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Darkest Knight
Karen Duvall


“Betray your sisters or your lover. You choose.”After the warrior she loves saved her from a murderous Gargoyle, Chalice watched helplessly as Aydin turned into a Gargoyle himself. Now, free from the curse that enslaved her, Chalice pledges to join her sister knights in The Order of the Hatchet—and do whatever it takes to regain Aydin’s humanity…and his love. What she encounters within their hallowed sanctuary is pure intrigue.Someone—or something—is murdering her sisters in their sleep, provoking fear and suspicion among the order. Meanwhile, Aydin, unable to stay away, starts haunting Chalice’s dreams, urging her onward. Ultimately, Chalice will be faced with an agonizing choice–one that will tear away at her newfound identity and force her to choose between duty and desire….







“Betray your sisters or your lover. You choose.”

After the warrior she loves saved her from a murderous gargoyle, Chalice watched helplessly as Aydin turned into a gargoyle himself. Now, free from the curse that enslaved her, Chalice pledges to join her sister knights in The Order of the Hatchet—and do whatever it takes to regain Aydin’s humanity…and his love. What she encounters within their hallowed sanctuary is pure intrigue.

Someone—or something—is murdering her sisters in their sleep, provoking fear and suspicion among the order. Meanwhile, Aydin, unable to stay away, starts haunting Chalice’s dreams, urging her onward. Ultimately, Chalice will be faced with an agonizing choice—one that will tear away at her newfound identity and force her to choose between duty and desire….

“Rich with action, romance, and sensory overload, the story goes places I never expected and delighted me every step of the way. Duvall is a writer to watch for!”



—C.E. Murphy, author of Urban Shaman


Praise for

KNIGHT’S CURSE

“Rich with action, romance and sensory overload,

the story goes places I never expected and delighted me

every step of the way. Duvall is a writer to watch for!”

—C.E. Murphy, author of Urban Shaman

“Duvall’s heroine is an endearing mixed bag of coiled emotions, and the other characters are a collection of good and evil

that readers will want to know more about.”

—RT Book Reviews

“This is a spectacular story. The urban fantasy world

that Karen Duvall has created feels genuine and fully realized

and best of all, the places and characters in this book

are just flat out fun to read about.”

—Bonnie Ramthun, author of The White Gates


Darkest Knight

Karen Duvall




www.mirabooks.co.uk (http://www.mirabooks.co.uk)


Dear Reader,

I had so much fun writing about Chalice, a modern-day knight, in the first book that I knew her adventures would continue. After all, she has unfinished business to take care of, namely getting Aydin back to his old self again. He changed into a gargoyle to save her life, so she promised to find a way to make him human again. The senseless murder of her sister knights by an unknown attacker is an unexpected foil to her plans, but she won’t let that stop her. Against all odds, she vows to catch the killer as well as restore Aydin to the man he used to be.

Knight’s Curse, the first book in Chalice’s harrowing adventures, is available in print and ebook formats. Please visit my blog, www.karenduvall.blogspot.com, for updates on my future books.

Karen Duvall


This book is dedicated to my five adorable grandchildren:

Kai, Zach, Adam, Andrew and Bella.

My heartfelt thanks go to my amazing literary agent,

Elizabeth Winick Rubenstein, who’s a great listener and extremely supportive. I also appreciate her assistant, Shira Hoffman, who always makes herself available.

I’d also like to thank my editor, Ann Leslie Tuttle, and her helpful assistant, Dana Hamilton.

Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers deserves my thanks, as well. I’ve benefited greatly from this professional organization devoted to writers of novel-length commercial fiction.


Contents

Chapter one (#u9c802c9e-6a76-529a-bf9e-42bf8c4bb4ac)

Chapter two (#ub52b56e6-d675-5f91-8484-c315ad8dce07)

Chapter three (#ub59967c9-759b-5c3d-8fac-b65d4c71d584)

Chapter four (#u3afc1e27-5ded-56c2-bfe2-3d890d332ef8)

Chapter five (#u22d51749-b12b-5fa9-a83f-bada66f610da)

Chapter six (#u6f1130ec-f13a-59b8-83df-37efa3321ccb)

Chapter seven (#uca87d6a1-3f97-55f1-a59d-20374e38719b)

Chapter eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twelve (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-one (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-three (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter twenty-six (#litres_trial_promo)


one

“YOU’RE COMING WITH ME, RIGHT?”I ASKED Rafe when he opened the silver veil that separated the physical world from the realm of angels. This misty otherworld was home to Rafael, my guardian angel, but not to me. I think I’d overstayed my welcome.

Rafe towered above me and scowled. “No.”

I leaned forward to peer through the filmy curtain. “I’m not ready to go there alone. It’s too soon.”

“Chalice, it’s been over a month.” Rafe closed his eyes and sighed so deeply I thought he’d collapse a lung if he had one. “But if you prefer to wait a while longer…” He held his palm flat against the transparent veil and the sigil on his hand glowed. The surface began to solidify.

I grabbed his arm. “Wait.”

His sigh came even louder this time. “Make up your mind.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “You have no idea how hard this is for me.”

The deep creases in his forehead smoothed as his eyes crinkled with the start of a smile. It made him appear almost human. “I can imagine.”

“No, you can’t.” The memory of my last day of bondage to Shui, a homicidal gargoyle, remained clear in my mind. The gargoyle’s death had freed me of the curse that once threatened to take my humanity and turn me into a winged devil as horrible as Shui. But my freedom had come at a price. In order to save me from my fate, Shui had to be killed by another gargoyle. Aydin, who was also bonded to a gargoyle, had allowed the curse to change him so that he could fight Shui to save my life. But, by doing so, I’d lost the only man I’d ever loved. It was time for me to bring Aydin back, to make him human again. The only way for that to happen lay on the other side of this veil, at the Vyantara fatherhouse. Home of my nightmares, where failing a heist used to mean a beating by my master or a death threat from Shui. Lucky for me the gargoyle died before getting his chance to feast on Chalice tartare.

I sucked in a breath. “I can’t face another gargoyle.”

“Then don’t face it. Just kill it.” Rafe’s hand stayed in place against the veil, but he didn’t reopen it. He waited for my okay.

“Come with me,” I told him, trying to make it sound like an order. He was usually good at following orders.

“You know what would happen if I did?” he asked, raising his eyebrows. “My presence would set off every alarm and ward in the house.”

I winced. “That would defeat the purpose of sneaking in, right?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

I heaved in a fortifying breath and blinked. Even after a month, it felt strange not to wear my contact lenses. Or the filters for my ears and nose. I’d worn these protective devices practically all my life. For being half angel, even if that half was the fallen kind, my unusual abilities helped keep me out of trouble. Unfortunately, they helped get me into almost as much. Rafe had been forbidden to meet me until after my curse was broken, so only recently was he able to teach me control over my hypersensitivity through meditation. Now I could turn my powers off and on as easily as a light switch, though I hadn’t practiced under stressful conditions. I was about to test my new skill big-time.

“I’m ready,” I said. “Open the veil.”

“One last thing before you go—”

“No!” I glared at him. He was about to deliver another lecture about staying focused and making safety my first priority. I’d heard it over a dozen times. “Do it now before I lose my nerve.”

“As you wish.”

The veil opened and I stepped through, my booted feet landing on a dark Oriental rug as wide and long as the room I stood in. I glanced behind me. Rafe and the veil were gone.

My heart did a brief tap dance against my ribs before I reminded myself that Vyantara fatherhouses fed on fear. I knew from experience that this building would suck out my energy like a baby sucks milk from a bottle, and I’d end up too weak to do what I’d come for. I had to kill the gargoyle Shojin and take its heart for Aydin. Before he had turned into a gargoyle, Aydin had been bonded to Shojin and now only Shojin could save him. I knew the gargoyle was here because on the last day Aydin and I were together, this is where the Vyantara had said he would be.

I thinned my mind’s sensory defenses just enough to get a sense of the place. Straining against the silence, I listened for signs of life and found two beings upstairs. Whether they were human or not didn’t matter. I only cared about hearing one heartbeat: the rapid bass drum pound that belonged only to a gargoyle.

It didn’t take long for me to detect it. One gargoyle was in the basement and it had to be Shojin. No two gargoyles could occupy the same space or there was sure to be a fight.

Mouth dry as parchment, I swallowed my fear and sniffed the air. The kitchen smelled close by and I knew I’d find a door to the basement there. That’s how most fatherhouses were laid out due to the spell-casting needs of their magic-users.

I crept down the narrow hall toward the scent of herbs and cooking oil. Squinting in darkness that appeared gray as fog to my sensitive eyes, I detected no ghosts. Most likely the house’s warding spells kept them out. Good. Ghosts were annoying distractions and the last thing I needed right now. My focus had to be sharp as a gargoyle’s talon.

The vibration down my spine told me I was surrounded by curses and charms. I sensed a huge collection here, possibly even bigger than the fatherhouse in Denver before it blew up. It reminded me of one more task on my to-do list: steal back every magical object in the Vyantara’s gallery of hellish artifacts. After I’d been kidnapped from a monastery in Lebanon at thirteen by the leaders of this nasty black veil group, I’d been forced to steal many of these artifacts for the Vyantara. I had my work cut out for me.

The wooden stairs creaked with my slight ninety-eight pounds of body weight. If Shojin didn’t hear me coming, he’d surely have smelled me by now. A gargoyle’s senses were nearly as keen as mine.

I sniffed the air and it chilled my lungs, which came as no surprise considering this was a Canadian fatherhouse in the dead of winter. But it didn’t lessen the scent of damp feathers and unwashed fur. When I reached the bottom step, a plume of steamy gargoyle breath seethed out of the darkness and enveloped me like a blanket.

Shojin’s eyes glowed red and I listened for his heartbeat to speed up, but he remained calm. His breathing came slow and steady despite the billowing clouds of hot air that puffed from his flared nostrils. I didn’t know Shojin well, only that Aydin had been bonded to him and that their eight hundred years together had forged a rare friendship. I did a mental eye-roll. In the thirteen years I’d been with Shui, we had shared only hatred. Gargoyles were assassins for the Vyantara. I could never befriend a murderer.

The gargoyle growled. Oh, there we go. That was the behavior I expected. I didn’t deal well with the unpredictable. Monsters should act and react in accordance with their vile and murderous nature.

I slid my balisong blade from its sheath on my back. The knife glinted a glorious purple in the red light that shone from Shojin’s eyes. No ordinary blade, this balisong could do something no other knife could. It could kill an immortal gargoyle because it was created from the dead body of one.

“I know you and Aydin were good buddies, Shojin. And I’m sorry to have to do this.” I brandished the blade and stood poised to strike. “But you have what I need to make Aydin a man again.”

The gargoyle hissed and lunged at me. It was an ancient creature, possibly the oldest one on earth, but you’d never know it by its speed and agility. Shojin’s wings spanned the width of the room and with just one flap, I was airborne and sailing toward the stairs. I landed on my back, the air whooshing from my lungs like a deflating balloon. I managed to roll sideways just as the gargoyle pounced. He missed me by a hair.

I wanted to yell but I didn’t have enough breath to make a sound. It was all I could do to stay conscious. We were both in full battle mode and my intent to win replaced any fear I might have had. There was no room in my mind to be afraid. My head filled with tactics and strategy, driven by instinct to survive.

