Marked Descendant

by L. D. Goffigan

  Thankfully, the drive was quick, and they soon arrived at a small craftsman-style house on the edge of town in a rundown neighborhood.

  “There’s someone inside,” Elias said, sighing. “It must be the current owner. I’ll take care of it.”

  They watched as Elias went to the front door. He spoke to the petite woman who answered; she immediately moved past him, heading down the street.

  Grinning, Elias turned to face them, gesturing for them to come inside.

  “What did you tell her?” Elisabetta asked, as they approached.

  “Something convincing,” Elias said, with a mischievous wink.

  Naomi moved past him to enter the cluttered living room, looking around. Where would a young Genevieve have spent most of her time?

  Instinctively, she moved to the bedroom in the back of the house. She didn’t know how she knew, but she sensed that this room had once belonged to her.

  The bedroom was simply furnished; a twin bed, a desk, a large bookshelf. She stepped inside, looking around, and stiffened when Alaric appeared behind her at the doorway. It took every part of her to remain stoic as she said, “I need to be alone to perform the spell.”

  Alaric hesitated, but he obliged.

  Naomi moved to one of the walls and sat down, leaning back against it. Conjuring her scant memories of Genevieve in her mind, she whispered the words of the Memory spell.

  For several moments, there was no reaction to her spell. Naomi’s shoulders slumped, but she repeated the words of the spell, until she saw a young Genevieve in her mind, crouched in the corner of this same room. Bruises marred both her arms, and she was weeping. A woman stood above her, shouting.

  “Do it!”

  “I can’t anymore! I’m drained! Please!”

  Naomi could feel Genevieve’s pain, her rage, her sense of inferiority. It was the strongest connection she’d ever felt to the witch. Her heart picked up its pace, a steady drumbeat against her ribcage. She knew this was a massive risk, but she had to take a chance, now that she was so close to Genevieve, without her being aware. For the first time, Naomi had the advantage.

  She whispered the words of a Locator spell, and a space opened up in her mind. She saw a quick flash of something—Genevieve kneeling over a someone in an alley, a knife in her hands—before the image was gone again.

  Naomi closed off her mind, her eyes flying open. What she had seen was an image from the present, an image from now.

  Chapter 23

  Alaric hoped that after spending the night apart, Naomi would have calmed and allowed him to explain. But when she locked eyes on him this morning, he could still detect her smoldering anger.

  A surge of his own anger rose. What was so terrible about his need to protect her? Hadn’t he warned her when they became lovers that he would give his life for her? Hadn’t he nearly given his life for her in Greece?

  That doesn’t mean hiding things from her, he thought, with a small stab of guilt. Not being truthful to her. He recalled the pain in her eyes the night before. See me, she’d pleaded. I do see her. I know she is capable, he told himself. He just wanted to do everything in his power to keep her safe.

  Now, he hovered in the cluttered living room of Genevieve’s childhood home while Naomi performed the Memory spell in the bedroom. Elias and Elisabetta were standing guard outside.

  He looked down at the gimmel ring he wore on his left hand, reaching down to stroke it. He’d noticed that Naomi still wore hers. It gave him hope that she hadn’t given up on them completely.

  Elisabetta stepped back inside. Alaric didn’t look up, still focused on his ring.

  “Naomi’s still performing the spell,” he said absently. But Elisabetta lingered.

  “Your witch is angry with you,” she said. “It’s not because of me, is it?”

  “No,” he said, short. He didn’t want to discuss his relationship problems with Elisabetta, but she waited for him to continue. “She overheard our discussion last night.”

  He didn’t offer her any more detail than that. Elisabetta’s blue eyes widened with understanding.

  “Ah. After centuries of existence, you still don’t understand women, do you?” she asked, shaking her head. “Hiding things from us never works out well.”

  “I wasn’t—“ he began, but stopped himself. “Our relationship isn’t your business.”

  “I know,” Elisabetta said, “but If I were you, I would do whatever it takes to earn her forgiveness. Even among our kind, life is precarious.”

