Dark Queen (Jane Yellowrock #12)

My second morning on the island in Jane form, I crawled from bed and walked naked down to the beach to swim. The air was warmer, eighties, but the water was cold when I dove in and swam deep. Halfway hoping I’d be eaten by a shark. I wasn’t that lucky.

When exhaustion claimed me, I crawled up the shore and lay in the sun on the sand. Naked. Alone. When the sun threatened to burn even my golden-toned skin, I rinsed off in the outside shower and went in search of something other than pig. I found a baked fish in the freezer, next to a plastic container that was marked with the words RICE PUDDIN’. I microwaved them both. Ate the entire fish—which had Deon’s touch on it, lemon and herbs—and the whole container of rice pudding, which tasted like coconut and rice and dates and cranberries. They shouldn’t have tasted good together, but they did.

I drank another bottle of wine, deciding that I’d drink a bottle per day from now on, to mark off the days as human. But I didn’t feel so well. And I was tired. Grief could make a person tired. Right? Right.



* * *



? ? ?

Days passed. A helo flew over once and I waved it off. It left. I was okay. I just needed privacy. But instead of feeling better, I was feeling worse. A lot worse. After the last bottle of wine, I knew it was time to call for extraction. I’d been walking on the beach at sunset, the empty bottle in my hand, swinging. I’d tried singing. Quit when my own ears protested. I was a mile along the beach, heading back to the house, when the sickening feeling hit me, a wrenching nausea that tossed me to my knees, retching. I vomited up everything I’d eaten for dinner, hard and nasty. Onto the sand.

It was full of blood.

I used to throw up blood when I bubbled time, but it had been days. Weeks.

“Beast? What’s happening?”

Jane is sick. Jane may be dying.

Relief zipped through me like lightning. I wouldn’t have to keep on. I thought about being sick. It’s the snake in the center of all things, isn’t it?

Jane is broken. Jane has darkness growing in her. Beast sent me a vision of my insides.

I have cancer, I thought, wonderingly.

Jane is dying. Jane has broken time. And time has broken Jane.

Well. How ’bout that.



* * *



? ? ?

The helo landed on the beach two hours after dawn.

I climbed on and accepted the ear protectors. Put them on and strapped myself in. Gave the pilot a thumb up and settled back to not enjoy the ride. I was weak and nauseous. Pretended to be fine. Eli met me at the landing site, took one look at my face, and grasped the bag I carried. Led the way to the armored SUV. Headed to HQ, which was where I told him to go. We rode in silence, his battle face on, giving nothing away. Midway there he said, “Babe.”

“Don’t,” I said. “Please don’t.”

He nodded and threaded through traffic. Parked in front of HQ.

“I’ll be just a minute,” I said.

“I’ll wait for you.” The way he said it held overtones of, I’ll wait for you forever, no matter what. I didn’t reply to the tone. I didn’t have forever. I opened the bag that had been waiting for me on the backseat and removed the small weapon. Stuck it in my waistband at my spine. Just in case. Picked up the vamp-killer and strapped it to my thigh. Stuck the Glob in a pocket. Also just in case. I shut the door.

HQ looked the same as I climbed the steps. The outer doors opened. The inner doors opened. The smell inside was different. No blood. No sex. No scent of fading funeral flowers or parchment. There were vamps here, sleeping, but not in great numbers and not the ones from before. Instead there was a long line of humans waiting. Wrassler limped toward me, his hands out, a welcoming smile on his face. I held up my hand to stop him. “Not now,” I said softly.

Wrassler’s face fell and he gave me a truncated nod before stepping back in line. No one frisked me. No one said anything about the weapons on my person. Everything was different.

Silently, I took the elevator to the basements, all the way to sub-five. I was armed with a fourteen-inch silver-plated-steel vamp-killer with a crosshatched handle, the Glob in my pocket, and a small .32 pistol loaded with silver-lead rounds. I didn’t need anything else for this.

