The witches had taken up residence at Mont Circeo permanently, formally relinquishing Dreadford Castle to the Queen of England.
And I...well, I guess I was the Queen of the gargoyles now, a fact that would probably take some getting used to.
“I can’t believe they’ve all awoken now,” I said during a lull in the fireworks. “I can still remember how this city was when I first came here. I never could have imagined it how it is now.”
Full of life and laughter. Parties and dancing. Happiness and hope. Shops had reopened and cobwebs were pulled down from even the darkest corners of the city. This place was once again a home, one that was all mine, along with my five beautiful men.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted two approaching figures. Tess and Alaric, striding toward us hand in hand. They’d grown even closer these past few weeks, and I had a feeling that my old friend might start forming a harem of her own fairly soon.
“Rowena,” she said, calling out across the rocks. “You’re not going to want to miss this.”
With raised eyebrows, I stood and trailed over to her, my gargoyles right on my heels. She pointed at the skyline in the distance, and the silhouette of two dark wings grew closer and closer as the moments ticked by. My heart flipped, and I frowned at the approaching figure.
“Please don’t tell me that’s Eris. That she’s somehow come back from the dead.”
“No,” Tess said, her eyes sparkling. “It’s your grandmother.”
She arrived moments later to find me pacing back and forth on the cliffs. Everything about her screamed magic and beauty. Her dark hair hung in loose waves around her shoulders, and her pitch black eyes sparkled as if dotted with stars. She wore a long dark cloak, one that rippled in the soft breeze of the night.
“Oh, Rowena. I am so sorry I couldn’t come to you until now.” She stepped forward and took my hand in hers, forcing me to stop my frantic pacing. Ever since I’d seen her figure in the sky, a crazy energy had taken over my body. I was freaking terrified. Not of her but of finally meeting the one woman I’d needed all this time.
“You left me here. To take all of this on all by myself.” Tears pricked my eyes. “I don’t understand how you could have done that to me. Not if you truly cared. Is it because my father was human? Does that make me too mortal in your eyes?”
“Oh, my dear,” she said, squeezing my hand. “On the contrary. I couldn’t possibly be more fond of you if I tried. You are the spitting image of your mother. You know that, right? She was beautiful and feisty and oh so very earnest, too. She might be a bit taken aback by these five handsome gargoyles you’ve chosen as your mates, but I know she’d approve in the end.”
“Then, why did you leave?” I asked. “Why didn’t you come help me when Eris came here?”
“I couldn’t, my dear.” She gave me a tight smile. “The prophecy was very clear. You had to do it alone. No help from the gods. That meant me. I was terrified that if I even spoke a word to you that the universe would classify that as me helping. So, I had to stay away, at least until you won. Which you did. And I never had any doubts you could.”
“So,” I said, taking a deep breath as my heart lifted in my chest. “You’ll stay?”
She cupped my cheek in her palm and smiled. “Of course I’ll stay. There’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”
The party lasted late into the night. I got tipsy on wine, so much so that my mates had to help me back to our room. They bickered over who would carry me, each wanting to be the mate who carried his Queen across the threshold on her first night as the ruler of this city. In the end, they all carried me inside all at once, each holding on to an arm or a leg.
I’d never felt more loved in my life.
I, Rowena Mortensen, had become Queen of Stone. And I couldn’t wait to spend the rest of my immortal life with my five winged mates.
And, maybe one day, I’d wake up to the flap of little wings.
Thank you for reading the Protectors of Magic series. Looking for another spellbinding reverse harem series? Turn the page for an excerpt of A Dance with Darkness.
Excerpt from A Dance with Darkness
CHAPTER ONE
It all started with bright lights and pulsing music. Bass reverberated through my body as I moved my arms and legs to the beat. My best and oldest friend, Bree, spun in circles by my side, basking in the neon glow of the club. Hot pink and astroturf green lights bounced off the walls. It was my eighteenth birthday, and I’d only had one request. I wanted to go somewhere I could dance.
