“So, he’s a warlock then?”
“I’m not sure. Possibly. Probably. But I don’t know.”
“Okay, then let’s go get him. Any exception to gratuitous violence?”
“No, none.”
Kai loped to the door, wagging his tail impatiently.
“We’re off to see the wizard, and plan to rip out his gizzard.”
Milo’s eyes flashed to mine, and I smiled faintly.
“Those aren’t the words, Kai.”
“But they fit.”
“I like the way he thinks,” Milo said, sliding around me to open the door, and Kai shot out.
“Meet you there.”
“Won’t people notice a wolf steaking through downtown?”
“Nah, the cloaking spell I did is pretty good about hiding him. It’s one of the only times he can run in the open. Otherwise, people tend to take shots at him.”
“Gotcha. After you.” He waved his hand, and I stepped out. We would get Evan back, and whoever had been stupid enough to try and use him as a pawn against me would regret it as he bathed in his own blood.
Chapter Eight
Milo
I knew she was strong, but this was more than even I’d expected. She was a warrior hiding in the body of an angel. I’d never had an opportunity to watch her go into battle, taking care of the few monsters that strayed too close for comfort the last few years. But watching her now, I could see why my father had never been able to find her, not even coming close. She’d been trained to survive.
“Out of curiosity, do we have a plan?”
“Kill them?” She took her eyes off the road, giving me a quick glance. “I don’t think it should a problem, especially now that you’re here.”
“Your faith in me is admirable. But shouldn’t we find out how these kidnappers knew where to find you? Why they kidnapped your friend? And how they knew you’d come rescue him? And I don’t know, perhaps why they want you in his place?”
“I don’t know if I trust you that much,” she finally replied.
“This is going to be an all or nothing kind of deal.” I gestured between the two of us. “Us: Trusting one another. You tell me your secrets, and I’ll tell you mine.”
She smiled faintly asking, “You have secrets?”
“Quite a few; and some of them will probably make you very angry with me.” She shot me a betrayed look, ready to throw me from the car if necessary, I was sure. I held up my hands. “I mean you no harm. In fact, I’ll lay my life down for yours, but that’s beside the point at the moment. We are on our way to fight people that obviously want you. That should be our primary focus.”
“I’m not so sure. You tell me you’ll die for me, and then change the subject. Makes a girl’s head spin.”
“Do I now?” A half smile crossed my face, as she rolled her eyes at me.
“I’m a powerful witch. Perhaps they want to steal me for their nefarious plans.”
“I could say there are many powerful witches in the world, but that’s no longer true. You are, however, the most powerful I’ve ever met. That spell you just did was proof enough. But how do they know you’re so powerful?” She refused to meet my eyes, and I continued. “It’s not often you meet a witch with a guardian.”
“What do you mean?”
“Kai, your wolf? He’s a guardian.”
“And that’s unusual … how?”
“Guardians have to be called upon. They aren’t your traditional familiar. They can communicate with their companion, lend them strength. They bond themselves. It’s a unique relationship.”
She nodded, casting a swift glance over me. “Interesting. You might be more useful than I thought.”
“How do you not know this already? You can cast a protection spell with zero effort, but don’t know what Kai is?” She had a confusing blend of awareness and ignorance when it came to magic, and it piqued my curiosity. Hell, everything about her enthralled me to be honest. She had a past I knew nothing about, even though I’d spent years hunting her and then conversely protecting her.
“Kai came into my life after my parents died.”
“Guardians and familiars only appear when your magic is awakened,” I replied slowly, starting to piece it together.
“My first vision was of their deaths.” She flashed a quick glance at me. “Kai appeared hours later. I knew he was special. I just didn’t know how. I’ve spent the last several years avoiding witches. I guess you can figure out why.”
I nodded, knowing a powerful seer was a useful weapon. If someone had killed her family to take Kincaid, I could see why she’d avoided others of her kind.
“Why are you telling me?”
“Because I made the decision to trust you. You should know what you’re getting yourself into.” She turned toward me slightly, but didn’t take her eyes from the road. “My ability can’t fall into their hands. Do you understand me? No matter what.”
“I’ll do whatever is necessary to protect you.” Which meant I’d kill anyone who tried to use her gifts against her will. I knew she wanted a promise that I would kill her before allowing her to be captured, but that would be an impossible promise for me to keep.
She sighed, accepting that would be the best she could get, for the moment. Her sigh reminded me of a long ago promise I’d made, but hadn’t kept, at least not so far.
***
She kicked the gravel, her hands stuffed into the pockets of her jacket, a mutinous expression on her face.
“I don’t want to leave.”
