Usually there was at least some sense of exhilaration whenever she’d survived such a close call. This time, she felt nothing but a kind of shell-shocked exhaustion. “They helped us. Somehow at the end, they helped us. Dammit, I wish we could’ve saved them. They weren’t responsible for any of this.”
Duncan shook his head. “No, but I don’t see what we could have done.” His eyes narrowed. “But if it is the Fomorians doing this, we need to kick some teal-blue ass.”
Masara’s gaze fell on Walker’s severed head, and she knelt, meaning to cast a stasis spell over it. She reached down…
Black, ropelike tentacles exploded from the sides of the severed head and shot upward, wrapping around her neck. They tightened, jerking the head up toward her face, jaws gaping wide to bite…
Something silver flashed past her face, and the grip on her head was gone even as she threw herself backward. Sliced tentacles fell from around her throat. She landed on her ass as Duncan reversed his stroke to hack the werewolf’s head in two. Roaring in rage, he struck again and again, sending bone fragments, blood, and bits of brain tissue flying. “What the…” Chop! “FUCK…” CHOP! “… does it take to…” CHOP! “… kill you…” CHOP! “… you possessing motherfucker?”
By the time he stopped, the grass was covered in blood and gore.
“Oh, holy Christ, our Savior,” she croaked.
Panting, he looked up at her, white-faced. “I thought you were dead. I thought it was going to kill you.”
“So did I,” she whispered. And she still wanted to run screaming. “Thank you. I’m impressed. I doubt I’d have been able to cut those tentacles without hitting me.”
He gave her a wild-eyed look through a badly clawed visor. His hands were shaking. “I was just thinking that if this was a horror movie -- and what with the flying zombie rats, it’s been that kind of week…” Duncan shook his head. “So when it actually grabbed you, I already had the axe lined up.” Glancing down, he leaped back. “Fuck me!”
Following his gaze, Masara too, jolted away. The bloody fragments of Walker’s head moved. Something black and heaving covered it, beginning to hum with a high, insectile buzzing. Glittering in the moonlight, it launched skyward on countless beating wings.
Flies? Flying roaches? It was impossible to tell. Acting on sheer reflex, Masara shot a fireball at the stream of insects. Even as the blast left her fingers, she remembered werewolves were immune to magic. But when the fireball hit the swarm, it ignited. Ash rained to the ground.
Still the hum continued. More swarms rose like smoke from the bodies and severed heads. Cursing, Masara started blasting fireballs at them. Another swarm ignited, but the rest of the insects shot off in a thousand different directions. A heartbeat later they’d all vanished.
“What the hell?” Duncan demanded.
Masara gaped at the night sky, blinking in shock. “I’ve fought dragons, demonic aliens, werewolves, giant snakes and fairies, and I have never seen anything like that.”
Magic exploded in her senses, and she wheeled around, dragging in her power and preparing to fight.
“Fuck,” Duncan swore, raising his axe. “What now?”
But to her relief, Masara saw the hot point of a dimensional gate expanding. A moment later, Arthur Pendragon strode through, followed by Belle, Tristan, Guinevere, Morgana Le Fay, and the Knights of the Round Table. They all had their swords drawn, and they looked bloody and battered.
The former king broke step, studying the bodies. “Well, hell. I take it I’m not the only one who’s had a bad day.” He flashed them one of his sudden, surprisingly boyish smiles. “But I’m delighted you survived. What the hell happened?”
Masara sighed as she looked down at what was left of the werewolves. “We lost some very good people who damn well didn’t deserve it.”
“I’m sorry it took me so long to get your message,” Belle told her as they all scanned the area. “We’ve been gating all over Mageverse Earth chasing King Bres and his bloody army. We were still trying to catch him when your messenger found us.”
“At least you’re here now,” Masara told her friend. “We’ve got to get those bodies into containment bags. Now, before anything else comes out of them.”
Arthur raised his dark brows. “Anything else?”
* * *
King Bres swore, his three-fingered hands curling into massive fists. He’d had the little Maja whore. He’d been so close to sinking his she-wolf’s fangs into her, he could practically taste the bitch’s blood.
