Rune studied the blond immortal, looked into gray eyes that were so much like his own and then reached back into the eons of time for a slip of a memory. When he found it, he shook his head. “Impossible. You can’t be. You’re all dead.”
“Not dead,” the being countered, flicking a glance at Teresa that was filled with both desire and determination. “We are the Forgotten. I am Parnell, one of many. We are the true Eternals. The first race created by Belen. The better race.”
“Rune?”
He heard the question in her voice and couldn’t blame her for it. Hell, Rune could hardly think straight himself. This shouldn’t be happening, but it made sense—in a twisted, truly fucked-up way. At least this explained how Elena had died and how Teresa’s aunt had been burned. At the hands of one who should have been an Eternal. A guardian.
He didn’t remember much. He’d had no cause to retain the details over the long centuries of his immortal life. The Forgotten were a part of the distant past. No more than a legend among the Eternals.
Speaking to Teresa, Rune kept his gaze on his enemy. “I told you that Belen created us from the heart of the sun.”
“Yes, but—”
“What I didn’t tell you was that Belen created others before us. They were meant to be your mates. To be your guardians. But they were flawed.”
“Flawed?”
Parnell’s outraged shout rang through the rafters of the chapel. A rustle of wings sounded in the distance as the doves roosting in the towers took flight at the noise. “We were better than Belen wanted. We were powerful. Too powerful.” Parnell lifted his chin and his gray eyes, color swirling, stared into Rune’s with hatred flashing so brightly it was as if the emotion itself was alive. “Belen looked at us and trembled. So he thought to destroy us and create instead a lesser race. One that wouldn’t challenge him.”
“One that wasn’t homicidal, apeshit crazy, you mean?” Rune scoffed at him, and he saw that Parnell didn’t take kindly to criticism.
Good. Keep him off balance
, he told himself.
Danger simmered all around him. Teresa’s life hung in the balance of whatever was going to happen in the next few minutes. Parnell was a formidable foe and he was also nuts, which put a whole new spin on the fight. You couldn’t figure what a crazy man would do. Couldn’t count on him making rational choices.
“Trust the Eternal, beware the immortal,” Teresa whispered behind him and Rune remembered the warning Elena had delivered from beyond her grave.
“Now we know,” Teresa murmured.
Yes, he thought, now they knew.
He took another step backward, into the chapel, knowing that Teresa was moving, too.
Keep her away from Parnell.
His only thought rang out loud in his mind and everything he was centered on keeping her safe.
“Come to me, Teresa,” Parnell said, reaching out one hand to her even as he kept the flames alive on the other. “I will be your other half. Your mate. I will protect you as I have been doing all along.”
“Protect me? What does that mean?”
“Don’t talk to him, Teresa,” Rune ordered as they cleared the doorway and backed into Saint Agatha’s chapel. “Just take the Artifact and get out of here.”
He didn’t look at her. He couldn’t afford to take his gaze off the man in front of him. Parnell might be wearing civilized slacks and a silk shirt, but he had the presence of a warrior and it wouldn’t pay to discount him. Especially now, Rune thought, knowing the man to be one of the Forgotten. They were immortal, dangerously unpredictable and until this very moment, believed to be dead.
“How did you survive?” he asked, keeping Parnell busy as he hoped Teresa turned to leave.
“We were able to mask our presence from Belen,” Parnell said with a shrug. “He doesn’t pay much attention after all, does he? Too wrapped up with his witch goddess to notice whether he actually killed his children or not.”
The only light in the chapel came from the flickering flames dancing on the skin of the two immortals facing each other. Shadows spun and danced on the stone walls and shone on their faces.
“Rune …” Teresa’s voice, breathy, soft, uncertain.
It twisted a knife in his guts. He wanted nothing more than to be there for his woman. To help her through this greatest of challenges. To share his strength with her so that she could withstand the pull of the dark magic enveloped within the black silver.
“Teresa, you have to go. Go now,” he ordered.
But she didn’t.
He sensed her, still right behind him in the chapel, and he hoped to hell the black silver wasn’t working its darkness on her.
“What do you want?” Rune asked, keeping his knife blade up and aimed, the flames on his free hand burning brightly.
