Furious Fire: Grimm's Circle, Book 8

by Shiloh Walker

  Maybe the orin frequently conversed with the vaporous forms of the glamori.

  But somehow, Sina didn’t think so, and she had a sinking feeling in her gut that this was more than a dream.

  I need to wake.

  It was an impossible need. She could still feel the bocan’s claws slicing through her shoulder bone, her sternum, nearly ripping her in two. If it hadn’t been for Luc, ripping her away, and Krell lunging his powerful body at the bocan to distract it, then Sina’s eighteen centuries would have come to a bloody end.

  She’d taken a bad injury and her body had slid into stasis, the healing sleep of their kind. She wasn’t sure what would happen when she awoke, because she could sense the weird, shifting changes taking place within.

  And this dream…

  A dream that wasn’t a dream, and that filled her with a cold, terrible fear.

  Because it wasn’t just demons that walked in the rocky, pitted valley below her.

  There were mortals as well.

  Or…they had been.

  And while there might not be a legion of them down there, there was enough of them to make her skin go cold.

  I have to wake up—

  Luc bent over the counter, taking five minutes to eat and grab a cup of coffee. He could do without the food, but experience had taught him that his body reacted better if he either ate or rested. He wasn’t going to rest. He had to be at Sina’s side, so he chose food over sleep.

  Granted, more often than not, he ate hot dogs and Cheetos and washed it all down with half gallon of chocolate milk. None of that was anything a dietician—or anybody sane—would consider healthy. But he didn’t have to worry about calories or heart attacks or any of those annoying nuisances that would have plagued him had he been human.

  He just needed the fuel.

  He felt Krell shift next to him, felt the tension in him. “What’s the…”

  The words trailed off and he shoved away from the counter, automatically merging his mind with the animal walking, then running at his side.

  The ragged breaths, the erratic heartbeat he heard coming from the bedroom meant only one thing. But it was too soon. Sina had taken a near life-threatening injury—the one thing that could have taken her from him—less than a month ago. She needed another month, easily, to heal.

  He entered the room, Krell racing ahead of him, instinctively knowing what Luc needed.

  Luc, blinded for hundreds of years, had adjusted to the loss of his sight, but when one fought demons and beasties from hell, sometimes having a way to see made that job easier. In those times, Krell served as his eyes, and right now, through the dog’s gaze, he could see the rapid rise and fall of Sina’s chest under the thin gray cotton of the Dopey sleepshirt he’d bought her a few months ago.

  Sina and her fondness for those seven, silly dwarves…sitting down next to her, he slid his hand along the bed until he could cup her head.

  “Shhh….” He bent down and pressed his mouth to her brow.

  Her shields were frail, faulty. Stasis left them vulnerable at best and just then, he could feel her panic, and her desperate need to wake.

  “You’re safe,” he whispered, sending those words out, letting them fall across her battered mind, hoping they’d reach her. His heart wrenched inside him.

  “You’re safe—” He jerked up as her body went from almost cool to burning. “Krell, I need you.”

  The animal, eerily intelligent, leaped onto the bed, padding to sit at Sina’s hip, watching her as if transfixed. Luc studied her through the dog’s eyes, searching for some cause of the heat.

  What’s wrong?

  The pendant at his neck pulsed, heated.

  He ignored it, as he’d done for the past two days. Will had other angels. He could call them.

  “Sina…” The name slipped past his lips before he could stop it.

  Her body arched, jerking.

  In the next moment, her eyes flew open, a low, keening noise escaping her.

  As her gaze flew to his, he covered her cheek. This isn’t right. It’s too soon…

  “Luc.” His name was a ragged sound on her lips and then she sat up, each movement slow, sluggish.

  “Lie down,” he said and he would have forced her to do so if he hadn’t suspected she was still hurting.

  “I can’t.” She shuddered, something like fear rolling across her face. “Something…something is wrong. We’re needed.”

  “Fuck that. You need rest, not another fight.”

  A harsh sound escaped her. “I don’t think we’ll have a say in this. None of us will. We have to…” she looked around, her expression dazed. Then, slowly, it cleared. Reaching up, she rubbed her chest.

  Exasperated, Luc caught her hand. “Stop that now. You just had your chest laid open, if you remember.”

  Her gaze slid to his. “I remember.” She tugged the loose V-neck of the sleepshirt aside, revealing a smooth, healed chest. “How long?”

  Krell inched closer at Luc’s mental nudge and he stared in amazement. “Sina, it’s only been a month. That…that’s amazing.”

  “I think it’s rather horrifying, actually.” Her voice was grim and she swung her legs out of bed. “Food. Clothes. Then we need go.”

  He let her rise, figured if she staggered on her way out the door, he’d have an easier time convincing her otherwise.

  But with each step, she seemed to get steadier. Rather than finding it reassuring, Luc was unsettled. She needed—or she should need more rest. That she didn’t meant only one thing. She’d undergone some changes in stasis and that only happened when those changes would be needed. Sina was already stronger than a bloody hurricane. Why did she need more power?

