Did I mention my life is weird?
Knox hangs up. “Alec will be here any second.” He eyes me carefully. “I scent concern. What worries you? Is it how I told Alec we were having a moment? I forget you weren’t raised with shifters. We’re really open about stuff like that.”
Once again, my mouth starts moving on its own. “No, I’m totally fine. I get that you and Knox just bust on each other. And if you want to, you can tell our friends how we kiss and stuff. So, totally good. I don’t care. Not me. At all.”
Wow. Terrible speech, Bry.
I clear my throat. “You know what? It might be time to change the subject.”
Knox’s blue eyes glisten with mischief. “If you say so, but you’re really cute when you’re embarrassed.”
“Okay. So. Well. Since Alec is on his way, I’ll just revive my inner wolf now.”
Knox’s brows lift. “You’ve had her in stasis all this time?”
“What can I say? My wolf really wanted to bite your ex’s face off. Or her ankle, finger, or toe.”
Knox cracks out another one of his thinking faces. In this one, he acts like he’s contemplating something super serious, but he’s mostly kidding. “Sounds like you made the right choice.”
“Thank you.” I wink. “I’ll just wake her up now.”
Closing my eyes, I concentrate on picturing the strands of golden power that interlace through my soul. Sure enough, I picture them as they weave and dance. I send them a command.
Awaken my wolf.
Inside my heart, my animal stirs. After smacking her lips, my wolf does one of those animal yawns that make you wonder how anyone’s tongue could possibly be that long.
“You put me to sleep,” she grumbles.
“You were in stasis,” I say in my mind. “There’s a difference. And then, I only did it because you were losing your cool and wouldn’t listen to reason. Ty just gave us the Codex Mechanica, by the way. That couldn’t have happened if you’d attacked her.”
My wolf lifts her chin. “She doesn’t need a face to hand over some box.”
After that, my inner animal plunks her head back on her forepaws and pretends to be asleep. I’ve seen this move before. This is my wolf’s version of the silent treatment. I decide to give her some space.
All of a sudden, a whirl of red smoke appears on the floor nearby. The twisting mist winds and lengthens until it’s about as tall as Knox. An electric sense of magic fills the air. That crimson mist is most definitely a transport spell. No question who’s casting it, either.
Alec.
The mists disappear with a flash of red light. Where the haze once appeared, there now stand both Alec and Elle. The pair of them are dressed in jeans and T-shirts. Of course, Alec is also wearing his ever-present sport coat. (Alec believes that real wizards don’t tote around enchanted gems in man bags.) Elle looks like she always does: tall and slim with long blonde hair and wide blue eyes. I’m so happy to see her, I could do a cartwheel or something equally embarrassing. Instead, I race over and give her a big hug.
“I missed you,” I say.
She pats my back. “Of course, you did. I’m awesome.” We step apart. “So, are you done being noble? Are you ready to accept my help?”
I can’t help but smile. “Yes, I am.”
Meanwhile, Alec scans Knox from head to toe. “You look like hell,” he announces.
Knox quirks his right brow. “Stuff it.”
When I first started hanging out with Knox and Alec, I’d worry how they’d greet each other with insults. Now, I know it’s a Knox-Alec thing. Those two have been friends since they were kids.
“Fine, I take it back,” says Alec. “You looked like hell back in New York. Now you look like whatever is below hell. Maybe some kind of deep sub-hellacious space, like a basement type-area where Satan stores his old records and stuff.”
Knox shoots Alec a rude hand gesture.
“I’d be angry about your crude and immature display,” says Alec. “But like I said, you look like you’re near death, so I can’t be upset with you.” Alec constantly looks like he’s posing for a menswear catalog. Right now, he’s taken on a pose where he sets his pointer finger on his chin. After a moment, Alec snaps his fingers. “Oh wait, I take it back. I should totally be pissed because HOW COULD YOU TURN YOUR PHONE OFF?”
Knox shrugs. “Because you put that silencer spell on it. That way, I can shut it off, and no one bugs me.”
