The Nightwind's Woman Read online

  “Whoa,” Kenzi exclaimed on a low expulsion of breath.

  “You can also change the light level and add soothing music if you like. All your favorite artists will be programed in for your convenience but it’s easy to input new ones.” He laid the control on the table. “The program helps to dispel the claustrophobia of being so far below ground.”

  She looked away from the mesmerizing scene that seemed so real to take in the furniture. Everywhere she looked there was something that grabbed her attention. From the red, green and navy-plaid dual sofas flanking a fieldstone fireplace to the very comfortable-looking overstuffed green chairs facing the roaring gas fire, the sitting arrangement was exactly as she would have placed it and the upholstery what she would have chosen. From the dark tables to the art on the walls—all of it was to her liking.

  “Kitchen is through there,” he said, pointing to a door beyond the dark wood table and chairs that sat in one corner of the room. “Everything you’ll need. I know you like to cook.” He walked to the hallway. “The suite has two bedrooms but we’ve turned one into an office for you.”

  And what an office it was, she thought as she joined him and peeked into the room. Again, everything was exactly as she would have chosen it. The guest bath was in colors of celadon green and burgundy.

  “Your room,” he said, opening a door.

  Kenzi sucked in a breath as she entered the spacious room. There was an ornate king-sized brass bed with a patchwork coverlet edged in ecru lace beside which were identical bedside tables with brass urn lamps, a huge dark oak armoire facing the bed, a large chair with ottoman and reading table at one end of the room, and at the opposite end, a wide pair of French doors beyond which a wrought iron balcony had been placed. In front of the French doors was a beautiful sofa flanked by floor lamps.

  Kayle put a hand to her back to urge her toward the windows. “Same deal as the great room window except…” He stepped forward, opened the doors wide and stepped out on the balcony.

  She followed and was taken aback by the soft breeze flowing over her from night-darkened woods beyond.

  “This part of your quarters is interactive,” he finished. “It’s called an image suite and like the one in the great room, it can change. Not just the picture you see but the room around you.” He picked up another control and the room changed from a balcony to something that took her breath away.

  “Oh my God!” she said, her hand going to her mouth. She swept her stunned gaze around the multi-sided room until it came to rest on a white wicker swing. A shiver went through her body and she slowly turned her eyes to Kayle.

  “Do you like it?” he asked.

  She couldn’t answer. All she could do was stare at him as realization set in. She could feel her heart thundering in her chest.

  He gazed down at her with a look that made her toes curl. “I wanted it to be perfect for you.” He reached out to place his palm against her cheek. “For us.”

  “You’re…” She swallowed hard, moving back from his touch. “You’re the shadowman,” she accused.

  “I am your shadowman,” he said softly.

  “Oh my God,” she said again and backed out of the image suite, needing to put distance between her and the illusion.

  He followed her, leaving the doors open to the shadowy gazebo beyond.

  “I should have known,” she said. The fingers at her lips were trembling. “I should have recognized your accent.”

  “I wasn’t ready for you to,” he said then swept a hand toward the door. “Let’s go into the great room and talk.”

  She nodded. Questions were tumbling around inside her head and she was surprised she wasn’t running from the room, shrieking like a banshee.

  “You’ve more decorum than to do that,” he said and she knew he had read her thoughts.

  “All of this,” she said as she sat gingerly on one of the sofas, “came straight from my imagination, didn’t it?”

  “Down to the last detail,” he said as he too took a seat across from her. He sat forward with his knees spread, laced hands braced on his thighs. “I’ve been waiting for you for a long time. I had no idea they’d found you. Apparently the Powers Who Be lifted my thoughts of you and incorporated them into the computer when they brought you here. They wanted it to be exactly as you would like, perfect in every way.”

  Once more she looked about the room. “It is. Eerily so.” She returned her attention to him. “Why me?”

  “You know why,” he said, holding her gaze.

  “My mother was not a witch,” she stated firmly, remembering what the Supervisor had told her about Nightwinds.

  “Nor was your grandmother or her mother before her,” he said. “Before that?” He cocked one shoulder. “All the women of your line were.” He tilted his head slightly. “Would you like to know about your great-grandmother Lenora?”

  “She was a suffragette and a staunch supporter of the Temperance Movement,” she replied.

  “Oh, Nora was much more than that. I’ve rarely come up against a woman as strong-willed and mean as that one,” he told her.

  “Mean?”

  “Brutally so,” he said. “She had the disgusting habit of chopping off the heads of newborn kittens instead of having the females spayed to keep unwanted litters from being born. I think she took pleasure in killing the helpless little things.”

  Kenzi shuddered. “That isn’t mean, Kayle. That’s evil.”

  “I agree,” he said, nodding. “But that was your great-grandmother. Using her shotgun to drive hungry drifters from her door was another favorite pastime. She was not a nice woman.”

  “And my grandmother?” she asked.

  “Gilda was as tenderhearted with animals as her mother was cruel,” he replied. “But she was terrified of her mother and did whatever Nora ordered. You knew Gilly died giving birth to your mother.”

  “Mother rarely spoke of her,” she said. “My grandmother raised Mama.”

