I kissed her forehead and hugged her gently. How much could I say without giving away so much that she’d run straight to Abigail with my story? If Abigail knew I was going to destroy whatever relic of ancient magic she hid behind the door in her basement she’d do her best to stop me. The result of that would be Abigail’s death and this innocent young woman I held would probably fight alongside Abigail. No, I couldn’t tell her everything. She was Abigail’s apprentice; she’d have to fight with her. “Look, Cynthia. Do you think I’d do anything to deliberately hurt you?”
She shifted and then sat up, supporting herself with both hands against my chest and doing interesting things where we were still joined. She breathed a spell and the candle Cris had left on the nightstand flared to life.
Cynthia stared into my eyes while I marveled at the beauty of her breasts, her flat belly, her lips, and those penetrating eyes. I felt myself stiffening.
She appeared to make up her mind and slowly shook her head. Her hair moved in waves around her face as her long tresses swayed back and forth with each movement. “No, I don’t think you would. But why won’t you tell me more? You’re obviously much more skilled than you have any right to be.”
I flexed my buttocks, causing my hips to rise beneath her. I opened my eyes wide and formed an “O” with my lips.
Cynthia returned the “O.” “That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
She shifted her position slightly and tensed her own muscles. I thought my eyes were going to roll back into my head.
“Not that you aren’t far more skilled in that arena also,” she added.
“You aren’t a novice yourself.” Even as I said the words came out of my mouth, I tensed. When I’d been her age, my words would have been tantamount to calling her a slut. Instead of the reaction I’d been afraid of, she smiled and demonstrated more muscle control.
“I’ve had some practice.”
“That older lover of yours?” I asked.
She froze. Damn, why can’t I ever leave well enough alone?
“What have you heard?” Cynthia asked.
“Nothing, honestly. I’m just guessing because you certainly didn’t learn this from a teenager.”
Cynthia relaxed and smiled again, then moved against me. “Okay, I’ll give you that. There are things only a more mature lover can teach, so I’m guessing you’ve had your own mentor in that arena.”
I moved with her. “You could say that.”
Of course, you could also spend forty plus years practicing.
“I do say, but that doesn’t explain your power. I saw the site last night. There was some powerful magic released and you survived it.”
“Can’t I just be lucky?” I asked.
“Abigail may be right about luck being a form of magic, but if all you had was luck I don’t think you’d have even attempted to stop either of those murders.”
“Cynthia, there are some things you have to try, whether you can stop them or not.”
“Granted—”
I flipped us both over and stared down at her. She lay still for a moment, and then began to move again. Our tempo picked up and the conversation was forgotten.
Later, I lay atop her, sated once more; my weight was supported on my arms and I kissed her softly. I was neither willing to get off her or to give her the chance to start up the unfinished conversation. Sweat dripped off the tip of my nose and hit her chin. I kissed it away. Someone slapped my exposed backside. Hard. I bit my lip and muffled a shout of pain and insult.
“If you’re done ravishing my cousin, I have breakfast almost ready. How do you want your eggs?” Cris stood beside the bed, holding a wide non-stick spatula.
I recovered my aplomb with effort and said, “Sunny side up, but if you just hit me with that; I’ll take scrambled.”
“No, I used my hand. How ‘bout you Cuz?”
“Soft scrambled, please,” Cynthia said.
My aplomb was getting shaky. These cousins were surreal and while not puritanical by any means, I’m not entirely relaxed about being accosted by a fully dressed relative of the woman I was trying to share a little post-coital bliss with. “Ah, Cris, I appreciate the breakfast, but could you give us a little, ah, privacy.”
She smiled devilishly and glanced at my buttocks where I’m sure a red, palm-shaped welt was visible.
“Don’t even think about it,” I said.
“Well, you’re no fun. Okay, but don’t make me come back,” Cris said over her shoulder as she parted.
“Thanks, Cuz; we’ll be there straight away.”