Shojin matched my intensity. He wanted to win just as badly. He knew what I’d come for and wasn’t about to let me take it from him.

One clawed hand the size of a grizzly bear’s paw sliced through the air to backhand my head and send me sprawling. My arms and legs flailed as I slid across the dirt floor to slam into a wall. I hit so hard I didn’t see stars, I saw planets. I wasn’t so fast getting back up this time. And Shojin took full advantage.

He grabbed me by the throat and lifted me up off the ground. I swiped the blade toward the arm holding me, but dizziness kept me from seeing straight and I connected with nothing but air.

I wanted to scream at him that he owed Aydin his heart. Killing me wouldn’t bring Aydin back, but killing Shojin could. Struggling to breathe, I gritted my teeth and tried forcing my will on the gargoyle. He stared hard at me, his ridged brow deeply creased with age, his curved raptor’s beak parted as if to bite. I fisted a clump of fur on his arm and hung on tight, sucking in what air I could while watching the edges of my consciousness fade to black.

Fury in his eyes, Shojin lowered me to the ground. His grip on my neck lessened, but I felt something warm trickle down the collar of my shirt. I vaguely wondered how badly I’d been wounded, and if it even mattered. For the second time in less than two months I was about to become gargoyle chow.

If I hadn’t been so weak from lack of oxygen I’d be slicing through his thick chest right now and cutting out his beating heart. As it was, my legs couldn’t even hold me up. I hung from Shojin’s claws like a bloody rag doll.

The gargoyle growled and squawked as if trying to talk. He shook his head and clacked his beak. What would he say if he could speak? Thanks for the quick snack, and I’ll have your guardian angel for dessert?

He pried the balisong from my hand, his clumsy claw gouging my arm in the process. Who knew a gargoyle preferred to cut his meat with a knife? But instead of peeling me open like a ripe piece of fruit, he plunged the blade into his own chest.

Shojin’s grip on me weakened as he sawed through his flesh in search of what lay beating underneath.

I knew in that moment that he loved Aydin as much as I did. His adoration for a mere human stunned me. I wasn’t sure I could grasp the concept of compassion coming from a fiend.

His eyes glazed and filled with tears. I could imagine pain had caused this reaction, but I had to give him more credit than that. Aydin had told me many times that Shojin was different. That his beast wasn’t a homicidal killer like others of its kind. I realized now that he’d been right.

A tear dripped from the corner of Shojin’s eye and slid over the coarse surface of his beak. I bit my lip to stop my own tears from flowing. I wouldn’t dishonor him by showing pity. He’d done an honorable thing for a friend and it was costing him his life.

He dropped the knife, which quickly dissolved to dust after having done its job, then closed his eyes while reaching inside the hole he’d cut into his chest. When he opened his clawed hand, a glowing lump of purple flesh lay centered in his palm. He offered me the still-beating heart.

We both fell to our knees and I caught the heart before it could hit the ground. It was warm and wet and mine.

Shojin gasped and collapsed forward, his dense body falling hard and shattering in more pieces than I could count. When a gargoyle died, it always turned to stone. So his lifeless body breaking apart was no surprise. What surprised me was that his heart continued its rapid bass drum beat. A minute later the organ went still in my hands.

The heart was still warm, still glowing, but solid and shiny as a purple gemstone. Now I understood why Shojin had fought me so hard. If I’d killed him like I wanted, his heart would have shattered along with the rest of his body when he died. He’d known I would come and had planned all along to end his life this way.

Shojin had proved himself more angel than demon; he was a creature with a soul. His sacrifice would mean new life for Aydin.


two

AS MUCH AS I WANTED TO MOURN SHOJIN’S passing, I had to get the hell out of the house before a flood of Vyantara magic-users descended on me.

I gulped a shaky breath and glanced at the pink scar on the palm of my hand. My sigil was new, only a couple of weeks old, but that made the young scar no less effective. Eyes still stinging with the tears I held back, I smeared blood from my neck onto the scar and flattened my hand against the wall, waiting for the fluttery buzz that came with opening a veil. The tension in my shoulders increased with each passing second. The veil usually opened immediately. What was taking so long?

I clenched my jaw and listened. No thundering footsteps on the floor above, no wards sending out rays of lightning or demon warriors to take me out. No veil opening for my sigil, either. I began to wonder if I was in a time warp. I’d seen something like that done once. In fact, it was my fallen angel father who had made it happen.

I tried my sigil again. Nothing. What the hell?

I looked at the stone heart I still held and rolled my eyes. Of course the veil wouldn’t open. Gargoyles, and anything associated with a gargoyle that wasn’t angel-blessed, was not allowed through the silver veil. As long as I had the heart I was stuck here.

But that didn’t explain why the Vyantara hadn’t come running at the sound of battle. I went back to the basement stairs and stepped cautiously up to the top. That’s when I saw the halt charm. About six inches tall, it was the figure of a hand woven with strips of bark from an ancient oak tree. I recognized it because I’d stolen the charm from a museum in Wales about five years ago for the Vyantara. It was one of many magical artifacts I’d been forced to steal as their indentured thief. The charm’s fingers were spread out in a stop gesture and its palm faced the door. Someone had placed it there to soundproof the basement.

Charms don’t work on me, which is why I could hear Shojin’s beating heart when I was on the other side of the door. I suspected Shojin himself had placed the charm here, and not to keep me from finding him, but to keep others away once I did. And it had worked.

But that didn’t solve my current problem. The only way I knew out of the house was through the house itself.

I wasn’t doing myself any favors by standing still, so I freed the spare butterfly knife from my ankle sheath and opened the basement door. Greeted by silence, I took it as a good sign and continued making my way through the kitchen. Getting to the basement in the first place had been no problem, so chances were good I’d get out of the house just as easily. A lot could be said for positive thinking.

I crept through the main part of the house where glass-lidded tables displayed dusty old relics tagged by yellowing strips of paper. Each one had a typed word and number that referenced it for the Vyantara’s catalog. They made their money by selling off these cursed and charmed antiques to the highest bidder. There were hundreds of them in this room alone.

I stopped and listened to the silence, hearing only the low thrum of slow heartbeats and the smooth breathing of those in sleep. No one would miss an object or two…or three. Along with the bottle of salt water I used for destroying spells, I always carried a special pouch that hid magical objects from detection. I’d simply toss a handful of these in the pouch and be on my way.

A pocket watch inscribed with a protection spell would be useful for my sister knights in the Order of the Hatchet. Our knighthood shared a bond of nearly a thousand years, starting when our ancestors fought side by side in the Crusade Wars. Each generation gave birth to daughters spawned by their guardian angels. My sisters still fought together, and though the war had changed, the goal of vanquishing evil remained the same. I was proud to be one of them.

I dropped the watch in my pouch along with a fountain pen filled with invisible ink that made the writer disappear instead of the words. Then I found something I wouldn’t mind having for myself if I weren’t immune: a dove’s feather that enabled the user to fly.

Treasures in hand, I headed for the front door, which appeared farther away than it had only minutes ago. In fact, the faster I walked the more distance I created between the door and me. DГ©jГ  vu.

The same thing had happened to me on my first night at the Denver fatherhouse. I suspected a similar ward had been triggered here and the apparition of my demon foe would appear any second. A fuzzy image took shape in the foyer and a zigzag of energy wiggled through it like a weak signal on a television screen. Blackish-purple and bald, green eyes glowing, the MaГҐgan demon offered me a menacing grin as if it knew me. Perhaps it did. I had severed the arm from one of its cousins a few weeks ago when it tried to stop my escape from a building that was about to explode.

I was fresh out of gargoyle blades and I doubted the knife I had would even make a dent in that thing. Its hide was strong as iron. At the moment it was only a projection from the hellish realm of the black veil, like the warning growl of an attack dog. If provoked, the creature would pop through to this side and kill me on the spot.

The last time I’d tried running from one, its claws had sliced my ankle and the venom had made me sick. I’d rather not repeat the experience, especially since the venom could be lethal. The Maågan didn’t know I had taken any magical objects because I’d hidden them inside the pouch.

I suddenly realized what had sparked the demon’s interest. Shojin’s heart. Shit.

The heart still felt warm in my hand, which I knew was stained purple with Shojin’s blood. Holding the pouch behind my back, I carefully slid the fist-size stone in with the rest of my booty. The Maågan continued to glare. I gritted my teeth and stalked toward it as I knew the creature respected anyone who confronted it head-on.

The distance closed between us, and the front door was now a mere few feet away. I didn’t make eye contact, but the demon’s gaze bored into me like twin lasers. Malice oozed from it like a septic sore. I lifted my chin and marched toward the exit.

I admit I was afraid. Not terrified, as I’d confronted much worse in recent weeks, but fearful enough to attract the house’s appetite. I felt my energy begin to drain. Between the Maågan’s murderous instinct and the building’s hunger, my hyper senses couldn’t do jackshit to keep me safe. I needed a miracle.

Knowing a sudden rush for the door would only kill me faster, I kept my movements slow and precise. My fingers curled around the door’s knob and relief overwhelmed me. As the door opened, a whoosh of frigid air cooled the sweat on my skin. I smelled snow. I could hear leafless branches rattle in the winter wind. An overcast sky opened briefly to allow a faint ray of moonshine to struggle through.

A quick tug on my jacket let me know I’d deluded myself into believing I was safe.

It jerked me backward, but I grabbed on to the door frame to hold fast. The fabric tore, but I felt no stinging pain from the Maågan’s razorlike claws as it searched for the pouch.

Still holding the pouch in one hand, I fisted the top to keep its contents from spilling out. The fingernails of my other hand dug into the door frame to anchor me in place. I’d lose this battle before long, but I refused to give up easily. I kicked backward, connecting with what might have been the demon’s head. It screeched and a roar of voices filtered down from the floor above. The home’s residents had awakened and they didn’t sound happy.

I was losing my grip and the threatening voices inside the house grew louder. A flap of giant wings forced my gaze upward and I half expected to see Shojin sweep down for the kill. But Shojin, whom I now thought of as a gentle giant, was dead. This must be another gargoyle. A hungry house and a demon weren’t enough for these guys? Give me a break.

I squinted up into the darkness and saw nothing but gray clouds and falling snow. Yet my nose detected more. Damp fur, old blood, and dirt that smelled like a farm. As well as a familiar scent that hurt my heart.

I barely had time to think when I saw the set of enormous curled talons appear inches from my face. They latched onto both my arms and lifted me aloft with the Maågan’s claws still gripping my jacket. I released my hold on the door frame and the jacket slipped free from my body. In a burst of speed, my rescuer surged upward, away from the fatherhouse and into the snow-filled sky above.

I was hardly conscious by the time my feet touched solid ground. Icy cold cut through me like a blade and my skin had turned numb. Frostbite would soon follow. The thought had barely touched my mind when a thick woolen blanket fell across my shoulders. Only one person knew me so well that he practically read my mind.

“Aydin.” I whispered his name, which was difficult to say with a nearly frozen tongue. He stayed out of my line of sight, but I heard him shuffling around in the dark. I took a minute to gaze at my surroundings. The crackle of a fire gave me tingles as I anticipated the warmth it would offer.

