Vowed in Shadows Read online

  horde-tenebrae: Blanket term for lesser demonic emanations, including malice, ferales, and salambes. Also, tenebrae.

  ichor: A physical by-product of demonic emanations not compatible with the human realm.

  league: Isolated clusters of possessed fighters assigned to high-density human-population areas with the mission of reducing demonic activity.

  malice: Incorporeal lesser emanation from the demon realm, typically small and animalistic in shape with protohuman intelligence.

  mated-talyan bond: The synergistic combination of male and female possessed powers.

  reven: The permanent visible epidermal mark left by an ascended demon.

  salambe: Highly emanating demonic form from the same subspecies as malice.

  solvo: A chemical version of the desolator numinis; produces opiatelike effects in humans while splitting off the soul.

  sphericanum: The realm of angels, separated from the human realm by the gates of heaven. Also used in reference to the ruling body of angelic powers.

  symballein: A token, such as an engraved metal disk, that is broken into two pieces and used to establish identity when reunited; from Greek.

  talya: talyan (pl.): 1. Sacrificial lamb; a young man (Aramaic). 2. A human, typically male, possessed by a repentant demon.

  tenebrae: Blanket term for lesser demonic emanations, including malice, ferales, and salambes. Also, horde-tenebrae.

  tenebraeternum: The demon realm, separated from the human realm by the Veil.

  teshuva: A repentant demon seeking to return to a state of grace.

  Veil: An etheric barrier between the human and demon realms and composed of captured souls.

  From the @1 Handbook of Possession

  Excerpted from Chicago league roll call, Updated 4/11

  Liam Niall: League leader

  Possession date: Chicago stockyards, circa 1845

  Teshuva subcaste: Ravager

  Bonded: Jilly Chan

  Ferris Archer: Talya

  Possession date: Georgia, circa 1860

  Teshuva subcaste: Annihilator

  Bonded: Sera Littlejohn

  Sera Littlejohn: First confirmed female talya

  Possession date: Chicago, 2009

  Teshuva subcaste: Enigma

  Bonded: Ferris Archer

  Handwritten note from interim Chicago

  Bookkeeper Sera Littlejohn: First confirmed? If you jerks would quit rewriting your history and deleting the parts you don’t like, you might actually learn something.

  Jilly Chan: Second confirmed female talya

  Possession date: Chicago, 2010

  Teshuva subcaste: Discord

  Bonded: Liam Niall

  Jonah Sterling Walker: Talya

  Possession date: Congo, circa 1890

  Teshuva subcaste: Bane

  Bonded: Nimue

  Nimue aka Nim, born Elaine Hamlin: Third

  confirmed female talya

  Possession date: Chicago, 2011

  Teshuva subcaste: Thrall

  Bonded: Jonah Walker

  Ecco (last name unlisted):

  Possession date: Redacted

  Teshuva subcaste: Chaos (unverified)

  Three yellow handwritten notes from interim

  Chicago Bookkeeper Sera Littlejohn:

  Allies:

  Nanette, possessed by lesser-sphere angelic force

  Lau-Lau, Jilly’s weird old landlady—possibly a witch

  Wow, this is a disappointingly short list

  Frenemies?

  Bella, owner of the Mortal Coil nightclub

  Cyril Fane, possessed by upper-sphere angelic force

  Definitely enemies:

  Bookie, “retired” to soulless summer camp

  Corvus Valerius!!!

  Fourth note (author presumed to be Ferris Archer):

  Finish your notes tomorrow. Come to bed. Now.

  From the @1 Handbook of Possession:

  Demonic classifications:

  Djinn: Upper echelon of demon-realm inhabitants

  Subcastes: Unknown

  Resonant vulnerability: Evil

  Teshuva: Repentant demons

  Resonant vulnerability: Penance trigger

  Horde-tenebrae:

  Known subcastes:

  Malice

  Ferales

  Salambes

  Early league writings chronicling the First Battle indicate numerous tenebrae subcastes answered the djinn rally against the angelic forces. Many subcastes are thought to have been eradicated at the end of that era, due to the valiant sacrifice of talyan lives.

  Handwritten note from interim Chicago Bookkeeper Sera Littlejohn:

  Eradicated, my ass. We haven’t seen the worst of it yet.

  Continue reading for a preview of Jessa Slade’s next Marked Souls novel,

  BY DARKNESS UNDONE

  Available soon from Signet Eclipse

  The Chicago league of demon-possessed talyan destroyed one enemy . . . and in the process unleashed a horde of new problems. Sidney Westerbrook, the league’s interim Bookkeeper, arrived from London less than twenty-four hours ago to sort out the mess and has already had his first encounter with a feralis pack. He’d be dead if not for the unexpected appearance of a rogue female talya. But strange little Alyce might be more dangerous to Sid’s mortal human heart than any feralis fang, and rescuing her from the demons of her very distant past could be his ultimate undoing.

