Rage: A New Adult Urban Fantasy (Spelldrift: Coven of Fire Book 3)

by Sierra Cross

  “Knock it off, Ambrose.” Larch was kneeling beside the other Fidei agent, helping her to her feet. Kat still looked a bit dazed from her swift introduction to the wall, but seemed basically ok. “They saved our asses.” And then reality came crashing back at me—Larch probably already had warrants for our arrest sitting on her desk. And Matt just let his Amalgam cat out of its bad-magic bag. From behind us, heavy-booted feet hit the pavement. “That’s why it pains me to place you under arrest.”

  A slew of Fidei agents formed a line behind us, blocking our exit. Of course I had no spellbeads in my pocket. “But it’s my job.” Larch nodded her head and her agents approached. “Take them all into custody,” she said. I guess she didn’t know that there wasn’t a warrant on Liv. I couldn’t help it, my hands itched and golden magic reappeared on my hands and arms.

  Matt shook his head. “Not this time, Alexandra.”

  The Fidei cuffed each of us, dragging us by the elbow to the waiting transport vehicle.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The metal bench cut into the backs of my thighs in this glorified dog crate I was confined in. I stared at the solid cement wall through lodestone bars—knowing the metal had dampened every bit of my magic. My muscles needed to pace, but there wasn’t room. This holding cell was five by seven, if that. Asher and Liv were being held in identical cells just down the concrete wall from me. But Matt had been taken somewhere else.

  And that terrified me.

  Time passed like ice melting in a refrigerator. Even though there was no window visible from my cell, there was one in the hall. And I knew the sun was on the horizon.

  “Come on!” I yelled. “You need to charge us or let us go!” Which I wasn’t sure was a smart thing to yell, but I was hoping it would at least score me a phone call.

  “Alix!” Asher’s voice rang out sharply. “As I’ve said every time you felt the need to be a human PA System, they won’t answer you. All you’re doing is giving me a cracking headache.”

  “Leave her alone, Asher,” Liv said, matching his tone. “We need answers.”

  “Maybe you do,” he said. “You don’t have a warrant—”

  The sound of the electronic locks disengaging reverberated down the concrete hallway, followed by the shuffle of feet. “All right,” a very non-enthused Fidei guard said. “Alexandra Hill, Asher Delany, Olivia Thomas. You’ve all been released on bail.” The locks on each of our cells released, one by one. “Follow me.”

  “Bail?” I asked stupidly.

  “Yup, a half mill each on you and the warlock.” The guard pointed to Asher and me. “She’s actually not been charged with anything,” he said as he ushered Liv out of her cell. “You three can get out of here.”

  Trudging down the hallway behind the black uniform of our captor, we all looked a little worse for wear. The thought of what kind of mega-favor I’d owe my aunt would have to be filed away later.

  “We can just go?” I said. Asher punched me hard in the arm. “Ow.”

  “If the good gentleman says we’re released,” Asher said, glaring at me. “We don’t need to ask him anything further.”

  “So Matt Montgomery will be released as well?” We passed through the second set of security doors and I looked over hopefully to see if he was at the main desk being processed for release.

  “You mean your other coven sister?” The guard gave a vindictive chuckle. “No chance. That Mal is being processed for extradition.”

  “What? No!” Liv said, the faintest glow of magic coming to her hands. My own words were stuck in my throat. I doubled over and had to force myself to breathe.

  “Don’t,” Asher said, leaning in close to Liv. “Let’s get processed and released. We’ll be piss-poor good to him if we’re locked up too.”

  He was right. Liv put away her magic, and I swallowed my rage.

  Thirty-two hours and eighteen phone calls later—and one more gigantic IOU given to my aunt for access to her lawyers—and I was looking at Matt through the magic-quelling lodestone bars. His big body was stretched out, dwarfing the jailhouse bed. His eyes were closed. This cell was in the east wing of the jail and built for longer term stays.

  “Alexandra,” he said moving only his lips. He sat up grunting and favoring his left side. He had a black eye and an angry scrape on his cheek. By the way he was holding his side, I was guessing a couple of broken ribs.

