And she liked it.
No, she thought. I’ve never liked Jason that way. What’s wrong with me?
Jason smiled a slow, knowing smile and shook his handsome, blonde head. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for the submissive type, Danny,” he whispered, leaning closer now so that his words brushed across her lips. Danny’s breath hitched, her heart hammering. “I’ve known you were a fighter since we were children, playing together by the sea. I should know,” he continued calmly. “I’ve had a lifetime of practice in reading women.”
Danny’s head was swimming now. Jason was solid at her back and his arms were strong where they held her. His words confused her and enticed her. They were like mini-clues and sweet nothings and deadly warnings all mixed together, and she couldn’t make sense of any of them because he was inside of her now. She was under his spell.
“But I could have been wrong,” he told her, and his grip on her chin tightened almost imperceptibly, as did his hold on her wrist. “Because it would take a submissive at heart to lay beneath a werewolf and allow him to mark her up in this manner. Especially when she was so capable of fighting him off. Because she was a witch.”
Danny blinked. Jason’s tone had changed and the swell of his power was receding, at once allowing her head to clear. She replayed his last words through her mind, making certain she’d heard him correctly.
When she was sure, she felt her jaw drop open a little and saw Jason’s gaze narrow in answer. He bared his teeth, still holding her tight, but clearly angry now. “Were you that hard up, Danny?”
Danny gasped and instantly found the strength to jerk out of his embrace. When she did, he took a step back and the world seemed to come crashing in all around her. It hit her hard. Dizziness caused it to spin and tip and she stumbled back, reaching out to steady herself on the expensive leather sofa behind her. Still, she was mad enough – filled with enough righteous wrath – to form the words she wanted to say. “How dare you?” she hissed.
Jason’s expression was once more impassive and unreadable, but his eyes were sparking emerald fire. “Well, that answers the question of why a witch of your caliber wasn’t able to transport out of Patrick’s Point state park,” he told her, his tone hard and unrelenting. “Clearly his domination is draining your powers already.”
Danny had been prepared to release a barrage of epitaphs onto her herald, which probably wasn’t a wise move in and of itself, but at his latest comment, she grew still. A cold, hard logic settled in around her like ice water and she froze beneath it. She couldn’t help but recall the warning Lalura had given her about sleeping with a werewolf. Jason had echoed it not thirty hours ago. And now, here she was with Lucas Caige’s mark on her arm, feeling more than a pint low in the magic department.
Could the warning have been true? Could Imani have been wrong? Was Lucas taking away her powers?
Oh no.
“You’re figuring it out now, aren’t you? Finally,” Jason said, his tone starkly disappointed. “Now that it’s too late.”
Danny felt the floor melt beneath her as she gazed down at the black sparkling mark across her inner arm. It was so beautiful. She’d never seen anything like it. And it’s killing me, she thought numbly. Lucas is killing everything I am.
The world tunneled and Jason was there in an instant, gathering her into his dark embrace. “I’m sorry, Danny,” he said, the harsh tone of his voice completely gone now. He lowered her to the rug beneath her and knelt beside her, still holding her in his black-clad arms. “It’s not too late,” he told her, shaking his head. She looked up into his eyes and noted the determined set of his jaw. “There are ways… we can get you out of this.”
“What ways?” she whispered.
It was a while before Jason replied. His fingers lightly brushed a lock of her black hair from her forehead. Then his eyes caught hers again and held them. “The mark of an alpha werewolf can be removed.”
A shock of fear, hard and strong, rushed through Danny and she stiffened in Jason’s arms. She knew all too well how a werewolf’s mark could be removed from a dormant. It required the work of a warlock – and it was incredibly painful.
“Shh,” Jason held her tighter and again shook his head. “Not that way,” he assured her softly, obviously noting her sudden terror. “No.” Something dark flashed across his eyes, there one second and gone in the next. He paused for a moment before continuing. “There’s another way,” he told her. “The mark will disappear when Lucas Caige is dead.”
