by Susan Arden
These were slinky shadows that were similar to the ones she’d seen in the lower passageway along the ley line. She didn’t understand why they were here. Their energetic tendrils played havoc with her peripheral vision. She told herself these shadows couldn’t harm her as she stepped into her casting circle on the floor. This was the one place in which they didn’t seem to venture.
She set down the flashlight and brought out her blade, taking the white bone handle into her grip, and relaxed as the laces reconnected with her arm. Next, the hairbrush. Sherry unraveled a few strands of hair and encircled her blade. Immediately sparks were released as the hair appeared to melt into the metal.
She invoked the blessings of the Earth gods and goddesses, and this time thunder crashed outside, rumbling from a near strike. The message—Back off!—delivered as though she were seeking to do universal harm. She stood her ground, and repeated the incantation again, stronger in her force to assert she was here on a mission to preserve. The doorway appeared. A sign the gods were appeased. But the elements invoked were unsteady.
None of it felt right. If her energetic fingerprint had changed, it would make sense with all she’d been through. She forced her mind to clear and focused her attention. She entered into the corridor of the first realm.
Energy flares erupted and aftershocks rippled around her. The whole realm was under some sort of storm. Worse than what she’d seen along the streets in the city. She rocketed forward, searching for the Sonya’s fingerprint using the blade as a divining rod for one specific life force. The blade began to glow, the energy emitted by Sonya’s hair matched a single energy point in the distance. Sherry let her own psychic senses guide her toward the place and at the point of contact an arc flared.
She’d never used the realm passageways to randomly exit. Always she’d ended up where she’d started. Except that one wormhole moment she’d tried to escape Quinn. This would be similar. All she needed was a doorway back to the world of form. She spoke the incantation, seeking help in finding a pathway out of the energy corridor. Before her, a dark hallway appeared. There was no choice. She followed the movement of energy lines, Sonya’s growing stronger. Sherry hesitated a moment and then jetted forward.
“Bejeezus!” A woman’s voice came to her as though far away.
Cool hands swiped down her face and Sherry opened her eyes. This was the first time she’d made it through the realm, exiting by way of a different portal from where she’d started.
She felt giddy and her stomach twisted. “Sonya?”
“Jesus, how on Earth did you do that?” Sonya was squatting down next to her. They were in a room with skylights and floor to ceiling glass panels. The wine colored streaks of the sun setting were the backdrop for Sonya’s bruised face. Her cut lip was swollen.
“I’m a spellcaster. My God. Everyone from the Den is searching for you,” Sherry whispered.
“I wish I was a spellcaster to get the hell out of here. Can you take me back wherever you came from?”
“No. I don’t know how to do that. We could get lost in an energetic realm. Who kidnapped you?”
“That man who came to the club returned. With others. They were looking for Quinn. And you. Really it was you they wanted. They’re sick. The things they said they were going to do. To you. To me. To everyone associated with the Den. There’s some woman they’ve got on their side. She’s worse than any of them and determined she’ll own Quinn as her own personal pet. Like a dog on a leash.”
“Do you know where we are?” Sherry asked, rage sweeping through her like a wildfire.
“Only that this is some building. Over by Mile High Park.”
“You’re joking.”
“No. We’re close to the Den. On the top floor of some penthouse.”
“They think you’re being held in some dingy warehouse. That’s where they’ll be searching.” Sherry pushed off the Persian wool rug as Sonya stood, reaching down to help her.
“This couldn’t be more different.”
“It’s not what I was expecting for a prison cell. Who owns this place?” She looked around the bedroom, and stared at a longhaired black cat, licking itself on an expensive white leather sofa. The huge bedroom had a view of the river.
“It loses its charm when Carrigan comes to visit. He likes to assert himself using violence. Says soon he won’t even have to use his hands.” It was then that Sherry noticed Sonya’s quivering chin.
“Do you know when he’ll be back?” Sherry asked, hugging Sonya.
The door opened and in waltzed a man wearing dark clothing and sweating profusely. “He’s back.” Sonya whispered and pulled away.
