Scales: Book 1 of the Fate and Fire Series

by Amity Green

  “We are.” He watched the road and we proceeded in silence, both lost in our tormented worlds.

  “Explain the ward thing again? I’m trying to understand this stuff.”

  “It’s Apotropaic magic. Wards are magical spells that are placed around an object, or even an entire place as protection from certain people or things. A ward can be a very powerful tool, and is not a toy. You’ve been extremely lucky so far.” He glanced over at me. “Or something.” He shook his head.

  “Don’t ask me,” I said, holding up my hands. “I don’t get it either.” At least I made it through the wards, without being hurt too badly. Peter acted as if it could’ve ended much worse.

  “So, if the book is warded, and the wards don’t work as well on me, it’s possibly I’ve seen the book Kai wants and not even know it.”

  “Exactly. I can’t see it through the wards and Ezra will not be willing to assist.”

  “Am I the only one freaking out because we’re going to search for this frickin’ thing in a bookstore?” It would be like looking for a needle in a stack of needles.

  Peter didn’t bother with an answer, so apparently I wasn’t alone there.

  “What is Ezra? I mean is he human?”

  Peter sent me an ironic look.

  “Don’t act like you don’t know what I mean. He acts all … bijiggity. The guy doesn’t even have pupils.”

  “Ezra just is.”

  I waited. He had nothing to add, apparently.

  “Well okay, then,” The whole situation was amazing. I laughed a little. “I have no freaking idea what the heck I’m doing.”

  “You, Tessa, are a mystery to us all.” He searched my face, tracing a finger along my jaw. After a moment, I turned to the window, reminded of Kai touching me like that.

  Whoa, Nellie. I needed a good therapist.

  We arrived at the junction in Kelty. The day was young, so the sidewalks were still deserted, save for shop owners preparing for the day, setting out displays and signs. I noticed one of those squatty, red post boxes on the roadside.

  “Stop here, okay?” I pulled a postcard out of my bag. Kai had given specific instructions that it must be posted that day. The card was hand-written from Brea to her parents back home in Austin.

  I hopped out of the car and dropped the card in the slot on the post box, determined to live up to my end of the deal for Brea. I had to have faith that Kai would keep up his side of our bargain, as well. Her safety was my biggest concern, not so much that Kai might break my fingers again, or some bigger part of my anatomy. I’d made it a point to omit the part about broken fingers when I told Peter about my deal with Kai. Apparently, the two of them had already talked by then because Peter knew he was to drive me to the bookstore to get the book. I seriously doubted Kai would tell Peter that he tortured me. Or that he kissed me while he did it. I’d developed a deep, fear-based respect for Kai. He could do things that frightened me on a new level. Out of so many supernatural elements and beings from my new life in the UK, Kai was the hardest of them all to understand. The way he was able control people was just plain eerie, but the fact that he liked doing things to me, could caress me after he hurt me, made him a whole new kind of monster.

  The way he’d looked at me in his study stirred something deep in my memory, like I’d seen him look at me that way many times before. It wasn’t the first time he’d hinted that way. I scoffed, mentally. There was no way. I’d known Kai for a short time during the early summer. Being told we’d known each other for a long time was obviously beginning to wear on my mind. If a person was told the sky was green long enough, they’d eventually step outside and check.

  The way I used to spend so much time with Kai sickened me inside. To my credit, he’d been hiding his true nature and acting like a normal, incredibly hot, fun-loving guy. He’d exuded a charm so profound I’d been drawn in, a magnet to steel.

  “What are you going to do about the fact that Petra’s with Kai?”

  “Petra and I hardly know each other. She says she’s done with him,” he snapped.

  “She’s still your sister. Doesn’t it worry you?” My tone was soft, words carefully chosen.

  “Pick a new topic.”

  “Well, excuse me for being concerned.”

  Peter said nothing, again only warming up when it suited him. He’d changed so much from the time when we worked together at the bookstore. It must have been hard to act friendly and affectionate when he was really all business.

