The Destiny Thief (The Fitheach Trilogy Book 3), page 1
The Conclusion of
THE FITHEACH TRILOGY
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ONE
The Oracle will be born of mutated lineage: a sire of black, a dam of white. Unparalleled power will be invoked, and the key will be made manifest. The vessel answers only to the true Oracle.
Did the gods know? Had they orchestrated the fate of Isla and Maeve Kelley? Was it all planned, my conception from darkness and violence? Part of me was that darkness, but a greater part of me was a Raven. I had to believe that, or this place would be my grave. I would rather die than let my dark side dominate and turn me into one of Maelcolm’s Rogues.
I’d been a “guest” in this house for seven days, each torturous hour passing like an eon. My captor kept the door to my tomb of a bedroom locked, leaving me quartered like a caged animal while I waited in mind-numbing silence for his return. Maelcolm made no attempt to deny his paternity. When I confronted him with the question, he freely admitted that he was indeed my father, and then he announced with clinical directness that I would be sharing his home until a suitable partner could be arranged. I was a prisoner while the Rogues initiated their plan to build an army with me as their bloodstock.
So much for fatherly love.
On this morning, the door was wide open when I turned over on the bed to check it. It had become a daily habit, eyeing the door the moment I woke, tiptoeing across the cold floor to check the lock, waiting for a grave error from the poor fool in charge of sealing me in at night. But I knew this morning’s slipup was no accident. Maelcolm was expanding my freedom to the outer territory of his house.
I quickly dressed in the same clothes I’d worn for days and headed down the stairs to check the exterior doors. The place was massive, gaudy and ostentatious with all the heavily carved wood and ormolu trim dripping from the edges of the overstated furniture. The sheer amount of it exhausted my eyes, making me dizzy from the smell of linseed oil and lemon juice embedded in the grain of all that wood.
With its bold panels and medieval iron lock, I assumed the large door in front of me marked the main entrance of the house. It was no surprise when I found it unyielding, requiring a key to open from either side. The windows weren’t much help either. Even if I managed to break the thick glass, the metal bars covering them with barely a six-inch gap between the long rods was impossible for anything bigger than a cat to slip through. In a word, the house was a fortress.
I walked down the main hall, listening to the hollow echoes of the empty house as I approached a doorway. A sliver of the room came into view, and I could see the edge of a cabinet and a group of shiny copper pans suspended from a rack hanging over a butcher block the size of a farm table. It was the kitchen, silent and empty. There were no sounds of utensils hitting the edges of pans, or the smell of eggs and bacon. No Sophia on the other side of that doorway. God, what I wouldn’t have given for a slice of her French toast and a cup of hot coffee.
“Are you hungry?”
I turned toward the tall figure with black skin and sharp onyx eyes standing behind me. “Who are you?” I asked, taking a step back.
“Ian.” He extended his hand. “I run this house when Maelcolm is away.”
Cautiously, I examined his dark eyes while I contemplated what that meant. “And when he’s here?” I replied without taking his outstretched palm.
He smiled wryly but didn’t respond. He was well dressed for a butler or whatever he was, his gait quiet and graceful as he passed me and continued into the kitchen. There was an air about him that suggested he was more than that, more than the hired help. Maybe he was Maelcolm’s version of Sophia. Or maybe he was just another Rogue pulling house duty, spying on me while the boss was away.
I remained in my spot just outside the doorway and listened while a pan and bowl clanked against the counter, the refrigerator door opening and closing several times. A few minutes passed, and I heard the whistling of steam coming from a kettle.
“You might as well come in and help,” he said as I eavesdropped on his movements.
The intoxicating smell of coffee hit my nose the moment I stepped inside. In the week I’d been there, I’d subsisted on the cold pastries and lukewarm tea Maelcolm brought me every morning. Lunch and dinner weren’t any better; bagged entrees from some corner market or nearby restaurant, delivered by one of his minions. Clearly he didn’t cook, and until now Ian’s services hadn’t been implemented.
