by Amy Cissell
“And beer,” I added. “Eleanor needs beer. It’s possible it’s a Fae remedy for power surges.” Sometimes I hated my inability to say random made-up shit to be funny. Phrasing was key, but it made my jokes much less amusing. At least I’m assuming it was the phrasing that made it unfunny since no one in the car was even smiling, much less laughing.
Florence sighed. “I’ll find a motel. Do we want something operational, or do you want to find something vacant and squat?”
“If it’s up to me, I’d like something with a fireplace.” Now that my anger was simmering down, I was back to shivering. I needed to find balance if I was going to survive this winter road trip.
“I’ll see what I can do.”
We drove into town and found a restaurant that’d specialized in wood-fired pizza before the surge. It was the only restaurant in the area that seemed operational, so we stopped there. Places were still taking cash—no credit or debit cards, of course—but I felt guilty paying in a currency that might soon have no value. We did it anyway, picking up three large pizzas. We also got directions to some romantic honeymoon cabins outside of town that had fireplaces and spring-fed hot tubs. We were the only customers and spent our soon-to-be-worthless cash on four cabins, each with its own fireplace and hot tub.
I raided my stash for a couple of bottles of wine and invited everyone to my cabin for dinner. Florence had one slice of pizza, declared herself full, and leaned back to sip her wine. Emma followed suit, and I gave her side eyes.
“No way are you full, Emma. I’ve seen shifters eat and know what your metabolism’s like. At least have a second piece. I got three pizzas because I assumed you’d eat an entire one by yourself, and I know I’ll eat at least one.”
“I am not a glutton,” she said, primly crossing her ankles. I rolled my eyes, and she continued, “Unlike some people.”
“If you’re really not hungry, fine,” I said, trying—and failing—to keep my tone civil. “But a hungry shifter is a dangerous shifter, and I can’t imagine your control is that great after being a captive for so long.”
“I am quite full.” Her stomach growled loudly, and it took every ounce of self-control to not laugh in her face. Instead, I passed over a pizza box. She snatched it out of my hands, glared at me, and ate another piece. I was almost done with one of the pizzas when Emma grabbed a third piece. She polished off the entire box of pizza, and I finished the better part of two. When I finally felt like my stomach wasn’t wrapped around my backbone, I groaned, leaned back, and picked up my glass of wine. I wrapped a blanket more firmly around my shoulders and scooted closer to the roaring fire, but the food and wine were doing their job, and I felt marginally warmer.
“So, tomorrow?” I prompted. “I can drive a bit as long as someone else warms up the car. What’s our gasoline situation?”
“We should be okay for now,” Florence said. “We’ll need to find a new source of gasoline and refill the cans before heading out for our next trip. We’ll get better gas mileage now that we’re no longer towing the camper.”
I sat up straighter, nearly spilling my wine. “Oh no! The supplies in the camper? The coffee and beer!”
“I transferred most of the supplies into the back of the car while you were in the hospital and Florence and Emma were in jail,” Raj said. “Anything that wouldn’t comfortably fit, I left with the Savannah vampires to either hold or trade. I gave them all the ammunition since none of us need that. I kept the coffee, gasoline, canned food, and as much liquor as I could.”
I relaxed again. “Thanks, Raj. You’re the best.”
“I know.”
A soft snore interrupted our banter. Emma had fallen asleep. “I guess it’s time to call it a night,” I said.
Florence roused Emma and led her off to her own cabin, next to Florence’s.
Raj leaned forward and topped off my wine glass. I took a sip and then eyed the hot tub. Steam was rising from the surface.
“Don’t let me stop you,” Raj said. “The warm water will help you relax, soothe any lingering aches, and keep you warm.”
I stood up and handed him my glass.
“Turn around,” I commanded.
He slowly turned a full 360, and I rolled my eyes at him.
“I’m going to strip. Turn around.”
“I’ve seen you naked before,” he said.
