She slipped one knee to the ground and swung the other to straddle his thighs, taking his roughened cheeks between her palms to kiss his mouth. He tasted of fresh air and smoke from the fire.
“You have no idea what I deserve,” Raven said. “You have even less of an idea about what your own value is. Walk away once we find Creed if you want—I won’t stop you. But until that time comes, don’t push me away.”
She shed her coat.
He did nothing at first, and then, slowly, his hands went to her hips. The scratch of his unshaven jaw scraped like sandpaper along the tender flesh of her throat as he trailed hot kisses to her ear.
Fumbling with the buttons of her blouse, Blade untucked it from the waist of her trousers. She drew a quivering breath as his rough fingertips grazed the smooth flesh of her abdomen. The demon inside her surged again, this time seeking pleasure, and she saw no reason to deny that, either.
She could not stop him from walking away from her, and in fact, agreed it was best. But for him, not her. They both had their demons to fight, and while she knew hers, she did not believe he knew his.
Chapter Eleven
Justice and his companions rode through the open gates and into the courtyard of the Temple of Immortal Right ahead of the storm. Although they had not been challenged at the valley’s entrance, Justice knew their movements were being monitored.
The temple was not one single structure but a complex of rooms burrowed warren-like into the steep basin walls of one of the mountain’s many craggy valleys. Its courtyard ran the length of the valley floor, with a cordoned-off training yard occupying center stage. Inside it, assassin trainers, bared to the waist without regard for the bitter cold, bludgeoned the novices.
Justice slid from his hross, slapped dried, crusted mud from his chaps, and stretched the cramps from his injured leg. Having seen the training before, he had little interest in watching it now. They were rarely well matched. Cage and Might, however, nudged their hross closer to the sweating and bloodied fighters.
Justice passed his reins to one of the assassin attendants.
“Where’s Siege?” he asked.
The pimple-faced young man gestured over his shoulder toward the row of entrances leading to the temple’s inner maze of chambers, his attention occupied by the shying hross displaying its dislike of unfamiliar hands on its reins. “The library.”
Justice passed the lecture hall and refectory before reaching the entry to a long, low room. Shelves lined the stone walls, filled to capacity with well-worn books, and the room held the unmistakable smell of dry, ancient paper. A trim, elderly man sat, straight-backed and frowning in concentration, his white-haired head bent over a desk strewn with reams of bound volumes. A soft, eternal light radiated from the low ceiling, a gift to the temple’s servants from the goddesses.
Siege was a Godseeker as well as an assassin, but it was the name he had earned when still a young man that won him undying respect. He had once fended off three demons that had been hunting him in one of the retired mines, unworkable since before the time of the immortals. He had escaped through an old, caved-in shaft and made his way back from the desert to the protection of the goddesses’ mountains.
He had also been carrying his weight in pure gold.
Now that demons were gone, Justice intended to bring some of those lucrative old mining claims back into production.
The old man looked up when Justice’s shadow filled the doorway.
“Justice,” Siege said. His voice held no surprise, and no welcome either.
Justice bowed a greeting out of deference to the man’s age and status. While he might be old—and rumor had it his heart was no longer strong—his years had not softened him. Siege remained one of the best instructors and a passionate defender of the goddesses.
Justice hated him. He suspected the feeling was mutual.
“This is a poor time of year for travel in the mountains,” Siege added. “What brings you here?”
“Goddess business.”
Siege set down the pen he’d been holding. “Have a seat.”
Justice removed a stack of books from a spindle-back chair and nudged it closer to Siege’s desk with his knee before he sat down.
Siege began to spin the pen beneath his fingertips, around and around on the desk’s polished surface until Justice itched to take it from him.
“What might that business be?” Siege asked.
“Have you heard the reports of spawn in mortal form? Have you seen what’s been happening in the mountains?” Justice asked.
The old man’s expressionless face hid his thoughts. “I’ve heard. So far, I’ve seen no firsthand proof.”
“I have.” Justice told Siege of the destroyed village he and his companions had passed on the trail.
Siege’s creased face did not betray him. “How can you know spawn were responsible?”
The question was valid. The mountains had been under the protection of the goddesses since their first coming, longer than any living mortal could remember. To acknowledge that half demons could enter here meant the goddesses held no power over them anymore. To any Godseeker, it was an ugly possibility. Spawn, unlike their immortal fathers, were born to this world. What if that meant they had no restrictions within it?
If they did not, that made them more dangerous to mortals than full-blooded demons.
Female spawn would be an even greater problem. No one knew how the immortals came into being, and Siege might view them as half goddess, not half demon, based on their gender.
Justice himself believed there was no true difference between the immortals—he despised them all equally.
He answered Siege’s question with care. “I’ve witnessed house fires, barn fires, and fires in the mines where people and animals burned to death. A goddess temple was burned to the ground with everyone in it, leaving nothing but smoke and ash behind. It would take demon fire to cause that type of destruction.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’ve also seen the devastation a spawn can cause when it gets too close to mortal men. I’m afraid my stepdaughter may be one of them. She uses seduction to entice and enslave them, just as a demon would. She tried it on me, a Godseeker.” He tapped his amulet and looked at the one Siege wore. “This is all that saved me. If I were a weaker man, not even an amulet invoked by an immortal could have done so.”
“That’s your stepdaughter’s sole demon ability?” Siege asked. “Seduction?” He smiled as if greatly amused. “Take it from an old man. That ability proves nothing other than that she’s a woman.”
Good. Justice did not want Siege too suspicious of her just yet, only willing to have an assassin bring her to him.
“I was once favored by a goddess,” Justice said. “I would hope that an ordinary woman could hold no such power over me. This one’s mother slept with a demon. I heard that from her mother’s own lips. And after my stepdaughter escaped lawful custody, I followed her into the mountains. While I don’t wish to believe it, it’s possible she brought the demon fire against those villagers. She could have enslaved the men, then used her control over them to round the villagers up and lock them in the temple before burning it. She’s even touched one of your recruits,” he added. “Creed. It’s possible she can make him do her bidding, too.” He could not resist a bitter jibe aimed at the goddesses’ faithful, one of which he would forever remain whether he wished to or not. “Once a slave, always a slave.”
The smile on the old man’s face vanished. “Creed is hardly weak-minded.”
Justice fought to keep his own opinions on that concealed. It seemed Raven’s friend was already earning a reputation for himself, even amongst the seasoned assassins. It had always been this way with Creed. He inspired the trust of others in him.