Guardians of Magic: A Reverse Harem Fantasy Romance (Guardians of the Fae Book 1)

by Elizabeth Hartwell

  “What the fuck’s a Fi-Fo?” I lie, and Blood Boy laughs.

  “Right. Know my name, bad offer like that, and you got a piece? Shoulda kept your nose where it belonged, Blondie. Ah, well. At least you will satisfy my hunger for a week or so.”

  He dives in for the kill, and I know my life’s got only a second left, not even enough time to say goodbye to those I’m leaving behind . . . when suddenly, Blood Boy disintegrates.

  Rolling up, I get to my feet and retrieve my weapon, turning. “Joe, you have an innate ability to—”

  My words stop as it’s not Joe who saved me, but four hunks, three blonds and one with sooty black hair. They’re wearing strange-looking pants, showing off chiseled upper bodies, but what immediately draws my attention are their eyes. All of them are like mine, with golden flecks in them . . . something I’ve never seen before. All of them are armed, one of them holding a bow.

  “Come with us, for your own safety,” one of them says. He’s holding a sword and glances at it before sheathing the blade across his back. “Please.”

  Chapter 2

  Eve

  I stare at the four men, who also look at me in total confusion. “A human?” one of them, his broad chest rippling with enough muscle to put Mr. Olympia to shame and holding a staff about as big around as my wrist, asks his compatriot warily. “Are you sure?”

  “She is who the stone led us to,” the apparent leader, the black-haired one among them, says. In his hand is a stone, and I swear I can see it pulsing.

  “The stone has to be wrong,” says another. He at least sounds normal. The others so far have an accent I’ve never heard before. “She’s no faerie.”

  Fairy? “What the hell are you talking about?” I demand. “The only fairies I know do their thing around New Haven’s Tickle District. And they’re men.”

  The four men, their pajama bottoms and short boots standing out in the alleyway even though they’re wearing them like Hefner nouveau is all the rage in fashion, look at me in confusion before Archer Boy shrugs. “Yes, I agree with Jacob. She can’t be the one.”

  You know, being talked about in the third person is one thing. Being talked about in the third person while four handsome, chiseled, and almost impossibly athletic-looking shirtless and armed men discuss you being ‘wrong’ is another. “Uh, hello? Stop talking like I’m not here. Who the hell are you people?”

  I know I should be calmer. I mean, I am a cop. But I’m totally confused, still in shock, and covered in vampire flesh. Forgive me if I sound awfully ungrateful. These men, or Paranormals, most likely, just saved my life. Now, if I only knew what kind of Paranormals they are.

  Thankfully, the giant with the big stick in his hands doesn’t seem all that perturbed. “Forgive us. We are the queen’s Guard for Her Royal Majesty Queen Cassina XI, may her glory reign forever. Who are you?”

  “May her glory . . . excuse me? Who the hell is Cassina?” I ask, bewildered. I don’t know if it’s just that my adrenaline is starting to ebb or my brain’s starting to wake up again, but I’m at least thinking a little bit.

  For one, I’m not sure what these guys are. First glance tells me they appear human, but unless these four just happen to all be ultra-hot fitness models who like to carry weird-looking medieval weapons, I’d bet my next paycheck they’re not.

  For someone tasked with knowing about the Paranormal, it’s unnerving not to know what they are. Whatever they are, though, I pissed them off for sure, as even the casual-sounding one looks like I just pissed on his grandmother’s Cornflakes. “She’s our queen,” he growls, taking a step closer. “And you’d do well to show respect to Her Highness. We may have spooked you by accident, but that doesn’t mean you can act like some scuzzy bint.”

  I take a step back, feeling threatened but at the same time feeling odd things happening to my body. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking at the four most gorgeous men I’ve ever seen. Or that I’m not extremely attracted to them. Part of it is their bodies . . . but it’s something else as well. It’s almost like I somehow connect with them.

  Where the fuck is Joe? I think, reaching behind me. It’s one of the reasons cops are supposed to always go out in pairs whenever dealing with Paras, even though Joe and I play fast and loose on that rule at times. We know we can both handle ourselves . . . to an extent.

