Noah

Book 5: Nightwalkers

by Jacquelyn Frank

Genres: Fantasy Romance

Synopsis

She will take him beyond his wildest dreams.



As Demon King, Noah is dedicated to protecting his kind from their human and Nightwalker enemies. Yet for six months he has struggled with vivid dreams that threaten his very sanity. Every night he's tormented by images of a woman both achingly real and tantalizingly beyond his grasp. And his bone-deep need leaves him no choice but to force her to leave the life she's known and enter a world beyond her imagining...



Every day, Kestra risks her life in perilous missions that veer just shy of the law, but she instinctively knows that the imposingly sensual figure before her is a danger unlike any she's ever faced. Kestra has sworn never to trust or need another man, but Noah's lightest touch scorches her with fevered desire, branding her as his mate, blinding them both to the terrifying truth. For within the ranks of their own people lies an adversary growing in number and power. And nothing and no one will be safe again...

Release date: September 1, 2008

Publisher: Zebra Books

Print pages: 512

Sample

“Whosoever wishes to know the fate of Demonkind must consult these prophecies…

“…as magic once more threatens the time, as the peace of the Demon yaws toward insanity…

“We must enforce ourselves more strictly as the time approaches. In the age of the rebellion of the Earth and Sky, when Fire and Water break like havoc upon all the lands, the Eldest of the old will return, will take his mate, and the first child of the element of Space will be born, playmate to the first child of Time, born to the Enforcers…”

—Excerpts from
The Lost Demon Prophecy

“Kes…what are you doing?”

“I thought I’d wash my hair,” came the whispered, tart reply over the slightly static connection. “What do you think I’m doing?”

Jim chuckled softly under his breath before reaching to tap the mike of his wireless earpiece, just to annoy her with the noise. Then he clarified, “I meant I wanted to know which room you’re in.”

“The Billiard Room,” she said dryly, “with an unusually heavy candlestick in one hand.” She paused and Jim heard her grunt softly over the open line. He leaned forward a little in his chair to peer at his computer monitor. “I’m in the machine room. Where else would I be?”

“Okay. I was just wondering.”

There was another brief pause, full of soft static.

“Incidentally, why do you ask?” she queried at last.

“Oh, no reason. It’s just that I have this huge red blob on my infrared screen that looks suspiciously like a security guard heading in your direction,” he informed her, snapping his gum in her ear over the mike.

Kestra cursed through her teeth, glanced around with sharp, seeking eyes, and turned her face upward almost out of innate instinct. After a quick calculation in her head, she scuttled rapidly across the vastness of the equipment room and headed straight for one of the air-conditioning turbines. With a running start, she stepped up onto the rim of the large machinery and launched her lithe, dark figure straight up into the air.

There was a clang as her hands just barely made the catch onto a pair of sturdy pipes that ran across the high ceiling. She immediately began to swing herself until she was able to get enough momentum to hook her feet over the piping. Without a single further sound, she wriggled herself up into the darkness of the tight plumbing. She sprawled over it, lying across it as if it were a casual cotton hammock instead of a series of conduits that ran both hot and cold against the press of her flesh. Once secured in the shadows of the one direction nine out of ten rent-a-cops invariably failed to look in, all she could do was wait. She covered the earpiece on her ear with her hand, not wanting to risk any chance of Jim or random static giving away her location.

She didn’t have long to wait before the guard made his appearance. Kes rolled her eyes shut for a moment, thinking that Jim had cut his half-assed warning pretty damn close.

The guard had no reason to hide his progress, so she could hear his footsteps from the moment he entered the stairwell just outside the door leading into the room. The door clanged open, recoiling off its backstop as the guard released the metal handle that he’d opened it with. In spite of all this noise, Kestra made very certain her breathing never went above a barely audible whisper of sound.

The guard clomped across the concrete floor, walking the straight path between the rows of turbines on one side, and water heaters on the other. He flicked on a Maglite and swept it back and forth over the dark shadows surrounding him. Kestra closed her eyes briefly, praying to whatever part of the universe it was that protected people like her. Then she watched the approaching man carefully for any signs that he took note of the tiny green lights on the undersides of half the gas heaters, which were guaranteed to be out of place.

He didn’t. He made it to the far wall, turned, and retraced his steps. He passed within a foot of her both times, but of course did not look up. He barreled out of the basement door with a noisy bang, his clomping footsteps echoing away up the stairwell.

Kestra exhaled a half breath of relief. After she was reasonably sure the guard was far enough away and had no intention of immediately returning, she leveraged herself out of her makeshift hidey-hole. She laid her forearms along two narrow pipes and, using them like a pair of parallel bars, swung her legs down. She released, allowing the momentum to somersault her over just once, then lofted into a perfect landing on the dusty warehouse floor.