This structure must be his temporary home, a hidden place relatively close to Shojin. I imagined the Vyantara were still looking for Aydin, as he’d be a valuable asset if caught. Gargoyle assassins weren’t easy to come by. They were ancient creatures, but new ones could be made by binding humans with a curse that would transform them into winged devils. I’d been cruelly bonded to one named Shui, but the monster’s death had set me free. Aydin hadn’t been so lucky.

I sniffed the air. That’s where the farm smell had come from. This old farm looked abandoned, the barn’s walls rotted and boards missing, though it appeared Aydin had tried making repairs. His dexterity compromised by claws, he’d been ill-equipped to wield a hammer.

The scent of roasting meat wafted through the air. Rabbit. I grinned in spite of my situation. He’d never cooked for me when he was human.

“Thanks for coming to my rescue,” I said to the hulking shadow by the fire. This was the first time I’d noticed he had a tail and I watched it twitch like an irritated cat. “I’d be dead if not for you.” Again.

He grunted. That’s all he could do. The ability to speak wasn’t included in the gargoyle transformation package. He could, however, rip someone apart with his bare paws and chew through bones like they were jawbreaker candies.

“I’ve missed you, Aydin,” I said softly to his back. His bat wings were folded at his sides and they shifted as if in a shrug. “Did you miss me?”

He seemed to ignore me, but I sensed he was listening. So I prattled on. “I haven’t been back to Denver since, you know…that day.”

He growled low in his throat.

“I couldn’t agree more.” Though I had benefited from my experience, he had not. I wondered if he resented me for that. I wouldn’t blame him if he did.

“I’ve been staying with the Arelim since then,” I told him, and waited for his reaction. Guardians were Arelim angels from the twelfth order of the angelic hierarchy, sworn to protect the Hatchet knights. But Aydin had been my real protector. He had explained to me my role in the knighthood and showed me how magic could be good if used in a good way. He even taught me how to fall in love.

Aydin turned sideways to peer at me. His eyes were still that lovely shade of jade, clear as ice. His face, however, looked like that of an oversize cat. That didn’t matter because I would recognize him no matter what he was.

“The silver veil is kind of nice, but it’s too solitary—even for me. And to be honest, I felt claustrophobic most of the time. There’s nothing to do there but meditate.”

Aydin pulled something from the fire he’d been tending and blew on the flame that engulfed what was on the stick. Charred rabbit. So much for his cooking skills.

He gestured for me to come closer, which I eagerly did. I could hardly feel my feet and I stumbled. Aydin caught me before I did a face-plant on the hay-strewn ground. He was surprisingly gentle for a gargoyle, but he let go of me so quickly I nearly fell anyway.

“Thanks.” I sat on one of the logs positioned around the fire and he handed me the skewered rabbit. “Aren’t you going to have any?”

He glanced away, then turned his wedge-shaped head to stare at me. He placed both paws on his belly.

“Ah, I see. You’ve already eaten.” And no doubt his had been rabbit tartare.

Feeling warmer already, I pulled a leg off the rabbit and peeled away its burned hide before taking a bite. Not bad. Not bad at all. I devoured the meat as though I hadn’t eaten in days. Come to think of it, I couldn’t remember my last meal.

I didn’t like the awkward silence between us. I’d always felt comfortable with Aydin, and though I realized he couldn’t speak, it wasn’t a lack of words that made our meeting so uneasy. We were both different now and we hardly knew each other anymore. I hoped we still shared the same goals when it came to my sister knights in the Order of the Hatchet. In spite of everything, I still loved Aydin; claws, wings, fangs and all.

I cleared my throat. “Anyway…” I gently swung my pouch of ill-gotten gain between my knees and the few objects inside clattered against one another.

Aydin lifted his chin and wiggled his feline nose. He sniffed and jerked his head at the pouch in my hands.

It was time to tell him what was inside.

“This? I’ve begun reclaiming stolen artifacts from the Vyantara.” I held up the bag. “My sisters can make good use of these.” Our original plan had been for Aydin to help me steal back the magical objects from all the fatherhouses, then help me teach my sister knights how to use them to protect themselves.

I pulled out each item, one by one, starting with the pocket watch. I slowly withdrew the halt charm made of oak bark. “There’s an interesting story behind this one.” I held it out to him and he nodded as if he recognized it. I smiled. “It was actually Shojin who found it.”

Aydin’s cat whiskers twitched.

I nodded. “Yep. I saw him today. He gave me something to give you.” My heart hammered so hard against my ribs I thought they’d break. I tossed the empty rabbit stick in the fire. “Shojin loved you very much.”

Aydin straightened and backed away from me. Though fur covered his face, I could still see his scowl. I think he guessed what I was about to give him. He shook his head.

“He made the ultimate sacrifice, Aydin.” I lifted the beautiful glowing heart from the pouch and held it up. “Shojin died so that you could become a man again.”

Aydin’s chest rose and fell like he had trouble breathing. He pointed at me.

“No!” I gave my head a quick shake. “It wasn’t me, I swear. He harvested the heart with his own claws because he loved you that much.” And so did I.

Still frowning, Aydin gently took the heart from me. My shoulders slouched in relief. Once he ate the heart, I’d have him back the way he used to be. We’d be together again, both free of our curses, both ready to start new lives. My eyes felt hot and I realized they’d filled with tears. Tears of hope.

Aydin’s paws rubbed over the heart as if cherishing a precious gem, which it was. Rare and beautiful. Then he threw back his head and roared. His anguished cry tore through me and I stood to hold my arms open to him. To comfort him. But he tossed the heart at my feet.

I crouched down to snatch it, unbroken, from the frigid ground. “What are you doing?” I yelled.

His lips peeled back from fangs sharp enough to pierce glass without making it crack. He fisted his claws and spread his wings before abruptly vanishing from sight.


three

“AYDIN!” I RAN OUT OF THE BARN AND GAZED up at the dense clouds that had dumped buckets of snow. I didn’t see him, but I sensed him up there. Invisible, and he was flying far away from me.

I clutched the gargoyle heart to my chest and whispered, “Shojin, you didn’t die for nothing. We’ll get him back. I promise.”

“I see he didn’t lose his ability to vanish like a thief in the night.”

I spun around to see Rafe standing behind me.

“How long have you been here?” I asked, blinking hard as I tried to figure out what was wrong with this picture. He looked so…different.

“Long enough to hear him roar and see him vanish,” Rafe said, sounding annoyed. “As I suspected he would.”

I squinted at him. “Rafe, what have you done to yourself?”

He placed both hands on his chest. “Me? Oh, you mean the clothes.”

I nodded and stared, openmouthed. “The clothes, the hair, the skin, and the fact you cut about a foot off your height.”

He turned his back to me and I gasped.

“Oh, my God! What happened to your wings?”

“Relax.” He faced me again. “This is a disguise. We can take human form whenever we wish. It’s often necessary when we interact with mortals.”

His hair was no longer white but a wheat-blond that looked as natural as the stubble on his tan cheeks and chin. What a change. His skin was normally porcelain-smooth, and he was usually taller than a pro basketball player. I had to give him credit for his choice of clothes. Acid-washed denim from top to bottom, but his jacket looked thickly lined with fleece, his gloves leather and his muffler cable-knit. Even his boots were stylin’. He looked like he’d walked straight out of GQ Magazine.

“Wow,” was all I could say.

He scowled, looking uncomfortable, and glanced down at himself. “Did I miss something?”

I shook my head. “Not a thing.”

He smiled. “Good.” Squinting up at the sky, he said, “Now that it’s gone, we can leave.”

Though Aydin’s rejection of the heart was a setback, I wasn’t angry, just disappointed. He needed time to grieve for his old friend and I could be patient. After everything Aydin had done for me he deserved at least that much.

“Rafe, Aydin is a he, not an it. And by the way, I still have the gargoyle heart so we can’t travel through the veil. I already tried and it wouldn’t open for me.”

“Of course not. I made an attempt to warn you about that, but you cut me off, remember?” Lips pressed firmly together, he added, “This is why I acquired a motor vehicle for our transportation.”

Like any good Boy Scout, Rafe had come prepared. This kept getting better and better. “Tell me you’re kidding.”

He scowled again. “Why would I kid you? Don’t you think I can drive?”

“Um. No?”

Shaking his head, he stalked past me and rounded the corner of the barn. I followed. Parked out back in a foot of snow was a shiny black Cadillac Escalade.

Pointing at the tires, I said, “You put the chains on yourself?”

He sighed. “Just get in. Thanks to the trophy you just acquired, we have a long drive ahead.”

Ah, yes. I was finally going to meet my sister knights and my grandmother for the first time. A Hatchet knight herself, she lived with my grandfather—an angel who chose to become mortal—in the very state I’d fled from a month ago. Colorado, here we come.

“Are we there yet?” I sounded like a petulant child, but I didn’t care. We’d traveled over two thousand miles and as nice as this SUV was, I wanted out.

Rafe glanced at his watch. “That’s the second time you’ve asked me in the last fifteen minutes. My answer is still the same. Two hours to go.”

“Correction. That should be one hour and forty-five minutes.”

“Traveling with me hasn’t been that bad, has it?”

I slumped down in the seat and uncrossed, then recrossed, my ankles on the dashboard. “I’m bored and I’m tired and my back hurts.” I wished we’d park in one spot long enough for Aydin to find me. I glanced out the window and peered up at the overcast sky. He had to be up there somewhere.

Rafe followed the direction of my gaze. “Still on the lookout for your winged devil, eh?”

“Don’t call him that.” I understood angels and gargoyles didn’t get along, but for crap sake, this was Aydin. One of the good guys. “He’s on our side, remember?”

Rafe grunted.

I stared at his resolute profile. He looked mortal, but he didn’t behave like one. He’d hardly eaten anything in over thirty hours and he never slept. Not once. The only time we stopped was to gas up and for me to eat and use the bathroom. I wanted a shower in the worst way.

Feeling grungy, I gave myself a sniff. “Do I stink?”

He scowled. “No, you don’t stink.” He shook his head. “You smell fine. You smell like…you.”

I didn’t know if that was good or bad. He had no odor whatsoever and if anyone would know it would be me. “How do you stay so clean without taking a bath?”

“I’m an angel.”

“Duh. I know that.” I rolled my eyes. “But you’re mortal at the moment. You’ve got mortal parts, right?” I looked pointedly down at his crotch.

He dropped a hand from the steering wheel to his lap as if to hide his manly bits. “Of course I do.”

Leaning toward him, I looked closely at his face. “I don’t believe it. You’re blushing.”

“Look, there’s a truck stop. Hungry? Need to use the facilities?”

“Sure,” I said, settling back in my seat again. “I could eat and take a pee. Don’t you have to pee?”

“No.”

I jutted my chin toward the hand that covered his package. “Then what good is that?”

“It’s plenty good, I assure you.” He turned the wheel a bit too sharply and I slid across the seat. I nearly landed on top of him.

I moved over to hug the door on my side.

“Sorry about that,” Rafe said, and a shadow of a grin touched his lips. He wasn’t sorry at all. He’d done that on purpose. “Don’t pout. It’s unbecoming for a knight.”

