The Devil You Know (39 page)

“I cannot be sure. Perhaps a week, a month. It will take some time for him to reassemble any forces not trapped with him on Koue. But be warned—his people will learn from their recent loss. Future groups will be better prepared.” Kathryn hesitated. There was something she wasn’t saying.

I cocked my head. “And your suggestion would be to return with you?”

“That would be the safest, yes.” The victory was gone from her eyes. There was no doubt what Kathryn said was the truth as she knew it.

Still I had to ask, “Safest for whom?”

“Safest for you, of course.” Despite the unquestionable honesty of her answer, we both knew she would benefit by my presence. They’d made no secret of that.

“And for my family?” I clenched my hands under the table.

The corners of Kathryn’s eyes tightened almost imperceptibly. “I cannot see into the future. Perhaps you should ask someone who can.”

“Clearly you’ve never had a conversation with a prognosticator.” Uneasy, I laughed humorlessly. Had Nana told her about my coma three years ago and the mostly forgotten dreams I’d had of the future?
No, Nana wouldn’t have.
Still it was an odd comment.

“Tell me what you know,” I demanded.

“We could offer them sanctuary,” Kathryn said graciously, adding with a cautionary tone, “but that would be only a temporary reprieve. The Betrayer is raising an army on his island. How they plan to escape, we do not know. But he has done it before so we know it is possible. When that time comes, we will fight him. If you embrace your demon-half, allow your guardian and demon powers to merge, and join us, we may be strong enough to defeat him and remove the threat. That is the only way to ensure the safety of your family and my people.”

“You don’t make this easy.” I looked away, rubbing at the stiffening muscles in my neck. “How long do I have?”

“This is what Gwendolyn and I were discussing. Our solar alignments are similar. In five Earth weeks, you will have a solar eclipse on this plane. A mirroring eclipse will take place in The Otherworld in six weeks. The eclipse is important in our history and to The Betrayer personally. He will wait until then to make his move. I cannot guarantee you will not be attacked until then, only that he will not instigate a major military event before that day.”

Could she know? No, there was no way she could know the significance of those dates to me.

“How long until you must have my answer?” I asked.

“We can wait no longer than your eclipse. You have five weeks,” she said resolutely. “Then I will send an emissary for your answer.”

Strangely, I felt relieved. There was still a dark cloud hanging over my head, but now at least I had an idea of when the torrent would begin.

“Five weeks.” I took a bite of my breakfast, hungry for the first time. I met Kathryn’s eyes again. We were alike in so many ways. Her light blue eyes reflected the determination I knew must be shining in my own. “I can live with that.”

Or so I hoped.

* * *

Hours later, in the woods outside the Delacy homestead…

Lying atop their portable deer stands, the two snipers clung to twin pines—the closest thing to high ground they could find in this godforsaken southland. Warlocks both, they’d been dispatched the night before by their boss, The Mistress, after her man on the inside had failed to report in. They’d arrived an hour after dawn and lay now, sweating in the hot noonday sun, watching the ward-circled house through their rifle scopes. Their orders were to keep their distance, and both obeyed without question. They’d seen the vampire’s reports of how their Mistress’s demon allies had met their end. But thanks to the snipers’ armaments,
space
did not mean their targets were safe.

Prepared for a long day of waiting, they were surprised to see the front door of the house open. The snipers watched the four exit and used the backgrounds they’d received as they came out. First an auburn-haired woman with silver-gray eyes—
Detective Jacqueline Slone
. Then an elderly woman with silver hair—
the Demon Queen of Denoir
. A tan man with black hair and a white forelock—
the Queen’s guard, Vanguard
. As they left the swirling green and blue wards and headed toward a black SUV, a woman with wild hair that changed color in the sun and shadow brought up the rear
—the Council’s Fae Sheriff Josephine Fera
. Even from this distance, the snipers could sense the unmistakable un-fake-able aura of demon power.

For a moment, Sniper One’s finger tightened on the trigger, silver eyes in his sights…

Then Detective Slone moved and all Sniper One saw was the silver-haired Demon Queen, his true target. A bullet to the heart would be easy, so easy. He’d never seen anyone, not even a Were or Vamp, walk away from an armor-piercing hollow-point dead left to the chest.

