Brimstone Prince

“He wouldn’t take me,” she said.

How cruel to be pained by both sunlight and the rejection of a monstrous creature of shadowy darkness.

She belonged to no world and no one.

Grim knew. Her obligation to Ezekiel might be a secret from his master, but the hellhound knew she had divided loyalties. From what she’d seen of Michael’s hellish companion, the beast would brook no shades of gray. He might be an ugly monster spawned in the depths of hell, but he was pure of heart. More pure than Lily Santiago, the daemon king’s ward who would die trying to earn a place for herself. Here. There. Anywhere. Her life was one long, ritualized sacrifice. If she played, summoned, served with all her heart perhaps one day she’d get love in return.

“He’s always been temperamental,” Michael said. Her silence was heavy in the car. She couldn’t hide her dismay. “I blame it on the whole ‘bred in the fires of hell’ thing.”

The vintage Firebird he drove as beautifully as he played and sang rolled to a stop. Lily was startled by the sudden cessation of movement and her game of not blinking was lost. Thankfully the moisture in her eyes had dried and no tears fell to betray her feelings. She could blame her sudden blinking on the sun. She looked around. Michael had pulled into a shabby gas station with two pumps and a peeled and cracked fiberglass statue of a man holding a wrench.

“He doesn’t trust me,” Lily said, softly. She didn’t turn back to Michael. She spoke as if to the hazy reflection of herself in the tinted glass. Her voice was as cracked by circumstances and expectations as the fiberglass statue of the mechanic was worn by time and desert wind.

Not to mention tension.

She was drawn to Michael. And the daemon king had known she would be. It wasn’t only her affinity for the Brimstone in his blood. The man was as appealing as his daemon heat.

“Lucifer’s Army he trusts. But he’s leery of a petite woman with a flute and a bag of dolls,” Michael said. “Maybe it’s because you’re way too young to be Samuel’s daughter. There are things about you that don’t add up.” She glanced at him. His hands were still on the steering wheel. He looked easy in the driver’s seat as if there was no place he’d rather be. Yet she knew he belonged on stage, playing and singing for an adoring crowd. Of course, the whole world was Michael D’Arcy Turov’s stage. She knew that even though she’d known him for only a short while.

“I’m going to freshen up,” Lily said. What else could she do or say? She couldn’t tell him she’d grown up in hell where time had flowed differently. She pushed open the car door and escaped only to find herself cornered by the very creature who seemed to know her secrets. Grim had solid legs again. He padded up to the car, panting lightly like a German shepherd who’d taken a quick morning jog.

“The daemon king is your rightful master, too, you know,” she muttered to the suspicious beast.

Grim licked his lips and sat back on his haunches. His fiery eyes were toned down so that any humans in the vicinity would think him hideous but not hellish. How the attempt worked she’d never know. He was obviously supernatural, and even acting casual his whole demeanor was more Big Bad Wolf than ordinary puppy.

Michael got out of the car to pump gas. He watched her skirt the giant hell beast and make her way inside the gas station. She walked as normally as she could with two sets of eyes setting her back on fire.

The less-than-shiny restroom had only one working sink. She managed to get a small trickle of water to flow and she splashed it on her flushed face. It didn’t do much to cool or calm her.

Rogues were drawn to her. They had been since she’d run away from the palace. There was no buffer for her on earth. Worse, Michael seemed to function as the opposite of a buffer. He enhanced her affinity’s call. He was half daemon. His biological father had been an Ancient One. He’d chosen to fall in order to rule with Lucifer in the hell dimension. They’d given up their places in heaven for autonomy in hell. Rogues were younger daemons. They resented the Ancient Ones’ choice. They wanted to take over the hell dimension, but their desire to rule hell was only a stepping-stone toward claiming heaven. Rogues had killed Lucifer. Lucifer’s Army wanted autonomy. Rogues wanted dominion.

Ezekiel was an Ancient One who needed a Loyalist heir to keep Rogues from power.

No. A little gas station sink water wasn’t going to absolve her sins. Both Michael and Ezekiel wanted her to help find Lucifer’s wings. But Michael didn’t want to wear them. He wanted to deliver them. He’d never made any secret of his distaste for the throne.

