Part 7 (1/2)

”This is an outrage,” Hart ground out, towering over David, who merely looked up at him with a completely neutral expression. Hart was a tall man, imposing, used to intimidating people, but he couldn't intimidate David. It simply wasn't possible. ”Give her back.”

”No.”

”This is an act of-”

”Say it, Hart,” David hissed, eyes narrowing, their blue going silver at the edges. ”Say the word and I'll have you shot before you take another breath. Start a war between us right now and it will be finished right now.”

Hart snarled, ”You had no right to steal what rightfully belongs to me.”

”I stole nothing. Cora came to my Queen and asked for asylum. She has exposed your cruelty and your partic.i.p.ation in illegal slavery-and we'll see what the Council has to say now that we have evidence to back up the rumors.”

Hart turned on Miranda. ”You did this, then. I should have known. You stupid little wh.o.r.e-no woman takes what's mine. I'll teach you-”

Hart raised his arm to backhand her, and Miranda felt David start toward them, but finally, Miranda's rage and hatred toward this sick excuse for a man had an outlet, and she let it fly, drawing up her power and pus.h.i.+ng- Hart flew backward, thrown hard across the room, and the sound of a body hitting the far wall and the crunch of breaking bones caused the Elite to freeze where they stood, staring with huge eyes at their Queen . . .

. . . their Queen, whose palm was outstretched toward where Hart had been standing.

She was breathing hard, but her body sang with pleasure and satisfaction, and she knew she was smiling.

David crossed the room to stand over Hart, and she heard him say very quietly, ”You have exactly one hour to leave my Haven. If you stay one moment longer, you will die. You are to leave the other three women here. Now, go.”

He turned his back on Hart and returned to where Miranda stood; the armed Elite converged upon Hart and waited while he got to his feet, one arm sticking out at an unnatural angle, and limped away with the four crossbows still trained on him.

Miranda lowered her hand, grounding herself, letting the excess power drain out of her. When she looked up at David he was staring at her, and to her amazement, he looked completely dumbfounded.

”That was you,” he said.

She nodded. ”Yeah. I know; I shouldn't have lost my temper.”

”No, Miranda-it was you. You threw him.”

”So?”

”With your brain.”

She frowned for a minute before she understood what he was saying. ”Oh.”

”How did you do that?”

Miranda's heart was pounding. ”I . . . I don't know. Is that . . . not normal?”

”No . . . it's beyond not normal. Pairs share power, but they don't share talents. That's not possible. How could you suddenly be telekinetic?”

David had all the answers. The thought that there was something that baffled him this much, and obviously worried him, worried her even more. ”I don't know. But I didn't know I was prescient, either, until that thing with Kat yesterday.”

”Every Queen has that talent to some degree. It usually doesn't fully develop until after she takes her Signet.” Seeing her distress, and moreover feeling it, David took a deep breath, then came over and put his arms around her. ”It's all right, beloved. I'm sorry I overreacted-there must be an explanation. I'll see what I can find out. Maybe it is normal; I've never heard of gift transfer, but I've never had a Queen, either.”

She leaned into his shoulder, suddenly exhausted by the whole evening, wanting nothing more than to climb into bed with him and shut the world away. ”And you're not angry at me over Cora?”

”No. You did the right thing. I'm proud of you.”

”Good,” she said. ”I was afraid I was going to have to kick your a.s.s.”

He sighed. ”You don't really think I'm a heartless b.a.s.t.a.r.d, do you?”

She chuckled in spite of herself. ”I think you know a lot more than I do about all of this, and we're going to b.u.t.t heads a lot until I figure it all out. But if you can be patient with me, I'll be patient with you, and it will all work out.”

”I hope so,” he said, holding her tightly. ”I hope so.”

A little over an hour later Faith followed the frantic call of Elite 18 to the guest suites. One of the servants had gone into the rooms that Hart had abandoned to start what would no doubt be an arduous cleanup, and her scream had brought the guards running.

Faith stood in the doorway, gripping the frame with one hand, the other on her sword hilt.

Hart had destroyed his own room, dumping books from shelves and knocking over furniture. He had thrown anything breakable he could get his hands on onto the wall, and there were bits of broken gla.s.s and ceramic all over the wood floor. Nothing appeared to be missing, just smashed and torn.

Faith, however, was in the doorway to the smaller bedroom, which reeked of s.e.x and blood. The only thing in the room that had been broken was a single wooden chair. Three of the legs had been snapped off.

Each leg now protruded from the chest of a naked woman.

Hart had stripped them, murdered them, and then thrown them into a pile, their long bony limbs splayed out on the floor of the bedroom.

Faith had seen a great many dead bodies in her life, mostly from violence without warning. So many faces had been marked with horror and fear at the moment of death. Here, on the other hand, she saw girls whose dying expressions had been utter indifference to fate, and one was even smiling.

Elite 18 was kneeling by the bodies and pointed to one of their bare stomachs, where it looked like Hart had slashed her with a knife. ”Look,” he said.

Faith came closer and squinted. The slashes weren't random. They were letters.

”Clean it off,” she said. Elite 18 nodded and grabbed a discarded pillowcase, wiping gently at the dead girl's midsection; a servant brought a cup of water, and they scrubbed at the dried blood until the letters were visible.

Faith's chest tightened as she read it.

SOON, b.i.t.c.h.

”All right,” Faith said quietly. ”That's enough. Let's take care of these poor girls.”

She ordered them separated, cleaned, shrouded, and burned, and everything in both rooms stripped and replaced from the handful of bedrooms toward the back of the Haven that hadn't been used in decades.

Then she shook her head with heavyhearted resignation and went to call the Pair.

Before she could even say ”Star-one,” however, she heard footsteps behind her and a shakily drawn breath.

Faith turned to the Queen. ”My Lady-”

Miranda darted into the bathroom without speaking, and Faith heard her retching.

Several of the st.u.r.dier-stomached servants had converged on the bodies and were gently coaxing the girls apart, laying them out on plastic sheeting. Esther, who normally saw to the Pair's wing, had arrived with cleaning supplies and grim determination and was overseeing the whole operation; the little woman had been on staff longer than Faith had been in Texas, and, having worked for Auren, surely she had seen worse.