Out of the corner of my eye, a tall hooded figure caught my attention. The guy was staring right at me with eyes the color of midnight. A spark of heat burst into my cheeks as I cast a sideways glance his way. He stood away from the crowd, leaning against the neon-lit wall with his arms crossed over his muscular chest. His gaze was dark and hooded and strangely intense.
With a slight shiver, I frowned and glanced away.
The upbeat song spiralled away, replaced by a more melancholy tune that chased away my feverish dance energy. I loved dancing, more than I loved most anything else, to any beat, to any song, but there was nothing quite like a fast tempo to get my feet moving. Now that the rhythm had slowed, I finally realized just how long we’d spent on the dance floor. My breath was ragged, my mouth parched. Still, if they changed the song to something more fast-paced…
Bree leaned forward and grabbed my arm. “Come on. Let’s try to buy a drink.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but it was no use. Bree was a force of nature, and once she got an idea into her head, there was no talking her out of it.
When we stepped foot off the dance floor, my eyes were instinctively drawn to where the strange hooded guy had been watching me. He was gone, replaced by nothing but the swirling neon lights. A twinge of disappointment went through me, even though that was completely ridiculous. It had been a long time since a guy had given me even the most fleeting of glances. All the guys from school knew me, well enough to know to stay as far away from me as they could. I was the weird girl who kept to herself, the one who nobody liked. No one except for Bree.
It had been nice to feel like maybe I wasn’t the pariah everyone at school thought I was.
We reached the bar at the far end of the club, and Bree hoisted herself up onto one of the iron stools. It was a weekday, so the place was pretty empty. A huge plus in my opinion. I wanted to dance, free and wild. Not get trapped in a sweaty mess of grinding college students.
Bree patted the stool next to her. “Come on, Norah. One drink won’t kill you.”
“No, but my mom might kill me if she found out.” Still, I hopped up on the stool and dug my elbows into the slick iron surface of the bar top. Warehouse 27 was one of those trendy industrial places, set inside an old warehouse that had once been used for freight storage. Everything was iron or steel, and every wall was covered in intricately-designed graffiti.
Not only would my mom kill me if she found out I was drinking. She’d kill me if she even knew I was here.
“What’ll you have?” The bartender strode up to the bar, giving both me and Bree a long stare before flipping two coasters onto the bar. He didn’t look much older than us, his dark shaggy hair falling into his eyes.
I glanced at Bree and raised an eyebrow.
“Two vodka and tonics,” she said with a smile and a confidence that suggested she’d ordered drinks at bars a thousand times before. But that was all for show. She hadn’t. We might live in the city that never sleeps, but we rarely stayed up past our bedtimes.
The bartender nodded and grabbed some glasses from under the bar before he gave me a nod, his eyes locked on something behind me. “Looks like you have an admirer.”
An admirer? Was it that hooded guy from before? My heart lurched, and I slid my chin onto my shoulder to glance behind me. A tall figure in a deep green cloak now stood in the center of the dance floor, his eyes locked on my face. He wasn’t dancing, a fact that made the chills sweep d
own my back again.
For a moment, I thought it was the same guy, though his cloak was a different color. Plus, there was something strange about this one. A sheen of light whispered across his skin, almost as if he were glowing from the inside out. I blinked and shook my head. That was impossible. The club lights were playing tricks on my eyes. But when I lifted my gaze to the dance floor again, he was gone.
“Norah,” my best friend said as she leaned her face close to mine, her breath a cloud of vodka and cigarette smoke. “You okay?”
“Yeah. I just thought I saw something…” The world seemed to tilt sideways, and my vision went blurry. Ears ringing and mouth dry, I drew quick breaths in through my nose. Everything around me was suddenly loud, loud, loud, and the pulsing lights made my head spin. I pressed my hands against the bar top to hold myself steady, but that did nothing but launch a lump of nausea into my throat.
“Norah. What’s wrong?” My best friend’s voice sounded so far away, as if she were on the other end of a broken cell phone. A hand curled around my arm, pulling me away from the bar.