  Her expression shadowed, and she looked away. Before he could respond, Naomi rushed out of the bedroom.

  “New York,” she said, breathless. “Genevieve is in New York.”

  “How do we know Genevieve hasn’t fooled you again? How do you know what you saw is real?” Elias asked Naomi, tense.

  They had raced back to the cabin to tell the others what Naomi had seen. She’d recognized the alley where Genevieve had been in her vision; it was only blocks away from the archeology museum where she’d worked during her brief residence in New York.

  At Elias’s words, Alaric bristled, on the verge of defending her, but Naomi spoke up.

  “Unlike the other times, Genevieve wasn’t aware of me. I was intruding in her mind, not the other way around. The Memory spell helped me connect with her, the Locator spell just gave me a flash of her location. I didn’t linger in her mind the way I have in the past,” Naomi said, leveling Elias with a hard look.

  “And,” Casimir added, looking up from his laptop screen, “there’s an APB that just went out for a murder at the same address Naomi saw in her vision.”

  “I stand corrected,” Elias said, expelling a sigh. “But we can’t take Genevieve on alone. We had Alliance backup when we fought Raphael. And let’s not forget, Genevieve isn’t Raphael. She’s a Descendant.”

  “Who’s very in control of her power,” Madalena added. “Think of what she’s capable of . . . how many people she’s murdered to make the Destruction spell more potent. In a city like New York, with a population that great . . . “

  They all fell silent, reeling at the dark possibility. Alaric expelled a sigh. He didn’t like it, but he knew what they had to do.

  “We have no choice,” Alaric said, “we need to go to the Alliance.”

  “Have you forgotten we’re fugitives?” Elias asked, glaring at him. “We can’t just—“

  “I don’t think we have a choice,” Naomi said. His heart leapt at her agreement; it was a step in the right direction, though she avoided his gaze. “We don’t know how many other witches she’s working with. We need reinforcements.”

  “And I’d argue that most witches on the Alliance aren’t working with the Order. Isobel is the exception. I trailed quite a few of them, and she was the only suspicious one,” Elisabetta said.

  “Who do we reach out to?” Casimir asked. “Who do we know to trust?”

  “I would say . . . Zahara,” Madalena said cautiously.

  “Zahara?” Alaric bit out. “She’s tight with Isobel. And she’s been especially harsh to Naomi. What if she—“

  “Remember—I trailed Zahara, and she never did anything suspicious,” Elisabetta interrupted. “Her being curt to Naomi doesn’t make her a traitor.”

  “And it would help to have another leader on our side,” Madalena said. “She could talk to the other members on our behalf.”

  “If you’re wrong about her—“ Alaric began.

  “We have to take the risk,” Naomi said, still not looking at him. “And we need to move quickly. We don’t know how long Genevieve will be in New York.”

  Alaric reminded himself that attempting to take on Genevieve alone would be foolish. As the only Descendant on their side, Naomi would bear the brunt of fighting her. Fear skittered through him at the thought; more backup meant more safety for Naomi. There was no other choice.

  “Then . . . let me be the one to talk to Zahara,” he said. “If anyone’s going to risk their arse, let it
be me.”

  “They’re after me,” Naomi said, finally looking up at him, her golden eyes flashing with defiance. “It makes more sense if I talk to her.”

  “No,” Alaric said, firm. He didn’t care how furious she was with him; he wouldn’t allow it.

  Naomi straightened; pain and fury in her expression as she glared at him.

  “It’s not up to you, Alaric,” she returned. “I’ll talk to Zahara. Genevieve is my blood, for crying out loud, and I’m a Descendant. She’ll want to hear from me.”

  “If Zahara is the traitor, the moment she sees you—“ he bit out.

  “Enough!” Madalena barked. She stepped forward, looking back and forth between them like they were disobedient children. “We don’t have time for a lovers’ quarrel. I’ll make it easy. Both of you will go. Casimir, can you send a private message to Zahara?”

  Alaric and Naomi glared at each other in a silent face off before Naomi turned away from him. He had to concede that on practical terms, Naomi was right. She was the one Zahara would want to talk to. But he wasn’t dealing in practicalities at the moment; he was operating out of instinct, to shield his mate from harm.

