Stained (16 page)

When he left, nothing but terror and moonlight to help him up the mountain. It was too high; he was choking on blood as their terrified cries filled his ears.

A blur of death and war followed, a maelstrom of pain and blood, until the tide deposited Julia in a bed. She stretched languidly and rolled to find a pair of large, amber eyes smiling at her.

"Nothing can harm us," the ghost whispered.

Julia blinked. Cayne was shaking her. "Huh?"

He took a step back, and she felt her face get hot. "Sorry." She'd only spaced for a few seconds, but everything she remembered must have shown on her face.

Cayne was rigid. "No, I am."

"Why?"

He sighed, and when she looked up, his shoulders had slumped. "You shouldn't have done it."

"Cayne," she said. "Come on!"

His face was mildly disapproving, and Julia wondered how much of her had slipped into him. It should have worried her, but for some reason it didn't.

"It's time to find out what's going on with you," he said.

"What do you mean?"

"It needs to be our focus."

Julia's first thought was Sam, but she realized that she didn't know if he was still an issue. "Cayne...what happened to him?"

"Samyaza left the city. I don't know for where."

Julia felt about a hundred times heavier. Of course he was still out there. "Shouldn't we go after him?"

Cayne shook his head. "I lost his trail yesterday afternoon."

"Afternoon?" Her stomach clenched. "I've been asleep for two days?"

Quietly, he said, "Three days."

"Three days!" Julia's voice cracked; she put a hand to her throat.

"It's okay." Cayne pushed off the bed. The cold in his eyes melted as he looked down and, almost smiling, said, "We're leaving today."

Julia wrapped herself in a towel and pressed her ear to the bathroom door. "Cayne," she called and waited, dripping, for an answer from the other side. None came.

She wiggled into her pants and had her bra almost on when she heard his low voice through the crack. "Yeah."

Julia backed into the tub, embarrassed. She'd only wanted to be sure he was there. "Just...um, checking!"

She heard him move on the other side of the door.

"Never mind." God, she was so not smooth. "Just never mind."

A pause, and then, "Are you all right?"

"Yeah."

"Having fun in there?"

Julia pressed her face to the door and spoke loudly through the crack. "Umm, can you do me a favor?"

"Yeah."

"Go stand outside."

He said nothing.

"Of the room. It's all stuffy in here, and I want to be able to breathe when I change." It came out a little harder than she'd intended; even her voice was charged with this fidgety new zeal.

When Julia heard the door close, she twirled out of the bathroom and grinned at herself in the mirror--until something caught her eye: bloody tissues in the trash can beneath the sink. She scooped them up, flushed them, and watched until the last scrap was sucked away.

As she styled her hair, her mind wandered. Remembered. She saw him, clear as real time, as their daggers sliced his flesh. She saw his aura dim, felt the ghost of cold panic drift through her. She had felt so helpless just standing there, watching them hurt him.

And what about the things she'd seen? All the images had condensed into a sort of vague sorrow, but if she thought hard, she could still see the faces, feel the pain--physical and not. Were the things she saw and felt real, or were they delusions? And what about the woman with the pretty eyes?

Julia banished that thought immediately. No way. Really, was it even possible for her to remember pieces of Cayne's life that he couldn't?

Something warm and urgent flared in her chest, and Julia shook her head to dispel it. At least she was able to do something. She remembered the thrill she felt when she healed him. How she had known him.

After giving herself a cheesy smile in the mirror, she tiptoed to the window and peaked outside. Cayne was leaning against the railing, looking charmingly ruffled. Julia grinned and swung the door open. "Boo!"

He did not look startled by her stealth attack, so she took a step that was almost a leap in his direction and asked, "Where are we going?"

Cayne moved past her and began gathering their bags. "We're going to see someone who can help."

Julia followed him onto the walkway, frowning at his back. He didn't seem at all aware of her good mood. Or the lengths she had taken to make herself presentable. He was too busy scanning the parking lot--because Sam was so going to jump out from behind a bush at the Tiger Inn at 10 a.m.--to notice her.

But dang, did she notice him. His piercing green eyes and the way his now-shorter chestnut hair whirled in gentle waves. The width of his shoulders and the tension at his elbows. Even the way he moved was appealing.

They reached the car and Cayne popped the trunk. Julia watched the muscles of his forearm bunch when he set the bags by the spare tire. His eyes were on her. They fell when she caught him looking. And then, in just such a way to make her heart hammer, they slid back.

"You look nice," he said.

Chapter 22

Julia was dancing inside. Despite the grim memories--his memories--that played in fast forward every time she closed her eyes, despite Cayne's unusual hot-and-cold mood, despite the four-hour car drive that was mostly busy Interstate, she was totally alight.

They were together, they were safe, and they were racing between giant green hills with curvy spines and wildflower robes.

