by Ann Gimpel
Mages were failed shifters. Those whose magic didn’t run quite straight enough to attract a bondmate. None of them accepted their second-class status, though. They all did everything they could before the truth they’d never be bonded sank in. By then, they were hostile, bitter, and filled with hatred for every shifter with a bond animal.
The last mage-shifter war had played itself out in the middle of the seventeen hundreds. It hadn’t been pretty. There’d been so much carnage on both sides the sorcerers’ council, concerned by the rising death toll, decreed an end to the fighting.
Niall pounded a fist into a nearby tree. He’d thought their internecine squabbles had been private, but apparently vampires had discovered them. In true vampire form, they’d found a way to leverage hatred to their benefit.
If mages willingly lent their power to vampires, it would make vamps strong enough to capture shifters, and a whole lot of other magic-wielders too.
It meant shifters weren’t safe from their magic being diverted and turned to dark purposes. Maybe the pair who’d fled weren’t as lackluster as Niall had judged them. Perhaps they’d been assailed by magic so pervasive they’d had no choice. Formulae existed that assessed additive magics and what the net result would be, except he’d never been much for burying himself in books.
Someone had their ancient lore tomes, but he had no idea who.
He stood in the clearing, sword in hand, the stench of vampire hideously strong, and plotted a short-term game plan. He needed to sound the alarm to all his kin, a process he could begin via telepathy. Before he did that, he should catch up with the wolf and the cat. Maybe they’d have critical information, material he needed. No point in disseminating one message to shifters near enough to reach with magic only to end up countermanding it with a second one.
Things would be bad enough once this news got out. Some shifters would probably want to fight, but that would bring their supernatural identities into the light of day. Niall had enjoyed the last two hundred years where he wasn’t constantly looking over his shoulder for the hangman waiting to drape a noose around his neck.
He wasn’t anxious to trade his peace of mind for the furtive existence that had driven him out of Ireland.
“Yeah, that peace of mind went up in smoke when I scented shifter and vampire at the accident.”
“Good thing you said it,” the jaguar noted. “Otherwise I would have.”
Niall glanced skyward. The sun was squarely above him. Half the day was gone. He was due at work tonight, which meant he had to get moving. He tracked the shifters to where they’d taken their animal forms, and then he stopped. He should return the blade to his home, but he didn’t want to take the time.
He raised his head, scenting the air. The wolf and cat had headed into the forest, leaving the road behind. He picked his way after them until he found a cairn of standing stones. It was a perfect place to leave the saber, and he tucked it between two boulders, shrouding its hiding place with a magical overlay.
No longer burdened by needing hands to carry the blade, he let the shift magic take him. Four legs with substantial claws were far better than two for negotiating the rough terrain. An hour passed before he closed the distance between himself and the two shifters. They crouched over a smallish deer they’d just killed. A creek burbled past nearby.
Niall released the enchantment keeping his magic hidden.
The wolf let go of her hold on the deer and whipped to face him, golden eyes narrowed in challenge. The mountain lion was a little slower, but he too spun to face Niall, growling a challenge.
“I rescued you,” Niall said, and then shifted amid a bright flare of power.
The mountain lion bowed his head. Magic shimmered around the wolf as she reclaimed her human form. Blood streaked her cheeks and chin. She tried to wipe it away, but all it did was smear.
Niall stared at high, firm breasts, a delicate waist, and flared hips. Red hair trailed almost to knee level, and her eyes were a clear, perfect blue. He’d bet his last spell she had an ass to die for. Heat licked at his loins, desperate, primitive. He’d just come from a battlefield. Warriors often traded swords for fucking. It reminded them how precious life was.
“Thank you for your timely intervention.” The wolf’s voice was low and sweet. It forced his overheated gaze away from her body. He was behaving abysmally, like a boor.
“Indeed, many thanks from me also.” The mountain cat was human as well. “My name is Stephan Lurie. Sarai is my niece.”