Resisting the habit of taking a gymnast’s bow, she swiped at the sweat dotting her forehead, smearing the dust and silt from the exteriors of the pipes across it, and turned her attention to her communications system and her smart-ass partner.

“Thanks for the warning, James,” she said with low heat.

“You’re welcome.” He tried to sound bratty, but she could tell he was relieved to hear from her.

“James, I thought you said there was no one on the premises,” she hissed.

Jim winced, knowing that he was definitely going to be in a huge amount of trouble for being wrong about that. “There’s not supposed to be. The guy’s off schedule. I’ll let you know when he moves on to the next building.”

“Not good enough. I want him out of my perimeter completely.”

“Well, what am I supposed to do? Kidnap him?”

“There’s an idea,” she retorted, kneeling down in front of the turbine that had just helped her escape the guard’s notice. She shrugged out of her backpack and withdrew her last two square packets.

Kestra left the backpack behind and scurried low across the floor to the next gas heater. She rolled gently onto her back and reached beneath the unit. There was the distinct clang of metal on metal as the strong magnet on the back of the packet stuck to the underbelly of the furnace. She flicked the switch on the front and waited while the lights went from yellow to green.

“The point is,” she continued as she rolled out from beneath the unit and moved cautiously to the next one, “that I specifically said no civilians in the kill zone. It was your job to see to it that’s what I got. That is why I spent a month timing this operation just right.”

“It’s not my fault the guy changed his routine, Kestra.”

“Make it your fault, James,” she bit back as she hesitated next to the last furnace. “Make it your responsibility. You have twenty minutes to get him out of the kill zone. I don’t care how you do it, just do it! And there better not be anyone else.”

“There isn’t. You and the guard are the only two heat sources in the entire warehouse row, save a rat or two.” There was a distinct pause. “Do you have any suggestions on how I can protect your civilian without getting arrested?”

Kestra thought about that for a moment, using the time it took to attach the last device to the last heater in order to mull over the situation.

“How long does it normally take for him to round off the row and start on the docks?”

“There are three buildings in the row. You’re the first on the round. If he follows form, it’ll take well over an hour. And if he rounds onto the docks, he’s going to spot you. I don’t care how sneaky you are, Kes, you don’t want him wandering your escape route.”

“Damn.” Kestra slid out from beneath the furnace and stood up. She dusted off her backside with more violence than necessary and marched toward her backpack.

Then she stopped and cocked her head to the side, her incredibly light eyes brightening just a little more as she thought of a possible solution.

“Oh, James?”

“Yeah, Kes?”

“Do any of the buildings opposite those in this row have an alarm system?”

“All of them. Take your pick.”

“And are they part of our rent-a-cop’s minimum-wage jurisdiction?”

“Why, yes, they are!” Jim gasped comically, knowing she was already done formulating her plan.

“Now, call me crazy, but if you were a security guard and one of the alarms in one of your buildings went off, you’d run like hell to check it out, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, you’re definitely crazy,” Jim agreed with a chuckle. “And you’re also right. But how do you plan to set off an alarm and not get caught? Don’t we usually do that the opposite way, where you don’t set off the alarm? Do you even know how to set one off?”

“How hard can it be?”

“And not get caught,” he reminded her.

“Mmm.”

“And blow up the row…?” Jim added.

“Yup.”

“And not get caught,” he reiterated most importantly.

“Uh-huh.”

 

Almost exactly twenty minutes later, Kestra dropped from the dock into the rear of the speedboat docked there. She whipped off the tie line and punched the ignition button. The motor roared to life; the only sound possibly louder was the blare of the alarm in the distance.

Kestra aimed the boat directly out of the harbor and toward the open ocean. She glanced down at the cabin when James stuck his head out of the hatch.

“You forgot to blow up the warehouses,” he said dryly.

“Yeah, I know.”

The row of warehouses blew up.

The Miserable Princess

A Demon Fairy Tale

Once upon a time, fairly long ago, there lived a Princess. This Princess was in need of a husband, or so her father thought. She had a responsibility to wed an upstanding male who might one day become King of all their people. She had a responsibility to have children who would become strong and powerful members of their society. That was what Princesses were supposed to do during that time very long ago.

However, this particular Princess, though she was kind and good-hearted, did not like to be responsible, she did not like being told what to do, and, most of all, she did not want a husband.

One day, the Princess, who was named Sarah, was forced to attend a competition between the males of her father’s people. She did not wish to go, but her father had told her that if she did not, he would choose a husband for her and she would have to be satisfied with his taste. He would hear no arguments, for he had lost his patience with his headstrong daughter.

