“No matter what you say to him, you can’t take away the pain he’s feeling.” Luke’s hand came up and gently caressed my cheek. “I thought I’d lost you. I thought I’d never have you back in my arms. That kind of heartache is not something I’d wish on my worst enemy. I thank the Goddess that I didn’t lose you. We can’t help it if we love each other. I’m sorry that it hurts Dean that we’re together, but he’ll come to accept it in time.” His fingers glided down my throat and slowly came to rest on the nape of my neck.
He pulled me toward him, and he kissed me. And after awhile he leaned back and gave me a wide smile. “You realize it’s terribly cold outside tonight.” He pretended to shiver. “I’m not tough like the old bird… I might need some help keeping warm.”
I laughed. “Are you suggesting we share a sleeping bag?”
“I am. I promise to keep you warm all night.”
I felt a delicious shiver run down my body at Luke’s words. I looked over to where Jamie and Mildred lay near campfire. At that moment, I wished desperately that we were alone. I moved into Luke’s arms and rested my head against his shoulder. Luke was with me again. He was right: whatever came up we would fight it together. We had been taking on all the crazy thrown our way since we first met, and we had somehow survived it all.
He might be in a different body, but his soul, his essence, was still the same, no matter how much darkness and anger swirled around inside him. And just maybe there was a glimmer of the girl I used to be inside me somewhere. The young wannabe healer who’d spent her summers running through the fields barefoot. The girl who’d loved to dig her hands into the dirt and grow things. That girl had dreamed of being a healer one day. That life was no more, but maybe there were new dreams to go after. Things to wish for. Things to live for. We were stronger together, and we’d survived this long, and if we were lucky maybe we’d survive the next impossible trials thrown in our path.
Mildred said the only way to cure me was to bring forth a demon and cut off its horn. I wanted to live. Mildred and Luke believed we could do this impossible thing. What other choice did I have but to trust them both?
* * *
I wasn’t sure what woke me. I was nestled in a sleeping bag next to Luke’s. It had been tempting to take him up on his offer to share a bag, but when we’d finally gone back to the others and started making preparations to go to sleep Dean had finally stumbled back into camp.
He had only looked directly at me once and in that one look, there was so much desperation and disappointment. Dean had told me that he loved me. Back in the mining town he had thought that Luke was dead, and he believed in his heart that we would be together. I had, in my grief, fallen into his arms, but it only happened because I’d been devastated and so sad. I had thought I had lost Luke forever. Once again, I had been ruled by my emotions and in the moment I got carried away. I had thrown myself at Dean, but nothing truly happened. Things had stopped before they went too far.
I knew a part of me had feelings for Dean. I did feel something when he kissed me. I was attracted to him, but that’s all it was—attraction. It wasn’t love. I loved Luke. I had doubted my feelings for Luke when he’d jumped into Caleb’s body. I had been so scared of the true Caleb, who’d tortured me, threatened to kill me. Fear had kept me from seeing Luke. But I was no longer afraid. I saw past Caleb’s face and into Luke’s soul. Luke was the one I cared for, the one I loved. A few stolen kisses with Dean would never change that. But how could I ever explain that to Dean? How could I make him understand that we were never meant to be together? I wanted to go to Dean and try to tell him everything I was thinking and feeling, but Luke’s words rang in my head. Give him time.
When Dean crawled into his sleeping bag, I had looked over at Luke. All smiles, he’d motioned to his sleeping bag, a silent invitation for me to join him, but I just shook my head. I knew seeing Luke and I together was causing Dean pain. I didn’t want to make things worse. I didn’t want to hurt Dean more than I already had. Eventually, he would get used to seeing us together as a couple and would come to terms with it. He would realize that he didn’t truly love me, and he would find someone else. Someone who loved him the way he truly deserved.