*****
Lucas stopped in the damp clearing and raised his head, scenting the air. In a flash, he regained his human form. It was instinctual, he guessed. In the world of predators and prey, it was a good idea to be as tall as your enemy when he finally approached you.
“I have a message from our master,” came a calm voice from the shadows of the clearing’s tree line. Lucas watched as a man stepped out of those shadows and nodded toward Caige, almost respectfully. “He knew you would come here,” he said as he gestured to the area around them. This was where Dannai had been only moments before. Lucas knew this because he could still smell her here. The space was filled with vanilla and chocolate and caramel and fear.
“And he wants you to know that this will be the last time you hunt for the Healer,” the man finished.
“Really?” Caige asked. “Good to know.”
There was a heartbeat where they seemed to size each other up, and then the two men met in snarling combat. Their bodies collided with fierce determination and Lucas felt himself flash from human to wolf and back again. He had never before gone up against an Akyri. The demon-like creature felt like a ghost overlapping a body formed of sinew and bone and spikes. He was impossible to get a visual handle on; his shape flickered and shimmered, testament to the magic upon which he fed in his symbiotic relationship with Jason Alberich.
So Lucas closed his eyes and used his other senses instead. Those were more than enough to make up for the confusing sights he now blocked out. In a matter of a few painful, blood-soaked minutes, Lucas had ripped the Akyri’s fangs from his forearm, shoved his own claws through the demon’s torso, and thrown his opponent’s lifeless body against a tree trunk.
The Akyri slumped to the ground and remained motionless. Lucas allowed his form to once more solidify into its human shape and took a deep breath. He knew that in a few seconds the Akyri’s body would shimmer one final time – and then disappear. He almost felt bad. The demon had only been following his master’s orders. There was no personal animosity involved. He was a pawn in a game of kings and it had been no contest.
But as he watched his fallen opponent indeed begin to shimmer and vanish, Lucas’s senses once more went on high alert. Earth crunched beneath a boot behind him. The smell of Akyri became thick in the air.
With a sinking feeling, Lucas took a deep breath and turned around. Four men draped in the black of their kind stepped from the shadows and into the clearing.
It was going to be a long night.
*****
“Make up your mind, warlock?”
Jason ignored the saber rattling that he knew was going to come from the infamous werewolf he was meeting and casually brushed a fallen leaf from the sleeve of his black jacket. After what he considered a sufficient amount of time, he took a deep breath and looked up, at last meeting Phelan’s blue gaze.
Gabriel was watching him with an amused air. The alpha werewolf was leaning against a massive redwood, one leg propped up on the trunk, his thick arms crossed over his broad chest. His eyes glittered like sapphires and a hint of fang peeked from beneath his lips.
“What exactly is it you want from me?” Jason asked, feeling decidedly impatient. While it was true that he wanted Lucas Caige dead, he didn’t like the idea of owing Phelan for anything.
Phelan pushed off of the trunk and began to pace, his gaze on the ground. This was the same clearing that Jason’s magic had trapped Dannai within only hours earlier. The same clearing in which
Lucas Caige had successfully fought off five Akyri.
The black diamond necklace Jason had given to Danny was working beautifully – he was able to control the flux of her magic through the rare stone, and even influence her emotions to a certain degree. Unfortunately, there had to exist a seed of a feeling already within her for him to feed it and build upon it. And so, while he was able to make her feel distrust and anger toward Caige because she already possessed a niggling doubt about him – he had been unable to stop the werewolf from marking her. Lucas Caige’s influence had been stronger than his own in that moment and Danny had sincerely wanted to bear the mark nearly as much as Lucas had wanted to give it.
Still. All things considered, the plan had been evolving well. The mark on Danny’s arm served to further Jason’s lie concerning her powers and the mating of a werewolf. And as far as getting it off of her was concerned – well, he’d planned to kill Caige anyway.
