I kept the magic energy ball in my hand and called out to the others. “Stop! He’s just siphoning the powers you’re throwing at him.”
Alataris arched his back, rolled his shoulder, then cracked his neck. “Yes, you see, only a fool would come unprepared to face your little rag tag team.”
“And yet my power gets to you.”
“A minor error on my part. I only accounted for the power coming in.” He pursed his lips and shook his head. “No matter. I won’t make the same mistake twice. But before I go, do take my offer into consideration.”
Tucker scoffed. “Come on, Zin. We need to go.”
“Just a sec.” I refocused on Alataris. “I will never join you . . . Dad.” I spat the word like it was an insult.
“Ah, but my dear. That apple doesn’t fall far from this tree . . . you’ll come around.” Then he smiled. He actually freaking smiled at me.
All my frustration, my distain for his arrogance, my fear of turning out just like him, my fear for my mother whom he held captive bubbled up my throat and I screamed. Then I launched the ball straight at his chest. It collided squarely with his torso and sent him flying up and over my crew. He smashed into the wall and slid to the ground. He lay motionless for only a moment before he rolled to his back and sat up, facing me and grinning like the Cheshire cat. Blood coated his teeth. A nasty gash ran down the side of his face and he cradled his arm. “See, apple tree, my dear.” Then he was gone, disappearing into a cloud of black smoke.
I swayed on my feet, feeling drained of all the power I’d siphoned from him. Ophelia moved beside me. “I’ve never seen him like that.”
Tuck threw my arm over his shoulder and held me up. “Like what?”
Just a little nap would be nice.
Ophelia ducked under my other arm. “So interactive, so smooth. Why do you think he even came here without his army?”
Tuck shrugged. “To intimidate us, prove he isn’t scared to take us on all by himself.”
I shook my head. “That’s not why.”
They both stopped in mid step and looked at me.
Ophelia rolled her eyes. “Okay, tell me why then.”
“Because for the first time in ages we are the only witch court to come this far.”
“So?” Ophelia started to walk toward the exit.
I wasn’t sure how much of my power I’d put into that ball, but it’d drained me completely. “So, I do believe Alataris is . . . afraid.”
Chapter 11
Alataris
She grows stronger by the day. I landed in the middle of my throne room. Black smoke fanned out from the portal I’d used to get away from her, from all of them. I gathered my magic and healed the cut I’d received, yet the aching in my body continued. Everything here was so quiet . . . too quiet. I needed people and action around me to think. “Catherine! Bring her to me now!”
The warlocks who stood at the entrance of the throne room jumped into action. They collided with each other before scrambling out the door. “Idiots! Complete morons!” They’re weak just like the rest of the pond scum I employ. No wonder those . . . children are gaining power.
“Catherine now!” I bellowed her name and the sound of it echoed off the stone walls. It was the middle of the night and she might very well be asleep, but I didn’t care. I needed her now. I paced back and forth, always the black hole of madness threating to take over. It was exhausting, all of it. Why couldn’t they see I just wanted to help all of the witch kind? Didn’t they know we belonged at the top of the food chain? I clasped my hands behind my back and turned to walk in the other direction. I counted each of my footsteps. One, two, three, four, five, six . . . turn. I did this seven more times. By the eighth turn the blackness that normally swallowed my vision receded. “If you don’t bring her to me soon, I swear I will bleed you all dry and turn you into thralls!”
Catherine was shoved through the doorway by the two guards. The shackles around her wrists rattled, yet even as my prisoner she was beautiful. With her wild chocolate hair that fanned out from her face in thick waves, knowing sapphire eyes, and heart-shaped face that was my undoing when I first met her. Had I been a wise man I would’ve stayed away from the likes of her and now because I couldn’t, our hellion of an offspring was poised to try and kill me. With my other offspring at her side. Perhaps I shouldn’t have tried to kill them? Nah, it was wise. After all I killed my own father to get the crown. Best not let history repeat itself.
