Hunter Circles Series Books 1-3: An Urban Fantasy Box Set

by Jessica Gunn

  “What do you mean?” Ben asked.

  “Kinder’s here,” Rachel said. “Kinder is at fault for all of this.”

  This couldn’t be happening. Except it was. And we were so not ready.

  Kinder was an Old One. Another Old One. First Lady Azar and Giyano. Then Shadow Crest. And now Landshaft. But Kinder was more than that. She was the Betrayer of Darkness. Mother of Aloysius’s children.

  Lady Azar’s mother. And she’d had it out for the Fire Circle as a whole since the beginning of recorded history.

  BACK AT HEADQUARTERS, I pounded on Jaffrin’s door. We explained what had happened at Arnie’s at lightning speed, with Jaffrin still on speaker-phone with the Ether Head Circle.

  Jaffrin stood, mouth agape. “Kinder?”

  “Is back,” I said. “And clearly that Power of hers never settled because that’s exactly what she’s doing—she’s collecting magik from around Boston and the Guild, and that’s a big fucking deal, considering the cianza at Boston’s center.”

  “We can’t protect it,” Ben said. His face had turned to stone. He knew about Kinder. About her having the Power. She was, aside from Riley, the only person still living that we knew had that magik. “The cianza is as good as an open target for the taking.”

  “But she has to know that if she goes near it, it’ll blow,” Nate said. “That’s not exactly hidden knowledge, and she’s an Old One. She knows better.”

  “Not sure she’ll care,” I said. “The Fire Circle betrayed her. She was a Hunter like us until the Fire Circle found out about the Power, hunted her down, and tried to have her killed. That’s why she turned on them.”

  Jaffrin rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands. “We couldn’t confirm until tonight that her Power hadn’t settled. It’s supposed to around age twenty-five, picking either ether or elemental-based magik and settling with the last ability she had inside of her.”

  “Well, clearly Aloysius made her immortal before that happened,” I said. “He must be regretting that decision right now.” The two of them were the only truly immortal demons the Hunter Circles knew of. And they’d been dancing around each other for thousands of years.

  “You’re assuming he even knows she’s still alive,” Shawn said. “Don’t the histories say she screwed him over too?”

  Rachel nodded. “She’s supposed to have been in hiding ever since.”

  What had changed in this world in the last month that had caused everything to escalate? It couldn’t have been Riley because he was two years old. And it couldn’t have been Shawn and me and the Alzan prophecy because we were twenty-four.

  So, what the hell had changed?

  “Something’s happening inside of Darkness,” Jaffrin said. “A power shift, perhaps. Maybe one of Aloysius’s sons is making a bid for the throne.”

  “Or Lady Azar,” Ben proposed. “She’s trying to get to Alzan. Who knows how long that’s been the case. And she almost did it when she had Riley.” Ben looked to me. “If we’d waited a single day longer to get him…”

  “Still doesn’t explain why Kinder’s going around murdering people in mass and stealing their magik,” I said. “It’s not like she can use eighteen powers at once. Even her ability is limited.” Supposedly, anyway. And according to the balance all power had a limit.

  Supposedly.

  “Is there a chance that she might be after Riley?” Ben asked, his words barely louder than a whisper. As if even the possibility of that being true scared him to the bone.

  No one spoke, not even Jaffrin. Which might have been worse than him speaking at all.

  “Great.” Ben stepped away to pace between Jaffrin’s desk and the door to his office. “What do we do now, then?”

  Jaffrin pulled in a deep breath. The line he had open to the Ether Head Circle clicked off. He looked down at the phone, then back to us. “I assume that means they’ll be calling the shots on this one.”

  “That’s reassuring,” I said.

  The Ether Circle did nothing but rule from afar, completely out of touch with what the rest of us were dealing with. And yet they were respected enough that no one spoke against them. There had to be a reason for that, but I’d never seen one beyond Jaffrin’s utter deference. And, you know, the fact that the entire Blackwood line had always obeyed them, even when they laughed in the face of Fire Circle Leaders.

