“I know.”
“You’ll have to convince her. And … after today, I wouldn’t advise you to visit. Not right away. Christmas maybe, if Desmond goes to his parents’.”
“She’s my friend.”
“We take our friendships very seriously in the pack, alchemist. We understand loyalty. But Desmond …”
“Is angry.”
“For now. But you returned Kandy to us, so balance will eventually be restored.”
“If I stay away.”
“For now.”
Silence fell between us. Normally, that would have bothered me. Normally, I would bristle against anything that came out of Audrey’s mouth. But I knew she was right.
“Thank you, beta,” I said, acknowledging the vital role that Audrey seemed to be settling into well.
“Till next time, alchemist,” Audrey said, baring her teeth at me in an arrogant display of aggression. “And maybe you could be more careful of the furniture?”
I laughed. That was the Audrey I’d expected.
“I’d like to see Kandy before I go.”
“Then Lara will drive you to the portal.”
Audrey stood in one fluid movement that I could never hope to emulate, dragon training or no dragon training. So I didn’t even try as I followed her into the house. She turned right toward the guest wing. I noticed she was barefoot, and just barely managed to stop myself from remarking on the opal polish that prettified her toes and stood out against the dark walnut flooring of the hall. I was ninety-five percent sure it was OPI’s I’m a Princess, You’re Not, which was a go-to favorite of mine. But Audrey wasn’t a friend, and I didn’t want to risk getting my eyes gouged out over nail polish.
An hour ago, Audrey had been a seven-foot, toothy, terrifying monster, but I couldn’t see a hint of it on her now. Whereas my hair had dried in fuzzy clumps of curls. My skirt and tank top were water stained and ripped. I had no idea where my shoes were. And I still wasn’t ready to acknowledge my ruined satchel.
But even as those thoughts popped into my head to distract me, I knew none of that mattered. That was just silly busywork for my mind, so I didn’t have to anticipate the next moment more than my wrenched gut already did.
Audrey led me to one of the guest bedrooms halfway down the hall at the front of the house, but she didn’t enter after she opened the door.
“Desmond’s sleeping,” she whispered. “But you shouldn’t linger.”
“The warrior’s daughter doesn’t take orders from you, beta,” Kandy snapped from inside the bedroom.
A massive grin spread across my face as I dashed into the room. Audrey chuckled behind me and closed the door.
Kandy was lying in the center of a king-sized bed. She had the emerald-green duvet tucked up to her chin and underneath her bare arms. Her hair was mousy brown. She looked like she’d lost ten pounds that she couldn’t afford to lose.
“You look terrible,” she said. Then she offered me one of her nonsmiles.
I started to sit in the green brocade chair beside the bed, then changed my mind. I tossed my ruined satchel to the chair instead, crawling onto the bed beside her.
“Good girl,” she murmured, her words suddenly heavy with sleep.
Careful to not actually touch her, I curled up close, nestling my head on the second pillow. I closed my eyes to listen to the deep, full sound of her breath.
I drifted.
∞
I woke. Maybe ten minutes had passed … the filtered afternoon light in the room hadn’t changed. Yeah, I noticed things like that now.
Kandy was sleeping. I eased off the bed, pulled the strap of my satchel over my head and shoulder, and carefully placed the cuffs from Chi Wen on the side table.
“I’m going to be out of commission for a while,” Kandy murmured, though she didn’t open her eyes.
“We’ll Skype.”
She laughed quietly. “I mean the cuffs. You should take them. Keep them safe.”
“They’re yours.”
“One doesn’t accept gifts from dragons lightly.”
“No.”
“I didn’t, Jade.” Kandy opened her eyes to lock her gaze to me. She looked as exhausted as I’d felt before the nap. Weak and utterly determined.
“I know.”
Kandy nodded and closed her eyes again. Her breathing fell into that deep rhythm almost instantly.
“Sleep well, my friend,” I whispered. Then I turned to the door.
