“And you expect me not only to get back the goods but to figure it out? I’m flattered.”
“You, with the help of Ms. Spencer.” Ramon crossed the room and handed Jack the flash drive. Then he took a seat opposite. “There’s a lot riding on you, Madden. Are you up for one last shot at glory?”
“Sure. But on my terms.” Time to close the deal. Jack pocketed the flash drive. “First off, no outside retrieval teams. I’m not going to ferret these things out only to get backstabbed at the last minute.”
“The retrieval teams are trained in surgical removal of—”
“You said it yourself, no one to trust. Don’t make the circle any wider than it needs to be. I’m more than capable of engaging in the Warden’s brand of theft—I’m sorry—retrieval. And so is Ms. Spencer. No teams. We work this op solo.”
Ramon remained silent for a moment.
Seth drifted over to watch the show. “As much as I dislike Jack, he does have a point. Atlantean artifacts are a powerful lure. Even the most staunch believers might stray the path with that kind of temptation.”
“Fine.” Ramon nodded. “How will you manage retrieval under the time frame? The artifacts are most likely dispersed. They could be anywhere in the world.”
“Leave that to me. Since I’ve left the Wardens and can’t use sorcery, I’ve become quite resourceful.”
Seth snorted. “I’ll just bet.”
Ramon looked almost uncomfortable. It was a rare display for the man. “If you act not only as locator but retrieval, what guarantee do I have that you won’t keep the artifacts and use them against the Wardens?”
“None. Other than my word. It’s still good, you know.” Jack enjoyed the moment of triumph, small though it was. He had them right where he needed them. Only a few more rounds, and he’d go in for the kill. “As much as I want revenge, it’s against Kerr, and the others responsible for setting me up and taking me out. Besides, it’s not like I can be fixed, right? What was done can’t be undone. I can only move forward.”
Seth and Ramon exchanged glances. Jack rushed on to close. “As much as I wanted to reach my destiny and ascend from demi-God to God, I wouldn’t use the artifacts at the cost of the whole timeline. If the dimensional line is threatened and collapses, we all lose, even me. I won’t risk that level of destruction. Where’s the glory in that?”
Ramon frowned. “My mystic still sees the war between Seth and Horus taking place, still sees the collapse of our dimensional line, Jack. Only now it’s coming faster. Our only shot is to collect the artifacts. They are the point of divergence, the only break we can find to avert disaster.”
Seth stirred and entered the fray.
“Which is why I’m here. Not that I don’t mind a little war every now and again. I don’t like losing. And worse, I don’t like the thought of Osirus’s son Horus winning. My nephew, like his father, has too firm an idea about order and righteousness. The universe needs a spark of chaos to keep life going.” He swirled the gin and tonic. “So what else do you want, Jack? I get the feeling there’s something more you’re looking for other than a free run through the candy store.”
No, not yet. I still need my answers. “Why did you kick us out of the conference room, Ramon? What did you and Kerr have to discuss?”
His change in tactics didn’t appear to catch Ramon off-guard. “The same thing we talked of earlier, Jack. The need for containment. I suspected with his paladin’s niece involved, Hugh and Kerr would want too tight a rein on the operation. I merely showed him how much more important secrecy and success are over control.”
“Are you really going to allow Raine Spence to squire, even though she’s part fey?” Jack wasn’t sure where the question came from, or why it was important to him, but it was there, and out, and he couldn’t take it back now to analyze.
“I’ll admit, it’s a little strange. But on consideration, it’s a sound choice. She’s beyond competent, and devoted to the cause. There are few enough suitable for the Order these days, and the ones that are, they are so often still tied to the apron strings of their patron God that it makes it difficult to instill the need to rise above the petty concerns and deal with the issues of the Covenant with a more global perspective.” Ramon sounded truthful, but he was good at sounding any way he wanted to sound. “Raine is pledged to the ideals of the Covenant, as opposed to those of a patron God. I think she might represent the wave of our future.”
“I can’t believe Kerr is allowing it without challenge. He’s the High Warden. Hugh seems pretty pissed as well.”
Ramon flashed a brief, humorless smile. “I’ll handle Kerr and Hugh.”
