shoulders, but Leona jumps on his back.

  “Don’t do it, Nathaniel.”

  He can barely feel her weight, and all he does is grin wickedly. “You wanna watch this up close, huh? All right, my love.”

  Leona’s beautiful ruby eyes with the shiny black eyelashes widen as she realizes what’s going to happen. But the moment Nathaniel stems himself to rip Varlam’s head from the rest of his body with his bare hands, increasingly fast thudding reaches his ears, the sound filling the chapel in only a few moments, shaking the walls. It’s Nathaniel’s army from the monastery, as Varlam said, here to help Nathaniel against—whom? Against himself?

  The doors hit the walls, and a group of Upgrades storm in, the Executioner and Gino Bogza leading them, Alice on her husband’s side, the gypsy Armando Gabor on Gino’s. They come to a stop, many mouths opening. They didn’t expect this, did they?

  The Executioner stretches out his hand in a stopping gesture. “What the fuck are you doing, Nathaniel?”

  “Leona,” the Queen of Hearts squeals from his side, rushing over to her best friend. She tries to help Leona off her lover, but the temptress shakes her head like a kid protecting a wounded animal.

  “He needs me,” she says.

  Alice clings to Leona, a desperate look on her face. “I sense his feelings, Leo. You need to get off him, now. He’s dangerous.”

  “Nathaniel, let go of that piece of shit Varlam, let me deal with him,” Damian continues, low and calm, but all the others take a defense stance, Gino even holding up his dagger. Nathaniel squints and tilts his head like a predator bird getting a better angle. Is Gino an idiot? Is he really considering fighting him, the Viscount?

  Nathaniel laughs hard imagining how all it would take is a flick of his wrist to break the neck of this anyhow annoying fuck-face. The sound fills the chapel, sending chills through the small army facing him, chills that Nathaniel feels deeply, and which give him ripples of pleasure. He enjoys the fear he triggers, he loves what he reads in some of these people’s faces. Especially in Armando Gabor’s.

  The boy has adopted a fighting position too, glaring at Nathaniel from under his eyebrows. He’s one of the few born fighters here, talented, determined, and he’s been through enough shit in his young life that he’s ready to take on more. But he wanted Leona, he was ready to take her. Nathaniel hisses. He would burn the boy alive, watch the flesh come off his bones and run his tongue over his teeth in anticipation of his taste. And now he knows he’d do it. Samael is half devil and, what’s worse yet, is that God isn’t willing to stop him. God let Samael wed his obsession, God is allowing Samael to exist. But he places it in Samael’s hands to control his dark side.

  Realizing this, Nathaniel lets go of Hector Varlam. The guy coughs with his hand at his abused throat, his reddened face regaining its olive hue rapidly. He looks at Nathaniel with hatred.

  Dark thoughts threaten to overcome Nathaniel. He must act now, before he starts killing, grabs Leona, and runs to his wicked brother. He spans his inner organs in that particular way he always knew he could but never tried. It’s as natural as reaching out for something with your hand, only that it’s the first time you do it. He feels his cells whirl all through him as they change build and consistency, then clusters of his flesh split away from each other, forming separate bodies. It’s like pulling muscles everywhere, he grimaces at the strain that goes all through him. By the way everyone’s gaping, it must be quite a sight, too. Upgrades stumble backwards, mouth agape, eyes popping out of their heads.

  “Holy fuck,” some whisper, some yell.

  Nathaniel can feel each and every one of the clusters of flesh into which his body has split like his own body. Only that now he has many of them. The hands are big and feathery, curving over air as the bodies lift from the ground and fly out of the chapel in all directions. The biggest raven, Nathaniel’s head, shoots upward through the cone-like opening in the ceiling. As soon as he’s out into the fresh night air, he spreads his wings and flies away to a place where he would meet the rest of him, and become whole again.

