Cursing all wizards with the exception of Lily, he headed for the car.
The cramped back seat made it clear that comfort hadn’t been forefront in the designers’ minds when they put together the aerodynamic wisp of a car. With his knees almost squashed to his chest, the staff crushed lengthwise across his lap, and the little girl scrunched into the space beside him, he was fairly certain it would take the jaws of life to pry them both from the vehicle whenever they finally reached their destination.
Vivian barely spared him a glance as she swung into the car. “Go.”
Gravity shoved him into the unforgiving seat as the driver slammed the pedal to the floor. Twisting awkwardly, Cole glanced through the back window and watched as the other cars sped in opposite directions. Hurriedly, the small ground crew was ushering the plane into the hangar while others were waiting to shut the doors.
Drawing a breath, he shifted back around, suddenly wishing that, even if Lily didn’t wake up soon, he could’ve at least had a gun.
With a jolt that nearly drove his knees into his chin, the car leapt from the tarmac to the service road, and the driver cursed as the tires slid across the gravel before righting themselves. Bracing herself with one hand on the ceiling and the other on the dash, Vivian ignored him, her gaze locked on the airfield.
Her phone buzzed. Eyes still on the service road, she drew it out.
“Yes?” She paused, and then cursed, the words precise and vicious in her cultured tone. “Divert from your route in case they kept some alive.”
She clicked the phone off and caught sight of the driver looking to her.
“First car’s gone,” she said succinctly.
The man’s face darkened.
“Can you get down lower?” Vivian asked, glancing to Cole.
He stared at her, and then shifted on the cramped seat, succeeding in lowering himself a few more inches.
“Hang on,” the driver called.
Vivian turned as the man released one hand from the steering wheel and extended it through the open window at his side. Pain spiked through Cole’s skull and, up ahead, the gate in the airfield fence burst open. Gripping the wheel again, the driver hauled it around while the car left the gravel and bounded onto the country road. Snagging the back of Vivian’s seat, Cole barely stopped himself from crashing into Lily as gravity tugged him sideways.
The little girl whimpered, her voice scarcely audible over the growl of the tires and the wind’s roar.
Righting himself awkwardly, Cole glanced through the smoked rear window. A blue sports car was visible in the distance.
And it was coming up fast.
“Um…” he started.
Vivian glanced back. Her eyes narrowed, tracking the vehicle.
“Stephen…”
“I see them,” the driver replied. He pressed the accelerator harder.
The blue car fell back briefly, and then began to match their speed.
Scowling, Stephen hit the brakes and the clutch. With his free hand, he downshifted while his other hand cranked the wheel around hard. The car whipped a tight turn onto another road, sending Cole crashing into Lily.
“Ow,” Lily protested sleepily.
Extricating himself from the seat, Cole looked down, but the girl’s eyes were still closed. “Lily,” he said, trying to keep his voice low. He tossed a glance to the rear window.
The blue car fishtailed as it raced onto the road.
“Come on, Lily,” Cole urged, shaking her shoulder.
Her brow furrowed in protest.
Vivian lifted her phone. “We’ve got company.”
Cole shook the girl again. “You’ve got to wake up, kid. Come on.”
“Head hurts…” Lily murmured.
“I’ll get you something for it soon. But I need you to wake up now.”
Her eyes opened slightly and then she cringed as if pained by the light. He reached over and shielded her eyes with a hand.
“Head… hurts…”
He grimaced. “Please, Lily.”
She didn’t answer.
Exhaling in frustration, he glanced to the window again. Country roads were surrendering rapidly to neighborhoods on the fringe of a city. Sapling trees and cookie-cutter houses blurred past, beyond which brief glimpses of parks and playgrounds could be seen. Stoplights in irrelevant colors zipped by as the car flew through intersections, bringing traffic to a screeching halt.
Block for block, the blue car kept pace.
“Where are they?” Stephen muttered.