“By all the gods, Raj, please just turn around.”
He did, and I stood, sloughing off my blankets, then quickly removing my coat, a hooded sweatshirt, long-sleeved t-shirt, t-shirt, tank top, and a sports bra. Once my top was bare, I moved closer to the fire and started on my lower half. Jeans, long underwear, four pairs of socks, and a pair of panties later, and I was nude.
“Okay, you can turn around,” I said after I slid into the natural hot spring.
His eyes flashed red as he raked them down my newly naked body, distorted as it was by the roiling water.
“Are you going to invite me to join you?”
“Only if you’re going to promise to keep your parts to yourself.”
“I think you misunderstand the purpose of an ensuite hot tub.”
“I think you forget how recently I lost my mate.”
Raj stripped quickly and efficiently. I averted my eyes so I wouldn’t see him nude up.
“You can stop pretending not to watch now,” he said.
I couldn’t deny it since I couldn’t lie, so I stayed silent.
He grabbed our wine glasses and the half-full bottle and stepped into the hot tub. I gave up pretending to look away and eyed his naked body appreciatively. He was a beautiful man, and his dark skin glowed with golden-brown undertones. He handed me my glass and took a seat as far away from me as possible.
After sipping our wine in silence for a few minutes, he looked directly at me. “We’ll find Isaac,” he said. “I promise. We will find him, and we will punish those responsible.”
Then, for the first time since Yule when I said my last goodbyes, I cried. Raj set down his wine and slid over. He put an arm around me and let me sob into his shoulder for what seemed like eons. Finally, I cried myself out. My eyes felt red and swollen, and I knew I was the picture of beauty.
“You are always beautiful to me,” Raj’s voice caressed my mind.
“I need a tissue,” I said.
Raj reached behind him to his pile of clothes and whisked out a handkerchief. I blew my nose, wincing at the picture I must be presenting.
“Thank you.”
Raj looked at me but didn’t say anything. He scooted back across the hot tub. I squelched the pang of disappointment I felt when our bodies lost contact. It’d been five days since Isaac had disappeared from this plane, five days since I’d been in his arms. Five days was a little too soon to be lusting after someone new, even if that lust was a pre-existing condition.
“Pre-existing condition?” Raj asked.
“Stay out of my head.”
“Why?”
“It’s private.”
“Eleanor, my sweet, I will not push you. I am patient. I know the witch said to stay out of my bed until after New Orleans, and that you intend to listen to her. I will not stop trying to seduce you—that’s been my goal since we met—but I won’t push too far past your limits.”
“Not too far?” Now I was trying not to be amused.
“I have to push a little. But I am old, and I am patient. You will come to my bed sooner or later. I prefer sooner, so I push.”
“So confident.”
“Of course.”
I laughed. I was finally warm, and the combination of the heat and the wine was making me a little sleepy and a little reckless. I wanted to know what it was like to kiss the vampire—really kiss him, not the kisses he’d stolen in the past. And then, I wanted to know what it would be like to have him drink from me.
“Eleanor,” Raj said. “If you don’t stop that particular line of thought, I might not be as patient as you need me to be.”
I tri
ed to redirect my train of thought, but from the red flashes in his eyes, I wasn’t doing a very good job.
“I should go,” he said.
I wanted to tell him not to go. I wanted him to stay with me, to hold me while I slept, but I knew as well as he did that it wouldn’t stay platonic for long. We were dancing dangerously close to a line I wasn’t sure I wanted to cross, and it wouldn’t take much tonight to push me over the edge. So instead of grabbing him and kissing him, I closed my eyes and said, “Okay. I’ll see you in the evening for the next leg of our journey?”
“I’ll be back before then. I need to feed.”
I ignored the stab of jealousy and nodded. I felt a feather-light caress on my face as he exited the hot tub. I kept my eyes closed until I was sure he’d have had a chance to dress and then opened them and looked around. He was gone, and I was alone.