“I’m not pouting.” Crossing my arms firmly against my chest, I sat up straight and looked longingly at the coffee shop ahead. Hungrier than I thought, I wondered if it was morning or afternoon. I’d completely lost track of time. “Waffles. No, make that French toast. Two eggs over easy and order me extra bacon.” He parked the Escalade and I hopped out to make a beeline for the restrooms. “Thanks, Rafe. You’re an angel.”

I gave myself a whore’s bath in the restroom sink, using generous amounts of hand soap in the process. The hand dryer was an awkward way to dry off, but I was used to it. I’d done this countless times on the road during my thieving days so I was no stranger to prancing around a public bathroom in the buff. Luckily no one came in while I indulged in my trucker’s toilette.

Moderately refreshed, I got dressed and strode inside the restaurant to find Rafe. He sat in a booth looking worse than dejected. He looked lost.

“Hey,” I said softly, sensing something was wrong. I slid onto the bench seat across from him. “You okay?”

He blinked at me. “I just received a message.”

I cocked my head. “Yeah? Who from?”

He swallowed, his Adam’s apple making a deep bob in his human throat. “The Arelim. It’s bad news.”

My heart sank into my stomach. Rafe had a telepathic link with his angelic brothers, who were never chatty without good reason. An angel with bad news always meant trouble. I waited for him to tell me what it was.

“Your sister knights,” he said slowly, his human eyes shining brighter than they should. He closed them and his hands curled into fists on the table. “Almost all of them are dead.”


four

“WHAT? No!”I STOOD UP AND NEARLY TOPPLED the table. I’d waited so long, struggled so hard to finally join my sisters in the knighthood. My mission was to train them in self-protection. I refused to believe it was too late. “It must be a mistake.”

Rafe gazed down at his fists and shook his head. “No mistake,” he whispered. “It happened a few hours ago. I was just told that those who didn’t perish were either out of the country, in a warded area, or on sacred ground. That’s the only common link the Arelim have found.”

I blinked over dry eyes that stung from the effort to control my sensitive vision. This news was too distracting. Lights became too bright, I saw people’s auras spike with the colors of their emotions, and smells from the kitchen roiled what little I had in my stomach. I no longer had an appetite.

“How?” I asked.

“Suffocation.” Rafe leaned back in the booth seat, his handsome face looking haggard, as if defeated. Angel or not, the dark circles under his eyes were proof he needed sleep. “How they suffocated is unclear, but it happened as they slept.”

It was mildly comforting to know they hadn’t suffered. I grieved for Shojin and now I added my sisters to what seemed to be a growing list. I hoped this wasn’t a sign of more to come. “What killed them?”

“Unknown, but the cause appears unnatural,” he said. “And by that I mean supernatural.”

That didn’t surprise me considering each knight had a supernatural ability of her own. “Magic?”

Narrowing his eyes, Rafe said, “Not exactly. The Arelim detected no spells, charms or curses.”

“Yet they weren’t strangled or smothered?”

He shook his head. “It’s as if their breath was snatched right out of their lungs.”

Now I was really puzzled. “What could do that? A demon?”

“Possibly.” He gave me a long look. “Or another knight.”

Wow. “Don’t tell me my sisters are prone to killing each other.”

“It’s been known to happen in the past, but that was hundreds of years ago. The motive had always been jealousy, usually of another knight’s abilities, or if her guardian angel chose to become human after mating. It’s very rare within the order to have an angel for a husband.”

Yet my grandmother had wedded her guardian after my mother was conceived. Had her sisters been jealous? Was her life ever threatened? There was so much I still didn’t know. “Are the surviving knights under suspicion?”

“No one is above suspicion, Chalice. Not even you.”

“Me?” That surprised me. “Impossible. I’ve been with you this whole time.”

“Perhaps it was someone you know.” His eyes became hard. “Someone who can enter a body and make it do whatever he wants.”

He was talking about Aydin. Even though he had that ability, Aydin would never use it to harm a living soul. Just because gargoyles were assassins for the Vyantara didn’t automatically make him one. “I know who you’re talking about and he’s not like that.” I felt my ire heating up. “What reason could he possibly have to hurt my sisters?”

Rafe shrugged. “He’s a beast of darkness now. Who knows what he would do, or why.”

I glared at him. “You’re wrong. Aydin took a vow to Saint Geraldine that he would protect the Hatchets. He’d never go back on his word.” Saint Geraldine was one of the very first knights in the order, but she was a mummy now. Or at least her head was a mummy. Suffice to say she still lived despite existing over nine hundred years without the rest of her body.

Rafe blew a blast of air out his nose. “How can you be so sure? You hardly even know each other.”

“I know him better than I know you.”

He looked stunned for a second, but quickly recovered. His eyes hooded as if he were bored. Though we hadn’t ordered anything, Rafe threw a couple of bills on the table and stood. “Let’s not keep your grandmother waiting longer than she already has. She needs you. And you need her.”

What I really needed was to be away from Rafe for a while. He’d been wearing on my nerves ever since we left Quebec and after seeing his hostile attitude toward Aydin, I’d rather be alone. Rafe’s ego was big enough to fill a small planet.

We finished our drive to Golden, Colorado, in awkward silence. I was angry and Rafe was…who knew what. Angels were hard to read. He appeared deep in thought, but he also seemed to be sulking.

The long, snow-packed driveway leading to my grandmother’s home had tall pines on either side that sparkled with frost. It looked like a fairy winter wonderland.

Rafe stopped the car. “We’re here.”

My gaze wandered over the majestic ponderosas and skeletal aspens that had lost all their leaves. No house in sight. “We are? I don’t see anything but trees and a few big rocks.”

He opened the car door and stepped out, his boots squeaking on the snowy ground. “That’s because it’s protected by a privacy ward.” His hand waved through empty space and like a mirage, the air rippled and gradually formed the image of a house.

No ordinary house, its size made it more like a mansion. Yet it still looked like a classic mountain home of exposed cedar logs and natural stones set into the walls. Awesome.

“Wow,” was all I could say.

“After you,” Rafe said, making a slight bow.

I stepped gingerly over the invisible barrier between the seen and unseen. A massive door on the front porch opened and out walked a woman who could have been my mother’s twin. On closer inspection I saw she was much older, with gray streaks running through her wavy ebony hair, and her frame was more generous than my mother’s had been. My grandmother had meat on her bones.

“Rafael!” she called to angel-man beside me. “And oh, dear lord! Is this our Chalice?”

I felt my cheeks grow hot.

“Yes, Aurora. It sure is,” Rafe said, a genuine smile in his voice. He liked her, I could tell.

“She’s the mirror image of Felicia, rest her soul.” My grandmother pranced down the steps, her breath steaming in the icy air. She hugged a thick wool cardigan closed against her chest and the knitted muffler at her neck trailed behind her. As she came nearer I got a good look at her eyes. Turquoise and gold. Just like mine.

Smiling, she stopped about a foot from me and opened her arms. I knew she expected a hug, but I wasn’t a hugger. I made only one exception, but getting to hug Aydin wouldn’t happen for a while. For my grandmother I compromised, leaning forward to touch my cheek to hers. She smelled like vanilla and cinnamon.

Eyes twinkling, she seemed satisfied with that. “Chalice, I’m so happy you’ve come.”

I was about to say how glad I was to be here when an enormous figure appeared at my grandmother’s back.

“So this is the granddaughter I’ve heard so much about.” The man stood slightly taller than Rafe in his human form, and his hair was black as Aurora’s. He looked mature, but it was hard to tell his age since there wasn’t a speck of gray in his hair. Signs of years gone by and exposure to the elements creased his handsome face. This must be my grandfather.

“Zeke, say hello to Chalice,” my grandmother said.

“Hi, sweetheart,” he said to me, a grin tweaking the corners of his mouth. It made me feel like a little girl again. As happy as I was to finally meet my grandmother, my heart swelled at seeing my grandfather. I knew the sacrifice he’d made. He’d been an angel before deciding to become human just so he could marry the woman he loved and be a father to his child. His courage and commitment took my breath away.

“Honey, are you all right?” My grandmother placed a hand gently on my shoulder.

I blinked and sniffed, then rubbed my nose. “I’m fine. Just cold. Can I get a tissue, please?”

Eyes wide, she said, “Of course! Grab that angel of yours and let’s get you two inside to warm up.”

Rafe drew to my side and I jumped ahead before he could touch me. I wanted nothing to do with him right now.

“Welcome to Halo Home,” Zeke said.

I stood at the entrance and stared, wide-eyed, at the vast interior of the first floor. The foyer opened out into the living room, which opened to the dining room, which opened to the kitchen. One great room with a giant round fireplace in its center. This house was way too large for only two people.

Aurora nodded. “I know what you’re thinking. Yes, it’s too big for Zeke and me, which is why we have other Hatchet knights live here with us. This house has become something of a sanctuary over the years, mostly for new knights in training.”

I nodded, though I was puzzled by something Aydin once told me. “I thought it was too dangerous for the knights to live together. Made them vulnerable.”

Rafe studied my face. “Turns out it was more dangerous for them not to.”

My grandmother lifted both eyebrows in agreement. “It’s true that keeping the knights together can make them a target for black veil crackpots.” She shook her head. “Young knights come to us as orphans from time to time and we care for them until they’re ready to go out on their own. It’s a sad but necessary part of being a Hatchet knight. We’re prone to losing the people we’re close to.”

I’d been an orphan too, except I’d had no one to help me but a monastery of monks in Lebanon before I was kidnapped by the leader of the Vyantara.

She tipped her head to one side and said, “Follow me to the kitchen, Chalice. You can help me finish making cookies.” She frowned at the two men and made a shooing motion with her hands. “I’m sure these two can find something to do with themselves.”

Zeke rolled his eyes. “Sure, steal our grandchild so you can have her all to yourself. When is it my turn?”

“When I say so.” She marched toward the other end of the house and I followed.

“I’m sorry to tell you this,” I told Aurora as I watched her tug cookie sheets from a lower cupboard, “but I can’t cook.”

She winked at me. “There’s nothing to it, honey. Have you ever mixed a spell?”

I thought about the summoning ritual I’d performed to bring my fallen angel father across. “Sort of.”

She set the pans on the counter and placed a large mixing bowl filled with dough beside them. “A pinch of this, a dash of that, stir it all together and presto. You’re a cook.”

It couldn’t be that easy.

She handed me a spoon. “Scoop up a teaspoon of batter and plop it on the cookie sheet. Keep doing that until the bowl is empty.”

I stuck my finger in the batter for a taste. Peanut butter. Yummy.

Aurora smacked my hand. “None of that now. You’re as bad as your mother was.”

Wiping my hand on a towel, I asked, “What was she like?”

“Your mother? Headstrong, fearless, determined. A lot like you, I suspect.” She dumped two cups of flour into a large mixing bow. “Felicia was an amazing woman. I wish you’d had a chance to know her.”

“Me, too.” But all I had was one photo. Aydin had rescued it from a fire and saved it for me. It was a precious gift I’d cherish forever.

“You’re very lucky, you know,” Aurora said as she cracked an egg on the side of the bowl. “I don’t know of anyone who’s ever survived the gargoyle’s curse with their humanity intact.”

“I’m guessing you know the whole story about what happened to me?”

“In great detail.”

Of course she knew. She must have her finger on the pulse of the entire Hatchet order no matter how scattered they were. I guessed that Rafe kept her well informed about everything having to do with me. Everything he knew, anyway.

