On hands and knees, she crawled with determination toward the exit, her little bum, covered in yellow leggings, wagging to and fro.
“Told ya.” Brígh snickered as she followed the stubborn kid. “If I didn’t know for sure she was Maeve’s, I’d have said she came from your stock.”
After uttering a few assurances to Maeve that I’d keep her daughter safe, I trotted to catch up with my newest sidekick. “I am not that stubborn.” I scooped Arianne off the grass and hoisted her up onto my shoulders.
The look Brígh shot me—one I’d seen often, from everyone—said I was being thick. “Pot”—she pointed to me—“meet kettle”—she moved her finger up to the one on my shoulders, who giggled and kicked her feet, knocking me off balance again. “The two of you could drive me to drink if you weren’t funny as hell—some of the time—and I didn’t like you both so much.” She snorted, talking through a grin. “Maybe I should find better friends—ones who’re easier to move than frickin’ mountain granite.”
I couldn’t contain the laugh that blasted up from my depths. The three of us snickered and carried on like we were off to Grandma’s house for a picnic instead of about to wander into the den of the big bad Overseers to blow their house in.
When I realized I didn’t have the foggiest notion where we were going, I halted in front of a purple shifter with white shutters. “Where, exactly, do these women live?” Gripping Arianne’s ankles, I scanned what I could see. “And how many are there?”
Brígh pointed down the street where the cobblestone petered off into grass and woods. “Just over that hill. Andrew’s still sleeping, but Neve and Cas are waiting there for us even though I told them not to bother. They said something about security something-or-other, even if they couldn’t come inside.”
“Neve could come if she wanted to, though, right?”
Brígh tipped her face to the side, her lips tugging down in a grimace as if I’d just told her she looked fat in her skinny jeans. “Do you want her to come?”
I wasn’t sure how to answer that without upsetting her more than I already had. I had sudden sympathy for Liam when I gave him that speak-carefully-or-suffer-my-wrath expression. “Um … if the guards are worried about security, and they always are, I just thought … why is that a problem, exactly?”
“Geez, you’re such a guy.” She huffed hard enough the blast sent a curl of her hair flying in her own breeze. “I just … you don’t trust me, do you?”
Oh. “Of course I trust you. How could you even think I didn’t?”
She flipped her fingers in my direction, dismissing me as she stalked off toward the hill. “Nothing. It doesn’t matter. Just …” She glanced at me over her shoulder, showing how much I’d hurt her with whatever I’d said wrong. “I wouldn’t trust me if I was in your shoes. I kept this thing from you for a whole week.”
I gaped at her, not because she’d kept it from me for a week, but because I’d assumed it had been much longer. “Only a week? Are you sure?” Duh, of course she was sure. “So, something has changed recently to bring this on. Is that what you’re saying?” A few long strides took me to her side while Arianne tugged at my braid like a little cowgirl driving a horse.
Brígh released a long-suffering sigh. “As events get closer, they’re easier to see. More certain. I’m sure we’ve been on this particular path for a while, but now that it’s almost here …”
She didn’t need to finish the sentence. “The clock has started ticking toward the end.”
“Yep. Pretty much.”
“Well, that’s just craptacular.” Remembering who sat on my shoulders, I said a quick, “Sorry, little one. That’s a bad thing to say, and don’t you repeat it, got it?” Or your mother will have my hide.
“You funny,” Arianne said, the words mixed with a giggle. A sharp inhale preceded her screeching, “Neve!” Arianne kicked harder against my chest as she leaned forward and pointed, grunting as she always did when she wanted something badly. Which, with her, seemed to be anything she set her sights on—one of a million reasons why I loved her to bits. An errant thought, a wonder if I held my future daughter in-law, haunted me before I slammed it out. I couldn’t bear to think about a future that may never happen.
Neve’s pink ponytail bobbed as she strode to us, a slight pregnant-waddle to her gait. I hoped I hadn’t started doing that yet. “I don’t like this, Lila,” she said.
