by Nora Roberts
Staggered, Zoe simply stood as Rowena glided from the room. Then she looked at Pitte. "It was you. In the woods. The buck in the woods. It was you."
He touched her again, just a skim of fingertips over her cheek. "Why didn't you run, little mother?"
"I couldn't. You were hurt." Her legs trembled, so she lowered to the couch. "I was too scared, and too mad to run. And you were hurt."
"She rushed him, with a tree branch for a club," he told Brad. "And she was magnificent. You are a fortunate man."
"She's not as convinced of that as I am. Yet."
Confused, Zoe pressed her fingers to her temples. "You were in the woods, watching out for me. The buck… it had your eyes."
He smiled when Rowena came back into the room. "I might not have been there, if Rowena hadn't nagged at me."
"Would he have killed me?" "He has spilled human blood." Pitte settled into a chair. "He might have spilled yours."
"Would he—could he have killed you?"
Pitte's chin angled just enough for arrogance. "He would have tried."
"Might have been a bit more effective to come as yourself, with a shotgun," Brad pointed out.
"I can't battle him in human form while he takes the form of an animal."
"You were badly hurt," Zoe remembered. "Your side was gouged."
"And has been tended. Thank you."
"Ah, here's the tea. He grumbled when I tended him." Rowena scooted forward to lift the teapot the servant set on the table. "Which is a good sign. Were Pitte seriously wounded he would say nothing."
"I was right to go back there. I feel, most of the time, I feel I'm not doing enough. But I was right to go back there."
"The path is yours to take." Rowena offered Zoe a cup. "Your man is worried for you. I understand," she said to Bradley and poured a second cup. "I can promise you we'll do all we can to keep her safe."
"You put protection around Simon. Put protection around her."
Rowena's face mirrored sympathy as she held out the second cup. "There is no key without risk. There is no end to risk without the key. She needs your faith in her. It's as vital as a shield and a sword."
"I have all the faith in the world in Zoe. And no trust whatsoever for Kane."
"You're wise on both counts," Pitte acknowledged. "He may be licking his wounds for the moment, but he's not finished. With either of you."
"He hasn't bothered with me," Brad pointed out.
"A canny foe chooses the time and the field. The more she cares for you, the harder the blow. After all, the surest way to the soul is through the heart."
As Zoe's cup rattled in its saucer, Brad nodded to Pitte. "Let's worry about what is for now, and handle what comes as we get to it. You're the keeper of the keys," he said to Rowena. "The rules have changed, you've said so yourself. Give her the key, and end it."
"He negotiates." Obviously pleased, Pitte sat straighter. "There is a contract."
"Which stated nothing about danger to life and limb," Brad said easily. "The terms of which were voided when attacks were made on the people involved."
"They waived recompense for any injuries beyond our control."
"There wasn't full disclosure."
Rowena let out a sigh. "Must you get him started?" she said to Brad. "I'm sure both of you would enjoy a good wrangle over contracts and terms and what have you. And the fact is, I would agree there would no longer be the penalty of a year of your lives, as stated in the contract, if Zoe decides to end her quest. Pitte would agree as well, though he would enjoy arguing the terms first for form."
"And entertainment," he added.
"I can't give her the key," Rowena continued. "Once the quest was accepted, once it was begun, it was out of my hands. I can't touch the keys until they're found by the ones chosen to find them, or until the time has elapsed. Such is the nature of this."
"Then tell her where it is."
"I can't."
"Because it's not anywhere until I find it," Zoe said softly as it settled clearly into her mind. "It's not there," she said, looking over at Rowena now, "until I know."
"You have all the power in this, and have only to understand how to use it."
"Did I send myself through the mirror? Or did you?"
"I don't understand."
"The mirror in the attic at Indulgence. Kyna was in it. We looked at each other, then I stepped through, and I was there, in the garden of the painting. I was part of her."
Rowena clamped a hand over Zoe's wrist. "Tell me all. Exactly as it was."
As she did, Rowena's gaze never left her face. The fingers dug into her flesh until she could feel the blood gathering to bruise.
When she was done, Zoe felt those fingers tremble once before they dropped away. "A moment," Rowena said in a thick voice, and rose to stand facing the fire.
" A ghra ." Pitte crossed to her, lowered his cheek to the top of her head. "Is it bad?" Shaken, Zoe reached out, searching for Brad's hand.
"I feared the worst for my world. That Kane would defy all law and go unchecked. That he would spill the blood of mortals and not be punished. Oh." Rowena turned, pressed her face to Pitte's chest. "My heart was dark and full of fear."
"A battle rages, there can be no doubt. And I am trapped here." Frustration scraped through Pitte's words.
"Here is where you're needed." Rowena stepped back from them. Her cheeks were damp with tears. "This battle must be won as well."
She moved to Zoe again. "There is new hope."
Opening her purse, Zoe pulled out a tissue, offered it. "I don't understand."
"I didn't see this, nor did Kane. Didn't anticipate it, nor did he. If she was able to show you, to let you touch what she is, he was able to reach her."
"Who?"
