"My father wouldn't do such a thing."

"Are you certain? A man willing to beat his daughter won't give a shit about killing a stranger."

She left before he could upset her more. Running up the stairs to the main floor, she wanted nothing more than to return to the safety of her room. She hesitated at the head of the stairs, tormented by the knowledge her father was incapable of mercy towards his daughter, let alone a stranger. If the man didn't freeze down there, he'd die at the hands of her father and his strange delusion that this man wanted her dead.

Jule was nothing like the men her father warned her about. She'd felt safe with him, a sense she found only alone in her room. She knew better than to relax around her father, whose hand was likely to fly at the drop of a hat. But this man, an enemy who had-- up until now-- wanted to kill her, left her feeling a little less alone.

She touched her cheek. She couldn't dismiss the sight of his darkened eye or bloodied lip. Her father beat them both. Yully trotted up to her wing and pulled a spare blanket out of the main linen closet. She returned with it to the wine cellar and pushed the door open.

Jule sat where she left him. She wasn't sure why she'd hoped he was gone, except that his absence would alleviate her guilty conscious.

"You can't tell my father I brought you this," she told him. "He'll hurt us both." She laid it across him then straightened it to cover his body.

"It's our little secret," he said.

She met his gaze again, caught in the dark eyes that seemed both warm and wary. He remained relaxed, his large body radiating heat in the cold room. The intensity of his gaze made her warm on the inside. She backed away from him to the door.

"Good night," she said.

"Good night."

Dear god, let him survive the night! Torn, she closed the door on him once again. She promised herself to find a way to check on him in the morning without her father finding out. As she crept up the stairs of the wine cellar to the kitchen, she couldn't help feeling troubled at leaving the man in the basement. She started down the hall.

"Daughter, where are you coming from?"

Yully stopped in place.

"I thought you were gone, Father," she said.

"I came back for my coat."

She turned. His eyes glowed eerily in the dark kitchen. His overcoat was slung over one arm, and he wore a wool suit over a dark turtleneck. His gaze went to the wine cellar door, which she'd left cracked.

"You didn't answer my question," he said, stepping towards her.

Yully recognized the fire in the back of his gaze and retreated. She couldn't think of a lie fast enough. He set his coat down on the counter, and her hands began to tremble.

"I'm sorry, Papa, I was just curious. I heard something in the basement and wanted to see what it was."

"You heard something all the way up in your room."

"Yes, Papa."

"And now you're lying to me about it. What did you find in the basement?"

"Nothing, Papa," she said in a hushed tone.

"You didn't find a man chained to the wall?"

She gasped, surprised he'd admit to what he'd done.

"I spend my life protecting you. I ask only for your loyalty, daughter. That man wanted to kill you. You heard him say it in the alley," he said.

"Father, couldn't you just call the police?" Her question was met with a blow she didn't see coming. She braced herself.

"You're a freak of nature. They'd haul you away from me, put you up in some sort of Bedlam," he snapped. "Then where would you be?"

"I'm sorry, Papa. I won't do it again." She prayed he accepted her apology. He was quiet for a long moment.

"I'll make certain of that in the morning." His voice had calmed, and he started past her. She released the breath she held, the danger averted. "Did he say anything to you?"

She thought of how she'd felt safe with Jule during their brief encounter. "No, Papa."

Her father turned at her hesitation, his gaze blazing. Yully saw the next blow coming, then the next and the next. She'd long since learned to take his beatings without screaming, but she sobbed nonetheless as the blows fell.

Jule pulled his hands free from the handcuffs and tugged the blanket up. He'd been afraid of scaring the beautiful redhead away if she saw he was free. The scent of her lotion still hung in the room, and he breathed the amber-vanilla deeply. He couldn't remember the last time he'd found any woman so intriguing. She wasn't the threat the Watcher made her out to be. She was unguarded and troubled, a combination that appealed to the Guardian in him.

She was worried about him, and he was touched by the idea she took pity on him when she herself was in more danger than he was. The sight of her bruised cheek made his blood boil. The Others had no mercy for mortals, and Jule couldn't imagine what it was like to be raised by one.

The Other had left him no food after beating the crap out of him with his otherworldly power. Jule wrapped himself in the blanket and stretched out on the floor, hungry and chilled.

"Your target is in this house, and you're going to lay there?"

He ignored the irritated Watcher and shrugged deeper into his blanket.

"You have no intention of killing her, do you?"

"Nope," Jule replied.

"If you don't, you will set into motion a fate we cannot-- "

"There is no such thing as a fate that cannot be changed, Watcher!" Jule snapped. "You know this. Why do you and the Others both want her?"

"The Others ..." The Watcher drew a deep breath. "Your mission is to kill her. If you can't do it, you get none of your powers back. And neither will any of the other Guardians. That was our deal. When she's dead, only then will you and the Guardians all get your powers back."

Jule was silent, realizing he had made that deal. He kicked himself mentally for not thinking before he made any sort of pact with the Watcher, even one that seemed so straightforward, until he met his target and realized she was an innocent caught in the crossfire.

"A powerful innocent," the Watcher corrected him. "Without their powers your Guardians will be slaughtered by the Black God. What is her life in exchange for thousands of Guardians and the humans they're protecting? It's not worth it, any way you look at it."

"If her death is so important, and I've already failed once to take her life, you'd call in someone else to do this job," Jule reasoned. "You have infinite immortals at your disposal."

"You're right," the Watcher said. "I'll find someone else to do the job."

The Watcher didn't look happy. The creature winked out of existence, and Jule sat up. The otherworldly creature wanted to force his hand, and he didn't understand why. He rose and paced, dwelling on the carnage that would surely ensue if the Guardians remained vulnerable for long. This woman was the key. Yet, he felt her death was not the answer.