“Yeah, join the club on that one, honey.” Brígh waved as Cas stepped in behind Neve.
I took the last few steps to stand on top of the hill and peeled Arianne from my shoulders. “Geez, kid, you weigh a ton. What’s your mom feeding you, anyway?”
She giggled and came to her knees beside me, her pig tails bobbing in the light breeze. “Elf tarts and pork pie. Yum!”
My stomach gave us all a little serenade at the mention of food, and Garret saw fit to stick his foot into my ribs—his version of a dinner bell. “Later. We’ll eat later.” I shifted and wiggled until he curled into his usual ball in my center.
The land sloped downward on the other side of the hill. Emerald grass spread as far left and right as I could see, edged with a thick pine forest, the branches so interwoven they appeared impassable. If I never saw another tree, I’d have been quite happy. I opened my mouth to ask where we were going when I saw it. “Is that a painting down there?”
“Yep.” Cas’ eyes never left his mate as if keeping her in his focus would ensure her safety. “Freaky isn’t it? Guy gives me the grade-A creeps.”
I squinted at the six-foot-tall, four-foot-wide image encased in a golden frame that made no sense. “What’s holding it there?”
“Nothing. It just floats.”
“Like the portal door I had to give the blood sacrifice to the first time I went to Dun Bray.” I moved a few strides closer as I cocked my head left and right at the image of grey, black and red. Horns. Flame-red eyes. “The mist seems to be moving. Tell me I’m not the only one who sees that.” Creepy-crawly sensations wandered through my hair and along my arms, inducing a gigantic urge to turn heel and run while scratching everywhere.
Brígh hugged herself, shivering. “You’re not crazy. The guy thing moves once in a while, too.”
“I feel like we shouldn’t be here.” Palms scrubbing furiously at my arms, I held my legs still so they wouldn’t carry me away.
“That’s the point. They don’t like visitors that aren’t Seers, and they’re masters at the creeptacular sh—stuff.” Brígh slapped a hand over her mouth as Arianne cranked her head up. “Oops.”
“So what do I do? How do we get in?” I asked.
A little tremble caught Brígh. “Just walk up to the dude. When his hand comes out of the painting, you grab it. We both have to be touching you when he does, though.”
“Tell me you’re joking. I have to … to touch it … that … thing?” The idea of touching the grey, elephant-skinned blacked-clawed thing injected me with a wicked case of the heebie-jeebies.
“I’m starting to feel better about being such a wuss if it bothers you this much,” Cas said, edging closer to me, “considering you don’t seem to be afraid of much. I’m just glad I went to the bathroom before I came here so I didn’t piss myself.”
I patted his cheek, managing a chuckle at his level of unease.
Brígh grabbed my arm while scanning the ground. “Freakin’ hell, where’d Arianne go?”
Shit. It didn’t take a genius to figure out which direction she would have gone, what with her having the patience of a gnat. Heart drumming a death march, my focus landed on the little girl who’d waddled down the hill when we weren’t looking, just as the putrid hand extended from the painting toward her. The world erupted in a deafening cacophony of screams and shouts from my company. Running wouldn’t have gotten me there in time, so I burst into a flaming ball of energ
y and flew at her. All fear of the creature disappeared, replaced by a deadly instinct to protect Arianne.
“Lila, no!” Brígh screamed. “Wait!”
My hand wrapped around Arianne’s ankle as her fingers slid against black clawed ones. The horizon melted. By the liquid feeling in my flesh, I must have, too.
8
Ripples distorted my view as my body returned to flesh and bone. Flames crackled in a stone fireplace that took up one entire wall. Some sort of metal table claimed the center of the room, supported by what appeared to be bird’s legs. Rows and rows of old tomes nestled in tidy rows on ancient-looking wooden bookshelves. Dried herbs and flowers hung in bunches from the rafters, filling the space with the stench of incense and old crone.
Arianne tilted up at me from where she knelt by my feet, smiling as if quite proud of her wayward adventure. She must have made a detour from Brígh’s original vision. Hard to predict a baby’s mind, I supposed, especially one with the attention span of a hyped-up humming bird.