“They said–” Vivian started.
A streak of silver raced across the intersection behind them. The sports car slammed into the blue vehicle, propelling it into a light pole.
Letting out a victorious whoop, Stephen whipped the car around a turn, leaving the accident behind. At his side, Vivian watched through the rear window, grimfaced.
Cole blinked and then turned back around in the cramped seat.
Streets sped by, one emptying into another as the car wove through the city. Stoplights flashed past, pointless and ignored, and neighborhoods became commercial districts, which transformed into towers of steel and stone.
Tires squealed behind them. From a blind intersection, a silver sports car barreled out, narrowly missing their bumper. Shattered windows marred its sides and its back was completely destroyed. Screeching around the turn, it careened wildly into the opposite lane and then took off after them.
“What the hell?” Stephen cried.
Vivian turned. “Those sons of…” Her glare snapped to Stephen. “Go!”
He didn’t need the instruction. Crushing the pedal down, he sent the car charging into the dense traffic ahead.
Cole grabbed Lily, pulling the unconscious girl closer.
Through the intersection, twin city buses raced past in opposite directions, and the sports car lunged between them. Instantly, Stephen hauled on the wheel, veering the car down a narrow fork in the busy street. Tall buildings crowded in, cutting off the sunlight. Cole glanced back.
The other car was nowhere to be seen.
Lily stirred next to him and he turned. Brow furrowing, the girl struggled to lift her head, succeeding after a moment’s effort.
“Cole…?”
“I’m here.”
The furrows faded, though she didn’t open her eyes.
Grimacing, he glanced up and then froze.
A silver sports car shot past an intersection a block away. Buildings brought his view up short, and then gave way again a heartbeat later.
The car was still there.
Swallowing hard, he looked down at Lily. “Hey, guys?” he called to the wizards.
They ignored him. Thumbing a button on her phone, Vivian tersely said, “Coming in fast,” and then hung up.
Cole turned back to the window, watching the other car.
“Hang onto something!” Stephen yelled.
Before Cole had time to do more than register the words, the wizard crushed the brakes to the floor.
Lily tumbled forward with the staff, and Cole followed, his shoulder slamming into the metal supports beneath the thin seat cushions. Without pause, the vehicle cornered sharply, flinging him from the seat toward the door.
The ground sloped and magic rushed past in a crescendo of pain that faded as swiftly as it had come. Sunlight vanished and concrete walls appeared inches from the windows. The tires screeched as Stephen yanked the wheel around and hit the brakes again, the sound echoing impossibly loud. Shedding the last of its momentum, the car skidded and then lurched to a stop.
Vivian threw open her door. “Move!”
Glaring in her general direction, Cole pushed awkwardly away from the door. In a tangle between the seats and the floor, Lily groaned, her eyes fluttering open.
With a wince, he straightened and then froze as their surroundings came into view. People encircled the car, their lack of weapons and the dull ache in the back of his head practically broadcasting their status as
wizards. Beyond them, concrete supports stretched from the floor to the ceiling of a massive underground parking garage. A few mismatched sedans provided cover for the wizards guarding the entrance slope, and along the walls, small cameras panned slowly back and forth like metronomes, watching everything.
In the midst of the wizards, Vivian barked rapid-fire instructions, her words muffled by the closed door. Fury on her face, the woman spun and yanked the door handle, nearly spilling Cole onto the concrete.
“Out!” she snapped.
Extracting himself from the seat, he drew the staff with him, noting with distant surprise that it appeared miraculously unharmed. As he reached for Lily, the woman made an irate noise.
Cole ignored her. “Come on, kid,” he said, gripping the little girl’s arm and helping her out of her wedged position.
Lily swayed as she reached her feet. “Where are we?” she asked, putting a hand to her tousled head as she blinked at the ground. “What happened?”
He glanced to Vivian, but the woman just gave him a dark look. “I said move,” she snarled.