So the Princess went to the royal booth and sat in her chair and frowned at everyone. She had to be there, but she did not have to pretend to be happy. Her father had said nothing about being happy or nice to anyone.

Princess Sarah looked around at the field of competitors with bored, cornflower blue eyes. She feebly brushed back her long, golden curls as she sighed. This was the third such competition her father had arranged. The Princess knew he hoped that somewhere on that field there would be a Demon who would finally catch her eye. There was no real reason why her eye should not be pleased, because Demon males were as wondrously handsome as Demon females were breathtakingly beautiful. Certainly they were all well mannered, elegant, and highly educated after so many decades of immortal life.

The Princess, however, was only 110 years old. She thought she was far too young to think about tying herself down to a husband who would probably want babies and obedience. Male Demons were notorious for their arrogance and their need of total control of all things they felt they had a right to control. The Princess did not need another person telling her what to do all the time. She wanted to choose in her own time, when she felt right and ready, and when she found a male who looked upon her as an equal, rather than a worker who required orchestration.

Sarah shuddered at her own thoughts.

In spite of their high-handedness, males of her race were far better than the human mortals when it came to the matter of marriage. The idea of being treated like property, a man’s chattel he could use and dispose of in the fashion of his own choosing, was a nightmare.

As for Ephraim, the aforementioned King of the Demons, she knew that he held high hopes that she would be one of the rare and lucky Demons who became part of the Imprinting.

The Imprinting was the meshing of the hearts, minds, and souls of a male and a female who were compatible with each other to a point beyond perfection. It was reputed to be a connection that transcended the complexities and intensities of mere love. It was an engagement of power that her father hoped would one day coalesce in her womb and produce the powerful potential of a future King of all Demons.

“Noah, what on earth are you reading to her?” Isabella asked in a curious whisper.

She had just entered her daughter’s bedroom, taking in the sight of her two-year-old, who was draped lazily across the current Demon King’s lap. Leah was lying on her back in the cradle of Noah’s biceps and forearm, with her arms splayed wide, wrists hanging limply as she snored softly and drooled against his silk-covered chest.

The King looked up at his Enforcer, the female counterpart of a pair, and smiled in a way that was both bashful and charming. He winked one gray-green eye at her, his darkly patrician features softened by his mischief.

“It is just a fairy tale,” he explained in a hushed voice, folding closed the small book in his hands before setting it onto the floor by his knee.

He reached for the sleeping child in his lap, touching gentle fingertips to her limp form. At that careful caress, Isabella’s daughter slowly began to turn from her flesh-and-blood form into the soft, localized cohesion of a cloud of smoke. The young mother held her breath as Noah manipulated the little cloud into her railed bed and, with practiced ease, returned her to her natural weight and form.

Isabella had seen Noah make similar transformations dozens of times, including to herself. He was a master of the element of Fire, and she did trust him implicitly. She knew from experience that it was very much a harmless trick, taking only the minimum of his awesome skills and power to perform.

As a mother, though, a mother who had until three years ago been all too human and as ignorant of the existence of these elemental beings as most humans were, she couldn’t help the concern that fluttered in her stomach as she understood that her child was being manipulated on molecular levels. She laughed at herself mentally for her silly anxieties a moment later. Noah was powerful and well practiced, the basest of requirements the Demon race expected from their elected King. Everything about him broadcast the natural fate he had been born to. He had been crafted out of a mighty lineage of Demon genetics, forged and tempered, having the awesome patience, wisdom, and education required of a great leader.

Even sitting as he was, there was no mistaking the grandeur of his height, nor the sculpture of a physique just as artistically molded as his mind was. He was not a warrior by nature, but neither did he remain on the sidelines in a soft, padded throne while others went into the fray for him. Isabella had fought by his side and she knew how strong he was, how cunning, and, above all, how merciless he could be when he faced an enemy that threatened the things he held dearest to his heart.

However, she felt she knew him better this way, cuddled up with her daughter in his role as a foster uncle who had probably spent as much time with the darling little girl as her own biological parents. Bella had barely given birth when it became very clear that Noah and Leah were going to be inseparable in their adoration for each other. He showered the child with love, attention, and blatant favoritism. All of this in spite of the fact that he had more nieces and nephews of his own blood than Isabella could count.

Bella didn’t look too closely at the great fortune of this adulation the King had for her child. As with anything, there were hidden layers to it all, most of it redirected emotions from a man who sat in a position of power, and that kind of enormous sovereignty could be all too lonely. All Bella could see at the moment was that Leah looked diminutive in Noah’s embrace, somehow no longer seeming to be growing too fast and too darn independent, as she had been complaining to her child’s father just the night before.

