by Ann Gimpel
“Of course not. I selected you because your strength complements mine.”
Jeremiah blew out a frustrated breath. “Part of having strength is thinking independently. You can’t have it both ways. Either you pick someone weak and obedient—if you want a yes-man. Or you select a worthy partner who won’t always agree with you.
“If you’re convinced bonding with me was a mistake, undo it, but figure out which horse you’re going to ride now. I’m not going to live with you threatening to decamp every time something happens you don’t like.”
A rich rumble filled his chest, making his breastbone vibrate. It took a moment before he realized the cave lion was purring. “I like you. I didn’t want to after what happened earlier, but it appears my instincts choosing you weren’t as far off course as I feared.”
“We’re partners, right?” Jeremiah sought clarification.
Another purr clinched his impression. He shut the passenger door and guided the Vette back into light traffic. He hadn’t been bonded long, but the lion’s absence would have left an empty space. He quested about for words to tell his bondmate he was glad it wasn’t leaving, but maybe the lion knew without the awkwardness of conversation.
He hoped so. While the beast continued to purr, he thought about how to approach the other mages. He wasn’t concerned about their courage, but he had to prepare them for a less than rosy welcome from at least some of the shifters. Not that it would be a surprise to the small group he lived with. They’d been there when Niall did a hatchet job on all of them because of Jeremiah’s actions.
A few shifters accepted them now, but bad blood ran deep between their people. What would it take to meld them into a cohesive team again? Something more than people forced into fighting on the same side in a war none of them wanted.
Chapter 6
“Do you mind if I go into town with Niall and Sarai?” Renee asked Stephan, worried about leaving the mountain lion shifter alone.
“Too antsy to sit still, eh?”
She nodded. “Yeah. I’ll calm down faster if I have something to do.”
He pushed to his feet. “We’ll all go. I have errands I need to run.”
“Thanks.” Gratitude welled, adding to the myriad emotions buffeting her.
“It’s okay. Better than sitting here stewing in adrenaline and hoping a bunch of vamps show up so I can behead them.”
An eagle’s hunting cry burst from Renee, and she grinned. “My bondmate likes your style.”
Stephan was already out the door, yelling for the others to wait for them.
She snatched a black wool cloak from a hook next to the door and wrapped it around herself. She was cold, and it wasn’t the kind of chill sitting in a warm car would fix. She’d been in a heated house, and her teeth were still on the edge of chattering. Glancing about, she located her purse and slung it over one shoulder.
Even before she came to the States, she’d never had quite as up close and personal an interaction with vampires as what she’d just lived through. Generally, they avoided anyone with magic who might reveal them to unsuspecting humans. One thing was certain. They’d be furious she’d bested them and out for vengeance. They had the feel of her, the smell of her, and they wouldn’t rest until they evened today’s score.
“Renee!” Stephan’s voice was sharp. “Even if you’re having second thoughts, you can’t stay here by yourself.”
She hurried out the door, twisting the lock before shutting it. “Tell me something I don’t know,” she muttered as she ran to a large, sturdy farm truck with the engine idling and a pile of boxes sitting nearby. It was one of the double-cab models, and she slid into the back seat. As an afterthought, she dug her keys out of her shoulder bag and hit the clicker to lock her SUV. No reason to make it easy for the vamps to fuck with her.
She waited until they were underway before saying, “Anyone in proximity to me will be in danger. I’ll go with you into town, but once we return, I’m leaving.”
“You can’t do that,” Sarai protested.
“You’ll be a sitting duck,” Niall broke in. “We can’t allow it.”
Renee bristled. “I’m a free agent. I’ll do what I need to. Vampires are exceptional trackers. They’ll come after me because of today, and not just four of them. They’ll send an entire fucking army.”
Insidious cold spread from her stomach outward until it felt like she was encased in a block of ice. “I’ll take my bird form. I’ll be harder to find that way, especially if I lose myself in a flock of eagles.”
“Where were you planning to find them?” Niall asked.
“Southeast Alaska,” she retorted. “It will take me time to fly there, which should get me off their radar too. I can’t go home, and anyone around me will be in serious jeopardy.”
Sarai sat between Stephan who was driving and Niall. In a graceful move, she turned until she was perched on her knees facing Renee. Her lovely face was set in grim lines. “I’ve never known you to be a coward.”
The words stung. “I’m not a coward,” Renee sputtered. “I’m doing this so they don’t take you down with me.”
Sarai shook her head until hair fell into her eyes. “Doesn’t work that way. We need every shifter to fight. If you throw your life away, all it means is one less soldier on our side.”
“If I remain with other shifters, it may mean a whole lot more deaths than one less soldier,” she countered.
“We did a fair job fighting twenty vamps in that Eastern European castle we ended up in thanks to Jeremiah’s misguided scheme,” Niall spoke up.
“He was incredibly brave and resourceful.” Sarai shot a pointed look at her mate.
“I know you think that, sweetheart, but he could have gotten us all killed.”
“What did he do?” Renee asked.
“Compelled their healer to concoct a slow-acting poison—slow for mages, that is. Once he had it on board, he coaxed eighteen vamps to drink from him before he collapsed,” Niall replied.
