Something About Witches (40 page)

She gazed up at him. He was too pale under his tan. She could smell his blood, feel it in the tremor in his hands. “I’m sorry. It hurts. It hurts so badly.”

“I know.” His countenance darkened. “Hold on.”

But her attention shifted, and Derek looked over his shoulder to track it. He spun, rising to his feet to block her, but she caught the leg of his jeans, shaking her head. “No…. he’s come before.”

Derek glanced down at her, saw the truth of it, then looked back to the silent visitor, gauging who and what he was. When he figured it out, she saw his broad shoulders ease, even as his mouth tightened, understanding.

Ruby swallowed. Every time this being had come, she’d defied the apparition, blocked him, refused to give him what he wanted, as fiercely as she’d just denied Asmodeus. But she couldn’t deny him this time. Derek had helped her see. She had to do it. She knew that, just as she knew she’d never reach a point when she was truly ready to do it.

The death angel spread his wings to half fold, his expression somber, waiting. He wasn’t unkind. In fact, there was a deep compassion beneath his ruthless inevitability. He didn’t reach out, didn’t push her. He simply waited, a force as undeniable as the ocean.

“Can you help her?” Derek asked. He’d dropped back on his heels, his hand on Ruby’s shoulder. She was shaking, too, she realized vaguely. It didn’t matter.

The angel shook his head, nodded toward what she had at her breast. She made herself look up at Derek, held on to
the strength in his blue eyes. The grief he showed her openly, sharing it with her.

“I would have loved her so much, Derek.”

“You did love her, baby. You do. You always will. Be her mother. Let her go. Just like you told me.”

She bent her head, touched her lips to that bundle of light, now no longer in a heaven of her making. But she’d made sure the soul had stayed close to her breast, had given her that tiny, thin cocoon as the rest of the magic was pulled away. The baby’s soul was aware things had changed, but she wasn’t afraid. She was with her mother. She would take her mother’s love with her, and she would be happy, because Ruby couldn’t bear to think anything else.

Lifting her head, she cupped both hands around that soul, and extended it to Derek. “You hold her. Give her…. to him.”

Derek nodded. His expression was full of emotion too painful for her to see as he cradled the much smaller sphere in his hands. As she had, he bent his head over it, laid his lips on it, his eyes closing. She imagined he was saying a prayer for their daughter. Knowing Derek, it included the stern admonition that the angels had better take care of her, or he’d come kick some major ass. She’d have smiled over it, if her smiles didn’t feel far away, in some part of her she’d given away.

He handed over the spark. The angel took it, in the same gentle manner, nodded to them both. Then he was simply gone, and the chamber was empty, silent, except for the whistle of air coming up through that chasm in front of them. Or maybe it was the chasm inside of her, where a whole soul used to be.

H
ER BREATHING WAS GETTING MORE LABORED
. “I
GUESS
you’ll need TO repair that,” she said at length, gazing at the abyss.

“One thing at a time. You first.”

“Any good ideas on that?” She managed a wry smile that he didn’t answer, his gaze concerned, worried. “My body won’t die, but without those soul pieces….”

She was a broken porcelain figure, holes and cracks. She couldn’t move without risk of further breakage. She didn’t want to move. “What do you think we should do?”

“You marry me; we have two point five kids, a picket fence and a golden retriever that will bite Raina when she comes to visit us.”

“Theo may have something to say about that.”

“I know— he’d rather have the pleasure of biting Raina. We’ll make sure the golden’s a girl for him.”

“He’s been neutered.”

“A guy can still flirt.”

He was lifting her, though she felt the strain of it in his body. “You broke ribs. How are you….”

“Not broken. Just extremely bruised. He got in a lucky strike.”

“Yeah, right.” She laid her head on his shoulder as he carried her back up the stairs to the basement area. Once there, he laid her on the floor, took the piece of broken rock he’d brought with him and began to etch a circle around her in the dirt. “What—”

“Lie still, baby. I’m going to make it all better.”

