Grimm's End: Grimm's Circle, Book 9

by Shiloh Walker

  A gentle breeze tugged at my hair. Slowly, I dragged my gaze to the ruins of the castle in front of me.

  “Rip finalized the purchase of the castle and the lands.”

  I nodded yet again.

  It had been three weeks since we’d returned.

  We’d had a memorial for Rob and I’d brought his ashes to Scotland.

  They thought I was crazy.

  But the last place where Will had been was here.

  Rob’s loyalty had been to Will.

  And the rugged, wild beauty of this place…something told me he’d appreciate it.

  Nobody really seemed to know him all that well, even Rip, and he’d told me that he was one of the few who would have called Rob friend.

  That made me hurt.

  He’d died for me, had promised to protect me to his final breath, and he had.

  He would have done the same for any of us, all because we were Will’s.

  But none of us had ever really reached out to him.

  I went to my knees and smoothed a hand down the stones. “How is it going on the battlefront?”

  “It’s…” Rip blew out a breath and said gruffly, “Stable, Mandy. Surprisingly stable. We’re slowly getting the upper hand after two years of getting our arses kicked.”

  I nodded.

  “It will continue to get better.”

  He crouched down next to me and after a moment, he said, “Tell me. Talk to me. What happened?”

  But I remained quiet.

  After a long, long while, Rip rose and walked away.

  Some things hurt too much to share.

  “I’m sorry,” I said to the stones that covered the simple urn. In time, I might have the strength do something more. Sprinkle them across the earth. Maybe work them into the soil of a young tree. I don’t know. “I should have reached out to you, gotten to know you better. I just…I’m sorry.”

  * * * * *

  “Are you going to leave us?”

  Sina found me sitting on the cliff three days later.

  It had been a month.

  Every day, I found myself taking off my pendant and holding it, pondering, considering.

  Every day, it was getting harder to hold on.

  I’d told him to come back to me.

  He’d told me he’d do it…if it was possible.

  But he hadn’t found me yet.

  Watching the sun reflect off the silver, I said, “I haven’t much thought about it one way or the other.” Then I shrugged. “But you’ll be okay, regardless. Rip says we’re leveling out.”

  “That doesn’t mean we’re okay.” She turned troubled eyes out over the water. “I know you found him.”

  I stiffened.

  “I won’t ask you to tell me what happened or push you for answers. But I knew the minute you returned, and when you wept so over Rob…that just convinced me even further. You found him.”

  I slid her a look from the corner of my eye.

  She was staring hard at me now.

  “And then you had to leave.”

  Rising, I slid the necklace into my pocket. Chilled to the bone, I wrapped my arms around myself. I hadn’t spoken of this to anybody, although the weight of the burden, the pain, tore at me. “Do you know?” I asked quietly, looking back at her. “What it was he did?”

  Sina stared at me for a long moment and then she looked away. “How did you learn of it? He wouldn’t have told you.”

  “In a way, he did.” I shrugged when she looked at me. “But it doesn’t matter. Something about…what happened at the end…he begged for forgiveness. I don’t know what it was, how it happened. But he was trapped in purgatory and when he asked for forgiveness, he was pulled out. A piece of him was lost there though. Trapped in purgatory—that’s why the veil thinned out.”

  “Purgatory?” Sina cocked a brow.

  “The netherplains.” Rubbing the heel of my hand over my chest, I added, “Demon central. He ended up there, instead of…wherever else he should have gone. I guess he made the first real rip.”

  For a moment, Sina said nothing.

  Then, slowly, she came to her feet, rubbing at her face, a look of disbelief etched across her features. “You…you’re telling me…”

  “He’s there. He has to find the original rip, where he was pulled from purgatory back to this world. There was…” I swallowed, thinking of the bond that had been forced on him. By the serpent, Will had said. “He was tricked, deceived…something was forced on him and when he was pulled out, not all of him made it through.” I looked down at the green earth where he’d flung himself into that dark void so long ago.

