The Secret (31 page)

She felt his hands on her shoulders. Felt the roughness of his beard against her neck. “I want it.”

“Maybe you’re right. It’s probably not a good idea. Not when Jaron is using me as bait. We don’t understand Volund’s connection with me. It might make you vulnerable too.”

He wrapped his arms around her waist. “Please don’t do this. It was stupid for me to say it then, but it doesn’t mean I wasn’t sincere.”

“So you’ll go through the rest of the mating ritual with me, but only if I agree to stay in Vienna?”

“You’re not truly thinking of leaving, are you?”

She didn’t say anything. She
was
thinking about it. Orsala and Malachi could scheme all they wanted, but the fact of the matter was if Ava stayed in the city and people were killed in some massive angelic battle, she’d never be able to live with herself.

His arms tightened. “You can’t be serious.”

“If I leave, then who do they have to kill but each other? No Irin would be forced into battle—”

“And you’d be caught in the middle.” He stepped back.
 

She turned slowly. “I am one person. We’re talking about thousands—”

“We’re talking about you! My mate. Do you honestly think I’d leave you unprotected?”

Ava said nothing. If she left, Malachi would have a hard time finding her, even with Rhys’s help. She could go to her mother and Carl. If she asked Carl to make her disappear somewhere, he’d do it. He’d probably be grateful.

He put his hands on her cheeks. “Stop it.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“You’re leaving me in your mind,” he whispered. “Don’t do it. Don’t you know I’d rather die than lose you?”

She shook her head. “I need to think.”

“Enough!” He cut his hand through the air. “You’re not going anywhere. I forbid it.”

“Oh really?” She balled up the power welling in her chest and said, “
Ya fasham
.”

Malachi’s eyes widened in shock as the unbalancing spell hit him full force. He reeled to the side and fell over. Ava stepped to the door and grabbed her coat and scarf. Then she threw another spell at him that Sari had taught her, and Ava knew Malachi’s legs were going to be immobilized long enough for her to leave.

“Ava!”

Okay, his mouth could move.
 

“I’m going out for a walk.”

“What did you do?”

“You’re a smart guy, I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

The cat had come to sit on his chest.

“Ava!”

She ran down the stairs and flagged down the first taxi she could find.

“Zentralfriedhof,” she told the driver. “Gate two.”

AVA didn’t know why she was so attracted to cemeteries. Maybe it was the quiet. For as long as she’d been alive, she’d found them soothing. She could walk among others, never feeling alone, but not plagued by the voices of the living. No matter what city she visited, she sought them out, content to linger among the dead while the living only tormented her.

The Central Cemetery in Vienna was one of the largest in Europe, containing the graves of many of Austria’s most famous composers. Knowing what she did now about Irin history there and the Irina tie to music, the city’s musical history made even more sense.

She walked the barren pathways toward the church, surrounded by grey headstones and the rare passing tourist. Some spaces were overgrown, but most on the central walkway were trimmed and many had freshly cut flowers, even in the dead of winter. It was one of her favorite cemeteries, a veritable city of the dead. Carefully tended, trimmed with lush gardens and populated by the marble figures of angels, poets, and mourners.

And Ava was freezing.

She tucked her scarf closer around her neck and wondered just how mad Malachi was going to be. Probably pretty mad.

It was the “I forbid it” that had been the last straw.

No. Just no.

He might have been hundreds of years older than her, but she wasn’t a child to order around.

She turned left past the graves of famous composers, leaving Strauss, Beethoven, and Schubert behind as she searched for the gravestone that had become her first magazine cover.

It was a darkly sensual embrace emerging from stone. The male figure’s hands possessive. Commanding. An odd sculpture to find on the grave of an obscure nineteenth-century writer. But it had spoken to her, the woman’s face tilted up to her lover in surrender.

Ava remembered how she’d felt when she photographed it.
 

Longing. For possession. To belong to another utterly. To be precious. Needed.

She heard a hoarse chirp by her leg. She looked down to see the black cat from her apartment building sitting by her leg.

“What the—”

Before her eyes, the cat grew, stretching in the shadows of the evergreen trees that surrounded the old graves. He became a man with gold eyes, his dark hair streaked with amber. His lips were lush, the angles of his face and eyes speaking Eastern heat. Silk and spices. Hooded eyes lined with black stared down at her.

“Your lover holds you that way.”

“Holy shit,” she breathed out.

“No, Vasu.”

“Who are you?”

He cocked his head, as if it should have been obvious. “Vasu.”

Ava blinked. “Okay then, Vasu.
What
are you?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

Awe turned to irritation. “First Jaron, then Death, now you—”

“Azril? Has he visited you?” Vasu cocked his head. “How interesting.”

“I’m really just wondering if I should run screaming at this point, or if you’re a friend of Jaron’s.”

“I would not call your sire a friend, but he is my brother. And screaming would do you no good. If I wanted to kill you, I would have already.”

Ava turned to look around. All the humans that had been in the vicinity—groundskeepers, carriage drivers, a few tourists—were gone. She was alone with the fallen angel in the long black overcoat who called Jaron his brother.

She narrowed her eyes. “Why were you pretending to be a cat?”

“Why not? Cats are very unobtrusive. I often pretend to be a cat.”

“That’s…”

“Ingenious?”

“Weird.”

A smile lifted the corner of his lips. “You are amusing. I can see why Jaron and Azril are interested in you.”

“Does Jaron know you’re here? How did you find me?”

