by T. G. Ayer
I frowned too. “I didn’t mean—”
He shook his head. “Kai, it’s got nothing to do with anything you said. If I’m bugged, something I hadn’t even considered until now, then I’m a danger to us all. What we discussed at O’Hagan’s could have incriminated us.”
I shook my head. “I’m just not sure that either you or the djinn are buggable.”
“What do you mean?”
“You guys are both hot.”
He smiled. “What can I say?”
“Shut up.” I smacked his shoulder, then skipped around him and headed into my room where I grabbed my messenger bag and returned as fast as I could.
“I meant your body temperature. I’m not sure any electronics can survive that kind of contained heat. Not unless it’s the NASA kind. And that’s bloody expensive.”
“Both Sentinel and Omega have access to a lot of money.”
I sighed. “Just great.” There was a very real possibility that all my secrets were out there for anyone to see.
“So where are you off to?” he asked too brightly.
“The DeathTalker Estate. To see Kira.”
Silence stretched between us as a flicker of flame flared in Logan’s eyes. It wasn’t often that his fire showed.
Not good.
“She collecting?”
“Yup. And something big is going down. Nerina was so jittery, she looked like she was about to explode into shadows.”
“I’m coming with you.”
I lifted my chin. “Not on your life. You saw how angry she was the last time you tagged along. How many hours did you wait outside for me?”
His cheek twitched, as if he didn’t care that the high priestess had made him wait more than two hours outside her library.
“You’re not coming.”
Logan’s eyes narrowed. “Fine. If you don’t take me, then at least ask Lily to go with.”
“Just to make you feel better?”
He almost blinked.
I grunted. “Fine,” I said ignoring the surprised arch of his eyebrows as I dug into my bag for my phone and texted Lily to come over.
Knowing her, she’d bring Anjelo and I’d have to kick him out before dragging her with me.
Fabulous.
Just fabulous.
Chapter 13
THANK GOODNESS I’D GIVEN LILY a key to my apartment. One more knock on the door and there was no telling how safe she would have been.
She flung the door open, kicked it shut and staggered in hunched under the weight of her rucksack.
“Did you rob a bank?” I asked, tapping my finger on my wrist as I leaned against the kitchen counter, arms crossed. I’d gotten tired of pacing.
Lily rolled her eyes. “Almost.” She set the rucksack on the table. “I brought whatever I thought would be needed.” She opened the flap and untied the mouth. “What do you think?”
I walked over and peered inside. Laughed. Shook my head. “We’re going to see a high priestess, not to fight the whole wraith army.”
Lily sighed, looking from the bag to my face then back again. “Can we fight the wraith army after we see the queen B-word?”
“Empty it and let’s go. We don’t want to keep the B-word waiting.” It surprised me Lily had actually used a clean version of the term. She’d never been one to couch her thoughts in niceties.
“No Anjelo?” I asked.
Lily jerked her head. “Nope. He’s otherwise occupied.”
I stopped in my tracks and turned around.
I’d known Lily long enough to recognize when something was bothering her. Her inability to shift had always been a chip on her shoulder but she’d learned soon enough that I wasn’t the judgmental type. Having her at my side in a fight had taken getting used to but now I used her skills to my advantage.
And she’d become more than just a sidekick.
I waited until she caught up with me at the front door. Then I blocked her exit. “Talk.”
Lily gave the way out a longing glance over my shoulder. Then her shoulders sagged. “Oh, all right. Anjelo’s been in a mood since we got back from Wrythiin.”
“Mood?” I prompted, hoping I wasn’t going to have to pull every detail out of her like some deranged dentist.
“Yeah. I think he’s taking it bad. You know, the whole how-could-I-have-trusted-Illyria song. You’d think he had feelings for the bitch.”
That’s more like it.
I shook my head. “I don’t think it’s that, and nor do you.”
She shrugged. “Maybe. Yeah, okay. But she played him and he risked your mom’s life with his carelessness. That’s more or less what he believes.”