  But the decision had been made; Madalena remained the de facto leader of their group, and there was no time to persuade her to change her mind. If Genevieve was in New York, on the verge of unleashing a deadly spell on innocents, he had to put his own concerns aside.

  They huddled around Casimir as he used a private network only used by senior members of the Alliance to send a coded message to Zahara. They waited, nervous, until Casimir received a response only seconds later.

  “I’m in Seattle,” Casimir read aloud. “I can meet in two hours at the entrance of the Skykomish Hiking Trail. I’ll be alone, you have my word.”

  “Her word,” Alaric echoed skeptically. “How do we know we can trust her word?”

  “We don’t,” Madalena said, with a sigh. “But it’s like what you’ve said; we don’t have much of a choice.”

  Madalena and Casimir briefed him and Naomi on what to say to Zahara when they met up with her. If they could convince her they were telling the truth, they could leave for New York right after their meeting.

  “What if she doesn’t believe us? And we’re apprehended?” he asked, silently thinking of ways to speed Naomi away if that were the case.

  “We’ll do our best to free you,” Madalena replied, but she looked uncertain.

  Everyone scattered, including Naomi, but Alaric remained by Madalena’s side. He lowered his voice.

  “If that happens, I’ll find a way to get Naomi out of there. The rest of you should get to New York and do whatever you can to kill Genevieve. I can handle the Alliance,” he said.

  “Alaric—“

  “Please,” he said urgently, holding her gaze. Madalena relented, giving him an abrupt nod.

  Alaric and Naomi drove to the meeting spot in Elisabetta’s car; the others were trailing them from a distance in a separate car, one of the few they’d found parked by the cabins. Alaric could no longer bear the tense silence that stretched between them.

  “I shouldn’t have hid things from you,” he said.

  “Now’s not the time, Alaric. We have—“

  “But I won’t apologize for wanting to protect the woman I love,” he interrupted. “Not for one second.”

  “It’s not you wanting to protect me I have the issue with,” Naomi said, turning to look at him. “It’s the trust, Alaric. You seem to not trust that I’m capable of—“

  “That’s not it, Naomi! You think risking your life is the only way to—“

  “We’re arguing in circles,” Naomi said, closing her eyes and expelling a breath. “I repeat—now is not the time. We need to focus.”

  He gripped the steering wheel; he hated them being in this state of disconnect, especially when they were on the verge of a risky meeting. But Naomi looked determined not to discuss things further, her mouth set in a firm line, her shoulders rigid; she was like a stone wall.

  When they arrived at the entrance to the hiking trails, he killed the engine and turned to face her. She started to get out, but he reached for her hand.

  “Whatever happens,” he said. “I want you to know how much I love you.”

  Raw emotion flared in her eyes, and they glistened with tears. He wanted her to say the words back, needed her assurance that there was a way back to each other. But she turned away from him, opening the door and climbing out.

  They made their way to the clearing in silence. He kept his focus trained on the path ahead, keeping his pain shuttered away, and used all of his senses to detect any foreign presence. But there was nothing, until several moments later, when he scented Zahara.

  He whirled, facing her as she approached. He scanned around her to make sure she was alone.

  “I keep my word,” Zahara said, looking affronted. “I’m alone.”

  She stopped opposite them, folding her arms across her chest. He noticed that she looked exhausted; the usually pristine witch had shadows beneath her eyes.

  “You have five minutes,” she said, her gaze flicking from him to Naomi. “And then I’ll put you both under a Binding spell and send you to the Alliance.”

  Naomi told her everything; Genevieve, her blood relation to her, the murders Genevieve had committed, the stolen grimoire with the Destruction spell, Isobel’s betrayal, and Naomi’s vision of her in New York.

  “She’s planning a Destruction spell, and she’s going to kill a lot of innocent people,” Alaric said, when Naomi finished. “We have to stop her before she does. We need whoever you trust on the Alliance—and they must be trustworthy—to come with us to New York. We’ll need as much backup as we can.”

