by Vicki Leigh
“Still in debrief with Trishna. Seth and Nolan are, too.”
The door to my room opened. “Not anymore,” Kayla said as I stepped into clean jeans.
Shutting the door behind her, Kayla hurried to me and placed her palms against my bare chest. My pulse spiked.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come visit while you were still healing,” she said. “Trishna refused to let us leave until she made sure we weren’t under Richard’s influence or something, and Nolan and I went last.”
I touched her cheek. “It’s all right, love. I wasn’t in there long, anyway. Did Trishna find anything?” Between Trishna’s paranoia and Bartholomew’s suspicions, nausea was settling in the pit of my stomach.
“No. All of us were clean.”
Kayla’s fingertips stroked my muscles. Chills ran down the front of my body to my feet. A warm hunger wormed its way into my chest, and, a hand still on her cheek, I lifted her face slowly.
“Bartholomew’s beginning to suspect something, too,” I said, lowering my face toward hers.
“Is that something we should be worrying about?” Her palm rested on my stomach as my mouth hovered above her lips.
“Not right now.” I kissed her tenderly. Her lips were so soft; my heart shifted, remembering how she tasted, how she felt. My hand slid from her chin to behind her neck as my mouth opened hers. Kayla leaned into me with a soft whimper, our kisses intensifying.
“What if the others hear us?” she spoke into my mouth.
“Who cares?”
My other arm around her lower back, I shuffled her to the edge of the bed and sat her on the mattress, our lips moving in time with each other. Sliding between her knees, I laid her on her back, kissing down her chin to her collarbone, nibbling lightly. Kayla held my head, moaning quietly.
A bomb rocketed through my head. I jumped away, gripping my skull with a groan.
“What’s wrong?” Kayla asked as the room spun.
“I don’t know.” Another explosion detonated in my head. With a shout, I dropped to my knees, crushing pain shooting down the left side of my body. Jesus. I squeezed my eyes closed.
Kayla leaped from the mattress, taking my face in her hands. “Daniel, tell me what’s wrong. Look at me.”
The worst agony I’d ever felt was the night I’d stuck my arm through a wraith and melted my skin—until now. It took every ounce of energy not to scream as the entire left side of my body fell limp, like someone lit my limbs on fire while drilling into my bones. I bent forward onto my right hand, balancing my weight between it and my right knee.
Kayla, something’s wrong. My arm gave out, and my elbow hit the stone floor with a crack. I shouted and rolled onto my back, my breath bursting in and out through my teeth.
“Help! Someone help!” she yelled. Kayla ran her hands through my hair. “Hang in there, Daniel. Sam will get— Oh my God.” She stroked my neck with shaking fingertips.
I popped my eyes open. Spidery, dark veins ran every direction down my neck, chest, stomach, and arms, originating from where I’d been shot with the arrow. I whimpered and dropped my head, groaning as another tidal wave of pain rolled through me, moving into every nook of my body. My vision darkening, I closed my eyes, seconds away from asking Kayla to knock me out. What was happening to me?
The door to our room opened, and footsteps ran in. “What’s going— Holy… I’ll call for Trishna,” Samantha said.
“Daniel, open your eyes,” Kayla said, placing a cold hand on my cheek. “Sam, he’s on fire. Daniel, look at me.”
I glanced into her large, petrified eyes—then another bomb detonated in my head.
Blackness overtook me.
ayla and I lay in bed, white sheets wrapped around our naked bodies. Sunlight poured through a skylight above, highlighting the green and gold specks in her hazel eyes. My heart fluttered. She was so beautiful. Her head rested on my shoulder, and her fingertips caressed my chest. My palm rested on her stomach—her pregnant belly.
Wait. Was this a dream? But, how—
“This is what you want most, right, Daniel? A family?” Kayla said, gold rings flickering around her pupils.
What the…?
The sky darkened, and a clap of noise, louder than thunder, rolled through the air. I startled, my insides squirming like maggots on a corpse. In an instant, Kayla was no longer cuddled with me but lying on her back, her stomach flat. An empty baby crib was in pieces on the floor next to the bed.