“I can cook for myself,” I said, eyeing the egg he cracked into the bowl.
“Yes, I’m sure you can. But then I wouldn’t have the pleasure of your company. It is a pleasure to meet you, Alex.”
I hated to admit it, but I liked him. There was something honest about him, a nonthreatening vibe that I hadn’t encountered since being taken. But I knew better than to trust anyone in this place past the extent of a few words and a plate of food. I had no intention of letting my guard down for any of them.
“Why haven’t I seen you before? I’ve been locked in this house for a week.”
He glanced at me, considering his words. “I believe Maelcolm wanted some time alone with you before he brought strangers into the house.”
“He’s a stranger,” I replied sharply.
My comment shut him down. Not another word was said while he moved through the room in his perfectly fitted suit, whipping up a meal of scrambled eggs and toast. When he was done, he presented my breakfast on the butcher block, cleaned the pan and bowl, and left the kitchen.
“Thank you,” I muttered after he’d already left the room. It was the first homemade meal I’d had in over a week, but it was also a stark reminder that I might never taste Sophia’s cooking again. I might never again see her stern but wise face, or stare at Greer’s over the dining room table at breakfast and dinner. Even if I made it out of here, I wasn’t sure what I’d go back to. I was nothing like the girl who disappeared from Battery Park. I’d been disassembled and put back together with all new parts, reinvented with the truth of what I was. How could I go back and look Greer in the eye with all that shame?
I took a seat in one of the grandiose chairs masquerading as a stool and forced myself to take a bite of the food I’d suddenly lost my desire for. My appetite was gone, but I needed to keep my strength up for the fight that was coming, the battle that would leave me a free woman or a slave to men for the rest of my days. The eggs were thick and tasteless in my mouth as I chewed mechanically, forcing them down my throat. Each bite was worse, but the coffee was a welcome stimulant that ironically had a calming effect on my brain. For that one precious moment of a sip, I was at peace.
And then I wasn’t.
The sound of footsteps came from down the hall as I took a bite of toast, growing louder until they stopped just outside the kitchen entrance. It was the heavy but controlled sound of boots that I’d learned to recognize when Maelcolm entered a room. The man who called himself my father showed up every morning with a bag of food, then disappeared for the next twenty-four hours. He was late today.
“Such a beautiful sight for these sore eyes,” he boomed, rounding the corner.
It was not Maelcolm.
Familiar, terrifying, and enraging all at once, the sound of his voice flipped my panic switch. My stool gave way, sending me crashing to the floor in a pile of useless limbs. Like a wild animal, my heart pounded against my ribcage, causing me to choke on the piece of toast at the back of my throat.
“And here I foolishly thought you’d be pleased to see me.” He took a long stride toward me, his expression agitated as his chest rose and sank heavily in the wake of my cold reception. “I forgive you,” he hissed through a clenched grin that chilled me to the bone. “Now get up, or I’ll yank you off the damn floor myself.”
Every part of my body vibrated from adrenaline as I pulled myself off the floor before he could touch me. I grabbed my plate and threw it against the far wall. The distraction was only good for a few seconds, but it was enough to get me past him and out of the room. I flew down the hall and up the flight of stairs to the second floor. He was a handful of steps behind me, and I knew if he got hold of me one of us would die before the morning was over.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Daemon stopped at the top of the stairs and leaned against the rail, clearly amused by my frantic pulling at a locked door. Where was I going? Where could I go? I suffered a sickening bout of déjà vu as I realize for the second time that he had me cornered against a wall I couldn’t possibly climb over. “Haven’t you realized by now that there is no escaping me? I own you. Your father has seen to that. Think of it as an arranged marriage—without the wedding.”
I slid to the floor as his words sank in. My own father had handed me over to my rapist, sold me for power. “Get it over with,” I bit out between my tight jaws, flinching when he took a step closer.
