The Lick of Fire Trilogy

by Bianca D’Arc

  Shit!

  Paul looked for a gate. He had to get in there and help her!

  Chapter Nine

  “You stay away from me!” Syd shouted at Elliot. She had nowhere to run. Elliot was in a rage like she’d never seen before. He had her death in his eyes, and she was certain he’d stab her with the clippers given half a chance.

  Then, something really weird happened. As she threw her hand out to stop him, little blips of red sparkles came out of her fingertips and seemed to hit Elliot in the chest, stopping his forward motion. Was this magic? Was it helping her keep him away? If so, she wanted it to keep on working, but Elliot was fighting back.

  “Your untrained magic won’t stop me, bitch. And your old friend up in the mountains won’t last long after my brothers get through with him,” Elliot sneered.

  Syd’s mind spun into panic. Was he talking about Arthur? Was Arthur under threat in his home, even as she was being attacked here at work?

  She could see Elliot struggle for every inch of ground as he moved closer. His forward motion had slowed to a crawl, but he was still moving. Still drawing near. If something didn’t change quickly, he’d be in range to hurt her. Damn.

  Syd started to panic in earnest. She was trapped, and there was no way around Elliot in the narrow aisle between the densely packed trees. Hysteria rose…along with something else. Something fiery. Something that tingled and made it feel like bubbles were popping against her skin. Frothy bubbles of fire that couldn’t hurt her, but would help stop Elliot, she hoped.

  She reached out with her hand again and ordered him in her strongest voice. “Go away!”

  And then, something happened. The little red sparkles coalesced into a ball of orange fire that formed at the tips of her fingers and then flew at Elliot so fast he couldn’t duck. One minute, he was there. The next, the sharp shears were clattering to the pavement, and Elliot was gone.

  Holy fuck. What had she just done?

  Paul felt the surge of magic before he saw the fireball. He was already halfway over the fence when Syd let loose. Paul expected carnage and flames all over the place. Instead, he watched something he’d never seen before. A fireball that consumed only the man it was aimed at, then disappeared.

  Paul dropped down to the other side of the tall fence and looked at the pile of ash that was quickly scattering in an unseen wind. That was all that remained of the man who had threatened Syd. Paul looked up to meet her eyes to find she was truly aghast at what she had done. She was looking from her hand to the ashes, her eyes wide, her body shaking.

  “Looks like we’ve got another one,” Stone muttered from the other side of the fence, where he was watching the byplay. Paul turned to him.

  “You’ve seen this before?” Paul asked tersely. Stone nodded.

  “Oh, yeah. That, my friend, was phoenix fire. It only burns evil and leaves no trace.” Paul looked back to find the little pile of ashes was gone completely. All evidence of the man who had been standing there moments before was gone.

  “Syd?” Paul began, walking toward her. “You okay?”

  She met his gaze, shock still prevalent in her expression. “What just happened? Did I kill Elliot?”

  “That was Elliot?” Paul asked, realizing what must have happened now that he knew the identity of the man who had cornered her.

  She nodded, and Paul closed the distance between them, taking her into a sheltering hug. She melted against him as if he was the only safe place in a storm of confusion.

  “Dragostea mea…” The Romanian endearment just slipped out. He wondered if she would be upset to hear him call her his love after only one night together. “This is why he was bothering you. Your power is just starting to rise, and they wanted to turn it to evil. You were right to resist, and if Elliot had not been evil, he would not have been affected by your fire. You could be a force for good in the world. He would have tried to warp your strength toward evil. You did the right thing.”

  “But I’m going to get arrested for murder!” She clutched at his shirt, truly upset while Paul tried not to see the humor in her situation.

  He looked over her head at Stone, who didn’t bother to hide the smile on his face. Paul jerked his head, a silent order for the other man to move away and keep watch. After a moment, Stone complied.

  “You won’t be arrested. There is no evidence. Your coworker will have simply disappeared, and nobody but us will ever know what truly happened to him.” He tried to find the right words to calm her worries.