  “Just go home. For real this time,” Jaffrin said, defeat thick in his voice as he plunked into the chair behind his desk. “Stay out of trouble for a day.” For once, he appeared more exhausted than we were. I didn’t blame him. The last forty-eight hours had been an utter mess.

  “We’ll try,” I said. “It seems to always find us, though.” The truth was, in placing all of us on a team together, despite his best magik-weapon-making intentions, Jaffrin had instead formed a huge target on our heads, and on the heads of the entire Fire Circle. All of us posed some threat to Darkness or were otherwise connected.

  And now, because we were all Fire Circle Hunters, we were targets for Kinder and her revenge. Because they’d hunted her when they’d discovered she’d had the Power. Back then, anyone with the Power had been killed because the ability to wield both ether and elemental magiks in one body simultaneously was considered wrong, despicable, and dangerous.

  That was why the ability was so rare these days. Because no one with the Power back then had survived to pass it along to their offspring.

  Except Kinder. And now Riley.

  CHAPTER 9

  BEN

  The rest of the team fell into their beds almost upon arriving home. I didn’t blame them. It felt like years had passed since Krystin had joined the team instead of a few dozen days.

  But I couldn’t sleep, no matter how badly exhaustion tugged at my eyes and muscles. I paced around my room for a good hour, phone in hand, before I’d gathered enough strength to begin dialing Sandra’s new phone number. Her Canadian one. I wasn’t sure what had me so afraid. Or rather, I knew what did, but not what I was more afraid of: her answering the phone or her not picking up at all. And what the latter would mean.

  Finally, I summoned some courage and forced my fingers to dial Sandra’s number. The call connected and rang, my pulse thudding behind my ears in a painful rhythm.

  I’d uprooted her entire life, both by getting her pregnant in college and again days ago by forcing her to move to Canada with minimal explanation of what was going on. I’d told her I’d solved the problem, that I’d taken care of the bad guys, but I needed to make sure they were gone for good before I knew it was safe for Riley to come back to the United States. Back to Boston.

  Sandra hadn’t been happy, but she’d obliged.

  And now… now the phone rang. Twice. Three times. By the fifth ring, I was certain she wouldn’t pick up.

  The call ended and her voicemail started. “I can’t get to the phone right now. Leave a message and I’ll call you back.”

  “Fuck!” I shouted and threw my phone. It smacked against the wall I shared with Krystin and bounced onto the floor.

  Shit. Would Sandra hear that in the message?

  I walked over to my phone and picked it up, finding it surprisingly intact. Thank all the phone-case gods. I rolled my shoulders and stared up at the ceiling, though aiming my words much higher. To whomever might be up there listening. “Are you having fun screwing with me yet? Because I’m not!”

  A knock sounded on my door, quiet and soft.

  “It’s open,” I called.

  Krystin poked her head in. “Everything okay in here? I heard a slam against the wall.”

  I righted myself and nodded. “Yeah. As okay as it’ll ever be.”

  Sandra hadn’t picked up, but she might have answered my call if I’d had the balls to dial her number sooner. Maybe she was busy, or driving, or chasing Riley around in the snow. Or maybe she decided she never wanted to talk to me again, least of all in the early morning hours when we hadn’t spoken for over two years before last week.

>   And although I’d only heard it for a few hours before handing him over to Sandra, I hadn’t realized how much, in that very moment, I wanted to hear Riley’s voice too. How much I wanted to talk to him, with him, even though he didn’t have many words yet. I needed to hear his funny laugh, to see him smile.

  My heart wrenched itself and my chest squeezed tight. I missed Riley so much. I’d gone over two years without him. One day wasn’t enough.

  I breathed in a ragged breath and plunked down onto my bed. “I can’t do this.”

  Krystin shut the door behind her as she entered my room. “We’ll figure out what to do about Kinder. It’s just another bump. I mean—it’s a huge hurdle, but—”

  “Not Kinder,” I said. “Riley. I can’t… I need to see him again.”

  Krystin paused. “Oh.”

