02 Seekers (38 page)

Had I known he had planned on killing her anyways, I wouldn’t have fought Anna. I would have attacked him first. Damian, however, was devious. I forced Anna to retreat to the center of the room. There, in the floor, was a secret door. Damian pushed a button on his fancy throne, and the floor opened. Anna dropped down into a dark pit. I skidded to a stop inches from the edge, all the furniture falling to the ground at her fall. From below, I heard the sound of deadly growling of Nightstalkers and Anna screaming in anger. The trap door shut again, cutting off the screams. I turned around to face Damian, some of anger ebbing away at the shock of his actions.

“She should have charged double!” Damian laughed, clapping happily. “You really are

something. She comes pre-packaged Isra! You won’t have to spend half as long training her.”

“Yeah…no kidding…I mean…Yes, my lord,” Daniel said.

I started toward the throne, the sword in my hand thirsting for violence. It had been cheated out of Anna’s blood, but it still hungered for payment. Looking at Damian, I was eager to oblige.

Damian gestured negligently to one of the figures lining the wall. That figure stepped forward, and a surge of energy flew out and hit me. It threw me against the opposite wall. I dropped the sword as I hit the wall, and tried to catch my wind. Another figure bent down and retrieved the sword, before I could get my hands on it again.

“Silver chains for her, I think,” Damian said.

“I’ll take care of it,” Daniel said, taking hold of me again.

“Good man,” Damian said. “Once she’s secure, come back here. We have much to prepare for.

Nguyen arrives soon.”

“Actually…he is here,” a new voice declared.

A tall man stepped through the open door. Aaron, who had slunk back to the threshold, moved out of the way to make room for the newcomer. I would have recognized him anywhere. His face belonged in one of my nightmares. The Asian man who had attacked us near King’s Cross

finally had a name: Nguyen. Daniel’s grip tightened as he, too, recognized the man who had attacked our car so many weeks ago.

“And he is impressed you have managed to find the one person in this world Marcus wants

above all others.” Nguyen smiled at me. “Clare, it’s good to see you again…I knew I hadn’t seen the last of you.”

Chapter 20

Damian stood up from his throne, his face confused. “You know her?”

Daniel’s body language shifted as Nguyen switched his eyes to him. Daniel stepped in front of me, protecting me from Nguyen, knowing that the charade was over. There was no way we could convince Nguyen that Daniel had honestly joined the Seekers.

“Yes, I know her. Why is he not in chains?” Nguyen demanded, pointing at Daniel.

“Isra?” Damian asked. “What do you mean?”

“Isra…I think not. Daniel, isn’t it? Yes, I believe that’s what Marcus said your name was. He is Marcus’s enemy.” Nguyen’s eyes turned hard. “Did your gift for seeing the truth not extend to him, or was Marcus’s faith in you misplaced?”

“I-” Damian searched for an answer.

“Chain them!” Nguyen commanded Damian’s men.

Daniel had already started forward. I looked around for a weapon, but I only saw the others closing in. They were hooded, their faces obscured, but I could sense their deadly intentions. It would be the chains or death. The Watcher who had taken my sword led the pack, his hand firm on the silver blade.

I may have been angry with Daniel – angry at his lies – but I didn’t want him dead. His lies didn’t change how I felt about him. I reached out and touched him on the arm before he could commit to a fight.
Not like this. They’ll kill you.

Perhaps, he was just trying to placate me, or he could sense the others behind us, but he stopped moving forward. While his body didn’t relax, the murder disappeared from his brain. Nguyen smiled as if he had heard our exchange. He gestured the others forward, his eyes telling us he had wished for a fight. Two Watchers grabbed Daniel on either arm, tearing him from my grip. The hooded Watcher with the sword grabbed my arm, forcing me toward the door.

Nguyen stepped closer to Damian and said over his shoulder to the man holding me, “Put them in the same room, so they can say their goodbyes. I’ll be in shortly... after I’ve dealt with Damian.”

