Suddenly my roots released their hold and retreated back into my feet. The vines wrapped around my fingers and wrists and arms receded as well. With a snap they each reentered their exit point and rusalki hands pulled back from my head. I let out a gasp and opened my eyes.
I blinked. “Who was the old woman?” I asked Azalea while catching my breath. “The old huldra? I’ve never seen a huldra so old. Our lifespans aren’t that long.”
Azalea only smiled.
“Revelations show themselves when the time is right,” Drosera answered. “We are ready to help the succubi.”
The rusalki walked toward the blue dome keeping the water out. “Wait,” I called to them. “What just happened?”
Veronia held my hand and I walked beside her. Before we hit the dome wall she answered, “You connected to your plant friends who willingly gifted you with the energy of our great mother, of Mokosh, for they live deep within her womb and carry her strength. We extracted such energy from you, and now our bond with Mokosh is reinforced, our abilities partly returned.”
So I’d connected with my roots, literally. The revelation was humbling. If only I knew exactly what they’d shown me. Within the vision lay answers to questions I’d never thought to ask. If I could only figure out what they were, I had a feeling it would change everything.
Twenty
As soon as I came up from the lake floor and walked onto the shore, all of my sisters spouted questions at me. I brushed off their queries when I noticed a lack of Marcus on the shore and realized he’d jumped in after me and had been searching the lake the whole time I was under. Amazingly, I hadn’t even noticed while I was down there. Not amazingly, he could have gotten himself killed. I doubted the rusalki’s birch scissors only worked on land.
When the ex-Hunter finally surfaced and spotted me, he swam hard and then ran once his feet hit land. He wrapped me in his arms and picked me up, into the air, raining kisses onto the top of my head. I allowed it for a minute, but then pulled away to scold him for interfering in Wild business, which the moment the words left my lips I realized my mistake in speaking them. I didn’t get to decide when Marcus was invited to involve himself in helping us and when he must stand by—when Marcus could show concern for my wellbeing and when he couldn’t. As if I needed more proof to my screw-up of acting like I had a right to dictate his feelings, his expression revealed a flash of anger, dissipating his concern, and then nothing, as though a switch had been flipped to turn his emotions off altogether.
After flying back to Portland, the incubus Aleksander had met us at the arrivals sidewalk of the airport in a shiny new black Escalade. The late afternoon sun hid behind thick layers of clouds. We had no luggage to throw into the back, only one small bag for all of us, so we piled in and set off for the yellow rental house.
“How was your trip?” Heather’s incubus asked politely. Aleksander had sent the same young incubus he’d sent yesterday…or was it the day before...to let us know the succubi had been captured. The whirlwind trip messed up my sense of time and date.
“Any new news on the succubi galere?” Celeste asked, ignoring politeness and getting straight to the point. She sat in the front passenger seat, so the incubus had no chance of ignoring her.
“No, nothing,” the man said, solemnly.
“Thank you,” Celeste paused. “I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”
“I’m sorry I don’t have better news to report,” he replied, turning to share a weary smile. “It’s Mason, like the jar.” Mason continued, “We’ve been keeping an eye on their apartment while ya’ll have been gone. Nothing new to report there either. Everything’s been quiet.”
“Too quiet,” Marcus commented, in thought.
Mason caught Marcus’s gaze in the rearview mirror. Unlike his disdain for Aleksander, Marcus didn’t seem to hate this incubus. He’d stopped shutting me out too, somewhere over the Midwest. My sincere apology whispered into his ear during take-off had a little something to do with it.
“You think the Hunters are planning something else?” I asked the large, dark-haired ex-Hunter sitting beside me, his hand on my thigh. I made a mental note to be more careful with his feelings. The patriarchal culture of the Hunters didn’t only demonize us Wilds, it also implied the big, strong males were made of logic and brute, leaving no room for actual emotions. While neither of us were human, the roles we were both placed in by the Hunters dehumanized us, stripped us from acknowledging what lived beneath the surface of one another. Marcus had proven his ability to see past my huldra exterior and into me. I needed to remember to do the same, to look past the warrior and into his heart.
Marcus didn’t pull his gaze from Mason, but rubbed my thigh as he answered, “I do think the Hunters are planning something else.”
“So Mason,” he called to our driver who currently negotiated the streets of Portland. “How long have you been an incubus?”
Mason shot a gaze back to the rearview mirror and narrowed his eyes for half a second. “Only forty-five years, Marcus,” he answered robotically.
I watched the two men, their tight expressions. Marcus crossed his arms over his wide chest. Definitely the larger of the two males.
Minutes later, Mason continued, his tone more conversational, like before. “Why do you ask?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Marcus answered, uncrossing his arms and putting his left hand back on my thigh.
In that moment, I would have given anything to read his thoughts.
But then Marcus opened his mouth again, and becoming a mind-reader was no longer necessary. “I’m interested in the process of becoming an incubus.”
I shot him a questioning glare. Mason noticed it too, from his rearview mirror, probably even felt my energy shift from curious to what-the-fuck-are-you-thinking. Marcus glanced at me with a placating smile and returned his attention to the incubus.
