Darkness Possessed (Order of the Blade) Read online

  “The fire god,” Eric said grimly. “The Calydon that Rohan sent Zach to hunt.”

  “Holy shit.” Ethan sprinted up beside him, his shaggy blond hair reflecting the orange in the sky. “That’ll melt the hair off a guy’s chest in a heartbeat.”

  A cold fear began to creep through Jordyn as she gaped at the sky. “Rhiannon’s ex is a Calydon. Powerful.” Not the same one, right? Not a fire god? Not a creature who had lit up the entire sky and shook the earth? But she didn’t need to ask it. She knew. She just knew.

  “The fire god is the one who controls this jungle,” Eric said, moving closer to her as the other warriors joined them. Rohan stopped by Eric’s other shoulder, his swords crackling with blue electricity. “I’ve never seen anything like that. Rohan?”

  Rohan shook his head. “Never.” His fingers tightened around his swords, and Jordyn could feel the tension emanating off him. “He lost control.”

  Jordyn knew what could make a Calydon lose control: his woman. His sheva. His mate. “Rhiannon,” she whispered in horror, grabbed Eric’s arm. “It’s Rhiannon’s ex. She’s there. We have to go.”

  He looked at her sharply. “That’s her ex? Hell.”

  “We have to help her! Now!” She whirled around to sprint back to the campsite to grab her bag, when Rohan grabbed her arm and stopped her. “No,” he said.

  “No?” She tried to tear out of his grasp. “What do you mean, ‘no?’ You can’t stop me! My friend is in danger!”

  “We can’t interfere! It must be Zach!”

  “Zach?” She suddenly realized he was talking about the warrior who he’d sent after the fire god. Was that who had set the night on fire? Not José? She looked suddenly toward the sky again, hope leaping through her heart. Maybe Rhiannon had an ally. Maybe she had enough help to stay alive until Jordyn could get there. “Well, I hope he’s good. Come on, Eric!” But when she turned to him, he was gone. Where was he?

  Rohan’s grip tightened on her arm. “We must let Zach do it. He’s the only one who can. The prophecy decrees—”

  “Prophecy?” She stared at him. “Are you kidding? Screw prophecies! That’s my friend out there!”

  There was a sudden burst of white light and a black cloud exploded around them. Jordyn gagged on the toxic fumes, stumbling backward as it burned her eyes. The other Calydons all shouted and leapt to the side, gagging and coughing. The cloud dissipated suddenly, and she saw that Rohan was gone. In his place was a patch of raw, ragged earth, scorched and burned. “What—”

  “I buried him alive in the ground,” Eric said from behind her.

  She whirled around to see that he was on his knees just behind where Rohan had been standing. His hands were covered with black soot, and his face was drained of color. “It won’t last for more than a few minutes against him since he’s so powerful. Let’s go!” He grabbed her hand and sprinted past her into the campsite.

  “What did you do?” Jordyn raced over to her backpack and grabbed her gun. Did she have enough demon bile to take down a Calydon strong enough to burn up the entire sky? God, she hoped so.

  “It’s an ancient, spiritual magic,” Eric said as he grabbed his duffel and slung it over his shoulder. “I appear to have a special talent for it, but I never know exactly how it’s going to work. That worked, so we get to live another day. Always a bonus.” He swept her backpack out of her hand and threw it over his other shoulder. “Run!”

  She didn’t bother to argue with his manly offer to carry her backpack. She knew she wouldn’t be able to run fast with it. “Thanks.” She spun around and bolted back out of the circle of torches. She saw the rest of Rohan’s crew up ahead, blocking her path, and she hesitated. “Can you bury them, too?”

  “No need. They won’t stop us. Go!”

  She grimaced at the sight of all the swords, but had no time to question Eric. The glow over the trees was already fading, and once it was gone, it would be almost impossible to track where it had been. So, she just gripped her gun more tightly and ran right toward the warriors.

  To her surprise, they stepped aside, opening a gap as she neared. She burst through, Eric right behind her. They’d gone only a few yards, when she heard footsteps behind her. She glanced over her shoulder, and was shocked to see all the warriors behind them, racing single file, weapons out. “They’re coming?”

