Shifter's Moon: A Celia Winters Novel Book 3

by Harrison, D. L.

  It felt like hours, but in what was probably closer to thirty minutes, Dina and Antonio came in the room. She saw Dina tense up a bit as their eyes met.

  “What is that, she seems wary about me for some reason, every time we’ve met. ”

  She felt Silva’s wordless shrug.

  What she didn’t expect was an answer from her fire elemental, “She is a daughter of magic. Her blood is weak, she cannot perceive me, but she can sense me. ”

  Huh, she could see where that would be unsettling, and why Dina would associate the feeling to her. She guessed one of the fae knocked up one of Dina’s ancestors, a long time ago. Even her blood was only one eighth fae through her great grandmother, who’d been knocked up by Cilla’s son.

  If Dina could sense an elemental, did that mean she could sense other spirit as well? She considered that for a moment, if so the woman could sense lies, which would come in very handy for a FBI agent. That made her wonder how many humans with that talent, actually had fae blood in them from generations past.

  They took a seat across from her, so far no one had spoken. Another tactic?

  She was amused, but she was also a little nervous, the tactic seemed to be working. Apparently knowledge of interrogation tactics didn’t imbue immunity.

  Silva sent, “Just relax, we can set them on fire remember?”

  She covered her mouth to hide a wicked smile and coughed, and then reached for the bottle water on the table.

  Dina said, “Your friends told us quite a story.”

  Relief washed over her as her nose told her, Lie.

  She shrugged, “I don’t know why I’m here.”

  She almost giggled hysterically, since she knew Dina would be noting the lies as well.

  Antonio asked in a curious voice, “So, why did you burn down that house? You wouldn’t know about all those other arsons down south would you?”

  His words were calm, but he was studying her with an intense expression. She might have been a witch shifter, but she was still a human woman. The words had impact, and she wondered what he read on her face. She knew she should just stay silent and not say anything, but absurdly that felt incredibly rude.

  “Am I under arrest?” she asked.

  Dina said, “Not yet.”

  She nodded, “I have nothing to say.”

  The two of them exchanged quick glances and then turned back to her.

  Dina asked a bit forcefully, “What are you hiding?”

  After telling them she had nothing to say, she felt no impulse to speak again. It was awkward, and uncomfortable, but she kept her silence. Antonio and Dina tried a few more times to get a response, asking about the fires, asking about what she was doing in Florida, but she didn’t answer. They tried various approaches with the questions, painting her as the villain, a victim under duress they would save, and finally a bystander that they would protect, still she remained silent.

  She even dropped into a light trance so her facial expressions wouldn’t give them any information. She wished she’d thought of that earlier, but there it was.

  Finally, they got up and walked out in frustration.

  Silva asked, “What now? ”

  She frowned, “We wait for word from Bria, or until they let us go, or arrest us. ”

  Silva prowled in a circle, not liking the idea of just waiting. But wait they did…

  Chapter 11

  It was in the early AM the next day when they were finally released. An agent came in the room that she didn’t recognize, who escorted her and her team out of the building. Once they got outside he turned to them.

  “Sorry it took so long. We had to track down all the information, which was extensive. Right now the agents don’t remember you, or have a record anywhere about questioning you, or even tracking you which meant cleansing another department. They are still on the case though for all the arsons leading from Florida to Georgia, so be careful and try not to come to their attention again.”

  She was too tired and annoyed to say thank you and mean it, so she nodded. They all piled into one large SUV, the agent offered to take them home. None of her friends were very talkative, and she felt a huge sense of relief when they were dropped off behind her store. She took a shower, alone, and was asleep in bed before Ed finished his.

  She woke up full of energy when her air elemental dumped a ton of information on her, despite only getting a few hours of sleep. Considering how packed full of energy she usually was, it was actually somewhat of a surprise she was so tired last night. Was her body simply becoming acclimated to being part shifter now? Or was she just managing the energy better? She wasn’t entirely sure, but she decided to take it as a good sign. She shouldn’t have to run twenty miles right before bedtime just to get to sleep after all. Not that she didn’t enjoy a good work out, it just shouldn’t be necessary.

  She considered waking Ed for a morning frolic, but decided to let him sleep a bit more. She might be bright eyed after three hours, but he wouldn’t be.

  Her morning routine was grounding as she took a jog, showered, and grabbed her morning coffee, and she’d just opened the store when Ed came down.

  Ed kissed her and said, “Looks like another meeting today, lunchtime.”

  She raised an eyebrow, “Three days in a row for a joint council meeting? Must be the end of the world.”

  He snorted, “Something like that. They got a lot of information from Karina.”

  She sighed, “Yeah, I got some information too. Jake is making preparations to come straight here. We were already enemy number one, but pinching Karina out from under his nose sent him off the deep end. He wants to eradicate the Charlotte coven tomorrow night.”

  Ed tilted his head, “On the full moon? Is he stupid?”

  She shrugged, “Shifters will be stronger too, they’re forced to shift on the full moon, they’ll be ready for a hunt, and in a bloodthirsty rage to kill witches. Jake also still has enough magic available to kill the anti-shifter wards, or at the very least, lessen their severity.”