What the hell was going on with everyone? Celeste was clearly falling in love with a succubus and now Marcus wanted to be an incubus/Hunter hybrid? I rubbed my temples and looked around the car. My coterie members were too exhausted and weary to take part in the males’ conversation or even to know how out of place it was.
Mason gave a nod, his attention set on the road. “It is a topic I don’t mind discussing, but not in the presence of females.”
“Why?” I asked, my irritation rising. “Because we’re too simple-minded or because we’re easily grossed out?”
The incubus raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Neither,” he said after his bout of confusion passed and he realized I was being sarcastic. “Because females cannot, in any circumstance, become incubi. So it stands to reason that if you cannot join us, then you are more plausible to try to beat us. Sharing the process of changing would be essentially giving you detailed information as to the best time to attack our kind.” He looked at me from the rearview mirror and looked back at the road. “I am no fool, Faline.”
I didn’t like that his answer made complete sense. It occurred to me that Marcus may have been planning on telling me the information once he received it. Yeah, I needed a nap. That took way too long for me to figure out. Feeling stupid, I nuzzled closer to Marcus and rested my head against his bicep.
We arrived at the split-level rental too soon for me to relax enough to fall asleep on Marcus. By the time we all eased from the Escalade in search of a comfortable place to sleep, I wanted nothing more than to feel Marcus’s body beside mine as I drifted off to dream land. But when Celeste jumped from her seat and headed into the house, Marcus gave me a tight squeeze and planted his lips on mine.
He pulled away from my embrace leaving me more than a little confused. “I need the extra key to the house. I’m going to go with him. I’ve got my new cell on me if you need anything.” He hopped into the front passenger seat.
“Wait, why now?” I asked, too confused for the amount of exhaustion that lured my mind to a place of rest and not a place of puzzle solving.
Marcus gave a reassuring
smile that failed to reassure me. “I’ve just got a few questions I want answered. Don’t worry, I’ll be okay.”
I watched the black Escalade drive away as my stomach tightened into a heavy lump of anxiety. I didn’t know how many more times I had it in me to stand there while someone I cared about disappeared from my protective grasp, from my sight. More often than not lately, saying goodbye for now meant possibly saying goodbye forever. And if I were a betting woman, I’d wager my bad luck was about to get a whole lot worse.
Twenty-One
The anticlimactic homecoming to our temporary abode involved seven huldra shuffling down the halls and some down the stairs, in search of their claimed beds. My partner sister followed me to my queen-sized bed. Shawna tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable on the mattress we shared, and only settled once she reached a hand to rest on my arm.
She was definitely improving, but her need to touch someone in order to fall asleep, especially when she was so drained, concerned me. As I dozed off, I thought about Marie’s explanation of Shawna’s post-traumatic stress disorder and how the succubi can’t heal my sister, only make her feel better in the moment. I wondered if the incubi had the same limitations.
“Faline,” the male’s voice called, interrupting me from my rest, pulling me from blissful sleep. I considered rolling over and ignoring whatever the voice wanted. But then I remembered where I was and whose voice it was that spoke to me.
I peeked one eye open to focus on Marcus’s square jaw and smiling lips. He ran the back of his knuckles along my temple. I closed my eyes at the sensation, and thanked Freyja for returning him to me, for not letting yesterday be the last day I got to hold him.
“I’m back from visiting Aleksander and I think we should talk,” Marcus whispered. A new layer of realization struck me like a frigid wind and I opened the other eye.
Shawna, still touching my arm, twitched, but didn’t wake. I slowly moved her hand from my arm and slithered out of bed. Marcus and I crept from the room and out to the back deck.
Once the sliding glass door closed behind us, I gave him a once-over. “You’re not an incubus now, are you?” I asked, unsure how I’d be able to tell if he’d changed.
He gave a deep chuckle. “No,” he said, placing his hands gently on my shoulders and kissing my forehead. “I am not.”
“Good.” I tilted my face up to get a kiss on the lips.
We sat across from each other on the wrought iron patio chairs and leaned our arms on the matching table. The peaceful quiet of darkness covered the backyard as a fall breeze ruffled my hair.
Marcus took no time in getting to the point. “I can’t stand Aleksander,” he started.
“So then it makes perfect sense you’d go hang with him,” I countered, joking, but also urging an answer to my unasked question.
“He’s cocky,” Marcus continued.
“Also true,” I said.
“But he has good reason to be cocky,” Marcus explained. “Dude is old as dirt. He was changed around 900 years ago, Faline. He’s had that many years to hone his incubus skills and recruit an army.”
“A passive army,” I added, unable to wrap my head around the idea that someone could live that long without warring.
“They refuse to involve themselves in other people’s battles,” he said. “Aleksander apparently created the first incubi hoard, not to fight wars, but to defend their way of life. Normally incubi live by themselves, sexual nomads, basically. Aleksander got tired of that life, and of seeing others like him be picked off. So he found a way for them to all come together.”
“Yeah, but how can he keep all that testosterone in one place, under control?” I asked.
Marcus reached toward me and cupped my hands in his, the hard, slightly rusted metal beneath our fingers. “Faline,” he said, his tone changing from informative to heart-felt. “The incubi aren’t Wild Women, but they’re a lot closer to your kind than Hunters are.”