“I’m Niall MacLier, and I figured you were related,” he stammered, feeling like a fool. A familiar fullness between his legs told him he had to be sporting a full-blown erection. Embarrassment didn’t make a dent in his lust. He needed to get laid more, but he couldn’t fix that problem anytime soon.
Maybe not at all the way things were going.
He cleared his throat. “I finished off the vampires, but I need to know how they bent you to their will.”
Stephan nodded, a somber expression on his face. “We should have known better, but we’ve lived for years at our ranch without any problems. We grew careless.”
“I disagree,” Sarai broke in. “We’ve never had any need to ward ourselves, so I fail to see how not taking a precaution we’ve never needed before can be labeled careless.”
Niall buried a grin. He liked Sarai. She had spunk. Probably meant she’d be a hellion in bed. His groin throbbed, and he shut down the sexual imagery.
“All right.” Niall was still on a fact-gathering mission. “You weren’t warded. Then what happened?”
“Those three vampires came out of nowhere, but it wasn’t just vampire magic,” Stephan said. “I felt something else.”
“We thought maybe mages were behind this,” Sarai said. Her eyes sheened. “My aunt Marie was with us. They killed her.”
“Goddess be damned, that’s terrible.” Niall’s arousal vanished in the face of Sarai’s grief.
“We must return. Offer her proper rites so her animal may run free again.” Stephan spoke stiffly, as if the words cost him.
“Of course. Would you like my help?” Niall asked.
“If it’s freely offered,” Stephan replied.
“It is,” Niall assured him.
“We must warn everyone we can,” Sarai spoke up.
“I’ve already begun, but telepathy only goes so far,” Stephan said.
“I’ll see what I can do to extend our reach,” Niall reassured them. “Where is Marie?” An image skimmed across his mind. “It’s enough. I can find her.”
Stephan wrapped a hand around Sarai’s arm. “Come, child. We will take a chance no one sees us.”
“If we come out inside the house, they won’t.” Sarai sounded fierce.
Alarms sounded in Niall’s mind. Inside a house would appeal to vampires since it was daytime. “Hang on. If vampires located you once, they can find you again. By now, they all know three of their legion are dead.”
“I refuse to leave my mate in her current state.” Stephan stood tall. “Maybe I should go alone.”
“Wait here,” Niall said. “I left the blade so I could shift. I’m going to retrieve it, and then we’ll all go. At least that way if we head straight into an ambush, we’ll have something to even the score.”
“I like the way you think, son.” Stephan held out a hand, and Niall shook it.
“I’d watch it with the son jargon. I’m probably older than you.”
“We can figure that out once Marie’s soul is on its way to the afterlife. And her bondmate is free.”
“Don’t think a thing about it,” Sarai said. “I’m past fifty human years, and he still calls me child.”
“It’s because you are a child to me…”
Their good-natured banter continued to flow as Niall summoned magic to return him to where he’d hidden the saber. Stephan was a decent man, and Sarai stunning to the nth power, but she wasn’t for him.
She needed a man who was mate material, somethi
ng he’d never been. Women were a diversion to him, a pleasant one, but nothing more.
“Aye, mate, keep telling yourself that,” he muttered as the stones hiding the sword formed in front of him. He was still giving himself advice when he headed back to the clearing where he’d left the two shifters.
He’d never paid much attention to behaving honorably where women were concerned, but this time would be different. He’d see to it.
If he didn’t, he had a feeling Stephan would do it for him. The man was fond of his niece and defensive as a cat on the prowl. Besides, there was something familiar about the cat shifter. Niall might have known him a long time back, but he couldn’t quite draw the memory out of its hidey hole.
Chapter 4
Sarai bent and rinsed her face and hands in the creek. The blood had already dried, but she did the best she could and looked longingly at the deer carcass. The animal had been young, tender, and a big step up from eating raw rats and marmots.
Stephan growled, and her head snapped up. “What? It’s a shame to let that food go to waste.”
