Chapter 22
Icame to with a start, and tried very, very hard not to let the panic clog my throat.
This time it wasn’t a dream.
The room was a lab, but so much larger and more industrial than the flashes of the one I’d been kept in. There were metal cabinets and counters to my left, and instruments laid out that made me whimper in fear. The lights overhead were a bright white, but much higher up, like the ceiling was vaulted. To my right was a set of monitors that showed Angelica in one, an unconscious Trey in another, but no sign of April or Wanda and I hoped they’d gotten away somehow. Jack was also missing, but I wanted to see that son of a bitch again so I could strangle him with my bare hands. Next to the monitors was an enclosed area that resembled a cage used for fighting, which confused the hell out of me.
I glanced down at myself and nearly screamed. I was strapped to a table, the chilly air bringing goose flesh up on my body, which was clad in just my bra and underwear.
But the worst of it, the thing that nearly made me lose all ability to think straight, was him standing there, gazing down at me.
“You’re finally awake,” Whitman said with a smile. “I was a little worried the spell had been too much for you. But you’ve always been stronger than you look.”
His fingers caressed my forehead and I jerked away. Though, the way I was tied down, I really didn’t get much distance from him.
“Where is Darius?” I asked, my tongue a little thick in my mouth.
“Right over there.” He hit a button on the keyboard near the monitors, and a door set into the wall at the foot of my table opened to reveal Darius, strapped to another table.
This one was standing upright, equipped with huge clamps that held Darius down head to feet. He was straining against all of it, eyes wild, and I knew he’d be screaming if it wasn’t for the thick leather that had been secured over his mouth.
“What are you going to do to him?”
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?” I asked in disbelief.
“Well, nothing that I haven’t already done. You see, Darius and I are old friends, even though he may not remember me. But I never forget one of my successful projects.”
Dread sank deep into my stomach as I tried to think of when or how this monster had gotten his hands on Darius. That was better than letting the terror of what he’d possibly done sink in. I’d let that throttle me later, after we were free.
I went inside and searched for my power but the moment I did, something sharp stung me in the back of my neck.
“Oh, Nina, darling, don’t do that,” he tsked. “Don’t tell me you have forgotten the lessons of the collar?”
My eyes widened, and an emotional response hit me even though my memory remained blank. The fear was potent, as was the desire to please him. It sickened me to know that this was some kind of trained response. How many times had he done this to me?
“Refresh my memory, if you wouldn’t mind,” I sassed.
“My pleasure,” he grinned at me, as if we were having another cigar and talking philosophy. “The lovely collar I have on your throat will deliver ever increasing shocks to you whenever you start to access your magic without my direction. You got quite good at obeying me. Why, sometimes you’d beg me to shock you because you’d been bad.”
I was going to be sick, right after I strangled this mother fucker with my bare hands.
“I don’t believe you,” I argued, trying to breathe.
“You liked the pain. It was beautiful to see you break and know that you wanted me to put you back together.”
Darius was thrashing now, rattling the table, straining the clamps. One of them popped off, and he was bending two others.
“Now, our dear beast over there still hasn’t learned the lesson,” Whitman pushed a button on a remote and Darius convulsed.
“Stop!” I screeched.
“Oh, don’t worry, it won’t kill him.”
The convulsions stopped and Darius’ eyes rolled back before he slumped to the side.
I couldn’t help the gulping, furious sobs that shook my body. Heat ran through me and I started to yank on the bounds at my hands and feet.
“You fucking monster!”I screamed.
Whitman’s eyes widened and he covered his mouth, feigning shock.
“No…you actually return his feelings for you? Don’t you know what he is?”
“He’s perfect and you’re a monster!”
Whitman’s face came close to mine, and though he was smiling, I could see a vein throb in his forehead.
“He and all Supernaturals like him are nothing but animals, put here to serve us, our needs. That is the way it should have always been, but places like the Archive have put everything out of balance.”
“And you put it in balance? How? By torturing and experimenting on people? You’re sick!”
