Waking the Queen Read online

  Saranna DEWYLDE

  Ride of the Darkyrie

  Part one:

  Waking the queen

  Copyright © 2012 by Saranna DeWylde

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the publisher, except where permitted by law.

  All characters appearing in this work are fiction or from classical mythology now in common usage. Any similarities between persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

  Cover design by A. D. Cooper

  http://coverdesign.adcooperbooks.com/

  Formatting by Jenna McCormick

  PROLOGUE

  I am the daughter of a serial killer.

  They say my father was sick, but murder isn’t a virus or some alien bacteria. I can’t deny it’s an infection. His blood runs through my veins, his breath is in my lungs and my synapses fire the way he programmed them. Murder is always there, hanging over me—the familiar stranger.

  He was a handsome man—black curls framing a marble Botticellian face. Yet for his classic beauty, he was a chameleon. His skin shimmered and there was something beneath it that was not like them —the ones he hunted. I remember his hands the most, strong and broad. Tools of his trade, their width and breadth meant to span a man’s neck. Meant to crush bone and tear sinew. I remember the way blood looked on those hands, like melted rubies splashed against snow.

  I am part of him, but I am not like him.

  I’m not like them either—the prey.

  Once, when I was very young, I tried to be. I rebelled as all children do, and swore I’d never be like my father. I hated him, hated the life he forced us to live. I believed I could have any life I chose, a normal life, if only I was free of him. I was sixteen when I got pregnant, but it wasn’t the boy I’d slept with on the roof of our apartment building who held my hair out of my face through the morning sickness, sat up with me those sleepless nights, or even held me as I shattered when after eighteen hours of labor, my daughter Thora was born dead—the cord wrapped around her tiny throat. It had been my father with his quiet voice and strong arms telling me everything would be okay even as I screamed and choked on my grief. Telling me that if I stopped trying to be human, that I would never feel such agony again. That only humans suffered so wretchedly.

  I was something different. Something apart. I was Helreggin, the Queen of Hel reborn to walk the earth and hunt the dark things that needed to be caged. So I surrendered to my father: my humanity, my pain, traded that empty chasm that drilled into my very bones for destiny. I would have given myself over to anyone or anything in that moment if I never had to feel that anguish again.

  I was twenty-one when I killed my first victim. They gave me a medal for it because I’m a cop. I have a lot of medals for valor. For service to my community. For killing.

  My first execution was a hunter, like my father. I knew it as soon as I saw him. Our eyes met over his prey, a pretty little coed begging me to save her life, the cool halogen street lights flickering in a pale nimbus around him and I knew on a primal level he belonged to me.

  My gun was suddenly in my hand and I pulled the trigger. I didn’t tell him to let her go; I didn’t identify myself as KCPD. I didn’t do anything but what I was made to do. An explosive flowering of crimson and meat blossomed against the wall of the building behind him. A splatter of flesh and bone as my bullets ripped through his guts and tore his life from him.

  He knew he belonged to me, too. With his last breath, he said he’d waited for me. That all his work had been for me, and he smiled when the death rattle gurgled past his lips in a river of blood.

  Father said it would happen like that; they’d come and bring me tribute because of who I am. What I am. He was a monster because of who and how he killed—outside the rest of what homo sapiens say is acceptable. And I am a hero covered in medals and glory because I do the very same thing, but within their societal norms.

  He was a beast, some even say a demon. But he was the one who kept me warm, tucked me in at night, read me stories of the Old Gods of the Northmen and the heroes of Valhalla, bandaged my hurts and baked me cupcakes with Nutella frosting every Saturday morning while we watched Nova.

  I don’t blame the legal system for killing him, for putting him down like a rabid dog. It was what he wanted. I know as surely as I breathe that they only caught him because he was ready to be caught.

  Even after all of this, I am a good cop. I have a good reputation. I was the youngest to make detective in my squad. The FBI has invited me to consult on their serial murder task force. I am a shining star.

  And they all want to know how I hunt the hunters. What is it that lets me get into their heads and think as the aberrations think? I have no answer for them except to say it’s what I do. It’s what I was born for.

  I am a hunter of hunters.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Dancing is much like killing.

  There is a certain grace to both, an art. Bodies moving, working in tandem toward a thing of beauty. An arch of a woman’s spine in a backless sequined dress bent over her gentleman’s arm in an elegant dip or the perfect arterial spray in bright red unfurling buds like a macabre spring shower.

  A gasp as his hand pulled her too close, or the knife slipped in too far. Anticipation a sweet, sparkling red wine—the perfect pairing to contrast with the dark chocolate bitterness of the end of all things. Or a complement to the sugary milk chocolate rush of mingled breath and a brushing of lips on heated skin.

  I was as good at dancing as I was killing, but dancing was not even my favorite part of the Policeman’s Ball. I loved to watch everyone else gliding around in their costumes of propriety. The way they shoveled themselves into suits and dresses that someone else said fit them best, but those cheap, rented tuxedos rub the most intimate of places raw and pantyhose are as binding as any chains.

