Witches (Runes series Book 6)

by Ednah Walters

  “No matter how powerful you are, you’re not a Norn and therefore cannot change anything,” Worthington said. “The training doesn’t begin until you’re eighteen.”

  I shrugged, ate a slice of my pie, and almost gagged. I was more nervous than I’d thought. Putting my fork down, I studied the Warlock. He’d already demolished his baklava. He must have really been hungry or he had a sweet tooth.

  A prickly feeling told me we were being watched. My sixth sense, which seemed to have sharpened since my witch powers emerged, picked up signals faster than normal. I didn’t dare look around, so I wrapped my hands around my glass and let my gaze lock with the Warlock.

  “So here we are,” I said.

  “I’d like to reconcile with my son,” he said.

  Wow, right to the point. “Then talk to him.”

  “I can’t. He asked me to leave. I’m supposed to try in a century or two.”

  Way to go, Torin. “That seems reasonable.”

  “No, it’s not,” he snapped. “He was willing to listen until that idiotic Roman boy intervened.”

  “That idiotic Roman boy has a name, Andris. He’s also a powerful Valkyrie, unlike you. He’s been with Torin for centuries and is like a brother. Family. So I’d be very careful how you talk about him, especially to Torin.”

  He leaned forward. “I am his father. My blood flows through his veins.”

  He made it sound like he was the wronged one. Like Torin owed him something. “Oh gee, you think you’d win Father of the Year award with that? Blood means nothing if you hurt the people who share it. You hurt Torin by what you did. If he wants time before he can forgive you, give it to him.”

  He leaned back against his chair. “You’re an opinionated young woman, aren’t you?”

  “You make it sound like it’s a bad thing,” I shot back. “Aren’t you here for my opinion? Isn’t that why you runed my car, stalked me to my shop, and invited me to this little meeting?”

  “I thought the Roman was holding Torin back. That maybe they had a special relationship, but—”

  “They do,” I shot back. “But no one holds Torin back.”

  “It’s you,” he said like I hadn’t spoken. “I saw it last night. He’d do anything for you, and you string him along.”

  “String him along? I would do anything for him too, including sit here,”—I looked around, noticed that we were drawing attention, and lowered my voice—“and share a drink with you. You want forgiveness? Show some humility. Some contrition. Prove that you’ve changed.”

  His expression didn’t change, so I couldn’t tell whether I had hit a nerve or not. “Why should I change? I didn’t do anything wrong.”

  Was he serious? “For starters, you,”—I glanced around again and lowered my voice even more—“sacrificed Seeresses, Immortals, and Witches for your crazy cause.”

  “I didn’t twist their arms to join me or force anyone to go against me,” he said in that annoyingly calm voice.

  “Wow. You are completely incapable of feeling any remorse.”

  He sipped his drink and watched me like I was some lab rat he was about to dissect. I didn’t want my pie anymore. In fact, I didn’t want to be in the same room with him. I needed to get up and leave without destroying Nikos.

  “I see why he loves you,” he said.

  “I highly doubt it.”

  “You don’t take crap from anyone, which is very surprising in one so young. You’ll make a fine Norn.” He leaned forward again. “You accuse me of being unfeeling, my dear. What about you? You’ll never give him what he seeks. You’re living on borrowed time because Norns don’t mate. When you turn eighteen, they will come for you to start your formal training. When you’re gone, what will become of Torin? The pain he’s feeling now will be nothing compared to what he’ll feel once you’re gone. So why not let him go now? I may not win the Father of the Year award as you so eloquently put it, but I’m not toying with his soul. You are. You will destroy him.”

  I wanted to tell him to shut up. To just shut the eff up. If I could give up my magic to be with Torin, I would. Since I couldn’t, I planned to have it all—the ability to help people and Torin. I just didn’t know how yet.

  I hoped my feelings weren’t transparent as I stared at his father. “That’s where you are wrong, Warlock. Torin and I will have our forever. I’ll make sure of it. And if you don’t change, you’ll never have a relationship with him. I’ll make sure of that too.” I stood, pulled out my cell phone, and removed a twenty-dollar bill from its case. I dropped it on the table, aware that he watched my every movement. “My treat.”

