Frozen Vengeance

by Evi Asher

  He reached the door and pulled back the latch, then stepped inside.

  Colt waited for Geli to come in before he shut and latched the door.

  He watched as she looked around and tried to see the place the way she would be seeing it.

  It was open plan—one room except for the two bedrooms in the back. The furniture was all dark, well-oiled wood. The wooden bench, pulled near the fireplace, had a quilt thrown over it, and it looked comfortable.

  The whole place would seem bleak and masculine except for the softer feminine touches that his mother had left.

  The cabin had belonged to his parents, and Colt had chosen to come and live in it when they died. That way, he always had them around him even though they were gone.

  The real warmth in the house came from the potbelly heater that doubled as a stove. It was cold, so he left Angelica standing in the middle of the room and went to light a fire. The kitchen was part of the room on the left, with worn wooden counters that were scrubbed and polished to a sheen.

  Geli had her arms wrapped around her and he could see the tremor of cold as it passed through her body.

  “The place will warm up soon.”

  “I-I-I, um…” she stammered. “I need to use the bathroom.”

  Colt straightened from his work at the potbellied stove with a grin.

  “Follow me.” He turned and opened the front door again, leading her outside and around the house and stopped in front of the outhouse. Angelica noticed that it was a rickety looking little shack with the obligatory moon-shaped cutout in the door.

  “You are trying to tease me?”

  “No.” He was almost laughing now. Her expression was one of utter astonishment and disgust.

  “That…” She pointed a finger at the outhouse. “Is your bathroom?”

  “Yep.” The grin was still tugging at his mouth.

  She breathed in and her shoulders hitched with a sigh. “Okay, then. Can I have some privacy please?”

  He lost his grin. “No.”

  “You are not running away, Geli. Go do what you need to do. I will be right here.”

  “Damn it, Colt, at least walk a little bit away.”

  He considered it for a moment, then shrugged. “Okay, I’ll be right there.” He pointed at the back wall of the house.

  She waited for him to go lean against the cabin before she looked over at the outhouse with an expression of disgust.

  He heard her mutter, “Might as well get this over with.” The she pulled open the door and went in, pulling it closed behind her.

  “I have to get back to Sarah’s house so I might as well show you your accommodations,” he told her once they were back in the house.

  “I’ve seen them. There isn’t that much here.”

  “Oh, no, Geli. You won’t be taking over my cabin.”

  She didn’t say anything else, but he could see the question in her expression. He strode across the room to the second bedroom and opened the door. The inside of the room was bare of any furnishings. Colt had been meaning to turn it into an office, but just never gotten around to it.

  He left the door open so she could see into the room, then went into his bedroom.

  Colt dug in the closet for the extra blankets and debated with himself about the bearskin. The little angel on his left shoulder won because he picked up the bearskin and carried it out to the second room with the rest of the blankets and bedding.

  As he walked out of the room, he looked over at Geli who was trying to hide her expression, but he could see she wasn’t happy at all.

  He walked the couple of steps it took to get into the spare room and dumped the bedding on the floor. “I’m sure you can figure out how to make a bed.”

  “A bed? You call a heap of bedding on the floor a bed?”

  He snarled at her, and stepped forward to tower over her. “I didn’t have much more in your cell.”

  “At least you had a bed,” she hissed, tilting her head back to glare at him.

  “Yeah, but here, you won’t be drugged every breath you take or chained to a bed, so I’d say that’s a fair trade off.” His tone was low and menacing, his whole body vibrating with the urge to…

  To what exactly, Colt? Because if you put on your big boy pants, you’ll admit you want to kiss her right now, and you want it like you’ve never wanted anything before.

  Colt made a sound of frustration and turned away from Geli. “Make your bed. I will build a fire for you in the room’s fireplace.”

  He had to find some physical activity to distract him because, damn him if his inner voice wasn’t right, he wanted to kiss the phoenix.

