“Grims.”
“Yes, we call them Tomes. But hopefully, some of his magic will help me better understand the tear. This warlock thought it would be best to go and inspect it. I do not disagree since we were in a bit of a rush to leave before and couldn’t take time to inspect it from this side,” Tess said in her very calm, sensible voice.
I had to give it to her. She could really read a room, and this room needed a heavy dose of levelheadedness. The strained interaction between Olezka and Asher reminded me again how little I knew of my mate and his world.
Sometimes, I felt like I knew him so well. I thought I’d learned what kind of man he was during our time in the Veil, but in this realm, there was so much I didn’t know. Yet, I trusted him with my life – that much I did know. In the end, he was an honorable mate who did the best he could for those he loved. I couldn’t really ask for more than that.
That warlock seemed to want to start crap right away, so I was understandably wary of him. But after my… restful evening, I was able to focus on other things and knew Tess was right. We needed to return to the tear. What if the Light fae had already started coming through it? I’d seen how they treated humans.
My stomach grumbled in protest for the fourth time.
“We should eat first. Are you our contact?” Olezka asked, returning his grip on my waist and looking down at me as I tried to wrap my arms around my stomach to stifle the sound.
“Yes.”
“Did you get us food or a car?”
Asher didn’t answer; instead, he walked over to the fridge and opened the door, revealing the contents that filled the inside. I knew it was empty the night before, which meant Asher must have brought food with him. After Olezka and I had reacquainted ourselves with each other’s bodies last night, I came down in search of food, unable to find even a box of stale crackers.
“We will contact you when we are ready to leave,” Olezka said formally.
“No thanks. I’ll stick around and gather information since this is once again my territory,” Asher retorted. “Besides, Tess needs help with the tear. It would be best if I stuck around as much as possible for now.”
I could hear Olezka’s teeth grinding together. Figuring that whatever was brewing between them wouldn’t defuse anytime soon, I stepped away from Olezka to the fridge, deciding to make breakfast. Tackle one problem at a time.
Asher leaned against the kitchen island, watching me.
“How do you like your eggs?” I asked the room.
Asher’s nostrils flared, and he leaned a little closer to me before his gaze shot over to Olezka accusingly. “What the hell did you do to her?”
My eyes widened, and my cheeks burned. I’d forgotten that most paras had a finely tuned sense of smell, but sheesh, we took a shower. Surely, I didn’t still smell like sex.
“What do you mean?” Olezka snapped.
Asher’s lips thinned, but he shook his head and turned his attention away from us. Unease coiled around me like a prickly vine. The harder I tried to tug away from the feeling, the tighter it held its grip on me, digging into my skin.
“Perhaps I’m wrong,” Asher muttered under his breath.
I focused on making breakfast since it gave me something to do with my hands, not to mention giving my mind a break from all of the thoughts running rampant through it, especially with this newcomer coming in and turning peaceful mate Olezka into hostile Olezka.
Breakfast was a fairly quiet affair. Olezka and Asher kept giving each other side-eye while Timur, Tess, and I tried to keep out of it. We had more important things to worry about. After Tess helped me clean the dishes, we got dressed in the clothes Asher brought.
For the guys, he brought shirts, jackets, and all-black combat-looking pants with extra pockets, which looked stupid-sexy on my mate. I couldn’t help ogling him for a bit. Tess and I got jeans and t-shirts. Nothing too exciting, but it was more than I’d managed to snag the night before from the laundromat. Of course, the jeans were a little tight on me and Tess’s were a little baggy, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.
I was eager to return to the tear to see if any other fae had decided to come through it and also to see if I could actually see it in the daylight now that I’d had a bit of rest. We piled into Asher’s car while Timur sat in the front, giving him directions.
The drive didn’t take long, but then again, I was lost in my own thoughts. I thought about what we would do after we addressed the issue with the tear. We still had to find a way to locate Key and save Ana. I couldn’t fathom a single reason why Ana would have willingly gone with him unless he was holding something over her head. Since he stabbed me, there was a good chance she thought I was dead already.
