Electric series- Raven Investigations BoxSet

by Stacey Brutger

  “To keep you from killing the one they select as your mate, they will bring him to your cell and have him bite you over a period of days, until all you can think about is him.”

  “Not going to happen.”

  But the mating heat was already weaving itself through her system, and she didn’t understand why. Without her dragon, she should be fine…right?

  Unless Gavin was correct and the spells on the walls were affecting her in some way.

  The craving to touch left her skin tingling painfully, the desire for any kind of contact almost irresistible. She rubbed her arms, but it did little to ease the ache. Nausea churned at the all too-familiar sensation, and she clenched and unclenched her hands as she struggled to hold onto the last shreds of her control.

  “You can deny it all you want, but the symptoms will only continue to worsen.”

  Raven listened intently, and her throat went dry when she couldn’t detect a lie, a nifty gift she inherited from her pack.

  While she might eventually succumb to the mating heat, the vampires’ plan was doomed to failure. What they didn’t know was that without her beasts, her magic would return full force, leaving her unable to be near anyone without killing them.

  She and Gavin needed to leave.

  Now.

  She studied her prison, then noticed Gavin’s cell was constructed differently. “They didn’t put as many spells on your cell.” She couldn’t keep the accusation out of her voice.

  Gavin wouldn’t meet her gaze. “I’m not important enough for them to bother breeding into their group. They’re keeping me for a different purpose.”

  “You.” Her heart rose to her throat, and she shook her head, backing away, wanting to put even more distance between them. “They intend for me to claim you.”

  He lowered his head, rubbing his hand against the back of his neck, his shoulders slumped. “We’ve already had skin-to-skin contact. They know you don’t wish me harm, so they intend to use that weakness against you.”

  Raven snorted then spun away and began to pace. “And it doesn’t hurt that you’re already affiliated with them.”

  His bark of laughter echoed down the tunnel, the bitterness in it painful. “Only fear and greed rule down here. But if you can get us out of the cells, I can get us out of the tunnels.”

  Trying to decide whether she believed him, Raven didn’t answer right away, barely able to suppress the panic scratching at her insides.

  The last thing she wanted was to be anywhere near him.

  He was a threat.

  And she sure as hell didn’t trust him.

  But she promised his brother to help him.

  Not to mention that no one deserved to be left behind and used in such a way, not even after the dirty kidnapping trick he pulled on her that landed them in this hell…yet she hesitated.

  “Even if you manage to escape, this place is a warren of tunnels. Chances are you’ll end up farther below the city instead of aboveground. They will give chase, release the shifters to join the hunt, and they will eventually recapture you.”

  She had two choices—fight or give up.

  Raven had never been much of a quitter. “Very well. Be ready to move when I give the signal.”

  “What signal?”

  Instead of answering, Raven stepped forward, ignored the prickling of static that bit along her nerve endings, and placed her hands against the barrier, hoping to drain the magic from the spells.

  Pure white light flared at the contact. Fire seared up her arms, blazing a trail of agony, leaving her feeling like her skin was cracking, melting the flesh off her bones. She gritted her teeth, refusing to pull away, allowing the power to roll over her and sink into her body. Only when she feared her insides would combust did she stagger away from the barrier, instinctively knowing that she would never be able to absorb all the magic without burning out and falling unconscious. She released her hold on her magic, shaking out her hands, but the sigils on the walls remained an angry white.

  If she couldn’t steal the power, she was left with one choice—fight fire with fire.

  She took all the volatile magic she’d denied and let fester for so long and flung it outward. Breaking a spell created by another witch was always dangerous, the repercussions possibly even fatal. Only if she was stronger than the witch who cast the spell would she remain standing.

  The magic resting in her bones answered her call sluggishly at first, gradually swelling into an unstoppable wave, becoming stronger with every second, until it tore out of her in a gut-wrenching surge of blue magic.

