“Keep an eye on her for me, okay?” he said to Mac, then repeated the order in thought-glyphs. The coyote wouldn’t be able to relay a detailed report or anything, but if she got herself in trouble, Mac would sound the alarm and hold off the attack… or die trying.
Whuffing as if to say, Finally! the coyote wheeled away and bounded out through the spare room. His mental touch faded with distance until it was just the thin tendril of background awareness, leaving Sven alone with his body still vibrating from Cara’s kiss.
He hadn’t remembered it being like that before; or maybe he’d locked the memory away with the other half-forgotten goals and dreams that had fallen by the wayside. He had a feeling there wouldn’t be any option of locking away these memories, though, not when he could still taste her on his lips and smell her on his skin. And what was he going to do about that?
“Not a damn thing,” he said aloud, hearing the words echo in his suite, which was bigger than he needed, yet still felt cramped.
And that was the problem—he needed his space and the freedom to roam… but he couldn’t have that and Cara too. Did he want her? Heck, yes, he wanted her; that was why he’d sent her away from Skywatch and why he’d made himself scarce when she came back. Only the distance thing hadn’t worked this time, because he’d still thought about her. Hell, he’d done more than think about her; he’d used her to beat back the shadows and clear his mind of the things he had seen and done, and to remind himself what he was fighting for. He had never planned on doing anything about it, though. And, damn it, he couldn’t do anything about it now, either, because he wasn’t any more likely to stick around than ever before… and if anyone deserved a man who would make her his absolute priority, it was Cara.
Which meant he needed to keep his hands—and his lips—to himself. Starting now.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Cara plastered a neutral expression on her face as she hurried down the corridor of the mages’ wing. Don’t let it show, she told herself. Don’t give anybody a reason to guess what just happened.
“Sparks don’t change anything,” she said under her breath as she powered through an archway and along the polished wood riser that led around the outside of the mansion’s sunken great room, beelining for her quarters. It didn’t matter whether his inability to stick around was a bloodline trait or a personality flaw; it was a deal breaker. She didn’t want to chase him around the globe, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to sit around and wait for him to come home. Not that he’d asked her to. He hadn’t, and that should’ve been a relief. The fact that it wasn’t coupled with the tears that stung her eyes as she stalked the perimeter of the great room were proof enough that she needed to pull it together. Please, gods, just let me get back to my quarters without running into anybody. Especially not Zane or—
“Cara Liu,” a peremptory voice said from behind her, bringing her up short with an inner, Oh, shit.
Hello, worst-case scenario.
She turned back as her father stepped through the doorway leading to the winikin’s wing. He was wearing his funeral clothes and a dark frown, and at the sight of his thunderous expression all she could think was, Oh, gods. He knows. Some guilty-child instinct nearly had her blurting that it was just a onetime thing and would never happen again. She bit back the words, though, annoyed with herself because her father’s disapproval really should’ve lost its power by now. Can I get a cleanup crew in the great room, please? There’s been a daddy-issues spill.
Pressing her lips together to keep from saying something she would regret, she held her ground as he approached. She didn’t miss the way his eyes went to her unmarked right wrist. He was the one who had given her the original marks, after all, ambushing her beneath the big Montana sky. He had cut her palm and recited the spell that was one of the very few the winikin could use. And then, after it was done, he’d told her that the old family stories were real, the Nightkeepers were real, and they needed her help. At first she had thought he was saying she was one of the magi, a magic-using superhero destined to save the world… until he’d told her that she wasn’t a superhero at all. She was a member of their support staff. A sidekick at best. And he’d been bone-deep insulted by her disappointment.
That had been the beginning of the end for the shaky relationship they had built in the years after her mom died.
“Did you need me for something?” she asked, telling herself that he shouldn’t be able to hurt her anymore and doing her damnedest not to look just-kissed.
“I saw Dez a little while ago, and he mentioned wanting us to do a training run in the next day or so. I thought you’d want to know.”
The training runs—mock battles staged at a set of cement-and-rebar ruins the Nightkeepers had built beyond the firing range—had proven invaluable at getting the winikin up to speed on the fighting front. Or as up to speed as they were going to get, anyway. Given that the equinox was less than a week away and Dez wanted the entire team ready to go, it stood to reason he would want to make sure they were ready to fight, especially after everything that had happened today.
It took an effort to shift her mental gears into leadership mode, but she managed it, filed the info, and nodded. “Thanks for the heads-up. I’ll get with Zane and make sure we’re ready.” Thinking—hoping—that was all he’d wanted to say, she started to turn away, sketching a “gotta go” wave in his direction.
“About Zane…”
She nearly groaned. She was too stirred up and strung out to think about Zane right now, never mind discuss him with Carlos. “What about him?”
“Did you see his mark?”
“I…” She frowned, realizing that it hadn’t come up. “No. Why?”
Her father tapped his wrist. “He’s one of us.”
“Of course he’s a winikin.” But then she saw how Carlos’s fingers rested on his bloodline glyph, and a low-grade shock ran through her. “He’s a coyote winikin? But I thought… Why didn’t you recognize him?”
