by Rhys Lawless
If I wasn’t so shocked, I would have laughed. Winston and Hew were being very affectionate with each other in public, and who could blame them. Caleb and I could hardly keep off each other for longer than a minute, especially since we bonded.
“Why didn’t you save us?”
The only words that came out of my mouth were the only ones that didn’t concern me.
How was the troll supposed to get through all the witch hunters, defeat a dhampir, and unbind my heart from the monster that had kept me prisoner most of my life?
“It’d be a hopeless task, dear boy. I wanted to. But I didn’t know what I was up against. And without your dad’s help—”
“Where…where is he?” I finally asked the one question that I cared about.
My whole life I’d believed he was human and had abandoned us. Even when it was revealed both Winston and I were witches, I hadn’t cared much to find him. Because he’d still abandoned us. But he had placed Mrs. Weatherby to protect us. Maybe he wasn’t such a bastard after all.
“I wish I knew, my dear. He disappeared long ago. That’s why your mom broke down. She thought he’d abandoned her. And it made her hatred for witches re-ignite. What I do know is he went after someone bad. Someone really bad. And he never came back.”
“He…he died, didn’t he?”
Her gaze dropped to her cuppa, and it was all the answer I needed.
“What was he like?”
As the words left my mouth, I realized how much I needed to know. I’d never wondered about him before. But after everything Mrs. Weatherby had told me, it was instantly like I was missing a piece of the puzzle.
Mrs. Weatherby placed her tea back on the table with both hands and smiled warmly.
“He was an incredible man. And an even better witch. It didn’t matter who or what you were to him. He always wanted to help people. It was in his blood. That’s why he fell in love with your mom. She wasn’t just pretty and feisty. She was living a lie, and he wanted to remedy that so she could explore her full potential.”
“How did they meet?” I asked because I was sure what Mom had told me was also a lie.
Her lips twisted to one side in a cheeky smile.
“He was her hit of course. She went after him, planning to kill him. Instead, he kissed her,” she said.
Wasn’t that how I met Caleb? How we got together? And he’d also helped me become a better version of myself.
How many more witch hunters had gone after witches only to find out the truth and run from the hunter’s life? With Christian’s invasion of the force, we might never know.
“What was his natural power?” I asked.
If there was something I’d learned since joining this strange world of the supernatural, it was that natural powers often corresponded to the witch’s personality.
“Wilder? Wilder’s magic could end wars.”
“What does that mean?”
Mrs. Weatherby considered me for a few moments before she said with all the warmth she had in her.
“Your father, my dear, was a healer.”
Two
Caleb
This mating thing was getting on my nerves. He wasn’t even gone for five minutes and I already missed him like crazy. My heart beat for his. My lips craved for his, and my body needed his. There was no other way to function anymore.
I’d never felt love like this. Not to this level. Not to this degree. If this was what mated familiars and witches felt like, then no wonder they were all inseparable and humped like bunnies at every opportunity.
My fingers itched to dial his number and ask him to come back. I don’t even know why we were still living apart. This shit had been happening for a month, and we still hated having to sleep in different beds.
Nora’s cry brought me out of my daze. I picked her up and soothed her in my arms.
She was the reason. Wasn’t she? Despite the promise Wade had made her when she’d sacrificed herself to save me, it still felt wrong to put the responsibility of Nora on him as well. Especially now he was a witch in training. And being quite terrible at it too. I tried to not let it show, but his spellcasting skills were atrocious, and I still couldn’t figure out the reason behind it.
Nora cooed into my chest, and her eyes glazed as she went back to sleep.
Ring! Ring!
And back to square one. Nora’s eyes opened wide as I walked over to the intercom and looked into the camera. It was a new installment, on Wade’s insistence. After the events at the bridge, we couldn’t take our safety too seriously, and he didn’t like that the only form of safety in my house was a bunch of spells, which, as had been proven before, could be broken very easily by a masterful witch.
Ash looked into the camera and waved, and I buzzed him in.
I waited for him to climb the steps. It was amazing what danger, time, and need could do to a relationship. If someone had told me three months ago that I would be friends with my ex and working with him to rebuild the new high council, I would have laughed in their face and kicked their butt with a spell or two.
But no. That’s what was happening. And I was okay with it.
Ash opened the second door at the top of the stairs and let himself in, nodding a “hi” at me that was the least cheerful I’d ever seen him.
“Sorry for dropping by so late,” he said and tickled Nora’s cheek for a moment before pacing all the way to the dining table.
“Is everything okay?”
He very rarely came by my house. We usually met at Java Jinx, the cafe the high council had assigned to me before this whole mess had come about. It was the new headquarters. The office at the Shard had been a bloody mess that we’d not only had to clean up but also sell it to cover the expenses that had come about from Ealistair’s and Rhafnet’s destruction. It’s not like we’d wanted to keep such an expensive and pretentious place anyway. If we were going to rebuild, we were going to do it right.
