The COMPLETE Witching Pen Series, Boxed Set: The Witching Pen, The Sands Of Time, The Demon Bride, The Last Dragon and Wilted

by Dianna Hardy

  She gaped at him, unable to form words.

  He reached for her again, and pulled her into an embrace. “The Earth will rumble and shatter, and all dimensions will bleed into one… It’s killing me that I can’t be here with you, at the end of all things,” he whispered, “but next time the Dessec come for you, they’ll bring the whole tribe – thousands strong – especially if the dimensions fall because there’ll be nothing parting them from us, and they’ll have nothing to lose. I have to go, so we can all survive.”

  She felt herself nod, numbly. She knew he was right – she just wished he wasn’t.

  “Go to Paul, and tell him that if he doesn’t keep you and this baby safe until I get back, I’m going to string him up by his entrails the next time I see him.” And he didn’t look like he was joking.

  “Are you sure?”

  “I hate him, Amy. But you need him, and the baby needs him, and I need you both to be safe. I call a stalemate. But if he does anything to hurt you ever again, I’ll cripple him.”

  That said, he kissed her, and this was it – she wondered if it would be weeks or months before she saw him again. Agony gripped her heart. She held onto him for everything they were worth, which was suddenly a hell of a lot.

  “This isn’t goodbye, Amy; this is ‘see you soon’.”

  She stifled a sob, and nodded. Crying wouldn’t help either of them.

  Pueblo began to shimmer as the teleportation took hold.

  “Oh, and Amy,” he said.

  She managed to catch that playful grin of his as he faded…

  “I love you, too, baby.”

  Then, he was gone.

  Chapter Fifteen

  The dawn was breaking, and it looked spectacular over Canary Wharf. The tall, London office buildings glinted with sharp hues of pinks and yellows as the emerging sun took hold of the day, as if it was cleansing everything in sight. How strange, that now the apocalypse was imminent, the night’s storm had passed … or maybe this was the quiet before the storm. Or maybe this was the way the world looked now he’d taken all sin from it – who knew.

  They had to leave now, or they’d never make it.

  The small earthquakes hadn’t stopped since he’d performed his own special brand of expurgation – one he didn’t even know he was capable of.

  And he shall take all sin from the world…

  He’d assumed that would mean finding some way to kill Abaddon, or at the very least, destroying Hell. He’d thought that actually bringing on the apocalypse was something he would be able to avoid through thought and caution.

  “Really?” asked Mary, as she laced her fingers through his. “Thought and caution? But you’re so thoughtless and reckless…”

  He turned, and placed a chaste kiss on her lips. “Ha bloody ha.”

  She beamed at him, her wings still out.

  Fuck … those wings!

  When she glowed, she still glowed that sexy indigo colour – and it was sexy (everything about her was sexy) – but her new could-have-been-washed-in-Persil wings were something else. They were so white, they were practically luminous. “You make my wings look old and grey now.”

  “You are old and grey,” she teased.

  “And you’re never too immortal for a spanking,” he shot back, then inwardly groaned at that delectable image.

  She made a little purring noise with her tongue, clearly enjoying the image as much as he, and God damn it, his hand actually twitched.

  “Down, tiger,” she soothed. “We have to go.”

  That, they did. “It’s just to drop the Pen off. I want to be in and out of there. The longer we’re with everyone else, the more danger we put them in.”

  “They’re going to have questions for us.”

  He shook his head, sadly. “We won’t have time to answer them.”

  “Gwain.” She placed a hand over his heart. “Don’t hurt so much – they’ll forgive us.”

  “For starting the apocalypse, or for ending it?”

  “It hasn’t started yet.”

  “Portents are like keys that unlock doors. The door to Armageddon just needs a little push now, that’s all. The earth’s rumbling; I already shattered it when I went into Hell to find you, and when I flew us back out; we’ve merged…” He glanced down at the sheathed dagger Sophia had given them, which Mary wore on the belt that held his jeans up on her. “Now we’re just waiting—”

  “For all dimensions to bleed into one,” she finished. She took his hand and placed it around the dagger’s handle, with hers on top of it. “We both know that the only thing holding us back is the safety of mankind. Do we choose a forever for us, over their salvation?”