Run with me.

He hadn’t meant it in the way her soul had heard it. There was no “away” far enough for her to run from Ezekiel’s expectations or Rogues’ hunger. But Michael was a powerful lure and her soul ached to answer his call. He was a what-if she wasn’t free to explore. There was no future for her that included a man, a car and a hellhound’s devotion.

Grim was right not to trust her. She looked into the smudged and cracked glass as water swirled down the gurgling drain. She would fulfill her bargain. She would pay the price Ezekiel asked for his years of protection. Then she would go back to the cold, dark palace alone.

Her guardian’s heart had always been out of her reach. He had been a distant figure always too busy to provide the time and attention she craved, but she owed him her life and her mother’s life. It didn’t matter that his time had always gone to the D’Arcys. She couldn’t refuse him. Not when his request was to help him save the one place she’d ever called home.

* * *

Michael had pulled the car away from the pump and parked it to the side. Lily walked toward it slowly, squinting her eyes against the sun, but soaking up the heat. She’d been cold since the Rogues had interrupted her and Michael by the fire. It was possible now that her body had tasted his Brimstone burn she’d never be warm without him again.

He was propped against the hood of the vintage car. He wasn’t playing his guitar. His arms were folded over his chest. His boots were crossed at the ankles. His jeans matched his boots. Worn and scuffed. They spoke of the dust of miles traveled. He was waiting for her.

Run with me.

If she were free to run there was no way she could resist him.

“So we haven’t had a chance to talk about your ritual... How did your summoning turn out?” Michael asked.

Lily stopped in her tracks. She held on to the straps of her pack. The wrapped dolls were dormant. Silent. All her secrets hidden. For now. The daemon king was supposedly back in hell where he belonged. She was standing in the sun. She wanted to belong, but didn’t. Not here. And not there. She was as in-between as the pathways Grim traveled.

Grim knew shadows.

He came around the bumper of the Firebird with his nose in the air, sniffing out the hint of sulfur on her skin she could never quite wash away.

“The Colorado River will lead us. The clerk had a map. I can show you,” Lily offered. She pulled the map she’d gotten from the service station counter from her back pocket. She forced herself to approach the car as she unfolded the map with each step. Michael pushed away from the fender with his hip and stood up straight to meet her. Grim paced a few steps away. His eyes were watchful.

Lily spread the map on the hood of the car. She was careful to keep some distance from Michael. He had tamped down his Brimstone heat and his affinity, too. His guitar was in the back seat. It sat there like a special passenger. Its seductive song silenced...for now. She was pretty sure it was unnatural for him to leave it there, neglected and unplayed.

It didn’t matter.

All the self-control in the world—hers and his—didn’t stop her body from humming in his presence.

She focused as much attention as possible on the map. It would have meant nothing to her without the spirits’ guidance. Geography of his world wasn’t her strong suit. It hadn’t been her home for a very long time. Thanks to her elemental guides she was able to point out the exact route she’d seen traced in the dirt of Michael’s bedroom floor.

“The Grand Canyon leads to heaven?” Michael asked.

“The river leads. The canyon is incidental. The carving of it a side effect of the river’s flow.” Lily shrugged off one of the wonders of the mortal world.

“And you couldn’t follow that path to lead me to Lucifer’s wings?” Michael asked Grim.

The hellhound tilted his head, but arrogantly. He was a creature of hell. What did he care about pathways he was forbidden to take?

Without being conscious of her actions, Lily had shrugged out of her backpack and placed it on the hood to hold down one corner of the map. Michael called her attention to the bag and its contents when he suddenly placed one hand over the lumps that showed beneath the worn canvas.

“If I hadn’t seen you summoning with my own eyes, I would think you were going to lead me on a superstitious version of a wild-goose chase,” Michael said. Every inch of her body tensed and Lily held her breath. His hand was directly over one of the larger lumps that indicated dolls other than the tiny carved representation of himself. She had no idea how her treasured warrior angel would react to Michael’s touch. It had never reacted to hers. Unlike the other dolls, it seemed to have no powers whatsoever. Part of her fascination came from its silence.

