“We’re here.” Nathan didn’t sound happy, either, but arriving at least closed the conversation.
We had about a half-mile walk into the woods, and we’d gone over strategy before we left the house. Aaron and Nathan first, followed by Sophia and Jonathan, then me, with Mordecai at our backs. When there are no waterfalls close, large trees are often used as a gateway, and this was supposedly an ancient shagbark hickory with a nearly three-foot-wide trunk.
When I step into the nothingness, people see it as me disappearing. I don’t. I’m just going from one place to another.
And so it was when Nathan, Sophia, and then Jonathan stepped from our world into Faerie — it looked like a bizarre optical illusion of them walking into the tree.
Aaron stared at the tree a few seconds, and brusquely turned to head back to the vehicle.
“Why did you send Nathan?” I asked. “You could’ve gone and left him.”
He shook his head. “I popped the Merrow Queen’s cherry, when she was still a princess and before she married. It was an arranged marriage and she wasn’t looking forward to it. She asked me to bed her, in hopes she might get out of having to marry the prince. He married her anyway, and I’m not his favorite person.”
I couldn’t help my grin. “Is there anyone in Faerie you haven’t slept with?”
“Plenty.”
Mordecai chuckled. “The question to ask would be the percentage of nobility in Faerie he hasn’t fucked.”
He rolled his eyes. “When Sophia meets a queen or princess, she just assumes I’ve been with them at some point and has stopped asking. She’s not happy about it, but that was my past. She knows I have no interest in anyone except her now.”
My necklace vibrated, and I stopped and put feelers out. Neither man asked why I’d stopped, but both went on alert.
“I don’t smell anything,” Aaron said after a few moments. “What did you sense?”
I shook my head. “Best not to talk about it here. Mordecai?”
“I don’t feel anyone close.”
“Okay then. Let’s continue, but extra high alert, please.”
It’s impossible to stay at high alert, with all of your senses scanning and taking everything in. I’d been at a heightened state of alert before, but we’d also been joking and cutting up. Now, I had my senses fifty yards out, feeling for energy signatures. My eyes and ears filtered everything through the “is it a monster” filter, and my olfactory senses gave me tons of information I had no idea what to do with.
When my necklace vibrated again, I kept walking and didn’t mention it. Was someone testing me, to see what triggered it and what didn’t? If so, how were they monitoring it?
And how the hell did they know where I was?
“Is there some rule about doorways balancing? Like, if there are so many doors to Faerie, do there have to be the same number to Hell, or the other realms?”
“No,” said Mordecai. “Why do you ask?”
“Is there a door somewhere else in the vicinity? So, could someone be peeking out and then pulling back really fast? Enough to get a look without being seen or sensed?”
“To my knowledge, there are no doors to the Hell Realm in the vicinity,” said Mordecai.
“But you know of doors to other places?”
Silence.
Whether they wouldn’t tell me or couldn’t probably didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, so I didn’t ask which it was. I had a feeling it was the former, and asking would just piss me off.
Aaron drove back, with me in the middle row, and Mordecai behind me.
My necklace buzzed a few times, but I didn’t acknowledge it. I watched all around — including inside other vehicles. I smelled for anything different or off, and I tried to sense energy or magic or whatever-the-fuck meant supernatural-and-not-human.
And I didn’t get anything until we were about to turn into the driveway. My necklace went off at full force, and it wasn’t a short burst this time. It jumped and vibrated and wouldn’t stop, and I finally put my hand on it and said, “Okay, there’s danger. I get it. You’re distracting me.”
It stopped, and Nathan drove at breakneck speed along the winding, twisting, narrow driveway.
Instead of the house, we saw a cloud. Dark mist, swirling and churning like an angry storm.
“How do we get in?” I asked.
Mordecai suddenly appeared beside me, and he grabbed me from the side with one arm, and Aaron across the seat with the other. The next thing I knew, we were in the nothingness, and he merely said, “Master bath,” before he transported us. I stumbled on entry, but Mordecai held me until I had my balance.
