Dark Secrets: A Paranormal Romance Anthology

by Colleen Gleason

  I wanted to help, but didn’t know where to begin. The Inquisitors’ return to Salem was starting to irritate old wounds in the Council. How could I hold the Council together? For the time being, politics of the Council were best left to the three Council chairs. I didn’t want to find myself forced to choose a side. My name was Switzerland and I was staying neutral as long as possible.

  Mahalia sat at her desk. She seemed at a loss for words. I didn’t have any either, at least, not any that would help, so I left her looking defeated in her study..

  Chapter 9

  Everywhere I turned, there were clusters of people conversing like this was a party and not a sequestering. I wanted, no, needed to be alone so I could think. Squeezing through the small clusters of people until I reached the back door, I braced myself for the New England cold and stepped outside

  What was left of the night cloaked any signs of the magic that had occurred the last time I was here. I walked over to where the circle was drawn in Oberon’s blood, remembering the physical pain I’d felt when Graive had sliced his palm and joined her magic with his. A dark thought was forming in the back of my mind. Was a blood circle really necessary to perform the recollection, or was Graive trying to wedge herself between the metaphysical connection Oberon and I shared?

  The screen door creaked open and, as if called by my thoughts, Oberon walked outside. I hadn’t noticed when I got here, but his dark hair had been cropped short since the last time I had seen him. Even in the dark, it made the blue of his eyes almost impossible to ignore. Almost. So much for that area of my personal growth.

  “Stop trying to ignore me, Maurin.”

  “I’m not trying.”

  “You’ve been acting weird. Even for you. Tell me what’s bothering you so I can help.” Frustration and anger edged his voice.

  “You’d be acting weird too if you’d been to, let’s see, three crime scenes, the morgue, a Council meeting, and a casting. Never mind being ambushed, kidnapped, and beaten to within an inch of your life, rushing a friend to shock trauma and, to round out the last forty-eight hours, another damned Council meeting!” I didn’t mean to snap at him. Ok, maybe I did.

  “It’s more than that.”

  “Seriously? That’s not enough for you?” I rounded on him.

  “I guess I should have expected the anger and sarcasm that you always wrap around yourself instead of actually expecting an answer to my question.” Now he was snapping at me.

  Good. A fight would cap the night off perfectly.

  “I’m not in the mood for games, Oberon. If there was another question in there, then I didn’t hear it.”

  “I know that you’re acting like this and putting all this distance between us because of Graive, but I can explain.” He stepped closer.

  “I’m not putting any distance between us. In case you weren’t paying attention to my answer to what’s been bothering me, I’ve been tied up—literally, in fact. As for Graive, you don’t owe me an explanation. I mean, it’s not like we said we were exclusive or anything, right? So it’s fine, you’re off the hook,” I turned to go back inside and away from Oberon.

  He grabbed my arm, forcing me to turn and face him. “I’ve known Graive for a long time—since we were kids. Her magic is close to mine in a lot of ways, so we took a few practical arts classes together. We became friends, and for a while we were more than that.”

  The confirmation of their history together did not make me feel any better. And the sudden realization that I was a jealous and insecure person didn’t help either.

  “I said that you didn’t owe me an explanation.” That sounded bitter, even to me.

  “She’s back because she wants to stop the Inquisitors as much as we do. Twelve years ago, before Mahalia was High Priestess, the Inquisitors were in Danvers to cleanse the town of witches, like they’re attempting to do now in Salem. They killed her mother and her two sisters. They left her for dead. The Inquisitors don’t see much difference between a witch and a necromancer, so Graive’s family was slaughtered just like all of the others.” His grip on my arm loosened but he didn’t let go, afraid I would take off given the chance.

  “My sister’s an oracle, but she was only eight then. My father barely had enough time to send us away. We left for Ireland the night before the Inquisitors arrived. He tried to warn the others in the Danvers coven, but they wouldn’t run based upon the warning vision of an untrained oracle. Keirsten came home with me for our parents’ funeral, but went back to Ireland shortly after to stay with our uncle and his family. She hasn’t been right since they died.”