  He wanted to grab her and yank her into his arms. He wanted to feel all that body heat of hers melded against his body. He wanted to lower his head and claim her lips, to see what they tasted like, or if they were as soft as they looked. He wanted that and more. The problem was that what he wanted, didn’t gel with his plans for her.

  He picked up the logs from next to the potbelly stove and walked into the room. Geli followed him in and watched him work.

  “I told you to make a bed on the floor, Geli.”

  “My name,” she said through gritted teeth, “is Angelica.”

  She obviously was not done pushing his buttons, but Colt did his best to keep his cool. A log crumbled under his grip, but he didn’t get up and pin her to a wall.

  “Make your bed, Geli.” He got the fire lit, then walked out the room, pulling the door closed behind him, and locking it. Then, he leaned his back against the wood and let his head fall back against the door.

  Why was it so difficult to get revenge on her? Why did he feel like a jerk for making her sleep on the floor?

  He pushed himself away from the door. It didn’t matter. He was going to take his vengeance in one way or another, because what she’d done to him deserved nothing less.

  Colt slammed the front door as he left, and it made him feel a bit better, something he could take his frustration out on at least.

  * * * *

  Angelica wanted to kick something. “Ha!” She spun to glare at the room as if it was at fault for all her troubles. She spotted the heap of bedding and attacked, kicking it all over the room.

  Once she realized how stupid she was being, she sunk down to the floor and started to cry. Scalding liquid coursed down her cheeks and she slashed the back of her hand over her face to dry it.

  He was such a jerk, such a mean spirited ass, but just when she thought he was beyond redemption, he would do something sweet and kind and she’d be thrown off kilter again.

  She didn’t know what to do about her situation. She couldn’t leave. She’d die in the cold.

  She couldn’t stay either, though. Colt had plans for vengeance and she had an idea she wasn’t going to like his idea of retaliation

  Duh, who would like vengeance aimed at them?

  “Shut up,” she hiccupped at her inner voice.

  “I haven’t said anything, Miss Angelica.”

  Angelica bolted to her feet, looking around the room to see who had spoken. Then, she saw him. He stood in front of the fire. She could see flames consuming the wood through his form.

  “Michael, what are you doing here? Don’t you haunt the house in the ghost town?”

  He smiled at her, and she had a feeling he was going to be handing her a lie.

  “I do, but I can go where I want, and I wanted to follow you, Miss Angelica.”

  The Miss Angelica thing was going to get annoying in a hurry.

  “Call me Geli—I mean—Angelica.”

  “Very well, Angelica.”

  He had a smooth southern sounding accent that she hadn’t noticed before and she had to admit, she liked the cadence of it.

  “Why follow me?”

  He shrugged and turned toward the flame. It was eerie because it made the flames she could see through him brighter. She suppressed a shiver of fear.

  “Are you the ghost of one of the people that died i
n the mine collapse?” Angelica thought he had to be, but she wanted confirmation.

  He nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”

  But something in his body language was off. He was hiding something.

  “Why are you really here, Michael?”

  “Why do you let him treat you in such a manner, Geli?”

  She suspected he’d used Colt’s shortening of her name on purpose.

  “That is none of your business.” She turned her back on him and started picking up bedding. She needed something to do with her hands so she didn’t get too introspective with the question he asked.

  “In my day, a gentleman would never treat a lady like that,” Michael said from his place at the fire.

  Angelica didn’t respond.

  “Especially not a lady as fine and lovely, and dare I say, as beautiful as you are, Angelica.”

  She nearly snorted at the absurdity of the situation. Firstly, she’d never considered herself beautiful. She didn’t have the dark, doe eyed beauty that Athera had, or the golden blazing beauty that Kel had, or even the sweet sunny beauty that Dani had. Angelica was plain. He dark hair was too dull, in her opinion, to be lovely. Her blue eyes—well, blue—nothing special there, she wasn’t the beautiful one.

  The second absurdity in the conversation was that she thought the ghost might be flirting with her, and she wanted to laugh, but what would be the point of that.