  “The original rip…where the hell is it and how are we supposed to find it?”

  “We don’t need to.” Sina’s eyes were huge, haunted. “That would be near Golgatha, Mandy. Near Jerusalem. Honey, that’s…”

  My stomach dropped out.

  Numb, I fell to the stony, rocky earth.

  I turned my gaze southward.

  “Thousands of miles,” I said. “Thousands.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  I did the math.

  It was over four thousand. We can walk endlessly—doing ten miles in an hour for eighteen to twenty hours is a piece of cake. A few hours to rest, then back up again? What would take mortals years, we could do in months.

  But that’s on our side of the veil.

  It had been nearly two years—again.

  There had been no sign of Will.

  I had no plans to go anywhere.

  But Sina intervened, which was what she did.

  She walked into the flat I’d rented, carrying a small, frail bundle. I was mostly out of the fight and she was mostly leaving me alone.

  But every now and then, she showed up, as though she had to make sure I was still breathing.

  I looked at the wriggling little thing she held and said, “Take it back.”

  “Sorry.” She shoved the baby into my hands. “They don’t accept refunds.”

  I didn’t look down. Once you met its eyes, it tried to bond to you. I’d read that somewhere. It might be dog-related, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t looking at a baby.

  “Take it to an orphanage.” I paused and then added, “Find Jacob. He’s the Dickens expert. He might know a thing or two.”

  “Cute.” She cocked a brow and then said, “Look at his eyes, honey.”

  I narrowed mine instead.

  “Look!”

  That air of command was impossible to ignore. She’d acclimated to the mantle of power well, her hair fully white, her eyes all silver now. Luc was still level, still grace under pressure—and more than once, he was the one who brought her down when she seemed to forget that there was more to leading than biting heads off.

  Like I’d tried to do for Will.

  My chest ached, thinking of him.

  Slowly, I let my eyes drift down.

  The baby waved a tiny fist and cooed.

  Sina rolled her eyes and then bent over the baby. I couldn’t see what she did, but the baby started to cry.

  Then I saw it.

  A rim of red.

  Slowly, I lifted my head. “What happened to it?”

  “Him. He is a boy,” she corrected. Then she sighed and gently brushed a finger across his brow. “His mother was human, and pregnant. Then she…gave in. I was going to kill her and the baby, but Luc said the baby was…ambiguous.”

  “Ambiguous. What’s that mean?”

  Head tilted, she said, “Rob would have said he was an evil son of a bitch…but he had a good man holding his leash. What would you have said?”

  My heart lurched now. “Rob.” Licking my lips, I thought of the man who’d become a friend and then I looked at the baby. “Rob…was…”

  “Rob’s mother was dragged through, while she was still human.” Sina sighed and turned away. “She was raped. We don’t know much of what happened, because she was dead not long after Rob was born. He was part orin. They would have thought
it was amusing, having a part-human baby there. He was just a runt of a thing when Will discovered him, more animal than anything else. He made us all…uncomfortable. Except Will.”

  Unconsciously, I lifted the baby to my shoulder. “You want me to raise this baby.”

  She arched a brow. “Mortals can’t do it.”

  “Are you doing this because you want me to keep fighting, to find something to live for?” I asked mockingly.

  “I want to believe he’s still alive too,” she said gently.

  The last time she’d said that to me, I’d wanted to hurt her. Badly.

  But now, as I turned my face toward the baby and breathed in the soft, gentle scent, I let myself cry.

  “I’ll take care of the baby.”

  I saw her nod from the corner of my eye.

  “He needs a name,” she said quietly.

  “William.” I closed my eyes. “William Robert Grimm. Seems fitting. I’ll call him Rob.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  It was a different world.

  Things moved even faster than they had before and the air was…quiet.

  Demons no longer pulsed in the shadows.

  It had taken quite some time to adjust.

  But he had done just that and now he had one goal, one focus.