Putting her words to action, she gestured sharply to Stephen and then strode toward the elevator on the far side of the parking lot. Cole eyed the wizard as Stephen moved in behind him, cutting off any retreat toward the vehicle and wordlessly pressuring him to obey.
Grimacing, Cole put an arm around Lily’s shoulder, guiding the little girl onward. Dizzily, she stumbled and then caught her balance on his side, her eyes locked on the concrete as though watching it roil beneath her.
“What happened?” she asked again.
He didn’t answer. Up ahead, the elevator door pulled back, revealing a glistening chrome and wood-trimmed interior monitored by an array of tiny cameras all its own. By the opening, Vivian tapped her foot impatiently, her gaze on the exit from the garage.
“Cole?” Lily persisted.
His footsteps slowed. He could feel the wizards behind him, watching his every move. All around, the security cameras swept back and forth, covering every inch of the underground expanse.
He wasn’t breathing. He wasn’t sure he could anymore. Everything they’d gone through, and here they stood, watched by cameras and wizards, and squarely in the council’s hands.
And short of having an eight year old blow them all to hell and probably get herself killed, there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it.
He hated wizards. So much it hurt and the pain left him shaking. They manipulated people, used people, lied and killed and didn’t give a damn about people. But for Lily, every one of them were bastards, and if, a few floors up, he had the chance to do something about that, then maybe…
At his back, Stephen made a wordless growl. Cole closed his eyes.
Maybe…
He wondered what his mom and dad would think of him now.
Drawing a breath, he opened his eyes and led Lily to the elevator. The door slid closed.
“What’s going on?” the girl asked blearily.
“It’s going to be okay,” he said.
Brow furrowing, Lily winced as she looked up at him.
Her gaze caught on the wizards. The blood drained from her face.
“Lily,” Cole said as the elevator began to climb. “It’s going to be okay.”
She stared at him. Watching her carefully, he handed her the staff.
“Just… hang onto that,” he finished softly. “Alright?”
Trembling, she swallowed hard. Her gaze returned to the wizards and he could see the panic rising inside her.
“Hey,” he said. “I promise.”
She hesitated, and then nodded, clearly determined to trust his word. Resolutely, her grip on the staff tightened.
Cole looked back to the elevator door, watching his blurred reflection there.
He didn’t want to be a monster.
But maybe he didn’t have any choice.
*****
Behind the darkened windows of the limousine, Jamison glanced over as Brogan hung up the phone.
“They lost them near the fifteen hundred block of Midway Avenue, near Chaunessy Tower,” Brogan said. “But they think there’s a barrier hidden in the building walls.”
Jamison’s gaze slid to the man kneeled below. Sweat shone on the wizard’s face, while blood dribbled past his lips to stain the floor.
“What other defenses are there?” Jamison asked softly.
Ragged gasps escaped the man, his unseeing gaze locked on the carpet.
Expressionless, Jamison sent the wizard’s magic ripping back through his body, making the man thrash and scream. Ignoring the noise, Brogan turned in his seat and motioned the limousine driver onward.
“What other defenses?” Jamison repeated as the screams faded to whimpering.
“Each entrance…” the man whispered. “Twenty guards… dozen more… every level… security cameras… on the walls… alarms… on the outside doors…”
Tears slid from the man’s closed eyes as he fell silent.
“Excellent,” Jamison said. “And now…”
He lifted the man’s cell phone from the seat. “Tell them to lower the barrier. You have a prisoner. And you’re coming in.”
*****
“How much farther?” Ashe asked tensely.
Brentworth sighed. “Just a few more minutes, your majesty,” he said from the front passenger seat. “Though, as I have already explained, the council’s defenses are more than sufficient. I am certain they are fine.”
Eyeing the back of the man’s head, she fought the urge to snap at him. It was the same answer he’d given the past three times she’d asked.
