For a moment, there was only silence. A large shape blocked out the fading rays of the sun as Magnus towered over her prone body. Then he dropped to his knees beside her and took her face in trembling hands.
“Great Odin, are you okay, ’Nata?” His eyes gazed into hers, filled with concern and contrition. “Did I hurt you?”
Donata pulled air into her starving lungs in great gulps as the space around them was suddenly filled with people. She used one filthy arm to wipe the wetness off her forehead, smearing her face with dirt.
“I’m fine,” she said, more worried about Magnus than she was about herself. “How about you? I wasn’t too rough for you, was I?”
She tried to inject a lightness into her tone, but had the feeling she wasn’t fooling anyone. Peter and Friar Matthew hovered just out of range, clearly at a loss for the right way to react. Ricky, always practical, handed her a towel. She took it with a grateful smile, still watching Magnus out of the corner of her eye.
He sat back on his heels, face filled with agonized guilt and dimples for once nowhere to be seen. One big hand clasped Donata’s, while the other scrubbed at his eyes.
“Gods, ’Nata,” he said in a hoarse whisper, “I am so sorry.” His gaze focused on the ground in front of her instead of on her face. “I had no idea I would lose control like that. I swear I never would have sparred with you if I’d known.”
She tried to say something reassuring, but he wasn’t listening. Remorse, shame, and self-loathing warred for supremacy on his expressive features, and she began to fear for his sanity even more than she had moments ago feared for her safety.
“Magnus, it’s okay,” she said. “We’ve never sparred in front of other people before; you had no way of knowing you’d react that way.” She put her free hand on his cheek, trying to project all the love and concern she felt for him. “Honestly, I’m fine. Nothing bad happened. You stopped yourself.”
He let out a strangled sob. “I stopped myself this time, Donata,” he said, the words tearing themselves out of his throat like razor blades. “The next time, I might not. The next time I could kill you. Or someone else.” He let go of her and buried his face in his hands. “I don’t know if I can live with this.”
Donata gazed at him in stricken horror. She didn’t know what to say to make him feel better. And it was killing her to see her friend in such pain.
Help came from an unexpected source.
Peter sat down on the ground next to Magnus and said in a gentle voice, “I think you’re forgetting that we wouldn’t any of us be here right now if it weren’t for your ability to fight. Donata and I would have both died in that warehouse if you hadn’t been there. And you saved our bacon when the Cabal had us cornered in the alley behind my apartment.” He put one hand on Magnus’s broad shoulder and repeated, “You saved us, Magnus. You saved us.”
Donata shot him a grateful smile. Peter smiled back, still focused on the tortured Shapechanger.
“And you did stop yourself, Magnus,” Donata said. “In the end, you stopped. Don’t forget that.”
“I suppose that’s true,” Magnus said in a choked voice, lifting his head to look at Peter. “It doesn’t make me any less of an animal, but I suppose even an animal can be useful.”
Friar Matthew tsked at him, squatting down on his other side.
“For shame, my son,” he scolded. “Do not belittle yourself. Or your god, for that matter.”
Magnus glared at the little monk. “What does god have to do with anything?”
Donata shifted restlessly on the ground. Where on earth was the friar going with this? They didn’t even believe in the same gods.
“God has everything to do with it,” Matthew said, his tone mild. “Your people follow Odin, do they not?”
“Yes, we do,” Magnus agreed, surprised that the monk knew that much about the Ulfhednar. “He is our patron god; our legends say he created the first Ulfhednar to be his sacred warriors.”
“Exactly,” said the monk. “Your own god created you for a purpose. And your abilities—challenging though they may be—are a gift from God.” Donata could hear the shift to a capital G in the timbre of his voice. “Who are we to question those abilities?”
Friar Matthew looked at the motley assortment of Paranormals around him, and his smile encompassed them all. Donata felt herself smile back involuntarily, and even Magnus’s face lightened in response.
“We are all given different gifts,” the friar said. “Some are more of a burden than others. And we don’t always know what God intends us to do with them until the time comes for Him to speak our name. But I assure you; He makes no mistakes, and gives no burdens to those who are not strong enough to bear them.”
Donata thought she saw something in his eyes—something secret, dark, and prophetic—but then it was gone, and she told herself she’d just imagined it. Next to her, Magnus straightened his stance, gradually regaining his normal aura of strength and good humor.
Peter looked thoughtful. “You’re a wise man, Friar,” he said, the words trickling out like wisps of smoke in the still air. “I hadn’t thought of my Dragon heritage as a gift. To be honest, up until now, I thought it was more of a curse.” He gave Donata a crooked smile, acknowledging her part in his recent education. “I’d been wishing I hadn’t learned about my Paranormal half.”
Matthew raised one bushy white eyebrow. “And now?”
Peter sighed. “Now I think that maybe I need to learn more about being a Dragon . . . maybe find out what my own gifts are.” He winced. “Even if that means dealing with a father I never knew I had.”
He and Magnus exchanged rueful glances. It looked like they both had family issues to work through once this was all over. Assuming any of them survived the days to come.