  Ed nodded, “We’ll figure it out. It’s going to be messy. At least we were able to destroy the replacement enchantments Karina recently recharged, they were still in the basement.”

  She didn’t say anything at that so he added, “I’ll see you at lunchtime?”

  She agreed, and he gave her another kiss before leaving.

  The morning was kind of slow, but she didn’t mind. It gave her a chance to catch up on the busy work. Straighten and stock the shelves, replace the potions she’d used for the birth, and yesterday after the assault. She also ordered replacement potion supplies, packaging for shipments, and tried to catch the store up on all other sundry needs. Berny came in late, a little before ten. At least one of them got some sleep.

  After a while of small talk, curiosity got the better of her.

  “So what happened yesterday, we never did talk about it.”

  Berny looked up thoughtfully, “It went well as far as things go. We took out the basement wall from the outside. Ed used his water affinity to take out the werewolf in man form, I used TK to smash the changed wolf against the wall hard enough to knock him out. Karina…”

  Berny looked disgusted, and angry, “Karina wasn’t in any shape to help them as we feared. She was completely drained and out of energy from building enchantments on amulets… and she hadn’t been fed so was weak on top of that, she was kind of out of it. She was shaking, and it took us a while to get her calmed, and get her dressed in those rags before we came upstairs.

  “You know the rest.”

  She shuddered, she couldn’t even imagine what Karina had gone through. They were keeping the woman naked? She was horrified by the idea and what that implied, even worse it brought up the knowledge of what happened to her mother, and how she herself was conceived. She pushed down the urge to throw up, she was sorry she’d even asked. If she’d had any guilt in killing those shifters, which she didn’t, that would have been the nail in the coffin on those em
otions.

  “My side went about the same, to plan. At least, until Carl jumped out the window and ran around the house.”

  Berny snickered, “Is that how that happened? Apex predator out foxed by a six-year-old?”

  She felt a surge of magic and Berny jumped in shock, “Ouch, what was that for!”

  Silva radiated smugness from the back of her mind.

  She sat down, “Umm, that wasn’t me. Apparently you can’t tease the tiger.”

  Actually it was kind of alarming. Silva was her, but in a lot of ways Silva was her own self. She was losing her fear for the magic. A couple of days ago she channeled magic to increase their shifter speed and strength. Just now though, Silva had used her air affinity to pinch her friend. She had a sudden vision of the future where Silva was playing with thunder storms.

  She trusted Silva with her life, but Silva had far less patience for human niceties and protocol. For the first time, she was very uncomfortable with her split soul, she didn’t want to argue with herself, or hold herself back when Silva was making such good progress, but she couldn’t let her alter ego go around pinching everyone that annoyed her, or worse.

  Silva sent, “That’s not fair. She was teasing me, and I had no way to tease her back. I am locked in here you know, except when we change. Of course I’m not going to go around and burn people up,” she finished sounding a bit outraged at the idea.

  Berny’s eyes widened, “What do you mean it wasn’t you?”

  She shook her head, “You teased the tiger, it was apparently the only way she could tease you back, since we’re in human form right now.”

  Maybe she was overreacting a bit…

  Berny giggled, “Fine, but you were still caught flatfooted by a six-year-old!”

  Silva swished her tail in annoyance in the back of her mind but didn’t retaliate again.

  She sighed, “Just don’t be surprised if she gets you back one day. It’s a good thing she likes you so much.”

  They teased each other a bit more and then got some work done before she had to leave for the meeting…

  They were eating a catered lunch this time before things got started. As usual, it was the witch council on one side. Bria, Damon and Sue, along with Ed as the witch council enforcer. On the other side, was Ella, Allen, and Joe, along with Paul as the enforcer. Josh was also present as an interim enforcer. She was once again seated on the end of the table, part of both, and neither, at the same time.

  It didn’t take them long to get through their sandwich, drink, and chips before the actual meeting started.

  Damon said, “We might as well get started. The first item is the vote for exposure. Unfortunately, that is currently deadlocked. The rule is when the councils all communicate and vote, it requires over a sixty percent vote to decide an issue. The issue has not been decided, since either for or against both fall short of that mark, it’s close. Not quite fifty/fifty, but no clear majority either way. We’ll have to shelve that one for now.

  “Half the cities as a whole are convinced it’s just a matter of time, and we need to put our own spin on it. The other half find it inconceivable it could ever get away from us at all, so finds the whole idea ridiculous.”

  Bria nodded, “It’s not that they don’t think if we come out we should spin it, just the idea of the humans catching on without us leading them to it is ridiculous. They are… arrogant.”

  Allen interjected, “Well said. I just hope those arrogant bastards don’t doom us. If you haven’t figured it out, we are a city that agrees we should reveal our world to the humans, but we dare not make that step without the full support of the community. They would fall on our city and destroy us if we did.”

  Ella nodded, “Moving on,” she was clearly tired of this topic, “You all did well yesterday, and Karina has confirmed they have enough magic to take another coven. However, being forewarned means the covens can stop the drain, or at least feed more magic to the ward until the enchantments they have run out. Is that correct?” she asked politely, looking across the table.