That Jack didn’t doubt. He felt a sense of relief knowing Ramon wouldn’t overtly try to screw Raine. Even when he himself knew he’d use her to reach his own ends. It was trying, this sudden tinge of morality and guilt that kept popping up. Satisfied he’d had enough answers, he moved in for the money shot.
“There’s just one last thing I need you to do. Awaken Raine Spencer.”
Seth contemplated his drink. “Her mystic abilities were already awakened.”
“I want her turned on, all the way. Mystical and magical. All channels need to be open for her to be an effective surrogate.” Jack gave them a moment to digest this before continuing. “As we know, I don’t have access to the majority of my power, but I’ve learned ways around that. I use a fair amount of plain old wizardry to open mystical channels and do—other things. I’ll need to use everything she has to find the artifacts. You said yourself when you called, they’re enchanted to hide them from the Gods and their followers.”
Ramon sighed. “Ms. Spencer is in a difficult position. Hugh…” he paused for a moment, as if searching for the right word, “…her uncle, like many knights, detests the half-breeds. She’s spent her life trying to live up to his expectations. She hates the magic and the uncertainty of her Elven blood as much as he does. I doubt she’d be of any use to you in that way.”
Something about Ramon’s speech bothered Jack. Nothing he could pinpoint, other than the way he referred to Hugh, perhaps. Still, it tickled the buttons of Jack’s alarms. “I don’t care what she hates, or what you think. I know what you want, I know what I need to get that, and that means fully awakening Raine.”
“But—”
“I’ll do it,” Seth interrupted. “This is too important to risk. Ms. Spencer was awakened by one of the mystics. I’ll take care of the rest.”
Ramon shook his head. “Very well. She wants a shot at knighthood. She can’t have that if she’s running too much magic. You’ll have to bind her again in the end.”
“No problem.” Seth finished the last of his drink. “Is that it, Jack?”
Everything suddenly sounded cold and callous to him. And easy. So very easy. What did Raine really matter to him? So what if she’d know the rush of magic, and then get locked down again. So what? “Too much on and off can ruin her. Permanently. You both know that right?”
“We all know it, including Ms. Spencer.”
Who was he to argue, then? “Other than my previous terms, there’s nothing else.”
The doorbell chimed sonorously through the house
That would be Ms. Spencer,” Seth said. “Do you want to tell her the new terms, Ramon, or should I?”
Chapter Four
Raine was not given to premonitions of any kind, but if she were, she’d lay down good money and odds that the fission of energy tingling her spine and making her want to turn and run was a good old-fashioned harbinger of doom. She tried unsuccessfully to shake the unnerving feeling and pressed the doorbell a second time.
Her uncle’s words weighed heavily on her as she waited outside Ramon’s brownstone. What if Kerr was correct and Ramon was at the heart of the conspiracy? Raine didn’t like Kerr, but she couldn’t ignore the fact that the High Warden was often right. And, she couldn’t ignore the fact that Ramon Salazar was considered a master player of the game. Come to think of it, he’d cons
ented to her terms without argument. He should have at least made a show of contention. She was, after all, hurling down a demand that was an affront to the Wardens and their beliefs about life, the universe, and everything.
Then there was Jack. Why would Ramon Salazar involve the wild outcast? One school of thought favored plausible deniability, an outsider who was beyond the internal conspiracy. The other favored Ramon as central to the conspiracy, bringing in his old crony Jack, to foment chaos and further confuse the facts.
Raine found it hard to swallow to begin with, that the Council of Wardens could fall prey to enemies within the sanctified order. Then again, these were strange and desperate times. Artifacts of great power and dangerous potential kept surfacing left and right, as if the very earth herself was purging her soul of secrets.
The rain picked up, hitting the concrete and blacktop with vicious slaps. A frigid wind swept along the narrow street, rattling windows and unsettling debris as it charged along the gauntlet. She ducked further into the doorway and was about to ring the bell a third time when the door was yanked open to reveal a very unexpected player.
Seth. The Egyptian God of Chaos.
Raine took a step back. Suddenly, Kerr’s theory didn’t seem so far off. “What are you doing here?”