Chapter Twenty-nine
The next morning, Donata sat on the couch with a book, pretending to read while she watched Peter and Magnus across the room, discussing some aspect of the Pentimento. The two men were so different: one dark, the other light; one moody and intellectual, the other cheerful and physical. One her past—or so she’d thought. The other, a new friend—and maybe more?
And yet they both struggled with their own individual demons, much as she did. Maybe that was why she was so drawn to them both. Of course, the fact that they were gorgeous, smart, funny, and seemed to like her despite all her flaws . . . well, that didn’t hurt either.
“They are good men, are they not?” Friar Matthew’s voice broke into her reverie, eerily echoing her thoughts.
“Huh? Oh, yeah, I mean, yes, they are.” Donata hoped she wasn’t blushing. She really liked the little monk, but she was glad he didn’t know exactly what was on her mind.
“You have been most fortunate to have their help with this difficult situation,” Matthew added, sitting down beside her. His tone was conversational, but pitched low enough so the men across the room couldn’t overhear their discussion. “And a shared trial can often bring people closer together than they might otherwise be, under more normal circumstances.”
Donata pulled her legs up to her chest and hugged her knees, feeling suddenly vulnerable. “Are you trying to tell me something, Friar Matthew?”
“Not at all, my child,” the monk said, mild as always. “Just thinking out loud. I didn’t mean to disturb you.” He started to get up again.
She gestured him back to his seat. “You’re not disturbing me, Matthew.” She gave a light laugh. “At least, not any more than I was disturbed already.”
She looked across the room at the Dragon and the Shapechanger wistfully. “You’re probably right about us being brought together by the crazy situation. Peter and I have only just met. And Magnus and I . . . well, we agreed a long time ago that there was no way for us to make a relationship work.” She sighed.
“But you wish that it could be otherwise?” The little monk looked inqu
isitive and non-judgmental, as if they were discussing an interesting novel and not her love life. Or the lack of one.
Donata lifted one shoulder in a careless shrug. “My mother always used to say, ‘If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride.’ You can’t always have what you want.”
“That statement would imply that sometimes you can have what you want,” Matthew rebutted. “And you are no beggar.” His faded blue eyes met hers with an earnest gaze. “What is it you want, Donata?”
They looked across the room for a minute in companionable silence.
“I guess I don’t really know what I want,” Donata admitted. Or who. “I know I want us all to come out of this safe. And I want them both happy, and in my life in some way or another.” She shrugged again, helpless against the strength of her unexpected feelings for both men. “Beyond that, frankly, I’m not completely sure.”
Friar Matthew nodded his white head sagely, as though she’d said something wise.
“Sometimes admitting to not knowing is the first step to finding the answer,” he said cryptically.
Right, Donata thought. Then I’m the next Oracle of Delphi. If you added up everything she didn’t know, it made a pretty big pile.
Friar Matthew patted her hand and gave her a look that mixed equal parts of affection and exasperation. She got the feeling, not for the first time, that he knew everything she was thinking and most of what she felt as well.
“You do realize that neither of them is ready to be in a relationship,” he said, his voice gentle. “They must first come to terms with their own natures, just as you need to make peace with yourself and find your place in society.”
Donata bit her lip. She didn’t know which was more frustrating—getting relationship advice from a celibate monk, or the fact that he happened to be right.
Defensively, she said, “I’ve been trying to find my place, Matthew.”
He raised one white eyebrow. “Have you, really? Or have you just been getting along?”
Donata opened her mouth to argue, and then closed it again without speaking. He was wrong. She’d been trying. Sort of. She thought about her burned-out apartment; she’d already admitted that nothing in it had mattered to her. That hadn’t been her place, obviously. She loved her family and wanted them safe, but there was no real place for her there either. Just large, echoing rooms full of expectations she would never meet.
Lifting her head, she gazed across the room at Magnus and Peter. Grimalkin and Elmyr both lay under the table, studiously ignoring each other, while Ricky worked at getting a burr out of the bulldog’s short fur. The sounds of an agreeable argument drifted over to where she and the little monk sat on the couch. There was a hint of cinnamon mixing with the ever-present scent of turpentine and preservatives.
Was this her place? Not the monastery, of course—goddess forbid. But these people? Maybe. Other than the cat, it was too soon to tell. But they mattered to her; that much was certain.
And what else mattered to her, besides her family, her few friends, and her cat? She thought about it for a long moment, feeling the monk’s sympathetic presence like a comforting blanket.
Her job, she supposed. Not the job she’d been doing for all these long years, stuck down in the basement. But the job she’d set out to do, when she’d joined the force as a starry-eyed cadet.
Keeping the fragile peace in her society. Doing her best to protect the people who had no idea of what was going on all around them, the Humans she had promised to serve with her still-somewhat-unacceptable Paranormal abilities. In short—she wanted to be a real cop, to take a more active role and not just hide out as the precinct Witness Retrieval Specialist.
So if that was truly her place, the thing worth striving for . . . how was she going to convince the Chief of that, when he was probably going to boot her off the force as soon as she set foot inside the station?
She sighed, shoulders drooping, and met Friar Matthew’s compassionate gaze.
