Lunar Marked (Sky Brooks Series Book 4)

by McKenzie Hunter

  Stop it!

  I was ready to douse them both with cold water. I didn’t want to be there for the bourgeoning of whatever it was. She was old enough to take care of herself and definitely discerning and obstinate enough not to become a convert to Team Samuel, or rather Team Magic-less Utopia.

  “Will you continue?” Josh asked stiffly, failing to mask his irritation. Hot magic guy was his thing, and I didn’t think he liked Samuel sharing the title with him.

  She nodded. Perusing over the pages, I remembered that I hated that I was still a novice with Latin. She read through things quickly and didn’t have to stop once to ask Josh a word or use Google translate.

  “This one is dangerous for anyone who has magic,” she said, frowning at the page. “And you need three objects to do it. It’s like summoning someone, but once you call they can’t decline. With a summons or calling, they don’t have to answer. With this spell, they have to. If I wanted to use this against you, I could. That’s messed up.”.

  Ethan and Josh looked at me with the same excitement. Ethos. We could call him. My heart was racing and I was trying not to get ahead of myself. But would it work with the Tre’ase that created Maya? We could find Tre’ase without involving Logan. I’d forgotten that we wouldn’t always have all three books. One was promised to Samuel, and I doubt he was leaving without it. But I pushed that little obstacle aside; I had to deal with one problem at a time.

  “What objects do we need?”

  “Gem of Levage, Aufero, and Fatifer and blood.”

  Blood. It’s always blood. What I wouldn’t give for a spell to ask for a strand of hair or something just as innocuous. But I had Ethos’s blood, on a shirt, a knife, and as a stain on my carpet.

  The anxiety that no one had acknowledged lifted. Finding the Tre’ase who created Maya wasn’t an option, but at least we could get to Ethos. Both Samuel and Senna held the same look of disinterest. Senna was so far removed from this world it was doubtful she cared about Ethos’s plans, and Samuel had a single-target agenda and if he could take away magic, Ethos wouldn’t be anyone’s problem anymore.

  “Can I go home to see my mom?” Senna asked. Her large green hopeful eyes were hopeful. The absence of her former stern frown reduced her from the agitated, petulant woman she was earlier, to what she really was: a woman who was taken from her home and family by the Creed days ago and was now staying in a home full of strangers, including a cousin whom she had terrible history with. Josh looked at his hands—if it were up to him she would be leaving at that moment.

  Her focus was on Ethan, who hadn’t spoken: she must have remembered him from their first encounter. After a long moment of consideration, he nodded. “The East Coast Pack will be around a lot until this is handled. If you send them away, try to lose them … or pull any of the crap you pulled before. . .” He let the rest of the sentence linger. He didn’t need to finish. She got the gist of it.

  CHAPTER 14

  A mixture of salt, tannin, and a ground metal that I wasn’t familiar with made a large circle in front of me behind the pack’s retreat. Just as Senna had instructed, the Fatifer was placed to my right, the Gem of Levage in the middle, and the Aufero to my left. It had returned to the odd coloring since Josh had used it on Ethan, but its magic didn’t bother me because Josh’s was coursing through me. I enjoyed the familiar aura of a natural source that I was able to control with ease. We weren’t going to risk failure by having to do this spell while manipulating the magic in the Aufero. The downfall of the plan was that I borrowed a lot of magic from Josh, which made him weaker and unable to take on Ethos as well as he had in the past. Samuel was there as backup, but I wasn’t sure how he would fare against Ethos. We needed this to work.

  I double-checked everything: noise-reducing earbuds—they wouldn’t drown out the shrill sound he made before but they would definitely help—sword to my right, and the Clostra in front. A couple of feet away Sebastian and Ethan were in animal form with several other pack members near them. Winter as usual had on enough weapons to hold off a small militia.

  I ran my hand over the sword again. After constant practice, it had become an extension of me, and I now controlled it with the same ease as I did my body. But the confidence of my skills with it wasn’t enough to keep my heart from pounding in my chest. When I exhaled, I realized I’d been holding my breath.