He grit his teeth, hand poised as if he were about to strike me but he held back and inhaled. The sight of him restraining himself was far more terrifying than if he’d just unleashed, and I cowered back from him even though showing fear was the last thing I wanted.
“Let me show you,” he ground out, “and then you’ll see, you’ll know, and you’ll be by my side like you were always meant to be. Come in, my beast.”
Another Orc walked in, his eyes red and body mountainous. He was snarling at me, baring his teeth, and about to lunge at me when Whitman pushed a button on the same remote and the Orc stopped mid step.
“This is one half of the Twins,” Whitman said, walking around the huge, frozen Orc as if it were perfectly safe. “You killed his brother and he’s been quite angry about it. He would’ve ripped your head off at that safe house, which I didn’t sanction by the way. That was Jack, who was double dipping in both mine and the Sinners coffers. Not a smart move. Oh, dear, in fact here’s a piece of him.”
As if he were flinging a simple piece of debris off the Twin, Whitman tossed what looked like a bloody piece of flesh. I bit back my revulsion at both the knowledge that Jack had been ripped apart and that Whitman could be so cavalier about it and focused on the Twin.
The only thing that moved on the Orc was his eyes, which darted to Whitman for a moment before coming back to me. I could see the murder in his gaze and the fact that Whitman was the only thing holding him back from ripping me limb from limb was not a comforting thought.
“She is mine. But him,” Whitman gestured to Darius, “well, I think you also have a desire to see him bleed, don’t you?”
The Orc grunted.
“Very good. Go to the cage and wait while I wake him up. Whichever one of you survives can be Nina’s new guard, how about that?”
“Do you honestly think Darius will just let you keep us like we’re pets?”
Whitman chuckled.
“You truly have forgotten everything, haven’t you?”
He went to a cabinet nearby and retrieved a tiny little device, no bigger than his pinkie finger with nearly invisibly thin wires trailing out of it.
“This is one of my greatest creations. With one of these, I can make any Orc I want a feral berserker. Of course, there were some failures that I sold off to the Protectors. They’re not so particular about cannon fodder. But once I perfected it, I have been slowly collecting a beautiful army of Orcs. You see, my darling Witch, I consider myself a true disciple of Xiang Yu, not some hobbyist. And the Orcs, with their latent berserker tendencies, are the perfect example of what Yu was talking about. With this device, I get to peel back all the layers and see the true Orc.”
The more he talked, the more horrified I became. Not just because I knew that the Orc that had died at the safe house was one whose will had been stripped away. But I had a terrible suspicion that Darius…
“No,” I breathed, looking over at where the male I loved was starting to wake up. “No you…please tell me you didn’t…”
“He was one of my first successes. Before my assistants had been banished from the Archive, one of them identified Darius as a prime candidate. I’d never had the chance to study the device on someone who had the berserker so front and center. So I arranged a little accident during his training with the Special Investigators and implanted my creation. The result was breathtaking.”
Tears fell hot down my face even as rage boiled in my gut.
“He ripped his entire team apart with his bare hands, did you know that? And when he was finished, painted in all that gore, was his true nature. After that, my research fell into place. Males like our Twin over here were prime candidates and the Sinners were only too happy to have some of their more reluctant members become more efficient at their jobs.”
Darius blamed himself for what happened, never knowing that he had been forced to do it as part of some sick experiment.
“I’m going to kill you,” I hissed.
“Oh, my little warrior,” he ran a finger down my cheek and I jerked away, only to have him seize my face and squeeze hard. “I suppose I’ll have to remind you who you belong to. But not before you watch your bodyguard bleed.”
By now, Darius looked like he was more awake, and the moment our eyes met, his eyes began to glow and I could see the berserker starting to come out.
But what would happen if he did that with Whitman at the controls?
“Darius, no! He’s corrupted your—!”
The blow was sharp and fast. I tasted copper in my mouth and stars blossomed across my vision. Darius bellowed and I watched in horror as he began to break his bonds. The berserker was there, straining his skin, taking control.
I have to stop this.
I reached for my magic, knowing the sting was coming and not caring. It kept me from grasping it but I tried again, while Whitman was turning dials on his remote and grinning from ear to ear.
