Jacob. Jacquelyn Frank

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ in the statement. The Enforcer, in the Demon world, was what mothers used to scare their children into good behavior. It was a necessary evil, considering the powerful mischief young Demons were capable of, but that didn’t mean it sat well with Jacob. It made for a pretty solitary existence, actually. Those Demon children grew up into adults and Elders who never quite shook off their fear of the Enforcer.

      Then again, that made his job all the easier. It was a rather nice perk when all it took was his appearance to quell even the most powerful stomachs, making actual battles for control less likely. He was surprised it had worked so well on his brother. Kane was notorious for claiming that, having been raised by the Enforcer, he wasn’t at all intimidated. That obviously wasn’t true, and Jacob wasn’t sure how he felt about it. Grateful he hadn’t had to fight his baby brother? Of course. But happy that his brother was as terrified of him as all others were? No, not really.

      “So, have you learned anything useful?” Jacob indicated the large, dusty tome sitting half read on Noah’s table.

      “Not really.” He paused for a beat, narrowing a pair of jade and gray eyes on Jacob, his irises so pale in contrast to his tanned complexion that they seemed to glow in the firelight. Noah’s inspection made it clear that he hadn’t missed the artful change of subject. “As archaic as we tend to be in culture and customs, these books prove how modernized we really are. It is like reading another language.”

      “Language is a living thing. As a scholar, surely you must appreciate that even a language as old as ours evolves over time.”

      “Well, that does not help me much now. We are in the midst of an intensifying crisis, and I am no closer to finding a solution than I ever was.”

      “Then we will just have to maintain, as we always have,” Jacob said quietly, his modulated tone meant to settle Noah’s piqued frustration. Noah’s temper was ten times more famous than his sister Hannah’s, though he usually exhibited ten times more control over it as well. Noah firmly believed that no individual could rule over others if he could not control his emotions. “I have faced everything imaginable and persevered, Noah. No one will be harmed, or be allowed to do harm, for as long as I draw breath.”

      “But it is getting harder, is it not?” Noah looked up and met Jacob’s eyes sharply. “Every year I watch you become busier and more disheartened. Every year I see more of the most highly accomplished Elders lose control as if they were in their first hundred years all over again. Tell me I am mistaken.”

      “I cannot tell you that,” Jacob said, sighing heavily as he ran a long-fingered hand through thick, brown-black hair. “Noah, I had to enforce Gideon just under a decade ago. Of the handful of Demons I thought to be impervious to this madness, Gideon the Ancient was highest among them. Gideon!” Jacob shook his head, mute with his disturbed emotions and the chilling memories of that dreadful encounter.

      “And he is still wound-licking. Gideon has not come out of his stronghold for these past eight years.”

      “Well, he certainly will not come about while this is continuing to grow worse.” Jacob frowned dourly as he sank into a chair across from Noah. “His seat at the Council table gathers dust and leaves us…incomplete.”

      Noah was aware of Jacob’s personal angst over that fact but refused to let him wallow in it. “It is for the best, at the moment,” Noah remarked. “I do not think you relish the idea of having to rein him in twice.”

      “No. I do not. But I am positive that locking himself away alone is the worst choice—the choice that will be far more likely to lead me and Gideon once more into a devastating conflict.”

      The bitterness in Jacob’s voice was not lost on the King. Noah had never known another man with the Enforcer’s sense of responsibility, loyalty, and morality. Death was the only thing that would ever convince Jacob to step down. This Enforcer would never retire so long as he breathed.

      But something had not been right with Jacob for a while now. Year after year he was forced to bring the Elders he most respected to heel as madness briefly overcame them. It was clearly dragging Jacob down in both mind and spirit.

      The worst, Noah supposed, had been the aforementioned confrontation with Gideon. Previously, Jacob had been the only Demon who could claim an actual form of friendship with that great Ancient. It had lasted up until the Enforcer had been forced to choose between that friendship and upholding the law. There had been no choice, really. Not for Jacob. The law was like lifeblood to him. An Enforcer with Jacob’s level of dedication and sense of obligation would psychologically destroy himself if he defied the law.

      Noah was aware that if he himself lost control of his faculties during one of these Hallowed full moons and Jacob were forced to snap him back like a recalcitrant child, it would be hard for him not to resent the Enforcer for it. Sure, it would be for his own good, for the good of the entire Demon race, and definitely for the good of the defenseless humans they coexisted with, but Elder Demons were a mightily proud lot and Noah was no exception. Falling prey to weakness was bad enough; having Jacob witness it was worse. Having the Enforcer punish them brutally, as the law demanded, was unbearable.

      Noah did not envy Jacob his position in the least.

      Just then, the man of Noah’s concerned thoughts raised his dark head from its brooding bent, tilting it to one side as his semirelaxed frame rapidly grew tense. Noah felt the hairs on the back of his neck stir as the other man’s sensory powers filled the room. Every Demon had his own particular abilities in which he excelled, and Jacob’s hunter’s perceptions were among his keenest.

      “Myrrh-Ann comes,” Jacob said, putting his glass down on Noah’s desk as he rose to his feet. “She is extremely agitated.”

      Just then, the two large doors at the end of the room burst open violently. A swirl of dark dust and wind spun into the room, whirling like a small tornado, crossing toward the two males in the blink of an eye. It abruptly settled with a final twist into the figure of a beautiful woman with hair as soft and silvery white as the clouds, her normally blue eyes nearly obscured by the dominating black width of her pupils as unspeakable fear pulsed behind them.

      “Noah!” she gasped, reaching blindly for the King as her panic caused a shudder to ripple through the air, bending every flame in the room. “He has been taken! You must help me! I cannot lose him! He is everything to me!”

      “Hush, now,” Noah soothed softly, coming around his desk to pull her into a comforting embrace. “Calm down, Myrrh-Ann,” he said quietly. “I assume you are talking about Saul?”

      “It was horrible!” the young beauty sobbed, clutching at Noah’s shirtfront. “He disintegrated beneath my very hands! Noah, you must help us!”

      Noah and Jacob both went very still, their eyes meeting over Myrrh-Ann’s bright head. They didn’t need to speak to know the other’s thoughts, to sense the quickened breath of alarm in one another.

      “What do you mean, ‘he disintegrated’?” Jacob asked carefully.

      “I mean he has been Summoned! Enslaved!” Myrrh-Ann screeched, whirling in Noah’s hold to glare at the Enforcer with all of her terror and outrage. “One moment he was with me, touching me, cradling our unborn child in his hands as it moved within me.” Her hands went reflexively to her rounded belly, as if she were afraid it would be the next thing to be taken from her. “The next moment his face was contorting in such unimaginable pain. Dear, merciful Destiny! He began to fade, feet first, in a swirl of the most acrid and vile smoke I have ever known.” She turned back to the King, clutching the silk of his shirt СКАЧАТЬ