Zoe Archer - Sinner’s Heart

They met each other in the middle of the chamber. She stared up at him, full knowledge of what was to come in her night-dark eyes. When he cupped the back of her head, her hands gripped the fabric of his shirt, her fingers digging into the flesh beneath, gaining purchase.

His mouth found hers, her hunger matching his own. They were not gentle or tentative. This might be the end, an awareness that gave their kiss its desperation.

It could not last. The world would not stop in its inexorable rotation. They had to break apart, and so they did, as the fire muttered.

Bram strapped on his sword and tucked the tomahawk into his belt. It had seen considerable use. Soon, its blade would be red—or whatever color demons bled. For all his experience on the battlefield and in the blood-soaked forests of the Colonies, he realized he had no idea what to anticipate in this upcoming confrontation. Such a challenge once excited him.

He glanced over toward Livia, stepping into her slippers. No, he did not fear what lay ahead. He wanted it here, now, and done.

They walked out into the corridor together, putting behind them the idyll of seclusion. Neither he nor Livia faltered in their steps and they went down the stairs, her on his arm. She moved with confidence, as if clad in Caesar’s armor.

He and Livia entered the practice room. The Hellraisers waited for them.

Four pairs of eyes turned to him and Livia as they stepped into the chamber. Even though he had seen Whit a short while ago, it still gave Bram pause to behold his old friend here again in his home. They had spent many a midnight here, carousing or in companionable drink. Yet they were not the same boyhood friends as they had been. They weren’t even the men they had been half a year ago. They—and the world—had irreversibly changed.

Zora hovered close, her gaze chary as she eyed the walls and ceiling as if they might collapse.

Leo stepped from the darker edges of the chamber. Less than a month had passed since last Bram had seen the youngest member of the Hellraisers, but, like Whit, he was profoundly altered. Leo’s gaze had always been incisive, yet now there was a new clarity in his gray eyes, a precision more cutting than the sharpest blade. He was no gentleman of noble or distinguished birth, his vast fortune having been earned through the Exchange, and never did his rougher origins show as they did now. The elegant town fashions he favored had been abandoned for plain, serviceable clothes more suited to a working man. He, too, seemed leaner, tougher—a brawler rather than a man of business.

Bram barely recognized the woman beside Leo. It took him a moment to realize she was Anne, Leo’s wife. The first time Bram met her had been on her wedding day. She had been a slight creature, possessing a quiet prettiness that she had buried beneath reticence. At the time of her marriage to Leo, Bram had wondered what, besides her aristocratic lineage, she could bring to the union. To himself, Bram thought such a diffident woman would be a lackluster bed partner.

It seemed that the experience of being married to a Hellraiser had also transformed Anne. No longer did she shyly avoid his gaze or stand meekly to the side of the room. Her shoulders were straight, her expression self-assured, an abundance of maturity in her hazel eyes. This was no genteel girl, but a woman of experience.

Both Anne and Leo Bailey eyed him guardedly. As well they should. They had not seen one another since Edmund’s death.

“The Devil still owns my soul,” Bram said, “but I’m your ally.”

“He has my espousal,” added Whit.

“I’m merely to take your word?” Leo demanded of Whit.

Scowling, Whit said, “We fought side by side not a month past. You trusted my judgment then.”

Leo narrowed his eyes. “Treacherous times make for inconstant allies.”

“I have remained constant,” Livia said before Whit could snap a retort. “You cannot question my integrity, and I swear upon the magic that runs through my veins that Bram is not your enemy. He’s as true as any of you. More.”

All four visitors gaped at Livia. Cautiously, Zora approached Livia, her coin-decked necklaces jingling with each step. She reached out with one ring-adorned hand. When her finger brushed across Livia’s arm, the Gypsy woman cursed softly in Romani.

“But this cannot be so,” she murmured. “A ghost made flesh?”

Eternally the regal empress, Livia tilted up her chin. “You cannot fathom the extent of what is possible.” With a wave of her hand, glowing spheres appeared overhead like stars, bathing the chamber in celestial blue light. Another wave and the spheres combined to form a second, pale sun.

“Fireworks may impress the crowds at Vauxhall.” Leo, as usual, appeared skeptical. “They’ll not be so effective against the Devil.”

“Or John,” Whit noted.

Livia flung out her hand. A sound like thunder shook the chamber as a shaft of light shot from her palm. It slammed into the practice dummy at the far end of the room. Ash drifted to the floor—all that remained of the figure.

Whit, Zora, Leo, and Anne looked back and forth between the destruction and a smirking Livia, their expressions identically shocked.

“Welcome back to London, Hellraisers,” Bram said. “You’re just in time for the end of the world.”

Rows of dispassionate faces stared down, ageless, untouchable. The faces would never age, know want or fear. They did not care that a great evil was massing, or that soon, very soon, that same wickedness would lay waste to everything.

Bram looked at the portrait of himself in the Red Drawing Room, hung between the rows of past men to wear the title Lord Rothwell. Gazing at his painted image, he felt neither disgust nor anger, but a dim kind of pity. The poor bastard in the painting had no idea what awaited him, the horrors he would see, and yet for all the agony he would endure, ultimately he emerged, if not better, then stronger. Everything brought him to this place, this moment: leading a counsel of war, his friendships in the process of being repaired, and an extraordinary woman by his side.

His dreams of the future had been facile. Honor. Glory. Unformed concepts that hadn’t been tested. Not once did he envision himself as he was now.

As it must be. The process of maturation took us far from all preconceptions. One could either bemoan the fact, curling in on oneself in a misery of stasis, or move forward.