The man she’d met the other day did not resemble the man who stood before her. He’d changed. His skin was bluish grey and he’d broadened as though he’d downed a pound of steroids. His eyes bulged and his shirt collar cut into his thick corded neck. Her stomach clenched, queasiness assaulting her.
“Well, look what the cat dragged in. Interesting. My mental acuities must be getting stronger.” Behind him two more men stood in the hallway. Equally deformed with their large hulking frames.
“And you were saying, my dear?” An unmistakable voice queried and then a distinct profile slashed through the light and Sherry stumbled backward, grasping onto Sonya’s arm at the sound of the familiar voice. “I positively will not believe our luck.”
The woman sounded just like the High Priestess and then she strutted into the room, her shimmering beauty dazzling. Blond and petite, she wore a dark blue velvet coat with a fur lined hood. The rose insignia of the Sisterhood was stitched in pink over the breast of the material.
“Your Grace?” Sherry stuttered, never having actually seen the Priestess except from behind a screen that shielded her identity while her silhouette was displayed.
The Priestess ignored Sherry, addressing Mick Carrigan instead. “Such a pity. That was embarrassingly easy to manifest her here. But Delacroix casters were never destined for greatness. Just like her mother. A slut.”
They believed they brought her here. There was only one way, but that would mean the High Priestess was involved. No. There was a mistake. Sherry stared, unwilling to believe she’d understood the High Priestess. This had to be some sort of ploy to capture the Fae and Carrigan. The man’s voice cut through her thoughts.
“She’s mine after you’re finished.” Carrigan’s glance swept over her and he chuckled. “I’ll be outside.”
The door closed and then the High Priestess met her gaze. “I said to leave the Lycan alone. Didn’t I?”
“I don’t understand. You’ve come all this way…”
“He’s not yours.” The Priestess narrowed her eyes at Sherry. “And you have tried my patience. Now, I’m perfectly willing to teach you a lesson. One you’ll never forget.”
“Our life forces are woven. This is beyond what I desire. The fates are involved.”
The High Priestess stilled for a second, then strode closer with measured steps. “You’re mistaken.” Energy swirled around the spellcasters, lifting the hem of the Priestess’s coat while Sherry’s own hair stood away from her head from the static energy flowing though her body. She held her arm to her side and pressed closer to Sonya, trying to hide her blade. So far the Priestess had not mentioned it. Failed to sense it was in the room.
“I’ve witnessed the ley lines. We’re connected as one.”
“That’s a lie.” The Priestess’s gaze flashed hatred. “You bitch. He’s not yours. Never will he be yours!”
“I don’t understand. He’s not going to harm me. Why do you care?”
“You are so unbelievably dull-witted. Stupid, just like your mother. He only wants to bed you and then you’ll be another notch on his bedpost. Is that all you aspire to be? A notch?”
“You’re wrong.” Sherry’s voice came out a growl. More wolf than woman. “He loves me.”
“Shut up!” The Priestess swung her arm and slapped
Sherry across the face. The force didn’t do much except jar her senses. It was her mind that reeled, unable to comprehend why the Priestess was overreacting. It made no sense.
“I’m telling the truth.” The skin on her face blazed, but she refused to break eye contact. Her muscles tightened throughout her body. A coiling ratcheted in her belly. Her senses of sight and smell enabled her to observe slight variations in the High Priestess’s demeanor. Under a thick layer of makeup, the other spellcaster’s skin held a bluish tone. The Priestess’s eyes were dull, and Sherry sensed a vapor rising from the woman’s skin, cold and clammy. Sherry sniffed the air. The Priestess stunk of some metallic scent. Repugnant.
“In your dreams. I can see you’re delusional. There’s no possible way you can remain a caster.” The Priestess began pacing and flashed a searing gaze toward Sherry. “Quinn does not love you. He’d never fall for someone so trivial. But you’re too wrapped up in your meager existence to see beyond your nose.”
