by A. L. Larsen
Darkness & Discovery
The Bespelled Trilogy, Book Two
By A.L. Larsen
Copyright 2012 by A.L.Larsen. All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission in whole or in part of this publication is permitted without express written consent from the author.
Dedicated with love and gratitude to
Lori Warner
Thank you for your kind words and encouragement!
Chapter One
It’s kind of an odd thing, getting ready for a first date with someone you’re already involved with. But that’s exactly what I was doing the day after Christmas. And I was nervous.
Alastair and I had already been through so much together. We’d survived kidnapping, imprisonment and attempted murder. And yet dating somehow seemed scary. Go figure.
Obviously, life had been…unusual since I met Alastair. My entire concept of the world and everything in it had been radically altered since the day I found him in my living room.
Finding out the guy you were falling for wasn’t human can do that to you.
Alastair had been part human, part angel before being turned into a vampire, and now he was one of a kind. A hybrid, basically. That uniqueness put a big target on his back, as did the fact that he was a vampire hunter.
Those revelations had been as shocking to Alastair as they’d been to me. Thanks to his manipulative maker, all of Alastair’s memories had been blocked by a spell in order to create a clean slate between the two of them. So he knew nothing about himself when we met, and had only learned a little since then.
Pretty soon we were going to track down the warlock that had cast the spell, and we were going to get Alastair’s memories back. But we’d needed a chance to heal and regroup first. We were currently at the end of several days of much needed down time, culminating in this date, as promised in a note Alastair had given me on Christmas.
My mind had been wandering, and realizing this I quickly pulled the curling iron I was holding out of my long brown hair. It had been in place too long, and now not only did I smell slightly singed, I also had one ridiculous banana curl immediately to the right of my face. I quickly tried to brush it out, but it just sprang back into shape. Awesome. I clipped it back with a barrette, and decided that was the best I could do.
I got up from my dressing table and took a look at myself in the full-length mirror on the back of my bedroom door. I was wearing a dark red sweater and my only skirt, which was brown wool and hit right above my knees, along with brown wool tights and boots. Ok, this outfit, like the rest of my wardrobe, didn’t exactly scream date night. In fact, it looked like I was ready to get dragged off to mass with Teddy’s family.
The thought of my ex-boyfriend Ted induced an instant frown line between my eyebrows. He’d gotten caught up in the danger that had come after Alastair, and had been taken hostage and almost died – only, he didn’t actually remember any of that. I’d asked my friend Joey, who was a vampire, to compel Ted and alter his memories. And even though I’d meant well, part of me still felt really guilty for doing that to him.
I fastened a silver charm bracelet around my wrist, a graduation gift from my Aunt Claire. And then I adjusted the beautiful opal pendant that Alastair had given me yesterday for Christmas, sliding the clasp to the back of my neck before holding my hand over the pendant for a moment. It was a flat stone about an inch in diameter, perfectly round and utterly luminous, in a silver setting that looked like delicate tree branches criss-crossing around a full moon. Alastair didn’t know its origin – he’d found it among his possessions and wanted me to have it. It made me smile every time I caught a glimpse of it, because it made me think of him.
After one last look in the mirror, I took a deep breath. This nervousness was surprising. I’d gotten comfortable with Alastair in a very short time. We’d even been living under the same roof since returning to Oregon. So, ok, the whole dating thing was new territory, but I was still surprised at the butterflies in my stomach. One more deep breath, and then I grabbed my coat and purse and left the bedroom.
Alastair wasn’t in his room at the far end of the hall, so I headed down the staircase, where I found him pacing anxiously in the living room. He paused when he saw me, and I tried really hard not to trip and fall down the remaining stairs. He was dressed in a dark blue button-down shirt that brought out his indigo eyes, along with dark jeans. And he’d tried to tame his thick dark hair, but styling products really didn’t stand a chance against that much unruliness.
He was so incredibly beautiful that I couldn’t help but stare. And then I realized he was looking at me exactly the same way I was looking at him. It was baffling that I could have the same effect on him that he had on me.
Alastair was the first to regain the power of speech, and quickly grabbed a bouquet of flowers from an end table, bringing them to the foot of the stairs. “These are for you. You look absolutely beautiful, Lu,” he said softly. His British accent was a bit more pronounced when he was nervous.
I took the bouquet of bright red tulips from him as I stepped down into the living room, and felt a blush rising in my cheeks. “Thanks. You look great, too. And thank you for these. I don’t think I’ve ever seen tulips in December.”
“Oh – is that strange? Maybe I should have gotten something else, a poinsettia or something. There were lots of those at the market.” He looked flustered.
“These are way better than a poinsettia. I’m going to go put them in water,” I said, heading to the kitchen.
Joey stuck his head out of his room as I filled up a vase at the sink. He grinned broadly when he saw me and said, “Well, dang. Almost didn’t recognize you without the yoga pants.”
I rolled my eyes and put the flowers in the vase, then carried them back into the living room, where I set them carefully in the center of the coffee table. Joey trailed behind me and murmured, “And Alastair’s right, you look beautiful.” Of course with his vampire hearing, he’d heard everything we’d said to each other.