  I liked to watch them because for this night alone, I wondered if maybe they had an idea what it was like to be me. Oh, the impulses they hide are nowhere near as dark as mine, but they have to hide who they are, what they are, beneath some fake, shriveled skin and mouth scripted lines they’d never normally say.

  But my enjoyment isn’t malicious. These are my brothers and sisters in arms and no matter what I am, or what I will become, I stand with them behind the blue wall.

  The chandeliers of the Westin Crown Center ballroom added to the masquerade, the soft tallow light like some glittery fairy godmother’s wand, painting a pretty shellac over the paper doll cutouts we’d made of ourselves.

  My partner and I both came stag, but we drifted toward each other—flotsam across a sea of people to stand together by the punch bowl. It’s what’s comfortable, what we’re used to. Humans are creatures of habit and in that, I am like them. I don’t have to hold my mask as tightly with Jason. Any otherness that might slip through the mask he’d see as the coping mechanism of a good cop.

  He laughed when he saw me, eyed my white Cinderella dress up and down like he would a dog with two heads. “Hey, gorgeous. Who are you and what have you done with my partner?”

  Not a very original line, but it got his point across. On the job, I’m more like Michelle Rodriguez in SWAT than I have ever been Cinderella, but again, the Policeman’s Ball is a chance to play dress up and I’m good at that, too.

  I smiled and gave him a little twirl like I used to do for my father when playing in the trunks of clothes he’d give me. But this dress had been made for me and me alone; there were no bloodstains, no stench of sweat and terror that could cling long after washing. Only my honeysuckle perfume and the
cherry-almond finishing spray on my hair.

  “You look pretty good yourself, Grimes.” His tux was Armani. It’d been tailored to fit him perfectly. Jason had money, more than he could spend in this lifetime or the next—a family business in antiquities.

  I liked the way the light made his blond hair almost gold and flickered over his tan skin. His eyes were a deep blue and reminded me of the sky as it turned to dusk. For as pretty as he was and all the smoothness of youth in his skin, it was his eyes that were most pleasing. There were a few lines around them, grooves worn into the landscape of his flesh—his experiences a steady stream of rainwater marking a path through granite. In the pools of his irises though, sometimes I thought there was something ancient and haggard looking back at me. Or perhaps I wanted to see villainy like my own in places others would look for comfort? Though I am comforted by him, by his steady presence, the scent of him.

  The orchestra began the first delicate strains of one of Wagner’s quieter pieces and I moved into his arms. His palm was warm on my bare back as we glided out onto the parquet floor.

  I realized I should have worn my hair down because the ghost of his breath over my bare throat caused me to shiver and elicited a sensation I’d never associated with him before.

  “It’s your birthday in four hours, Hill.”

  As if I needed reminding. In four hours, I could read the last letter my father left for me and begin my ascension.

  “Did you get me a present?” I hated how breathless I sounded. I am very fit; I run miles every day, a turn around the dance floor shouldn’t make my heart pound against my ribs—a frightened bird in a bony cage. Yet, it did. It made me sound insipid and perhaps even flirtatious.

  He pulled back, his hard gaze assessing me as if I was some new creature he’d never seen before. “And here I thought you were going to hand me my ass on a platter for getting you a gift.”

  I leaned closer to him. “It’s good that you know I can hand you your ass on a platter, Grimes. Just because I’m wearing a dress doesn’t mean you should forget it.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, Hill.” This time his breath tickled my ear and I turned my head away to see Tommy Anderson watching us dance with a scowl on his face and he took my glance as an invitation to come over.

  “Dance with me, Brynn?”

  “She’s already dancing with me,” Grimes answered for me in a proprietary tone.

  I didn’t like that Grimes answered for me. I didn’t like that Anderson called me Brynn. He called everyone else by their last name. It’s like he thought I was some little girl to be coddled. Or that we shared some level of intimacy. He grabbed my ass once when I first joined the squad and I put him on his ass and had a boot on his throat before he knew what hit him. We’d settled into a sort of wary truce, but he obviously still felt he had to conquer me. It fucked with his worldview that he couldn’t. He set off alarms in my head and I knew one of these days, he’d be one of the hunted. He’d go too far and he’d like it. So he’d do it again and again and again. Until I stopped him.

  “Maybe the next one, Anderson.”

  Grimes maneuvered us away from him. “What about your present?”

  “You’re not going to give it to me if I dance with Anderson?”

  “Maybe not. Maybe I have to give it to you now or it will spoil.”

  “Maybe you’re just trying to whip your dick out and show Anderson yours is bigger?”

  A laughed echoed from low in his chest. “It is, but that’s beside the point. I’m an alpha male. I can’t help it.” I knew he’d be smirking, one corner of his mouth turned up in that way that most women find devastating. His last girlfriend said it was just like tequila, it made her clothes fall off. Instead, I was content to leave my cheek on his shoulder.

  “That would imply I’m your territory, Grimes. And I’ve already told you I’m like a female alligator. If I can take you down, I’m not interested. The male has to be stronger to prove his DNA is worthy,” I teased. Even if he were serious, we weren’t even the same species.

