My five companions didn’t hesitate.
As I said, we were none of us greenhorns.
I’d ripped the silver out of the mountain itself, wrapping it around the demon in strings of molten metal. I didn’t know how I was melting it, but I burned along with it. As I handled the silver with my magic, it burned into me, leaving my hands blistered and steaming. The blisters crawled up my arm until I almost blacked out with the pain.
The next thing I knew, Trip and Cole had me into their arms and were dragging me up the path, Grant following close behind. I caught a glimpse of the other two women up ahead.
The demon howled from inside its silver bindings. Maybe we couldn’t kill it with silver bullets, but we could by God—or at least by magic—hold it in place.
The last thing I saw as we retreated was Cole’s recording device ticking away on the shelf where he’d left it.
“Ruby,” Tripp said intensely, “I need you to take the supporting spell off the beams ahead of us as we pass them. Can you do that?”
“I think so.” My throat was raw, my voice scratchy. When we got to the supports, Trip said, “These, my love. I need you to take the magic spell off of these.” I nodded, but my hands throbbed in agony. I glanced at them once, then decided it didn’t matter. I reached out to touch the beam with one hand, and the blisters broke open at the contact. As I pulled the magic back into myself, I whimpered, but I didn’t stop.
“It’s down,” I finally said.
“That’s the point, right there,” Grant Madsden said, pointing at a spot on the beam. “If we concentrate our firepower there, we can bring the entire thing down.”
Trip turned to Annabelle. “Take her out of the cavern with you?” He pointed his chin at me even as he readied his weapons.
Annabelle nodded, but I said, “Wait,” and turned to Hattie. “Come on,” I urged her.
“I won’t leave him.”
“Grant will follow us,” I promised, praying I was right.
Her eyes welled up with tears, but she nodded and came with us.
We began moving as quickly as we could, retracing our steps. I realized that the blisters on my body extended to my feet, as well, but there was no time to stop.
I glanced back once to see the three men shooting at the ceiling. At least one of them was using bolts of anti-ectoplasmic energy from one of the P.I. Agency’s guns.
The creaking, rumbling sound began deep under our feet, and despite the painful blisters inside my boots, I picked up the pace, running as hard and as fast as I could to reach the entrance. We stumbled out into the snow and starlight, the noise of the mine collapsing following us every step of the way. We backed away from the entrance but turned to watch anxiously, waiting for the men we loved to follow us out.
Cole and Trip stumbled out together, coughing as they came. I dropped to my hands and knees and buried my arms in the snow, sighing in relief as the icy coldness took away some of the heat from my burned hands.
But Hattie was still waiting for Grant. “Where is he?” she all but screamed.
“He was right behind us,” Cole said.
A giant plume of dust erupted from the entrance, and we all stumbled farther back from the tremors it caused. Hattie dropped to her knees with a wail, only to scramble back to her feet when Grant staggered out, a handkerchief held over his mouth. Behind him, the mine entrance filled with rocks, sealing it shut.
For the first time since we’d emerged, I thought to look around for Mr. Carlisle, but he was nowhere to be seen.
Everything else was as we left it.
Chapter 12
“Should we look for him?” I asked later that night as we sat around a fire we’d built partway down the trail, away from the mine entrance. Hattie had given me a small spoonful of her laudanum, and for the first time since we’d left the mine, I wasn’t in pain.
Cole shook his head. “The demon said we got his message. I think Mr. Carlisle might have been the demon’s messenger.”
“That would explain the rest of my dream,” Annabelle said.
“So does the P.I. Agency even exists?” Trip asked.
“Maybe in the same way I do?” Grant suggested.
I shook my head. “No. You are as real as you were before you died.” I was certain of that after my magical tour of Grant’s mind and heart. “We don’t have any assurance that Mr. Carlisle was real in any way.”
“And what did the demon mean when he said I was cursed?” Hattie asked. “Did anyone else hear that? Was that for all of us?”
I held my hands out. “He said I was cursed to react to silver. This happened when I bound him with the silver I pulled out of the mine—and that was without even touching it.” I turned to Trip, ready to test my theory. “Hand me one of the silver bullets.”
He looked surprised. “You sure about this? He told me I was cursed, too.”
“I’m sure.”
He reached into his saddlebag to take one of the bullets out. Even from where I sat across the fire from him, I could hear the sound of sizzling when his skin touched the special ammunition. He jerked his hand back with a yelp.
“Let me,” Cole said. He pulled the bullet out without any problem whatsoever and handed it to me. My skin sizzled, too, and I dropped it instantly.
“He told me I was iron-cursed,” Hattie said.
“And you?” I asked the Swansbys.
“Bronze,” they said in unison.
“There was more, too,” Grant said. “Something about being forced to hunt monsters?”