  “Their teammate’s gone rogue and about to die at the hands of that webbing. They’re not going to sit around if there’s a chance to save him, just because Rohan thinks they shouldn’t interfere.” He grinned at her as he fell in beside her, his long legs keeping up with her easily, despite the fact he was carrying two heavy bags. “Rohan’s their leader, but they don’t have the same faith in his visions that he does. We fight for what we believe in and what we can see. It’s what we do. Never leave a man behind, if we can help it.”

  She noticed that Eric said “we fight,” not “they fight,” and she knew that the stoic warrior who decried this tight band of warriors was more connected to them than he had been willing to admit. Not a Calydon in real life, but in his heart, maybe. The idea should have unsettled her, but it didn’t. It made him seemed more grounded in normalcy. She didn’t know anything about his spiritual magic or his “I’m not a man” background, but she understood Calydons. His bond with the other Calydons made him seem more approachable…and more dangerous.

  He looked up at the sky. “I don’t know what we’re walking into,” he said grimly, “but I sure as hell hope we’re in time.”

  Jordyn thought of Rhiannon’s scared face when she’d said that she was going to go back and face her ex, and she felt her throat tighten. She’d seen what Calydons could do to their mates. She’d lived the aftermath of having to kill her soul mate. She’d seen carnage and destruction that would haunt her forever. And even worse, she’d already lost one best friend to an abusive man, and she couldn’t bear to lose another. “Me, too,” she whispered, as she pushed herself to run even faster, giving it every last ounce that she had to offer.

  ***

  Zach unleashed a battle cry as the first of his attackers landed in the bottom of the pit. He swung fast and swung hard, taking down the first three that attacked. The sai that José had melted had not regained form yet, but he kept trying to call it out, knowing that he was toast if he didn’t get it back. And even then—

  A blow hit him between the shoulders, and he staggered under the force of the hit, even as he swung around and took out the warrior behind him. But as he laid him out, he got pummeled in his right shoulder, tearing a gaping wound that cut right through the muscle, leaving his arm useless.

  Grimly, he whirled around, spinning in a circle, faster and faster, using himself as a hub and his sai as a deadly spoke, moving so fast that none of the attackers had time to dodge his blows and attack. Even as he gained speed, he felt the fatigue screaming through his body. He’d been at the last of his resources before the attack, and he knew he had only minutes left to continue to move at this speed before he couldn’t sustain it.

  He thought of Rhiannon, clasped in José‘s arms somewhere, and fresh energy surged through him. I’m coming, Rhiannon. He sent the thought out into the night, even though he knew she wouldn’t hear him. The earth was hot beneath his feet, burning through the soles of his boots, and he knew that José‘s fire still smoldered in the ground from when he’d created the pit that had trapped him.

  Zach shut his eyes, and opened his preternatural senses. He became viscerally aware of the location of each of his attackers. He could smell their sweat. He could hear the beat of their hearts. He could feel their bloodlust to kill him. He knew exactly where each of them stood, and how they were balanced on their feet, ready to take advantage of the slightest falter by Zach.

  Then, he reached deeper inside him, for the part of him that had been dead for so long, the part of him that had once been so volatile that he couldn’t control it, the part of him that he’d shut down the day he’d killed his daughter. He reached p
ast the memories of his daughter’s charred body. He surged past the guilt and grief of her death. He tried to cut loose the iron grip of fear of who he was. Deep inside him, he felt something stir, that same something that had exploded so violently when he and Rhiannon had been trapped beneath the earth.

  It rumbled deep in his core, a shifting of a great weight that slid roughly through him. Elation rushed through him, and he opened himself to it, sending his focus into the embers in the earth beneath his feet, trying to open the connection to the fire. The connection was almost there. He could feel it at the edges of his consciousness, straining to get free, but he couldn’t access it. He couldn’t break through the wall that surrounded it so tightly and kept it trapped inside him.

  “Come on!” he shouted. “Now!” But even as he shouted it, his mind flashed to the image of his daughter’s face, her rosy cheeks, and her blue eyes, staring up at him with such adoration, worshipping the man who would soon kill her. Guilt and terror tore through him, and the heat simmering inside him slipped out of his grasp, receding into the chasm it had been in. “No!”