I noted Aaron and Mordecai were holding hands with their fingers clasped, and I had to assume the primordial god was helping the ancient dragon maintain his human form. My necklace shielded me, but if we moved more than a few feet away from each other, we might not find each other again.
The next thing I knew, we were back in the nothingness.
“Everyone okay in there?”
I nodded. “My necklace kept vibrating in short bursts — in the woods, and then all the way home. Every one to seven minutes, randomly. Ya’ll heard me tell it to pipe down in the driveway. It seems to be protecting me from whatever the mists do to ya’ll.”
“I’m okay as long as we’re touching,” said Aaron. “I’ll probably be okay a few minutes without you.”
Mordecai nodded. “We don’t know what shape our people will be in. They may fight us if their willpowers are taken over, or they may just be vegetables, with no response. They’ll probably all be in animal form.”
“So, two wolves, a grizzly bear, and a rabbit? They won’t hurt Gabby, will they?”
Aaron looked grim, and I put my hand on Mordecai. “Take us back now, or I’ll go in without you.”
He shook his head. “Two minutes to form a plan. Patience.”
“I’m nose-blind in the mist, and visibility is limited to about six feet,” said Aaron. “Not sure about sounds. Fighting will be difficult if we have to hold hands.”
“I can only see about three feet.” And that was with a boost from Bran’s blood. I’d have probably been totally blind without it.
“Say buzz or jump to let us know what your necklace is doing,” Mordecai told me. “If you run into problems, return here.”
“I can’t stay here long. Cora senses it as me dying.”
“She’ll survive, and she’ll understand. I’m going to focus on Gabby. Grab her and take her to your property on the mountain. The workers are inside the house today, so you’ll be fine taking her to the woods near the field. Order her to change as soon as you get her there.”
I nodded, and he looked to Aaron. “I’ll handle Horse, you take the wolves. We’ll have to let go to fight, but I’ll try to touch you every couple of minutes.”
Mordecai landed us in the center of utter chaos.
Vampires and demons fought, and I had no idea who was on our side and who wasn’t. Some were likely Marco’s vampires, awake but forced to stay downstairs another hour until the sunset. Some felt like Celrau, and the demons were… half-demons. Possibly quarter-demons.
A grizzly bear was trying to protect a big white rabbit in the corner. He wouldn’t let me past him, and I went through the nothingness to reach her. She was huge, and I grabbed her and held onto her fur, and stepped out before he could get turned around. I hated to leave Mordecai and Nathan, but it’d looked like the wolves and bear were protecting Gabby from the bad guys, so that meant five people fighting the bad guys now.
I landed in the forest on the mountain with my arms firmly around Gabby’s neck. She was terrified and wanted to bolt, but I hung on for dear life.
“Change, Gabby. We need to talk. I have to go back and help them, but I can’t until I get you sorted.”
It took a couple of minutes of me soothing her before she calmed enough to hear me, but she finally changed into her human form, naked and terrified.
“Can you take me to the clubhouse? I’ll be safe there.”
“I can take you to the wooded area.”
She nodded. “That’s fine. I have clothes downstairs, and someone will be there who can make sure I stay safe. The same block that doesn’t let you step in with your disappearing thing will also keep the mists out.”
I nodded, put my arms around her, and took her to the compound. Within seconds of us landing, I heard the clubhouse door open. Gabby did too, because she said, “It’s Dozer. He’ll keep me safe. You can go.”
I shook my head. “I need to physically hand you off. We both want me back so I can help fight, but not until I know you’re safe.”
“Fight who?” Dozer asked. He took one look at Gabby and pulled his shirt off.
“Bad guys,” I told him.
“Either Killian or Manandán’s people,” said Gabby. “The mists made us all change. She needs to get back to help them fight.”
“The mists won’t bother me.” Viper seemed to come out of nowhere. “Take me with you to fight.”
“Why are you immune?”
