He stood at the bottom of the stairs until he heard her door close, then headed for the study to report to Daniel, although it felt a little bit wrong. When his brother saw him in the doorway, he motioned him inside. “Where is she?”
“Taking a nap,” he said, then filled his brother in on Willow’s conversation with Michelle.
When he was finished, Daniel sat back in his chair and looked off into space, which Taylor knew meant he was turning it all over in his mind. “I don’t know if I like the idea of Willow searching for her magic here. We have no idea what she’s going to do when she gets it back.”
“You still don’t trust her,” Taylor said, feeling annoyed with his brother’s stubborn refusal to see that Willow meant them no harm.
Daniel sighed. “It’s my job not to trust her,” he said. “I should have sent her with Michelle, but I didn’t want her and Amanda together. Maybe I can find another witch to take her; this spirit thing is way beyond me.”
Taylor began to panic, the thought of Daniel sending Willow away making his blood freeze in his veins. “You can’t do that,” he said, a bit louder than he intended, but went on anyway. “We can’t just turn our backs on her; she’s our responsibility. Besides, we don’t even know what she’s supposed to do yet.”
Daniel stared at him for a minute, then asked, “Why do you care so much?”
The question caught him off guard, and it took him a minute to answer. “She’s not a bad person; she just got caught up in something she shouldn’t have. Her magic is gone, Daniel; I don’t think she can defend herself if Lucas comes after her and you know that he will.”
“Yes, and that’s the only thing that’s kept her here so far, but once her magic comes back, there’s nothing to stop her from using it on us, so you can’t blame me for being cautious,” Daniel said.
Taylor had only one argument left. “What’s going to happen when Lucas finds out her magic is gone and that she’s worth nothing to him?”
When he saw Daniel’s face soften, he knew he’d won. “She can stay for now, but I want to know what she’s up to,” he said, then narrowed his eyes at Taylor. “I hope you’re not getting yourself involved too deeply. I’d hate to see you hurt when she finally leaves, and we both know she will someday.”
Chapter Six
***Willow***
Willow woke to someone knocking on her door but wasn’t ready to face the new reality of her life, so she reached for the other pillow, planning to cover her head. But when she pulled on it, it didn’t move, and the knocking continued. Frustrated, she tugged at the pillow and almost immediately there was a huge crash as something went tumbling off the bed.
Surprised, she sat up in bed and looked over at the empty side. Except, that it wasn’t empty; it was piled with books, the only open space where the pillow had been resting. She stared at the empty spot for a few seconds, afraid what she’d see if she looked around the room, then finally lifted her head.
She must have let out a cry of alarm because Taylor came charging through the door. “What’s wrong?” he asked, “I heard a loud noise and then you...” but his words trailed off when he saw the room.
Willow tore her eyes away from the stacks of books, manuscripts, and journals that covered every available surface, her eyes meeting his. “It wasn’t like this when I went to sleep,” she said, her voice shaking.
Taylor carefully picked his way across the room between the stacks and held out his hand. “Let’s get out of here for a second,” he said.
She took his hand, hers shaking and together they carefully made their way to the door, his hand holding hers in a firm grip that helped chase away the shock. When they got into the hallway, he shut the door and looked down at her.
“Looks like the spirits have spoken,” he said, grinning at her.
Willow looked over at the bedroom door, her brain finally beginning to work. “I guess that was a not so subtle hint, but I’ve spent the last two years studying spells. I don’t see how more studying is going to help,” she said, sighing with frustration.
Taylor reached over and turned her face so she was looking at him. “We’ll figure it out,” he said, “but it’s past lunchtime: that’s why I came looking for you. You’ll feel better after you eat something.”
Willow smiled at him, feeling warmth spread through her when she realized that he was taking care of her again. “You’re always taking care of me,” she said.
“I can’t seem to help myself,” he said, grinning at her.
When they started down the stairs, he took her hand, and she didn’t pull away, the comfort of his big hand holding hers too nice to give up. Everyone was waiting for them in the dining room, and unlike this morning, there were smiles when they walked in the room, except Daniel, who still looked suspicious.
“Did you have a nice nap?” Natasha asked.
“It was nice until I woke up,” Willow said, trying to decide how to tell Daniel what her room looked like. “Something happened while I was sleeping.”
Daniel opened his mouth, but Taylor jumped in. “Willow’s room is full of books and papers; they’re everywhere, stacked on the floor and even the bed.”
“What kind of papers?” Daniel asked, his eyes narrowing with suspicion.
Willow looked at Taylor, then back at Daniel, “Umm, I’m not sure. I didn’t look at any of them; I was a little shocked to see it all,” she said.
Daniel got to his feet. “Well, maybe we’d better all go have a look,” he said.
If the situation hadn’t been so serious, Willow would have laughed as everyone got to their feet and filed upstairs behind Daniel. When he threw open the bedroom door, it bumped against a stack of books, which tumbled over, hitting the next stack, and soon the room was an even worse mess than it had been when they left.
