It took time to master the art of movement in his nearly paralyzed form, but Peter was nothing if not persistent. The increased activity outside his prison of the frieze helped. The more daemons that passed, the more he and the others trapped in the walls found themselves enlivened.
The response was chaos, mostly. There was no method to the madness of movement around his frozen form, only shifting, swirling and screaming as he had when he’d first found himself trapped.
Peter had been trained well by the Order. He spent hours reaching one hand out from the wall. Inch by inch he fought against whatever force had placed him in the purgatory of the palace walls. Once his hand reached forward into the shadows of the corridor, he worked to follow it with his arm. One goal drove him, as it had for many years. He would have Samuel’s daughter and her affinity for his own.
* * *
She found whisper-soft ivory undergarments folded on her pillow. The absence of a corset didn’t worry her. She was certain the dress would fit her perfectly. Sybil’s creations never needed help or adjustment. The strapless bra was light as air when she lifted it to place it against her skin and made of a material that was translucent, yet it conformed to her curves with the right amount of support. She couldn’t help glancing in the mirror as she pulled the equally translucent and airy thigh-high hose over her legs. After her night with Michael in the garden, the ensemble suggested numerous enticing possibilities. The idea of his calloused hands sliding against the silky hose...
Lily turned from the dress before she allowed herself to be carried away with a sultry scenario that could never be. She didn’t need help with the ball gown. Sybil’s designs were always easy to manage no matter how luxurious they seemed. In spite of the numerous layers of organza, the dress was light and went over her head with ease.
As she’d imagined, it settled on her slight curves like a second skin. Made for her by a seamstress more aware of her measurements than she was herself. Her arms were completely healed after several applications of the ointment Sybil had given her. They were no longer tender or pink. She stepped into the starry sandals and then allowed the skirts to fall to the floor. Their sweep was perfect. Not awkward or confining. They moved with her easily as she crossed the floor.
It was time. The celebration would go until midnight and by that time Michael would have to make his decision. It was a poignant countdown with a foregone conclusion. He would agree to be king. It wasn’t in a D’Arcy to back down from a challenge, even if it warred with their very nature.
Lily had to ensure that she wasn’t part of his decision—for or against—even though his choice would sever their connection forever.
* * *
His tuxedo was midnight blue with a sheen that reflected and refracted the candlelight as he moved. Lily watched him for long moments from the shadows. The snowy white of his silk shirt was the perfect contrast to the tie that matched the tuxedo save for the diamond chips that sparkled there like stars.
Sybil had designed their clothes to be complementary. All of the guests including the D’Arcys would know that they were meant to be seen as a couple. Ezekiel’s orders? Or had the daemon seamstress taken it upon herself to play matchmaker with two people she had watched over since they were young?
Lily couldn’t hide for long. Even in the crush and whirl of a ballroom filled with Loyalist daemons in their best finery, her starlit ball gown had been designed to shine. She’d only managed to go unnoticed this long because Grim had disappeared rather than escorting her with full hellhound ferocity into the ballroom. She had no idea where her vigilant watchdog had disappeared to, which added one more concern to her evening. She needed to know where he was in order to avoid him when she had to slip away.
Michael saw her before she had braced herself sufficiently to step from the shadows. Had he been watching and waiting for her to appear? He turned fully toward her and walked several paces her way, but then he stopped. When their eyes met, she’d been pulled forward as if by a string attached somewhere deep in her chest. He stopped when she came into the glow of the candlelight and he wasn’t the only one. All around the room, guests paused in what they were doing to turn toward her with audible sighs of admiration. Lily froze and looked down at herself, drawn by a soft glow she hadn’t expected. In her dark bedroom, the dress had sparkled. In the candlelit grand ballroom of Ezekiel’s palace, it shone.
There was more sparkle than she’d seen sewn into the fabric of her skirts. Layers upon layers of soft midnight illusion held millions of tiny multifaceted gems and they all seemed positioned perfectly to catch the light. The crowd began to clap softly. Sybil deserved the applause and the quiet murmur of surprised admiration that flowed around the room.