“Give him a chance,” Kandy said behind me. “The sentinel. He’s no Hudson, but he’ll do.”
“That’s high praise from you.”
“Yep.” She laughed.
I waited until the sound faded away before I closed the door behind me.
∞
Desmond was waiting for me in the entranceway. I could taste his magic from Kandy’s room. His citrus-finished dark chocolate was easily at half strength. Moreover, the taste didn’t comfort me as it once had, when for an ever-so-brief moment I’d thought I might find a haven in his arms.
A haven from the terror that my sister had wrought in my life.
The realization that I didn’t need that from him — from anyone but myself — hit me as his gaunt face came into view. The magic he’d expended to heal Kandy had hardened his visage further. Maybe even eaten away at him.
His eyes glittered with shifter magic and animosity, but I didn’t feel like smirking at all the cracks that had suddenly appeared in his armor. He was usually so political, so careful to protect his alliances, his investments. But now he was eager to kick my ass. Warrior’s daughter or no warrior’s daughter.
“I absolve you,” he said.
That stopped me in my tracks. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.”
“What, are you a priest now?”
He glowered at me, clenching and unclenching his hands.
“Imagining strangling me isn’t going to help with whatever lame diplomacy you’re going for, Desmond.”
He growled. A low rumble that spread through the entranceway. I swear I could feel the granite tiles vibrating underneath my bare feet.
“You invaded my home —”
“You thought I invaded your home.”
“Who was that dragon?” He didn’t mean Pulou or Qiuniu. He’d already met or seen both of them in Tofino ten months ago.
He couldn’t figure out if he wanted to strangle me for almost getting Kandy killed, or whether he wanted to own me. He was still jealous. Jesus, shapeshifters and their freaking territory issues.
“You mean Warner,” I answered. “The guy who saved Kandy’s life.”
“The life you put in jeopardy.”
“No.”
Desmond looked as surprised as I felt at my denial.
“No?”
“No.” The second time I said it, I felt the truth of it. We all made choices. We all did our best. Warner, Audrey, and Kandy were right. It was utterly egotistical of me to take the blame for everything bad that ever happened around me. I wasn’t a god. I wasn’t the devil or some minion of evil. I was simply Jade Godfrey, half-witch, half-dragon, baker of cupcakes, treasure hunter, and warrior’s daughter. That was more than enough mantels for one person.
Desmond and I stared at each other until Audrey appeared in the hall behind her alpha, looking anxious. And not just for the furniture. All three of us knew that Desmond couldn’t take me in a fair fight — and that I wouldn’t submit to his authority, with or without one.
“So … Lara is cool to drive me to the portal?” I asked.
Desmond nodded and stepped away from the front door. I resisted the urge to punch him in the gut. You know, just to prove I didn’t need his permission to exit.
“Thank you for bringing our pack mate back to us,” Audrey said. Her tone was cool and formal as she closed the gap between her and Desmond. “We will meet again.”
“Far too soon,” Desmond snapped
. Then he turned his back on me and walked away.
Well, that was that.
I could hear an SUV idling in the driveway. I locked my gaze to Audrey’s. She smiled. Yeah, there was no love lost between us, but she was even more political than Desmond. I’d just tumbled into the living room with an impossible amount of power and prestige at my back. Audrey knew gold when she smelled it.
I had a bunch of nasty things I wanted to say, childish denials of guilt and whatever. Instead, I nodded. “I thank the pack for its hospitality, and for taking care of my friend.”
Audrey nodded back, though she lost the smile.
I think my formality disappointed her somehow. Perhaps I didn’t conform to the box she’d shoved me into and labeled in her mind.
I left.
I didn’t look back. But I did text Kandy a chocolate bar emoticon on the drive to the portal from Lara’s phone, tagging it with the letter J. Sure, Kandy’s cell was probably completely fried from the portal magic and the double near-drownings — like mine was — but I already missed her. She’d get the message the first time she booted up her new phone.