  I didn’t expect her to say much to that. Or to understand. She didn’t have kids. And until two weeks ago, I’d almost forgotten what it was like. Lady Azar had Riley kidnapped weeks after he’d been born. I’d barely known him at all.

  “I called Sandra. That’s what the phone being thrown against the wall was about. Sorry if I woke you.”

  Krystin’s gaze traveled to the wall where phone-sized dent had been made. “Jeeze. Use that football arm outside the house, please. The poor wall.”

  I swallowed hard, jaw working. I knew she was trying to lighten the mood, but I wasn’t sure anything could at this point. “All I wanted was to hear her say they were okay. I need that information to come straight from her, not through Jaffrin.”

  Krystin stepped farther into the room. “He’s an ass. And sometimes an idiot. But he wouldn’t lie to you about that.”

  “No? Are you sure? Because I think he would.”

  “Why?”

  “To keep me from rushing up there at the first sign of trouble, abandoning our team and Boston when shit’s about to go down.”

  I moved over so she could sit if she wanted to. I didn’t know where Krystin and I stood. We were friends, sure, and teammates. But since she’d kissed me at Fire Circle Headquarters, I hadn’t been able to tell if that was just something she’d done or if she’d meant something by it. And truth be told, I wasn’t sure I wanted it to be anything. I was exhausted—from being a Hunter, from worrying about Riley and Sandra. And now having to be a team leader while everything was going to hell.

  Krystin nodded and sat beside me, not touching. But having her close, feeling that strength she seemed to exude, settled my nerves. Maybe that was her aura and I was somehow feeling it, though I knew that wasn’t possible. Only witches were sensitive to auras.

  “For what it’s worth, I wouldn’t blame you if you dropped everything and left,” Krystin said. “He’s your child.”

  I nodded. “And that’s the problem. How can Jaffrin expect me to choose between Riley and the Fire Circle?”

  But of course he expected that from me because that was the entire reason I’d joined the Circle in the first place. He’d sought me out, he’d offered me answers about my magik and about who’d taken Riley, and had given me a way to go after them by becoming a Hunter. He’d promised me we’d get Riley back. And we had. We’d saved him.

  But now… now I was too far in it to drop everything and run, like Krystin had suggested. I had a job to do and I’d never be able to outrun the shame at not completing it. Even for Riley. Especially since his fate rested on what I accomplished here in fighting demons. Ridding Boston of them, one nest at a time.

  But then I had to wonder, would I even be the same person at the end? All that killing and fighting… Would Riley even recognize me?

  “He’ll have to deal with whatever you decide,” Krystin said as she eased a hand onto my arm. The small act of reassurance calmed my entire being. I wasn’t alone. For so long, I’d thought I was, even with my cousin at my side. Not anymore.

  “Guess he will.” But would Sandra let me come back? I didn’t think so. And that was the other problem. “It just makes me feel guilty, leaving Riley in Canada like that.”

  “You’re protecting him. That’s what fathers do.”

  I shook my head. “It feels like I’m stashing him away, out of sight. Did you know that it took until Sandra was in a car accident for the entire pregnancy to feel real to me?”

  Krystin, to her credit, didn’t react.

  “It’s true,” I continued. “I was so damn scared of dying like my own father, of not being there, that I made all the effort to not be there for Sandra and Riley. And then, when I was in the middle of obsessing over my newfound powers and over final exams, she got into an accident and I thought it was all over. It took until me thinking they’d both died to realize I was going to be a father whether I wanted it or not. And now I’m pushing him out of sight all over again. What if it takes until a demon does get them both this time for me to act?”

  Krystin shifted so she was facing me. “You are acting, Ben. You’re actively getting rid of demons. You’re making Boston safer for not just Riley, but for everyone’s kids. It’s only been one week. Nothing’s going to change overnight.”

  “My life did. Twice. The lightning strike. Riley being taken. Both happened in less than two minutes.”