  I stood completely still, listening to him, as it sunk in that the story wasn’t just about Graive’s loss, but his as well.

  “So, I guess it was what happened to our families that drew us together, but it wasn’t enough. Tragedy causes strong, uncontrollable, and unpredictable emotions, but there’s got to be more than that to keep a relationship going. Graive and I are better off as friends.”

  He tried to pull me closer to him, but I dug in my heels.

  “Yeah, well, I think she disagrees. Anyway, if Graive was the only issue, then I think we could…but she’s not. I think you want her to be, but it’s not that simple. She only highlights the real problems.”

  “And what are those?” For the first time his anger was actually convincing.

  “We’ve been out a few times since the metaphysical bond was formed between us, but I don’t really know you, and you don’t really know me, either. For example, I didn’t even know that your parents were murdered.”

  “Well that’s on you. You could know me if you wanted to. I mean, how else do you think people get to know each other, Maurin? They do it by talking and doing things together, but you’ve been resisting this the whole time.” Oberon raised his voice, almost to a yell.

  “Can you blame me? I can’t just run away with my emotions when up until a few days ago I wasn’t even sure how much of them were actually mine!”I yanked my arm free, showing him what resistance actually looked like.

  “This is probably the biggest difference between us right here. I was raised to accept things like this, to have the faith that you don’t. It’s at the core of what I am. My magic won’t work without it.”

  “Yeah, well, I wasn’t raised to accept anything about what I could do. I don’t know how to have faith in any of this. I mean, I’m trying, but…I’m not good at relationships. It never works out with me, with what I can do.” I wiggled my fingers to let him know I was talking about being psychometric.

  “I don’t have anything to hide,” He turned his palms up to me.

  “Don’t. Don’t do that. Don’t put your hands out like a reading is going to fix this.” I tried to ignore what remained of the cut in his palm from Graive. “It took a lot of training to learn how to keep my shields in place to keep everything out so I could walk around without gloves on all the time, and now you’re asking me to take them down. I don’t think I can do that, Oberon.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. I’m not asking you to take them down. I’m asking you just to let me in.” He pulled me in for a hug, and this time I let him. “See? I’ve already learned a couple of things about you tonight.” His breath was warm on the top of my head.

  “Yeah, what’s that?” My stomach clenched, nervous to hear the answer.

  “You’re jealous for one, which I kind of like. You’re a little unsure of yourself for two, which I understand because of your family, but we’ll work on that.” He squeezed me tighter.

  “What do you mean because of my family?” I asked, trying not to get caught up in painful emotions and images I thought I’d let go of a long time ago.

  “Well, you said you weren’t brought up to accept anything about what you could do, so I just put two and two together, that you weren’t close with your family.”

  “Yeah, well, that’s an understatement. Everyone in my family’s a Norm. Imagine their surprise at producing me, the freak, for a daught
er. I got out of there as soon as I was old enough and never looked back. So, yeah, all of this is a bit overwhelming for me.” I suddenly felt exhausted from all of the sharing.

  He loosened his grip on my body and stepped back a little so he could look at me. He started to say something when he saw the brand on my neck for the first time. His hand shook a little as he reached out to trace the scar. “They’re going to regret ever laying a fucking finger on you.”

  “Pretty sure I covered that. They thought they had me figured out; that they did all the research and followed the paper trail, but they didn’t predict that I’d take down the big guy. They hauled ass off the island when they realized the Butcher wasn’t going to be able to finish me off.” despite my big talk, I couldn’t stop the shiver racking my body when I mentioned the Butcher.

  Truth be told, that could have easily gone the other way, with me sprawled out somewhere dead for the coven to find, but I wasn’t going to dwell on that. I was alive and ready for some revenge. Maybe I should have my name fastened into a brand so I could burn it onto the ass of every Inquisitor who crossed my path.