With a sigh, I set my hands on my hips. “I should have gone to talk to him but I’ve been crazy busy with all the hell that’s breaking loose. It didn’t cross my mind he’d be taking it this hard.”
“Not your fault.”
“It’s not his either and it’s time he faced it.”
“I’ve tried to make him face it,” Lily said. “Believe me, I’ve tried. But it’s like he can’t hear me.”
I snorted. “Yeah, that’s usually the case with the people we care about the most. We don’t listen when they talk because we take them and their opinions for granted.”
Lily’s mouth turned down. “You think he still cares?”
So that’s what was really going on.
“Lily,” I admonished as I walked toward her. I held onto her shoulders, tipping my head to meet her gaze. “You know he cares. His feelings haven’t changed. He’s just taking longer than most to adjust. Guilt is a difficult burden to bear.”
She nodded, sniffed, shifted her gaze. Anjelo wasn’t the only one taking it hard.
“Look. If it makes you feel better, I’ll go talk to him after I see Kira.” I spoke softly, hoping she wouldn’t take it the wrong way.
She turned to face me, her eyes shining. “Yes. That’s probably the best thing. He’ll have no choice but to listen to our Alpha, right?”
Their Alpha.
I’d forgotten that Anjelo had declared me his alpha before he’d ended up being pulled into the wraith plane. Now it looks like Lily had taken up the same standard. It probably wasn’t legal to acknowledge an alternate alpha and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it since it meant he was divesting himself of my father as his pack leader. Too late now.
“Right,” I said. “No choice. Let’s go.”
I slung my messenger bag over my shoulder and headed out of the apartment and toward the stairs, a pensive Lily in tow.
No choice.
Heading for the stairs, I wondered when I’d grown up and chosen to stop using the rickety fire-escape at the back of the building?
Sure, it had always been untrustworthy and its rusty bolts had had me clinging on to both walls and guts a few times as I teetered above the street.
Could that need for excitement, for the rush of death-defying stupidity, have had something to do with my panther’s needs? Since I’d chosen to give her more freedom, time to run as a cat, perhaps I no longer required the rush of adrenaline that came with choosing to risk becoming a chalk outline on the pavement below.
Who knew?
But even that rusty-lattice web of doom was better than the Birdcage. I could deal with troubled teens and a certain DeathTalker B-word, but nothing—not even imminent death—would get me to choose that clunking monstrosity over the stairs.
Chapter 14
I DIDN’T HAVE A CAR, so we’d run to the meeting.
What was the point of a walker owning a vehicle anyway, when they run like the wind?
Oh yeah, for times when you want to appear cool, calm and collected instead of looking like you’d been hit by a windstorm.
I should have thought this through, but it was a little late now.
The street outside my apartment was deserted enough but we made for the back alley. None of the surrounding buildings had windows facing the alley.
There, Lily tightened
the strap of her rucksack. She’d only removed the heaviest weapons from it. Good thing even Pariahs—walkers who couldn’t shift into their animal form—could run or I would have had to leave her behind. Then she’d have been mighty peeved.
I gave the nod and we both set off, Lily following close behind me so she could see where I was going.
It was difficult to enjoy the scenery as we went. Our speed meant most things passed by in a blur while wind dragged our hair away from our faces and flattened the fabric of our clothes against our bodies.
Still, what would have taken forty-five minutes in a car took us a mere fifteen.
I slowed as we approached the final turnoff, hung a left, and jogged along the dusty road. A few moments later, however, we were deep into a forest of elms and ash, following a shadowed trail. The trail ended at an imposing pair of black iron gates set into a twenty-foot high wall of rugged gray stone.
As I’d expected, the gates opened as we approached, their grating sound of metal-on-metal setting my teeth on edge. High on the wall a security camera swiveled to follow our progress as we entered the property.
Behind us, the gates grated shut.
