“Cool,” Brittany whispered.
“Come on in,” she said, waving at us.
Brittany stepped into the circle. Feeling the magic Josephine had used to create it simmering around the edges, I hesitated. I wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t that her power felt evil or dark. In fact, the magic seemed almost benign in my head, neither good nor bad. There was something about being in a circle and at the mercy of another that made my hackles rise.
“What is it?” Brittany asked with an impatient rush to her words.
I shook it off, straightened my back, and took a step forward. As I crossed the barrier, magic shot up my spine and I couldn’t contain the shiver. “Christ-on-crutches, that’s strong,” I hissed.
“You felt that?” the witch asked.
“Yeah, I always do.”
“Then you are further along than I knew. What else?”
“OMG! She can make these badass shields. Like a force field or something. It’s quite a bit less enthusiasm.
I guess when you’ve seen fifty other wolves, it kinda loses its luster. The shields though, I was the only one who could do that and evidently, to Brittany, that was the impressive part.
“You are no’ a werewolf.”
“No, I am something else. The wolves call it The Golden Anidae.”
“The Wolf Queen,” she replied, clearly impressed. The rustle of cane let me know Ev was tightening his circle around the perimeter and I turned to face Josephine.
“You’ve heard of it? You are very well informed then,” I said with a skeptical glare. That was quite a bit of knowledge and werewolves tended to be pretty tight-lipped.
“I migh’ be older than ya think.” She smirked. “I’ve come across a werewolf or two.”
“Yeah? How old?” The hair rose on my arms as her magic swirled around her at my question.
“I inherited this plantation from my mother,” she said, turning her full gaze on me. “In 1867.”
I reached for Gladi strapped to my back and drew it in the blink of an eye.
“How?” Brittany asked, and I saw excitement there where it shouldn’t have been.
“The spell is not worth the cost, little girl,” Josephine bit out, her eyes flashing with anger.
“A white goat,” I snarled and I loosened my grip on Gladi, ready to fight my way out of the witch’s trap if need be.
“What?” Brittany asked, glancing from me to my sword and back to Josephine.
“The spell required a human sacrifice,” I hissed, and Josephine had the good grace to look ashamed. “Does Caroline know?”
“No.” The magic didn’t sway as she took a deep breath and gathered herself. “It wasn’t my intention that night. I was young and I wanted revenge on the man who had caused both my maman and I harm,” she said with a weight to her words.
Without her saying the words, I understood what had been done to them. It didn’t take a whole lot of imagination. Men had been raping women since the beginning of time. It wouldn’t stop anytime soon either.
“My maman never recovered from her injuries. He’d been . . . brutal.” Josephine shook off the memory and even after a century and a half the trauma of what had happened was still clear on her face. “I hunted him down and tortured him, over days. I used his blood as the catalyst so that no one would be able ta hurt me again. The result of that spell is what ya see here. I have remained the same since that day.”
I slid Gladi back into her sheath and breathed in deep. Josephine’s scent revealed no lie and the truth in her words rang out. I stepped forward. “Caroline can’t know. I understand that sometimes retribution is necessary. I adore her but she will only see the murder of a man, not a monster. And,” I huffed, glancing up at the old woman perched on the deck, “I wouldn’t hurt her for the world. She likes you and I expect you to live up to her estimation of you.” I hadn’t intended to threaten her but the idea of Caroline losing something or someone else, made my stomach turn.
“Are you always so demonstrative?”
“Yes,” Brittany said with a smile in my direction. “Dahlia protects what she cares about and doesn’t mince words . . . or actions.”
“Good. You’ll need that strength to master your powers. Shall we get started?”
“Yes please,” Brittany said, eager.
I nodded, hesitant.
Josephine had us running through breathing exercises, visualization exercises, and feeling our auras through our senses. As I sat there, shifting through the magic that coursed through me, both the Fertiri and dark fae, I felt them merge together and become something more. Then, without warning, an audible pop echoed, loud and forceful, above my head. So much so, I felt the burst of it deep in my bones as if a balloon had exploded in my chest.
“What the hell?” Brittany cried, and I heard the quick rustle of the cane as Ev barged through the line of magic at the edge of the circle. Additional feet thumped through the cane as Aubrey and Steve came in closer at Brittany’s cry. Opening my eyes, I ducked as a tiny, luminescent wing skimmed my cheek and something sliced across my skin. I swiped a bead of blood from my face and caught a glimpse of bright purple wings with white veins flashing through the flesh. Yellow hair the color of a ripe lemon hung down her back and bright white teeth gleamed in the sun as she snarled at me.
“Holy shit,” Brittany cried as she ducked and covered her head with her hands. “What is that?”
“Pixie,” I hissed through gritted teeth.
The damned pixie dove for her again and without thought, I shoved my power out, using the blood the pixie had drawn from my cheek to slam a protection wall into place. “I hate those things,” I ground out.
The pixie dove again and when it couldn’t penetrate the wall, it landed and paced on pointed toes, back and forth, staring down at us in a clear threat.
Josephine strode over to my wall, ignoring the pixie since I was the only one it seemed to be interested in. She ran her fingers gently across the surface and I shivered at the feel of her touch skimming across my wall. It was as if she had walked across my grave.
