by Zoë Archer
Of the Heirs themselves, all four were accounted for—Staunton, Bracebridge, Richard Halling, and John Milbourne. Faces she knew all too well. The mountain men left little impression beyond their fur-covered coats, matted beards, and greedy eyes.
The Native woman, Swift Cloud Woman, stood off to the side, watching everything vigilantly. Only Astrid noticed the woman staring at the totem greedily.
“Halling, take her weapon,” Staunton said.
While Astrid remained bound by the spell, a heavyset Heir she recognized as Richard Halling approached tentatively. A bloody bandage was wrapped around his hand. He cast a glance at Staunton, uncertain.
“Take it. Follow the plan.” Staunton’s pleasant demeanor chipped a little with his snapped command. “She can’t hurt you.”
Halling edged closer and reached for Astrid’s pistol, as one might reach into a basket containing a serpent. She hissed at him, and he jumped back. Petty of her, but she’d take what victories she could.
Seeing that she truly could not move, Halling sauntered forward. He plucked the pistol from her hand, smirking.
At least she still had her knife, if she should get free of this spell.
“Check her boot,” said John Milbourne.
Astrid bit back a curse. Halling took the opportunity to slide his doughy hands down her hips and legs. Acrid bile burned her throat at his touch.
“Just another reason why women shouldn’t be in the field,” Staunton said with a pretense of dismay. “Someone might take advantage of them.”
Knowing chuckles from the other Heirs, including Staunton. Halling found her knife, then, after slithering his hands up the insides of her legs, stepped back with a triumphant grin.
“Declawed the cat,” he crowed. “She can’t hurt us now.”
Astrid found that the binding spell still allowed her to speak. So she said, “Your father bought your way onto this expedition, didn’t he? No other reason why you would be here. Unless,” she added thoughtfully, “the Heirs had a halfwit quota they needed to fill.”
Halling turned red, then moved to strike her.
“Careful, Richard,” Staunton warned. “Remember the plan. We don’t want to hurt Mrs. Bramfield. Not unless we must.”
With a mulish sulk, Halling stomped off, but not before giving Staunton her pistol and knife. Staunton tucked the gun into his belt and tossed the knife into the fire. He strode to Astrid, his eyes almost pitying.
The closer he got, the more Astrid shook within the confines of her invisible prison. Each step revealed his humanity, the fact that he was no more than another person of flesh and breath. No longer the colossal embodiment of evil, but only a man. A man who killed without compunction. Somehow, this revelation made everything worse, because Staunton was simply human, with will and vulnerability, who made the choice to commit murder for his ambitions.
“I think you know what we want,” he said.
“You know I won’t tell you anything,” she replied.
He placed his hands on his hips. “Your answer is not unexpected.”
“Then you understand,” she said, “that as soon as I can, I will kill you.”
“Death is part of our work, Mrs. Bramfield,” he replied mildly. “Your husband knew that.”
“It was your bullet that killed him. And since he is dead, and I am not, I will see you punished for that.”
He was unmoved by her vow. “Whether there will be more death is entirely up to you.”
She narrowed her eyes, but said nothing. God—if only she could break this bloody spell. Her pistol, so close. Even without a weapon, just to be able to move and wrap her hands around Staunton’s neck, crush his windpipe. Killing Staunton could not bring Michael or Max Quinn back, but it might provide a small measure of justice. Or satisfy her need for vengeance.
At her silence, Staunton continued. “I offer you generous terms. Tell us what you know about the Primal Source—”
A harsh sound approximating a laugh scraped from Astrid’s throat.
He shot her an annoyed glance. “Tell us everything you know, and in exchange, we shall grant you freedom. You’ve grown close with your Indian comrade. Danger can do that to people. He wouldn’t object to warming your bed, too. Just think of it,” he added, cajoling. “You and the shape changer, safe in your little wilderness cabin. Perhaps coming to love each other. No more Heirs. No more Blades. Only peace.”
“And a litter of half-breed babies,” threw in Halling with a snicker.
