by Jane Cousins
Vaughn turned to look at his fellow warrior. “Where are we on finding those babies that Xander fathered?”
Marcus shook his head. “My hackers are moving as fast as they can. Fertility clinics have very strict privacy rules and government sponsored firewalls. I don’t know how many kids are out there or in what states to look specifically, it’s a crapshoot that will take as long as it takes.”
Vaughn issued a frustrated sigh to mirror the one Marcus had released. “Well at least we know they need the children alive, they shouldn’t be in any immediate danger but it needs to remain a priority.”
Marcus nodded.
“I still don’t get it…” Flynn was frowning.
His brother Dash, mirrored his frown and finished his sentence. “… what’s the difference between the rituals again?”
“Don’t do that.” Cara and Erik said in unison before turning to look at one another, scowling.
“Oh. Come on…” Flynn exclaimed.
“… it’s not that annoying.” Dash finished in their defence.
“It is if you’ve just spent some quality time with Sek and Mot.” Hadleigh replied, twirling the dagger absently between her fingers so fast it was almost a blur. “So quit it, or someone bleeds.”
Cara slipped into librarian mode. “The first ritual, requires the blood of both an ancestor and a witch in order to restore the mummified remains to living status, essentially it would make Apep a biddable slave with no will power of his own.”
“Sounds perfect for what Sek and Mot have in mind.” Rafe contributed his thoughts. “Especially if their main goal all along was to raise Apep so they could suck down his Chi, rather than restore him to power. Wouldn’t that ritual make the most sense for them? They could just command Apep to stand still whilst they drain him dry. After they get his Chi back in him, that is.”
Cara shook her head, adjusting her glasses, wishing she was wearing something a little more professional than yoga pants and a hoodie. “The Chi is not just about the essence of one’s soul, but a combination of mind, body and spirit. Will-power sustains it. In slave form, Apep’s Chi would be weak and I’m assuming rather limited.”
“Which wouldn’t do them much good if they want to attain daddy’s God status.” Nate ran fingers through his sandy coloured hair.
“Agreed.” Vaughn nodded. “With everything you’ve told us about Sek and Mot admitting to killing their sister, going after their father, killing his priests. It sounds like they are the reason why Apep sought refuge in death in the first place, by dying and hiding his Chi, he’s thwarted their plans for thousands of years.”
“Okay, so when they still thought Apep had his Chi on board, why even attempt the ancestor witch ritual with Hadleigh if they know it’s only going to give them half-assed results power-wise?” Flynn was frowning.
“Because after several thousand years I think they are getting desperate.” Cara could see interest flare in the eyes of all the warriors at her words. “They had Xander, the ancestor, under their thumb. Believed they had found a witch.” She looked Hadleigh’s way for a moment. “And I was on the run, whereabouts unknown. They’ve been dragging around their father’s corpse since the day he died. Pouring the blood of their descendants down its throat so they could siphon power off the mummy, rather like a battery. It must be tiresome, the corpse, having to track down ancestors and ensure there is a viable blood donation pool available.”
“So if the ritual of getting a descendant to willingly accept Apep’s Chi is the answer to their problems, why haven’t they done it already? Sounds easy enough, grab a descendant, torture them until they accept Apep’s Chi… that is if it had been in the mummy, but they didn’t realise that until you told them, so what’s so difficult about the Chi ritual?” Marcus’s blue eyes shon laser bright in query.
“First of all, it has to be the right descendant, the chaos focus. And they only come along once every century or so. From what I can tell they have to be triggered…” Cara clenched her teeth, suddenly her mouth was dry and her chest tight. “… like I was by my mother’s death… murder.” She was very aware of Erik sitting next to her, silent and solid which both comforted and irritated her.
Sensing her distress, Erik reached over to place his hand along the back of her chair, his fingers idly playing with one of her ringlets.
Distracted from her dark thoughts about Sek and Mot, Cara shot Erik a hard look, brushing his hand away, at the same moment the sturdy plastic cup containing water in front of her mysteriously cracked, its contents draining along the grain of the wooden table directly into Erik’s lap. Erik only just managed to push himself out of the way in time to avoid a soggy lap.