Leah was truly in no more danger from the King’s power than she was when her Earth Demon father separated the child from gravity and sent her squealing and giggling into the air with barely a backhanded thought as they played. Isabella realized that she was still prone to the occasional human foible of fear, a knee-jerk reaction that was habit more than anything. However, she was always able to overcome her trepidations quickly. All she had to do was think of her Demon husband’s highly moral nature, his powerful sense of justice, and the fact that this intense compass also guided many of the Demons in high positions in their society, a category Noah defined even as he fell into it. He made a point of setting the example he intended all others to follow.

“Well, your fairy tale is apparently a great success,” Isabella whispered, reaching down for the book with clear curiosity.

Noah turned suddenly, grabbing her wrist and deftly removing the journal from her hold.

“Thanks,” he said, tucking the book protectively into a pocket on the inside of his jacket.

Isabella frowned slightly, rubbing her wrist where he’d grabbed her a little too enthusiastically, clearly having forgotten his own strength. It was nothing to her, really. After all, she wasn’t human any longer. Well, mostly not. She was a hybrid of ancient Druid and modern human genetics, and since she’d developed significant strength with her other freshman abilities, she’d barely even bruise from the King’s rough handling. Still, if she’d been wholly human, that grip would have broken her wrist clean through, and it wasn’t like Noah to be so unthinking.

“Time for me to get going,” Noah said, gaining his feet quickly and reaching to plant a fast kiss on her still cheek.

With a twist, the Fire Demon morphed into a column of smoke. The column collapsed and scattered across the floor, scudding in all directions for cracks and crevices leading to the outside of the manor.

He was gone barely a second before a storm of dust swept violently into the room, surrounding Isabella’s tiny figure. It snapped suddenly into the shape of her husband, his arms already wrapped tight around her and her wrist coming under immediate inspection.

“What the hell is the matter with him?” Jacob barked, his displeasure over the King’s rough, thoughtless handling of his bride all too clear in his tone and expression.

Since Isabella had become his Imprinted mate those three short years ago, Jacob had found himself with little tolerance for other men touching her, never mind causing her even the smallest of harm. His possessive temperament was part of the nature of their particular Imprinting.

Until Bella had arrived and threaded herself deeply into the tapestry of Jacob’s soul and of his existence, the Imprinting had been so rare that it had only ever been talked about in Demon fairy tales, like the one Noah had been reading to Leah. For the male Enforcer, the intensity of knowing what a rare treasure it was they shared made him irrationally overprotective at times. Still, he was better now than he had been at the start of their relationship. Of course, facing his wife’s exasperation and frustration after each excessive incident had played its part.

“I don’t know,” Isabella murmured in reply to what had been intended as a rhetorical question. “Jacob,” she said suddenly, turning in his arms and wrapping anxious fingers around the loose fabric of his burgundy shirt where it was tucked tightly against his lean waist. “I’m afraid.” She laid her dark head on his chest, burying her pretty face against his shirt until she could feel his warmth pulsing against her cheek. “I’m afraid that someday soon our friendship with Noah is going to be tested in the worst possible way.”

Jacob frowned even more darkly, his entire countenance a dark storm of intense, overcast emotion. Troubled clouds scudded over his heart as well.

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand her. He was the Enforcer. He had been so for over four centuries, elected by the King himself to keep Demon law in strict alignment. Every time the Hallowed moons of Samhain or Beltane neared and passed, any Demon who was without an Imprinted mate could be tempted into straying toward the frail humans or other vulnerable races. These innocent, unsuspecting creatures were not likely to survive the passion of a Demon trying to satisfy dark, clawing hungers that were as primal as the need for food, water, and breath.

The intensity of the effect only grew worse with each passing year. Each Hallowed moon that progressed saw those who, no matter how strong and how self-disciplined they were, slipped back into the more ruthless, animalistic nature that Demon ancestors had long ago been born to. When this type of chaos blossomed, it was the duty of an Enforcer to see that it did not turn toward innocents, and if it did, to severely punish the offender.

Bella and Jacob were the only Enforcers. That meant insane behaviors would always end in a confrontation with one or both of them, a confrontation that the temporarily insane Demons always lost as the lucid, organized Enforcers tracked and trapped them.

Then there was the terrible punishment to follow. This duty rested solely in Jacob’s hands. Isabella had not developed the stalwart, armored heart that was required to mete that punishment out, and he hoped she never would. It was a responsibility he took on gladly because he would rather her heart stay sweet and unburdened. Punishment for a Demon was an unspeakable thing, and the humiliation of it tended to stigmatize the one who suffered it for a long period of time afterward.