“I also know about the newly made gargoyle who used to be your friend.”

“Aydin is still my friend.” The flutter in my belly reminded me how my feelings ran deeper than mere friendship. “He may look different on the outside, but he’s the same man on the inside.”

My grandmother made a huffing noise. “Don’t be so sure.”

Her too? I plopped a glob of dough onto the pan. “You sound like Rafe.”

She looked at me and arched both her eyebrows. “Oh yes, you gave Raphael a nickname.” She chuckled. “Rafe. It suits him.”

I dug the spoon into the bowl. “I don’t get how he can be so judgy,” I said, then clamped my mouth shut before I could accuse her of being the same. We were just getting to know each other and I wanted her to like me. “I thought angels were supposed to be open-minded.”

“He worries about you, Chalice.”

I frowned, unused to anyone worrying about me unless they had an ulterior motive. It made me wonder if Rafe had one, too. “He’s a bit late, don’t you think?”

“Don’t be so hard on him. Your enslavement by the Vyantara wasn’t his fault.” Her voice sounded soft, but I heard the steel underneath.

“I’ve been on my own for a long time, Aurora. I know what’s best for me.”

She shrugged. “Maybe you do, but you have us now. Isn’t it time to let those who care about you into your life?”

I looked at her. “I’ve done that. Aydin cares about me. He saved my life.”

Aurora’s chest heaved with a sigh. “Okay, I’ll give you that. We would have lost you if not for him.”

Nodding, I said, “Exactly my point. Aydin’s a good man.”

“But he’s not a man anymore. And that’s my point.”

“Rafe isn’t a man, either.”

“Touché.” She scooped a glob of peanut butter out of a jar and dropped it in the bowl she was stirring. “But he could be. It’s what he wants.”

I blinked. “The only way that can happen is if…”

My grandmother gave me a hard look. “Your grandfather and I have been happy together for over fifty years. He was a wonderful guardian angel, and he’s an equally wonderful man.”

My skin heated at the thought of Rafe and I doing the wild thing. I didn’t think of him that way and it wouldn’t be right. It was hard enough being friends with the guy. He was more like an overprotective big brother than anything else.

I rapidly dropped more dollops of dough onto the pan. “He and I don’t really know each other.”

“That will change with time.”

“He’s not my type.”

“You two are more alike than you think.”

This conversation was making me more uncomfortable by the second. “Don’t get your hopes up. I have other plans.”

She folded her arms across her chest and waited for me to go on.

“Aydin won’t be a gargoyle much longer.”

Her expression softened when she said, “Honey, I know it’s hard to accept, but once humans have transformed—”

“They can become human again by eating the heart of their bonded gargoyle.”

Her eyes squinted in thought. “That old myth? Chalice, you’d have to kill a gargoyle to take its heart. The creature would turn to stone so fast you’d never get hold of it in time.”

I glanced behind and around me to make sure we were alone. I peeled back the shield on my senses and heard murmurs from both men in the other room as well as three distinct heartbeats somewhere else in the house. I knew my grandparents had other knights living with them and the three I sensed were far enough away they couldn’t see us.

I reached inside my inner jacket pocket and touched the warm chunk of polished stone that was Shojin’s heart. It seemed to pulse in my hand, though I knew my imagination got the best of me. The heart was just as dead as the gargoyle it came from.

Treating it like a fragile piece of glass, I held it out for my grandmother to see.

She looked puzzled before recognition brightened her eyes. “Oh, my.”

I smiled, feeling warm affection for the gentle monster the heart had come from. “This is the heart of Aydin’s gargoyle. All he has to do is eat it and he’ll become human again.”

“But how…?” She swallowed. “I don’t understand. It should have shattered along with the beast when it turned to stone.”

I slipped the heart back into my pocket. “I know, but there’s a reason that didn’t happen. It’s a long story.”

The mixing bowl I held grew suddenly warm. Glancing down at the lumps of dough on the pan, I saw steam begin to rise as if the cookies were baking. What the hell? The edges were turning brown and they weren’t even in the oven.

The wooden spoon in my hand exploded in flame.

“Oops,” said a quiet voice from the doorway.

I threw the spoon onto the stone-tile floor and stomped on it to put out the flames.

“Rusty! What have I told you about using cloaking spells in the house?” My grandmother soaked a towel under the faucet and tossed it over the smoldering spoon. “I hate it when you sneak up on me like that.”

Sneaking? I was more concerned about the fire. Even so, the very idea of a cloaking spell that could evade my senses had me worried.

Aurora crouched down and mopped up the mess of burned wood and ashes. “Honestly, Rusty. What were you thinking?”

“It was a joke,” said the young woman who stood leaning against the counter. “I didn’t mean for anything to catch on fire.” Her hair was the color of flame, long and wavy, and she appeared close to me in age. Maybe a year or two older and about five inches taller. Forest-green eyes reflected an odd combination of confidence and uncertainty. Her gaze flicked over me, then back to Aurora. “I thought it would be a fun way to introduce myself.” Her mouth tilted in a smug smile.

My grandmother shook her head and tossed the ruined towel in the sink. “Chalice, this is Rusty, one of the Hatchet knights staying with us.”

My heart fluttered. A sister knight, and she stood right in front of me. This was a moment I’d been longing for, but I somehow didn’t feel all that pleased to meet her. Rusty’s choice of introduction left a bad taste in my mouth, not to mention burned fingers.

“Hello, Rusty.” I blew on my hand. “I’d shake your hand if it wasn’t for the blisters.”

Aurora grabbed my arm to haul me to the sink. She flipped the knob on the faucet and cold water flowed over scorched flesh that was already starting to heal.

“Honestly,” my grandmother mumbled. “Rusty can be such a show-off.”

“Sorry, Chalice.” Sincere regret shone in Rusty’s eyes and my irritation waned. She was my sister. I couldn’t stay mad at her forever.

I grinned. “No worries. It’s already healing. See?” I waved my pink fingers at her.

“No wonder I have so many gray hairs,” Aurora said as she tossed me a fresh dish towel to dry my hands.

Another young woman, her small stature and dark complexion in sharp contrast to Rusty, joined us in the kitchen. She was about my height and had an ethnic cast to her features; her shoulder-length hair was stick-straight and shiny as black glass.

“Hey, Natalie,” my grandmother said. “This is Chalice.”

“Hello,” I said, happy to meet another sister.

She waved a small hand. “Hi.”

An awkward silence followed.

“You’ve witnessed Rusty’s ability firsthand,” my grandmother said as she tossed a glare at my red-haired sister. “Natalie has a unique talent for finding things.”

I was pretty good at finding things, too. I wondered if she shared my freakish anomaly of heightened senses. “That’s a handy skill to have.”

“I’m a psychometrist,” Natalie said.

Oh, yes. I’d met a few psychometrists in my previous line of work. They were clairvoyants with a unique ability to read psychic impressions that people left on objects. There were some who could even recite the history of things that were hundreds of years old. The Vyantara had often used psychometrists for authenticating the cursed and charmed objects I stole for them.

When the phone rang, everyone jumped. I imagined recent bad news to be the cause, though its delivery would have come via angel and not fiber optics. It was obvious that the nerves around here were strung as tight as a hangman’s rope.

Rusty snatched the wireless phone from its cradle on the wall. Her expression tense, she nodded and murmured something in the receiver before hanging it up.

“A fire broke out in a farmhouse outside of town.” She glanced at each of us, her expression grave. “The snow slowed it down, but flames are playing leapfrog in the treetops and spreading fast.”

Aurora put her hand to her chest. “Dear Lord. Was that the fire chief?”

Rusty nodded. “The fire’s almost out of control so he’s calling all volunteer firefighters.”

A firestarter who fights fires? That’s a switch. “Is there anything I can do?” I asked before thinking. Fire scared the crap out of me.

“No, Chalice, but thanks anyway.” She flashed a smile faster than I could blink. “Natalie, will you drive?”

Natalie nodded.

Rusty trotted to a closed door near the front of the house and yanked it open. Coats and jackets dangled from hangers and she pulled one free.

Aurora had followed her and I was right behind. “I think you should take Chalice with you,” my grandmother said.

Rusty blinked in surprise. “There’s nothing she can do.”

“Yes, there is.” Aurora looked at me, her face tight with concern. “We have a room stacked with boxes that contain the curses and charms Quin Dee brought to us.”

Quin. I’d never forget the angel whisperer who got killed because of me, though the angels had made sure he didn’t stay dead for long. My heart tripped over itself at the memory of his sudden and welcomed resurrection.

“The knights need protection at all costs,” my grandmother added in a voice edged with panic. “We can’t lose any more. Chalice, will you help them?”

“I’ll do what I can,” I said, my brain whirring as I tried to remember what all had been in that stash of hexed objects. It was Aydin’s pilfered treasure that he had entrusted to Quin. He’d wanted to make sure my sisters would have them someday. My job would be teaching them how to use each one. “I’ll grab a charm or two that could be useful.”

Rusty huffed out a breath. “We don’t have time for this. The chief said the fire is reaching a critical point.”

“I’ll hurry.” I followed my grandmother to a room in the back of the house.

It was all here. Every old rusted trunk, rotted wooden crate, ancient cardboard box, barrel and jar. I felt their power the moment I crossed the threshold into the storage room, but I was immune to their effects. Having endured the gargoyle’s curse, I could handle these objects with impunity, as could Aydin. My sister knights could not.

I scanned the stash, remembering what most everything was, and reached for a weathered old ox horn. It had special properties that would be useful in a fire.

I ran outside, where Natalie and Rusty were already sitting inside a battered old red Jeep.

Rafe marched toward me. “Where do you think you’re going?”

I scowled. “Since when do I have to check in with you?”

“Since the day I became your guardian.”

Which was little over a month ago and I still wasn’t used to the idea. “Is that part of the deal?”

“More or less.”

I shrugged. “Well, I’m going with my sisters. You do whatever you want.”

He raised an eyebrow, looking superior and irritating the crap out of me. “Aren’t you forgetting something?”

“Chalice!” Rusty stuck her head out the open window. “Are you coming? Or would you rather wait for the entire town to burn down first?”

I lurched toward the Jeep and Rafe grabbed my arm. He dipped his chin. “You don’t want something to accidentally slip from your pocket, do you?”

I blinked. Shit. I still had Shojin’s heart. When I started to hand it to Rafe, he backed away. “I can’t touch it.”

Damn.

“Give me one more sec,” I shouted at Rusty, then ran around to the back of the house. A large ponderosa tree stood sentry there, a ring of melting snow at its base. I grabbed a stick to dig in the slightly frozen ground, creating a hole just big enough to conceal the heart. I buried it, then packed a few handfuls of snow on top. That would have to do for now. I’d find a better hiding place when I got back.


five

IT TOOK LESS THAN TEN MINUTES FOR US to reach the burned-out farmhouse at the edge of town. Flames flared orange in the distance, black smoke billowing up to blend with a gloomy sky. The house was just a smoldering mess of charred wood, exposed brick and chunks of blackened plumbing.

Natalie grabbed a toy truck from the ground and clutched it to her chest. “He’s still alive.”

“What?” I shot a look at Rusty, who appeared equally surprised. “Who are you talking about?”

Natalie swallowed. “The child no one knew was home when the fire started.”

