It was all very well to say the realms could only survive through cooperation, but how had Rake, a descendent of creatures that would once have eaten humans for between-meal snacks, become a protector of mortals?

Come to think of it, how old was Rake? Maybe he hadn’t been joking about eating his first wife. Archer shivered. Rake growled something in—Babylonian? Sumerian? Hittite?—and kissed the top of Archer’s head.

Archer’s heart swelled and he kissed Rake back. He liked kissing Rake. His chest was smooth and his skin warm and he smelled of sex and vanilla and he had delivered more physical pleasure in the last half hour than Archer had known in the last half century. The caress was automatic, of course. Just good manners. He appreciated Rake’s sexual expertise and it was very nice to be held like this, to fall asleep in someone’s arms. Not that he planned on falling asleep. Archer had places to go and things to do.

Not immediately. He could wait a bit. Make sure Rake was deeply asleep. That was just common sense.

What did Rake want from him? Archer continued to mull it over. Was tonight intended as some sort of seduction whereupon, following the fulfillment of a sexual fantasy, Archer spilled all his deepest, darkest secrets and promised to help the badges round up his old comrades? If so, Rake had forgotten to ask him about his deepest, darkest secrets.

He wondered if Gaki had noticed him leaving with Rake. That was liable to send the wrong message.

When he was sure Rake was truly asleep, Archer slipped out from beneath his muscular arm, using a glamour to trick Rake’s sleeping consciousness into believing Archer still lay next to him. For long seconds he stood beside the bed and stared down at Rake’s relaxed form. There was no sign of the demon now. Rake looked like any weary mortal. Weary and ridiculously content.

Archer found himself unexpectedly reluctant to leave. It would be nice to spend the night, to sleep with the heartbeat of the sea pounding beneath the building, lulling him. Nice to wake tomorrow together and have toast and honey in that sunny room and let Rake cuddle him. Just a little. Perhaps they would talk and laugh and talk some more. Not about world-shaking events. Not about their jobs or politics. Only about matters important to themselves.

He listened to the echo of his thoughts with disquiet. What was he thinking? That fantasy wasn’t merely foolish; it was dangerous. And not merely for himself.

He found his clothes in the living room and dressed silently. The wards on the door took a few minutes to figure out. Rake clearly didn’t like to take chances. At last Archer opened the door and stepped quietly into the dry, temperature-controlled hall. The building continued to slumber. He walked briskly to the front entrance and let himself into a night that smelled of old wood, plum blossoms, and starlight.

His ears still throbbed, almost unbearably sensitive after Rake’s attentions. Archer shivered, remembering. His whole body ached in a distant way, not from the scratches and bites and bruises inevitably resulting from coupling with a demon, but with pangs of something like nostalgia. Missing Rake’s touch already—and he had nothing to anticipate because this had been a one-off. He could not risk it being anything else. Thus the walk along the quiet street, moonlight glancing off the hoods of cars, the lamplight slicing through shrubbery, seemed poignant and bittersweet. It felt as though he was leaving home forever as he walked down the deserted street to his car.

Archer jeered at himself as he climbed into his Beetle and started the engine.

***

Gaki’s estate was a tree-shrouded sanctuary in North Vancouver far from the hustle and bustle of the city proper. Archer studied the layout from behind the tall, spiked gates. It wasn’t as large and ostentatious as he had expected. A custom-designed Craftsman four-story with a detached garage and large guest cottage. The property was positioned within a protected bay on a private peninsula with a good 650 feet of private waterfront and sandy beach.

The house was well guarded with everything from security cameras to protection spells.

Standing deep in the shadows and well away from the biting iron of the double gates, Archer contemplated the dark windows.

They were there, he knew it. The beads were hidden somewhere in that house. His beads. Jewels designed by long ago faerie artisans for Archer’s family.

Did the beads sense his presence? Did they warm to life anticipating his touch? Did they know that soon he would have them?

A light went on in the highest story of the house and began to glow green.

Archer smiled. Yes. Soon they would be his.

 Chapter Seven

Even before the naga skin came back to life and ate the guide for the tour that had been specially arranged for a group of retirees from the Slovakian NIAD branch office, Archer was having a lousy day. But an eighteen-foot hooded cobra as wide as a Douglas fir loose in the yellow marble halls of the Museum of State-Sanctioned Antiquities in Vancouver took precedence over a sleepless night, running out of honey for his morning tea, and a stolen parking spot.

“Tell Barry to get everyone else out of the museum,” Archer ordered Mr. Baker, who had run, panicked, to his office to report the terrible news. “Where’s the rest of the tour party?”

Mr. Baker shook his head. His mouth worked. His eyes were stricken. He had been acting as docent for this very special event when the glass case had cracked and then burst apart to release a fanged nightmare.

Archer shoved him out of his office and sent him stumbling toward Barry’s. “Never mind. Go tell Mr. Littlechurch.”

As Mr. Baker fled, Archer yanked the fire alarm. Bells clamored overhead, the sound ricocheting off the stone and drowning the cries and screams coming from the exhibition hall. He returned to his desk and pressed the silent panic button under the birch top.

That technically ended his responsibility. According to the government employee handbook, he could now lock himself in his office or flee the museum, whichever seemed to offer the best chance of survival. He certainly owed no loyalty to a group of badges, retired or otherwise, but somehow he could no longer think of Irregulars without thinking of Rake. Not that Rake would ever be an elderly, helpless human, but—

The entire building shook as though the roof had caved in.

Without further thought, Archer left his office and sprinted down the hallway, skidding to a stop in the doorway of the exhibition hall. The naga was in the center of the long, wide room, its own display case reduced to debris beneath its coils. The surrounding cases had been knocked over and a number of people in plainclothes cowered behind them—with the exception of one old codger who was waving his cane to try and distract the snake from an elderly lady trying to crawl away.

Six feet or so of the cobra’s olive brown body reared up, hood spread, forked tongue flicking out. It swung its massive head, hissing as Archer slid into view.

Archer ducked back, leaning against the wall, heart pounding. That was…one…big snake. He swallowed hard, thinking.

“Archer!”

Archer turned his head. Barry wasn’t quite running and still looked startlingly dignified given the circumstances, but he was definitely moving faster than Archer had ever seen him move. “The Irregulars are on the way!”

Archer nodded distractedly. He grabbed another quick look.

The man with the cane was hiding beneath a stone bench. Archer couldn’t see the woman. The next instant a flick of the snake’s tail sent an aluminum-framed walker flying into one of the stained glass windows. The terrified oldsters huddled still further down behind their makeshift shelter.