Sinner's Heart

Chapter 3

Bram strode through the darkened corridors of his home, with only a few lit candles flickering in the shadows. Stillness smothered the house, yet his heart beat loudly in his ears as he descended the stairs.

A lone footman stood outside the closed doors to the Green Drawing Room, candle in hand.

“No one disturbs us,” Bram said.

Bowing, the footman backed away. Bram stood alone in the corridor, his hand upon the door, his muscles and thoughts taut. How to face the man he once considered one of his closest friends? The man was now a murderer. Was he here to kill Bram as well?

In a fight, John would be no match for Bram. Yet there were new measurements of a man’s capabilities beyond physical strength. Bram himself had witnessed the Devil bestowing more power upon John, though what that power might entail was yet untried—upon Bram, at any rate. The Devil had tried to give Bram more power as well. The ghost had prevented it, however, stepping between him and the bolt of magic. Because of her, he possessed only his original gift.

She might be his savior. She might be his destruction.

He didn’t want saving, and his destruction was assured.

Something brushed along his neck, cool and electric. It moved through him in volatile waves. Her. He knew the feel of her presence, her force and purposeful cunning. He knew no living woman like her, and that was a blessing, for of a certain such women were created to rule the world.

He stared into the shadows, waiting for her to manifest. Yet she did not. She remained a formless, invisible energy swirling through the dark. Agitation thrummed through her.

Don’t go in there.

Her voice resounded in his mind, low and urgent.

“He’s one of my best friends,” he muttered.

Neither of us knows what John truly is anymore. Send him away.

“No.” For if there were judgments to make, he’d make them himself, not at the command of a long-dead Roman with a siren’s voice.

But—

He pushed open the double doors and stepped into the Green Drawing Room.

John whirled to face him. Aside from a slight disorder in his clothing, he seemed much as he always had, with his scholar’s sharp face, his lanky height that he had never grown into, as if he had more important and worthwhile things to consider besides the thickening of his body.

“Bram,” he said after a moment.

“John.” They stared at one another. Of the five Hellraisers, Bram and John were the most disparate, and had spent few hours alone together. Now they were all that remained, a strange irony. The rakehell and the man of letters. “How did you know to find me at home?”

“This is my final stop of the night. I tried all the familiar places first.” John glanced at Bram’s banyan. “You’ve been pulled from your bed. Are you alone?”

Livia’s presence clung close, buzzing and unquiet. Yet Bram answered, “I am.”

Frowning, John studied him, searching for something. “Certain? I might’ve sworn—”

“There’s only me.” He didn’t know why he concealed Livia from John. These were perilous times—no one could be trusted.

Moving further into the chamber, he went to a side table and poured himself a brandy. He silently offered a glass to John, but his friend shook his head. The most abstemious of the Hellraisers, was John.

“What are you doing here? I would have thought you’d be sequestered in the corner of some assembly, engineering a political alliance.”

“It is for that reason I’ve searched you out.” He lowered his voice, confiding. “I’ve come for a favor.”

Bram raised his brows. “You mistake me for one of your Whitehall power brokers.”

“There are more ways to gain influence than direct channels.” John offered a smile.

“I’ve never cared for subtlety.”

John chuckled, though Bram did not share in the laughter. “Direct as the point of a blade, as always. Yet you’ve your own means of persuasion.” He gave Bram a meaningful look, for he knew the specifics of Bram’s magical gift. “In truth, that is why I am here tonight. I need your persuasive talents to get inside a certain gentleman’s private study. Into a desk drawer in that study.”

Where, no doubt, important and confidential documents were kept. “You want a housebreaker, not me.”

The corner of John’s mouth curved, the most he could provide for a smile. “Your way is so much more elegant. It’s a simple matter of persuading one of the servants to let you into the study.”

“Bribe one of them.”

“All the servants in this household are nauseatingly virtuous. Come now, Bram, we’re friends, you and I. There’s no need to dissemble about your own virtue. I’ve seen you seduce married women right out from under the noses of their husbands.”

