Armor of Roses and The Silver Voice Read online

  Ace Books by Marjorie M. Liu

  THE IRON HUNT

  DARKNESS CALLS

  A WILD LIGHT

  THE MORTAL BONE

  Anthologies

  WILD THING

  (with Maggie Shayne, Alyssa Day, and Meljean Brook)

  NEVER AFTER

  (with Laurell K. Hamilton, Yasmine Galenorn, and Sharon Shinn)

  INKED

  (with Karen Chance, Yasmine Galenorn, and Eileen Wilks)

  eSpecials

  HUNTER KISS

  ARMOR OF ROSES AND THE SILVER VOICE

  Armor of Roses

  and

  The Silver Voice

  Marjorie M. Liu

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  “Armor of Roses” was previously published in the anthology Inked, published by The Berkley Publishing Group.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  ARMOR OF ROSES AND THE SILVER VOICE

  An Ace eSpecial / published by arrangement with the author

  PUBLISHING HISTORY

  Ace eSpecial edition / December 2011

  “Dear Reader” letter and “The Silver Voice” copyright © 2011 by Marjorie M. Liu.

  “Armor of Roses” copyright © 2010 by Marjorie M. Liu.

  Excerpt from The Mortal Bone copyright © 2011 by Marjorie M. Liu.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For information, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ISBN: 978-1-101-54603-1

  ACE

  Ace Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  ACE and the “A” design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Contents

  Cover Page

  Also by the Author

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Letter to the Reader

  Armor of Roses

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  The Silver Voice

  Special Preview

  Dear Reader,

  It’s with great pleasure that I present the e-release of “Armor of Roses,” a novella set in the Hunter Kiss universe. Previously published in the anthology Inked, this story holds a central place within the series—and sends Maxine Kiss hurtling backward through the decades to Shanghai during World War II, where her grandmother, a young woman, is struggling to battle some very real demons.

  I’m also excited to include a brand-new, never-before-published Hunter Kiss short story: “The Silver Voice.”

  It’s no secret that I love a good hero, and while the focus of the Hunter Kiss series has always been on Maxine, one man has stood by her side as friend and lover—and now husband: Grant Cooperon, who was born on earth . . . but is not of earth.

  The last of his kind, Grant is a Lightbringer, capable of using his voice to manipulate fields of energy on a quantum level, which effects change in any living creature—both physical and mental. Like Maxine, he is dangerous. And, like Maxine, his mother hid much of his past from him.

  But that is about to change . . .

  I hope you enjoy “The Silver Voice,” told from Grant’s point of view as he struggles to understand who and what he is.

  As a special treat, the first two chapters of the next Hunter Kiss novel, The Mortal Bone, have also been included. The battle for Maxine’s life and future has never been so desperate, or lonely . . .

  Kindest regards,

  Marjorie Liu

  Armor of Roses

  A Hunter Kiss Novella

  1

  ACCORDING to Mark Twain, in a notebook entry dated in 1897, time is atomized, broken into infinitesimal fragments in which moments that have been lived are forgotten and without value, while moments that have not yet been experienced do not exist and are of no importance. Only the present, the immediate, has significance; time is isolated, time is discrete. Even memories, hardwired into the brain to give dimension to the temporal, are fleeting.

  Because we die. Because each life is a single conscious moment, burning.

  Lost, in time.

  THERE were no zombies at the party. I would have been happy to find some. If nothing else, the small talk would have been less insulting. Nor would I have been as tempted to shove an opera singer over the railing of the yacht.

  “But my dear, you look so cultured,” complained Madame Borega, loudly enough that heads turned to stare. “What do you mean you’re from Texas?”

  Her affront was palpable, her distress audible in the faint tremor of her rich vibrato vowels. Texas, apparently, was apocalyptic. I might as well have told her that I was a killer—and that the two tiny demons hiding in my hair would be more than happy to set her face on fire.

  Both of which were true. But she didn’t need to know that.

  A gentle hand touched my elbow. I looked up to find Grant beside me, leaning hard on his cane. His gaze was faintly amused, but darkly so, and he settled his attention on Madame Borega with a smile that held an edge.

  “Wonderful performance last night,” he said in his deep rumbling voice. “Your Aida was a joy.”

  Madame Borega lowered her gaze, smiling—but, before she could thank him, or demure, or tell Grant that he was a hot, hot former priest and she wanted to pull a Thorn Birds on his ass, he added, “But frankly, Suzanne, I was shocked to learn that you were using an enhancer.”