As I lay in my sleeping bag looking out into the darkness, I wondered what woke me. I stared into the fire. Its low flames and embers gave off a flickering light. I had been having a restless night. Tossing and turning with both guilt about Dean and worry about what Gage was up to. It was going to be a long day tomorrow and what I needed most was to clear my mind and go back to sleep. I started to close my eyes, but the soft sound of singing off in the distance made me flip them open again. I looked around the campfire. Mildred slept peacefully, and I could hear Dean snoring ever so softly. The bag where Jamie had been laying was empty.
I sat up, the leaves beneath my sleeping bag rustling.
Luke opened his eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Go back to sleep,” I answered. It seemed silly to worry him. Jamie got restless. She couldn’t be far.
Now I slid out of my sleeping bag. As I passed the campfire, I could see my breath in the firelight. It was a chilly night. Winter would be here soon. I looked off into the dark woods. Jamie was scared most of the time. She wouldn’t wander far away from a warm fire and the people who were protecting her…would she? She knew Darla and the death dealers were hot on our trail.
I followed the soft sound of singing. I came around a tree, and the sight before me stopped me dead in my tracks. Jamie sat on the ground, an orange light outlining her body. Her outstretched hands moved back and forth, and all around her were misty forms. She was singing a song I had never heard before… Or had I?
Déjà vu tickled at the back of my mind, and I leaned against the tree to try and get my bearings. After a moment, there came a sudden recognition. Those shadowy forms were my spirit pack. My spirit pack sat around her in a circle while she sang to them.
Suddenly my dream from so long ago came back to me—the little girl singing to trees filled with animals, the three nightmarish creatures stepping out of the shadows. I reeled in shock, then spun around and searched the darkness. In that dream, three demons had approached. Was the dream coming true? Was it actually a vision? At any moment would I hear crashing in the woods as the demons came into view? I held my breath and listened.
The wind carried nothing but Jamie’s voice.
I watched her sing to my spirit pack. She’d shown us her scrying abilities, but now she was calling to a pack of animal spirits? A pack that I controlled. A gift the old gods had bestowed on me.
I looked around again. No demons loomed out of the darkness, no old gods defended me. There was just a child singing a sweet little song in the trees.
What was she? What powers did she possess? And how sure was Mildred that the demon didn’t still possess her? Mildred had said the demon was still around. Would I be able to feel the creature if it were here? I didn’t feel anything. No ghostly fingers touched me, no voices whispered on the wind. There were no spirits around that I could detect except for my spirit pack. I moved out of the trees to get a better view, and a small branch caught in my clothes, breaking with a loud crack.
The child stopped singing and looked over in my direction. I moved my body back behind the tree just as her eyes shifted to where I’d been standing. I waited behind the tree for a few seconds and then I looked back around.
The clearing was empty.
For one long moment I wondered if this was a dream. Was I still asleep? The wind picked up, and my body began to tremble with cold. No, this was no dream. I was awake, standing in the dark woods.
It was easy making my way back to the campsite; I could see the flames of the fire between the trees. Jamie lay in her sleeping bag with her eyes closed. I stared at the child. I hadn’t imagined what I’d seen. I had watched Jamie singing a lullaby to my spirit pack. I had watched part of my nightmare come true. Now I had to worry that it wasn’t a nightmare, but a vision. I
n my dream, three demons had showed up. Horrid creatures that stood against the child and the spirit pack. The child had said that I wasn’t ready to battle the demons and that surviving such a battle was close to impossible. Would we all be killed trying to keep the Legion from crossing into our world?
* * *
My stomach grumbled as we rolled up our sleeping bags, packed away the camping gear, and started hiking again. We had to watch our rations, so breakfast was light. We each ate a handful of nuts and a protein bar. We couldn’t buy more food until we stumbled into another town. Mildred seemed to have an idea of where she was going, so at least this time we weren’t mindlessly wandering around the forest. We followed behind her as she strode confidently along.