Alec rolls his eyes. This guy has a collection of eye rolls, by the way. The one he’s using now is his sarcastic half-roll maneuver. “I only did that because your crazy ex-girlfriend kept calling you. You weren’t supposed to use that spell on me. Elle and I have been wor—” Alec stops mid-sentence. For the first time, he scans the room. “Whoa, we’re in your castle in Aix-en-Provence.”
Inside my soul, my wolf perks right up. All her anger about going into stasis vanishes under this news about Knox. “Our mate has castles! Yay! So many dens for our cubs.”
I decide to ignore the cubs comment. “Don’t get too excited,” I reply in my head. “We don’t know what Alec meant.”
Turning to my outside voice, I address Alec directly. “Wait a second. Do you mean to say that Knox has more than one castle?”
“Sure,” says Alec. “He’s got dozens.”
“It’s not dozens.” Knox looks to the ceiling, his mouth making silent calculations. “Only eight.”
Within my heart, my wolf prances about with her tail held high. “Dens for cubs! Dens for cubs!” I keep right on ignoring her.
“My bad,” says Alec, this time with a three-sixty eye roll. “You only have eight castles.”
“I don’t have anything,” counters Knox. “Az had a ton of castles, and he left them all to me.”
Elle shoots me a look. “Interesting distinction.”
“I know,” I say. “That’s what I was thinking, too.”
Fact: this is why life’s so much better with Elle around. Estrogen-laden mind reading.
Alec moves into another one of his catalog poses. This time, he leans back on his left leg while shoving his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “So, let me get this straight. You brought your new mate here to meet your old ex?”
“Long story,” growls Knox.
Alec turns to me. “Is that why there’s blood everywhere?” His smile widens. “Tell me you killed her.” Alec bobs his brows. “I simply can’t stand Ty.”
“All this red isn’t blood,” I say quickly. “It’s left over from a crimson rain spell that Ty cast.” After that, I have a slow moment to think through what Alec said. “Although, what kind of friendship do you and Knox have, where transporting into a bloody room doesn’t surprise you?”
Alec shrugs. “I know how your mate likes to kill stuff. And I like to transport him out of danger before that stuff kills him back. Speaking of which …” Alec turns to Knox. “Did you maybe … ?” Alec mimes a stabbing motion. “Tell me that you at least got Ty a little bit.”
My inner animal takes his words as total validation. “See?” she says in my heart. “I could definitely have gotten a toe.”
“Ty isn’t dead,” says Knox. “She just evaporated away for a while.”
Alec mock-frowns. “How disappointing.”
Elle points at a streak of crimson on the oak wall. “So what’s that red stuff, anyway?”
“It’s the residue of a memory spell,” I explain. “Ty cast it to help Knox recall information about the Void. Otherwise, there’s this curse that wipes everything out like—that.” I snap my fingers.
“The Vo—” Alec pauses midsentence. Here we go again. A long moment passes while Alec looks around the room, confused. At last, he speaks once more. “What were we talking about again?”
Knox hands him a glass of red-tinted water. “Drink this, and we’ll tell you everything.”
I do the same for Elle. “You, too.”
Elle and Alec both take in big swigs of water. A red haze ap
pears around their skin while that familiar something-something fills the air. The spell ends. The crimson mist disappears. With that, our friends now have tons of questions about the Void.
It takes a few minutes, but Knox and I explain all about the Codex Mechanica and the Void. Elle seems excited to learn that magic could be wiped away. Not that I blame her. It was Elle’s magic that made her a target for her stepfamily. For his part, Alec doesn’t seem too upset about losing his abilities as a wizard. In fact, Alec only appears worried about Knox.
“So what does that mean for my furry friend here?” asks Alec. “Will Knox lose his animal?”
Inside my soul, my wolf whimpers. Whenever this topic comes up, my animal never worries about herself, strangely enough. All she cares about is that she doesn’t want anything to happen to Knox. Wolf mate bonds are intense.
For the record, I’m slowly coming to terms with the fact that magic and the Void need to be destroyed. It sucks, but it’s less awful than the universe being devoured by a crazy ghost man. Even so, it’s too early for us to get wrapped around that particular axle.
