LITMIR.BIZ

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       Chapter 2

      He could hear the siren song that sounded when her heart beat, when she inhaled and exhaled. But that wasn’t what called him to her. It was the subtle scent of her, beneath soap, blended with a hint of verbena perfume. Like cotton warmed by the sun, but cooled by the breeze on a spring day, there was a freshness, a goodness to her, untouched by Brimstone.

      Untainted.

      And she thought he was a daemon.

      He settled the boy with the costume matron, Sybil, who had been at l’Opéra Severne almost as long as he had. She’d always appeared as an older woman with that particular blend of sternness and maternal habits that made everyone defer to her in case she should decide to box their ears or swat their behinds. She looked no older than she’d looked the day he’d been ushered into her care when he was about the age of the boy he’d brought from Savannah.

      Katherine D’Arcy was wrong.

      No surprise that his Brimstone-tainted blood had fooled her. He wasn’t a daemon, but his grandfather had inked a deal with the devil in Severne blood. The Brimstone had come after, scorching their veins with its invasive mark.

      He was only an heir to damnation, but Katherine D’Arcy was associated with the Order of Samuel, and in such a woman’s eyes there could be little difference.

      Once he’d settled the boy with Sybil, he made his way back to the suite of rooms that made up his apartment several stories below and behind the grand opera stage for which the house was famous. The seemingly endless levels of basement beneath the opera shouldn’t have existed in a city that itself was beneath the flood plain of the mighty Mississippi, but nothing followed natural law here.

      The opera house was a universe unto itself, influenced by its damned denizens and masters.

      Its gilded mahogany columns and highly polished boards held ground against elaborately carved wainscoting more baroque than anything else you’d find in the river city. The carvings seemed to gambol and change as you passed, often reflecting your own experiences and thoughts back to you as if some long ago sculptor had chiseled out premonitory dreams in a laudanum haze. And all the shadows were draped in heavy layers of black-and-crimson satin and velvet curtains, which in spite of being impeccably maintained always ended up seeming shabby chic in the candlelight.

      Time, distance, reality were softened inside l’Opéra, but the softness didn’t mute the cruelty of an eternity in the luxurious chains of candlelit opulence you couldn’t escape.

      His rooms were more austere, but still overly filled with the detritus of centuries. His prison was made even more claustrophobic by books and art and textiles from too many years and fears to count.

      Resisting the oppression of time had helped to harden him as much as his constant training had.

      Only his bedroom reflected his true taste for simplicity. In it, the only furnishings were a large black cypress bed and a matching trunk bound with cracked leather straps and a heavy iron padlock.

      He opened the trunk with gloved hands, carefully removing an iron cask. Even with the gloves, the heat of the metal fittings of the cask was uncomfortable to his hands. Without the added protection of the Brimstone in his blood, he would have been horribly burned.

      He placed the cask on the hardwood floor, noting the scorch marks from it having been placed there before. The trunk was lined with lead or it would have turned to ash. Good thing his task wouldn’t take long.

      He opened the iron lid, a habitual move that was still momentous every single time.

      Inside the box, on a bed of coals, lay a rolled parchment. A curl of smoke rose lazily from one end, but there were no flames. He picked it up, ignoring the prickle of burns to his fingertips.

      Slowly he unrolled the scroll.

      The first names on the list had been marked through years ago. Their glow had faded to smudged black. But the second-to-last name on the list still shone like an ember in his dimly lit bedroom. It brightened even as he watched, and suddenly a line of fire scratched across the name. The blazing line flickered, flared and then went out.

      In time, the name of the boy’s mother would fade as the others had before her.

      Lavinia.

      It would blaze in his mind much longer than that.

      This time there was no corresponding pain as a slash of black was added to his scarred forearm like a grim tattoo. He hadn’t actually dispatched Lavinia himself. But there were many more marks from his shoulder down to beyond the crook of his elbow. A torturous tally he couldn’t ignore. One appeared each time he sent a daemon back to hell. Sometimes he wondered if the black marks reached deep, all the way to his heart. Marks that would stay with him forever even after he was free.

      There was only one name left on the list.

      Michael.

      After centuries of damnation’s shackles, he was almost free. More importantly, his father would be free before he died. They’d suffered under the burden of Thomas Severne’s lust for success. The only way they could regain their souls was to hunt down the daemons on the scroll.

      A being had to be extremely evil to wind up on hell’s blacklist. Or so he told himself when the nights grew long.

      The boy was sleeping. He’d been reassured by the familiar warmth of Brimstone and by Sybil’s welcome. Severne was suddenly fiercely glad the old monk had been the one to dispatch Lavinia. The gladness stung. It was a weakness he couldn’t afford. Not now when his father’s soul was almost within his grasp before it was too late. He had always been as hard as he had to be. He’d grown even harder over time. His father needed him to stay strong.

      He’d sent thirty daemons on the list back to hell. Usually a name was enough. Younger daemons were horrible at incognito. They always revealed their secret at the wrong time, in the wrong place. They shared their true name out of passion or pride, and then he was inevitably there to catch them. Because he didn’t rest. He’d watched those thirty daemons consumed by the very fire he feared as a corruption in his own veins. The boy here in his home would be a constant reminder.

      Severne allowed the scroll to roll in on itself. He replaced it in the cask and then set the cask back in the trunk.

      Only one name left... Michael.

      But he might be the one that got away if Severne failed to use Katherine D’Arcy the way he intended. Michael had proved illusive. He was one of the ancient ones. They were much more experienced and discreet and much harder to find.

      He rose from the trunk, but stood in the dark for a long time with the glow of the scroll still gleaming behind his eyes. He fingered the network of fine white scars that he’d received over the decades from daemon bites and claws or whatever weapons they could wield against him. Those marks were also reminders. Of what he had done. Of what he still had to do.

      Hard.

      Katherine’s skin had been perfectly smooth. So very soft to his touch.

      He didn’t touch the tally marks. He suspected they’d scorch his fingers as badly as the scroll. If not literally, then figuratively, because of the guilt each mark represented.

      She was coming. He could feel her approach, a distant tug on his senses that was both anticipation and... Her lips had been sweet, flavored by a vanilla lip balm and the champagne she’d been given after her performance. He hadn’t had to kiss her to influence her. The Brimstone in his veins gave him heightened powers of persuasion. A touch would have sufficed. He’d tasted her because he’d had to, but he hadn’t expected the taste to linger on his tongue. Most flavors were burned away before he could even enjoy them.

      She threatened to soften him. He could feel the seduction of what it would be like to ease into her arms. Instead, she was the one who had to be seduced. He needed her to complete his task and end his imprisonment. The contract

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