“Shut it,” snapped Staunton over his shoulder, then turned back to Astrid, gentling his expression. “Doesn’t that sound lovely, Mrs. Bramfield? A quiet, safe life. Never again having to confront the prospect of the man you love dying in your arms. Could you face that again? Seeing your Indian paramour gasping his final breaths, and you, powerless to help him?”
She swallowed thickly around fiery pain, desperate to block out the images his words conjured. But she could envision it plainly: Nathan, lying as Michael had, bathed in blood, his eyes going glassy, his sleek body cooling as she cradled him.
“And if you refuse,” added Bracebridge, “you will most assuredly see that come to pass.”
Staunton asked, “So, what is it to be? Give us what we need and save your future lover’s life, or refuse and watch him die.”
Everyone waited, watching her. Even Swift Cloud Woman stared at her, awaiting her answer.
Astrid felt each beat of her heart, even as her body was paralyzed. She had not noticed when in the falcon’s clutches, but now she sensed it. An invisible yet gleaming, luminous band around her heart. It spun out from her like a web, fine but strong. Stretching out, reaching. Connecting her. To Nathan. Somewhere out there, in the forest, far away but getting closer. And even with the distance between them, he was there, in her. The bond had been forged over the past weeks, and made everlasting the night before, when she revealed her love and they cemented their bond through the joining of their bodies.
Once, she might have been afraid of severing that bond, might have even consented to obliterate her every principle in order to preserve it. Now her bond with Nathan gave her the strength to do what she must. She knew he would understand her choice.
“There’s a third option,” she said.
“Yes?”
“I tell the lot of you to go bugger yourselves.”
Staunton heaved a sigh like a disappointed parent. “You are going to be tiresome.” He turned to the assembled Heirs and their mercenaries with a snap of his fingers. “Pack up. We formulated a plan, and we shall adhere to it. We have the woman, so we’re moving out.”
“But it’s almost dark,” complained one of the mercenaries. “We can’t travel at night.”
“No time for niceties,” Staunton barked. “We leave tonight.” As everyone hurried to do his bidding, he swiveled back to Astrid. “I may have neglected to mention something rather important.”
“Your parents sold you to a carnival for the price of gin. You’re really a French tightrope dancer.”
A corner of Staunton’s mouth turned up. “Ah, droll humor. The last refuge of the desperate.”
“Just ask your wife.”
He shook his head. “Alas, I am not married. Women tend to make life exceedingly aggravating. As you are graciously proving now. But what I failed to mention to you before is that, if you did not consent to disclose what you know about the Primal Source, we will be forced to take you with us.”
Icy fear clutched the back of Astrid’s neck, yet she said, “To the circus?”
“To England. Yes, my dear Mrs. Bramfield,” he said in response to her unguarded look of shock, “my fellow Heirs and I are most eager to have you enjoy our famous hospitality. You see,” he continued with a warm smile, “at our headquarters in London, we have a lovely, quiet room in the basement. Equipped with sound-deadening panels and the very latest in persuasive devices. And all waiting just for you.”
Miles unraveled beneath him as darkness fell. He crossed
forest and river, vaulting over rocks, skirting mountains. Animals scurried out of his path, alarmed by the sight of a large, dark wolf tearing through the wilderness, a beast possessed. His paws took scrapes and cuts as he sped across sharp stones and unstable earth.
It meant nothing. He felt only the pull on his heart, the searing pain of Astrid’s loss. No. She was not lost. He could find her. Would find her.
Nathan raced on, drawn forward by the bright path of energy she left in her wake.
Confined within her invisible prison, watching the Heirs and their mercenaries pack up their camp, she was losing her battle against panic. To be taken back to England, away from Nathan, kept like a rat in the basement, tortured—
No. Thousands of miles stood between her and that basement. Somehow, some way, she would find a way free. They could not keep her captive in this spell forever. She would seize any opportunity en route to escape.
The Native woman, seeing the Heirs distracted by their preparations, edged around the camp’s fire and sidled close to Astrid.