“Look,” I say. “It’s true that the First Wardens tried to use the Codex Mechanica for a two-step process.” Putting it in official terms seems to make this easier to discuss, somehow. “Step one, the device finds the fountain, and step two …” My voice wobbles as I say this next part. “The Codex Mechanica destroys all magic.”
Alec shakes his head in a movement that means, Say what? “As in inner shifter animals and everything?”
Knox nods.
Alec folds his arms over his chest. “I really don’t like this.”
I hold my hands palms up in the universal motion for Don’t worry. “The destruction part was a big fail.” I bob my head, thinking. “Actually, it was more like a medium fail.”
“Not helping,” huffs Alec.
“All I’m saying is that, right now, we only want to focus on step one, finding the fountain. The part about killing magic is a distant step two.”
“So,” says Elle. “Step one is to just find the fountain and protect it from the Void.”
“Exactly,” I point at her. “If the Void gets the fountain’s power, he’ll devour the world.”
Elle taps her lips with her pointer finger. “And the Codex Mechanica says the fountain’s hidden in Julius Caesar’s villa.”
“Technically,” says Knox. “It said to find the third disc in the geyser.”
Alec folds his arms over his chest, lifts his right hand, and touches his cheek. It’s another in his collection of menswear catalog poses. “You don’t believe these wardens, do you?”
“I don’t trust anyone but you and Bry,” says Knox. My mate turns to Elle. “I don’t know what to make of you yet.”
Elle shrugs. “I’m a con artist. Good call.”
Alec taps his chin. “And your lack of trust for these past wardens … does it have anything to do with the fact that magic is making you sick because you’re around Bry?”
The veins pop out in Knox’s neck. “Magic isn’t making me sick for being near Bry. There’s another explanation, and she just left a few minutes ago.”
I know what he means. Ty.
My heart sinks. Don’t get me wrong. I wish this were all Ty’s doing, but I just don’t buy that yet.
Inside my soul, my wolf whimpers. “If we’re making Knox sick, we have to destroy magic. He’s our mate.”
“Let’s just find the fountain first, okay?”
“If I have to die so Knox can live, you have to take my life.”
My eyes widen. Elle and Knox both catch the movement. Knox is the first to speak. “What’s wrong, Bry?”
“It’s my wolf,” I explain. “She’s not happy about this.”
Elle steps closer, her face all smiles. “How about we all get back to finding the fountain?” She focuses on Knox. “The Codex Mechanica said it was at Caesar’s villa?”
“Yeah,” grumbles Knox.
“So.” Elle scoops some kind of puff pastry from the tabletop. “Looks like we’re off to Italy, then.” She eyes the now-pink treat.
Focusing on food is a lot easier than dealing with destroying all magic and our inner animals, to boot. For a long moment, I stare at the once-white pastry. It’s now dotted with red from Ty’s spell.
“Are you sure you want to eat that?” I ask. “It’s probably all soggy from the rain.”
Elle looks at me like I’m crazy. “It’s pastry, Bry.” My best friend loves food. After that, Elle pops the thing in her mouth anyway because, hey, she’s Elle. “It’s goooood.” She talks to Alec through her mouthful of pastry. “So, when are you transporting us?” She ends her question with a grin and a wink.
Some pink colors Alec’s cheeks. “I could start right now, I guess.” For the record, Elle’s the only one who transforms Alec from Mister Smooth to a red-faced babbler. It’s really sweet.
“Wait, before you cast that spell, can you … ?” Knox gestures around his head, which is still matted with red stuff.
Alec cracks out another classic from his collection of eye rolls. In this one, Alec shakes his head while staring at the ceiling. “I suppose.”
“Thanks, man.” Knox gestures around the room. “Oh, and one more thing. Can you clean up this place, too? That way, Louis isn’t scrubbing walls for days.”
Through the door, I hear a familiar French voice. “Merci, my master. Sir.”
Knox cups his hand by his mouth. “No worries, Louis. And remember, call me if Ty gets to be too much. She promised to go away forever, so she’ll be back in two weeks or so.”
“I promise,” says Louis.
