Page 17 of Vanish Into Light

“So does everyone,” Rose said, before Lance could snap at him again. “But if there’s answers to find, they’ll be here.”

They parked on a patch of brown, ruined lawn, and piled out of the Hummer, hefting bags, and bedrolls, and weapons – a plethora of weapons. Tris had a broken-down, belt-fed machine gun slung over one shoulder, she noted.

As they headed up the front walk – Lance was leading, but Rose hadn’t fallen in beside him – Gallo appeared at her elbow and asked, in an undertone, “What’s up with Lance?”

“How should I know?”

He took a long stride so he could lean into her field of vision and give her acome onlook. “Is he jealous you’re back with Beck?” he asked, in a whisper.

“I’m not…” Well, she didn’t know what she was, exactly.

“You’re not as quiet as you think you are,” Lance said, ahead of them, and mounted the wide, shallow steps that led to the doors – and to Beck, and whatever he’d planned for them.

The doors were unlocked, and Lance pushed them open with perhaps too much force; they squealed, and groaned, and scraped over the debris that littered the black-and-white tiled great hall. They proceeded into the vast space, footfalls echoing off the high walls, drifting up into the open air, where the glass ceiling had once been, and where mist now sifted down like clouds. The silvery light of mid-morning illuminated the stained-glass portrait of Saint Michael; gave him a sad countenance, she thought.

But before him, the throne sat empty.

She’d half-expected Beck to be lounging there, she realized, one leg hooked negligently over the arm, tail flicking like a cat’s.

But, no. He chose to make an even grander appearance.

A sound like an umbrella snapping shut drew her gaze upward. Beck stepped over the rail of the third floor, into the chasm that had once been a glass-domed atrium, opened his wings, and glided down. A few slow flaps, and he landed lightly, toes-first, on the tiles. His wings settled with a great rustle, mantled, closed, and caped.

He tilted his head to examine them. “You came.”

“You told us to.” Lance sounded gruffer than usual.

The old, faint, enigmatic smile that Rose remembered from all their evenings in the library made an appearance. His gaze was pinned on Lance; Lance’s hand flexed, and then opened. “Yes. And you listened.” Then Beck blinked, and his gaze shifted to her. “Rose, dear.” He held out his hand, and even if she was confused, now, and less certain, rattled inside in a way she’d never been with him before, the magnetic pull of him was just as strong.

She stepped forward, away from the others, and slid her hand into his; felt the faint, not unpleasant scrape of his claws, and the heat of his skin. Let him pull her in snug to his side, and draw her arm through his. He smelled of smoke, and she thought of the glow of his cigarette cherry, and the heat of his gaze through a screen of tawny hair.

Something inside her unclenched a fraction; her breathing came easier. Whatever had happened yesterday must have been a fluke; nerves allowing the worries of others to crowd in around her long-held truths. She’d seen blood on Beck’s hands countless times. Why should blood on his lips be any different?

She heard him emit a soft, pleased hum, as he sensed her relaxing; the sound vibrated with the low harmonics of a cat purring.

“I’ve been busy during the night,” he said. “Let me show you.”

~*~

Lance had always hated this mansion – even when it was whole and gleaming. He knew there were lots of people who would have gladly moved in if offered a chance at it; whodidn’twant a mansion? But he’d always preferred things to be simpler; less fussy and pretentious. He valued comfort over aesthetics.

And, also, an evil man had lived here, one he’d had to pretend to agree with.

As he followed Beck and Rose down the hall into the west wing, he couldn’t say that an evil man didn’t still live here.

Rose would have argued with him, but Rose was biased. She’d always seen Beck – Becket, damn it – as her savior; as a mentor and a first lover. Probably the first person to ever care about her.

Lance had lain awake a long time last night, after Rose finally cried herself to sleep. She’d told him she loved him, finally, and that should have filled him with warmth, and hope…but the words that had run through his head again and again had been Becket’s.

If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll admit that Rose’s penchant for violence is what attracted you in the first place. Stop trying to make her into something she isn’t.

He’d wanted to deny that, had tried very hard to do so. But. There were women in the military: strong, capable, attractive women. He’d indulged in a casual fling here and there over the years, never invested. He’d been with the hookers and strippers that had serviced Castor’s crew: the sorts of encounters that brought only momentary pleasure, and which left him wanting to take long, hot showers afterwards.

And then there had been Rose. Rose in the warehouse at Beck’s side, in her long coat, with her knives bloodied. Too young, and wilder and more vicious than anything he’d ever seen – save her lover. When he held her now, he could remember her furious and struggling in his arms, screaming, that first night, when she’d lost Beck. She’d constructed a careful mask for her face, one that cracked only rarely, but her body told the story of her emotions: of her heart, and her drive, and her anguish, and her taste for violence. She was ruthless and focused in a way he’d never seen in another Knight.

She was, in a word, breathtaking.

He’d told himself that her violent streak was something Becket had instilled in her. That he’d taken her brightness and warped it into something sinister.

---