  “That’s awful,” she mumbled against his chest. “How could I have done something like that? I didn’t want to kill him. Just make him go away.”

  “He went away, all right,” Paul muttered before thinking better of it. Syd stiffened in his arms and moved away.

  “What if I lose my temper and do it again? What if I accidently did that to you?” She was upset, and he feared he’d only made it worse with his off-hand comment. He had to try to fix this.

  “You wouldn’t be able to turn me to ash, Syd. For one thing, I’m not evil. Your special flame only burns evil, which is a good thing, or all these lovely trees and your employer’s fine building would be going up in flames right now.”

  Syd looked around her, realization dawning, it seemed. “Those flames should have spread,” she murmured. “Even with the living trees, there’s plenty of dry fuel here to take a spark.”

  “Exactly,” Paul agreed. “Your flame is magical. It only attacks evil. Elliot had to have been pure evil to go up so fast.”

  “He was going to kill me with the shears,” she confirmed, nodding toward the metal tool on the ground. “He said, if they couldn’t recruit me, they were going to retire me permanently.”

  “Then, you were right to kill him.” Paul didn’t sugarcoat his words. She would have to learn to deal with her power now that it was blossoming. “His words betrayed his allegiance. He was part of the Venifucus. An order dedicated to pure evil. I shudder to think what they would have done to you to get at your power.” He stepped closer to her, catching her gaze. “You did the right thing.”

  He held her for a long moment while Stone scouted the area. So far, no one had seen a thing. Paul wanted to keep it that way.

  “How did you get over the fence?” Syd drew away, her glance going from Paul to the tall fence and back again as she seemed to settle down a bit.

  “I’m a shifter. We can do things that mere mortals can’t.” His smile was meant to tease, and she seemed to respond, the light coming back into her eyes slowly.

  “What about him?” She nodded toward Stone, who was just visible in the distance. Stone could probably still hear their conversation, though. Werewolves had excellent hearing. “Isn’t he a shifter, too?”

  Paul moved back and turned to contemplate Stone, giving Syd a moment to collect herself. “Different species. Wolves aren’t very good at climbing, though they can jump pretty well—within reason. That fence has to be ten feet at least. It’s probably a bit beyond our new friend’s abilities.”

  Stone threw him a dirty look over his shoulder, proving to Paul that the werewolf Alpha could, indeed, hear him. Paul grinned. Stone probably could’ve made the leap over the fence, but he’d held back in his role as rear guard. Paul knew that, but he couldn’t resist checking if the wolf had a sense of humor.

  “I think it’s twelve feet, actually,” Syd put in. “Howard—the owner—was really proud of it when it was installed. He’d had some trouble with kids getting in back here and messing with the trees in the past, but that ended as soon as the fence went up.”

  “He didn’t put in any surveillance cameras, did he?” Paul felt reasonably sure that there were no electronic gizmos in the area. Most gave off a high-pitched frequency that he could hear, but that went beyond human capabilities. He didn’t hear anything like that in the area, but Syd would probably know if there was a recording somewhere he’d have to destroy.

  “No. Howard doesn’t believe in spying. The fence did the tr
ick, and that was good enough for him,” Syd said with quiet authority. Howard sounded like a good boss. At least, Syd’s tone when she talked about the man was filled with respect and friendship. “Oh, no,” she gasped and stood rigidly upright. “Elliot said something about Arthur being in danger. I have to go help him!”

  “Your friend, the shaman?” Paul asked, not having heard all of what Elliot had said to her.

  “Elliot said something about his brothers and that Arthur wouldn’t last long against them.”

  “Venifucus,” Paul spat. “They must have gone after your friend. They like to destroy those who fight on the side of Light whenever they can. It’s part of their plan for total world domination.”

  “We can’t let them hurt Arthur!” Syd pushed past Paul, not bothering to pick up the long shears that had been left on the ground where they fell. He didn’t blame her. She probably didn’t want to touch anything Elliot had handled.

