by Jayne Hawke
Wrapping my mind and magic around the creature, I pressed it back through the veil, back where it belonged. Castor gave a small nod, apparently satisfied that I hadn’t lost my edge.
“Practise more often. We’ll resume your combat training next week,” he said as he stood and headed into the kitchen.
I didn’t bother asking why. I knew he wouldn’t tell me. Sometimes, we just had to live with the knowledge there were secrets we weren’t going to unravel.
Twenty-Two
The entire pack was in the office before me. Elijah had a broad grin on his face, and his eyes were a brilliant gold rather than his usual darker caramel tone.
“We went for a run this morning,” Liam said without looking away from his laptop.
I’d heard that runs were big deals for shifters. They changed into their animal form and ran with wild abandon through the countryside. Some packs hunted, too. I felt like it was rude to ask for details.
“I might need to start running more regularly if it’s going to make me look that vibrant,” I said.
“We could do with some fresh meat to chase,” Rex said with a savage smile.
“Oh, sweetie, you wouldn’t stand a chance,” I said.
Elijah glanced at Rex, which was enough to settle the grumpy wolf down again.
“Someone’s been putting a lot of effort into looking into that Inverness coven,” Liam said.
I swallowed hard and tried to seem casual.
“Really? One of my contacts mentioned someone digging into that. Has some new information come up?”
“Nothing new that I can see. It looks like one really determined person,” Liam said.
“That’s weird,” I said with a shrug.
I made myself a strong black coffee and settled into what I’d claimed as my seat.
“Liam, find out what you can about whoever’s digging into that coven,” Elijah said.
“Let me know what you find, I’m curious. There could be some fun treasures I didn’t know about,” I said in what I hoped was a light tone.
“What’s the deal with that coven?” Jess said as she tore open a packet of Jammie Dodgers, round shortbread biscuits had a thin layer of raspberry jam in the middle.
“It was weird. They were a powerful, rich coven. Then one night they just... died. The circumstances were supposed to be strange, but no details were ever released. The Knights worked really hard to keep it covered up. Even the underground forums and such couldn’t get the details,” Liam said.
I still didn’t know why the Knights had stepped in, but I was grateful.
“There’s supposed to be a lot of money locked away. I heard that the grimoires and interesting artifacts were all missing when people got there,” Elijah said.
“Where did you say you were from originally Lily?” Rex asked.
“Dartmoor. They left the country when I was sixteen, so I struck out on my own. It was the best thing I ever did.”
“Isn’t the magic wild down there?” Jess asked.
I’d had the good sense to spend a few months down on Dartmoor so that I could answer questions like that.
“Yes, it is. It feels as though it really doesn’t want you there, but that makes it invigorating. It can be a challenge for younger witches, but I always enjoyed it,” I said.
“Maybe we ought to take a trip up to Inverness, see what we can find about this coven. There could be treasures, and we’re due a holiday,” Rex said.
There was a tension about him. I tried to push the ridiculous idea that he knew about me aside, but I couldn’t miss the way he looked at me. The challenge in his eyes.
“I’ve heard that it’s a beautiful little city,” I said.
“We’ll see what territories lie around there. Maybe someone will let us stay a little while,” Elijah said.
Shifters worked in territories, the same as the fae. They needed permission from the territory owners before they could wander in there. Sometimes, a shifter could move freely for work, but they couldn’t sleep there without clear and explicit permission. It sounded exhausting. Witches also held territories, but they were business focused. As long as you didn’t screw with another coven’s businesses, you were left alone.
“Does no one have anything on these missing artifacts? My people are all silent,” I said.
“Not a whisper,” Liam said.
“Shouldn’t we be looking for new angles rather than poking at the weird old coven case?”
Liam shrugged.
“No reason I can’t do both. I have searches running in the background for keywords and such.”
I took a sip of my coffee and tried not to tap my foot. The office was feeling small with all this talk of my old coven. We needed to be out there getting the job done.
Twenty-Three
I couldn’t handle being in the office anymore. I needed some fish ’n’ chips down on the beach. Elijah had opted to join me. He kept glancing over at me as though he was trying to spot something or figure something out.
“What?” I finally asked as we were heading down onto the beach.
The broad concrete strip between the small wall that marked the edge of the pebble beach was relatively quiet. The small cafes and souvenir shops looked to be mostly empty. We’d timed our lunch well. I picked a quiet spot away from the shops and views of the hotels and apartments on the opposite side of the busy road behind us.
“I’m just trying to figure out what you’re hiding and why.”
“Maybe I’m hiding something for good reason.”
He slowly looked me up and down.
“Or maybe you just haven’t found the right person to share with yet.”
“I have a good friend, a housemate.”
“The fox shifter, your familiar.”
There was a slight bite to the word ‘familiar.’ I braced myself for the usual judgement and rant that came from shifters when the topic of familiars came up.
“Yes, Castor. He’s been a good friend to me for many years.”
“And yet you still seem like this secret weighs on you.”