“Whatever it was, the poison was far more toxic to the vampires, and they burned up from the inside out,” Sarai said, adding, “I took my wolf form and jumped two more, who were trying to escape.”
“I thought only silver and iron bullets, or beheading, would kill them,” Renee muttered.
“Same thing I thought,” Stephan said, “but I was wrong.”
Renee turned the information over. Jeremiah told her he’d been gravely ill and healed by a shifter. “Was it one of us who made sure the poison didn’t kill him too?”
Sarai nodded. “Yes, another eagle shifter, Ronnie. You might know him.”
“I do. He’s a good man. In truth, he’s a distant relative. All of us have the healing knack. Do we know why Jeremiah risked his skin?”
“Aye.” Niall glanced over a shoulder. “He meant to set an example for the mages who’d signed on with the dark side.”
“Huh? How so?” Renee frowned, not connecting the dots.
“His approach was twofold,” Niall went on. “It rid the world of a decent number of vamps and also sent a message to the mages who were strengthening vampire power.”
“Indeed,” Stephan chimed in. “The implication was they’d be our next targets.”
Renee chewed her lower lip. “If what the vampires told me today is true, the mages no longer have a choice in the matter. They’re shackled by vamp mesmerism, providing a ready source of magic.”
“Serves them right. If they had a shred of decency left, they’d refuse food and water until they had no more power for the vamps to siphon.” Niall’s tone was dark.
“For all we know, the vampires are forcing blood on them and they’re in limbo, neither mage nor vampire, but some no-man’s land in between,” Stephan muttered.
“Aye, ’twould certainly downplay their need for nourishment,” Niall said.
Sarai leveled her gaze at Renee. “You’re not going off on your own. It’s not up for discussion.” Before Renee could reply, she turned back arou
nd.
No one seemed inclined to talk further as the truck sped toward Denver on the interstate. Eventually, Stephan turned off onto city streets. The small respite offered thinking time. Even though she hated to offer Jeremiah points for anything, she was impressed by his courage. He’d been willing to die to prove a point.
She reminded herself the bond animals were almost never wrong. According to her eagle, the lion had searched long and hard for a shifter to bond with. That it picked Jeremiah suggested the mage—shifter, she corrected herself—had significant worth.
Yeah, and I treated him like warmed-over dogmeat.
She cringed. Maybe she’d get a chance to apologize, but for now she needed a game plan. The vamps would be all over her no matter what she did to divert them. Hiding behind wards wouldn’t do it. Besides, she couldn’t maintain extreme warding 24/7. It would drain her magic over a couple of days and she’d need time to recover.
Time when she was unwarded and vulnerable.
Stephan turned the truck down an alleyway and parked.
“You’re coming inside with us,” Sarai said to her uncle.
“Eventually. For now, I’m going to drop you off and drive to the feedstore. I have to inform the others about today.”
“We can use telepathy for that, Uncle,” Sarai protested. Dark circles sat beneath her eyes, and her forehead was creased into a welter of fine lines.
“How?” Stephan turned to face her. “We share our magical origins with mages. They’re capable of eavesdropping on our telepathy. Presumably vamps can as well. Cellular calls are easy for anyone without any power at all to hack. The feedstore is only about fifteen minutes away. I’ll be back here long before you’re done.”
Sarai gave her uncle a quick hug. “Keep your psychic view peeled.”
“Oh believe me, I plan to. Out, everyone. I’ll return as soon as I can.”
Niall opened the passenger door and jumped down, offering a hand to Sarai. Renee exited from the closest rear door and reached back inside to grab her shoulder bag. For the first time ever, she wished for a gun. And silver-and-lead laced bullets. Magic killed, but you had to be close to your targets. Guns offered a safety margin, one where you didn’t risk being snared by vampire mind control.
She slammed her door and hurried after the other two shifters. She’d visited Sarai’s shop a time or two. The place always smelled divine from all the dried herbs and flowers Sarai used to create decoctions and potions.
Still antsy as hell, feeling naked and exposed, she scanned with magic and hissed, “Stop.”
Niall and Sarai turned as a unit. “Why?” Sarai asked.
Renee whispered, “I smell vampire.”
Sarai hooked a hand beneath her arm. “It’s old. They were here, but they’re not now. Believe me, I know the difference.”
“They attacked you here?” Renee could scarcely get the words out.
“Yeah. My own fault. I wasn’t careful, but I was holding my own until Stephan showed up. Then things went downhill fast.”
“Until I got there,” Niall growled. “Come on you two. We can chew the fat inside.”
Renee had questions. Lots of them, but she bit her tongue. Recent events weren’t nearly as important as what came next. They had a lot of planning to do. Once they were inside and Niall had wrapped a ward around the office, she said, “I’m not worth much with astrological stuff, but I want to help.”
Sarai trotted to an overflowing bookshelf and dug three fat tomes out from beneath a stack of slightly thinner volumes. “You can work on the lore part. Start with these,” she instructed.
“What am I looking for?”
“Anything in our histories that addresses vampires or mages gone rogue.”
Renee took the books and settled on an overstuffed leather couch. Sarai booted up her computer and began typing.