Instantly, Cara felt better. Now what had she been talking about? “Triggering a chaos focus was probably easier done in the past when my ancestors had short lives, surrounded by disease, danger and death. But according to Sek, the focus doesn’t just cause chaos by triggering major events they can sense them… are attracted to them, probably unknowingly. So even when they were lucky enough to track down a chaos focus they too often died young and rather unexpectedly before Sek and Mot could get their hands on them.”
“Hard to believe they were unsuccessful for several thousand years.” Drum spoke for the first time, his voice low and rumbling.
Cara shrugged. “From my own experience, coming into these… powers, is no picnic. I’m educated and think of myself as fairly rational but even then, when faced with what was happening around me, I descended into panic mode… and panic only triggered bigger events. Sek mentioned that several times they had a chaos focus in their grasp only to lose them right in front of their eyes. They can’t drug them, or torture them, the consent has to be given entirely of free will and right mind.”
“Am I correct in thinking that you have, since your last visit here, gained some kind of control over your powers?” Marcus speculated.
Cara couldn’t help the blush that rushed to turn her cheeks pink. “I’m working on it.”
“What are we going to do about Sek and Mot?” Hadleigh pulled the discussion back to her main focus.
Marcus flicked his attention down briefly to his mini laptop before looking up once more. “The police have issued a BOLO out on Sek and Mot. Thanks to the explosion at The Met they are officially wanted as persons of interest. But as we know those bastards are the definitions of sneaky, they could be holed up anywhere contemplating their next move.”
“Which has to be finding the object with Apep’s Chi in it.” Hadleigh growled. “We need to find that object first.”
“I think I can help you there.” Cara spoke up. “I’ve been doing a lot of research regarding Apep’s death, his priests and their practises. If I can just track down a list of what was included originally in his sarcophagus we’ll have a starting point.”
“Problem is, you said Sek and Mot sold all of Apep’s death trinkets, they at least know what they were and will have a head start on us tracking them down.” Rafe pointed out.
“Worse still.” Cara couldn’t help but point out. “If they manage to wake Apep using the first ritual, with the blood of the descendant and a witch, then they could use Apep’s living husk like a sniffer dog to find his belongings.”
“Shit.” Marcus was on his feet.
Vaughn’s teeth were gritted. “We need to find those babies that Xander fathered ASAFP, and get them and their families under protection.”
“I’m on it.” Marcus was already striding from the meeting room heading off to his electronic high tech lair.
Vaughn turned his attention to Cara. “Same goes for you, we need you on lock down.”
Cara was surprised in the face of Vaughn’s intense golden stare that she wasn’t trembling or panicking in the slightest. Instead she met his gaze coolly. “I need to continue my research at the Haven Bay library, the vault contains a lot of material I haven’t yet had time to read.”
Vaughn was shaking his head. “It would be better if you
were here, that way I don’t have to waste manpower on a protection detail.”
“I have the protection detail covered.” Erik spoke up, sounding confident and determined.
Vaughn shook his head again, the artist with the smart mouth, even though he was his brother-in-law, was not someone who instantly leapt to mind when one thought of a reliable, competent bodyguard.
“We should just kill her.” Hadleigh pointed out calmly.
Erik was on his feet in an instant, gripping the wooden table, glaring hard at his sister. “Now you listen to me, Gigantore, I know resorting to bloodshed is your number one go to move but you’ll have to go through me if you want to hurt Cara.”
Hadleigh didn’t even blink, instead her lips curved slightly up at the edges. “You think you can take me big brother?”
“No.” Erik might be angry but he hadn’t let go of all rational thought. “But if you incapacitate or kill me that’s only going to double Mum’s focus on your baby making future… so just think about that before you make any rash moves.”
Cara couldn’t believe it but Hadleigh actually paled under Erik’s threat, she really needed to meet Erik’s mother one of these days and see what all the fuss was about, surely she couldn’t be that bad.
