“Sorry, failure to specify on my part, just a minute.”
“Show me Sally again, but a bird’s eye view of her from five hundred feet above her car.”
That seemed to work, she got a good picture of where she was.
“She’s going north on seventy seven I think. She’s near Lake Norman.”
Damon asked, “Can you keep track of her?”
She nodded confidently.
“Then take Ed and go, don’t bother bringing her back, just end her. That’s both Bria’s and my judgment in the matter. I’d go too, but I need to rebuild the damn wards, which is probably another reason she took them down. I can’t go haring off when my coven is so vulnerable to attack.”
She nodded in acknowledgement and they both headed for the stairs. It wasn’t long at all before they were speeding north out of Charlotte, so much for being home…
Chapter 22
It took about a half hour before Sally changed course again, she was having her elemental check every five minutes. They were maybe twenty miles behind her when Sally went west on I-40.
Ed asked, “Is that safe, using an elemental to track someone?”
She hedged, “I think so, I’m being extremely careful how I word things, and it still counts as information, not action.”
He nodded with tight lips.
“Besides,” she added, “I’m not letting her get away, since we’ll never stop the assassins if she goes underground.”
She left off the part where she wanted to rip out the woman’s throat.
The drive seemed endless, and she was fidgeting again. She just wanted this nightmare over with, so she could go back to her normal schedule of protecting Charlotte and Rock Hill, running her store, and working out. She’d also get to figure out where Ed fit into all that, and she hoped that it would include a lot of shared breakfasts.
She’d have to talk to him about it soon, but she was avoiding it. Why she found it easier to give her body and soul to him when they made love, than to even contemplate talking about where it all was going, was beyond her. But it was true. Maybe she worried that for him it was more about the stress and intimacy of constantly dodging death, than something real… not to mention her insane sensual appetite.
Of course, she wasn’t entirely sure she knew where she wanted it to go either.
Either way, worrying about it wasn’t going to help.
He glanced over at her, “You’re restless again, don’t go rushing in this time either when we catch up.”
She glared at him, “I won’t.”
She’d apologized already, and wished he would just let it go.
A little over two hours into their trip, things changed.
“She’s stopping in Asheville, north side.”
Ed asked, “Think it’s a trap?”
She blew out a breath and turned her body slightly toward him.
“I don’t know. I’d like to say no because she destroyed her room and all her stuff, she may feel safe. But the woman is a natural schemer, she probably has a lot of backup plans. It might be a trap, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she has backup wherever she stopped.”
Ed bobbed his head back and forth for a second.
“I hope not, but we’ll go with that assumption.”
A few minutes later, “Crap, she’s moving farther north again. Maybe she just stopped for supplies.”
They made it around Asheville and started going north on state road.
She took a deep breath and reported what she saw, “It looks like she’s done now, she’s at a cabin in the mountains, maybe a rental, but I’m not sure. Anyway, there are a couple of other cars parked there. I recognized one of them, it’s Cinna’s. I’ve seen it before. The other one I have no idea.”
He nodded, “So at least three, but probably more. And assume the cabin is warded.”
She grinned, “Thanks for the reminder.”
She sent the elemental with orders to get a quick look at the appearance of all the people in the cabin if any, wards if any, and return with that information. He was back before she took a second breath. This was addicting, she was having too much fun, and that scared her a little. Probably not enough to stop however…
He asked, “What are you doing?”
She smiled, “Examining her ward structures, I love elementals. I’ll tell you when to turn.”
He frowned, “What good will that do.”
She shrugged, “It’s detailed information, if I figure out the right spot, I can collapse the wards like she did at the coven house. Think of it like demolition charges on the load bearing structures to take a building down, rather than using a wrecking ball, simply put it’s easier and much faster.”
Ed looked dubious.
She added, “I guess I left that part out, it’s how I got past the wards in that jail cell fast enough to still surprise Gerald when I attacked.”
She added, “The turn is coming up, we should pull over after the turn and walk in the rest of the way, it’s about a half mile. This one…”
Ed turned off the state highway and pulled over into the field, right up against some trees. They got out and she started to strip right there in the tree line.
She looked over, “I need to get close to collapse the wards, then I’ll wait for you before I breach, I promise,” luckily Silva agreed, because she wouldn’t really be in control at that point.
Ed nodded, not taking his eyes from her body.
Her wavy brown hair was glowing in the moonlight, and her eyes were twinkling with excitement.
“Just remember, were here for Sally, if the others don’t attack, or run, let them go. If I had to guess they’re probably her family.”
Ed looked surprised, “Even Cinna?”
She sighed, “I might regret it in a few years, when she grows in power and maybe gets a glimmer of intelligence, the girl is poison. But consider who raised her, she might turn around.”
By her own scent, she knew she didn’t really believe that, but it was possible.
Ed shrugged, “Chances are she’ll attack anyway and make it moot.”
She pulled a little extra magic and her body flowed into her tiger form, intense pins and needles flared all over her body as her tiger nerve endings were built and awakened. Silva stretched and stalked in slowly, she could both sense and scent Ed right behind her. He was a little loud in the woods, but quieter than most. They took the half mile slowly, and approached cautiously. She had her eyes out for traps, both magical and mundane, as did Silva, but there weren’t any.