  “Go around front. I’ll meet you there with the car,” Paul told her before he jumped over the fence.

  Seeing Paul’s move, Stone came back to meet up with him. The werewolf Alpha offered to follow them up into the mountains right then and there, but Paul declined.

  “If you can get a group together—say a half-dozen members of your Pack, or some of the bears—” Paul told Stone as they made their way swiftly back to the parking area, “—we may need some help in the aftermath. Or, if I can’t contain them myself, I’d appreciate being avenged, though I don’t think it’s going to come to that.” Paul’s dry humor brought a smile to the werewolf Alpha’s face. Stone did have a sense of humor, after all.

  Stone agreed with Paul’s request and quickly took note of the directions Paul gave him. Paul knew where Arthur’s house was from his aerial reconnaissance the night before. He’d seen the old house, standing proud and lonely on an outcropping of rock midway up a mountain. It had been the only logical place Syd could have come from in her little car.

  Stone promised to bring a crew with him as quickly as possible. They’d be right behind Paul and Syd, or so the Alpha claimed. Paul was glad of the promised help. He wasn’t sure what they would find when they reached Arthur’s house. He also wasn’t sure how Syd’s fledgling magic would react to another threat. All Paul knew was that he had to help her. He had to help this friend of hers that meant so much to her.

  And part of his mission in life was to stop the Venifucus wherever and whenever he found them. It was part of his service to the Lady of Light. Part of his calling. Part of his penance for a misspent youth when he wasn’t sure which way to go. He’d been tempted into doing some bad things for which he’d atoned long ago, but in his heart, he would never be able to fully cleanse his soul. Thus, he’d struck a deal with the Goddess. He would serve Her and do all in his power to fight the darkness that threatened the mortal realm. In return, someday, perhaps, She would help him forgive himself for his youthful foolishness, and maybe…just maybe…She would help him find his family.

  Syd did her best to calm down before she reached the office area. She went straight to the locker room where she retrieved her bag and put away her garden apron and rubber boots. She then went to Howard’s office and did the best acting job she could manage under the circumstances, telling her boss she really needed the afternoon off. Howard was a very reasonable fellow, and Syd had been an exemplary employee to this point. She almost never called in sick, and she’d never before left in the middle of the day, so Howard believed her when she said she wasn’t feeling well and needed to go home.

  He told her to take it easy and feel better. Just like that, she was free to go. Syd clocked out and headed for the parking lot. Paul, thankfully, hadn’t moved her car from where he had parked it, and she was able to get in on the driver’s side and pull away without anyone seeing him, seated low on the passenger side.

  She was glad he hadn’t tried to take over. She wouldn’t have been able to sit still in the passenger seat for the long drive up into the mountains. As it was, worry was her near-constant companion as she drove them hastily out of town. There would be no stops on the way, this time. No, this was a possible rescue mission. She didn’t have time—more importantly, Arthur didn’t have time—for her to make her way lazily up the mountain. She had to get there as fast as she could this time and hope for the best.

  “Do you want to talk about it?” Paul asked quietly once they’d been on the highway for a few minutes.

  “About what? Elliot? Arthur?” she asked, her voice a little shrill even to her own ears. A lot had happened, and she was barely keeping it together.

  “All of it,” Paul replied patiently. “Any of it,” he went on. “I know it’s a lot to take in and deal with. You’ve just discovered you have a potent, sometimes dangerous magic. I know from personal experience how hard that is to understand, at first.”

  “Personal experience?” she asked, keeping her eyes on the road for the most part, but shooting him a curious glance, now and again.

  Paul wanted to tell her the whole story, but she was already overloaded from everything that had happened in the short time since they’d met. He would share only as much as he thought would help her. Feeding her the information a little bit at a time had to be better than bombarding her with all the facts at once, right? He hoped he’d chosen the right strategy.

