“No!” But even as she stood, even as she lunged for Graham, it was too late.
His blood dropped and time seemed to extend forever.
Crimson blood splattered down onto death magic soaked ground.
Some of the blood landed on Excalibur and the sword flashed brilliantly. The death magic protections Graham had woven around himself shattered.
Jet could finally reach for Graham. He did, grabbing the man, swinging him around—
“Get back!” Delphi pushed Jet back from the clearing as the dirt beneath her feet moved.
Jet took three quick steps back, dragging Graham with him. “What is it?”
“Golem.” Graham was panting so hard the word barely emerged, but his gloating satisfaction and anticipation came through.
“Which means what?” Jet demanded tensely of Delphi.
“Clay monster driven by malevolence,” she answered. But her attention was on Graham, a disfigured, ugly man so sure that only he mattered. Excalibur hummed in her grip and she agreed with the sword. It had been forged to deal with men like Graham. She raised the sword, resting its point low on Graham’s stomach, at his solar plexus.
“Gut me, my boy still lives,” Graham gasped.
Delphi let Excalibur answer.
Graham’s eyes went wide. He screamed, soundlessly, slapping at Excalibur.
It was too late. The sword had needed only an instant. One instant and it had eaten all of Graham’s magic.
“His magic is gone,” Delphi said to Jet.
Jet looked beyond her. “So how come that thing is still growing?”
The golem was raising itself from the dirt. It was brown mud and dried blood. Pieces of bone showed white, not as a skeleton but forming part of the body.
Delphi swung the sword in the golem’s direction. The glow of the sword vanished. Excalibur felt inert. It was just an old sword to fight a magical monster. Delphi was terrified and frustrated, but she understood. “The golem isn’t evil of itself. Its hate is born of pain. Excalibur won’t act against it.”
But Jet would. “How do I fight it?” He shoved Graham at Perez who grimaced and studied the former mage before raising his gun to strike Graham with the butt.
Graham collapsed unconscious.
The golem straightened. It stood seven feet tall and stockier than a steroid-abuser. It looked as if when it ran, steel-reinforced walls would fall at its charge. It took a step forward. The ground thudded.
Okay. Bad news. The golem didn’t need Graham’s orders to function.
They needed Arlee. Her entropic magic could have undone the golem in seconds, breaking apart the unnatural creation. For Delphi, it would take longer.
But it could be done.
Where were the guardians? Someone needed to contain the golem.
The golem’s eyes opened. Empty sockets glowed an eerie green with the bioluminescence emitted by bacteria that feasted on dead things. It stared at Delphi.
Jet shoved in front of her. One instant he was a man. The next a ten foot grizzly bear stood to its full height and roared.
Delphi slammed a look-away spell around the combat zone so that people would neither hear nor see the danger. If that included the guardians who ought to be here fighting the golem, then so be it. She had to assume she and Jet were on their own.
A jaguar-were snarled a challenge. Not completely on their own. Perez had made this fight his.
The golem swung toward Perez who’d circled around, stealthy and silent, and came from the side. As the golem’s massive head turned ponderously, Jet, in bear form, cuffed it hard.
The golem rocked. However, a blow that would have torn a man’s head from his shoulders didn’t seem to damage the clay figure at all. And because it was made of clay, neither Jet nor Perez could bite it. They would have to wrench it apart.
Blindingly fast, the golem bent low and punched Perez.
The jaguar-were flew into the woods. The crash of his landing sounded painful. If he died, Arlee would…
Jet roared.
“Spell!” Delphi shouted. “There’ll be a spell written on parchment.” Knowing Graham, it would be written on human skin. “Somewhere in the golem. Rip it out and the golem will disintegrate.”
The golem swung at Jet, its thick arm lethally fast.
Jet didn’t flinch from the blow, but caught the golem’s arm. He sunk bear claws deep into the slippery clay and ripped the arm from the golem, sending it spinning into the undergrowth.
The golem struck Jet with its other arm.
Delphi heard ribs crunch. Almost worse was that even as she watched, in only seconds, clay slid from the golem’s massive torso to reform its arm.
This golem wasn’t baked. Its clay hadn’t been fired in a kiln. It could reform, perhaps even reshape itself. Maybe it could even reclaim its arm and reabsorb it. The creature certainly moved in the direction Jet had flung its arm.
As Jet grabbed for it, the golem kicked backwards. Jet avoided the kick and Perez hit the golem from the side, rocking it off balance.
Jet tore off its regrowing arm and flung it in the opposite direction to the first arm.
Evidently, Jet and Perez had worked out their own strategy for slowly diminishing the golem. However, given the golem’s power, they might die first.
Delphi’s magic surged and lapped around the golem. But she needed to focus it. She needed to make her own strike count.
Books burning, her prophecy had said. Not books. Parchment! Parchment held the spell that powered the golem and Graham hadn’t baked the golem. Fire wasn’t part of its generative spell. So fire could destroy it.