  Angelica turned back toward the ghost. “To quote my friend Scarlet, pull the other

  one.” She paused, then said, “Let’s cut the bull, shall we?” She was quoting Scarlet

  again, her favorite source of colloquialisms. “You want something from me, or you

  wouldn’t have followed me here, so get it over with and tell me what you want.”

  “You wound me with your words, Miss Angelica.” He lifted his transparent hand, laying it over the general vicinity of his heart.

  “I saw the way the man was treating you, so I came to aid, to be your protection in any way I could. That is all I wanted.”

  Angelica felt like a jerk. Here was this guy—ghost, trying to do something nice and she’d become so hardened that she was seeing the worst in him, not the best.

  “I’m sorry, Michael. I didn’t mean to insult you.”

  “All is forgiven, Miss Angelica, but can I ask you to tell me what you are doing with this man?”

  Angelica took in a deep breath, sank down onto the bearskin blanket, and told Michael the whole story.

  Chapter Eleven

  Hell is not a hot place with fire, brimstones, and roasting pits for the wicked. Hell is a frozen, windswept, icicle right at the top of America, called Alaska.

  Athera pulled her coat tighter around her and burrowed her chin deeper into the collar. She hated the cold and this place was horrible. The icy wind made her wallow in misery. That, and the fact that she had known where Angelica was before they looked at the map with the orb.

  Athera remembered Heath—the precognitive Outsider—grabbing her arm, his eyes going crazy with swirling colors as he had said, “The ice-bear is going to take her. He is going to take her, and he is going to punish her for what she’s stolen from him.”

  The moment the orb had touched Alaska, Athera had remembered. Some ice-bear had Angelica, the Therin that she was supposed to breed with, and he wanted to hurt her. Time was not something they had a lot of, so Athera would do anything, suffer any cold, to get her friend back, and get her before the ice-bear could harm her.

  They stood on a frozen runway near a tiny village in the north of Alaska. They’d just arrived in a small plane, and her stomach was still rolling from the hairy landing.

  “We need to get somewhere warm. Winter has come early this year,” their pilot told them. “Follow me, people.” He walked toward a building further away from the runway, his small wiry form seeming to float through the snow.

  Athera grimaced at each step as she followed him through the clingy mush. The things she did for her friends, seriously, she needed to have some psychiatric treatment.

  The pilot—James Marsh—opened the door to the building, or at least he tried. A gust of wind took it out of his hands and slammed it back against the door frame.

  Laz reached forward and helped James up. “Wind is strong.”

  “No shit. We nearly didn’t make that landing,” James said as got up and led them into the small building. He went to the stove and started building a fire.

  Archer walked past Athera toward James and picked up a piece of wood to pass it to the pilot. “That’s why we hired you. We were told you are the only pilot with the balls to fly in this kind of wind.”

  He laughed. “Damn right, but it’s gonna get me killed soon enough.”

  Athera was the last into the room. She pulled the door shut against the wind and shivered from the cold blast of air.

  Looking around the area, she sighed. Scarlet stood as close to Archer’s warmth as she could get. Laz lounged in one of the kitchen chairs that the small cabin sported and James had just gotten the fire lit.

  It was only Archer, Scarlet, Athera, and Laz on this mission. Archer had tried to make Scar stay, but she had thrown a temper tantrum of note, and gotten her way in the end.

  “I need help unloading your gear before I bug out. You call me on the radio when you are ready for me to fetch you.” James straightened, the fire now lit and warming the room up.

  “I’ll help,” Archer offered and led the way back to the door.

  “I’ll see you all in about two weeks.” James shook his head. “I still don’t know why you’d think of this as some kinda vacation. I think you’re all nuts.”

  “To each their own,” Laz drawled as he stood and followed the other men out. “I’ll help, too.”

  Athera glanced over at Scarlet. “I hate the cold.”