“Alataris!”
I jumped at the sound of my name. “What?”
Catherine rolled her eyes at me. “I’ve been standing here for fifteen minutes, waiting for you to say something.” She blew a piece of her hair out of her face then rubbed her hands down her ripped jeans. Dried blood coated the skin under her shackles and around the metal rubbing against them. The only difference between her wrists and mine was I cleaned the blood away and kept it hidden with my jacket. She was my soul mate and what happened to her . . . happened to me. “You know if you didn’t try to escape, I would let you move about the castle.”
“Let me be clear, this isn’t some kind of let’s move in together situation where I’m going to roam around your castle like the good little wife you want me to be. You kidnapped me against my will. I have no desire to be here with you. I hate you.” Her hands curled into fists.
“How dare you speak to me like that?” I stormed toward her and raised my hand to crack her across the face. She didn’t flinch away, didn’t even budge. I dropped my arm and shoved away from her. “You’re not worth the sting in my hand.”
“Any you’re not worth the shit under my boots, yet here we are.” She pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes at me.
I stomped up the two stairs leading to my throne. Pain shot through my ribs and down my arm from taking the hit from Zinnia’s magic. So much power. Catherine turned to face me. I leaned back against the chair and looked down my nose at her. “Talk to me.” I waved a dismissive hand toward her as though she were nothing. In truth she was everything.
“Dance, monkey, dance, is that it?” She turned for the door. “Guards, take me back to my cell.”
I jumped to my feet. Anger flooded my veins and I saw red. “The insolence.”
The two guards by the door shoved their hands under her arms, lifted her up, and placed her back in front of me. As they walked away from her, Catherine kicked her leg out, connecting with the back of one of the guard’s knees, knocking him to the ground. She spun around and brought her heel across the side of his head, knocking him unconscious. The other guard rounded on her. He held his hands out, gathering magic in his palms. Catherine didn’t hesitate. She jumped at him and wrapped the chains from her handcuffs around his neck and yanked him down to the ground. He landed face first and she shoved her knee into his back. The chains clanked together as she pulled them tighter. She was magnificent.
I clapped my hands. “Good show. Now let him go.”
“Why should I?” She spoke through thin lips. She’d taken out two of my men in less than two minutes and hadn’t broken a sweat.
“Because if you don’t, I will have to weaken you and we both know how you hate that.” I put my most impassive face on that I could muster. But she was exquisite. When Zinnia finally sees the light and joins me, it would be for the better. Once she fell in line Catherine would have no option but to follow.
“Fine.” She grabbed the back of the guard’s head and slammed it into the ground, rendering him unconscious as well. She pulled the chains from around his neck and rose to her feet. “If you’ll excuse me . . . back to my cell I go.”
She took three steps and I called out, “I saw Zinnia tonight.”
Her back stiffened. “What did you do to her?” She spun to face me. “If you hurt her, I swear—”
“My dear, look at me. Surely you feel the ache in your ribs and down your arm. I am worse for the wear not her.”
“How . . .” She cleared her throat and shifted from one foot to
the other. “How is she?”
“Formidable.”
She took two stiff steps toward me. “I swear if you hurt her . . .”
“You’ll what? Remain here in my dungeon?” A chuckle bubbled up my lips and I shifted in my seat. The cushion behind my back and under me helped my weary body.
Catherine’s gaze locked onto the torch on the wall. “I only wanted to see her one last time.”
“Don’t be silly, once she accepts my offer all will be exactly as I planned.” Evermore was a naïve world. They all needed to see I was here to protect them, to guide them. They only needed to see the error of their ways. Even now my magic was integral to Evermore. I was everything they needed and they didn’t even know it.
Catherine tilted her head to the side. “What offer?”
“To join my side, of course.”
She gave a single humorless bark of laughter. “She will never join you.”
“Then she will die.” Just like all the others.
