“No reception here, remember?” Karen asked, smiling at his phone. “We enchant a TV so we can keep up with the news, but as for everything else…”
“Right.” Ordinarily, his satellite phone would get reception pretty much anywhere on the planet. But in Sanctuary, their magical wards shut down any electronic device they didn’t specifically protect. So as long as he was on this mountain he was out of contact. He eyed the witch beside him. “Don’t suppose you’d consider cutting a hole through the ward so I could make a call?”
She shook her head. “Don’t suppose I would.”
He muttered something, but she cut him off quickly.
“We can’t risk it, Eternal. Not even for you. All it would take is one stray signal picked up by the wrong person and Sanctuary would be in danger.” She scrubbed her hands up and down her arms. “As it was, the tracker Terri was carrying came all too close to the entrance. We’ll have to be on high alert for the next few weeks, just in case.”
He hadn’t considered that. Realizing that he may have brought trouble to this spot bothered him more than he cared to admit. “Do you need me to stay? I can leave the mountain, make a call and come back to help guard the place for a few weeks.”
Her head tipped to one side as she studied him. “You would do that?”
He inclined his head. “We in the magical world have to help each other.”
“True,” she said, taking a deep breath. “But in this case, it’s unnecessary. The Guardians will be able to handle whatever comes our way. And if need be, we will all fight. Human and witch.”
He looked into her eyes and read the fierce determination written there. And still he had to ask, “What about the Wiccan Rede… An it harm none, do what ye will?”
The leader of the witches gave him a rueful smile. “Times change, Eternal. You know we risk great damage to ourselves in using our power against our enemies.”
“Yes,” he said solemnly, knowing that whatever harm a witch did would return on her threefold.
“And yet, what choice do we have?” She shook her head and looked out over the starlit lake. “We use human weapons when we can and resort to magics only when there is no other option. We, each of us, are prepared to accept the karma of what we do-to ensure that we are not wiped from the earth.”
“You believe you can hold this camp against all intruders?”
She smiled. “It wasn’t easy for you to get in, was it?”
“Hell, no.” He grinned suddenly, remembering the warrior women who had dropped from trees to challenge him. “Still not easy to know who to trust, though.”
“True enough.” She looked back at the camp, tidy log cabins with lamplight falling through the windows to lie on the ground like gold dust. “But the turned witches-traitors-are still few and far between. We’ll survive, as will the other Sanctuaries around the world.”
“It’s bad times,” Rune said softly.
“True again,” Karen agreed, then looked out over the mountainous view. “But we’ve lived through bad times before. We will this time, too. Now that the Awakening is here, everything will change.”
He slid a glance to her. “How much do you know?”
She smiled. “More than you think, less than I’d like.” Shrugging, she continued, “The story of the last great coven has been handed down from mother to daughter throughout the centuries. We all know about the chosen few. And the tasks they must complete to ensure the safety of this world. We don’t know who they are, but we know the time is now.”
Rune snorted a laugh. He and the other Eternals hadn’t considered that the witches had kept a chain of information going throughout the centuries. But they should have. Witches were clever women. And it didn’t pay to underestimate a clever woman.
“The Sanctuaries hold libraries of spell books. Shadow books,” she was saying. “We’ve saved the ancient tomes and added to them over the years. If the chosen ones need help they’ve only to seek out a Sanctuary.”
Intrigued, he stared at the short woman beside him. “You’ve been preparing for the Awakening all along?”
“Of course,” she said. “We all need the Awakened ones to succeed. If they fail… everyone loses.”
“Good point,” Rune said. But they wouldn’t fail, he told himself grimly. He and his fellow Eternals would do everything in their considerable power to ensure that their witches prevailed.
Karen laid one hand on his forearm. “Tell them, Eternal. Tell the chosen ones that the Sanctuary libraries can be accessed by a dimensional spell.”
“Dimensional? Hell, that’s what got us into trouble in the first place! Opening portals into other worlds is a bad idea.”
“It is,” she agreed, with a shake of her head. “But that’s not what I mean. Sanctuaries have all been equipped with a dimensional hotspot, so to speak. A way for us to share information.”
“You manipulate dimensions?” Rune asked, astonished at the level of power in the tiny witch before him.
“Combining our magic makes us stronger,” she pointed out. “If the chosen ones need our help, they’ve only to be close to a Sanctuary to open the portal.”
Rune stared down at her, admiration shining in his eyes. “You amaze me.”
“We do what we can with what we have,” she said with a nod. “But in the end, we are all prisoners here. In these safe spots around the world. Cut off from families, friends, hope. The question is, how long will we have to hide? How long, Eternal?”
“Wish I knew.”
It all depended, Rune thought, on the Awakening. On the coven coming together again, to end what they’d begun so long ago.
If that happened, then they would have proof to show the world that witchcraft could be an ally. That witches themselves could be trusted to help when the world needed it most.
He shifted his gaze back to the shadow-filled valley. No pressure, he told himself.
Chapter 32
“What was that?”