Delphi raised Excalibur. The sword mightn’t judge the golem as evil, but the spell that powered it was. “Find the spell. Find the parchment.” She felt a tiny flare of magic within Excalibur.
The golem ducked its head and drove it into Jet’s stomach. Given Jet’s cracked ribs, that could kill him!
Perez dug his claws into the golem’s right calf and pulled. The golem went down, on top of Jet.
“Ignis!” Fire! Delphi shouted.
The golem flung itself backward, off Jet, and shook itself free of Perez with a powerful kick. Once again, the battered jaguar-were flew into the woods.
Delphi’s magic poured through Excalibur and into the golem. It latched onto the spell parchment, onto its death magic taint, and set it alight. The spell smoldered.
The golem’s eerie green eyes focused on Delphi. It ran. One step, two.
She’d have fled, but the golem had to be contained, not let loose to rampage through Central Park. She raised Excalibur. A steel blade could slice through clay. She held onto that thought and held her magic steady. The spell parchment smoldered.
The golem swung its massive remaining fist at her.
Delphi flinched and ducked. She didn’t even have her personal ward. She maintained only the look-away spell that protected everyone else in the park from seeing this nightmare and the fire spell.
The golem knocked Excalibur out of her hand.
There was an oak tree two paces from her, but before she could reach it to hide behind, the golem’s fist was already swinging back.
The ground shook as the golem went down under the weight of Jet’s attack. Jet stood on the golem’s back and raked at its body, digging and flinging mud, then roaring because the mud had hardened.
Whoosh! The spell parchment ignited.
“Jet!”
Her mate leapt off the golem and to her.
The golem crumbled. Anticlimactically, within seconds, it went back to the earth. Only a few bone fragments remained in the clearing.
“Oh, Jet.” Delphi hugged her mate, her face buried in his fur, his huge paws gentle against her back.
Reality shimmered and he was in human form again. Fully clothed, which was a neat trick, but his breathing raw with injuries suffered.
“You need a doctor, a healer.”
Jet ignored her frantic comment and kissed her.
&nb
sp; Their mate bond felt almost tangible, oddly alive; almost as if her magic… “Jet?”
“Keep going,” he muttered against her mouth. He kissed her, hands holding her tight. “Fay can heal Steve.”
So one mage could heal her were mate.
Delphi would do the same. She let the feeling of her magic pouring into Jet grow until it slowed naturally. It took about two minutes. Long enough that when they broke their kiss, Perez had shifted back to his human form and cuffed the still unconscious Graham. “His magic is gone,” Delphi said. “He’s all yours. You can charge him with kidnapping.”
“And murder,” Jet said. “He killed Ian. We have witnesses for that crime and the evidence of his knife.”
“He killed his sidekick?” Delphi wasn’t sure why that one final cruelty bothered her so much. Perhaps it was because it underlined how alone a death mage was. No love. No loyalty.
And now, for Graham, no magic.
Delphi clung to Jet’s hand as she stooped and collected her sword. Excalibur would need an illusion before she walked out into public view. “Are you hurt?” she asked Perez.
His teeth flashed in a quick grin. “I’m a cat. Unlike a clumsy bear, we always land on our feet.” He had deep scratches and was probably bruised.
“Thank you,” Delphi said, because he hadn’t left Jet to fight alone.
Guardians ran into the clearing, led by Sven. Portia ran beside him. She looked directly at Delphi. “You don’t know your own strength.” It was an accusation.
Sven paused, studying the ground where the golem had disintegrated. “We sensed death magic, then it vanished. We couldn’t get to it. A look-away spell amped to the max baffled us and since we recognized it as yours, Delphi, we didn’t know if we’d do more damage breaking it. We’ve been running through the damn park like idiots.”
“Graham had a golem,” Delphi said. “Jet and Perez fought it. I burned its generative spell. I also used Excalibur.” She lifted the point of the sword from the dirt. “Graham doesn’t have magic anymore.”
“Which makes him mine,” Perez said.
The guardians didn’t argue. They were too busy staring at Excalibur.
Kora, commander of the guardians, had been right, Delphi realized. The power to consume magic, even with the qualifier that it had to be evil, would forever change Delphi’s status in the Collegium. Feeling Jet safe and strong beside her, Delphi didn’t care.
She smiled at Perez. “Thank goodness I don’t have to do your paperwork.”
He groaned.
Jet cuddled her close. “I’ll need to give a statement about Ian’s murder. Are you okay to pick up Tony and Grace?”
It was such a normal question.
Delphi stretched up on tiptoe to kiss him. “Absolutely.”
Chapter 12
Mousey the cat sprang from the top of a plastic skeleton, rattling its bones, to land at Grace’s feet, swat the pompoms dancing on the hem of the little girl’s sugarplum fairy costume, then race off up the stairs to join the neighborhood kids in shrieking their lungs out.