  “I was raised in an orphanage,” he reminded her. “I thought I was completely human until I hit puberty, and suddenly, my abilities started to emerge. The day I first shifted was the day I left the orphanage for good. I was fourteen. I’ve been making my way on my own ever since, learning about what I could do through trial and error.”

  “But you know other shifters, right? Couldn’t they help you?” she asked, her tone sympathetic.

  He shook his head. “Different species have different issues. Some cat shifters, for example, start shifting when they’re babies. Wolves don’t start shifting until puberty, like me, but I’m not a wolf, and very little else of their lore applies to my kind. Bears are close—they’re very magical—but not an exact match either. Besides, I didn’t meet my first bear shifter until I was in my twenties. By then, I’d figured out most of it.” He sighed. “Having the power to hurt and kill was something I didn’t deal with well at the time. I was sorely tempted to go too far, to seek revenge on those who had hurt me in the past. And, I’m sorry to say, I gave into the temptation once too often when I was too young to really understand the ramifications of my actions. I have spent most of my adult life trying to make up for my past transgressions,” he admitted.

  Silence reigned for the next few minutes as Syd got all she could have of the little car’s engine. Light as it was, it really moved on the highway, reaching speeds well over the limit, but Syd didn’t seem to care, and fortunately—or perhaps, magically—there were no police cars in sight. At this rate, they would make it from the city to the base of the mountains in record time.

  “I get feelings about people,” Syd told him out of the blue sometime later. “From almost the moment we met, I sensed you were a good person. I wouldn’t have let you into my car if I didn’t have a good instinct about you.” She glanced at him for a moment, compassion in her gaze. “Whatever you did in the past, you’ve made up for it in the present, and I suspect, you’ve changed your ways and chosen your path for all time.”

  Paul was a little stunned by her words but couldn’t find any fault with them. She was right. He’d chosen his path. He wasn’t going to make the same mistakes he’d made as a young man. He was playing strictly on the side of Light, forevermore. It pleased him down to his soul that she had seen that about him. Most people he encountered weren’t so sure of his intentions and tended to mistrust him.

  Yet Syd, with so much on the line, had chosen to see only the good in him. It meant a lot. More than it probably should have, so soon into their acquaintance. But who was he to question Fate? Or, perhaps, it was the hand of the Lady, playing out once again in his life.

  “You’re
right about me,” he said quietly. “And I have feelings about you, too. Your soul is pure and unblemished. And, regardless of what happened earlier today, it remains so. You did the right thing with Elliot, even though it might take some time for your human half to come to terms with it.”

  “Human half?” She looked at him, frowning.

  “Dragostea mea, I’m willing to bet that you’re a shifter,” he told her. “And, if you are, you will be learning the truth of it sooner rather than later. The only advice I can give you is to not fight the change when you feel it come on. It is what has always been meant to be. Go with it. But remember to come back. My heart will break if you are lost to the shift and do not return to me.”

  That was about as close as he could come to admitting the deep feelings in his heart for her right now. He didn’t want to scare her off by speaking of his love too soon, but he also didn’t want her thinking that they had no attachment. Especially since, after speaking with Lance and Slade, he knew her first shift was going to be risky for many reasons. Most importantly, to him, was the chance that she would chase the sun and never return to him. He wanted to impress upon her now that he would be devastated if that were to happen.

  At the same time, he couldn’t just come out and tell her she was a phoenix. No, that was still just an educated guess at the moment. She could turn out to be something entirely different. He didn’t want to build up any expectations. He had to let the process unfold naturally and see where it led.

  “This is all just too weird,” she said, shaking her head in denial.

  “Forget it for now,” he counseled. “Let’s just take this one step at a time. We’ll check on your friend, Arthur, and see what happens from there, okay?”

  She breathed deep before nodding agreement. “That sounds like a plan to me,” she said as they neared the foot of the mountains which could be seen in the near distance. Clouds were gathering around the peaks and rapidly descending.