“That’s a good girl.” He took his time strolling down the hall, the stalking being part of his foreplay. He reached the second door on the left and turned the knob. The hinges opened with a whine as he lowered his eyes and beckoned me with a flick of his outstretched hand. “Come on. Up.”
“No,” I defied, watching his frown turn into an amused sneer.
He released the knob and ran his finger along the wall as he walked toward me. “I’m going to enjoy dragging you into this room, Alex. And then I’m goi
With a rough yank, I was on my feet and being dragged down the hall toward the bedroom. “Get off me!” I screamed, more from rage than fear. The door slammed shut and he threw me across the room toward the bed. The reality of what was happening must have registered on my face, because his own expression heated, a predator feeding off the fear of its prey. It was when he pulled his shirt off and then worked his pants to the floor that I knew no one was coming to stop him from making me his victim for the second time. My own father had lied to me and was now handing me over to Daemon like sugar or a sack of wheat. I was nothing more than a commodity.
His determined hands grabbed at me when I climbed on top of the bed and scurried toward the other side, catching me at the edge of my collar and ripping my blouse halfway down the front. He caught the heel of my right foot when I kicked it squarely at his chest, then gripped my ankle to drag me back down the length of the bed. While I struggled to get out from under him, I drifted away for a moment as the irony of what was happening distracted me from my escalating fear. But a second later, I was right back on that bed with his full weight on top of me, the vulgar smell of smoldering cedar strangling my nose. With each breath the smell intensified, growing in conjunction with his arousal.
“Let’s give it a good ride, shall we?” He leered down and forced my legs apart with his knee, dropping on top of me until I could barely breathe under his weight. I managed to turn my face away from his suffocating chest, focusing on my arm as it fell straight out to my side, palm up and limp. Every sound faded like I’d dropped to the bottom of a deep hole. But I could hear my mother’s voice clear as a bell telling me not to just lie down and die. And then I heard Isla Kelley repeat the words she’d spoken in my vision, threatening to kill me herself before she let that happen. I doubt Daemon planned to kill me, but what he was about to do to me was as good as pulling the trigger of a gun.
Just a drop of blood, I thought. That’s all it would take. If I’d been a virgin the first time he attacked me, he’d already be dead.
My outstretched hand began to move, itch with an irritation that bordered on something pleasant. Something was crawling under my skin, down the length of my arm until the mirage reached the center of my hand, intensifying into a sharp burning sensation. I focused on the lines of my palm, visualizing the bright flame I could feel under my skin. To the left of my life line and directly on top of my fate line, it flicked as clear as day. And then I was on fire. In the center of my hand was a ball of flames, alternating between blue and red as it licked at the surface of my skin.
Daemon’s hands stopped grabbing at my clothes, his eyes catching the flicker as the flame grew brighter. He jumped off of me and backed away toward the other side of the room, his eyes mesmerized by the brightness of the fire, by what he must have known he was no match for. Oddly, I had no fear of it. For the first time I understood that the power was mine, and that he’d finally pay for what he’d done to me.
Without forethought or hesitation, I hurled the ball of fire across the room, striking him right between his eyes. For a moment, the flame lowered to the size of a single matchstick burning between his brows. But a second later his face lit up into a blazing torch, his shoulders convulsing as the fire spread across his torso and down his legs, sending him up into an effigy of flames. I stood silent without a drop of pity as he burned. Daemon incinerated before my eyes without making a sound. No screams or struggle. He just stood there and allowed it to consume him as if frozen or resigned to his own fate. Or penance.
When it was over and Daemon was reduced to a cloud of fine ash scattered in the air, the flame came rushing back and hit me squarely in the chest. My body absorbed it like mist sinking into parched skin. The fire was part of me, just like the birthmark on the back of my head.