  I took his advice and moved on. “I’m worried about what it might be like after Kai gets the book back.” If Kai was being held back because it was missing, that meant the guy I’d been dealing with was Tame Kai compared to what he would be when he had it back again.

  “Ezra has had that book for the better part of two centuries. Kai hasn’t created another gargoyle for at least that long. That grotto, castle and all belonged to a clan that was like family to Ezra for centuries. The place has an ancient, charmed history.” Peter looked for my reaction, waiting for my curiosity to be piqued. He’d nailed it. I was glued to his every word. I blinked expectantly, waiting for him to continue.

  “The standing stones go back to their ancestry, an ancient place of ritual and worship.”

  “Could you imagine having that kind of timeless faith? I mean the kind that made you believe with your soul, to the point of ritual.” I shook my head. “Religion today just doesn’t have that devotion, if you ask me. I mean they’ve got ritual in going to church and studying the bible, but so many only go through the motions. Like it’s only a way of life when someone’s looking.” And as for growing up with a group of nuns watching over me, I didn’t buy in to blind faith.

  “The ancients lived their lives according to lore and the power of the natural world. And to answer your question, Kai would traipse around taking whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it. The world as we know it exists merely because Ezra’s held the bastard at bay by stashing away that book. Kai has done away with some of Ezra’s clansmen for it.”

  “So we’re talking what, a few hundred years ago there was a war between some Scots?”

  “Hardly the case. More the nature of about eleven hundred years. And Kai isn’t a Scot.”

  “He talks like one.”

  “Kai isn’t human, like us.”

  I couldn’t help it, I started to laugh. “Human?” That was a stretch.

  Peter wasn’t impressed with my humor. He remained silent, looking out over the wheel with a slight frown.

  “Human, that’s us,” I said when I’d calmed enough for coherent speech.

  “What you need to know is Kai is an Ancient. Been wandering the planet for eons.”

  “And then he lost the big book of mojo.” I added.

  “Exactly. It deflated his abilities monumentally. Even the wickedest of powerful men fall victim to misplaced trust. One of his own stole away with his book.” He looked over with a tight, satisfied smile. “He’s able to work small charms, manipulate things a bit and maintain things he’d created before the book was taken, but he is weak in comparison to before. If he gets that book back, we may as well bid farewell to the rest of the world as it stands. Kiss our asses goodbye.”

  “He’s older than you?” I regretted the words the second they hung in the air between us. I’d risked Peter announcing another demand I change the subject, but it was increasing hard to wrap my head around the way no one around me seemed to age. Ever. And it chafed thinking about Kai getting what he wanted, especially since I knew he’d been using me because I was close to Ezra.

  “Easy,” he teased, “you’re not going to age now either. And yes, he’s much older.”

  Kai skulking around the earth for ages spooked me. I didn’t believe in ghosts, vampires, werewolves, witches, anything like that growing up. There was no monster in my closet ready to eat me when I turned out the light, nothing lurking under my bed, ready to swipe at my ankles. Kai had likely seen countless souls come and go in his l
ife, making them common, just another consciousness taking in a full life’s experience and then fizzing out. Whether he valued life, or didn’t for that matter, made him a complete loose cannon.

  “There was a time when Kai was feared as a god,” Peter continued.

  “Demon, more likely.” I was getting pretty uneasy about the task I’d been set to do. If I gave Kai the book, he would change the world, and not for the better. He wasn’t the kind of guy who would use his powers to find a cure for cancer or discover the secret for world peace.

  “It’s so weird Ezra has that book.” I had no idea how the old weirdo had managed to keep it away from Kai for so long, wards aside.

  “Don’t underestimate Ezra. He may seem feeble, and even unstable, but he is a quick study. He got the recipe for his wards from that very book, and that really digs a hole in Kai. Ezra changed Petra right before he changed me.”

  “Wow.”