She gasped as the beat of my heart thumped through the barrier. “This is your magic, the blood magic. This is what you were born with.”
“It’s mine, or the Fertiri, but I suppose that’s mine too.”
“The pixie?” Brittany asked.
“That’s from Fairie. The Outer Realm to be specific,” I answered. A flash of memory burned through my mind of an inky black stairwell in a murky castle where thousands of beautiful, tiny pixies with talons for claws and teeth like a shark’s mouth swarmed and attacked.
“And you called it. From across the dimensional divide,” Josephine whispered, almost to herself.
“It was more likely Baba Yaga’s taint or maybe it was drawn to her magic. I don’t know but there’s no way I pulled that thing from the Outer Realm. They need a hot spot or a mushroom circle to cross over,” I said, searching for anything I could grab onto in order for what Josephine suggested to not be true.
“But you did. That thing appeared right over your head,” Brittany squealed, excitement clear in her bright gaze. “You can use it. You can use fae magic.”
“Can ya send it back?” Josephine asked.
“I don’t know,” I said hesitantly. In fact, I wasn’t sure how I’d brought it over. All I knew was that the dark fae magic mingled with my Fertiri magic in a way it probably shouldn’t. I visualized all the vampires and werewolves that belonged to me. Not in any specific sense so that I could see their faces or recall their names, but in a way that I could feel them as an extension of myself and my consciousness. As I expanded the idea, the pixie was there at the periphery. Whether I liked it or not, the pixie was mine just as much as the werewolves and vampires were. That was a frightening thought.
�
��Try,” Ev implored softly.
I nodded and closed my eyes again, breathing deep in search of the place in my mind I’d been when the pixie had blinked onto this plane. Dropping my shields and releasing my power, I collapsed the blood wall. As the shield dissipated, the pixie dropped gracefully in a flutter of wings and rested on my shoulder. Calmer and more acclimated, it no longer seemed angry or attempted to draw my blood. Tiny fingers stroked my cheek and its magic burned into my skin, a hot brand across my face. The pixie, beautiful and deadly, didn’t possess magic. She was magic, heart, body, and soul. It wouldn’t exist in this plane or the next without magic or the dark fae taint Baba Yaga had left on me.
I focused on that little pixie and how its magic vibrated differently than Gladi, the wolves, or even the vampires. I needed to understand and know the frequency made the fae in all their forms different. The pixie’s magic was much more violent, a hard back and forth as if it banged against something solid. Gladi’s magic hummed quick and predictably repetitive to the point I couldn’t tell where it stopped and I began. I knew a place where the magic was harsh and violent. I fixed my mind on merging the two, the pixie and the Outer Realm, and before I knew it, the pixie had disappeared. Sighing, I slumped my shoulders in relief and wiped away the sweat that had beaded on my upper lip.
“I think I sent it back but there’s really no way to know where in the hell it ended up,” I huffed.
“You did,” Ev said with a confidence I didn’t feel.
“How can you be so sure?” I asked, trying desperately to have the same confidence in me that he did.
“Because no matter how much you hate the pixie, you wouldn’t leave it alone where it couldn’t defend itself,” he answered with so much faith in me that it shook me to my core.
“Ya have so much power, both your own and the fae magic but know so little about how to use it,” Josephine said.
“She’ll learn,” Ev volunteered.
“Ev,” I snapped.
“Dahlia,” he said, turning to me with a vehemence in his navy blue eyes that I’d never seen before. “You saved me. You are the only family I have . . . you and the Pack. I finally belong somewhere. These people, they’re trying to take that and any future I might have away from me. If you learning this will stop it? Stop them? Then do this. Please.”
I reached out and brushed the shaggy hair away from his eyes. He needed a haircut. He’d been through so much already and become a little brother to me, more than my own had been. He was a part of my everyday existence and if anything happened to him, I wasn’t sure what I’d do. I wasn’t sure I’d ever recover. “Okay,” I said on a heavy sigh. Even if he’d gotten to me, I couldn’t let him think I was going willingly. That just wasn’t me.
“It’s about damned time!” Brittany shouted.
“Language, child!” Caroline called from the back deck, and I suddenly wondered how much she’d heard. Josephine’s pained expression told me she had the same concern.
“Sorry, Miss Caroline,” Brittany called back loudly, forgetting our earlier conversation. Ah, youth. After that, Josephine spent the rest of the day with Brittany and I went back to focusing my magic and trying like hell not to pull something else from the Outer Realm. There were worse things over there than pixies.
Chapter 15
“She did what?” Dean bellowed, and inside the limo his anger seemed much hotter in the confined space than it would’ve outside.
“Yep,” Ev said, pride evident in his tone. He didn’t seem cowered at all by Dean’s anger. Dean had thrown some power behind his shout but didn’t direct it at Ev so he didn’t wipe the smile from his face. “She plucked the little pixie right out of thin air. Pretty,” Ev added, “but it looked like that thing had teeth.”
“It did,” Dean growled and glanced at the slice across my cheek that was still visible in a raised, soft pink line.