  The green of the mountains, the lush scent of the trees, it all tugged at memories that were so deeply buried and part of him wanted to lean against one of the massive trunks and breathe in the air, even just stare up at the sky.

  For a while, he had indeed forgotten just what it was like to stare up and see blue.

  A voice rose, somewhere off in the distance.

  An ache tugged, deep in his heart.

  But he hadn’t forgotten her.

  If it is within my power, I’ll come to you. I’ll find you. Somehow.

  It had taken what felt like a millennia to keep his promise.

  A noise rose, disturbing the birds and him. He cocked his head, listening. It wasn’t a noise he was familiar with.

  Frowning, he braced a hand on the trunk of the tree, edging closer, trying to place that bright and happy sound.

  Laughter…

  But strange. It sounded so young.

  Then it was gone.

  Cut short.

  Aggravated, he started to move quicker through the trees.

  He knew these woods like the back of his hand and although some of the paths had shifted and changed, some trees taller while others were gone, this was the home of his heart, imprinted on his soul.

  So it was something of a shock when he found himself falling face first, tripping over…something.

  He didn’t know what.

  He would have lunged upright, attacked.

  But a blunt weapon pressed against the base of his skull. A quiet voice warned, “Move, buddy, and you die.”

  He closed his eyes. He wanted to drag in a breath of air, but he would have sucked in soil and grit. So he just imagined.

  “Roll over,” Mandy said. “Slowly.”

  He did.

  She held a staff in her hands.

  Her hair was shorter.

  But so was his. He’d cut it the very first thing, once he’d climbed and fought his way through the rip. Using a knife that had long since gone dull and then another that he’d stolen.

  He’d had to wait until later to get a real trim, contacting Sina for money—after he’d convinced her that he wanted to find Mandy and see her. Alone.

  That had been two, maybe three weeks ago and he was still acclimating himself to just how much different the world was.

  It had been eight years.

  Eight years.

  The shadows of those years lay in the eyes of the woman as she stared at him with shock.

  “Mandy.”

  The staff wavered, then fell.

  She backed away, shaking her head. “No,” she said simply. “I…you’re dead. I finally stopped dreaming, finally stopped seeing you in my head every time I turned around.”

  He sat up slowly.

  Something crunched behind him, the noise somebody makes when they’re learning to be quiet. Learning. He spun just as something came crashing down on his head.

  “Robbie, no!”

  He reacted, lips peeling back from his teeth even as instincts and brain started to process.

  Rob—

  Small, frail bones. Big scared eyes.

  Child.

  He had a child in his hands.

  He leaped to his feet, still holding that small, frail child.

  “Let me go!” The boy bared his teeth at him as red glowed in his eyes. “Mum!”

  Will did just that, backing away in stunned shock.

  The boy kicked him in the shin and ran around him, straight to Mandy.

  “Mum?” Will asked woodenly.

  She gazed at him, her eyes wet. “Is it really you?”

  He bared his teeth. “Where the bloody fuck is Rob?”

  “Watch your mouth,” she snapped. And then she looked away. A heavy sigh escaped her as she stroked a hand down the back of the boy’s hair. The child darted a look at Will. “And stop. It’s not what you’re thinking, although I should punch you. We…”

  Her lips pressed together and she pulled back, smiled at the small child. “You’re a crazy, brave guy. And you didn’t listen. I told you to stay hidden. Now…off to home. I need to talk to…my friend.”

  “But—”

  “No, Robbie.”

  As my son dragged his feet the entire way up the trail, I wrapped my arms around my middle. I dug my fingers into my arms to keep from reaching for the man before me.

  He looked so…normal.

  Jeans and a T-shirt, a hoodie thrown over the shirt to combat the chill of the fall. I’d come back to Germany. I couldn’t raise a child on a battlefield and I didn’t know of any other place to call home. So I’d returned to the cabin Will had left me.

  And he’d returned…to me.

  After all this time.

  Eight years.

  Black hair cut close, not quite military short, but almost. His skin was swarthy and dark, his eyes dark brown and piercing.