He drew the circle, cast it with a deftness that would have impressed her with its immediate solidity and weight if she wasn’t drifting, purposeless. It was so hard to care about anything, but it still hurt like hell. How weird was that? She came back to the present fast when he used his pocket knife to cut open the shirt she was wearing. He drew the blade across his wrist, the blood welling up, bright and red. The drops pattered onto her sternum.

“Derek, no….” She knew this magic, knew it was never done. Rarely done. People gave kidneys to loved ones, because that was the nature of those organs; they had two
of them, after all. She tried to lift her hands, but he simply pressed them down, out of his way, as he began the chant. Laying his hand over that blood on her chest, he charged it with his intent.

Even if she could accept that he was about to do this, it required a full coven. He couldn’t do it alone. Not and have any strength left when it was over. No matter how well he’d done at the end, she knew he wasn’t at full peak.

“Then I guess you’ll be the one carrying me up those stairs.”

She must have said it aloud. She wet her lips, stared up at him. “Don’t do this.”

“It’s happening. Deal with it. You promised to marry me. You’re not going to get out of it so easily.”

“Yeah, well, I promised you coffee and doughnuts this morning. See how that turned out?” Her voice was fainter. His brow creased and the pressure of his hand on her chest increased.

“Be still, baby. Just close your eyes and let it happen.”

He built the power in that circle so fast and strong, it was overwhelming. This was what he knew how to do, what came as easily to him as breathing. It didn’t matter that he was hurt, that he’d lost blood. Nothing disrupted his focus. She had to open her eyes to watch him, because as a magic user she couldn’t
not
watch him pull off one of the most awe-inspiring pieces of magic there was. She’d had to do it with complicated potions, chants, working with elemental energies and dipping into the Dark well of the Underworld. He simply focused the power on himself, reached into that well of…. essence, for lack of a better word, and split a chunk off for her. A piece of his soul.

He stiffened, a lance of obvious excruciating pain doubling him over. “Derek—”

She cried out then, alarmed, because suddenly she was pinned, held down by an incredible weight, as if something enormous was being pushed under her rib cage, something
that would never fit, never go right…. but then, like a dislocated shoulder, it popped into place.

She was gasping, her vision blurry. Twisting to her side, she retched out black, vile-smelling liquid. The stench of it, the feel of it, told her she was seeing the Darkness she’d taken into herself, the change from those pieces of soul she’d sold for Rose’s Heaven. She knew what to do here, didn’t need to make Derek do more than he had already. She cleansed it with white fire as soon as she could prop herself on her arms. Then she turned to find him collapsed, the blood still trickling from the cut on his arm.

Scrambling drunkenly over to him, she turned him with a grunt of exertion and had a harrowing moment, trying to find his pulse. There, steady, strong. He opened his eyes.

“Going to lie here a bit. Then we’ll get that coffee.”

I
T WAS AN INEXPRESSIBLE FEELING
. H
ER SOUL, BUT
something more than her soul, too, cobbled with his. That intuition they’d always shared was somehow enhanced, as if they didn’t even really need to talk at all. She was as aware of his proximity and the emotions he carried as she was of her own. Was this what twins were like? One overly large soul split apart at birth? Of course, they were already soul mates, weren’t they? She’d denied it for over three years, but as a young girl, it seemed like she’d known it before she even knew what it meant. This just enhanced the truth of it.

He did lie there for quite a while. When she could manage it, she went above, got some blankets, pillows. She wished she had some fresh flowers to bring down and add color and life to the dank basement room while he convalesced there. Funny, it had been a while since she’d thought of something like that as important. Though he grumbled about it, she brought her first-aid kit and at least cleaned the gash on his skull, which fortunately hadn’t fractured the bone, as far as she could tell.

“So not even a demon straight from Hell can crack your hard head,” she noted. “Color me shocked. This could use some stitches, you know.” She was trying to hide her worry. Her body felt revitalized, whereas he was still pale and obviously sapped. Had Derek given her too much? What if he’d simply exchanged his own life for hers? It would be like him to do that. He might be ageless, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t be killed. She’d never asked him about that.

“Are you going to die or go soulless zombie on me?” she snapped abruptly. “Did you do something that pigheaded and stupid?”