  Only the pale blue didn’t last, and a deep red strand of tainted magic from the ancients began to twine around the blue. Without her dragon to filter the magic, the wild magic she had hoped was gone, prayed the dragon had successfully burned out, came flooding back with a vengeance.

  Her spirits plummeted while her stomach churned in denial. The ancient magic must have gone dormant. Without the dragon to protect her, she was relapsing. It wouldn’t be long before it infected her entire system.

  Raven tried to pull back, shut it down, but it was like trying to catch a feral cat. No matter how hard she chased it, she couldn’t hold the magic tightly enough to keep it from slipping through her fingers.

  To her surprise, the pain she expected from using the deadly magic never came.

  Instead of consuming her magic as she expected, the strands began to merge into a pure royal purple. The fire in her veins slowed to a gentle simmer, the pain turning into a pleasant hum. The magic didn’t fight her, instinctively obeying her command with an ease that felt like coming home.

  The magic hit the barrier and bounced around the room, striking multiple sigils at once. The sigils dimmed as the magic within them was consumed, the spell fracturing, the glyphs shimmering before glowing a deep purple.

  Infection.

  She probed the sigils gently, but the spells seemed benign, just waiting for her command. Despite her worry about spreading infected magic, she marveled at how easily it was to control.

  The ancient magic was not at all what she expected.

  She waited for it to take over, waited for madness to consume her.

  Instead the power felt good.

  With only a thought she was able to pull back the magic, where it settled into her veins with a pleasurable hum. No crippling pain, no scorched skin, no incapacitating nausea. The magic sloshed through her system until there was no corner where the infection hadn’t spread, and she dreaded what it would cost her in the end.

  Magic always had a cost.

  Her thoughts immediately jumped to Rylan. A small dose of her blood had turned him into one of the few daywalkers, a rare trait acquired by only the most powerful vampires. Rylan was already hunted by his own kind, and she worried how the infected blood she’d given him to save his life might change him further.

  And worse…that he would come to hate her for it.

  Then there was Taggert. Her blood had turned him into a berserker, the fabled two-legged werewolf and deadly killing machine. People were already asking questions, wanting to put him down like a rabid animal.

  Not to mention the blood she used to heal Nicholas when he’d been skinned alive and left for dead. So far he’d shown no strange or frightening symptoms after consuming her blood, but she was afraid it was only a matter of time before it manifested.

  In her attempts to save the members of her pack, she’d only succeeded in putting them in more danger.

  She’d been a fool.

  Everyone she touched was cursed.

  Abandoning them to their fate was out of the question, but she couldn’t go back when she couldn’t be sure her touch wouldn’t kill them outright.

  A hard smile came to her face—what better way to test her theory than to break out of prison and hunt down the very people who were determined to use her for their own ends.

  As the magic faded, the ache under her skin came back with a vengeance. To her horror, she reali
zed that the sigils weren’t a simple spell…but a curse.

  A spell she could break, but a curse only vanished after it ran its course.

  So even if she managed to escape her cage, her dragon wouldn’t return until the mating heat dissipated.

  Raven dropped her hands away from the light purple sheen of the barrier, staring down at them dumbly, with no clue what would be left of her once the curse ultimately had its way with her.

  “Raven.” Her head jerked up at the hiss of her name. “They’re coming. If you’re going to do something, you need to do it now.”

  Chapter Two

  “If we leave, they will only hunt us down.” Raven flashed a malicious smile at Gavin, ignoring the way he flinched and slowly backed away, her thoughts full of what she planned to do to those who had taken them. “If we cut off the head of the snake, chaos will reign, giving us a small window to escape.”

  Before he could protest, a splash of power swirled down the tunnel. Raven turned toward the source, spotting two females heading toward them. One glided over the ground, dressed entirely in black, her form all but disappearing into the background. She was slim and pale, her shimmering black hair reaching past her shoulders.