The car rolled to a stop on the side of the road. Timur had his window cracked and lifted his chin, taking in the scents. Watching him track was an interesting concept in his human form, but when he turned back to us, his eyes were those of his beast, which I had only seen a few times.
“We were definitely in this area; I don’t smell any other fae at the moment. I think Tess is right that he wouldn’t send anyone else through. Not through this gate, anyway. He would use his.”
“Doesn’t matter. An unsuspecting human might walk through, or a para from our world might enter theirs. Dark Mages will be drawn to the magic that I can already feel pulsing in this area,” Asher said, his hands tightening on the steering wheel.
“If you all don’t mind, I’d like to get closer to it again to see if the sides are still splintering,” Tess interrupted, getting out of the car with ease and striding toward where the gate presumably sat. The rest of us scrambled to follow her. Olezka walked by my side, keeping me as far from Asher as he could.
The area didn’t seem familiar, but last night, I was exhausted and mostly kept my gaze down. I kept a wary eye on the area around us in case a fae decided to pop out of nowhere. It made me nervous to be this close to the gate again. I hadn’t realized how badly I wanted to stay away from the tear, away from the Light Fae King’s Kingdom.
Suddenly, Tess stopped in her tracks, and her eyes got wide, her mouth dropping in shock.
“It got bigger,” Timur whispered.
I stared at where they were looking, squinting to try to find the tear, but saw nothing. Not even the spell Ana cast on me to be able to sense magic nearby tingled.
“The King posted guards around it,” Asher said, peering into the tear.
Why can’t I see it? Is it because I’m human?
“How much bigger is it?” I asked.
“Not much but enough that it looks like it’s steadily growing,” Olezka answered, looking down at me with a worried expression on his face. They all suddenly got tense, and Olezka moved me behind his back and forced us a couple of steps backward.
“What’s happening?” I whispered, pressing my hands against his back and clutching his jacket.
“One of the guards inside the Veil is approaching the tear,” he growled, his back tensing further. “He is speaking with Tess. Apparently, a human hiker was in the area and saw the tear. He came closer to investigate and stumbled inside. They are working on erasing the human’s memory now, but the guard is asking Tess what she plans to do about the tear.”
“Wait… what?” My head was spinning. A human fell through the tear. How did they see it and I couldn’t? Besides that, why would they erase the human’s memory?
“The Sentinel will provide guards and assign witches to enact wards to keep the humans away from the area,” Asher supplied. “Do you think the tear grew because the hiker entered?”
There was silence until Olezka growled.
“The guard said yes; any activity through the tear will cause it to grow. As such, the King will not send the human back through this gate but rather his own.”
“The human saw the gate?” Asher asked, sending a quick gaze in my direction.
Silence reigned again while the guard answered, I assumed. But when I looked away from Olezka’s
back, I noticed Timur and Tess staring at me as well. Olezka slowly turned around.
“Then why can’t Sixx?”
“I asked you earlier what you did to her. I can sense something… off about her,” Asher said.
“Like what?” Olezka snapped.
“Like a curse,” Asher said ominously.
Chapter 11
“What do you mean I’ve been cursed?” I practically screeched.
Olezka grabbed my upper arms and forced me to focus on him. “Dyshat', breathe.”
I sucked in a breath and held it.
“Release it, Sixx,” he commanded.
Nodding, I released it in a rush, still panicking. What did it mean to have a curse on someone?
“It’s not exactly a curse,” Asher explained, “but it’s something magical. It’s strange, and I can’t quite get a handle on it. I believe it’s why you cannot see the tears.”
“Calm, Sixx. I will not let anything happen to you,” Olezka promised, brushing my hair behind my ears as he leaned down to press his lips against my forehead.
