Miranda

by Sherry Foster

  “How much longer on that ladder guys?”

  “If you move we can slide it in the hole now.” David pushed past Trey and helped lower the ladder into the hole. Once it was firmly seated Kyle started down with Trey right behind him. They flipped it at the bottom and Kyle started up again while Trey watched. When he reached the top he tried to climb into the house but everyone could see the barrier stopped him. He climbed back down shaking his head.

  “It’s no use Trey, the barrier just won’t give.”

  “Dammit, move, let me try. Maybe I can call out to her and get her up enough to lift the protection.”

  Trey headed up the ladder and when he reached the top he took the extra couple of steps on the ladder putting his hips above the bottom of the door. He leaned forward to brace himself against the barrier and call out to Casey. Everyone heard his startled shout as his lean turned into a fall and he face planted upside down in the cabin. His swearing and the others’ laughter filled the air as they watched their Alpha struggle to untangle himself. When he was upright he stood at the door and glared at his pack members before turning away and moving out of their sight. The watched as the foot moved and saw him when he came back into sight carrying Casey. He looked at the ladder a moment and glared down at Kyle before turning away carrying Casey.

  Kyle get your ass back up here. What the fuck is wrong with you. You apparently didn’t go high enough to get in the door. Climb all the way up this time shit head.

  Trey laid Casey on the sofa and went in search of something to tend to the head wound. The bleeding had stopped but Casey’s breathing was shallow and it looked like she had lost a lot of blood.

  Dammit Trey, come let me in the door if it is so easy. Trey went back to the door and reached his hand out for Kyle but the protection would not let Kyle’s hand through and stopped Trey’s hand from pulling back in. Trey let go of Kyle and pulled his hand back in before swearing.

  “Fucking fucked up day, fucking snow, fucking witches. Look tell you what, I am going to try to get her cleaned up a bit, get the road clear and get one of the SUVs up here so we can lay her down in the back. When I get her cleaned up I will find some warm blankets to wrap her in, she is fucking freezing but I don’t think frostbite has hit yet. The house is not as cold as I would have thought so the protection must have helped some. Call back and have them get Shelly to the clinic. Tell her we are going to need xrays and she has some stitching up to do.” Trey shook his head. His plans for this snowy day had included making long hot love with his mate followed by a movie and popcorn and more lovemaking. Instead he was freezing his ass off miles from home in the cabin he had spent his honeymoon in trying not to think of all the places he and Gabby had made love.

  When he heard the phone ringing he reached in his pocket but almost immediately realized it was not his. With barely a second thought he reached for the phone he saw on the floor. Seeing the name Craig he answered it.

  “Hey box-boy what’s up?”

  “What the hell? Trey? Is that you? Where’s Casey?”

  “Casey is unavailable to take your call right now but at the sound of the beep you can leave your name and number and she will return your call, if she ever regains consciousness. BEEEEP.”

  “Wait, what? No, Trey fuck it man this is serious, let me talk to Casey.”

  “Can’t man. Casey was attacked about three hours ago. We just made it into her house and she is out. We don’t know what happened but she has a pretty bad gash on her head, fair amount of blood loss, I am trying to get her cleaned up and wrapped up in blankets. Massive crater outside her house and protections all around her house. So far I am the only one who was able to get through the protections. We had to build a fucking ladder to climb down in the crater and then back out and into her house so if this isn’t important you are going to have to call back later. Even if it is important you still have to call back later. We are going to get her to the clinic as soon as someone gets a decent vehicle up here we can carry her down the mountain in.”

  “How bad is the snow on your side of the mountain?”

  “Come on Craig really? You called to ask for a weather report. Look it up. Now I gotta go so I can tend this wound.” Trey started to hang up the phone but the next words stopped him in his tracks.

  “Fix her up Trey. I will put my bird in the air as soon as the weather clears but we need that witch. Our lives may depend on what she knows.”

  Trey heard the beep that let him know the call had been ended. He raised his eyebrows and looked at Kyle who was still standing on the ladder. Kyle just shrugged his shoulders. Trey shook his head and turned back into the house. Two hours later the SUV with Casey inside headed down the mountain through the blinding snow following the little plow. David had made the decision to keep the plow and use it all the way back to the plant. The blizzard was heavier than they had expected. Trey hoped they could make it back safely cause they might be able to take to their wolf form and make it, but they couldn’t leave Casey behind.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Craig hung up the phone and looked at Conall and Sibeal before looking back at his phone. “Gotta find out what that front is doing. Soon as it lifts I will head to Trey’s and get her.”

  He looked around the living room and back at his mate’s parents before looking at the empty popcorn bowl. His stomach rumbled and he sent a glance back to Kate.