I watched until Cris disappeared down the hallway and then turned back to Cynthia. I kissed her softly and then asked. “Are you sure you’re ready to quit?”
“Are you kidding? I’ll hardly be able to walk as it is. Besides, if breakfast gets cold she’ll be back and if I know Cris she won’t be satisfied unless she climbs in with us.”
I grinned.
“Forget it,” Cynthia said. “It isn’t going to happen.”
“Never say never.”
She slapped me across the buttocks, pretty much striking the still sensitive area Cris had abused. “Ow.”
“Yes, ow is right.” She pushed against my shoulders and I rolled off her.
She climbed out of the bed and walked to the hallway door. “Cris, give us ten minutes to shower.”
“Make it five. You don’t have to enjoy the shower,” Cris called back.
She turned to me. It was the first time I’d had a full view of her body, even if it was by candlelight. “You better get moving.”
“Right behind you,” I said, but then lay there long enough to watch her gorgeous backside disappear into the bath. I sighed, rolled to my feet, and followed.
The shower was too brief, but I enjoyed it anyway. We soaped each other and washed all the nooks and crannies that we’d previously explored in the bed. I toweled her dry, taking far longer than I needed to and didn’t stop until she caught my hands. “That’s enough, lover, next time you can rub my skin raw, but not now.”
I offered her the towel and she refused it. “Dry yourself; I’ll get us robes.”
I dried and then brushed my hair back with my hand until it laid flat. Then she was back wearing an ankle-length white robe of lush, terry cloth. I was disappointed to see her luscious form concealed again and it must have showed in my face. She kissed my lips as she handed me the robe and a pair of slippers that matched the ones she wore.
“You’re too sweet for words, lover,” she said and hurried out before I could grab her and ravish her some more. There are times when it is absolutely fantastic to have the body of a twenty-year-old male. It makes up for all the times I’m treated as someone who’s barely out of high school. I slipped into the robe and slippers and hurried after her.
Cris was a master of kitchen organization. When I walked in, she was in the process of sliding four sunny-side-up eggs onto a plate; on the two plates beside that one were mounds of scrambled eyes. The toaster ejected four slices of lightly browned toast with a soft chime. She placed two of them with my eggs and one on each of the other plates. She filled the remaining space with eight thick slices of crisp bacon.
“That’s some meal. Did you think I worked up that much of an appetite?” I asked. Cups of steaming coffee and utensils set at three of the four positions around the dinette table. I took the middle place beside Cynthia.
“Hah. Cuz, do you have an opinion on that?” Cris asked as she set the plate in front of me.
“He performed admirably, but the large portions are to restore your energy. The healing spells just make your body repair itself quicker. The energy for cell regeneration has to come from somewhere and unless you have a lot of excess fat, which I can guarantee you don’t, you’ll need to restore yourself or your body will sacrifice muscle to repair itself.”
“Oh,” I said.
“But then you already knew that,” Cynthia said with a frown. “That brings us back to the topi
c of your background. You distracted me before I got a real answer out of you.”
“Oh?” Cris said. “Was that what he was doing when I came to get you? Distracting you?”
“Yes, I believe it was,” Cynthia said.
I took a bite of bacon. “If I remember correctly, you started things.”
“The first time, but not the second,” she replied.
“Second?” Cris said. She looked from Cynthia to me as she set the other two plates on the table. “Look, I’d really love to hear more about this, but since I’m the one who has to live vicariously through her cousin, I think this conversation could be held after we eat. I don’t like my eggs cold.”
“No one is stopping you, but we’re not leaving the table until I have an answer,” Cynthia said.
I crunched through the rest of the first slice of bacon and started on the eggs. Unable to ignore Cynthia’s stare, I nodded. After a moment, she lowered her eyes to her plate and began eating.
