I glare at her. “You’ve given me quite a lot to process.”
“It’s nothing you and your hunter can’t handle, I assure you.” She grins, all earlier anger gone from her deceivingly youthful face. That’s always been the thing with Farah—she can flip her emotion switch faster than someone terrified of the dark can turn on a light.
It’s aggravating.
“Tell me of your hunter.”
“Again, I thought you knew everything.”
She chuckles. “Very well. I’ll tell you what I know, then.” When she closes her eyes, magic begins to seep from her pores, encircling her with golden wisps of power. She begins to hum, a soft, feminine noise that fills the room and makes me incredibly uncomfortable.
I’ve been around enough witches to typically tell whether they’re light or dark, but on that same note, I’ve been around enough witches to understand that misreading one can have disastrous qualities.
“Rainey Astor,” she whispers.
The magic swirls brighter, faster, and soon, Farah’s golden hair is flying about her face. Her power strengthens, the force of it sending me back a step. “Farah?”
“Rainey Astor,” she repeats, her body convulsing.
“Farah!” I yell, but still, she doesn’t open her eyes.
The magic encircling her darkens to near black before finally vanishing as though it never existed at all. Farah opens her eyes, the golden weighted heavily with whatever it was she saw. I can’t help but fear it was not the positive outcome we’ve been hoping for.
“What did you see?” I demand.
She forces a smile, but I can see that it does not meet her eyes. “Nothing that should concern you, Elijah.”
“What the fuck does that mean? What did you see with Rainey?” I stalk across her office and slam both hands down on the top of her desk. “Please.”
Hard, golden eyes soften as she stares up at me. “I saw a powerful hunter unlike any the world has ever seen. I saw a war, blood, and a battle to be won. But I also saw loss.”
“Loss?”
She nods. “Some will not survive this fight.”
“Rainey?” I choke out, nearly cracking beneath the weight of my question. If Rainey dies, there is no future for me. No world in which I wish to exist without her.
“She will not be the same when it is over,” Farah warns. “But from what I see, she will remain standing. Though, as you and I both know, that does not necessarily equate survival.” She gets to her feet and strolls across the room. After opening a cabinet, she withdraws two vials of clear liquid and offers them to me.
“What are these?”
“Barrier spells. It will keep you and Rainey off the radar of those hunting you. It’s only temporary but should be enough to hold off the bounty hunters for some time.”
So will keeping her locked away while I hunt them down, one by one.
Farah laughs darkly, and I wonder if I spoke out loud. “I can see what you’re thinking, Vampire. It’s all over your face. I caution you to not attempt to shield your hunter by hiding her away. You will only push her out the door if you do. Rainey Astor is not one to sit out of a fight. She’s ferocious, and the only way you will win is if she is beside you. Remember that.” Reaching over, she pats my hand, her cool skin resting atop mine. “This will keep her hidden, Elijah. Take comfort in knowing they will not be able to track her when she is not with you.”
I trust Farah, always have despite our differences. But there’s no way in hell I’m giving this to Rainey without checking it myself. So, I shove one vial in my pocket and open the other. Lavender-infused liquid slips down my throat as I drink it down. I stare down at the empty vial in my hand, attempting to gain control over my fear at Farah’s words.
Some will not survive this fight.
She will remain standing. Though, as you and I both know, that does not necessarily equate survival.
“Who will not survive?” I ask her, and she smiles sadly at me, lifting a hand and gently touching my cheek.
“The war will be worth the casualties, Elijah. For if you win, the tables will shift.”
Her words are heavy and laced with double meaning, so without giving myself too long to think about it, I ask a question I’m not entirely sure I want to know the answer to. “And if we lose?”
Her eyes darken, going from their typical butterscotch to a deep golden that simmers with power. “Then the world will descend into darkness, unlike anything we’ve ever seen. Death will run rampant through the streets, and all will bend to the will of evil. It won’t matter whether you’re human or supernatural—everyone will suffer the same.”