“Not if I have anything to do with it.” She spun around toward the door and marched toward it.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Women. Who the hell understood their twisted minds? They never made sense, not even the teenage ones in my way.
She held her hand in the air and the cuff slid farther down her arm, exposing the soul mate mark we shared. “What’s yours is mine . . . including our fate.” She took off running down the hall.
I chased after her. Blackness swarmed my vision. My temper burned through me. It pressed on my chest and made the muscles in my body quake. How dare she threaten my life with her soul mate mark? She was small and quick, but I was taller, and my strides ate up the distance between us. My breaths came in angry puffs, still I pursued her down the long hall. She made a quick turn down another. I rounded the corner and was smacked in the face by her chains.
I saw stars and stumbled back. She too stumbled against the wall. I staggered to my feet. “We share a fate, remember?” I motioned to her face and the angry circular marks on her cheek that I knew would match the ones stinging my face.
I lunged forward and shoved her up against the wall, pinning her arms above her head. I pressed my body against her. Catherine squirmed and kicked her legs, yet I held her still. “Don’t forget, I am the most powerful. And if you think I’ve come this far to only let you be my weakness, you thought wrong. I will keep you locked here forever. There will be no escaping me and there will be no ending me.”
I reached up and wrapped my hands in the chains and yanked her to me. “My enemies will never use you against me.”
Catherine narrowed her eyes and pulled back on her chains. “Careful. You never know who your enemies are.”
I pulled her down the hallway, dragging her back to the throne room. I shoved her to the wall across from it. I summoned my magic and held my hands up. Chains shot out around her body, wrapping around her arms and legs, anchoring her to the wall. “Too bad you’ll never leave here.” I turned away from her. “All that’s left to deal with is our daughter.”
“If that’s the case, then you’ve already lost. Zinnia will never give in to you.” She choked on her words. “My only regret is I won’t be around long enough to see it.”
Chapter 12
Tuck
The people in the club poured out the doors into the streets. All that remained behind were our crew and Elle. Zinnia sagged between Ophelia and me. Her legs gave out and we let her slip to the ground. She looked up at me with half-lidded eyes. “I just need to take a little nap.”
Elle ducked under Brax’s arm and the big softy that he was, he let her. She dropped to the ground and let Zinnia’s head fall into her lap. “What happened to her?”
I brushed the hair back from Zinnia’s face. “She used too much of her magic all at once.”
“All of her, say that again, magic?” Elle looked down at her with wide eyes.
Ophelia shoved her hand into the inside of her blazer. “Open her mouth.”
“What do you have in there? A whole bloody pharmacy of potions?” Grayson dropped to his knees beside me. “She’s going to be fine, boss. Just fine.”
“I know.” They all closed in on us, making a tight circle. “She’s only exhausted, nothing more.”
Ophelia held a small vial of glowing violet liquid up. “This will wake her up. Well, not only wake her but more like a shot of atropine to the heart that’ll last for hours and hours.”
I grabbed her wrist and stopped her from dropping the potion into Zinnia’s mouth. “Why would we need to do that now? Why not just let her sleep it off?”
Ophelia closed her eyes and sighed. “Because he won’t expect it tonight. Not after he showed up here.”
I sat back on my heels and looked up into the faces of my crew. Here we were in the middle of a dance floor in New York City with the lights on, the crowd emptied, and the lingering smell of shifter hanging in the air. “Are you suggesting—”
“That you let me give my sister this potion to wake her ass up and we go after the crown. That’s exactly what I’m suggesting.”
“Bloody risky but also bloody brilliant.” Grayson shrugged.
Beckett moved in closer. “If we do this we’re going to need one other person to help.”
I let go of Ophelia’s hand. “Who?”
She tipped the potion into her mouth. “Cross.”
“Why him?”
Zinnia sat straight up and sucked in a deep breath. Her eyes were wide, her legs jittery, and her magic lit her up. Ophelia grabbed the sides of her face and looked in her eyes then nodded. “She’s good.” She rose to her feet and dusted off her hands. “And we need Cross because he grew up in that castle just as much as I did. He can help us.”