She turned, checking the positions of the other vehicles. Two car lengths away, Elias and the twins followed in a dented Jeep that probably should have been put out of its misery a decade ago. Similarly, Luke and the other guards were another two lengths behind that, trailing in a tiny pipsqueak of a car that she marveled they could all fit inside. The retired councilmember apparently owned a dozen such vehicles, all registered under false names and stashed in nearby garages, just in case he’d ever needed them.
“And the king?” she asked, still watching the cars. “You’re certain he’s fine too?”
Silence answered her.
She turned back. “Councilman?”
“The king will not be an issue.”
Her gaze met Nathaniel’s briefly. “And why is that?”
Brentworth took a moment to respond. “Because there is a chance he has been dead for some time.”
Ashe’s eyebrows climbed. “What?”
“A ‘chance’?” Nathaniel repeated.
“We were unable to recover a body. At least, not the full components of one. But what we found pointed to the king being dead, yes.”
She paused, taking in the neutral tone with which he delivered the words. They could’ve been discussing missing pieces from a coffee table puzzle. “But you’re not sure?”
He shook his head.
“And you haven’t gone looking for him since?”
“We’ve looked your majesty,” Brentworth assured her. “Trust me on that.”
She glanced to Nathaniel incredulously. “So if your king isn’t dead, then what’s he doing? Why hasn’t he come back?”
Brentworth paused. Carefully, he turned to her.
“Because, if he is not dead, then he remains the leader of the Blood.”
Ashe froze. And then she blinked as her mind tried to play his words back again.
They didn’t sound any less terrifying the second time around.
“Excuse me?” she heard herself ask in a tone far too calm to be real.
“Victor Jamison, king of Taliesin, betrayed us all, your highness. If he is not dead, then he is the one hunting the Taliesin council. And the one who created those who call themselves the Blood.”
She looked down. Her hands were far away and ever-so-bizarrely numb. She wanted to laugh for some reason. Chuckle at an impossibility that wasn’t really f
unny at all.
The Taliesin king. And the winter night her family died. It’d all been true. Taliesin had killed them. He’d killed them. The Blood had killed them.
“Why?”
The word was raw. The calm tone was gone. Her mouth moved, but someone else was speaking now.
Silence answered. Her gaze snapped up to find Brentworth watching her, and at her expression, he sighed.
“Because he wanted power, your highness,” he said, as though it was obvious.
She trembled. Nathaniel glanced to her warily.
“I would choose your words carefully, councilor,” he warned Brentworth. “And do not lie to her or I assure you, she will make it the last thing you ever do.”
Brentworth’s gaze went between them briefly. He inclined his head. “As you say.”
For a long moment, he paused, weighing his words. A considering look flickered through his eyes.
“Taliesin is not like Merlin, your highness,” he began delicately. “Contrary to your manner of government, our council does not follow the rule of kings. We make a pretense of submission as a comfort to the people but, in actuality, our royalty are only figureheads. Icons for the purpose of morale. Nothing more.”
She didn’t respond. She wasn’t certain she could have if she’d tried.
“Victor sought to change that. After his father passed away, he resisted the council’s efforts to mold him into the king our people needed him to be. He wanted more power. More control. He wasn’t content to live as we had for nearly five centuries. And so there were… disagreements. The council was forced to go to greater and greater lengths to keep him in line, but our efforts failed. And we had no idea how unstable he had become.
“The king wanted to break the spell. In his mind, restoring magic to himself was the only way to truly overcome the council. And so, one snowy winter night, he did just that. With the aid of his supporters, he tracked down your family, slipped away from the bodyguards we’d assigned him, and then dressed as a delivery person and headed to your grandparents’ home. Last minute Christmas gifts, I’m given to understand. And when your grandfather answered the door…” Brentworth sighed. “He shot him. A silenced weapon, I would assume. But he took Nicholas’ blood, mixed it with his own and…”
Taliesin Ascendant (The Children and the Blood) Page 29