The Storm Sullivan Saga: The Emerald Seer Series Box Set

by Violet Patterson

  “Careful, brother. You are too close to letting the rage consume you.” Lucian broke into his head, flashing memories of all the dark places they’d been together and all of the good things that came out of those experiences. Then, he did the only thing that could break through. Lucian flashed images of the babies in his mind, their scrunched faces and tiny fists, heads of curling dark hair and delicate mouths. Ryder remembered his promises – the ones he made to Storm and to himself.

  “I will bring you back, whatever it takes, I will bring you back.” Ryder kissed Storm softly on the lips. “Do you hear me? I will bring you back.” Ryder set his forehead against his wife’s.

  Roane

  Sliding into the bed beside his mate, Roane could not stop smiling. He felt as though his face would crack under the pressure but he could not help it. Damarra glowed as she held their baby boy in her arms and he felt complete, a sensation he’d never known before. The boy, their son, looked so strong and handsome wrapped in the white blanket from Almha.

  “What shall we name him?” Damarra looked up for a moment before returning to their son’s face.

  “I have no idea, do you?” Roane had not thought about it at all. As happy and surprised as he was, until he saw the birth Roane did not believe it was real. Now, he sat here with a nameless baby and he knew that it was bad luck to wait too long to name anything let alone a baby.

  “I was thinking Calibos.” Damarra did not look at him this time; she just ran the side of her finger along their son’s jawline and began humming to him. The boy opened his eyes and made a sound. “Calibos, you like that, son? I think you do.”

  Damarra resorted to cooing to their son while his eyes remained open but Roane’s sense of foreboding stirred in the back of his mind. Something in his visions, something in the journals. No, not today. His journals were locked away in the archives where the monks kept them safe. He did not need to go back there now. Roane pushed every negative thought aside and stretched out in bed with his wife and son. “Calibos? I like it.”

  Sophia

  Something had gone very wrong. The Phoenix and Pac Man continued to pace back and forth through the foyer, Dorian emerged from below and took off without a word followed very closely by Watson and most of the soldiers. Then everybody left in a flurry leaving her with Olivia and the wood sprites who insisted on standing guard. They induced the trees along the plot lines to grow and form a natural barrier inside the stone wall. Sophia said nothing while they worked and found herself not only impressed but entranced by the beauty of the massive tree wall that now surrounded the manor and plantation. When they were done, the sprites returned to the house and helped Sophia clean the bedroom. They were good kids, all of them, and Sophia found herself grateful they’d stayed. Olivia disappeared suddenly and Sophia was too distracted to follow after her. Just as she was throwing the sheets in the washer, a thundering crash made her jump. Running to the front of the house, Sophia recognized the black Hummer tearing up the drive and nodded to the wood sprites who raced out of the house without a word. Trees began to grow up and around the shredded front gate and choked out the alarm system with their magical limbs. Lucian emerged from the Hummer with two bundles in his arms and instinctively, Sophia rushed to take one of them when Ryder slid out of the vehicle with Storm in his arms, his expression grim.

  “What happened? What’s wrong?” Sophia’s queried breathlessly. She recognized the idiocy of asking but couldn’t wrap her mind around what she was seeing. “Get her upstairs. It’s all clean and the nursery is ready. Do the girls need anything?”

  A massive blast at the front gate cut off any response Sophia may have received. The males bolted in the house and she heard them thunder up the stairs. Pac Man and the Phoenix leapt out the open front door. Run, Sophia, ours. Upstairs, quickly.

  Sophia did not have to be told twice. She scooped the Phoenix onto her back and sprinted in the house after Pac Man slamming the door shut behind them. Taking the steps two at a time she nearly collided with Lucian at the top of the stairs. Do not let him go out, Sophia ours. Not this time. We must stay.

  “Don’t go, Lucian.” Sophia touched his arm and looked up into his eyes with all the resolve she could muster in a situation she didn’t understand yet. “She says you cannot go. Please listen this time.” Just to drive her point home, she added, “For me.”