His blue eyes opened, firm mouth quirking in that way she loved, that made her heart hurt. “As much as you would obviously appreciate that sacrifice, no. What I did…. It’s like giving you a piece of lung, and the cells regenerate to create more of a lung, build on it. I gave you an extra piece of soul to adhere to your own, and as you practice the Light magic, stay away from Dark, it should strengthen it, restore you fully as time goes on.”

“And what about you?” she asked shrewdly. “How does this impact you?”

“I’ll feel its loss awhile. But as long as you’re near, I have my whole soul, don’t I?” Lifting a hand, he brushed it across her cheek. “I’m sorry about Rose.”

“No.” She shook her head, even as her voice broke a little over it. “You were right. She’s where she needs to be. It was time. I’m not sure I can ever regret holding on to her as long as I did, even though it might have been the wrong thing to do. I can’t ever regret a single second she got to be mine.”

“She’ll always be yours. Just like me.” He gave her a shadow of his usual heart-stopping smile, then paused, considering. “If we could turn back time, I wouldn’t want you to do it the way you did it…. but I’m glad I got the chance to see her, touch her.” He met her eyes, opened himself to her in a way that was new for her experience of Derek, a way that warmed the cold crevices of her heart. “I never had
a child. Someone who would miss me if I wasn’t around, in a blood-related kind of way.”

She ducked her head so he wouldn’t see the tears gathering in her eyes. “If you’re as insufferable to our next child as you are to me, she’ll probably want you gone.”

“Especially if it’s a girl.”

“You are a natural irritant to females,” Ruby agreed.

“Did you just put me in the same category as feminine itching?”

“If the shoe fits….”

“I’ll get even with you for that later,” he promised.

”I needed your strength to do it, to let go,” she admitted. “You’ve come in and out of my life so much, ever since I was a little girl. Giving me room to become who I am, to make my own decisions. But you’ve always been there when I truly need you, to help me get through things. I’ve told you why I pushed you away, but I didn’t tell you that, and I…. I just want you to know.”

He cupped her cheek, his thumb caressing her lips. He was so attentive, so loving, so essential to her, she wasn’t sure now just how she’d managed three years without him. Well, yeah, she did.
Badly.
And wouldn’t it just feed that overbearing male ego to hear her admit that? She had a responsibility to womankind everywhere to pull it back together.

Sniffling, she pushed his touch away to wipe her nose gracelessly. “But I swear, if you did something that causes you to be permanently…. maimed, or whatever, I won’t talk to you again. Besides which, you knocked my gun off the ledge when you were scrambling over me. That was one of my favorite guns.”

“Shooting him was an effective tactic. A very unexpected one against a demon. Fighting two magic users, he never saw that coming. You weakened him enough to put the nail in his coffin.” Derek’s tone was admiring, pleasing her, even though she took pains not to show it.

“Well.” She shrugged. “It’s like I said. Magic doesn’t always work, but superior firepower has never failed me.”

“I might have to consider adding to my arsenal, then.”

“I might give you a discount, with the proper incentive.”

His chuckle eased her tension, but she wouldn’t be fooled any longer. She touched his face. “You need a healing ritual by a full coven. And you need it now. Do you think you have one more transport in you? I’d do it, but that’s a sorcerer trick, not a witch one. At least, not one I know. Yet.”

“Trick?” He gave her an offended look. “I’ ll—”

“Please.” She gripped his shoulder. “I’m worried, Derek. You don’t look good.”

He squeezed her leg. “Don’t get all worried, girl. I’ve been worse off than this plenty of times. Hold on to me. I’ll take us right to the circle. You can go get Linda and her ladies. Just don’t let Theo trample and slobber all over me while I’m on my back, helpless as a turned turtle.”

“You sure you have the strength to do this?” She stretched out at his side to put both her arms around him, trying not to hang on to anything that might be hurting. “I could call Raina and Ramona.”

“Be at Raina’s mercy? Not in this lifetime.” He snorted. “Besides, it’s no big deal. If I don’t have the strength to transport us, we’ll end up in a million intertwined atoms, scattered across the universe. Kind of romantic, don’t you think?”

“Derek, you ass—”

The world disappeared.