Lily, however, was torn. The look in Michael’s eyes was unfamiliar to her. He didn’t join the applause. He only stared as if he’d been struck. The candlelight was equally brilliant if more subtle on his tuxedo. He gleamed darkly. He was the shadow—the shining night sky—to her galaxy.
“Take him a glass of champagne, love. I warrant his mouth has gone dry,” the daemon king said. He’d come up beside her and he lifted one of her hands with his and pressed a long-stemmed crystal glass full of golden liquid against her fingers. She grasped when he let it go so it wouldn’t fall. He backed away and was swallowed again by the crowd, a crowd that seemed to swirl around her and Michael at a slight distance as if the rising affinity created a force field between them that kept the blur of others away.
Her feet weren’t rooted to the ground. She discovered she could take a step toward him and then another. He only stood and watched her approach. He didn’t help her narrow the gap. He didn’t smile. His face was unreadable. His hazel eyes leaped with candlelight, movement and then the glitter of her dress.
She held the glass out to him when she came as near as she dared.
“Happy birthday,” she said to break the silence—and the tension. She hadn’t realized her breath had been held until he blinked. The slow lowering and raising of his lids freed her to expand her lungs. He reached for the glass and brought it back to his lips in a sudden move that startled her as if he’d unfrozen when she spoke. He tilted his head back and drained the sparkling champagne in several long swallows. Lily watched the workings of his throat as the liquid went down. He placed the empty glass on a passing tray and scooped another in a smooth move that surprised because his attention was still fully on her. He offered the fresh glass of champagne to her.
“You’re stunning tonight. I fear Sybil might have to retire. She’ll never equal this. For you or anyone,” Michael said.
Lily took the glass from his fingers, carefully, so as not to draw the room’s attention again if they touched. She hoped he didn’t notice that the golden fluid shimmered with movement as she raised the glass to her lips. She sipped its chilled sweetness, but it didn’t cool her. Michael’s Brimstone caused perspiration to form on her upper lip. The room was full of Loyalist daemons, but they were distant warmth compared to the man beside her. Ezekiel? Possibly. He often buffered her affinity. He might be as responsible for the bubble around them as they were themselves.
“It reminds me of the desert sky,” Lily said. She’d torn her gaze away from his. It was too easy to grow dizzy from the kaleidoscope of reflections in their depths. Or the emotions she couldn’t read. “Do you remember asking me to run away with you? The sky that night?”
“I remember every moment with you,” Michael said. “Especially the stars...and the sunlit lilies crushed beneath us.”
Lily’s attention flew back up to his face. She licked her lips and tasted perspiration and champagne.
“You avoided my touch when you took the glass. But Lily, this is my birthday and I have to touch you. Say you’ll dance with me and damn the consequences,” Michael said.
“I’m here to dance,” Lily said. “All night long.”
This time, she drained the champagne. The effervescent bubbles in her nose matched the ones in her stomach. He took the glass as she lowered it and placed it on another tray. Then he took her hand. Ezekiel’s buffering or not, when they touched the whole room seemed to pause again. Lily could feel the perusal of hundreds of gazes. She glanced around as she followed the tall figure of the half-daemon prince to the dance floor. Most of the faces were a blur—except for a lady in red who was, of course, Victoria D’Arcy. Her arched brow and wild crown of scarlet curls were vivid against the rest. By her side stood the daemon king. He, too, stood out against all others—tall, dark, lean and ever watchful.
Lily looked away from them both.
They were the first on the dance floor. The black marble shone stark as obsidian except for the slight tracings of white that might have been mistaken for wavering seams of natural discoloration in the stone if it weren’t for their intricate spiderweb patterns.
