Celeste arched a disbelieving eyebrow. Amusement sparked in her eyes. “You might want to let him know that.”
Flustered, Bri waved the statement aside and resumed her seat. She did want Cole to be her man. Even now her body tingled as the warmth of love encompassed her, but too much about the situation remained a mystery. Before either of them could commit to each other, answers needed to be found, not the least of which was his compulsion. Her life had unraveled, and Bri needed a subject change fast before her mind took her down another rabbit hole of doubt.
“What was the language she spoke?” She tossed the question at Celeste.
The Warrior-woman began to speak incompressible words, beautiful and ancient. They flowed from her mouth, the weight of each hanging in the air. When she fell silent, a grimace flashed across Jonah’s face, dulling his eyes. He pressed a hand to his chest, a vulnerable gesture Bri had never seen him make. He had always been the pillar of strength in her life, and seeing him weakened bothered her more than she wanted to admit.
He must have discerned her anxiety. “Don’t spend your time worrying about me, Bri.”
“It doesn’t work that way.” She laid her hand on his arm, offering a bit of comfort she sensed he’d be reluctant to accept. She turned to Celeste. “It’s a beautiful language, what is it?”
“Quytel.” Celeste’s expression transformed her youthful face into a defiant mask.
“It is an ancient and sacred language, imprinted on each of the Quytel at the time of their initiation,” Jonah stressed. “Once a Quytel is divested of their abilities, they are no longer able to speak or understand it.”
“Then how was my mother able to speak it?” Bri glanced between the two.
At Celeste’s shrug, Jonah frowned. “That’s a good question.”
Bri had to know. “What did she say?”
“I am the death and destruction you seek. I must be destroyed,” Celeste translated.
Shivering at the stark honesty of the statement, Bri had difficulty swallowing past the sudden lump in her throat.
“There’s more,” Celeste added. “She also said, ‘Find her, save her. She is the key.’ I thought she might be referring to Bri . . . but she was there, so there must be someone else Rowan is searching for.”
Jonah’s silence retained an eerie quality, and he didn’t move a muscle. Then, his expression cracked and lines of strain appeared around his eyes and mouth.
“Jonah,” Celeste prompted, a note of concern in her voice.
He finally acknowledged her, his eyes fairly shooting sparks. “I think you’re right. Rowan is telling us we must destroy her in order to stop her.”
“I don’t think . . .” Bri started, protest pounding an uncomfortable rhythm in her veins.
Jonah held up a staying hand. “That’s not all, is it, Celeste?”
The Warrior shook her head slowly and flashed Bri an apologetic look. “I’ve been having pretty much the same nightmare Bri described to us, and it started around the same time. A few weeks ago.”
“Celeste,” Bri gasped, her mind spinning from another piece of the puzzle without an anchor.
Jonah’s expression turned thunderous. “Why are you telling me this now?” Menace coated his low tones. “As your Commander, I should have known about this as soon as it happened.”
A spark of defiance glittered in Celeste’s eyes as she silently glared at him.
“Rowan is more powerful than I had anticipated, and leveraging you, she may now have access to the power of the Circle,” he snapped. “Did you think about that?”
“She doesn’t.” Celeste didn’t seem at all intimidated by the whip of power crackling in the air.
“And you are sure?” he asked with deceptive mildness.
“She was a Warrior with you for centuries. You knew her better than anyone.” Celeste’s eyes narrowed, her tone accusing as she turned the tables on him. “You would know if she escaped death and still had access to her power.”
Jonah responded with a curt nod.
“You knew?” Celeste abruptly stood and crossed the room to stare out the window, her back to them.
“Knew what?” Bri tried to follow their cryptic conversation.
“That your mother did not, in fact, die when you were a child,” Jonah stated.
Bri’s heart thudded in her chest. Glued to her chair, her reality shifted right out from under her, like watching a train crash happen in slow motion without being able to do anything to change the outcome. What else about her life didn’t she know? What else had he kept from her? As her anger coalesced into betrayal, a strange, oddly comforting numbness took over.
Jonah’s jaw ticked, a bitter twist to his words. “Your mother was one of my most trusted Warriors. Rowan had incredible power and the potential to become a Quytel Commander, which is no small thing. It is indescribably rare for a woman to be a Commander. It has only happened once before. She threw it all away when she fell in love.”
Clearly her mother had hurt him deeply by choosing a different life.
Celeste sat down again next to Bri. “Your father, Eric, was a good man. I only met him once, but your mother loved him and she seemed happy.”
“She was also careless,” Jonah pointed out. “She decided to give up her place in the Circle, her life as a Warrior. We divested her of her Quytel powers and she walked away. A few years later, you were born.”
Bri absorbed every detail, imagining her parents, young and in love, defying expectations. Her mother had given up being Quytel for a family. An iron fist gripped her at the loss of the mother and father she never had a chance to know.
“You are a true psychic, Bri, with powerful abilities like your mother, not a latent as I told you before.” Jonah’s voice remained carefully neutral, as if he were telling her it would rain on Sunday. As if he hadn’t just stolen a piece of herself. “When you came into my care, I took control of your powers and suppressed them, effectively making them latent.”