My hooded captor nodded and dragged me out of the room, past Aaron who was staring at me

oddly. With my gift of super hearing I was able to hear Nguyen dismiss the others in the room, then lay into Damian with strong words, which questioned Damian’s intelligence and ability to lead the nest. Despite the apparent evil of Nguyen, I smiled at his words to Damian.

The room we were taken to was much further down in the maze of sewers and tunnels than I had previously explored. We walked – were dragged – for a solid thirty minutes. The door on the room had three silver locks, and was so thick it could have withstood four nuclear blasts and come out looking shiny and new. They had a single flickering light in the center of the large room, and dark shadows encroached on the light. But it wasn’t the shadows that worried me; it was what I could see in the light. Two sets of silver chains were bolted to the hard silver floor.

They were far enough apart that, when we were locked in them, Daniel and I couldn’t touch.

They fitted the chains around our wrists, keeping our arms behind our backs, and left without a word. Daniel was not so silent. He swore at our captors and made sure they had a hard time locking him down, but he didn’t give way to the full brutal nature of his anger. I knew it was act, though I didn’t get why he bothered.

When they were gone, he stopped cussing and stared at me for a long moment. I stared at the ground, unable to look at him, etching the smooth lines of the silver floor into my brain. My face was still throbbing from where he had hit me, and our last real conversation was running through my head. Despite my anger at reliving the conversation, all I could think was how happy I was to see him again. That made me mad.

“Where are we?” I asked finally, hating the way I loved his eyes on me.

“This is where they take the people in the prisons…once their usefulness is over. This room is designed for Watchers. Further down is where they keep the Nightstalkers corralled, and where the others do their killing…I mean, training.”

“Terrifying Geography 101. Never thought I’d get that class,” I said.

“I’m sorry I had to give it to you,” he said. He stepped as close to me as his chains would allow.

“Clare?” he whispered, his voice different with the emotion coursing through it.

I looked up. His green eyes had lost the defensive protection I had noticed earlier. They were more Daniel than even when he had rescued me from the crypt. Vivid green burned into my soul, scorching me.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“For hitting me or for being a big, fat, lying liar?” I asked.

“Both…and more.”

I went back to staring at the ground, not sure how I was feeling or if it was fair I had to face those feelings in such an unusual place.

He strained against his chains as he tried to reach me. “You might not want to be with me…” It sounded as if he would rather say anything else in the universe than that. “But I’m asking, no, I’m begging, that you forgive me. Know that I never meant to lie to you…I was just afraid to tell you the truth…afraid you would leave me for it.”

“And what is the truth exactly?” I asked.

His answer was immediate. “I used to work for Odette…sort of. I did jobs for her that correlated to my mission of protecting people. She gave me information, leads, and help, and I helped her deal with things she trusts only a few to deal with. But I stopped working for her when I met you.”

“She sent you to King’s Cross?” I asked.

“No…I decided to go on my own.” He was silent for a moment, thinking his words over

carefully. When he spoke again he spoke quickly, as if he thought saying it fast would make easier. “She did tell me that in King’s Cross I would find the answer to bringing Marcus down…

to ending the war. She told me it would be the greatest gift I had ever known. She told me to look for one who bore the tattoo of both an angel and a phoenix. She said this person would be the answer I had been looking for. I had almost given up hope when you arrived. I didn’t know for sure you were the person I was looking for until I saw your back that day in your room. But by then it was too late: I had fallen in love. I hadn’t planned on that, but it was impossible to ignore. I knew that whatever Odette had planned for you, the reason she wanted me planted in that town, would never happened. I swore I would protect you from her plotting and her

ridiculous visions.”

“Visions?” Protect me from what?

“Odette is the most powerful seer in the world...mostly because she is one of the oldest Watchers in the world. Her visions of the future can be years in the making. She twists and bends things to make something happen that might not come to pass for a decade or more. She, and the other eight who she keeps in her circle, constantly manipulate the future, and sometimes the past, to get what they want…and only God knows what that really is.”

“You didn’t answer me. Not really,” I said. “What are you protecting me from?”

“I don’t know the extent of her visions, but I know the extent of mine. You know how I’ve seen myself turning into a Nightstalker?”

My stomach clenched at the thought. I hated that vision….hated it because it felt so real. I nodded without looking at him.