  Sid kicked off his filthy jeans and eased out of his shirt. He noted the bloodstains from his draining wound, and suddenly had a better understanding of the league’s rather shocking clothing allowance. Standing in his boxers, he wrapped his shoulder in gauze, then with a groan crawled into bed. But sleep eluded him, circling him endlessly as his inbound flight to O’Hare had done, so he grabbed his specs and pulled one of his favorite books into his lap. His father hadn’t been thrilled to part with the gold-bound and -illuminated texts, but Sid had convinced him the opportunity to study female talyan with original manuscripts in hand superseded jurisdictional pettiness. Besides, the ancient journal had lots of pretty pictures that weren’t done justice in reproduction.

  He donned archival gloves in deference to the old man and the old paper and hoped he wouldn’t fall asleep and drool on the pages.

  Somewhere just beyond the edges of his perception, he sensed the warehouse quieting as the night-fighting talyan rested, secure in their sanctuary. The cinder blocks seemed to breathe out peacefulness that he’d never felt in person among the restless warriors.

  Eventually, his eyelids drooped. Through the haze of his eyelashes, the intricately drawn illustrations danced with strange, wild life, a tangle of angels and demons without clear distinction.

  He blamed his gritty eyes for making him blink dumbly when he looked up and saw the visitation, as if one of the ethereal figures from the primeval text had stepped off the page, as if a fever dream had come to life. He fumbled in setting his drooping specs higher. “Alyce?”

  She ghosted across the room, her bare feet silent on the linoleum. Her pale eyes glittered, amethyst over ice. “Shh. I’ve come to free you.”

  A ping raced through his body, from the sudden acceleration of his heartbeat to his extremities, like a warning signal. “Free me?” He sounded as clueless as he no doubt looked. He pushed aside the book, careful not to wrinkle the pages. “Did Liam let you in?”

  “There was a devil-man at the gate.” She fisted her hands in her skirt. The grandmotherly housedress lacked the ichor stains of her last ensemble, but the powder blue polyester was worn to near transparency in places. And now there were fingerprints of blood in the folds. “I did not stop to ask him his name.”

  “Oh, Lord.” The ping went round his innards a few more times, gaining particle-accelerator speeds. Had she killed Liam or one of the other talyan? That would put a definite wrinkle in his reintroduction strategy.

  Alyce shook her head. “These beings are not of the Lord. I see the devils in their
eyes.”

  “They are possessed,” he admitted. “But not by devils. Or not evil devils, anyway. Their teshuva—the demons inside them—are like yours.”

  “Evil,” she whispered. “Like me.”

  “Repentant,” he corrected. “Fighting for the light now.”

  “There is no light for me.”

  “Not before, maybe. But now that you’re here, everything is different.”

  She pressed her bloody palms together and raised her hands until her fingertips brushed under her chin. Despite the prayerful pose, her gaze speared him without mercy. “Is this where I die?”

  He recoiled. “God, no!”

  “Lord and God, you say. I thought maybe you would banish the devil from me.”

  “I can’t.”

  Her hands fell back to her sides, and he was left staring at the reven around her neck. The welt briefly shimmered with violet light, then faded to black, as if her teshuva hadn’t the strength to maintain its outrage.

  But she had incapacitated at least one of the talyan to get this far.

  What was she?

  Slowly, keeping his eye on her, he climbed out of the bed. His navy boxers weren’t suitable for an audience with the queen, but he wasn’t indecent.

  Alyce stood back, showing no sign of bolting. Instead, her gaze flicked over him, touching on the gauze at his shoulder, the bruise on his forehead, and various contusions in between. She never dipped below the belt line. “Were you badly hurt?”

  He shrugged the shoulder that wasn’t wounded. “They patched me up here, so it can’t have been too bad. I’ve never had to go to the hospital for feralis injuries before.”

  “Don’t. They won’t believe you.”

  His fingers itched to find a recorder, or at least a pencil and paper. “You’ve tried? When?”

  “I don’t quite remember.” Her wintery gaze darkened. “It did not end well.”

  Which reminded him about the talya at the gate. “We need to go pick up the pieces of the welcoming party you left in the dust.”

  “He was rude.”

  “That happens with talyan. But it’s not nice to break them just for that.”

  She nodded. “I did not understand they were yours.”