“She’s having some type of break,” Sonya whispered. “This is the woman who talked about destroying you. She’s obsessed with Quinn.”
Sherry stared at the Priestess. Dread seeped into every pore of her being. It was unheard of for the High Priestess to take a lover. They were forbidden contact with males except for the sole purpose of producing an heir—a human heir—in a ceremony that was as secretive as it was ancient.
The Priestess went to the door and slammed it open. She spoke to one of the men in the hall. “Take her. I want her defiled. By you. By all your men! I want Quinn to see what happens when he defies me. All the others were meaningless. This one is an intolerable affront to my position Make her pay. And then make him pay.” The crazed Priestess raged within the hall, shrieking for Carrigan.
Sonya tugged Sherry across the room. “Can you get back to where you came from?”
“And leave you with these sickos? No. I can’t do it. I won’t do it.”
“If you don’t, they’ll torture both of us. At least this way you can go and get help. Please!”
“Sonya, I don’t even know if I can.”
“Try. You can do that. You’re powerful, Sherry. I don’t know all that you’re capable of, but I haven’t seen any of them jump out of the air.”
Carrigan’s voice sounded down the hall, coming closer.
“I promise, somehow, I’ll be back with help.”
There was no casting circle, but then in the office there had not been one either. Maybe she could do access the realm all along without the circle if she used the right incantations. She closed her eyes quickly invoking the blessing of Mother Earth and Father Horn. The sacred words tingled on her tongue. She moved her hands in the sacred mudras. The Gods welcomed her and she wove her blade, brandishing the power to harness the elements. More sure this time, she opened her eyes, and the doorway appeared before her. She glanced over at Sonya’s flickering image and then dove forward, past the outer realm, transforming into her energetic form and hovering over the ley line. She pointed herself toward a tether she knew all too well: Quinn’s life force. There was no uncertainty as she moved effortlessly toward his form. Drawn to his magnetic power even in this realm, she connected to his life force, immediately awash in his scent, eternal and part of her. She shifted her blade and the path toward her opened. She stepped through the realms and opened her eyes, tumbling onto a hard floor.
“Are you alright?” Quinn said, starting toward her.
“Shut your mouth, wolf,” Carrigan said. One of the men jerked him backward. His arms were pinned at his sides. Quinn was being held in front of Carrigan.
She’d jumped into the ley line only to exit down the hall from Sonya, and into an enormous sunken living room. The High Priestess was just entering.
“What the hell is she doing out here? I just left her back there.” The Priestess pointed down the hall.
“She’s got more tricks than a carnival clown,” Carrigan snorted. “More tricks than you.”
“No, she doesn’t. She’s low level. That’s why she’s here in Denver, working at a sex club, for crying out loud.”
“She has more integrity than you, Nina,” Quinn snapped. “I should have realized you were a leech. No matter how many times you throw yourself at me, I’ll have to pass.”
“Nina? Her name is Nina?” Sherry asked. “As in Miles. The woman who complained.”
“Yes. Same one from the club the other night.”
Carrigan walked up to Quinn and punched him in the stomach. “I said to shut the fuck up. Both of you.”
“Sorry. You’ll have to try harder than that old man.” Quinn didn’t flinch.
Carrigan leered at him, then swung his gaze around. His jeering laughter rang out. “I doubt that.” Quinn watched Carrigan walk over to Sherry, saying to the guards, “Take her to the master bedroom. I want her naked. Tie her spread-eagle to the bedposts.”
“You’ll die before you get the chance,” Quinn responded.
“Fuck off. I’m the one holding all the cards this round.” Carrigan stared at Quinn with evil delight dancing in his eyes. “By the time I’m through with her, you’ll be sorry as shit you stole my family’s property. This was easier than shooting fish in a barrel. First she shows up—twice!—and you come knocking on my door. Are you all mental?”
A man pulled Sherry away from Carrigan. Good, Quinn thought He had hoped for an opportunity where she might be removed from the room. He didn’t want Sherry to see what he planned. Only one way to deal with these fuckers: brutal savagery.