And Kayla’s throat was slit.
I shot up in my bed with a shout. Cold sweat drenched my skin, and chills ran through me as if I sat in subzero weather. The door to my room flew open. Kayla ran in from the other side.
She gasped. “You’re awake!” She hurried to the bed and flung her arms around my neck, a whimper escaping her lips.
I was slow to wrap my arms around her. Would this moment turn into another nightmare? I held my breath, waiting for another explosion of noise. It didn’t come.
Closing my eyes, I squeezed her and kissed her strawberry-scented hair. The fragrance warmed my cold limbs and relaxed my muscles. She was here; she was alive. I cleared the lump of emotion from my throat.
“I’m all right,” I said, rubbing her back. I rested my cheek on the top of her scalp. My head swam with the image of Kayla lying dead in a pool of her own blood. I grimaced as nausea filled my stomach.
“It was touch and go for three days,” she said. “And your screams… I didn’t know what to do.”
“Wait, what? Three days?” I pushed her out of my hold just enough so I could see her face.
Kayla nodded, her eyes wet. “Trishna’s not sure what happened, but whatever it was, she couldn’t cure you. Those veins covered you for two days, and you were so feverish, and I thought for sure—” Her voice broke. She cleared her throat. “And then today, you started to get better. Bartholomew took some of your blood to see if maybe that arrow had been laced with something. I still haven’t heard anything.”
Blimey.
Pulling her close, I kissed her hair again. “It’s all right, love. It’s over.”
She wrapped her arms around me and squeezed. Again, the feel of my hand on her pregnant stomach and the metallic smell of her blood flooded my head. I shuddered. Between reliving the worst dream of my existence and waking in a deep sweat, the room felt like a freezer.
Kayla touched my bare chest. “You’re shivering.”
“Yeah. I think I need a hot shower.” And maybe some answers as to how the hell I’d had a nightmare. For over 200 years, I’d never dreamt. In fact, I didn’t think Protectors could. As soon as I warmed up, I’d speak to Bartholomew.
Kayla stood so I could slide out from under the sheets. “Can I join you?” she asked, biting her lip.
My mouth gaped. She’d never been so bold. But before I could react, her dead stare flashed in my thoughts, and I flinched. Blast, I needed a moment alone.
I swallowed and touched her cheek when I stood—thankfully still in my trousers. “I’ll be just a few minutes.”
Kayla nodded, frowning.
I drew her to me and held her close. “Hey, thank you for taking care of me.”
She smiled, her cheek against my chest, and her arms squeezed a little tighter. With another kiss to her hair, I moved out of her hold and ran my knuckles along her jawline before entering the loo. After stripping free of the shorts, I turned on the shower and adjusted the temperature until it was almost scalding. I stepped into the waterfall and let the spray beat my back, relaxing my tense muscles and thawing my still-cold body.
I pushed my wet, dark blond hair out of my face and closed my eyes, replaying the scene from the asylum. Richard had been one step ahead of us. Again. He’d said he’d known I wouldn’t pass up a lead, but raising Nolan’s dead mother had to have taken some effort. Which meant he’d known we’d be coming long before we did. Albuquerque had to have been arranged—they’d known we were there.
We definitely had a mole.
&nbs
p; I punched the wall with the side of my fist and hurried through the rest of my shower.
Kayla was on the sofa with Seth and Tabbi when I exited my room. The three of them watched me, their eyes full of concern and curiosity. I’d share my thoughts with them later.
“I need to visit with Bartholomew,” I said.
Kayla jumped up from her seat. “I’ll come with you.”
I shook my head, grabbing a nutrition bar from the box on the kitchenette’s counter. “I’ll just be a few moments. I only want to ask if he’s learned anything from my blood sample. I’ll be right back.”
Her face fell. She frowned but nodded and plopped back down on the sofa, turning her face toward the television. Seth shook his head as Tabbi’s gaze fell on Kayla. I didn’t bother analyzing my friends’ expressions—I’d disappointed Kayla, again—and stuffed my face instead, snatching a bottle of water from the mini-fridge, my gut in a knot. One of these days, I’d think before I reacted.