I saw the moment when Darius’ body was not his own anymore. He stopped thrashing and his wild eyes turned to me, confused and angry.
I can do this…
I tried again, this time the pain was worse, but Whitman wasn’t paying attention to me. He was too busy setting up his stupid little cage fight. Twice more, three times, and by now the pain was bad enough to make tears spring to my eyes and my fingers twitch.
Darius was walking, but jerky and slow, like he was fighting the control Whitman was exerting over him. When he stopped just outside the cage entrance, his entire body shook.
“Oh, I see, you need some persuading,” Whitman chuckled, viciously twisted a dial on the device.
Darius’ entire body strained, his spittle became foam around the corners of his mouth and he let out a roar such as I’d never heard before. It was filled with fury and agony, in equal measure, and I was sobbing as I watched him do everything he could to refuse Whitman.
“Darius, stop, please! I need you to live!”
“Yes, listen to Nina. If you’re a good little Orc, I may even let you stay by her side, muzzled of course.”
Darius was heaving now, foam flying from his mouth on every exhale. He ripped open the cage and staggered inside. He was covered in sweat and I had no idea how weak fighting Whitman’s control had made him. I needed to save him from this, now.
I squeezed my eyes shut, determined not to be distracted by Darius’ fight or my own pain. With a deep breath, I dove head first into my Well of Power. The pain from the collar was excruciating and I could feel the capillaries in my nose burst as I grazed the power inside of me.
I didn’t back off, even when I bit my tongue, or when my muscles cramped from the pain shooting mercilessly through me. In the distance I heard the wet slap of flesh against flesh, the grunting and roaring of two feral Orcs tearing each other apart, punctuated by Whitman’s voice. It sounded as if he were narrating this fight, and the way he was so detached from the pain he was causing, the knowledge that he was the one who did this to me, to Darius, it coalesced into something bright and sharp within me. It cut through the pain that nearly caused me to pass out and at last, I grasped my power.
The first thing I did was remove the collar, which snapped in half and clanged to the floor. I almost sobbed with relief when the electric shocks ceased, but I was just getting started.
Now that I had my power in my grasp, I could feel the way it had been transformed down to the most infinitesimal degree. The Morrigan’s power had molded completely with mine, whether that happened just now or earlier, I couldn’t tell, and it wasn’t important. Gold and black velvet were twined together into cosmic ropes that spun and coiled out of a new Well of Power. This one was made of dark metal with crows and swords embossed in gold on the outside. Centuries of passion and bloodshed was my inheritance. The distant clash of swords, the copper smell of blood, the musk of good sex, it all filled my senses and fueled my rage.
I would raze this place to the ground. I would tear this mortal to pieces and lay his bones out for the crows to pick apart. His entrails would be my crown and his skull my chalice.
Strategy…I need allies.
This entire building was metallic and usually it would’ve taken me far longer to find a single room, much less a lock. But I did it in seconds now, and the locks to both Angelica’s and Trey’s cells were crushed, their doors opened. If Angelica was as smart as I thought she was, she’d get reinforcements. So now to get myself free.
The metal bindings around my body melted away and I floated upright until my feet touched the floor. Sparks flew as lights exploded and glass shattered, cutting my skin, but I barely felt it.
“Nina! Oh my dear, you are glorious!” Whitman cackled as I approached.
He grinned at me as if he were Frankenstein and I were his monster. Maybe I was, and just like that mythic creature, I’d make my creators life a fucking misery.
I looked over at the cage, desperate to know if Darius was still alive. He stood above the Twin, or at least I assumed it was the Twin. The male Orc that had pursued us with the single minded focus of a true warrior was lying in a pool of blood, his arms torn off and his face an unrecognizable mass of pulverized flesh and bones.
“What have you done?” I asked Darius, my voice foreign to my ears.
It was too deep, too raspy and yet it was also mine.
“He’s fulfilled his true purpose, embraced his true identity.”
I looked over at Whitman and grasped him around the throat.
Instead of cowering in fear, as he should’ve the maniac laughed at me.
