Paige raised her face to the ceiling before returning her gaze to the sheriff. She had to be able to work this case. Not because her job was on the line if she didn’t. Mostly likely, her job would be on the line for working it.
But these people were being attacked by demons. Probably because of her. Kind of. Sort of. Something inside her wouldn’t let her leave until she knew they were all right. “Look, all that documentation was lost on our side. We barely know the treaty existed.”
“Exists.”
“Okay.” She needed a different approach. “What I really meant was, I don’t know what rules I’m breaking just by being here.”
“Several.”
Paige rolled her neck, stretching it. “Then, why haven’t you done something about it sooner than this?”
Karl straightened her back, grimacing. “I was politely reminded of it.”
“By ‘polite,’ you mean, not so much.”
Karl nodded.
“People are scared.”
“They are.”
“Oh, man.” Paige smiled and fell back in her chair. “Scared of me. That’s rich.”
“You are a powerful witch.”
“Yeah, but, Jennifer—” If the sheriff could play the first name game, so could she. “—you have an entire community. I’m outnumbered.”
“We have the stories. We’ve always outnumbered your kind and it still didn’t turn out well for us.”
“But I’m a Whiskey. My family fought for your side.” Not that she had the full histories or anything. She was just repeating what Tony had told her.
“You gave birth to an Eastwood.”
That was the third time that had been brought up. “Mark had been estranged from his family for years.”
Karl bit her lip, but didn’t say anything. “We can’t just ignore that.”
“What?”
“Your connection to the Eastwoods.”
Paige looked down. “Why?”
Karl narrowed her eyes.
“Like I said, our records were destroyed. We don’t have the histories.” Time for a little honesty. “The only reason I even know about this is because Tony told me. Why are the Eastwood so important, and who the hell are they?”
“You really don’t know?”
Paige shook her head.
“Okay. Well, when the war came to the Americas, the witches and the paranormals found a kind of peace.”
Her stomach twisted, but why, Paige didn’t know. “That sounds good.”
“Yes.” Karl lifted one hand, palm up. “It was. They settled in the most remote place they could find, at the time. Portland, Oregon. They made a life for themselves, created a society.”
“Paranormals?”
“Paranormals and witches.”
Surprise trickled through Paige. She’d been led to believe that the war had been bloody for hundreds of years. Okay. Well, even if it was only since the settling of the America’s, it was still hundreds of years.
“Merry Eastwood took power of the Eastwood witch line.” Karl flicked her eyebrows. “At about the same time a Whiskey girl fell in love with a shifter.”
That sounded like a bad skit of Romeo and Juliet.
“Merry wanted power. The Whiskeys were the most powerful line and they were going to taint that line with the blood of a shifter.”
With the blood of a shifter? Paige sat up.
“Merry Eastwood restarted the war. She took over Portland, and nearly destroyed the Whiskey line.”
“If they refused to play, then she’d destroy them?”
“Kind of.”
“Then, again, I don’t understand why you’re so scared of me.”
“I’m not done. Your ancestor brokered this treaty. No witch is to speak to a paranormal. No paranormal is to speak to a witch.”
“But this case…”
“I know. We really need your help. But Merry wanted to make sure the Whiskeys and the shifters didn’t rise up against her. Again.”
“So, we don’t tell the Eastwoods. Besides, she’s dead.”
“She’s not dead.”
Whoa. How could a woman survive hundreds of years?
Black magick.
Fuck. Definitely not someone she wanted to mess with. She might have a demon door, but she didn’t do black magick. “Okay. Yeah. Definitely, we don’t tell her.”
“You don’t have any contact with the Eastwoods?”
“No. Like I said, Mark was cut off for years before I knew him, and then he died before Leah was born.”
Karl’s frown lessened. “I’m sorry.”
“He was a good man.” She struggled to wrap her head around the idea that he came from a family that practiced black magick. Well, one witch. And he ran away from her, so that said something about the man she’d loved.