“The coyote winikin were spread thin. When I saw his mark I asked him who his parents were.” He named two people she had never heard of, would never meet. “They were both mage-bound,” he said, emphasizing the last two words.
“Okay.” She shook her head. “So?”
He shifted on his feet, squaring off as if ready to fight. “You should give him a chance, you know. He’s a good man from a good family.”
Under any other circumstance, she might’ve laughed at the idea of her father acting as a go-between, might’ve screamed. As it was, all she could do was sigh in heartsore exhaustion. “Did he put you up to this?”
“No. My conscience did… because as much as I hate to say it, you need to keep yourself entirely separate from the Nightkeepers if you hope to lead the winikin.” He paused. “Do you understand me, Cara Liu? If we’re going to survive the war, you need to be their leader first and foremost. Nothing else can matter.”
A chill trickled through her, not because he was wrong, but because he was the last person she wanted to talk to about this. “You saw me coming out of Sven’s suite.”
He winced, but shook his head. “I saw you with him earlier, out on the ball court. And I remember how it used to be between you two.”
“There was nothing between us back then, and there’s nothing now.”
His look didn’t quite call her a liar, but it was close. “If you took up with Zane—”
“You want me to sleep with my second in command to prove my loyalty to the winikin?” She wasn’t sure which was worse—the suggestion, or the fact that it didn’t surprise her that it would come from him.
He hesitated, then said softly, “I want you not to be alone anymore, sweetheart.”
“You don’t get to call me—” She bit it off as her eyes threatened to fill in earnest. “Damn it. That was a low blow.” It was what her mother had called her. Never him, though. Never him. And she was too damn raw to keep it from hurting.
“This isn’t a fight,” he said, a
nd for a second, she saw the father she had once foolishly idolized in the old man who stood opposite her.
“Isn’t it?” Pressure vised her brain, making her want to run and scream. She couldn’t do this. Not right now and not with him.
“Think about it, Cara Liu. Your actions don’t affect only you anymore.”
“Fine, I’ll think about it. Now if you’ll excuse me?” She didn’t wait for his response, just headed straight across the great room for the glass doors that took up most of the far wall. Five minutes earlier, all she’d wanted was to get back to her quarters. Now, though, she wanted the open sky and storm-cleaned air.
She could feel his eyes on her as she pushed through to the deck, where the pool sparkled in the fading sunlight. Bypassing the shimmering water, she headed down the short flight of steps to the main pathway, not letting herself run. Not quite. She took the branch that led past the training hall and cottages and on toward the firing range. She didn’t have any real plan—maybe she would shoot; maybe it would be enough to walk off the frustration that churned inside her, making her head feel like a pressure cooker being run too hot. If steam started coming out of her ears, she wouldn’t have been surprised. In fact, it might’ve been a relief. As it was, it helped to be alone.
Really alone. And farther from the mansion than she’d meant to go.
“Damn it.” Realizing this might not be the best idea after all, she made herself slow down, breathe, and pay attention to her surroundings. She was near the picnic area, right where the ceiba tree rose a hundred feet and spread its enormous canopy to shade the cacao trees, which stirred in an almost imperceptible breeze. The rain-forest microcosm shouldn’t have been able to survive in the desert, but it had grown up from the ashes of the winikin and mage children who had died in the massacre. The air was moist and warm, the sound that of moving leaves, the vibe one of peace.
For a second she paused and let the tranquillity remind her that running—or even walking—away wasn’t going to fix her problems. She wasn’t going to hook up with Zane for her father or the winikin, and Sven… well, there wasn’t a decision to be made there. Sparks alone just weren’t enough, and—
Brush crackled, jolting her with brutal suddenness. She pulled her nine-mill and thumbed her wristband to arm the panic button, though she didn’t hit it yet. Heart drumming against her ribs, she moved off the path and angled toward where the noise had come from. “Hello?”
There was a jangle of discord in the air, a prickling awareness that said someone—or something—was out there.
It’s just a bird, she told herself. Or it could be Sasha or one of the others harvesting cacao for the upcoming equinox ritual. Maybe just someone going for a walk, like her, or continuing the search for the weak point in the barrier that had allowed the Banol Kax to send their creatures through.
Or it could be one of those creatures. Or worse.
Leveling the pistol, she swept the tree line. Not letting her voice shake, though it badly wanted to, she said, “You’ve got to the count of three before I call for backup and embarrass us both. One… two…”
There was a soft whuff. Then leaves moved, parted, and a pair of pale green eyes gleamed from the shadows.
“Oh. Christ, Mac.” She let her gun sag as adrenaline raced through her, threatening to turn her fight response into a full-on case of the shakes. “You scared the crap out of me.”
The big coyote whuffed again, using the low bark that always made her feel like she could almost understand him. Now, though, she didn’t need a translation to know what was going on. “He told you to watch out for me, didn’t he?”
Mac stepped out of the grove, looking at her with his ears and tail cocked hopefully, as if unsure of his welcome.
She exhaled a long, shuddering breath. Then she patted her thigh in invitation. “Come on, big guy. Let’s go kill some targets.”