“If a woman is under her husband’s nose, he’s got her in the wrong place.”

Bram felt, rather than heard, Livia’s amusement. Then her voice within him. The worst kind of scoundrel.

Oh, he answered silently, but I’m very good at it.

So I’ve witnessed. I myself found it far more entertaining to be wicked than respectable.

This intrigued him, but John’s words brought his attention back to the room.

“Will you do it? It is a very small favor, but it would be an immeasurable assistance.”

Bram only stared at John. “We’ve not seen one another since Edmund’s burial.”

The heavy velvet curtains suddenly became fascinating, for John fixed his attention on them. “A sorrowful day.”

“As of now, I’m the only Hellraiser you haven’t tried to kill.” He took a drink. “That might change. I may wake up with your rapier in my heart.”

Shaking his head, John said, “This is precisely what Leo and Whit want—division between us. But we two, together we’re the strongest of all. So much power. We can have anything we desire, anything at all.” He stepped closer, the light from the fireplace paring his face into sharp yellow planes. “Mr. Holliday’s gifts were twofold—we were given power, and we also learned which of us were weakest.”

“Whit and Leo weren’t weak.” Bram had known Whit for most of his life, long before either of them had seen the world’s true face, full of ruin and loss. They had stalked the streets of London together, haunted its glittering ballrooms and smoke-shrouded gaming hells. When Bram had returned from the Colonies, unable to do much beyond drink and fuck, Whit had not judged him. He’d given Bram acceptance, when Bram could not accept himself.

“No?” John scoffed. “Even with the power they were given, both were misled by women. That Gypsy girl, and Leo’s insipid wife. No man of strength could be so deluded by a woman.” He smiled. “Not you, Bram. You know exactly what women are for—bedding, and nothing else.”

Fool, Livia fumed in Bram’s mind.

Bram took another swallow of brandy. “So my cock makes me strong.”

John seemed to make the decision to be amused. “How marvelous that you are so little changed.”

Was Bram the same as he’d been before? He barely recognized his reflection in the water of his washing basin. The face he knew, but what was beneath it, that had been irrevocably altered. Witnessing one friend murder another tended to do that.

“It’s not usual,” Bram said, “for a man to attend the funeral of the one he killed.”

John’s face tightened. “The damned fool stepped into the path of my blade.”

Not enough regret, whispered Livia. Not nearly enough.

“The blade that was meant for Leo.”

This, at the least, John did not dispute. “He’d turned against us, turned his back on the Hellraisers. He could not suffer to live.” His voice was cold and hard as frost.

“This is Leo we’re talking of. The man you once carried home on your back when he’d been too fuddled with drink to walk. You and he used to debate for hours about phenomenally dull finance policies.”

“That was before.” His mouth hardened. “We’ve learned valuable lessons since then.”

“I was never much for education.”

Stepping closer, John said, “Bram, think. Consider everything we’ve been given. You and I aren’t like the others. We won’t fall to the wiles of females. We know how to use our gifts to our best advantage. With our abilities, anything we want can be ours, anything at all.”

“I’ve already got what I desire.”

“Yet you could have more.” His eyes burned like coals. “Mr. Holliday’s power is great in me. All thoughts are mine to read, from the limbless beggar to the mightiest lord.”

“Tell me what I’m thinking now.” In truth, Bram wished John would, for his own thoughts were tempestuous and made for rough navigation.

John made himself look rueful. “All minds but the Hellraisers’. Those are illegible to me.”

Perhaps that was for the best. He felt Livia close, agitated and angry.

“Inconvenient,” answered Bram.

“But I don’t need to worry about what you’re thinking.” John narrowed his eyes. “Do I, Bram?”

Bram did not answer. Nor did he look away. He only stared at John until the other man chuckled.

“The hour is late, so I’m for bed.” John strode to the door of the chamber. “You won’t forget that favor I’ve asked of you.”