“What’s rightfully ours, of course,” Parnell told him. “It’s the Awakening. We want our witches.” His gaze slipped past Rune to Teresa. “We want what should have been ours for the taking.”
“The Artifact,” Rune said.
“Yes,” Parnell told him with a smile. “The Artifact and the witch who charms it. We will be the power in this world. We will bring Belen out of his dimension screaming. We will become what we always should have been. Eternal.”
“You are out of your fucking mind,” Rune told him with a shake of his head. “Nothing is yours. Not the witches. Not the Artifact. Go back where you came from. Hide from our god, because once he knows you’re not dead, you soon will be.”
From behind him, Rune heard Teresa’s deep sigh. “Rune, it’s getting warm. The Artifact. It’s heating up.”
“It’s the call of the dark, Teresa,” Parnell whispered in a coaxing tone. “It recognizes your soul. As it would know mine. It urges you to be what you once were.”
“Don’t listen, Teresa,” Rune told her firmly. “Just go. Now.”
“Now it’s … humming,” she said softly. “The power is—”
“Indescribable?” Parnell offered. He smiled at her and his eyes briefly flashed black.
Demon energy. The immortal had demon power charging through his system. He—and maybe all of the Forgotten—had made a deal with the demons. Who knew what kind of power that merging would create?
Rune’s instincts roared. He had to get Teresa away from both Parnell and the Artifact before the black silver could do damage to her will and spirit.
“Put it down, Teresa. Drop it.”
“Don’t,” Parnell said, taking a half step, only to stop again as Rune shifted position to cover him. “Hold it, Teresa. Feel the pull. Feel the power.” His voice was seduction. Dark, hypnotic. “Open yourself to it.”
“Rune …”
“Can’t you feel it?” Parnell continued. “All you ever wanted is within your grasp. The past doesn’t matter. Only the future and what it can bring.”
Rune felt her hesitation. He feared for her in the face of the strong pull of the dark magic. For what might happen if she forgot who she was in the rush of what she was feeling now. He couldn’t risk looking at her, but he could give her something. He could tell her what he should have said in the street outside. Before they ever came into this place to find the piece of their missing past.
“Teresa … I trust you.” The words were soft but implacable. And long overdue. He had finally learned to let go of old betrayals and ancient pains. He had come to discover that Teresa was a woman of honor. Loyalty. She deserved his very best and he would not doubt her again. Ever.
He heard her soft intake of breath and knew she was surprised at his words.
“We are mates,” he continued, his voice only for her as his gaze remained fixed on his enemy. “We are one. Together we are unstoppable. I
trust
you, Teresa.”
“Teresa, come to me now,” Parnell said again, his tone commanding, brooking no argument.
“You said you were protecting me before, Parnell,” she whispered. “What did you mean?”
“That doesn’t matter,” he snapped, inching closer to Rune, Teresa and the black silver.
“Did you kill Elena?” she asked.
Rune gritted his teeth, knowing the answer but wishing she hadn’t asked the question. He would spare her pain if he could.
“She was nothing,” Parnell argued. “As the old woman was. As the one you saved tonight is. Humans to get in the way of your future.
Our
future.”
“They were my
family
,” Teresa said, every word stained with the power of her raw agony.
“You don’t need them. You only need me,” Parnell said, keeping one eye on Rune as he inched ever closer.
“You bastard!”
A wave of power sucked all the air out of the room and then rushed back in—like the buildup to a tsunami—as a lightning bolt slammed into the stone floor in front of Parnell.
The flash of lightning was just the distraction Rune had been hoping for. He launched himself at Parnell, taking the big man down in a thundering crash that shook the glass in the windows high above them. Rune called on the flames, covering his body with fire, heat roiling off him in waves. His powers were intensified, the pulsing rage overtaking him. His strength was immense, thanks to the Mating ritual. He was more powerful than ever before and he used every ounce of it in the blistering fight with his enemy.
Parnell’s flames erupted as well, blinding heat surrounding the two combatants as they rolled across the stone floor. Each of them was armed and knife blades flashed and gleamed in the fiery light.