  CHAPTER XVI

  Anything for love

  LEONA

  Leona crumbles to the ground sobbing, Alice’s hands around her. Damian rushes over, along with Armando and Hector. There’s a ball of pain rolling inside of her and, even though the pain is new, she knows it’s caused by the physical separation from her lover. Now they’re wed, together in all forms of energy and, as husband and wife, they belong with each other.

  But, as she looks up at all these people surrounding her, two of them with eyes tormented by love, hate and lust that she herself has triggered in her wickedness, she realizes....

  “Both Nathaniel and I are an infection to this world,” she whispers, low and barely comprehensible to them except to the person nearest, Alice. The Queen of Hearts grips Leona’s shoulders tighter, looking intently at her, feeling her emotions.

  “No, don’t do this to yourself. We’ll find a solution....” But then she stops abruptly. Leona grins, knowing the Queen of Hearts picked on her feelings—and her decision.

  “No,” Alice whispers.

  Leona rises to her feet. Her best friend tries to hold her down, pleading, “No!”

  But Leona lifts her chin, addressing all Upgrades now staring at her.

  “This has shocked the entire Order,” she says, her voice filling the chapel, along with the wind that starts blowing harder. It seems the storm inside her does influence the elements. Leona grins to herself—witchcraft, indeed. She deserves her fate.

  “You bet your gypsy ass,” Gino spits angrily, pointing a finger at her like an inquisitor. He turns to the others, his back at Leona. “The Viscount, the man we all believed without sin, free of any human cravings, was having his way with a gypsy temptress! She managed to seduce the embodiment of sanctity and resilience, imagine what she can do with the rest of us or, better yet, poor bastards like normal humans.” He waves a hand in the general direction of Armando and Hector.

  Armando frowns, Leona can see the youthful impulse making him jolt forward and grab the blond Upgrade’s arm.

  “You son of a bitch,” Armando snarls. “You could care less what happens to us normal humans, we’re all sewer rats to you—I heard you say it. You hate Leona, plain and simple, don’t pretend you care about anyone else but your own goals by punishing her.”

  “I’d rather hate her than fall prey to her powers, you arch-monkey,” Gino snarls back.

  While Armando and Gino argue, all the other Upgrades’ attention on them, including the Executioner’s and the Queen of Hearts’, both of whom look ready to intervene and protect Armando should he get attacked, Hector approaches Leona. He touches her arm softly, and her eyes find his face.

  “Come with me,” he pleads. “If you stay with them, they’ll burn you alive.”

  Oh God, the way he looks at her. He’s disheveled and unshaved, as if he’s lived in a cave all this time, so love sick that he’d neglected himself completely. Her cursed powers have done this to him, combined with what Alice did. In order to save herself from rape three years ago, Alice found Hector’s ability to fall in love buried deep in his latent genes, and she activated it. She turned a psychopathic criminal into a love-sick caveman. Leona smiles to herself.

  “Even love is evil with people like us,” she whispers.

  “What?” Hector says.

  But Leona is done explaining. She turns to the group, raising her arms.

  “I’m a witch, and I demand to be burned at the stake.”

  Heads turn to her, Armando and Gino freeze at each other’s throats, mouths popping open. When the meaning of her words settles, Alice runs over, pushes Hector from Leona’s side so hard that he lands on his butt, grunting and cursing, and cups her friend’s face in her hands, forcing their eyes to meet.

  “You’re not doing this, you are NOT doing this,” she says through her teeth, sparkling blue eyes fixed on Leona’s. Leona feels compelled to smile again. The Queen of Hearts and the arch-temptress Lilith, life-long friends, loving each other like sisters. She touches Alice’s hands on her face.

  “Alice, your powers benefit the world,” she says calmly, accepting the fate she’s decided for herself. “Mine, they are a curse, they bring obsession, madness, death. You awaken love in people, and even though this love is intense, your gift cures them in some way, while mine triggers a sick manifestation of lust.” She touches her forehead to Alice’s, lowering her voice, making this last sentence only for the two of them. “You’re the bright moon, and I’m the dark side of you, I guess we both always sensed that, on some level. But you need to understand, and not be in my way now. If I go, Nathaniel will have no choice but follow me to the underworld.”

