“There is little reference in the ancient teachings to what you describe, and never about twins, which perhaps means we are on a new path. This has no precedent, and that in itself gives me hope. She may have blocked you, but she has either refuted her gift or it has waned without your presence. I hope for the latter because it makes her less of a prize for the Caprine and mayhap easier for you to reason with her, to get close to her and beg her pardon. If she has refuted her magyk and you are unable to resurrect it, then you may never find her again. And I don’t know if the opportunity for connection will still be there.”
Xander immediately shook his head and was mirrored by his twin. “We will always be connected, magyk or not. We are destined. And we will find her.”
“Then I would suggest you take great care. Your witch might not be inclined to be lenient if her magyk has only waned and you do resurrect her gift. There appears to be an adage in both of our worlds. It has to do with a woman scorned, and perdition having no fury. I find it an interesting concept from my perception of magyk and how it might apply in such a situation. There is also the very real risk you will alert Terach to her presence when you reenter her realm because he has something I cannot ascertain.” Arion shrugged in apparent ambivalence.
Xander heard Arion’s first warning, but it was his last one that took his attention. He and Sulie would deal with their little witch, but they needed to find her before Terach did. There was no doubt in his mind what the goathead would do to Jolene, with her. Sulie looked at him and concurred, his eyes troubled and dark.
“We will leave first thing in the morning,” he announced. “We should read what you have found, Arion, and if you give us additional entry points, it will facilitate our transport between realms.”
“I will create them and text you the location of the new points. The literature has already been taken to your home and all the other necessary documentation readied. Your apartment is still available, as is your car. The vehicle is near the primary entry point. I will come if you call. Good hunting, my friends.”
Chapter Sixteen
Jolene stood tall. She put a hand in the small of her back and stretched over it. She pulled off her hat and wiped the sweat from her forehead with the back of her other hand and grimaced at the gesture. She had just smeared dirt and little bits of garden foliage on her face, although it really didn’t matter. It was just her and Uncle Marshall out here. She went back to weeding the carrots after settling the straw hat on her head. She had her hair pulled back, and it protected her neck, but the sting of the sun on her shoulders around the straps of her halter had her deciding to reapply sunscreen in short order. Uncle Marshall was placidly hilling potatoes at the other end of the plot, and aside from bird sounds and the wind whispering through the leaves of his windbreak, it was peaceful and calm.
So why wasn’t she contented? This was what she wanted, what she sought out. The shuttle dropped her at the highway junction because of a tight schedule, and Jolene trudged the distance to the cabin, feeling civilization fade behind her with every step. Her rolling case kicked up as much dust as her footsteps, and her laptop weighed a ton on her shoulder before she strapped it to the luggage and pulled it along, too. Little salty tears crept down her face and evaporated before they hit the ground, and Jolene remembered wishing she had brought a bottle of water.
Uncle Marshall hadn’t even seemed surprised to see her. He gave her a hug and took her things to the little spare bedroom and then set an extra place at the table. Jolene had opened her mouth once or twice to tell him something, but those luminous gray eyes of his, so much like her own, looked back at her and forestalled the need. Uncle Marshall rarely talked, unless it was to himself, and Jolene noticed how much older he appeared, and a little more confused.
Their days settled into a predictable routine. They rose early, with the sun, and breakfasted at the little wooden table set outside the front door, usually something simple like fruit and eggs. Uncle Marshall didn’t eat flesh either. Jolene learned to drink her coffee and tea black and pretended she didn’t miss the cream, although she made a mental note to pick up more honey on the next grocery run. Even given the paucity of her funds, she didn’t have anything to spend her money on aside from small grocery items and toiletries, and Uncle Marshall, too, had more than enough money for his needs.
The dishes were stacked in the sink to be done at the end of the evening meal, and Jolene noted there were exactly enough plates, cups, bowls, and utensils for four people to last the day. Her uncle lived frugally out of choice. They listened to the little battery-operated radio for the weather report, and that was all. Uncle Marshall cared only what impacted upon his little place in the world, and she was content to follow his lead. Aside from a phone call to her parents to let them know where she was staying, Jolene had no contact with the outside world either, nor with the other realm she never allowed herself to think about. She asked her mom and dad to keep her whereabouts private, even from Becky, saying only that she would call back periodically for messages. And her parents, bless them, intuited her need and accepted her request with few questions other than to elicit her promise that she wasn’t ill or hurt in some way. And physically, she wasn’t. There was nothing they could do for her emotionally. They made her promise to come and visit when she felt she could and then left her and Uncle Marshall alone. Her computer had no Internet access and didn’t have an adapter for the little windmill generated electricity that served to keep the small fridge working, so she couldn’t even read her mystery books when the battery drained, yet she didn’t miss them either.
After they ate breakfast, they turned their attention to the vegetable patch. Weeding was something that took place every day, and while it was hot and sometimes tedious, the fresh vegetables made it all worthwhile. The fruit trees and bushes took far less work, as did the few flowerbeds. Uncle Marshall rigged an ingenious irrigation system, and aside from the manual opening and closing of spigots, it pretty much ran itself.