The moment his magical flames winked out, Torin cursed viciously and pushed Shea to the ground, covering her with his own body. Her breath came fast and frantic from beneath him. He felt her fear and shared it. Not for himself. He’d been battling evil for eons. Spilling blood was nothing new to him. But seeing Shea terrified and knowing that there were humans somewhere near who wanted her dead filled him with a fear he’d never known before. It tainted every breath.
“A grenade,” he muttered, keeping his voice low, though there was clearly no need for stealth. The sound of the fire at the motel below roared into the night like a caged, starving beast.
He looked down at her wide, frightened eyes and wanted to kill whoever had brought her to this. In the span of just a few days, she’d been captured, tortured, chased and shot. And now someone had blown up the room she was in.
“Enough.” He planted a hard, fast kiss on her mouth and then stared into her eyes. “Whoever launched the grenade into our room is probably still down there. I’m going to find them.”
He lifted his head to peer over the rock behind which he had Shea hidden. Looking through the trees, he could see what was left of the motel. His blood turned to ice, then an instant later, began to boil.
The room he and Shea had been occupying was an inferno.
The rest of the place didn’t look much better. There were screams and shouts as people ran for their lives. But Torin was looking for those who would be running toward the flames. Whoever had tried to kill them would no doubt want to check the scene, make sure he hadn’t failed.
Which meant Torin was going hunting.
“Stay here,” he ordered, rolling off Shea to come to his feet in a crouch. He stared down at her and saw shadows from the intense light of the fire race across her features. “Right here, do you understand?”
She pushed up, swept dirt and pebbles from her cheek and stared at him. “Why? I might be able to help.”
“I need you safely here while I find those responsible.”
“An
d do what? Kill him?”
“Not until we’ve had a talk.” He wanted information. He’d removed the tracker from Shea’s body, so how did the assassin find them? He had to know which agency was funding this hunt. And he needed to know how to stop it.
Shea looked at the conflagration, flames shooting high into the air, sparks lifting, flying in the wind toward the trees, which were already beginning to smolder. She grabbed Torin’s arm and hung on. “Forget about finding him. There’ll be others here soon. Firefighters. Police. Let’s just go. Now. While they fight the fire.”
“Go where? Shea, if we don’t stop this here, whoever is behind it will only follow us.”
“Who cares?” she shouted it, but her voice was lost in the surrounding clamor. “Everybody in the free world is already looking for me, Torin!”
He went down on one knee beside her and grabbed her upper arms hard enough to leave an imprint of his fingertips on her skin. Just touching her grounded him in a way that nothing else ever had. Knowing she was his now gave him strength that even his god would tremble at. He looked into her green eyes and felt love wash through him. Love like he had never known before.
“You are my heart, Shea,” he said, sliding his hands up to cup her face in his palms. “I will do whatever I must to see you safe.”
She covered his hands with her own. “Do you think you’re any less important to me? Don’t go down there, Torin.”
“I have no choice. No one will harm you. Ever.” He leaned in and kissed her hard. “Do you believe me?”
A second, then two, ticked past as he waited, staring into the eyes of the woman he’d hungered for throughout time.
“Yes,” she whispered, meeting his eyes. “But-”
“No.” He released her and stood up. He had her belief. He knew her trust wasn’t yet his, but that would come. Provided he could keep her alive long enough for her to become immortal. Thirty days until the mating ritual was complete. Thirty days to find what was lost and return it to safekeeping. Then they would have the coming centuries together and no one, he told himself, was going to rob them of that time together.
“Stay. Here.” Then he flashed into flames and was gone.
“How the hell can we get in there to see the bodies?”
“We wait.”
The first man snorted, then shot a look of pride at the roaring fire consuming the back end of the small motel. “Be like waiting for the fires of hell to burn out.”
“They’re dead,” his friend said, assurance ringing in his tone. “No way they got out of that in time.”
“You best be right. The boss won’t like it if the witch escaped.”
“And just who,” Torin asked, flashing in behind the two men, “is the boss?”
One of the men turned instantly, brought up the shotgun he carried and pointed it at Torin’s chest. Before he could fire, the Eternal had grabbed the barrel and shoved it up. It discharged harmlessly into the air. Torin wrested the gun from the man’s grip tossed it aside, then reached out and broke the shooter’s neck with a quick twist of his hand.
The assassin’s friend looked as though he’d seen a ghost. And he had. The ghost of death coming for him. Torin had no patience for those who would lie in wait and kill from a distance. He had no sympathy for those who killed for money. When he looked at the remaining man and watched the light of the fire dance over his wide, terrified eyes, Torin felt nothing for him.
Only the sheer determination to get what he’d come for.
Around him, the night was alive with sound. The fire. Shouts. Screams. And in the distance, a siren called out, wailing mournfully.
Standing in the treeline behind the motel, they were well hidden. He grabbed the man by the neck, lifted him high off the ground and looked up into small, frightened eyes. “Who is it you work for? Who is after Shea Jameson?”
The man frantically pulled at Torin’s hand, futilely trying to loosen his grip. Nails scraped and scratched but couldn’t help him.
Torin’s hand only tightened around the man’s throat as he kicked his legs wildly, looking for purchase, desperately laboring for air that wouldn’t come.
