by Brenda Trim
I was about to ask if leaving the car there was a good idea when she cast a spell to hide the vehicle. I loved magic. It made life so much more interesting. While it made most things easier, it also created problems.
There were more people out and about than I expected at this time of night. I would have thought most would be eating dinner either at home or in restaurants. When we entered the park and got close to the blue bridge, I noticed Fae popping out of the shadows.
“What the hell?” I grabbed Violet’s hand and slowed her down.
Violet patted my hand and let go of me. “Don’t worry, most of them are hidden from humans.”
I cocked my head and watched a brownie run right in front of a couple walking down one of the main trails. “Is that what the greenish outer glow is about?”
“Yep,” Aislinn replied as she hurried closer to us.
“What are those?” I’d never seen the small, slimy creatures crawling out of the lake in the middle of the park. It looked a little like a mole crossed with a lizard and was dark green, almost black.
One side of Violet’s mouth lifted in a sneer. “Those are squonks. Nasty, smelly creatures. The market is on the other side of the bridge.”
The energy of the park was soothing, but nothing as vibrant as I experienced in Cottlehill Wilds. The water was still with the moonlight shining off the surface, but I didn’t see anything under the surface.
Once we reached the other side, a gnarled older woman glared at us from between two trees. All I could see was her silver hair and her navy skirt and big, flowing maroon top. Violet headed right for her. “We’re searching for a bilge. Have you seen one in the city?”
We stopped a few feet from her, and I realized she wasn’t sitting on a bench like I thought. She was merely short. This close I could see her stormy gray eyes. Her most telling feature aside from her antagonistic energy was the fact that she looked more like a raisin than anything else.
“You don’t belong here. Go home.” Her voice was like a leaf rattling in the wind. It wasn’t very scary, but it didn’t sound human either which I found odd. Her energy was closer to Violet making me assume she was a witch.
Aislinn bared her teeth at lady. “We aren’t going home until we do what we came for, witch. You’d be wise not to mess with our coven. The Backside of Forty isn’t known for their tolerance.”
The old lady threw her head back and cackled. Her laughter died down and she said a word that had the hairs on my arms standing on end. I reacted without thinking. “Indicens!”
The witch’s voice cut off and Violet turned wide eyes to me. “What did you do?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “Shut her up. She was calling out for backup.”
Aislinn got right in the woman’s face. “That’s how the Backside of Forty handle shit. If anyone ever breaks that spell and you get your voice back be sure to tell everyone you know.”
Violet tugged me in the opposite direction at a fast clip. Aislinn was right behind us. I saw a ripple in the distance and assumed it was the market, but when imps appeared out of nowhere with weapons drawn, we took off running. We made our way through the park and out onto the street.
We were heading away from our car, so we couldn’t jump in it and take off. My knee was throbbing, and my lungs burned, but I wasn’t ready to collapse just yet. It was one thing to be in shape physically, and another to be able to escape violent beasts chasing you.
I yanked on Violet’s arm when we turned a corner, leaving the park behind. “What do we do now?”
“We keep moving. V, you need to keep your ‘momdar’ on as we move through the streets. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find them.” Aislinn wasn’t even winded as we raced along the pavement. I remember what it was like to be under forty. Oh, to be young again.
“It’s hard to sense them when I’m running for my life…oof.” Violet jolted to a stop and windmilled her arms when she ran into a guy as we turned yet another corner. She was slightly ahead of us close to what I thought was St. Paul’s Cathedral. I’d been there once when I was a kid.
I braced her back from behind and barely stopped myself from running into her back. Aislinn paused right beside me. I wasn’t sure what alerted me to danger, but I grabbed hold of Violet and pulled her around the guy.
The guy had slicked back hair, bright blue eyes and a paunch belly that was moving under his shirt. Before we cleared him, his hand flashed out and grabbed my arm. I yelped and threw my elbow out at the guy. It slammed into his gut and I felt the air whoosh out of his lungs. When he touched me, I knew he was the reason my internal radar was going crazy.