  “Snap out of it sweetheart and talk to us. You are scaring your mom and dad to death. Look at them. No, don’t you turn your head away. Look at them. Dammit Kate we are all in this together. Sure this sucks balls, ow, don’t hit me. I didn’t say fuck, ow dammit stop hitting me.” Craig heard Kate’s parents snorting in laughter and he smiled. The ones in his pack who really and truly knew him would have recognized his deliberate attempt to antagonize his mate. When he saw the faint smile cross her lips he leaned down and kissed her. “That’s my girl, ow, now come on why did you hit me that time?”

  “I am not a girl. I am your mate, I am a woman grown and I am an undefeatable witch.” Kate raised her head high.

  Craig patted her shoulder, “Uh huh, yep, undefeatable. That’s us.”

  “I hate to rain on your little cheer-leading party there but neither of you are undefeatable. And if you don’t buck up and start training to protect yourselves and this pack you will find out just how defeatable you are.” Conall looked at his daughter a moment before turning back to Sibeal. “We have anything microwavable in the freezer. Craig’s stomach is growling and I am almost certain my stomach is about to go in search of food with or without me.”

  Sibeal tried to get up but Conall pressed her back down, “I am perfectly capable of running microwave if you tell me what we have.”

  She shrugged, “Pizza is already in the oven. If someone has attacked Casey we need to get her here and find out what is going on. For now we need to work on some riddles.”

  Craig raised his eyebrows “Riddles?” he glanced at Kate but she shrugged her shoulders. His gaze flew to Conall but he was too intent on checking the pizzas cooking to worry about the conversation going on behind him.

  “Don’t look at me, mum has never shown any interest in riddles before.”

  “Last week when Casey was here she found a way around the geas on her tongue about the clans. She used riddles, somehow. We need more people here. Who was in that meeting?” Sibeal turned questioning eyes toward Conall as he walked back in the room.

  “Wait, do I have a geas on my tongue? You and dad never put a geas on me not to tell clan secrets. If I am half witch, I mean, I have told Craig plenty these last few weeks. Nothing happened to me then. So if I am a witch, you can tell me and then I can tell anyone who needs to know.”

  Kate stared at her parents who stared back. She waited. She tapped her foot. She crossed her legs and uncrossed them. Then waited some more. “Hello? People who told lies to me my entire life if you want to start telling truths now is the time.”

  When the silence had stretched
on far longer than anyone was comfortable with Conall finally spoke, “Dawn is your best friend right?”

  Kate looked sideways at Craig and thought over the question. Everyone knew she loved Dawn like a sister so the question had to be a trick but if it was she couldn’t see how. She finally cautiously admitted, “Yes, she is. Why?”

  “So while you were locked up in that prison sharing secrets with her every night you must have told her all about the clans and witches and how our magic worked and well, she should know as much as you by now right?”

  Kate wrinkled her brow and stared at him with a shocked look. “No, you know I didn’t spill any secrets.”

  “But you trusted her with your life, your bond to your mate. A woman so trusted was surely worth sharing secrets with right?”

  “I never felt I could tell her. If anyone had found out it would have cost me too much.”

  “So you never tried?” Conall persisted with his question.

  “I, well I may have tried a couple of, oh my god, is that why I felt so unwell and uneasy? I thought it was because keeping secrets was so much a part of how I was raised and the fear the wrong person could over hear something or use the information against me. All that time you are telling me some magical bond controls what I say? Well that is some horse-shit and I won’t stand for it.”

  “Excuse me? Why the fuck, ow quit hitting me, you said horse-shit, ow, woman if you smack my arm one more time I swear I will turn you over my knee and paddle you.”

  “I would like to see you try.”

  “Hey, hey now, there will be no bottoms paddled in this house.” Conall heard a delicate snort from beside him and turned to leer at Sibeal, “You know what I mean.”

  “Whoa, dad, TMI TMI, I need brain bleach. I have told you two a million and three times, I do not need to know what kind of hanky panky goes on between you.”

  “Kate, dear, that goes both ways. Do you really think your mother and I want to hear the two of you discuss things like paddling. Remember we changed your diapers and as far as we are concerned you should never have sex with anyone in your life.”

  Sibeal left the room for a moment and they could hear her opening the stove. The smell of freshly baked pizza filled the air.

  “Eww dad, how did we get on this subject? Stop, okay, Craig I am sorry I hit you. I mean, not really, but it is socially acceptable to apologize when other people believe you are in the wrong.”

  Conall look of comical confusion started Craig laughing. “She has been saying weird things like that since shortly after Dawn came to visit. Apparently Dawn fell in with the wrong crowd, or as she puts it, was kidnapped by a psycho and forced to flee to Trey’s pack. The little girl has no social skills and believes everyone is dumb as a box of rocks. Dawn imitated her a few times and your little miss perfect here thought it was some funny shit so now she says the oddest things.”

  Sibeal brought two pizzas into the room and sat them down on the small table in front of the couch. She handed out napkins and the four ate in silence. Kate kept eying her parents until Craig finally asked her through their bond what was bothering her.

  They are still hiding something or they are still lying about something.

  How do you know?