In the end it meant that neither of them could pretend not to see the indications of a Demon who was pressing at the edges of sanity, their sense of civilization and moral sagacity rubbed raw with the growing phase of the moon. It was little details, ones that made an aura vibrate with high-strung tension, or the occurrence of aberrant behaviors that were ever so slight but that warned them that the Demon in question was struggling with his own volatile nature. These were the sparks that indicated a fuse was lit and growing ever closer to a deadly moment of explosion.

Apparently Isabella was seeing those signs in the Demon King. If he were going to be honest, Jacob would have to agree, although the very idea of it made his stomach churn. If they were forced to battle so respected and powerful a man, so beloved a friend…

Isabella looked up at him with sad, understanding eyes. She was his spiritual mate, and as such had telepathic access to all of his thoughts, but even if she hadn’t been able to hear his wishes, she would know what Jacob was praying for.

That Noah would find his destined mate as soon as possible.

It was the only thing that would prevent the inevitable juncture of confrontation the King and his Enforcers were heading toward. Destiny, whom all Demons revered for both Her diligent forward motion as well as Her capricious sense of humor and irony, intended the Imprinting to be the Demon race’s salvation. Jacob would never fear the potential of his own madness during the Hallowed moons again. That potential had been whisked away when Bella and the Demon prophecy about Druids like her had fallen into his lap. That was when they had all learned that it was possible to find soul mates in the Druids lying dormant and hidden in human society. It promised to rescue an ancient species trembling on the brink of madness.

It also had the potential to diminish the need for the Enforcers. One day, home and hearth would take up more of their time than hunting and being harbingers of punishment. However, there had been very few matches in the past three years, which certainly didn’t make up for centuries of the nearly absolute absence of the Imprinting. Bella and Jacob’s relationship was a small drop of fortune in the vast bucket of turmoil that the Demons swam in each Hallowed season.

Jacob bent over his petite wife and pressed gentle lips to the inside of her slightly damaged wrist. As a Druid, she would heal quickly enough from the injury to allow her to forget it by morning; as her Imprinted mate, Jacob felt even the slightest of her pains far too keenly to ever forget them that easily. And though he knew she saw his thoughts clearly, he sought to soothe her troubled heart.

“I think you fret overmuch,” he chided her gently, smiling when she absently curled her fingertips over the contours of his cheek in reflex to his kiss. “Noah is tense, I agree, but you can clearly see he understands what needs to be done to divert himself. He has survived six and a half centuries of Hallowed moons without ever stepping out of line. Noah hardly needs a little snippet like you, hardly three decades old, trying to mother him.”

Her violet eyes widened at the insult, her mouth opening slightly before she recovered, her gaze lighting with understanding.

“You are trying to get my back up on purpose so I won’t worry,” she countered. Dark lashes fell to shadow her gaze and she leaned into him to press her cheek over the beat of his heart. “I love you for that,” she said, sighing deeply and softly.

Jacob’s hand came to the black curtain of her hair, stroking it top to bottom, knowing the caress soothed and contented her. She relaxed against him, making a small sound of pleasure. “We both see the straining at Noah’s spirit, little flower,” he told her with infinite gentleness, “but we will trade our friendship with the King away if we spend it watching and waiting for him to self-destruct.”

Isabella nodded gravely once and then reached for her husband’s mouth with her own parting lips as she buried comforting fingers into the charcoal-and-chocolate hair sweeping over the nape of his strong neck.

“You are right,” she sighed, kissing him tenderly again. “You are absolutely right.”

The scent was sweet, like spun sugar that flew in threads through the air of a successful carnival. The innocence of it belied the overwhelmingly mature sensation of heat and pure animal hunger that washed over him. It was a craving he knew, and yet had never known its equal in depth. He was blinded by it, clenched tight as if his entire body were a single flexed muscle of awareness and anticipation.

She had fought him every step of the way. She always did. Sometimes he thought she did it just to vex him, but mostly he could sense her hostility was all a part of a power struggle she felt she needed to win, whatever the cost. He suspected she was too young a creature to be so jaded, yet it rang true in the antagonism with which his arrival was always greeted. This was the one thing he could be certain of, if nothing else besides her cotton candy scent and long, pristine white hair.

But she was meant for him, chosen by Destiny whether she wanted to be or not. All of this emotional static of resistance was eventually pushed aside as she was overwhelmed with other feelings that spoke to her soul, bypassing her learned behaviors and well-enforced mental barriers. He ruthlessly used this to his advantage, countermanding her enthusiasm for jockeying for power until she was made to realize that the Imprinting was a force which neither of them could ever hope to do battle against.

His fingers and hands curved around firm, feminine flesh that was of a supernatural texture. She felt like the petals of a flower, but so much silkier, so very much more vital. She exceeded the simplistic adjective “soft” in hundreds of ways. Yet there was no mistaking the strength beneath her silken skin. What would she do, he wondered, to make herself so strong? What would she look like when his sensual and emotional war on her forced the inevitable surrender?