Forward, then.

“John leading an army of demons?” This from Leo, arms crossed as he stood behind his seated wife. “A militia of books, perhaps, or an infantry of Parliamentary bills—but demons? I can’t see it.”

“He’s a scholar not a soldier.” Whit stood by the mantel, his arms also crossed.

Bram glanced down to see that he, too, had folded his arms across his chest. He smiled wryly to himself. Men were much the same when it came to preparing for combat, from the Colonies to a London mansion.

“His old identities have gone up in flames.” Livia sat in a throne-like Tudor chair. Her words were abstracted as she continued to maintain the web of magic over the city. “The Dark One has worked his alchemy on him. Nothing of his old self remains.”

“Nothing?” Zora stood next to Whit, hands on her hips.

“Not an inch of his skin is without the Devil’s mark,” Bram said.

Anne shuddered, and Leo and Whit swore.

“There’s no hope for him,” Whit said.

“None.” Bram gazed at his friends. “No redemption, no clemency. I need to know that when the time comes, I can rely on all of you to do what must be done.”

“Kill him.” Leo’s expression hardened. “Edmund died in the street like an animal. I’ll gladly wipe John from the face of the earth.”

Rather than rebuke her husband for his bloodthirstiness, Anne nodded in agreement.

“A fight it must be.” Bram glanced at Zora and Anne. “This shall be hard warfare. Harder than any battles you’ve yet fought. Are you equipped for the challenge?”

Whit and Leo chuckled, while Zora and Anne exchanged speaking glances. Zora stepped back from the mantel, as did Whit. Suddenly, her hand was gloved in flame. The flames stretched, becoming longer, until she held what looked like a whip made of fire. She snapped the whip. The burning logs inside the fireplace shattered. She smiled as she turned back to Bram, the flames around her hand shrinking until they went out.

Anne rose from her chair. She, too, faced the fireplace, then lifted her hands. A biting gust of air seemed to spring from her palms, knocking over a small table in her path. The wind scoured the hearth, dousing the flames just as all the candles in the room were extinguished.

Darkness filled the drawing room.

Livia snapped her fingers, and the fire and candles all relit. Both Zora and Anne gazed at Bram, wearing matching expressions of challenge.

“You’ll make for excellent artillery,” said Bram.

“Better than any cannon or firearm.” Whit curved an arm around Zora’s shoulders.

“More accurate, too,” added Leo, taking his wife’s hand.

“The women are our most powerful weapons.” Livia raised a brow. “The men may prove the greater liability, for they’ve no magic.”

“True.” Whit rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. “Yet Zora can turn this ordinary saber into a weapon of exceptional power.”

“She might do the same for you,” Livia said to Leo.

His mouth twisted. “Swords are forbidden to commoners. I’d say hang the rules, but I never learned the art of swordplay. But I’m a damned good shot, and can fight with my fists.”

“You can persuade the demons to turn back,” Whit said to Bram, “or fight amongst themselves.”

Bram hadn’t made use of his Devil-given gift in a long while. It could prove useful in the coming fight. He turned to Leo. “Let me kiss your wife.”

Whit and Zora exclaimed, Anne gasped, and Leo snarled, “Like hell.”

From her position near the fire, Livia remained still, her expression opaque.

“I’m going to kiss your wife,” Bram said, “and you are going to permit me.” He focused his will on Leo, exerting pressure through thought. You’ll allow me to do as I want.

Bram took a step toward Anne. She immediately brought her hands up, a swirl of cold air churning around her. Yet before she could push Bram back with her magic, Leo planted his fist solidly in Bram’s jaw. Bram stumbled back, his head ringing, but he kept his feet.

“You don’t bloody touch my wife,” Leo said with a rumble.

“We just proved two hypotheses,” said Bram.

“That you’re the same damned libertine you’ve always been?”

“That my gift of persuasion no longer exists. I’d never attempted to use it on you before, so it ought to work. Clearly, it didn’t.”

“And the other theory?” Anne asked, slowly lowering her hands. The icy wind abated, so the only sounds came from the fire and Leo’s enraged growls.

Bram lightly touched his jaw and winced. By morning, he’d have a large bruise adorning his face. “Master Bailey does indeed throw a very powerful left hook.”

“You could have tried to persuade him to do something else,” Whit objected.

“Such as?” asked Bram.

“Punch you.”

Though it hurt like a bastard, Bram grinned. “He’d want to do that anyway, magic or no.”

By minute degrees, the strain in the chamber eased, yet it did not entirely dissolve. They were not the same band of friends they had been months earlier, affable and reckless, unconcerned with anything but their own pleasure. A metamorphosis had transpired. Bram saw it in Whit and Leo’s gazes, in the set of their shoulders and the way they both stood as though ready to brawl. Nothing was certain, no outcome was a given. If they had once been confident that the world would bend to their desires with nary a consequence, that confidence had been replaced by a hard-edged understanding—they must fight for what they wanted.

Bram did not regret the difference.

“You’re like us, then,” Leo said. “No magic.”

Livia rose and moved to stand in front of him. She was older than the other two women in the room, and she wore her experience like an empress wore her ermine. He had always preferred his lovers to be worldly—it made for a more stimulating time in bed, and it also ensured that there would be no misunderstandings as to the transitory nature of their relationship.

But all those were fatuous reasons. Gazing at Livia, at the hard-won wisdom in her eyes, he understood that there were facets of her he would never entirely grasp, and that he could spend the rest of his days searching them out with only the promise of knowing her fully.