  He halted in the middle of grabbing his jeans. The Chicago talyan? His? Hardly. London had loaned him out because Liam didn’t have his own Bookkeeper, but they didn’t want him. Hell, he didn’t want them either. He wanted London. Someday. Hopefully a long time in the future, when his father retired to putter around his garden.

  Alyce was watching his face, her expression mirroring the furrow of his brow. “I’ve made you sad. I didn’t want to hurt him. But I wanted to come to you.”

  He smoothed a hand down his face, erasing the quick, helpless calculations of his father’s chances of surviving to spring, much less retirement. “You don’t make me sad. In fact, I can’t possibly explain how happy I am to have you here.” He stepped into his jeans, wishing she wasn’t watching quite so closely, but intrigued by her empathetic responses. How did a talya—eternally driven by the demon to the furthest reaches of violence and destruction—keep any semblance of softer emotions?

  No wonder she was odd.

  What a spectacular find. Or, he supposed, how spectacular that she’d found him.

  He had a half second to wonder how exactly she’d found him when she reached out and flattened her palm over his belly, just above the unbuttoned fly of his jeans.

  Alyce held her hand against Sid’s warm skin even when he sucked in a harsh breath to pull away.

  She had never of her own will touched a man. She knew she should not touch him now. But the textures of him made her fingers reach out for the smooth planes of his flanks, where hard sheets of muscle wrapped around into his rippled abdomen . . . and the tidy line of hair connected the shadowed indent of his navel to the darker mysteries below the button of his pants.

  “You are real,” she murmured. He was clean, cared for, wounded but alive. And oh so warm. “Not one of my delusions.” She canted her head to gaze up into his brown eyes. “I wasn’t sure.”

  To answer, he had to let out the breath he’d been holding. “I am real. As real as you.”

  “I haven’t been sure of that either.”

  Slowly, as if she might run—or attack—he lifted her palm from his belly. He tangled his fingers through hers and raised her hand to his chest. Against her knuckles, his heart pounded.

  “Real as you,” he said.

  She nodded.

  “Can we go find the other talyan? Don’t be afraid. They won’t hurt you.”

  She tensed but released him at once when she saw him wince at the tightening of her grasp. “They’ll want to.”

  “They’re just nervous.”

  “Because of me?”

  His lips quirked, and suddenly she wished she’d touched him there instead, to feel that soft curve. “You are very scary.”

  She lowered her head, letting the curtain of her hair fall over her eyes.

  He closed the distance between them in one step. “Alyce, I was teasing.” He hesitated. “Well, exaggerating. Or maybe . . . Never mind.”

  Thorne had warned her. He’d known she wasn’t suited for proper company, even with an unstained frock. She took a sidling step away.

  But Sidney followed. “Alyce. Look at me.”

  She did. Or, she looked at his mouth again. Words came so fast and furious from that mouth, faster and more furious than the devils. And yet she very much liked his mouth even when it confused or teased her.

  What did Thorne know—him and his devil’s whispers? Well, he had mentioned that one thing, that thing older than evil. That always bought silence.

  She jolted up onto her toes and pressed her lips to Sidney’s.

  So soft . . . His lips were every bit as soft as she’d guessed. And wonderfully warm. And they curved around hers, like a secret smile she couldn’t see but could feel. Only for her. She supposed she could get used to being teased.

  “My Sidney,” she whispered against his mouth. Or she meant to. What came out of her was a moan even softer than his lips.

  She reached up to sink her fingers into his hair. The russet locks were just long enough to tickle the backs of her hands and send delightful shivers through her. Then she remembered the rest of his hair, the light patch of curls on his chest, and lower down, and she wondered where else that might tickle her, so she let her fingers trip over his breastbone and down his belly. Ah, this hair was rougher but every bit as pleasing to her touch.

  His fingers wrapped around her upper arms. Good, or she might have fallen as her knees weakened. Mouth to mouth, their breath swirled and merged, a close, sultry mingling that promised deeper intimacy if she could just—

  He pulled away, and their lips parted. “Wait.” He locked his elbows, and his grip on her arms kept her from stepping back into his embrace. “Alyce, wait.”

  His grasp wasn’t really strong enough to stop her—and his hands were shaking slightly, besides—but she waited because he’d asked.

  “What are we doing?”

  “I know the answer to this one,” she said quickly.

  He laughed, the sound as unsteady as his grasp. “How did you stay so innocent with a demon inside you?”

  She froze. “I am not innocent.”

  Despite the eerie shiver in her voice, he kissed her again, on the forehead this time. Which was sweet, but not as sweet as on the mouth.

  That must be the demon he’d mentioned.

  For once, she was rather glad of the devil inside.

  Also by Jessa Slade

  Forged of Shadows

  Seduced by Shadows

 

 

 
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