She hurriedly grabbed for the backpack, more out of embarrassment than fear. She had no idea what Michael would think of the likeness, but she’d prefer he never see himself in a tiny doll she’d treasured for so many years. She was too hurried. Her rushing made her clumsy. Her whole body brushed against his and her hand tangled with his fingers. Had she actually wondered if this world was real all morning? Because it was suddenly ferociously real... Her skin flushed, her breath caught, every muscle tightened. There was no breeze—the air stood still—and yet she felt a rush of response lift her hair.

At first she thought her sudden movement had caused Grim to growl low in his chest. That maybe the contact of her against his master had worried him. The hellhound was up and pacing. Grim’s hackles had risen and turned to something more like smoke swirling on his back. Michael narrowed his eyes, but his focus wasn’t on the bag she had pulled away from his hand to clutch to her chest. Rather he looked back down the highway the way they’d come.

“It’s time to go,” he said.

The map resisted being folded correctly when she grabbed it off the hood of the car. She was breathing again, but her respiration was rushed and her fingers were clumsy. Grim was all swirl now. He hadn’t disappeared, but he looked like nothing but smoke and ember eyes.

“Keep an eye on them,” Michael ordered. Grim had vanished before his master finished speaking.

“It’s getting worse. I don’t think we’ll be able to shake them as long as we’re together,” Lily said. She sounded winded. She was winded. That slight contact between them had left her oxygen-deprived. Michael had already opened the passenger-side door for her. A prince to her princess. His consideration was salt in the scratch of her reaction to him. She wasn’t sure if she would have been able to operate the door handle herself.

“We have to be very careful. When we touch, the affinity is amplified,” Michael warned. It was the understatement of the century. Did his body still vibrate as if it was an instrument’s string? She wondered that hers wasn’t quivering for the world to see, still reacting from the slight brush of her body against his.

As he crossed around to the driver’s side, Lily swallowed. The distance between them was still negligible. Because it wasn’t from the earth to the moon. She didn’t have the guts to tell him actual touching might not be necessary at all. She still felt amplified. Every cell in her body seemed tuned to the possibility of the future touch and taste of him, but even if those touches never happened, the memory of previous ones might well keep her affinity vibrating forever.

There was a time she’d felt safe, if a little trapped, behind the palace’s walls. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever feel that way again. She’d flown with Michael, silhouetted against the desert sky. His burn and the adrenaline of that moment might be with her forever after.

Deep down she thought this new fear was a small price to pay for the exhilaration of that flight.

Chapter 7

Peter could taste the wild, sweet affinity on the back of his tongue every time it was unleashed. He’d traveled across the world to this godforsaken desert before Samuel’s daughter had even met the half-daemon prince. Her blood alone had lured with a purity of call he’d never sensed from others.

She’d been sheltered from detection for years. Hidden. Kept by Ezekiel. They had never suspected. Samuel, once the mightiest daemon hunter, had allied himself with the heir to Lucifer’s throne. Such an alliance had been unexpected, as the Order of Samuel was already dismantled. Scattered to the winds. So few brothers were left to carry on Reynard’s work. That great man had been murdered by D’Arcys and Loyalists. As had most of his followers.

Peter himself had been close to giving up. But he’d remained faithful. He’d survived by selling his soul to Rogues. In that he’d also followed in Reynard’s footsteps.

And now he had hope again for the first time in years.

He traveled in a fleet of gleaming black vehicles with a group of Rogues more ruthless than any he’d known. They’d been on the trail of Samuel Santiago’s daughter for months before Michael Turov had found her for them. The second he’d touched her they had pinpointed her exact location. Together they burned with the heat of a thousand suns. Residual desire coursed through Peter with the memory of that burn. The Rogues were like a pack of hounds on her scent and he, too, panted. But the Brimstone his deal had accepted into his blood was for the Order of Samuel. With Samuel’s daughter he could rebuild what they had lost. Perhaps, in time, he could turn on the Rogue allies and purify the earth of the daemon scourge once and for all.

The Rogues could have heaven. What did he care of that far-off realm? He would rule a new order on earth. He wanted to bathe in Samuel’s daughter’s affinity, and when he no longer needed her, maybe he would bathe in her blood. All the years of powerless fury he’d suffered would be soothed.

