by Hazel Hunter
“Okay, what are you looking at? Do I have something on my face?”
Hailey touched her face gently with her fingertips. She hadn’t ever had much opportunity to speak with other Wiccans so casually, and she realized how out of practice she was.
“Well, I guess I do have a question at that.”
Hailey braced herself. She knew it was too good to be true. People always wanted to know about her power, and when they found out what it was she was capable of and what it meant, they backed off very quickly. She had enjoyed getting to sit with Erin and speak to her so warmly. The fact that it was over gave her a pang, but it was an old wound.
“Go on.”
Erin’s dark eyes were bright and curious.
“So what’s going on with you and Piers?”
Of all the things that Hailey had expected, this was certainly not one. She must have let her surprise show, because Erin lifted her hands placatingly.
“I totally understand if that’s not something that you want to share or that you don’t want to discuss it with me. That’s totally fine, and I’ll back off, just give me the word.”
“I’d tell you that you’d crossed a line if I had any idea where the line was,” Hailey said in confusion. “What are you talking about?”
“So you and Piers never saw each other before yesterday?”
“No, not at all.”
“Wow, most people were guessing that you were some secret lover of his from before any of us knew him. Guess that blows that theory out of the water.”
Hailey felt even more at sea. Secret lover?
“Yeah, none of us have ever seen the bossman light up like that. You stopped by my training session yesterday, and I barely recognized the man.”
“So he’s not always so…?”
“Happy? No. This is a whole new ball game, and the busybodies of the Castle want details.” Erin smiled. “It’s no big deal, I promise. Folks at the Castle tend to be the devoted and dedicated type, and most of us choose to make this place home, work and entertainment all rolled up into one. I guess it makes us pretty prone to gossip and speculation. So you’re not Piers’s secret girlfriend come out of hiding. That’s cool.”
“So he looks different when he’s around me?”
“Mostly he’s just…really serious, you know? Quiet. Kinda stern. You’ve shaken things up a little bit, I can tell you that for nothing.”
Hailey considered the other witch’s words in surprise. She had never gotten an idea that Piers was anything but open and honest. The way he had treated her felt perfectly genuine, perfectly truthful. The fact that he had another face, one that the rest of the Castle seemed to take as a matter of course, startled her.
Erin looked as if she was going to say something, when they were interrupted by Piers himself.
“Good evening, you two. I thought I would stop by and see how you were doing.”
“Just getting up, I’m afraid,” said Hailey with a grimace. “Thanks to the jet lag, I’ve managed to sleep the day away, and now I’m ready to do things.”
Piers looked startled and then speculative.
“Ready to do things? How would you feel about going on patrol?”
“Patrol?”
“Oh, that.” Erin rolled her eyes, but there was no real disdain in it. “Every adult in the Castle takes a turn keeping an eye on things for a half-night shift. Some of us stay close to the walls because there’s nothing to be gained from sending a weather witch into the forest in the middle of the night. Flyers like Piers here and the shapechangers tend to roam a little further afield.”
“It’s just a precaution to make sure that we know what’s going on. Technically, I own this property, but lines between what belongs to the Castle and what is national forest start to get pretty blurry. I did my best when I was picking this place out, but its still simple enough for someone who knows their way around the woods to come onto our grounds.”
Hailey shivered. He didn’t have to say who had the skills and the interest to come looking for a group of Wiccans living peacefully away from the world. Templars were witch hunters, and they were relentless. They were powerful warriors who would use any means necessary to destroy the witches of the world. The Magus Corps battled them officially, but in effect, every coven had to be ready to mount a defense against the Templar forces.
“I would like to come,” she said shyly. “I mean, I can even fly if you’re willing?”
“More than willing,” Piers said with a warm smile. “Come on, we’ll get you outfitted.”
As Piers turned to go, Erin met Hailey’s gaze and quirked an eyebrow at the coven master. Hailey could only shrug helplessly and follow Piers. It took him a little bit of time to find a suit of all-weather clothing for her. Most of them were too big, and he had to dig until he found something that worked.
“Sorry, this was the best I could do.”
Hailey made a face.
“Don’t worry about it. I’ve been dressing out of the teen boy’s section of the store my entire life.”
The suit fit and felt a great deal like a ski suit, but she could feel the difference right away. It was light and flexible, and though she knew it would keep her warm, it was easy to forget it was there.
When she stepped out into the courtyard, she could see why such gear was necessary. The setting sun dyed the Castle in shades of gold and orange, but there was a nasty bite to the air. The temperatures were dropping, and they would continue to do so deep into the night.
Once they were out of the Castle, Piers turned, offering her his arm.
“I want you to take as much as you need, okay? The last thing I want is you to be sparing and then to fall right out of the sky.”
“I don’t think that’s the way it works,” Hailey said. “Usually, I just feel the energy ebb a little, and then I know it’s time to land.”
“Better safe than sorry. The last thing you need is to fall down the mountain.”