  As I walked away from the Warlock I felt the table near the door watching me. I glanced over and my eyes met Femi’s. She was seated with three men that had wise eyes. Immortals. My feet didn’t falter. I didn’t know how I made it to The Mirage, but I did. Hawk called out my name, or maybe it was Jared, but I kept walking. It wasn’t until I reached my car that I started to shake.

  As I tried to calm myself down before driving home, Femi opened my door. “Scoot over, doll.”

  ~*~

  We had barely left the parking lot when a warm draft filled the car and Torin appeared in the back seat. Who had contacted him? I didn’t want him to see me like this. I was still processing and needed to get my emotions under control.

  “Are you okay? What happened?”

  The concern in his voice triggered all kinds of emotions, and I didn’t care what he could or could not see. I could always hold it together when he wasn’t around. As soon as he appeared, eyes blazing as though he was ready to annihilate anyone who touched me, all my defenses crumbled. I wanted his arms around me so badly my shaking got worse. I unbuckled my seatbelt, scrambled over to the back seat, and straight into his arms. He pulled me onto his lap and held me tight, rubbing my back while pressing my face on his neck.

  “It’s okay, luv. I’m here now. Shhh.”

  I burrowed deeper and held on to him until his warmth chased away the numbness that had crawled under my skin.

  “What happened, Femi? Hawk opened a portal in the middle of the soccer field and said I should come home.”

  “I’ll let Raine explain.”

  “If someone hurt her, I need to know. If they said anything to cause her pain, I need to know. That’s why we have the code. The explanations can come later. Was it the Norns?”

  Femi mumbled something in her native language. “She’s okay, Torin. Just a little shaken. Raine, if you haven’t noticed, is a tough one.”

  “But there’s just so much any person can take. What was she doing before—?”

  I lifted my head and he stopped. He searched my face frantically, fury sharpening his eyes. I imagined losing him and the sickening feeling in my stomach returned. I pushed it down. “I’m okay now. I just needed you to hold me.”

  He stroked my cheek with his knuckles. “Was it the Norns?”

  I shook my head and decided to stop the conversation in the only way I knew how. I kissed him and time stopped, fear and frustration morphing into comfort, then passion. Or maybe it was his need to reassure himself that I was okay that made him ruthless in his possession of my senses. I didn’t complain, I just clung onto him and allowed him to erase his father’s smug face from my head.

  When we resurfaced, we were alone in the car. Femi had already parked outside our house and left. Torin pressed a thumb under my chin and lifted my head, so he could study my face. The storm in his eyes still raged on, but it was less ominous.

  “I want to know what happened,” he whispered.

  I nodded. We’d vowed never to keep secrets from each other. He got out of the car first and then pulled me out and scooped me up.

  “I can walk,” I protested.

  “I know.” He studied my face and grinned. “I hate that I can’t protect you all the time, so allow me these little pleasures.” He started for his place. “Besides, you weigh nothing. Hello, Mrs. Rutledge.”

  “Is Raine okay
?”

  Was that actual concern in my neighbor’s voice?

  “She twisted her ankle, but I plan to take good care of her,” Torin lied smoothly.

  “Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.

  I groaned. Torin chuckled. “No, but thanks for asking, Mrs. Rutledge. I got her.”

  He did. No matter what his father said, Torin and I had each other. As for Mrs. Rutledge, her attitude towards me had thawed a bit in the last few months because of Dad’s illness, but she was still nosey and liked to watch my every movement from behind her curtains. I was amazed she hadn’t noticed how often we had company without anyone arriving in cars.

  The door opened before we reached it to reveal Andris. “Is she okay?”

  “No,” Torin said.

  “Yes,” I said at the same time, trying to mask my dismay. “What are you doing here?” I peered over Torin’s shoulder at Andris as he closed the door.

  Concern clouded his brown eyes until he caught me watching him. He winked. “Couldn’t miss a chance to watch Torin act romantic.”