Zinnia scrambled up off the ground. “What are we waiting for?”
“Are you all crazy? I just learned about that guy and he seems dangerous.” Elle moved in closer to Zinnia and threaded her arm through Zin’s.
“This needs to be done and it has to be us.” Zinnia turned and wrapped her up in a hug. “I can’t believe you took this so well. But I have to go.”
Elle held her closer. “Just promise me this won’t be the last time I see you.”
“I swear to you, I will come for you no matter what happens.” She stepped away from Elle and turned to face the rest of us. “Let’s go.”
Chapter 13
Zinnia
After we’d ventured to the island to save the ice dragon from Alataris, it was easy enough for me to show Beckett in my mind how to get to the island. The blue portal opened just at the foot of the hill Alataris’ castle sat on. Tuck stepped out before the rest of us with his sword drawn and at the ready. I followed closely behind him. As we strode out, I looked up at the castle. Four large turrets sat at each corner of the castle. They were joined together by an oversized stone wall that protected the interior of the castle. The thick metal gate was drawn in tight. “How do we get in?”
Alataris’ floating island was by all accounts a tropical paradise.
Beckett held his hand up and two blue orbs spun around his fingers. “Allow me.”
Cross stepped in front of him and grabbed his wrist. “If you try that every alarm in this place will go off and we will be detected before we even breach the walls.”
“Then what do you recommend we do? Have Tucker fly us over the wall and land in the middle of the courtyard?” I wanted in just as badly as they did, but we had to act quickly.
Ophelia moved up beside Cross. “There’s a tunnel buried under a thicket of vines ten feet that way. A tunnel my father has no idea exists. We used it often to run around the island in the middle of the night.”
“And what exactly where you lot doing in the middle of the night?” Grayson wagged his eyebrows.
“None of your damn business.” Cross folded his arms over his chest.
Tucker nodded. “Okay then, you two should lead the way.”
I reached out and grabbed onto his arm. “T
uck, if we are here then we have to get her, my mother. This might be our last chance. I can’t be this close and let her stay.”
“You’re right. First we get your mother then we get the crown.” He took a step toward the direction Ophelia was pointing.
Ophelia shook her head. “That doesn’t make any sense. We have to divide and conquer. The point is to get in and out as fast as we can, not add detours. Beckett, Cross, Serrina, and Tabi go get Zinnia’s mother. Me, Zinnia, Tucker, and Brax will go after the crown. Ashryn, Grayson and Adrienne will stand guard outside the tunnel. Make sure no one finds us or follows us.”
Ashryn always the silent killer walked the ten feet and took up her post. She held her bow and arrow at her side, loose and ready. Her sandy brown hair was braided into two long pigtails down the sides of her elven face. She wore only a plain brown T-shirt, jeggings, and brown boots. She never questioned only observed and when she looked at me, I swear she knew all our secrets. Adrienne pulled a small dagger from behind her back and held it up. “No one will get in or out.”
I wanted to go after my mother. I had to be there when she was found. But I also had to get that crown from Alataris to save Evermore. “I-I want to get my mom.”
Ophelia shook her head. “No, I’m going to need you for this.”
“Why?” I knew the crown was important, but so was my mother.
“Because for better or worse that crown is steeped in siphon magic. Who knows if any of us can even touch it? Not to mention you can siphon off any protective enchantments he might have around it. We need you, Zin.” Ophelia reached out and grabbed my hand.
Beckett motioned to Cross. “You can trust us, Zin. I swear it, I will keep your mom safe.”
Why did this have to be so hard? Why did it have to be one or the other? My mom or the crown. I knew what I had to do, but I didn’t like it. “Very well, but please.” I fought back the tears I wanted to let fall. This was my mother and I loved her more than anything. “Get her to me. I’ve waited for so long.”
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