“Thanks.” I looked closely at my best friend. He stuck a bright smile on his face when he noticed me studying him, but I’d seen the momentary look of sadness that clouded his pale green eyes. “Do you want to come along, Joey?”
“If I come along, then it stops being a date. And a date is what Alastair promised you. Besides, there’s a Bruce Lee marathon on tonight, so I’m set. Have I told you that satellite TV rocks?”
“Yeah, you might have mentioned it,” I said with a grin. “About a million times in the last week.” I watched him for another moment. He still had a cheerful expression on his face, but I knew he felt left out. “You’re sure you don’t want to come with us?”
“Positive.”
“Ok.” I squeezed his arm and said, “In that case, we’ll see you in a few hours.”
“Take your time. Me and Bruce Lee, we got a lot of catching up to do.”
I turned to Alastair. “You ready to go?”
He’d put on a black leather jacket and was fidgeting nervously. But he nodded and said, “Absolutely.”
My little fabric purse, which I grabbed from the couch, felt heavier than it should. I glanced inside and muttered, “You again.”
“Are you talking to your purse?” Joey asked with a smile.
“No, it’s even crazier than that. I’m talking to a knife.” I pulled an ornate silver dagger out of the bag. Its handle looked like two intertwined snakes, their tails wrapped around a royal blue stone. It had been given to me recently by Bryn, a friend and warlock, and apparently it was bespelled.
“You’re right, that is crazy,” Joey said cheerfully, as I set the
knife on the fireplace mantel.
“It keeps following me around. Every time I open a drawer, there it is.”
“Well, since it saved our bacon when we were rescuing Alastair, I’m gonna guess it’s not a bad thing that it follows you around,” Joey said. “It probably bonded with you.”
“Which is super weird, since it’s an inanimate object,” I pointed out.
“Object: yes. Inanimate: apparently not so much.”
“Can you imagine how much trouble I’d be in,” I said, “if it suddenly appeared in my bag when I was trying to go through airport security, or something like that?”
Joey said, “I think it’s kinda cool that it likes you. I wish I had a weapon like that.”
“Well, you and Knifey hang out and watch Bruce Lee together. Then maybe it’ll bond with you instead,” I said, slinging the thin strap of my purse over my shoulder. Before I even made it to the front door, my purse thumped against my hip and got significantly heavier. I sighed and kept going.
Christmas was still in full swing in downtown Ashland, Oregon, lights festooning everything. I’d found it annoying a few weeks ago, when I’d been trying to ignore the holiday season. But my life had been at rock bottom then, and now that it was on the upswing I could actually appreciate how festive my town was this time of year.
Alastair took my hand hesitantly as we window-shopped on the plaza, and I glanced up at him. “Is this ok?” he asked.
I squeezed his hand reassuringly. “It’s way better than ok.”
“I don’t have a clue what I’m doing, you know,” he told me. “I doubt I ever dated much. So please tell me if I do anything wrong, stupid, or embarrassing. Especially tell me if I do all three at once.”
“You can’t really mess this up, Allie,” I said gently. “You and I already care about each other. I know the dating thing feels unfamiliar, and I’m nervous, too. But really, we should both just relax.”
“I think I know what would help me relax,” he said with a little grin.
“What’s that?”
He stopped walking and tugged my hand gently, pulling me into his arms. And then he brushed his lips to mine.
My heart felt like it was going to beat its way out of my chest, that’s how affected I was by his kiss. Everything about Alastair made me want to hyperventilate. I wondered if I’d ever get used to it, to him. He was literally one of a kind, a mix of things I could barely comprehend, brought together into one extraordinary, gorgeous person.
I tried to laugh off my butterflies, and said, “That’s the opposite of relaxing.”
He put his arm around my shoulders and smiled. “Thought it was worth a shot.”
We strolled into Lithia Park and lingered on the little bridge over the creek, leaning on the railing and against each other and relaxing bit by bit. “Tell me something, Lu. Something I don’t already know about you,” he said.
“Like what?”
Alastair turned toward me and pulled me close, resting his forehead against mine. “Tell me anything at all. I love hearing the sound of your voice.”
“Um…ok.” I blurted the first random thing that came to mind. “When I was six, I was convinced I could turn invisible just by shutting my eyes. I figured if I couldn’t see anyone, they couldn’t see me either.”
His face lit up with a big smile. “Sound logic.”
I was smiling too as I said, “The dumbest part is, I kept testing it out. I ran into a lot of walls that summer, because I kept walking around with my eyes shut.”
“Why’d you want to be invisible?”
I shrugged. “Doesn’t everyone dream of having superpowers at one point or another?”
“I suppose so. But why not fantasize about, oh, flying, for example? Or being super strong, or something like that?”
Because my childhood sucked, and I’d wanted to be invisible so I could hide from my life. I didn’t say that out loud, because that really didn’t seem like cheery date banter. Instead I smiled and said, “You know, in all likelihood, you possess both of those superpowers.”
“I doubt it.”
“Joey thinks you can transform into your angel half. He’s never seen it, but he’s pretty convinced it’s possible. And if you did, you know what that means.”