“Snake. Rattler. Cherokee. I’ll be okay.”
“Some of Marco’s vampires are there, fighting on our side. I don’t know who they are, so this is tricky. Aaron’s there and is trying to stay human. Mordecai’s there. The two wolves are ours, and you know the bear. As far as I know, all the demons and all the Celrau are the bad guys.”
He nodded and pulled a gun from god-knows-where, and I took him at his word he’d be okay. One last look at Gabby and Dozer, and I put my arms around Viper, stepped into the nothingness, and then into mass, brutal pandemonium.
The grizzly had lost most of one arm and someone was about to bite him. Viper took aim, shot the vampire in the head, and went to Horse. I put my back to the wall and formed a short light staff — this was close quarters and I didn’t want to hurt someone on our side.
The mists curled away from my staff, as if the touch poisoned them. Or perhaps evaporated them. Who knew, but it fucking worked. I stepped to Horse and told him, “It’s me. The mists run from my staff. I’m going to wave it around your head. Be still, okay?”
Fighting was still going on in the room, but I couldn’t see who was involved. I didn’t trust Viper enough to have my back — I’d never fought with him and had no idea of his skillset. I moved behind Horse and cleared the air around the huge bear enough he could change back to human and heal.
Viper did, indeed seem unaffected by the mists, so I left the two of them and headed towards the muffled sounds of fists hitting flesh.
With humans, fights don’t often last long. A few well-placed punches and kicks, and someone will be unable to fight any longer. Supernaturals, however, aren’t as fragile as humans, and the floor was so slick with blood, I nearly fell.
I’d been able to see three feet away from me near the wall, but the mists in the center of the room were thicker, and without my sword I wouldn’t have been able to see my hand in front of my face.
I could smell farther than I could see, and the stench of blood was almost sickening.
Meanwhile, I could clear the mists in front of me enough to see where I was going, and ten steps later, I came upon someone who smelled like Celrau, so I cut his head off. A half-demon came at me from the side and nearly kicked my face, but I ducked and swung my staff at him, and cut him mostly in two across the torso. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would disable him, so I moved away and looked for someone else to kill.
My sense of smell told me Mordecai was close, so I followed the scent until his large, looming silhouette came into view. He seemed to be locked into combat with someone a lot smaller than him, but there wasn’t a clear winner, which was scary. No one should be able to give an ancient god of war a run for his money at hand-to-hand combat.
I had the element of surprise, so I stabbed his opponent in the back and didn’t even care it’s considered poor sportsmanship. This was life or death, not a game.
Mordecai’s voice thundered at me, “Kitten! Godsdammit! You aren’t supposed to be here!”
I’d sliced the man’s spine and it had slowed him down, but he still turned and struck out with long talons. It wasn’t a man. Some kind of bird, but human sized, and it felt like fighting a velociraptor.
I was just realizing I was no match for this thing even with my staff when Mordecai wrapped his arms around the creature and they both disappeared. Nothing I could do — if he didn’t want me to find him, I wouldn’t. I breathed in and turned my head to look all around me. It was suddenly eerily silent. I formed another staff of light and started swinging them both like I was in some kind of martial arts demonstration, but it worked to clear the mists from me as I walked. I got a whiff of wet-cat, and I moved towards it.
A massive roar suddenly filled the room — it had to be a pissed off Nathan, and possibly injured. Something came flying at me, and I dodged it, then had to dodge something else. And something else.
Were they throwing shoes at me? I dissolved the staff in my right hand, formed a bowling ball sized light ball, solidified it, and threw it in the direction the shoes were coming from.
And then rushed towards the horrible, awful sounds coming from whatever I’d hit. Think of the sounds an injured dog makes, but meld it with a pissed off bull. I had no idea what kind of creature I was running towards, but I’d injured it and I needed to incapacitate whatever it was.
When I saw it, I still had no idea what it was. It was almost cute, kind of bearlike, but a little mongoosy. I didn’t have time to ask it what it was, because the fucker jumped on me and bit me.
