Jason, with his quiet voice and watchful eyes, was infinitely more dangerous to her than Neha had ever been. He listened when she spoke, had already learned things about her no one else knew. Such a man wouldn’t use his physical strength to overpower her, nor lies to trick her. He’d just know her so well that he’d get her to contribute to her own downfall.
Sweat dampening her palms, she realized too late they were headed for a part of the complex Neha would not want him in under any circumstance. “We can go no further in this direction.”
“Why?”
“This area is for Neha’s private use, off-limits except by her invitation.”
“Very well.” Flaring out his wings with that suspiciously quick agreement, he made a vertical takeoff so fast that she had no hope of catching him.
Compelling . . . and deadly.
It was a truth she could not permit herself to forget, no matter the temptation to touch the blade. Too much was at risk—her entire existence, her very life. Jason was a dream she’d have to save for another life . . . but first, she had to make it out of this one alive.
Losing him above the puffy white clouds that had crept across the sky, she returned her gaze to the pathway of red stone and to the small palace she’d warned Jason not to enter. Neha was secluded at Guardian, would not return till morning. Jason had left Mahiya alone. She’d have no better chance to grab the brass ring.
The trickle of sweat down her spine a chilled bead, she stepped forward.
None of the guards attempted to stop her—Neha often called her in when she wanted something done. But then, Mahiya only ever entered the front rooms. Today, taking advantage of the fact that no guards were permitted within, she continued down the corridor and toward the room at the very center of the palace, a room within which she could sense things that made her hindbrain skitter in warning, jibbering at her to run!
Mahiya wrenched the primal urge under control. This wasn’t her first foray into the forbidden section. The last time had been in the depths of the night, while Neha was actually inside the room at the center. It had taken gut-clenching courage and grim determination, her heart pulsing in her mouth with every jagged breath. What she’d seen that night had been disturbing, but the discovery hadn’t been enough to complete her plan.
Today, the smooth marble walls weren’t encrusted with ice, her breath didn’t fog the air, and her bones didn’t hurt with the pain of extreme cold. Touching her fingers to the marble, she walked quickly and silently down the long final corridor, the door to the room within sight. It had been so hardened with ice the previous time, she hadn’t been able to glean the handle.
Now, the knob shone bright gold. Mahiya went to put her hand on it, hesitated at the last instant. This was far too easy. Forcing patience, she hid herself in a small alcove while she considered the situation from every angle—to discover what Neha was up to, she had to get inside that room, but getting inside that room might well mean her death. Because Neha was an archangel, with abilities both secret and overt.
Her most overt one was the way she could control and manipulate reptilian creatures of every kind. Like the golden vine snake wrapped around the doorknob. Mahiya’s heart punched against her ribs as the creature flicked out its red tongue and she realized what she’d taken for an ornate design was a living being.
A poisonous living being.
Because one of her more covert abilities was the fact that Neha could create poison glands in nonvenomous species. Touching that knob would have meant a bite that left Mahiya paralyzed and helpless for hours.
However, that was unlikely to be the only security feature, because while Neha was an angel of old, she was in no way blind to the benefits of modern technology. Now that Mahiya was thinking properly instead of being driven to act by the knowledge of how quickly her time was running out, she realized that even were the door unlocked, Neha would have set it with a silent alarm that alerted her to any trespass.
Once inside, would an intruder find the room unoccupied . . . or herself surrounded by hundreds of snakes irritated to hissing anger at being disturbed?
A hint of noise, a whisper.
Freezing, she hoped whoever it was—a maid?—had only entered to take care of something in the front rooms.
“So,” said a tempered, familiar voice from the left of the alcove, “you seek to unearth Neha’s secrets.”
A bolt of terror hitting her bloodstream, she shifted into the light to face Jason. “I came to get something I’d forgotten,” she said, then considered her empty hands. “I didn’t find it.”
Near-black eyes watched her without blinking. “You’re very good at lying, but I’m even better at detecting it.” Turning his attention to the closed door guarded by the vine snake, he looked at it for several careful seconds before shifting on his heel and saying, “We need to talk in privacy.”
It wasn’t an invitation.