Jessica Andersen - Nightkeepers

Dear God, it was beautiful. And horrible. Terrifying and wonderful. He saw the skull in vivid whites and blacks, the date, the jaguar . . . the blood soaking the burning earth. It was all there, and more. It was . . .

It was everything he’d been looking for, everything he was trying to make the others believe with his theories and papers, the final proof for a dissertation that had started losing momentum months ago.

It was perfect. And she’d been keeping it from him.

Anger coiled in his chest, red-black and foreign-feeling, and when his face felt strange and stretched tight, he realized he’d bared his teeth.

This should’ve been my discovery, he thought. Mine, not hers .

He reached out, wanting to touch the colors, wanting to inhale them, bring them into his body and breathe them out again as shapes and sounds. The room spun, contracting his attention into a grayish cone that began and ended with the piece of painted bark.

He’d originally intended—to the extent that he’d had a plan at all—to do a rough translation of the fragment right then, without removing it from her office. He’d planned to use it to springboard additional research, then use his findings to convince her to give him access to the full text. Or so he’d told himself. Now, as he reached out and carefully refolded the packet layer by layer, he knew that he’d never meant to do that at all.

He’d come to steal it.

Mind numb, fingers moving automatically, he slipped the packet beneath his shirt and tucked the tails of the garment into his waistband to hold the bundle in place against his skin. He cinched his belt an extra notch to secure everything, and took a long look around to make sure he’d left no sign of his presence. Then he slipped out the way he’d come in, a thief in the night, prompted by a half-heard whisper in the back of his head, the feeling of stars coming into alignment, and the dark, sensual power humming just beyond his fingertips, whispering to him. Calling to him.

Speaking words only he could understand.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

As Leah and the trainees filed into the sacred chamber for the Venus conjunction ceremony, her blue robes swished around her ankles and her stomach clenched with nerves. She didn’t think she was the only one fighting to stay calm, either. Sven was a funny gray-green color, his lips almost bloodless and pressed together in a thin line. Jade was sweating lightly, even though the AC was up and she’d be sitting outside the circle while the others underwent the ritual. Michael was his usual inscrutable self, with thick shields hidden behind a sexy smile, but she’d noticed him popping a Pepto tab when he thought nobody was looking. Brandt and Patience were hanging on to each other for dear life. Rabbit had lost some of his normal swagger, his nostrils flaring as he breathed in the copan smoke liberally scenting the air, and Alexis and Nate were clinging together in the corner, trying to look like they were fine. Yep, definite barf potential, all of them.

Worse, if one of them went, it’d be a chain reaction. Hold it together, Leah told herself as the door opened to reveal Red-Boar in his black robes and Strike in royal crimson, both wearing feathered headdresses and celts, and resolute expressions.

There were no nerves there, Leah saw, or if there were, they were well hidden as they all took their positions: the trainees in a circle around the altar with Red-Boar at the center, Strike on one side of the chac-mool , her on the other.

The sight of Strike in full-on I’m in charge here mode went a long way to settling her nerves.

Red-Boar flicked his black robes out of the way with a practiced move and sat cross-legged with his back to the altar. Over the top of the chac-mool , Strike and Leah faced each other and joined hands. Electricity arced across her skin at his touch, but it served only to bring the nerves right back where they’d been. What if the three-question ritual didn’t work?

Worse, what if it did?

She met his eyes, letting his apparent calm steady her fears. Letting the strength of his grip anchor her.

At Red-Boar’s gesture, the trainees dropped to sit cross-legged. Then the winikin filed in, carrying bowls, parchment, and ceremonial knives that they passed out. When they were gone and the door shut behind them once again, everyone had a bowl and knife except Jade, who sat against the wall, her expression caught somewhere between relief and humiliation.

Without a word, Red-Boar lifted his large, ornately carved stone knife, set it to his palm, and drew the blade sharply across his flesh. Blood welled, then dripped into the bowl, soaking into the layer of paper at the bottom. The others followed suit, then took turns passing a torch and using it to set the parchment aflame.

At Red-Boar’s gesture, each of them leaned forward and inhaled the smoke of burning blood, and whispered, ‘‘Pasaj och.’’

Seconds later they stilled and their faces went slack, indicating that they’d jacked into the barrier, sending their souls into the gray-green mist but leaving their bodies behind. When they did so, Leah felt . . . nothing. No power surge, no beckoning sense of urgency, no invitation to follow. Nothing except the edge of the altar digging into her ribs and the grip of Strike’s fingers on hers.

This isn’t going to work, she thought, panic kindling in her stomach. Whatever the magic was, I lost it .

‘‘Look at me,’’ Strike ordered. When she locked her eyes with his, he said, ‘‘Don’t you dare give up.’’

In the torchlight, his black hair and close-trimmed beard made his dark good looks lean toward dangerous, sending a quiver of awareness through her, a hum of nerves. He looked like he could be a demon, could be a king. He looked like a fighter, a warrior, like the man she’d dreamed of before.

The one she still dreamed of every damn night, and then woke up aching and alone.

‘‘Ready?’’ he asked, his voice a harsh rasp that licked along her nerve endings like fire.

She took a deep breath and nodded, but didn’t trust herself to speak. He wouldn’t even be bringing her into the barrier at all, except that the three-question spell was a once-in-a-lifetime deal, three questions per magic user per existence. And while she wasn’t a Nightkeeper, they were hoping she had enough of whatever magic she’d once possessed to get her into the barrier and call up the three-question nahwal with Strike’s help.

Better that, Red-Boar had pointed out with his usual lack of tact, than letting the king’s son burn his three questions on his human girlfriend. Jade’s research suggested the questions had to be specific to the petitioner, meaning that none of the other Nightkeepers could ask for her. The meant it was Leah or nobody.

‘‘Let’s do this.’’ Strike released her hands so he could cut his own right palm, then hers. Instead of letting the blood fall into separate bowls, they locked hands so the red wetness mingled as it dripped into the king’s ceremonial bowl, which had a small piece of parchment at the bottom. When the paper was wet with their blood, Strike lit it with one of the tapers, and they both leaned in to inhale the smoke. That put them face-to-face, and Strike shifted and touched his lips to hers. ‘‘Trust me.’’

Then he jacked in. Leah saw the change in his face, saw his eyes go blank and his expression slacken. Failure kicked her hard when she stayed behind, when she didn’t feel anything other than the burn in her palm and the tickle of smoke in her sinuses. Damn it, she couldn’t follow, didn’t have the power, didn’t know how to—

Hey, Blondie, his voice whispered in her mind.