“No. Not really,” Ash said and looked out of the big industrial window at the night sky.
I put Nora down in her cot and approached Ash. I stood behind him and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Ash, talk to me. What’s going on?”
He continued to stare out of the window.
“I hate to burden you with this. I really didn’t want to come and give you the bad news. After everything you’ve been through. After all the crap I put you through—”
“You didn’t put me through crap,” I said. It was a lie. But he didn’t need to know that.
Ash turned and looked into my eyes.
“Come on. I did. We both know it. I used my power on you more than necessary, used you, and then threw you away like you were a piece of garbage,” he said.
“And I used my power on you. You weren’t the only one doing the using, Ash. I was using you too. To get over my past, my heartbreaks. We were doomed from the start.”
What I couldn’t understand was what had brought all this up. What had happened?
“I’m so sorry. For everything,” he said. “The things I said…your class had nothing to do with what I did. I was going through some shit. I still am. I was trying to push you away from me to…to protect me.”
I put my other hand on his other shoulder and pierced him with my gaze.
“Ash, snap out of it. I know all this. I’ve been inside your head, you know. I’ve moved on. And so have you.”
I didn’t shout, but I felt like it. There was no reason for him to be getting this nostalgic and apologetic.
He smiled.
“I’m glad you found someone that can love you like I never could,” he said.
I smiled back at him.
“Ash! What’s happening?”
He turned towards the window again and I dropped my hands to my sides.
“I didn’t want to say anything to you. But Graham insisted I come over. He wants to keep you in the loop. But I didn’t want to worry you,” he mumbled.
“For crying out loud,
Ash. If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to shove my fist up—”
“Christian’s body is missing,” he said.
That shut me up, all right.
“What?” I said after moments that dragged on for far too long. Ash wasn’t laughing, so it wasn’t a joke either.
“We went to check on his body a few days ago and discovered it was missing.”
“How is this possible? I thought he died on that rooftop and Ealistair was just using his body,” I said.
Ash shrugged with hesitation. I could tell it wasn’t easy for him to come and tell me this on his own, and I could tell without even touching him.
“Who knows how anything works in this world, hey? Maybe it was just a part of him that died on the rooftop, or maybe Ealistair had something to do with bringing him back before Avalis destroyed him. We—I don’t have the answers for you. And I’m sorry. I will do everything in my power to find him and stop him.”
I didn’t reply. What could I say? One of the most dangerous people I’d ever come face to face with was alive again. The one who had destroyed hundreds of witches’ lives. Hundreds of hunters’ lives. The man who had come between Wade and me. What on earth could I even say to that?
“Thank you for telling me,” I said after a long pause.
It was decency that made me say it and nothing else.
“I did the right thing, right? By telling you?” Ashton asked and his face creased, the worry lines taking over his silky-smooth skin.
I looked into his eyes and told him exactly what was on my mind.
“Fuck knows. I think so. But maybe it’d be better if I didn’t know. I can’t possibly—”
My sentence was left unfinished. A sharp pain shot through my body and brought me to my knees. I tried to hold on to the window ledge, but I was too weak.
“Caleb, what’s going on?” Ash kneeled next to me and touched the back of my head.
Please, Goddess, tell me I haven’t made things worse.
Ash’s thoughts evaded my mind just as a shearing, pumping ache hit my stomach. It was Wade. It was his pain as much as mine. I felt it to my core, but I knew it didn’t belong to me.
Just like the rest of the pain in my body. It didn’t belong to me, but it was a part of me.
Something was going on with Wade. I knew it. Of course it was him. We were linked for life now. And it was our link that was telling me he was in danger.
“Caleb, talk—”
“It’s Wade,” I explained, and right then another hit pulsed through me.
It was becoming clearer that I was right. But I had no means to help him. He was on the other side of town, almost home, and I was here, at my home, with no way of getting to him. I didn’t have access to the strong and ancient spells Hew did, and my natural power was useless with distances.
“What? What’s wrong with Wade?” Ash asked and helped me off the floor and onto the couch.
“Something—someone’s attacking him. I don’t know. That’s how far our bond goes. It’s impossible to tell who he’s up against.”
Was it Christian? Had he gone after Wade already? How could Wade protect himself? He was still trying to perfect his spell casting and had a long way to go. There was only so much he could do with his natural power. This was a losing battle.
“What bond? What are you talking about?”
We hadn’t told anyone. The only other person that knew about our connection was Mother Red Cap. Kathleen. And that was it. Witches didn’t mate with witches. That was unheard of. And we’d performed a ritual that did just that. I didn’t even know what repercussions that would have for the supernatural order of things because surely we’d upset it. If witches were meant to mate with familiars, it meant that by mating with each other, there were two familiars out there that would never get to mate with their fated witches.
These thoughts had been circling my mind for the last month, and I didn’t even know where to start to find out what damage we’d caused. Avalis, Ealistair, and Rhafnet might have been gods, but they didn’t own the world and its magic.