“Never alone,” his voice whispered to me. “If you need me, just call.”
I sat in the hot tub and finished my wine. I tried not to think about my complicated relationship with Raj, or my missing mate, or anything more confusing than whether or not I should finish off the last of the pizza. I got out of the hot tub and wrapped myself in the large robe that Raj had left by the tub. I grabbed the pizza box and made a nest of blankets in front of the fireplace. I added enough wood to hopefully last through the rest of the night, then stared into the flames and finished the pizza and the last of the wine.
I knew I was dreaming because it was summer, and I was warm. I stretched out, and wings erupted from my back with a suddenness that was both painful and exhilarating. I dropped forward onto all fours and slowly morphed into a dragon.
When the transformation was complete, I launched myself into the air and surveyed my surroundings. The Earth was barren but beautiful. Browning scrub grass dotted the canyons that were at the base of impossibly high cliffs dotted with holes. When I flew in closer, I realized that the holes were doorways. I was somewhere in the southwest. A hot updraft rose from the canyon floor, and I spread my wings to catch it. As I soared upwards, the unmistakable energy of a gate caught my attention. I flapped my wings to get out of the heat stream and turned towards the gate. I flew over a circle of stone foundations that marked an old village. I wondered who lived there and who lived in the cliff-side village. Did they have people afraid of heights? Or were the easily accessible homes reserved for the elderly and pregnant women?
Something caught my eye ending my idle speculations. A figure crept out across the desert floor. I was high enough up, and its back was to me, so I couldn’t see if they were male or female, but the way it kept glancing around marked it as someone hoping not to be seen. I flew in closer, operating under the assumption that since I was dreaming, this figure wouldn’t be able to see me.
Once he—for the figure appeared masculine now that I could see the lines of his body—reached the inside of the foundation circle, he lay down items in an elaborate pattern. He remained crouched for a long time, hands stretched out and then the items slowly sunk into the ground. He dusted his hands off, then stood. The setting sun caught his hair, and it flamed a brilliant red as he turned towards me. Finn.
In an instant, I forgot this was a dream, and I dove towards him with claws outstretched. I flew right through him with no effect. He didn’t even flinch. He surveyed the area, concentrated for a second, and then the ground smoothed out, looking as if it had never been disturbed. Then he backed away before turning and disappearing.
I landed in the center of the circle and shed my dragon shape. I located a spot where Finn had buried one of the items and dug it up. I had a flash of wonder that I could affect my dream world when I couldn’t touch Finn, but it faded quickly as I examined my find. It was a small disc, about four inches in diameter and less than two inches thick. I turned it over a couple of times and then saw the pressure plate on one side. It was a landmine. I laid it down and sank into a cross-legged position. I didn’t know how to disarm a landmine. Now that I knew they were here, I could fly into the center where Finn had not placed any mines, but that would leave me isolated.
The worst, though, was that this was not the next gate. That meant that it was going to be a minimum of three months before we got here—maybe even longer if New Orleans was between the mystical rocks and the cliff village. Tourism had probably dropped off some in recent weeks, but the effects of the cataclysms were less in the southwest, and there might still be tourists coming through here. Or national park rangers. Or lost hikers.
The more I thought about all the innocent people that could get caught in Finn’s deadly booby traps, the angrier I got. I transformed back into a dragon and roared a great wave of fire at the ground, blackening it beneath me, but having no effect on the one visible landmine.
Fuck.
I flew back to the cliff where I’d started my adventure and once again shifted back to my human body. I concentrated on leaving the dream world behind and waking up, and slowly the blue sky, purpling to dusk in the west, faded into black. I struggled for a second, feeling suffocated after the recent freedom of heat and flight and realized I was cocooned in my nest of blankets.
“Let me help,” Raj said, and he was there, untangling the blankets from around my arms and legs and freeing me from their claustrophobic confines. I sat up in front of the still-burning fire and shivered a bit, more from the memory of my dream than from any real chill. The room was pleasant.