  Zahara was still reeling from all that Naomi told her; her eyes had gone wide, her jaw slack, her lips parted. He’d never seen her look so discombobulated. She believes us, he realized with relief.

  “I flew in from London after Blaize was killed. Isobel’s story about you killing him—and Camille—it didn’t add up,” Zahara said, looking at Naomi. “I—I didn’t want to believe Isobel was the traitor. We’ve been friends a long time. What you’re telling me is what I’ve susp—“

  She stopped abruptly, and Alaric stiffened. Bloody hell. He could scent the multiple witches and vampires nearby. The Alliance. Panicked, he turned to Naomi.

  “Apparate,” he hissed.

  But it was too late. In an instant, a group of witches and vampires surrounded them. He grabbed Naomi, intending to speed away, but his limbs were frozen. A witch had cast a Binding spell on him.

  He froze as Isobel approached, her dark eyes filled with rage. Zahara turned to face her, shaken.

  “I didn’t authorize this!” she shouted. She turned to the other Alliance members who surrounded them. “Take Isobel into custody. We need to question her.”

  But no one moved. Isobel smiled, shaking her head.

  “It’s sad,” Isobel purred. “We’ve suspected you of being a traitor for some time, Zahara. Take them all into custody.”

  Chapter 24

  Panic swirled through Naomi’s veins as two witches stepped forward to grab her arms. She turned towards Alaric, but a witch had already apparated away with them. Her panic increased; Isobel would kill him as soon as she had the chance. She would kill them both the moment she had the chance. And it looked like she had the full weight of the Alliance behind her. Naomi prayed the Alliance hadn’t captured the rest of their group as well; they might be their only chance of getting out of this alive.

  Isobel stepped towards Naomi with a triumphant smile.

  “You should have stayed hidden.”

  Fury propelled Naomi forward; she lurched out of the witches’ grasps towards Isobel. She managed to grab a few strands of Isobel’s silvery blonde hair before they dragged her back.

  “It looks like your true colors are coming out, murderer,” Isobel hissed. She nodded at the two witches who held her, and a gust of wind tugged on Naom
i’s body as they apparated away.

  When she was again on solid ground, she found herself in yet another nondescript room. Naomi leaned back against the wall, shuddering, the hot sting of tears searing her eyes. Her gut twisted as she thought of Alaric and the last words he’d spoken to her. I want you to know how much I love you. In her stubbornness, she hadn’t said the words back. She looked down at the gimmel ring she still wore, taking it off and clutching it to her chest, as if it were Alaric himself. What if that was the last time she saw him? Alaric wouldn’t let himself be taken into custody so easily. Had Isobel killed him already?

  Anguish consumed her, and she buried her face in her hands. She didn’t know if Alaric was alive, and Genevieve was in New York, on the verge of unleashing the Destruction spell, while she was trapped in this room. How was she going to get out of this? Her despair settled in on her like a crushing weight.

  You have a choice, Naomi. She could give in to her sense of hopelessness, to her despair. Or she could fight back. She was a Descendant, just as powerful as Genevieve. If anyone could stop her, it was Naomi. She needed to push aside the self-doubt that had plagued her since learning she was a Descendant, and concentrate on her successes instead of her failures. Hadn’t she killed Raphael and destroyed the first Incantation Stone? Hadn’t she located Genevieve in New York?

  Naomi took a breath, opening her eyes and dashing away her tears. She remembered something she’d done before the despair had claimed her. She reached into her pocket and took out the stray hairs she’d pulled from Isobel. Her attack had been purposeful, her last ditch effort to save them all was dependent on having something that belonged to Isobel. This has to work, she prayed. It has to.

  The door soon opened, and two witches she didn’t recognize entered. The looks they gave her were full of hatred as they grabbed her. Isobel had poisoned their minds against her; they probably thought she was a power hungry murderer of fellow witches.

  They took her out of the room, leading her down a long dark corridor to what appeared to be a ceremonial room; it was a carbon copy of the Alliance’s ceremonial room in London.