It didn’t escape notice that this was a statement, not a question. “I won’t forget.”

But will you do it? Livia pressed.

He refused to respond, and stood in the middle of the room as John made a quick bow before leaving. The front door opened then shut. The wheels of John’s carriage clattered down the street.

Studying the carpet beneath his feet, Bram followed the snaking pattern of vines. If plants such as the ones in the Savonnerie rug existed in real life, they would trap unwary animals and either choke the life out of the creatures or else consign them to a slow death by starvation.

Damn him, if only he had power over time. With that gift, he’d take the Hellraisers back to the moments before they had freed Mr. Holliday. He would keep them from journeying to the ruined temple where they had found the Devil’s prison, distract them somehow, and they would go on just as they always had.

“You can’t go back.” Her voice did not come from within his mind. Glancing up, he watched a silver white glow appear in the gloom of the chamber. It coalesced into a form he was coming to recognize far too well.

“I’m aware of that,” he snarled.

“All of that”—she waved her hand toward the door from which John had exited—“was a test. Asking for a favor serves to bind you to him. And the rest . . . he wants to know where your loyalties lay.”

“What a habit you have of stating things I already know.” He poured himself another drink and took a goodly swallow.

She shook her head, and he felt her displeasure down in his marrow. He tried to shake it off—he’d stopped courting anyone’s opinion long ago. One imperious, assertive ghost meant nothing to him.

Yet she persisted, hovering nearer. “You’ll have to make your choice. Sooner rather than later.”

“I don’t need to choose anything. Neither you nor John can force me to.” He heard the petulant note in his voice and didn’t care. He was a man grown, beholden to no one and nothing.

“What will it take to break the haze of debauchery that surrounds you? Another death? The earth splitting open and catching fire? Wait long enough, and all of that will come to pass. But by then, it will be too late.”

He slammed his glass down onto a table. “I exorcised my conscience decades ago. The position doesn’t need filling.” He turned away.

Yet she now appeared right in front of him, her dark brows drawn down, her hands curled into fists.

“Stop running and listen to me—”

“No!” he roared. “Not another bloody word! I order it.”

She stared at him coldly. “I’m not a soldier to be commanded. I’m not one of your empty-eyed strumpets, either.”

“What you are is a goddamn plague. And I want you gone.”

Her teeth clenched. “I. Can’t. Leave. Whatever binds us together, it can’t be broken.”

“You haven’t really tried.”

Her eyes blazed and she whirled around the room. In her fury, she was something from ancient legend, awful and beautiful. “Don’t you ever question me!”

“If you’re no vacuous harlot,” he drawled, “then I’m no fearful acolyte. This temper tantrum is wearisome. As you are.” He tilted his head, considering. “But I’ve resources at my disposal. For enough coin, I could get a priest to exorcise you.”

She snorted. “A feeble ritual with no true power. All the strength of that faith has been gutted. It’s now nothing but blind devotion to empty ceremony. Not even the priests believe.”

“I’ve another power to call upon.” He smiled cruelly as her eyes widened.

“Don’t—”

“Haven’t we established that I never respond to commands?” His gaze holding hers, he spoke with deliberation. “Veni, geminus.”

The candles guttered, the fire dimmed. Shadows engulfed the chamber. Only Livia’s illumination remained constant. The scent of burnt paper rose up to the ceiling, curling amongst the molded plasterwork.

From the darkness, a shape emerged. A man.

Bram relit the candle. He turned to the newcomer. The man stepped nearer, revealing his elegant evening clothes of burgundy velvet, a baronial signet ring on his hand that rested on the pommel of a dress sword. He had Bram’s height, his size and form, his dark, unpowdered hair, his bright blue eyes. In every respect, he looked exactly like Bram.

His twin.