He craved answers to all of this as he heard her breath, close and frustrated, rolling thick and slow over his nerves and skin like a mist-laden Louisiana breeze in high summer. He felt her hair, a heavy mass of whitewater silk that poured haphazardly over his too-hot skin in such a way that he felt bound by the tangle of it.

Hard as he tried, powerful as he could be, he could not see her face. He tried to ask her name, but was speechless. The paralysis of his vocal cords extended at times to every extremity. He could feel, but not touch. Then he could touch, but only hear her response. He could look and not truly see. There was nothing but the gleaming white blond of that endless hair. He gritted his teeth with unfathomable frustration, fighting the mystical binding that held his dominant will a prisoner.

All he wanted in the world was to see her face.

Noah woke with a jerk and a staggering intake of breath.

He sat up with the sudden violence of the freedom of reality, his long, strong fingers entwining around covers that were already tangled around his bare hips and legs. As he tried to feed himself with sharp intakes of oxygen, sweat skied down the aristocratic slope of his nose, beading and dripping off it, accompanying those skimming nearly every other surface on his skin. His dark hair was drenched. The pattering sound of the droplets coming off slightly curled ends and dropping onto stiff sheets was identical to that of rain on a rooftop.

As he gathered his bearings, the Demon King brought the sheet up to his face to swipe at the moisture that nearly blinded him. That was when he realized the fabric was scorched stiff, as if someone had left an iron on it for too long.

And that, in spite of its burnt state, it still carried the scent of sweetly spun sugar.

Corrine looked up when she heard the polite knock on the front door of the home she shared with her husband, Kane. Her russet brows drew together and she tilted her head. She put aside the book she had been reading, uncrossed her long, slim legs, and stood up slowly.

It was unusual for the people she associated with to bother with such a commonplace courtesy as knocking. The Demon society her husband came from didn’t have the same sense of privacy that humans did. Considering that her husband’s friends and family were just about the only people she associated with nowadays, the knock was more than just perplexing.

It was worrisome.

There was danger that came under such guises. Things that seemed terribly ordinary, yet were out of the ordinary, sometimes heralded equally unique hazards.

The Demons were currently, as they had been upon occasion in the past, at odds with a sect of misguided humans who hunted them using deadly force and black magics. These humans had taken it upon themselves to rid the world of all the Nightwalker races. Vampire, Lycanthrope, Demon, and Shadowdweller…they would probably even hunt down the gentle, delicate Mistrals as well if they only knew about them. All that seemed to matter to these types was that these races had power that they did not.

They feared.

And fear always led to prejudiced actions. Being formerly human herself, Corrine understood very well the cruel, brutal things human beings tended to do when faced with things of great differences that they didn’t understand. To make the situation far worse, about two years ago a very powerful Demon female named Ruth had taken leave of her morals and senses and had joined ranks with these self-appointed butchers. She had provided them with information that had led to the increased vulnerability of the Demon race. Ruth had held nothing back, especially since the death of her beloved daughter, which she blamed on Noah and those highest in power.

Corrine shuddered with the chill that crossed her soul as she recalled the attack on her own sister Isabella, which had almost killed her and the unborn child she had carried at the time. Corrine herself had fallen victim to these forces once already, snatched from under her very own roof. Coupled with some of the gruesome reports Kane had discussed with her, it was clear that no one would be truly safe until Ruth and her companions were all neutralized.

Ruth’s revenges had too often begun with a simple knock on the door. Kane was constantly warning her to think carefully before she moved anywhere outside the circle of his protection. Now, though he was always close to her in spirit and could always use his power as a Mind Demon to teleport to her side in a heartbeat should she need him, she still felt enormous trepidation when she realized she was pretty much alone and facing the unknown.

“Corrine?”

The faint call sent a wash of relief through her, forcing an involuntary sigh to escape her. She moved hurriedly toward the door after hearing the familiarity in the voice coming from the other side. She yanked open the portal, smiling when the promise of the voice was fulfilled with the handsome visage of the Demon King. Her welcoming expression warred with the urge to scold him for giving her such a clear case of the heebie-jeebies.

Noah smiled at the slender redhead, noting that, as usual, she was mostly composed of a riot of abundant coils of hair. She was taller than her sister Isabella, more willowy and leggier than his little Enforcer’s decidedly compact and curvaceous figure. In fact, if it were not for their attitudes and Bronx accents, Noah felt there would be nothing to suggest they were at all related.

Noah did take note of the relief on her face, however, and felt the kinetic energy of her residual fear like a tepid breeze. It was then that he realized he had given her a scare, and he kicked himself for not giving his actions more thought.

