INVISIBLE POWER BOOK TWO: ALEX NOZIAK (INVISIBLE RECRUITS)

by Buckham, Mary

  His laugh sounded bitter. “The type of people we’re going up against are not your normal threat. If you hadn’t done what you did, you, me and your team would have died.”

  Finally, someone who saw what I’d done the way I saw it. It wasn’t black magic I’d used, at least I didn’t think it was. Most black magic involved body parts and death. I’d only channeled power.

  “You want me to use that ability against Vaverek?” Is that where he was going with his thought process? “Because it’s not a spell I’m sure I can replicate. With any precision especially, sort of like having an AK47 and a bad case of palsy. I’m surprised the spell worked at all.”

  Plus my dad had warned me against exercising it. He made me swear I’d never use it, once he’d seen me call it as a child. But I had employed it again, to save Jake from that rogue Were. And look where that got me—prison for life. Is that why my dad had abandoned me to the Council? Because he knew I’d broken my word to him? Or because I was some kind of a freak with what I could do?

  Bran waved his hand before my face. ”Come back,” he said, his voice low and if it had been anyone else, I’d have said concerned. But this was Bran.

  “Tell me what happened to the non-humans you’d been fighting after I left.”

  “Why did you leave?”

  He actually laughed, but not containing any mirth. “You stole my magic without as much as a by your leave. Did you think it made sense for me to stick around?”

  Well, when he phrased it that way. “It’s not like I really planned for that to happen. I was just trying to save all of our skins.”

  “I realized that.” He tapped one closed fist against my knee. “Didn’t mean I was happy with you at the time, so leaving was the better part of discretion.”

  Go figure.

  I swallowed and let him continue. “I take it you haven’t used that kind of magic a lot.”

  “Are you serious?”

  His laugh this time was genuine. “Thought so. Sort of like playing with a nuclear bomb.”

  So he did understand. Which I wasn’t sure I liked. An enemy was better than a frenemy with him, and way better than trusting that we could be anything more. Been there, done that. Still had the broken heart.

  “Back to the non-humans,” he said.

  See? He wasn’t getting all off track. He was precision point warlock.

  “What about them?”

  “Any survivors?”

  “You going to bring this up to the Council?”

  He sat up straight, as if I’d dashed cold water in his face. “No.”

  “You swear?”

  “By the secrets of the Craft, I thee swear.”

  Using the old words meant something and I had to respect that. “Okay.” I sucked in a breath that did nothing to quiet the increase of my heart rate. “As far as I know no non-human lived.”

  “Yet you and your teammates did.” His face creased in concentration.

  “And so did you.” He seemed to ignore that point and had turned inward so I pushed. “Why does it matter?”

  He glanced at me. “It makes common sense to know the limits of a weapon.”

  “You mean me?” I jabbed my thumb into my chest. “You’re thinking I’m going to go ballistic like that again?”

  “Aren’t you?”

  I opened my mouth to protest then closed it. He was right. It wasn’t like the team or I had a lot of amazing super-powered weapons or ninja skills to stop preternaturals who by and large were bigger, stronger, and deadlier than we were. Except for Kelly who could disappear, and even then it wasn’t clear that preternaturals with a strong sense of smell couldn’t scent her. The rest of us were like sending a squirt gun to take out a howitzer. What had Ling Mai been thinking creating this team and sending us out so ill prepared?

  Oh, wait, what was I thinking? This was Ling Mai whom I doubted gave a rat’s toenail for any of us. We were feet on the ground. I had no doubts she had a larger plan in mind, so maybe our deaths might serve to kick-start phase two in whatever she had up her sleeve, but none of us were likely to see it.

  I raised my eyes to clash with Bran’s, patiently waiting for me to arrive at a conclusion he’d already made. “Given the same or a similar situation I’d probably do the same thing.”

  He gave a slow, measured nod until I asked, “Why?”

  “You’ve forgotten the prophecy?”