  I wiggled to get down, but Torin’s arms tightened as he continued on to the kitchen. I opened my mouth to tell Andris to leave, but then I realized I might need him.

  Once Torin learned about the Earl, he was going to go ballistic. Probably go after him, which might have been the Warlock’s intention all along. That thought had flitted through my head during the drive, and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. The Earl was sneaky and mean. It didn’t mean he was wrong about all of the things he’d said. Some were true. If I ever left Torin and joined the Norns, he’d lose his mind and soul.

  “What he’s trying to say is after last night, if anyone hears the code, they alert the others,” Blaine said from the kitchen and I almost got whiplash trying to see him.

  He was leaning against the counter and munching on an apple like he hadn’t a care in the world, but his topaz eyes stayed alert. Even more surprising were his clothes. Blaine was usually a meticulous dresser. Today, he wore cargo pants with grease stains and a T-shirt that looked like a reject from a second hand store. He hadn’t shaved and more grease strains competed with the stubble on his chin, and his bronze hair was covered with a woolen cap. He could pass for a mechanic at Joe’s Corner, a local car repair shop.

  “Put me down, please,” I begged Torin, but I might as well have been talking to a brick wall. He set me on the kitchen counter and pushed my hair away from my face to study my expression. He was babying me again, and I hated it. I swatted his hand out of the way, but that didn’t stop him. Worse, I couldn’t get off the counter because he stood between my legs. Fighting him was useless. “What code?” I asked.

  No one spoke.

  “‘Come home’ is an SOS code for you,” Ingrid said, entering the kitchen. She must have just come from the mansion.

  She and I hadn’t spoken since we battled the Earl, even though she’d joined us in Florida during the weekend. As an Immortal, she was part of our group, but she’d always been in the shadow of her sister Maliina—Andris’s evil ex-girlfriend. Now that Maliina was rotting in Hel, Ingrid was slowly coming out of her shell. She and I had never been close, but she’d helped me understand a lot about Seeresses.

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “It means you are in danger,” Ingrid said.

  I gawked at her, and then glanced at the others, my eyes stopping on Torin. “When exactly did you guys come up with this code, and how come I wasn’t told? No, how come I wasn’t in the meeting?”

  Torin’s usual smirk was missing, which told me how seriously he took this. “Cause I knew how you’d react. Just like you’re doing right now.”

  I smacked his chest. “Damn right. I’m not helpless and you know it. I have runes and elemental magic. I don’t need you guys running to my rescue.” I glared at them, but Blaine continued to eat his stupid apple. He had grease under his fingernails. This was a Blaine I’d never seen before. Andris just smirked. Neither one of them showed any contrition. Ingrid was the only one who seemed uncomfortable. Torin wore a long-suffering expression as though I was making a big deal out of nothing.

  “You can’t fight, Freckles,” he said, pulling up a stool with his foot as though he knew I’d create a portal and disappear if he gave me breathing space. He sat and wrapped his arms loosely around my hips. “Waving a staff around doesn’t count.”

  I gripped his hair and yanked his head back so he could see I wasn’t amused. He didn’t even wince. “I don’t need to fight, pal. I point and BAM, things happen. I just didn’t get a chance to use my staff last night.”

  I had no idea what that staff did, but they had to understand I hated being treated like I was helpless. I let go of Torin’s hair and stroked it. He needed a haircut. And why that mattered now was beyond me.

  “I can move things.” I pointed at the wooden bowl of fruit and it lifted. “Smash heads without lifting a finger.”

  Blaine moved away from the hovering bowl. Ingrid picked an apple from it and came and sat on a stool. Andris rolled his eyes and muttered, “Show off.”

  “It’s the only way to stop you knuckleheads from acting like I’m an idiot. Do you want a demonstration of my elemental magic?”

  “No,” they all said in unison.

  “We get it,” Torin said. “You’re bad-ass. Still, I want to know what happened.” He indicated the others with his head. “Do you want them here? Because I left the assistant coaches in charge and they could use Andris’ help. And Blaine was…?”