  She met my gaze and her eyes hardened. “You need to snap out of it, Ben. You and I, we both have our reasons for being here and our obsessions to back them up. And right now, you need to focus on resting and getting ready for the fight that’s coming. Because if ever there was a reason to fear for Riley’s safety, it’s with Kinder. If she knows about him, she might want to pay him a visit. We need to take her out of the picture and soon. And I don’t know about you, but my magik’s not strong enough for me to do it on my own. Especially if she takes my power from me.”

  Krystin paused and I didn’t respond. I had no words, as she was entirely correct.

  “It’s going to take the whole team, Ben,” she said, then she smirked. “And isn’t that what you’ve always wanted me to say?”

  A small smile reluctantly edged my lips. “Fine. But I’m not sleeping until I hear from Sandra.”

  Krystin reached over and slipped the phone from my hands. “No. You’re sleeping now. If anything has happened, Jaffrin will tell you. Otherwise, trust him with this information. There’s a reason that you elected not to know where they were. To only have her phone number.”

  So that Darkness couldn’t use me to get to Riley. Like they wouldn’t try anyway. Please.

  I let Krystin win this one, since exhaustion now pulled heavily on my eyelids and on my body. “You’re right.”

  She smirked. “Damn straight I’m right.”

  “Goodnight, Krystin,” I said, even though it was early morning. It’d likely be nighttime before any of us were awake again. “Thank you.”

  She stood from my bed. “Anytime. Now stop throwing things around so I can get some sleep, okay?”

  “Yeah. See you later.”

  I watched her go, wondering how I’d gone from thinking she was too good for this team to realizing I needed her to balance me out in such a short amount of time. I now understood why leaders often had a right-hand man. Or woman, in this case.

  For balance.

  CHAPTER 10

  KRYSTIN

  I didn’t bother going far this time, figuring if Giyano had found me at Castle Island alone, he’d do so again just as easily anywhere else. At least daylight was on my side. I walked down the street, headed nowhere in particular, and hoped that whatever tracking spell he’d forced onto my hand would guide him to me.

  How had we gotten here, me going from wanting to kill him on principle for murdering my father to Giyano becoming my only source of true information? I shuddered and tucked my hands into the pockets of my leather jacket. Nothing about this war was black and white—I’d learned that long ago. But the amount of gray blooming around me was enough to make even the most innocent person look murky from afar.

  The sun shone brightly above and the smells of a local food truck parked a
cross the street wafted my way. Gourmet grilled cheese. I wished I was even remotely hungry. Instead, my stomach churned. The truth was that even though it was the middle of the day, and even though dozens of people were around me, I wasn’t sure how much I trusted Giyano not to try something.

  And still, I walked.

  I’d made it ten minutes before footsteps echoed behind me in his rhythm. Finally. I turned off the main road into a small park and walked through the playground to a quieter area with benches. There I sat, waiting.

  Giyano strolled into the park behind me, wearing black shoes and dark pants below a black jacket that ended just past his waist. Underneath, he wore a forest-green sweater. He’d tucked a set of aviators into the neck of his sweater and carried himself with more confidence than I’d ever known.

  It was the first time I’d gotten a really good look at him in the light. And, minus a scar running along the side of his chin that I’d now noticed for the first time, he looked… normal. Human even. Minus the aura burning around him like flames. That magikal bit aside, he looked like any other guy I’d ever met.

  “You called?” Giyano asked as he sat beside me on the bench, his English accent wrapping around his words. “Bit cold outside to meet here, don’t you think?”

  I settled into the bench, pretending to lean back. Really, I was vying for a better position to reach for the knife beneath my jacket. Just in case. “I have a question I was hoping you’d be able to answer.”

  “This isn’t what our relationship is about, Krystin,” he said, looking off into the park like he was the most carefree person in the world. I supposed that here, in the middle of the day, he didn’t have much to worry about. Lady Azar would never grace the regular public with her presence and she was his only real enemy.

  Except for me, when I was done needing him.

  “We don’t have a ‘relationship,’” I snapped.

  He chuckled and crossed one leg over the other, arms folded across his chest. “Then what do we have?”