  Sue cleared her throat, “Essentially yes, more than that, since we know he is coming, and we expect tomorrow sometime, we can invite Fran’s coven to join us in the defense. From what we understand they have about fifty shifters, which isn’t overwhelming for our two covens.”

  Joe spoke up, “Are you sure you won’t accept our help?”

  She looked up at Joe in surprise, the shifters offered to help defend the coven? That was… unheard of. She felt a surge of warm emotion she could barely suppress.

  Damon replied regretfully, “It isn’t a lack of trust, it’s a matter of coordination. If our anti-shifter wards are active you won’t be able to get close. Also, when you’re all wolves and bears, if you joined the fight I don’t believe we’d be able to tell you apart. The last thing I want to do is hurt one of your family or pack mates.

  “Even coming in and attacking from the rear could lead to friendly fire. I suppose if you really want to, you could block their escape route far enough back to stop them and pick them up after the battle? I’m hoping once the alpha Jake, and his second Manny are dead, that they will retreat or flat out surrender.”

  Bria opened her mouth, and then closed it when the door opened.

  She couldn’t have been more shocked by the two people that walked in. She had expected neither, and that they were together was even more boggling. Her fae mother who was practically glowing, and of all people, FBI agent Dina Rodriguez.

  Ella asked, “Who are you?”

  She looked around and saw all the men in the room staring at Cilla in adoration. Only Ella, Bria, Sue, and herself seemed to be unaffected by the fae’s aura. It was kind of funny, except for the expression on Ed’s face which made her a little jealous.

  “This is…”

  She was cut off, “I am a daughter of magic, you call us the fae.”

  Sue frowned, “What do you want.”

  Cilla sighed, “You must reveal yourselves to the world tonight. You might win the fight tomorrow night thanks to my daughter retrieving the witch, but it will be ugly, and very public. If that’s the world’s first impression, you will cause heartache and pain for all of us.”

  Sue and Ella seemed a little confused, Bria on the other hand glanced at her in understanding already aware of her special lineage.

  Bria asked, “Is there no path to prevent exposure?”

  Cilla shook her head, “No longer. If you had heeded my daughter and went after both the witch and to kill Jake it would have been avoided. It is too late now, even if you went to attack him immediately he is no longer in a place of obscurity, doing so would merely hasten the issue. All we can do is manage the damage. Do you think for a moment I would be here, myself, if all the supernatural races were not in danger?”

  Ella asked, “Who is your… companion?”

  Cilla snorted derisively, “She is an FBI agent, I believe you will be familiar with the name, Dina Rodriguez. She was spelled to forget the evidence and suspicions last night. Shortly after that, she threw off the spell. She is weak, diluted, but she is a daughter of magic. Mind control magic will not work for long against even the weakest of us.

  “Which is another reason to expose yourself to the world for good or ill. She didn’t come with me, she was outside staking the place out, I believe there is an audio transmitter in here. Of course, she doesn’t understand who she is, I will enlighten her before I release her from my spell.”

  Bria’s voice was even as she said, “We will have to consult with the other cities, see if any are swayed by this new information. They should be.”

  Cilla nodded, “Quickly. You need to reveal yourselves tonight, or it will go badly. It still might, and there will be many problems, but it will be so much worse if you wait. If you don’t come out with your own spin tonight, the fae will at dawn tomorrow.”

  Apparently Cilla was done speaking her peace, because she turned around and dragged Dina out with her. Her mother never
explained why she’d bamboozled the men in the room, be it she didn’t respect them, or wanted a smaller group for the conversation, or was it automatic? She wasn’t sure she even wanted to know. It was still a shock, since it was the first time she’d seen Cilla outside of her dreams.

  The men seemed to be coming out of it, and Bria said, “The enforcers can go for now, we’ll let you know our decision soon enough. It’s going to be a hellish afternoon.”

  As she got up and left the room, she had an interesting thought. She’d shelved the idea of learning spirit magic until she could learn more about it, but it hadn’t occurred to her until just then, that Bria might be an excellent source of information for that branch of magic. After all, Bria was a daughter of magic too, and with decades more experience. It was something to look into after this latest emergency passed.

  Chapter 12

  On the way back to the store the shock started to settle in. Her grandmother had crashed the joint council meeting, and they were going to have to expose themselves to the world. While she knew the picture in her head of villagers carrying pitchforks and torches was ridiculous, the underlying sentiment didn’t seem all that unlikely.

  At the very least, there would be some humans who would hunt witches, and very possibly go hunting for shifters during the full moon. Religious whackos, government conspiracies, people that would see them as evil, or as a threat to national security, it all had her mind spiraling. Then there would be the other side, the ones that came into her shop, curiosity seekers who would want a piece of magic for themselves. People that would seek magical solutions to the world’s problems.

  She wanted to believe most people would be fine with it, if a little surprised and disturbed at first. Most people didn’t tend to get upset about things unless they were personally affected by it. Once they saw the world hadn’t ended, and likely wouldn’t, they would be fine. It would be the few percent on each end of the spectrum that would cause all the problems. Hopefully the people in the middle would hold enough sway to make a difference there.