by Lissa Kasey
Sam’s scowl turned to a grin. “Anyone tell you you’re too old to be in an Asian boy band?”
Sei’s hair was a messy mop that didn’t quite reach his shoulders. A crazy bit of curl had appeared when he let it grow a bit, but without the added weight of having it long. It had also lightened over the years, taking on a touch of the golden brown of Jamie’s blond tones beneath the dark brown Sei had been gifted from his father. He didn’t think he was as pretty as he’d been in his younger days. Yeah, Asian boy band material? Not so much.
Seiran nodded. “Yep, can’t sing either. I dress mostly for work.”
“You sing just fine. Frog jammies are work requirements?”
“Frog jammies are ‘I’m going to bed’ wear. Aren’t you working? Shouldn’t you be in a suit? Or is thug sheik on the menu for your guys tonight?”
“Ronnie,” Sam groused.
“Sammie,” Sei grumbled back. “I already thanked you for helping me bind the golem. Unless you’ve got a book stashed in those too tight pants of yours about golems, I am planning on taking myself for a bit of a spin around the garden and then to bed.”
“You wish you knew what was in these pants.”
“Not without substantial eye bleach.”
“I’m hot,” Sam defended.
“Not my type.”
“No. True. You like them tall and blond.”
Seiran didn’t really like much of anything these days. He wondered if Luca and Con would be bursting through the door too, or if he would just be blessed with the vampire tonight. “If you’re not here to give me info about the golem, why are you here?”
Sam finally turned to stare at the golem, as though he’d just noticed it for the first time. “You brought the fucking golem home?” Sam asked incredulous.
“What else am I supposed to do with it?”
“Um, leave your work at work?”
“Right, ‘cause you do that all the time?” Seiran said. “Who brought me pixies thinking they’d mix with the fairies?”
“How was I to know pixies and fairies have some sort of intrinsic hatred of each other?”
“Research?”
“That’s your job. I’m a problem solver. And my problem was solved by removing the pixies.”
Which Seiran had then had the work of finding a new home before his own became a war zone. They now lived in a nice garden maze in the UK somewhere, with lots of signs around it to keep humans away. Pixies didn’t like humans much and were carnivorous. Much like gnomes, they couldn’t really be around the human population without causing trouble.
“Vampires know exotic pets have to be cleared through Max now,” Sam continued. “No pixies, gnomes, griffins, or gargoyles. Funny how much of this shit I used to think was all make believe.”
Better off for most humans to believe that. It kept them out of trouble. “Yeah, well, someone found magic to create a golem by sacrificing three lives. I’ll be able to question the guys using it tomorrow. But I suspect it was sold to them, possibly one of them bound to it with a minor spell, which was why the glamour was unraveling.”
Sam blinked at the golem, studying it. “Nice cover. Boring. Forgettable. The magic is tight.”
“He’s had my power to refuel him. Which means he’s not unraveling anymore. At least until I take the spell apart.” He was human looking. Though in reality he wasn’t correct as golems were genderless. The persona Forest had chosen appeared male. But since there was something in there other than magic and sticks, Seiran felt wrong calling him an it. Like somehow it would erase the lives lost to create the being.
The department media group had taken snapshots of Forest using the image of each of the three who had been murdered to create the golem. The shifting of its glamour to each of them insanely accurate, believable, and disheartening. Well, all but the third who appeared blurry and undefined. For the first two they had names, and addresses, even rambling about things each of them had liked in life. The third was male, dark hair, but it was all they could get out of him before the golem turned combative, which made Seiran shut down the questioning likely before they should have. How much of those souls were trapped inside? He didn’t want to think about that. The more he stewed on it, the more he wanted to unravel it.
Did it know who created it? Yes. Could it tell them? No. More magic. Spelled not to divulge things. More spells woven in unfamiliar ways. In fact, even trying to unravel the golem to free the souls bound to it, was a maddening mess of attempting to complete a puzzle in a language they didn’t know. Sei had the entirety of the Department of Magic researching. He could force the earth to take it back, but it might not unbind the souls. Not everyone was convinced they were souls. Seiran had seen enough to make him think it was more than simple energy. He didn’t want to chance leaving them locked in some sort of stasis for the rest of eternity.