She grinned, and then the grin faded when she saw him rolling up his sleeve. She knew that it was necessary for skin to skin contact for her to pull off some of his energy. However, now that the moment had come, she felt unexpectedly shy.
“Would it help for you to imagine that I was throwing a small child?” he asked teasingly.
“No! I mean. Well, I’ve only really done this with one person.”
Thinking of Kieran stung, but she would have to deal with that hurt later. Right now, she wanted to learn about going on patrol around the Castle. Thankfully, Piers didn’t ask her about who she had done this with. He only waited patiently as she set her hand on his bare wrist. His tanned skin was almost shockingly warm. She could feel his power again.
Just like before, it was like an ocean of light, a place of inexhaustible energy. She felt him willing it to her, offering her whatever she needed. She could become drunk on it, but she shook herself and put herself to the task at hand. She started to pull his power from him, working quickly and carefully. Through her concentration, she heard him sigh. There was something almost blissful about it, but then she was done. He stepped back briskly and nodded at her.
“So you said the flyers were unpredictable and wild. Let’s see what you can do with it now, hmm?”
Hailey made a face at him, but she leaped into the air quickly and easily. She hovered a few meters above the ground for a moment. Piers raised an eyebrow at her.
“If that’s all you can do, perhaps you don’t need to come on patrol with me.”
Hailey grinned. In response, she simply zoomed straight up into the air, spiraling away until the Castle was far beneath her. She was exhilarated by her flight, but then she quickly realized that she may have made a mistake. High up in the mountains, the air was already thinner than she was used to, even though she had lived in mountains previously. Now the air was thinner yet. She gasped, and the distraction was enough that she started to fall.
Suddenly, she felt a strong arm loop around her waist, bearing her weight ea
sily.
“So those rumors about flyers being flighty and unpredictable. I see where they were coming from,” Piers said gravely.
Hailey got enough of her breath back to laugh, but when she made to vault out of his arms, Piers held her firmly.
“Get your breath back completely, and then launch off. We’re going to stay together. We’re not going to go bat chasing. By all the gods if I have to put you on a leash, I will.”
The image of him firmly clasping a collar and lead around her shouldn’t have made her blush, but it did. Suddenly she was all too aware of the way his body felt against hers. He was lean but well-muscled, firm against her. He held her with a careless ease that told her how much power he had. She thought of that ocean of light. She wanted more.
After another few moments, she took a deep breath and nodded. Cautiously he let her go. She could tell that he was waiting to see if she was going to dart off again. The light was fading fast, the temperature was dropping rapidly.
“All right, coven master, how do you want to do this?”
Piers thought for a moment.
“I usually do a few circuits of the Castle spiraling further and further out until I come back. I want you to fly to my right and behind me. That way, you’ll stay out of my way if we find something nasty out there.”
“And if we do?”
Piers grinned. There was a touch of grimness to it.
“Then you come straight back to the Castle, and alert everyone that there was something I consider a threat.”
She followed along behind him as he began his rounds. The first circuit was closest to the wall. It gave her an opportunity to marvel at the design of the Castle. It had seemed impressive when seen from above and when she was viewing it from inside. From her low flight now, she could see how perfect the walls were, how completely defensible. The man who had designed it had obviously had a great deal of experience fighting off concentrated attacks. She sneaked a look at Piers, who was visible by the last light of day.
His face was serene, and when he caught her looking, he smiled.
“Welcome home,” he said, and she felt that shaky emotion that she had before. She had a place here. It was still a new and enchanting thing.
Another circuit and a half took them further out into the forests that covered the mountainside. Now it was full dark. Hailey had been a city child for most of her life. The deep velvety blackness of the night in the mountains made the hair on the back of her neck stand up on end, but soon, very soon, the stars came out.
She watched Piers, but she also watched the sky. As soon as the sun sank beneath the horizon, the light faded to reveal thousands upon thousands of stars. Hailey smiled up at them, enthralled to see her old friends again. The Angioli coven had had a beautiful starscape as well, but here the constellations were shifted, strange from what she knew.
She realized she had stopped flying to gaze up at them. She turned to see Piers hovering a small distance away, watching her closely.
“They’re beautiful,” she said.
“So are you.”
The words were uttered so simply and so easily that at first she thought she had misheard them. Surely he was saying that the stars were beautiful or that the mountains around them were beautiful. Then she realized that she had not misheard. She blushed, grateful he could not see it.
“Shouldn’t we be patrolling?”
“It’s a quiet night. As long as we are back in reasonable order, we can take our time. Half the reason I like to have people do this is so that they can get comfortable with the countryside.”
“You have a very beautiful home,” Hailey responded, gazing up at the stars. “I can see why you would do everything that you can to protect it, to preserve it.”
“Everyone deserves a place where they can be safe.”
There was a strangeness to the way he said it. Then he flew on, and Hailey had no choice except to follow.
