by Eden Butler
“Took help, but yeah. I did that.” He moved closer and I hated the proud little glint that made his smile widen. “He’s not so big and powerful if you’ve got the right hex.”
“But you’re a shifter.”
A small shrug and Joe waved off my assessment. “Shifter part comes from my mother. The wizard bit comes from my father, though you’d never know it.” At the mention of his father, that smile went cold and there was a curl on his top lip that made him look angry, bitter. “I look nothing like the Grants, do I?”
“You’re a Grant?”
“The bastard son of Carter Grant.” He picked at the sparse tufts of grass at his feet, then threw the small sprigs absent-mindedly on the ground. The curl of his lip exaggerated. “Rightful heir to the Grant coven.”
“Bane’s cousin.”
Joe’s nod was dismissive and he looked away from me, glancing only once at the Elam with something akin to longing in his eyes. That’s how he’d done it, I realized. His own blood, but blood without skill was weak at best. He’d have needed Bane’s blood to strengthen the hex and take the Elam.
“Mom was a poor, stupid shifter traveling through the Cove to her folk in Mississippi. One too many beers at Batty’s and Grant convinced her to stay the weekend.” He jerked his attention back to me and I could hear the resentment, the cool anger in his tone. “Guess he wasn’t expecting me. None of them were, and they damn sure had no problem sweeping me under the rug when she died two years later. Your father really is very good at his job, isn’t he?”
It made sense to me. My father was traditional to the core. Of course he’d do Grant’s bidding, no matter if he could stomach what that job was personally. It was an old argument we’d never been able to settle. What’s right verses what’s necessary. Still, Joe mentioned my father with the same bitterness in his tone that he’d used speaking about Grant, and I hoped that his anger for both of them wasn’t the same. They were very different men. “So this is revenge? All of this? To get back at Grant and my father?”
“This is beyond revenge, Jani.” Joe’s eyes were a little too wide and bloodshot. It gave him a frantic, desperate look. “You should know that. I need you.”
“Me?”
“Who else would side with me, help me destroy the Cove, destroy the secret, but the only girl to escape the Grants?” Joe took to pacing then, walking around the Elam, behind me as he spoke like he couldn’t keep himself still. “The only witch to walk away despite what they did to you.”
“What did they do to me, Joe? My family…” I scrambled to my feet when he darted toward me, holding up my hands to keep him back. “They’ve done nothing wrong.”
“No? Your father, my father, they didn’t conceal the fact that you and Bane were meant to meld? They didn’t try to keep you apart just to ensure the lines are strengthened?” When I said nothing, Joe shook his head, likely understanding that I had no idea what he was talking about. “Your own father didn’t keep shifting your memories, shifting Bane’s so you wouldn’t remember all the times as kids you almost melded?”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“No? That’s not what Ronan said. That’s not what your twin told him.”
“Ronan?”
I was stupid, pathetic, and got the impression Joe thought the same when he looked at me like that. Pity. It was written all over his face. “I needed an in, Jani. I needed someone who would help get you back here. Sabotaging the jobs your father did was easy enough. I needed you here because I knew no one else would help me. Well, until Sam, that is.”
My head went woolen and clouded then. This, all of this, was like something out of a bad super villain comic. My twin? My brother? My own father stealthily sabotaging my life so that they could conceal the truth? My father in concert with Carter Grant didn’t surprise me. Him working his hexes to conceal what the lines wanted for me and Bane was a theory that had bounced around in my head for years. The possibility that it could be true hurt like a bitch. But Mai and Sam knowing about it and remaining silent? That was too much to accept.
Joe continued to watch me and that same pitying frown exaggerated the longer he stared at me. I was sick. “Sam?”
“Big brother caught on early. Figured out what Ronan was doing, that he was helping me. Of course, he had no idea what my end game was. He thought I was interested in getting a little revenge on the Grants. Thought I just wanted to come out to the Cove and take Bane’s place.” Joe looked around the wood, the stretch of acreage and territory that technically was his and I was almost sorry for him. “I do that, then Bane would be free to be with you. And after all your poor brother has gone through, who could blame him for wanting his little sister to be happy?”