  “To be exactly like her,” he said with a twist of his lips. “Thankfully Inez did not pick up Nora’s more bloodthirsty habits although she was not the most compassionate person I’ve ever known.”

  “No,” Kenzi said, lowering her eyes. “She wasn’t.”

  “Now here you are,” he said.

  She lifted her gaze. “Are you going to offer your services to me?”

  “I am.”

  “What happens if I turn you down?”

  He smiled. “You won’t.”

  Kenzi’s brows drew together. “How do you know I won’t?”

  “Because you aren’t like the last three generations of Thompson women,” he replied. “You are the one I’ve been waiting for. You are the Chosen.”

  “The Chosen,” she repeated.

  “The woman meant to save my immortal soul and make me human again.”

  She slumped back against the sofa, staring wordlessly at him. “I think you’d better start at the beginning,” she said.

  “Okay,” he replied and leaned back. “It was a dark and stormy night…”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  Kayle looked up at the wildly thrashing leaves overhead, squinting as the cold rain peppered his eyes. He was drenched to the bone, shivering, trying to outrun the she-wolves intent on making roadkill of him. He could hear their frenzied shouts and ululating shrieks over the harsh booms of thunder and piercing snaps of lightning. Around him the wind skirled, pushed against his trembling flesh with phantom hands.

  It had not been his intention to garner the notice of the Matriarch and her blood-thirsty band of warrioresses nor to be the recipient of their anger but he had managed to do both. Now, he was running for his life and freedom—away from a hoard of women intent on causing him as much pain as they could muster before killing him.

  Gasping for breath, he pushed away from the tree under which he’d been hiding and headed up the steep slope. His feet slipped in the mud, his bare knees scraped across rocks and debris as he went down but he managed to make
his way to the top. Not daring to risk a glance behind him, he took off running across the plain. He stumbled, righted himself and then winced as pain lanced up his right calf. Limping now, half dragging his right leg as energy and strength began to fade, he listened as the cacophony of shouts and hoots reverberated through the storm-lashed night. They were gaining on him and the sounds of triumph were like a sharp blade carving a line down his naked back.

  One of the things he knew they’d do to him if—and when—they brought him to ground.

  It took every last ounce of stamina he had to put one foot ahead of the other. His body ached and bled in a dozen places from scratches and cuts. He knew it was only a matter of moments before he went down—never to rise again. When the first rock slammed into his hip, he yelped. The force of the hit spun him half-around and he realized with shock that the warrioresses were only a few yards away. He tried to pour on more speed but felt himself falling—felled to his knees by another rock hurled at his back. He pitched to his side and lay there panting as the painted faces of his captors filled the night sky above him. The last thing he saw was the glint of light striking off the metal of the first spear descending toward him.

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  “What crime did you commit to be put to death?” Kenzi asked.

  “I dared to touch a Temple Virgin,” he said then shrugged. “She stumbled and I caught her before she could fall.”

  “And for that they executed you?” she questioned, aghast.

  “It is taboo for a male to so much as touch the hem of a Temple Virgin’s gown. To lay hands to her is a mortal sin. It was reflexive action on my part but the Hell-hags did not see it that way. My life was forfeit the moment my flesh touched hers.”

  “What are Hell-hags?”

  “The witches of Bandar,” he replied. “Daughters of the Night they are called. Powerful witches with a bloodlust like you wouldn’t believe. Men are lower than vermin in their eyes.”

  “You should have let the bitch fall,” she said.

  “Aye, well, hindsight being what it is, I agree,” he quipped, “but then I would not have become a Nightwind and would not now be sitting here with you.”

  “You died and came back as an incubus demon?” she queried.

  “It’s a bit more involved than that.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  He came to in the freezing cold with the rancid stench of a cesspool weighing upon his nostrils. No light shone in the utter darkness and no sound reached his straining ears. Heavy chains dragged against his wrists and ankles as he twisted and turned in a useless effort to break free. He soon found he was well and truly bound with no possible way to gain his freedom.

  And he was completely alone with the cold and stench as his only companions in that vile place.

  He yelled until he was hoarse but no one came. He prayed. He swore. He uttered the most gods’ awful curses against the female gender yet he remained alone in the noxious, lightless cavern that oozed beneath the bowels on whatever world he now dwelt.

  Naked and cold and as lost as any man had ever been.

  For what seemed like centuries he lay in the piss and vomit and pus, the cesspit of all the wastes of all the living things of the Megaverse, until one day twin sparks of red light pierced the stygian darkness. The lights blinked and he realized he was staring into the elongated pupils of another being. He had all but given up hope of seeing another sentient life form and hope soared in his withered breast.

  “Help me!” he pleaded. “Please, I beg you!”

  From out of the ebon shadows slithered a hideous beast with forked tongue and scales of sickly green. It slid toward him with the sound of a million angry buzzing bees and the stink of Its loathsome body was a thousand times worse than the stench of the Abyss.

  “What will you give Me and Mine if I release you from your prison?” It asked.

  “Anything!” Kayle swore. “I will do anything you ask!”

