A laugh rips from her throat. “Are you calling this pasty thing an angel?” she balks my way. “Oh honey, I’ve seen a heavenly being or two—and you don’t have what it takes.” Her eyes ride up and down my body before pulling the Sector to herself. “Make a move for my man, and I will crush you under my heel. Why don’t you take your own advice and be gone yourself? There’s a cliff at the edge of town. I heard a long walk in that direction can do wonders for your soul.”
The crowd around us breaks out into riotous laughter, all the while pointing my way and goading me to try it.
“Did you just tell me to jump off a cliff?” I ask, rather amused at this creature who dares to test me.
“You said it, not me,” she purrs as she attempts to climb him like a mountain.
“Then you have sealed your fate. As you desire for me, it shall be done for you.”
The crowd gasps.
“What are you?” a belligerent man shouts from the side. His portly frame can hardly contain the buttons on his shirt. “A witch?”
The crowd breaks out into laughter once again, women slapping their thighs, men holding their barrel-shaped bellies.
“A witch I am not, but since you’ve dared to imply it, I’ll send the plague upon you all. Remember this as you roil in pain. You’ve brought this curse upon yourself.”
“The Black Plague?” An older woman with disheveled hair and missing teeth cackles. “This hag thinks she’s got some real might!” More laughter ensues from the crowd, and this time Marlena joins them.
“You too,” I say to her. “In fact, you’ll get it first.” I swat the air and she blows away deep into the crowd and I quickly implement a protective hedge around the Sector and me for the evening. The crowd disperses, and soon another irritating presence appears. “Demetri.” He looks comely tonight with his dark hair, his knowing eyes, that mouth I’ve drunk down like wine. I close my eyes a moment, lest he sees the lust in them, and I unravel all of the good plans I’ve laid out like stones of lapis.
“Demetri,” Sector Marshall growls.
“Candace”— The dark prince smiles my way, the smile of a wolf once he spots his prey—“you shine in the heavenlies, but you rule with an iron scepter on Earth. There is no woman like you.”
“I’m no mere woman,” I say, taking up my lager once again.
Sector Marshall chuckles. “Dear Candace, do note that you rule with an iron scepter in the heavenlies as well. I’d be remiss not to mention the obvious. Of course, to a dolt such as you, Demetri, it’s not as apparent.”
Demetri’s chest expands. “Oh, Dudley, you do have a wicked charm about you. Am I correct to assume you’ll be utilizing those powers of persuasion to lure some unsuspecting woman to a dark corner so you can have your way with her?”
The bartender furnishes him with a drink of his own and he tips his glass to the Sector.
“Yes, well”—Sector Marshall sweeps the room with his gaze—“Candace has informed me, I have a rite of passage to tend to. It appears I’m about to become a father.”
A laugh bubbles from me. “Don’t sound so enthused.” I tilt my head his way. “No, really, don’t. I’m not allowing you to fall in love. I’m not enforcing a bond between you and the child either. You will know your ancestors when the time is right. And, they’ll be in eternity right along with you before you know it. There will be plenty of time for bonding then.”
Demetri gives a wistful shake of his head. “Earthly time is so tedious once we’re on the planet. How amused they would be to know when the Master suggested they were but a vapor, He wasn’t off the mark.” Demetri raises his glass and holds it to the room. “To the oblivious vapors among us.” He gives a wink my way. “Perhaps it is time that I, too, find a woman to bear a child for me.”
“You will,” I smart. “But in a different time, a different place. You’re only granted one woman, but you’ll take three. And you’ll love one deeply.”
His smile expands, but it’s nothing more than a façade. I know all of his smiles, all of his kisses, and right now Demetri isn’t amused. He’s angry with himself for betraying me so easily.
“Don’t say it,” I cut him off at the pass, but he simply smiles a little wider.
“My dear, love, Your Grace.” He gives a mocking nod. “If I am with another woman, it will only be because my end goal is to land by your side again one day. That is the purpose of these people, these half-breeds, isn’t it? The Factions, the war you’ve manufactured between my kind and our Sector brethren. It’s all a ploy to see how hard I am willing to fight for our love, for you. Mark my words, Candace. I will win. I will prove to you that I am a proper suitor for you. And you will forgive me of past transgressions. Together we will spend eternity side by side.”
I lift my chin as if he’d struck me.
“Let me expound on my point. You will not love two of the woman you’ll lie with. Those will be perfunctory affections, a means to an end. But the third will rival any affection you feel for me. Perhaps I will arrange that you could never truly have her. I’ll set the simple to confound the wise.” A prideful smile curves my lips.
“Nonsense.” He lands his glass down on the bar and the amber liquid slops over the lip. “There won’t be a single woman who could wrangle my heart compass from your direction.”
Sector Marshall grunts, “Spare us the platitudes. You made your philandering bed. Why don’t you enjoy an earthling or three? Neither of us will care.”
Demetri glances down as he considers this a moment.
“Dudley gets a lineage— as do I.” He closes his eyes a moment as if it pained him. “And—seeing that he has the advantage of your grace and mercy, I ask boldly for a gift as well.”