Torin shook him like a dog. “Who sent you here?”
Fury spat at him from the man’s eyes. His face was red, mottled. His hands continued to tear at Torin’s grip, hoping to ease it. Torin easily turned and slammed the man into a wide tree trunk, rattling the man’s head so hard his eyes jittered. “Talk to me, bastard, or die right here.”
Wildly, the man nodded. Frantic eyes rolled back in his head, feet kicked against the tree.
Torin eased off on the pressure slightly to allow the faintest whisper of air to enter the man’s starving lungs. “Talk.”
“Orders,” he said, still sounding strangled even as he hissed in one small breath of air after another. “Over the phone.”
“From who?”
“Don’t know,” he insisted, slapping now at Torin’s hand, locked firmly around his throat. “Didn’t ask! Stop!”
That last word came out on a wheeze as Torin’s hard fist squeezed more tightly again. All around him, the fire roared and humans scurried, trying to save something of the burning motel. The siren continued to wail, closer now, and he knew that in moments there would be even more humans cluttering up the scene. He had no time to waste with this scum.
“You take blind orders to kill a woman? No questions asked?” The black fury inside him was growing, spreading.
“Not… woman…” the man managed. “Witch.” Hatred fueled that word and glittered in the man’s dying eyes. There was no remorse. No regret. Only a determination that burned as fiercely in his soul as the flames that ate up the motel behind them.
“I cannot let you live,” Torin told him flatly. “No woman is safe-witch or human-while men such as you walk free.”
Worry darted across the man’s eyes but a moment later was replaced by resignation and a kind of fanatic pride. As Torin’s grip eased, he spoke again in a hoarse voice. “Killing me stops nothing. She’ll never be safe. Witches should die. They’ll find her. They’ll kill-”
Torin snapped the neck beneath his hand and let the man fall. If no one moved the body, it would be consumed by the spreading flames of the fire he had caused. There was justice in that.
Either way, the threat was gone for the moment and Torin shifted his gaze to the trees where his woman waited. He’d wasted enough time on this task.
He called on the flames and flashed to Shea’s side.
Kellyn felt the stars beginning to align.
She even gave the desk clerk at the Renaissance Mayflower Hotel a coy smile as he tapped his fingers across the keyboard.
“I’m sorry, miss,” he said finally, and to give him his due, he did seem disappointed, “but our Presidential Suite has been reserved in advance.”
A quick whip of impatience sliced through her, but Kellyn smiled through it. Leaning across the marble counter, she took the young man’s hand and squeezed gently. The sparks flying from her touch went unnoticed by anyone else. “Check again. I think you’ll find the room is in my name.”
He stared at her, his eyes blank, his mouth slack. Her spell countered his objections and as she waited for his response, she whispered, “Do for me what I will.”
The young man blinked, took a shaky breath and nodded. “Yes,” he said, his voice as robotic as his movements. “You’re right, of course. The room is reserved for you. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Kellyn smiled again, relishing the sweep of power she felt. How did humans manage to stumble through their lives without the electrifying pump of something magical inside them? What boring, tiny creatures they were. And yet, she told herself, oh, so helpful when properly motivated.
“See? I knew you’d find the mistake,” she assured him graciously. “Now, I’d like champagne and strawberries delivered to my suite in an hour. Please be sure the champagne is very cold. I’d hate to be disappointed.”
Again he
r power crackled against the young man’s skin and he nodded quickly. “I’ll see to it personally.”
“Aren’t you kind?” When he produced a sign-in sheet for her signature, she simply waved her free hand at it and it disappeared. He went through the motions of filing the nonexistent paper away and then handed her the key cards. “You’ve been very helpful”-she paused to read the name tag pinned to his suit jacket-“Michael.”
“Thank you, miss. My pleasure.”
“I’m sure it was,” she said, releasing him at last. As she did, his free hand swept to the spell-charmed wrist she’d held and idly scratched at his own skin. He would feel the burn of her spell for a few hours, but would remember nothing else about this encounter.
And should the original party show up to claim his reserved Presidential Suite… well, she would deal with them in the same way.
Turning, she walked down the long marble lobby, enjoying the quiet click of her Ferragamos. Power. It was all about power, really.
At the elevator, she waved one hand at the closed doors and they opened instantly. She stepped inside, leaned languorously against the wall and smiled to herself as the doors swept shut.
“Good to be a witch,” she whispered to no one.
She’d waited through lifetime after lifetime for this and now it was all within her grasp. It was all coming together so nicely. As if it were Destiny. Preordained. And she believed it was. How could it not be?
She had a plan. More, she had powerful backers. Yes, she was being forced to deal with humans, but when the stakes were this high, she was willing to put up with some aggravation.
They didn’t understand, of course. How could they? The humans believed that they were in charge. That she was their willing accomplice.
She laughed a little as the elevator opened onto the Presidential Suite. Above her head a wide skylight offered a view of the night sky, shining with stars and the ever-increasing moon. The floor was a mosaic pattern of inlaid marble and the wall sconces threw small shafts of golden light.
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