They were close. So close. And other Rogues were close to a different prize they’d sought. Lucifer’s wings were almost within their grasp. Ezekiel would be brought to his knees. But he wouldn’t be bowing before Rogues. He would be bowing before a new order of saints. One led by Peter himself.

* * *

He hadn’t had the flame nightmare in a very long time. When it visited him with a vengeance, as if to make up for years of leaving him in peace, the vivid memory of pain seared along the tracks of his scars and woke him with the sound of his own screams. Grim was there before the sound died down and the hulking beast almost smothered him with his concern. He pressed his great hairy body against Michael’s arms as if he were putting out actual flames and not the memory of a first Brimstone burn that had almost annihilated a toddler too young to control it.

One of Michael’s first lucid memories was of his mother’s soothing song and touch. She’d held him in spite of the danger. She’d risked being burned alive in order to bring him back from the brink of combustion. Rogues had taken him to get to her and the daemon king. Adam Turov had helped Michael and his mother defeat the Rogues that had also tortured him as a child.

His stepfather also had scars from his time with the Order of Samuel. But the beautiful opera singer, Victoria D’Arcy, had helped the daemon hunter to heal. They had raised Michael together even though his biological father had been a daemon. He’d had love, stability...and the looming threat of a grandfather who wanted to bequeath him the throne of hell on his twenty-first birthday.

Thankfully he’d been sleeping outside the roadside hotel to keep watch and to keep his distance from Lily Santiago when he woke screaming. The night air helped to cool his skin, and no one saw the glow along the tracks of his scars caused by the Brimstone in his blood rising to the surface.

Lily didn’t have to touch him. Ever again. Keeping his distance did nothing. The memory of her touch was enough. He’d fallen to sleep hotter than he’d been in a very long time. Thus the dream. Thus the burn. He rose and went for his guitar for comfort. The music and the affinity his mother had bequeathed him held the Brimstone burn at bay.

Of course, the music did nothing to erase the memory of Lily’s taste on his tongue.

* * *

Sometime after midnight, Lily woke suddenly with her heart pounding. Her fists were clenched, but the only intruder in her room was a stray shaft of moonlight beaming through the slim opening between the heavy motel drapes. It wasn’t the first time she’d woken afraid from a sound sleep since she’d left the protected confines of the daemon king’s palace. She’d been hunted from the start. Rogues craved her ability to lure and hunt daemons because of the power it would give them over Loyalist enemies. But their desire to use her was at war with their more personal desire to claim her affinity for their own pleasure.

Reason to run, for sure.

But running with a half-daemon prince wasn’t exactly salvation, especially when she found herself uncomfortably close to having those same thoughts to covet and claim. She was no greedy Rogue daemon, but Michael’s Brimstone was alluring.

Michael would have been alluring if his blood was cold as ice.

Lily rose from tangled sheets that spoke of her restless dreams and tiptoed to the window. She twitched the curtain just enough to look down on the Firebird gleaming in the pale moonlight. She hadn’t expected to see Michael leaning against the hood in a familiar pose, his legs crossed at the ankle. She eased back, but he wasn’t looking up at the window where she stood. He was concentrating on the guitar in his hands.

She couldn’t hear his song. Not with her ears. But she suspected she’d woken with his playing, attuned to him in ways she couldn’t understand. He played to quiet the Brimstone in his blood. To soothe away the burn. Knowing he was as restless as she was didn’t help. He was used to controlling his burn. She was less practiced at pretending. Especially when she wasn’t at all sure the attraction between them was something they could fight.

That’s when she saw Grim. She’d been too distracted by the striking figure of a daemon prince curled around his guitar at midnight. At first she hadn’t seen the giant shadow of his constant hellhound companion. But, unlike his master, the hellhound had seen her. His snout was pointed toward the window and for a second the burning coals of Grim’s eyes met hers. He had been sitting at Michael’s feet. He rose and walked several stiff-legged paces toward the hotel. Lily heeded the warning. Her fingers slid from the curtains and she turned away from the beautiful prince playing by the light of the moon.