  He screamed his frustration, and then something hit him in the chest. He looked down and saw a battle axe embedded in him. He had a fraction of a second to register it, and then he felt his heart stutter, and blood rushed into his lungs. He stumbled, and there was a cry of victory as his attackers closed in for the final kill.

  ***

  The acrid scent of smoke was the first thing Rhiannon registered. It burned her nose, jerking her awake. Gasping for air, she rolled onto her side, coughing the searing smoke into her lungs. She dug her hands into the dirt, her body aching and sore as she tried to regain her breath. Her chest felt like it was on fire, and her throat was raw and sore. Even her eyes stung. As she sucked in air, she wiped her hand across her mouth. Grit scraped her lips, and she realized her hands were covered in dirt.

  She suddenly remembered being trapped in the tunnel with Zach, and she instantly bolted upright. “Zach? Zach!” She scrambled to her feet as she scanned the jungle around her, searching for him…but there was no one there. “Zach!” She swung around, frantic, trying to get her bearings. What had happened? Where was he?

  Movement caught her eye, and she searched the dark woods. “Zach?”

  No one answered, but she felt something watching her. The hair on the back of her neck stood up, and her mouth went pasty dry. “No,” she whispered, as she took a step back. It couldn’t be. Not like this.

  But as she watched, a man stepped out of the shadows into the moonlight, a tall, muscular man who made fear lodge in her throat. Instinctively, her hand went to her hip, but there was no dagger. Her bow and quiver were gone. She had nothing, and he was here.

  Fighting the urge to run, she stood taller as he walked toward her. José was just as she remembered. His dark hair flowed over his shoulders, and his heavily muscled chest was bare. Flame tattoos cascaded down his arms and wrapped around his torso. Across his stomach was a scar, the scar from when she’d tried to kill him, a scar he, apparently, had chosen not to heal entirely. A reminder of what she’d done to him.

  His eyes were a dark, bottomless black, and around his neck was a beaded necklace. Black leather pants were slung low over his hips, and the top button was undone, revealing a V of dark hair disappearing into his pants.

  Against her will, her eyes followed that V to the bulge in his pants. Nausea churned in her belly, but she couldn’t take her eyes off it. God, what was wrong with her? Why was she responding to him like that? She didn’t want him. She wanted Zach…Zach. Where was he? How had José separated them?

  Fear gripped her belly, an icy cold terror for the man who had made such incredible love to her, who had made her feel safe and free for the first time in so long. “Where’s Zach?”

  “The bastard who fucked you?” José‘s voice was hard and bitter. “He’s dead.”

  “Dead?” Her voice broke, and her legs went numb. She couldn’t breathe. The world suddenly seemed to spin, and she lost her balance. Zach gone? A bottomless abyss of grief swelled up inside her, sucking her down as tears fell from her heart. Zach? Are you gone? Desperately, she reached out with her soul, trying to find him, but there was nothing.

  José caught her arm in an iron grip just as she started to fall. “You whore,” he snapped. “You’re my woman. How could you fuck someone else?”

  The agony of his fingers digging into her flesh jerked her from her grief about Zach. Anger rolled through her. This was the man who had killed Zach? Fierce strength rushed through her, and she ripped her arm out of his grasp. “You’re supposed to protect your sheva,” she snapped. “How could you do what you’ve done to me?”

  A smile stretched thinly across his face. “It’s how it works, bitch.”

  “No, it’s not!” She’d always hated what he’d done to her and how he’d treated her, but until she’d met Zach, she hadn’t truly grasped how it should have been. She knew now what it was supposed to be like between a man and a woman. Zach had taught her what it felt like to be cherished, and he’d done it simply out of love and humanity, not because he was bound to her by some supernatural bond.

  Her upper lip curled in disdain as she looked at the man who had trapped her for so long. She didn’t see his handsomeness. She didn’t crave his touch. She just saw a creature who was depraved and twisted, who had contaminated the sheva bond into something horrific and evil. “You don’t get to have me again,” she said. “It’s over.”