Michael didn’t wait for her to come into the circle of his arms. He pulled her onto the dance floor and then turned to meet the momentum he’d caused. She was pressed flush against his broad chest with her skirts crushed and his hands splayed on the curve of her back. It wasn’t a waltz position. It was an embrace. One she didn’t fight. Instead, she wrapped her arms up to cup his neck. She gloried in the heat of his skin and the silky texture of his hair against the back of her fingers. The glow of three immense chandeliers in the high cathedral ceiling of the room created a halo around his head. His face was cast into shadow. He was angelic and mysterious in that moment even without wings, but he was also solid beneath her hands and sturdy against her body. The kiss happened without thought or pause. He leaned to accept an invitation she had instinctively made with a tilted chin and open lips. In spite of the shadows and the halo of light, the press of his lips was salty and real. As was the hot, moist thrust of his tongue. Desire arced from his teasing probe to her nipples and the flesh between her legs that was still tender from the night before. Remembered pleasure heightened the current thrill of his touch. His hands kneaded low on her waist. Champagne and wood smoke blended in the sweet soft and rough textures she explored with the quest of her own tongue.
And then the music started.
Other couples joined them on the dance floor at a slight distance, but close enough to disturb their intimacy. Michael lifted his lips from hers and after a slight protest of tightened fingers on the back of his nape, Lily let him. Tonight was for dancing before it was for goodbye.
“Later,” Michael murmured above her ear. She didn’t contradict him. There would be no later for them if he accepted the throne before midnight. His deal with Ezekiel would be done and her only recourse to not be a part of it would be to run away. Her heartbeat quickened as if she was already in flight. She didn’t need the adrenaline to tell her by freeing Michael she would be risking death.
She would be the walking dead without him anyway. If Rogues hunted her down outside the hell dimension, she would fight and then accept the consequences. It would be the least she could do for the man she...
Her eyes were closed and her cheek was pressed to Michael’s chest. His loosening hold and a pause in his steps disturbed her thoughts. She raised her head and opened her eyes to see the daemon king behind Michael’s shoulder. Her dance partner released her and stepped away with one final squeeze of her hand. Michael passed her to Ezekiel and only then did she know that her guardian had cut in.
“Shall we dance, Lily?” Ezekiel asked. As usual his words had myriad meanings. They’d been dancing around her affinity and his plans for his grandson all along.
“For a little while longer,” Lily answered. She accepted his hand in place of Michael’s. As far as she remembered, she’d never touched his hand before. It was calloused and scarred, nicked from a thousand battles. It was also perfectly formed, with long, elegant fingers and symmetrical lines. He held her hand gently, as a gentleman, not a warrior. And his smile was dark, but fatherly in the candlelight.
“I’m sorry there haven’t been more celebrations such as this in your life. You obviously enjoy it,” Ezekiel said.
It was true. Even with the tension of the night building to an inevitable heartache, she had enjoyed the music and the movement with Michael and she enjoyed Ezekiel’s grace. The dark shadows of the palace had come alive with colorful guests, laughter, flowers and a tangible excitement she wasn’t immune to even though its cause would prove tragic to her heart.
“We’ve been at war with Rogues. Not the best time for parties,” Lily said. She’d had her flute for music, and the lessons with her mother had been happy times full of dance and song.
“If we don’t dance, then what are we fighting for?” Ezekiel countered. He was slightly taller than Michael and leaner. He was full daemon and an Ancient One at that. His otherworldly features, so angular and perfect in spite of his scars, had been created in heaven itself. He had followed Lucifer when he’d fallen. He’d been one of the original seekers of autonomy in another world.
She looked up at him and examined his face. For the first time she noticed a pinched quality around his eyes as if his nearly immortal life of intrigue and fighting was beginning to take its toll. She couldn’t help it. Her hands tightened on his shoulder and against his fingers.
“Michael will be a good king. You weren’t wrong about that. You were only wrong in trying to use me to guarantee his acceptance of the throne,” Lily said.
“He doesn’t care. He would give up heaven and earth for you,” Ezekiel said. A full orchestra of daemonic musicians played the waltz that fed their movements. Lily only had to hold on to the daemon king and he did the rest—effortlessly graceful and fluid as he whirled her around the floor. Her head grew light and her breathing was rapid, but she didn’t let go.
Not yet.