I breathed a little easier, but the thought still lingered in my mind. What’s wrong with me?
Tess remained standing near the tear, speaking to someone on the other side. Timur edged closer to us, his nostrils flaring. Could he scent the difference in me that Asher could? Surely Olezka would have. The question must have reflected in my gaze because Olezka rubbed his hands up and down my arms.
“You smell exactly the same. We cannot detect it.” He sounded frustrated.
Timur nodded in agreement, his lips tight. Tess broke away from the tear.
“The Court’s healer said they have not been able to find anything, either,” Tess offered with a worried look creasing her human glamour. If I hadn’t known something was up yet, that would have been an indicator for me; the fact that I didn’t even have an instance of double vision, seeing her normal visage overlaid by her fae glamour, was a red flag. The spell Ana put on me should have allowed that.
Asher strode over to our little group and tried to elbow Olezka out of the way, which resulted in Olezka growling at him in a warning.
“Don’t touch her.”
“I have to if you want me to find out what’s wrong with her!” the agent snapped. “You two have bonded, right? The magic I feel is unnatural, but it’s not something I can easily describe to you, hound.”
Olezka’s top lip curled back, revealing sharpened, deadly canines. I stepped forward in a horrifically stupid move and put myself between the two much larger, more powerful males. It was moments like this that made me miss SOL. I needed to revisit my favorite weapon store if we ever arrived back in town to pick up a replacement.
“Hang on – you can rip him to pieces later if he does something wrong, but so far, he’s the only one who can tell me what’s going on.”
“She was also having trouble when we made our way into town, remember?” Timur mentioned. “She shouldn’t have been that cold if you two have completed your mating.” Timur grabbed his brother’s shoulder and held him back as Asher approached.
“I do not like it. I do not trust him,” I heard Olezka whisper to his brother. Timur looked down at me as I stood between the two men.
“Olezka, you’ll be right beside me, so there’s nothing to worry about. But I’m scared, and he has answers.” I reached out, gripping my mate’s strong hand. Facing Asher, I looked up at him, waiting for instruction.
“It’d be easier with both hands,” he said wryly.
“Yeah, well, one doesn’t currently belong to me,” I said with a shrug, offering my free one. He glared at Olezka but finally sighed and took my hand in his. It was colder than I expected. Asher took a step closer and peered down at me with those strange eyes. A shiver splintered down my spine as ice filled my veins.
“Easy; it’s my magic,” Asher explained, keeping his intense gaze focused on me. His power crept through every sliver until there wasn’t a piece of me that hadn’t been touched by his magic. Fire flared at the base of my neck when it tried to touch there, and I flinched, trying to take my hand back. Both hands gripping me tightened.
“Don’t move.”
“Stop touching her,” Olezka warned at the same time.
The fire flared again, and I cried out in pain this time. Asher swiftly withdrew his magic, releasing my hand. I wasn’t sure if it was because he found what he was looking for or if it was because Olezka and Timur were both radiating pretty terrifying growls.
“I can’t be certain since your guard dogs won’t back off, but I believe that the bond you share with Olezka, which is supposed to strengthen you, is fighting off a magical poison. Magical poisons are rare and hard to extract without immediately activating the poison and killing the victim. Unfortunately, I don’t have the skills to destroy the poison, but I’m sure someone in the Sentinel Core can. As of right now, it's stable. I confirmed it’s not been activated, but the magic you share with your mate recognizes it as a dangerous toxin and is fighting against it.”
“Can my body fight it off on its own?”
“No. From what I can tell, the bond is the only thing keeping the poison contained.”
“We should return to the city immediately. We’ll go through the gate to the Dark Court,” Olezka said. He didn’t say the rest out loud, but I knew if he had his way, he would take me back to the palace where fae would heal me, and we’d be back to square one when it came to trying to locate Ana.