  “What, no,” Hector calls, trying to get up. “You can’t do this.”

  The Executioner is there in a flash, planting a foot on his chest and pushing him back down. His body hits the floor with a thud. Armando starts towards them as well, but Gino grabs his arm and yanks him backwards, tossing him into two Upgrade’s clasp.

  Leona rips herself away from her friend’s clinging arms, giving herself over to the Upgrades, her wrists together as if she’s offering them to be cuffed. They grab her roughly.

  “Put her in a dungeon,” Gino calls as they exit the chapel into the night chill.

  “No,” she says. “No dungeon. You need to build a stake and burn me right away. Otherwise, he’ll come for me, and no one will be able to stop him.”

  She turns to them, raising her voice. “Dr. Nathaniel Sinclair, the Viscount, is the incarnation of the dark archangel Samael. Tonight, he has wed his millennia-old lover, Lilith. Me. Cast Lilith back into the fires of hell, and the Dark Lord, as her husband, will have to follow. Otherwise, the Dark Lord will join his brother, the Regent, turning to the wicked side of immortality. With the two brothers reunited, there will be nothing left to stand in the way of evil.”

  “This is insane,” Alice calls. “Don’t let her do this. Leona, please, why would you ask for your own execution? We should be focusing on finding the shadow stalker, uncovering the killer, that’s what everyone should be thinking about right now, that’s where we should start to solve all this.”

  Leona smiles bitterly. “We already know who the shadow stalker is.”

  Everybody pauses. Eyes widen.

  “We do?” Gino says with a frown on his forehead.

  “It was in front of us all along,” Leona says.

  “No!” Varlam tries to intervene, but the Executioner holds him down. Armando is struggling as well, but he’s immediately yanked back, too.

  “It was Nathaniel,” Leona reveals as if nothing, eyes up at the night sky.

  “Whatttt?” Gino bursts, stomping forward towards her, but Damian intercepts him before he can touch her. There’s a maddened expression on the blond Upgrade’s face.

  “Pull yourself together,” Damian demands.

  Moments of commotion and raised voices, with Upgrades shifting and running their hands desperately through their hair. They’re quick-witted, Leona knows, so they don’t need forever to understand what she means.

  “It was all her fault.” Gino points an accusing finger at Leona, eyebrows quivering in a murderous frown. “She changed the very blood in his veins, she clouded his reason, filled him with nothing but lust, drugged him with the scent of her wet pussy. The Order is headless, defenseless, because of her! We have to finish her and the Viscount, so that we can regroup.”

  “Stop trying to cause panic, you asshole,” Damian intervenes. “Even if the Viscount would attack us in some evil craze, I’d take on him. I stood up to him once, I can do it again. We’re not defenseless.”

  Gino scoffs, pulling his arm from Damian’s grip. He measures the Executioner from head to toe. “You are ready to take on him, right? And then what, lead the Order yourself? Just how stupid do you think we are, Executioner? Do you think we forgot just how rotten you’re at your core yourself? I worked with you side by side for years, remember that? I was there when you met your wife.” Spittle flies out of his mouth with contempt as he stresses the word. “I was there when you started drooling over her. She’s the only thing that keeps you good, and your resolve is weak. Without her, you’d turn to evil yourself in an instant.”

  “That’s more than unfair, Gino, and you know it.” Alice steps in. “He’d been on your guys’ side for ten years before he and I fell in love.”

  Gino looks from one to the other, taking a few steps of distance and motioning with his hand from Damian to Alice as he speaks, making a point to the others. “So this is what’s really happening. The Executioner and his child-faced wife, trying to take over the Order.”

 

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