Blood of the Demon (13 page)

“Mammon,” Taeg said simply.

“Hmm, my old mentor?” Cresso raised an eyebrow. “What’s that bastard done now?”

“Oh, he only plans to take over all of Earth. For starters. And he’s actually found a way to do it.”

Cresso let out a disbelieving laugh. “How?”

Taeg filled Cresso in on the
Book of the Dead
and the events of the past several days, including Brynn and her role in the whole thing.

“Shit. This is not good, man,” Cresso said. “And he already knows that this Brynn is the heir?”

“Yes.” Taeg stared grimly at his beer. “If we don’t find the
Book
before Mammon does, the Council will order us to kill her to stop Mammon from succeeding in his plan. And I really don’t want to do that.”

Cresso nodded in understanding. “I agree it’s no fun to have to take an innocent life.”

“Not just that.” Taeg chugged the rest of his beer, then turned to Cresso. “Keegan has feelings for her.”

Cresso winced. “Ooh. Tough break. So, what do you need me to do?”

“Head to Egypt. From what we hear, Mammon has gotten quite a few demons on his side. He’s promised them a demon hierarchy once he’s taken over the world, and they’re foolish enough to believe it. See if you can talk to a few of them to find out where they’re searching for the
Book
. I can’t do it, for obvious reasons.”

“Nor your brothers. Mammon is bound to have told his minions to be on the lookout for the four of you.” Cresso nodded his agreement. “I’ll make flight reservations to leave within the day. Unlike
some
of us, I can’t just disappear in one place and reappear in another.”

“Yeah, I’m just special that way,” Taeg replied, his voice deadpan.

Cresso was silent for a long moment before shaking his head. “I’ll never get over how perfectly normal you and your brothers are, given the circumstances.”

“Yeah well”—Taeg shrugged—“we don’t get to choose who we’re born to.”

Chapter Eleven

By the time their plane landed in New Orleans, Brynn was tired and on edge. Her nightmares last night, on top of everything else she’d learned in the past few days, weighed on her shoulders until she wondered how much more she could possibly take. Add to that her growing attraction to Keegan, and there was no way she could have rested on the plane. Not with him sitting right next to her, so close she could’ve reached out and licked him, had she dared.

Her body didn’t seem to care that Keegan was a demon, or that they were on the run. It didn’t care about anything other than how good he smelled and how deliciously small and safe she felt next to him. She couldn’t help but wonder if he had felt the same way. Once they’d landed, he practically dove off the plane in his haste to get out.

Then again, maybe he’d never been on a plane before.

“I can’t believe this,” Keegan muttered to Ronin, who was navigating the rented car through the crushing traffic toward their French Quarter hotel. “I tell you to find us another place to go, and you bring us here.”

“No better place to hide than among a crowd of drunken revelers. Besides, the Council keeps a hotel suite on permanent reservation in this city.”

Though Ronin’s reply was breezy, he acted as anxious and tense as she felt right now. Even though he drove confidently, his erratic weaving made Brynn suspect he’d never driven before. But more likely it was due to the tenuousness of their position. They couldn’t run from Mammon forever. Damn her ancestor and his weakness for that succubus. It was because of them that Brynn was here right now.

On the way to the hotel, Keegan explained more to Brynn about her ancestry. She’d been too overwhelmed last night to ask about it in detail, but the Council he worked for seemed to know quite a bit about the Egyptian priest who was the cause of all this mayhem.

“His name was Iyri,” Keegan said. “What you should know is that demons have been crossing over to Earth for many millennia. Humans have crossed over to Infernum, too, though few have lived to tell the tale.

“Iyri was one of very few humans who have a natural resistance to succubi, something he discovered when he was seduced by one. As you can imagine, Sitha was pretty surprised when, instead of dying, he seemed to have a limitless supply of energy she could feed from. And he was shocked to learn the beautiful young woman who’d just seduced him was, in fact, a demon.”

“Yeah, that would put a damper on any relationship,” Brynn murmured. He threw her a dry look. Too late, she realized she’d unintentionally insulted him.

Red-faced and feeling like total shit, she opened her mouth to apologize, but before she could say a word, Keegan continued. “Being a man of magic as well as faith, Iyri used a spell to trap Sitha, to bind her to him. He spent the next several months studying her while she fed off him. However, it seems, somewhere along the line they fell in love.”

“What did they do then?” Brynn asked.

“The problem was that Sitha was on the run from the Council—a fugitive—for some past crime. The Council learned of her whereabouts and ordered that Iyri return her to them for punishment.”

“But he didn’t?”

“He loved her too much to let her go. And by that time, she was already pregnant with his child. A true rarity, the child of a demon and human.”

She fought back a blush. “So humans and demons
can
actually, you know,
mate
?”

“Yes. It happens more often than you might think. Though as I said, children from those matches are rare.”

“What about... ” This time she did blush. She couldn’t help it. “I know it probably wasn’t a concern back then, but what about diseases?”

Keegan turned his intense gaze on her. There was a hint of a question in his eyes. Lord, he didn’t think she was talking about the two of them, did he? That wasn’t what she was getting at, even if her awareness of him was so acute that her heart sped up with every move of his body.

“Demons don’t carry diseases,” he finally said. “Nor can they transmit them.”

“Oh,” she replied.