“I am sorry,” he said softly to her, reaching for the hand that gripped the door frame, taking it warmly between both of his after prying it free. “Did I frighten you?”

“Scared the daylights out of me, is more like it,” she declared, her Bronx enunciation heavier than usual due to her ruffled calm. “Since when do Demons knock?”

“Since Druids who are part human with very human foibles started joining our ranks,” he rejoined, chuckling under his breath as he placed a soothing, chivalrous kiss on the back of the hand he cradled. “I am trying to set an appropriate example.”

“Your efforts are appreciated,” Corrine commended him, blowing a coil of her hair off her face with exasperation, “but next time, warn me before you make attempts at non-Demon behaviors. I had visions of pissed-off magic-users about to bounce me into the ground. Or worse.”

She finally relinquished her fear, stepping into his offer of peaceful affection, hugging him with warm, familiar welcome. He put soothing energy and tenderness into the embrace, pushing it into her until he sensed her heartbeat slowing down from its frightened flutter. He had come to seek solace, to free himself of a torture that had gone on too long already. He hadn’t come to thoughtlessly frighten her to death.

“You are looking well,” he said, almost at the same time she was thinking that he wasn’t looking quite like himself.

Even under the worst duress and circumstances, Noah would always look as powerful as he was. As a Demon of Fire, his energy resources were virtually unlimited. He could borrow from the energy or life force of anything that lived or sparked in order to revitalize himself. Corrine suspected that, were it not for the lethargic compulsion of the sun that all Demons fell under, Noah would not even need to sleep to replenish used resources of the day.

But it was no secret to Corrine, or anyone else who had even the slightest familiarity with the Demon King’s usual easygoing nature, that Noah looked more than a little tense around his edges.

“So,” Corrine said, this time infinitely more relaxed as she did so, “what brings you to our little corner of the world?”

“Oh, just visiting,” the King said lightly, linking his hands behind his back as she stepped back to allow him access into her home. “Kane is not here,” he noted.

“No. He’s visiting Jacob at the moment.”

She watched the King’s smile automatically grow wider at the mention of her brother-in-law’s name. Corrine thought, with no little amusement, that the King’s fondness for Jacob was obvious. Unlike humans, Demons weren’t constricted by the confusing rituals that preceded the revelation of one person’s feelings for another. In fact, it was safe to say that they wore their hearts on their sleeves, embroidered in wild red, with indicator signs flashing in neon that said point-blank the value one person had within the heart of another.

It was one of those things in their complex culture that she’d come to appreciate and enjoy. Still, Corrine was amused by the way Noah made his favoritism for Jacob so evident. But she understood that Noah and Jacob had a very special sort of friendship, one that could only be formed between two men of outstanding and distinct power.

However, she was puzzled as to why Noah had dropped by her home. Though her sister and brother-in-law were extremely close to Noah, his affection didn’t naturally extend just by familial association. To say she and Kane were special friends with the King would have been an exaggeration. Oh, they were as welcome and loved by Noah as any other member of Demon society, but it was rare for the monarch to single them out without there being a purpose behind it.

So Corrine watched him with no little curiosity as he wandered into their comfortable home and looked it over with interest. He’d been there once before, though not in a circumstance that would have allowed him to take much note of the décor or the warm, feminine trinkets that Corrine had added to it. Still, you didn’t rush a King to reveal his business, and for the moment Corrine was content to simply visit with him and let him come to it in his own time.

“Why are you not visiting your sister while Kane visits with Jacob?” the King asked conversationally, his rich accent a denser, older version of her husband’s. Noah was more than a half millennium older than Kane was. Kane’s verbal affectations had come from being raised around the inflected English—Jacob’s inflected English, to be exact. Like Jacob’s, Noah’s elegantly distorted English had come from the Ancient Demon language itself, learned long before English had fallen from his tongue.

“I see her often enough,” she assured him, leaning casually into the archway that led into the living area Noah was inspecting with singular fascination. “I’m actually taking a day off from watching my rather rambunctious niece. Leah is going through the Demon/Druid version of the terrible twos, and believe me when I tell you, I deserve some time to myself. Especially with Samhain not too far around the corner. Once your Enforcers get busy Enforcing, I’ll be babysitting quite a bit.”

“Indeed,” Noah agreed, his tone a little more grave, whether he was aware of it or not. “And I believe Leah is a Demon. Although she is part human and part Druid when you see her lineage in her parents, their children…that is, any children born of Demons and Druids can only be one or the other. It is why the races were able to remain separate for generation upon generation. Of course, we cannot know for sure until she comes into power as a Demon does or remains dormant as a Druid does…but the Prophecy speaks of Leah as a new breed of Demon—” Noah cut himself off, drawing even more of Corrine’s curiosity as he fidgeted with a small statuette in a manner that was very much out of character for the unflappable King. “Your sister will be busy these next nights. I had wondered who she would entrust Leah’s care to, considering that Demons can never be fully trusted around Samhain and—”

He broke off again, wrestling with intense private thoughts. Of course Corrine was quite familiar with the drawbacks that came with Demon holy days like Samhain and the phases of the moon around them. Just as she was familiar with the benefits of them.