  This had to work.

  The moment the invocation was spoken magic poured over the area, consuming it until nothing but it could be inhaled. We waited for something to happen. Nothing. For a long stretch of time there was nothing but the feel of my magic wafting through the air, taunting me with my failure. Dammit.

  I was prepared to try it again when lights swirled around me in variations of orange, red, and blue. A centripetal force of magic slammed hard into me, knocking my breath out with a powerful blow. I struggled for breath, fighting for each one I took, when an angry Ethos manifested himself without his human shell. The shrill angry sound ripped through the air, and I resisted the urge to cover my ears as I went for the sword. His tail whipped out, striking me in the chest. I stumbled back a few feet.

  Again, he approached me speaking the same language he had before, but this time I understood. “Maya, wake up.”.

  Foreign life blossomed, spreading through me, as the unnatural feeling threatened to take over. For a brief moment I no longer felt like I was commander of my thoughts, movements, and feelings. The aching feeling of losing control of my own existence consumed me and I fought it with everything I had. A dense cloud of energy persisted, and she attempted to smother me out. I can’t lose this. I can’t let her control me. I struggled harder, yanking back control, snatching back my volition.

  My magic shoved into his chest and he flew back, hitting the ground with a thud. He spread his hands over the area, and fire blazed, blocking me from him. I cast a spell—a shift of wind blew but not strong enough to control the flames. Another one came, stronger than mine, from Samuel’s direction, dampening the flames to a small fire. I lunged with the sword, and it slashed through Ethos’s arm, severing the limb. Another shrill noise ripped through the air. A ball blasted into my chest and magic wrapped around me binding my arms to my side. He advanced, and the fiery pits of his orange eyes seared into me. Death—he wanted to give it to me slowly and painfully. His tail lashed out, and Steven’s fangs latched on to it as his claws dug in, tearing at the thick leathery epidermis.

  Ethan and Sebastian attacked from behind, and the band that I had been trying to disable withered into a thick mist of destroyed magic that stuck in the air. The putrid scent of it smelled toxic. Ethos fell back, and as Ethan and Sebastian moved away, I brought down the sword like an axe, splitting his head from his body. He moved: not just the body but the head trying to inch back into position to reattach itself. What. The. Fuck.

  We watched the bizarre occurrence. That couldn’t be happening. Nothing lives without a head. Ethan, who had changed back to human form, moved close to the body; placing his hand on it he leaned down and whispered something. It stopped moving and slowly went through a strange version of the vampire’s reversion, the dark scaly skin drying and shriveling before collapsing to dust. The same thing happened to the head, when it touched it. I kept staring at Ethan trying to get him to look at me, but his gaze only swept briefly in my direction, his lips drawn into a tight line as he quickly gathered up all the protected objects. The Aufero continued to build a protective field around itself whenever Ethan neared it.

  “What that hell was that?” I hissed in a low whisper, sidling in close to him after grabbing the Aufero.

  He was cool and indifferent as he looked at me. His brows drew together as though he wasn’t sure what I was talking about.

  “What you did—it was like he went through reversion. I thought Josh used the Aufero to fix you—to fix things.”

  Not even a flicker of interest in the conversation as he behaved as though we were simply discussing the weather as opposed to hi
m touching Ethos and making him turn to dust.

  He shrugged. “He did.”

  I stopped, hoping he would, but instead he kept going, turning briefly. “Sky, don’t make this into something it isn’t. It was just a spell. if I hadn’t done it probably Samuel or Josh would have.”

  His mom was a witch, his maternal grandmother a dark elf—he had more magic in him than anyone else. He was bound to have some abilities that others didn’t, but the cynic in me wanted it to be more. He waited, a light smile lingering on his lips “Everything there is to know about me, you already know.”

  “You swear.”

  He nodded. “Everything there is to know about me, you already know,” he repeated before going into the house.