Grace ran after her cat, laughing.
Delphi laughed, too, slipping her arm around Jet as he reached out to steady the skeleton that still swayed from the cat’s antics. “We must have the only crowd-loving cat in New York.”
“Fortunately.” Jet smiled at her. It was Halloween night and his empty house had been converted into a memorable haunted house. All of Delphi’s family seemed to have helped in the transformation and most of the neighborhood had tramped through it. The adults—other than those supervising the kids—were now comfortably ensconced next door in Delphi’s house. As was Tony’s pup, Senator. The German shepherd pup would grow into his name. At the moment, the pup was snoozing on Delphi’s granddad’s lap. Harry and the Senator were good friends.
Something crashed on the floor above, but Jet ignored it. Perez and Arlee were up there, along with Arlee’s new foster daughter, Mist. They’d sort things out.
Jet slipped into his were-hearing. Yes. Mist was swearing at the kids and Perez was laughing at Arlee’s attempt to shush her.
“Maybe we should have had the apple bobbing in the laundry,” Delphi said. Instead, the barrel had been set up in the bathroom.
“The floor will dry,” Jet said easily.
Tony raced up to them and past them, a trio of his friends and Delphi’s twin niece and nephew running with him. “We’re going to see Senator!” he shouted to Jet and Delphi before running on out of the house, across the yard—the fence was long gone—and into the house he now called home. Delphi’s house. Their family home.
“The puppy’s asleep,” Delphi said.
Jet grinned. “I’d say not for long, except that I’ve seen Harry in action.” Delphi’s granddad would quiet the kids with one scowl.
“True.” Delphi snuggled closer.
Jet inhaled deeply, letting the scents of Delphi, pumpkin spice and roasted chestnuts fill his lungs. He was happy. So happy that it felt almost dream-like. But the mate bond, strong and vital between him and Delphi told him all of this was real. His, forever.
The night travelled on slowly and he went with it, enjoying Delphi’s happiness. Parents collected their children and chatted briefly, happy and connected. This was community, family. There were hugs and reminders of various holiday events.
Portia, the guardian who’d worked with them, had brought her five-year-old nephew. Sven brought his grandkids. Graham was in prison, awaiting trial. He wouldn’t see freedom, again. Those criminals he’d transmutated had been tracked down—not by Graham’s confessions, but via the records Ian Lewis had kept. In a sense, Ian had managed vengeance for Graham’s betrayal of him. Perez and Delphi’s mom were working with the Collegium and Jet to keep an eye on the various criminals in their new identities. Thoreau had survived his interrupted transmutation, but his face looked as if someone had melted it.
Jet shrugged off thoughts of work. The last of the children left. Jet picked up Grace who fell asleep instantly against his shoulder. Mousey yowled till Delphi picked him up. Tony leaned against Jet. “Bedtime, buddy.”
Tony’s protest was swallowed by a yawn.
Delphi walked upstairs with him to help put the kids to bed. Mousey chose to stay downstairs where the food and people were.
With the kids safely asleep, Jet drew Delphi into the shadows of the hallway and kissed her.
“Mmm.” Delphi sighed with bliss. Love was golden. It flowed in sparkly ribbons through her and Jet’s mate bond, and it seemed almost visible in the house. Kissing Jet was like—
She jolted. “Jet! Behave.”
His grin was wicked. Last night, he’d found the one spot on her body where when he kissed her, she lost all self-control. Who would have thought that the inside of her left elbow was such an erogenous zone? Now his kisses were tracking up from her wrist.
She struggled, none too convincingly.
Tantalizingly, he stopped. “We have guests.”
Her family. For an instant, she debated…but no. Then she smiled, kissing him exuberantly. “They’ll be gone in an hour or so. You can ravish me at midnight.”
At midnight, Delphi wrestled Jet to the bed. “Just because I said trick…” They were both naked. He was grinning, but the strain of his self-control showed. She intended to break it. “Doesn’t mean I don’t want my treat.”
His eyes widened as she told him just what she wanted. Then with a sexy growl, he gave her exactly the treat she’d requested. “Trick or treat, gorgeous, and happy Halloween.”
Note From The Author
The Collegium series has been great fun to write, and I hope it’s equally fun to read. Each novel is a stand-alone story. Demon Hunter and Djinn Justice both star Fay and Steve, but after that, the books feature new couples.
Reading order (not that it matters):
Demon Hunter
Djinn Justice
Dragon Knight
Doctor Wolf
Plague Cult
Hollywood Demon
Alchemy Shift
If you’d like to chat with me about my books, I haunt my Facebook page and I’m on Twitter @Jenny_Schwartz, or you can contact me on my website.
There may be new Collegium books in the future—I love my shifters and mages—but for now I’m caught up in a new series. Pre-order Phoenix Blood, the first book in the Old School series, for 99c. It releases December 27, 2016.
Till next time,
Jenny
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