  “She didn’t know I was next. Had no idea I was there, too. Next time I saw her she was tossing hunks of elephant sculpture through the windows at Librorum Taberna. I’ve always thought Kai hung out close to Ezra in hopes Ezra would let his wards down. So that’s how Kai found Petra. Ezra kept me hidden and safe until I was much older.”

  That explained why Ezra was completely stunned when he saw Petra collapsed in the bookstore. And Kai thought I was the key to recovering what he’d lost. “And then I came along, just in time for Kai to think up a good way to get his book back.”

  “His plan wouldn’t work with just anyone.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Remember the night I took you out to teach you how to fly?”

  “Yeah, of course. What about it?”

  “Ezra warded the entire bookstore to keep you inside.”

  “So ….” I’d been able to fly off the roof that night the same as Peter. From my recent experience, when I had trouble with a ward of some kind, it either slimed me to the point of making me vomit or blasted me in the face so hard it knocked me out.

  “I didn’t know at the time.” Peter looked over at me expectantly.

  “And?” I snapped. I wasn’t putting it all together.

  “And you can make it through Kai’s wards, too, which in essence are the same ward spells that Ezra uses from that book, just juiced up. Neither of them understands it. The difference between the two of them is remarkable though, in the way they’ve decided to deal with you.”

  “So the wards work on you?”

  “Absolutely. I’m unable to locate Kai’s book at the shop because the wards do their job and deter me whenever I get close to it.”

  “Holy hell,” I breathed. “Kai told me he knew why I am the way I am when we first met. I wonder if it has anything to do with the wards not working.”

  “What do you mean, ‘the way you are’?” he asked, perturbed.

  “I’ve struggled with fevers since I was little. No one could ever figure out why, but my body heats up to crazy temperatures. I just learned this, but one time when I was like, two, I got so hot that the fever put me in a coma for almost a year. Kai says I heat up because I have an old soul that’s trying to get even. Like, it’s angry.”

  “You confuse him. Pretty big blow to his ego having you tromp right through his ward in the hallway.” Peter smiled, like he remembered hearing a funny story.

  “Tromped? I hardly tromped. I had to run as fast as I could, from clear across the room straight at that doorway to make it through that slime, then I threw up. That’s hardly tromping.”

  “You’re unique, Tessa. And as for the rest,” he looked at me, shaking his head in wonder. “There’s something inside your soul that needs to get out. Your soul’s in your heart, right where it belongs. Kai hasn’t had the honor of knowing you the way I do.” He watched the road.

  Peter seemed to find the perfect words when it was so important to me to hear how he felt. I didn’t know why, especially after the way he’d become so moody, but his opinion of me was important.

  “Kai should feel fortunate he can still work small bits of magic at all,” he said, moments later.

  “He can do enough to scare me.” I sat on my hands, remembering the feel of bone splintering inside my fingers.

  “Do you know what Ezra said when we talked about you breaking through the wards?” Peter glanced at me quickly before putting his eyes back in front of us.

  “What’s that?” Ezra was an odd, old dude so it was hard to tell.

  “‘You see, Peter, I told you keeping her was best. She’s charmed and has no bloody idea,’” Peter said, in his best imitation of Ezra.

  I laughed. “That was pretty good.”

  “Ezra was happy you were with us. He considers you a blessing. Like a daughter.”

  I inhaled sharply and looked out the window. Like a daughter. I disagreed.

  “Quite the similarities between them though. They both have a use for me. And they’ve both taken things from me, too.” I continued to watch outside as rolling green met forest and returned to more hills, grass, and wild flowers.

  “Ezra, the ‘nut-job’ may have saved you, bringing you into a new life at the bookstore.”

  We rode in comfortable silence for miles. I’d overlooked Ezra’s deed in the face of his absurd, sometimes grumpy, quirkiness. But the biggest epiphany was, I would break the bargain with Kai.

  “There’s no way I’m giving Kai that book.”

  “I never thought for a moment you would.”