“I have to make sure.”
“I understand. But I don’t know the Eastwoods. They never contacted me. As far as I know, they haven’t contacted anyone else in my family.”
Karl flexed one hand and bit the inside of her cheek. “Would you refrain from talking to them about this?”
Oh, shit. “Um, I can’t. I already discussed this with my sister.”
Karl’s shoulders dropped, her lips tight.
“I needed help.” Paige shrugged deeply. “But, good news, she’s pregnant and no one wants to talk to her, so I’ll just send her a quick text.” She pulled out her phone.
“I don’t mean to imply anything.”
Paige understood where the woman was coming from. “I get it. I do.”
Karl grunted.
Paige swyped, Don’t tell anyone about the shifters. Grandma included, and hit send, looking up.
“I really think you’d be a good resource in this.”
“Well,” Paige clasped her hands. “I do know demons and that’s what you’re dealing with.”
“Yeah.”
Paige’s phone chirped. She looked down to read, Does Tru count? She smiled and texted back, Nope. “We’re good. Leslie didn’t tell anyone.”
Karl ran her fingers over her hair. “Good,” she said relieved. “Well, now that we both understand the war we could start by working this case together…” She let that thought trail off.
“Right?”
“Could you do something for me?”
“Um, sure?”
Karl walked around her desk, and perched against the edge of it, gripping it with both hands. “Do to me what you did to Kevin and Kris.”
Paige’s eyes widened. “Uh. I didn’t do anything. I just looked at them.”
“Yes, but I need to experience it so I can tell others that it’s safe.”
“But you know it’s safe because I looked at your spirit already.”
“Kind of, but we didn’t react the same way. You didn’t override me to get to my fox.”
“Well, yes. There is that, but I don’t know how I didn’t.”
Karl shrugged. “I need you to try.”
What could go wrong here? Everything. Paige didn’t understand how her shifter vision even worked, how it affected them. “Okay.”
Karl nodded once, straightening her shoulders. “Okay.”
Paige squared off with her. She turned on her witch vision, seeing Karl’s pink soul. Pools of mauve and dark, muddied red hung heavy in spots like mildew.
Good to know Paige wasn’t the only one nervous here.
The fox spirit looked up, her head shooting off a fiery array of smoke as she twisted to the left and then to the right.
“Hello,” Paige said quietly.
The fox said nothing, but continued to look at Paige, first with one eye, then with the other, as if trying to see something she knew should be there.
Paige dampened her witch vision, not quite turning it off, but simply turning it down. The fire and the pink soul-flare merged into the physical version of Sheriff Karl, her expression pinched.
The fox jerked.
Karl flinched, her eyes widening minutely.
“Hello,” Paige tried again.
The fox tipped her head, leaving pinkish-orange smoke trails. “Hello,” she said through Karl’s mouth.
Sheriff Karl opened her mouth, then closed it.
Paige didn’t move, didn’t add anything.
“Fox?” Karl asked, her eyes wide as she rose from the desk.
“Yes?” the fox answered, using Karl’s mouth.
It looked, for all intents and purposes, like Sheriff Karl was talking to herself.
“I’ve never felt you like this,” Karl said, her voice filled with wonder. “Unless we were shifting.”
“The strange witch,” the fox said with a whispery tone, “gives us more control than I would have suspected.”
Karl’s gaze lifted to Paige. “What are you doing? Are you calling on the elements? Are you controlling my animal?”
Paige shook her head. “No. Honestly. With Kevin, I did call on elements because I thought, maybe, I’d have to, but with you? No. This is just me seeing your fox. I’m not doing anything.”
“This is strange,” the fox’s thin tone said. “But I do not feel as though we should fear her. Her intentions appear clean. Her soul—” The fox looked at Paige’s chest.
Where the door was.
“—good.”
Paige swallowed hard. Had the fox seen the door? If so, why hadn’t she told the sheriff?