“You won’t kill me.”
“Why not?”
I squeezed and his face turned red as he held up the remote and pushed a button. Darius jerked and spun around toward me. The moment he saw me with Whitman’s throat in my hand, Darius went crazy. He began beating against the cage, attempting to rip open what had to be reinforced steel.
I released Whitman and unleashed my frustration by bending the table I had been strapped to in half with my powers.
“What have you done?” I demanded in that strange voice.
“He will kill anyone who threatens me. If I am killed, an implant in my body sends a signal to the implant in Darius, and it kills him.”
I glared at Whitman and bared my teeth in disgust.
“You are a coward, making others fight your battles for you.”
“I am a visionary,” he spat at me. “Creating balance in a world that has so very little of it.”
“I freed Angelica and Trey, they are bringing reinforcements now. You will not, cannot win.”
He snorted.
“You trust her to save you, to help you?”
“She has so far, why not now?”
“Oh, my dear,” he reached up to run the backs of his fingers across my cheeks as if we were old friends. “Who do you think used you to lure me out? She wanted to catch me and dismantle my smuggling business. And like the hack she is, Angelica had no success previously. Then, you were dropped into her lap, courtesy of your beloved bodyguard. She knew I’d worked with Francesca on this sort of experimentation. She knew that I had defected to the Protectors, but she had no proof of any illegal activities. So she used you, knowing that you were the perfect bait. She just didn’t realize all the places I’d infiltrated, all the people I owned. Jack was a very good little soldier, bringing you to me.”
“No,” I gasped, that true north of vengeance suddenly wavering. “No, she did this to save me. I needed that cuff to siphon off the power before it killed me.”
“This power? The power that has strengthened you, that as a descendant of the Tuatha de Danann is your birthright? You were never in any danger of dying, only causing death and destruction when the power I gave you finally fused with your own abilities. That’s what she wanted to cure. That’s what the Archive wants to control. Who you really are!”
“I don’t believe you.” I seized his throat again, betrayal burning in me.
“Yes, you do,” he wheezed. “I can see it…in your eyes. I have…never lied…to you.”
And I knew that was true.
He may be delusional, but he wasn’t a liar.
I’m not dying…I’m just powerful…and apparently bait.
Angelica had used me.
Whitman had tortured me and wanted to use me.
Only Darius just wanted me.
I glanced over at where he paced like a caged animal. I couldn’t even see the male I knew behind those glowing red eyes. Whitman had buried him so far beneath the berserker that the feral side of Darius didn’t know me either.
But I could fix that.
I grinned at Whitman, and the stupid man’s eyes lit up.
“I know you’re telling me the truth,” I said softly. “Let him out, please.”
“And you’ll be mine?”
“According to you, I always have been.”
He narrowed his gaze at me and opened the cage. Darius came snarling out of it, his body vibrating with deadly energy, blood coating his chest, hands and arms, splattered on his face. He growled at me, low and menacing and tears burned my eyes.
Hold on, Darius, it’s my turn to save you.
“Remember, you can’t hurt me without killing him.”
“Because of the device, correct?”
“Yes, it’s wired into certain parts of his brain.”
“What if I make you remove it?”
He shook his head and gave me an incredulous smile.
“My dear, every subject who has the device removed has suffered brain damage ranging from memory loss at best, to a vegetative state at worse. Would you have me condemn him to that when he could still be of use in this world?”
The cost of saving him hit me like a punch to the gut, and I couldn’t breathe. I would lose him, even if this worked. I couldn’t let him live like this, not knowing what I did about his life, about his fears. He would forget me, forget us, but to save him I would pay that price because Darius deserved a chance to live free from this madman’s control, he deserved his dreams.
And right now, in this moment, I could give him that. Even if it was without me.
I gathered my power inside of me, honed in on the device in Darius’ neck as well as the sharp metal around me. Before my powers and that of the Morrigan’s had combined, I would’ve had chosen one or the other, and it would’ve been impossible to find the small metal device in Darius’ neck.