Anyway, I left my best friend to heal her wounds, surrounded by the magic and care of her pack family. I was going to miss her terribly, but I tried to not be sad about it. Kandy would kick my ass if she found me moping.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
A dragon was cooking pancakes in my apartment kitchen. Badly. I could see — even before I’d fully entered the living room — that half of his first attempts were burnt and tossed to the side. He was currently undercooking the second batch.
He’d gotten past my wards somehow. Though as they folded around me, I could feel that they were intact. So he hadn’t damaged them to get into the apartment.
I stopped. Just stopped right there at the top of the stairs that led down to the bakery. The door, the exit, was still open behind me. The living room and the kitchen island were between me and Warner at the stove.
I could turn around. I could walk away. I wasn’t sure that thought had ever occurred to me before. I could leave the map and the responsibility of it to Warner. It was his job — his sworn duty — after all. I wasn’t even a full-blooded dragon. No one would question me taking a step back. No one would question that I hadn’t realized the burden I’d accepted when I’d taken the map from Pulou.
A map that led to artifacts that could be used to kill guardian dragons.
My ruined satchel was suddenly epically heavy. I pulled it off over my head, then dropped it to the worn hardwood floor beside me. I thought about taking two steps and face-planting onto my leather couch, but I didn’t feel like moving any farther.
Warner lifted his attention from the raw dough in the frying pan and turned his head to catch my gaze. “The wolf?” he asked.
“She’ll live. Thank you.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You don’t thank me, alchemist. We all do our parts. It’s been a long time since I’ve worked as part of a team. I’ll do better next time.”
I didn’t respond. Though the words ‘next time’ were literally rattling around in my empty head.
He flipped the pancake. It broke, oozing raw dough everywhere. He grumbled as he scraped the frying pan clean in the kitchen sink.
The sentinel had placed the sacrificial knife he’d ‘borrowed’ in the fortress on the granite counter of my kitchen island. Returning it to me, unasked. Returning the responsibility of my own creation.
I should move. I should shower. I should strip off my ruined clothing. I should find some shoes. I should fix the safe and get the map and knife locked away. If I was going to continue forward, I should be asking questions, demanding answers.
I did none of those things.
I watched Warner adjust the heat of the element and spoon more batter into the frying pan. He had one of my old cookbooks open on the kitchen counter between the stove and the fridge. The one I always went to first, so much so that its binding was broken and its pages of recipes were really just a pile of loose printed paper.
I wondered why he’d chosen that cookbook over all the fancy hardcovers I had shoved away in the cupboard above the overhead fan. Yeah, people bought me cookbooks, which I guess made sense. But I always preferred fine chocolate as a go-to gift.
“Your mother and grandmother are at a coven meeting,” Warner said without looking up from his cooking.
“Did Scarlett let you in?” I thought I’d adjusted the wards enough that I was the only one who could invite — or uninvite — Adepts into the apartment.
Warner looked up at that, surprised. “No,” he said. “You did.” Then he laid a blazing, sexy-as-hell grin on me. Like he could smile like that every day … at me. Warmth curled in my belly.
“The kiss,” I murmured, as I clicked together the pieces of the puzzle that his chameleon magic presented. He borrowed. He adapted, like the ability to change his accent or clothing. That was a bit of alchemy in itself — though he transformed himself, not magical objects as I did.
Here, he’d obviously absorbed the bit of my magic that he’d gotten while kissing me, and had used it to pass through my wards. I certainly had invited him.
Warner’s grin widened, turning intimate and smoldering before he laughed and returned his attention to the pancakes.
For some reason, I felt like moving again. I sauntered over to the kitchen island and climbed up on a stool to prop my chin on my hands.
This third batch of pancakes looked perfectly edible. His ability to absorb new situations, learn languages, and adapt in general was impressive. He was my complete opposite. I had to be beaten over the head before I absorbed any important information.
