Claimed by Sin: an Urban Fantasy Novel (The Gatekeeper Chronicles Book 3) Read online

  Stomach full, I pushed my plate to the side. “When do we start?”

  “Tomorrow morning,” Loki said.

  “The boys are feeling much better,” Ajitah said. “They say they’re ready.”

  Loki grinned. “They did great.”

  Carmella nudged me gently. “You want to watch a movie or something to pass the time?”

  “Yeah,” Aaron said. “We can watch Avatar.”

  Avatar…the movie I’d planned for my first date with Garuda. Oh god. Pain ripped through me, bringing fresh tears to my eyes.

  “Shit, Malina…” Aaron pulled me into a hug.

  “I’m okay. I’m fine.” I pushed him away, slipped off my chair, and headed into the lounge. I needed to breathe. Just a moment.

  Why was this so hard? Losing Dad had been bad. The pain was still there, an ache that would never leave, but Garuda was a gaping wound, an agony that screamed silently for some kind of relief. Except the only cure was the cause.

  “Malina.” Loki joined me, forcing me from my thoughts. “You’re sure it was my world?”

  I stared at him. Hadn’t I already explained? Wait…I’d come back, and then… No, I hadn’t spoken to him about what we’d seen. Just that it had been his world that had taken…taken Garuda from me.

  “Yeah, I’m sure. I saw you.”

  He stepped closer. “You did? What was I doing?”

  Who cared? “You were doing something in a chamber with a bowl and some vials.” Just go away so I can breathe.

  Loki ran a hand over his face wearily. “The anointing. It was the potion I made to make Elara love me. To make her want me as much as I wanted her. I was so careful, but I must have done something wrong, because it was the potion that allowed the darkness to infect her.”

  “Yeah. I can understand you getting confused with all the vials. And there was this strip of paper with symbols on it.” I looked up at him sharply. “They looked like the ones in the journal.”

  He cleared his throat. “The symbols summoned the power for the spell. You touched the vials?”

  “No, just the paper, but then someone came, and I dropped it.”

  Loki’s face blanched. “You dropped it? Where did you drop it?”

  I cast my mind back. “The bowl, I think. Yeah, it fell into the bowl.”

  Loki gasped, his hand flying to his mouth. “Fucking hell.”

  “What?”

  He turned his back to me, his shoulders shaking. Was he crying?

  “Loki?”

  He held up a hand. “Fine. I’m fine.”

  He was laughing—the crazy idiot was laughing. I’d somehow broken the most powerful witch in this reality.

  “What the heck is so funny?”

  He turned to face me, the laughter dissipating. “All this time, I thought I’d done something wrong with the spell, when in reality, you were the one to corrupt it.”

  “What? What do you mean?”

  “The slip of paper you dropped into the bowl changed the whole spell. It summoned not just energy, but the source of that energy.”

  “You’re saying I caused the unraveling? But that’s crazy. Your world died eons ago.”

  “It’s a paradox. If you’d never gone back to my world, it wouldn’t have been destroyed. But you were always going to go back because you’d already been there.”

  My brain hurt.

  “This reinforces my theory. The multi-verse is guiding us. Working alongside us to make sure we keep it ticking. This was all meant to be. I may not have messed up the spell, but if I hadn’t tried to force Elara to love me, none of this would have happened. There would have been no potion for you to corrupt. Hell, there’d be no Daughter of Chaos.”

  “She did love you, though.”

  He stilled. “What?”

  “The doorway you created spat us out in her closet. We heard her speaking to her brother. They were arguing about her feelings for you. She did love you.”

  He stepped back and sank onto the sofa behind him. “She loved me?”

  “Yeah.”

  For once, the powerful Loki was caught off guard, his eyes dazed and his mouth soft—trapped in the memory of another time.

  “Loki?”

  He blinked and sat up straighter. “But she’s gone now. Only the darkness remains, and we must send it back to sleep.”