  Chapter 26

  Peter guided us to a purring stop behind the bookstore six hours later. I’d left finger prints over virtually every part of the interior during the remainder of the trip. The cockpit of the car fascinated me, all bells, whistles and soft leather. It passed time much better than dwelling on the elephant in there with us. The Plan Fairy needed to make an appearance because I had nothing at that point.

  Peter’s key still worked on the back door.

  “I guess this means he’s not too mad about us being gone.” I actually hoped Ezra wasn’t at the bookstore. Maybe he was out for one of his “business abroad” trips that took him away for nearly a full week at a time.

  No such luck.

  Ezra manned the post behind the register, wearing dark glasses and fawning over a music mag with a teen-aged couple. When he saw Peter and I approach from the back of the store, he escalated the speed of the purchase.

  “Off you go,” he said as he handed the bagged magazine over the counter.

  “Thanks Mr. Finfrock,” the female of the pair said.

  Ezra followed the two to the front door, flipped the sign, and turned on us.

  “Charmed you could join.” He pushed the dark glasses to the top of his head and glared at Peter, and me too this time, all white eyes and attitude.

  “You got the windows all fixed up,” I hoped changing to a positive note might help diffuse the situation.

  “How was The Grotto?” He said the name of Kai’s domain as if he spoke about someone’s armpit. Ezra wasn’t smiling but he wasn’t all tight-lipped like he got when he was mad at me.

  “Interesting,” my small, guilty voice answered.

  Ezra amazed me once more by knowing what we’d been doing and where we’d been. He searched us with darting, colorless eyes, then sighed. “I’ll get some tea warming and you can tell me about it.” He guided us to the drink station behind the store’s front-end with an unmasked air of importance.

  “I’m going to run upstairs to my room. I’ll be back down in a sec.” I didn’t wait for a response.

  Kai had given me an extremely detailed description of the book. I had about a day and a half to get the thing found in the vast bookstore and get my behind back to Scotland. There were parts of Librorum Taberna I hadn’t explored yet.

  The tome I searched for was close to three inches thick and about two feet square, and covered in bruised, brown leather. Its pages were made of vellum. Kai hadn’t specified, but I’d wager it weighed close to twenty pounds, gi
ve or take. I, of course, was not permitted to open it.

  There were latches around the book that were cast from electrum, a natural occurring alloy of gold and silver, commonly used to create royal jewelry by Iron Age Celts. Kai said it was silver in color. I imagine that’s what that torc he wore around his throat was made of.

  Dealing with Kai’s “Pinky and the Brain” syndrome was going to be tricky. I had a huge problem and I didn’t know how things were going to play out with him trying taking over the world, but the long car ride had done me well. I’d had hours to think.

  First thing I did when I entered my room was change into clean jeans and a fresh shirt. I dumped my backpack out on my bed and rolled fresh clothes to pack, this time taking every clean pair of underwear I had in my drawer. I smashed my bag flat, put my worn Garged Out cami and skirt back in along with some more socks. Changing to a gargoyle and being naked at the same time really shouldn’t have been a big deal, but it still felt better wearing something.

  I ran down the stairs to meet up with Peter. We needed to get started looking.

  The two men sat at the tea bar, both their faces marked with concern.

  I ignored their worried vibe, dropped my bag and filled a mug of Earl Grey. Keeping upbeat was the only way I would stay motivated.

  “So, looks like we all know what’s going on.” I looked pointedly at Peter. We should have talked about whether we were going to tell Ezra or not. I wasn’t sure it was the best move, but the cat was out of the bag, growling and hissing, from the looks of Ezra.

  “There is no way I could help you look with the wards in place around that book, Tessa, and this building is far too large for you to search in one day, yes?”

  He had a point, but I thought keeping Ezra, who was digging through a box of pastries, oblivious was best. “Nice job,” I mouthed at him.

  “You can’t simply hand that book over to Kai. There’s a reason I’ve kept it hidden so well, dear girl.” Ezra spoke with an even tone, around a mouthful of some kind of bread. He sipped his tea calmly, which worried me. He should throw a fit, make crappy comments, scream and yell.