Right about now, he'd give almost anything to talk to Sofia, the White God's Oracle. She alone could provide insight into what he needed to do.

"Sofi says hi." The Grey God's voice was quiet, and Jule didn't sense him appear. He chuckled, silently thanking Damian and his mate.

"I'm happy ..." He paused as he turned, startled to see the Grey God without the scars that knotted his face the last time Jule saw him. The man gazing back at him was wiry and lean with angled features and swirling gold eyes.

"I got a new face," the Grey God said.

"I see that. Lookin' good, Darian," Jule said. "How's everything on your side of the world?"

"Interesting. Dusty found his mate and destroyed most of Florida."

Jule laughed, not at all surprised by the news of his adopted brother, the human turned assassin with a low tolerance for bullshit.

"Damian doesn't know I'm here," Darian added. "But Sofi asked me to visit."

"So you defied your brother for the little blonde Oracle?"

"She runs the place, Jule," Darian replied. "Damian's just figuring that out. Anyway, she wanted me to tell you to trust your instincts."

Jule snorted. "She sounds like a Watcher."

"You have no idea," Darian agreed. While the Grey God appeared calm, his air was agitated and his gaze stormy. Jule sensed a great deal of turmoil behind his calm features and pitied the man. Darian had spent thousands of years enslaved to the Black God before the Oracle freed him, and Jule couldn't imagine how deeply that experience must have scarred the Grey God's soul. Darian's power had grown; the air of the room shimmered, and light and dark alike warped in the space around Darian.

"Good to see you, Darian," Jule said, genuinely happy to see Damian's brother alive. "The new Black God?"

"Nothing more than a kid. Sofi says his path is dark. I can't help feeling bad for him," Darian said, his gaze growing dark and distant. "I know what that life is like. I guess the alternative was worse."

"We all have our paths," Jule said. "Doesn't mean they're easy."

"Yeah."

"Tell everyone I said hello and I'm being held hostage by one of the Others."

Darian's eyes widened. "Really?"

"It's for a good cause."

"A woman?"

"Something like that."

"Sofi said to tell you 'I told you so.'"

"Give her a hug when you get back," Jule said with a chuckle. Darian cocked his head to the side, as if hearing someone call his name.

"I gotta go," he said. "I'll see you in a couple of days. Things will get worse before they get better, but they should get better."

The Grey God disappeared, and Jule dwelled on his parting words. The Darian he remembered had never been brooding or hesitant like this man. Sadly, he realized his old friend truly had died when he became enslaved by the Black God.

Trust your instincts.

Jule rubbed the back of his neck. His instincts told him the Magician was in danger-- and needed to stay alive. If what the Watcher said was remotely true, she was a powerful weapon in the hands of the Others, and he had limited otherworldly ability to protect her from them. Some of his innate defensive powers remained, or she would've turned him to stone or the Other would've vaporized him.

He touched his swollen lip. He hadn't ever been without his healing powers. His thoughts darkened as he thought of leaving the Guardians defenseless to protect a woman he wasn't sure he should.

One life. It should've been so simple. He closed his eyes, remembering a time when he'd made a similar choice. He'd chosen a human over the immortal realm and been banned for it. In fact, he'd chosen a woman over his life in the immortal realm. A woman who died during the Schism. The memories surrounding his exile were deeply buried, but he did recall how pissed the immortals had been with him and wondered why his one choice mattered so much.

The Watchers must've gotten some sort of twisted pleasure out of dangling a similar situation over his head again after so long! The fate of humanity was on his shoulders, with only an innocent woman between him and his ability to help the Guardians.

"Little bastards," he muttered.

Trust your instincts. He trusted Sofi over the Watchers but couldn't help wishing the damned Oracle had been a bit more specific. If the Watchers went to Damian, and Damian wanted the Magician dead ... she'd be dead. Jule would never cross one of his brothers.

One thing at a time, he told himself. He wasn't to that point yet, and he had to figure out just how to protect the woman from the man she considered her own father. Staying in the basement where the Other could find and kill him wasn't his top choice, but at least he was in the house. He could keep an eye on both the Other and the Magician better.

And stay warm. He was beginning to hate the cold.

Chapter Three.

The White God, Damian, studied the Black God's youthful features, both pitying and wary. Black Gods grew into their powers the way he had discovered his White God powers, though he suspected an evil education was far from pleasant. The gangly youth before him had dyed his hair from platinum back to its natural color of black. His brown eyes were shadowed, his Hispanic features the color of caramel.

"Why did you call me here?" the Black God asked, ill at ease in the small room in the basement of their old headquarters in Miami.

"We both have a mutual problem. Believe it or not, I come in peace," Damian said. He spread his arms to show he wasn't carrying any weapons.

"Is my sister okay?" The Black God's gaze turned sharp.

"Absolutely," Damian said and smiled to himself, marveling again at the turn of events that led to his chief assassin, Dusty, mating with the Black God's sister.

"He knows what I'll do to him if something happens to her?"

"I'm pretty sure he gets the picture," Damian said, unable to help his amusement. "It's not every day you marry the sister of a God."

"Then what do you want?" the Black God asked.

"We have a pest problem. You know by now about the Watchers and Others?"

Jonny, the Black God, hesitated before nodding.

"You know they're at war with each other and playing games with us here on earth."

"I ..." Another hesitation, as the youth grappled with what to say to his sworn enemy. "Yes. The Others were attempting to influence the outcome of who won the Black God mantle by using me. It didn't work." Angry light flared in the Black God's eyes.

"They staged a revolt within the Black God's ranks," Damian reminded him. "Something like this won't happen among the Guardians."

"Except for Claire."