“Porche, I know. I don’t either, but we don’t have a choice. At least, not yet.” She gave me a hopeful look. At twelve, she thought I could do anything, and I felt the weight of it. I’d just turned fifteen a couple days before, and as my gift, we’d come to see Lionel and Paul. They’d welcomed us with open arms, feeding us and giving us a sense of normalcy, which only made it harder to leave when we inevitably had to. Dad was chomping at the bit to go already since he’d caught wind of a witch that might have something to do with the Davis girls.
An idea had begun stirring inside of me though, of a life where we didn’t have to move around. One where we could stay put and be normal.
“What are you thinking about, Milo?”
I glanced at her, wondering if I should get her hopes up. It’d be a while before I could make it happen. There was no way Dad would let either of us go off on our own. He’d made enemies over the years with his persistence in searching for the Davis girls. There were those who watched him, waiting to see if he found them, so they could use them for their own purposes. Others hoped he didn’t find them, because if the prophecy came true, then magic was at risk.
“Milo! Tell me.”
“I’ve been thinking. When I turn eighteen, I can go to college. Get a real education, a job, and a house for us.”
“A house? A real house? One we don’t have to leave?”
“That’s the plan.” The hope that lit up her face made my chest ache. I knew how much she wanted a stable life, one that didn’t require us to constantly move chasing leads. Leads that never led anywhere, I thought to myself. But making our dream happen wouldn’t be easy. Dad would see it as a betrayal. He considered us a team, all united to one goal, but I’d started to believe he was no better than the girls’ father. Our father accused their father of using his daughters to gain more power, to use them to rule magic, but our own father’s plan to kill them, any one of them, to stop the trinity from forming felt wrong to me.
I had no reason to care for these girls. In fact, I blamed them for the life we were forced to lead, the death of our mother at their father’s hands, but that didn’t mean I wanted them dead. Looking at Portia, knowing she was around the same age, I couldn’t imagine taking their lives.
“Do you promise?” Her question jerked me from my dark thoughts, and she gave me a steady look. Promises were important to us. We didn’t make them, unless we meant to keep them. Neither of us took them lightly, and w
e’d never broken one we’d made to the other.
“Portia, I promise that as soon as I am able to I will make a life for us, one away from hunting Davis girls, and constantly moving around. I will find a house for us, a place we can call home. I make this promise to you.” I held out my hand to her, and as she grasped it, I felt electricity shoot through my arm.
“A kinship bond!” She looked at me excitedly. “That’s what that is, right? Your magic, you’ve got your magic now!” She threw her arms around me, jumping up and down in her excitement, and I held tight to her, wondering what would happen now. Kinship bonds were usually between family members, similar ideals and compatible magic formed them, but I’d slowly started to drift away from my father’s ideals and was afraid there would be no kinship bond between us.
“It looks like it. Guess I’ve reached maturity.” Magic didn’t generally show up, until a witch or warlock had reached puberty, and more importantly, a level of maturity that could handle the use of magic. It tended to happen earlier for girls than boys, but I wasn’t sure what to think of the appearance of my own magic.
“Huh, I guess so. We should go tell Dad!”
“Wait.” I grabbed her arm, stopping her. She looked at me, surprised. “Not yet, okay? Dad will have a bunch of questions. Let me wrap my head around it, okay?”
“Okay.” She nodded slowly before smiling. “Your magic, and a promise that one day we’ll have a home of our own on the same day!” She hugged me again, her happiness shining through and warming me. If we kept looking forward, everything would be okay.
***
“Earth to Milo.” Fingers snapped in front of my face, jarring me. “Hey, there you are. Lost you for a bit.”
I looked over at Kincaid, her golden curls pulled back and a curious expression on her face. We were parked on the street in a part of downtown the tourists weren’t allowed to see.
“Why is it kidnappings and bad shit always happen downtown or out in the woods?” I commented, distracting myself from the bright blue of her eyes and the memory of my promise to Portia.
“No idea, but we should really work on it. See about suburbia as the new crime haven.” I chuckled as she went with my observation, no hesitation.
“So, we’re here?”
“Close.” She pointed down the street. “That building. I think they’re in the back. An office of some kind. Kai is checking it out.”
“Any change to the plan?”
“Nope, kill them all is still pretty much it. Well, after I sniff the place out. If I smell hellfire and damnation, we’re good.”
“Bloodthirsty, aren’t you? And are you serious about the hellfire and damnation?”
“Mainly just tired of being hunted. And yes. I’ll know if they’re evil. Follow my lead.” Her words shouldn’t have felt like they were aimed at me, but they did. For a long time, I had been one of the ones hunting her, and if my father had found her first, he would have attacked her. “I want a family, a place to call home. I don’t want to have to hide anymore.” Her words echoed the promise I’d made to Portia, and I realized we weren’t so different. “And if the story of the three sisters is true, then I don’t have much longer to wait.”