All this time, my power hadn’t been strong enough to detect it. All this time he’s lived with it, giving him pain in his neck. Not knowing that this was the reason why he’d murdered his team, that it wasn’t his fault.
I had to time this perfectly, there was no room for error.
Once I had the part of the device I needed wrapped with my power, I stepped close to Whitman and put my hand on his chest, almost as if I were about to lean up and kiss him. My other arm went around him and I pressed my lips to his throat. He took in a sharp breath and squeezed my hips with his hands.
“So, you’ve come around have you?” he chuckled.
“I thought I’d give you a little present.”
He only had time to wrinkle his forehead in confusion before the table Darius had been bound to slammed into his back and tied him down.
At the same time, I used my powers to snap the wires of the device in Darius’ neck. My Orc fell like a puppet with his strings cut and I forced myself not to run to him. There was nothing I could do, no way for me to know whether just his memory would be affected, or if the result was far more serious.
And right now, I needed to finish this.
“You just killed him,” he sneered at me.
“No, I didn’t. He’s not your slave anymore.”
“If you broke the device, you just condemned him to a far worse fate than the one I’d planned.”
Anguish clogged my throat and rage burned through my blood. I thought of all the things I knew in my soul that he did to me but couldn’t remember, all the nightmares, all the terror, all the grief at what was stolen from me, and I let that fuel me, let it direct me to what to do next. It drowned out any voice of reason or morality. And all I had left was this beautifully bloody desire.
I leaned in and smiled at him.
“Would you like to see the real me before you die?”
I raised up all the metal pieces that littered the room and fashioned them into knives with the thinnest possible blades, and cut away his clothes. Distantly, I felt the arrival of vehicles, heard the very faint cacophony of voices about to descend on this place. I had wanted to take my time, savor his agony.
But I’ll have to gorge myself on it quickly instead.
The knives flayed the skin from his body in a flurry of metal and blood. Viscera and screams were the paint and the floor and walls, my canvas where I showcased his agony. His blood fell on my skin, and against my will, I tasted his depravity. He had done…unspeakable horrors to innocent Mundanes and Supernaturals, all with the curiosity of a scientist studying a specimen.
As he lay there, gasping and gurgling in agony, barely alive, I expelled a gallon’s worth of black ooze on the floor, the by product of his blackened soul.
I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, and saw the vengeance on his body. It was horrific, and nowhere near as bad as what he deserved. But it would have to do.
I leaned in again and whispered, “Was it good for you?”
Then I slit his throat.
Everything happened so fast after that.
The room was flooded with agents and others in tactical gear. I was surrounded, as was Darius.
“Don’t touch him!” I ordered, my voice still that strange mix of mine and something darker.
“You are under arrest for violating the articles of Artifact use,” said a man in front of me brandishing a stinger and another gun full of strange looking goo. “Relinquish the artifact and turn around, hands behind your back.”
“I can’t relinquish anything.”
“Resisting will only make it worse.”
“Stand down, Agent!” Angelica bellowed from behind me.
I had thought that doing away with Whitman would siphon off enough of my rage that I could face her, but I’d been wrong. My body throbbed with fury, so I stared straight ahead.
The agents backed off. I heard one of them run out and vomit, another complained about getting blood on his shoe. The one that had tried to arrest me was trying to act as if the gore didn’t bother him but he left pretty quickly.
Before long, it was just Angelica, Trey and I in here, a few Agents lingering outside and talking into their walkies.
“I was never dying,” I said through gritted teeth.
“No,” Angelica’s voice was firm, more distant than I’d ever heard it. “Though I imagine you know what was happening by now.”
“The power was melding with my own.”
“And you’ve now officially, truly become the first documented living artifact. Congratulations…or condolences, depending on how you want to look at it.”
“You used me,” I turned around to face her. “You used us both.”
To her credit, Angelica didn’t even flinch. She held my gaze, a hint of shame in her blue eyes.
“Yes,” she whispered, “and I’ll make it right if you come with me without fighting.”
“You mean let the Archive lock me up? Lock him up?”
“No one is locking anyone up. You have my word.”
“What the fuck is that worth?”