  Raven couldn’t detect a heartbeat…which meant vampire.

  Her captor and the person responsible for her imprisonment.

  For some reason, she hadn’t expected a female.

  The woman next to her was smaller in stature, plump, and not nearly as graceful, her feet scuffing along the floor with almost every step. A witch, no doubt, if the slight overly sweet smell of sugar was any indication. No shifter would make such a racket.

  As if she summoned her wolf, a brush of fur crossed Raven’s mind. Seconds later the beast sank her claws into Raven’s insides and dragged herself through the swirling magic, nipping and snapping at the strands that crept too close.

  To Raven’s shock, the magic retreated at the white wolf’s command, not even trying to suppress the animal as she surged forward.

  Her shifter senses came alive for the first time since she woke up inside this cage. She fought to breathe past the tightness in her chest, waiting for the infection to swarm the beast.

  Yet the wolf showed no fear. It took Raven a few seconds to realize she was fine, and she marveled at the knowledge that they could coexist.

  She’d become used to the constant struggle.

  But she wasn’t sure she trusted this new development.

  Nothing in her life ever went smoothly.

  But it gave her hope that the curse wouldn’t hurt her pack either.

  Unfortunately, the constant ache to scratch off her skin didn’t abate with the rise of her magic. The sensation felt like her wolf was urging her to shift, which was impossible. She’d been warned that if she ever tried, she would die horribly as the multiple animals at her core tore her apart.

  Raven was absurdly glad that she hadn’t lost contact with the other animals. Her wolf had pushed forward in order to protect her secret from their captors. Raven wasn’t sure why the magic obeyed, but she was grateful, if a little bit leery of its easy capitulations.

  As the women approached, the wolf charged forward and the urge to rip them apart became so overwhelming, claws ripped through the tips of her fingers.

  Both women came to a stop in front of her cell, doing nothing more than observing her, as if she was an exotic pet at a zoo. But Raven noticed the stiff way they held their bodies, how they were angled away from each other.

  While the two women might be working together, they clearly didn’t get along. Most paranormals stuck to their own species for a reason, and many were known to be vindictive and deadly when crossed.

  Even with the barrier separating them, she could smell the sharp spice wafting off the vampire, but what caught her attention was the bitterly sweet stink of magic from the witch…the same magic that had created the spells in her cell.

  “You don’t look like much.” The vampire’s voice was husky and melodious, resonating in Raven’s chest. Then her lips curled, revealing sharp fangs. “You smell like dog.”

  “I say we trade her for the money.” The green eyes of the witch shifted nervously, never resting on anything longer than a few seconds. “Take the guaranteed payoff.”

  “She’s a mutt. Her place is to serve.” The vampire pursed her lips, but her eyes remained shrewd. “She’s worth more alive. I want out of this hellhole, and she’s the key. She’s making waves in the supernatural world and somehow managed to gain influence with the ParaConsulate. I want that influence, and she’s going to get it for me.”

  “This is not the way to go about it, Lucinda.” Gavin pushed away from the wall and prowled toward the edge of his cage. “People fear her for a reason. You move against her, and you’ll regret it.”

  Lucinda’s pale face was as unmoving as a marble statue, then she threw back her head and laughed, braying like a pack of jackals. “Come now, Gavin. You’ll be a good match for her, and you’re good enough in bed to keep her sated. You didn’t really think being my lover would make me change my mind, did you?”

  “We’ve been over for months, neither of us any more than a passing fancy to each other, and you know it.” He shook his head, as if defeated, but ready tension showed in every line of his body. “I’m trying to save your life.”

  Gavin’s hostility was gone, his bluish grey eyes appearing almost concerned when he looked at Raven. But she wasn’t foolish enough to believe he cared. No, he was trying to protect his prize. He just didn’t know how right he was.