We followed the graveled drive hedged in by expansive green lawns to its end—an impressively large stone castle complete with three towers, one on each front corner and the third on its back wing. With its dark, diamond-shaped paneled windows the castle looked foreign, with edges of fantasy and danger. Not at all like something that belonged on United States soil.
We walked up the steps to a large, ornate door. As I reached out to knock it, like the gates, it opened before us. A small woman, wrapped and hooded in stone gray, her eyes trained on the honey wood floor held the door open with one hand and gestured down the wood-paneled hall with the other.
I knew the way but I followed her gesture, taking a left to the waiting room outside Lady Kira’s library. Then I dropped my messenger bag on the rich mahogany coffee table and sank into the dark leather of the sofa, prepared to wait.
Lily, on the other hand, took her time joining me, studying each painting and artifact along the route.
“Do you know what that is?” she said, pointing a finger over her shoulder at what looked like an old pottery relic. Her voice, low and breathy, trembled with awe.
“What?” I asked, not really interested.
“It’s the remains of one of the oldest DeathTalkers,” she whispered.
I rolled my eyes. “Lily, they wouldn’t have their predecessor’s remains hanging around in here. It’s not as if it’s a mausoleum.”
Lily narrowed her eyes and set her rucksack on the floor beside me. “It said so on the card.”
“What card?” I asked staring at the door to the library. Was Kira going to make me wait as long as she had on my last visit here?
Lily pushed my shoulder to get my attention. “The card in front of the urn. It said the name of a DeathTalker ancient.” She shivered dramatically.
I sighed and aimed a pointed glare at the library door. “Can we talk about burial urns later?”
“Sure,” she said, flicking the urn a watchful look over her shoulder. “But you have to admit it is muy creepy.”
“Muy creepy?”
Her mischievous grin flashed out. “Anjelo is back.”
I smiled, then ignored her.
Thankfully, a mere ten minutes later the library door opened and Nerina came out. Her expression said she wasn’t very far from hugging me breathless.
Okay, then.
“Only you may enter, Kailin.” She spoke softly, her expression apologetic.
As I rose to my feet I felt Lily tense. I didn’t recall telling her she’d actually meet Kira with me. I’d only asked her to come along, and even that had been simply to placate Logan.
I glanced at her, a question in my eyes. Lily shrugged, nonchalant now she saw I wasn’t bothered by Kira’s demand.
I took my messenger bag and followed Nerina inside the large high-ceilinged library, and got my first surprise.
Kira was not alone.
The dark-haired high-priestess stood near floor-to-ceiling windows, and was flanked by two more DeathTalkers.
Kira’s pitch-black eyes stared down at me, cold and arrogant, but since the last time we’d met I’d grown thicker skin against the woman’s barbs and feline insults.
“Welcome, Hunter,” she said.
What? No cat insults?
I inclined my head.
She ignored my lack of verbal greeting and gestured at the woman on her left. “This is Gaia, High Priestess of the European Council.”
Gaia smiled, her pale eyes glinting with a hint of blue. She was tall and thin and seemed a thousand times nicer than Kira.
“Well met, sister Hunter.” Gaia dipped her head in a shallow bow and I did the same.
“And this is Sini.” Kira allowed no time for more social conventions. “She controls the African Continent.”
Sini, a dusky woman, was wrapped in gray cloth too, but she wore what appeared to be a turban. The cloth wrapped around her head and hung loosely about her face to hide her features.
She cast her honey-dark eyed gaze over me and her smile was tight. Only when I returned it did she relax. Maybe Kira hadn’t given her much of a welcome either.
“So,” I said, to help move things along. “I take it something bad happened.”
Kira arched a pencil-thin eyebrow. “Hence your summons.”
That put me in my place. “Summons? Don’t you mean your request? I need no compulsion to honor a promise freely given.” I wasn’t about to let her walk all over me.
Gaia smiled and so did Sini, so it was probably a good thing Kira didn’t glance sideways. I wasn’t clear on DeathTalker hierarchy so any one of these three women could be the highest ranking.