“Do you want to talk about your dream?” Raj asked.
“We need to, but we’ll need Florence, too. What time is it?”
“Nearly dusk, about five.”
I sighed. “It’s probably time to get going, then.”
“I have coffee for you,” he said.
I smiled. “I’m not sleeping with you.”
He laughed. “That wasn’t my aim. I merely desire civility.”
I grabbed the proffered cup of coffee. I wanted a shower, but there was no hot water other than that from the hot spring. I settled for a refreshingly brisk face wash with a hot coffee chaser then made Raj turn his back so I could layer on my clothing.
Chapter Two
WHEN FLORENCE AND Emma arrived with breakfast—fireplace toasted bread with jam—I told them about the dream. Florence looked as concerned as I was, Raj was as unperturbed as ever, and Emma just looked confused.
“Who’s Finn?”
“Six-foot-tall red-headed douche-canoe elf,” I said. “He was my best friend and more for years, but our friendship took a decided turn for the worse after I found out who I was and that he’d known all along.”
“Does he have a little goatee type beard?” Emma asked.
“Yes.”
“I think I know him.” She refused to say more, but her delicately pretty face got hard, and the mind readers’ faces turned grim.
“We need to kill him,” Raj said. “Why is he still alive?”
Florence looked ill. “He’s alive because of me. I asked you not to kill him.”
“You said we’d need him,” I reminded her. “Is that still true?”
She didn’t answer for several seconds, and I wondered what was going on in her head.
“She’s wondering if what we still need him for outweighs the damage he did to Emma,” Raj said.
“What do we need him for?” I asked out loud, but also directed at Raj in case he was picking up something.
“I can’t tell you,” Florence answered, not shocking anyone.
“She’s hidden that away,” Raj said to me.
“Well, he’s not here right now anyway,” I pointed out. “So we aren’t going to kill him today. Eventually, he will pay for his crimes. And now we have fair warning that no one can approach that gate except me, and that I must approach from the air.”
“It’s too bad you didn’t dream the location of the next gate. That would’ve been more useful,” Emma said.
I felt my fists tighten and a surge of heat washed over me. Anger was counterproductive, and she was right
. “You’re right, Emma,” I said, trying to unclench my teeth. “That would have been a lot more useful. However, knowing there are landmines scattered around a future gate is also a handy fact. We’ll want to use caution for all the gates, in case there are similar booby traps everywhere.”
“Where are we headed today?” Florence asked.
“We’re headed northeast until we get tired of driving, and I said I’d take my turn.”
Florence went out to start the car and get it warmed up, while I made sure we were packed and the fire was out.
“This is the best place we’ve ever stayed,” I said, eyeing the fireplace and hot tub with regret. “We have weeks before we need to open the next gate, we should stay here for most of that time.”
“There’s no way anything could go wrong with that,” Raj said.
“Think of the possibilities,” I pointed out. “Eventually, you’d wear me down in the hot tub; you know you would. Hot tubs are dangerous.”
“Hmmm…maybe you’re right.” He took two steps towards me until only a fraction of an inch was between us. “I know you tease, but this is not a game for me. Not anymore.” He dipped his head and kissed me before grabbing my backpack and disappearing out into the cold.
I raised my hand to my lips and tried to tamp down on the erotic movie that had started playing in my head.
“I guess I know how seriously you took your mating,” Emma said. She glared at me, and I stared coolly back.
“Excuse me?”
“You claim you mated with Isaac and now he’s dead, and you’re making out with a vampire less than a week later? You’re a liar and a cheat.”
“First, I can’t claim anything that’s not true. You’d think your time among the Fae would’ve taught you that we can’t lie. Whatever else you want to think of me, at least know that is one thing that is never going to happen. Second, you do not know me, or Raj, or my relationship with Isaac. He was my mate. We were together less than two months before we mated under the full moon. How long did he date you?”