They swept down close to the canopy of the pine trees. Hailey was flying along, watching the sky above and the pines below, when Piers laughed. He hovered in the air, his eyes focused on the space behind her. She turned and had to laugh too. Following along behind them at a distance was Merit. The snowy owl’s broad wings were completely silent. She looked a little miffed that they had spotted her and dove down into the cover of the trees.
“That’s Merit,” Hailey said with a grin. “She’s a bit protective.”
“That’s wonderful. My own Grosvenor usually just leaves me to my folly.”
They flew on, and Hailey made a note to ask what Piers’s familiar was. Most witches and warlocks had them, though most didn’t keep them with them on a permanent basis. They served as pets, as aids for focus and as protection. They had once been vital to the survival of Wiccans who needed to cross hostile territory on a regular basis, but they were less necessary these days.
Despite the protection of the cold weather gear, the chilly temperatures were beginning to take their toll on Hailey. She could feel herself lagging behind Piers’s relentless speed. Though she could catch up at the moment, she realized she was flagging.
“Piers?”
He spun in the air with the grace of a born acrobat. He was by her side in an instant, wrapping his arm around her waist.
“It’s fine!” she yelped in surprise. “I’m really fine!”
He looked dubious.
“Let’s just say I’d rather not take the chance when the option is between me catching you, and you dropping down hundreds of feet to the forest floor, okay?”
Hailey grimaced at his blunt words.
“Okay, that’s a good point. This isn’t an emergency. I’m just really, really not used to flying much, and I think I’m getting tired.”
“How often have you flown?”
Hailey thought.
“Counting this time? Two, maybe three?”
If anything, Piers’s grip on her grew even tighter.
“And you didn’t think to tell me?”
“Well, I guess I would have, but…”
“But what?”
“But you were being all challenging.” Hailey paused. “I know it sounds bad when I say it like that.”
“To say the least. All right, we’re putting down somewhere so that you can get some serious rest.”
Hailey would have protested that she didn’t need much beyond a breather, but then Piers was flying with her in his arms, skimming low over the pine trees. His pace was smooth, far smoother than her own, making Hailey relax into his embrace.
She watched with interest as he circled and then slid between the slight opening in the trees. Hailey thought that he was just going to put them on the forest floor, but instead he wove through the forest. Hailey blinked when they came to what looked like an enormous round basket hanging from an ancient evergreen.
“What in the world is that?”
Piers grinned.
“The Castle has many secrets, but this is one of my favorites. Let me show you.”
CHAPTER FIVE
HAILEY HAD NO idea what to expect, but Piers was obviously proud of the giant basket.
“Can you hover on your own for a moment?” he asked. “I can do this with you in my arms, but it would be clumsy.”
Mystified, Hailey did as he asked.
Piers turned and pulled open a hatch, climbing inside. After a moment, a warm light appeared from inside the structure. Piers poked his head back out.
“Come in. The sooner we get inside with the door closed behind us, the warmer we’ll be.”
Hailey approached the structure cautiously, climbing inside as she had seen Piers do. He closed the hatch behind her as she stared around in wonder.
What had looked like an enormous round mass of twigs and branches from the outside was revealed inside to be a small room with a sturdy wooden floor and smooth wooden walls. There was a chest set against one wall, and the light radiated from a small crystal embedded in the ceiling. When Hailey shifted her weight, she was
aware of a very slight sway, but other than that, she might have been in a tiny room in a cabin on the ground.
“What is this place?” she asked, looking around in wonder.
“It’s one of our safe bases. Sometimes, because of the work or research we need to do, the Wiccans of the Castle need to spend their time in the forests. When that happens, they can use these safe bases as places to stay. They are self-contained, warm, and have food and water as well as bedding. This one just happens to be high in the air. There are others that are low to the ground and some that are in the ground.”
“It’s beautiful.”
She looked around, already warm enough that she could remove her hat and gloves. Piers was stripping down as well. He didn’t stop until he was down to a black T-shirt and jeans. Hailey giggled.
“What are you laughing at?” Piers’s voice was amused. She pointed at his shirt.
“I would not have pegged you for a Metallica fan.”
“Finest music in the past five hundred years,” he said with a grin. “I’ve been keeping track.”
“Really?”
“Nah, not quite. I like music, but keeping up on it can be a bit tiring. Usually I find a band I like, I stick with it until it is no longer fashionable, and then I drop it when everyone’s ready to bury me if I don’t find some new songs. I figure I’ve got another ten or fifteen years or so with this band before the coven threatens to revolt.”
Hailey grinned.
“Have you truly lived so long?”
“I have.” Piers smiled easily, but there was a shadow over his face. “I was born in England in 1597. You would not believe some of the strange music that I’ve listened to.”
Hailey didn’t necessarily want to hear about the music, but she knew a deflection when she heard one.
“This is very beautiful, the safe base. I mean, it’s so cozy and warm.”
Piers was checking the time on his smartphone.