Seiran couldn’t leave the thing locked up within the Dominion walls, hoping the golem didn’t get out or let someone else in. The tie to his creator had to be severed too, or else they might break through any lesser witch’s hold. Which meant Sei had to bring it home with him.
His wards were strong enough to keep anyone out, and the binding he’d wrapped around the golem should keep the golem from being called out by anyone else. It was as safe as he could make it. As long as he kept the golem near him. Which meant he probably wasn’t going to get much sleep tonight.
Sam frowned. “This is really bad timing.”
Was a golem ever good timing?
“I need you to come with me to see Max,” Sam said.
Seiran glanced down. “Pa-Ja-Mas.”
“Whatever. Max won’t care. You just have to come with me now.”
Leaving the house was the last thing Sei wanted to do. If he couldn’t play in the garden before bed, at least he’d like to snuggle up with his kids for some dumb movie or even hold them while they fell asleep. Wow, he was feeling old tonight. Sure, still healing, but that couldn’t be all of it?
“Can’t we do this another night?”
“No,” Sam folded his arms across his chest.
“I am not a vampire lackey.”
“Actually, you are,” Sam said.
“Gabe is gone.” It still hurt saying his name. Memories of those last few months too hard for words most days. Sei wanted to remember his boss at the bar instead of the lover he wasn’t sure had ever been real. And a decade and a half was a long time to be alone.
“That’s the problem, Ronnie. He’s back.”
Chapter 5
The car ride gave Sei a long time to stew. There had been a bit of an instant uprising in the house with his kids, his brother, and Kelly protesting, which had riled up the bond on the golem.
Negative emotions and death magic didn’t seem to mix. Good to know. However, it also meant Forest sat next to him in the backseat, Sei in the middle, Sam on the other side of him. The car was driven by one of Maxwell Hart’s many hired drivers. Seiran kept his hold and attention firmly on the golem. He would have to spend more time researching it. Was there a way to stop negative emotions from feeding it, or was that simply how golems worked? Perhaps it was another spell he had never encountered. The stack of new magic he was discovering today was bordering on uncomfortable.
His power should have been enough to hold it, no matter what. Didn’t earth surpass death? Staring at Sam’s reflection in the glass, Sei thought, maybe not.
Sei hadn’t changed clothes, instead choosing to shove on a pair of garden Crocs and follow Sam out the door. Since the house was far outside of the city, and Hart haunted downtown, it was a long drive.
“You’re too quiet, Ronnie,” Sam said staring out the window.
But Seiran wasn’t sure what he felt. Numb, mostly? Confused? The storm of emotion he’d received from his family had been intense. For himself, he couldn’t really concentrate on a specific feeling. He had dreams from time to time. A stirring of memories, sometimes good, sometimes bad. In truth, he’d given up hope years a
go, not only of Gabe’s return, but of any semblance of not being alone forever.
Which was a little unfair, because his kids, his brother, and his friends, were his life. And he was never alone, from family to work, to the earth that fueled his power. He didn’t date. Not that he felt he couldn’t, more that it simply felt strange. The few times he’d tried it had ended in disaster, so he had stopped trying at all. Men flirted with him, he’d had a dozen offers from powerful witch families for an official marriage and more kids. As if he needed that kind of work and a loveless tie to people he didn’t like—not the kids, the witch families. In truth, he chose loneliness a lot of days, finding it more soothing than memories of things lost.
“I don’t know what to feel,” Sei admitted quietly. “How is he?” Did he even care? Yes. And wasn’t that terrible? Those last days, the betrayal, and then that final memory of Gabe giving himself back to the earth, letting go so as to not hurt Sei. Conflict of emotions, okay that was a bit of a battle Sei hadn’t expected. Too much all at once to figure out when he was tired and drained from a long day.