Warner deemed these pancakes acceptable and put them in the oven to keep them warm. Someone had obviously read more of the cookbook than just the pancake recipe.
“The shadow demons,” I said, even though I would have sworn I wasn’t remotely interested in talking about anything of substance. “I think they stripped the magic from the fortress. Like magical leeches. Maybe even weakening it so much that the pocket that hid the fortress collapsed when we tried to remove the instrument.”
“Or the earthquake was the final trap laid by the sorcerers who built the fortress.”
“It could have been. Except then, how would we have wound up in the ocean without walking back through the doorway, or deliberately cutting another exit through the barrier?”
Warner nodded thoughtfully while flipping another round of pancakes.
“But the leeches couldn’t touch the braids,” I said, continuing to voice my thoughts out loud. “Or wouldn’t.”
“I think you’re right.”
“So they weren’t trying to take the map.”
“Just attracted to its magic.”
“Or to the key it held?”
“Yes.”
“For who? You said they were demon scouts. In the service of what sorcerer? If they’re a form of demon, then they’ve been called to this dimension, but by who?”
Warner frowned. “Dimension?”
“That’s how my father explained demons to me. Not of this world.”
Warner nodded. “The corpses,” he said.
I didn’t immediately follow what seemed like a change of subject. Then I remembered London, and Sienna calling demons forth through the sorcerers. While they were still alive.
“The skeletons of the sorcerers in the fortress,” I said thoughtfully. “Willingly sacrificed before each magical trap. Did you show Pulou the runes?”
“Not yet.”
“Because I still have them.” I’d tucked them in my satchel for safekeeping after Warner had given them to me in the fortress. I laughed at myself, then smiled. Kett would have frozen me out for making such a blunder. For opening my mouth to question what I should already know.
Warner simply answered the question. “Yes.”
“You think someone used the sorcerers to gain entry to the fo
rtress. Performed some sort of black magic, blood magic, to call the leech demons through them.”
“To bind them to her.”
“But she had to try to take the braids herself, because the leeches are only capable of draining magic. Maybe even sustained by it.”
“Eternal life, as they wished,” Warner said grimly.
I shuddered. I couldn’t imagine that was the existence — the shadow leech form — that the sorcerers would have devoted their lives to achieving. “The child dragon,” I said.
“She wears the form of a child now.”
“Now? You think she survived the earthquake? The flood?”
“Dragons are difficult to kill.”
“Do dragons always revert to a younger form like that when their magic has been drained or compromised?”
Warner shook his head. “I’ve never seen or heard of the like.”
“Maybe it’s a lingering effect of the stone spell,” I said, shuddering at the memory of slowly being encased myself.
Warner nodded, but didn’t answer. I could tell he was still peeved I hadn’t countered the spell on the altar more quickly. But the fact he didn’t bring it up pleased me. He might be pissed, but he wasn’t going to fight about it. Like maybe he trusted my judgement.
“How many leeches did you kill?” I asked, changing the subject slightly. “They disappeared at the same time as the kid.”
“If I was truly vanquishing them. If they don’t just regenerate. Not enough.”
I nodded. I was too exhausted to think about it anymore. I felt — utterly selfishly — bereft without Kandy.
Warner stepped over to the fridge and pulled out two plastic containers and an aerosol can of whipped cream. He placed these before me on the island, then grabbed two plates out of the cupboard and two sets of forks and knives.
I watched him as he moved around the kitchen with utter confidence, like he’d lived and cooked here for months. I’d been invaded, and I didn’t seem to mind one bit.
I blamed the exhaustion.
Warner pulled the pancakes out of the oven and set two onto plates. He opened one of the containers — which appeared to hold some sort of stewed sweet cherry — and spooned the fruit onto the center of the pancake. The second container held chocolate shavings.
Shadows, Maps, and Other Ancient Magic (Dowser Series Book 4) Page 22