Oh, my God. “Where are the parents?” I wondered out loud.

Natalie shook her head. “Not here, that much I know. But the boy is close. I can sense him.”

Rusty gave me a disapproving look. “If the boy inhaled too much smoke he may not be alive for much longer.”

“Don’t you have a fire to put out?” I asked, though I was more annoyed with myself than with Rusty. I shouldn’t have taken so much time to hide Shojin’s heart. Handing Rusty the ox horn, I told her, “Take this with you.”

She pushed it away. “I’m fine on my own. I don’t need help from a hex that once belonged to the Vyantara.”

I understood how she felt, but seriously? This from someone who whipped up a cloaking spell like a quick cup of coffee? “It can help you. Breathe through it if the smoke gets too thick. It acts as a kind of oxygen mask.”

“Thanks, but no thanks.” She turned and sprinted toward a line of flames less than a mile away. “I’ll send help back for the boy,” she shouted over her shoulder.

“I hope she’s as good at fighting fires as she is at being stubborn,” I said to Natalie.

“She is,” Natalie told me. “Though I wish she’d accepted your offer.” Her dark eyes shone with concern. “The knights are not invincible. We could use the help.”

Help against an unknown, and unnatural, enemy. The kind of help that only something equally unnatural could provide.

I wanted to ask her about the others, what she knew about them and their powers. I wanted details about the knights who had survived. And though it was peaceful here in the deserted yard of a burned-out farmhouse, a clock was ticking. An injured child, possibly a dying one, needed someone to find him.

I watched, breathless, as Natalie’s skin paled enough to rival the whiteness of snow beneath our feet. Her fingers worked over the metal toy, its bright yellow body dented, scratched and rusting on the edges. She gripped the thing as if clinging to life, which its owner might have been doing himself right then. Her knuckles turned bone-white and a drop of blood trickled down the side of her hand that had been cut on the old metal truck.

I knew better than to interrupt a psychometrist’s connection to a subject. She was linked to this child and disturbing her now could break the tie, or worse. I’d witnessed a psychic lose his sanity when someone hastily tore him away from the object he clutched. His mind was still attached to his subject and he never recovered. I wasn’t about to take that chance with Natalie. A cut hand was nothing compared to a lost mind.

A tear slipped free from Natalie’s glazed eyes. “He’s hiding.”

I’d guessed that already but kept my mouth shut. She was thinking out loud, expressing her vision.

“He’s cold,” she said, and freed one hand from the toy to hug herself. “And scared.”

“Where is he?”

She swiveled to directly face the farmhouse and pointed. “There.”

Impossible. The house had burned to the ground. Nothing could have survived that.

“Can you show me?” I asked her.

She shook her head. “That’s what I see. The house. And a darkness so black it’s as if he’s blind.”

“Is he?”

“No.”

Which meant some part of the house had been protected from the fire. “I’ll go look.”

“Be careful,” Natalie said.

No one needed to tell me that, but I still promised, “I will be.”

Seeing the charred remains of furniture and other household stuff tossed here and there reminded me of the Vyantara fatherhouse that had blown up soon after I’d summoned my fallen angel father. But there were no scattered charms and curses here, and thankfully no ghosts, either. Just ruined pieces of a family that had probably lived here for generations.

As I weaved through the smoldering ruins, I visualized the dissolving of walls that guarded my senses. The first sound I heard was a sobbing child. The boy had breath enough to cry and that lightened my heart with relief.

I squinted through the lingering smoke. No auras were visible, and therefore nothing alive that I could see. The boy’s crying sounded weak, but I could still feel it through the soles of my boots. He was below ground. I sniffed the air and, although it was heavily scented with the smell of burned wood and plastic, a subtle aroma of soap and shampoo wafted through. The bathrooms above ground had been destroyed, which meant the scent came from the boy.

“What’s his name?” I called to Natalie, who stood at a safe distance.

“Timmy.”

“Timmy?” I called out. “Can you hear me?”

I heard coughing, then a murmured reply I couldn’t make out. He began sobbing quietly again.

“Can you knock on something for me?” I asked, following the trail of muted sound to what must have been the kitchen. A blackened refrigerator lay on its side. “Knock on the wall or the floor. Anything.”

No answer.

And no more crying.

I hoped we weren’t too late. Where was the boy’s family? Why was he left here alone?

My vision could penetrate thin surfaces like paint and paper, even some fabrics. But the solid objects around me were too dense. However, I did manage to see through the black ashes covering the floor and noticed the outline of a door. A cellar door. And the charred refrigerator lay directly on top of it.

I crouched down to try pushing it off, but it was way too heavy for me. Timmy was down there; I could hear him breathing, but only barely.

“Natalie, I found him!” I called out. “He’s in the basement, but I can’t get to him. There’s a refrigerator blocking the door.”

“Help should have been here by now!” she yelled back, and I heard the Jeep’s door slam shut. “Hang tight, I’ll take care of it.” The engine started, followed by the sound of tires crunching over snow.

I kept pushing at the fridge, but it hardly budged. Whatever had been inside leaked out onto the blackened linoleum in a dark putrid mess. I closed my eyes to concentrate. Timmy was still breathing.

Then I heard something new. Wings flapped loudly above me and I glanced up at the sky, seeing nothing. Yet a sudden wind swept my hair back and flung ash and charred bits of wood in my face. Still crouched low to the ground, I covered my head with my arms.

I smelled damp fur and animal musk, but also a natural spicy scent I remembered from when he was human. Aydin had found me. Or maybe he’d been following me from the start. Either way, it was a relief to have him here even if I couldn’t see him.

His gargoyle form suddenly appeared above me and his talons pierced the appliance like it was made from tin foil. The fridge crumpled when he lifted it off the floor. I watched as it flew a dozen feet to the side, then bounced a couple times before coming to a stop. The cellar door was free. And Aydin was already gone.

Sirens screamed in the distance, meaning help had arrived. I opened the cellar door and a plume of gray smoke puffed out the opening. The dimly lit outline of a child lay at the foot of the stairs. I scuttled down the steps and scooped up the boy, who couldn’t have weighed more than forty pounds. His dark hair was powdered with ash, and soot smeared his nose and cheeks. He still breathed, but barely.

I ran up the steps and out of the burned rubble toward the ambulance. “Help!” I called to the two men who hopped out the back. “This boy was in the cellar when the house burned.”

They took him from me and got to work. I heard the boy cough and a wave of relief washed over me.

Catching my breath, I scouted the area for Natalie. I saw that a thick wall of smoke had replaced the flames so I hoped that meant the fire was out.

Gasps of heavy weeping came from the back of the ambulance and I wondered if it held another victim of the fire. I went to see if there was anything I could do to help.

Natalie sat crouched inside, head lowered over a prone figure covered head to toe with a white sheet.

“Natalie?” I climbed up to sit beside her. “What’s going on?”

Head still down, she snuffled before saying, “It’s Rusty. She’s dead.”

“What?” I couldn’t believe it. An immense sadness welled up inside me, but my fury battered it down. My sister knights were dying and I was helpless to stop it.

Hands shaking, I gently lowered the sheet to find Rusty’s pretty, pale face underneath. “How did it happen?”

“Don’t know,” Natalie said. “I arrived at the front line. Found her by a wall of fire. She was backing it off. Using her will to put it out. Then…” She gulped air before going on. “Then she collapsed.”

“Did anyone try to revive her?” I touched my fingers to Rusty’s throat. No pulse, but her skin was still warm. I thought about the boy. “She must have suffocated from inhaling too much smoke.”

Natalie shook her head. “Smoke has never been a problem for her.”

It obviously was now. I lowered my ear to Rusty’s face and listened. Not even the slightest breath.

“The EMTs did try to revive her.” Natalie wiped her nose on the sleeve of her coat. “But she wouldn’t come around.”

So that’s what had taken so long for them to get here. I glanced outside the ambulance to see both EMTs caring for the boy, who cried and coughed but appeared to be okay. I didn’t want them seeing what I was about to do.

“I’m going to try something.” I reached into my coat pocket and tugged out the ox horn charm. “I don’t know the extent of its power, but I have to give it a shot.”

The ugly black horn, no bigger than the width of my hand, was chipped and blackened with age. I’d never seen one used, but I knew it to be an object of magic the Vikings kept with them as part of their battle armor. It enabled them to breathe through smoke as they pillaged the villages they burned.

I didn’t know much about this charm and was hesitant to place the horn between Rusty’s blue lips. There was always a price to pay for using dark magic. If it gave her breath back, what would it demand in return?

“Chalice?” Natalie gulped a breath between sobs. “What are you doing?”

“What Rusty should have done when she had the chance.” I slipped the horn’s tip into Rusty’s mouth.

I waited a full minute. Nothing happened.

I started to withdraw the horn when a wisp of smoke trailed out the charm’s cone-shaped end.

“I think it’s working,” I whispered.

Rusty’s chest began rising slowly, as if being pumped with air. Now I was afraid she’d burst from a breath too big for her lungs. Instead, color pinked her cheeks and her eyelids squeezed so tight it looked like she was in pain, and I hoped she was. That would mean she was alive.

Rusty coughed and the ox horn flew from her mouth and landed in the snow outside. She sat up, gasping, clutching her chest and heaving in gulps of air.

Natalie lunged at her and wrapped her in a hug so tight I thought she’d squeeze the breath out of her again. They cried in each other’s arms. As much as I wanted to join in, I hung back and tried not to feel left out. I was a knight too, and that knowledge would have to be enough for now.

“You scared me to death,” Natalie told her.

Rusty looked confused for a second, then shot me a glance. “Was I dead?”

“Pretty much, yeah,” I said.

She touched her lips. “Was that thing in my mouth? That cursed horn?”

I pulled back my shoulders and straightened my spine. “Yes. It gave you back your life.”

“If not for Chalice you’d still be dead,” Natalie said. “She saved you.”

Rusty frowned, not appearing one bit thankful. Then her frown deepened. “Something took my breath away.”

Natalie nodded. “The smoke. You suffocated.”

Shaking her head, Rusty said, “No, smoke has no effect on me. It was something else.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“It felt so…strange.” She still clutched her chest, her eyes growing distant as if trying to remember. “Like being inside a vacuum. There was no smoke, no air, no nothing. As if something sucked my breath right out of me.”

Natalie and I exchanged looks. She said, “That’s impossible, Rusty. It’s only happened to knights that are asleep.”

“Maybe whatever it was is now desperate enough to prey on us when we’re awake,” I said. “Rusty, what was the last thing you saw before passing out?”

“Fire.”

“You didn’t see anyone near you?” I asked.

“Of course there were people near me.” Rusty bit off each word. “We were fighting a fire. Four fighters stood beside me, each wearing a protective suit and mask.”

“So you couldn’t see their faces,” Natalie said.

“No, I couldn’t.”

“I bet one of them did it,” I said. “The Hatchet murderer disguised himself to get close to you.”

“Hatchet murderer?” Rusty chuckled. “You make it sound like a villain from a bad horror movie.”

I glared at her. “I wasn’t trying to be funny.”

“Don’t worry, you weren’t,” Rusty said, but the corners of her mouth pulled up in a smile. “Thanks for saving my life even if you did use that…thing.”