The meal passed relatively quickly and quietly with the three of us sharing glances and requests to pass the jam or freshen the coffee. Cris’s glances seemed smug when they fell on me and I spent the entire meal trying to determine what lie I could tell without it sounding like a lie.
We finished and I was sopping the yolks’ remnants with my toast when Cynthia took my plate. “That’s not something you do in polite company, besides; you’re only doing it to give yourself more time to come up with a story.”
Damn, but there was no point in protesting my innocence.
Cynthia cleared the rest of the table except for our cups. She brought the coffee pot back to the table and drained it evenly among our cups. She sat down beside me and met my gaze.
“Okay, okay, I give up. Look, I do have more training than I let on. I spent a decade with my mentor learning magic. I’d be with him still, but he was killed.”
Cynthia glanced from me to Cris as though looking for some confirmation, but Cris kept her eyes on her coffee. Cynthia reached out and cupped her hand around mine. “I’m sorry to hear he was killed, Rafe. But why’d you lie? Having more training than me wouldn’t have kept Abigail from hiring you.”
I lowered my gaze as though embarrassed. “He wasn’t a user of earth magic and most of my training isn’t green.”
“But Abigail checked your aura,” she protested.
“I know. Walt was careful to balance what he taught me. Equal amounts of light and night. It kept my aura neutral.”
Cynthia’s hand released mine. “Night? He taught night magic?”
“After he died, I started studying earth magic. That’s why my aura is green now.”
“But night magic? Abigail would have detected...I mean. No, I don’t believe it.”
She turned toward Cris and her face turned cold as it did. “You knew this Christine? You knew he practiced night magic and you let me make love to him?”
Cris opened her mouth to object. I was afraid of what she’d say.
I grasped Cynthia’s hand and she tried to pull away. “Cynthia, can’t you see that I couldn’t tell Abigail what I’ve told you. I can’t help what my mentor taught me, but he kept it balanced. I’ve never knowingly done evil. Not all night magic is evil, it’s –”
“It’s all evil! Only someone corrupted by it would believe otherwise.” Her voice quivered and her eyes welled with moisture.
“Please, hear me out. Sure some of the things he taught me could be used to commit evil, but only if I use them. After he died, I moved away from his teaching and into earth magic. Just because I know some night magic doesn’t make me evil.”
“I’ve never heard of anyone taking the dark path and not being tainted by it,” she said.
“Cynthia, I’ll bet Abigail knows night magic. You can’t fight what you can’t understand and Abigail seems too capable a witch to not study her foes.”
“No, Abigail wouldn’t study night magic. You don’t know,” she insisted.
“Then what does she keep behind that door in the basement. Something back there is neither earth nor white magic. Do you know what it is?” I asked.
“No.”
It was her turn to lie.
CHAPTER 21
What can I say? I’d expected Cynthia to lie, but still, something in me cringed when she did, much the same way she cringed away from me at my admission of learning night magic. For if Cynthia knew of the grimoire, did it mean that Abigail had taught her from its pages? No, she knew of its existence, but that was probably about all. The kind of night magic hidden away by Abigail could not be common knowledge among her coven, but she’d had help casting those wards over the door. Unless...unless she was using the grimoire’s own spells to protect it from outsiders. Talk about playing with fire.
I gave Cynthia a warm smile and tried to show my relief. “Good, whatever’s behind that door is nothing that you should be messing with.”
“How would you know?” Cynthia asked.
“You can feel the power. Tell me you haven’t stood outside that door and felt it.”
She glanced toward Cris and I saw they both had felt its power. Well well, maybe Cris could help me more than I realized; if Cris had the same contact with the grimoire as Cynthia; if I could convince her of the importance of my destroying it. It was a lot of ifs, but I needed more than its destruction. I needed to put an end to whoever was trying to get it. Abigail may have hidden it for decades, but those who wanted it would abuse its power in ways that could shift the balance of power in the world. I wasn’t even counting on the Ragnarök business that Ophelia brought up. Some days you have to settle for surviving.