They worked their way to the edge of the woods by the cabin, Silva flicked her tail out, touching his chest, and he nodded down to her. He’d wait there until she gave the signal. She urged Silva to be silent, and got within ten feet of the house, she was crouched down and it was very dark and she was confident Silva wouldn’t be seen.
She worked a wisp of dispersal magic into the complicated weave of wards, just touching the place she wanted to break. A linkage. Then she let out another little wisp, slowly but surely connecting to twenty different spots, it took her a few minutes. When she was sure she had all the important spots, she sent a pulse of dispersal magic down all the wisps at once with a sharp mental command to initiate the dispersal spell.
She didn’t need to do anything to signal Ed, the wards dropped like pulling the key piece out of a house of cards. She knew that would serve. A moment later she felt his hand on her side, and between his touch and scent Silva had the urge to playfully tackle him, but now wasn’t the time. He was right behind her as Silva bunched up and jumped into the back door. Wood verses seven hundred pounds of lithe muscle and cat, meant a foregone conclusion. The door flew open as the frame cracked and splintered.
The cabin was pretty much one very large open room, they were standing in the kitchen, and there were five people across from them in the living room that looked panicked, either from the wards dropping, them bursting in, or most likely both.
She recognize
d Sally and Cinna, she didn’t recognize the other three. A man and two middle aged women, but she recognized they were related in some way to Sally just from their scent, it was all over the cabin. There was a loft, and they couldn’t make out the whole place from their current angle, but she didn’t sense or scent any other people.
Silva didn’t waste time and lunged directly at Sally, ignoring the others for now. Which was a mistake. Cinna wasn’t a very strong witch, but her particular talent made up for that. She’d always wondered what it would be like to fight a telekinetic, because Berny was awesome at it. She found it wasn’t fun. Cinna stopped Silva in midair, and then tossed her like a missile back at Ed.
Silva roared in anger while she tried not to hurt Ed. Celia acting independently started to launch balls of fire at Cinna and Sally. While she had more potential than Sally, she didn’t have access to nearly all her power and Sally easily snuffed the balls of fire out contemptuously. She changed tactics and tried to steal their breath, but their wards rebuffed her.
She really wished she could hit four on the scale, because there were some good spells she could use at that level in her war spell book, but that didn’t help her now. She started doing a combination of air attacks, flares of fire to distract, and one word dispersals while Silva tried to dodge incoming fire and get to a point she could lunge again.
She wondered what the hell Ed was doing, there was a loud groaning sound coming from behind her, but she had no clue what it was, and in the meantime Ed hadn’t fired one spell at their enemies. She was sure whatever it was would be good, she just hoped it happened soon. The other three individuals seemed to have retreated to a corner to avoid the crossfire.
Probably a good thing, they were having a harder time with just two on two than she had expected. If that brat Cinna didn’t have telekinesis she thought it would’ve been over by now.
There was a loud crack behind her that sounded extremely ominous, then the sound of spraying water. A moment after that there were ice spears flying across the room at Cinna and Sally, who were both defending against it, Cinna with telekinesis and Sally with fire that turned the ice to steam.
Silva roared and took that as her chance, and launched herself, this time at Cinna. Silva saw her as the greatest threat, and Cinna faltered at the roar, and the large cat flying right at her, when she was already desperately defending against spears of ice, and liquid water trying to gain entry into her nose and mouth to drown her.
Celia almost felt bad for Cinna as Silva’s claws sunk deep into the young woman’s neck, and ripped down her body. Almost.
Sally fell to the ground with her arms up, “I give up, don’t kill me. I demand to be judged by the…” Sally’s cowardly plea turned into a bloody gurgle, as a thick spear of ice took her right in the throat. It nearly decapitated Sally, and her gurgles went silent in mere seconds.
Silva roared in satisfied victory and sat on her haunches, her eyes locked on the three in the corner. They stared back at Silva with fear in their eyes. Celia was fairly sure from the scent one of them had wet themselves.
Ed came across the room and joined her, and said, “Who are you, and what do you have to do with the mess Sally caused?”
Chapter 23
The man cleared his throat and stood slowly.
“I had nothing to do with whatever she did. I’m Sally’s brother in law, James, and I own this cabin. She called earlier and said she needed to get away for a few days, that’s all I know. This is Sally’s sister, Mary, and my wife. This is their other sister Katherine.”
Ed frowned, “Sally was guilty of hiring assassins to kill a feared rival within her coven, which is not activity that will ever be condoned in Charlotte. She was sentenced by the two remaining councilors. She’s caused many deaths and property damage because of her paranoid ways.”
He paused for a minute and let that sink in.
Silva and Celia were unconcerned at the moment. The man had spoken the truth, so he was allowed to keep breathing for now.
Ed frowned, “We don’t believe you to be involved. However, you are her family. I will have your word you will not seek vengeance for the justice that happened here tonight, and you’d better mean it, or you won’t be leaving this place alive.”