I popped a chip into my mouth and ignored him. This wasn’t a topic I was going to entertain.
A thudding tread along the pavement behind us drew my attention, but I didn’t turn. There was nothing to gain in whirling at every potential threat. Better to keep an ear on it and let it think it was unseen. If it turned out to be nothing, it wouldn’t matter, and if it really was a threat then a potential ambush could easily work in reverse if played well.
In this case, ambush wasn’t on the menu. As the footfalls grew louder, I felt the magic and realized that it was an ogre approaching. I reminded myself that it might be there to relax on the lack of a beach, but Elijah made no such allowances. His sword, a near match to my own longsword, was out and ready while I was still silently observing the soundscape.
With the cat out of the bag, I turned around on the seawall we’d been resting on and draped my legs over in the opposite direction. An ogre was a challenge, but if he was as good as he thought he was then he’d have it in hand. I could happily watch, relax, and figure out his weaknesses, and if he started to fail then saving him would be all the sweeter for the wait.
His stance was truly medieval, a two-handed grip with the blade in an extremely high guard. I wanted to make a crack about how some classics actually did go out of style, but I kept it to myself for a change. Better to see how it worked. The ogre stomped up in its own sweet time, eight feet of ugly vaguely reminiscent of a blue-grey human with a big head, big hands, and a bigger mouth. They came in a variety of colours, but other than that they were nearly identical to one another, at least to my eye.
“Get out of my way, dog person. I’m working,” it offered Elijah by way of greeting.
Their strength was in smashing things, not quipping.
A mangled-looking fist that seemed like it had seen both ends of a sausage machine slammed down towards Elijah’s head, and he caught it on his blade and held
strong, allowing the beast to make a deep cut into its own hand before it could check the momentum.
It looked down at the hand as if disappointed in its performance as I shouted, “I think that might have actually counted as corrective surgery,” then threw a heavy backhand with its left.
It was faster than it looked, faster than most of its kind, and for a moment it looked like Elijah was going to take the ugly blow on the chin... and the entire rest of the head, given the size difference. He jumped back in time, and the hand swept in front of his face, the wind from the swipe tousling his pretty hair, bringing a little laugh from me that I did nothing to stifle.
Before the ogre could finish the move, Elijah made a quick leap forward and stabbed up into the beast’s sternum, hoping to finish it quickly with a heart blow. The ogre was too quick, though, and the blow slipped along the ribcage, leaving a trail of red blood to mar the blue-grey of the ogre’s skin but not much more than that.
“A couple dozen more of those and he’ll bleed out in no time,” I quipped.
As I spoke, a heavy fist came in for what would have been a kidney strike on a comparable-sized creature but with the size difference landed on Elijah’s shoulder blade. It hit hard enough that he was driven forward against the ogre, his sword pinned between the two of them. From where I sat, it looked like he’d kept the flat of it against himself, which I hoped was the case since the alternative wasn’t pretty.
I buried the sensation of concern that image brought and focused on the fight, distancing myself by analysing his technique. He’d clearly been caught off guard by the strike, and he was sprawled forward against his opponent, his legs barely under him. Another several hits came down in the same way, and I began to think he needed help.
Before I could touch my sword, his swept out from in front of him in a rather ingenious changing through technique seemingly derived from the same Liechtenauer school as his initial guard. While his arms remained in at his sides, protecting himself as much as possible, the sword moved parallel to his body in a semicircle that sliced the ogre’s right arm off at the elbow in an impressive show of hand strength and dexterity.
The ogre gave up the close-in assault and threw itself back with a roar, clutching at its missing arm as blood poured to the ground. The bloodflow slowed in seconds. Ogres couldn’t regenerate the way some other species could, but they did have a finely tuned clotting response and a shocking ability to push through injuries. A less experienced fighter would have thought the fight all but over and gone for a flourishing kill stroke. I almost warned him not to make that mistake, but I decided to let him go with it for a moment.
He spotted the trap of it, knew his enemy’s real response would never have been so dire, and used the time it spent play acting to make a sweeping attack at its unguarded stomach. Again, it showed a reaction speed that belied both its bulk and its species’ reputation, tucking its stomach in and going for a headbutt; no small feat in either case.
Elijah spun away from the headbutt with a snarl, his patience with the whole thing seeming to wear thin. He ended his spin on the armless side of the monster and, before it could turn to respond, made a beautiful but painful-to-watch slash from lumbar to abdomen and out. It was over.
Savouring the moment before the kill for a brief moment, Elijah sliced the head off the beast in one long, brutal swing.
Twenty-Four
Elijah turned to face me with canine teeth bared and eyes more wolf than human.
“Enough with the lies, Lily. I can hear your lies. I know that the shadow stone didn’t come from one of your mysterious contacts. I know that you’re hiding a big secret. And now whatever you’re hiding brought an assassin down on me. Talk. Now.”
I stared him down. I wasn’t going to be cowed by the big bad wolf. Still, the fact someone tied to me had tried to kill him had rattled me. Whether I liked it or not, I was growing fond of the damn shifter.