  “Damn it!” I managed. “They beat you?”

  “You should see the other guys,” he joked. But I noticed the torn skin around his wrists. He was restrained.

  “I’m going to get those lawyers in here.” Anger fueled my words. “I’m taking pictures—”

  “Alexandra,” he said calmly, sliding his fingers between the bars, reaching for my hand. “Leave it. This is just what happens to Mals.” My fingers went to his, like metal to a magnet. We entwined our hands as best we could through the narrow bars. Immediately, heat rose in my core, my lips burned to press against his. But he hung his head. “If I live long enough, maybe we can change it together. In the right way.” And then he looked at me, and I saw the caged animal behind his eyes. He was keeping his body still, but in his mind, he was ready to chew off his own foot to get out of here. “But first I’ve got to set my mother free.” The hold over his emotions cracked. “Now that I know she’s in there, it’s killing me to know she’s…she’s in hell.”

  “We’ll set her free. We’ll find a way to get you out of there.” I started a comforting stream of words that I knew weren’t true. He was scheduled to be on a Fidei transport flight to Barcelona day after tomorrow. Interagency cooperation at its finest.

  “Alexandra, we both know they will exact their justice on me before we can change the system.” Then he pulled his hand back and ran it through his hair. “But it kills me to think I won’t be able to help Alana out of the Void. Even for me—and I was tethered, like Asher said—it was like being in a nightmare you can’t wake up from.” His voice was softer now. I realized he hadn’t ever really told me about his time in the Void. He talked around it, but never told me what it was really like. “I can’t let her suffer like that any longer. I can’t.” His muscles were trembling with anger and before I could say anything to calm him, he threw a left hook at the wall. I yelped in surprise.

  “Fuck!” He gasped in pain. As he drew his hand to his chest, I saw the blood on the already purpling skin. He’d busted a bone or two for sure. “Promise me, you’ll do everything you can to release her,” he said through teeth he was clenching against the pain. “We both know I’m not getting out of here.”

  Did I know that? Could I grasp such a concept, accept it? A river of fear was running like ice water in my veins. My boots hit the pavement hard as I stomped out of the Council Suprema building and back into the Spelldrift shopping district. Grey heavy clouds loomed on the horizon, suspended—just like Matt’s fate. Was I fighting against an inevitable outcome? That couldn’t be the case. Matt and I had just found each other, just overcome a lifetime of prejudice in order to be together. I needed him like I needed air.

  My feet took me to the front door of Strong Brew. Of course they did. I had things to do. Coffee was an energy booster, and I could use a good dose of that.

  I pushed open the wood-framed glass door and inhaled the scent of home. The place was packed, as it usually was during the office worker’s mid-afternoon slump. I looked at the line ten people deep, wondering if I could stand in one place long enough to get to the counter. Then I felt a familiar ping of magic tingling through my coven tattoo. Asher turned his head and looked at me with his big grey eyes. With a nod of understanding, he ordered two tall breve lattes in for-here cups and motioned for me to grab a table.

  A couple with a squealing toddler was packing up their table as I approached. They left the table covered in muffin crumbs. I threw my leather jacket over the chair and got napkins to clean the mess. By the time Asher joined me, the table was spotless, and I was waiting for my dose of Strong Brew. He sat
down, and I threw a Circle of Silence spell around us, more out of habit than anything else.

  “So…” I said wanting to rip this Band-Aid off and get it over with, but not sure how to phrase it. “There were some moments between you and me on the trip. They left me wondering…” I wanted to clear this up before there was an awkwardness between us.

  He looked at me for a long moment and swallowed. “Now’s not the time,” Asher said. “Right now, let’s focus on our sundry coven tasks…like releasing Matt’s mother’s soul. Freeing our guardian from prison. Rescuing Liv from her delusional thinking. Ending injustice for Mals and Deviants. You know, the little things on our plate.”

  “Speaking of Liv, where is she?” I wrapped my fingers around the mug, letting the warmth sink into to my fingers. While I was handling all the lawyer stuff, Liv had stayed up day and night combing through magical tomes, following up on the thread she’d discovered. Searching for any clue on how to separate Callie from the Splinter that had taken over her body.