“I care. I would have him give up nothing. And especially not for me,” Lily said.
“I have to admit, I wondered. If he would even be here tonight. If he would live up to his heritage. His real father was extraordinary and even now he is tireless in his watch,” Ezekiel said.
Lily nearly stumbled over her own feet at Ezekiel’s words. Had he known about her warrior angel? She had always carried it everywhere with no thought to hiding it from the daemon king. Had he known long before she did that the doll was a likeness of Michael’s father and that her abilities might call whatever was left of his soul to life?
“Victoria says he still exists as a frigid shadow who watches over her and Michael,” Lily said. Her words were breathless and soft from the exertion of the dance in an athletic partner’s arms and from fear. What other beings did Ezekiel manipulate for his own ends?
“He was a Guardian. That unique calling didn’t leave him when he fell to earth or when he became a lover and a father and a friend. Though I would say Victoria might be surprised whom he considers his charge,” Ezekiel said. “Michael is the son of a Guardian. He has proven to me that his blood runs true by his care and concern for you.”
“And you will reward him with a throne he doesn’t want,” Lily said. He was impossibly hard against her hands. Like immovable stone that lived and breathed and danced. “I won’t help you force him to be king.”
“I never imagined you would, Lily Santiago. Your blood also runs true. It has been the great joy of my life to see you learn and grow into your own heritage. Your affinity is the purest I’ve seen outside of heaven,” Ezekiel said.
This time Lily did stumble, but the daemon king didn’t let her fall. He saved her from the missteps her surprise had caused, and with effortless strength he placed her back on her feet.
“Perhaps you didn’t know that Samuel’s gift came from heaven itself. What is the affinity if not the ability to tune in to the music of the universe? Love is the language of the stars, my child. No doubt Sybil created your dress for this evening as a nod to your ability and where it came from,” Ezekiel said. “Those of us who’ve walked those pathways don’t speak of it often. Even as we make a place for ourselves apart from our creator, we miss that connection. That’s why those tuned in to it call to us. We remember. We long. We ache. Even as we’re determined to live independently in this dimension.”
“I thought the desert sky...” Lily said softly.
“Entire galaxies in the palm of his hand...and people think I’m intimidating. But I see that my grandson is eager to reclaim his place in your arms.” Ezekiel led her off the floor with deft turns and several smooth strides.
“I never knew. I thought my father’s affinity was a random freak of nature, an arrangement of chromosomes or an accident of birth,” Lily said.
Several servants had converged on them with trays when they’d seen their king leave the dance floor. Ezekiel plucked two glasses with a regal nod of approval and handed one to her. She sipped the cool dark liquid and an explosion of flavors from the Turov pinot noir caused her to close her eyes in pleasure.
“This wine is an accident of birth. It’s also the careful result of love and obsession. Random and planned. Such is life. Such is ruling a kingdom...or the universe,” Ezekiel said. “You came into my life like a song. Love on two gangly legs. I had been planning for your arrival my whole existence without knowing when, who or how. Have a good night, Lily. Don’t worry too much about daemon deals and sacrifice. Blood will out.”
Ezekiel moved away and Lily watched him as the crowd parted like the Red Sea for Moses. Though she doubted Moses had ever worn a shimmering tuxedo that rode a man’s muscles like designer armor.
Her resolve hadn’t wavered. No matter the daemon king’s talk of heaven and hell or her as a young girl. He’d sounded almost...affectionate...but she knew better than that. He had been a distant authority figure at best. A frightening unknown creature at worst. She had loved him and still did in spite of his manipulations. But he had never loved her. His treatment of her mother had been her greatest warning that he preferred D’Arcys. Kindness and care wasn’t love. He had held them at a distance because there was no room for them in his scarred heart. Perhaps he grew sentimental because he thought she would marry Michael and become the closest thing to a D’Arcy she would ever be.
The thought made her ache. Worse to be so close and yet so far from her guardian’s love.
Fortunately, she saw what Ezekiel had seen and the sight completely distracted her from old pain. New pain sliced through her, hollowing out her gut and causing her hands to clench.