Sam had undergone the most horrible tragedy. Losing his wife, his unborn child… I couldn’t image what that pain was like, but would all that heartache make him betray the Cove? Everything we fought to protect? “I…I don’t believe you.”
“Why in the hell would I lie? There is no reason for me to lie, Jani. I want the Elam destroyed, but my magic isn’t strong enough to contain it.”
“But my father said you turned Malak. You had him do your bidding. You had him kill Freya and Wyatt.”
“No!” Joe’s voice carried over the roar of the Elam, his face turning pink. “That’s not what I meant to happen. I wanted that idiot to find you, to take you. But something went…badly wrong when I turned him. It was…too much for him. He caught your scent and he attacked. Fool couldn’t even tell witch from wizard when he transformed into the creature.” Joe shook his head, his coloring draining. “I didn’t mean… Freya was a mistake and Wyatt…was unavoidable. He already had your scent but couldn’t discern between male and female prey. He wasn’t supposed to kill. Not you. Not…Freya…and I didn’t want that. It was on Malak, not me.”
“But you turned him and left him to do your bidding. That is your fault!”
He stood closer, looking down at my hands as though he itched to touch my fingers. “He’ll pay for what he did. And they’ll all pay when you destroy the Elam.” Again he looked at my fingers, biting his lip. “It wants you. Can’t you hear it?” Joe stood behind me then and I stiffened my spine, uneasy with him so close. “Grant blood created it. Grant blood is attracted to you. It’s calling you. It’s gotta be you.” Joe moved my hair off my shoulder and rested his hands on my neck. I could hear the Elam singing to me. Its call was overwhelming. “You help me destroy it and you can leave the Cove. Walk away like you always wanted, and Bane will be free to go with you once I take over the coven. Everyone gets what they want.”
“My family…”
“Your family what?” he said, jerking me around to look up at him. “Your family who lied to you? Your family who changed your memories, kept you from what you wanted? Abandoned you? Help me, Jani, and you’ll be free from them. All of them.”
Joe wasn’t wrong. Circe and Hera, if what he claimed was true, then everyone knew about what had been done to keep me and Bane apart. My parents had known and my father had made certain I stayed away from Bane. My brother, even my twin, had kept me in the dark likely because they thought it was for my own good. Looking at Joe, I understood his anger. He’d been betrayed, too. He’d been abandoned by his blood. We weren’t that different when it came right down to it.
There must have been some resignation in my features, something that made Joe pick up on my hesitation because he came closer and let his voice lower, soften. “Your father cared more about the bloodlines and the Cove than his own daughter’s happiness. Mine wouldn’t even acknowledge me. They both need to pay, Jani. They both deserve a little vengeance.”
There was too much sensation, too much happening too quickly for me to concentrate. The Elam hummed louder and it filled my head, clouded it from the smell of the woods, the honeysuckle... Sirens continued to wail and cry in the Cove below.
“All the lies, Jani. We can bury them in the past or bring them forward. The mortals w
ould know about us. We’d be free to be who we are, whenever we want. No more hiding, no more lies, and your father and mine would be held accountable for all the things they tried to keep hidden.”
Joe stood too close, becoming part of the crowding noise in my head that made it impossible to focus on anything for very long, but he was too impatient, too eager to have me agree to his manic, mad plan. When I didn’t respond, when I kept my face covered in my hands as that noise grew louder and louder, the shifter lost his patience.
“Fine then, if you won’t help me, then I’ll have to persuade you.” There was a rustle from the woods and one of the trackers I’d seen following us appeared, dragging a gagged but still struggling Mai behind him.
“Son of a bitch.” As soon as I moved towards my sister, the burly tracker shook his head, sliding a knife from his belt to hold it against her throat.