  “She finally fell asleep,” Asher said, “On the couch in the Cozy Corner.”

  “I’m so glad to see you’ve embraced the proper name for your office,” I said, smiling.

  “I pick my battles,” Asher said, shrugging. “How’s our guardian?”

  “I think he broke his hand expressing his emotions to a concrete wall.”

  “Big surprise.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “He’s a guardian through and through,” Asher said. “He has a sacred mission he needs to complete and he’s being kept from doing that. It’ll eat him up from the inside out.” He was looking into my eyes like he wished we were having a different conversation. “It’s the nature of the beast.”

  “We can’t let that happen.” I swallowed my tears.

  “We’ll do our damnedest.” He put his hand on mine. “But sometimes fate doesn’t bring the outcome we desire. And we have to learn how to go on living anyway.” He was speaking from experience, baring his soul. But these were not the words I wanted to hear.

  “Screw that.” I pulled my hand back. “There has to be a way to get him out of there.” Aunt Jenn’s lawyers were the best there are, but they were about as optimistic as Asher. I refused to just accept this. What we needed was a miracle…or a favor. “The vampires. Bonaventura owes us one.”

  “You saw him in the alley.” Asher sounded like he was going to try to talk me out of it. “I got the feeling that it took all his strength not go for our jugulars. I’m not sure he’s our guy on this one.”

  “It’s the only card we have left to play.” I knocked back the rest of my coffee and stood.

  “What? Now?” He looked out the window. “He just expended a shit-ton of energy in that little frenzy of his. Vampires don’t sleep often, but I’m sure that one is sleeping now.”

  “Well, we’ll just have to wake him.”

  “Ah, waking vampires is an extremely unsafe behavior.” He scrunched deeper into his seat like he was planning on staying. “I for one, have better things to do than be breakfast.”

  “Well, I can’t watch Matt break more bones.” I shuddered. “Or worse. I’m going now.”

  “Fine, go,” he said, not moving.

  “See ya.”

  I walked through the light mist, trying not to think about the bloodlust in the vampire’s eyes. Maybe this was stupid, but I couldn’t stop myself. I’d just unlocked my car when Asher jogged up behind me. I exhaled with relief—I hadn’t really wanted to do this alone—but when I opened my mouth to thank him he stopped me.

  “Just drive,” he said.

  At Bonaventura’s gate, Asher leaned over me to speak into the security panel. He’d ingested a compulsion spell—which wasn’t cheap or easy to come by—and was activating its power with a mumbled incantation. I did as I was told and covered my ears. His lips moved, and his words come out as a white shimmering mist that moved like smoke across my face and right into the panel microphone. Asher pulled my hands away from my ears. Nothing happened.

  “Are you sure that’ll work remotely?” I asked.

  “Yes, I’m sure.” He gave a look like it pained him that I’d even ask.

  More waiting.

  A click and the looming wrought iron gate slid open.

  The mousy maid cracked open the massive front door and stood trembling in her grey uniform. “I’m not sure why they let you in, but you need to leave.”

  “Fiona, we need to see Ambrose,” I said.

  “He’s sleeping.” She said the word as if it should end the discussion. “Leave now before you wake him up.”

  “But he needs to wake up.” I laid the flat of my hand on the expansive door and gave it a shove. The scrawny maid stutter-stepped backward and we entered the elegant foyer. In the large painting that dominated the room, an eighteenth-century version of Bonaventura menaced me with his glare.

  “It isn’t done.” Fiona sounded terrified. “You don’t wake them up. Ever. You don’t.”

  I felt bad for the woman, I really did, but she chose to work for this guy. “It’s gonna be what it’s gonna be.”

  “Sorry, luv,” Asher said apologetically to Fiona as I brushed past them.

  “Ambrose!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. “Ambrose!”

  “You might want to make yourself scarce,” Asher said to the cowering maid.

  “You don’t wake them. You never wake them,” she muttered as if in a trance. Her face had gone chalk white; she backed out of the room.