Michael stood near the wall of the ballroom. He propped one foot behind him and balanced his guitar on his knee. She wasn’t surprised to see his guitar. It was as much a part of him as his legs or his hands. A different sight froze her in place and chilled the blood in her veins. Behind him a larger frieze than in any other room besides the throne room roiled with unnatural movement. The carved figures came and went from the surface of the marble as if it was as malleable as mud. Their mouths opened and closed as they silently shrieked. And a giant shadow had unfurled its wings on either side of Michael’s broad shoulders.
The ghostlike entity that Victoria claimed was Michael’s father had just cast its vote for the new daemon king. What stabbed at her heart was that she didn’t disagree. He would make a fine king. She would like nothing better than to share the only home she’d ever known with him. Only her affinity stood in her way. She couldn’t be the chains—no matter how seductive—that bound him to the throne. He could never truly love her if he wasn’t free to travel and sing and walk in the light. The highlights in his hair would dim. His voice would grow rusty. His heart would be shuttered to her forever.
He didn’t know it now. Maybe he would even welcome a weighted choice rather than a free one. If he chose for her, his own conscience could be clean. But she couldn’t let him choose the darkest of fates because of her. She’d grown up with the souls on the walls. She was used to the coming and going, the torment and the occasional loss when a soul winked out either to Oblivion or... She watched as Michael remembered that it wasn’t a bare wall behind him. She watched him drop his foot down and move away.
She saw the walls as a necessary pause, more of a purgatory than damnation. She could tell that Michael didn’t feel the same way. Could she blame him? His real father had been trapped in walls like these at l’Opéra Severne before it burned. Victoria and Michael had almost died.
He saw that her dance with Ezekiel had ended and he placed his guitar against the wall. His father’s shadow had diminished to nothing, hidden in the shadows of the dancers that shifted across the wall. No one else had seen anything unusual in the shifting shadows, but, then again, most avoided looking directly at the walls. A new waltz had begun.
Lily drank her fill of Michael as he moved toward her. As with the daemon king, the crowd of guests parted almost in unison to let him pass. He didn’t notice. He was far too focused on her face. She could feel the flush on her cheeks. As he came closer and closer, his Brimstone heat caused her temperature to rise. Maybe. Or maybe she could have reacted to his sensual grace if he had been wholly human without a drop of daemon blood at all.
Finally, he stood near her. Nearer than necessary, but not near enough. She wanted to be alone with him. She wanted their midnight-blue garments to be piled together on the floor, a sparkling heap intertwined. Suddenly, she was exhausted from merely planning to run away. She didn’t want to go. She wanted to succumb to his kisses and experience the slide of their naked skin together again.
“You look as if you’re done with dancing,” Michael said. He touched her cheek and her whole world stilled. Dancers spun around them. Her heartbeat thumped slowly in her ears.
“I need to be in your arms,” she confessed. His fingers slid down to tease along the line of her jaw and she tilted her chin to meet his gaze. His eyes had narrowed. He knew something was amiss.
“Ezekiel upset you,” he guessed. He was wrong. The turning of time upset her. They were closer to midnight on Michael’s twenty-first birthday, which meant they were closer to the decision he would make that would drive her away. And she was upset that she was too close to all she’d ever dreamed of before it would get ripped away.
“I’m used to your grandfather. He doesn’t bother me,” Lily said. But she stepped against Michael’s muscular chest even though he hadn’t opened his arms. If he was surprised, he recovered quickly. His hand dropped from her face to her waist and his other hand reached for hers on his chest.
“You’re used to Ezekiel and to hell and to this palace,” Michael said against her forehead. His lips were hot. Her skin seemed hotter. He said it like he didn’t understand how she could be even with years and years of practice.
“It is my home. He’s the only father I’ve ever known,” Lily said.
Michael pulled her away from the dance floor. The waltz was a slower tempo than the one they’d danced before. The sound of the music filtered out through several sets of French doors that led onto a stone terrace. He pulled her through one doorway as if he followed the delicate vibrations of music on the night air that teased into the stuffy ballroom, beckoning partygoers outside.