  Oh crap, not that again? I rose to my feet, needing to pace. Our last mission together he’d mentioned some witch-warlock prophecy, which was a bunch of hooey as far as I was concerned.

  As I marched across the room though I could hear his voice warp around me.

  “Acies. Acendo. Adamo.”

  Like summer lightning raising the hair along the skin his words prodded, challenging me, asking something I wasn’t touching with a thirty foot anything.

  “It’s a bunch of mumbo jumbo,” I said, the worst words one could lob at something he obviously believed in. I remembered when he first described it as a very old portent, between a powerful warlock and an even more powerful witch.

  It was that last bit that stuck in my craw. Yes, I was witch-born but not witch taught, which meant my spells tended to be hit or miss. And if I did hit, they weren’t always the right target. So calling me a powerful witch was like saying a kid’s scooter and a Harley Davidson were in the same league.

  I knew, to the marrow of my bones, of the cost of playing with magic and there was always a cost. An unexpected boomerang effect that lashed back on the practitioner in unexpected, and mostly unwanted ways.

  “The prophecy starts the time of change, the time of loss,” Bran continued as if he’d heard nothing I’d said. “We’ve already started it.”

  “Bull puckey,” I wanted to say something stronger, but my throat seemed to swell shut, as if I’d angered magic itself by degrading it.

  Is this what my mother had dealt with? She might have been raised among witches but once she chose my father, and his life on a small farm in Idaho, she was isolated, having to hide her abilities. Alone.

  Yes!

  I froze in my pacing. The woman’s voice. Turning slowly, as if tracking the echo of her words, I reached out to feel her, to find her. But there was nothing.

  Why did that not surprise me.

  “Something spook you?” Bran rose and crossed to where I stood. “What is it?”

  “Nothing.” I brushed him off as I wished I could brush the cry away. My plate was overfull, no need to bring one more relative, imagined or not, into the mix. I turned toward where Bran stood, his face set in a thoughtful expression. “I’m beginning to think you made up Willie and François.” I waved one hand toward the closed door. “What they’re doing.”

  “Pushing away, Alex?” he said, as if I was the one who brought him here under false pretenses. “So sure if someone wants to help there must be an angle? A demand in response?”

  I was sure my brows were hiding in my hairline. Where had this come from? I just wanted to know where Fido and Fang were and what was keeping them.

  Before I could open my mouth and set Mister High-and-Mighty straight the door belted open and the missing duo emerged, looking like they hadn’t tracked through the streets of Paris but were dragged through them.

  “What happened?” Bran demanded, stepping toward them.

  François used his thumb to point at the Were two steps behind him. “Someone decided they didn’t like Willie sniffing after him.”

  “The doctor?” I asked, my gaze tap dancing between the two of them. “Did you find him?”

  “Several times.” Willie coughed as if clearing a jam in his throat. “That was the problem.”

  “What problem?” I crossed to stand in front of them. Didn’t they realize this was a time sensitive issue? “What do you know?”

  François was the one who looked up, rubbing his shoulder as if it was sore. “I think we found Vaverek.”

  CHAPTER 46

  “What do you mean
, you think?” I snapped at François. He cut a quick glance at Bran as if asking what’s-up-with-her? If anyone said PMS there was going to be blood and it wasn’t going to be mine.

  Willie was the one who answered, swiping at what looked like blood on his shirt. “It’s not as if these men had their scents labeled.”

  Bran raised his brows at me as if daring me to contest that point.

  I released a sigh. “Fine. Tell it your own way.”

  “Not much to tell,” Willie shrugged at François. “I took after man one and two.”

  “And I covered three.”

  This was going to be harder than I realized. I returned to my seat on the couch, hoping a little distance might buy me some patience.

  “So?” I prompted as the well of intel already shriveled up.

  Willie seemed the most amendable to my tone, which was tell-me-now-or-you-die. “One and two took the shifter with them.”

  “While number three exited in a different direction,” François added. “Is

  there anything to drink? I’m parched.” “Me, too,” Willie piped up. Who knew an adult male Were could look like a puppy begging for treats?