The next moment, the witch had torn free and hit his puppet with that axe, and the wolf bitch had sacrificed herself to break his grip on all three of them. The whole situation had blown up in his face.
He’d never felt such pain in all his long life. He’d been so incapacitated, he’d almost lost the Contagion to her magical blasts, which would have truly thrown his plans into chaos.
Two years of planning, painstaking negotiations to build alliances with the trolls, the Jotung, the Centauri, and the Mer. The creation of the Contagion and infecting the two wolves… It had gone so well at first. The Contagion had overcome the Direkind pair’s natural immunity and provided a conduit he could use to possess his victims. He’d been able to use them to kill the mortal bitch with no difficulty at all, despite their stubborn attempts to resist his control.
Just as Bres had expected, the werewolf officer had called in the Magekind to assist in a cover up of the mortal’s murder. He’d then staged the attack on Llyr’s palace as a feint, and seen to it that his victims couldn’t call for help. This should have isolated the two Magekind agents and left them vulnerable to infection. As an added benefit, the attack on the palace had given Bres an opportunity to study Arthur Pendragon in action.
Then, after all that, the attack had failed, so frustratingly close to victory. Because of three stubborn dogs and a pair of Magekind who didn’t know when to lay down and die. Still, he’d preserved the Contagion. The plan could still go forward.
It had to. He’d spent years studying the wards around Avalon, and he was convinced there was no other way to penetrate the city’s magical shields. No one could get through the wards except the Magekind agents they’d been designed to recognize.
Which meant he had to infect one of the Majae and seize control of her once the Contagion had cracked her mental defenses. A Magus wouldn’t do; vampires couldn’t create magical gates. Once he had her, Bres could walk her right through the city’s defenses and pry Avalon apart like an oyster.
And kill every single member of the Magekind.
The very thought soothed his frustrated fury. Bres smiled in cold anticipation. Soon, prey. Very soon.
* * *
Masara touched Duncan, and his battered armor dissolved into sparks and vanished, replaced with the leather he’d worn at the beginning of the evening. Hers did the same. Next began the cleanup. They didn’t relax until all three werewolf bodies were enclosed in magical stasis units they wouldn’t be able to escape even if they somehow came to life again. Belle transported them back to Avalon to be examined by one of the Maja healers, this one a former pathologist.
In the meantime, they had to come up with some way to explain Walker’s death to the Tyger County Sheriff’s Office without raising questions nobody wanted to answer.
In the end, it was decided that the best solution was one the Magekind had used many times before. Morgana conjured three “corpses” identical to Walker, Ellie, and Jack, but for the fact that they would pass as human. Conjuring a car for the Rands identical to their missing vehicle, the witch staged a head-on collision with Walker’s Toyota, added appropriate injuries to the bodies, and called 911 before gating away.
Meanwhile, Masara repaired the damage to the Harrington’s home, then called Amy’s cell.
“Hello?” Amy said, sounding hesitant.
“It’s Masara,” she said. “Is it all right if Duncan and I gate to your location? We’d like to talk to you.”
There was a long, painful silence before Amy asked, sounding numb, “Is it over?”
She exchanged an exhausted glance with Duncan. Lord, I hope so. “Yes.”
“All right.” The Dire Wolf’s voice sounded choked. They said goodbye and hung up.
Masara sighed and turned to Duncan. “Let’s get it over with.” They owed Jack and Ellie this.
* * *
They stepped through the gate to find Amy huddled in the circle of her husband’s arms. Tom was dressed in a pair of pajama bottoms and a T-shirt, while his wife wore a top and shorts. Both looked as exhausted, as pale and hollow-eyed as Masara felt.
Nearby, a pair of small figures lay in one of the two king-size beds, dark hair and red curls peeking above the navy-blue comforter.
“We’ll need to talk out on the balcony,” Amy told them in a hoarse whisper as her husband moved to open the room’s sliding glass door. “The kids are asleep, and I don’t want them hearing this.”