However, when he’d learned that all five of the demons he had sent after the alpha had failed in killing Caige, Jason had realized just what it was he was up against. Lucas Caige wasn’t what Jason had expected. Truth be told, the warlock was no longer certain that he could handle the alpha on his own. In fact, he was almost certain that he couldn’t.
He also hadn’t planned on just how angry it would make him to see another man’s brand on Danny’s body. He’d almost lost control with her. He’d almost let the charade drop. It was unlike him to lose his cool.
It was the hard, cold combination of his wrath and the failure of his Akyri that spurred him to finally take Phelan up on his offer. It was why he was here now, meeting with the notorious alpha werewolf. If anyone could kill Lucas Caige – it would be him.
“As a warlock, I’m sure you’re familiar with the spell required to remove a mark from a dormant’s body,” Phelan said, glancing up and shooting Jason a meaningful look. A smile tugged at the corners of the werewolf’s lips as he looked away once more and went on. “But I do wonder whether you’re aware of what it takes to turn a made wolf… back into a dormant.”
Jason’s gaze narrowed. His blood pressure rose, but he hid his reaction well. On the inside, he was being positively flooded with cortisol this night. No one was supposed to know about the dormancy spell. No one was supposed to know that such a thing was even doable. “It isn’t possible,” he lied calmly.
Gabriel chuckled softly and stopped his pacing less than a yard away from Jason. Jason could feel the air around him crackle as if the werewolf’s power were clashing with his own.
“A warlock, an Akyri, and the offspring of both,” Gabriel went on as if Jason hadn’t spoken. “That’s what I need,” he said, “and when you join the ranks, warlock, that’s what I will have.”
Jason felt his blood beginning to chill in his veins. The idea that someone other than a magic user – and a werewolf, especially – knew how to do such a thing was outrageous. The dormancy spell was one of the warlock community’s most closely guarded secrets. Secret one: Warlocks could revert a made wolf into a dormant. Secret two: Warlocks weren’t often killed by their enemies because their enemies believed it necessary to rip out a warlock’s heart in order to destroy them and that wasn’t easy. However, silver bullets could also kill a warlock. Secret three: Some warlocks, if strong enough and aided, could even bring the dead back to life. These were furtive, undisclosed, cloak-and-dagger truths that warlocks had hidden from the rest of the world for centuries.
The dormancy spell seemed tame compared to the others. But it was guarded for a reason. And this reason was what sent ice cubes into Jason’s bloodstream. Gabriel Phelan was right. The spell required the participation of a warlock, an Akyri, and the offspring of both. What he had failed to mention was that during the casting of the spell, one of the three would die.
Chapter Eleven: “Behind The Curtain”
“There she is,” came a soft voice. Danny would recognize it anywhere. It was that sweet, soulful kind of voice that rumbled when it laughed, could hit any note it tried, and added a winsome quality to every shared and spoken dream. Danny opened her eyes and stared up at her best friend through the haze of sleep that draped itself like a fog over her bed. She blinked a few times and it cleared.
Imani made a half-chuckle sound and shook her head, brushing a lock of Danny’s hair from her forehead. “Girl, you just wasted six of my nine lives. I don’t appreciate that,” Imani told her. She waited a moment, stared down at Danny for several long heartbeats, and then asked, “What happened? You just disappeared and Alberich wouldn’t tell me anything.”
Danny frowned and slowly sat up. She still felt very weak. With a sinking heart, she realized that only a portion of her power had returned while she’d rested. “Lucas came to the house,” she told Imani. “He sort of… kidnapped me.”
Imani’s brow rose sharply. She lowered her head and gave Danny a disbelieving look. “He what?”
“He picked me up and carried me out the window – don’t ask me how – and then ran with me until we got to this cave somewhere in the seaside cliffs nearby.”
A long, silent pause.
“Oh?” Imani finally said. There was another drawn out moment of silence in which she was no doubt trying to digest the information and figure out whether or not Danny had somehow sustained brain damage. And then Imani took a slow, deep breath and straightened where she sat beside her on the bed. “Okay. I can actually believe that ‘cuz I’ve seen the way he looks at you.” She nodded and cocked her head to one side. “So what happened next?”