She felt a new kind of cozy, snuggled into a liberated hotel pillow, her body singing and softening all at once. She let her eyes close with the knowledge that his gaze was on her, moving over her all the time, and dreamed of charcoal feathers and Cayne's mouth.

Julia awoke to eight lanes of too-fast traffic spilling around the car, and Cayne driving with white knuckles. His lower lip was caught between his teeth.

So this was L.A.--nothing like she'd imagined. She couldn't even see the Hollywood sign. There was only this ugly Interstate leading them east, to the home of a "seer" Cayne said he'd met before he started his quest to kill Sam. Julia doubted Miss Crystal Ball could help them.

"So," she began, trying to keep skepticism out of her voice, "what did you ask Rosa about the first time you saw her?"

"This girl I liked."

Julia was appalled to catch herself frowning. Cayne caught her too, and laughed. "What do you think I asked her about?"

Julia rolled her eyes. "Oh, I don't know, the hidden health benefits of the cinnamon roll?"

"Longevity." He winked.

"How long do you think your lifespan is?"

One dark brow arched; he looked surprised. "You serious?"

"Um, yeah?"

He gave her a little mocking smile. "From what I gather...pretty long."

The Interstate poured them onto a worn East L.A. four lane--the kind of place where people staggered down the road in hooded sweatshirts with smoke clouds hovering around their heads.

Funnily, it wasn't the people or the burned-out buildings that bothered Julia most, but the telephone poles. They were haggard and rotten, like burned trees, their thin black wires sagging between gas stations and liquor stores.

Julia studied everything, scanning the streets for danger the way Cayne did. Her breath hitched when, for a moment, she saw a familiar-seeming biker just out of the corner of her eye. Julia turned, but he was gone.

Cayne didn't seem to have noticed. As he turned onto a small street lined with stucco homes, Julia tried to decide whether she should mention anything. She decided no.

"So tell me about her."

"Rosa? She's Touched."

"By an Angel?"

"No, she's human."

Julia giggled nervously. "We have got to get you in front of a television."

"Why?"

As she explained her joke, Cayne pulled into the drive of a pink stucco house with a yard of lush green grass tucked neatly around a cement porch. Julia followed Cayne to the door, and when he knocked, she felt each beat of his knuckles in her bones.

It occurred to her that this woman might tell her something awful. Maybe she really could see--Julia could swear she felt an "otherworldly" vibe from somewhere within the house--and maybe she'd see Julia's death. Or Cayne's.

She glanced at him. His hard face was serene. That, for some reason, made her more nervous.

Before she had time to really work her stomach into knots, the door swooshed open, revealing the largest man Julia had ever seen. He was gigantic--easily more than eight feet tall and wider than a refrigerator. He stooped through the doorway and nodded at Cayne.

"She's waiting for you."

Definitely. Not. Human. His voice was far too deep. Like, from the darkest depths of the earth deep.

As Julia calculated her escape route, Cayne knelt right there on the stoop and began unlacing his shoes. She was about to ask him what he was doing when she noticed two other pairs by the door; one was gigantic. Julia grinned nervously at Hombre the Barefoot Giant and bent to work off her All Stars. "A little warning, please," she hissed.

Cayne looked at her oddly. "Sorry."

Julia wanted to scream.

They followed the big man inside, where the air smelled like lemons and spice. He led them to the heart of the house, past a small green and white kitchen and a sunflower-themed bedroom. They found Rosa in a sitting room comfortingly devoid of psychic-looking stuff.

When Julia saw the seer, she felt some of the butterflies in her stomach fly away. Rosa looked...normal. She wore a white sundress and sat in a purple recliner, her short, plump legs crossed at the ankles. When Julia saw Rosa's eyes, she gaped. They were crossed. Like, so crossed there was no way that they worked.

Her suspicion was confirmed when Rosa greeted Cayne with an outstretched arm. She kissed his cheek and nodded at Julia. "You brought one of the Stained with you."

"The Stained?" He seemed to be chewing on the word. Julia cleared her throat, and he said, "Her name is Julia. She has questions."

The seer nodded. "I could have predicted that."

Julia glanced nervously at Cayne, who rolled his eyes. Rosa chuckled. "You need to relax, honey."

How much, exactly, could this blind seer see? "I'm trying."

Rosa shook her head. "This'll wait until tomorrow. You're too tense, and I believe you could use a good night's rest on a comfortable mattress." The giant reappeared, squeezing through the open doorway. Julia stepped back as the massive man lumbered to Rosa's chair. He lifted the seer into his arms and cradled her as if she were a baby. Julia noticed that the older woman's legs swayed limply.

"When I lost my sight, I lost my legs, too," she said. "Most of them, anyway. This is Malachi."

The big man said nothing as the seer affectionately rubbed his cheek. He swooped through the doorway, and Cayne extended a hand for Julia.