But the Mistress’s orders had been specific. And both men knew being eaten alive like the black-winged demons would be preferable to what she would do to them if they didn’t do things
exactly
as she ordered. Denoir’s Queen and her guard must die as they stepped into the gate and not a moment before.

The gunman removed his finger from the trigger. In sync, the two descended their trees and made their way toward an old crumbling barn and the dusty rental car parked behind it. When the SUV passed them, they moved onto the road, lagging far behind until they hit the interstate. They continued on this way, cruising seemingly without a care, for another hour. The gunmen did their part, turning the radio to a random country station, smiling and bobbing their heads aimlessly to twangy music they didn’t understand.

All were nearly to New Orleans when the SUV did a quick U-turn and gunned it, zooming past the gunmen. The grassy median wasn’t wide, but even if it had been, the men would have clearly noted that their prey was no longer in the vehicle. Where the silver-haired Demon Queen had sat, there was now a willowy gray-haired woman.
Gwendolyn Delacy
—the name flashed across their eyes along with the snapshot they had been given of her. The black-haired man was now a petite blond. They didn’t know the name but had been given a grainy photo and advised to leave her for the time being. The blond smiled and waved happily, blowing them a kiss. The gunmen’s eyes moved down, to the frighteningly familiar, red-eyed terrier in the woman’s lap. Guessing the dog’s species wasn’t necessary. They could feel the change in the magic suffusing the car. It was demon all right. But it didn’t belong to the ones they were after.

They’d been duped.

The driver started to jerk the wheel and follow, but a sharp word stopped him. After a quick consultation, they continued on, sweating more in the car’s A/C than they had in the hot sun. Their quarry was gone. They both knew it. That meant their lives were forfeit.

The Mistress did not take failure lightly.

Within an hour, both men were at the airport. Their boss had a long reach, but with her right-hand, Bon, missing and presumed dead and her dark-rider, Sarkoph, undergoing a forced healing in his glass prison, the Mistress was running short of help…and patience. Both circumstances afforded them a chance at life.

The two snipers bowed, shook hands, and went their separate ways, changing names and identities as frequently as they changed planes, proving that even men with no future and no past cared for their present.

What little of it they had left.

* * *

At the others’ signal, Aunt Helena and I bundled Van and Kathryn out in illusion charms and went for a stroll through the sunny gardens. As I had known they could, the two demons locked their magic away tightly, appearing to even the deepest search to be nothing more than the two guardians they impersonated…unless of course one was doing an
attitude
check. For while Kathryn didn’t mind being disguised as Nana, Van looked like he had swallowed something sour. Apparently the Brittan lookalike felt blond was not his color. I’d told him to suck it up and taken away his channel-surfing privileges.

Even now, I wasn’t sure if he was pouting more from being disguised as a woman or from my turning off the TV midprogram, and I didn’t care. Saturday cartoons might still be running, but it was time for the demon remote-hog to go home.

For extra measure, we four walked through the woods to Cassie’s. Aunt Helena remained speaking with the younger witch conspicuously near the front window while Van, Kathryn and I went out the back. We made our way to an old, rarely used logging road where we found Mynx, complete with chauffeur’s cap, leaning against the demons’ ride.

I began to laugh. “This is your idea of inconspicuous?” I stared incredulously at the black hearse, wondering if the faded curtains and nearly bald tires had cost extra. Seeing the two coffins in the back, I laughed harder. No doubt they were lead-lined, warded and impervious to magical searches. That explained why Mynx had said the demons would need no escort.

You couldn’t attack something you couldn’t find.

“Brilliant,” I said, smiling.

“Thank you.” Mynx bowed, doffing her cap. “I aim to please.” She opened the hearse’s back and sketched another bow to Kathryn and Van. “Your chariot awaits.” She gestured to the open coffins.

Kathryn graciously allowed Mynx to help her into a coffin that was plusher on the inside than its plain pine exterior indicated. Without a word, she crossed her hands over her chest and closed her eyes, assuming the role almost eagerly.

Van balked. “I’ll ride up front with her loveliness.” He coquettishly blinked Brittan’s green eyes at Mynx, smiled that thousand-watt smile, and reached to lower the hearse’s door.