  I opened the door for Quell, who had knocked so softly I wasn’t sure anyone was at the door. He waited outside, slowly looking me up and down taking in the dark jeans and lilac fitted tank, then his attention went to the three-inch heels that were for appearance only. I was sure they weren’t going to last most of the night. My tight curls had been tamed into submission and draped over my shoulder in loose waves.

  I hadn’t been out in so long it felt like I had spent my life fighting Ethos, Michaela, and every possible thing that went bump in the night. We still didn’t know where Kelly was and we couldn’t find the mystery manimal that Winter and I saw in the woods; but I didn’t want to think about any of it. I was joining Josh, Ethan, and the rest of the pack to drink and dance until everything that happened over the past few weeks was just a memory.

  He tilted his head. Smiling he touched my hair. “You look beautiful.”

  “Thanks, we are going out. Do you want to go?”

  “No, I want to talk,” he said, extending his hand. When I took it, he threaded his fingers through mine and we walked outside toward the back of the house. The heels didn’t last long on the uneven surface and eventually I took them off and carried them as Quell led me farther until we were deep in the woods behind the house.

  “Do you know what happened to Fiona?”

  His grasped tightened; he nodded once but didn’t elaborate. I wondered if Michaela was cruel enough to tell him what she did. Who am I kidding, of course she is. Michaela didn’t see anything wrong with her actions. She was the Mistress of the otherworld, and for some reason she was given a pass on transgressions that would have gotten others punished or worse.

  “Michaela asked me to leave the Seethe,” he whispered.

  My first impulse was to tell him he should have just told her to go to hell, but he would never do that. I had it among other choice words in the chamber of phrases I was ready to lob at her at any given moment.

  The moon offered enough light that I could see the sadness on his face. As he looked past me, desolation was a thick presence between us. “I will have to leave.”

  I felt his sorrow and mine in the pit of my stomach. How could they do this to him? “You don’t have to go. Leave the Seethe, that’s fine; but don’t leave here. Please.”

  “That isn’t an option. When you are exiled from the Seethe it is considered an insult to stay. It will not end well for me. I’m going to go back home.”.

  I didn’t think I knew where home was for him. He’d been gone for over seventy-years: how could that be his home? This was his home. Keeping hold of his hand, I walked over to the large oak tree, sat down, and waited for him to take a place next to me.

  I couldn’t speak for a long time. The idea that he was leaving had rendered me speechless, and all I could do was try to figure out a way to fix it. There was a part of me that wanted him to go because he needed to get away from Michaela, but I wondered what would happen to him. He would need blood; how would he get it? Would it be like the last time? Did she do this to hurt him or me?

  “Why did you hang yourself?”.

  His thumb ran along the side of my hand in a slow, light rhythm before he pressed it to his lips. Coolness lingered long after he’d stopped. “I’ve killed five people since I’ve been a vampire. As a human, I lost count of how many. I can remember the women, the way they tasted, the sound of their voices, the way they fought, and the look on their faces before they died. I hate that I did it, and they are my memories—sad memories, but memories nonetheless and they haunt me. I can’t picture the faces of those I killed as a human. Not one. There were so many that they merge together into nothing but a collage of my sins. I don’t remember the sounds of their screams, their last words, the smell of their pain. Nothing. Shouldn’t I remember some of them? Shouldn’t they be bad memories, too?”

  I couldn’t come up with an answer that would give him the closure he needed or absolve him of the feelings. “War isn’t pretty, it just isn’t, even ours. I’ve killed people and I will probably kill more.” For a brief moment, I thought about the people I’d killed. It didn’t make me feel good. Knowing that I wanted to kill Michaela was even more distasteful. “Perhaps it is good that you don’t remember, because that was your old life. It and the things you did during it should be put to rest. You owe it to yourself to let it go.”

  “That is why I did it. I hanged myself because I let it go. The faces, the violence, and all that I did; I had let it go. The memories were leaving me, and they shouldn’t have.” His grip on my hand tightened.