They all stared at the mess for a few seconds, before Taylor’s brother Max said, “This is going to take forever to clean up; glad it’s not my room.”
Taylor elbowed him in the ribs. “This is what your room would look like if we didn’t have a housekeeping staff.”
Everyone laughed and some of the tension disappeared, but Daniel cleared his throat and said, “I think after lunch, we’d better figure out what all this is about.”
“That’s exactly what I told Willow,” Taylor said, looking down at her and giving her a reassuring smile.
Willow tried to smile back at him, but the smile felt forced, and she didn’t know if she’d be able to eat a thing at lunch. It had never occurred to her that Daniel would think she was to blame for the books, and in a way, she was, but she hadn’t brought them to the house herself, hadn’t asked for them.
Now that she’d calmed down, she knew that the spirits had sent the books, but it was going to be hard to explain that to Daniel. He surprised her after lunch by going back up to the room with them and helping dig through the piles of books and papers.
They’d been working for ten minutes when Daniel stood up and said, “From what I can see, you’ve got the biggest library on the history of witchcraft ever collected. If you’re supposed to read all this, it’s going to take a year.”
Willow nodded looking around her, “I’m sure it’s the spirits who sent all this, I just don’t know what they expect me to do with it. I can’t possibly read it all, but I don’t know what else to do.”
“Maybe there’s something in all this that tells you how to get your magic back,” Taylor suggested. “I’ll help you look.”
Willow looked around the room again, feeling discouraged. “Thank you, Taylor, but I don’t even know how we’d make a dent,” she said, then got an idea. “Maybe if we sort them, somehow it will all make more sense.”
“It looks like you have a busy afternoon. I’ll send up drinks and snacks,” Natasha said.
“Taylor and Max will stay and help you,” Daniel said, and it was clear that it was an order, not a request.
Max groaned, but Taylor smiled. “We’d love to.”
I
t took hours, but by late afternoon, they had everything sorted into piles that seemed more manageable. Willow felt a little better, but nothing had changed, and she knew that her only choice was to sit down and start reading.
***Taylor***
Days passed as the three pored over books, manuscripts, old journals, and even a few contemporary novels that had them all either laughing or scared out of their wits. They also discovered that witches weren’t the only topic contained in the collection; there were books about shifters, werewolves, and even a few on vampires.
What had at first been an overwhelming chore had become an obsession for all three as they tried to piece together what the writings were trying to tell them. Taylor and Max were slumped in chairs by the fireplace, exhausted, heads throbbing from days of looking at faded print.
“Well, we’ve gone through it all, at least looked at everything that’s here, but I’m still not sure what it all means,” Max said, his brow furrowed, his annoyance clear. “If the spirits wanted to tell you something, Willow, they’re not doing a very good job of communicating.”
Willow was in the closet sorting through one last stack of books. “I feel like we’re missing something,” she said, her reply muffled.
“Okay,” Taylor said, getting to his feet. “Let’s talk about what we do know, what we’ve learned from all this.”
“We know that all these books are about paranormal creatures,” Max offered.
“But it leans heavily towards witches,” Taylor added.
Max opened his mouth to add something else, but Willow called, “I found it, I found what we’ve been looking for.”
Taylor was across the room in seconds. “What did you find?” he asked, peering into the closet.
Willow held out her hand to him and he helped her up, noticing that her hands were shaking. “This is it. This is what all of this is about. Look,” she said, holding out a bound notebook. “I think this is a rough draft, but oh, this can’t be right.”
Taylor took the notebook from her shaking hands and sat back down in his chair, read the first page, then looked back up at her. “I just opened it and started reading like I’ve been doing all day. I didn’t see the title until after,” she said, then nodded to the notebook. “Read it.”
He flipped open the notebook and began to read, his brain swimming with information, his heart pounding with excitement. When he finished, he wanted to read it again, but Willow was pacing restlessly back and forth across the room, and he knew he had to say something.
“I think this is his library. I think this is what he based some of this on,” he said, pointing first to the stacks of material around the room and then the notebook. “I wonder where his research is.”
“Taylor, why is all of this here; why do we have it?” Willow asked, a hint of fear in her words.
“You two have lost me,” Max said. “Let me see that thing.”
Taylor handed the notebook over to Max, whose eyes got big when he saw the title. “I’ll skip reading this for now, but does this say what I think it does?”
They both nodded. “And it looks like he’s got the research to back it up,” Taylor said.
The three stared at each other, true understanding of what they’d just learned still out of reach. “I’m going to take a break; this is more than I can handle right now. My head already hurt, and now it’s pounding,” Max said, rubbing his temples.
They watched Max leave, then Taylor said, “I didn’t want to say anything in front of Max, he already seems a bit freaked out, but I know him. I know Professor Miller, or at least I used to, but I never imagined he was doing anything like this.”
Willow stared at him for a second. “What? You know him?”
Taylor nodded, “I met him when I was in college; he was one of my professors for a couple of semesters. He’s a brilliant man. But one day he just disappeared, never showed up for class, and when they got into his lab, they found blood samples, human blood samples,” Taylor explained. “It was a huge scandal at the time.”