  “Will you sign with your own blood that you will obey Me?”

  “I will!” Kayle swore. “Anything!”

  A flash of light turned the darkness to agonizing pain and Kayle hid his eyes from the glare, crying out in pain. When he was able to open his eyelids, he realized another being had joined the first and he stared at Her with growing fury, a hiss on his shrunken lips.

  “Female!” Kayle spat as he shrank back.

  “What do you here, Lilith?” the first creature demanded, arching Its loathsome head over the dark beauty of the goddess.

  “I claim him as one of Mine own,” the female stated.

  “He is here to atone for his sins!” the beast roared.

  “You owe Me a boon, husband,” the goddess reminded. “Release this one into My care.”

  “No!” Kayle shouted. “I want no dealings with females!”

  The serpent hissed and rose higher in the blackness. Its triangular head wove back and forth as Its slit-red eyes pierced Kayle to the core of his being.

  “You will atone by serving them, then!” the beast spat. It turned Its grinning maw to the goddess. “He is yours!”

  “No!” Kayle shrieked.

  But Kayle had been whisked from the putrid malefaction of his prison and when light fell upon him, he was horrified to find his flesh had become scales, his hands and feet nothing more than stumpy appendages with long, thick yellow talons.

  “What’s wrong with me?” he wailed, looking up through slit eyes at the lovely woman standing above him. He felt fangs in his mouth and was stunned when a forked tongue whipped past his lips.

  “Do you wish to look human again, Randon Kayle?” She asked.

  Disgusted by his loathsome appearance he readily agreed that he did.

  “Then swear a blood oath to Me and Mine and I will make you a man among men. I will give you comely looks no female can resist.”

  Broken, desperate to change his hideous countenance, he agreed and with one pass of Her hand, his body was restored.

  “You will serve Me and Mine. Do what you will to those of our enemies, but it will be Me, and Mine, you will obey.”

  He had bowed his head. “I will do as You bid,” he swore though it cost him greatly to make such a vow.

  “Bide your time here in this lair,” She said, “until that one voice winds its way to you. Listen closely for the one cry of pain your heart will not let you ignore. When you hear it, speed you to that woman and bind her and hers to you for all time. Make her one of Mine with blood and the power of your body.”

  Craftily he had looked up at the dark beauty. “I have one caveat,” he said, relieved he could now speak without the hissing.

  She had looked down upon him with anger but had nodded, apparently intrigued by his daring to barter.

  “I will do Your bidding until I find the one woman who is willing to take me as I am, for what I am,” he said.

  “And how will you know such a woman?” She had demanded.

  “I will know,” he said.

  “And when you find her?”

  “You will release me,” he told Her. “I will be free of You and Yours.”

  For a long moment She regarded him then nodded.

  “So be it. If you can find such a one, you will be set free.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

  “You think I’m that woman?” Kenzi asked.

  “I know you are,” he replied. “She knew I would find you one day else She would not have bargained with me as She did. There is little goodness in Lilith’s heart. What She does, She does for a reason.”

  Kenzi frowned. “Why would She want the two of us to be together then?”

  “Because She has plans for us.”

  Chapter Four

  “Well?” the Supervisor asked.

  “I’d like to see some of the…ah…patients I will be treating before I give you my answer,” Kenzi replied.

  He nodded. “Understandable. That can be arranged.” He leaned back in his chair. “What did you think of your quarters?”

  “Oh
, I loved them,” she said. “Who wouldn’t?”

  “Can you see yourself living there for the next forty years or so?”

  She lifted her eyebrows and looked away from his intense stare. Taking a deep breath, she seemed to be mulling over his question. When she looked back at him she smiled. “Yes sir. I can.”

  “And the facility?” He tented his fingers. “What is your opinion of it?”

  “State of the art,” she replied. “Comfortable. All the necessities provided. I’ve yet to see where I will be working but if everything else I’ve seen so far is any indication, I am very encouraged.”

  “And open to working here?”

  “Quite possibly,” she said.

  “What of the Alpha?” he inquired. “What is your opinion of him?”

  She lowered her head and dusted her hand over her thigh. “I think you know there was a connection between us before I ever stepped foot in Tearmann.”

  “One of the reasons you were chosen for the job offer but…”

  She looked up, her eyebrows knitting together. “But?”

  “Had you not been the best qualified for the job, Doctor, it would not have been offered to you despite the fact you and he were fated to be together.” He pushed back his chair. “All right. Let’s take that excursion into the bowels of the facility so you can get a gander at your patients-to-be.”

  * * * * *

  Kayle stood at the two-way mirror and stared at the woman who was Darkyn Sorn’s life-mate. He knew she could sense his presence for she was staring right back at him with unblinking calm and lips that were pressed tightly together. She was, without doubt, feeling the animosity that was rolling off him in waves and was quite possibly interpreting that as potential danger. He’d made no attempt to communicate with her to alleviate any misconceptions that might be forming in her mind—a mind that was completely shut down to him. He wasn’t sure he was ready to interact with her or that it was advisable. As yet, Sorn had not met her but the Reaper was on his way and Kayle was curious to see their reaction to one another.