“That I could fly?”
“And that I’d expect you to give me a ride,” I joked.
But he frowned a little and said, “I hope you never see me like that.”
“In angel form? Why not?”
He turned his head and watched the rushing creek as he said, “Joey describes angels as terrifying. I couldn’t bear it if you were frightened of me.”
I rested my palm on his cheek and gently turned his face toward mine. “I could never be afraid of you, Allie.”
“Then you’re braver than I am, Lu. Because I scare the hell out of myself.” He said that so softly, not meeting my eyes.
“Why?”
“Because part of me is a monster. Because I have the ability to kill, apparently without remorse. And another part is so far removed from human that I can’t even begin to understand it.” He turned away from me again, looking back out at the creek. “I worry about what I’ll become when I get my memories back. Well…not become. But revert back to.”
“You’ll still be you, Allie. This part of you, the part that’s so sweet and gentle, isn’t going to go away when you remember who you are.”
“I hope you’re right.” He took a deep breath and turned toward me, trying to lighten the mood with a little smile and a squeeze of my hand. “No point in worrying about it now. You’re probably hungry. Let’s go get some dinner.” And he took my hand and led me off the bridge and back toward the plaza.
We had dinner at Greenleaf. Well, I did, anyway. Alastair ordered a cup of soup, but didn’t so much eat it as experiment with it. He scooped up a spoonful and stuck the tip of his tongue in it, and then tried to identify all the ingredients based on what it smelled like. Well hey, that’s what happens when your date isn’t actually human.
After dinner, we walked hand in hand a few blocks to the Varsity Theater. It hadn’t snowed in a couple weeks, but it was still bitterly cold, and I’d been too nervous about the date to remember a hat and gloves. Alastair realized I was cold just as we reached the theater. Maybe my subtle attempts at blotting my running nose with the back of my hand had tipped him off. “Lu, you’re freezing,” he said with concern, and pulled me into his arms.
His jacket was unzipped, and I slid my arms under it and around his body, holding him close. There was something reassuring about the way he felt, so strong and solid. And he was warm – really warm. That had to be the angel side of him, because most vampires ran the same temperature as the air. I snuggled against him and the rest of the world just sort of disappeared.
For about two seconds, anyway.
“Lu?” a familiar voice asked.
I stepped back from Alastair and mumbled, “Hi Teddy.”
My ex-boyfriend looked pale and thin, his slightly too long hair sticking out from under a knit cap, dark circles evident behind his glasses, his hands thrust into the pockets of his old ski jacket. He glanced from me to Alastair and back again, clearly confused.
I had asked Joey to compel him, to make Ted forget he’d been abducted by werewolves and imprisoned by vampires, because I didn’t want him to know there were monsters in the world. I’d wanted him to feel safe, wanted him to be able to keep living a normal life. But I felt guilty for manipulating him, on top of feeling terrible about all that had happened to him because of me.
And the fact that he looked so lost only compounded my guilt. I also had to wonder how thorough the compelling had been, since it kind of looked like he was experiencing déjà vu right now.
“How have you been, Lu?” he asked, his brow still wrinkled in confusion.
“Good. Uh, this is Alastair,” I told him. “Alastair, Ted.” The two shook hands awkwardly. They’d seen each other before, but that was one of th
e things that had been wiped from Ted’s memory. “How are you, Teddy?”
“Ok, I guess, but it’s been a pretty weird winter break.”
“How so?”
“Well…I went to San Francisco by myself for some reason, and got mugged. My truck got stolen. I only remember the sketchiest details. Next thing I knew, I was at my cousin’s house in Berkeley. He bought me a bus ticket home.”
My guilt ratcheted up a couple more notches. Ted had just repeated the cover story that Joey had implanted when he’d compelled him. And his truck was at my place. He’d gone there looking for me, and that’s when he’d gotten snatched by a pack of werewolves that had been watching my house. The truck wouldn’t start (I’d planned to anonymously leave it in Ted’s driveway) and I still didn’t know what to do about that. It was impossible to tow it down the steep, windy mountain road leading from my home in the woods. I knew that because Joey and I had tried, and we’d almost wound up with both my Bronco and the truck at the bottom of a ravine.
“That sucks,” I murmured. But what I was thinking was, I suck.
Ted was staring at Alastair, and now he asked, “Do I know you?” Ok, yeah, definite déjà vu.
Alastair watched him closely as he said, “Maybe you’ve seen me around town.”
“Maybe,” Ted agreed, but he didn’t look quite convinced.
“So, are you here for the new Joss Whedon movie?” I asked, in a desperate attempt to change the subject.
“I just saw it, I’m on my way out. Are you seeing it, too?”
“Yup. Wait, you saw it today? It’s been out for a while. I’m surprised you weren’t here on opening day,” I said, a little too cheerfully.
Ted grinned a little at that. “I did see it opening day, and a few times since then. You know I love me some Joss.” He looked like his old self, but only for a moment before the lost expression returned. “If you two are on your way in, I should let you go. I know you hate walking into a theater when the previews have already started, Lu.”
“Take care, Teddy,” I said.