  The other phoenix nodded, and Athera noted that her lips had a slight blue tinge to them. “Get closer to the fire,” Athera advised as she moved up to the warmth. Holding out her fingers to the fire, she felt frozen.

  “Phoenixes don’t belong in this kind of cold. It saps our energy,” Scarlet said through chattering teeth.

  “I’m praying to any deity that will listen that Angelica is okay because we’ve been here a day and I feel like I’m never going to be warm again.”

  When the door blew open, Athera stuck her hands as close to the flames as she could. She watched the other Eternals carrying the gear in. “Where is James,” Athera asked when she didn’t see the pilot. Then, her keen hearing picked up the sound of the airplane’s engine. “Question answered,” she muttered.

  Laz dug through one of the bags. “We need to get the map out. Where did you stash it, Archer?”

  Archer had wrapped his arms around Scarlet lending her some of his body warmth. “It’s in the green bag, in the front flap.”

  Laz dropped the bag he was holding and reached for the green backpack. He unzipped the front flap of the bag and pulled out the map. “You ready, Ath?”

  Athera unzipped the top part of her parka and pulled out the thong holding the orb, shivering as her cold fingers grazed her skin. She pulled out the orb and went to stand next to Laz as he unfolded the map on a small table.

  Athera extended her hand with the cord of the orb wrapped around her fingers. Laz put his hand over hers, and she enjoyed the warmth of his fingers on hers.

  She tilted her head to look up at him. “How do you stay warm in this cold?”

  “I’m a Necromancer. We are all about death and cold, so I don’t feel the drop in temperature like you do,” he answered. “Now, concentrate on Angelica.”

  “I don’t see why the damn talisman couldn’t give us a direct location. I’m getting sick of this hopscotch around the state.” Archer rested his chin on Scarlet’s head, and wrapped his arms tighter around her. It was obvious he didn’t like to see his She suffer in the cold.

  The orb went nuts, spinning in wide arcs.

  Laz didn’t look up from
the map. “Quiet, Archer, we are trying to get a reading and it

  doesn’t help you insult whatever power is running this thing.”

  When Archer didn’t answer, the scry-orb swung in a lazy arc then dropped to a

  small mark on the map.

  Athera leaned down to stare at the mark. “Lincoln. It’s a small village.”

  “Yeah, we are going to get a lot colder because we are going over open country to get there,” Laz pointed out.

  “I spoke to James. There are snowmobiles in the shed way down the runway as well as some extra fuel to take with us,” Archer said.

  “At least we don’t have to walk.” Athera was grateful for that. The idea of walking to the village wanted her to get back on the plane and go home.

  “I’m hoping Angelica is there, because I’m sick of this iciness,” Scarlet said from her spot in Archer’s arms.

  “I have a feeling we have reached the last part of our search. Angelica will be in this village, then we can get her and go home,” Archer said.

  “Good, let’s get some food in us and rest up for a bit.” Laz folded the map and put it back in the front pouch of the green backpack.

  “It’s still morning, so why don’t we leave now?” Athera asked. She was eager to get Angelica back and she didn’t want to postpone any more. There had been too much time wasted already.

  “It’s too far away. The days here are short” Laz looked up. “I don’t want to be out there in the cold, Ath.”

  “I agree,” Archer said. “We’ll get some rest and leave the next morning.”

  Athera gritted her teeth. She wanted to snap at them all, but she was out voted, and Scarlet was too close to hypothermia to be out at night.

  “Okay, then.” She stomped off to the supplies bag and started pulling out food to make for them.

  They had made a list of cooking turns for once they were away from civilization, and she’d gotten the bad luck of being first. Athera sincerely hoped they liked burned food because she had zero cooking skills.

  * * * *

  The village hall was the largest structure, set in the center of the outspread village. It had always reminded Colt a bit of a Viking long house. A square room with a fire pit in the middle. That’s where the similarity ended. Around the fire pit in the town hall was a circular set of tables, and behind the fire pit, tables were the council members’ chairs. So, the leaders of the village sat across from each other with the fire in the middle.