  I mounted the staircase taking the steps two at a time. “Ambrose! Wakey wakey!”

  “Alix, really,” Asher said. “Maybe we should wait—”

  I made it halfway up the stairs. Faster than my eyes could follow, impossibly strong fingers clenched around my throat. My body was lifted off my feet, and I was slammed up against the wall so hard my vision blurred. Then Bonaventura’s face came into focus. He wore only a pair of silk pajama bottoms. The muscles of his smooth chest looked like they’d been chiseled from granite. There was no humanity in his brilliant blue eyes, only animal instinct. My body was just registering the lack of oxygen, and my fingers fruitlessly tore at his iron grip. He growled, and I saw his razor-sharp fangs, elongated and ready for use.

  Asher ran up the stairs, his magic glowing on his fingertips. What remained of his gloves floated as ashes to the oriental runner on the stairs. The closer Asher got the tighter the vampire’s grip got on my throat. With tattoos swirling, Asher formed firebolts ready to throw, but I knew a lone warlock’s magic wasn’t strong enough to overpower an angry vampire. At best, it would just piss him off more.

  Little white stars danced around the edges of my darkening vision. Here goes nothing. I went old school and kicked the vamp in the crotch with everything I had—and after working out with Matt, what I had was pretty significant. Ambrose’s fingers loosened slightly, and he doubled over, more in surprise than agony. I dropped like a rock, clutching at my throat, greedily gulping air. Asher was next to me, muttering an incantation, throwing a veil around us. I knew it wouldn’t keep out the vampire for long though.

  “Director,” I croaked out of my burning throat. “We have business with you.” My words were not penetrating his raw fury. “Director!”

  He lunged at me. His long fingers connected with the veil and golden sparks flew, making him flinch. He shook his head, blinking down at his blackened hand as if the pain had cleared his thoughts.

  “Damn it to hell, witch!” His fully-alert eyes zeroed in on me. “What do you imagine you’re doing in my house?” The power of his yell drew on all his superhuman DNA. The sound echoed and the frames along the walls clattered. I covered my ears too late. It felt like they could be bleeding. “Fiona!” he roared. “Take them to my study.”

  As Asher and I waited in Ambrose’s study, Fiona brought in a tray of tea, shaking so hard that the tea cups rattled. She practically dropped the tray and scurried back out of the room. After about fifteen minutes, Amb
rose sauntered into the room barefoot, wearing a pair of dark pressed jeans and a crisp white linen shirt. Never could I have pictured this man in a casual attire, but boy did it suit him, accentuating his ripped muscles. He settled down in an armchair and looked up like he was holding court.

  “Nice trick, warlock,” the Director said, looking at his fingertips which still were partially blackened. “If you know that spell, seems like you’d also know better than to wake a vampire.”

  “Seems like it, doesn’t it?” Asher said, staring daggers at me.

  “Yeah, we can chat about my character flaws later,” I said. “Right now, I’m calling in that favor.”

  “And what would you have me do for you?”

  “I need you to get our guardian out of jail.”

  Ambrose looked taken aback, then a smile spread across his face and a deep, rumbling laugh filled the room. The vampire’s version of a belly laugh. I had no idea how anything I said could be funny, but he kept laughing.

  “Ah, that was almost worth being awoken. Almost.” He stood to leave.

  “I’m not joking,” I say, pissed. “I need you to get Matt out.”

  “No, I realize you’re not kidding,” he said. “It’s your blatant ignorance that I find so amusing. I should think it was self-explanatory that the favor had to be something that was in the realm of possibility. This is not. Not remotely. Good night.” He turned.

  “I didn’t say ‘get him cleared of all charges.’ I said get him out.”

  The vampire turned back around and considered my request. “The most I could do is to call a hearing with the possibility of having him released under house arrest for the…what…the one day he’d have left before the guardians retrieve him.”

  “Done. We’ll take it.”

  “That isn’t worthy of the favor of a vampire.” He dismissed me. “It’s not a guaranteed outcome. You may walk away with nothing.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s not your call to make,” Asher said. “We’ll take it.”