  Swearing, he grabbed a pair of black BDUs and a long-sleeved black shirt—her preferred gear if she was going to have to fight, and moved into the kitchen. “That was my lunch,” he said dryly when he heard the crunch of Cheetos.

  “I’m saving you from yourself,” she said. “Luc, you really need to learn to cook.”

  He thought about telling her that he’d tried to learn, while she was out of his reach, caught in that healing sleep. He’d tried to learn for her because she’d need food, real food. He’d followed the recipe, done everything it had instructed…and Krell had refused what was supposed to be macaroni and cheese. He’d done okay with a salad. No cooking or baking there, but Sina needed more substantial food after the injury, after the time in stasis.

  “I guess you’ll have to teach me,” he said, moving up behind her and pressing a kiss to the back of her neck.

  She went quiet, laid a hand on his.

  “What is it?” he asked, knowing her moods almost as well as his own by now.

  “This is going to be bad, Luc.”

  He hugged her close. “We face it together. We do what we have to.”

  “I just got my hands on you. I don’t want to lose you yet.”

  He turned her, resting his hands on her hips. “Even if we ended up being parted—” he didn’t say killed, because he wouldn’t risk it, “—know that it won’t be forever. We’ll find each other again. I didn’t wait this long to lose you so soon. Now if you’re insistent on leaving, finish stealing my food and get dressed. I’ll make us both a sandwich.”

  She showered, dressed, that urgency a constant murmur in the back of her mind.

  Luc came striding out of the room where she’d woken, dressed all in black, blades riding in sheaths on his arms, a staff in one hand. He looked like beautiful death.

  I’m not losing you so soon, she promised herself.

  Some part of her even believed it.

  But there was a heaviness in her heart. Something was horribly, horribly wrong and she could taste the blood. It hung in the air like tears, just waiting to fall.

  “We need to find Will,” she said
, reaching up to grab her pendant as Luc joined her, turning over the bag that held her weapons. He grabbed the paper bag holding sandwiches from the counter and snapped to Krell.

  “He’s been calling me. I’ve been ignoring him.” Luc’s face was unreadable.

  Sina processed that, then pushed it aside. She’d think about it later.

  For now, she needed…

  White light started to burn. She closed her eyes against it instinctively, but she still saw it—that was when she realized the light was in her. It was huge, all-consuming.

  Urgency guided her.

  Just follow it, something seemed to murmur in her head. Just follow…

  “Follow,” she mumbled, confusion swirling through her.

  Will. She needed to find Will. Blindly, she reached out and caught Luc’s hand. “Krell. Get…”

  Dimly, she saw Luc reach down, saw him tense.

  He said something, but over the rush of wind, the power crackling in her head, she had no idea what he said.

  She opened her mouth to ask, but the very air was ripped from her lungs.

  Then Sina and Luc went flying.

  Chapter Eleven

  Twenty people had arrived already and yet more continued to trickle in. Finn knew some of them, but there were a couple he had yet to meet.

  Will had gated a couple of the Grimm to the castle. Others had been in Europe and it had only taken hours.

  And through it all, the woman who felt like a fire under his skin remained tucked in a room Will had deemed safe inside that ruin of a castle.

  She stayed there, only rarely venturing out.

  Finn had seen her maybe three times in the eighteen hours they’d been there, and once was when he’d stormed into the little cave where she was sitting with her back to the wall. He shoved a sleeping bag and food at her and when she didn’t take them, he put everything on the floor. Over his shoulder, he snapped out an order to eat.

  Her caustic reply had been… “Sure thing…sweetheart.”

  She’d all but hissed the word at him and it grated along his nerves.

  Something about the way she said it had made him pause, almost made him go back in there. Everything about her pushed at him, prodded at him and if he had the time, if they were someplace, any place but here—any time but now, he might have just given into that madness and tried to figure out why she left him feeling like he’d been rubbed raw.

  But now wasn’t the time.

  His skin felt hotter, tighter than it ever had and he’d ended up building a bonfire with some of the fallen timber and debris, just so he could expel some of the heat within him.

  Some of the others gathered around it. He kept himself apart, studying those he didn’t know. For the most part, Finn had spent his time in North America and the United Kingdom and his ears caught a patois of accents and languages, everything from what sounded like Chinese to Spanish. The Spanish he could follow easy enough. The Chinese, he didn’t understand a word of it but he had to admit, one of the two speakers sort of fascinated him.

  Most of the Grimm had died fairly young. The youngest that he knew of was nineteen, but most had been in their twenties to early thirties. A few had been in their forties.

  The man who spoke Chinese was a diminutive, wizened creature. His head barely reached Finn’s chest. His eyes were a bright, burning black and he moved with a swiftness that left Finn a little bewildered.

  He also all but crackled with power. He’d only met two others who had that kind of mad energy inside them. Will…and Sina.

  Sina, who still hadn’t reached out to them.

  “He won’t tell you how old he is.”

  Glancing away from the old angel, he met Greta’s eyes.

  She grinned at him. “I’ve tried to find out. You won’t get an answer, either. Yan doesn’t talk about such things.”

  “I wasn’t planning on asking,” Finn said, shrugging. “I just…” He stopped, deciding it was better to eat those words than say them. Sometimes, he could show common sense.

