Insatiable (The Curse of Avalon Book 3)

by Sariah Skye

  “Wait. Wait wait wait… what exactly are you saying? Who is Nimue, exactly?” Bash asked, scratching his chin.

  Mordred frowned gently, and I gasped. Smacking Bash insistently in the arm, it hit me. That frown, it was just like—

  “—Nadina!”

  Now it was Bash and Xander’s turns go turn stark white.

  “Yes, on your world she goes by Nadina. She’s been following your father around for some time. Shadow fae are technically demons, so because of that, she’s impervious to incubus magic which is how she was able to get close to him. She was the one who stole Excalibur from him.” Mordred grinned, then. It was uncanny how much he appeared like Nadina; it was so obvious now. “I am pleased that you got it back.”

  “Holy shit. Holy shit!” Bash said, the wheels turning in his head. “Gah! I’m such an idiot, how did I not see this!?”

  “Do not despair, she’s a master manipulator,” Mordred said grimly. “I’m afraid I’ve never seen eye-to-eye with my parents. I’m in charge of the Avalonian Rebel Forces against them.”

  “You?” I shook my head in amazement.

  “What is Nadin—Nimue’s—end goal, then?” Xander asked.

  “Once the barrier between Camelot and your world is weakened, it’ll open up the Underrealms fully. Earth is fair game, and demons like you’ve never seen will be unleashed in the world,” Mordred said.

  Oh shit. “So what do we do?”

  “Find the spell. Make it your priority. Resurrect Avalon, and I’ll try to hold Arthur’s army back. We are twenty-thousand strong, but Arthur is still stronger. With Avalon resurrected, it’ll put a huge crimp in his plan.”

  “What about my father?” I asked, with teary eyes.

  “I continue to try to free Lancelot. I’m only thankful that Guinevere managed to escape, she is but an innocent bystander in all of this. But, she’s charged with treason as well. If she is caught…” He trailed off. “In the meantime, once you resurrect Avalon, you open the portal to come here, to Camelot once you have the spell. But before you do, wait until I contact you to make sure it’s safe. I’ll create a diversion. We don’t have much time though, so hurry. I will do what I can,” Mordred said; his image shimmered in and out once more. “I’m afraid I must go before I’m caught. If I am, Lancelot has no chance. Find the spell. Bring Excalibur; use Merlin. Lady Avalon, you are our only hope.” And just like that, the image faded into oblivion.

  I stood, motionless in front of the portal, stunned and saddened.

  “Avie?” Xander asked hesitantly, after a few moments of silence.

  “‘Lady Avalon, you’re our only hope.’” I snickered. “That sounded very Princess Leia in Star Wars, didn’t it?” Ah, classic awkward Ava. When in doubt, snark it out.

  “How can you joke around?” Bash asked in disbelief.

  “It’s what I do!” I exclaimed. “Get uncomfortable, crack a joke! Don’t ever bring me to a funeral!”

  Xander shook his head slowly. “I… don’t even know what to do with this.”

  “Yeah we do. We confront Rhys, that’s what. How could he not know about this?” Bash groused. “I just…” he pulled at his hair and let out a frustrated yell. “Goddammit all…” He pointed at me, “Go get Trystan, you get Mathias,” he pointed at Xander. “Shit’s goin’ down. I’ll be there in a minute, I need to find out about these shadow fae.”

  “Right.”

  “So what the hell is going on?” Trystan demanded. “Nadina is Nimue, some bitch fae working with Arthur?”

  Rhys was very quiet; suspiciously so.

  “What do you know?” Bash demanded to him.

  “I really don’t. I never met her, that’s the truth,” Rhys said in a small voice. “She wasn’t an official Avalon witch, that much I know, though she still had connections with them. I am not sure, that’s truth. Arthur had a lot of secrets.”

  “History doesn’t say she had a kid at all, though. Mordred was supposed to be—Morgause’s?” Bash said, looking over one page in a stack of hundreds.

  “That can’t be, Morgause never had children; she said so,” I said. “She wouldn’t lie; I know it.”

  “History had it wrong, then,” Bash said flatly. “Or, it was purposely recorded wrong.”

  “Why have they been so quiet, lately?” Mathias challenged suspiciously.