  But it was all window dressing because under it, the power of him still beat against my skin.

  “Rob’s dead,” I said when his gaze flicked up the trail again, toward the cabin. I told him in short, quick words. It hurt no less to try softening the blow.

  When I was done, he bowed his head.

  There was no sign my words had any impact, but I knew he felt each one of them and I knew he felt the impact of Rob’s loss just as I did. Straight to the heart.

  After a few more moments, he looked back at me. “The boy. He’s…”

  When he hesitated, I offered, “Like Rob? I know. Sina brought him to me when he was a baby, only a few days old. She found him—his mother had been grabbed by orin. She fought their pull, but…she gave in eventually. Luc sensed that the baby was still on the edge. So I’m playing Yoda.”

  “Trying to keep him from giving in to the dark side.”

  A weak laugh escaped me. “You remembered some of your geek training, Will.”

  He took a step toward me. “I forgot the color of the sky. I forgot the sound of human voices. I forgot what it was to have food in my belly…”

  He was in front of me now.

  “But I didn’t forget the sound you made when you sighed in your sleep,” he murmured, reaching up to cradle my face. “I didn’t forget how you laughed when you teased me or the way you would try to make me laugh. You made me laugh when I had gone centuries without it. I forgot so much…but I didn’t forget you.”

  I gasped when he lowered his face to mine. When he brushed my lips with his, I felt tears burn.

  “Will…”

  “Yes. That is my name now. It took me forever to find my way back, because I had to do that one, crucial thing. Forgiveness of self can be the hardest of all.” He lifted my chin. “And now I must beg your forgiveness, because
I kept you waiting so long. Will you forgive me, love? Will you take me…not back, because I’ve never even given myself to you. But I want to do that now. You gave yourself to me a thousand times over and I wouldn’t let myself accept the gift. Is it too late?”

  “Never.” I tugged his face to mine. “Make it a thousand and one.”

  “A thousand and one. You’re my heart.”

  I laughed shakily as he kissed me. He would have done it again. But we both heard that faint, muffled step. I sighed and eased him back. “Robbie…”

  The golden head peaked around the corner. I gestured to him, holding out a hand. “Come on. I want you to meet somebody.”

  Robbie eyed the towering man with curious eyes—curious, suspicious eyes.

  Will returned his look.

  “Robbie, this is Will. The man I’ve told you about.”

  Robbie’s eyes narrowed.

  Will glanced at me and then crouched down in front of the boy.

  “You’re Will.”

  “Yes.” Uncertainty written on his face, Will hesitated and then held out a hand. “And you’re Robbie.”

  Robbie glanced at the hand and then, abruptly, he kicked Will before I could stop him—he’s too fast. Not kid fast. Orin fast. Part of his make-up. I lunged, but he was already backing away, glaring at us mutinously. “You made my mum cry!” he shouted.

  Then he took off, racing up to the house.

  “Shit.” I rubbed the back of my neck and looked at Will. “I’m sorry. I…”

  But Will was grinning. I couldn’t believe it. I blinked. Then I rubbed my eyes and stared at him, hard. Yes. He was grinning. “I think I can handle this…he acts just like you—an angry, child-sized version. This could be fun…and I’m actually going to let myself enjoy it.”

  He startled a laugh out of me.

  Then a moan. Curling my arms around him, I sank into his kiss with a sigh.

  This was what I wanted to enjoy.

  Just…this.

  For the next two thousand years. Or two hundred thousand.

  About the Author

  Shiloh Walker has been writing since she was a kid. She fell in love with vampires with the book Bunnicula and has worked her way up to the more…ah…serious works of fiction. She loves reading and writing just about every kind of romance. Once upon a time she worked as a nurse, but now she writes full-time and lives with her family in the Midwest. She writes romantic suspense and paranormal romance, and urban fantasy under the name J.C. Daniels. For more about Shiloh Walker, please visit her website: www.shilohwalker.com.