  He had no answer. He’d like to say no, but as much as he loved his fellow human beings, everything he had done for most of his existence had been for her, not them.

  “I don’t know, Mary … I just don’t know.”

  ~*~

  It was six-thirty in the morning, the sun had just risen, the coffee pot was gurgling, and Amy was chewing at the bit because, technically, coffee was a no-no if she was pregnant. Well, sod that. It was the end of the world, and she was going to have a bloody great big mug of the stuff. The foetus was some kind of holy baby, so it could just deal with it.

  Yeah, you are a great mum, sneered her inner-voice.

  Fuck off, she replied.

  “Is there enough in that pot for everyone?” called out Elena from the living room.

  “Yep!”

  “Good,” she said as she walked into the kitchen. “I’m magicking us all a breakfast feast: sausages, bacon, eggs, fruit, cereals, the lot. If it’s the last breakfast before the world ends, it may as well be the best, and using magic frivolously is hardly a problem right now, is it?”

  “I’m down for that. I’m famished.”

  Everyone was being overly cheery, as if that could ward off the inevitable. The quakes were getting bigger, and now they had made the News all over the world: what was going on? What did all this activity mean? Tsunami warnings had gone up across coastland countries, and everyone inland was braced for falling buildings and electrical shortages. Volcanic activity was also being monitored. Evacuation had been discouraged unless fatality would be imminent within the vicinity – because the earth was fracturing everywhere. There was nowhere else to go.

  Elena squeezed her arm. “How are you holding up?”

  “I’m worried sick about Pueblo. And my mum – Elena, she’s all alone in the Cotswolds.”

  “We’ll go get her, I promise – as soon as we’ve got an open window to do so.”

  She nodded her thanks. “How’s your mum?”

  “Better, although she refuses to have us try and sort out her little age problem. Oh, and … er … I told her about stuff. She wanted to know about my granddad, and what’s been going on…”

  “Oh.” She suddenly felt queasy.

  “Don’t throw up again, okay? She’s cool with it, and, well, she’d like to meet you.”

  Great.

  “Great,” smiled Amy, although she felt anything but. It was sort of like meeting your boyfriend’s mother for the first time … except she was meeting her sort-of-but-not-really-ex-husband’s daughter from the marriage that came after theirs. What in God’s name was she going to say to the woman? “What do I say to her?”

  “I dunno. Steer clear of ‘I’m the one that came before your mum’, and you should be okay.”

  Amy glared at her.

  “Knock, knock.” Paul came in through the doorway carrying a large rucksack. He’d said he needed to pop back to The Council for some things, and that now would be the best time to do it, since no one there would recognise him. He’d promised to be no more than fifteen minutes, so Amy figured what Pueblo didn’t know, wouldn’t hurt him, and she didn’t want to be under constant guard anyway – she was pregnant, not useless.

  The Council had quickly reordered itself after Etienne had ‘disappeared’, appointing a new High Priest in no time,
but then, Etienne had structured the system to be able to deal with such things.

  Amy looked at the clock. “Fifteen minutes, just like you said. Very punctual.”

  He smiled. “Always have been.”

  “Yes, I know.”

  And that killed the conversation.

  Elena rolled her eyes. “I’m going to check on my—”

  Her sentence ended in a little squeal, as the ground began to shake, and this quake was the biggest they’d felt so far.

  “Table!” shouted Paul. “Under the table, both of you!”

  They didn’t argue, but ducked under as a couple of glasses fell off the shelf.

  “Mum!” cried Elena.

  Paul shot her a look. “I’ll go.”

  After a pause, she nodded.

  “Be careful!” Amy called out after him. As if it wasn’t bad enough to have to worry about one man going off on some half-cocked mission, she now had to worry about two? For the next nine months?

  “Elena!” Karl stumbled into the kitchen.