“What?” Her mention of the three sisters caught my attention, making me wonder if she somehow knew the prophecy. It made a weird sense. She was a seer, born of a line of seers. Perhaps, she’d known it, or learned it at some point.
“The three sisters. Don’t tell me I know something you don’t?”
“Maybe you do, or maybe we’re talking about the same thing.” I murmured, thinking about it.
“We need to go.” I gave her a startled look, and she tapped her head. “Kai.”
We stepped from the car and strolled down the eerily deserted street.
“Showdown on 5th Street,” I muttered, garnering a laugh from her.
“Kai said there are five guys. One for each of us, and three for him.”
“Not into sharing, is he?”
“He doesn’t get to hunt too often anymore. But anyway, Evan, that’s the guy we’re rescuing, appears to be in a room in the back.”
“Are we accounting for magic here?”
“The protection spell will resist magic, as well as bullets.”
“But will it allow us to see if they’ve set a magical trap?”
“No.”
“Great. You know this is borderline insane, right?”
“Yes, but I don’t see anything bad happening.”
“Well, in that case, let’s go.”
I caught a glimpse of Kai out of the corner of my eye, his tail disappearing behind the building. We made our way inside, the sound of our footsteps echoing in the space.
“Well, well, well. The prodigal daughter has returned to us.” The man walked out from behind a support beam, clapping. I tensed, ready to spring for him, but awaited Kincaid’s cue. She was calling the shots on this rescue mission, and I wouldn’t hijack it, until I thought she was in danger, even though danger was relative in this instance. “Be a good little girl, and we won’t hurt your friend.” Neither of us missed the emphasis he placed on friend, and from the look on her face, she didn’t understand it either.
“How about you fucking die, and I do what I want?”
He looked taken aback at her attitude, and I shook my head. She was easy to underestimate with her looks but, at the core, she was a badass, with a temper to boot. She charged him, catching him off guard as she slammed her hand into his face. Since she had him occupied, I went for the guy coming around the side and behind her.
A growl, some snarling, and then a wet snapping sound told me Kai had joined us. When Kincaid went flying past me, propelled by magic from a newcomer, I realized she had zero offensive magic. I used what little magic I had to whisper a counter spell. It didn’t have any effect on our opponent, but it managed to negate the spell he’d cast against her. Kai lunged for him, managing to snap the guy’s neck as Kincaid scrambled to her feet. Two more guys poured out from another room, so I went after them using my enhanced strength. I knocked one guy out, and was going after the other when he pulled out a gun and started shooting.
Completely unfair to bring a gun to a magic show was my thought as two bullets hit me in the chest. His distraction with shooting me had him miss hitting Kincaid coming around his side. A quick jerk, and she broke his neck.
“Are you okay?” she asked a bit frantically, scanning me. I reached up, patting my chest. I’d felt them hit, but they hadn’t pierced me. A glint of metal on the ground had me leaning down to pick it up. My eyes widened as I saw the flattened bullet casing. I held it up, so she could see, and she pressed her lips together.
“Huh, it really does make you bulletproof.”
I pocketed the destroyed bullet and took a look around. There were seven bodies surrounding us, most had their throats torn out, thanks to Kai. Two resembled broken marionette dolls, after I’d snapped their limbs.
“I guess we should see about your friend.”
She nodded, and I took one last look around. Killing them left no one to answer the questions I had, but watching Kincaid step over them, I had the feeling she knew quite a bit more than she let on.
We moved down a hall, and I was alert for more guards. If the seven we’d killed had been all they had, they’d vastly underestimated the woman in front of me. I wasn’t willing to let my guard down though. Those men were lackeys of her father, disciples who believed as he did, that the magic the girls possessed could be extracted from them in blood sacrifice. Once Mitchell Davis realized he wouldn’t be raising the trinity into his way of believing, he’d determined he would use them individually, instead. The only one he had any desire to see alive was his golden child, the seer. Her power could be taken in sacrifice, but not her gift, and a seer was worth far more than the power in her blood.
My father had uncovered his secrets years ago, which had only driven him to further pursue the trinity sisters, to destroy them before they c
ompleted their trinity and unleashed the full extent of their power. If their father ever captured even one of them, he could use their power for his own ends. I’d asked my father why he didn’t just kill their father, and his answer had terrified me as a child and still to this day. Mitchell Davis had already killed for his vision and used those deaths to increase his own power; power he still used in his blood magic. He was too powerful for any one of us to kill. The only ones who stood a chance against him were his own daughters.
She stopped next to a door and pointed at it. I nodded, positioning myself next to it as she shoved it open. Kai raced in, and Kincaid followed a few seconds later. I slid in, sweeping the room with my eyes, surprised there were no guards with him.
The Trinity Sisters Page 23