His looks were deceiving. He was Fae. And, I’d bet my house he worked for the Queen. He didn’t carry the same aura as the King’s Guard. My foot followed suit and crashed into his knee. I needed to get off the street. I felt like a sitting duck. When I frantically glanced around, I spotted a massive church not too far away.
Letting go of Violet, I grabbed the Fae and pulled him with me. He wasn’t going to let us pass without a fight, so I was going to give him one he’d never forget. As we got closer to the area more humans were sight-seeing on the street out front.
I was committed to my path now, so I used the double decker buses as cover and headed to the right of the massive building. Up close it was one of the biggest, fanciest churches I’d ever seen. I snuck into the trees on the opposite side of the towers.
I was too confident in my hold and paid for the distraction. We weren’t exactly hidden when his fist smacked into my face. My head snapped to the side and I smacked it when I hit the ground.
“Fiona!” I didn’t have time to ask Violet why she was shouting my name. I knew I needed to roll, or I was going to regret it. His booted foot came down, narrowly missing my chest.
Violet and Aislinn tossed spells at him while I pushed to my feet. Water flowed from his fingertips and hit Aislinn in the chest. I ran at him, but he kept pushing it at Aislinn while holding up a shield toward Violet. Some of her sparks made it around and hit him, making him grunt every time.
I heard many footsteps running down the sidewalk toward us from the direction of the main entrance. “I’m on it,” Aislinn called out to me. I heard her cast a shield to hide us and turned my focus to the Fae. Just in time, too because he had thrown a funnel of water at me.
It caught me and I gasped a lungful of briny liquid. Coughing overtook me, making it impossible to hold my breath. My chest felt like a bonfire was burning in there. I couldn’t say anything, but I focused on winds taking the water away and mouthed the word to cast the spell.
To my surprise, the wind blew against the water and whisked it away. Of course, I hadn’t considered what would happen to me and ended up being tossed into a tree for my efforts. After hitting my back on the bark, I fell to the ground and was able to brace myself when I landed. For the first time in longer than I could remember my bad knee didn’t threaten to make me throw up right then and there. In fact, I barely even felt the landing.
I had my shield up before he managed to start throwing a volley of spells my way. Standing up straight, I felt the phone vibrate in my back pocket, surprised it hadn’t broken when I hit the tree.
“Batto!” I called out, keeping my focus on him. It was his turn to bounce around as my spell battered him over and over again.
The Fae’s back was to Aislinn and I could see more and more people coming to see what was going on. I didn’t have time to stop and help. Thankfully, Violet joined her. I left them to deal with the humans.
“Violet keep searching for the kids,” I called out then followed that up with a spell. “Glacio.”
I watched ice spread over the Fae, but it never did what I wanted because he threw shards at me a second later. One impaled me a second later. Using elements against Fae and witches was risky because they wielded them easily.
My entire body hurt. I might be getting better, but I wasn’t used to taking so much abuse. When a rock slams into my bad knee and sends me
crashing to the grass, I react out of instinct.
“Finis!” I poured all of my intention toward him. I thought about what might be going through his head. Then about the blood pumping through his veins and the smug look on his face. It pissed me off and made me see red.
He relished hurting others. He didn’t deserve to keep breathing. That wasn’t very magnanimous of me, but I didn’t care. Anyone who could take a life without hesitation was vile.
A smile broke out over my face when he went still. A second later I lost the grin and gasped. I kept him pinned with my stare and couldn’t miss the blank gaze looking back at me.
In the next second electricity traveled all over my body. I shuddered with the feel of the massive influx of energy I received. All I could think was that I was drinking in his essence. The core of power in my belly that awoke when I moved to Pymm's Pondside swelled to overflowing. I was a sponge, taking it all in. My cells filled and plumped up and I felt like I could fight a thousand enemies and run a marathon.