  Bran gestured to the kitchen where the other two headed, like frat boys making a beeline for the beer. I held my tongue, but that wasn’t going to last long.

  Leave it to Bran to notice. “They’ll get to the point.”

  “In this lifetime?”

  “That’s not fair,” Willie said around gurgling Gatorade. “You try sniffing all around Paris all day.”

  “Poor baby,” I murmured, forgetting about how well Weres hear. Or not.

  Bran raised his hands. “So you followed two and François tracked the other. What happened next?”

  “The shifter didn’t smell right,” Willie said, oblivious to the impact of his words. That wasn’t just any shifter; that was Van.

  I slammed to my feet. “Not right in what way?” I asked. Okay, I may have snarled a little. Willie’s first response was classic Were. His nostrils tightened, his head lowered, his stance widened. Then he pulled back, sucking in air as if his life depended on it, closed his eyes and started chanting, “Om madre padre om.”

  “Seriously?” I glanced at Bran. This was his idea and it wasn’t getting us anywhere.

  “Recovering Were, remember?” François offered with half-a-joke in his tone until he caught my expression. “Right. Your brother. Forgot for a sec.” He turned to Willie. “Hey mate, tell her what you mean. Family connection.”

  Willie’s eyes snapped open and he managed to look sheepish, a hard look for a Were to accomplish, recovering or not. “Oh, yeah. So the scent, it had this bite to it. Acrid, a hint of bitter.”

  I rolled my eyes at Bran as if to say we weren’t at a wine tasting and he stepped in. “Do you mean he smelt afraid? Or worried?”

  “No. Nothing like that. It wasn’t an emotional smell. More like the scent you pick up if someone is really ill. That kind of pungency.”

  My stomach plummeted. “Could it be because he’s been under extreme stress since he was kidnapped?”

  Willie tilted his head as if pondering, then shook it in the negative. “No. I’ve searched for hostages before and while there was that taint, this was something different.”

  “Could it have been drug induced?” Bran asked.

  Of course. Why hadn’t I thought of that?

  Willie’s slow nod helped me inhale a breath. “Yeah, that could account for the acidity factor.”

  I scooted forward on the edge of the couch cushion as I asked, “Were you able to trace the scent to where he was being kept?”

  “No. It was as if they expected to be tracked.” He eyed me, trying to be clear and concise even as I was only half listening past his first word. “They kept doubling back, splitting up and then rejoining.”

  “The two with Van, you get a read on them?” Bran asked.

  “As to what they are?”

  “Yes.”

  “One was clearly a Were. Very strong, too. He was the one who left the shifter then came back and left again. The other was human. His scent wasn’t very happy either.”

  Poor man, I wanted to snarl.

  “Where did you lose them?” Bran cut me off from jumping in and stopping the flow.

  “Le Métro,” Willie answered. “The Invalides station. All three of them were together there.”

  “The subway?” I asked, getting a little lost.

  “Oui.”

  This was making no sense. “Why would kidnappers take a wolf there? It’s not like Van would be easily mistaken for a dog in broad daylight.”

  “My guess.” Willie had moved on to chewing a hunk of bread and cheese. Weres were notoriously hungry all the time trying to keep up with their metabolism. “I think he’d shifted back into his human form long before the Métro.”

  “If he was groggy, or still sedated, two men could manage your brother and he wouldn’t resist.” Bran was obviously trying to calm me down. Not that it was helping much. “But I don’t understand the Métro. Why not a taxi or private vehicle?”

  “They had a private vehicle, which the Were left at one point. When he joined backup with the other two they left the car near the Invalides station. It was as if they waited for rush hour traffic to begin. No way to track through the mess of scents there.”

  “Plus it’d be easier to hide an impaired man in the crush,” François added from where he leaned against the wall. Up to this point he’d been so silent I’d almost forgotten about him.

  “So all indications are they suspected we’d do exactly what you did.” Bran’s voice sounded like a low, dangerous rumble as he glanced at François. “And the man you followed?”