“Nerina, if you please?” Gaia’s soft tones managed to fill the large room. When Kira kept her lips in a thin line, saying nothing about Gaia taking over, I wondered if Gaia ranked higher or if the women were working to a common plan.
When Nerina came to a stop at my side, Gaia said, “Kailin, in order for you to fulfill your blood promise, we wish for you to see an incident through the eyes of the deceased.”
I blinked.
Nerina slipped her hand into mine and drew me to a long leather sofa. Sat me down. Held out a tiny cup.
“May I ask that you drink this? It is Elven Mead. It will assist in the mind-meld, allowing you to relax to a level which most humans are unable to access.”
I glanced at Gaia, but her encouraging nod bolstered my courage. I took the cup and sniffed the contents; a silvery-gray drink that looked like mercury and smelled of copper and ozone.
Weird.
I dipped the tip of my tongue into it. It tasted cool and minty, like icy spring water steeped with peppermint.
More weird.
Finally, I drank it all in one gulp and handed the cup back to Nerina realizing too late that I hadn’t asked how much to have. Her calm expression told me I’d done the expected thing.
She placed the cup on the floor at her feet then sat beside me and took hold of my hands. Her skin felt smooth and cool. She smelled of mint—or was the mint taste in my mouth affecting my sense of smell?
“Now keep calm, relax.” Nerina’s voice slipped through my thoughts. “Just lean on my energy and I’ll take care of you. Afterward you may feel a little ill so we will leave you to rest.” Her fingers tightened on mine. “Ready?”
I gave a tiny nod and then felt a strange pull on my energy as whatever Nerina was doing sucked all the strength from my body, all the breath from my lungs.
My heart stuttered in my chest as I closed my eyes. It took real effort to force myself to calm down, to heed Nerina’s warning.
Calm.
Shapes danced in my vision, shadows that coalesced to form furniture and people, like a strange dream.
A street.
My ears caught sounds, laughter, a car roaring past. A tin can skittering on t
he blacktop.
A large room came into view, what looked like a bar stripped of its furniture and booths. A bunch of kids. A pool table. A game with colored balls set up on the playing surface. Not a single pool cue in sight.
A girl stood by the side rail, her short aquamarine hair tipped with bright green, her slim form covered in silver-studded leather that matched the dog-collar around her neck.
She leaned over the table, swayed her butt from side to side drawing a few whistles and more raucous laughter. I got the sense it was all good-natured because she smiled, rested her elbow on the side rail, aimed, and sent a burst of energy at the eight ball. The eight-ball hit the black with a crack and then both of them spun over the playing surface and into the far corner pocket.
As shouts roared through the room, cheers and jeers alike, a taller, spiky-haired man drew closer to her. Smiled a sensual smile.
“Are they all here?” His silvery eyes were oddly colored and didn’t mesh with his olive skin.
The strangest of this was I could see each individual feature and yet when I tried to get a picture of his face, it just blurred, as if the viewer had gone cross-eyed.
The blue-haired girl tilted her head and looked over the man’s shoulder as another couple of people entered from a shadowed back door. “Now they are.”
She pulled her attention back to him and tipped her head to study his face, a frown creasing her smooth brow. “So what was it you wanted us all here for? Something you wanted to tell us?”
He nodded and looked around at the gathered people.
There were about a dozen young adults, a mix of races, but I sensed all paranormal or fae. The girl used energy. At the back a short Asian boy bounced lightning in his palm while his friends nudged him to stop. A second girl, reed thin and pale, glowed a soft blue.
It was only then I registered that my view of the room had adjusted. I’d become one of a crowd shifting toward the rest of the group as instructed. From where I now stood, I could look the silver-eyed man in the face.
He gestured for the girl to join her friends and though she frowned she obeyed. She hadn’t even turned around before he straightened to his full height, locked his knees, he drew his hands forward, palms out and then flung a bolt of energy directly into the crowd.