Carlos's attention was torn between the grass and the color waves overriding it, and the things guarding the entrance to Cain's spot. Everything here was freakin' energy? How did they eat? What did they eat? His focus split again as Cain stopped before the entrance, stroked a fawning Hons back, and it nuzzled his shoulder as the other one stood and roared a complaint to get similar attention.
"Shush," Cain said in a low, calm voice, sheathing his blade. "It is all right."
The sphinxes glowered at Carlos, nuzzled their master again, and sat back down on their pedestals with eyes forward. Cain motioned with his head for Carlos to follow him inside. But how did Cain kept those suckers fed and chilled out?
If he hadn't been a competitor, Carlos might have openly admitted that what Cain had just shown him was some smooth shit. However, any appreciation for what this brother could do would remain a very quiet secret within his weary soul. Carlos edged by the lions and kept his gaze sweeping as they entered a long, open corridor.
A gleaming, oblong, crystal-blue pool of water stretched before him in Olympic proportions, almost seeming like glass. Carlos studied it hard, and for the first time really witnessing the delicate, congruent bands of hue that made up the shimmering surface. Water wasn't water? Oh, shit, he was screwed.
Energy-generated lotus blossoms floated on the still surface, and white marble was everywhere. Carlos had to fight with himself not to reach out and touch it so that he could inspect the phenomena in detail.
From where he stood, it seemed as though pure gold was the mortar between the marble tiles. Freaking hieroglyphics with inlaid silver? And everything around him had an energy pulse. Almost gave off a tone from the slightly moving hues. The brother could hold illusion energy like that, put tone and color all in it to this degree? Dayum. Oh, hell no, his woman couldn't ever come over here and see this shit. If this was just a cliff-side lair, not even the main palace, then . . .
"You need some clothes," Cain said, unfastening his blade harness and casually dropping it on a white marble bench by the pool.
For the first time since they'd clashed, Carlos studied the weapon with full appreciation. That was real. It was held in a black, hand-tooled sheath with intricate designs of gold and silver studs that had been forced into the leather. The ornate platinum handle was crusted with diamonds, and the four blades that became one were highly polished steel, but in the center blood gutters were gold alloy with silver Neteru sym-bology worked along them. And the Neteru King's Council had just given him a pocketknife? No respect. He refused to go deeper into Cain's lair as he watched him walk up a flight of twelve alabaster steps, his feet making the pale pastel colors in the masonry swirl beneath each footfall. Carlos ran his hand over the nape of his neck to keep from battle bulking again as Cain strode with unflinching authority past a massive, solid gold, twenty-four-karat four-poster bed, each post crested by a pyramid-shaped, clear quartz crystal as big as his fist.
Vivid hibiscus in vibrant color splashes, ferns and elephant grass and huge leafy jewel-green plants of energy looked like they simply grew up from the marble floor and surrounded the bed. Energy-trembling white silk linens, white-on-white satin embroidered pillows, and sheer Egyptian drapes that resonated with low, sensual harmonic tones sprawled lazily across the monument of pure decadence. Aw, man... tones from the colors... white had every rainbow color resident within it, therefore every note.
Instant insecurity rooted Carlos to the floor. Cain could probably fire up the bed like Rider could fire up his ax, pull a blossom off a nearby plant and hand it to Damali all romantic-like while composing on the fly, and make everything around them and under them do multipart harmony. This was the brother's studio, for real. This was where he probably listened to Damali's work. This put a vanishing-point move to shame---
or... shit, what if he could do that too, with the music vibe to go with it? Have her atomically deconstruct, tap a white-light color fusion, feel all the music, every tone to the max, and then bring her back breathless while wurkin'. The brother was built, even he had to admit. Plus this motherfucker could sing?
Carlos briefly closed his eyes and walked in a tight circle, and then abruptly stopped himself so he wouldn't give Cain any more satisfaction than he probably already had. No woman had ever put him in a position like this--ever. If his own imagination didn't kick his ass first, something told him there was a possibility that the SOB coolly getting undressed and dropping heavy armor might.
Okay, he had to keep his head tight as a matter of pride. So the man could handle his business--but he'd have to kill his ass for sure, if he ever dragged D over this threshold. Period.
He was so upset that he couldn't ignore Cain. The being turned around and casually loped toward a huge marble built-in armoire that held an ornate twelve-foot silver-edged mirror. Carlos's heart was beating harder than it needed to. If his woman ever fell by this joint. . .