  “Either he was meant as a decoy or as lost as the most clueless tourist.” François’ tone told me which of the two theories he thought was most likely. “Interesting thing is that I followed him to the exact same station as Willie tracked his two leads.”

  “Invalides station?” Bran clarified.

  Both François and Willie nodded.

  “Do you think that station was important?” I asked, “Or could any station have worked?”

  “At rush hour the 1, 2, 4, 12, and 13 lines are the busiest,” François said as if he rode them on a daily basis, or had anticipated my question and did his research. The RER lines can be more crowded but if they were looking for packed trains they could have taken several closer stations.”

  “But didn’t.” Why one station over another?

  Bran pulled out his phone and punched some numbers. I ignored him to focus on François, recapping so I understood. “So both sets of men seemed to be leading you on a wild goose chase only to lose you at this particular Subway or Tube stop.”

  “Le Métro.” Bran said not looking up as he continued to punch his phone. I so wanted to flip him off but didn’t, mostly because he wouldn’t have seen the gesture. When I glanced back at François though I could tell by the cant of his lips he knew exactly what I was thinking.

  Bite me, I mouthed.

  Instead he blew me a kiss.

  That earned him Bran’s attention and a frown, which didn’t seem to faze the MI-6 agent at all.

  “Anything else?” Bran asked, which had François shaking his head. “One thing.”

  I didn’t realize I was circling my hand in a get-on-with-it move until I caught François’ grin. At least he took my hint.

  “The man I followed, who also happened to be a Were, crossed paths with another man who was at the park.” That had both Bran and me sitting up straighter. Fortunately François didn’t need a lot of prodding to continue. Either that or he knew exactly how far he could go in making us wait.

  “There was the other shifter who attacked the first wolf.”

  I didn’t say anything, but earned a sideways glance from Bran. We were talking about my dad, but I bit my lip, mostly to keep it from trembling.

  “That shifter was removed by this unknown additional man. I’d ca
ll him the Green man.”

  “Why?” I blurted out.

  “His scent.” François seemed to pause. “The one time I smelled something close to him was a woodwose.”

  Why hadn’t I paid more attention to Fraulein Fassbinder’s obscure bestiary lectures? “And a woodwose is?”

  “Wild man of the woods,” Willie called from the kitchen where his head was buried in a cupboard. Probably still looking for more food. “Weres are sometimes mistaken for woodwoses which is plain stupid as far as I’m concerned.” He looked over his shoulder. “I mean who would confuse a nature being with a carnivore?”

  François jumped in as if he wanted to save his friend from my acerbic comeback. “A woodwose is considered more a fertility or nature spirit like a Green Man, but both harken back to pagan nature rituals.”

  “What’s any of this got to do with this man you followed?” I prodded, thinking I was doing a pretty good job holding in my temper, until I saw Willie rolling his eyes.

  “The Green man and woodwose are universal figures,” Bran said. “Which doesn’t give us much way to pinpoint who this person was.”

  “Except he was with my dad.”

  “Whoa, your dad was the other shifter?” Willie asked, earning a hand across the throat gesture from François.

  “The point I was making was whether this man is a nature preternatural or not isn’t helping us find my brother or Vaverek.”

  “But it is giving us one lead,” Bran said, looking directly at François. “You said this Green Man crossed paths with the Were. Coincidence?”

  “No, I wouldn’t say so. Both ended up at the same café and the same table. Their scents indicated they stayed there for at least thirty minutes or so, not much longer and it could be less, but I’d say no less than twenty minutes.”

  Now I was speared by Bran’s freeze-me-in-place look. “Which means we have one thread in common.”

  “My dad,” I murmured, my backbone tensing.

  Bran was the one who spoke the words I’d been dreading. “Your father and the Council.”

  CHAPTER 47

  Jeb walked the streets of Paris for what seemed like hours, watching night steal the light and warmth of the day, aware of the rage rushing through him. When he’d accepted his position on the Council he never dreamed he’d have put his family in danger. Now he faced losing one or two of his children.