“Would you be willing to give us a blood oath?”
Oh, blood oaths were bad. Well, they were fine. Until you inadvertently broke it.
The fox shifted, wisps of orangey-pink smoke drifting into the air.
Paige felt a curious intrigue emanate from the animal spirit. “You know, I don’t know.”
“Blood oaths give us insight,” the fox said.
Into what?
The fox’s soul eyes blazed as she looked again at the demon door.
Huh. Did it mean the animal spirit might have a better idea on how to fix the door, to close it? She needed that. In order to keep her family, this community, possibly the world safe, she needed that damned door closed. But a blood oath?
It wasn’t as though she intended the shifters any harm in the first place. What was the risk of putting a blood oath behind her intentions?
She wasn’t going to acknowledge she’d said that. To herself. In her own mind.
“I’ve never sworn a blood oath before. What do I do?”
The fox raised her head, Karl’s following a few seconds behind. “Just swear you will do no harm and then cut your finger.”
Paige knew that real magick needed more. The spirit animal knew that as well. She swallowed and pulled out her pocket knife. She hadn’t sharpened it in—well, since she bought the thing, but she hadn’t really used it much either. So, hopefully, it would do the job.
Feeling more than a little uncomfortable and a tad stupid, she reached inside herself and called out with her mind to the All Mother. Hey, I need your help. Just help me make sure I don’t screw this blood oath thing up, please. No hurting them. Still able to do my job.
Something pushed back slightly, like a mother pushing away a bothersome child.
Paige sighed. The All Mother was many things. Patient with idiots wasn’t one of them.
With the All Mother invited into the proceedings, Paige took in a deep breath.
The fox spirit tipped her head to the side as if curious.
Paige couldn’t tell what the animal spirit might be curious about. Had she seen the All Mother? Paige sure didn’t. All she ever received was a distant, Why are you whining to me? Go do something. Whatever. “Okay. Here it goes. I have no wish to do the shapeshifters here any harm.”
“You will not,” Karl said firmly. “This is an oath. Not a wish.”
Paige refrained from rolling her eyes. “I will not harm any shapeshifters here.”
Karl nodded, her dark eyes closed.
The fox penetrated Paige with its gaze.
“Unless,” Paige continued.
Karl stiffened.
“I have need or reason. If the shapeshifter is dangerous to the wellbeing of others, then I will do what I must.”
Karl opened her mouth, closed it, and narrowed her eyes.
The fox nodded serenely.
Unfolding her knife, Paige placed the blade at the base of her thumb and pressed. Cutting her hand wasn’t nearly as easy as it looked like in the movies. She knew she was putting a blade to her skin to penetrate it and draw blood. Her hand and her mind were telling her just how dumb that idea was.
Someone yelled in the front.
No time. Paige sliced her hand. Pain bit, racing up her arm, leaching her veins, coursing through her body.
It had been a simple knife slice. It could use a Band-Aid, but no more than that. She’d done worse on accident.
“You are bound,” the fox said.
“Hey, Paige,” Dexx called from the front.
Karl glared at the door.
Someone else shouted. Something scraped against the vinyl floor.
Time for ceremonies to end. A scuffle in a police precinct wasn’t news, but in a paranormals-only precinct? This was new territory.
Karl’s blinds were open on the two partially glass walls. Two burly men stood at the counter. One reached over it, swiping at Jakobs.
She scrambled to her feet and batted the man’s hands away.
“Give me a minute,” Karl grumbled, pushing past Paige. She opened the door and the sound level increased.
Through the glass, her shifter vision picked up nothing.
Through the open door, the impairment disappeared.
The burly man with the brown beard stopped still crouched on the desk. His large, red wolf rose like a smoky mist.
The dark man beside him straightened. The head of a green, leafy buffalo turned toward Paige.
Wolf Man gripped the top of the desk and launched himself over it with ease, releasing a purely human roar.