Born from the darkest part of himself when he struck his bargain with the Devil. The other Hellraisers, Whit and Leo, had been stunned and appalled when they finally discovered that their gemini were their doubles. Doubles who did wicked deeds, all whilst wearing their faces. Whit had alluded to it when they had all met on St. George’s Fields, and Leo had made his revelation clear when they had gathered outside his home weeks ago.

But Bram never shared in Leo and Whit’s horror. He’d known all along exactly what the creature was, what it meant. And he hadn’t cared.

“My lord,” the geminus said, bowing. It was Bram’s voice, Bram’s bow. “How may I serve you this night?”

Bram pointed at Livia. “Get rid of her.”

Livia spun to face the geminus, readying herself for battle. She had little desire to be bound to Bram, but the creature’s method of removal was guaranteed to be unpleasant. She led the cause against the geminus’s master. Of a certain, it would try to destroy her.

She reached for her magic, an ancient spell stolen from the wild lands to north, preparing to fight the creature.

Yet, before she could summon her power, the geminus stared at her and stumbled back. It blanched, eyes round, its mouth open. It held its hands up, as if to ward her back.

The thing was frightened. Of her.

“No!” the geminus cried. “Keep her from me!”

Bram scowled. “I told you to get her out of here. You’ve magic of your own. Do it.”

The creature only shook its head, scuttling backward until it collided with the wall. Livia stared at it, baffled by its fear. Stranger still was seeing Bram, or something that looked and sounded exactly like Bram, cringing in terror. So very unlike him.

“I command you—”

“No!” the geminus shouted again. “She is a danger! The greatest danger!” It glanced wildly between her and Bram.

And disappeared.

For a moment, she and Bram simply gazed at the spot where the geminus had cowered. Then they looked at one another.

“The hell?” he growled.

“Twice I’ve helped kill gemini. Doubtless that’s earned me a reputation.” She couldn’t keep the smugness from her voice, but it had been far too long since she’d held an advantage over the Dark One. She needed to keep herself from complacency, however. This was a very minor victory in a much bigger war.

“Marvelous,” Bram drawled. “I’m shackled to Devil’s biggest adversary.”

She whirled on him. “You rat-eating bastard! That creature might have destroyed me.”

“Yet here you are. Safe as virgin in a library.”

“But you didn’t know that when you summoned it.” Fury poured through her. “Is my presence such an inconvenience to your debauchery? Are you too concerned that I’ll disrupt your pursuit of quim? Distract your cock just as it’s about to spend?” She sneered. “Poor Bram. All he wants is to fuck himself into oblivion, but the fate of millions of souls keeps intruding. What a nuisance.”

His face twisted with cold rage. “Quiet.”

“I’ve never been quiet,” she snapped. “Not in life, and most assuredly not in death. And I vow to you, vow, that someday I’ll make you pay.”

“Why wait?” Bram planted his hands on his hips and tilted his chin. “Do your worst, Madam Ghost. For nothing can match the hell I’m in now.”

Anger surged in hot waves, and she embraced it. She’d been trapped within this half state of being, without substance, without feeling, battling an enemy that was and always would be more powerful than she. Mighty men once trembled before her, kneeling in supplication, begging for her aid. Her, a daughter of Rome, a priestess of incalculable strength. Now brought to the lowest kind of existence, and lashed to a man of boundless self-interest.

It was intolerable. Galling. A wound that could never heal.

At that moment, she didn’t care if Bram was crucial to the fight against the Dark One. All she wanted was to hurt him, as she hurt.

“That is one order I’m happy to obey,” she spat. Energy swirled within her, magic she could wield like the fiercest weapon. Once, she had studied ancient scrolls to learn the proper incantations, but she no longer needed papyrus or words. The magic had imbued her very blood. Even in this spectral state, she had power few could match. She had given a Gypsy woman the means to control fire, and bestowed command over air to an English girl.

“I’ve razed buildings of stone,” she snarled. “Torn demons apart with just a wave of my hand. I was the woman who first summoned the Dark One. You are nothing.”