  Lucian’s shoulders dropped, the tension draining from his face. “How can you ask me this?”

  “Because she tells me you cannot fight this one, you are needed here with us.” Sophia sighed, so maybe she ad-libbed a little. “We have to protect the babies. Storm is clearly out of it and that means Ryder is useless. You know we need to protect those girls.”

  “I’ll go.” Olivia emerged from the shadows. Sophia stepped back and even Lucian startled slightly. Gone was the young blonde woman who so closely resembled Angeline, gone were her carefree smiles and dancing eyes. She bore the look of a White Priestess now but without the long white robes. “Do not look at me like that. I know what I must do and you know what you must do.” Olivia turned and seemed to float down the staircase away from them. Sophia ran to the nursery and watched out the large picture window as the fledgling priestess floated toward the front gate where the wood sprites were working diligently against what appeared to be a band of fire sprites.

  “You have to seal that window.” The voice of Trin Sullivan came from behind them. Sophia whirled to face her old friend and nodded.

  “Lucian, get me the incense from the study.” For once, he didn’t argue.

  “Storm is in a mystical coma.” Trin spoke matter of factly but the sorrow in her ghostly eyes was almost painful to witness.

  “How? The childbirth?” Sophia felt like she’d been punched in the gut. How could this happen?

  “We do not know. Nobody has been able to locate her yet, not on any plane. There are many realms to search but we fear she is caught in the in-between.” Trin’s ghost hung her head. “I didn’t see this. How did I not see this?”

  “How would you know? How could you have seen this?” Sophia wanted to comfort her friend, the woman who knowingly sacrificed her chance at resurrection so Sophia could be with Lucian. “We will find her Trin. Nobody is a stronger tether to her than Ryder and now that they share children –“

  “It matters not. If it is as I fear, she may be lost to us unless she figures it out on her own.” Trin shook her transparent head. “Damarra knew. She told Storm not to leave until the babies were born but my stubborn niece did not listen. Now look.” She waved a hand toward the bassinets where the babes lay sleeping peacefully.

  “Shouldn’t they be crying? I mean, I doubt Storm was able to feed them, they have to be hungry.” Sophia looked questioningly at the peaceful sleepers.

  “I fed them. I snaked two bottles of formula from a nurse’s cart and fed them on the way.” Lucian entered the room with the incense jars she requested and shrugged. “Don’t get too excited, I couldn’t stand the crying anymore and I needed something to get my mind off Ryder. He is wrecked over this. He was very nearly consumed by rage.”

  “What!” Sophia took the incense from Lucian and began to work more quickly to seal the window. “Lucian, you need to get in there, stay with him until I get there.”

  “Soph, he is fine. Really. I talked him down and he is fine. Let’s seal these windows and give him some time with Storm.” Lucian touched her lightly on the arm and urged her toward the window.

  “I will watch over them for now.” Trin Sullivan’s ghost vanished through the wall heading toward her niece.

  “Luc, you have to see this.” As Sophia worked the charm on the window, the night sky was lit with a series of light flashes both in the front yard and in the distance. “The real war has started, hasn’t it?”

  Lucian slipped an arm around her waist and pulled her close. “Yes. Yes, it has.”

  END OF THE NIGHT

  EMERALD SEER IV

  Featuring WILD CHILD – an
Emerald Seer Short Story

  Wild Child

  An Emerald Seer Short Story

  Damarra

  The pain. Nobody prepared her for the pain. She saw Credne pacing the periphery and Roane stood at her side, concern creasing his brow. Every once in a while a flicker of fear raced through his eyes but he kept watching her face, stroking her hand, and murmuring loving words. He loved her. Damarra had never known such a thing. This was taking too long. The birth process was not supposed to hurt one of her kind, was not supposed to take so long for one such as her. Was it different because of Morgaine’s magic? Or was it different because of Roane? A groan escaped her lips, a strange, foreign sound. Roane squeezed her hand.