“And stop listening at doors,” adds Knox.
“I only do it to keep ze Master safe. But zen, I will leave as requested.”
After that, an exaggerated set of footsteps sounds from the outer hall. Clearly, Louis is trying to make it obvious that he’s walking away. That said, I know Knox well enough to realize that he must trust Louis a lot. Otherwise, Knox would’ve had Alec cast ward and silencer spells around the dining room so all our conversations would’ve been private.
Alec’s gaze flickers between Knox and the red mess that is the dining room. “Wait just a minute here.” Alec wags his finger at Knox. “Did you finally turn on your cell because I sang the Jeopardy song, or was it because you hate being sticky and you didn’t have time to clean up?”
If Alec has an eye-roll collection, then Knox has one for thinking faces. This time, Knox bobs his head while puffing out his lower lip. “Could be the sticky thing.”
Alec gasps. “You’re such an ass. I’m doing zero for you. Do you hear me? No spells. No cleaning. No transport. You can haul your own ass to Italy.”
“I get that you’re pissed at me,” says Knox. “But what about Bry and poor Louis here?”
I give Alec my best puppy dog impression. “Please?” Sure, I’m begging, but I’m also in a big hurry. Plus, there’s no way I want to go back into that Fiat. Talk about uncomfortable.
Elle points to her shirt. “Hey, I dribbled some red goop on my shirt, too, so ... help?”
It’s the help that does it. The moment Elle asks anything, Alec gets all gooey-eyed. We’re totally getting all the spells.
“Fine,” says Alec. “I’ll cast some cleaning and transporter spells. But that’s it.” He pulls some gemstones from his pocket. “Now, get ready to witness my awesomeness.”
As Alec fiddles with his gemstones, I remember something Az once told me.
* * *
We have our family of chance and our family of choice.
* * *
All my life, I’ve had no idea who my real parents were. But in this moment, I know with certainty that my true family consists of Elle, Alec, and Knox. Just having them here makes a terrible situation almost fun.
A fine choice, indeed.
Chapter 25
A few minutes later, Alec finishes his transport spell. Knox, Alec, Elle, and I all stand at the end o
f a winding dirt road. A bright yellow sun burns down from an impossibly blue sky. Around us, a landscape of rolling hills is sliced into neat rows of grapevines. The scent of earth and green leaves fills the air. I scan the area. No one else is around. I clutch the Codex Mechanica under my right arm. No way am I letting this thing out of my sight.
Before us, the road ends with a low hilltop crowned by a small cluster of dingy buildings. At one time, I’d imagine these structures were all gleaming white walls and neat peaked roofs of red ceramic tile. Now, the place is run down, gray, and moldy. Large holes gape in the tile rooftops. Gnats buzz about the scene. Other than the insects, the place sure looks deserted.
“Is this the spot?” I ask Knox. After all, Knox came here before to hunt Denarii. If anyone would know if we’d reached Julius Caesar’s old villa, it would be my mate.
My inner wolf stands at attention. “I hope we see our mate kill something,” she coos.
“I’ve seen it.” I shudder, remembering how Knox had to take down Madame Grimoire, my old therapy group leader who was actually a Denarii zombie-mummy. Head removal was involved. “It’s not as pleasant as you might think.”
Knox scans the landscape carefully. “Nothing’s changed since the last time I came by. Still looks abandoned.” He gestures toward the villas. “This is all one compound for Jules. He had servants and visitors. There were no locals or anything. But like I said, all that was long over by the time I got here.”
“It’s pretty modern,” I say. “Somehow, I expected more Ancient Rome.”
Instead of pointing, Knox chin nods toward a particular spot on the horizon. “There’s a building at the back of the property that’s a classic Roman ruin. You know, a small, round temple with smashed-in walls and busted columns.”
Not sure what I expected from Caesar’s personal estate. Maybe a big statue of Brutus with the words original backstabber written on it in Latin? A bunch of run-down modern villas wasn’t exactly what I had in mind.
Still, if it’s where the fountain of magic is hidden, it’ll always be a gorgeous spot in my mind.
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