Her heart skipped and then thudded painfully in her chest, tight and hot. A not-so-subtle pounding began at her temples and behind her eyes, forcing them closed, as anger shot up through despair.
She inhaled deeply. When she opened her eyes she only had one lingering question she needed an answer to. “Why?” she bit out.
“To keep you safe.” He leaned forward, reaching for her again.
Bri stood to evade him. “From what?” She stared at him, hands on her hips.
“From Anton and your mother.”
She shook her head. He’d hidden her away from her mother. How dare he.
“I knew she wasn’t dead and feared she’d been taken by one of our enemies. She didn’t come for you, which meant she couldn’t.” He stood and gained her side before she could move. Taking her chin in his large hand, his touch gentle, he refused to let her turn away from the truth. “She would have come for you, Bri, if she could have. I waited for that, believe me.”
Chaotic anxiety pumped through her veins as she turned the information over and over in her mind. Jerking her chin out of his hand, she stepped back, needing space. “So you’re saying I was born a psychic, and you’ve been suppressing my powers to keep me safe from my own mother. Now she’s trying to kill me.”
“I’m not sure she’s trying to kill you,” he clarified.
“I don’t think so either,” Celeste chimed in from her place by the window.
Bri couldn’t look at either one of them, not now. She was the puppet on a string. Walking over to the window, she gazed out at the beauty of the forest, its darkened interior peaceful and quiet, a safe haven. Maybe if she kept on running, she could leave all of this behind and start a new life for herself.
Behind her, she heard Celeste ask, “How is Rowan so powerful? Did she not lose her abi
lities?”
“I’m not sure. Her powers are twisted now, evil, used only for destruction. There are forces out there, paranormals and psychics, rogue Quytel . . . and who knows what Anton has learned over the years.” His voice cut off abruptly.
“What is it?” Celeste urged.
Bri turned at the demand in her question and saw the change in Jonah’s youthful visage. His expression hardened, and the tension in the kitchen kicked up a notch. Her heart gave a loud thud as anxiety pooled in her stomach.
“Mack may have some information about your mother.” He looked straight at her.
“He’s okay?” Her mind spun from relief to anger and then settled on how useful telepathy might be.
“Yes.” Jonah crossed quickly to her, pulling her into a hard hug. “I love you, Bri.”
Tears flooded her eyes, but she remained stiff in his arms.
It didn’t seem to deter him from displaying affection. “I’ll be back in a couple of hours, honey,” he murmured, kissing the top of her head as he had when she was a child.
Chapter 23
Cole wandered outside, following the scent of jasmine and lavender. The forest and the hill behind the house came into view, and a warm, gentle breeze dispelled the heat of the afternoon sun. Bri stood with her back to him at the far end of the porch, well out of sight from the front door. Arms wrapped around her narrow waist, her long blond hair hung in a golden wave over her shoulders.
Cole approached slowly from behind and pulled her against him, resting his chin on the top of her head. He felt the way tension thrummed through her body. She let out a breath and snuggled closer, the gesture catching at his heart.
“My mother is evil,” she whispered. “She’s been the one tapping into my power and directing it to destroy you.”
She shuddered, and he hugged her closer.
She rubbed her hands over his forearms. “Jonah kept my psychic abilities suppressed to protect me all these years, so she couldn’t find me or use my power.”
He really disliked Bri’s father. Cole turned her around to face him. “Come again?”
“Apparently, I’m a natural psychic. Jonah was somehow able to suppress my abilities until now.” She rested her cheek on his chest. “He told me it was to protect me from my mother.”
Cole shook his head, tamping down anger. It wouldn’t do Bri any good to have him tell her how much her father pissed him off. “I’m trying to understand his reasoning. Honestly, it’s hard to respect his decisions about you.”
She laid her hand on his collarbone, the gesture bringing them closer. “Celeste has had the same nightmares. She thinks my mother is trying to use our power, to combine it somehow with her own. Even she hasn’t been able to do anything until today. Must have something to do with us being together.” She pulled his arms more tightly around her like a protective shield. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take. I’m losing my mind.”
He rubbed his chin across the silky smoothness of her hair. “You’re strong, Bri.” He tipped her head up and brushed his lips over hers. More than anything, he wanted to protect her, chase away her demons, and help her find stability again—in him. “I’ll be right beside you.”
“Are you sure?” she whispered against his mouth. “There could be more, worse than this.” She glanced up, her gaze clinging to his as if searching for hesitation or doubt.
He kissed her again, long and slow. Her lips were petal-soft under his, her taste intoxicating to his spirit. Love soared within him, wending its heat into every dark corner of his soul.
Easing away, he held her face between his hands. “I have never been more sure of anything in my life. I love you, Bri.”
Her eyes softened into warm pools of deep green, the color of the earth that was so much a part of him. Lust flared between them, hot and intense. The scent of her desire rushed his senses, and their bodies moved in a sensual rhythm together.
“Cole. I . . .”