“That was his research,” Willow said.
“Or at least the first stage. Just think about how many samples he could have gotten from the students. I gave him one,” Taylor said, shaking his head. “No one knew, not even the society, and now we do. What are we supposed to do with this?”
Willow was still staring at him. “The society?” she finally asked.
Taylor sighed; he hadn’t meant to mention The Opal Society, but it was as much a part of him as his family was. “I guess no one has told you about it.”
When Willow shook her head, he said, “Then we’d better sit down for a second. I’m probably not supposed to tell you about this, but I think you should know.”
He waited until she sat down, not liking the suspicious look in her eyes, but aware that she’d been through a lot lately. “Not very many people know about The Opal Society; it’s a secret group that protects the world from evil dragon shifters. My family has been a part of it for generations, passing on leadership from father to son.”
“So, Daniel is the leader now?” Willow asked.
Taylor nodded. “And if he can’t do the job, it goes to Adam next, but I doubt that will happen.”
“Why not?” Willow asked, thinking that it sounded a little like the family was royalty.
“Daniel is one of the strongest dragon shifters ever born; he was even part of a prophecy,” Taylor said, shaking his head. “That’s why Lucas wants him dead; with Daniel gone, he’s sure it will be easy to destroy the society.”
“Lucas painted a much different picture when he finally told me what he wanted me to do. He said that your family used their power for their own good, that for generations you’ve been slowly killing off other dragon shifters to keep that power,” Willow said, her voice small and quiet. “He said your wealth was tainted by the blood of dragon shifters.”
Chapter Seven
***Willow***
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she was sorry she’d said them, but things were so much different than Lucas had made them out to be. Suddenly she understood why Daniel had been so cautious, why he’d kept her locked up for days, and knew that it would take a long time for him to trust her.
She wondered again why she was here, why she hadn’t just left when she’d had the chance. But looking around the room, she knew that she was supposed to be here, that some force far greater than her was at work.
“There’s more going on here than just my magic,” she said, gesturing around the room, her eyes coming to rest on the notebook.
Taylor nodded. “I think so too. I think it’s something that started a long time ago, something that has thrown things off balance, and if what’s in that notebook is true, it’s only just begun.”
Willow let that sink in for a second before saying, “But why is what’s in there so important? I mean, it’s exciting and interesting, but why is it so important? Why would the spirits give it to us?”
Taylor hesitated for a second, then plunged all the way in; he’d come this far, so he had to tell her the rest. “We’re dying out, Willow. Not just dragon shifters, but other shifters and witches too. Over the decades, our powers have been getting weaker and weaker, and it won’t be long before we’re all gone.”
He could see that she still didn’t understand. “Don’t you see that we’re slowly killing ourselves because we refuse to mix together? Our blood is slowly being weakened by purity, and the only way to fix that is to change everything we believe.”
“So, you’re saying that witches and shifters should intermarry, have families together to keep us strong?” Willow asked, still a bit perplexed. “I guess I never thought about it before. I mean, no one ever told me that wasn’t allowed.”
Taylor nodded. “In my world, we’re strictly forbidden from intermixing with humans, witches, or even other shifters. It’s been a long-standing tradition that’s become more like law in the dragon shifter world.”
Willow sigh
ed in frustration, “I wish I could say that helped, but it just made the problem bigger. I can’t figure out what the spirits are trying to tell me; it’s just too much to process.”
“I think it’s time we showed this to Daniel,” Taylor said. “It’s something we’ve been discussing for a long time. I wonder what the council would say if they saw this.”
Willow followed him down the stairs, an even bigger weight on her shoulders, more confused that she’d ever been. They found Daniel in his study with the door open. Taylor knocked on the door and poked his head inside. “We’re both coming in,” he said.
Daniel scowled but didn’t protest, so they stepped up to the desk. Taylor didn’t say anything, just put the notebook down on the desk in front of him. He picked it up and read the title, then set it down again.
“Where did you get this?” he asked.
“It was under a pile of books in the closet,” Willow said, her voice cracking with nerves.
Taylor turned and looked over at her, saw the look on her face, then reached out to take her hand. When he had her small hand firmly in his, she relaxed and gave him a little smile. Daniel looked back down at the notebook, then flipped open the first page and read it.
“I think you’d better give me some time to read this,” he said. “I’ll find you when I’m done.”
It took him nearly an hour to come looking for them, but when he saw them, he demanded, “I need to see the books and papers in your room.”
Willow led the way, her legs shaking as they climbed the stairs. Daniel had a look on his face that made her nervous, and she hoped that his intensity wasn’t aimed at her. When she opened the door for him, she let him go in alone, happy to keep her distance from him.
He walked around the room, taking everything in, then picked up a few books and looked through them. “Some of this stuff is very old; in fact, it should be kept in a controlled environment,” he finally said, stepping back out of the room and closing the door. “If it’s still there tomorrow, we’ll have to move it all to a more suitable place.”
Dragon's Flame (Dragons Secret Society Book 3) Page 4