I looked down at the snow where the horn had fallen. It lay there looking dull and ordinary, its power spent. I vaguely wondered if it could be recharged and if so, who could recharge it. Cursed or not, it was a handy gadget to have around, especially for a fire master like Rusty. I hopped down from the ambulance and snatched it up to shove into my coat pocket.

I gazed out at the sky, wondering if Aydin still watched. He was more of a guardian angel than Rafe, who spent too much time being stubborn about accepting Aydin for the good man he was. He wouldn’t stop criticizing him for becoming a gargoyle, which wasn’t even his fault. Come to think of it, none of our guardian angels had come to the rescue.

“I’m new at all this knight stuff,” I told my sisters. “Can I ask you both a question?”

They had guarded looks on their faces, their eyes shifting attention from me to each other and back again. “Sure,” Rusty said. “Shoot.”

“Where was your guardian angel when you were suffocating to death?” I asked.

The corner of Rusty’s mouth slid up in a smug grin. “That’s not how it works. It’s not like they’re on autopilot.”

Granted, I still had a lot to learn, but I was confused. “Guardians don’t guard?”

“They’re more like guides,” Natalie said. “Once we’re old enough to be knights, our guardians shift roles from protector to partner. They come to our aid only when summoned.”

Okay, I could buy that, but I had to admit the partner thing made me squeamish. I was about to say so when the two EMTs came back to the ambulance with the boy on a backboard. They stood statute-still and stared at Rusty, their mouths gaping like howler monkeys.

“Oh!” Rusty scrambled to her feet and wobbled, but Natalie caught her before she could fall. “The boy! Is he okay?”

“Chalice saved him, too.” Natalie sounded like a proud sister. It gave me a warm feeling.

Rusty blinked. “Cool,” she said as Natalie helped her down from the ambulance.

The EMTs were sputtering something about Rusty being dead, her heart having stopped, blah-blah-blah. I’d been around the supernatural long enough to know death wasn’t always a permanent condition, but these guys had no clue.

I infused my voice with amazement when I told them, “It was so strange. Rusty suddenly sat straight up. We about jumped right out of our skins, didn’t we, Natalie?”

Natalie trilled a nervous giggle that sounded about as real as a sitcom laugh track. She patted her chest. “Oh, yes. Quite a shock.”

The men shook their heads and went on with their work, securing the boy to a gurney. One of them said, “Miss, you need to come with us to the hospital and get checked out. You could be more injured than you think.”

“I’m fine,” Rusty said, waving them off like flies. “You have a more important patient to worry about.”

I tilted my head toward the boy. “Does anyone know where his parents are?”

The EMT who’d expressed concern about Rusty said, “They’ve been notified. The boy was supposed to be in school, but he snuck out to go home.” He frowned at Timmy, who looked no older than six or seven. “We suspect he started the fire.”

Someone was in big trouble. “I’m just happy he’s okay.”

“So are his parents. Thanks for your help.” The EMT nodded at me before slipping into the seat behind the wheel. His partner stayed in back and closed the ambulance doors.

We watched them drive off, siren blaring.

Rusty gave my shoulder a friendly yet firm slap. “Welcome to Halo Home.”


six

“YOU WERE DEAD?” MY GRANDMOTHER asked, her turquoise eyes intent on Rusty.

Rusty nodded. “Suffocated. And not from inhaling smoke.”

“She had the breath sucked out of her,” Natalie said. “Sound familiar?”

Aurora’s face went pale. “That does it. No one leaves this house until the murderer is found and dealt with. Is that understood?”

“The Hatchet murderer.” Rusty waggled her fingers and made a ghostly wailing sound.

My grandmother closed her eyes as if praying for patience. “There’s nothing funny about this. Over forty knights have been picked off like flies, leaving only a half dozen left. That’s counting the four of us.”

Rusty bent her head and mumbled, “Sorry.”

“I think Rusty is still suffering from shock. Death will do that to a person.” I felt my grandmother looking at me and sensed she didn’t appreciate a smart-ass.

Aurora sighed. “Okay, I get it. A little levity in a crisis can be cathartic, but please, let’s not forget the knights we have lost.”

Damn. Now I felt guilty. I was trying hard not to feel anything at all and being a smart-ass usually worked for that.

Rafe and my grandfather stood by the fireplace in stony silence. They hadn’t involved themselves in our discussion, which was probably just as well. I’m sure they grieved in their own way.

“Am I interrupting?” asked a young but strong voice from the foot of the stairs. A teenage girl stood with her arms crossed, her jeans torn in a way that should be fashionable, but I didn’t think hers were like that on purpose. Her razor-cut white hair that was too pale to be bleached hung over half her face and the dark liner around her eyes made her look ghoulish. She tugged at her woolen cap as if trying to hide her eyes. Wise choice. She had so much eyeliner on that I couldn’t tell what part of her face was real and what was painted.

“Xenia, come in,” my grandmother said, making a scooping gesture with her hand. “I want you to meet my granddaughter.”

Oh, another knight. Great, but I wondered why she hadn’t come with Natalie and Rusty to the kitchen this morning. Had she slept in?

Xenia avoided my eyes, and she didn’t venture any farther into the room. If I thought I was out of place, this one acted like she was in a whole other world.

Aurora smiled. “Xenia is a new recruit for the knighthood,” she explained. “She came to us last week.”

“A normie,” Rusty said under her breath.

“A what?” I asked.

“Normie,” Natalie repeated. “Means her father wasn’t an angel. She just talks to them.”

Exactly like Quin Dee, who was an angel whisperer like his father had been, and his father’s father, and so on down the line. Saint Geraldine had been an angel whisperer, too.

“Where do the Arelim find these…normies?” I asked.

“Angel whisperers have a telepathic link with the Arelim,” my grandmother said. “The ones selected to train as knights have been screened based on their willingness to devote their entire lives to serving our order.

“Now that we have to practically start the order over from scratch, more young women like Xenia will be joining us.” Aurora gave each of us a long look before adding, “And I’ll be depending on you three to train them.”

I was almost as new as Xenia and still had a lot to learn myself, but I’d do my part. “What kind of powers will the new recruits have?”

“None,” Aurora said. “Their only gift is an ability to communicate with all Arelim, not just their guardians. Plus they will only die if the Arelim allow it.”

“Normies are immortal?” I asked, stunned by this news.

“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Rusty said. “I mean for us. Not for them.”

“This only applies to those whisperers who become Hatchet knights. Possible immortality compensates for their lack of supernatural powers,” my grandmother explained. “It’s their only protection from the evil they will vow to fight.”

Of course. Quin had sacrificed himself to the enemy, and the Arelim had given him his life back. It made sense that these new knights would be granted the same gift.

Xenia rolled her eyes. She obviously didn’t appreciate her immortal status, or she didn’t believe it. If I were her, I’m not sure I’d believe it, either. Pretty far-fetched if you asked me.

“Does this mean they’re protected from whatever is killing the knights?” I asked.

“We don’t know,” my grandfather said. These were the first words I’d heard out of him since this morning. “The angel whisperers, or normies as you girls like to call them, don’t have to succumb to natural causes of death. At least not permanently. We’re not so sure about the unnatural kind.”

“And I suppose guinea pigs for testing this theory are in short supply,” Rusty said.

“Let’s just say we’re not taking any chances,” Zeke told her.

Wow, what a day. Too much too fast, and I was starting to fade. I stifled a yawn.

My grandmother cleared her throat. “Chalice, you’ll be sharing a room with Xenia.”

Xenia rolled her eyes again. If she kept doing that they’d get stuck staring at the back of her own head. The girl jerked her chin in the direction of the stairs before heading that way herself.

“Hold on, Xenia. I need to give Chalice something first.” Aurora tugged at a loop of thin chain she wore around her neck and pulled a shiny object out from beneath her sweater. She dragged it up and over her head, then held it out to me. “This belongs to you now.”

I glanced at Rafe, who stood still as a mannequin beside the fireplace. He nodded and tilted his head toward my grandmother.

I stepped closer to see what she offered. About the size of my palm, it looked like a talisman in the shape of a shield. An embossed crest was divided in half, with one side the scarlet cross of the Crusades, and the other a silver angel wing. The sight of it brought a lump to my throat. I’d never seen it before, but I knew exactly what it was.

“My mother’s shield,” I whispered.

Aurora nodded. “I gave this shield to your mother on the day she was old enough for knighthood, just as my mother had given it to me, and her mother to her.” She lowered the chain with the shield over my head. “It symbolizes dozens of generations from our bloodline, all the way back to the first Hatchet knights who fought in the Crusades.”

Which meant my ancestor was a knight who had fought beside Saint Geraldine. A chill skittered down my spine and made my ears ring. My chest felt tight with so much emotion I was afraid I’d crumble, but it wouldn’t do for me to show weakness in front of a recruit who already had doubts.

I inspected the old shield and found deep cracks in the metal and evidence of rust or blood beneath a surface of thick, clear lacquer. “Is this the original?” I asked.

My grandmother tilted her head to one side. “Part of it. The original shield was used in battle, where it was nearly destroyed. After the war ended it was broken down and reshaped into what you hold in your hands.”

“Wow.” It felt heavy and I couldn’t imagine wearing this around my neck 24/7.

“It’s a symbol now, Chalice.” She smoothed the hair from my forehead, then cupped my face in both her hands to stare into my eyes. “This shield of knighthood is yours to keep. It’s who you are and who you’ll always be.”

I inhaled a shaky breath and pressed the shield to my chest. “I’ll take good care of it.”

She lightly patted my cheek. “I know you will. Now scoot. You must be exhausted and you have a big day tomorrow.”

“I do?”

“A half-dozen squires are expected here before noon.”

Squires were knights in training. Oh, my God. So soon? I wasn’t ready.

“You’re ready,” Rafe said, as if he’d heard my thoughts.

I shot him a look and narrowed my eyes. Such a know-it-all. He gave me a crooked grin.

Dazed from my surreal day, I robotically followed Xenia up the stairs to our room. A bed never looked so good. My bag of meager belongings sat on the floor beside it.

I think Xenia was talking to me when I trudged bonelessly to the edge of the bed. She could have been speaking Mandarin Chinese for all I knew. My brain was fried and sleep called to me like a siren’s song. I did a face-plant on the mattress, missing the pillow completely, and fell instantly asleep.

* * *

I awakened slowly and thought my bladder was about to burst.

Opening my eyes to a deep darkness that only a moonless night could provide, it took me a few seconds to place my surroundings. My night vision kicked in and a bedroom came into focus.

I padded my way down the hall, following the scent of shampoo and soap. By the time I returned to my bed I was no longer sleepy. My brain had already started buzzing with all that had happened the day before and what I’d have going on today. It was exciting and daunting at the same time.

I wandered to the window and glanced outside at a bluish haze, which was how my eyes perceived night. It looked as I expected until my gaze landed on the snow around the giant ponderosa in the yard. The tree glowed with life, which I also expected, but the area where I’d buried Shojin’s heart glowed, too. So brightly, in fact, that it could easily be seen by anyone without my superior eyesight.

“Oh no,” I murmured. I’d meant to hide the heart, not make it a beacon. If I brought it inside the house, it would glow no matter where I put it. I’d just have to bury it deeper. Then I could cover it with iron to guarantee no one would find it. Iron blocked all magic as well as extrasensory perception.