Her uncle walked close and directed his words into her ear. “You stay away.”
“But we were just eating it,” she protested.
“Not what I meant.” Stephan exhaled sharply. “We don’t have much time before Niall returns, but I saw how he looked at you—”
“Uncle. He rescued us.”
“I’m well aware of that fact, but that one like as not has women in every town, lots of them. He probably hasn’t changed at all since our boat of shifters landed in New York.” Stephan made a face. “Damn if he didn’t spend the six weeks we were at sea moving from one bed to the next.”
Sarai resisted a strong temptation to roll her eyes. Stephan had always been an overprotective papa bear type, but this was ridiculous.
“I only just met him.” She turned a disappointed look her uncle’s way. “We have bigger problems. I’m not exactly in a mating mood.”
“He can be quite persuasive. Watch yourself.”
“Hush. He’ll be back soon.”
Magic flared, making her words prophetic as Niall strode toward them, blade in hand.
“Handy implement.” Stephan’s voice was gruff. “Where’d you come by it?”
Niall shrugged. “I brought it from Ireland, along with a few other relics I couldn’t bear to part with. It’s been sitting in the bottom of one closet or another since our ship landed. You were on my ship, right? You look familiar.”
“Yup. I was on it.” Stephan’s words skirted rebuke but didn’t quite get there.
“Thought so. I never forget a face…”
Sarai took advantage of the men’s conversation to take a good, hard look at Niall. He was a hell of an attractive man. Thick, black hair framed a high forehead and squared off chin dotted with a couple of day’s beard growth. His eyes had blazed silver in the cabin, but that was because he was partially immersed in his animal nature. Now they shaded to a deep, rich brown. He was tall, with muscles bunching along his shoulders and back and down his arms. Legs like small tree trunks supported him, and between them his cock had deflated somewhat.
She’d noticed it in full bloom. How could she not? Long, thick, and proud, it had jutted from his body. Despite her words about not being in a mating mood, her nether regions twitched. She hadn’t had a man in years. Between her uncle’s eagle eye and her aunt’s nattering about saving herself for just the right mate, she’d had to sneak around to have any kind of a sex life. Aside from a few spontaneous tumbles in the small back room of her shop, she’d lived like a nun.
She had a feeling Niall would more than make up for her long stint being celibate. Maybe him being a womanizer was a good thing. She wouldn’t have to worry about any hard-to-extricate-herself-from entanglements. Truth was, she loved her freedom. Marie had paraded dozens of potential mates through their home, and Sarai had found something wrong with every single one.
Her aunt finally took the hint, and the cavalcade of shifters in search of a mate had first slowed and then faded entirely, leaving her free to concentrate on her psychic shop in one of Denver’s poorer sections. Over time, she’d built a decent business constructing astrological charts, casting tarot spreads, and matching up crystals with people’s energies.
Niall was a Gemini. She was certain of it. His energy had that barely suppressed passion characteristic of the mutable air sign. She itched for details to corroborate her impressions, and maybe she’d get them. Later.
An image of his cock, sticking straight out from the mat of black curls between his legs tantalized her, and she pressed her thighs together. She was Cancer to the core, an almost perfect mate for don’t-tie-me-down Gemini—
“Niece!” Stephan’s command cut through her musings.
“Yes?” She focused on her uncle.
“We’re ready to depart.”
She walked close to where the men stood on the far side of the deer, understanding this would be a group teleport so they’d all come out in the same spot.
“Open your magic to me,” Stephan commanded. “I will control the casting.”
She expected Niall to protest, assume the alpha position, but he remained relaxed, ready, with an unreadable expression on his face. What had he and her uncle talked about after she’d stopped listening? She cringed inwardly and hoped Stephan hadn’t threatened Niall with mayhem if he so much as looked cross-eyed at her.
She hadn’t realized it until that moment, but she wanted to get to know the jaguar shifter better. A whole lot better. So what if it wasn’t permanent?