“Fine. The shadow stone came from a potential stalker,” I bit out.
He softened and pinched the bridge of his nose.
“How bad?”
“I don’t know. I haven’t seen any further sign of them. The stone showed up on my doorstep with a weird note. They haven’t made further contact, and I haven’t been able to find any trace of them.”
“Stalkers aren’t something to be taken lightly.”
“I know, but as I said, he hasn’t exactly threatened my life.”
“He could be related to this attempted hit.”
I squeezed my eyes closed. I hadn’t wanted to make that connection.
“Yes, they could be.”
“And the Inverness coven? Why do you tense and shut down conversations about that?”
I rolled my jaw.
“A coven was wiped out. It’s hardly a happy topic, is it.”
He narrowed his eyes at me.
“The truth will come out,” he growled.
“Look, I’m sorry the stalker tried to have you killed. I had no idea they would do that. Like I said, they haven’t been all that chatty.”
I turned and began towards my car.
“I’m going home. Let me know if someone makes progress on the case.”
A pale pink envelope was waiting on the doorstep for me. It came with a lilac ribbon wrapped around it. I couldn’t detect any magic on it, so picked it up. The handwriting was neat and tidy but not very distinctive. My stomach was twisting into tangled knots. The timing was too perfect, too close. It had to be from the stalker.
I tore open the envelope and read the note within.
He’s not good enough for you.
Fantastic. My stalker was trying to take out my business partner. That was just what I needed. I paced around the living room for a few minutes before Castor emerged from his sunny spot and shifted into his human form.
“What happened?”
I showed him the note and told him what had happened to Elijah.
“We need to put an end to this stalker,” Castor growled.
“Agreed.”
The problem was, I didn’t know how to find them. There was no magic that I could use to track them on the note. I didn’t know why they’d chosen me. There hadn’t been any weird people hanging around a lot.
“Elijah knows something’s off about the Inverness coven.”
Castor sighed and slumped down onto the couch.
“We knew the day would come. He’s a better option than most.”
“You think I should tell him?”
“Perhaps. When the time’s right.”
Years of hiding. The idea of coming out and telling someone everything that had happened didn’t fit into my mind. I’d never imagined such a time would ever arise.
“What do we do about the stalker? I don’t have any way to trace him. Maybe James will have heard something.”
Castor curled his lips.
“Is there no one else?”
“James has the most information about things like this, you know that,” I said wearily.
“I’ll go and see what I can dig up. Be careful with James.”
With that, he stood up and left. The house felt cold and empty without him. I glanced down at the note, which sat on the coffee table in front of me. How had this happened? What did this stalker want?
I pulled out my phone and sent James a text to see if he was up for an information exchange at my office. The mysterious thief was a dead-end, but the stalker needed to be dealt with. I wasn’t going to allow them to harm Elijah.
Twenty-Five
James didn’t answer my text. Which left Liam. I hated leaning on the fox shifter like that, but he was my best resource. I grabbed a basket of high-end baked goods made with real butter and cream and headed back to Elijah’s office. The entire pack was there. Rex growled at me. I gave him the finger and strolled over to Liam.
“You want me to look and see what I can find out about your stalker,” Liam said as he extended his hand to take the baked goods.
“
Elijah told you,” I said flatly.
Liam looked up at me with a wounded expression on his face.
“You’re a friend; you could have just told us. We’d have helped you.”
“Well, I’m asking now.”
Jess came over and lifted the lid on the baked goods.
“Oooh lemon and poppy scones!”
I swatted her hand away.
“Don’t steal Liam’s food.”
She narrowed her eyes at me.
“Pack share,” she grumbled.
“If Liam wishes to share he can, but I’m not going to stand here and let you steal from him,” I said.
I was growing protective over the fox. Maybe it was because of Castor, or maybe it was how didn’t like seeing the quiet guy losing his hard-earned rewards.
Jess backed off and crossed her arms.
“Fine.”
I remained standing near Liam for a minute to make sure she didn’t try and ambush him.
Looking at Elijah, who was watching me very closely from his preferred seat, I pulled the most recent note out of my jacket pocket. He looked at it and pursed his lips.
“It would appear that the stalker was responsible for your attempted hit,” I said as I handed him the note.
He breathed in the scent from the pink paper and rolled it over in his hands.
“No scent. Not a trace of anything.”
“No magic either,” I said.
“So, they have skills,” Rex said.
I sat down in my seat and watched as the wolves poked at it.
“We’re looking for a magic user, then. No human would be able to cover their tracks like that,” Elijah said.
“That really narrows it down,” I said sarcastically.
I shouldn’t have taken it out on them, but the whole thing was starting to rattle me. This person had tried to have Elijah killed, what next?
“Has anyone-” Liam started.
“No, no one has stood out as having hung around me a lot recently. No one stands out as having acted weird, or clingy, or anything. I haven’t seen anyone more than anyone else. I’m not a moron, I’ve been doing this whole investigator thing for a while now. I’d know if someone was being creepy.”