Just man-up and suck it up, Carlos told himself. He wasn't no punk. Fuck it. Carlos's gaze shot around the expanse. Tall, eight-foot Egyptian pots seemed to guard each of the twelve columns that stood beside the small energy lake fronting as a pool in this brother's bedroom. Carlos swept them mentally--this was as good a place as any for a black adder to slither out. But Cain seemed so relaxed and casual it was setting Carlos's teeth on edge.
He watched Cain serve him his back, remove his body armor, and drop it to the floor like a man who'd come home from a tough day at the office. No stress, no worries, just glad to be home, and tolerating the noise his children were making. That had to be the only reason Cain was physically changing and not just willing it so--he was obviously tired. The battle on the other side of the rip had worn him out a little; Carlos clung to that, glad that something gave him the advantage.
But he wasn't sure what pissed him off more, the fact that this guy clearly wasn't worried about him--so much so that he'd left a weapon within his reach, turned his back on him, and was trying to figure out what to change into, like he wasn't even there--or the fact that he'd have to do about a thousand more push-ups a day and bench press three-fifty at the gym to ever be cut like that.
Carlos rubbed his hands down his face. Damali was so wrong, the girl couldn't ever get right.
Cain tossed a pair of sandals in Carlos's direction, making them whir toward him like Frisbees. Carlos caught one in each hand, and then flung them down hard. He wasn't wearing this SOB's clothes. And he definitely wasn't stepping into shoes in front of Cain that would be way too big. Truth be told, he really didn't wanna know how much bigger Cain's feet were than his at the moment, and he definitely wasn't putting on a robe that would swallow him whole--clean or not. Doing the fang comparison had been humbling enough. The man had him by two inches, which was never gonna sit well with him as long as he was alive.
"You cannot walk around without shoes," Cain said, giving him a quizzical look. "It is not done in the royal families." He pulled a long, elegant, gold-toned robe over his head, and began fastening the elaborate embroidered clasps with silver lion's-teeth hooks. Of all days for him to go looking for Damali... no shoes on, no drawers, just a pair of pants, no shirt. Wait until he got home! Carlos stared at the shoes on the floor, willing them to be the right size. If he could just get a good vamp whirl going, he'd serve the cocky bastard across the room black Armani, a pair of leather slip-ons, and show him how it was done back in the 'hood. Matter of fact, he didn't do Old World nothing, not robes and dreadlocks, nor Egyptian braids, none of that--he did clean-shaven, precision-cut. Fuck Cain!
And, yeah, he cussed--so? If Damali wanted some romance-language shit, some corny guy carrying a blade instead of a nine, who would croon to her in what sounded like Shakespeare's era, she could have all that. It wasn't him by a long shot. And so what if he didn't sing, he'd like to see Cain's ass at a modern-day bargaining table, throwing down serious deal-making, strategy, handling business like it needed to be handled--he had a skill, now, she'd better act like she knows. Not to mention--
"Why are you working yourself up like this over a pair of shoes?" Cain said, seeming genuinely perplexed. "Conserve your energy."
Carlos could practically feel steam coming out of his ears. He was so angry that his throat was cracked and dry. His blood pressure was spiking so hard it felt like his pulse was pushing his eyeballs out of their sockets. He made fists with his hands. "I want my shoes, my shit, and I don't want anything from you," he shouted.
Cain smiled, shook his head, and went back to his closet. "Now you really do sound like a child."
"Are you sure?" Marlene asked, glancing around the compound's altar room.
Damali's gaze took in each of the ancestral artifacts and mementos from many lands that rested peacefully within the solemn, wood- framed room. Bright sunlight poured into it to splash the ivory walls. She took a deep breath. "Yeah. I need to talk to Queen Eve."
"Remember, Damali, that's still his mother--Neteru or not."
"I know," Damali assured her as she stepped forward, preparing to kneel.
Marlene caught her arm. "No. You don't know. The mother-son bond is stronger than anything you could imagine. I know Eve won't take this to the male Neteru Roundtable for a divination on her own. Not when it comes to Cain. She and Adam have been at odds for years over her son, his stepson, okay? I'd feel better if you went to a more neutral queen from that era, like Nefertiti. Even though her husband, Akhenaton, got elevated posthumously he holds serious advisor weight at the table--since he reintroduced monotheism into law after periods of human uncertainty on the many gods issue."