Vaughn eyed Erik coolly through inscrutable gold eyes. “I warned you about name calling… Dash.”
Dash, seated next to Erik, stood up in a fast flowing motion, like water… warrior fast, bringing his palm around he smacked Erik hard across the back of the head.
The sound of flesh meeting something hard and unyielding filled the air a second before Dash began jumping on the spot, cradling his aching hand. “Shit, what the hell was that? What, in Maat’s name, is your head made of dude?”
Erik didn’t move a muscle, his gaze still locked on his sister, where the real threat in the room lay. His hands continued to grip the wooden table, he could do this all day… well as long as he didn’t let go of the table.
Vaughn’s gaze travelled speculatively between Erik and Dash, who was still cradling his sore hand. “Drum?”
As Second, Drum understood what his captain was asking without having to hear the words. Standing up, he strode around the table, unceremoniously pushing Dash and his ouchie out of the way, wuss.
Cara was beginning to worry, my God, how wide was this man… Drum, who was approaching Erik with murder in his black bottomless scary eyes? A light bulb overhead blew out.
“Huh, nice to know you care.” Erik muttered out the side of his mouth to her, biting back a smile, aware of Drum’s fast approach but refusing to drop the staring challenge he had going with his sister.
Care? Stupid macho man, she was tempted to kick him. He was just so annoying… and now in danger thanks to her. She desperately wanted to look away but couldn’t as Drum bought a massive fist around and punched Erik in the gut.
The crack that rent the air was definitely the sound of several knuckles breaking in Drum’s hand. The huge man didn’t swear in reaction, or even let out a hiss of pain. Instead he just stood there, glanced down at his damaged fist for a moment then back at Erik, who hadn’t moved an inch despite the momentum of Drum’s pile-driver.
Drum’s right eyebrow rose for a split second before once more his expression was grim and watchful.
“Okay, maybe bodyguard duty isn’t totally out of your wheel-house.” Vaughn conceded, trying to recall what, if anything, he knew about Erik’s powers. Admitting to himself he may have been a bit lax in not determining what his brother-in-law was capable of. Though he supposed it wasn’t surprising, with Hadleigh in his life now as his meld mate, he had the best possible distraction.
“Hey, I don’t need a bodyguard.” Cara protested. She’d been holed up safely in the library just fine before Sek and Mot kidnapped her from her beachside cottage.
“You can’t live in that library.” Erik stated, it was as if he could read her mind. “Sek and Mot know about Haven Bay now, so you need to be wary, on the move and stay somewhere new, my place fits that bill.”
“Which goes back to my statement that we kill her.” Hadleigh waved a hand. “And before you leap down my throat, I mean fake her death, like we did Serena’s tragically early demise.”
Erik scowled, a staring match with Hadleigh was about the only competition he had a hope of winning but damn it, he so wanted to blink right now. “I’m not backing down on this Hadleigh.”
Hadleigh smiled, the knife still in her grip.
“Your little sharp toys don’t scare me.” Erik assured her. Never show fear when facing off with Hadleigh, he still remembered his father’s warning, given to him when he was five years old and Hadleigh had just been born. Goddess, the look on her face in that crib, it had been kind of chilling to see such a bloodthirsty look on a newborn as she’d eyed her three older brothers with eerie intent.
Hadleigh’s dagger disappeared into thin air to be replaced by a white plastic knife that she’d palmed from somewhere on her person. The plastic knife glinted with a wicked lethal looking point. “How about this little sharp toy?”
“Quit it you two.” Cara intervened, reaching up to grab Erik’s t-shirt, dragging him back into his seat. Cara had a lot experience over the years breaking up squabbles between siblings, though usually the combatants were a lot, lot younger than these two. But she supposed growing up with magic created strange rivalries. “I’m not sure if faking my death will be enough.” She turned her attention to Vaughn, who at least seemed rational. “I think Sek and Mot might be able to sense me… the chaos.”