Magic settled around her, drawing her out of her thoughts, all of which pointed to Niall. The wooded glen fell away, replaced by the familiar walls of the farmhouse. A place that still smelled of her aunt. Sadness welled, superseding her earlier reflections.
Niall and Stephan exchanged a pointed glance before fanning out in different directions. Sarai scented the air. Had vampires invaded their home? It didn’t appear so. No one seemed to need her, so she darted into her room and tossed on an old set of sweats, followed by socks and boots.
“Out here!” Niall’s voice rang from the direction of the back porch.
She headed toward him at a dead run, not knowing what she’d find.
Stephan was already there when she arrived, anger kindling in his eyes. “You’re right. Goddammit. They were here and not that long ago.”
“Let’s retrieve Marie before they desecrate her further.” Niall’s grim expression could have been carved in stone.
He was still naked. Still gorgeous, but Sarai wasn’t paying attention. With the men behind her, she sprinted to where her aunt had fallen. It was a good quarter mile, and she was breathing hard when she fell to her knees next to her aunt’s body. It was totally drained of blood, but that had happened before they were herded away from their home.
Offered no choice but to follow the vampires.
She gathered Marie into her arms, heart aching for the cat shifter who’d been her aunt. Marie was a gentle, giving soul who’d loved unstintingly. Grief cut deep, and tears tracked down her face.
Stephan knelt next to her, holding his arms out for his mate. Sarai kissed Marie’s white forehead and gave her to Stephan, who rose to his feet with Marie clasped against his chest.
“Where do you wish to consecrate her?” Niall asked.
“Near her home. It’s what she would have wanted,” Stephan replied. His features twisted in sorrow, but he remained stoic.
Sarai followed the men back to the farmhouse. She bore witness as they summoned mage fire to cremate Marie. Fueled by strong magic, the flames burned her to nothing but bones and ash in a matter of minutes. Her bondmate formed above the funeral pyre, head bowed in sorrow as it, too, bid Marie farewell.
“Come with me.” Stephan motioned to Niall once the fire had died to ashes. “My clothes should fit you, and then we’ll move forward.”
Niall shook his head. “I have to get home. I’m late for work as
it is.”
“Is your work more important than saving our people?” Stephan’s question was quiet, without inflection, but he turned his unrelenting gaze on Niall. Sarai knew that look since she’d been its beneficiary on many occasions. It wasn’t the kind of skewering you could squirm out from under.
She transferred her full attention to Niall. How would he respond? Would he tell her uncle he’d take care of things from his end as best he could and be done with it?
Her eyes widened. If he did that, it might mean she never saw him again.
Back off, sweetie. Her inner voice was tart. Focus on what’s important.
Niall set his mouth in a determined line, but it didn’t make his lips any less kissable. “What’d you have in mind?” he asked Stephan.
Her uncle nodded. “That’s better. Surely you recall our last war with the mages?” At Niall’s nod, he went on. “We can’t afford another like it. Not in the modern world. Humans would decide all of us were a threat, and they have far more effective methods of tracking and killing than they possessed in the Old Country.”
“I already figured out that part,” Niall said dryly. “Once humans discover us, we’re all fair game. They won’t discriminate between mages or shifters or even vampires.”
“Maybe we could teach them,” Sarai spoke up. Both men turned disapproving glances her way, and she shrugged. “Men aren’t as intolerant as they were in the world you were born into. Or as superstitious. They don’t view supernatural phenomena as something that has to be eradicated—”
“Your experiences don’t exactly bear that out.” Stephan’s words held a sharp edge that shut her up fast.
Niall made a chopping motion. “Och, darling. Sure and you’ve been brainwashed by the media.”
“Watch the endearments,” Stephan snarled. “She’s my family.”
Niall rolled his eyes. “Pay attention to the important parts, mate. Do you disagree with me? Or do you believe humankind have embraced diversity, like your local Internet provider would like you to think?”