Broad Daylight (The Veiled World Chronicles Book 1)

by LJ Rivers

  The windows were tinted, but I could see well enough through them. The fact that they hadn’t shielded my eyes disturbed me. If they cared about hiding where we were going, they would have blindfolded me. That they hadn’t couldn’t possibly bode well. I would know exactly where we were, which probably meant they weren’t planning on releasing me any time soon. If at all.

  Now that was a chilling thought.

  Outside, the houses were becoming farther apart, and farmland began stretching out on either side. We took a sharp turn up a tree-lined road surrounded by vast fields. Looming ahead were the recognizable green canopies of Spandauer Forst. Stefan and I had been here a few times during our long distance training sessions, and I had instantly fallen in love with the area. Its nature reserves, lakes, and moors spanned several thousand acres, in stunning contrast to the concrete and asphalt of the city.

  Shaking the thought of Stefan from my mind, I focused on the large villa that came into view up ahead, a few elaborate lamps lighting up the circular area in front of the entrance.

  The car came to a stop at the bottom of the half moon stairs.

  Sigmund raked a hand through his disheveled salt and pepper hair. “Now, please behave. Or Nova will give you a repeat performance of your first encounter. I would rather not resort to violence. Again.”

  I gave him a reluctant nod, having already spotted at least four heavily armed persons along the sides of the house.

  Nova came around the car and opened the door, gently taking my arm and guiding me outside, Sigmund at my heels. I grimaced, straightened my back, and climbed the stairs after Nova, all the while acutely aware of the armed security watching me as I went.

  Chapter Five

  We entered a wide hallway with several doors to our right. An elaborate staircase to the second floor obscured my view on the left. The third door we passed stood ajar to what looked like a five-star restaurant kitchen, suited to serve hundreds of people. I gaped but didn’t have time to study the room much before Sigmund ushered me forward. The ropes around my wrists dug into my skin, and I gritted my teeth. I had probably only made it worse by trying my best to wriggle out of them. Albeit in vain.

  The mellow notes of a piano echoed off the walls, and the potent smell of herbs and spices laced the air. I recognized the notes as Mozart’s “Die Zauberflöte”—The Magic Flute. Not because I was particularly versed in classical music, but Edwin’s close friend, Wolfgang, used to play it all the time when I was younger.

  The hallway opened up to a spacious room with a piano and a sitting area on one side, another sitting area on the other. Books and herbs were stacked on a variety of shelves throughout the room, and I spotted more than one mortar among the spines and jars. A fire crackled in the hearth to my left. It was far too hot outside to light the fire, so I assumed it was more for the sake of ambiance than to keep warm. Then I spotted an honest to goodness cauldron mounted inside. This was getting wackier by the second.

  My eyes widened as they fell on Leon playing the piano. I would have to worry about the why’s and how’s after I had finished mapping the room. Tearing my gaze away from him, the familiar notes echoing in my ears, I studied the rest of my surroundings. Three closed doors led to other parts of the house, and an open double door ahead led to an impressive balcony. Floor to ceiling windows covered almost the entire back wall, providing an impressive view of the fields and the forest beyond.

  A woman stood just outside, her back to us, swaying to the music. Her sandy-colored hair was pulled back into two closely fastened braids, loose strands falling from the arrangement and the intricate knot binding it all together. Other than that, she was maybe five feet two inches, with a petite frame. She lifted her head as if listening intently to something above the music, then turned, her face lit by a lantern outside.

  I wasn’t sure what I had expected, but she was young, younger than me by a few years, I guessed. Her pale skin lacked any signs of furrows or lines. Her lips stretched into a perfect cupid’s bow, and her rounded features required no makeup, which was probably why she didn’t wear any. She held her hand up, and the music stilled.

  “Thank you, Leon. That was inspiring.”

  He made a quick bow, glancing at me with something akin to worry in his features.

  The woman gestured to the seating area at the other end of the piano, and Sigmund gave me a nudge to move. Nova breezed past and perched on an ottoman near the windows, while I fell into an armchair that threatened to swallow me as I dumped down.

