It was not madness or delusion.
He now knew the shape of her mouth, the blond-white gleam of the tousled hair that framed her soft cheeks, the depth of the tiny dent in the center of her chin. That if she stood before him, the top of her bright head would barely reach the top of his shoulder. He saw without seeing her spare, boyish frame, the hollows of her throat, the scars across the knuckles of her roughened, blunt-nailed hands. He did not have to look into her eyes to know they were bluer than a midsummer sky, or that her eyelashes and eyebrows were four shades darker than her hair.
He knew all of these things because he knew her, had known her these many months, had taken solace from the curve of her lips, the brightness of her eyes, the sound of that voice. The same voice that had called to him too many times for him to be mistaken about this.
His maiden was not a dream.
Chapter 4
As Gabriel encountered the reality of his dreams, another outcast endured what was becoming his personal nightmare.
The one person John Keller loved most in the world, his sister, Alexandra, was in terrible danger. To save her, he had to trust creatures he had been told were soulless demons intent on destroying humanity. The soulless demons, who had until a short time ago considered him one of their enemies, had reluctantly allowed him into the ranks. In a few hours they were all jumping on a plane together and going to Ireland to fight the Demon King and rescue his sister.
As plans went, this one had total disaster written all over it.
John knew the Kyn felt suspicious of him, but he saw no sign of it. Since coming to Orlando, he had been treated courteously, even indulgently. He had also been kept out of discussions about his sister and the plans being made to retrieve her from the Darkyn's high lord. Being treated as an uninvited, unwanted guest didn't bother him, but not knowing what was happening to his sister was quietly driving him out of his mind.
"You are Alexandra's brother."
The scent of camellias, not the voice, alerted John to the fact that he was no longer alone. He turned away from the charming Monet he had been studying and faced the short, slim, fair-haired man standing behind him.
"John Keller." He hadn't heard the man come into the room, but as silently as the Kyn could move, he never would. This one looked and sounded familiar, although it took him a moment to place him. "We met in Chicago, didn't we?"
"We did. I am Suzerain Valentin Jaus." The vampire did not offer to shake hands as a human would, but when he removed his coat John saw that he had trouble using his right arm. "I was very sorry to hear about Alexandra's abduction. Has there been any word of her?"
"Not that I've been told." Not that anyone intended to tell him anything. He recalled that Alex had liked this particular vampire—she and Michael had stayed in his enormous mansion as guests—and Alex had surgically reattached his arm after it had been severed during a duel. While the Kyn healed spontaneously, it appeared even they had limits. "Are you going to Ireland with us?"
"I would be of little use." Jaus touched his stiff right arm. "I am to stay behind and protect the seigneur's interests until he returns. You should consider doing the same."
That would make Cyprien happy, but John wasn't interested in placating Alexandra's boyfriend. "She's my sister. I'm going."
"You are human. You cannot physically prevail over even one of us, and hundreds of Kyn guard Richard's castle. You do not strike me as suicidal." Jaus removed his sunglasses and tossed his coat over the back of a chair before he approached him.
"I don't have to be immortal to be useful." He hoped.
"Your motives puzzle me as well. What can you hope to accomplish with this… how do you think of it?" Jaus cocked his head. "A gesture of brotherly concern, perhaps?"
John turned his back on the man and looked at the painting again. "It's none of your business."
"I hold your sister in high regard, as well as friendship, so I must disagree." The suzerain came to stand beside him. "You are a Catholic priest, a member of the Brethren. You showed little interest in Alexandra's welfare when she asked for your help in Chicago. Now, inexplicably, you are here and you wish to die for her. Yet you are the same man. Explain this to me, please."
He was the same fool the Brethren had used to get to her. "I'm not a priest anymore, and I never belonged to the order. They used me only to get to Alexandra and Cyprien."
"As you say." The vampire's striking, pale blue eyes shifted. "Monet was a genius at depicting water and light, I think. I have one of his paintings of the Seine in my home." Jaus reached out suddenly and put a hand on the back of John's neck, and the scent of camellias became heavy. "Now you will tell me the truth, priest. Why do you wish to go to Ireland with the seigneur?"
"To save her." John didn't want to say that, but something forced the words out of him. "To explain everything that I didn't. To stop the killing."