4
Rainey
“Well this place looks like it probably has bodies buried in the basement,” Ramirez says dryly as he stands beside me in the driveway of the old bed and breakfast Beatrice Smith ran. “I can’t imagine it’s been open for at least a decade.”
“What do you mean?” I ask as I stare up at the pristinely polished house before me. Thorny rose bushes with bright blooms flank both sides of a wraparound porch. The log siding of the house is clean and polished, and the large windows flanking each side of the front door are so damn clean they look like they belong in a Windex commercial.
“This place is a dump.” He shakes his head and turns back to the car.
“A dump?” Eyebrow raised, I glance over my shoulder at him.
“I guess the place wasn’t operational after all.”
I turn back to the house. Glamour. This must have been strictly for supernaturals. It would make sense—nothing we’ve discovered about Beatrice paints the picture of a woman who loved people.
Hell, the woman had no social media accounts, no known friends, no living family. Honestly, this B&B is the closest we’ve gotten to anything having to do with the dead witch. I’m damn glad I chose to bring my own ride out here since it looks like this is one walkthrough I’ll have to do myself.
His phone rings, and he puts it to his ear as I look back at the house.
“Ramirez. Sounds good. We’ll be there in a few. M.E. said she has something for us on Smith.”
“You go ahead, I’ll meet you there in a few.”
He lifts an eyebrow. “You aren’t planning on going in that broken-down house, are you? There won’t be anyone here to call for help when you fall through the floor.”
I laugh. “No, we can come back out with dogs tomorrow and search the place.”
“All right.”
“I just need to make a quick call before I get on my bike.”
“I keep telling you to get a vehicle with doors and a roof, Astor.”
“And I keep telling you they aren’t for me. I like danger.”
He chuckles and gets into his car as I walk toward my bike, trying to appear completely normal and not like I’m about to run into a glamoured house.
At least, I wasn’t lying about the phone call. “Rainey, is everything okay?” Elijah asks after answering on the first ring.
“Yeah,” I reply and wave at Ramirez as he backs down the drive, and I straddle my bike. “I need you to meet me somewhere.”
“Where?”
“A glamoured B&B out on Beverly Hill Lane.”
“Text me the address.”
The line goes dead, so I fire off a quick text and shove my phone into my pocket. A bird chirps overhead, but I can’t sense anyone—or anything—else in the vicinity. Since I know looks can be deceiving—the house before me a perfect example—I palm my dagger anyway before heading for the porch.
The large windows show off an empty living room with plush couches and a stone hearth that has yet to be lit. There are paintings of various scenery, some forests, some water, all beautifully done. Still, I see no one inside as I make my way to the front door.
“Rainey Astor.”
I spin, blade raised. “Who the hell are you?” The woman who stands before me is wearing a pencil skirt in a vibrant blue, her white flowy top and red hair making her
look like a walking American flag.
She grins at me. “I see you’re enjoying my attire. I do like to look patriotic for our men and women in blue.”
“Huh?” The edge of my vision begins to blur—but not in a way that makes me dizzy. No, it’s almost as though I’m suffering from tunnel vision and the only thing I can focus on is the strange woman.
“The effects will wear off once you’re inside.” She crosses the porch, her heels clicking on the sturdy boards. “Come in.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“Someone who can help you, I’m sure.” After pulling open the door, she steps to the side and gestures for me to walk into the living room.
I’m trying to come up with reasons why I shouldn’t.
Why I should stay the fuck right here on the porch until Elijah gets here.
But I want to go inside, desperately.
Green eyes glitter with anticipation. “I won’t harm you, Hunter. Please do come in.”
“I’ll kill you if you try,” I warn, shaking my head to clear it.
She nods, so I move past her and inside. The second I cross the threshold, the place transforms, and all of the haze I was suffering from disappears like a bubble popping inside my brain.