  While the woman looked young, there was something in her arctic-blue eyes, a kind of deep sense of knowledge and wisdom I sometimes saw in the faces of elderly people—those who had seen too much and carried the burdens of a long life. She took a seat by a spinning wheel and teased the fibers from a mass of wool attached to a spindle. Working her fingers meticulously, she eventually spun the wheel ever so slowly.

  “Why is she bound?” she asked Sigmund, as she turned the direction of the wheel a few times.

  “Well,” he cleared his throat, “I tried spelling her, but that didn’t work. Plus, I’m pretty sure she would have killed me. I had to send Ulrich to the convaler coven, and after Nova knocked Miss MacKay’s lights out, I figured it was the only way to get her to cooperate.”

  The woman nodded slowly. “Free her hands, Sigmund. We’ll talk about your actions later.” She had a distinct voice, not soft, but strangely melodic, with a sharp edge. I had difficulty placing her accent, as it sounded a little like a lot of things. Italian, Irish or maybe Swedish, I wasn’t sure, but it wasn’t one I was familiar with. If it weren't for the fact that I was being held prisoner by this woman and her lackeys, I might have appreciated us both having mixed accents.

  Sigmund hesitated for a second before he did as ordered. Once free, I put my arms on my knees, rubbing my wrists in relief.

  “My apologies, Miss Mackay. Or may I call you Camryn? We’re usually not this formal.”

  I shrugged. “It’s my name.”

  “Well then, Camryn, I didn’t mean for you to be treated this way. They were only supposed to get intel and escort you to me. Preferably of your own volition.”

  All I wanted to do was leave, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t be that easy, so I might as well hear her out.

  “You may want to start with your name,” I said, unable to conceal the hostility in my tone.

  The light from the fire danced in her eyes as she spun the wheel clockwise again. “My name is Saga. I’m the clan leader of Berlin, and I’m afraid I’m the reason you’ve been brought here in such an unseemly manner. That said, when Leon made me aware of you, I was left with little choice in the matter but to find out who you were. After you walked away from him, I had to arrange for another way for us to talk.”

  “You could have, I don’t know, called,” I said.

  She arched an eyebrow. “Would you have come if I had?”

  I thought about that, then shook my head slowly.

  She snapped her fingers, and Leon appeared, handing her a file. The spinning wheel slowed to a stop as she opened the file and stepped away from her work. “Camryn Anker, born Camryn MacKay in Aberdeen, Scotland, in the year 1995, to Lorelei MacKay, father unknown. It says here your mother died in the Sinai Peninsula when you were five. It doesn’t specify how or why she was there, though.” Her eyes traveled across the pages in front of her.

  The offhanded mention of my mother left a bitter taste in my mouth. “That’s not public record,” I said through my teeth. “Where did you get that? Also, why read it to me?”

  “I simply want you to understand exactly how much we know and are able to find out.” She paused, nodding to herself thoughtfully. “Raised by your mother’s half brother, Edwin Anker, after her passing. Leon, why does that name sound familiar?”

  Leon leaned in, reading from the folder himself, and whispered something to the so-called clan leader. She made a little sound, almost like a ’huh’, then looked back at me.

  �
��You were homeschooled?”

  That was not the follow-up question I had expected, but assuming it got me out of there faster, I obliged to answer. “I was. I had a few teachers, but mostly Edwin taught me himself.”

  “I see. Am I to assume you have never been part of a coven?”

  The air went out of me in the beginning of a laugh, but I reined it in and looked at her as straight-faced as possible. “No, ma’am, never.” While she didn’t look like a ma’am, something about her exuded authority.

  After a long staring contest where she gave me a thorough appraisal, she broke eye-contact and handed the folder back to Leon. “You really don’t know anything, do you, Camryn?”

  “Know what? I’m sorry, but whatever it is you think I can offer you, I’ve got nothing. I work security, and from what I can tell, you’ve got plenty of muscle, so you don’t need me for that.”