  The woman froze, staring at him. A deep crimson flush stained her décolletage and rose into her face, all that red visibl
e beneath the heavy pale cake of her makeup. I thought she was embarrassed, but then her lips tightened and her eyes hardened, and it was like watching a skunk lift its tail.

  “My voice,” she said, “needs no enhancement.”

  “I’m sure it doesn’t,” Grant said, in the most conciliatory tone imaginable. “I just thought, perhaps, that you had been ill. Using a microphone is nothing to be ashamed of, which is what I told Roger Breckin over dinner.”

  Madame Borega’s gasp was so violent, this time people did more than turn their heads. Conversations stopped. Drinks were put down. I held myself steady in the three-inch heels I had been wobbling in all night, and casually rubbed the back of my neck. A small hot tongue rasped across the back of my hand.

  “You told Roger . . .” began the opera singer, touching her throat. “Oh, my God.”

  And with that, she fled—in fits and starts, stopping every few feet to stand on her toes to scan the crowd. Grant made a small humming sound, slid his large warm hand around my waist, and guided me in the opposite direction. His limp was more pronounced than usual. I kept my steps deliberately short, pretending it was the heels that were making me careful.

  “I’m no opera expert,” I said, twining my fingers through his, “but I think you just ruined that woman’s night.”

  Grant was taller than me even while stooping over his cane; a ruggedly handsome man with brown hair brushing the broad shoulders of his tuxedo, dark eyes keen with grim humor. “Roger Breckin helps finance the Seattle Opera House. He’s one of the richest men on the West Coast. He’s also Susan Borega’s benefactor, but his standards are exacting. One hint that her voice needs a microphone to fill the hall he paid for, and she would be ruined.”

  “Ah. But at dinner we were seated with a Watanabe and Anderson. No Breckin in sight.”

  “Funny how that works,” Grant replied, and tightened his arm protectively. I bit back a smile, and glanced over the railing of the yacht. I meant only to look at the water, still unused to living close to the sea, but instead spied three demons being dragged through the cold dark ocean like body surfers, their claws lodged in the outer hull.

  Zee, Raw, and Aaz. Steam rose from their small angular bodies, along with bubbles and frothing foam. Red eyes glinted like rubies shot with fire, and when they saw me observing, I was given three vigorous thumbs-up signs. My boys, rocking out. I had vague childhood memories of them watching Flipper on old hotel televisions—that, and Muscle Beach Party with Annette Funicello, who they still thought was hot. All they needed now was sand, shades, and some chocolate-covered surfboards to eat over a bonfire, and their fantasy would be complete.

  I flicked my fingers at them in a subtle wave, and two small voices began humming inside my ear, long bodies coiled against my scalp with a subtle sinuous weight that still, after all these years, made me want to pat my head to reassure myself that no scales, tails, or snouts were sticking out of my hair.

  I forced my hands to stay still, relying on faith and trust. No one else could see Dek and Mal. I might feel them, but the two demons hidden in my hair were only partially in this dimension, bodies resting here and elsewhere, lost in some mysterious realm that all my boys traveled like armored skipping stones.

  My protectors. My friends. My family, bound to my blood until I died and passed them on to the daughter I would one day have. Just as they had been passed on to me.

  Grant peered over the rail, choked down a quiet laugh, and then turned to scan the crowd. Watching auras. Reading every guest’s darkest secrets with nothing but a glance. For a long time he had thought he suffered merely from synesthesia—a cognitive peculiarity allowing him to see sound as color—but he knew differently now.

  “Maxine,” he said, speaking my name softly, so no one would hear him. I had used an alias all evening, but I missed being myself, hearing my real name. “Thank you for coming with me tonight.”

  I gave him a wry look. “And let you face the hyenas alone?”

  He smiled, but it was tense, and I could not help but notice how he was careful to take the weight off his bad leg. His grip on the cane was a little too tight. It had been a long night standing, or having to sit with his knee bent. Bone did not heal well when crushed, but Grant never took anything stronger than Ibuprofen—and for an old injury like his, that was nothing.

  Better pain than the alternative, though. For both of us, control was paramount. I might be dangerous, but so was Grant. More so, maybe.

  I followed his aimless gaze, taking in the after-dinner party. We were on a luxury yacht, cruising around Elliot Bay. The sun had been gone for hours, and I could see the glittering lights of downtown through the far windows, glimpsed around men and women who dazzled almost as brightly. This was not my kind of crowd. Not Grant’s either, though he moved among them with an ease that I envied. I had always been an outsider, but for once my feelings of isolation had nothing to do with not being human. I simply was not human like them.