“Kid, you are in so much trouble.” I crouched and pulled her against me. “The others are probably outside having a fit.” Could they not come through after us? Or was it a one-time shot? Where did the horned guy get off to? Wherever he’d gone, I hoped he stayed there.
Along with the perfume of flowers and spices, dampness thickened the air. Were we underground? In a swamp somewhere? Memories of the creepy farm cellar where Rourke had electrocuted me came back and sent a shiver through me. I waited and listened as Arianne struggled to get out of my grasp, saying “Go, go, go,” but hearing nothing else.
I’d have forced my will on her, but doing that to a baby seemed so wrong.
Arianne’s sudden stillness turned my muscles to stone. Head tilted left, she paused. Listening, I figured, her pigtails shifting the other direction.
“What is it, little one?” I whispered against her ear. I sensed no minds anywhere other than the two of us.
“Coming.” She jabbed a finger toward the fire, but her body language didn’t relay any fear, only subtle excitement.
“Who’s coming? The Overseers?”
Her head bobbed, and she craned it around, staring at me, smiling even brighter. “Afraid of Lila.”
They’re afraid of me? I could deal with that.
Willing myself into a relaxed state, I stood and tucked Arianne between my feet. “Don’t you dare run off on me again, you hear me? Maybe if you stay quiet, they’ll forget you’re here.”
She gave me a thumbs-up and a conspiratorial grin. Someone needed to teach that kid about caution and danger. I didn’t like that she was braver than me.
The fire flashed blue. Zapping sounds, like arcing electricity, careened into the room as three forms emerged from the flames, flickering, brightening until they solidified. I called my energy, but kept it swirling in my center in case I needed to explode a few heads in a hurry.
The first Overseer appeared as I’d envisioned, with long, white hair and enough wrinkles to make a sun-wizened apple jealous. Her floor-length dress started white at the top and ended black, showing every shade of gray in between as if she’d stood in tar and it had slowly seeped up the fabric.
The other two, however, appeared to have just stepped off the cover of one of those glossy fashion magazines—when there used to be any before Parthalan screwed the powers of the world into destroying one another for his amusement.
“What do you want?” the redhead asked, glancing down toward Arianne with the same regard I’d give a butterfly in a room full of vampire bats. Red arranged her royal blue pencil skirt around pale legs as she rested one hip on the table.
“Nice to meet you, too, red. In my version of civilization, this is how we greet someone new.” I extended my hand. “I’m Lila Gray, and you are?”
She sniffed, or maybe laughed, I didn’t know which. The action stuck her nose even higher if that was possible. “Miranda Loch.” A nod indicated the midnight-haired woman to her right. “Deirdre Renauld.” Another jut of her chin directed me to the shriveled prune. “Tameryn Olivier.”
Deirdre crossed her arms over a white dress shirt with a mandarin collar, dark eyes roving over me as if looking for something that should have been there but wasn’t. A shift of her body moved her weight from her left stiletto heel to her right, jeans swishing with the motion. “We will not disturb the timeline any further than your aide has already done, so leave.”
I scratched a tickle from my nose so I wouldn’t sneeze with the stench of incense. “Your warm welcome for your queen is overwhelming, ladies.”
“You are not our queen in authority.” Tameryn wove strands of her hair into a braid.
Nervous?
“The only power we recognize is that of our Goddess.”
“Yeah, so I’ve heard.” My snarky smile faded, chased away by the sudden spurt of anger at their attitudes. “Do you really think the Goddess means for her children to destroy everything? I mean, how can you sit here in your little magical fishbowl when you could be helping? The elves didn’t have to die like that.” My power swelled in equal proportion to my desire to tear one of their arms off and beat them to death with it.
“If it comes to pass, then it is the will of the Goddess. It is not our place to question,” Tameryn said.
I tossed up a hand and let it smack down against my hip. “Then, why give you the gift of Seeing in the first place? For what purpose? If you can’t tell anyone what it is you See, then I can’t see that it has one.”