  Oberon took my hand and unsnapped the small leather cuff I was wearing.

  “What are you going to do with that?”

  “Cast a glamour for you. When you wear it, it will hide the mark on your neck. I could cast something more permanent, so that it would be practically invisible all of the time without you having to wear anything, but something tells me you wouldn’t go for that. At least this way you don’t have to look at it if you don’t want to.”

  “That’s my favorite leather cuff.”

  “We’ll use this one temporarily, then. You can soak it in salt water later, and I’ll make you a new one with something else.”

  “But it’ll have salt stains on it.”

  “We can clean it. Stop being stubborn, and let me do this for you, Maurin.” His voice softened, in spite of his frustration with me.

  I gave in; mostly because I had the feeling making the glamour was actually more for him than it was for me. He didn’t care that I had scars, emotional and physical, but this one was different, a reminder of what the Inquisitors had taken from him.

  He held the leather cuff in his hand, muttering something in Gaelic, before snapping it back on my wrist. I didn’t feel anything at first.

  “Is it gone?” I turned my head to the side, stretching my neck a little so he had a better view.

  “No, it’s still there.” He reached for the mark.

  “Ouch, don’t touch it.”

  “I didn’t. Let me see it.”

  “Ouch! Holy shit, that burns! Is it supposed to do that?” I asked, through gritted teeth.

  “No, take it off!” He sounded worried; no it was more than that. He was freaked out.

  I fumbled with the snaps, the burning in my neck growing hotter and more painful with every second.

  Oberon ripped the cuff off of my wrist. The heat subsided, but the pain was almost unbearable. It was as if I had been branded all over again.

  “Did you do it right?” I was, trying not to be mad at him for an honest mistake.

  “Of course, I did it right. It’s a beginner-level spell. I’ve been doing glamours since grade school.” Apparently witches don’t like it when you question their abilities because he was immediately on the defensive.

  “Okay, don’t get all bent out of shape. I was just asking, since my neck feels like you put a red hot poker on it!”

  “Sorry. I don’t know why it did that. That’s never happened before. I didn’t even know that could happen.” Pride out of the way, he was back to being concerned.

  “Holy hell, it actually hurts more now than when I got it.” I could feel the burn seeping. “What if there was something on the iron that they used? Do you think they poisoned me?” With the increased pain came a sudden wave of nausea.

  “It’s possible, but you were fine before I cast the glamour. We can see if Mahalia still has that allicorn powder. It can’t hurt.”

  Allicorn is unicorn horn ground into a fine powder and extremely rare. It can cleanse the body of just about any toxin you can imagine. Amalie had taken it from The Witches’ Closet, a magical supply store in town, when we went up against the Morrigna.

  It was a good thing too, since Arcana, a coven member and proprietor of The Witches’ Closet, had been attacked by a hellhound. The bites from the hounds were full of more bacteria than a Komodo dragon. If it weren’t for the allicorn powder, Arcana would never have survived. In fact, she was still recuperating from her horrible wounds. If there were some sort of poison in me, then allicorn would surely draw it out.

  We headed for the house, but I didn’t make it. Falling to my knees, the cold, damp ground soaking into my jeans, I stayed there on all fours, unable to move, as pain arced through my body. The nausea got worse, and I started dry heaving.

  Oberon knelt down beside me, rubbing my back until the nausea passed. Then he scooped me up and carried me inside. He set me down on the couch in Mahalia’s study and grabbed the afghan that was thrown over the back of the couch and covered me up with it. “I’m going to get Mahalia. I’ll see if she’s got any of that allicorn. I’ll be right back.” After kissing my forehead, he ran from the room to track down Mahalia.

  I stayed on the couch with my eyes closed; my head pounding, and my neck still on fire. Something took shape in the darkness of my mind - a man, but his face was unclear. He was walking closer to me. It must have been a dream, because there was no one else in the room. I hadn’t slept or eaten enough to replace the energy I’d used in healing myself, so I ignored the mystery man and fell further into sleep.