“And that I’d be confined to the land I’ve chosen,” Cole added. “What does that even mean?”
We all stared at each other for a long, silent moment. I didn’t want to voice my theory. But I suspected I would never again leave the West.
Cole finally spoke. “I’m not sure, but it can’t be anything good.”
“It means we’re cursed,” Hattie said. “We will have to spend the rest of our lives dealing with the curse that was just put on us.”
I couldn’t imagine what that meant. But I knew that I needed to get away from this place. “Whatever it is, we can deal with it tomorrow. Right now, we need to get back down the mountain.”
“As soon as the sun rises. We don’t want to risk taking the horses down the mountain in the dark.” Grant spoke with the easy authority of a federal Marshal.
“I’ll take first watch,” Cole said.
But none of us slept that night. As soon as the gray light of dawn brightened the skies enough for us to see—enough to make sure our horses didn’t break their legs or necks on the way down—we mounted up silently, gathering what was left of our supplies and our weapons.
The future was uncertain.
Then again, it always was.
Trip and I would continue to face it together, no matter what happened. And now, it looked like, we had four other people we could call on in times of need—not counting the P.I. Agency itself, assuming it actually existed.
We might be cursed, but I didn’t believe in curses that couldn’t be broken. We just had to figure out how.
For now, though, I had to keep hoping that we would eventually, somehow, rid ourselves of these unwanted gifts.
We pointed our horse’s noses back down the mountain and rode as quickly as we could back to Leadville, planning to leave on the first train out of the mining town.
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USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and New York Times bestselling author Margo Bond Collins is a former college English professor who, tired of explaining the difference between "hanged" and "hung," turned to writing romance novels instead. Sometimes her heroines kill monsters, sometimes they kiss cowboys or aliens. But they always aim for the heart.
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Cursed By Christmas
Dynasty of Blood Saga: A Christmas Story
Stephany Wallace
About Cursed by Christmas
I thought making it through Christmas Eve was going to be easy…
What the hell was I thinking? I should have known that with a brand-new empire under my ruling, an evil Witch not on the guest list, a Gargoyle Shifter, Vampire Slayers, and humans all in the crazy mix that was my family, things would be everything but perfect.
Whoever said Happily Ever After was the end, clearly didn't know any Vampires.
The question remains, will we survive this party, or be forever changed by it?
Chapter 1
Cetatea din Dracul—The Fortress of the Dragon. Transylvania, Romania…
COUNTESS DARIAH
Snow peaked mountains stretched over the horizon as I stood on the balcony of our palace, looking out onto my kingdom.
A million snow covered roofs peppered the cities in the distance as far as my eye could see, contrasting beautifully against their red brick facades and reminding me of sweet peppermint candy. One by one, twinkly Christmas lights began to shimmer over the houses and through their windows, announcing the night had begun to fall.
It was officially Christmas Eve.
I had never really considered myself to be a Christmas person, you know, with being a ruthless bloodsucking Vampiress, yah? At least not during what I now called the years of darkness, when my identity was stolen from me, the truth about my life hidden for what seemed like an eternity—not a term an immortal Vampiri would ever use lightly. We knew the real meaning behind forever.
And yet, as I glanced over the lands that witnessed my parents fall in love, creating a legend that would change the course of our world, an air of accomplishment, happiness, and even hope illuminated my being. This land had seen me grow up among people who swore to protect me, and who risked anything, even when I unknowingly declared them my enemies. When I couldn’t remember they were actually my family.
My kingdom had suffered under the betrayal of blind ambition, fear, discrimination, and greed, but it had also been witness to the power of love and truth. A year ago, I had reclaimed my legacy, my birthright, supported by the very family I had once forgotten, and by a man who changed my life in every possible way.
Now, after a year of fighting the remnants of the despicable poison the Străbun Dynasties had spread, we were truly free, and the Adevărată Imperiu—the True Empire was alive once again.
It hadn’t been easy to unite the Vampir race after the war, to show them life in peace with the humans was possible, but we had done it. The family I had chosen to be part of my life and I had accomplished it together.
Strong arms wrapped around my body from behind just as a chilled breeze swept by me, and goosebumps erupted along my skin, spreading all over my body. Though I wasn’t entirely sure which of the two had caused it.
That was lie. It was Mathew. It was always Mathew.
“You know what I’m craving?” his deep and delicious voice asked in my ear, his lips brushing the sensitive skin just below, making me shiver.
“A spiced peppermint mocha with whipped cream?” I teased. “Because I could really go for one of those.”
Mathew’s chest shook against my back with his earthy laughter, delighting me, and sending a bout of happiness through me. His large hands gripped my waist instantly, turning me around to face him.
Eagerly, my arms wrapped around his neck and I pulled him close, letting him claim me with an enticing kiss. Mmm… “Maybe I am craving the same thing you are.” My lips curled into a sinful smirk as I glanced up to look at him.