As soon as I’d made it three steps, my head began to clear, but the clammy sensation on my palms remained.
Bree’s head ducked to mine. Her grip stayed tight around my arm, and I could see now that she was pulling me in the direction of the women’s restroom. “What the hell’s going on? Is it another one of those panic attacks?”
“Yes. No. I don’t know.” For the past couple of weeks, I’d been experiencing increasingly overwhelming panic attacks, or so the doctors said. Heart palpitations, nausea, clammy hands, blurry vision, shortness of breath. It all fit. The problem—to me, at least—was that I never felt panicked when I had one of these so-called panic attacks.
They happened for no discernible reason, at least that I could tell.
One minute, I was fine. The next? I could barely see straight.
“Do you have your pills on you?” she asked as she pushed open the grimy black door that led into the women’s restroom. I wrinkled my nose at the smell, my eyes darting from the yellow sinks to the mound of wet, crumpled paper towels that were spilling from an overflowing trash can.
“Yeah, I brought them just in case, but I can’t manage to swallow them without some water.” I pointed to the yellow sink. “And I’m not drinking from that.”
She gave a nod without a moment’s hesitation. “Okay, stay here and take some deep breaths. I’ll get a glass of water from the bar.”
She disappeared from the bathroom a moment later. Sighing, I leaned against the sink and stared at my reflection in the cloudy mirror. I looked about as good as I felt. There were dark circles under my eyes, and my complexion was so pale that my skin now matched my light blonde hair. Frankly, I looked like I’d seen a ghost that had been tormenting me for years.
These panic attacks were starting to seriously suck ass, and the doctor had said I wouldn’t improve until I figured out the trigger. She thought it might have something to do with my home life, but I wasn’t home now. I hadn’t even been thinking of my step-dad, much less feeling panicked about him. The only thing that could have set it off was the strange guy who had been watching me…
The door pushed open, and my shoulders relaxed. Whether or not these were actual panic attacks, the medicine did make me feel better. I could take the pill, splash some cold water on my face, and go back to swirling around the dance floor until the sun broke through the morning sky.
But a figure much taller and much more muscular than Bree stepped through the door. His dark hood no longer obscured his pale, gleaming face, though his black eyes were just as piercing, if not more so.
I sucked in a sharp breath and took a step back. My heart began to tremble in my chest. What the hell was he doing in the women’s restroom? Had he followed me in here?
“Tonight’s your eighteenth birthday,” he said in a low rumble of a voice, one that was almost lyrical, like he had an Irish or Welsh accent. It sent shivers down my spine.
Swallowing hard, I stared at him. What was this? Some sort of strange pick-up line? I hadn’t been out at clubs and bars enough to know the difference, but this seemed like a bizarre way to approach a girl who had caught your eye.
He let out an irritated sigh. “That is why you’re here, yes? To celebrate your eighteenth birthday.”
“Yes.” A pause. “Why are you asking?”
He nodded. “Good. Can I see your ears?”
My mouth almost dropped open. “Can you see my ears?”
He took a step closer, a move I matched with a step away, forcing me closer to the wall behind me. I didn’t dare move too far back. If I did, I would quite literally be backed up against a wall, and I was feeling more than a little freaked out—and, strangely, a little excited—by this strange guy who had cornered me in a women’s restroom at a club.
Where the hell was Bree?
“Yes.” Another impatient sigh. “I need to see your ears.”
“Yeah, I don’t think so, buddy.” I crossed my arms over my chest and narrowed my eyes, hoping the stance made me look a lot more confident and in control than the trembling heart in my chest suggested. “I’m flattered, but I’m not interested. Now, if you don’t mind, could you leave the women’s restroom? I have some business I need to tend to in the toilet.”
Inwardly, I groaned. I have some business I need to tend to in the toilet? Why the hell did you have to say that?!
His lips quirked, but the intensity of his gaze didn’t falter. “Just let me see your ears, and I’ll leave you to tend to your business. In the toilet.”