"The king. It is not only Kane who can use war to his own ends. If we can win on this ground, the king will win on his. You've been given a gift, Zoe. For a few moments you were a goddess, the daughter of a king." Her face glowed. "You weren't only shown what they are, what they lost, you touched it. Kane can never break that bond."
"She tried to fight, but she couldn't. She drew her sword," Zoe said, and could feel—even now—the way it had all but flown out of its sheath. "But he struck her down before she could use it."
"The battle's not done." Gently now, Rowena touched her hand. "In your world or in mine."
"She knew him. She understood—when it happened, she understood, and she looked him in the face."
"She touched you, lived in you for those same few moments, knew, I think, what you knew. That was your gift to her."
"I'm not going to leave her there. I hope she knows that."
* * *
Brad hung back as they started to leave, and turned to Pitte while Rowena walked Zoe to the door. "If he hurts her I'll come for you, whatever form you take."
"I would do the same, were our situations reversed." Brad glanced toward Zoe, kept his voice low. "Tell me what to do to make him come after me."
"He will, because you're linked. All of you are linked. Make her love you, and it will be the sooner."
Chapter Thirteen
Sleep, Zoe decided, wasn't going to be a priority for a while. The way she had things planned, it wasn't even going to make the top five. She had a son to raise and she didn't feel as if she'd been giving him the time or attention he deserved. She had a business to get organized, and that was going to eat up considerably more time.
She was having her first serious adult relationship with a man, and she hadn't had the time to figure out how she'd gotten into it, much less how to enjoy it.
She had a quest, and if she didn't cross the finish line in under two weeks, all was lost. What was trapped inside a glass box had for a miraculous moment lived inside her. She was prepared to sweat blood to save it.
So sleep would just have to wait until she could work it into her schedule.
She spent a day at Indulgence interviewing her prospective employees, working out potential hour
s and a pay scale. She spent the evening with Simon, helping him design a birdhouse for a school project, giving his hair a trim, and just enjoying his company.
Most of the night was split between paperwork and household chores she'd let slide for too long.
She crunched numbers, she juggled them. She stretched them, and she compressed them, but the results were the same. The start-up costs had devoured her capital at a staggering rate. A great deal of that had to do with her own determination to start up with style, she admitted. But she'd be damned if she would allow anything to dull this dream.
So, she would be running close to the bone, she acknowledged as she studied the spreadsheet she'd created on the computer. She had run close to it before. If they managed to have their opening the day after Thanksgiving, and if they actually had paying customers, they would quickly start to offset the outlay. In dribbles, but a dribble could become a trickle and a trickle a flood.
Those weeks before Christmas were the prime cut in retail, and just what Indulgence needed to get it off the ground.
If there was one thing she knew how to do, it was how to stretch a dollar. She'd make it. She would need to eke out another two years on her car without any major repair bills, please God.
She could nip at corners a little here, a little there, without it affecting Simon. Six months, maybe a year, and Indulgence was going to make such a big difference in their lives. It would give them the stability she so desperately wanted for her son. And it would give her the pride and respect she so desperately wanted for herself.
It was where she'd been heading since she'd walked out of that trailer at sixteen. A major intersection among the many in her life. One more direction. Considering, she sat back. What about the others?
If Indulgence was one of her crossroads, so was the house she lived in, the house she'd saved for and was paying for every month with her hard-earned money. It seemed to Zoe that if both a trip back to her roots and an exploration of the attic at Indulgence could churn up power and forces, then scrubbing her own kitchen floor might do the same thing.
She tidied her papers, shut off the laptop, and got out her scrub bucket.
She'd picked this house first because she could afford it. Barely. And she'd known, just as she'd known when she stepped into the house that had become Indulgence, that this was her place. The home she would make for Simon.
It hadn't been much to look at then, she recalled as she soaped the floor on her hands and knees. Dirt-brown paint and a weedy yard hadn't added up to much of a presentation. Inside, the carpets were worn and the plumbing questionable, the kitchen linoleum a disgrace and the walls pocked with nail holes.
But the size had been perfect and the price right.
She'd scraped, she'd painted, she'd dug, she'd planted. She'd scavenged from yard sales and flea markets, and even the town dump.
She hadn't slept much back then, either, she recalled as she sat back on her heels. But it had been worth every hour. She'd learned a lot about herself and what she could do.
Smiling, she ran a finger over the shining square of vinyl. She'd laid that floor with her own hands. She'd watched for sales and had hunted up the clean white pattern at HomeMakers.
She'd bought the exterior and interior paint at HomeMakers, too, she realized. And some of the plumbing supplies, as well as the light fixture in the upstairs bath.
In fact, there wasn't a room in the house that didn't owe something to HomeMakers. That had to mean something.
It had to mean Bradley.
He was everywhere she looked, Zoe mused. And even when she wasn't thinking of him, he was in there, circling around in her mind. Being involved with him was thrilling, and just a little frightening. But being in love with him… that was just impossible.
More, it was dangerous for him. She hadn't missed what Pitte had said. The more she cared about Bradley, the more he could be hurt. She didn't question that he was part of the quest, that he would be a part of her life somehow. But she wouldn't let her own fantasies about what could be, if only things were just a little different, put him in Kane's path.