“So you’re considering having Aleksander change you?” I said.
Marcus only looked into my eyes for a long breath. “If it worked, I’d have my Hunter abilities and incubus abilities. I wouldn’t have to pretend to align with the Hunters anymore; I could cut myself free and belong to another brotherhood.”
His brotherhood—this hadn’t occurred to me. But of course, he missed being a part of a brotherhood. I wouldn’t want to live without my sisterhood, my community of like-minded females that both supported me and helped me grow. The unconditional love. How much of a struggle must it be for Marcus to love the Hunters like brothers—because I had no doubt he felt unconditional love for those Hunters he’d grown up with—and yet absolutely disagree with their life decisions? Deplore their choices, even?
The next obvious question popped into my head. “And if it doesn’t work?”
“He’s never changed a Hunter,” Marcus answered. “Hunters don’t get along well with other supernatural beings; they kind of have a god complex when it comes to that stuff.”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “Can you unpack that?” It was obvious that Hunters had a god complex with Wild Women, but I wanted to know how that varied with other supernatural males.
“The council of Nicaea was a group of influential men, rich and powerful,” Marcus explained. “One of those men, whose name was removed from the official record of attending those meetings and helping to decide which books made it into the Bible, disagreed with the direction those leaders intended for the church. He left the conventional church of the time and took his religious servants, men later called monks in our Hunter history, with him, to follow the path he believed was the more righteous one.”
Just hearing such words as church and righteous caused my muscles to tense. The fear ran deep, the history of persecution and the stories whispered by my mother that told of the burnings of midwives and herbalists. The Hunters’ constant teachings covering the inherent evil of Wild Women and their inability to find righteousness didn’t help. Marcus’s history, his present, and his future, were worth the discomfort, though. He needed to talk about this and since leaving his brotherhood, I was all he had. I knew this was a decision he’d made freely, but I still felt guilt over it.
“They built the first monastery that passed as something else,” he went on. “It’s not even in history books, I don’t think. Because to the world at the time, it was nothing special. They didn’t even have monasteries for the mainstream church until much later. But it was the home of the first Hunter complex.”
“How did he create Hunters, though?” I asked, my gaze bouncing to the intricate tattoos standing out against his skin in the dark, along his smooth, muscular bicep. “You aren’t a human male.”
“We kept records for everything, except that,” he answered. “If there are no records on how we were made, there will be no way to find out how to unmake us.”
“Makes sense,” I said, assuming the Goddesses and their priestesses kept no records of how we were made either.
“But what I’m trying to get to,” he continued, “is that we were created in response to supernatural beings. There are holy texts that refer to supernatural beings. Most weren’t included into today’s holy scriptures because of the man who created us, he wanted all non-humans stricken from people’s minds, and eventually he obtained his goal, or at least his descendants did. Like thieves in the night, we removed your kind from power, and then from history, and almost from folklore. We believed that we were created by God himself to govern and kill your kind. Think of it as the right hand of the creator.”
“Well,” I said. “You and I have different ideas of who created the world and everyone in it.” I paused for effect. “And why she did it.”
Marcus’s seriousness finally melted and he cracked a smile. “True. But I’m answering your question about why Hunters don’t get along well with other supernaturals. We believe our whole existence hinges on protecting humans from them. Kind of like the way bleach would feel about E. coli.”
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“But they’re wrong. So very wrong,” Marcus said deeply before leaning across the table to kiss me just as deeply.
I could have easily gotten swept away in the moment and stood from the chair to trail the sexy man into the quilted bedroom and have my way with him. Unfortunately, something else nagged at the fringes of my mind.
“If Hunters are really so set apart, then it stands to reason that whatever incubi do to change human men could interact with your Hunter genes and kill you,” I stated.
“Or maim me,” he corrected.
I had no idea what my face looked like at the moment, but apparently the word “concern” was written in my eyebrows because Marcus stood to pull me up and closer to him. “Babe,” he rumbled into my ear. “I haven’t made the decision yet. I’m only gathering information.”
“And from what you’ve gathered so far?” I asked, my cheek pressed against the soft cotton covering his chest.
“I’m not gonna lie, there are more pros than cons.”
I huffed. “What other pros can there be?” I asked, only counting two: more abilities and being accepted as my mate. Oh, and the third of belonging to a brotherhood.
“Aleksander will stop pursuing you,” Marcus said as though his statement was as normal as letting me know he picked up peas from the grocery store for dinner.
I pulled away to stare at him. “You don’t have to worry about him. I’ll never choose him over you,” I assured the male who’d risked life and limb for me, the man whose touch melted me.
“The reason I couldn’t stand him in the beginning is the same reason I can’t fault him now,” Marcus said, again too calm for the topic. “He’s an incubus, Faline. They rarely find a life mate to lock onto, and when they do, there’s no unlocking their intentions. He’s old and he can manipulate your energy and mine, make us feel and think things. He’s assured me that he’s not that type of man, under oath, which is the only reason I didn’t slit his throat. But I’m not dumb.”
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