by Ayer, T. G.
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, 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 the one of the oldest death talkers," 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 death talker 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 death talkers.
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 loose about her face to hide her features.
She cast her honey-dark eyes 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 death talker 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 fulfil 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-grey 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. He skin felt smooth and cool. She smelled of mint--or was the mint the 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 the 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 a
nd 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 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.
Screams shattered the air around me, ripped the insides of my ears. Pain ripped my flesh and eyes. I smelled ozone and fire, and white-hot power.
And then it all went black.
CHAPTER 15
I ROCKETED TO MY FEET, gasping for breath, my brain throbbing with the drumbeat of my pulse and my mouth tasting of metal and vomit. I wanted to run but I was surrounded by mist and shadows. Surrounded by enemies. Blind. Helpless.
"You are safe," said a calm voice from the mist. "Breathe."
Nerina.
"Breathe," she said again. "Slowly, Kailin. In. Out. In . . . "
I breathed, wrapping an arm around my midsection, as if the mere gesture would encourage my churning gut to settle.
A few moments passed before my vision cleared enough for me to recognize the hazy blotch in front of me as Nerina's face. She must have jumped off the sofa when I did.
She seemed unaffected by the vision. I, on the other hand, was a twisted, confused wreck.
"What the hell was that?" An inane question. I had a pretty good idea what I'd witnessed.
Nerina took my shaking hand and guided me back down to the sofa cushions. "I apologize," she said when we were both seated. "I know what it feels like to see such a thing for the first time."
I wasn't troubled by the vision itself, just the content. "Why couldn't I see his face? I know what he looks like, even his eye color, but his face . . . It was indistinguishable."
Nerina nodded. "We also found that strange. We think it may be a type psychological block. Perhaps Kira blocked it out. The trauma . . ."
"Did they all die?"
Nerina nodded. "We were able to see what happened in the room well after what you were shown. Death talkers have a greater awareness of the world, even after death, giving us greater flexibility with what we can see. After he killed them he simply left. It seems he was certain enough that were all dead."
"How many?" My voice still shivered. Much more to death talkers than I'd ever hoped to learn. Right now my head hurt too much to think about the specifics of mind-melding.
"Twelve."
"Hunter."
The word vibrated with tightly-controlled fury.
"Yes, Kira?" I blinked and the rest of the mist cleared away.
What the hell?
She stood before me now with dark circles under her eyes, and slight tremor rippling through her stiffly-held frame. She looked as though the last few minutes had sucked out her arrogance and strength and left behind a fragile shell.
"You have had enough time to recover," she said, and no matter what her body looked like there was nothing frail in that granite voice. "Now I will have your word. You will find that monster and kill him."
I stared at her, my ears ringing. She wanted me to assassinate someone? Given what I'd seen the killer do I was inclined to hunt him down anyway. But having Kira--anyone--use a Blood Promise to force me to kill was a different thing entirely.
Before I could tell her so, Gaia came to her side and slid an arm around her shoulders. "Come. I think it's time you rested a little. You need your strength."
Kira glared at her but didn't shrug her off. Instead she submitted without complaint and let Gaia guide her out of the room.
Through the open door I caught a glimpse of Lily. She frowned at the two death talkers and shot me a questioning look. Before I could respond, the door closed.
"You do not have to do this," said Sini.
I angled my body so I could look up at her. "Of course, I do. I made a Blood Promise. I have no choice."
Although it sounded like I was reluctant to fulfill the promise, she must know it wasn't because I thought the dead shouldn't be given justice.
Sini shook her head, a sad smile curving her full lips. "Kira is not herself. Grief blinds her."
I glanced at the closed door, pieces slowly falling into place. "She knew one of the people he killed?"
Sini sighed. "Your vision came from a death talker teenager. Kira's daughter, Mika. Her youngest, most rebellious child."
Kira's daughter? Blood drained from my cheeks and when I turned back to Nerina her twisted expression said she understood exactly what I was feeling. "I'm so sorry."
"Mika was rebellious long before she came into her powers." Sini sounded regretful as she continued. "She and her mother had numerous arguments. Finally, the child left the estate to live on her own. She still attended her school but refused to live at home."
"Where was she . . . when it happened?" I asked softly.
"In Cicero," Sini said. "On the outskirts of the abandoned quarter. A set of loft apartments above a bar and restaurant; all abandoned, of course. The young people fend for themselves and though Mika had money from her mother she refused to use it."
"Did she and Kira reconcile?" I asked, this time feeling sick to my stomach for a totally different reason.
Nerina shook her head. "It was only after her death that they made their peace." She spoke softly as if she was afraid Kira would hear.
I hoped Kira didn't have the ability to hear through walls. I didn't handle grief well myself. The idea that an enraged, grieving mother might come running back into the room and demand I kill for her was difficult enough. Facing that emotion from someone who disliked me--and who I didn't care for either--somehow made it worse.
I got to my feet slowly, feeling my stomach tilt but not as badly as it had. Beside me, Nerina rose too.
"Tell Kira I will find her daughter's murderer and fulfill the promise," I said. "The killing felt like . . . part of a plan to me. He needs to be found before he strikes again." And before more paranormals died.
Sini nodded, her honey eyes troubled. "Unfortunately, the problem is not limited to this one incident."
That stopped me cold. "He's killed before?"
She nodded again. "Gaia and I are here because we both have reports from our territories of similar incidents. When Kira told us about her child's murder, we decided we needed to call a High Council meeting to discuss our next steps."
Her mention of the DeathTalker High Council reminded me of our trials with the Walker one, and I only wished our council members were as amenable as Sini was.
"A worldwide attack on paranormals?" I asked, not bothering to hide my shock.
"It does look that way." Sini's face grew darker and it was clear that the death of Kira's child had hit them all hard.
&nbs
p; I nodded. "I'll uphold my end of the bargain and fulfill Kira's request but I can't promise to kill them all." I had to make that clear. "However, I'll do whatever I can to help. That includes using all my resources to find out who's behind the attacks and to stop them."
Sini did another shallow bow. "I believe you are just the person for this job, Kailin Odel." I noticed she didn't call me 'Hunter'. "We are grateful for your help, even if it is under duress."
Grim determination flooded my veins. "As harsh as it sounds, this is no longer only a death talker problem. He killed other paranormals as well as Kira's daughter. Have you spoken with the other high councils? Warned them?"
Sini shook her head. "Not yet. Kira wanted to guarantee you would eliminate the killer first, before we brought in every other clan and group."
"I saw mages and fae in that room," I said softly. "They were all killed by the same man. It's only fair to give the all high councils warning." And especially the Grand High Council. They'd want the Elite in place aspic they knew about this.
"I hear what you are saying," Sini said. "But Kira is the one who holds your debt and it is she who saw and experienced the terror and pain of her own child's death. Nobody else in that room was capable of revealing what happened. No other parent will see it, feel it, live with the agony of it as she will."
I understood. "Which is why I will do my best without involving any of the other groups initially But I will try to warn them against future attacks."
So the Elite would have to wait.
She nodded. "I understand. And may I say again how grateful we are. Kira may not show it but she, too, is very thankful. Nerina?"
Sini must have given her some silent instruction because Nerina bowed. "Let me show you out," she said. "And you must tell me if you need anything from us."
I frowned, "Like what?"
I turned back to Sini to say goodbye. The high priestess was no longer in the room.
"Weapons." Nerina drawing my attention back to her. She handed me my messenger bag and walked with me. "Assistance."
"Death talkers have weapons?"
She shrugged as she opened the door and let me pass through to join Lily. "Not modern ones. But we can provide funds for the purchase of new weapons and ammunition."