“The totems,” she hissed at Astrid, eyes bright and avaricious. “Where are the other totems?”
“You truly believe I will tell you where they are?” Astrid answered.
A hard, cunning expression settled over Swift Cloud Woman’s face. “You are white, but not a fool.”
“But you are a fool,” said Astrid, “if you think you will be able to wrest any of the totems from the Heirs.”
No answer from Swift Cloud Woman but a flash of fury in her dark gaze. Though frozen in place, Astrid almost recoiled from the violence and hatred in the Native woman’s eyes, a hatred directed toward everything and everyone. Astrid realized that, out of all the people within the Heirs encampment, perhaps Swift Cloud Woman was the most dangerous.
“The One Who Is Three,” she sneered.
With an internal jolt, Astrid remembered the Native woman saying this before, back at the cave entrance. When Nathan made his first transformation into the bear. The first sign that he was not an ordinary Earth Spirit.
“I heard his howl. The sound of a beast pining for its lost mate.” Swift Cloud Woman pushed the words out like a taunt. “He is coming for you.”
A thrill of joy and terror burst inside Astrid, but she said nothing.
“Only once every seven generations sees the birth of the One Who Is Three. A warrior of legend. He comes now,” Swift Cloud Woman said, then voiced what Astrid was afraid to think. “It will not be enough. These men will kill him, and you will watch.”
Astrid felt these words as surely as a stab to her heart. “I will not tell you where the other totems are.”
At this, Swift Cloud Woman’s mouth arched into a tight smile. “Despite yourself, white woman, you are wise.”
“Such sagacity wasn’t easily gained.”
The Native woman shared a look with Astrid. Shining in her eyes, like a tiny, flickering flame, were the last vestiges of Swift Cloud Woman’s humanity—that still loved and mourned. But hatred damped this flame, nearly extinguishing it. Soon, the flame would be gone forever.
My God, she’s not that different from me. Or how I once was.
But no one had brought Swift Cloud Woman back from her darkness, and she dwelled there, forever.
“What?” the Native woman demanded, seeing the expression change on Astrid’s face.
“There is no hope for you,” Astrid said quietly. “All the vengeance in the world will not bring back the dead.”
Swift Cloud Woman shied back from Astrid and, with a snarl, stormed away, leaving Astrid alone to twist upon the spikes of fear and hope. She desperately longed to see Nathan, but she knew that the Native woman spoke the truth. Even with Catullus providing assistance, the likelihood that the Heirs would slaughter both men was too great. If it meant never seeing Nathan again in order to save his life, Astrid would readily consent.
But such a choice would decimate her.
He’d never faced a more difficult decision. All he wanted—needed—to do was race into the encampment and start tearing out throats, slicing men to tatters. Everything within him demanded he do just that.
Yet, as Nathan crouched in wolf form just beyond the boundaries of the Heirs’ campsite, watching them, he knew that to do that, to unleash his animal impulses without thought or plan, would not only kill him, but endanger Astrid.
He stifled the growl that wanted to rumble from his throat. A growl of both relief and rage. Relief that she was unharmed. Rage to find her captive. She was there. Standing not thirty feet from where Nathan hid, her back to him. Something kept her immobile, though. He saw it in the rigidness of her posture, her unnatural stillness. He had a strong suspicion the magic-wielding Heir was responsible for that.
Again, he forced down the need to just slam into the Heirs’ encampment and start spilling blood. A direct assault wouldn’t work, not with men so dangerous and Nathan on his own. His mind spun with plans, strategies. If he went for the mage first, Nathan could free Astrid, then, with her armed, they could both take down the Heirs. But, even though he knew the Heirs wouldn’t risk killing Astrid, they had no issue with killing him. Even in bear form, he was just a creature of mere flesh. One well-aimed bullet would see him dead, and Astrid still captive.
How, then, to do this? On his own, there seemed no possible way. He was unarmed, save for his teeth and claws. The Heirs had a hell of a lot more magic at their disposal. One man—or wolf, or bear—against six, plus the Native woman and the enormous falcon. Nathan could not do everything himself.