“I followed your taxi after I left the scribe. He is very angry with you.”

“I bet.” Ava took a deep breath, reassured that the angel didn’t seem to be trying to kill her. “You must run really fast as a cat.”

“No, I took the shape of a bird when you entered the automobile.”

“Of course you did.”

Ava started walking toward the church. Vasu fell in step beside her.

“You’re not really going to leave Vienna, are you?” He sounded as irritated as Malachi had. “It will ruin everything. And I don’t like being here.”

“Vienna?”

“It’s very cold.”

“What am I ruining? Jaron’s plans to use me as bait to draw Volund here and use the Irin to help kill his enemy?”

“I believe Jaron has every intention of killing Volund himself. The Irin are only useful to take care of the Grigori and lesser angels. You would be no match for Volund.”

“There aren’t any Grigori in Vienna.”

Vasu’s mouth ticked up at the corner, and he looked past her. “Are you sure?”

She smelled it when the wind kicked up. A hint of sandalwood on the air.

“What have you done?” she hissed. “Did you lead them to me?”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Grimold’s sons have been trailing you for days.” Vasu opened his jacket and Ava saw a row of silver daggers. “Come, Singer. Choose your weapon. Or have you learned to fight with magic alone?”

She ripped two daggers from his coat and turned to scan her surroundings. The cemetery was still utterly empty except for the two men who stood at the end of the row, black against the limestone path. Ava turned and saw two more.

“They’re tracking me?” she asked.

“There are two more by the gate where you entered. How fast can you run?”

“Not fast enough.” She began whispering a spell of protection around her mind. She was mostly immune to Grigori seduction, but she didn’t want to take any chances. “If they’re just tracking me—”

“No.” Vasu cocked his head. “They want you. For what, I don’t know.”

Ava started running. There would be few taxis this far out of the city center. But the tram line ran near the main road. If she could get out of the gate…

“What are you doing?” Vasu ran beside her. Or did he? The Fallen didn’t even look like he was moving, but… he was.
 

“Trying to escape. I’m not stupid; it’s six against one. Are you going to help me or what?”

“I can’t really do anything to them unless they attack me. And they won’t attack me. It wouldn’t be courteous.”

“Must be nice!” She could hear their steps coming closer. “Listen,” she panted. “Really nice to meet you, but I’m kind of fighting for my life here, so if you’re not going to help—”

“If you promise to stay in Vienna, I will help.”

“What?” she rasped out a breath. “You too?”

She cursed the immortal lives of stubborn men everywhere.

“I want this to be over. I want to go back to Chittorgarh.”

“I don’t know where that is, but… fine. I’ll stay here.”

“You vow this?”

“Yes!”

“Excellent.”
 

Then Vasu grinned—actually grinned—and it was brilliant, beautiful, and utterly cruel. Her body came to a halt and Vasu came behind her.

“Turn.”

Ava spun and the two Grigori soldiers were right on top of her. The spell came to her mind immediately.

“
Shanda vash,
” Ava whispered, and she felt and heard the whisper of Vasu’s voice overlaying hers.

The Grigori soldiers didn’t just stop, they flew back as if thrown by an invisible hand.

“
Man
.”

“Good,” he whispered in her ear. “Now sing with me.”

He whispered again, and she moved, racing toward the Grigori, both blades in her hands. She could feel Vasu like a shadow at her back.
 

Magic hummed in her veins as she whispered the next spell. “
Ba dahaa
.”

Both men screamed, clutching their temples in agony as she leapt on them.

“Now,” Vasu whispered, and she kicked one in the side, her body reacting as if she were a trained soldier. The thought was in the back of her mind that she wasn’t entirely in control of her body, but when she heard the shouts of the other Grigori and the approaching footsteps, she ignored it.

“Now, Ava!”

She twisted the head of one Grigori to the side, plunging the silver dagger into his neck. He began to dissolve beneath her, even as his friend tried to roll away.

Vasu pushed her toward him, whispering another spell in her ear.

“
Zi yada
,” she hissed and the soldier froze.

These weren’t Irina spells. Had nothing to do with what she’d been taught, but Vasu whispered them in her ear, the formless mass of him at her back, and she repeated his words, the dark power in her rising to the surface.

Not Irina magic. Fallen magic.

It came as easy as breathing.

“
Kareshta
,” Vasu murmured as she plunged the dagger into the neck of the second Grigori. “Beautiful.”

He rose as she did, turning and stripping off her coat so she could move. Her black shirt clung to her body like a second skin, and Ava ran toward the men who would pursue her, gold eyes flashing in rage, with Vasu pressing against her back.

They killed my son in front of my eyes… the last thing he saw was animals raping his mother.

Constance’s pain was all she could hear as she threw her remaining knife, catching a Grigori in the eye.
 

“
Zi yada
!”

The Grigori collapsed to the ground and froze.
 

Another knife was in her hand, pressed there by Vasu’s hand.

“Again.”

Another dagger flung. Another bleeding Grigori on the ground.

He writhed as Ava ran to him, Vasu her shadow and the dust of the first two Grigori coating her lips.

The rage took her, spurred by the angel’s voice in her ear.

“Kill him.”

Ava didn’t kill him cleanly. She stabbed the soldier in the gut twice, slicing up to his throat, slashing it as his blood spurted over her and tears ran down her face. Vasu’s voice still whispered in her ear.

“They killed your sisters. Take your revenge. You deserve it and more.”

She felt her gorge rise as she flipped the man over and stabbed him in the back of the neck.