He placed a finger on her lips to stop her protest. He could see in her eyes how she felt. They were a perfect fit. He needed to get her upstairs to a bed, soon. Before he could suggest a change in venue, the front door banged shut behind them. Celeste. He knew her by scent.
“What is it, Celeste?” he demanded, his back to her.
“Sorry to interrupt, but I need to talk with Bri for a minute,” she announced in a tight-clipped voice.
Bri took a deep breath, and a different kind of shudder wracked her body. She stepped away, giving them both a small measure of relief from their combined urgency. Hands linked, they faced the female Warrior.
“There are a few more things we need to discuss. Take a walk with me.” The last came out as more of a command than a request, but Celeste seemed uncharacteristically uncomfortable, so Cole gave her a pass.
“Sure.” Bri squeezed Cole’s hand with a barely audible sigh of reluctance. She raised on tiptoes and kissed his mouth, chin, and neck, each caress light and fleeting. When she met his eyes, he saw love and longing reflected there.
“I’ll be back in a few,” she whispered. “Wait for me?”
“Always,” he vowed with a smile. Unable to resist her mouth, he took one last kiss, deep and not nearly long enough. He moved away and urged, “You’d better go while you can.”
“Right,” she responded finally, letting go of his hand.
Celeste had stepped off the porch and waited with a stern expression.
Joining the Warrior at the bottom of the stairs, Bri glanced over her shoulder at him and smiled.
He watched the two women meander slowly from the house, loving the way Bri moved, a gentle sway to her slender hips, her long hair accentuating her curves. She appeared much more fragile than she was. The woman had an iron will. She’d need that and more to cope with everything her father had kept from her.
And the upcoming battle with her mother.
Bri stole a glance at Celeste under her lashes. The Warrior set a slow pace as they wandered toward the tree line. The tall grass licked at their calves as they walked.
When Celeste finally stopped and turned to Bri, her blue eyes were much darker than usual, a storm on the high sea. Yet she didn’t say anything for a long moment, and Bri found herself waiting, the gentle breeze teasing her skin. It wasn’t a hardship; this was one of her favorite times of day, when the afternoon sunlight made the world alive in a vibrant burst of color. The leaves of the nearby trees flickered, brilliant green jewels against an azure sky.
“When I was a girl of maybe fourteen or fifteen,” Celeste began, “my mother introduced me to Jonah. This was over three hundred years ago. As I told you, I had to keep my psychic abilities well hidden from everyone, no small feat in such an insular community. Jonah arrived and gave me a way out. He offered to guide me through the initiation process of becoming Quytel.”
A small smile curved her lips. “I couldn’t tell my mother because it scared her. I loved my powers and all I could do with them. I would go off on my own and practice, strengthen them, even as a child. When Jonah told me about the Quytel, I knew it was the right choice for me.”
Bri tried to imagine Jonah as a young Commander, approaching an ostracized child, taking her under his wing. Somehow she knew nothing could ever be so simple with her father.
Celeste started walking again and Bri kept pace, listening.
“Part of becoming Quytel meant leaving my family, my life, behind. Only my mother really mattered to me. My father had died by then, and I didn’t have a lot of friends in the village. I left with Jonah for several months, a year maybe. I don’t remember now how long it took. The training was hard, but I loved it.”
Celeste studied her feet as they approached the edge of the forest, before continuing. “Not many psychics make it through the initiation. They either flame out because o
f the intensity, or die trying. But it came easily for me. I was initiated and welcomed into the Circle.” Pride laced her voice, as she described her distant past. She met Bri’s gaze and held. “That’s when I met Rowan for the first time.”
Bri shivered, a subtle chill settling in her bones. She glanced over her shoulder at the house. They were further away now, but still within view. Cole, watching them from the porch, made her feel safe.
“I visited my mother one last time after that, but when I got home I found her quite sick. There was virtually no medical care, nothing like there is now, of course.” a grimace of pain cross Celeste’s face. “I knew she was dying so I stayed with her. The day before she died she told me she wasn’t my biological mother.”
Her voice softened. She glanced back at the house and then straight at Bri. “It was devastating. I couldn’t think straight. I thought maybe the fever had confused her, but she was lucid. She told me Jonah had brought me to her as a baby, only a few days old. She couldn’t have her own children, so she was thrilled to raise me. Jonah had sworn her to secrecy and paid her well to hide the truth from me. He told her to keep me safe and he would return for me when I was older.”
Bri’s hand crept up to press against the pounding of her heart. It seemed Jonah took many people’s lives into his own hands in the name of safety. “Celeste, I’m sorry.”
Her lips curved into a sad smile. “It was a long time ago. She told me she’d loved me as if I were her own, and I know she spoke the truth. It broke her heart when I left. And it broke mine when she died.”
Celeste stared into the dark interior of the forest. “I had been tied to Jonah at that point, linked to him through the Quytel Circle. I was young but suddenly found I couldn’t trust him. About fifty years later, I overheard Jonah and Rowan having an argument. They’d been fighting about her daughter, how Jonah had made Rowan give her up. Rowan demanded to know where she was. She wanted to see her again before she died a natural human death. Jonah refused to tell her anything.” Celeste paused and took a deep breath.
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