Parnell’s strength was formidable, fed as it was by the demon trace energies inside him. His eyes went from black to gray and back again countless times as the immortal and the demon within seemed to battle for dominance.
Rune brought his blade down in a wide arc and made contact—he heard the other immortal’s hiss of pain. But it wasn’t enough. There was only one way to kill an immortal, he knew. He had to take Parnell’s head.
He couldn’t see Teresa, but he heard her voice, calling to the moon, chanting, working a spell, and he hoped whatever she was trying would work. He did trust her. Always would. His only job now was to rid them of Parnell. Forever.
Parnell flashed out of the fight and reappeared a few feet away. Roaring his frustration and outrage, he charged and Rune met the challenge. Two massive bodies collided in a flurry of flames and darkness. Deep shadows flickered in the fire drenching Parnell’s body and Rune knew that his enemy had a well of power to draw on. The dark ones had claimed him and Parnell had surrendered to them, in a futile effort to claim what was never his.
“Bastard!” Parnell shouted as his own knife swept across Rune’s broad chest. Blood welled and then stopped as the wound sealed itself in the eternal flames wrapped around his body.
“You sold yourself to a demon,” Rune shouted, pummeling his enemy with his huge fist even as his knife hand arced for a deep blow.
“We found power!” Parnell pushed away, breath heaving, flames darkening as demon energy pumped anew inside him. “The power your god denied us.” He threw his head back and shouted, “Belen! See what you did! Look at us and tremble!”
Madness ruled him. Through the flames swallowing Parnell’s body, Rune saw the glint of insanity in the immortal’s eyes and wondered if it had always been there. Or had the demon energy pushed him over the edge?
Parnell charged again, his hamlike fists swinging. The blade of his knife winked in the light. Rune rolled with a punch thrown by his opponent and gained his feet instantly. Teresa continued to chant as Rune charged at Parnell again, his knife leading the way. Rune stabbed and slashed at the man trying to take Teresa from him.
Outside, lightning boomed and pummeled the earth in a series of electrical blasts as the very sky came alive to Teresa’s power. Each bolt seemed to shudder through the ancient stone walls, shaking them to their foundations.
His head snapped back with the slam of Parnell’s fist into his jaw, but Rune wouldn’t be stopped. Again and again, the two immortals battled for supremacy as the witch they both wanted called on the moon and the skyfire she wielded so well.
Parnell, fighting wildly now, dealt a blow aimed at Rune’s neck and missed. Rune came up fast and swung out with his own knife, its edge razor sharp. In the last flickering moment before his blade made contact with Parnell’s neck, he saw the immortal’s eyes widen in the knowledge of what was to come.
Then it was over.
Parnell’s body and severed head hit the stone floor and a moment later the lightning suddenly ceased. A curtain of silence descended on the ancient, sacred place. Rune let his own fire fade away and drew in heavy, fast breaths before turning from the fallen immortal to Teresa.
She stood near the altar, wrapped in a cloak of moonlight pouring through one of the stained glass windows above. The Artifact lay in her cupped palms, secure in a glowing sphere of silvery light. Within that sphere, miniature lightning bolts crackled and spat at the black silver as if daring it to challenge Teresa’s power.
“Teresa?”
Her gaze met his and she smiled. “I called on the moon, Rune. I used her magic to capture the Artifact. With the strength of the Mating and the influx of raw energy from Palenque, I’m strong enough to hold it. Its lure can’t tempt me. Or you.”
Humbled, awed, he walked to her and carefully placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. “You are the witch you were always meant to be. You are the woman who holds my heart. You are the air I breathe and the light to my darkness. You are …
everything
.”
Tears shone in her eyes, but a beautiful smile curved her mouth as she looked up at him. “I love you, too. And thank you.”
“For what?”
“For the gift of your trust,” she said, lifting one hand to stroke her fingers along the line of his jaw. “You gave me the strength I needed, Rune. Knowing you believed I would do the right thing made all the difference to me.”
“I have loved you throughout time,” he said, “and Belen willing, I will love you until eternity itself ends. And then beyond.”
She went up on her toes and kissed him. Then she said, “Let’s get this thing back to Haven. Then I want a weekend in bed with you. No interruptions.”