Jaus's voice became silky. "What will you do on behalf of the Brethren while you are there?"
"Nothing. They're bigger monsters than the Kyn." That the vampire was using the strange power of the Kyn to force him to speak the truth didn't bother John, only that he felt he had to do so. "I won't let them use me anymore."
"Will you betray Cyprien to save yourself?"
"No one can save me." John jerked out of Jaus's reach and stared at him. "Just ask next time. I don't lie."
"You must not be human, then." Jaus studied John's face as the door to the study opened and Cyprien came in. "He has not deceived you, Michael. He does care deeply for Alexandra, more so than perhaps even she knows. If he is acquiring a tolerance to l'attrait, he may provide some reasonable assistance to you."
"Thank you, Valentin. Byrne has acquired a new breeding stallion for his mares and wishes someone to admire his gift for choosing superb animals. Perhaps you would care to indulge his ego?" Cyprien waited until Jaus had left the study before speaking to John. "Humans cannot lie to Jaus. I had to be sure of you."
Anger that Cyprien doubted him, and shame that he had every reason to, warred inside John. "I know what you're thinking."
Cyprien's eyebrow arched. "I genuinely doubt that."
"I should have taken better care of my sister, but that's the past and I can't change it." No matter how much he wanted to. "I'm not going to walk away from her now. So if you want me out, you'll have to lock me up or kill me."
"These things I could do. Or I could exercise my own talent, and make you forget that you ever had a sister." Cyprien lit a cigarette and watched him through the smoke. "Many times I have been tempted to erase her from your mind, and you from hers."
"I can't stop you." John spread his hands. "If you're that much afraid of me, go ahead. Do it."
"However much I wish you were not," Cyprien said, "you are most definitely her brother." His mouth became a bitter line. "I have made promises as well, Father Keller."
"I'm not a priest anymore. It's John." He dropped his hands. "I didn't come here to fight with you, or to be humored. I don't have any psychic tricks or immortal attitude. I just want to get my sister home safely."
"It will not be that simple." The vampire went to his desk and removed a file. "As Val said, Dundellan is a fortress. Richard has spent decades securing it and hand-picking the Kyn who make up his garrison. They were all chosen for the strength of their talents as well as their battle experience."
"We could ask him to give her back," John said. "Negotiate with him."
"He has everything he wants." Cyprien rubbed the back of his neck with an irritable gesture. "Richard will never surrender Alexandra, not now that she is under his complete control. She is too valuable to him."
"Because he thinks she can cure him?" That got Cyprien's attention. "I do speak French, and I've overheard enough bits and pieces of your conversations to get that much. He didn't have to kidnap her. You know as well as I do that Alexandra would have helped him for nothing."
"Richard needs more Kyn to battle the Brethren, but had no hope of such until Alexandra became involved with me. Yes, she may cure his own condition, but it is not what she can do as much as what she is. He now knows that her blood changed Lucan's woman from human to Kyn." He met John's gaze. "Alexandra is the key to our future, to our very survival as a species. I believe the high lord will do anything to keep her."
"That's why you'll do whatever it takes to get her out of there." Cyprien nodded, and John relaxed a little. "I can help. You'll need a human to do some things for you, especially during the day. I don't know how else I can help, but I can and I will. Anything you say. Use me."
The two words hung between them for a moment before Cyprien checked his watch. "I must go and make the final arrangements." He picked up the file and held it out to him. "These are the floor plans for Dundellan Castle. Study them while we are on the plane; you will need to know the layout."
Before John could reply, a Kyn dressed as a teenage boy came into the room. Jamys Durand glanced at Cyprien but came to John. His expression and the hand he held out were only too familiar to John. Jamys could communicate only by using his Kyn talent to speak through humans, so John had been acting as his unofficial interpreter.
"Jamys has something to tell you before we leave." John braced himself for the mute vampire's touch, and the eerie sensation of hearing him inside his mind.
Before you leave for Ireland, I must tell the seigneur about the cell in Dublin. Although he couldn't make a sound, Jamys's telepathic voice resonated with depth and feeling inside John. I think the high lord had an informant among the interrogators. One of them left the cell only an hour or so before Lucan came and freed us.