I never got a chance to get Luke alone. When I’d slipped back into my sleeping bag, Luke had been soundly asleep. I had lain awake looking over at Jamie, questions swirling through my head. Was she a danger to us? Was she full of goodness? Was she full of evil? I had barely spoken with her since the midnight ritual. When I first got to know her, I had been so taken with the way she looked, the way she made me feel when I was around her, I never thought to try and find out who she really was. Her eyes were a clear blue now; before they’d had a sinister orange glint to them. I wanted to believe with all my heart that meant the demon no longer had any control over her, but there was no way to know for sure.
Luke came up beside me and took my hand. He had a backpack slung over his shoulder.
Mildred, Dean, and Jamie walked twenty feet ahead of us. I struggled behind, unable to keep pace with the others.
Luke gave my hand a squeeze. “What’s wrong?” He looked over at me. “I can tell by the look on your face that something’s troubling you.”
“It’s Jamie. I found her in the woods last night when everyone else was asleep.” I told him all of it. About finding Jamie in the clearing, the orange light, and her singing to my spirit pack.
When I finished, he looked over at me, his eyes wide with astonishment. “She was singing to them?”
“Have you ever heard of such a thing?”
“No. That’s what worries me. All of the things that are happening I’ve never heard of, never seen before. How are we supposed to prepare ourselves when we honestly don’t know what we’re going to face when we find Gage?”
“Do you think it’s a mistake to go after Gage?” I asked. It was true the note I found from Wendy back in the mining camp still haunted me. Find me. I knew she expected me to come for her, to save her.
“What choice do we have?” Luke said. “But I would feel more comfortable if we had more mages with us.”
I looked behind me into the empty forest. If Darla and her people caught up with us, he might just get his wish. “If we try this, we may all die,” I whispered.
“And if we don’t, you’ll die for sure.”
The poison was above my elbow, halfway to my shoulder. How much longer did I have? How long until the weakness that filled me got so bad I could no longer walk? I could no longer breathe?
“It’s actually a good thing Jamie has magic,” I said.
My words surprised him.
I tried to explain myself. “Dean is strong and formidable, but only becomes a true threat if someone blasts him with magic. Mildred has the lightning, and you have hellfire. But if the child has some magic she can use to help us, that’s a good thing.”
He finally voiced the one thought that had been haunting me. “What if the demon still possesses her?”
“If it did, I think we could tell. Before I could feel the shadow of the creature on her. I don’t feel that same sense of evil from her.” I looked at him. “Do you?”
“No. But it created her; it was inside her. Being possessed by a demon for a short time changed Wendy.” An image of Wendy talking to herself in the corner flashed across my mind. Wendy had attacked me. “Wendy started to lose her mind.”
“Jamie doesn’t seem crazy. She seems saner than Mildred.”
I thought back to Mildred’s behavior in the asylum. How long would we have the sane Mildred around? How long until she started to act crazy again? I stopped walking and faced him. “Do we have an actual plan? Once we get to the island—what then?”
“We find Gage,” He answered.
“And once we find him?” I demanded.
“We have hellfire. We have lightning.” He grabbed both my hands in his. “We have you. You have powerful magic.”
I could just make out the outline of the others ahead of us. If we didn’t start walking, we might lose sight of them altogether. I started moving forward, but Luke grabbed my arm and pulled me with him toward a cluster of trees.
He moved closer until his body was pressed tightly against mine and my back was against a tree. I could feel the heat of his body. His fingers reached up and grazed my lips. Then they trailed slowly down my neck.
“When I think of anyone touching you but me, it makes me crazy.” Desire laced his voice and I shivered in anticipation. Before I could say anything, he roughly pulled me to him. His mouth crushed down on mine. He kissed me until my lips felt bruised. When he finally pulled away, my heart pounded, and my breath came out in small gasps.
“They’ll wonder where we are,” I said, trying to collect myself.
“Let them wonder.” His hands were still in my hair. He lowered his lips to my neck. His hands glided from my hair down to the zipper of my jacket. I held my breath while he unzipped it.