The terrace was lit by colorful silk lanterns. They had been crafted with intricate designs cut into the fabric. Light spilled through myriad shades and shapes, creating kaleidoscopes on the stone as the breeze stirred them to gentle movement. The dark purple sky above them didn’t provide much light. But the soft glow paired with the lantern light was enough to urge Michael into the more private shadows created by the skeletal trees that formed a ring around the terrace. They moved close together and yet she was still jealous of the hairsbreadth of air that came between them.
“You’re home to me,” Michael murmured into her hair.
She wanted to sink into the warmth offered by the sentiment. It was every bit as warm as his embrace. But she couldn’t indulge in the fantasy his murmur seemed to offer.
“You never wanted to come here. You made a deal with Ezekiel to deliver the wings. You intended to buy your freedom with them. I can’t let you be influenced by my affinity. It isn’t fair,” Lily said. “I never meant to manipulate you the way the daemon king has manipulated his loved ones for centuries.”
Michael stopped. He drew back to look down at her face. She was at a disadvantage. The lantern light fell on her face, but it was behind Michael’s head. His face was in shadow. She could hide nothing from him while she stood in what might as well be a spotlight. She willed away the flush that heated her cheeks and the emotion that must swim in her eyes. There was a soft halo around the golden tips of his hair, but his features were hidden. At best, there were deeper shadows that outlined his angular cheeks and his strong jaw. She couldn’t see his lips—whether they were hard or soft. She couldn’t see his eyes—whether they were cool or full of flames.
“You’re right. I never wanted to come here, but I also never gave this dimension a chance. I defined it by what my preconceived notions had been. I was repelled by the carvings on the walls and by Ezekiel’s expectations. It isn’t your affinity that has changed that. I’m not being manipulated or influenced,” Michael said.
His hands had been holding her for the waltz, but he moved them now to cup her face. Lily shivered beneath his gentle touch and the pleasant roughness of his calluses against the sensitive skin of her cheeks and neck. He brushed his thumbs along the sides of her mouth and she moistened her lips with her tongue. Then he held her more firmly, as if she was capable of slipping away. He leaned toward her and she was rooted to the spot—waiting, longing, craving.
“You’ve opened my eyes, but it isn’t because I’m unable to control my Brimstone. If you told me to let you go, right now, I would. I would stop if you didn’t want my kiss as much as I wanted to taste you. Our connection is compelling, but I’m strong, Lily. I’ve had to be my whole life to handle my daemon blood,” Michael said.
He paused as if he waited for her to protest or plea. She held her breath, but she slid her hands up his lapels to the hot skin of his neck, then she buried her fingers in his hair. It was the permission he’d needed to softly press his lips to hers.
She gasped in reaction to the sudden thrill of contact, and he took advantage of her open lips to deepen the kiss, slowing and thoroughly teasing and tasting the silken depths of her mouth with his tongue. She pressed closer against him and it was her movements that became hungrier. He tasted of wine and wood smoke, flavors that would forever cause instant arousal because they reminded her of him.
Her heartbeat quickened, but her blood seemed to warm and thicken. It flowed languidly through her veins to spread heat and tingling awareness throughout her body. Her legs grew weak, but his body was hard and fully capable of supporting her weight as she sagged against him.
He was strong. Sybil had said he was the strongest man she’d ever known and Sybil had known the daemon king for an eternity. She’d known Severne and Turov. She’d known Lucifer and Michael’s father.
Lily gave herself to the kiss, completely succumbing to the pleasure of swooning in Michael’s arms because she felt the glimmer of hope stir in her breast for the first time.
Maybe he sensed her capitulation. He gentled his mouth. He lowered his hands to her back. He pulled his lips from hers and buried his face in her neck, where he nuzzled the delicate skin beneath her ear while she tried to steady her breathing and her feet on the ground.
“You have to give me the chance to prove that I’m clearheaded in this decision even as I’m far from clearheaded over you,” Michael said.