“He’s different. Doesn’t even look all the same. Max says it will take time for him to be like he was,” Sam said. “Memories scattered, a lifetime of puzzle pieces, I guess.”
A millennia of puzzle pieces then, Sei thought, since Gabe had been one of the oldest vampires still alive. “He doesn’t remember me?” What a startling thought that was. Gabe having been such a huge part of Sei’s life, only to have been such a small one for the vampire, that he’d been forgotten.
“Yes, no? Maybe? He said vampires don’t touch witches. Seemed to be remembering his sire…” Sam paused, then added, “and Max.”
“Max or Titus?” Sei asked. Maxwell Hart had been Gabe’s first love. In retrospect, Sei had learned that when Gabe had gone to ground, but never confronted the vampire about it.
“Titus,” Sam said.
The knot in Sei’s gut tightened.
“You know Max isn’t interested. He’s got that shifter fetish down tight. Doesn’t even mind the smell. Their blood has the taste of dog. I don’t know how it doesn’t bother him. The smell alone makes me gag most days.” Sam rambled, something he rarely did, but Sei tried to pay attention to his voice instead of the chaos of rising emotion. “Ronnie?”
“What?”
“You don’t have to be what you were before,” Sam said.
“I’m his Focus.”
“Which doesn’t have to be sex or romance, or more than just a partnership. A partnership with boundaries and rules.”
Sei sucked in a deep breath. He knew that a Focus didn’t have to mean romance, or even friendship. Vampires in the old days used to find the most powerful warriors and bind them just to gain power themselves. He’d spent the last decade and a half reading everything he could find on vampires and their lore. Some of it provided by Max, most of it buried deep in the bowels of the Dominion libraries. Witches were not encouraged to bind with vampires. But Gabe had been his first real love. Not his first relationship, or even first sexual partner, not by far, but real love. To think about being tied to him, and that emotion forever lost? Not possible. No matter how much it hurt.
And wasn’t that a terrible realization, that despite everything, the betrayal, the years alone, the self-doubt that any of it had been real, Sei still loved him. He didn’t even know if Gabe would ever be that person again. And still his heart stuttered at the memory of Gabe’s smile, or the way he held him.
He had cried a long time after Gabe had gone to ground. Never in front of his family. They didn’t need to see his weakness. Jamie had been uncharitable enough, wanting to destroy everything that had been Gabe’s. Sei didn’t have the tears anymore. Or at least was unwilling to release them.
“Ronnie?” Sam asked quietly.
“Fuck you,” Sei growled.
“You wish.”
“Not without serious brain reprogramming.” Sei sat very still, staring out the front of the car like it was fascinating. He knew the answer before he asked, but had to ask anyway, “Is there a way to break the Focus bond?”
“Other than true death? No,” Sam said. “And could you maybe wait until one of your kids is old enough to step in as Pillar before you jump off something high?”
Sei sighed heavily. “I wouldn’t do that.” Not that it would kill him anyway. His tie to the earth meant he lived until it was done with him. Since he was still nestled firmly in the strength of the Mother’s power, he doubted that would be any time soon.
He couldn’t imagine putting that burden on one of his kids. Or the grief of his death. He’d been thankful they were all too young to remember Gabe, and so they hadn’t had to think of him as dead, as Sei had. They simply didn’t know him at all, or as anything other than rare mentions in old stories. Better that way, it had to be, because it was all Sei could give them of the man who had abandoned him.
“Maybe you should have brought the fairy?” Sam said after another long stretch of silence.
“Kaine is having some issues. I think Bryar is dealing with that.”
“Not sure Bryar has the most objective ideas when it comes to child rearing.”
He didn’t. But Kaine was more fae than human, and Sei could only help with so much. It was a variance of magic as well as a lack of the physical mortality that Sei’s other kids had. Kaine created magic with thought, spells and wards were unnecessary. He lived and breathed magic, was created from magic itself. Sei understood the difference. He straddled those worlds himself. His ability as the Pillar of Earth meaning he didn’t need a lot more than intent. But that wasn’t how the rest of the world worked.