With a quick wave goodbye to Seth, I exited our home and hurried through the center of Caelum. Our hidden town was filled with people chatting and laughing, and Magus and Protectors evaporated together to and from the city with smiles on their faces. What was happening? Trishna never let us come and go so freely.
Inside the commons room, Nolan was hard at work at the laptop, dark circles around his eyes. Trishna and Bartholomew hovered over a large book. Spotting me, Trishna ushered me to a corner of the room before I could tell her I wasn’t there for her medical expertise.
“Why did no one tell me you were awake? I would’ve stopped by,” she said. “Lift your top, please. I need to make sure you’re fully healed.”
With a sigh, I raised my dark T-shirt. Trishna nodded, but her eyebrows furrowed. “Looks like all traces are gone. How do you feel?”
“Tired, but fine. Kayla said Bartholomew studied my blood?”
She motioned for me to follow her. I dropped my shirt and stepped toward the table where Bartholomew waited.
“He did,” Trishna said. “Turns out, he was right. Your blood was laced with some sort of demonic poison.”
My eyes widened. “What?”
“It was nothing I’d seen before,” Bartholomew said. “And no matter what she did, Trishna could not heal you. We simply had to let it run its course and hope you would recover. I tried to formulate an antidote, but…” He shook his head, lines breaking his forehead.
“Are you feeling any different?” Trishna asked.
“No. Not yet, anyway. Well…” I scratched the back of my neck. “I did have a nightmare.”
All of them, even Nolan, stared at me, wide-eyed. Trishna had warded Caelum from Nightmares. In order for them to enter, a powerful witch or warlock needed to break her charm. No one in the city matched her abilities.
“Are you sure you didn’t just imagine whatever you saw?” Trishna asked.
I shook my head. “It was right before I snapped out of the poison’s hold.”
Bartholomew’s tan face was devoid of its usual color. “I need to look into this. Excuse me.”
When he was gone, Trishna turned to me. “Your team already shared their sides of what happened. But I want to hear your thoughts. Can you debrief me about New Mexico?” She sat at the table and signaled for me to join to her.
Taking my seat, I rehashed what I’d seen and heard, and I shared what I’d come to suspect in the shower: someone tipped off Richard about New Mexico.
Trishna agreed. “Bartholomew and I both believe now that running into the Magus at the Walmart wasn’t an unfortunate coincidence. Someone tipped him off, and Richard definitely knew we’d follow up on the lead. Which means: as of right now, he’s still one step ahead of us. From what Nolan’s shared, I’m not surprised we haven’t been able to locate him. He’s growing more powerful by the minute. Not to mention, he’s an expert in staying hidden; he’s done it for hundreds of years.”
Trishna rubbed her forehead and continued, “I have eyes and ears all over the country, informants of all species, and none of them have reported spotting him. And every time we get close to a member of his coven, they either disappear, or our Protectors can’t evaporate with them back to Caelum. We need a new plan, an offensive one.”
I nodded, scratching the back of my neck. “Can we be sure he’s still even in the country?”
“Oh, he’s definitely here,” Nolan spoke for the first time. “He’s determined to make this world one where the supernatural rule. And, to him, there’s no better place to start than one of the most powerful countries on the planet: the US of A. Not to mention, he’d never leave without Kayla. According to him, she’s the ‘key to everything.’”
A chill ran down my spine.
“That’s it, then. We continue as planned,” Trishna said. “Tonight, we move forward with the party to welcome the new recruits and give our people a chance to relax and have a good time, because tomorrow, everything changes. If it’s a game Richard wants to play, he picked the wrong opponent. We will catch him, and we will kill him.”
ran my hand through my hair as I left the commons room, cringing at the thought of wearing a tux. I’d understood Trishna’s decision to give her coven a night of fun before our lives changed dramatically, but I’d never been one for formal events. It reminded me too much of my seventeen years as an earl’s son. I’d much rather hike through the mountains or read a novel.
Blast, I was boring.