He needed help. He needed Graves.
A surprising, humbling moment. Nathan had spent the whole of his life acting on his own, guided by only his judgment and impulses. Even when he had left the Earth Spirits to follow Astrid, he’d answered to his heart alone.
Yet he saw now, there was a value in being part of a collective. Knowing that someone else would be there, watching his back, tending to the tasks he could not do alone. It wasn’t weakness, but wisdom.
But how long would Nathan have to wait? The Heirs were packing up their camp, which meant they were moving out, and soon. If Graves didn’t show up quickly, Nathan would have no choice but to act, and hope like hell he had enough fury in him to see Astrid safe.
“Something’s troubling Duchess.”
Staunton glanced over to Bracebridge, who was patting and soothing the giant falcon. The bird—seemed ridiculous to call it that when it was the size of an outbuilding—shifted from foot to foot, ruffling its feathers and making chirrups of unease.
“Magic is close,” Bracebridge said.
“You’ve got a Source literally hanging from your neck,” noted Staunton.
“Perhaps,” the mage allowed, hand hovering over the hawk talon. “All the same, I should make preparations, in case we do have visitors. And you?”
Even though he knew it was there, Staunton touched the pouch that hung from his belt. “I am ready for callers as well.”
“Should be a lovely gathering,” Bracebridge grinned, already anticipating being able to use his newest spell. What the mage had planned made Staunton’s gut clench in revulsion, but Bracebridge was always eager to advance his magic use. Better that he should try the spell than Staunton.
With a nod, he left Bracebridge. As he strode to finish breaking down his tent, he was pleased to see a growing look of unease on Astrid Bramfield’s face. Good. Her mettle always annoyed him, the fact that she inherently believed herself as good or strong as any man. A poor example of British womanhood—not the docile, ornamental female who dedicated her life to pleasing and serving men, to creating a warm and welcoming haven in the home. Of course, Staunton had little experience with that himself, with no wife of his own and a mother dead in childbed, but in principle it needed to be upheld. An empire was built upon the stability of its foundation, and women were the foundation of everything.
Movement in the corner of his eye snared his attention. The Native woman was pacing like a metronome, back
and forth, glancing between Astrid Bramfield and Bracebridge. Or, more specifically, the totem around the mage’s neck. Swift Cloud Woman looked ready to pounce at the slightest provocation. He wasn’t sure what to do about her. Now that the Heirs had Astrid Bramfield and one of the totems, they had no more use for the Indian female.
He’d have to get rid of her somehow. Either pay her off, or something a bit more drastic. A shame, really. She had more intelligence and understood him better than most of Staunton’s men. Which made her dangerous.
Staunton surreptitiously checked his pistol, ensuring it was loaded, then again touched the pouch at his waist. Whatever happened, he would be sure to be ready. His goal of mastering the Primal Source was too close, and he would be damned before anyone got in his way.
A faint rustling nearby. Nathan tensed, then let out his breath.
“I smelled you coming,” he whispered after shifting into his human form.
Graves, crouched low, face shining with perspiration, grimaced as he neared. “At this point, none of us are particularly crisp. Even me.” He glanced down ruefully at his once-pristine waistcoat, now grimy and torn, and the scuffed toes of his formerly gleaming boots. Thank God it was dark, or else the man might have been so dismayed by his appearance he’d be inconsolable.
“You made good time,” Nathan said in an undertone.
A handkerchief, somewhat less than snowy, appeared from Graves’s pocket, and he used it to clean his spectacles and mop his brow. “Thank God I take exercise every day, else I’d be whimpering in a ditch somewhere.” The square of cambric returned to his coat. “I half expected to arrive and find you already paws-deep in Heirs and bullets.”
Nathan softly snorted. “Came damned close.”
“Glad you didn’t,” answered Graves. “You might have the makings of a Blade, after all. If that’s what you want,” he added.