Deirdre’s brow jacked up, and Miranda pointed a worried glance at Tameryn, but none of them gave me an answer. Clearly, the old one was the leader of the bitch brigade, and I got the feeling I had the most chance of getting through to the redheaded Miranda than the other two.
“And what do you suppose is going to happen to the three of you when the rest of us are eaten by trees?” I met all of their gazes, noting the beginnings of fear radiating from the two younger ones. “How will you eat? Certainly even all-knowing Seers need food now and then, and this place doesn’t look big enough to hold a lot, which means, eventually, you’ll have to go out and become lunch along with the rest of us. And what will you have left to See other than pain and suffering, then nothing at all? Will you just wither away in here, alone, without the touch of your people? Without the fae, Iress will lose its power. I imagine you’ve thought of that, though, and have a plan so you won’t become mortal.”
More shifting of feet, and Miranda plopped down in a chair at the table as if her ass had grown too heavy for her legs to support.
Taking advantage of their uneasiness, I said, “Quite frankly, I don’t give a lily-white damn what the three of you do, but you will tell me a few things before I leave today, like how long in advance did you know what would happen to the elves? And what did you do to Marla, whoever she is? And even more importantly, who’s next on the Magi’s agenda?”
“No. We will tell you nothing,” Tameryn said.
I tried to take a step forward and stopped when Arianne’s weight on my foot reminded me of her presence. “Tell me, or—”
“Or what?” Deirdre asked, eyeing me the way a gazelle would do to a salivating lion. “Your cumhacht has no effect on the Overseers. As we said, you have no power over us, no authority to order us around like you do everyone else.” Her tone suggested she wasn’t sure of that. That she kept darting glances at her fearless leader didn’t help her attempt at confidence any.
I narrowed my eyes, tracing a path from one to the other, realizing she probably told the truth. Even if I couldn’t affect their will directly, for whatever reason, I could still control their stuff. As a test, I gathered up my energy, sent it through the floor, and exploded the chair next to Miranda. She jumped up, squealing, as I said, “I might not be able to affect your will, ladies, but I can certainly affect your environment. I�
�ll go out on a limb here and guess that you all bleed as well as the rest of us. Tell me what I want to know, and I won’t have to test my hypothesis.”
A sweep of Tameryn’s arm had the other two scrambling toward the fire.
When I tried to move toward them, I ran face-first into a ward I hadn’t noticed, completely invisible to the eyes and senses. It hadn’t affected my energy, only my body. “Come back here!”
As the younger two stepped into the flames, the old one smiled at me. “Tell Brígh to report to us tomorrow to face the consequences of her betrayal.”
My hair flew up in a current of my power, whipping above me. “You do anything to her, lay a finger on a single hair, harm her in any way, and I will not hesitate to kill all of you. Slowly.”
A blast of light knocked me on my ass. I blinked, half blinded by the brightness above me.
“Christ!” Cas hovered over me, plum hair dangling in my face. “We couldn’t get in. That grey thing just disappeared after you went through.”
“It’s okay.” I rubbed the back of my skull where it had smacked against the ground, and he helped me to my feet. “Well, that went well.”
“You were supposed to wait for me!” Brígh jammed her foot down.
“Yeah, tell it to that one.” I directed her to the pony-tailed avenger, once again sitting on my feet, who clapped her hands and grinned. “Again,” she said. “Again, again!”
“Find out what you need to know?” Neve asked while her gaze remained vigilant.
I shook my head and brushed dirt off of my butt. “Nope. The only thing I found out is that they’re afraid of me, and they haven’t given much thought to the outcome of their tidy little delusions.”
“Ah.” Cas laughed with little humor. “Like, if they keep dicking us around, they’ll be just as dead as we are?”
“Pretty much.”
“So, what do we do now?” Brígh glared lasers at me. “How do we know who’s in danger next, or if anyone is for that matter? I’ve tried to See, but it’s just not coming.”
Rise of the Magi Page 7