  Ajitah and Drake wandered into the room, and I ducked out—done with the social thing for now. This was my limit for the night—a night that stretched out before me like an endless trial. There were too many hours to dwell, remember, and feel. Aaron and Carmella were sweet for wanting to be there to lend an ear, a shoulder, whatever. But I wasn’t ready for that. I couldn’t talk about it. Not yet. I didn’t want to feel. I wanted action, movement, a mission, anything to take my mind off the gaping hole in my chest where my heart had once been. There was only one place where I could find that kind of diversion.

  I slipped away, jumped in the car, and started the engine. The passenger door opened, and Ajitah got in.

  “What are you doing?”

  He buckled in and stared out the windscreen. “It’s team fight night at The Circle, and I could do with a workout.”

  This wasn’t about him or a workout. I stared at the ignition, considering my options. I could kick him out, get to The Circle, and find out there was no participation due to lack of a partner. Or I could take him along and let him have his “workout.” I started the engine. Fuck it. It wasn’t like we had to have a conversation or anything.

  The buzz of the crowd and the coppery scent of blood, mingled with the stale odor of sweat, set my pulse racing.

  “You came back,” Al said. His gaze slid over my shoulder to Ajitah. “And you brought my star with you.” He looked from Ajitah back to me, his craggy face split in a joyous grin. “Please tell me you two are teaming up.”

  Ajitah stepped forward and held out a wad of cash. “We’re teaming up. Place that on us, to win.”

  Al’s brows shot up. “Well, well. Things are gonna get pretty exciting.” He glanced across the arena at a pack of Yaksha. “You’ve been gone a while, and a new star has been born. Marco and his pack have been killing it. They’re the new favorites. But I know you two.” His eyes narrowed. “I know what you’re capable of. Let’s hope most gamblers have forgotten.” He tucked the money into his fanny pack. “You win tonight and the three of us will make a killing.”

  “I don’t care about the money. I just want to beat the crap out of something.”

  Al let out a bark of laughter. “Well, you’ve come to the right place, darlin’. I’ll set it up.” His eyes gleamed with wicked intention.

  It was time to get a drink.

  Ajitah trailed me to the bar, leaning against it while I downed a couple of shots. The alcohol had no effect on me aside from the heat it created when it hit my stomach. My metabolism burned through it too quick for me even to get a buzz. But I enjoyed the taste.

  “You ever done a team fight?” Ajitah asked.

  I shook my head. “Can’t be that hard. We go in and kick their asses together.”

  He snorted. “When you put it that way, yes, I guess it is pretty simple. But we need to work as a team. We need to complement each other’s strengths and weaknesses. Since we’ve never fought together, it may—”

  “Look. I don’t give a shit. I just want to go in and beat someone up, okay?”

  He pressed his lips together and tucked in his chin.

  Man, I was a bitch. I turned my back on the crowd and raised my hand for another shot. “I’m sorry. Let’s just… Let’s do our best, okay?”

  “So we meet again.”

  I turned to see the familiar face of the yaksha that had accosted me the last time I’d been here. “What do you want?”

  “Just saying a friendly hi before I kick your pretty ass in the arena.”

  So this was Marco. “Yeah? Well, use your teeth while you have them, hun, ’cause when I’m done with you, you’ll be picking them u
p off the floor.”

  “Ooo, nice comeback. Maybe when we’re done with the fighting, we can make with the rutting.”

  Ajitah’s chest rumbled in a warning growl.

  Marco blinked up at him. “Aw, I see you brought your own little gladiator to back you up.”

  Little? Ajitah was twice the size of the mangy mutt.

  Ajitah stared down at the yaksha with the classic emotionless expression I’d seen him use in the arena before.

  Marco took a step back. “Yeah, well. I’ll see you on the flip side.”

  “Tosser,” Ajitah said as soon as the guy was out of earshot.

  “How do you do that?”

  “What?”

  “The face.”

  “What? This?” His expression smoothed out again.

  Even though I knew he was doing it for effect, a chill ran up my spine. “Yeah, that.”

  He shrugged and picked up my refilled shot glass. “I just do.” He downed my drink and placed the glass back on the bar, catching the barman’s eye. “Another.”

  There was no time for another, because the bell was tolling and our fight was being announced.

  Time to kick some arrogant yaksha ass.