  It’s got to be the hormones. I’ve picked up a bit of a resistance to vamp ‘mones. I can at least keep a straight head around them. But everyone’s got that line inside, that place where stress, weirdness, and unknown shit can get through whatever defenses we may have. Whoever these four are, I’ve obviously started to feel influenced by them. There’s no other way that I’d be noticing their chiseled bodies and how sexy they all look, or my own body’s reaction, otherwise.

  I’m compromised. I back up, surreptitiously reaching behind me for my other weapon. It’s old-fashioned on the Para Justice Squad to carry a normal piece, but I’ve run into too many regular humans who are getting their needs met with Paras to not trust a good Glock. Meanwhile, I keep my ears out for Joe.

  “Jacob, stop,” says the beautiful sooty-haired one sharply. More than the others, his voice has a cultured air about it, as if speaking an old form of English. “She is clearly frightened after being attacked.”

  “I’m not scared,” I retort with as much authority as I can muster. Scared? Oh, yeah, I’m scared. And I’m pissed. My hand freezes inches from my backup piece, not wanting to pull it unless I must. “I’m Detective Eve Carter and I take out Paranormal trash like that for sport.”

  Jacob rolls his eyes, unimpressed. “You hear that, Cole? She says she’s not scared. And she’s a murderer too.”

  “I’m not a murderer,” I growl, shivering despite myself. “I’m a detective, charged with keeping the law. I just happen to specialize in dealing with and interacting with the Paranormal population of Old Haven.”

  “Is that so?” asks Jacob, taking a step closer. His eyes are so gorgeous, silvery with gold flecks radiating from the center, that I almost feel like I’m falling into them. His eyes gleam, and he smirks. He knows I’m compromised . . . he must. Maybe these four are some form of vamp I’m unfamiliar with? “What kind of Paranormal creatures would you say we are?”

  My knees start to tremble, and in my thin top, I can feel my nipples stiffen. Jacob’s eyes also widen, and I swear his look changes from mostly teasing and angry to equal parts anger and a desire to turn me around, push me against the fence, and fuck me as deep as I can take. Desperate to regain some control of myself, I shake my head violently. “Wait a minute. Back the fuck up!” I cry. I can’t believe how out of control this has gotten. “I need you—”

  “Jacob!” Cole says sharply. “Space. She obviously isn’t prepared for us.”

  Jacob growls and backs up. “I know her kind, Cole. Her job is to enforce the Apartheid laws the humans have passed over all Paranormals. She’s no power, just a woman with a gun and a laser.”

  I shake my head. While they showed up at an opportune time, they did just kill a vampire, even if it was done to protect me. And they’re standing in the middle of Old Haven, a clear no-carry zone, with enough medieval weaponry to make the Dread Pirate Roberts nervous. I need to arrest them, but . . . holy shit, they’re hot! My heat level is rising just being near them, and I can see it in their eyes too. Jacob’s not the only one who wants me. I think all four would love—

  Eve! snaps a voice in the back of my mind. Paras can have powers, remember? You’re potentially compromised!

  Right. I need to keep myself under control. I reach back again for my gun but freeze when Cole stops me cold with a held-up hand. His eyes are just as inviting as the others but somehow different. The others want to devour me. Cole’s eyes burn with a different desire. That, as much as his hand, stops me.

  “You’ve been having headaches,” Cole says, his gold-speckled eyes staring at me intently. “But they come and go like waves on the shoreline of your mind.”
>
  My jaw drops. Tonight was the worst one, but he’s right. For almost a week now, I’ve had a constant headache. “How?”

  “Hearing voices that aren’t yours inside your head,” he continues, ignoring my question. “You look at people, and you feel like whispered voices are tickling in your head, if they could only be focused on.”

  “How did you know that?” I ask, shocked. I’ve always had good cop instincts. I can usually read people relatively easily . . . but since the headaches have started, it’s been stronger than simply reading people.

  “Your danger is very high,” Cole says. “You need to come with us. For your safety. I swear, on my own life and honor, my compatriots and I shall not hurt thee.”

  “Hold up a minute,” I reply, shaking my head again. “I’m not going anywhere with you. And can you please stop talking like that?”