Since I hadn’t bothered to undress before falling into bed, I didn’t have to worry about waking my roommate by rummaging through my bag looking for clothes. I glanced over at the twin-size bed on the other side of the room to see Xenia still as death beneath a hill of blankets. I fought the urge to shake her and make sure she was alive. The Hatchet murderer had made me paranoid.

I grabbed my jacket from the floor and scurried down the stairs to the kitchen. It didn’t take long for me to find the iron skillet I was looking for. It took a bit longer to find a shovel, which was stashed with a couple of terra-cotta pots and an empty half-barrel planter under the deck outside.

The snow over the buried heart had softened and would probably have been completely melted in a few hours. I scooped away the slush and dug the shovel into the mud underneath. The hole I had made for the heart was even shallower than I thought. Though the stone was probably harder than most rocks, I handled it gently, taking care not to crack or chip its glowing surface. It had to be perfect for Aydin.

I shrugged off my jacket, which had made me too warm anyway, and wrapped it around the heart before getting back to work. The ground became harder the deeper I dug, the frozen mixture of clay and soil solid as a brick. But I hammered at it, swearing under my breath, until I finally pulled away fist-size chunks. Once I got about two feet down, I kneeled to place the heart back in the hole, covered it with the iron skillet, then mounded clods of frozen dirt on top. A generous frosting of snow completed the job. A perfect deep-dish mud pie. And here I thought I couldn’t cook.

I stood to survey my work. No more glow. Mission accomplished.

Shaking the bits of snow and dirt from my jacket, I slipped it on over my sweaty shirt and zipped it closed. My boots were covered in mud, the knees of my jeans caked with the stuff, and my face was undoubtedly smudged with evidence of my secret. I’d have to shower and change before anyone saw me and started asking questions. Aurora and Rafe were the only ones beside Aydin who knew about the heart.

No sooner did his name pass through my mind than I caught a faint whiff of damp fur and sandalwood. A bare whisper of Aydin’s scent trailed on a chilly breeze, and then it was gone. I’d only imagined it. I couldn’t get him out of my mind.

I vaguely wondered what time it was and let my gaze sweep the horizon in search of dawn’s faint light. Instead I found the ghostly outline of a figure just beyond the perimeter of Halo Home’s warded boundaries. Opening and closing his wings, the hulking form paced slowly back and forth across the road.

I could see that Aydin waited for me. The compulsion to run to him grew like a cresting wave that had nowhere to go but forward. My grandmother had forbidden us to leave the property, but she’d surely make an exception this time. Aydin would protect me. He always had.

I ran through the drifted snow, my boots breaking through a crust of ice that had formed overnight. When I reached the perimeter of wards, I stopped. Aydin would be invisible to someone with normal vision, but I could see the particles of his life force. His ghostly gargoyle form turned to face me. I breached the wards and walked his way.

He wasn’t solid in this state, and I knew he couldn’t materialize without the risk of being detected. If I could just get close enough to sense his essence, I could imagine him as he once was and get lost in the fantasy of us being together again. We’d never had a chance to get as close as we had wanted, but it didn’t have to stay that way. We could have a future now, but only if he did the one thing that would make him human.

Aydin came to me. His gait was brisk and I realized then that he had no plan of stopping. That’s what had happened inside Geraldine’s tomb when Aydin’s ghostly body had merged with mine, his thoughts blending with my own before putting me to sleep. He’d had to do it to prevent me from accidentally spilling the secrets Geraldine had told us to our Vyantara master. I doubted sleep was Aydin’s intention this time and so I welcomed the merge. I needed to feel him close and having him inside my mind was more than okay with me.

I closed my eyes, sensing his presence flow into me like water through a stream. My pulse quickened, my skin flushed with heat, and an electric buzz skimmed down my spine. Aydin and I were now one.

I’ve missed you, I told him in mind.

I missed you too, he said, and my heart melted because I could hear his voice, his human voice, inside my head.

You’re not mad at me anymore? I asked.

I was never mad at you, Chalice. He paused. I was hurt. You know how much Shojin meant to me.

Of course I know. His sacrifice was… I couldn’t find the words.

He was a selfless creature. I tried to tell you that.

He certainly had and I’d never believed him until it was too late. But even then, I doubt anything could have stopped Shojin from giving up his heart.

I inhaled Aydin’s familiar scent and it comforted me. Eyes still closed, it was like being in a lucid dream. I stood, semiconscious, on the snowy road. Scents of fresh pine and new-fallen snow filled my nostrils. Then I imagined him big as life right in front of me.

My head felt suddenly too light and I dreamed of Aydin reaching out with human hands to catch me before I could fall.

You look…human.

It’s your imagination. You’re seeing me as you remember. His almond-shaped eyes captivated me, and they crinkled in the corners when he smiled. I knew that smile. I’m inside your head right now. At least this way I can talk to you without snarls and grunts.

He made a good point. Visualizing him like this was as close as I could get to being with him for real. I reached out to touch him and my fingers grazed the rough cloth of his jean jacket like the one he’d worn when we’d shared our first kiss. That was when we said goodbye at the airport. I never saw him human again after that.

Don’t you want to come back? I asked.

He heaved a sigh and closed his eyes. I’ve been thinking long and hard about that. It wouldn’t be right for Shojin to have died in vain. Of course I want to come back. I need you.

Butterflies danced in my belly. He was about to say yes. So you’ll eat the heart?

He winced. That sounds so…barbaric.

I know.

Aydin shook his head. I can’t. Not yet.

My heartbeat slowed. Why not?

You and the few sisters you have left could use a big, ugly immortal gargoyle to your advantage.

Merging with my mind had allowed him to scan my thoughts, which saved me the time of explaining everything about the murders. He now knew as much as I did. Once he became human, he could help me train the squires to use charms for self-protection and lower their risks of getting killed.

I can still help train the squires, he said.

Not if you’re on the opposite side of the wards guarding the house. As a gargoyle, you can’t cross.

He studied me. Convince your grandmother to take them down. I’ll guard the house. Guarding houses is what gargoyles were originally meant to do before they were turned into assassins.

I shook my head. That will never happen. Angels and gargoyles have been enemies since the beginning of time. It will take more than begging to make my grandparents, not to mention the rest of the Arelim, change their minds.

He shrugged. Then we’ll find another way.

I felt a pout coming on. I already know another way.Change back. Be the warrior knight protector you used to be.

And still am. In this dream we shared, he pulled me into a hug. As long as I’m like this, I’m stronger and more intimidating to the bad guys.

Was it selfish of me to want him the way he used to be? Maybe. I’d been waiting over a month to change him back, so another month wouldn’t kill me. But not having his protection could kill my sister knights.

Merging our minds like this was so intimate it made my head spin. I’d never felt this dizzy with him before, but we’d never stayed joined this long, either. That’s when I realized I wasn’t the giddy, swept-off-my-feet kind of dizzy. I couldn’t breathe.

Aydin yanked his spirit out of me so fast that it felt like part of my soul had gone with him. I stood bereft in the icy night without Aydin’s warmth. And without oxygen.

My ears rang with a sudden barrage of shouts coming from the house. One shout sounded louder than the others, and I recognized it as Rafe’s. I peered through glazed eyes to see Rafe charge at Aydin, who was now in physical gargoyle form. His leathery wings spread wide and a violent hiss spewed from his fanged mouth as Rafe sprouted wings of his own. He shed his human form in one great burst of silver sparks and dived toward Aydin.

I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t breathe. I lay on the frozen ground like a gasping fish out of water. My eyes watered, but I still had vision enough to see the cloaked figure standing by the side of the road a hundred yards away.

I pointed and struggled to send Rafe a mental message, but he was too busy trying to take down the one person who might save us all.

Hands were holding me, trying to calm me, but desperation had me flailing to signal that the murderer was mere footsteps away. Couldn’t they see it? A black cloak fluttered around the shadowed face of whoever was trying to kill me. The strength of this creature’s power convinced me I should be dead by now. But it was toying with me, studying me. Clearly it wasn’t finished with me yet.

The figure appeared slender, almost skeletal, as a breeze pressed its robes tight against its body. That’s when I saw the curves. It was a woman.

I jerked a look at the winged warriors who battled soundlessly in a hovered position above the road. Angel and gargoyle wings beat the snow into blizzardlike flurries. Neither could be killed, so if someone didn’t stop them, their pointless fight would last until the end of time.

I saw Aydin try to yank free of Rafe’s powerful grasp. Not to escape, but to get at the woman on the road. From the look of intensity in his eyes, I knew he’d seen her, too.

Air suddenly whooshed into my lungs. I gulped it in, the dry cold making me cough as the top of my head felt ready to explode. I blinked in the woman’s direction. She was gone.

My grandfather wrapped his arms around me in a fierce embrace. “Thank God we have you back,” he said into my hair. I felt his tears wet on my face. He’d thought I was dying.

My grandmother was already on her feet and stomping across the road to where Aydin and Rafe still hovered in battle.

“Kill it!” Aurora shouted to Rafe, her hand stabbing the air in Aydin’s direction.

Nothing but another gargoyle could kill Aydin. However, a knife made from the body of one would do the trick. Rafe pulled something sharp, purple and shiny from the belt around his white tunic.

“No!” I shouted, or tried to. It came out as a squeak no one could hear. But Aydin had. With a powerful flap of wings tough enough to ride a tornado, he shot up into the air and vanished from sight.


seven

I DON’T REMEMBER GOING BACK TO BED, but I wakened there, my head pounding while sunlight stabbed into my corneas like ice picks. Closing my eyes to block it out didn’t help. I buried my head beneath the blankets, where I noticed someone had removed my muddy clothes and left me wearing nothing but panties and a T-shirt.

“Xenia, I told you the light hurts her eyes,” my grandmother said from somewhere in the room. “Close those drapes right now.”

“It’s almost noon,” Xenia said. “None of the rest of us is allowed to sleep in.”

“The rest of you didn’t almost die last night,” Aurora scolded as she stepped into the room.

When I heard the sound of the drapes being closed I peeked outside my cave of bedcovers.

“How are you feeling, Chalice?” Aurora asked, her voice not as warm as I would have liked. “Can I get you anything?”

You can get me my gargoyle boyfriend. But of course I didn’t actually say that. So I asked for water instead. My throat felt like I’d gargled with sandpaper.

After downing the full glass, I said hoarsely, “About last night…”

Aurora sat on the edge of the bed. “You’re lucky to be alive.”

I leaned forward and forced out a wheezy breath. “I know. But it’s not what you think.”

“It’s exactly what I think. That gargoyle tried to kill you.”

“Aydin? That’s ridiculous,” I said. The stern look in Aurora’s eyes told me she thought otherwise. “He’d have no reason to kill me.”

“Then how do you explain what happened?” She stood and stepped to the window, and I was suddenly afraid she knew where I had buried the heart. But its glow was hidden, I’d made sure of it. “A gargoyle is a creature of darkness, a trained assassin. Its nature is to kill people like us. I realize it was only doing what came natural, but that’s no excuse. It has to be destroyed.”

“Grandmother, you’re not listening to me.” I gritted my teeth to stop myself from saying something bitchy. “Aydin cares about me, about all of us. Being our knight’s protector has been his calling since the day he helped Saint Geraldine birth her child nearly a thousand years ago.”




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