I stopped the door’s descent, no longer amused. I’d made it quite clear before leaving the house that his and Kathryn’s lives hinged on doing exactly as Mynx said, and he’d agreed. This moment was not the best to go back on that agreement. “You ride in the back. Or you stay here.” At the blond woman/demon man’s smile, I added, grinning back, “And by ‘here’ I mean in the woods, alone, to walk your way to the nearest gate,
unescorted
.”

His/her smile only dimmed slightly. “Would you believe I’m afraid of small spaces?” Van arched a blond brow, daring me to be uncivil.

“Not for a moment.” I gave him an uncompromising stare, my hand still on the door. If he had such a weakness, he wouldn’t admit it to me.

A minute passed as we stared at each other, neither willing to give in. Mynx simply leaned back against the car’s side, indifferent. As each second passed, Van’s smile grew smaller and smaller, until finally it was a scowl. I saw the exact moment his patience broke.

“How can I protect my Queen with my powers bound and my senses blinded by this prison?” He pointed at his empty coffin, its lid open and waiting.

Mynx gave me a look. It was her run, but she’d told me I was to handle Van. I was the only one that wouldn’t deck him—though it wasn’t from lack of temptation. I nodded. Without a word, Mynx opened her door and slid inside. One blink later, her hand was on the ignition. I turned to Van, who watched Mynx, not understanding.

“You don’t protect her.” The magic stirring in the air said I shouldn’t goad the nice demon. But a new pecking order needed to be established…preferably sooner rather than later. “You lie there quietly, like a good little boy, and let Mynx deliver you both to safety. Or you stay and find your own way home.”

Even half-dead with an arrow in his back, I’d yet to see Van truly angry, so I was expecting an atypical, cheekily arrogant comeback. I was startled when his face darkened and fire flared in his eyes.

“I’ll not shamefully hide behind another as my family is threatened,” he seethed. “We are demons. We don’t run. We don’t hide. And we don’t pretend to be something we are not. This is an assassin’s trickery.” Face twisted with revulsion, he snarled, “It is something a
selenocid
would do.”

My eyes flashed with anger, and by Van’s slight step back, I knew they’d turned red with demon fire. Since her first run-in with Ramus’s metaphysical fist, my demon-half had been remarkably restrained around the other demons. But she was pissed now, and I was of a mind to agree with her. Something rumbled low in my chest and I suppressed the sound with difficulty. She—We—knew the insult he’d given us.

“Selenocid? You mean the House of the Gray Moon?” My voice grew coldly calm. “Or should I say…the ones who so recently kicked your ass?”

Van’s tan face flushed red, but he remained silent, unable to contest the truth.

“I’ve read of them, only one of two demon houses to have wings…and the only one whose wings are black, like Ramus’s. You’re right. They are assassins. They run. They hide. They slit your throat in the dark of night.”

He nodded, thinking he’d won the argument, until I added, “Which is why you must learn to do the same. A house that doesn’t evolve
dies
.”

“Blasphemous!” Van spat the word at me, grinding his teeth.

The air around us grew hot, but I was unafraid.

“How dare you even compare our House to that scourge!” He raised his hand, fire running from his fist to his rolled shirtsleeve. “Crowns be damned. They stole everything—EVERYTHING—that was ever important from us.”

He looked at me like I was a stranger. And really, I was. Ties of blood did not make us the same. I returned his stare, unblinking, looking into eyes that could easily be my own.

“No.” We both turned in surprise as Kathryn sat up. Speaking quietly, she looked at us with sadness. Van lowered his fist, shame and fury warring in his gaze. Kathryn continued, “There is no dishonor in outwitting our enemies, nor in allowing our allies to carry us when we cannot carry ourselves. We have too long been stagnant in our ways. It is killing us. Cate is right. We must adapt.” After a pause, she added, “And that is why she will someday be Queen. The Otherworld must come to a new order or it will not come at all.”

For every word Kathryn said, there were a thousand that remained unsaid…at least to me. Her eyes communicated something to Van I didn’t understand—perhaps didn’t want to understand. There was a long pause as they stared at each other.