Witches used spells. The fact that Sei and Kaine didn’t, made them the quirky ones. Even Kelly who was the Pillar of Water, used spells, incantations, and wards. He had some unstructured magic, but the bulk of his abilities were directed by the symbolism they’d grown up learning.
“Bryar is very black and white,” Sei said. Much like fae in general, no matter the power level or branding, they were all a bit cold and very literal. He loved Kaine, but sometimes relating to him, or making him understand, felt like shoving the Taj Mahal through the eye of a needle. Impossible.
“I’m working on Kaine. He is trying. That’s all I can ask.” Sei almost added that Kaine was just a kid, as he was younger than the twins, but that wasn’t true either. Fae weren’t born as babies, not in the way humans were, or even witches who had longer lives. Time across the veil was completely different, which meant for all Seiran knew, Kaine could have lived a thousand years already.
They rode in silence a bit longer.
Sam sighed. “That golem is creepy.”
“You’ve dealt with golems before,” Sei pointed out. Sam more often than Sei. They drove through downtown now. Streets dark and mostly empty. The late spring weather still dropping chilling air at night. He should have brought a coat. Or maybe dressed in more than pajamas.
“Only to set them on fire. Melt the clay, dilute it with water, breaks the spell.” Sam stared at Forest who remained mostly motionless but looking human. The golem didn’t react at all to the idea of being destroyed. Seiran was certain he could unravel the spells binding him rather than outright destroying the golem, but not until he located the one who had created it. At least that was something he could focus on.
“Does Max have books on necromancy?”
“Maybe?” Sam shrugged. “He’s got that big vault of stuff that the rest of us don’t get to see much, including a list of all the vampires in existence. But you can ask.”
“Is he more likely to say yes to me, or to Luca?” Sei asked, wondering if Luca, one of Sam’s lovers who also happened to be Max’s son, might have more access.
“We’ll ask and see, yeah?” Sam said. The car pulled into the parking garage of a luxury high rise, which didn’t surprise Sei at all. Max never stayed in one place long. He’d been in Minneapolis for a while, and had taken over St. Paul when Gabe had gone to ground. But he
traveled enough that he bounced place to place rather than nesting anywhere.
The driver had them buzzed through the security gate and drove them to a guarded elevator. “Intense security,” Sei said. It reminded him of a military base rather than a complex of condos.
“This is a vampire only building. Max uses it for meetings and visiting vampires. He pretty much only stays here now when in town. Feels a bit like a prison to me.” Sam said. The car slowed to a stop and the driver got out to open the door.
This area of town was more the CEO end of the high-rises. It was a little shocking to find a vampire specific building standing in the middle of it all. Max was a CEO of a couple dozen businesses, some bigwig in the business world. He had money, power, and the attitude to go with them. He’d taken over running a lot of Gabe’s businesses, and Sei had been grateful. Sei did not have a business degree nor did he care for all the upkeep, but he did have a growing stream of revenue from all those businesses that far outweighed what he made at the Dominion. Would Gabe be able to take over his businesses again? What about the bar? Sei still worked there some weekends to clear his head of all the bullshit red tape of the magic world.
“There’s just so much,” Seiran muttered. “Not the best time.”
“Never is, Ronnie.”
They got out and Sam led Sei to the elevator, taking them up to the penthouse. Sei’s gut clenched as they traveled higher, the tiny box making it hard to breathe. Or maybe it was the anxiety over having to see him again after all these years.
Gabe’s arm sprouted branches, leaves, and flowers, the earth eating away at it. His grip crumbled with his strength as the muscles dissolved into fine particles of earth.
The memory was vivid and intense enough that Sei staggered. Sam steadied him, but said nothing, not even to snark. He did pull a handkerchief out of his pocket and hand it over. Only then did Sei realize tears were falling again. Dammit.