“Tear me to shreds, Madam Ghost.” Challenge glinted in his glass-blue eyes. “The only people who’ll mind are my servants, and simply because of the mess.”

She raised her hands, gathering her power. An Egyptian killing spell, the Summoning of Seth. Bright energy poured from her palms and shot toward him. He did not move from where he stood, waiting.

Before the stream of energy could hit him, it veered away like a bird with a broken wing. It collided with a small table off to the side. The table shattered.

Livia stared down at her hands. Never had that happened before, not even when she was a girl newly learning the ways of magic, surrounded by clay tablets and papyri.

Bram grated out a laugh. “That happens to men sometimes. Not me, though. Not since I was a lad.”

She bared her teeth at him. “It’s only because I haven’t tried to hurt a mortal yet. But my power will soon learn the way.” She flung her hands out again, and another burst of energy rushed from them.

And once more, the energy went astray, digging a deep gouge in the floor.

His laughter was an ugly, taunting thing.

“You ought to visit a clockmaker,” he said. “Get those gears back in alignment.”

“I . . . can’t understand it.” Shame choked her as she once more gazed at her hands. It felt as though her arms had been severed from her body, something crucial missing. “Always, always magic was mine to control. What has happened?”

“Don’t know whether I’m relieved or disappointed.” He crouched next to the gouge in the floor and ran his fingers over it. “Too bad you haven’t any money, for this will take a good bit of coin to repair. And you owe me a table.”

She barely heard him. Instead, she turned her focus inward, searching, seeking. There had to be a reason why her magic had failed. It hadn’t stopped entirely, so it still existed within her. But it was broken. Incomplete.

She inhaled sharply. Incomplete. Half the power it once had. Which meant that the other half of the power was in another place. Where?

Bram rose up from his crouch, sinuous in his movement. And then she understood.

“It’s in you,” she rasped. Drifting closer, she said, “My magic . . . when we were bound together, part of my magic went into you. That’s why my spells don’t succeed.”

His brow lowered. “I don’t feel a damned thing.”

“Because you aren’t cognizant of anything above your waist. But it’s there. I know it is.” Gods, what an agonizing thought. Magic belonged to her and her alone. She shared it with no one, especially not Bram. It was as though she had to share her heart with him, or else the blood would cease to move through her veins.

But she needed her magic. Without it, she was simply another woman. Worse than an ordinary woman. She was a ghost with no strength, no power. As futile as a snake’s dream of flight.

“We need to work a spell together.” She forced the words out.

“You’re jesting.”

She shook her head. “I must have use of my magic. I must.”

“I’ve never performed a spell in my life.”

“You use the Dark One’s magic to get women into your bed.”

He waved his hand dismissively. “Entirely different. I’m not a bloody sorcerer.”

“If you just try—”

“No,” he roared. He drew a breath, and dragged his hands through his hair. “I’m no one’s pawn, damn it. Not yours, or John’s, or Mr. Sodding Holliday’s. I have one agenda. One.”

“Your own,” she surmised.

His mouth firmed. “Splendid, Madam Ghost. You have been paying attention.”

“It doesn’t matter if you maroon yourself on an island. The floodwaters continue to rise, and eventually even the most distant isle will be deluged. You’ll drown.”

“I know how to swim.”

“No,” she countered, “you know how to float. Swimming entails effort, and that’s something you are determined to withhold. This selfishness will destroy more than yourself.”

“If this is your technique for persuasion,” he sneered, “it’s no wonder you’re on the losing end. Allies aren’t won through insults.”

“Forgive me. I hadn’t realized you were weak enough to need flattery.”

He spit out a vile curse and stalked toward the door.

“Where are you going?” she demanded.

“Doesn’t matter if I tell you or not,” he said over his shoulder. “You’ll wind up there anyway.” Pulling open the door, he then stormed from the chamber.

The moment he left the room, it began to dim around her, as though a heavy veil draped over her eyes. Resentment and anger were her most vivid sensations. She refused to follow him. She’d rather dwell in this half-world of mist and shadow than spend another minute in his company.

