"Damn you, Artemis."
She approached him slowly. "I want you, Acheron. I want you back like you were before."
He inwardly cringed as she cupped his face in her hand. They could never go back as they had been. He'd learned too much about her since then.
He had been betrayed one time too many.
He would say he was a slow learner, but that wasn't true. What he'd been was so desperate for someone to care about him that he had ignored the darker side of her nature.
Ignored it until she'd turned her back on him and left him to die painfully alone.
Some crimes were even above his ability to forgive.
His thoughts turned from himself to the innocent men who were living in a cave. Men who knew nothing of their new existence or enemies. He couldn't leave them there like that.
He had cost enough people their lives, their futures.
There was no way he could let them lose their souls and their lives too.
"All right, Artemis. I will give you what you want, if you give them what they need to survive."
She beamed.
"But," he continued, "my terms are this: you are going to pay them every month a wage that will allow them to procure whatever they need or desire. As stated earlier, they will need shield-bearers to care for them personally so that they won't have to worry about scrounging for food, clothes, or arms. I don't want them to be distracted from their work."
"Fine, I will find humans who will serve them."
"Living humans, Artemis. Free humans. I want them to serve of their own free will. And no more DarkHunters are to be created. Ever."
"Four of you are not enough. We need more to keep the Daimons in check."
Acheron closed his eyes as he felt the endlessness of this relationship. All too easily he could see into the future and where this was headed. The more DarkHunters, the more he would be locked to her. There was no way to keep her from tying him to her forever.
Or was there?
"All right," he said. "I'll give in on this, if you will agree to provide them a way out of your service."
She stiffened. "What do you mean?"
"I want you to establish a way for the DarkHunters to regain their souls so that they are no longer bound to you if they so choose it."
Artemis stepped back. This wasn't something she had foreseen. If she gave him this, then even he would be bound by it.
He could leave her.
She'd forgotten just how devious Acheron could be. How well he knew the rules of the game and how to manipulate them and her.
He was truly her equal.
And yet if she failed to give him this, then he would leave her anyway. She had no choice and well he knew it.
However, there were still things that could keep him by her side. One way she knew that would ensure his presence in her life for all eternity.
"Very well. Let us make the rules to govern them then." She felt his thoughts drift back toward Ias.
He pitied the poor Greek soldier who loved his wife. Pity, mercy, and compassion would always be his downfall.
"Number one is that they must die to reclaim their souls."
"Why?" he asked.
"A soul can only be released from a body at the moment of death. Likewise, it can only return to a body that is no longer functioning. So long as they 'live' as a DarkHunter, they can never have their souls again. That's not my rule, Acheron, that is simply the nature of souls."
He frowned at that. "How do you kill an immortal DarkHunter?"
"Well, we could cut off their heads or expose them to daylight, but since that damages their body beyond repair, it rather defeats the purpose."
"You're not funny."
And neither was he. She didn't want to release them from her service.
Most of all, she didn't want to release him.
"You have to drain out their DarkHunter powers," she told him. "Make their immortal bodies vulnerable to attack, then stop their hearts from beating. Only then do they die in a manner that will enable them to return to life."
"Fine, I can do that."
"Actually, you can't."
"What do you mean?"
She fought the urge to smile. Here was where she had him.
"There are a few laws you need to know about souls, Acheron. One is that the owner must freely give it up. Since I own their souls…"
Acheron cursed. "I will have to barter with you for every soul."
She nodded.
He looked less than pleased by the knowledge. But he would come around in time.
Yes, he would definitely come around…
"What else?" he asked.
Now for her one rule that would bind him to her forever. "Only a true, pure heart can release the soul back into a body. The one who returns the soul must be the one person who loves the DarkHunter above all others. A person they love and trust in return."
"Why?"