“Better?” she asks as though it’s a perfect explanation for why the fuck I walked through a front door and into a forest.
“Where the hell are we?”
“Inside the house,” she replies as she walks barefoot across the thick, green grass and into a kitchen made entirely of wood. No longer in the clothing from outside, she’s wearing a pale green dress that hugs her upper body and spills into a skirt that flits as she walks. Leaning down, she stokes a fire, and after grabbing a ladle from a hook beside the hearth, dips it into the black pot hanging on a bar overhead.
“This is not inside the house.”
“It is. All part of the glamour. Tea?” she asks, ladling some liquid into three mugs.
“Who else is here?”
“No one, yet.”
“Who else is coming?”
“You should know. You called him.” The moment she finishes the sentence, the door bursts open.
“Rainey?” Elijah yells, eyes wide with panic. “Why the fuck did you come in here al—” He trails off, his gaze landing on our host. “Aoife?”
She smiles widely, showing off perfectly white, straight teeth. “Hello, Elijah.”
Elijah’s gone completely pale, his eyes full of emotion. “How?”
That single word uttered from his lips is packed with so much pain, so much grief, it seeps into my bones. I whirl on the woman he called Aoife, prepared to demand an answer for him if only to ease some of his agony.
But when my gaze lands on her, I see she looks just as somber. “I promise to answer all of your questions. Please,” she gestures to the stump in the center of the grassy floor. “Join us.”
He doesn’t move.
“Okay, who the hell are you, and why are you here?” I demand. Not even the anger in my tone is enough to snap Elijah out of whatever spell he’s under.
“I am Aoife,” she replies as though her name alone is supposed to provide some sort of answer.
“Ee-fa?”
She nods. “Aoife. And I’m here to stop the destruction of the supernatural world.” Her tone is so casual that I almost think she’s joking.
“Excuse me? Destruction of the supernatural world?” My gaze goes from her back to him. “How do you two know each other?”
Her attention transfers from me to the man still staring at her as though she’s a fucking ghost respawned and he’s unsure just what to do about it. “Elijah and I go way back, don’t we?”
I clear my throat. “That doesn’t really answer my question.”
Her brow furrows as she carries three mugs to a wooden stump in the center of the clearing that is also, apparently, a living room. She sets them down and kneels in the grass. “I suppose it doesn’t, but we’ll get to that. I would like to apologize for the lack of furniture. I am at my strongest when I am amongst nature,” she says as she runs her hands through the grass. “Come, have a seat, please.”
Elijah is still staring at her, completely in awe with the woman who just made us tea. I can’t help but feel a bit jealous, but I do my best to swallow it down as I join her.
She smiles at me, kindness etched in every line of her beautiful face. Freckles line her cheekbones, a dusting unlike the dark spots on mine. Her pale skin is complimented by bright golden eyes that watch me with interest.
Elijah stays rooted in his spot, unable to move.
“You planning on moving?” she asks him.
“Who are you?” he whispers.
I’ve never seen this man back down from a fight. Even when Doloris had us massively outnumbered, so to see him so afraid now—I’m just not entirely sure what to make of it, but it’s definitely far from comforting.
She reaches across the table toward me and touches my hand. Power rushes into my body, surging through me like electricity, and I jolt at the contact even as she appears to be unaffected. “We have much to discuss, Elijah and me, but I would like you to be a part of it as well.”
“I’m not going any-fucking-where,” I growl back.
“Good.”
Elijah, seeming to finally snap the hell out of it, walks toward us and drops to the grass beside me. “How?” his voice cracks, the weight of it a pang in my heart. He’s hurt.
She sighs sadly and lifts her cup to take a sip. “I was welcomed into the veil between here and the otherworld by a fae prince. He offered me life, power, if I would go to faerie with him.” She meets his gaze. “If I would be his bride.”