Vaughn frowned, even as he reached over, covered his wife’s hand holding the plastic sharpened knife and pulled it down into his lap. “Okay, so if they can’t be fooled… then your only other option is to scare them so badly they’ll never bother you again, no matter how desperate they are to get their hands on you.”
“And how would I go about scaring two demi gods?” Cara asked drily.
Nate clicked his fingers. “Your powers. Fight chaos with chaos.”
“Nice idea.” Cara conceded. “If I had better control, give me a few more years… a decade or so and I might just be ready to face off against them. Assuming I don’t kill myself by triggering a natural disaster during my training.”
“Actually.” A smile appeared on Vaughn’s face. “We might know someone who can teach you what you need to know.”
Erik swivelled in his seat. “And just who do you have in mind?” He was racking his brains and couldn’t think of anyone.
“How do you feel about meeting a Goddess?” Vaughn enquired.
A Goddess? Cara’s eyes widened, it was one thing to know there was magic in the world but a Goddess? Wow. “Maat? She’d really help me?”
“I can only ask.” Vaughn provided. “If she agrees, she’ll get in touch.”
Cara covered her mouth with both hands, the Goddess Maat… she had so many questions.
“I wouldn’t be too much in awe if I were you…” Flynn smiled as he spoke.
“… she can be a surprisingly big pain in the ass.” Dash completed, with a matching smile of his own.
“That’s it.” Hadleigh threw off Vaughn’s restraining hand. “I warned you two about the creepy finishing each other’s sentences, time for some bloodshed.”
Vaughn watched his wife move, she was like poetry in motion, speed and grace rolled into a gorgeous deadly package. “Have fun, Honey.”
Cara froze, watching the twin warriors scramble out of their seats, racing for the door, Hadleigh hot on their heels. Oh, what she wouldn’t give for the nice quiet of the library right now.
“Which one of you wants to bleed first?” Hadleigh’s voice drifted back to them from the corridor.
“Come on.” Erik leaned across, capturing Cara’s hand. “Let’s go home.”
She stood up, staring at his hand, home? Heaven help her, that sounded so right… Erik’s hand in hers felt so right. Too right, she couldn’t afford to indulge in this go nowhere fantasy.
/> She tried to tug her hand free but Erik was having none of it. Why did he keep doing this? Pulling her closer when any sane man would be pushing her away? He’d seen what she was capable of… did the thought of more sex or some mysterious code of chivalry trump the fact that essentially she was a walking disaster waiting to happen?
But damn it, his hand, though calloused, felt so warm and strong wrapped around hers, it was nice… comforting… grr, she couldn’t afford to indulge in these feelings. Feelings? Uh-oh, no way…. no, no, no… she was not having feelings for Erik Valhalla. He might be all kinds of gorgeous, funny, surprisingly sweet and unbelievably good in bed but she was a certified chaos vortex. She would not be responsible for dragging him into her mess.
Besides, he was a self-confessed, terminally single, breast whisperer… she could not afford to let herself get attached, that road would only lead to heartache and in her case… disaster. It was one thing to like the man but anything more… no… except she had a sneaky suspicion it might already be too late for her to tamp down on the feelings she had for Erik Valhalla. Dread and panic swept through her.
The meeting table suddenly and inexplicably collapsed in on itself.
Damn, she’d done that. Embarrassment stained her cheeks with high colour. Next to her Erik threw back his head and laughed out loud. Cara glared at the annoying man, he really was very, very strange.
Chapter Nineteen
“This is not the library.” Cara looked around in surprise. Infinitely preferring the trans-portal way of travelling then her relatives’ sand warp snatch and grab. One moment they were in Atlanta, the next they were here… wherever here was. Her gaze quickly catalogued the lofty high ceiling, the strangely curved walls, the highly polished floorboards and the colourful collection of soft furnishings, but what caught and held her attention was the rather humongous tree trunk growing through the centre of the room.
Erik dropped her hand as they exited his utility cupboard. Watching closely as Cara walked over to press both of her hands against the tree and stare upwards, as if she could see the heavy branches overhead, instead of the ceiling.