For a moment, my resolve weakened, despite every logical bone in my body telling me otherwise. He was strange and unsettling. He’d followed me into the restroom, demanding to see my ears for reasons I didn’t understand. And he wasn’t being at all friendly. Instead, he seemed almost irritated, as if this entire exchange was some kind of chore, one that was very much beneath him.
But I still had this strange, inexplicable urge to give him whatever he asked. I felt almost drawn to him, as if my body recognized him even if my mind and my eyes did not. Had we met before? He wasn’t someone from school, not unless he’d graduated several years before.
He stepped closer. This time, I did not take a step back. His cool hand brushed my cheek as he slid my long, blonde hair behind my ear. My heart hammered, so fast that I could barely breathe. Everything within me felt tight and tense, and a strange scent whispered into my nose. A combination of mint and frost and night.
“Ah, just as we thought,” he murmured almost too low for me to make out the words.
“Just as who thought?” My eyes were locked on his face, at the way his skin glistened underneath the yellow glow of the fluorescent lights.
He stepped back, and the strange magic of the moment vanished as he pulled the hood back over his head and the door swung open to reveal Bree. Her eyes bugged out of her head, and her grip on the water glass tightened, but the strange guy—whose name I still didn’t know—completely ignored her presence.
“Don’t take that pill.” And with that, he strode away, leaving me gaping after him. I slid my hand over my ear and gasped. It had a small bump near the top in the shape of a tiny pointed tooth. A bump that hadn’t been there this morning. A bump that hadn’t been there in all my eighteen years on this earth.
Was that what he had been looking for? And if so, why?
I needed to go after him and find out.
CHAPTER TWO
“Who the hell was that?” Bree stared at the door as if it had grown a pair of wings. “And why did he tell you not to take the medicine?”
“You know what? I wish I knew.” I grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the door. “Come on. Let’s follow him and ask.”
But her feet didn’t follow. Instead, she stayed rooted to the spot, her lips curled down into a frown. She held up the water glass and raised her eyebrows. “You need to take your anxiety medicine, Norah. I don’t care how hot the dude w
as, that’s no reason for you not to take care of yourself.”
“I’ll take it later,” I said. “If we don’t go after him now, we might lose him.”
For a moment, I didn’t think she would budge. Bree, as much as she was my best friend, had always had a protective parental streak when it came to me, more so than my own absentee dad. Sometimes, I appreciated that someone was looking out for me, particularly since my own family liked to make my life a living hell. Other times, like now, I just wanted her to be my partner in crime.
She must have seen it in the look on my face because she lowered the glass onto the restroom counter and gave me a signature Bree grin. “Alright, I’m in. Let’s find out what he’s up to. But after that? You need to take your medicine.”
I let out a sigh of relief, which made me realize just how much I’d been hoping she’d say yes. The strange guy was more than just a random creep. I could feel it in my gut. There was a reason he’d told me not to take my medicine. There was a reason he wanted to see my ears. He knew something about what I’d been going through, and I was determined to find out what it was.
For the past few weeks, I’d felt like I was going crazy. Maybe, just maybe, there was reason to think I wasn’t.
Bree and I pushed through the restroom door to step back into the neon glow of the club. While I’d been inside, the space had begun to fill. The crowd had thickened, and the bar was surrounded by at least two dozen patrons in need of a drink. It made it almost impossible to pick out a single guy in dark clothes.
My eyes scanned the warehouse. There he was. By the door. He stood with three other guys, their heads bowed together as they spoke. Each of them wore those strange hooded cloaks, though all in different colors. Black, gold, red, and green.
As if they could sense my gaze, they all turned my way in unison, and my lungs tightened in response. Every single one of them was inexplicably gorgeous, just like the one who had cornered me in the restroom. Their eyes were bright and piercing, even at this distance. And their skin…they all had a strange sheen, though in differing shades of brightness. The one in red practically glowed like the sun.
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