  The arena doors closed behind us, and the crowd fell into silence. Marco and his teammate—a slightly larger version of him—whooped and leapt about, acting more like monkeys then the lupine beasts they were. The crowd went wild with cries of “Moonlight, Marco, and Juno!” I guess Moonlight was their pack. Someone howled. The bell rang, and we were all action.

  There was no hanging back with these two. They attacked like mini whirlwinds, going for the jugular with their claws. This was no knock-’em-down-and-win fight. This was a slash-’em-and-watch-’em-bleed-out fight.

  I couldn’t kill them, but I reveled in the threat of the unchecked violence of their assault. Ajitah was always there in the periphery of my vision—at my back, at my side. The thud and slap of fist meeting flesh, the sharp spike of copper in the air, the musky scent of yaksha exertion and my blade slicing through flesh and fur were a buzz my metabolism couldn’t kill. This was what I needed. This primal moment. I spun and kicked Marco in the face. He laughed, shook it off, and leapt at me, claws extended. I hadn’t used my hellhound powers in the ring before. Not until now. My hands burst into flame, and I slammed my fist into the side of his head.

  The roar of the crowd was a momentary panacea for my grief. Marco screamed, batting at his face. He fell to the ground and rolled around in the sawdust to put out the fire. When he jumped to his feet, his face was a mess of blood and weeping skin. But he was already healing, morphing, and growing into his beast form.

  Ajitah grabbed my elbow. “Malina, swap.”

  “No way.”

  This was my fight. Marco was mine. Except he was no longer Marco. He was pure beast. I’d heard of them, of course—the yaksha who could go full beast—but this was the first one I’d seen. His clothes were gone, torn to shreds as his body took the form of a massive wolf. Wide shoulders and powerful haunches. Yeah, it was rare to see a yaksha in this form.

  Howls filled the air. The crowd roared, battering at the cage with their metal tankards and pipes.

  This was what Al had meant about the new favorite. Who wouldn’t love seeing something so rare?

  Ajitah flung Juno across the arena. The yaksha hit the ground and didn’t get back up. Marco’s lips curled back to reveal huge, bone-crunching teeth. All the better to eat me with.

  Ajitah moved to my side. “We got this.”

  “No. He’s mine.”

  “Dammit, Malina. This isn’t just a yaksha; this is pure beast.”

  I exhaled, opening myself to the power of the seal—allowing it in fully for the first time. Up until now, I’d avoided tapping into it too much. Not ready to admit it was fully mine. That Dad was gone, and I was all the world had left now. But Dad was gone. Garuda was gone. And I was ready.

  Power surged through my veins, burning like ice. The color bled out of the world and then snapped into infrared.

  Ajitah stepped back. “Malina…what the fuck?”

  But I wasn’t Malina any longer. I was the naga. Fiery. Powerful. Lethal.

  The room fell into pin-drop silence.

  I swayed, testing my new form. Unlike the first time, I was now in full control of the majestically sinuous body. Marco, in beast form, swayed with me as if mesmerized. He shook his shaggy head, predatory eyes narrowing, snout crinkling as he bared his fangs once again.

  A low, ominous hiss filled the air as I showcased my fiery fangs. Come on, beastie, make your move.

  Marco’s muscles tensed, bunching as he prepared to pounce, but I was ready for him, swerving out of the way, tail whipping around to smack into him. Marco hit the cage bars, his body aflame once more. He rolled to douse the fire and attacked again.

  Movement to my left caught my eye. My head whipped around to find Juno back on his feet, his body expanding to match his teammate’s.

  Ajitah cursed and fell into a crouch. “Malina, if you’re still in there, don’t eat me.”

  I chuckled, and it came out as a hiss. This was gonna be fun.

  The yaksha attacked, and I fell into fight mode: body moving on instinct, tail whipping out to smash, fangs sinking into flesh, jaws squeezing. Marco whined and yipped, trying to get free. Something raked my side. Juno. But he fell back soon enough when his face burst into flame. Ajitah leapt on him before he could gather himself, and I flung Marco to the ground, my tail coming down on him like a hammer of fire. The beast screamed.