He possessed half her magic. When he wasn’t in her presence, the world retreated. Without him, she was reduced to one of those pathetic specters who drifted aimlessly, frightening weak-minded mortals but capable of little else. Yet John’s appearance this night proved to her that the Dark One’s power waxed, and its poison had sunk deep within John’s veins. He belonged to the one he called the Devil—no matter how much the mortal believed he acted in his own best interest, the ultimate victor would be the Dark One.

John planned something, something that would likely engulf the nearby territories of the earthly realm. Yet John had no idea that the Dark One would assume control, destroying everything, devouring the world entirely. She knew this from her own bitter experience. With her lashed to Bram, however, she could do nothing to stop this destruction from happening again.

She needed Bram. And she hated him for it.

There truly wasn’t enough brandy in the world to solve this. Drink would not take any of it away.

But that didn’t stop him from trying.

In his bedchamber, Bram sprawled in a chair by the fire, drinking steadily from the decanter. He stared at the flames. They shifted and danced, forming shapes that appeared then vanished. Nothing he could hold.

As a child, Arthur had been the one to watch the fire, entranced by its constant change. He would try to tug Bram down beside him, tell him stories about what he saw within the flames. But Bram had always wrested away, impatient. He had wanted to run, to splash through the creek that ran through the northern corner of the estate, to laugh and stage battles with the boys in the village.

It didn’t matter how many times Father caught Bram sneaking back to the nursery, bruised and scraped, his clothes torn and dirty. Father whipped him to teach a sense of decorum, as would fit the child of a baron. None of the whippings made a bit of difference. Bram kept running through the brook, kept challenging village boys to fights.

“Obstinate barbarian,” Father had called him.

Bram remembered standing in the corridor, listening to Father berate the latest tutor for Bram’s execrable spelling and unmannerly penmanship.

“My lord,” the tutor—Mr. Filton? Mr. Finmere?—objected, “the boy simply refuses to be taught. He will not be guided by anyone, even if what one suggests would directly benefit the boy. It must be done at his decision, or not at all.”

Mr. Filton or Finmere had not lasted long. Soon after, Bram was sent away to school. Where he met Whit. They weren’t immediate friends. In truth, they used to beat each other bloody, until mutual antipathy toward another boy became the foundation of their friendship.

Where was Whit now? Still in London? Or had he and his Gypsy woman fled the city in the wake of Edmund’s death?

A furious, aching loneliness gathered in Bram’s chest. He drank more brandy. It did nothing to relieve the sensation.

He wasn’t truly alone. Livia, his own personal Fury, was close by. Not in his bedchamber at the moment, yet she remained near. She couldn’t leave him even if she wanted to. And she wanted to.

Her words echoed. Accusing him of being selfish, concerned more with his own pleasure than the doom of countless souls.

“I am selfish,” he said aloud. “Always have been.” It formed a comfortable cloak, his aggressive egoism, keeping others’ demands at a distance. He needn’t worry about anything but making himself happy.

He laughed into the darkness. Happiness was ever elusive. But he knew its shadowed caricature: depravity. And for years after his return from the Colonies, that had been enough. Or so he’d believed. The Hellraisers had been good company, never asking questions, as intent on the pursuit of pleasure as he.

He didn’t trust John. No reason why he should. And the hard, eager look in his eyes unsettled Bram deeply. Ambushers had the same eyes as they lay in wait. But what was John planning?

It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. All of them—Livia, John, the Hellraisers, Mr. Holliday—all of them could go rot. He was beholden to no one. No one relied upon him, either.

Watching the fire as it consumed the wood, he outlined his own plan: Drink until he lost consciousness. When he woke, he would immerse himself in the realm of London’s voluptuaries, and there he’d remain, importunate ghost or no ghost. And if the world burned down, he’d watch it burn, letting the flames engulf his own flesh.