  Seattle’s elite. Software moguls, Boeing executives, famed novelists and musicians, sports stars and movie stars; old money, new money, more politicians than I could shake a stick at; as well as one former priest who was a celebrated philanthropist—and me. His date.

  The last living Warden of a multidimensional prison that housed an army of demons waiting to break free and destroy the earth.

  But tonight I was in a dress. First one I had worn in years. And since it had been a long time, I had decided to make a statement. Deep neck, no back, short as hell. Bright red. Long black hair loose, faintly curled. Good thing this was a night event, or else I would have had to make adjustments to the wardrobe, what little there was. No one but Grant and a handful of others ever saw my skin while the sun was up. Safer that way.

  Few ever saw my right hand, either, but tonight was another rare exception. I glanced down at the smooth metal encasing several of my fingers, veins of silver threading across the back of my hand to a shining cuff molded perfectly to my wrist. Not quite a glove, but almost. Bound so close to my flesh and the curve of my bones and joints that sometimes it seemed the metal had replaced flesh.

  The armor was magic, or something close. Bound to me for life. And though possessing this . . . thing . . . had proven useful in the past, the metal had a bad habit of growing. I usually wore a glove to hide it—wore gloves anyway, during the day—but this was a good night to test an old theory: that most folks would accept most anything strange as normal, because the alternative simply could not be imagined.

  I had not been proven wrong. Magic had become nothing more dangerous than jewelry. This was Seattle, after all. If you didn’t have some kind of piercing or body art, you practically couldn’t get service at local coffee shops.

  “Did you find any sponsors for the shelter?” I asked, as a leggy blonde strolled by on the arm of a giant whose face I recognized in a vague, sports star sort of way. A member of the Seattle Seahawks, maybe. He stared openly at my breasts, and then my face—but did not appear embarrassed until he glanced sideways and found Grant frowning at him.

  “Several,” Grant said, still watching the football player. “Not much hard cash offered, just goods and services, which is all I was really after. I’ll probably have to sell one of the Hong Kong apartments, but it’s near the Peak. Even in this market I shouldn’t have trouble finding some tycoon willing to lay down thirteen million.”

  “Right,” I said dryly. “Small change.”

  “Whatever it takes.” Grant gave me a grim smile. “I doubt my father expected that his money and property would be used like this when he left it to me.”

  “You make it sound as though he would have found it dirty. There’s nothing shameful in keeping a homeless shelter afloat, or helping people.”

  “I know,” he said quietly, still watching the crowd. “But I don’t like the attention any more than you do.”

 
True enough. Grant did not need donations to keep the shelter going, but there was little wrong with getting things for free, or involving the private and public sector in charitable works. Unfortunately, that meant events like this, where his looks, history, wealth—and how he was spending it—had made him a minor celebrity.

  That was also why, over the past eight months of our relationship, I had declined attending other black-tie events that Grant had been invited to. Cowardice, excused as self-preservation. I was afraid of people asking too many questions. I was unused to attention. Not accustomed to being noticed, most certainly not for being on the arm of a man.

  A man, I had been told, who had never once in five years brought a date to these events. Which, given what I knew about Grant, was not much of a surprise.

  But it did make me stand out.

  And that, as my mother had always said, was a good way to get dead, and fast.

  THE dinner cruise docked an hour later. Every bone in my feet felt broken, and my soles burned. I hobbled down the gangplank, fighting to maintain my dignity. Grant was having his own difficulties.

  “A long hot bath,” I muttered.

  “Long hot night after that?” he replied, grimacing as the gangplank bounced under the weight of so many people. His cane slipped on the red carpet that had been laid upon the thick metal rails.

  I grabbed his hand. “You’re getting ahead of yourself, buster. We haven’t even made it off the damn boat yet.”

  He flashed me a pained grin. “Race you.”

  I groaned, and slung his arm over my shoulder, making it look as though I needed him to hold me. He sighed, and planted a rough kiss on top of my head.

  Some of the guests had drivers waiting for them, but most had driven themselves and chosen the valet parking that the function organizers had provided. I was sensitive, though, about who got behind the wheel of my Mustang, and had left the car a block away in a short-term lot. I was kicking myself for that now, but it couldn’t be helped. I didn’t want to risk questions about why there were so many shredded teddy bears in my backseat, along with bags of nails, fast-food cartons, knives, and a half-eaten aluminum baseball bat—teeth marks plain.