“It’s not the only long-term vision I’ve had. There is another…” He hesitated, and I saw him fighting against the desire to not tell me. I could tell it was something bad. His next words confirmed my suspicion. “I’ve seen the end, Clare, the end of the world as they say. Beyond my vision of me turning, it’s the one vision I’ve had more than once. According to Odette, my vision is not far off.”

I stared at him. Then, because his story sounded so ridiculous, I started laughing. “Awesome.

You’ve seen the end of the world…how Nostradamusy of you. Does doomsday have a date or

should we all just hold our breath and wait?”

He ignored my laughter and my sarcasm. “No…there’s no date. Just a couple of signs that Odette has seen…such as you surfacing.”

“Me?”

“Yes.” He said it so seriously.

I stared at him again.

“But I’m done with her visions, and I’m done with mine. They’re a lie. I’m not going to be dictated by a future that has no certainty beyond this second. I told her as much when I

realized…when I knew…when I fell in love with you. I wasn’t going to play her games any

longer. But her games are impossible to escape.” His eyes turned hard. “She managed to get me down here and get you captured. I’m sure that was her plan all along.”

“I thought she wanted to save the world?”

“Yes, she does, but to what end, I don’t know. I do know she’s not afraid to make people take the hard path to get where she wants them. I know she will manipulate us until she gets what she wants, regardless of where that manipulation takes us.”

“But what does this have to do with me? I don’t get it.”

He shrugged. “She wouldn’t tell me what you’re role in all this is. She just wanted to make sure I kept you safe…not that I’m managing all that well,” he said pulling against the chains at his wrists.

“How can I know anything you’ve just told me is the truth? How can I trust you again? How can I even know that our…” I trailed away. Relationship…love…friendship…I couldn’t find the

right word.

He strained against his chains again, but they didn’t budge. “You can’t. I’m a liar. I’ve been doing it since I could talk. I’m very good at it.”

“Well, that helps,” I said.

“I’ve never lied about the way I feel. Not once. You can be so damn frustratingly stubborn, but I can’t turn off my emotions...I may be a liar, a thief, and a spy, but with you I am always just Daniel.”

“Daniel…I…”

He was looking at me with such sincerity, such heartbreaking honesty that all I wanted to do was hug him and let him know I forgave him a million times over. I could understand wanting to protect someone from a powerful, dangerous Watcher. I could understand feeling protective

about someone I loved, particularly when so many people wanted to use them to their ends: I did feel protective of him. But I couldn’t understand the lying. I couldn’t be sure if he was lying to me now. I tried to form the words that would articulate all my questions and doubts, but I didn’t get the chance to finish.

“This is all very awkward and everything, but how abouts we get you out of there?” a voice said through the door.

The voice was familiar. I tried to move to the door, but the chain wouldn’t reach. I stopped when my chain ran out, straining to see.

“Spider?!” I questioned doubtfully.

“Don’t sound so surprised, doll, you’ll hurt my ego,” he said back.

“How did you…I mean, I thought you were…”

“My fiancé helped me get down here,” he said.

“Your fiancé? I asked.

The door swung back as Spider finished picking the lock. There was a moment where I saw

nothing but the dark corridor, then Spider appeared out of thin air. Next to him, all legs and perfect makeup was Serenity. She smiled coyly at Daniel and me, her bright teeth shining in the dark of the hallway.

“She can turn invisible, Clare! How hot is that! Think of all the people you could rob…the places you could sneak into…I don’t think I’ve loved a babe more!” Spider said happily.

“That’s a real great reason to love someone…” I said.

“Better than some,” he said with shrug.

He hurried forward and circled around me, so he could take a look at the chains on my wrists. I heard him muttering to himself as he worked at the lock. I was so busy trying to read the

expression on Serenity’s face that I didn’t notice Daniel starting to shake. Spider picked my lock then moved to Daniel, oblivious of the danger. Rubbing at my wrists, I kept my eyes on Serenity.

“What are you doing here?” I asked her harshly.

“I was told you were down here, and when Mick told me Damian was expecting Nguyen, I just