  “You can do this my love, I know you can do this.” He sounded so certain.

  Another voice broke through the fog of pain. Female and familiar – Almha. “You will do this, Damarra. Your child is almost here.”

  “I need to push.” The voice that came from her lips sounded odd, tired and somewhat breathless.

  “Then push, my love.” Roane brushed stray hairs from her face and she felt a cool wash cloth on her forehead.

  As the next wave of pain hit, Damarra pushed, forcing all of her focus and strength into expelling her child. Never again. She would never do this again. As much as she wanted a child, Damarra never dreamed hers would come this way, never dreamed it would drain so much of her light. She worried that Roane would not feel the same about her as her light diminished. She would have contemplated the troublesome consideration longer were it not for another contraction. Damarra cried out in pain and frustration as she pushed.

  “I can see the head.” The excitement in Roane’s voice bolstered her spirit.

  Damarra pushed again, forcing everything she had into this one action, imagining her child’s cry as she screamed out. A high pitched wail broke the air and Damarra fell back into the cushions. Roane leaned over and kissed her forehead lightly. “You were wonderful, my love.”

  “Is the baby alright?” Damarra heard the incessant wailing but could not seem to find her child.

  “Yes, Damarra, your child is well.” Credne leaned into her line of vision in his usual awkward fashion. “Almha is overseeing the cleansing and then she will bring him to you.”

  “Him?” Damarra frowned.

  “A son, my love. We have a son.” Roane wiped a cool cloth across her forehead and down her cheek. He seemed to glow with pride. She could not help but smile his way. Her Immortal was pleased, how could she be anything less? “What shall we name him?”

  “Calibos.” The name came to Damarra suddenly. It had not been a consideration before now but it seemed to fit.

  Roane grinned and nodded, “Calibos. I like it.”

  “So it be. So he be named.” Credne bobbed his head and drifted back into the shadows as Almha re-entered the room.

  “It is done. Your child is well.” Almha placed the bundle on Damarra’s chest and backed away.

  Roane leaned in, wrapped one arm around the baby, and slid onto the cushions beside Damarra. “He is amazing, my love. You were magnificent.”

  Damarra looked down into the face of her child. Her child. His skin was fair and his eyes were just like Roane’s, staring at her with unusual wisdom and curiosity. “Calibos, my son.”

  “Our son.”

  “Yes, our son.” Damarra kissed her Immortal gently on the cheek.

  “What was that for?” Roane’s surprise at the gesture still amused her.

  “Because I am happy.” Damarra lost herself in the moment, ignoring the gnawing uncertainty in the back of her mind. She felt certain the child would be a girl.

  ****************

  “You cannot hide here forever.” Almha slipped into their room, her whirling white eyes seeing nothing and everything. Roane slept, softly snoring in the armchair beside the babe’s cradle.

  Damarra stood staring into the mirror, watching destinies unfold, all but the one she sought. “I know.”

  “Then why do you linger?” Almha crossed the small room and took Damarra’s hand.

  “I need to see. Something is - ” Damarra paused, afraid to voice her concerns, even to Almha.

  “Wrong?” Almha squeezed her hand, warm and reassuring. “Things change sometimes, my friend. You know this above all others.”

  “But I thought destinies never changed.” Damarra could not make sense of it. Somehow something had changed things, an utter impossibility unless all she knew was wrong. She did not like to be troubled, did not like the weight of concern.

  “That is where destinies get tricky. You changed something that should not have been possible, exploited a loophole if you will. The destiny did not change so much as the manner in which it comes to be. Does that make more sense?” Almha tilted her head questioningly.

  “No, it does not.” Damarra continued to watch the images in the mirror, babes blossoming to children growing into adults and fulfilling some purpose or other. Still no sign of her babe. No destiny in place for her Calibos.

  “It will, Damarra. Destiny is a funny thing. There are many more destinies than there are creatures to fill them. That is the puzzle of it all. None are born with a destiny intact. Destinies come after, once the child marks the world. Your child has yet to mark the world. Your child has yet to enter the world you seek his destiny in.” Almha touched the center of the glass causing the images to melt away. “Do not waste time here. You cannot protect him from the world he belongs to.”