  “Maybe they’re preparing… for war.” Rhys’ normal joking disposition was serious. His words left an ominous tone in the room.

  “My dad… he’s gonna die,” I said, sniffling. I was curled up on the sofa, knees tucked into my chest, and I hugged them close to me.

  “That is not going to happen, lass,” Trystan said softly; he was sitting right by me but for how alone I suddenly felt, he just as well have been miles away. “We will get him back,” he clasped my knee and rubbed his thumb against the top of my thigh gently.

  “How? We don’t even know the spell!? This is…” I stopped mid-sentence. Why bother?

  “It’s close; everyone keeps saying that. I’ve scoured all the books I have, even old spellbooks. Nothing comes even close. There is one tiny mention in an old book of Merlin, but I doubt it was actually yours, Rhys,” Bash said. “All it said was something possibly about a secret society, but there are tons of those.”

  “Did you know Arthur had a son, Rhys?” Xander asked gently.

  Rhys shook his head. He sat on the floor, absentmindedly petting the pups; switching off and on between the two youngest. “No, I’ve been gone a long, long time. Arthur banished me. He wanted to execute me but it’s impossible. I can’t die without tremendous effort. I guess shoving me in that vessel was their best solution to get rid of me.”

  Mathias was pacing the living room, and he scrubbed a hand over his face. “What are we missing?”

  “Guys…” Xander gestured to the TV. It was still on from earlier, but the volume turned down. Bash snatched the remote from a table and turned it up.

  “We have a breaking news alert; a new development in the story of the missing Minnesotans. Our news room has learned of several more reports of more missing people. For more on this story, we go to special investigative reporter, Brad Owens.” A handsome middle-aged man appeared on the TV, with a microphone and a bright light. It was dark—it was nearly six at night—and he stood in front of a green I-94 highway sign.

  “Thanks, Cassandra. I am standing here along highway 94, just a few miles north of St. Cloud. Several more people have been reported missing, and the only thing that ties them together?” He motioned back at the sign. “They all seem to be missing from towns located just off of highway 94, from well-known restaurants, truck stops, and tourist areas. The other thing they seem to have in common?” The blurry photo of Nadina—Nimue—flashed onto the screen. “Various security footage from gas stations of this woman have been reported. We do not know as of yet if the cases are connected. From Sartell to Sauk Centre and finally Osakis just southeast of Alexandria; there seems to be a pattern. Alexandria police are on alert tonight for any possible incidents tonight.”

  “Holy fuck.” Bash said, wide eyed, covering his mouth with his hand. “Guys this is bad. Really, really bad.”

  Mathias grunted in agreement; he paused in his pacing to watch the news report.

  “Again, police are asking the public if they have any information, to please report anything to the police, no matter how small you think it is. Live, from Highway 94 in Osakis, I am Brad Owens.” The news story flipped to its normal programming.

  If the tone in the room was ominous before, it was positively dire now.

  Bash was the one that started pacing next. “Okay. There’s a pattern now. She’s obviously heading for somewhere. Is she going to Alexandria next?”

  “Where is that?” Rhys questioned.

  “Northwest of here, about an hour and a half away,” Xander explained.

  “But what is in Alexandria? Or is there something else she’s heading for?” Trystan wondered.

  “We know s
he’s searching for the spell,” Bash said, you could tell his brain was moving a million miles an hour. “She must know something we don’t.”

  “What the fuck is in Alexandria, of all places, that she could want?” Xander snorted, shrugging his shoulders.

  “No idea; there isn’t anything there but tourist traps, camping—” Trystan began.

  My eyes widened, and I slapped him in the knee. “The Kensington Runestone.”

  “The—what?” Xander asked. “I’ve never heard of it.”

  Bash paced quickly, his hands moving wildly as if he were putting all the pieces of the puzzle together. “Oh my god. Oh my god, that’s it. It’s been there all along, in broad daylight! I didn’t put any stock in it because it’s supposed to be a hoax, but—” Bash was in motion, flipping through his stacks of papers, tossing them about haphazardly. Xander was visibly miffed at the mess but didn’t protest.