  “Undercover,” he said.

  “Studying my runes,” Ingrid said.

  The humiliation of being treated like a baby aside, I needed them here to stop Torin from going postal on the Earl’s ass.

  “This won’t take long. Your father etched some runes on my car.” Torin stiffened and sat up. This time, I was the one who stopped him from leaving. I slid off the counter and onto his lap. “I didn’t know what they meant, so I ignored them.”

  Andris created a portal to my car, and then closed it. “Locator runes,” he said.

  “Go on,” Torin said in a voice I’d only heard him use once, the night he’d vowed to kill his father for trapping his mother’s soul on earth.

  “He appeared outside The Mirage just as I was leaving and asked if we could talk.”

  “The bastard!” Andris ground out. “I hope you said no. I hope you created a sink hole and ordered the roots to trap him there for the next millennium.”

  “Andris!” Torin snapped.

  “Actually, I said yes.” Andris groaned, but Torin’s eyes didn’t leave mine. They were quickly acquiring an iciness that would have scared me if he were someone else. “He said he wanted to talk and I wanted to hear what he had to say.”

  Torin nodded, though I doubted he agreed with my decision. His body had gone rigid, his hands forming fists around my waist. I quickly summarized my conversation with his father and finished with, “He wants me to let you go now, rather than later when I join the Norns.”

  Torin didn’t speak. He was probably plotting his father’s demise.

  Andris, on the other hand, had plenty to say. Most of it was things we already knew, but no one stopped him. “He obviously didn’t get the memo,” he said, pacing. “You are the one Seeress the Norns can’t control. You don’t have to deal with them or fear them. You’re—”

  “Shut up, Andris!” Torin snarled.

  “Screw the rules. She has a right to know.”

  I sat up. Torin looked ready to slug Andris, who stared defiantly back at him. Blaine and Ingrid stopped acting indifferent. They either had no idea what was going on here, or they knew and were bracing themselves for my reaction.

  I cupped Torin’s face and forced him to focus on me. “What do I have a right to know?”

  “I can’t tell you. We,”—he tried to glare at Andris, but my grip tightened on his face—“are not supposed to influence you.”

  “You have to c
hoose a side, Raine. You can’t stand on the sidelines. You are either with the gods, Hel and the evil giants, or neutral like the Norns. Whichever side you choose, that’s where you will reside. If you choose the gods, you’ll head to Asgard when you turn eighteen. If you choose Hel, you’ll join Eirik in Hel’s realm. If you decide to stay neutral, you move in with the Norns. Those ugly hags lied again. They are not with the gods. They’re only after their own survival, and having you with them ensures that. Eirik was given a choice and he chose his mother. At least that is how the gods see it since he turned eighteen and never went back to Asgard. No one knows whose side you’re on or where you’re going to live.”

  My heart was pounding so hard I swear everyone could hear it. Where I was going to live? Earth was my home.

  My eyes met with Andris’, then the others. From their expressions, this wasn’t the first time they’d discussed this. Could this be why Torin hadn’t said anything when I’d helped people at school? He hadn’t wanted to influence me?

  “But I’m with you guys,” I said.

  “Then you are on the side of the gods,” Andris said.

  I started to nod, then shook my head. “No, I don’t want to live in Asgard. I mean, I want to live here. Why can’t I live with you guys?”

  “Because they will continue to try and influence you,” Andris said, frowning. “The Norns tried and failed, but they won’t stop. The gods might try next. If I didn’t know what the Earl is after, I’d say those Draugar were really after you. They were watching Jace’s house after you visited him. You have to decide—”

  “Hey!” Torin said firmly, his eyes locked on Andris. “Leave her alone. She’ll decide when she’s ready.”

  “We don’t have the luxury of waiting for her while they screw with us. She needs to go before the gods and declare her position, Torin, before things get worse. You know it and I know it, and you,”—Andris raised his arms and turned around—“bitter hags know it too. There. I told her the truth. Send a bolt of lightning and finish me off.” Then he lowered his arms and smirked defiantly at Torin, as though daring him to say something.