I pulled my blouse together, fastening the few buttons that were still attached, and walked calmly out of the room and back down the stairs to the first floor. Maelcolm was waiting in the living room, staring out the large barred window. I stood silent when he turned and examined my damaged clothing, trying to formulate something to say to him. But I was just too damned confounded for words. When it was clear that we would stand there all day if one of us didn’t break, he did what any authentic Scot would do—he went for the cabinet against the wall and poured two glasses of whiskey.
“Drink,” he ordered, shoving the glass under my nose.
Normally I would have thrown it in his face, but I was feeling a bit less aggressive now that the immediate threat was gone, and I really did need that drink. I took the glass from his hand. “I thought you said Daemon was dead.”
He looked at me steadily. “I said he was being dealt with.” He swallowed his drink in a single swig and went back for another. I did the same, holding my glass out for a refill. He returned with the replenished drinks and then continued to the center of the room, expelling a loud rush of air as he planted himself in one of the grand chairs. His palm slid along the length of the armrest and settled over the carved claw at the cap. “I thought you might like to finish the job,” he continued. “You did want to end him yourself, yes?”
I couldn’t argue with that. After Daemon raped me, I’d vowed to kill him. Maelcolm was dead-on about that. “And what if I couldn’t? What if that little talent I just discovered hadn’t manifested up there?” My head motioned toward the second floor as I polished off my drink. “You were watching, weren’t you? What if that monster did that to me again? Would you have just stood there and let it happen?”
Maelcolm ran his massive paw over his face. His fuse was burning short, and I could tell by the way his mouth sank and his breath accelerated that he wasn’t interested in discussing what-if scenarios with me. But he damn well owed me an answer.
“Answer me!” I demanded, slamming my glass down on the table next to his chair, nearly shattering it.
Instinctively, I stumbled back when he vaulted out of his chair. He’d already demonstrated his lack of parental affection, and I had no doubt he’d throttle me or lob me across the room if I pushed his temper too far. And that was if I was lucky. Maelcolm and his Rogues were violent creatures. I kept that at the forefront of my mind at all times, regardless of my blood connection to him. He snatched my wrist, painfully squeezing the bone until I thought it might snap. Then he was dragging me down the hall, making me fight to stay upright and not trail behind him like a dangling ragdoll. He pulled me into a parlor room that seemed a little out of place for the twenty-first century, and yanked me in front of a giant mirror that must have stood seven feet tall, leaning against the wall. My refection next to his massive frame was comical.
“What are you doing?” I spat.
He looked down at me and inhaled deeply, calming himself before he spoke. “What do you see?” he asked, gripping my chin and forcing my face back to the mirror.
“Right now I see a giant bully standing next to me.”
He lifted my right wrist, the one he’d dragged me by, and held it out toward the mirror. He began to squeeze it even tighter. The pain radiated down my arm until panic started to set in. I imagined the bones cracking under my skin and the muscle rupturing against the broken shards. I tried to pull away, but he had me around the waist with his other arm and held me in place effortlessly while I fought against the pain.
“Take another look,” he ordered.
I looked in the mirror and saw my eyes begin to change. I was used to seeing the blue fire radiate from them when my blood flowed, but I wasn’t prepared to see the emerald green staring back at me. I blinked to clear the hallucination, but now I was looking at something very different: not one face, but three. I had my mother’s bright emerald eyes and the snow-white hair of Isla Kelley. The rest was mine. But in that moment, I knew I was all of them.
The pain abruptly stopped and my hand began to itch and burn, just as it had the moment before the flames appeared. I looked at Maelcolm through his reflection in the mirror and extracted my wrist from his grip without effort. It was as if he’d simply let go. But I knew he was holding on just as tight as he had been before. I was stronger than him. A smile spread across his face, but it had no joy in it—it was pure satisfaction. I stared at my hand for a few seconds, and then it occurred to me that if I was strong enough to pull away from him, maybe I was strong enough to overpower him and find the key to the door. Maybe he hadn’t even locked it when he came in.