Behind him came three more equally brutish minions. They congregated behind Joe and watched me, looking like they could easily thwart whatever hex I threw their way. Outmanned, but not outsmarted. Not just yet.
“Decision time, Jani.” Joe stepped next to Mai, looking her over before he glanced back at me, and for a second his features returned to the sweet, charming man I’d met in Bane’s kitchen. “I wasn’t lying about how beautiful you two are. It really isn’t fair.”
Blinking once allowed me a second to take in a calm, focusing breath and catch another scent on the breeze, this one thicker than it had been just seconds before.
“No,” I told Joe as I opened my eyes to look at him. “It’s not fair at all, but then not much ever is.”
“How do you mean?”
“You got left behind by Grant.” I glanced at Mai, winking once and my twin grinned back at me. “I ended up in the middle of a plan that had nothing to do with me. Shit is unfair, but we adjust and we deal.”
“I don’t adjust.” Joe grunted when I stepped toward the Elam.
“Maybe that’s your problem. Conflict resolution, Joe. We all need a game plan when life throws a hurdle in our way.”
“Oh? And what’s yours?”
I stood, looping the leather cord the Elam was connected to between my fingers. “Back up, asshole.”
Nineteen
In films, when the big bad gets a little too cocky, the hero typically takes advantage. She uses their lapse of attention, the point when the villain thinks he’s won, to draw her ace in the hole, to bring out the twist that shocks the bad guy and gives her the upper hand.
Joe wasn’t Grendel and I wasn’t Beowulf. He didn’t look remotely like Mordred and I lacked the necessary parts to be King Arthur. But I did have something that the half-shifter, half-wizard was either too stupid or too unaware of to notice. Bane Iles could read me.
“Decision time, Jani.” Joe had said, getting a little too close to my sister for my liking.
But my mind hadn’t been on him or even her at the moment. It was otherwise entangled with Bane and the silent conversation he’d started with me just as Joe had produced Mai from the woods. The wizard was powerful, his concealment charm untraceable except for the small click of energy I felt whooshing around the wood. Joe wouldn’t be able to detect it or the congregation surrounding us.
We’re here, Jani. I’d heard. We’ve got your back.
That allowed me a moment of confidence, something that rarely happens, something that gave me the idea of distracting Joe while Bane and his crew circled us.
“I wasn’t lying about how beautiful you two are,” Joe said, looking between me and my twin as Bane instructed his crew deeper into the woods, circling stealthily. “It really isn’t fair.”
“No. It’s not fair at all, but then not much ever is.”
Keep stalling. It’s working.
“How do you mean?”
I wouldn’t think of the tone he used when he spoke to me. I didn’t think of the hurt I’d caused him and how I could hear the hint of it even in my mind. Instead my focus went to Joe, to baiting him, distracting him so he would not notice my brother just a few feet behind him in the woods, or Trevor and Bane directly behind the tracker holding Mai.
“You got left behind by Grant.” I glanced at Mai, winking once and my twin grinned back at me. “I ended up in the middle of a plan that had nothing to do with me. Shit is unfair, but we adjust and we deal.”
“I don’t adjust.”
When you’re ready, tell him you’re not alone. That’s when we’ll charge. Get Mai and get to the lines. We need you to get the Elam back to town before the feds arrive.
How the hell am I supposed to do that? A quick glance over Joe’s shoulder and I caught Bane’s gaze. There was no warmth in that expression.
Aren’t you a witch? Ride the damn lines, Jani.
“Maybe that’s your problem,” I told Joe, avoiding the glare Bane gave me. “Conflict resolution, Joe. We all need a game plan when life throws a hurdle in our way.”
“Oh? And what’s yours?”
One glance at my twin and I knew she’d caught my hint. Duck, it said and move quick. We were twins. We knew each other better than we knew ourselves. It was all right there in a glance, and I knew it the second Mai’s smile flirted on her lips.
“Back up, asshole.”
One small grunt and Mai stepped back, twisting out of the tracker’s grip just as Papa, Sam, Bane, and the rest of the covens emerged from the woods.