  “Stop! Enough!”

  I zeroed in on the objector. A young woman, face contorted in agony as if I were pummeling her and not the yaksha.

  “Please. Don’t kill him. Please.”

  She loved him… She loved this creature trapped beneath my crushing, burning weight. The smell of cooking flesh and fur stung my nostrils. Garuda’s face filled my mind, and all I saw were his eyes, filled with the knowledge that he was going to have to let me go. Saturated with the sorrow of what could have been. I released Marco and slid back, my body shrinking and morphing back into its human form.

  I turned and strode toward the exit. “Open the fucking door.”

  I’d thought this would help. That I’d channel the pain, expel it somehow. A quick glance over my shoulder showed the female cradling a singed but healing Marco. Ajitah caught my eye. There was too much compassion in his gaze.

  I didn’t need it.

  I was so done.

  13

  We stood around the chalk circle Loki had drawn on the patio. The triplets had been positioned on the circumference, while Loki stood within the circle.

  “You’re sure this will work?” Ajitah asked Loki.

  Loki finished drawing the last symbol on his arm and nodded. “It’ll work. We’ll pull the hinn into the circle, and I will bind him here.”

  I shifted from foot to foot. “Fine, let’s just get on with it.” I wanted this done.

  Carmella linked her arm through mine and leaned into me. “You okay?”

  God, how I hated that question, but she meant well, so she earned one of my most perfunctory smiles. “I’m fine.”

  The sun was high. Plenty of time to grab the nagamuni and then go searching for the bitch who was wearing my mother like a pretty dress.

  When Aaron and Drake joined us, the ritual began.

  Loki began to hum, and the boys joined in, their voices rising in unison, coaxing gooseflesh up and down my arms.

  Ajitah came to stand beside me. “I guess I’ll have to let Loki train them.”

  “That’s not a bad thing.”

  “No. It’s just…scary.”

  Yeah, it was. They were so tiny. Yet, without them, we wouldn’t have been able to cross into another reality.

  Garuda…

  No. Not now. Not until this was over. Once this was done with, I’d mourn the two men I’d never had the chance to allow fully into my life. I’d grieve for the guys wh
o could have meant the world to me.

  The air in the circle began to shimmer as if heat was rising from the ground. But Loki remained impassive, unaffected. So not heat… magic. The spell was working.

  Something flickered into existence in the circle with Loki. The earth witch dove, grabbing hold of the form. But…wait. Something was wrong. The form was tiny. The shimmer abated and the hum died.

  I stared at the creature in Loki’s arms.

  “Toto?”

  Loki released my dog, but Toto remained in the circle, his body trembling.

  I met Loki’s gaze. “I don’t get it.”

  Aria materialized outside the circle. “He really isn’t what he seems.”

  What the heck was she talking about? “What? Loki?”

  “No,” Aria said. “Toto. I sensed it when you first brought him here. I spent time with him, trying to figure out exactly what I was picking up on, but found nothing. I thought I was mistaken. Maintaining this place takes a lot of my energy and concentration. I believed the otherness I sensed may have been my imagination.” She said the word as if it was a conundrum to have, and wield, an imagination.

  The triplets had stopped humming, which meant the locator spell was over. We’d located Toto, which could only mean…

  Drake stepped into the circle. “Let me try something.” He placed his hands on my dog, then began to chant. The strange, lilting words made my ears itch. Loki backed up as if stung by the mantra, but Toto began to convulse.

  “Wait, what are you doing?” I made to step into the circle, but Aria grabbed hold of my arm to stall me. Her grip was surprisingly firm.

  “Watch,” she said.

  Drake held on, eyes closed, forehead beaded with perspiration as he continued to chant. Suddenly, Toto folded in on himself—meat and bone and sinew. A scream rose in my throat, and I pressed my lips together to hold it back. Drake fell back, sliding out of the circle on his ass, and Carmella gagged. But I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the gross ball of flesh that now hovered inside the circle.

  “What did you do?” Ajitah said softly.

  My pulse pounded in my ears. “You just melted my dog.”

  “No. It’s a reveal spell to uncloak the hidden.”