  “Here, under the table.”

  Karl nodded, relief showing on his face, then propped himself under the door frame.

  The quake subsided as quickly as it had begun, but this one had left people shrieking outside on the street, car and house alarms going off, and all the dogs in the neighbourhood barking.

  The two women gingerly crawled out from their hideout, and the three of them stared at each other in silence. What was there to say, anyway, when you were waiting for the world to end?

  “So,” Karl grinned. “Breakfast?”

  “Oh, breakfast would be awesome,” came the familiar voice from across the living room to their left. “I don’t even know when I last ate.”

  The three of them spun and stared, gobsmacked, through the open doorway, to see Mary and Gwain standing by the couch.

  “Why didn’t you tell me you were hungry?” said Gwain.

  “You have nothing in your fridge.”

  “I do.”

  “Beer doesn’t count.”

  “I’d have got you something.”

  “When? Before Michael’s visit, during Sophia’s visit, or after all the hot sex?”

  He never got a chance to reply, because his face met the front of Karl’s fist.

  ~*~

  Truth be told, he was getting a bit tired of being hit, but he knew Karl’s anger came from a just place, as opposed to Michael’s, which came from righteousness, and Abaddon’s, which came from a place of lunacy having spent an eternity living in darkness and sin.

  Still, it pissed him off, and not just because that flawless punch had landed him on his arse – the boy had some muscle – but because what hurt him, hurt Mary. He had to consciously remind himself that Karl had no idea that was the case.

  But it was Mary who took the lead. She shook her head, and pulled herself to standing in record time. “Hey, hey, hey,” she cooed, as she gently took Karl’s fist in her own hand.

  Cooed? Mary cooed? Yeah, he’d heard it all now, and this woman was fuckin’ amazing. He wondered if she’d coo, purr, or scream bloody murder when he sank that blade in her heart.

  Karl looked at her, confused, and then Mary spread her wings.

  Well, wasn’t the boy’s face a picture.

  Elena and Amy still stood in the doorway with their mouths hanging open, seemingly unsure of what to do. And he’d be damned if the blonde’s aura didn’t indicate she was with child. Shit. Looks like they’d missed out on a whole bunch of stuff too.

  He turned his attention back to the lad. He had to stop thinking of him as a boy, despite having watched him grow up … from a distance, anyway. It was a full grown man standing in front of him now. One he was about to leave stranded. “Karl … son…” Gwain stood and placed himself next to Mary.

  Karl suddenly looked pained, as if he’d just realised what he’d done. “Gwain … sorry. I’m sorry…”

  “No, I’m sorry. I buggered off without a word and left you to pick up all the pieces.” He hesitated, then placed a hand on the boy—the man’s—shoulder.

  Karl straightened, and looked him directly in the eye. “You fucking bastard.” Then he threw his arms around him, relief pouring off him.

  Gwain’s chest tightened with emotion. He returned the hug, then clapped him on the back.

  They pulled away from each other, and Karl turned to Mary. He took in her whiter-than-white wings. “Bloody hell…”

  “Is exactly where I’ve been,” she grinned.

  “We can’t stay long,” Gwain said.

  “Breakfast,” hissed Mary, next to him.

  He let out a long breath. “But we’ll stay for breakfast,” he mumbled.

  Mary squealed in delight, bounded across the room to Elena and Amy, and then all the girls were hugging and squeaking and everything had gone super-sonic.

  “You know,” he said to Karl, “there are some things not even evolution can change.”

  “Are you telling me that women have always spread joy in high frequency?”

  “Mm-hmm. Even in Neanderthal times.”

  Karl laughed out loud, and Gwain hated himself for what he was about to do.

  He dug into his pockets. “Here,” he said, and placed the Pen in his hand. “I need you to look after this – I know you can … And here…” In his other hand, he placed the keys to his penthouse.

  Karl looked at him, bewildered. He’d been to the penthouse once, just before they flew to Hyde Park to save Elena. “These are the keys to your penthouse.”