“You’re a fucking fae princess?” I ask, gaping at her. A fae? In Billings? I’m awestruck, unable to tear my eyes away as I take in everything around me. I thought she was a witch—but now I realize how foolish that was. My hunter senses are picking up a hell of a lot more than a magical current running through her body. No—Aoife is power. Every molecule in her body radiates it.
She laughs sadly. “No. Unfortunately, the wedding never happened. He was killed by a witch.”
“Oh.” Feeling like an asshole for my outburst, I focus instead on the way Elijah is reacting.
“I watched you die, Aoife.”
“You did.”
“You’ve been alive this entire time? Do you have any idea what happened to me when you died?”
Her eyes darken to a deep green, and thunder booms overhead. Which, of course, should make no sense since we’re inside a damn house.
Even magic should have its limitations.
And since this is my first fae, I have zero experience to compare her to. Is she just overly powerful? Or is this mild compared to what her kind can do?
“I did. I watched every moment of your downfall, Elijah, and I was greatly disappointed and saddened. You were so much better than that.”
He explodes up from the ground, and I jump up with him, more than ready to kill the bitch for whatever it is she did to him. It doesn’t matter that I have no clue what it was; I’ll kill for Elijah, without hesitation.
“You fucking abandoned me by choice? Losing you killed me.”
Aoife gets to her feet—slowly. “You and I were never meant to be, Elijah. You were always meant to love another.”
I gape at her, the pieces coming together. “You were his fiancée,” I whisper, and she turns her emerald gaze to me before nodding slowly.
One glance at Elijah, and I can see he’s getting damn close to snapping. I can’t blame him. He once told me that he went on a human-killing bender after his fiancée was killed. That she was who’d grounded him in humanity, and without her, he flailed around. A fish out of water, or more accurately, a vampire lacking empathy. He blamed himself for her death, and I know a part of him still does—or rather did, seeing as how she’s standing before us now.
It never bothered me that he’d loved another before we met. I’m too practi
cal to be upset by his past.
But seeing her here alive and well? I won’t lie, it’s fucking with my head.
“I had to go, Elijah. When the fae prince came to me, I refused him at first. After all, what could compare to what I felt for you? But soon, I realized that I could grow to love him, so I accepted his proposal. When he pulled me from the veil, I received my first vision. It was of you standing at the epicenter of a magical storm. A woman bathed in power by your side.” She walks forward and places a hand on my shoulder. “You and Rainey were always meant to find each other.”
“You abandoned me, Aoife. Left me to wither away and die alone.”
“If I hadn’t, you never would have met Rainey.”
I don’t realize how badly I need to see it on his face—the realization that his life didn’t turn out too shitty without her. But when he turns his attention to me and lets out a calming breath, it soothes the doubts. And when he reaches over to grab my hand, my heart rate slows. Especially when I meet Aoife’s eyes and see nothing but happiness.
No jealousy.
No regret.
Just relief that Elijah isn’t alone anymore.
I clear my throat. “So, destruction of the supernatural world? Care to elaborate?”
“There is a darkness coming,” she warns. “Something the likes of which we’ve never seen. Even the fae grow restless beyond the veil.”
“Are they coming here too?”
She shakes her head. “They refuse to meddle.”
Elijah snorts. “Yet they have no issue fucking with shit when it suits them.”
“This is true,” Aoife agrees. “I am here to bring you the warning and assist when I can.”
“Why not seek me out before then? If you’ve always known who I am,” I ask and shove both hands into the pockets of my leather jacket.
“I knew you would come here,” she replies.
“Did you kill Beatrice Smith?”
Aoife pales, and her eyes wide. “Bea is dead?”
I nod. “We found her body this morning. What do you know about her?”
“I rented this place from her,” Aoife answers after a moment, shifting her gaze from Elijah to me. “Such a sweet woman—a witch who kept to herself.”
Blood Captive: A Paranormal Vampire Romance (Vampire Huntress Chronicles Book 2) Page 4