  Lucinda turned, her brown eyes calculating when they landed on Raven. There was nothing remotely human remaining. “You’re concerned for her.” She appeared surprised, her gaze assessing while she scanned Raven up and down, her mouth curling slightly in contempt. “Pity. You’ll get over it soon enough.”

  Raven could feel the fever building under her skin again, her wolf making her susceptible. She raked her fingers over her arms, trying to alleviate the ache, uncaring of the welts her claws scored into her flesh. As if hearing her plea, the wolf bowed low, retreating, and Raven’s power lurched forward, the need to destroy increased as magic surged once more in her veins.

  Lucinda neared, a sneer curling her mouth as if she smelled something nasty, completely unaware of the increasing danger. “Don’t worry, little one. The pain will be over soon.”

  Power burrowed into Raven’s flesh, its demand to be released almost overwhelming. Her skin warmed and tingled, the magic trying to force her hand. The burn of delicious magic was seductive, urging her to wreak destruction, but Raven would not submit.

  She would not become addicted to the power.

  She would not be subservient.

  As if sensing her need to do violence, her hand tingled, and she could almost feel the hilt of her sword against her palm.

  Taking the sword’s presence as a sign, Raven gathered the humming magic and flung it at the cell door. The barricade rippled, the purple quickly consuming the remaining magic. The vampire appeared unconcerned at the change, but the witch quickly retreated, tripping over small chunks of broken cement as she staggered away.

  “Something’s wrong.” The witch’s high-pitched squeak quivered in panic. “She’s trying to escape.”

  A furrow appeared between Lucinda’s brows, and she snarled, “Then strengthen your spells.”

  The witch brought up her hands and began chanting. Magic swirled in the tunnels like an invisible wind.

  Raven’s palms prickled again, and the urge to call for her sword became irresistible.

  So she stopped fighting the compulsion, and curled her hand into a fist. Claws vanished as the hilt struck her palm, and the urge to kill surged. Instead of red magic, purple fire spilled down the blade.

  The witch quaked, her eyes locked on the weapon, and her spell fractured in an explosion of glittery dust. The witch violently shook her head and scrambled to get away, her eyes wide with stark terror. “She’s a Prime. She�
�s going to kill us all.”

  Raven watched her scurry off, the need to hunt digging its claws into her spine, and her wolf gave a rumbling growl, wanting to give chase. To her shock, the purple magic swirled around her wolf, ruffling her fur, but didn’t attack.

  Her wolf crept forward, pawing carefully at the magic.

  Never before had her magic and her animal been aware at the same time, and she half expected a trap to slam shut on her foot.

  Magic and shifters didn’t mix.

  The two opposite sides of her soul had always threatened to tear her apart in the past, but the new blended magic was different. For once the warring factions seemed to be in perfect accord, with one goal in mind…her protection.

  Lucinda snarled before the witch took more than a few steps, slamming the shorter woman against the tunnel walls, dirt and cement dust raining down on them. “You will hold that barrier.”

  She peeled the witch off the wall, swung her around, the tips of the witch’s feet barely dragging across the floor.

  Raven gave into the mad urge to rip Lucinda’s head off and lunged. Her power wrapped around her seconds before she slammed into the barrier. Pure magic flashed in her cell and swirled in the air at the impact. Her muscles strained as she struggled to break the last of the sigils. A cruel, pleased smile stole across Lucinda’s face, then began to fade when Raven didn’t hit the floor writhing in pain.

  A slight glow rose from the barrier, shimmering a deep purple, and the magic flowed through Raven instead of trying to drown her under the waves. She brought up her sword, thrusting it through the center of the barrier. The sound of glass shattering announced the spell’s destruction, and the barricade fell.

  Without missing a beat, Lucinda flung the witch at her and took off down the tunnel in a streak of black smoke.

  Raven spun, taking a glancing blow to her shoulder when the witch flailed, her knee connecting hard enough to make Raven stagger. Raven thrust out her arm, shoving the witch aside, and the woman landed with a sickening thud.