I’ll give her this, the woman is fucking fearless. Or maybe just stupid.
In spite of the blood covering my body and the floor all around me, Angelica stepped forward and whispered in my ear.
“Not much to you I’m sure, but what choice do you have right now?”
“I could kill all of you and take him away.”
“And be on the run for how long? He needs medical attention, right?”
“He needs more than that.”
He deserves more than that too.
She stepped back just enough to look me in the eye.
“You want to negotiate? Fine, let’s negotiate.”
“Just like that?”
“You said it yourself, you could kill us all. But I can make your life a misery or a joy after this, Nina. The choice is yours, and I’m willing to hear what you want.”
I looked down at Darius, still unconscious on the floor. I wanted to go to him so badly that it was a physical pain that hummed in my chest. Would he wake up? Would he know me when he did? What would I do if he never remembered?
“He needs a new identity,” I said, my voice starting to return to normal. “A new place to live that’s safe. His memory will likely be compromised and so he’ll need care for that.”
“I’ll do more than that even, I’ll have our medical department look into artifacts to heal his mind,” Angelica said, her expression turning tender when she looked at Darius.
That got my attention and my hopes up, though I tried to temper it. After what she’d done, I didn’t want to hope that Angelica would actually follow through on such a thing.
“Why would you do that?” I asked.
“Because whether you believe me or not, this was not what I ever wanted, and I wish there had been any other choice.”
“There was! You could’ve told us the truth, I would’ve helped you!”
“But he wouldn’t have. Darius would’ve taken you away and then you both would’ve really been up shit creek without a paddle.”
I frowned at her, a final piece of the puzzle falling into place.
“You lied about the Archive too. They were never after me, were they?”
“No, but,” she held up her finger, “they would’ve been if he’d taken you. The deal that I negotiated with the council was that you help us, I prove you aren’t a danger, then you agree to wear suppression cuffs for the rest of your life and be monitored by us.”
“So that’s your proposal for me?”
“If you want the best care for Darius, along with everything else you’ve asked for? Yes.”
The power was so full and rich, I couldn’t imagine living without it, even though I’d only tasted it for a few hours.
But for him…for Darius, I’d give anything.
“I want to be with him, wherever we end up,” I said. “Even if he doesn’t know me.”
“That can be arranged. Is there any kind of job or business he ever expressed interest in?”
Tears burned my eyes and fell in hot drops down my cheeks and I nodded. We’d get our dreams after all, but he wouldn’t know that.
Would it be better to live next to him, knowing that we once loved each other, even if he doesn’t? Or should I let him go?
“Nina,” Angelica said, daring to touch my arm, “I swear he’ll be safe and so will you. I know that’s not worth anything to you now, but it’s all I can give you. But you have to agree to the terms of the Archive. Technically you’re an artifact but you’re also a living person. There’s no rules for this sort of thing. Your case will be used to decide the future for anyone else we discover like you. Think about that before you make a decision.”
Angelica walked toward where more agents were attempting to load Darius onto a stretcher. Trey walked up and effortlessly lifted him up. I hadn’t really been able to see Darius before, but now that he was facing up, he looked like he was simply sleeping.
I ran to him, taking his hand in mine. Both were sticky with dried blood. We were filthy, covered in the evidence of our crimes and yet I couldn’t care less. I pressed a soft kiss to his mouth, Darius not responding at all. That was what broke me and I started to sob into his chest. Would I never feel his arms around me again? Never know his kiss, his hard won smile?
“I love you…I love you so much,” I whispered into his gore crusted chest.
Arms went around me and pulled me off him as they rolled the stretcher away. I tried to reach for him but Angelica stopped me.
“He needs to go to the Archive’s medical center. He will get the best care, that I can promise you either way.”
I nodded and watched until I could no longer see him.
“I’ll do whatever you want,” I said, my voice broken.
“Nina—”
“I know what I’m saying. I know both what I’m giving up and what I’m getting. I just want to be with him, whether he remembers me or not.”
The director took a deep breath and gave me a sad smile.
“Okay, I’ll make the arrangements.”