  But the idea we could be filled my imagination with a terrible joy and it occurred to me again how similar killing is to dancing, what it would be like—our bodies working together in that synchronicity, a ballet in blood. My mouth went dry.

  “What would you do if I did take you down, Hill?”

  “Die of shock.” Was he flirting with me, something outside of our usual banter?

  “So are you going to dance with Dudley Dipshit or do you want your gift?”

  “Gift,” I answered easily. He’d intrigued me.

  “It’s a two-parter. First of all, you’re going to want to go to bed early.”

  “Why is that?” The new quality to his voice made me remember the first time I had sex—the sticky, awkward fumbling on the roof of my apartment building and wondered if that’s what Grimes wanted from me. I didn’t think it would be at all like that with him, but I didn’t want to know. Because Jason Grimes was the white picket fence type. A wife, and a dog and a yard… I’d already learned the hard way those things weren’t for me and Jason would never settle for half of anything. Best to forget the sound of his voice, or the way his hands made me feel.

  “We got a tip on the Angel of Mercy killings. Said we could find Astrid Johanson doling out her comforts in a west bottoms warehouse at four tomorrow morning.”

  “That’s great news, but I knew it was her. We would have caught her anyway. So, it’s not a present.”

  “You don’t get the rest of it until tomorrow.”

  “You know I don’t like surprises.”

  “This one you’ll have to see to believe, Brynn.” His voice was a teasing promise, but he’d done little to change my opinions about surprises. I despised them.

  I finished our dance and then I danced with Anderson anyway. Grimes cheated on the gift, so I decided he had it coming. It had nothing to do with the fact that I needed some distance from him after our dance. Nothing at all.

  Although, after that dance, I left. As it was, it would be midnight before I got to sleep and that was my one vice. I didn’t like to do anything to excess except sleep. I liked to cocoon beneath the covers and stay until I absolutely had to get up. My father always said it was like my chrysalis, only I could take breaks when butterflies couldn’t.

  ~*~

  Four a.m. was just too fucking early.

  Even to catch the Angel of Mercy killer Astrid Johanson.

  If the bitch had been truly merciful, she would have elected to work at a more reasonable hour. But no, with Angel of Mercy killers, it was all about them. We’d liked her for the murders all along, but we didn’t have enough to put the steel bracelets on her—the evidence was all circumstantial.

  She worked as a nurse at the VA hospital in Leavenworth, but she volunteered for KCMO hospice services and all of the murdered vets had been her clients. When my partner and I had gone to her apartment to question her, I’d known she was a killer from the moment she’d opened the door. Even though she looked just like the illustrations of the noble Valkyries in all of my father’s books, her pretty blond hair and smooth Nordic features couldn’t hide her aberration from me.

  My partner hadn’t been so astute. He’d been wrapped up in her blatant femininity, the way her hips swayed, the extra button undone at the valley of her breasts, her little pink tongue darting out to moisten her lips as she talked. She’d asked him about himself, subtly turned the conversation toward him and his work. How hard it was to be a cop, how brave he must be. The truth was in her eyes if he’d bothered to look at them instead of her tits. They were blue like the sky, but there was something frozen inside them, something eternal that was more than human and less at the same time.

  Looking into the eyes of a serial killer is like staring into a mirror and suddenly realizing that what’s looking back is something else—something alien. If he were to gaze hard enough, he’d see the same thing in my eyes.

  She tried to turn that charisma on me w
hile we were interviewing her, deflecting my questions, asking how difficult it must be for me as a woman to succeed in such a male-dominated field.

  It was all smoke up our asses. Astrid Johanson never answered any of our questions satisfactorily. It had taken a bottle of single malt and three hours to point this out to my partner. He wasn’t stupid, but he was one of them. One of the masses of humanity who didn’t see how my kind had been marked as something apart from them—we were the predators. We moved among them like chameleons, pantomiming their customs and wearing masks, emotions that were not real, but made them comfortable with us.

  My partner, Jason Grimes, he was a good man. A strong man. Working with him was part of what helped me believe that humanity was worthy of my protection, of all I’d sacrificed to blend in with them and keep them safe. Not that I had a choice—it was hardwired inside of me the same as whatever drove my father was hardwired inside of him.

  Although at four o’clock in the goddamn morning, part of me considered shooting Astrid Johanson just for getting me up this early—Angel of Mercy killer or no.

  The warehouse the caller identified had been abandoned for some time and was scheduled for demolition. It was a great hulk of a building, a gutted carcass of brick and metal. The glass from the windows had been gone for years, leaving only black spaces like empty eye sockets.

  I told Grimes to wait for me, but while I could see his car, there was no sign of him. He’d probably gone in already like some goddamn lone gunman. Whatever it was inside of him that made him a hero also made him a dumbass.

  I drew my .40 Ruger and pulled the slide back as I approached the rusted door that hung open, the darkness inside gaping like a wound. Instinct told me there was something there that would change me irrevocably and it was to be feared.

  My heartbeat thundered in my ears and I was torn between detaching myself from the emotion and reveling in it. I hadn’t been afraid of anything since I was four and my father had shown me he was more terrifying than anything that dared to lurk under my bed.