I tried to swipe it with my staff, but it wouldn’t penetrate the skin. What kind of cute animal has armor for skin?
I didn’t have anything in my right hand, and the little bastard was gnawing on my shoulder like it was a delicacy. I manifested a light knife and came up through the fucker’s stomach. It took me a few seconds to drag it through bone and skin, but I made it to his heart and he stopped biting. There was no way I could fight anyone, and I knew I was in trouble. With the last of my strength, I went through the nothingness and landed in Bran’s dungeon. If you try to go to his house — anywhere on his property — you end up down there. I’d known it, but at least it would get me help.
Sure enough, I had guards to me in seconds, but I blacked out before I could tell anyone what happened.
10
I awoke in Bran’s bed, with Bran still in it. I took one look at him, the room spun around us, and I dove for the edge of the mattress… and promptly puked in the floor.
“Sorry. Am I going to turn into whatever bit me?” I needed food and water, but I also needed to know whether I was going to shapeshift into a cute monster.
“We don’t think so.”
I closed my eyes.
“When will we know?”
“You had enough of my blood still in you, and since you managed to kill him and get away, the bugger didn’t kill you.” He sighed. “It was close.”
I got up, realized I was naked, but kept walking to the bathroom. The room was still spinning, but I needed to pee — and wash my mouth out.
A new toothbrush was on the vanity by the sink, along with a tube of toothpaste. I used it when I finished with the toilet, and tried not to look at myself in the mirror. My hair was a frizzy mess, I had zero makeup on, and my eyes were puffy with gross stuff in them.
I washed my face and ignored my hair.
Thankfully, someone had delivered some toast and a glass of what I hoped was Coke while I was in the bathroom.
“Where are my clothes?”
“Trashed. Use the robe on the sofa. I’ll have someone bring you some clothes. Size three?”
“Or five, depends on the cut.” I slid into the robe and sat on the sofa. A few nibbles of toast and couple of sips of Coke, and I thought I might be okay.
“Is everyone okay? Where are they?”
“The shapeshifters are fine. Several had to change to heal, but
no lasting problems.”
“Mordecai?”
“We haven’t heard from him. His cell phone isn’t on the network, so we’re assuming he took whoever he was fighting to another realm.”
“Thanks for saving me again. What do I owe you?”
“Find a way to make things right with Abbott and we’ll be square.”
“Fuck. I’m not sure that’ll be possible until Gavin’s back.” I sighed. “Maybe never.”
“He knows you were in the right. Talk to him.”
“Give me a reason to be in the same room with him, and I’ll do what I can.”
He stood, and I looked away. He was naked, too. “He’ll be here two hours after sunset. Is the toast enough?”
“For now. I might be ready for an egg sandwich in about thirty minutes.” My shoulder was still bandaged, and I looked at it. Again. “Do I want to know how it looks under there?”
“Best to wait until tomorrow. You seem to be using your hand okay.”
“It hurts, but nothing I can’t handle. Where’s my phone?”
“Turned off and in a signal blocking bag three stories below us. I had a mutual friend let Randall know you’re being taken care of, so the Alpha could tell Cora, but you’re welcome to use a burner phone to call her if you’d like.”
I nodded. “Please.”
He retrieved one from his nightstand and brought it to me. Still naked. “It looks like the phone is calling from Russia. Don’t mention me, or where you are. We don’t know how they’re finding you.”
I ignored his floppy penis and called Cora.
“Please tell me she’s okay.”
“I am. I’m sorry I worried you.”
“Fuck, Kirsten. You have to stop doing that.”
“I know. It was bad. Are you okay?”
“Yeah. I felt you black out. I’m used to how it feels when you, well, leave, but this was different. I was scared for you.”
I’d been scared for myself, but there was no sense sharing that bit of information. “I still have no idea what bit me.”
“According to Kenny, a giant honey badger — and the regular sized ones are bad enough.”
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