“Okay, maybe you’re right. Maybe I haven’t been trying. At least, not until recently.” Donata slumped down on the couch, one hand reaching out automatically for the cookie plate on the low table in front of them. “The irony is, the first assignment in a long time that I really cared about was the one that got me into this whole mess in the first place. And now I’ve screwed it up, maybe beyond fixing.”
The friar nibbled on his own cookie thoughtfully. “I’m not sure it’s irony, my dear. Sounds more like destiny to me.” He licked a crumb off his upper lip. “Of course, I’m just a humble monk, unschooled in the ways of the world, so what do I know?”
Donata snorted. “Right. Humble my ass, excuse the expression.” She smiled at him. “And I suppose you’re going to say that it’s my destiny to save the world from the Cabal, or another Inquisition, or maybe this mysterious missing Paranormal race?”
Friar Matthew shrugged, fingering his cross. “It isn’t for me to say, Donata. Perhaps all of those. Perhaps none. But it does seem clear to me that you are an important person, at the crossroads of an important moment in time. The actions you have taken have led us here, for better or for worse.” He gestured around the room. “None of us would be here, together, if it weren’t for you. Irony or no, you have given this task your all. That’s what really matters, not whether or not you can fix it.”
Donata shook her head, reaching out for another cookie. “I don’t know, Friar. If that painting falls into the wrong hands before we can render it harmless or find the answers we are looking for, my all isn’t going to prevent a disaster. I don’t feel important; I just feel confused, pressured, and afraid.”
The little monk gave a surprisingly throaty chuckle in response to her morose statement. She jumped, dropping a piece of cookie down the front of her shirt. As she scrambled awkwardly to remove it without embarrassing herself, she shot a glare in his direction.
“What’s so funny?” she asked crossly, shaking her shirt.
He just smiled at her. “What makes you think that isn’t how all important people feel?”
She had no answer to that. No answer at all.
* * *
As is so often the way, things were calm right up until the point when they weren’t. And then all hell broke loose.
Donata and Magnus had been sitting on the couch in the early-evening quiet, bickering amicably over which one of them would get the narrow bed in the bedroom and which one would use the bedroll on the floor. They’d had the same discussion every night since they’d gotten there, and Magnus had always ended up sleeping on the floor, but Donata was determined to make him take the (slightly) softer bed for one night. They’d stopped including Peter in the argument when it became clear that he wasn’t going to sleep for more than a couple of hours anyway.
Peter, as always, was hunched over the worktable. He’d finished the copy of the Pentimento earlier, but kept wandering back to it to see if the quick-dry preparation he’d used on the oil paint had done its job. He was as close to fidgeting as he ever got, and he was starting to get on Donata’s nerves.
“I shouldn’t get the bed just because I’m a woman,” she was saying to Magnus.
He’d just replied with a smirk—“It’s not because you’re a woman, it’s because you’re a wimp”—when the front door flew open and Friar Matthew ran in.
The little monk’s fluffy white hair looked like he’d been through a wind tunnel, and he’d grasped his robe with both hands and hiked it up so he could move faster. Pink cheeks and panting breath attested to the speed of his journey, and he put one hand against the doorjamb as he gasped for enough air to pass on his news.
“Friar Matthew!” Donata jumped up from the couch and hurried over to make sure he was all right, Magnus on her heels. “What’s wrong? Here, come and sit down. Catch your breath.”
“No time,” Matthew wheezed. “They know. They’ll be here soon.”
He allowed them to help him to a chair and took the glass of water Peter pressed on him, but he kept looking back over his shoulder as if the devil was chasing him. Peter went into a corner and spoke briefly into his cell phone.
“Matthew,” Magnus said, kneeling down in front of the monk, eyes wide, “who knows? The other monks? Who?”
The friar sputtered as a gulp of water went down the wrong way, and Donata hit him lightly on the back. She stayed next to him, one hand on his shoulder, although whether for his comfort or hers, she couldn’t be sure. Fear sent tremors up and down her spine in a premonition of doom.
“One of the other brothers got suspicious,” Matthew said, his breathing still labored. “He saw the trays of food and the lights on when I wasn’t here.” He swallowed more water, his color finally starting to return to normal. “He must have spied on you and then told the head of the monastery. Prior Michael called me into his office after dinner to scold me for involving the order in this matter.”
He looked briefly indignant. Then guilty. Then back to indignant again as he remembered the rest of that difficult conversation.
“The prior informed me that he had connections to the Cabal—that the whole order has connections to the Cabal.” Matthew’s amiable face contracted in distaste. “He said he’d called in their enforcers to ‘clean up my mess,’ if you please! And then he forbade me to warn you!”
The very thought of being instructed to abandon his friends made his color rise again, to Donata’s alarm. The friar was not a young man; she didn’t know how much more excitement he could take.
Magnus obviously shared her concern for his old associate. “Matthew, please, calm down. Everything is going to be all right.” He spoke in even tones, but looked over his shoulder at the door even as he said it, his brow furrowed.
Following his gaze, Peter got up and closed the front door, throwing the heavy deadbolt. It was so rarely used, it took a minute to get it to turn at all. Then he went and did the same thing to the back door.
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