  Well, they are my parents. I have always known they kept secrets from me but I didn’t know the secrets concerned me so much and the times I would ask, mum and dad and Uncle Ira and Aunt Jolene would get so sad. I eventually learned what questions not to ask. But I learned to tell when they were hiding secrets and what ever it is must be big. Watch how mum keeps fidgeting with her thigh and nibbling her bottom lip and tugging her right earlobe. Then watch how dad reaches over and stills the hand and then rubs her lower back. She is worried about something and trying to figure out how to tell me and dad is busy trying to reassure her everything will be fine. So my question is, when are they going to drop the next bomb on us?

  Well, it can’t be much worse than what they have already dropped on us right? I mean, Miranda’s granddaughter is a pretty big bomb.

  “So your dad and I have been talking and he demanded,” Sibeal started to say before her mate interrupted.

  ‘Suggested, I suggested we tell them.”

  “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted, your dad demanded we tell you about what happened when the two of you went on the rescue mission last week.”

  Kate smiled, “We rocked that mission. You should have seen us. No one could stand against us. Anytime anyone got to close the wolf would rise and flames would just shoot from our hands. I wish you could have seen it.”

  Sibeal looked uncomfortable and leaned into Conall who also looked uneasy.

  “Okay, what are the two of you hiding?”

  “Kate, dear, the magic the two of you are trying to wield is so heavy it hangs in the air and kind of whips around. If your mother had not been shielding the two of you, neither of you would have made it back from that mission and most of your friends would have fallen to your magic. She used her magic plus a good bit of stolen magic to buffer the two of you but the cost was a heavy one. If we can’t get your magic under control it will destroy your mother and probably the two of you in the process.”

  “Stolen magic? Where does one steal magic from?” Craig’s confusion at the statement startled the other three.

  “Links,” Kate muttered, “you two have links with others? How have they not found you already? How did you hide that from the clans?”

  “Wait, back up, what are you talking about? Pretend for a moment you have a shifter in the room who did not even know witches existed until oh say three weeks ago. But now he is somehow part witch with unbelievable powers he can’t control. Explain it to me. Use small words if it will make you feel better.”

  Conall snorted, “You are not a witch. You are bonded to a witch which means you both are the other half of each other so you share your wolf with her and she shares her powers with you and together your powers are greater because,” He turned to Sibeal who shrugged. “Okay mate, because magic happens.”

  “Fine, not a witch, I am actually good with that. Except you know what, it doesn’t matter what I am anymore only what I can and can’t do and since I only know what Kate has explained so far I am starting to feel a bit like a mushroom.” When the others looked at him blankly he rolled his eyes, “You know, kept in the dark and fed shit. So links? Stolen power?”

  “Right then. Links happen when you connect to another and siphon off their magic. They are a bit weaker with their magic but they can’t actually trace the link, nor will they know they are weaker if they have been siphoned from all their lives. Ira found a way to kink the link so it split. Think of it like a wide path with a small hidden path coming off of it. If you don’t know about the hidden path then you will not only not look for it, but you won’t even know it exist to be looked for in the first place. When we broke free of Miranda, in the instant the magic was wild, Ira and Jolene worked to kink multiple links to Miranda. She would not realize because of the free magic whipping around and we would only siphon off a trickle from everyone. But the tickle builds up if not used so we would have a reserve if we ever needed it, which we have been using like water the last three weeks to hide the two of you.”

  “So you are saying the reserve is used up?”

  “Craig, mate, the reserve is three centuries worth of a trickle of magic. It is not used up but it will not last forever either and we dare not pull much more without being noticed.”

  “Right, totally understand.” Craig nodded knowingly before Kate pushed him over.

  “You didn’t understand half of what they said.”

  “Fine, I don’t get it, but what was it your dad said, magic happens. So what now? We start training to do what? Shield ourselves? Steal our own links?”

  Sibeal yawned before turning toward Conall, “Well, it is late and we need to talk to Casey, so go home, go to bed, go get Casey in the morning if the weather clears and” he shrugged his shoulders,
“I guess we will figure out more tomorrow.”

  Craig leaped up from the love seat dragging Kate with him and pulled her toward the door. She dug her feet in though and refused to leave.

  “I know you are not trying to force me to leave without letting me hug mum and dad bye are you? I mean, we do have a couch at the house you can sleep on. Hey, don’t shove me. Bully.”

  “Me? I am the bully? You are the one who keeps hitting me for no reason. When we get home I swear I am going to pull out a dictionary and have you look up the word bully.” Craig tried to keep a straight face but burst into laughter at the look on Kate’s face. “Fine, I will behave, kiss your mum and dad and we will see them tomorrow. Better?”

  “Maybe.”

  Conall and Sibeal stood in the doorway and watched the two leave after the goodbyes were said. Just before they got out of sight they saw Craig grab Kate and swing her up in his arms and start running with her squealing like a child. They smiled and closed the door.