Patrick sat back in the seat, elegant and graceful in his tuxedo. I knew that he’d get out of this limo without a wrinkle or crease. Even in the taffeta gown and all the care I’d taken to smooth it out, I knew I wouldn’t look nearly as pristine as Patrick or Dean.
My vampire watched me with a predatory delight when the slit up each thigh of the skirt widened as I shifted, exposing a long length of flesh. Desire flashed in his onyx gaze and my stomach dropped as heat flooded me. A grin spread across his full kissable lips and I knew I was in trouble.
“Were you able to send it back?” he asked.
“Yes.” I shifted again and straightened. The stays in my bodice didn’t bend or allow me to, you know, breathe which was becoming a real problem. It also didn’t allow for weapons. In response, my old stake garters were strapped to each thigh. Six small wooden stakes circled each leg and I had a moment of nostalgia for when the only things I hunted were vampires.
I crossed my legs and the garter showed. Patrick eyed it and his gaze met mine. I knew what he was thinking about. That night in the limo, a night just like this, when our powers had mingled and I’d finally given in to my desire for him. Limo sex is hot and if Ev hadn’t been in the car, I was pretty sure Patrick would have started something that would have required us to circle the block a few times.
“Any way,” Ev coughed, breaking the tension. “So this party, why are we going again?”
This party. Who does that? Who has a formal dinner party for vampires? Not only a dinner party, but a ‘welcome’ party for centuries old vampires which just seemed stupid like I was going to a vampire prom. For the undead, vampires sure did like their drama. “Because we have to,” I bit out.
“Let us return to the other topic, shall we?” Patrick interjected. “Would you be capable of pulling more pixies onto this plane? Or . . . something of greater substance perhaps?”
I thought about it. Remembering the pop of magic and the headache that permeated afterward for hours, I wasn’t sure I wanted to repeat it. It had been as if someone had plunged Gladi into my brain. The same wide blade but a sharper jolt of magic that I now understood was the fae presence. I probably could but it wasn’t something I would look forward to or volunteer to do. Not until I understood more about what I was doing in a way that didn’t make my brain explode.
“Maybe,” I replied cautiously.
“Control,” Dean growled, clearly still angry.
“Yes, of course. I was getting to that. Once the pixies or other beings were on this plane, would you be able to control them?” Patrick asked.
Now he was interrogating me and I didn’t like where it was going. “I honestly don’t know. I didn’t try,” I snapped.
“It followed her and rested on her shoulder,” Ev blurted, knowing I couldn’t get to him and strangle him in this dress.
“It did?” Patrick almost purred with delight. “That is both astonishing and hopeful. I’ve also encountered those fierce creatures and didn’t come out unscathed. I would not relish another engagement.”
“I know what you’re thinking,” I said, “and it’s a bad idea.” I met Patrick’s sly gaze and didn’t look away.
“What? What’s he thinking?” Ev asked, glancing from Patrick to me and back again.
Patrick’s grin grew into a malicious full smile showing teeth and fang and I knew . . . just fucking knew, he’d get his way. He usually did when he had that look in his eye. The only problem was, I wasn’t sure I could deliver.
“Oh, to call forth a fae army from the Outer Realm to destroy our enemies. You know, the usual,” I added sarcastically.
“Lord of the Rings kind of army? That would be cool.”
“More like pixie hollow with Tinker Bell and her friends,” I replied and Dean snorted in amusement. Just as I was about to tell Patrick he was crazy, the limo stopped and the car behind us, carrying Booker, Garrett, Niyati, and six others stopped behind us. We were permitted ten in addition to
the three of us. We left Brittany at home with Aubrey and Steve to guard her for all our safety. She could find trouble quicker than anyone I’d ever seen and that included me.
The driver came around the car and opened the door. Ev exited first, followed by Dean. Patrick stepped out and held his hand back into the car for me. Let’s be honest, I needed the help with this stupid bodice.
As I stepped out, I glanced up at the house. A fortress really. The limo had pulled into the gate and around a circular drive at the foot of massive granite stairs leading up to a house of strong stone and high walls. Around the edge of the property was a fifteen-foot-high wall painted white but I could see the concrete beneath. Along the top of the wall was another three feet of thorny rose bushes, shaped and sculpted for maximum damage. The thorns may not kill them but it would hurt like hell and anyone could follow a blood trail.
I took a deep breath and forced my shoulders back which had the added effect of shoving my breasts out. “Here we go.”
“No pressure,” Ev whispered, “but try not to kill anyone.”
“You take all the fun out of it.” I pouted, releasing some of the tension with the playful banter. It helped.
“We wouldn’t want to ruin that pretty dress,” Patrick added, teasing as he glanced down at the bulge of my boobs about to pop out of the bodice.
“You picked this thing out,” I snapped. He grinned as his gaze darted back down at my breasts and his expression turned hungry. A wave of desire burned in the pit of my stomach and I knew just from that look, I was wet and ready. The entire household would know too. Just fucking perfect.
“Good choice,” Dean growled on the other side of me as his hand descended down my hip and across the curve of my ass hidden beneath the fabric.
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