  He came across what he was looking for and started reading. “The Kensington Runestone was unearthed by a farmer in 1898, wrapped up in the roots of a dug-up Aspen tree…blah blah blah…later determined to be a hoax. The farmer was shamed, and the stone forgotten, but in the years following, people started wondering again. Carbon-dating dates the stone to approximately eighteen-hundred years old, and the stone is of mineral content consistent of England.”

  “Holy fuck!” Trystan exclaimed. Bash held up a finger.

  “There’s more. A new research project began to shed new light on the lore of the runestone and a new theory was proposed; that it was a relic, recorded and passed on throughout time, revealing the legendary holy grail and its location.” He smacked the paper. “Guys! This is it! This is the spell!” He seemed triumphant, and relieved to finally have the answer. “We know that there are a couple of supposed grails, and it is thought the grail contained information to Jesus’ bloodline… but what if it is really the ‘Avalon’ grail? The so-called fountain of youth? The grail is supposed to make you immortal, and young again. Sounds like Avalon to me!”

  Rhys let out an unintelligible sound. “That certainly sounds like Avalon. No one ages there, no one dies. The witches heal—that’s got to be it. Do you have a photo of it?”

  Bash nodded quickly, flipping through more paper, tossing more of them on the ground. He was such a flurry of motion, all the dogs in the room freaked out, and started running for the backroom. He came across what he was looking for; a photo of a large slab of stone.

  “Show it to Ava,” Rhys instructed. “If it’s the spell, she can read it. At least, a little. The rest will probably be spelled.”

  He thrust it at me and waited expectantly. I carefully eyed the worn ruins, hoping something would register. After blinking a few times, something started coming into focus. “To summon the isle of Avalon.”

  “Holy fucking shit. That’s it. We found it. We really found it!” Bash was positively giddy. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before! It’s so obvious now!” He knelt down and grasped my hands. “You figured it out.”

  “Great. But now what?” I asked dryly. “That big stupid stone is stuck in a museum. People go see it every day. We can’t actually you know, take it and use it.”

  Bash’s triumphant face fell. “Right. Right.”

  “What about a photo?” Mathias suggested, but I shook my head.

  “I’m looking at it right now. I can only read the top line,” I said.

  “The spell would be hidden unless you have a tie to Avalon. Or reasonably, Camelot,” Rhys said. “They would have done it that way to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands, or someone, who is not even related to the legends, copying it in another form and trying to use it later. It’s good magic.”

  “A little too good,” I said blandly.

  “And if that’s the case,” Mathias said, “then Nadina—or Nimue—is on her way right now to get that stone and she has a head start.”

  “If she beats us to that stone and has a way to summon Camelot… it’ll be disastrous,” I said.

  “It stands to reason though she can’t actually summon it yet,” Rhys pointed out. “You usually cannot summon this type of magic alone. It usually requires... well at least more than one. It will probably tell us, but it’s usually no less than three. For some reason, most magics work in threes.”

  Bash frowned. “That means… this is probably a trap. She needs Merlin, and she needs Ava.”

  “But—what about us? We can’t summon it without three? We only have well, me and Rhys!” I said, defeated, slumping against the couch. “It’s pointless.”

  “No, we have three.” Xander’s gaze was pointedly fixed on Bash.

  Rhys cheered. “Yes! You’re a siphon! You can take the magic of others and channel it as your own!”

  Bash’s eyes widened; his knees went a little weak, Trystan reached out and grabbed his arm before he fell. “Igraine was right. She was right all along…”

  “How was she right?” I asked him quietly.

  “‘You need to understand your connection; it will be imperative,’ and ‘you and Ava have the power to see it through,’” Bash said solemnly. “Holy shit.” His expression was such that he looked like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders… and I supposed he kind of did.

  I lowered my legs and opened my arms; yeah, I was telling him to sit in my lap. I’d been dealing with this for a while; I knew I was going to have a huge role in all of this. But Bash? He didn’t have any idea other than “just” my protector.

  He obliged, draped his legs over mine, and curled up against my side.

  “Sucks, huh, babe?” I said softly to him, with a hint of a smile.

  “Yep. Sure does. No pressure or anything, right?” He laughed uneasily.

  “Nope, no pressure.”