Lunch happened whenever the morning chores were done, and the afternoon was filled either with cleaning, basic maintenance, or walks around the property to see what nature was doing. Jolene liked those walks the best, and not just because they weren’t technically chores. Small trout flitted in the stream that crisscrossed the property and provided them with their water for irrigation. She liked seeing the various bird species build their nests in preparation for raising their families, finding their territorial behavior entertaining. She found where the endangered spotted owl made its home, the female watching her with apparent indifference from a great height. Porcupines sometimes waddled across the trails, secure in their protective quills, and Jolene occasionally caught sight of a coyote slipping away amongst the underbrush. But it was the deer she felt most connected to, their dappled red and brown hides above their long graceful legs making her wish she, too, could run so effortlessly. If she stood still and was patient, sometimes the does would pause and stare at her with their large liquid eyes and their ears would twitch independently of one another like semaphores, although Jolene couldn’t decipher the messages.
Aside from two injured doves recovering in a large flight cage, Uncle Marshall’s barn stood empty of animals this time around. The last time Jolene visited he was caring for two orphaned fawns, but they had flourished and grown up and been released back into the forests. Jolene suspected they were the ones who allowed her to get close on her walks, but she didn’t want them believing humans could be trusted so she didn’t make any overtures.
She used any spare time to read her uncle’s vast and tattered collection of books, anything from organic farming to the decline of democracy, although it was the books on Gaelic, Roman, and Greek mythology that really kept her interest. Her middle name was Etain, and she remembered Uncle Marshall telling her years ago he had asked her mom to christen her with it, but her parents preferred Jolene. They tried to make Uncle Marshall happy by giving it to her as a second name. It seemed E
tain was an ancient name, one that a princess and rider of horses had proudly borne. Jolene wondered at the forces that conspired to place her with Xander and Sulieman and then pushed the thoughts away. Something had foiled those forces. Perhaps they hadn’t compensated for the differences in the present-day realms. It didn’t matter because Xander made his choice and Sulie would have had to back him in the end. So Jolene made hers, and if her body longed for them, and her soul was bereft and her heart broken, well, life still went on. She hadn’t been able to eat at first, hadn’t wanted to, and she wondered if there was any truth to people dying from a broken heart, but then her appetite came back.
Her body cried for her to dance, even if just for the exercise, but Jolene’s heart wasn’t in it, and she worked harder instead. After a time, she made what should have been a startling discovery but wasn’t, because she had known magyk. She and Uncle Marshall didn’t need to talk out loud to communicate with one another. It should have been like living in a monastery, but it most assuredly was not. There was no vow of silence here. She and her relative worked side by side or at opposite ends of the property, walked together or separately, broke bread together, sat together, and thought to one another.
Jolene would think about a drink of water when he went to the barrel on the porch, and he would bring her one, accepting her silent thanks with a smile. Uncle Marshall came to her when she found the spotted owl’s nest, in response to her excited utterances in her head. The night her thoughts turned to Xander and Sulieman, despite her best efforts to keep it all locked down, elicited a gently placed hand over her own, comforting her and taking away some of the pain, as she and her uncle sat on the porch and watched night fall.
Jolene knew when Uncle Marshall needed something from her, or wanted her to do something. He called her for a meal or signaled it was time to take a break, again without words or gestures. To an outsider, it would probably look as though the two of them were mute and it might be unnerving. For Jolene it was special. There were no particular expectations of her, and certainly no judgments. It allowed her heart to scab over, but she wasn’t content, and Uncle Marshall knew it, although she didn’t think he was able to infiltrate her dreams. Still, he suggested nothing, offered no advice, just let her be to sort it out herself. Jolene knew that in time she would need to move on and make something out of her life, because regardless of how she loved her uncle and this place, it wasn’t enough. She just didn’t know what it was she should do. There were times when she wanted to reach inside for her magyk but was too fearful. Part of her worried it was gone, gone with her horse men. Another part was afraid it was there and would resurrect into something dark and wrong, in response to her battered self. In the end, Jolene continued to do nothing. Her heart ached beneath its protective casing, and she understood she was adrift, her destiny denied.
* * * *
“I find myself restless tonight, niece.”
Jolene straightened in her chair so abruptly she nearly tipped out of it onto the porch floorboards. She stared at Uncle Marshall in disbelief. After weeks and weeks of nonverbal communication, his words tore the silence shrouding them like velvet. She took a breath and cleared her throat, certain any utterance would sound rusty and untried.
“Why?” Her voice was tentative, frightened even, to her ears.
“I don’t know, my dear. It seems something has disturbed the balance of our life here. But I’m an old man and prone to musings, and I doubt there is anything to it or anything to be done. I’ll take myself off to bed.”
Jolene watched her uncle push up from his chair and walk slowly into the cabin. Something deep inside of her pulsed familiarly, and she pressed both hands against her belly to calm it. She, too, felt something all day, and despite her adamant refusal to acknowledge it, it worried her. Uncle Marshall had just given voice to it. She denied her power and thought with time it had simply subsided because she didn’t have to work as hard at keeping it acquiescent. Then she made herself believe it departed or changed into something she wouldn’t want. But now it was awake, and she could only wonder why, and wonder if it was back in a different form. She looked into the night but saw nothing to alarm her and heard nothing. She speculated Uncle Marshall’s comments merely spooked her and she was being fanciful. All the same, she would lock up the cabin tonight and keep a stick of firewood handy by her bed.