She bit her tongue, immediately sorry for blurting out the words.
The handsome God seemed unconcerned and flashed a brilliant smile that would have melted the average mortal female. “I’m a guest, same as you. Please, come in.”
She followed him into the well-appointed entry, then into the first floor parlor. Seth took her raincoat from her and draped it across a very expensive side table.
Ramon Salazar stood and greeted her politely. Jack was there too, sprawled out indecently on a small couch. A charge zipped through her as he smiled and nodded.
“Good, now the party can really get started,” Jack drawled. He glanced at Seth. “Can I watch?”
“Watch what?” She looked to Ramon and then Seth, and the charge she’d felt from Jack was fast replaced by the earlier sense of foreboding. “What’s going on?”
Ramon ignored her questions. “Can I get you a drink?”
“I’d prefer we get on with business.” She took a seat opposite Jack and tried her best not to look his way. Every time she glanced at him though, she found him staring blatantly at her, a hot kind of hunger smoldering in his gaze. “I take it things went well with Kerr and my uncle?”
“As good as negotiations with a mad dog can go,” said Jack.
“We’re all on the same sheet of music,” said Ramon. “I’d like to bring you up to speed.”
That would be nice. Being closeted up with Ramon, Seth, and Jack made things more and more damning. She certainly hoped Ramon had a good story to tell her, something to make her believe Kerr and her uncle were seeing bogies where there were none.
For the next ten minutes, Ramon and Seth alternately conveyed the gist of the operation with a silent Jack watching her, his gaze relentless and inescapable. It was difficult to concentrate on the information. Jack’s intense presence was palpable, surrounding her, seeping into her blood, making her desire things that were best avoided by sane people. She asked Ramon and Seth questions, sometimes only to break the power of Jack, to sever if only momentarily the strange and potent connection they seemed to share. In the end Raine had to admit, the case was compelling, and the conspiracy just as up in the air as before. Several points concerned her, as did the presence of Seth.
“I thought the Gods weren’t to interfere in this, Seth?” She shifted her position, turning her profile to Jack, blocking him from her mind. “The Tribunal decreed the matter be solved by the Wardens, including the artifact retrieval. Banishment is on the line if you’re caught.”
Seth scowled. “Consider me an interested party. There’s no crime in what I’m doing. Or, what I will be doing.”
“Doing?” Her mind flashed back to Jack’s earlier comment.
“Now the real party can get started. Can I watch?”
Ramon laid a well-manicured hand lightly on her shoulder. “When you agreed to act as Jack’s mystical surrogate, the bargain included certain terms.”
Rain’s throat went dry. Oh no. Oh Gods no. What more did they want of her? “It did, yes.”
“Your awakening was incomplete.” Ramon’s voice was soft, almost caring. But she knew him to be as self-serving to the cause as any of the Elder Wardens. “Jack has requested you be fully opened and Seth has agreed to perform that task.”
The bottom of her world fell out from beneath her feet and she dropped into a dark, endless abyss. “Do I have a say in any of this?” she ground out as she struggled to gain control over the fear exploding inside of her.
Jack stirred. “If you say no, I’ll be forced to find another surrogate. Your bargain, including your shot at knighthood, would go down the drain.”
The fire in his gaze had chilled to ice. Her own blood cooled and her palms started to sweat. Panic curled tight in her gut. “I can’t be a knight if I’m running magic in my blood.”
Jack straightened and leaned forward. “How bad do you want this, Raine? Remember what I told you earlier, about how I play?”
She remembered, like it was burned into her brain. She should have expected this of him, to ask for every last ounce of everything she possessed, and then come back for more. To ask to awaken the worst of her Elven side—to turn on the dormant sorcery residing inside of her, it was beyond reason. She’d be hard pressed to hold back the Elven insanity in her, to remain herself, under her own control. She turned to Ramon, knowing she couldn’t trust anyone in the room, but knowing at the same time he was the one most likely to give her a straight answer. “Will I become one of them?”
Before Ramon could answer Jack erupted like a nuclear bomb hitting ground zero.