James replied, “You have mine, I knew what kind of woman she was. She was family but… I have no ill will toward you for making her pay for her crimes.”
Truth.
His wife glared at him though, and said, “And you’ll simply take their word for it?”
The man coughed, “Come on Mary, you know what your sister was like, and what she was capable of. She was too weak to grasp at the power she craved, so she was ruthless and often overreached. It was only a matter of time before she paid for it.”
Mary scowled, but eventually nodded her acceptance of it.
She could hardly blame the woman, it was her sister, no matter what a bitch Sally had been she was Mary’s family.
Katherine said softly, “I have no intention of pursuing vengeance, my anger at the actions of the night are toward my sister.”
Silva stood up, the cat was ready to go.
Ed nodded soberly, “I froze much of the line, you’ll want to get a plumber in here to fix that pipe sooner rather than later, it won’t last very long in this climate.”
Ed and Silva turned and left the destruction behind, and trotted back to the car. She changed back to human and got dressed. It was getting late, and they were a couple of hours from home, but they set out. She wanted her own bed.
Ed looked thoughtful for a while, and when he spoke his voice was tentative.
“What aren’t you telling me Celia?”
Celia frowned, “What do you mean?”
Ed chuckled, “What do I mean? Well, I mean for the woman that dropped a twister through a house, and sucked up a man and then electrocuted him to death with lightning, you had an awful hard time taking out two witches that were mediocre at best. So what aren’t you telling me? I can feel your power Celia, you practically glow with it next to most of us.
“I know I’m fairly strong, but I’m not near your league, Bria is the closest I know, and Damon is a close second, but no one else comes close. I guessed that comes from your fae blood, you told me about that, but why is the magic you use so weak, and you seem to use it as a last resort. You should have been able to blast them in seconds. So yes, what aren’t you telling me?”
She sighed and looked down in thought.
“It’s because I was bound. There is a part of me that fears magic, and if I channel too much of it… I freak out and lose my concentration. I know it doesn’t make sense, but most phobias don’t. I’m getting better actually, I was a lot weaker last month. I’m using a ladder technique that seems to be working. Right now I can access about a third of my power, which wasn’t enough for Sally because she was at least a little over half my power in strength. In a sense I owe my success to Gerald, he gave me a potion to keep me docile, and I had full access to my magic for about half a day, until my phobia came back.”
When he didn’t respond, she continued.
“Beyond that though, telekinesis is a very powerful gift, even if Cinna wasn’t that strong with it, the power itself made up for the differences. If not for that we would have taken them out fast.”
Ed nodded thoughtfully, and finally asked, “A part of you?”
She frowned, she just couldn’t lie to him, it was beyond her. She hadn’t wanted to share her split personality, so she’d added that and was hoping he’d miss it. But no such luck.
She shrugged, “Obviously a part of me loves the rush of magic, and the power. Even with strong discipline it can be…”
She trailed off, feeling ashamed for continuing to tell the truth, but in a misleading way. Besides not wanting it spread around, it was a part of shifter secrecy. Some things just needed to be kept a secret. But she felt guiltier about this, because there was a part of her that didn’t want him to know she was broken, she
didn’t know if she’d have the courage to tell him if she could.
It was a bit complicated in her head.
Ed frowned and his voice was full of concern, “Well you need to work on that, and for god’s sake don’t tell anyone else.”
She nodded, “It’s not that much of a liability. Perhaps if I was only a witch it would be, but with strong personal wards and shifter strength and speed it more than makes up for it. Except tonight, with the telekinesis, or you’d have noticed long before now. But yeah, I’m not exactly shouting it off the rooftops. Thanks.”
Ed sounded confused, “For what?”
She smiled and took his hand, “Looking out for me.”
Ed squeezed her hand and said, “Always.”
They had about two more hours on the road.
She asked in a tentative voice, “Ed?”
Ed replied, “What is it?”
She said softly, “I’m… hungry.”
He laughed, “Alright, we’ll stop somewhere on the way.”
It was pretty late, so they opted for fast food. She ate four double cheeseburgers and a two large fries with a chocolate shake. She noticed Ed giving her looks of both amusement and obvious attraction. She had to admit tonight was pretty close, she was feeling a bit amorous herself. She wondered if he would want to go home, were they safe?
She tried subtlety, “So I imagine you can’t wait to get home to your own bed, when do you think it will be safe.”
He gave her a considering look, “I’m not sure when it would be safe. I mean, we’re probably fine during the day to go back to our normal schedules. Since you’ll have Berny or Mia in the store with you, and me or Josh when you’re not. But I don’t think it would be safe for you to be alone at night for a while.”
She almost gasped and wrinkled her nose at him. He’d been telling the absolute truth, up until the last sentence. He’d been lying his ass off then.
She smiled at his artfully innocent face and asked curiously, “When do you think it’d be safe at night?”
He shrugged nonchalantly, “Better safe than sorry right? Maybe we can reassess the danger in let’s say… a month or so.”
Demon's Moon: A Celia Winters Novel Book 2 Page 13