  It didn’t seem to matter, though. The man turned his head and looked at them, his gray-white beard neat, his bald head smooth. “Haven’t seen one as old as me, hmmm?” His voice was unaccented and musical.

  If he sang, Finn thought, he’d probably make everybody around him cry.

  “Ah, no. No, I haven’t.”

  “I’m one of a kind.” Then he winked and went back to talking the woman at his side—the one who looked young enough to be his great-great-granddaughter. She gave Finn an appraising stare before looking back at Yan.

  “The woman with him is Tomoe. You probably can’t feel her as much because Yan is like a lightning storm, but trust me. She’s strong. She’s older than me, but I’m not sure by how much. A few centuries, at least.”

  Finn narrowed his eyes. “Tomoe,” he murmured. That sounded familiar to him. Plus, the swords he could see at her back, and the tanto situated at her waist…maybe. Just maybe.

  “You could always go talk to her,” Greta suggested, leaning in close, her voice so low even he could barely make out the words. “Maybe call her sweetheart—see what kind of reaction that gets you.”

  Tensing, he turned his head and stared into glinting blue eyes. A smile tugged up the corner of her mouth as she slid a look back over her shoulder toward the ruins. “That was an interesting exchange earlier, Finn. Very, very interesting.”

  “There wasn’t an exchange.”

  “Hmmm. And that’s why the rage in the air hit me like a sucker punch. Known her long?” Greta fingered the medallion at her neck, staring out over the field, watching as Will moved from one group to the next.

  He was drawing closer to them, Finn noticed. Rallying the troops? Polishing up his St. Crispin’s Day speech? “I don’t know her,” he said, trying to pretend he was unaware of Greta’s shrewd study.

  Finn thought he’d missed her. Working with Greta had been easy. She’d been one of his earlier trainers and there had been something almost calming about her. He hadn’t felt like every nerve ending was exposed around her and he hadn’t felt like he had to watch every damn thing he said or did for fear of pissing her off and ending up getting his ass chewed by Will again.

  Yeah. He’d thought he missed her, but he’d forgotten the way she could all but see inside him. So easily too. Like he wasn’t made of skin and blood and bone, just glass that let her see straight into his soul.

  “Yeah.” Greta scoffed at that.

  Irritated now, he hooked his thumbs in his pockets and rounded on her. “I don’t,” he said, enunciating each word. “I met her the first time yesterday when she tackled Will as he was gating in and she ended up pulverizing some internal organs in the process. Somehow, it also managed to bloody him.”

  Finn smiled a little at that memory, but it faded just as fast because he had to remember what happened later. Sighing, he held Greta’s gaze. “I don’t know her.”

  “You’re serious.”

  “Why the hell is that so hard to believe?” he muttered, edging around her, intent on heading to the cliffs only to stop short when Will lasered a glare at him.

  He resisted the urge to snap to attention and fire off a salute—the one-fingered kind, but the tension crackling in the air, the ever-present cloying evil that seemed to grow thicker had him sighing.

  “There’s too much there.”

  “What?”

  Greta came to stop beside him, her eyes confused. “That just doesn’t make sense,” she said softly. “I feel something between you two. Something old—” She hissed abruptly, clapping a hand over the medallion at her neck.

  A heartbeat hadn’t passed before Will stood at their sides. “Greta.”

  Her eyes narrowed to slits. “What was that for?”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Will said, his voice neutral. Then he
nodded to her partner who was moving to join them. “Rip and Yan will be leading two units, those who don’t have any distance-fighting abilities. Finn, you’re going to be up top.”

  Finn scowled and followed Will’s line of sight. “It’s happening here?”

  “Something will.” Will’s face closed off, his eyes going distant. He was quiet for a moment and then he shook his head. He looked almost frustrated when he spoke again, “I don’t know what. I need to sit, focus. There’s no time. If Sina would—”

  The air around them went tight and hot. The sensation was familiar. Sort of. Finn’s ears felt like they’d pop and his skin started to crackle, itching from the inside out as that electricity gathered in the air.

  Shooting a look at Will, he saw that Will’s eyes had gone all silver, not even a pinpoint of a pupil showing and then he was herding Greta and Finn back behind him.

  Finn shoved the arm away. “What are you—?”

  “Stay back,” Will barked. “Everybody, back.”

  They didn’t move fast enough for him, even though the Grimm weren’t slow. They were flung back, clearing a circle and just in time—a flash of white, and then a jagged, giant maw, all white opened.

  A gate…Finn thought, stunned.

  But it was nothing like the portals that Will commanded.

  It wasn’t one of the rips a demon sometimes managed to tear open—he’d seen those.

  No, this looked like one of Will’s portals. If Will had lost all the skill he had, gotten drunk and decided to see just how badly he could fuck things up.

  That thought hadn’t quite finished settling in his head when two dark shadows appeared in the center of that blinding whiteness. No. Three. Hurtling upward at them. Way too fast, and they weren’t walking, either.

  It was like a giant had flung them.

  The scream ripped from Sina’s throat. It felt like something was ripping her in two—no, it was.