It was enough to have a man like him care about her, and care so much for her son. She wouldn't be greedy and ask for more.
With the floor done, she glanced at the clock on the stove. It was nearly three-thirty in the morning. She had a spotless kitchen, a balanced checkbook, a menu design, and a price list. But if she'd taken another step toward the key, she didn't know it.
She decided to get a little sleep and start fresh in the morning.
Bradley sat by the red glow of the campfire and drank lukewarm beer. The temperature didn't matter. When you were sixteen it was all about the beer. His father would skin him if he found out—and he nearly always found out. But nothing could spoil the freedom of a hot summer night.
He didn't intend to sleep. He was going to smoke another cigarette, drink the rest of his beer, and just be.
It had been Jordan's idea to camp up here in the hills, close to the shadows of Warrior's Peak. The spooky old place had always pulled at his friend, so he was forever making up stories about it and the people who might have lived or died there.
And Brad had to admit that the house was fascinating to look at. Interesting to think about. When you did, you had to wonder who the hell would build such a big-ass monster on a mountaintop in Pennsylvania. It was kind of creepy, but cool.
Still, he would leave the Peak to Jordan. He much preferred the rambling wooden house by the river. Even when he thought about moving to New York after college, or traveling around, he couldn't really imagine living anywhere but the River House.
Not for keeps.
But college, New York, and for keeps were all a lifetime away. A million summers away. Right now, he liked being exactly where he was, a little buzzed on beer by a campfire in the woods.
Being so high in the hills only added to the adventure of driving up there with Jordan and Flynn, climbing over the high stone wall like a gang breaking into prison instead of out.
He had to work on Monday. Good old B. C. didn't tolerate malingerers. Vanes pulled their weight, even during summer vacation, and that was okay. But he had the whole weekend to hang out with his friends. To tromp around in the woods, in the wild grass, to know there was no one to tell them not to.
He understood all about responsibility—to family, to the business, to the Vane name. One of these days he would make his own mark—like his grandfather, like his father had. But sometimes a guy just had to get away from all that and have a beer, a couple of burnt hot dogs, and a night around a campfire with good friends.
He didn't know where the hell they'd gone off to, but he was too lazy to find out. He sipped the beer, ignoring the little voice in his head that said he didn't actually like the sharp, yeasty taste all that much. He smoked a cigarette and watched the fireflies put on their nightly light show.
The hoot of an owl was just creepy enough to give him a thrill, and the steady hum of insects added a nice backdrop to his thoughts about how soon he might talk Patsy Hourback into the backseat of his car. So far she was being very strict about limiting their activities to tonsil-diving kisses and the occasional tantalizing handful of breast—on top of her shirt.
He really wanted to get that shirt off Patsy Hourback.
The trouble was, she wanted him to say he loved her first, and that was just way too intense. He liked her, a lot, and he had a serious case of lust going for her, but love? Jesus.
That was scary, long-time-in-the-future stuff. He didn't love Patsy, and didn't see his feelings going in that direction. When he took that fall it would be… later—that was for sure. It would be a hell of a lot later, and with someone he couldn't quite see yet. Someone he didn't even want to see yet.
He had a lot of things to do first, a lot of places to go.
But meanwhile, his just-in-case condom was burning a hole in his wallet, and he really wanted a shot at Patsy Hourback.
He finished the beer
and contemplated having the second of his share of the six-pack. But it wasn't much fun drinking it by himself.
The rustle in the brush made him grin. "That must've been the longest piss in history, especially when you've got that little dick to work with."
He waited for the rude comment or insult, then frowned when the woods settled into silence again. "Come on, guys, I heard you out there. You don't come back, I'm going to drink the rest of the beer myself."
The answer was another rustle, from the opposite direction. He felt a chill creep up his spine, but defended his manhood by reaching for the second beer. "Yeah, that's going to scare me. Jesus, it must be Jason in his hockey mask! Help, help. You two are so lame."
He snorted, popped the top on the beer, and took a long swallow for form. The growl came out of the dark, and was wet and hungry.
"Cut it out, Hawke, you asshole." But the order squeezed out, thin and jumpy, from a throat that had snapped shut. His hand inched along the ground in search of one of the sharpened sticks they'd used to roast the dogs.
The scream ripped through the silence, horrible and packed with fear and pain. Brad shot to his feet, the stick clutched in his hand like a sword. He whirled in a circle, fear gnawing at his belly as he searched the shadows.
For a long, long moment, there was no sound but his own raging heart.
When the scream came again, it was his name.
Fireflies flashed in mad flicks of light as Brad sprinted toward the sound. It had been Flynn's voice, a desperate high-wire sound of terror, of agony, that couldn't have been faked. There was another call, equally urgent. This one from Jordan, from behind him, and it seemed to shatter the night.
Torn, panicked, he spun back. A thrashing sounded in the dark, rushed toward him with a force that couldn't have been human. Suddenly the night was full of sound. The wind roared through the trees, limbs crashed to the forest floor around him. And cries came from every direction at once. As he ran, the summer heat turned to bitter, biting cold and a mist spilled over the ground, rising like a river until it was nearly to his knees.