“One of them?” He snorted with derision, a look of disgust curling his sensuous mouth. He leaned even closer, pinning her with a gaze that cut her to her very core. “I have news for you, sweetheart. You are one of us. There is no ‘them’. You can run from that, but you can’t hide. Not even with the clipped ears and the prissy manners.”
The sound of her slap rang in her ears. She’d acted on pure impulse, giving into the rage his words provoked, and whacked him. Nothing could be more repulsive, more Elven, to act without thought, to indulge whatever whim crossed the mind or riled the blood. She drew back her hand and stared at it, mortified, as if it belonged to anyone but herself.
Jack sat back, a satisfied smile on his handsome face, her handprint a red streak on his fair, otherwise unblemished skin. “That felt good, didn’t it?”
“No,” she said more to herself. What had she gotten into? It was starting already. The madness…
“It’s human to feel, Raine. And Elven. You’re both. You shouldn’t be ashamed.” Jack’s voice penetrated her thoughts. “I’m not your uncle. You don’t need to hold back with me.”
“I’m not holding back.” She stood and stepped away from the men. How far would she go, how far would they push her, to gain her dream? “I’m not one of them. I’ll never be.”
Elves were hedonists. They did whatever they pleased to indulge their whims, regardless of consequence. All that mattered was the moment. Wasn’t that what she was doing now? Giving in to fancy, living in the moment? No. This was no whim. She was doing what she needed to better serve the Covenant, to realize her dream, and prove to everyone once and for all she was more than her ill-fated birth. After this, she’d no longer be the outcast half-breed.
There really was no choice. “When?”
Seth shoved his hands in his pockets. “Now.”
Raine sat down again, defeated. “Ramon, I think I’d like that drink now. Scotch. Neat.”
The occupants of the room fell into a stiff silence while Ramon poured her drink. Only once had Hugh mentioned the sorcery in her bloodline, when she was very young and he was very, very drunk. It was her birthday. He’d
railed against her mother, his brother Edward, and the evils of sorcery that some Elves seemed to possess by virtue of inheritance. Then he’d cried into his empty whiskey glass, and passed out, the blade of his dagger clutched in his hand as if he’d planned to use it in defense, or, attack. They’d never discussed the incident afterwards. So much went unsaid between them. Sometimes that was good, mostly, though, it made her sad.
Ramon handed her the cut crystal glass and she downed the liquid fire in one shot. “Why?” She looked to Jack. She suspected he needed her as much as she needed him. “The truth, Madden. You have one chance to get this right. Lie to me and I’m out of here.”
“Thanks to Kerr, I can’t touch the power that was once mine. Not only will I never ascend beyond demi-God, the best of my sorcery is lost to me.” His words were laced with raw pain and blatant truth that hurt to hear. “Even the simplest of tasks requires new methods for me. I have learned to use bush magic to aid the mystical-seeking exercises that we’ll need to find these artifacts. To be most effective, though, I need you, Raine. All of you. One hundred percent, not the fifty you’ve decided to show the world.”
“It’s so easy for you to be who you are, Jack, consequence be damned.” She put her glass down harder than expected. “I don’t have that luxury.”
His next move surprised her. He reached for her, held her hand, and covered it with his other in a protective gesture. His gaze held hers for a moment, searching for something, and when he spoke, it was as if she was the only person in the world who mattered. “You have the luxury to be complete with me, Raine, as long as the op lasts. It’s not as sexy as knighthood, I’ll grant you that. It’s not even something you’ve ever considered desirable, but I guarantee, once you’re whole, you won’t want to go back to living in pieces again.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.” She shut her eyes for a moment, steeled her courage, and pulled free of his grasp. If she was to do this, it had to be on her own. “I’m ready.”
Raine retired to a small guestroom with Seth and he had had her lie on a crimson velvet Victorian fainting couch. He pulled up the small chair from the dressing table and sat beside her, and she had the funny notion that this seemed like a session with a red-headed, fashonista Sigmund Freud as opposed to the preparation for a magical ritual shared by a God and mortal. She laughed in spite of her fear, or perhaps, because of it, to release some tension.
ImmortalIllusions: The Eternity Covenant Book2 Page 5