  Cole glances at Jacob, who shrugs. “Fine. Don’t blame Cole too much. He doesn’t get to this realm very often. He’s a bit behind the times,” he says. “The longer you stay here, the more damage you will cause to this place and those around you.”

  “What are you talking about? I protect people. I stop terrible things from happening. I swore to protect and serve!”

  “Not now. Things change. You’re changing,” Jacob says. “As for protect and serve . . . that’s our job right now.”

  “Bullshit.”

  Cole speaks again. “I beg thee . . . come with us where it’s safe so we can explain what you are.”

  “I can tell you what I am,” I growl as I draw my backup weapon. “I’m one pissed ass cop who’s about to go Deadpool on your ass if you don’t stop talking gibberish.”

  The four glance at each other, not nervous but more with looks of ‘now what?’ Meanwhile, I’m still trying to figure out where Joe is, but I don’t have time for that. “I’m placing the four of you under arrest. Now down on the ground, and drop the Kung Fu fighting gear.”

  Before any of them move, a car comes blazing up and spins around. I glance back and see that Joe finally has his ass out of neutral. “Joe!”

  I turn back to the four . . . but they’ve disappeared into the night.

  Chapter 3

  The Guardians

  “She’s human!” Noah declares in shock. Gathered in the trees that make up the center of Haven Park, the four Fae stand around looking at each other, at least somewhat comforted by the presence of the greenwood around them. “How is it possible that she has the gift?”

  Cole closes his eyes, remembering the woman . . . Eve. An appropriate name, if his knowledge of human history is correct. He could see such a woman spawning a whole new race. “She’s half human, half faerie,” he says, remembering her golden hair and gold-rimmed eyes, unusual features for a human. They were captivating, and beneath his loose battle trousers, he can feel his cock stir again, a discomforting feeling considering the reason. “That’s how.”

  Tyler, who’s been quiet since his hyperspeed reflexes saved Eve’s life, sighs. “Even still . . . when has a Halfling been born with the gift?”

  Cole, whose own heritage growing up was questioned from time to time because of his dark hair, shakes his head. Fewer than ten percent of the residents of Lunaria have anything other than gold or platinum-blond hair, and his black waves often led to teasing and questions growing up. “It’s been a long time, but it’s rare. This is an ill omen indeed.”

  “We must go get her now!” Jacob, always the faerie of action, says. “I don’t know why we didn’t just snatch her then. What, do you think her partner was going to help? What could he have done?”

  Cole shakes his head, stroking the grip on his sword in a meditative movement that he picked up centuries ago. “Not yet. Something is amiss here, something that has nothing to do with her gift. Don’t you feel it?”

  “I do,” says Noah. The second-most experienced of the four, Noah had faced his own comments, considering his huge size and broad chest among the normally tall and willowy Fae. “While Halflings are rare, even more rare nowadays, they are all tracked by the government. This woman, though . . . when we came, there was no mention of Fae or a Halfling in this region of the human realm. That is troubling.”

  “I don’t feel a damn thing,” says Jacob. “And Noah, not everyone who dips their dick in human clench reports it back to the Lunarian Guard. I see nothing strange about her at all.”

  Cole shakes head and snorts. Jacob, for all his speed and skills, is also impulsive and the biggest ‘joker’ among the queen’s Guard. “Of course your eyes fail you,” he says, trying to focus. “We can’t go back yet. Something is going on here. Something that can bring calamity and ruin back to the Fae realm. We have to stop whatever it is.”

  “Did you see her, though?” Tyler asks, swallowing his nervousness. “She’s incredibly beautiful.”

  Cole can’t help but agree, but he says nothing. Since laying eyes on Eve, his loins have been on fire, but what disturbs him is that there was something more . . . and that more is supposed to be reserved for the queen. No low-born Guardsman is supposed to have feelings of attachment to anyone other than Her Majesty . . . or else, they face harsh punishment.

  “She’s even more beautiful than the queen,” says Noah, a shocked silence dropping over the foursome at the blasphemous words. For almost her entire thousand-year reign, Queen Cassina has encouraged her entire army, and especially those chosen for her Queen’s Guard, to lust after her. Taking only one a year into her bedchamber, both as training and as a reward for the most outstanding accomplishment in her royal service, it’s bound her entire Guard to her tightly. None are allowed to have sex for more than physical need, and while it’s become clear over the centuries that Cassina herself will never mate either, it hasn’t stopped every member of dreaming of being the Fae who takes her bond in his heart.