  “Yes, they are, and if the quakes get bad, the safest place is on the roof. You have wings, the others can teleport, and nothing can fall on you if you’re on top of everything else.”

  Karl thrust the keys against Gwain’s chest. “Sod that. You’re saying goodbye.”

  He ignored him, and pushed his hand, still holding the keys, back towards Karl. “There’s a safe in the bathroom that adjoins the master bedroom, behind the mirror. The smaller key opens it, along with a code. You’ll want to read the info you find in there. Some of it’s … about you.”

  He paused. “Me?”

  Gwain nodded.

  “What’s the code?”

  “Your birth date.”

  Silence thickened the air between them.

  Gwain clasped a hand to the side of Karl’s face, and swallowed back tears. Apocalypses turned grown men into sissies… “I’m proud of you, my boy. You’re the angel I’ve always wanted to be.”

  “Breakfast!” called Elena, from the kitchen, and Mary hooted her approval from somewhere in there as well.

  He nudged Karl forwards, and they both entered the makeshift cuisine to a banquet of everything and anything you could ever want for your morning feast. It smelt divine, and he suddenly realised Mary wasn’t the only one who couldn’t remember when she last ate – his stomach rumbled.

  He sought his angel out over the ‘mmmms’ and ‘aaaahhhs’ of delight, and met her eyes above the busying hands reaching for the grub.

  She smiled at him. It was steady and sure, and bittersweet, because as they sat down, he knew she understood as well as he did, that this would be their last meal.

  ~*~

  Half an hour later saw everyone stuffed. Well, almost everyone. Mary was still picking at bits and pieces, and my goodness, the woman had an appetite. Elena had missed her. She always seemed to inject everything with life – strange, considering they now knew she represented everything that was darkness, death and pain.

  Both Mary and Gwain had filled them in on what had happened to Mary at the prison, and what had transpired with Sophia and Archangel Michael.

  And now all of Heaven was gunning for Mary’s head.

  Mary, though, seemed oddly calm with it all. In fact, she looked more than calm – she looked healthy. The girl had never looked unhealthy, but now, her pale skin sort of glowed a bit pink, and that haunted look she carried around in her eyes, which Elena had always assumed was from her nightmares, was n
o longer there.

  Gwain also looked strangely peaceful, although less resigned to the idea of Mary beheaded, as were they all. Still, probably for the first time – she’d never really looked properly before – she could see what her mother was saying: Gwain always looked distant. Even now, with everyone joking and larking about, he sat a little removed from them, not quite part of the merriment, his eyes, ever so slightly glazed over and focused on something no one else could reach.

  Except Mary.

  When he looked at Mary, he was anything but distant, and the way he stared at her held so much feeling, Elena had to look away. It was too easy to feel like she was intruding on something private, even though the only thing passing between them was a look.

  It should have been weird, the whole Mary and Gwain thing – she didn’t think she’d ever seen Mary with a guy before, nor heard her talk about one – but they just … fit … which she supposed made sense, what with them being made from the same nucleus of dark matter that had existed before Heaven did, or whatever the hell Mary had tried to explain to them earlier. She was still trying to get her head around it. At least all the prophecies about the dragons and sins and stuff made sense now.

  And that was really what was on everyone’s mind: the prophecies. The last thing they were waiting for was all the dimensions to bleed into one, whatever that really meant.

  Elena let her gaze fall on everyone else. Her mum, who had joined them fifteen minutes ago was talking to Amy, who had looked about as thrilled as a potato when she’d first approached her. However, true to style, her mother had opened the conversation with, “So, you’re the one that came before my mother,” and, after initially looking like she was about to faint, Amy had proceeded to get on with her mum like a house on fire.

  Gwain and her mum had also talked briefly, and Mary had been more than curious at their interaction, but then Mary was curious about everything, anyway. When Gwain had offered to try and heal her, her mother had blatantly refused, looked at Mary, and ordered them both to save their strength – “they were going to need it”. Elena wondered if that had come from some kind of clairvoyant insight.