“At any rate,” Keegan continued, “Iyri created the
Book
. It contained a spell that allowed for the resurrection of the dead, in a form that was stronger than human or demon. They would be strong enough to protect Sitha from the Council. But there’s always a price to pay for strength. The dead had to feed off living flesh in order to subsist.”

Brynn shuddered. “That’s horrible. But he did it anyway?”

“Love makes people do strange things,” Keegan said. “Because he recognized the danger of this book, he crafted the spell so that only one of his bloodline could activate it. With it, he would be able to control the army of the dead.”

“God, that’s crazy. He loved her so much he went to any length to save her.”

Keegan nodded. “Even at the expense of his own world.”

“So what happened then?” she pressed.

“The Council found out about his plan and stopped him before the spell was fully completed. The dead were in the process of reanimating, but they crumbled to the ground when Iyri was killed. They tried to destroy the book, but Iyri had made it indestructible, so they buried it with him, in a hidden, unmarked tomb. Many believe the tomb is somewhere in the Valley of the Kings, but no one knows where. Not even the current Council. The old Council members purposely didn’t keep any record of it. In fact, no one was supposed to know about it at all, but one of the men responsible for digging the grave spread the tale, and it survived to modern day.”

Brynn sighed. To be sure, her ancestor had committed an evil act, but he’d done it with only the best of intentions—for love. “What happened to Sitha?”

“They allowed her to live long enough to give birth to the child. Female offspring of succubi are born full succubi themselves, but male offspring take on most of the characteristics of their fathers. Since the child was a boy, he was given to a human family with no knowledge of his demon heritage.”

“My great-great-grandfather, many times over.”

Keegan nodded, a strand of hair dropping to cover his eyes. Right now, they blazed blue-green, but she couldn’t help but recall what they had looked like unglamoured—red, intense, and expressive. Beautiful, in an alien sort of way.

“Sitha’s gift, as well as Iyri’s magic, was passed on in various, progressively weaker incarnations,” he said. “Until you. You can drain humans of their energy and read inanimate objects, all because of Sitha and Iyri and their love for one another.”

Brynn closed her eyes for a long moment, the details of her distant past penetrating her mind. “It’s such a sad story.”

“That’s life,” he said. “Shit happens.”

As they pulled up to their hotel in the middle of the French Quarter, she couldn’t help but think about Keegan’s blunt response to the story. The events of the past few days had made it perfectly clear that he was right: shit does happen.

§

Ronin stood on the expansive balcony of their two-bedroom suite. Thankfully, it faced the street, so Brynn could see the crowds of people roaming below, even if she couldn’t partake of their revelry. She’d done nothing but pace their suite since they arrived yesterday, and he couldn’t blame her. Her life, even all of her perceptions about life, had done a one-eighty in the past few days.

Keegan was on the phone in one of the two bedrooms, debriefing with a Council liaison. Devil only knew what was going on in there.

Hurting a woman went against everything Ronin stood for. Growing up with the knowledge of what happened to his mother, he’d vowed to never abuse a woman. So far, he’d managed to hold true to that vow, even when his father’s fists had tried to sway him otherwise. But now, if the Council ordered it, he would have to stand idly by while Brynn’s life was snuffed out. Or worse, if Keegan couldn’t go forward with it, he’d have to do it himself. It was enough to drive a man to drink.

Where were Taeg and Dagan when you needed them?

As if on cue, his cell phone rang, the caller identification showing Taeg’s cell phone number. “Yeah?”

“Well, hello there, Miss Sunshine,” Taeg’s voice rang out. “You manage to keep from beating in Keegan’s face yet?”

“That’s only a concern with the two of you,” Ronin said.

“Oh yeah.” Taeg let out a dry chuckle. “I tried Keeg’s cell, but he didn’t answer. What’s our big bro up to?”

“Council debriefing.”

“Aw, fuck a duck. That shit is so annoying. Anyway, let him know I met Dagan’s skinny ass at the airport. Cresso’s flight is due to arrive in a couple of hours. I’ll touch base again once we know more.”

“Got it.”

There was a short beat of silence before Taeg spoke again. “Hey, man, I got a hunch.”

“Not another one of your hunches,” Ronin said, rolling his eyes. “What is it?”

“Our guy Iyri was a high priest, right?”

“Right.”

“And wasn’t the priest’s ceremonial office located in Memphis?”

“From what we’ve read, yes.”

“So I’m betting that’s where he was when he was captured,” Taeg said.

“Yeah, that makes sense. You’re thinking—”

“What are the odds the Council would decide to bury him right there?”

Ronin thought about it for a minute. “Knowing the Council, pretty damn good. Shit. I bet Mammon’s got his demons searching in the wrong place.”

“That’s what I’m thinking. I’ll flash over to the site of ancient Memphis while Cresso’s making the rounds locally.”

“Sounds good. In the meantime, I’ll do some research, see if I can narrow down a location for you.”

“Ten-four. Over and out,” Taeg said before hanging up.

Ronin let out a chuckle. “What a dick.”

But an amusing one.

He headed inside for his laptop, but no, it was locked in the room with Keegan. He was stuck waiting for him to finish.

Ronin paused in front of Brynn’s room. She’d been awfully quiet the last few hours. He knocked on the closed door, and then again, a bit louder. She didn’t respond.