“What are you doing?” I whispered as warm nimble fingers slid beneath my shirt.
“Nothing,” he said as his lips brushed against my neck.
“Luke, we can’t do this here.” But my mind, my body was lost in a wave of pleasure. The way he smelled, his touch, his lips—I wanted him so desperately.
“They’re here!” the child’s voice rang out.
Luke spun around.
It was Jamie. She was watching us with obvious curiosity.
I pushed myself away from Luke.
Mildred walked up and stood beside Jamie. When Mildred spoke, there was a twinkle her eye. “We found the highway. It’s not far from here.” She gestured behind her. “Maybe a quarter of a mile away.” She took in my rumpled appearance and smiled. “We were worried you’d gotten lost.”
I could feel the heat on my cheeks as I straightened my clothes. I looked up and my eyes locked with Dean’s. He was now standing behind Mildred. I expected to see anger, but instead I saw a look of defeat flash across his face.
Mildred watched us, and she finally broke the uncomfortable silence. “It’s a long way to the island. I think our best course of action is to hitch a ride.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?” Luke said. “There are people out here hunting death dealers.”
“They’re just as likely to stumble across us in the woods as they are to find us driving down the highway in a car,” she answered, sounding amused.
Dean spoke up. “I heard they’ve set up roadblocks in some towns.” He kept glancing in my direction.
Luke was openly glaring at Dean.
“We’ll hitch a ride until we find another mode of transportation.” Mildred turned and started to walk away. She called back over her shoulder. “Come along, children.”
One after the other, we began to follow her. Somehow Mildred had become the pied piper. We weren’t exactly sure where we were going or what we would find when we got there, but along we went, trailing after Mildred. I just hoped she wasn’t leading us astray.
Chapter 9
I stood on the rear deck of the ferry, watching the boat cut its way through the low swells. It had taken us three days to get here. For part of it we walked, and the rest of the time we hitched rides from strangers.
One of Mildred’s powers was popping in and out of places, another was controlling lightning, but I wondered if she had a third. On three separate occasions, she’d stood at the side of the road and flicked her fingers in the direction of an oncoming car and that car
had stopped. And after a brief conversation, the driver agreed to pick us up and take us along with him. It had been grueling, hitchhiking; I hated being crammed tightly into a car with strangers, always wondering if they would hurt us if they found out who we were.
But yesterday Mildred had somehow acquired a minivan. We had been dropped off at a rest stop, and while we were stretching our legs and looking for our next ride, Mildred had disappeared. Twenty minutes later she’d driven up in the minivan. We didn’t ask her how she got it, and she didn’t give an explanation. Honestly, I’d been so happy to see her again, I’d gotten in the car without a word. When she’d left, I’d been worried she’d abandoned us. She was the only one who knew exactly where we were going.
Once in the van, we drove all night. Luke, Dean, and I took turns at the wheel. I slept through the last leg of the trip. When I woke, we were boarding the ferry.
I stood at the stern of the boat, happy to finally be outdoors again, even if it was raining. I leaned against the railing and looked out into the water. My coat was plastered against me and my hair clung to my face and neck. I was the only one outside. Everyone else was inside, sitting in the rows of chairs that lined the ferry’s cabin. But I wasn’t alone. I watched ghostly animal forms ride in the boat’s rolling wake, racing along with the ship. I watched them race beside the boat and felt anew the bond that tied me to the old gods and, through them, to the creatures of the wild. My spirit pack—bears, wolves, and now dolphins.
“I thought they only came when you were in danger?” Mildred stood at the railing a few feet away from me. I hadn’t heard her approaching and wondered if she’d teleported.
“That’s how it’s worked so far,” I said, looking down at the spirits diving in the waves. “But when I came out here, dolphin spirits appeared.”
“If someone sees them…”
I raised my hand. The rain was beating down in a steady stream on both of us. “No one else is foolish enough to be out in this weather.”
Legion Page 20