  “No,” he whispered. “It’s just beginning.” As he spoke, a sudden wave of desire rushed through her. Heat pooled in her belly, and longing throbbed between her legs.

  “What?” Horror congealed through her, and she grabbed for her throat…and then went ice cold. The amulet was gone.

  José laughed, that deep, booming laugh that she hated so much. “I figured it out, bitch. That rock is gone, and you will never get it back. You’re mine, and this time, you’re going to love it.”

  Bile churned in her belly, even as desire coursed through her. She felt filthy responding to him, disgusted with herself. “I will never love it,” she snapped.

  “Oh, but you will.” He pulled her close so that her breasts slammed into his chest. She winced and then wanted to cry when she felt her nipples tighten. How could she be so weak? She couldn’t believe it was happening again.

  His lust flooded her, and he slammed his mouth down over hers. Just like she’d done before, the moment his mouth clamped down over hers, she hardened herself to his influence, and tried to distance herself. The moment she did so, Zach’s face appeared in her mind. She saw his smile. The twinkle in his eyes. She heard his laugh, and the affectionate tenor of his voice. She saw the way he’d looked at her with such admiration when they’d first met, how he’d called her a warrior. She thought of how his touch had helped her focus her energy and call the plants to life. As all those memories tumbled through her head, a strange sense of fierce determination began to course through her, beneath the lust that was boiling through her.

  Why did she have to be weak? Why did she have to be his victim? Jordyn had killed her soul mate, right? Why couldn’t she do it, too? She squeezed her eyes shut and envisioned calling out his weapon. A sheva could call out her mate’s weapon whenever danger threatened. She’d done it once, when one of his crew had attacked her. That had been the final stage to seal their bond, and it wasn’t until much later that she finally realized that he’d commanded the rogue to attack her, to force her to call his weapon and complete the bond, trapping her forever.

  Since that one time, she’d never been able to call it, no matter what he’d done to her.

  But now, with his mouth on hers, and Zach’s voice in her mind, she felt different. She felt like she had a chance. She felt like she could do it! She focused all her energy on the brands on her arm, urging them to come to her, to save her, to allow her to defend herself against José. She could feel their energy humming in his arms, but she couldn’t reach them.
Frustrated, she tried harder, and they began to recede from her, refusing to respond to her call. Why wouldn’t they let her call them against her own mate? Was destiny so stupid that she didn’t even realize that a woman’s greatest threat could come from her own soul mate? Apparently. Tears burned in her eyes, as she realized it was the same as before, the exact same.

  José suddenly broke the kiss, his eyes dark with rage. “I can taste him on you.” He flung her backwards, and she stumbled, but stayed on her feet. “You will bathe in the river,” he snapped. “Clean his touch and the filth from you. And then you will come crawling to me, and you will beg me to take you again, and again, and again. And I will, until you never, ever think of another man again. Now, go!” He pointed behind her, and she felt his mental push in her mind, commanding her acquiescence.

  She didn’t try to fight it. A bath gave her time to try to figure out how to stop him. She whirled around and raced toward the river, her skin prickling at his gloating laugh. Even as she reached the riverbed, and plunged into it, not daring to take off her clothes, she felt his lust settling in her belly. Desire rushed through her, and she had a sudden image of him standing over her in his naked glory. “No!” She forced her mind to picture Zach, shoving José‘s image out of her head. The lust poured over her even more thickly, but this time, it felt empowering, because it was her own desire for Zach. Excitement pulsed through her as she ducked her face in the river and scrubbed off the dirt. If she could use José‘s lust to call up her response to Zach, then maybe she could use Zach to summon her relationship with plants, even though he wasn’t with her.

  Was he really dead? The thought made her falter, and she immediately dismissed it. Zach would never die on her. He’d promised to keep her safe, and he would. He would not die.

  She whirled around and faced the shore, which was lined with heavy jungle plants. She let the lust fill her, and her belly clenched at the thought of Zach. She opened herself to the desire, and let it flood her, focusing on a vine at the edge of the riverbank. Energy pulsed through her, the energy of her life, and one of the leaves on the plant rippled. Elation leapt through her. Yes. Yes! Another leaf began to move, swaying purposefully in rhythm with the first one. And then another, and then another, and then—