  “So, all we gotta do is, what? Steal a huge rock from a public area, avoid falling into a trap, and summon an entire land mass over our home,” Trystan said bitterly. “Anything else?”

  “Yeah,” Xander said with a derisive chuckle. “Try not to die in the process.”

  “Fuck me…” Bash said, shaking his head, still looking disbelieved.

  “I’d love to, but now’s not probably the time,” I snarked, gently nudging him. He barely even cracked a smile.

  “How are we going to get a giant stone tablet out of there—and bring it here?” Xander kept running his hands through his hair anxiously. “I… Rhys can you teleport it?”

  Rhys cringed. “It’s possible, but not probable.”

  “And seriously, we’re going to get caught. An entire town is going to know if a giant piece of rock is suddenly missing,” Trystan grumbled.

  “We could set up a decoy,” Mathias suggested. “It only needs to fool them for a little while, we can return it later.”

  Rhys snorted. “No, we can’t. We don’t know what else is on that tablet. There could be hundreds of spells, dangerous if they fall into the wrong hands. It belongs to Avalon, not a museum.”

  “Indiana Jones would be disappointed,” I kidded awkwardly, groaning at myself. “Ugh, someone stop me.”

  “It’s okay, luv.” Trystan gently squeezed my knee.

  “It’ll take too long to create an exact replica. Even a bad one will be… impossible.” Bash sighed, defeated. “I don’t see how this is going to work.”

  “At the very least, we can go and see if we can stop Nimue from using it. She won’t be able to take it anywhere, I assume; she’ll probably try to summon Camelot from where she is, in Alexandria,” Mathias said. “We can’t let that happen, at least.”

  “He’s right.” Rhys’ face was solemn.

  “We need a miracle,” Trystan stood, “or a beer. Anyone else?”

  Bash grumbled angrily. “Dude, we really shouldn’t be drunk during this.”

  “Hey, if I’m going to die, I’m going to enjoy myself first.” Trystan paused on the way to the fridge, throwing a playful look at me. “Avie, you want a quickie or something?”

  “By the gods,
man, enough!” Bash shouted at him.

  The sound of Mathias’ phone distracted us away from Trystan. He cocked a brow. “Link?” He lifted the phone to his ear. “Everything okay? It’s Sunday, the club it—” he paused and flinched. “Open the door? Why?” He hustled to the front door, unlocking the wards with a wave of his hand, and flung it open. “Link? What are you doing here?”

  Bash sat upright, glowering. “And how did you get through the wards?”

  Mathias motioned in and the baby-faced, blond fae entered, followed by another man; someone I didn’t recognize. But Xander looked like he’d seen a ghost.

  “Thomas?” He asked in amazement and confusion.

  The strange man acknowledged him with a nod. “Hello, again, Jian Xiang. I am pleased that you are doing well.” Xander just stared mouth agape at him.

  “The Thomas? Thomas Alexander?” Bash stood quickly, arms over his chest, eyeing him carefully. Thomas’—or the man claiming to be Thomas—gaze tracked over to me quickly, and I could swear his turquoise eyes flashed to brown before turning back.

  I gasped. “Incubus!”

  Mathias was immediately defensive, but the strange incubus raised his hand. “Please, allow me to explain. There isn’t a ton of time though.” Thomas the incubus spoke in a careful, proper British accent, and his voice was deep, almost deeper than Xander’s.

  He turned to Mathias and held out his hand. “We have met before, Mr. Romanello, but only over the phone. I am Mr. Finn.”

  It was Mathias’ turn to be shocked. Hesitantly, he shook his hand.

  “Everyone calls me Finnian though. Now at least,” his attention focused on Xander next.

  “You’re—not Thomas, then?” Bash asked, confused.

  “No, I am. Well, I was. But…” Thomas-Finnian-incubus whoever glanced at Xander. “That was another life ago, it seems like.”

  Trystan was fuming; he was white-knuckling that beer he’d just gotten. “Would someone please tell me what the hell is going on here?”

  “We can explain but quickly,” Link said. “We’re part of a secret organization called the Loremasters.”

  “Never heard of you.” Mathias menacingly folded his arms over his chest, lifting a severe brow. “And in all my years, I’ve heard of everything; even a gods-be-damned shapeshifting sword.”