It had been a full Samhain moon that had brought her and Kane together, giving her a blissful new life filled with passion and love. However, it had come very close to completely destroying her in the process. Corrine could appreciate Noah’s trepidation. Also, the King wasn’t married, or mated as the Demons called it, and that made it all the harder for him. Corrine hadn’t noticed any signs of Noah losing control, but it wasn’t exactly her area of expertise. What she could see was his disturbance of the moment.

Noah’s restraint was legendary and unparalleled, and his nature was consistently serene. It was only ruffled when his family came under threat. Even a threat to his society as a whole couldn’t disturb him to the depth that a threat to those dear to him could. So to see him disturbed in any way incited concern as well as curiosity.

Despite the soft warning in the back of her mind, Corrine threw patience and protocol aside with a sigh. “Noah, is there something I can help you with?”

Noah looked up from his distant study of the figurine, his jade eyes with their clouds of gray meeting hers in that way that only someone of royalty or great position seemed able to manage. Noah wasn’t a cruel or overtly strict monarch, but he was a man used to the privileges that came with his position, a position he’d earned the hard way. Demons selected their royal leader on merit alone, not entirely because of lineage or fortune of birth.

“Come on,” she coaxed the King gently, advancing into the room and purposely putting the warmth of her body into the influence of his personal space. It was a trick she’d learned from Kane. The best way to soothe the sometimes volatile temper of a Fire Demon, he’d told her, was to bring the warmth of her energy and its good intentions so close to them that it had a soothing effect. “I’m aware you care for me and Kane as much as anyone else, but you’re not in the habit of dropping in just to shoot the breeze. You love my sister like that, not me.”

Noah looked down at his feet and chuckled softly, a short sound followed by a rueful shake of his head. “You shame me,” he said quietly. “I never realized I played favorites so obviously.”

“Frankly, I prefer to be ill-favored,” she teased him with a pretty, flirtatious smile. “When you love someone, Noah, you elevate them to remarkable status in your circle of advisers or in your army of defenders. By all means, Noah, love my sister and leave me the hell alone!”

Finally, Noah truly laughed. He threw back his head, the reddish highlights within the ebony fall of gently curling hair gleaming sharply in the muted gaslight that lit the room. The sound of his laughter was infectious, and it made Corrine laugh with him. It also eased her to hear it, to see him relieving himself of the seriousness of whatever it was that was on his mind.

“You know something, you may have just thwarted your own effort, Corrine. Until now, I do not think I have truly appreciated the warmth of spirit and heart that runs through your family. I have credited one sister, while overlooking the other. For that, I beg your forgiveness.” He gave her a smart, cordial bow, and she stepped back from him with a chuckle.

“Damn it, if you make me a Council member or something, Kane is going to freak out,” she joked.

“Sorry. Only Elders are allowed on the Great Council.”

“Then explain my sister!” she demanded, reminding him that Isabella was barely thirty years old, not the requisite minimum of three hundred.

“Well, that is different. She is an Enforcer.”

“Yes, yes.” Corrine waved that off the way only an older sister could wave off a younger sister’s accomplishments. “Don’t make me accuse you of trying to change the subject again, Noah.”

“Perish the thought,” he assured her, his eyes turning serious again only a heartbeat after his words had. This time, she allowed him the pair of minutes he took to order his heavy thoughts. “I have struggled with myself for quite some time about the matter of seeking you out, Corrine,” he began at last. The King paced away from her briefly, and then turned to look at her. Corrine watched as he rubbed his hands together, as if warding off a chill. The concept of a Fire Demon catching chill was preposterous. She bit her lip, held her tongue, and somehow managed not to overstep herself. “Since we found you and Isabella, we have only been able to find three other Druids. Can you tell me why? What do you think is the cause?”

The question was pretty much out of left field, but if Noah was headed in the direction she suspected he was, it perhaps wasn’t so off topic.

“I have only a theory,” she responded willingly. “No one knew Druids still existed. Every Demon thought Druids had been annihilated in the war a millennium ago.” Corrine knew he was familiar with the history, so she kept it brief. “But when Jacob met Bella, and the night Kane touched me for the first time, triggering the birth of our dormant Druidic DNA, we all learned differently.”

“A hard lesson,” Noah observed. . . .