I went cold all over and fell to me knees willing the connection to end. I had no desire to have any part of him inside me. There was nothing pure or clean about him. My stomach churned and my gag reflex was trying to win a gold medal for the most pushups in under ten seconds.
The little bit of dinner I’d managed to eat came rushing back up and detoured to exit through my throat and nose. The connection was finally broken, and the influx stopped. My skin crawled and my blood felt like sludge.
“I can’t…” I couldn’t catch my breath. Everything hurt and I could feel the dark energy trying to merge with my own.
Violet was at my side. “What happened?”
“Oh, my Gods,” Aislinn interrupted. “He’s dead.”
Violet’s head snapped up and her lower jaw dropped open. “Make sure the shield remains in place while I cleanse Fiona.”
Aislinn said something I didn’t catch while my stomach purged some more. This time what came up was black sludge. My vision wavered at that. I couldn’t let this infect me. I would never be the same if I did.
Violet wrapped her arms around me and held me tightly. “Purgo.” Her voice was soft, and I felt it more than heard it. Bright white light washed through me. I felt the darkness recede with every inch it traveled until my vision cleared and my stomach stopped revolting.
I stood there gasping while I clung to Violet. I have no idea what happened just now, and I didn’t have time to figure it out. “I’m okay. We need to find the kids now. Someone likely felt that expenditure of energy. You ready to get back to work?”
Violet’s gaze ran over me from head to toe. She must have seen what she was looking for because she nodded and turned to Aislinn. “They’re to the West. I have no idea how far away they are, but it’s definitely that direction. I think.”
“Of course, they are. You have that super-duper momdar.” Aislinn was teasing her, trying to alleviate her mood.
I sent a silent prayer to God that we were on the right track. I wanted to go home and crawl into bed and throw the covers over my head. It had been a long damn week already and it wasn’t over yet.
Chapter 14
“I swear I’m going to be covered in bruises. We really need to create a healing spell. Dark Fae assholes have no consideration for us middle-aged women.” I rubbed the spot on my shoulder as we darted down the street.
We barely made it to the sidewalk where a bunch of people were trying to see where the commotion was coming from when my skin started crawling. I tugged Violet’s hand and we slowed, trying to blend in with the others.
My eyes darted around the street as we walked to the left and the front of the cathedral. I gasped when I saw several small creatures scurrying out of the sewer. When one pair of beady green eyes landed on me, I tilted my head and kept glancing around at things like a tourist would.
“That building is so beautiful. We don’t have much in the States with as much charm.” My voice was too bright and obviously forced, but I needed to act normal or they would follow us.
“What the hell are you talking about?” I grabbed Aislinn’s hand and squeezed it, giving her a go-with-me look. “Oh, you mean that building across the street?”
“Yeah. I mean St. Paul’s Cathedral is an icon in this city and for good reason, but there is so much more.” I lowered my voice and whispered, “Ugly little things coming from the sewer. Don’t look. Let’s keep going.”
Violet’s posture stiffened, but she pointed out the stained-glass windows close to us and told me some inane fact about them that didn’t really register. It was far harder than I would have thought to keep my gaze from traveling back to the sewers and checking where the creatures were now.
By the time we made it to the end of the block, more appeared. This time they came from the direction we were heading. I recognized very few of them and couldn’t ask anything at the moment.
One of them had a dozen arms and was seven feet tall. Another had pustules covering its grey face. There was one with tentacles for eyes. They were terrifying. Thankfully there was magic that shielded them from view or chaos would break out in the middle of London.
There would be hundreds of panicked videos uploaded to the internet in a hot minute if others could see what was all around them. Instinct urged me to run. If I did that I would draw attention. I’m certain I was shaking as I walked far too slowly for my liking.
It seemed like forever until we turned a corner and I no longer caught sight of various creatures prowling through the shadows. “We need to get the hell out of here as fast as we can.” My voice remained barely above a whisper just in case.