All was chaos, the wild rush of hexes and spells, bodies transforming into animals—wolves and panthers, eagles and ravens all twisting from skin and bone to fur and feather—the small congregation of fighting building to a cacophony of violent sounds that gave me pause, had me stumbling as I dragged my twin away from the melee.
“What are we doing?” Mai screamed, dodging spell fire and leaping wolves as we ran from the fight.
“Getting to the lines and getting the Elam back to town.”
But Mai stopped me, pulling out of my touch behind a large cropping of trees where Sam fought with a large tracker. His nose was bloody and there was a wide cut on his bottom lip, but my brother kept fighting.
“You can’t ride the lines, Jani. They’ll absorb you.”
“We don’t have a choice.”
“You’ll die!”
“I won’t…”
“What’s wrong?” Sam asked, rushing toward us as the fighting continued. “What do you need?”
“This crazy witch wants to ride the lines back to town.”
Both my siblings stared at me, eyes wide, and I could feel the thick wave of fear coming from them. Around us the fighting continued and the Elam throbbed in my palm.
“It’s the only way to stop the lines from flooding the town with magic. It’s the only way to keep the mortals from knowing anything is wrong.”
“They already know, Jani,” Sam said, dodging a hex with a counter wave of his hand. “Beckerman has called in the feds and…”
“They aren’t here yet. I can stop this.”
“At what cost?” Sam shook his head and I could just make out the glassy flicker of his eyes in the mid-morning sunlight. “I never wanted any of this…”
“It doesn’t matter what you wanted, Sammy. It’s done. You helped Ronan…”
“You did what?” Mai asked, jerking on his arm so he had to look at her.
“Mai, it doesn’t matter.”
“I only wanted the truth to come out,” he told Mai before glancing at me, “about you and Bane.” He exchanged a glance with Mai and by her expression I knew for sure she’d kept the truth from me as well.
“It doesn’t matter now.” My siblings had done what they thought was best. They’d done what they could to shield me. None of that mattered anymore. Not when everything we’d fought so hard to protect was threatening to unravel. “Bane knows and he hates me for it.”
“Oh, Jani…” Mai started, grabbing my hand, but I waved her off, not willing to let my emotions cloud my thoughts. That’s not what I needed at the moment.
�
��This,” I nodded toward the forest, in the direction of the lines just beyond the ridge, “is the only way to save the Cove. It’s the only way to keep the mortals from finding out."
“Then I’ll help you,” Mai said, taking my hand.
“What? No!” Sam said, stepping between us.
But as she offered, I knew Mai was right. She could center me. She could be the peak of realization I needed so that the lines would not overtake me. She could tether me to who I was and how I wanted to remain.
When we stood, inching away from the fighting, Sam grabbed tight to my arm, twisting us both around. “I am damn well not going to lose both of my sisters for this fucking town.”
“You won’t, Samedi. We’ll be fine.” Mai kissed his cheek, taking my hand as we ran toward the line, letting the pulse and buzz of its song wash over us.
Behind us Sam called out a thousand warnings, then a thousand oaths when Joe sucker punched him in the jaw. One quick glance over my shoulder and I saw Sam tussling with Joe as he clamored toward us. Both men rolled around on the ground, arms flailing, fists flying, and then my brother went still.
“He’s going to try to jump with us,” Mai said, tightening her arm around my waist.
“Let the asshole try.” Mai’s skin was cool to the touch when I rested my palm against her wrist. In front of us the ley lines hummed like an electric fence and their energy signature glowed bright. We need only step into the streams that ran perpendicular to each other—one shooting toward town, the other moving toward the back of the ridge and into the groves.
“Beautiful,” Mai said, resting her face against my shoulder. “So beautiful.”
“Don’t let it absorb you,” I told my twin, pinching her hand when she hummed.
“Right. I’ve got you.”
“You ready for this?” Mai nodded, gripping me tighter and we both stepped into the lines. But we weren’t alone.