“Hey, Daniel, wait a minute,” Nolan said, jogging after me.
Groaning, I stopped and waited for him to catch up.
Nolan glanced up and down the tunnel before speaking. “About what happened at the asylum, y’know, when you pushed me out of the way—”
I held up a hand. This was the first I’d spoken to him directly since we returned, given my catatonic state. “No need to thank me, mate.”
“Okay, because I wasn’t going to. It’s your job to protect people, right?” He smirked.
I crossed my arms and raised an eyebrow.
“No, but seriously. I’d probably be dead right now if it weren’t for you. You’re lucky you’re short. Any taller and that arrow might have hit your heart.”
“I’m six feet tall.”
“Yeah, well, I still got two inches on you, midget.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, then walked away.
Nolan followed. “Look, you took an arrow for me, so I figure you deserved to know the truth. About everything.” When I stopped, his face fell. He scratched the back of his neck, looking away. “Somebody needs to know. I’m tired of keeping the secret.”
I squinted, sticking my hands in my pockets. “All right. What’s up?”
“It’s about my mom. You know, the crazy lady at the asylum.”
“I remember.” I’d never witnessed someone’s face pale like Nolan’s had when he’d seen her.
“Okay, well, my mother is the reason I want Richard dead.” He sighed. “Years ago, she found out what he was planning, and it freaked her out. She tried to take me and run. I was maybe seven. Anyway, we got as far as Denver, and next thing I knew, Mom was gone. Richard had treated me like a son for as long as I could remember, so when he told me she’d just left me in the hotel parking lot, I believed him.”
“Nolan—”
He held up a hand, finally meeting my eyes. “Then about ten months ago, he sent me to his house to pick up something, and I found her corpse in his basement. She’d only been dead a few days. For ten years, Richard syphoned her energy until her heart finally stopped beating.”
I grimaced. When Kayla had taken some of Nolan’s energy to heal Samantha, I’d seen how it had affected him. The thought of being tortured and syphoned—only to have someone stop long enough for you to regain your strength before stealing your magic again—made me sick.
Nolan kept going. “When I cornered him, Richard locked me in the basement with her body and told me I could either die like my ‘traitorous mother,’ or we’d both forget I ever found her. I
was his ‘only son,’ he said, and that’s when I finally realized why my mother had been so desperate to get me away from him.” He let out a breath through his teeth. “Richard’s my father, too.”
I stared at him, openmouthed and unable to form a coherent sentence. Nolan’s brown eyes were glassy and cold, and his eyebrows were pinched together. Now that I knew, the resemblance between him and his father was clear—the same nose, same facial structure, same dark brown hair. But why had Nolan kept this hidden? Why had he stayed with Richard after his mother’s death? Call me untrusting, but people usually kept secrets when there was something to hide.
“Why should I believe you’re not trying to play us?” I asked.
His nostrils flared. “Because who wants to admit they’re that bastard’s kid? I only stayed with him because I wanted to find some weakness and kill him.” The tension drained from his face. “Anyway, that’s how I know Richard is still in the US. I was supposed to be the one to lead his army overseas.”
My hair stood on end. “Do you know what he’s planning, then?” A flutter danced in my stomach. Maybe Nolan had the key to stopping Richard all along. If we knew what Richard wanted with Kayla and the others, we might be able to win the war.
Nolan shook his head. “He never shared more than I needed to complete a task. I only know what you do: he needs all four Magus who were born on October 31 to fulfill his plans. With them, he’ll destroy everything.”
I ran a hand down my face. “And he has Adelynn, Alex, and Margaret. Kayla’s the only one he’s missing. Does she know the truth about you?”
“No. And I don’t want her to.”
“Why? This is something you need to tell her, mate.”
“Because as soon as she knows I’m her brother, she’ll do anything to protect me. I can’t be another person that she’d sacrifice her life for.”
“You do know she would anyway, right?” Her selflessness was one of the things I loved about her, though it also scared me to the point of nearly turning into the Beast and locking her in a tower. Even if Richard gave Kayla an ultimatum between saving Samantha or herself, Kayla would protect Samantha every time.