“Good answer, baby.” Giving me a naughty, crooked smirk, he leaned down to kiss me again and my chin lifted to meet him.
The sound of flapping wings echoed around us that instant, their movement creating a wind burst so strong that it forced us against the wall. We turned around to see the large Gargoyle Shifter gliding towards us with his Dragon-like wings.
“Hi, Ivas,” I greeted, my voice reflecting the love I felt for the one being that had been with me unwaveringly through my darkness, protecting me, and being my loyal companion even when I didn’t know who I was.
To anyone other than us, his presence would incite fear. My Gargoyle was what many would call a creature of nightmares, with a body that resembled that of a man—though he had no private parts—a bald head with a beak-like mouth, Vampir fangs jutting from it, sunken empty eyes, and pointed ears. Clawed fingers extended from his hands, large wings, and even a crest atop the center of his head, that like his other traits, reminded you of a Dragon.
Ivas’ smooth leathery skin shone under the sconces of the fortress when he landed on the balcony, wobbling when he used his wings to come to us, like extra legs.
Sitting before us in a crouch, he rested both hands on the ground between his feet, and nudged Mathew’s palm with his head—asking for his caress. Ivas might look like he’d escaped a nightmare, but he was as sweet and loyal as a puppy.
Unless you wanted to hurt me or my family in any way, then he would rip you apart without hesitation. No, I was not exaggerating.
“Hiii…” The strung-out word left his throat while my husband stroked his crest, and Ivas’ eyes fell closed, fully enjoying it.
“You are so spoiled,” I called to him, and saw him open his eyes again, now engulfed in a soft green light thanks to my husband’s warrior magic coursing through him.
“Loove…” my Gargoyle added in his guttural voice and came to me, wrapping both arms around my waist in a hug.
“I love you too, my beautiful boy.” I stroked his crest, placing a kiss on it.
“Sometimes I think he loves you more than I do, baby. I’m getting jealous.”
A heartfelt smile curved my lips and I nodded. “Exactly, so you better keep up.”
“Baaaby…” Ivas repeated my husband’s endearment for me, and we both chuckled. So far, he could say love, family, hi, hungry, sleepy, no, Daddy, and now baby. After Mathew came into our lives, he began to slowly learn how to speak, and that was his latest accomplishment.
“Daaaddy…” Hugging my husband, he assured he cared for him too, and stepped back.
“Were you flying around the kingdom for fun, sightseeing?” I asked, and saw him nod, ruffling wings behind him while he looked up at both of us. Whenever he stood to his full height, Ivas was taller than any of us, but crouching like he was at the moment, it was easy to be tricked.
Though to be fair, it wasn’t hard being taller than I. Still, I was little but fierce.
“That’s nice. Why don’t you go take a little nap? You must be tired, and there are a lot of people coming to meet you tonight. You are so special that they all want to see you. Don’t worry, Mommy and Daddy will be home when you awake. We are not going anywhere.”
It felt like the assurance was needed, he’d been extra protective of me in the past few months.
His head tilted to one side, and he blinked, considering my suggestion. Finally nodding, Ivas shot to the sky, flying towards the bell tower on the right
side of our castle. He landed on the tower, resuming his usual post as he perched on the edge with his Dragon-like wings closed behind him, clawed hands rested between his feet in front of him. Slowly, he transformed before our eyes. Ivas’ smooth leathery skin disappeared, replaced by a grey, stony, aged exterior, and he reduced in size until he was nothing more but a beautiful and menacing Gargoyle statue atop the fortress.
“So, where were we?” I asked, glancing at my husband, and a naughty smirk captured his expression.
Pulling me up, he carried me back into the room and let me fall on the bed, grinning when I slightly bounced on the pillow top.
“Now that’s what I like to hear…” He climbed onto the bed like a sexy predator, and slowly pulled off his shirt, sending all kinds of tingles down my body with his enticing approach. The origin runes on his chest ignited in a soft emerald light, illuminating every rippling muscles as his Nyvith magic awoke.
Who would have thought I’d end up with a mystical Vampir slayer?
“Why Nerdy Professor Sexy,” I faked gasped, using the endearment that reminded us of his once human life. “If I had realized that you had such deliciously naughty moves the first time I saw you, I would have snatched you up right away.”
“Is that so?” he asked, amused, laying against my body while his lips immediately searched for my neck.
“Yes. Yes, it is.”
“Well, let me let you in on a little secret. I have moves you have yet to discover.” My husband’s mint-green eyes bore into mine, and I raised a single eyebrow, challenging him.
“Really?”
“No. I only have the five moves you already know. I’m still a nerd, remember? You are expecting too much of me.”
Curse of Christmas: A Collection of Paranormal Holiday Stories Page 16