“Give me one of those.” Niall sat on the other side of the couch. “Looks like it will take forever to cull through them.”
She handed him a book. “If these operate like other shifter lore books, they’re scarcely indexed. Open your magical center and ask them a question. They should point to something useful. If they don’t, finetune your query until it yields what you’re looking for.”
“Exactly,” Sarai said without turning around. Her fingers flew over the keys, and images danced across her screen.
“It’s never the book’s fault,” Niall muttered and opened the volume lying atop his lap. The smells of old parchment intensified as he splayed his hands across crinkled pages.
“Pretty much. How could it be?” Renee grinned, feeling more centered than she had since the vampires forced her out of the sky. She switched to the floor and opened both books in front of her, chanting softly. Magic rose and fell around her in varying tones and timbres.
The forthright, masculine tones of Niall’s casting blended with the power shimmering around Sarai, turning the air incandescent. The tang of shifter workings filled the cozy office, redolent of forests and oceans and trees wetted down from a brisk rain.
She inhaled hungrily. The metallic scents of modern life—concrete, plastic, chemicals—had all but drowned out the natural world, overshadowing it with phony, crude smells that chipped away at her soul. Shifters had a long, proud history. She felt humbly fortunate to be counted among their numbers.
Pages riffled beneath her fingers, slow at first and then faster. The question she’d asked was what role she and her eagle played in the unexpected rise of vampire power. Normally, she had to ask a dozen questions. She’d never hit the nail on the head first time off the blocks.
She took it as a good omen.
Or maybe a very bad one.
The pages of the book on her left stopped abruptly. A few leaves flipped back the other way. She could have sworn the damned thing was glowing, so she switched to her psychic view to check.
Breath whooshed from her. Ley lines wrapped around the tome, glistening in shades of orange and gold. The book was so beautiful, her throat thickened with emotion. When she glanced up to show Niall and Sarai, the room wasn’t there. Instead, a thick mist surrounded her.
Panic surged until she understood her own magic had created the cocoon. No vampires. No mages. Just her and her nascent power. The book on the right quieted as well. It hadn’t been rustling as fast, so the place it stopped moving didn’t require backtracking.
She inhaled raggedly, blew it out, and did it again. Nothing changed. The magic circling her was as sweet and pure as any in her long lifetime. With fingers that trembled a little, she picked up the left-hand book and began to read. Shockwaves rocked her as she skimmed today’s events. They weren’t perfectly aligned with reality, but close enough.
The book knew what had happened to her.
It detailed the danger mages posed. For some reason, it discounted vamps as scarcely worth anyone’s time but stressed that their unholy alliance with mages would make them more dangerous by a factor of a thousand. A chill tracked down her spine, all sharp claws and teeth, a feral animal on the loose with her as its target.
When she turned one more page, it was blank.
Renee licked dry lips. She’d been here before. This book had run its course. She’d have to feed it another question to cull more from its pages. She ran a few possibilities through her mind since the book hadn’t told her anything she didn’t already know.
The other book edged toward her with a slithering, slapping noise. Her eyes widened, and she stretched a hand to pick it up, placing it atop the first. She’d never known lore books could move, but if their pages could turn independently, anything was possible. She focused on the indicated page.
It blurred, the letters rearranging themselves in a crazy, arcane ballet as she watched. Many languages showed up in the lore books. The one taking shape before her was a form of ancient Gaelic. Except when she’d learned it, it had been called old Gaelic, not ancient.
Her mind was wandering, and she had a prickly feeling at the base of her s
pine. The cozy cocoon around her hadn’t changed, and she was still shrouded by silvery mist. The others couldn’t be worried about her, or they’d be trying to break through.
As soon as the letters stopped jumping around, she began to read. After the first sentence or two, her heart skipped into triple-time rhythm, pounding so hard she feared it would beat right through her chest. The premise laid out before her was so fantastic, it was impossible to believe.
But the books never lied.
She read the two pages twice, looked for more, and came up with the same blank vellum she’d found in the first book. Her fingertips tingled where they contacted the page. Because she was still tuned into her psychic view, she saw the ley lines disentangle themselves from the books, one at a time. Once the second one was free, the mist pooled into iridescent strands that melted into the ether.
Sarai was still at her keyboard. Niall hadn’t moved from his spot on the sofa. He shook a fist at his book and raked a hand through his dark hair.
Not knowing quite where to begin, Renee cleared her throat.
“Yes, hon?” Sarai asked, adding, “Give me a minute. I’m nearly done, and brother is this a game changer, but you may not like it much.”
“Good you came up with something,” Niall muttered. “So far I’ve hit one dry hole after the next.” He shook his head. “Never been much of one for books, and this is why. They hate me.”
“Aw, sweetie.” Sarai not only turned around, she got up and went to Niall, giving him a hug. “Take a little break and try a different one. They’re keyed to different wavelengths. Maybe that’s not the book for you.”
“Bollocks. None of them ever are,” he said sourly.
Renee got to her feet, bones cracking as she stretched out the kinks. “What was that about a game changer?” Before Sarai could answer, she blurted, “Uh, did either of you notice anything strange about me?”