He bounded over to her, barking with joy, and some of that good mood transmitted to her as she headed up the path with the big coyote at her side, anticipating going a few rounds with the simulator Michael had put together to teach the winikin how to shoot straight. Violence might not solve everything, but sometimes it was a damn good way to blow off steam. And gods knew she needed to clear her head enough so she could figure out how to deal with Zane, her father, the upcoming mock battle… and the part of her that was warning that sparks like the ones she and Sven made together didn’t come along every day, and she should grab them when and where she found them. Even if they weren’t planning on sticking around.
Coatepec Mountain
Mexico
Anna sat lotus-style in the temple at the top of the mountain, facing the huge chac-mool altar with her eyes closed, her dark, copper-burnished hair tied back in a knot at her nape, and her face tipped up to the sun. The sky was a clear, perfect blue, the air a soft seventy-five, and the birds were singing their little hearts out from the trees farther down the peak, near the excavation where she and several of the others were trying to figure out how, exactly, Coatepec Mountain would figure into the end-time war.
Around her at the points of a perfect equilateral triangle stood three ancient stone pillars carved to represent the balam, the jaguar that was her bloodline totem. Together, the pillars and altar outlined the place where a vital intersection—the Nightkeepers’ connection to the gods themselves—appeared during the solstices and equinoxes. But the equinox was still a week away, and today, save for her, the mountaintop was deserted. Strike and Sasha had ’ported north to Skywatch to huddle with Dez and the others over the latest attack, leaving Anna blessedly alone.
Gods. Finally.
Powerless to help the warriors with anything but teleportation, she had named herself the guardian of the intersection at Coatepec Mountain, and set out to uncover its secrets. So far, though, she hadn’t gotten very far. Maybe now, with her mind clear of background chatter, she would be able to sense something in the stones, some clue of how they were to be used, or when.
She picked up the knife she’d brought with her, suppressing a shudder. A brush of her fingertips found the ridged scars on her wrists, old and closed, though they ached with the beat of her heart as she set the knife point to one palm. “Please, gods,” she whispered, “let me help.”
There was no use asking them to help her—she hadn’t felt their presence in a long, long time. She didn’t know if they had given up on her because she had turned away from them too often, rejecting their gifts over and over again, or if she was the one blocking them, afraid that if she let one piece of the magic come, the rest of it would follow. It was probably a combination of the two, which might have been a relief if she’d had any ability to control it. But she didn’t; it was all in her head. Literally.
It was going to be up to the gods, and maybe—hopefully—a ritual that could convince her subconscious to release whatever hold it was keeping on her magic. She didn’t want to be a seer, didn’t even want to be a Nightkeeper. But when she weighed those desires against the end-time war, they lost out, big-time.
“Okay,” she murmured, not really sure if she was talking to herself or to the voice she sometimes heard inside her head—that of a ghost with unerring logic and a snarly attitude, both of which had transcended death. “Wish me luck.”
She didn’t hear anything, didn’t feel anything, but imagined him making a derisive face and telling her not to be a girl, and go ahead and cut already. So she did. Blood welled up and pain slashed through her, but it was familiar and cleansing, and it was terrifyingly easy to switch hands and cut her other palm, gripping the blood-slicked handle tightly.
There was no buzzing hum in the air, no sparkles of red-gold, no sign that the magic even cared that she was bleeding onto the packed earth as she dipped into the pocket of her bush pants and closed her fingers around the small, yellow quartz pendant she carried with her, partly as a talisman, partly as penance.
Anna had been two years away from the start of her training and decades away from
receiving the skull from her mother when the king—her father—had declared war on the intersection beneath Chichén Itzá, believing that sealing it would prevent the end-time war. Her mother, foreseeing the massacre and knowing that that was the true vision, had stood by her husband in public, but did three things in private: She tutored Strike and Anna’s winikin, Jox, on the use of the magical safe room hidden beneath the mansion’s library; she faked a stillbirth and sent the newborn—Sasha—far away where she might be safe… and she gave thirteen-year-old Anna her crystal skull.
Lifting it now, Anna let the silver chain run through her bloodstained fingers until the quartz carving dangled, then began to swing hypnotically. Its empty sockets stared at her, blinking from sunlight to shadow and back again as the carving twisted on its axis.
The skull had power, and she had the innate ability to use that power. There was no other way she could have seen the things she had seen during the massacre otherwise. But the experience had scarred her, changed her, and when the magic came back online for all the others two decades later, it hadn’t done so for her. Oh, she had moments here and there, but nothing consistent or controlled, and even those visions had fallen off over time. But the potential was there. She just had to break through the barriers inside her.
Hands shaking, she looped the chain around her neck. The skull settled between her breasts as she focused inward, hearing the beat of her heart and the rush of the blood in her veins, feeling the sting of sacrifice and the heavy weight of the pendant against her breastbone, and seeking the magic that had once come as naturally to her as flirting and laughing. All of which now seemed to belong to another lifetime. And, just as she couldn’t summon any interest in flirting or let free the easy laughter she had once loved, she couldn’t find the magic now.
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