  The man in my dream stopped only inches away from me; so close to me, but his face disconcertingly out of focus. I couldn’t identify any of his features, just his massive size, towering over me.

  “I’ve marked you, Maurin Kincaide.” The rumbling baritone matched the shadowy figure.

  “Who are you?”

  “I am Lachadiel, but you already knew that. You are connected to me through my mark.”

  “Well, Lachadiel, I’m in the middle of a nap. So we’ll have to do this another time.” Tired of having bad dreams, I tried to think of happier things.

  “It’s pointless to resist me, Maurin. You bear my mark. You’re mine to call.” He sounded entirely too pleased with that idea.

  “Okay, enough! This is my dream, and I’m done with you. Happy thoughts, happy thoughts.”

  Suddenly, he was a crushing force in my mind. I recoiled from him. Was this for real? He wasn’t just a part of a dream? I tried to break the mental link. I was no one’s to command. Scota didn’t even control me. She was my past, and I am her future. She was a part of me now, but I was in control of my life. Even the metaphysical bond between Oberon and me didn’t control me, though at times I bet he wished it did. I’d be damned if some servant of the Inquisitors thought he was going to control me. Or maybe I was damned already, and that’s why this shit kept happening to me.

  Thinking about Oberon and Scota seemed to push Lachadiel further away. I could still feel him pacing like a caged tiger somewhere in the recesses of my subconscious, but he wasn’t pushing like before. I focused on Oberon and on our bond. I thought of how he smelled, the way his arms felt wrapped around me, and the way his lips felt against mine. I drew on our connection, using our shared strength to push Lachadiel completely out of my mind.

  The door to Mahalia’s study flew open. Oberon rushed to my side, and the alarm showed in his eyes. “I could feel you using my energy. You were drawing on the bond. You’ve never done that before. What’s wrong?”

  I was so relieved to be free of Lachadiel, if only for the moment, that I threw myself into Oberon’s arms. My lips found his, and for the first time, I initiated the contact. Oberon stiffened at first, shocked by my embrace, but he quickly relaxed and began kissing me back fervently. Before I knew it, we were both on Mahalia’s couch, with Oberon almost on top of me. I pulle
d his shirt over his head, tracing his tattoos with my fingers. My hands were entwined in his hair, and I pulled him closer as he tried to pull back.

  “Maurin, wait.” He took a couple deep breaths. “Tell me what happened.”

  “You want to talk now?” I asked, a little out of breath myself. “I thought that you wanted this.”

  “I do want this. More than anything and it’s taking everything I have to stop right now, but I need to know what happened that forced you to use our shared energy like that” He pulled away and slumped onto the couch.

  Crawling up into his lap, I straddled him and nuzzled his neck. I needed to touch him, feel his skin on my skin and block out all thoughts of Lachadiel. And Oberon was a damned good distraction.

  “Someone’s going to walk in on us.” Oberon covered my hands with his, stopping them from exploring his chest.

  “You never struck me as a prude.” Working one hand free, my fingers danced along his collar bone.

  “You’re killing me, you know that?” He groaned. “I never talked to Mahalia. I barely made it down the hall before you started pulling energy. I sent Graive after Mahalia for me. Either one of them could walk through that door any second.”

  “What are you worried about? Mahalia seeing you with me, or Graive?”

  “I thought we covered this. Don’t try to make this about something else, when I know damned good and well you’re just trying to avoid telling me what happened.”

  I slid off of his lap and onto the cushion beside him without saying a word.

  “Don’t even start, Maurin. Don’t get all bitchy and distant just because I called you out on why you suddenly can’t keep your hands off me.”

  “I’m going to be a bitch right now because I practically threw myself at you, and this is the response that I get.”

  “That’s bullshit, and you know it. If you’re actually ready to do this, to take things to the next level, then I don’t want to be interrupted, and I sure as hell don’t want it to be on Mahalia’s couch.” He leaned in for a kiss.