  “So if I do not take him there he will never have a destiny?” Damarra’s understanding of her predicament became clear though she still felt foggy about the purpose of destinies and could not fathom how they could be changed.

  “That is correct. Not only will he not have a destiny but his true destiny, the one you seek for him, could be passed on to another. Is that what you wish?” Almha nodded again toward the glass where several babes took form. “Each day sees more births and the multiplication of many species. Soon there will be cross-breeding. You changed that, Damarra. Before you mated the Immortal such things were unheard of.”

  “I do not understand? You told me you saw us together. I was following the path you set me on.” Damarra pulled back from her friend, shocked and hurt. She would have chosen her own kind if it meant a change such as this.

  “I did see you together but you made the choice to see it through. You made the choice to seek the witchling. You made the choice to take the potion and to have the child.” Almha frowned. “Do you regret it, Damarra? Are you not happy? Do you not feel joy?”

  Damarra felt deeply betrayed. Her friend lied to her. “How could you do this?”

  “What? Tell you that this was the only way that would see you to happiness? You were not born, Damarra, not in the way other creatures were born. None of us were. We have no destinies. We only have choices. I saw a way for you to find happiness and purpose. I showed you the way because I care for you. Would you rather live all your days in the shadows, watching others love and wondering how it would feel?” Almha reached out and touched her arm lightly. “I wanted to give you purpose and your light glows brighter every day. Is that so wrong?”

  Damarra refused to look at her. She heard the words but still felt the betrayal. Yes, she appreciated the love she saw among the mortals. Yes, she longed to know how it really felt. But this seemed wrong somehow. Everything went slanted as she gazed into the mirror watching the babes grow and change as they would over the next several years. Damarra contemplated what she had gained from Almha’s pushes as opposed to what she lost. Who knew what was yet to happen, what ripples through time her transgressions would bring? Damarra felt a heaviness she’d never known, one she felt uncomfortable bearing.

  “It is difficult, is it not?” Almha’s voice sounded dull, sad.

  “What?” Damarra continued to ponder her predicament, not knowing what the future held for the first time ever. Not knowing where she belonged or what she should be doing.

  “N
ot knowing. Not seeing. Being displaced.” Almha continued to stare at the looking glass. Damarra tore her eyes from the mirror and watched her friend with growing concern.

  A sinking feeling landed in the pit of Damarra’s already sore abdomen. “Almha, what is happening here? Was this not the will of the Tuatha De?”

  “It was not.” Almha met Damarra’s eye, her expression somber. “I persuaded them. When I tried to see your future I saw nothing. Goddesses have futures even if they have no destinies but yours went blank. I could not find you. I looked for you in the futures of others of our kin and could not find you. I felt something terrible that I had not known before. It was ugly and made me feel wrong. I cared for you and could not bear a lifetime without you in it. You have suffered so much and I could not bear for your light to be extinguished. The Tuatha De agreed. Do you understand now?”

  “So you made a new future for me?” Damarra leaned back against the wall. The room started to spin.

  “Yes, in a matter of speaking.” Almha held Damarra’s gaze, her expression unreadable.

  “What have you done, Almha?” Groping for a ledge, something to steady herself, Damarra found herself sinking to the ground.

  “I gave you back a future.” Almha drifted away.

  Damarra could not focus on her, fear spreading through her limbs. “What was the price, Almha?”

  “It remains to be seen, friend.” Almha left the room.

  *************

  “My love?” Roane touched her lightly on the hand. Tears were streaming down her cheeks and he wiped them away gently. “What is wrong?”

  “What have I done?” Damarra could not put into words the despair she was feeling. What had Almha done to give Damarra a future? What repercussions would it have through the generations? What would her son be like?

  “You have given birth to a gift, to our son!” Roane frowned, concern knitting his brows. “What has happened to you?”