Danny told Imani the whole story. She left out a few minor details that she felt were less important than others, such as the fact that Danny had basically behaved like a wanton slut around the werewolf, and stuck to the important stuff. Nevertheless, Imani’s expression became more and more troubled as the story progressed.
Finally, Danny lifted her arm and shoved back her sleeve to reveal the mark Lucas had left there. Imani whistled low, pinched the bridge of her nose to stave off what was clearly an oncoming headache, and shook her head.
“Shit, girl. You’re in the thick of it now.”
“Jason didn’t tell you anything at all?” Danny asked as she lowered her arm.
“Huh-uh,” Imani said. “He brought you home, told me to stay here with you, and then started covering the house with every single ward in existence, plus a few I didn’t even know existed. Not a living soul’s gonna make it in here without our permission.”
Danny felt strange. She had the oddest sensation of being hollow. It was like there was this vacuum forming where her heart had been moments ago. It hurt and it was empty at the same time. Was that possible?
“Jason thinks that the mark is weakening me,” Danny whispered, glancing down at the black symbol across her wrist. “He thinks this is proof that if I sleep with Caige, I’ll lose my ability to heal.”
“Why would he think the mark is weakening you?” Imani asked, frowning.
Danny felt the vacuum over her heart grow bigger. “I couldn’t even transport myself home,” she admitted. “I still don’t feel completely back to normal. How long was I asleep?” Maybe she just hadn’t had enough rest.
“It’s about noon now,” Imani said as she gave Danny a strange look. “Jason brought you in early this morning.”
“So I slept five or six hours and I’m still drained.”
“You’re drained? You really don’t feel your power?” Imani asked, clearly troubled by something she didn’t seem able to make sense of.
Now it was Danny’s turn to frown. “Not all of it. Why?”
“Because I can feel it. It’s all around you, just like it always is, and it honestly doesn’t feel any different than normal.”
“That makes no sense,” said Danny. She looked at the mark on her arm, and then raised her gaze to focus on a snow globe on the dresser across the room. She willed it to come to her. It gracefully lifted off of the wooden surface and sailed through the air until she caught it in her right han
d. Then she stared down at it and willed the ballerina inside to become a dancing pirate.
The figurine’s hair shortened, it grew a black three-pointed hat, and one of its eyes blacked over. However, by the time that Danny began to feel out of breath, it still wore a tutu above its peg leg.
“Wow,” said Imani. “Seriously?”
“Sorry,” whispered Danny. “I gave this to you for your birthday, didn’t I?”
*****
Two out of three aint bad, Seth thought as he contemplated his odds of remaining alive once the dormancy spell was completed. Of course, his chances for survival were actually much better than sixty-six percent. They were one hundred percent. He was a magic user as well as an Offspring, after all. In fact, if he had to wager as to which of the three of them would die by the final chant: himself, the warlock, or the Akyri, he would bet on the Akyri. There was no way that Jason Alberich wouldn’t be prepared for the dangerous effects of the spell. The warlock herald was one of the most powerful among his kind.
It was the Akyri who would have nothing to back him up. If anything, his dependence upon a warlock’s power for survival would seal his doom. All Jason had to do was leech the sustenance back out of the Akyri and the creature would weaken. Then the dark magic of the spell would naturally choose the demon for its sacrifice.
Seth smiled, not bothering to hide his fangs. He glanced toward the shop windows as he passed them by and stared into the darkness beyond. It was late; everything was closed. He let his eyes shift, focusing first on the background, and then on the reflections upon the glass itself.
There were a lot of misconceptions held by the human race. It was so easy to feed a human a lie. And once a lie spread, there was no killing it. No amount of evidence to the contrary would ever weaken its insidious power. Some lies were more dangerous than others. The worst, most dangerous ones had been around for as long as humans could record history.
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