I told Ash what had happened, urging him to secrecy, if not for me, then at least until we found what trouble Wade and I had caused. His jaw dropped and his eyes bulged.
“So now you…you can feel him?” he asked.
I nodded.
“It’s like he never leaves me. Like he’s always here.” I pointed to my heart. “But when he leaves, there’s a little tug that tells me I should be back in his arms.”
Ash stood up straight again and paced around me.
“Dude, how are you doing this? Why are you not living together yet if that’s the case?”
“He’s had the shittiest life, Ash. He’s been raised a witch hunter, he’s been controlled by an evil maniac for most of his life, and he’s just found that he is a witch. He’s got enough on his plate without adding fatherhood and living together to it.”
“The man committed himself to you in the biggest way possible, Caleb. If he didn’t want all these things from you, with you even, then he wouldn’t have.”
He had a point, and I knew it. But accepting it and doing something about it was a completely different question.
“Can you still feel him…you know, in trouble?” Ash asked.
I took a moment to focus on myself and my own body and took a deep breath, and then I shook my head.
“He’s fine,” I said, relief washing over my entire body like a soothing lullaby.
My phone rang a few minutes later, and I knew it was him before I even looked at the screen.
“Are you okay?” I said when I answered.
“I’m fine, but you won’t believe what I’m about to tell you. A vampire attacked me, Mrs. Weatherby saved my life, and my dad…well, he had her watch over both Winston and me.”
It looked like I wasn’t the only one with big news, then.
Three
Wade
“I can’t,” I grunted.
“Yes, you can. Come on,” Caleb shouted. “Harder. Louder. With passion.”
My fist turned beet-red, and I felt the sharp edges of the crystal dig into my skin until blood was dripping from my hand and onto the concrete floor of the warehouse.
“Focus, Wade. Where is your head at?” Caleb shouted opposite me.
I quirked my lips and answered him.
“Harder, faster, with passion.”
He didn’t look amused by my joke. As a matter of fact, he looked pissed off. I couldn’t blame him. My training was going nowhere. I might as well just give up now and save us both the trouble and embarrassment.
“I swear to Goddess, Wade, half the reason you’re not able to cast spells is because all you’re thinking about is sex.”
“As if you’re not.”
Again, it didn’t do anything to lighten the mood. That was a first. I usually got him to cave by this point. Maybe he was getting fed up with me.
“You could have died last night, baby. It’s no longer funny. Being good with your sword is not enough. Nightcrawlers can be ruthless. And they will be. Especially now. After everything that happened at Tower Bridge.”
Something was wrong. Caleb was never like that. Yes, he was hard with me during training, but never like this. Something was going on that he wasn’t telling me.
I wasn’t one to keep my thoughts to myself. Besides, he could pry them off me anyway, so I asked him.
“Did something happen? Are you okay?”
“You mean other than the vampire who tried to kill you?” he asked and snatched a towel off a nail on the wall and stepped closer to me to wipe my bloodied hand.
“There’s something else,” I told him, placing my free fingers under his chin.
Even though I lifted his head so he could meet my eyes, he turned his gaze behind me.
“I’m just tired. I didn’t get any sleep after you called. And Nora was whining every two seconds.”
He obviously wasn’t ready to share with me, so I d
ropped the subject.
“Can’t you tell me what the spell is and then I can try and cast it?” I asked him.
Now, his gaze met mine. And I didn’t like it one bit. If his right eyebrow had gone any higher up his forehead, it’d have become one with his hairline.
“Wade, you’ve been studying this shit for a month. If you can’t remember the spells now, what about when the next vampire comes after you? Or the one after? You need to master spellcasting. Stop being lazy.”
I hated seeing him like that. He needed cheering up. Whatever it was he wasn’t telling me was making him grouchy and impatient. I put my hands around his waist and kissed his nose.
“Take that back. I am not lazy,” I whispered to him.
“You are!” Caleb whined but gasped when I wrapped my fingers around his neck and squeezed.
“I said, take it back,” I repeated, stressing every word.
He stared right into my eyes and shook his head slowly.
“You’re a lazy-ass witch,” he growled.
The arch of my hand pressed harder against his carotid and with my other hand, the one I was holding the spell in, I copped his dick and balls. His hardness pulsed and Caleb swallowed.
“Are you disobeying your master?” I asked between my teeth.
“Y-yes,” he said.
“Do you want to be punished?”
He nodded and my hand loosened around his neck. I dragged him by the crotch to the nearest armchair, one of the many scattered across the floor, and I sat down.
“I’ll teach you for disobeying your master,” I snarled and made him bend over my legs, and I exposed his ass so I could give it a proper spanking.
“Punish me, master. Make me obedient,” Caleb begged, and I brought my palm down flat on his butt cheek. It turned rosy straight away and it became darker the more I spanked.
“When I…ask you…to do…something…you do it…understood?” I said and slapped him in between every other word.
“I’m sorry, master. I won’t do it again,” he said, a whimper escaping his lip with a quiver.