Masara and Duncan followed them out into the brisk evening air. The brilliant skyline of Manhattan towered around the hotel. The fall air was cool as it blew around them, carrying the sounds of honking horns and the smell of gasoline. There was barely room on the balcony for all four of them, but it was better than waking up the children.
Amy sank down into one of the two plastic chairs and huddled there, wiping her eyes with a balled-up tissue. “What… what happened?”
Masara straightened her aching shoulders, grateful for Duncan’s quiet presence at her side. She described the events of the night in a few terse sentences. “I wanted you to know your parents helped us. Ellie didn’t just fall into that ward. She threw herself into it, and the pain seemed to break the puppeteer’s control. Your father cried out to Duncan to take his head. So did Walker, who said to strike before ‘he’ could regain control. Possibly Bres or one of the Fomorians’ allies, though we don’t know for sure. Either way, they all fought hard against whoever it was. Without their self-sacrifice, I doubt we’d have survived.”
“That sounds like my folks.” Some of the horrible grief lifted from Amy’s face. “My parents did have a Spirit Link.”
“What?” Duncan asked, confused.
“It’s a kind of psychic bond Direkind couples form,” Tom told him. “Not everyone does it, because if your partner dies, the psychic shock kills you too.”
“Like the Truebond?” Duncan asked Masara.
“It is similar, but as I understand it, it communicates sensation and emotion more than thoughts.” She brushed her thumb over her lower lip. “I did have the impression they seemed to feel each other’s pain.”
Duncan’s dark brows rose. “If that was what was going on, maybe they used the pain to break the puppet master’s control.”
Amy frowned. “So the rabies theory is definitely out.”
“We thought so.” Masara grimaced. Apparently, there was no way out of telling them the ugly details. “But it seems to be more complicated than that. When I bent over Walker’s decapitated head, tentacles shot out of it and wrapped around my neck. It would’ve bitten me if Duncan hadn’t cut me free.”
The two werewolves stared at her in startled revulsion. “My God,” Tom said.
“It gets worse. After it was over, a cloud of insects appeared around the bodies and flew away. I fried some of them with a fireball, but the rest escaped.”
“Where did they go?” Amy demanded.
Masara shook her head. “Again, no idea. The other Majae attempted tracking spells, but nothing worked. They’re gone.”
A horrified silence ticked by. “You do realize they’ll be back?” Tom asked at last.
“That’s what we’re worried about,” Masara admitted.
“Look, I can’t…” Amy wiped her eyes again and blew out a breath. “What’s going to happen to my parents’ bodies? How are we going to explain this?”
Masara described the simulated car crash with its simulated bodies. “You’ll probably be getting a call from law enforcement once they find your parents’ IDs.”
“Well, at least we’ll be able to have a funeral.” She frowned. “What about the real bodies?”
“We’re conducting autopsies on them to try to determine what was done to them and how. Normally I’d be optimistic, but as we’ve discovered, werewolf magic seems to trump ours.” Masara sighed. “Either way, we’ll cremate the remains and return them to you.”
“That probably would be safer,” Amy scrubbed a hand over her eyes. Her husband wrapped his arms around her, and she leaned back against his body.
“You think this thing will come after us and the kids?” Tom asked.
Masara hesitated a long moment. “I don’t think it’s particularly likely. From what he said, I was his main target. Why, I don’t know. But until we take care of this, we’re going to have agents keep an eye on you. I’ll maintain the ward around your house and provide you with a panic button you can activate if you need to call for help.”
Amy dredged up a smile with obvious effort. “Thank you. For everything.”
Masara shook her head. “I only wish I could’ve found a way to free your folks and Walker.”
“Considering everything you’ve told me, I can’t imagine how that would’ve been possible. That thing…” Her lip trembled. “Just catch it for us. I don’t want any other family to go through this.”
Masara leaned forward and squeezed her hand. “We’re going to do everything in our power. Besides, this thing has made a very bad mistake.” She smiled grimly. “It’s pissed off Arthur Pendragon.”
Chapter Ten
Duncan stepped through the gate Masara created without even noticing where it led to. Then he stopped dead, blinking as he gazed around in wonder. “Where are we?”