Chapter Seventeen
“I really don’t mind this realm, Xander. I’m not enamored with the cities, but the forests are much like ours.”
“Only if the humans are absent,” Xander replied darkly to his twin. “They impugn the majesty of the forests with their garbage and general disrespect for nature.”
Sulieman sighed. “Get over yourself, Brother. If we are successful, our witch will want to return to visit her home, and we will not allow her to come alone.”
Xander hadn’t thought of that. He was getting ahead of himself. While he was typically a good strategist and saw the big picture, he found he had leapt ahead to the part in his dream where Jolene accepted them, accepted her destiny, and returned to their realm to become Ipotane and never looked back. He huffed deep in his chest. He was lucky he had a twin, an alter ego as it were, because he’d lost perspective when it came to their witch. He so longed for her, he wasn’t thinking clearly.
They found their car as promised and immediately got on the road to Sacramento. They thought to start back at Jolene’s apartment and see if there was mail to be forwarded or if she communicated with any of the other tenants. Failing that, they planned to connect with Becky, who might be convinced to share her friend’s whereabouts, although if Arion hadn’t been successful, Xander wasn’t optimistic they would have better luck. Still, there was the possibility Jolene had since been in touch with Becky. Arion indicated no one had seen her at the dance studio, but Xander would follow up with every lead once more. This was his job, and he was very good at it. He had located the Caprines, after all, and it would be a bonus if he found Terach again. The goathead had better not be anywhere near Jolene if he valued his worthless hide.
Arion had positioned a small team near Jolene’s parents’ home. One of them had even taken a room in the bed and breakfast, but there was no sign of her. Careful, casual conversations about the pictures of their children determined only that they were living all across the country. Phillips was a common name, and even Arion hadn’t been able to track all of Jolene’s siblings down in the limited time he had. His magyk didn’t work very well as a search tool unless he was casting for other magyk or one of their kind. Jolene had yet to become Ipotane, Xander reminded himself, despite the fact he awakened her magyk and Sulie fueled it. They felt reasonably certain she wasn’t with her brothers but had yet to locate her sister who’d presumably taken her mate’s last name.
As soon as they crossed the barrier and transformed, Xander fancied he could sense Jolene. Sulieman immediately assured him it was no flight of fancy, that he, too, felt their little witch, although neither had a sense of the direction to take or any idea of the distance from her. It worried them both they might be painting a road map to her whereabouts if she was responding to their presence as Arion had suggested might happen, especially if Terach possessed some power they didn’t know about. Xander cursed under his breath. Whatever their connection, it wasn’t yet strong enough to lead them to her. It was indeed going to be case of good old-fashioned detective work, probably against the clock.
“She tasted so sweet and felt so good under me, Brother.” Xander’s cock immediately filled and pressed painfully against the zipper in his jeans. He hated human clothing.
“I know, Sulie, and she will again. Under us, over us, between us.” Xander didn’t question the certainty in his voice because it echoed his thoughts. Their little witch was coming back with them, and they would be mated. Oh, it was going to be a difficult time, but he didn’t believe Jolene would harm them. Hurt them a little perhaps, but not really harm them. And once they were mated, her
magyk could never be used against them in any negative way. He hoped. She would never be able to deny them or it again. He hoped. He fought against remembering he had denied her, because there was going to be some serious groveling in his future, and he had to keep his mind on this phase of the operation.
The rest of the drive passed in silence. Both he and Sulie were thinking similar carnal thoughts about their little witch with her strong, curvy, little body, and once they had her again, she would know boundless pleasure. Xander and Sulieman were both accomplished and experienced lovers, but what they felt for Jolene transcended their past experiences. The emotional component, their desire for commitment, made the physical aspect far better and to be treated with great reverence. Although Xander didn’t think Jolene would break, she might just break them.
After reaching his apartment and opening some windows against the stale, unoccupied odor, they quickly unpacked and put together a simple meal from the groceries they picked up along the way. Sulie left the eating area, and Xander found him in the bedroom holding the torn shirt Jolene left after their first sexual foray. His twin lifted the fabric to his face and breathed deeply. He turned to Xander, his eyes bright with the sheen of memory.
“I scent her, Xander. She was in this room with you, and I envy you that first joining.”
“I wonder if things might have gone differently had it been you our witch first met,” Xander replied ruefully.
Sulieman shook his head. “You were destined, Brother. You are the first born. But I will have the softer side of our female. There is enough of her wonder for both of us.”
Xander watched as Sulie carefully folded the torn shirt and tucked it into his own, right over his heart. His heart ached in response, and they stared into one another’s eyes before leaving without another unnecessary word. It was time to follow every lead until they found the one to take them to Jolene. They drove to her old apartment and began to knock on doors, hoping the early hour would find all the tenants still at home.
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