“What the hell do you want?” Quinn said, his voice coming out low. Any normal creature would react to the dangerous notes woven throughout his rasping tone.
“Ah, I see now how to get your attention. Lethal, and quite unwise, to give away that much power. Wouldn’t you say?”
“Is that your plan? Revenge?” Quinn was buying time, feeling out who else was present. “This is your idea of a rise to the top? You stink of Fae.”
Understatement. This dumb fuck was Fae. From what Quinn could tell, the melding of human and Fae did produce a stronger race. If Carrigan was their poster child, the union produced psychotically crazed lunatics. Even Carrigan’s body looked unstable. Sweating buckets and grey skin erupting in pustules.
“I’ll be more powerful than even you, wolf boy. You’ll be nothing but my bitch by the time I’m through with you.”
“Bet you’ve been dreaming of that for a long time.” Quinn struggled to keep the lid on the blistering fury building in his body. The fur under his skin bristled.
At the moment, he was pulled in two distinct directions that managed to slow him down enough to think. These pseudo-Fae humans might have the ability to turn Sherry into one of them with a bite or scratch. Fucking Fae weren’t supposed to inhabit humans. Destroy or curse, but not meld, and given they didn’t crawl into minds yet, he had to act rapidly before they managed to do that.
The predator in him demanded he shift into Lycan form; he barely contained the rapidly rising compulsion to attack those around him. The pungent scent of fear roiled off these hybrid humans in choking waves, and a feral growl rumbled in his chest. He held back from snarling, a hair away from snapping and sinking his teeth into the man next to him. He fought to maintain control, assessing who best to take out first. With each passing second, his lupine senses pressed him to take action to protect his mate. He could easily twist free from these cretins but he had to find the means to safeguard Sherry before anything else.
“Just going to stand around and watch, Quinn? Always figured you were more talk than action.” Carrigan turned and moved toward Sherry, a look of panic shuttered over her face. “Let’s go and see what skills you’ve learned.”
Quinn’s body grew rigid as rage threatened to suffocate him. Cold. Brutal. A snarl tore from his lips. Never had he felt this blood call to destroy another being. It sliced through him. His mating bond flared, linking him with Sherry. Their union unbreakable
. She was his to protect. No one threatened her. Midnight fury raced in his bloodstream. Quinn punched one of the men holding him so fiercely in the face it sent the hybrid crashing over a table and into the wall. He ducked as the other hybrid man threw a punch. Quinn elbowed the man’s larynx, crushing his windpipe, and grabbed for the hybrid’s gun. He pulled a second pistol out of the man’s belt before shoving him to the floor.
He took aim and shot at Carrigan as the fucker disappeared into a hallway, yelling for backup. Three of Carrigan’s hybrid turned brothers spilled into the room. He couldn’t leave Sherry here unprotected in order to track down Mick Carrigan. Quinn moved as though a blur, stepping in front of Sherry, and firing at the first hybrid. The man grunted and dropped to the floor. Quinn continued to shoot with Sherry safely behind him. The hybrids were slow to react; they fired, missing him. Rather than test their aim he dodged and brought Sherry down with him, covering her body with his. Bullets from his gun sprayed across the room. The hybrids fell like lifeless marionettes.
The air was heavy with the metallic stench of Fae body fluids, pooling into greasy grey puddles on the floor around the hybrids. Not crimson blood. Proof that Fae had learned how to bind forms, inhabiting the bodies of known humans who could be mortally wounded.
He rose off Sherry. “You okay?”
“Yes. What happened to Carrigan? And where’s Sonya?”
“Stay behind me.” He pulled her upward.
At the same time, Nina rose from behind the sofa. “Quinn, we can leave here.”
“You imposter,” Sherry growled, bolting from behind him.
His strong arms encircled her waist, refusing to let her move. “No. Stay next to me.”
“Let me deal with her. She’s the Priestess. This is between casters,” Sherry said, trying to pull free from him and all the while his gun remained pointed across the room at Nina.