Buffalo Boy rocked his head from side-to-side as if popping his neck, his spirit animal perfectly in sync. The buffalo head shrank to the size of the man’s human head, giving the dark skin a neon green glow. Then, he slipped shape.
Paige went for her gun, but her arm froze. She jerked it, trying to force it to move where she directed it.
A gentle ping ricocheted in her mind with a cackling laugh, her words coming back to haunt her. Just help me make sure I don’t screw this blood oath thing up, please.
Damned All Mother and her frelling sense of fucking humor.
She flipped the bird mentally to the goddess who ignored her, and moved to intercept Buffalo Boy.
Wolf Man advanced in long, ground eating strides, his human face morphing into that of a wolf.
Wind rose, picking up papers and tossing them about.
Shit. That was her. Paige’s soul had called to the wind without her in control. What the fuck? She scrambled to call it back, to release her hold of the element.
The wind laughed and tugged at the deep red center of her soul.
Deep red. Her soul. Not the door.
It fed off her emotions? When had that changed?
The floor rumbled. Desks shook. A telephone fell to the floor and shattered.
Earth answered the call of her heart before Paige even understood what she was emoting.
Blessed Mother! The moon. It had to be the call of the super moon along with the already increased power of her gifts. Shit. She needed to get herself under control.
The other police officers scrambled back, their chairs sliding and crashing into desks or onto floors. Their spirit animals rose from them, morphing into their physical bodies.
Karl stood in front of Paige and held up her pink-blazing hands, shoots of mauve zinging outward.
Wolf Man’s wolf spirit repelled the calm she offered, his soul diving into a deep, molten red.
Someone pulled the hammer back on a weapon behind Paige.
The sound was like a switch on her emotions. Calm set
tled over her.
The wind stopped. The earth stilled.
Dexx stepped in front of her and sighted down his .357 Smith and Wessen revolver.
“That’s one of the missing shifters!” Karl charged Wolf Man. She hit him with two fuchsia palms in the middle of his red, flaring chest and shoved.
Wolf Man stumbled backward.
“Stand down, Dexx!”
“Not when he looks like that, I’m not.”
Paige blinked. She didn’t understand what was happening or how to help, but bullets didn’t seem like the right answer.
Karl’s fox turned her head slightly, her pink flame ear flicking backwards.
The shifter vision distracted her. Seeing their souls. Seeing their animals. She needed to assess the situation. She turned off her shifter vision.
The officer closest to Paige turned on her. His dark hair morphed forward to cover his entire face as he shifted into a panther.
Jakobs pulled her head backwards and cawed, her arms flung out. Wings grew along her shoulders.
Wolf Man growled low.
Paige didn’t know what to do. This wasn’t her area of expertise. What if they were acting out because they feared her? Her witch connections? What if this was her fault?
“Aaron,” Karl said, her voice calm. “You don’t want to do this.”
Buffalo Boy finally made it around the front desk and joined his friend. His human head was no longer visible. His shoulders bulked. His back bowed, but his limbs remained human. He snorted a whuffing breath.
The panther took a menacing step toward Paige.
Shit. Should she leave? Would that help them? Were they in control?
Or was the super moon overpowering their control, too?
Wolf Man straightened suddenly. His long ears twitched, turning one way, then another.
Buffalo Boy’s head swiveled.
The panther stopped, his green, cat eyes focused on Wolf Man.
Jakobs stopped, her torso a human-sized crow, her legs still human.
Wolf Man tipped his head and turned his attention to Dexx.
As one, the other partially shifted people turned toward him as well.
Paige didn’t know what to do. She raised her hands, calling on the elements. To send them at the shifters or to contain them, she didn’t know.
Nothing answered her call.
They came when she didn’t call and ignored her when she did?
The panther leapt at Dexx from behind and sank his sharp teeth into Dexx’s shoulder.
whiskey witches 02 - blood moon magick Page 17