Silken Rapture (Princes of the Underground 2)

He glanced down at the man he held. Isi was dark and youngish looking, although it was hard to fully see his features with so much blood smeared across his face, neck and chest. Blaise wished for Isi’s sake that Aubrey, with his prodigious skill for healing, had been one of the attacking Literati party. Isi’s throat had been cut nearly clean through from front to back. He was holding his severed neck together with his surrounding arm, pressing his hand down desperately against the gushing wound. The incomplete beheading would have instantly killed a human, but given Isi’s paranormal nature, he had not yet succumbed to death.

“I have to get him to Sanctuary,” he told Michael. “But there’s an unconscious canid in the tunnel over there that needs to lose his head. Do a thorough survey of all the chambers. And be careful.”

Michael nodded and started with the other Literati toward the narrow, dusty passage. Blaise headed in the other direction, intent on getting Isi to safety.

Chapter Eleven

Later that night, he retired to his quarters, feeling exhausted. Aubrey had arrived at Sanctuary and told Blaise Isi stood a fifty-fifty chance for survival. Although his neck hadn’t been completely severed, his throat and a portion of his spinal cord had. His superhuman powers of healing were working to knit the wound, but it was a close thing. He was alive, but barely. According to Aubrey, the only thing they could do was wait.

Isabel had discovered Blaise’s whereabouts soon after he’d arrived. Her face had gone white as snow when she’d seen him.

“It’s from Isi,” he said, divining that her look of horror came from believing he was covered in his own blood.

“You found him,” she said, peering into the guest suite where Isi lay.

“Yes, thanks to you.”

He’d wanted her to leave—the Iniskium warrior’s wound was gruesome—but Isabel refused to budge. Like him, she’d watched tensely as Margaret and Aubrey labored over an unresponsive Isi. She hadn’t said anything, but she hadn’t needed to. She’d stood next to him, one hand at his back, the other on his forearm. He’d taken great comfort in her presence.

A short while ago, he’d noticed how pale and drawn she looked, and refused to take no for an answer when he said she needed to rest.

“I’m so relieved you’re safe. Come in with me,” she said when he’d escorted her to her bedroom suite.

“I can’t, Isabel.”

“You can,” she whispered.

He glanced down at his blood-soaked clothing. “I’m not fit for your company.”

She smiled. “You’re always fit for my company, Blaise.”

He swallowed thickly and forced himself to look away from temptation. “I need to clean up,” he said in a cracking voice before he walked away.

He showered to get the stench of revenant blood and saliva off him. He’d longed to accept Isabel’s offer—he could always make her forget later, couldn’t he? It wasn’t different than any other occasion when he went to her room, and she believed it was the first night that they consummated their passion.

But he was covered in blood and gore. He reeked of revenant stench. He couldn’t bear to soil her further than he already had.

His wounds had almost completely healed, although the scratches on his chest were still pink with new skin, and smarted. After he showered, he lay in bed and almost immediately fell into a deep sleep.

Usan had once told him that the Magian did not dream, for they had long ago learned to decode the unconscious world and make it conscious. Blaise had formed a picture in his mind of the Magian as beings that were closer to angels than humans, and that was one of the many reasons he believed himself cursed.

What fool would mix the essences of angel, beast and man?

Morshiel was right to call him a freak of nature. It was no wonder he didn’t tear himself limb from limb in a fit of insanity, as mixed as his blood was.

Blaise often dreamed, and his visions were a mixture of his wolf and human nature. A Native American shaman who was visiting England had once told him wolves communed with their mates in the dream world, and those visions were always true. The wolf also dreamed of the hunt and the many potential futures of his prey’s actions. Not all of

the things dreamed about the hunt would come true, but one of them would. Wisdom was required to discern which possible futures were most likely to manifest.

Men dreamed of their hopes, but mostly their fears.

That night, Blaise couldn’t decide if human or wolf was ruling him.

He dreamed he entered Elysse’s mausoleum—a cold, gray place he’d visited many times to mourn, a place that seemed as familiar to him as his inner world. He knelt by her stone tomb and tried to pray. For him, it was always trying, for he was sure the words were as meaningless as dry dust coming from a soulless throat…a soulless heart.

But he did try, fumbling the words.

He saw to his amazement that he could see directly through the lid of the thick, gray granite tomb. Elysse looked at him with eyes the color of the sky on a clear, summer day. They were like searchlights, her eyes. She flinched and uttered the familiar, dreaded words.