“Home,” she said, with an exhausted sigh as she stepped through behind him. “After all that, my heart is hurting. And I desperately need time to rest and heal and be with you.”
“I can’t think of a prettier spot.”
It looked as if they’d stepped into a fairyland. Directly in front of him, a waterfall danced and leaped down a rock cliff to splash into a ten-foot pool that steamed gently in the moonlight. Exotic scents filled the air from the flowering bushes, trees, and draping vines that surrounded it -- African daisies, King Protea, Impala Lily, Ixia. Flowers he’d never even heard of until he’d encountered them in Masara’s garden. Though he knew it was fall, the air felt deliciously warm and springlike.
When he turned, scanning their surroundings, he spotted the undulating shape of Masara’s house covered in the countless cedar shingles that made it look like an exotic African animal. A stained-glass window depicting a lion glowed through the darkness in a thousand colors, and recognizing it, he realized they were in the garden behind her house. “I never knew this pool was here.” They’d walked in the garden many times before, but the mounds of greenery that surrounded the pool must have concealed it.
“I was saving it for a surprise.” She touched him, and his leather street clothes vanished.
Glancing around, he froze, staring, breath caught in wonder as hers vanished, as well. Masara looked like a goddess, her body lean and muscular and very female, her pretty breasts tipped by hard, dark nipples. She hooked her hand behind his neck and pulled him down for a kiss so hot it curled his toes.
He groaned against her mouth as his cock instantly hardened and his upper jaw took on a furious ache. He wanted to grab her… but, remembering Robert, he kept his hands where they were.
“You are not Robert,” she growled.
Duncan’s throat tightened, and he wrapped his arms around her. The feel of her, warm and naked against him, reminded him of that horrible moment he thought he’d lost her. Breaking the kiss, he pressed his head into her hair and squeezed his eyes shut. “When I saw that werewolf tear your armor off and rear back to bite, and I knew there was no way I could get to you…”
“I handled it.”
He lifted his head and managed a
smile. “I noticed. And I also heard you drop the F bomb. You’ve never done that before.”
Her white teeth flashed at him. “You’re a bad influence on me, Marine.”
“Yeah?” Duncan stroked his thumbs over the regal rise of her cheekbones. “Let’s see just how bad an influence I can be.” Leaning in, he kissed her again, licking her lips, tasting the perfect heat of her mouth.
Masara caressed him in return, her fingers tracing the breadth of his chest, dancing over the rise and ripple of muscle. Through the link, he could feel just how much she liked his body, the way arousal clenched like a hot fist in the pit of her belly. He also saw what she intended the moment before she did it. Duncan grabbed her wrist just as she gave him a hard shove. A tug pulled her after him as he plunged into the pool with a huge splash.
For a moment they sank together into the deliciously hot water, their bodies twining around each other, until his backside hit the pool’s smooth stone floor. They came up together, their heads breaking the surface, spitting water and grinning at each other like a pair of kids. The steaming water seemed to fizz over his skin in a way he recognized. “This feels really good. Is it enchanted?”
She leaned against him lazily. “Yes. The stones that line the pool are spelled for healing. That way if I’m too magically drained, a good soak will take care of the worst of my bruises and cuts.”
Duncan grinned wickedly. “Ever made love in here?”
She wrinkled her nose at him. “Water, oddly enough, generally isn’t the best thing for nice slippery sex.”
“Why don’t we try it and see?”
He dipped his head and kissed her, long and slow, until she purred into his mouth, “You talked me into it.” Lifting her right leg, Masara wrapped it around his hip. Duncan caught her under the thigh as she coiled the other leg around him and hooked her arms behind his neck. For a long, sweet moment, they did nothing but kiss.
And for that moment, kissing was enough. There was so much pleasure to be found in the taste of her velvet lips, the slick texture of her teeth, the strength of long, smooth legs gripping him as soft breasts pressed against his chest, while his thick cock nudged her belly in stark erotic promise.
Master of Valor (Merlin's Legacy 2) Page 14