My opinion was that we still had matters on this side of the Veil that needed to be dealt with, and as long as the poison wasn’t killing me, we should stay and work them out. Also, I couldn’t stop thinking about the human who stumbled into the Veil through the tear.
I spoke up. “I don’t think we should leave just yet. We’re still needed here. We haven’t even begun to figure out what to do with that.” I gestured to where I thought the tear was. Olezka didn’t even look; he kept his steady gaze on me.
“This is not just your decision to make, zhizn' moya,” he chided gently.
“And you can’t just force a decision on me, Olezka,” I said, putting my hands on my hips to accentuate my point. His eyes darkened with anger.
“I’ll stay behind and study the tear, Sixx. No other human will be harmed. Plus, both sides decided it would be best if nothing else passes through,” Tess said.
Logically, I knew we needed to return to the other side of the Veil. There was so much unfinished business, but I was tired of feeling powerless in a world not meant for humans.
That gave me an idea. If we went back through the Veil, we’d have to go home first since that was where the official Dark Fae gate was located. Once there, I could make a pit stop. Besides that, I trusted Tess. She wouldn’t let anyone pass through the tear.
“I will remain with her,” Timur added.
It made me feel better knowing that he’d stay with Tess, especially since she was new to this realm. Then, I felt guilty because she hadn’t even wanted to be part of this. She was only dragged here because of our botched escape plan.
We needed to return. Ana still needed rescuing, and we had to find Key and stop him. While we knew he wanted to use an alliance with the Light Court to secure his claim to the Dark Court’s throne, his purpose for using Dreamscape eluded me.
After watching Olezka being beat to a pulp by a human dosed with Dreamscape, I didn’t underestimate Key’s power. Not to mention the utter control he had over me when he used his mind-melding trick. I shivered at the thought. I’d discussed this with Olezka, Erebus, and his small council, but with what was happening in the Veil at the time, I think they all pushed it aside as a lower priority.
“Do we have any idea what might have caused the tear?” I asked, looking at the space where it should be. What if someone created it on purpose? What if someone was using it? What if that someone was Key? Then again, why all of the way out here?
I supposed it was more important to focus on the location of it inside the Vei
l. But why on the Light Court side? We had too many questions and not enough answers. Unfortunately, we wouldn’t be getting any answers there.
“Then it is decided. Sixx and I will return home to the gate. Timur, you will remain with Tess until this is resolved,” Olezka declared, raising his brows in a challenge. I stuck my tongue out at him with no heat behind it.
A couple more agents arrived while Tess spoke with Asher and other fae through the Veil. Olezka helped where he could. When the last of the group from Sentinel arrived, he spoke to them. After a quick exchange and a transfer of keys, he came to gather me.
Saying quick goodbyes, Olezka and I left in one of the last group’s cars. By the time we reached the side of the road, I could no longer see past the glamours. Olezka led me to the car and opened the door for me.
I sat on my side, squirming. The glamour that hid the forest and the tear melted away as we left the area. My thoughts went a mile a minute and my curiosity ate at me. Twisting in my seat, I tapped my fingers against my knees and started to flick at my nails.
Olezka laughed quietly. “Ask.”
“Ohmygod, thank you! I’ve been dying to ask. Tell me everything!” I jumped in my seat, turning to face Olezka, my hands landing on his leg. He didn’t even flinch; he simply shook his head and smiled.
“Tell you what, pchelka?”
“The whole dirty history between you and Asher,” I said with so much glee it made him pause to look over at me for a good solid minute. I blushed fiercely. “Watch the road,” I mumbled.
Olezka’s lip quirked up to the side in a sexy little smile. I needed to escape the anxieties that were twisting around my mind and driving me to the brink of insanity. There were a lot of things we needed to worry about but so little we could do about it until we had more information. And I couldn’t even begin to think about the fact I was almost as good as dead with an insidious poison trying to creep through my veins.
“It was over a girl,” Olezka sighed.
Sixx Saves the World: The Sidekick Chronicles Page 7