  “True,” she allowed, taking a seat by the spinning wheel once more. “Although, they normally don’t carry guns. Last night’s events forced me to take additional precautions. At any rate, you’re right, I don’t need you for security, but it’s customary for any witch to make herself known to the clan leader when she enters another clan’s territory. As you are a shield witch, I figured you were trying to stay under the radar, but I can’t very well allow you to do that when I know you’re here. Besides, it’s clear to me now that you are completely oblivious. Either that, or you could give Brigitte Bardot a run for her money, though I find that highly unlikely.”

  I absently rubbed at the itchy area around my bite wound. “A shield what now?”

  “A shield witch. I must say, I’m surprised at your ignorance.”

  I sputtered out a full-blown laugh this time, unable to help myself. Tears burst from my eyes, and I clutched my stomach, heaving for breath. “I’m sorry, but this is insane. Witches aren’t real. We’re all human.” I gestured at the others.

  “No, we are not,” she said adamantly. “Not all witches have specialties like yours, that is true. Ulrich, for example, can do your garden variety of magic, but has no specific affinity for one particular craft—an artisan witch. Sigmund, on the other hand, specializes in scrying and locating spells, whereas Leon is what we call an empath.”

  After wiping my eyes, I pulled myself together enough to ask another question. “Which means?”

  “In short, while he can perform all the same kinds of magics as, say, Ulrich, Leon can also read or inflict emotions.”

  I let that sink in for a second, then pointed my thumb at Nova, who was lounging gracefully on the ottoman. “What of her?”

  My kidnapping driver flashed her teeth at me in a disconcerting smile but said nothing. When Saga didn’t respond either, I conceded and carried on. “And you?” I asked instead.

  After a few seconds of spinning her yarn, Saga seemed to have reached some conclusion. “I am something a little different. Every once in a while, a witch is born with more than one specialty. I have three.”

  She didn’t care to mention what they were, and I didn’t ask. It was all nonsense either way. Instead, I decided to break the illusion. “Let’s see some witchcraft, then. If you are what you say you are, convince me.”

  “I suppose there are things we could show you, from a distance, but the thing about shield witches is that you absorb magic. You have no active powers of your own, but anyone who touches a shield, or, if the shield witch is especially powerful, anyone within her sight, will be unable to perform magic. You are, for all intents and purposes, immune to magic. I don’t know exactly what this means for my clan or your presence in my city, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t try to find out.”

  I stared at her, dumbfounded. Was she for real?

  Saga gave me a look I couldn’t quite pinpoint. Pity? “I can see you’re finding this hard to believe. Why don’t we start with last night’s events? Walk me through them. Please.”

  I noticed how Leon jerked a little and took it as an indication that Saga rarely used that particular word. Seeing as he had witnessed the entire event anyway, what would be the harm? “Sure, why not?” I muttered and started telling the story, careful not to mention Petra’s name. Part of my job was to protect my clients, and even though my contract had been terminated, I was still bound to secrecy.

  To my surprise, Leon intervened the second time I mentioned my client.

  “She was guarding Petra.” He didn’t even give a last name, but the look on Saga’s face told me she knew exactly who Petra was.

  A little annoyed, I continued my account, still not naming Petra myself. When I got to the part about the bite, Saga gave my neck a cursory glance.

  “You say he bit you, puncturing your skin?”

  “Yes,” I said reluctantly.

  “Did he drink from you?”

  This was so surreal. “I don’t know. He kind of sucked on me for a second, I guess.”

  “What happened when he struck you afterward?” She inclined her head at the bruise on my jaw.

  “I staggered a little, I guess.”

  “Peculiar. That man who attacked you, did it not strike you as strange?”

  “Sure.” What was up with these questions?

  She gripped the spinning wheel with one hand, and her face hardened. “He was a vampire, Camryn.”