Her backpack was only a few steps away. She kept it close at all times. In addition to the kachinas, her father’s sword was stowed in a side pocket that served as a sheath. Only the top of its hilt protruded, but it was within easy reach should she need it. It was probably a mistake to pick up the pack and bring it with her when she climbed back into bed. She did it anyway. It wasn’t safe to stare at Michael. But there was an alternative. She’d been staring at his kachina-doll likeness her whole life.

So why did the beat of her heart kick up again when she pulled out the tiny burlap bundle to unwind it? Why did every slow revolution of the doll as she freed it feel like a risk she couldn’t afford to take?

The room was dark, illuminated only by the moon on one side and the soft glow of emergency lighting from the interior corridor on the opposite side.

She saw the doll with the pads of her fingers more than her eyes.

It was still a treasure, but it was no longer as compelling as it had been before. Now she’d seen the real warrior angel in action. She’d heard his song. She’d felt his burn. She’d tasted his perfect lips. But more than that, she’d felt his scars. The tiny carving hadn’t revealed those scars to her. She’d had to see them on the real man in real life. Something deep in his changeable eyes told her there was much like the scars about him. Things the kachina doll had never revealed in spite of her familiarity with it.

She had to obey the daemon king.

But as she held the doll in her hands the smooth statue suddenly grew cool in her fingers and she trembled. The chill was unexpected. The real man could warm her if it wasn’t forbidden in so many ways. The hellhound knew her secret. But Michael was the true mystery. A daemon prince determined to run away from the throne of hell. He was scarred by his past. He fought his future. Yet he’d had the kind of familial love she’d never known.

The doll was too cold to comfortably hold and she rewrapped it, puzzled by the sudden change. What could it mean?

Ezekiel had a plan, and she was entangled in his scheme because love and gratitude bound her. She’d run away only to find that her guardian wouldn’t set her free. Whether Grim approved or not, one of her ancestors had seen the daemon prince in her future. Was he her destiny or would she be his damnation? Was the sudden chill from the doll meant as a warning?

She wanted to warn Michael. It wasn’t the Brimstone in his blood he should fear. It was her place in Ezekiel’s plan and the power she might have to overcome his resistance.

Chapter 8

It wasn’t safe for her to travel alone. She couldn’t fight off an army of Rogues with her father’s blade. She wasn’t sure how much sleep they’d managed between them, but they were up before dawn to meet at the car as they’d planned. Grim had disappeared. She blinked at shadows to determine if the hellhound was lurking near his master, but couldn’t decide if her gooseflesh was in response to the cool morning air or the beast’s stare.

“We should separate and meet at the river, but I don’t want to leave you on your own and Grim won’t cooperate,” Michael said.

Lily wouldn’t have been keen to travel alone with the hellhound anyway.

“I’ll think cold thoughts,” she promised, knowing it was a lie.

“Will you?” Michael challenged. He had placed his guitar in the back seat and he braced his hands against the top of the car on the driver’s side. Lily stood in the open door of the passenger side and met his gaze over the dusty roof. Something in his narrowed eyes spoke of tension and she dropped her eyes, but that only led her to look at his white-knuckled grip.

“Maybe you’re the one that needs to chill?” Lily suggested.

“I’m working on it. Trust me,” Michael said. He pushed away from the car and got behind the wheel in one fast, fluid motion. Lily swallowed. If this was him working on tamping down his Brimstone burn, she couldn’t imagine him letting go. Couldn’t, but did for several long moments as she tried to remember how to get into the car like a woman who wasn’t lost in thoughts that could get her killed.

Only the sudden thought that the daemon king had known exactly what he was doing when he’d thrown them together spurred her to take a deep breath and get into the car. He wanted them harried and hounded by Rogues. He wanted them drawn together. He wanted them to crave the forbidden fruit while they went for the wings.

A mantle fit for a future king.

She’d wondered what Ezekiel’s entire scheme entailed and maybe she was beginning to have an inkling of an answer. It was in the flush on her skin as she sat too close to Michael in the enclosed space. It was in the deep breath she took as she buckled her seat belt, already craving the scent of his skin, warmed from the outside by sun and from the inside by his fire.