Aislinn turned and glanced behind us then blew out a breath. “Agreed. We can increase our pace a bit. We shouldn’t be walking too much. The river’s going to stop our progress before long. We’ll go back and get the car if we need to cross over.”
I pulled out my phone and shot a text to Sebastian letting him know we were heading toward the Thames from St. Paul Cathedral. He had to be getting close to us by now. Turns out its extremely difficult to type and walk at the same time.
I stepped off the curb and nearly into traffic, twisted my ankle and ran into a pole. How the heck does anyone do it so well? I guess if I was glued to my phone, I would have learned how to do everything and send a text like my children, but that has never been me.
Violet tugged my arm a few blocks away and we changed directions slightly. “We need to turn here then keep heading toward the river. My sense of them is getting stronger.”
“It’s about time something went our way.” Aislinn wasn’t wrong about that. It seemed like the deck was stacked against us lately. “Does anyone have a credit card or cash on them? I left my purse in the car and I need a drink.”
I patted my pockets and was about to tell her no when I pulled out my cell. “I keep forty bucks in my phone case. I started it years ago when I found myself in a situation with nothing but a phone and I had to rely on my co-worker for a loan. Only problem is I haven’t exchanged it for pounds yet, so we’d have to go somewhere that takes dollars.”
“Thank the Gods you’re prepared for just about anything. Loads of places take American money. Hey, is that Bas? And the sexy dragon?” Aislinn pointed to a car parked on the other side of the street.
I followed her finger and saw Sebastian glaring at us. A smile broke out over my face and I crossed the street to join them. The river was on one side of us and pubs, restaurants, and townhomes were on the other. Violet had stopped outside one of the pubs and was looking at the buildings around her. Aislinn was stopped in the middle of the road and turned back to Violet.
“Thanks for coming, Bas, Argiess. Let’s go over here. Violet may have homed in on the kids.”
Bas grabbed my hand and twined our fingers together as he walked with me to Violet. With Argiess on my left side I felt sandwiched between hotness. I could smell Bas’s sultry scent and Argiess’s spicy one over that of the Thames which was a blessing.
&n
bsp; I noticed Aislinn watching Argiess and hoped things panned out between them. She needed something good in her life. I sucked at setting people up, so I hesitated in pushing him in her direction. I’d have to think on that one for a bit.
“Have you found them?” I called out to Violet.
She bit her lower lip before releasing it. “They’re close. I feel them, but none of these rooflines looks like what I saw.”
Argiess continued walking down the sidewalk a few feet and paused about fifteen feet away. “There’s a side street here. Did you check it?”
Violet shook her head and was moving in the blink of an eye. “I haven’t been that far.”
I was right behind her wishing I could do more to help her at this point. When I tried to extract my hand from Sebastian’s he refused to let go. I cocked an eyebrow at him and got a scowl in return.
I was about to tease him when Violet cried out. This time I took off running and was at her side in an instant. “What is it?”
Violet was staring at a set of about five townhouses connected to one another. “They’re in there. And they’re still alive. Let’s go.”
Sebastian stopped Violet with a hand on her shoulder. “Wait. We can’t just rush through the doors without doing some reconnaissance. We risk their lives if we aren’t prepared to handle whatever is in there.”
Violet’s eyes filled with tears and her shoulders slumped. “I can’t stand that they are so close, and yet I can’t rescue them. I know you’re right, but I don’t like it. I want to blow something up.”
Aislinn wrapped an arm over her shoulder and held her. “Save it for the mission. And I think it’s a safe bet the Backside of Forty will be blowing something up before the night is through.”
Argiess chuckled and shook his head side to side. “I’ve never met women so blood thirsty as you three.”
I lifted a shoulder. “Then you’ve never met a mother whose babies were in danger. Fuck with us or our kids and you get burned.”