  I rested my head against his shoulder. “During times like that you are forgiven for your actions. What would have happened if you hadn’t done the things you had? While you see a monster the people whose lives you saved and those you saved indirectly, don’t see that.”

  Even with the moon illuminating them, his eyes were dark, sullen. Vampirism just allowed him to hide from the things he was feeling, it didn’t help. “Why did she ask you to leave?”

  “The two of you mean a great deal to me; she created me, you brought me over. My feelings for you two are different but equally true. I don’t think I am able to choose between the two of you.”.

  I wasn’t particularly fond of being put in any category with Michaela, but I understood why he was exiled. She wanted him to choose and he was unable to do so. I wanted him away from her but my reasons were selfish. She didn’t deserve him and she would miss him. And when I killed her, I wouldn’t have to face him afterward. Vigilante justice riled so deep in me that my heart was beating erratically, ready to dish it out. My skin felt tight around me, ready to exact the punishment she deserved. I don’t know if there were many I hated more than her. I pushed it aside and dealt with the situation at hand—Quell.

  “I think you leaving is going to be good for you. I hate to see you go, but I think it will be good.”

  “I’ll miss her.” No matter what I said, I would never untangle his twisted logic. Michaela had saved him from his demons, somehow found a way to absolve him of his sins—or at least masked them temporarily, given him an amnesty from the war crimes he had continued to punish himself for. But she’d really wanted to recreate that person he saw himself as for her own entertainment. I wished I could break the hold she had on him.

  “I want you to go. It will be better for you.” I returned to my positon next to him, taking his hand as my phone buzzed in my pocket. I was supposed to meet them an hour ago. I sent a quick message to let them know I was running late.

  “Will you come with me?”

  I couldn’t even bring myself to say the words, I simply shook my head no. It took me a while to look over at him, too much of a coward to see the look on his face.

  “I will miss you,” he finally said after moments of silence.

  If someone had pulled out my heart and stomped on it, I don’t think it would have felt less painful.

  My life had become a series of visiting people I didn’t like and, even worse, having to talk to them, which I was reminded of when I knocked on Demetrius’s door. I didn’t understand why he and Michaela lived separately but I just added that to the many things I didn’t comprehend about their dysfunctional relationship.

  The palatial neo-Mediterranean stone house stood
out in the nondescript land of suburbia. Its manicured lawn looked like it belonged on a magazine; exotic flowers on each side of the stairs produced such a pleasant scent that it almost made me forget I was visiting a vampire’s home at night, probably during his feeding time. Large pillars and stucco enclosed the entrance, darkening the area, and I started to count the many things that could go wrong with this visit.

  He answered the door before I could knock again, his onyx eyes whetted with curiosity as his brow rose. Supple lips bowed into a deviant simper. Feeling more like I was entering a lion’s den than a home, I advanced slowly, pressing my purse with my weapons in it closer to me. I ditched the comb, lipstick, and brush for a knife and stake.

  “Well this is a very pleasant surprise,” he said in a low salacious drawl. This man could make the word marshmallow sound dirty. I’m not sure what I expected Demetrius to be doing on a Friday night, but being dressed in dark jeans and black casual shirt that matched his midnight hair and listening to classical music wasn’t it.

  But the glass of sanguine liquid that I was sure wasn’t wine was definitely what I expected.

  “I need to talk to you,” I blurted out.

  “Of course, come in.”

  No thank you. Standing at the entryway of the lair of the strongest vampire in the world was as far as I planned to go with tempting fate and potentially becoming a snack.

  “Can I get you something to drink?” he asked, his gaze slowly roving over me. I wished I had changed into something different that covered up more and didn’t cling so closely to my body. The jeans fit, hugging every curve of my body, when I really wanted to be wearing oversized sweatpants and a turtleneck.

  “When Michaela wanted me to come to help Quell, I did without questions. I did because you asked me to.” I was playing fast and loose with the story, but I did help; but it was for Quell and not Michaela.

  He nodded, taking a drink from his glass as he waited for me to continue. “I need a favor from you, please.”