The doors opened. The lighting was low. Brute was sitting at the feet of the Son of Darkness. One of them, anyway. Joses looked pretty good for a heartless lump of vamp-meat. Stinkier. Hairier. Brute had been biting him enough. Joses was halfway to being a werewolf-vamp bag of bones.

“Hiya, Brute.”

He panted at me, his white coat catching the low lights with an almost ethereal glow.

“Leo’s in a box of blood. He isn’t in charge anymore.” I pulled the vamp-killer. Dropped the bag. “Okay with you if I finish this?”

Brute chuffed. Tilted his head, tongue lolling. He looked at Joses, his eyes staring at the vamp’s wrists and ankles, where he hung, suspended on the wall. Brute chuffed what might have been a warning. Looked at me. Turned his massive head back to Joses and whined, a single plaintive note.

I walked past the white werewolf and positioned myself.

“You will not.” The words grated out, harsh as stone on stone.

I looked at Joses. He was looking back at me. Eyes focused, black pupils in yellow orbs. Sane-ish. As sane as the old ones ever got. Talking. Giving orders.

“Say again?”

“You will not. I live. Forever.”

“Yeah?” I reared back, the vamp-killer in a two-hand stance. Joses’s shackles snapped. Shattered. Fell away. He surged off the wall, spider-fast, pushing, bowing, springing, leaping in explosive force. Right at me. Beneath the vamp-killer blade.

Time slowed into a battlefield intensity. I saw/smelled/felt/heard the pop of displaced air. Vamp speed on meth, a rupture in reality. And he grabbed me. Claws sinking deep. Inside the vamp-killer’s reach. Beast shoved into me, claws bursting from my fingertips, fangs ripping through my jaw.

Too late. Too late.

The Son of Darkness opened his mouth. Unhinged his jaw. I reared back, my claws piercing him. Shoving him away.

Foolish kit. Not defense. Must attack, Beast thought.

A werewolf roared. I jerked to the side. Not far enough. The SOD’s five-inch fangs sank deep. But there was no pain. He was healed enough to have vamp saliva. Analgesic, I thought. His magic shot into me. Struck at my core, at the five-pointed magic that resided there. My mind flickered on and off. All I could think was . . . How . . . ? And then even that was gone.

Joses sucked deeply at my torn shoulder. Moved his head to my throat. My blood felt heated and languid. My muscles softened. My joints relaxed. My arms came up around him.

Suddenly I was in my soul home. Lying on the damp, cool gray stone. Staring up at the ceiling, domed overhead. Hayyel’s wings fluttered where they rested, draped down the walls.

Beast appeared over me, her golden eyes glowing. She lay atop me, her cat warmth soothing. And then she slid into me, falling through my soul, to the place where we were one. And I was back in the basement. Things were happening around me. Roars. The ground was shaking. People were screaming.

Beast lifted my hand away from Joses. Slid it into my pocket. Curled my fingers around the Glob. Beast eased my hand out of the twisted cloth and raised my fist. She pressed it into the wound on Joses’s shoulder where my/our claws had pierced him. Into his blood. The Glob that held a shard of the Blood Cross and part of the spike of Golgotha woke. Blazing hot. Attacked. Sudden as a pouncing mountain lion. It gripped Joses’s magic. Tore it free. Joses stopped. Frozen.

The memories of Joses Santana opened. And I fell into the sensation and person of Joses—Yosace, Bar-Ioudas. I saw, I felt, I knew . . . knew . . . the moment the two Sons of Darkness killed their sister and spilled her blood onto the pile of bloody wood. Onto their father’s dead body. Chanted as she died. Chanted and spoke wyrds so ancient, even Yosace didn’t know the meaning.

Knew the moment the betrayer opened his eyes. Took his first breath. And attacked.

Knew the feel of Ioudas Issachar’s fangs buried in Joses’s own throat.