“Cynthia, what Abigail has is wicked bad. She’s done an excellent job of protecting it from misuse for a long time; I can see that. But now someone is getting ready to take it from her. We can’t let that happen.”
“I don’t understand. How can you know someone’s after...assuming you’re right in that she has something bad locked up in the basement, how can you know someone’s after it?” Cynthia asked.
“What else could these summonings mean? You told me you don’t have much demon activity, but now in two nights someone has brought powerful demons across and sacrificed innocents to gain their favor.”
“Favor? You mean they murdered them just to gain a favor,” Cynthia said.
“Demon favors aren’t cheap,” I said.
Cynthia’s eyebrows turned down and she leaned back, away from me. “And you know far too much about them.”
“I’ve explained that. I can’t change the things I know, but that doesn’t change what I am. I did my best to save those girls. Are you going to condemn me for trying?”
Cynthia stared at my aura, something she hadn’t done since the first time we’d met. After a few moments, she turned toward Cris. “And you vouch for him?”
“Of course I do. I would have warned you if Rafe were a threat. Blood is still thicker than water, Cuz.”
Cynthia nodded thoughtfully. “All right then, I won’t say anything to Abigail. But you’d better be careful, she is not stupid and you’ve already displayed more knowledge than you should have. If she asks me directly, I will have to tell her. I may be able to keep things from her, but I can’t outright lie to my mentor without her knowing it.”
“I understand, Cynthia, and I’ll be careful. I need to be searching for these people after dark. Can you handle the store if Abigail needs someone there tonight?”
“I imagine she’ll want to be ready to move if she suspects there’s going to be another killing tonight. Then one of us will have to watch the shop until closing time.”
“If Abigail suspects that these summonings are to gain access to her treasure, she’ll want to be at the store each night until the killer’s caught,” I said.
“That would make it easier for you,” Cynthia said.
“Tomorrow is the first night of Big Springs Jam,” Cris said.
I looked at her, confused by the nonsequitur. “And that means what?”
“That there are going to be twenty to thirty thousand people at the concert in the park tomorrow night. It’s only a couple of blocks from Nuevo Retro and would be a great time to stage any kind of robbery,” Cris explained.
“Well, kudos to you. That could be the time and we know the place. All right, we’ll just have to be prepared for something big tomorrow night,” I said.
“Bigger than two murders?” Cynthia asked.
I stared at her for a moment and kept my thoughts of innocence lost in my head where they belonged. “Cynthia, you have to believe me when I say that these murderers will stop at nothing to get that book from Abigail. We’ll have to be prepared to help Abigail protect it when the time comes; otherwise it’s Ragnarök.”
Both women stared at me.
“Ragnarök?” Cynthia said.
“That’s what Ophelia tells me.”
“Ophelia? Who’s that?”
I looked from Cynthia to Cris and back. “You don’t know the naiad?”
“The naiad? The Big Springs naiad? That Ophelia?” Cynthia’s voice rose as she spoke.
“Yeah, we talked,” I said.
“But she doesn’t speak to anyone.”
“Sure she does, she spoke to me,” I said, confused and wishing I’d been more circumspect.
“She talks to Abigail, a few times a year, but that’s it. She keeps to herself and doesn’t like nosy people,” Cynthia said.
“Wow, I hear naiads are beautiful. What’s she like?” Cris asked.
“Pretty, well more like beautiful, probably the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met. Current company excepted, I mean.”
“Hah, don’t give me that,” Cris said.
“Wait. You’re certain it was Ophelia?” Cynthia asked.
“That’s what she said her name was. How many naiads do you have in the lake?”
“Don’t be silly, Abigail says she’s the only naiad within five hundred miles or more.”
“Oh? Then I guess it was Ophelia,” I said.
“What’s Ragnarök?” Cris asked.
“Norse mythology, something like Armageddon,” I said.
Wanderers: Ragnarök Page 20