  Finally, Cole clears his throat. While the most excellent of Guardsmen, Cassina has never rewarded him with more than a view of her naked form, a night of passing her oils and soaps as she teased him with her words and flashes of her sublime body, the one he had for centuries thought was beyond compare . . . until now. His cock, however, has never felt anything other than a one-night stand’s touch, and for Noah, one of those long assumed to be on Cassina’s short list of those for her next reward, to say such things . . . “Be that as it may, we have a mission.”

  “What is the course of action?” asks Tyler uncomfortably. Cole feels sorry for Tyler. The youngest of the foursome, his sexual urges, style, and conquests are legendary talk in the barracks. While Tyler’s devotion to Cassina is as ironclad as any of them, there’s just something about Eve that makes their faerie blood pound.

  “Just kill all the Earthlings, Paranormal or otherwise, and problem solved,” Jacob says easily. He’s not being serious. He rarely is. “We could use a little bit of a workout. That demon lord and those hounds were a piece of cake.”

  A wolf howls in the background, cutting off the lighthearted chuckle from the other three. Cole feels the call deep in his bones, where all Fae know their connection with the light and the natural world . . . where the magic lies. It’s a shifter wolf out on the hunt, a descendant of faerie blood, so diluted by humans their magic has been reduced to a mere single form which is strong only when the moon is full.

  When the howl drifts off into the night air, Cole turns to the others, his decision made. “We follow the Halfling woman. Protect her, for there will be other forces after her, and make her see reason. It might take some time, but it is better that we teach her about her true nature and find out what’s hunting her. Put an end to it. Then . . . then, we shall let Her Highness decide what to do next.”

  Noah nods. “Protecting her, and ending this threat, will protect the Fae.”

  Tyler grins, excited. “Exactly. We’ll become her guardians.”

  Jacob chuckles. “Guardians . . . Tyler, you’ve been too long from this realm. May I suggest for you a hooded green tunic with an eye mask?”

 
The joke falls flat, and Jacob shrugs after a moment. Cole looks around at his brethren, making sure they have the message before punctuating the plan. “Until we resolve what’s going on here, we’ll have to protect her at all cost. Treat her like she’s the most precious faerie in existence, and yes, integrate into this . . . very human world.” Cole pauses, knowing he’s about to say something that’s even more blasphemous than what Noah said seconds ago. “Until we leave this plane, we must treat Eve as if she’s our queen.”

  Chapter 4

  Eve

  Slamming my hand down on the hood of Joe’s car, I feel the plastic dent a little. Fuck it. I think the department can handle the repair bill. Besides, now it doesn’t scream Para Justice so damn much. “Thanks for finally showing up!”

  Joe shrugs, spreading his hands. “Looks like I was just in time. Sorry. I nearly got seduced by a hot succubus.”

  I roll my eyes, wishing Joe would stop thinking with his dick. He’s a fine partner, but women are his weakness, even if he is—thankfully—professional with me. “C’mon, Joe, this is no time for jokes. I was nearly a vamp meal while you were looking for a blowie.”

  Joe looks over at me, then glances at the remains of Blood Boy. “What the fuck did you hit him with, a tactical nuke? You blew his ass to smithereens.”

  “Wasn’t me,” I admit. “Blood Boy had the drop on me and would have munched on me if not for some . . . Samaritans.”

  “Great . . . let me guess, the four Paras I saw who pulled the fucking Batman act as soon as my lights hit them?” Joe asks.

  I nod. “Captain’s not going to be happy,” I reply, wiping a bit of Blood Boy off my left arm and flipping it down to the pavement. “You want to call this in, or should I?”

  “Wait until we’re gone and send a couple of Patrol Petes down here to ‘find’ it,” Joe says. It’s a clever idea. If there’s any chance in hell of this undercover operation continuing to work, our hanging around a crime scene isn’t going to help. “And you get to tell the cap. I delivered the unwelcome news last time.”