  My mouth fell open. Leon had said the same thing earlier that day, but hearing it all over again was something else. As if more than one person saying the word somehow made it more believable. This clan—or cult was more like it—were all suffering from the same deranged delusions. I wondered if they were all born into it, bred to believe the cookie monster was real and brooms could be used as modes of air travel.

  Leon cleared his throat, and Saga gestured for him to speak. “I’m not sure if it’s important, but I’ve been thinking about it a lot. I’m absolutely positive I had him directly in the line of the solarbeam, but I didn’t notice any steam coming from him, and no burns. He just seemed spooked.”

  “Is this true?” she asked me.

  “Why would he burn? I figured he was scared you would be able to identify him. Then, of course, when I pulled my gun on him, he realized his only choice was to flee.” I almost said climb, but that sounded ridiculous.

  “It might have been an ancient vampire, or perhaps Camryn’s shield power protected him.” Saga mused. “I’m not sure, but I will give it some consideration. My main concern is whether he was targeting Petra specifically.”

  “He would be able to smell her either way,” Leon said. “Even if he thought Camryn was human, there is no way he wouldn’t recognize the scent of a werecat.”

  Saga stood abruptly and paced the room. Although, it was more of a serene, purposeful back-and-forth stroll. “We cannot afford a war with the vampires,” she said at last. “We have to know who this vampire was. If he’s one of Ursula’s, I’m afraid the outcome is out of my hands, but we’ll have to prove what really happened. That said, I fail to see why Ursula would risk our alliance in such a manner.”

  It was my turn to hold a hand up. “Excuse me, but I—” I was going to say I wanted to go home, but in the space of this conversation, I found myself wanting to stay. Needing to. The sensible part of my brain told me to run like the wind and never look back, so why was I not looking for an escape? Instead, I asked something else. “I’m a little lost. Were … cats?”

  Saga smiled, and a lick of flame reflected in her gaze. “Werecats.”

  “Saga,” Nova said in a purr. “May I? She seems to need a more visible approach.”

  Saga gave a careful nod, and Nova stood, stepping as far away from me in the room as she could get. Standing by the open doors, the evening breeze ruffling her short hair, she stretched on her toes.

  “Look away, boys. Not you Camryn, you have to watch.” She snickered as the men turned their backs to her, Leon still focusing on me. Without preamble, she shimmied out of her top and pants. She wore no underwear, and I suddenly felt like I was watching a peep sho
w, as if I was doing something naughty. My brain told me it was wrong, but I kept my attention on her as requested. The woman was entirely naked. Her porcelain skin was smooth, almost shiny in the lantern light. I resorted to keeping my eyes on hers, unable to do anything else. After all, she had told me to look. Her skin rippled, bones shifting and changing underneath.

  What in all of creation was happening?

  Transfixed, I stayed frozen to the spot as a whip of sudden wind and a blanket of shimmering dust swirled around her. Within another few seconds, the woman was gone. In her place stood a gorgeous silver and black wildcat. Her bushy tail rose proudly as she pranced over to me, stopping next to my feet. She was bigger than the few wildcats I had seen, but didn’t look all that different from domesticated cats in appearance. I reached out and brushed my hand through her thick, soft fur, marveling at the animal before me.

  “See?” Saga said, amused. “A werecat.”

  Leon’s dark eyebrows knitted. “How is it she can touch Nova? I don’t quite understand how this power works.”

  He didn’t understand? Then I was definitely lost.

  “You’re still so young, Leon,” Saga began, “and I know most witches these days will not have come across shield magic before, but there is a difference between active magic and this. While Camryn could have stopped the change, as that is an activation of magic in itself, she can’t turn Nova back into a human. Although, I suppose she could keep her from shifting for as long as the two stay in close proximity to one another. Being a werecat is part of Nova’s DNA, and when she’s a cat, that part of her is ingrained in her body and not an active use of magic. Her animal is an extension of her very being. That said, she will only have the normal hearing, sight and agility of any wildcat as long as Camryn is touching her, as her werecat senses are magic-induced. Understand?”