The Volatile Amazon

by Sandy James

  “Fuck,” Megan echoed her husband.

  One by one, photos of the Amazons appeared. All four of them. The unflattering mug-shot style pictures stared back from the screen.

  “These women,” Helen said, “are our worst enemies. Each and every one of them wants me dead.” She put her hand against her chest. “Your savior, and they want to destroy me. They must be stopped! The Children of the Earth will pay a reward to anyone who can capture one or all of these traitors!”

  “So much for the world never knowing we existed,” Gina said.

  “Where in the hell did she get those pictures?” Zach asked as his face flushed red. “I thought the goddesses wiped away all the memories of the girls existing? Those look like drivers’ license photos. And how was she able to add Sarita’s scar to hers?”

  “Beats the shit outta me,” Johann replied. “But my bet’s on Seior, either to erase memories or to scour for information.” A rueful chuckle slipped out. “I’m guessing you’re going to pop up on that list soon. How much of a bounty do you think they’ll offer for the infamous computer giant Zach Hanson, especially if he wants to kill their savior?”

  A crooked smile crossed Zach’s lips. “Hope it’s not enough for my wife to turn me in and claim the reward.”

  Gina elbowed her husband in the ribs. “You’re not getting away from me that easily.”

  He gave her a quick kiss. “Glad to hear it.”

  “Helen used all your maiden names—except for Rebecca. Megan Feuer, not Herrmann.” Sarita interrupted them.

  “And I’m Gina Himmel. She’s not as up-to-date with us as we feared. But she’s obviously using Seior.”

  “Seior is powerful stuff,” Johann said. “If it’s used right, it can undo all the good of white magicks. Helen’s gone to the dark side. She’s not hiding behind someone this time, either. No Chernabog or Sekhmet. She’s hanging her ass out there.”

  “She has Darian,” Gina pointed out.

  “But he’s not an Ancient,” Zach replied. “From the way he’s dressed, I’d say she’s passing him off as her personal assistant.”

  “Or bodyguard.” Johann’s gaze grew hard, his blue eyes turning stormy, as he became the Sentinel Sarita knew so very well. “She wants a fight? Well, we’ll give her a fight. In fact, we’ll give her a war. I vote we get ourselves ready and we strike the first blow.”

  “And we make it a doozy,” Zach added.

  “We need to tell Rebecca and Artair about this.” Sarita headed toward the door.

  Gina followed. “If it’s war, it’s time to make a battle plan.”

  * * *

  Ian tossed his sunglasses aside and grabbed the crystal container of scotch.

  “Drinking again?” Helen asked. She cast off her gold robe and strode to the bar. “I should forbid you. I need you sensible, not drunk.”

  As if he could get drunk on the swill they called scotch. In his era...

  Ah, but that was the problem. This wasn’t his era. He was trapped in a time not his own, alone. “I want Sile and Old Ewan to come to me.”

  “I tire of you asking the same thing,” Helen replied. “They stay at the castle until you complete your job. Once Artair is dead, I’ll send you home. Then you can rot in that stupid hellhole for all I care.”

  Drinking the contents of the glass in one swallow, he let the whiskey burn its way down his throat. Everything about his existence seemed...wrong. Yet he couldn’t understand why.

  He’d been granted a reprieve when Helen rescued him from limbo, and now his chance for revenge grew near. Helen had launched her quest to capture the Amazons, and with them came Artair MacKay.

  Ian would face him—man to man—and cut him down.

  So why wasn’t he relishing his chance to finally avenge his death? Instead, he felt lost. Confused.

  Wrong.

  His brother was a formidable warrior, so the fight wouldn’t be easy. Although Ian had spent so much of his life being groomed as the laird’s brother—dealing with the livestock and the crops—he’d also trained with the soldiers. At least he had when the men would allow a cripple to spar with them. Then he’d become laird in his own right when Artair was gone.

  Once Ian’s hand had been restored, he’d tried to make up for lost time, training like a madman for near to six months until...

  No wonder his clan thought him possessed.

  He snorted, not sure why the sound made him smile.

  When he faced Artair, Ian had a good chance of victory. They would be more evenly matched now that he was training again. Should he lose and faced death again, he was taking his brother with him, no matter what.

  Helen motioned him over to the table. Spread over the surface were pictures of the four women she wanted. “You will see to any reports that the Amazons have been found. Take all the help you need, but check each viable lead.”

  Ian stared at the pictures. He knew the faces well, having studied them at Helen’s insistence. Yet his gaze always returned to the exotic Water Amazon. Sarita Neeraj.

  Her eyes fascinated him. Hell, everything about her fascinated him. He could almost hear her voice, feel the silky thickness of her hair. But he’d never met her. He hadn’t personally encountered any of the Amazons. So long as they remained in their home of Avalon, he couldn’t touch them. Helen was working on breaking the enchantment around the floating compound, but she wasn’t quite there. Not yet.

  Helen picked up a remote and flicked on the enormous television, flipping through channels until she found one discussing the destruction of art happening around the world. The reporter commented on the strangeness of each piece depicting a god or goddess from many different cultures.

  Helen tilted her head back and laughed, sounding a bit crazed. “I’m winning. Do you hear me, Ian? I’m winning.”

  “Ye truly believe all of this—” he swept his hand toward the screen, “—is necessary.”

  Her laughter stopped abruptly. “I’ve told you before—don’t question me. I do what I must to ensure my power exceeds those of any other Ancient. None will be able to challenge me. Once I am ready to claim my place as the leader of this world, there will be none who can defeat me. When everyone worships me, my powers will grow as the other Ancients weaken—until I am the strongest goddess the world has ever known. Then I’ll show them all that I am truly a daughter of Gaia—that I have become all I knew I could be—the savior of the earth.”

  Ian poured himself some more scotch, drank it down and then headed to his room. He slammed the door behind him.

  Stripping out of his suit, he longed for the freedom of his plaid, although he would never wear the MacKay colors again. After spending the day with Helen and the stupid sheep she called followers, he felt dirty. Used. Was his revenge worth...this?

  “Aye.”

  So why wasn’t his heart consumed with revenge any longer? What had changed?

  Searching his thoughts he found nothing. Worse than nothing...he felt as though something important had been lost.

  He stepped in the shower and started the water, not caring that the first spray against his skin was ice cold. At least it reminded him he was alive. Closing his eyes, he let the water run over his hair, wanting to scrub out the sticky goop Helen insisted he wear. She dictated his dress, his haircut, his manners. She groomed him like some prized pony, and he was fucking tired of it.

  As always happened when Ian closed his eyes, images hit him from every direction, making him dizzy. Artair kneeling at his side, screaming out for help, his palms slick with Ian’s blood. The MacKay clan chanting as they tossed more wood on Ian’s pyre, damning him as a witch as the flames licked at his skin. Sile and Old Ewan standing tall, refusing to denounce their laird.

  And then there was a woman—an exotic woman with dark skin.

  She w
as always there, her beautiful face and brown eyes swimming in his thoughts, pushing aside the bad memories and filling his heart and his mind in a way he couldn’t understand. She would kiss him, caress him, love him.

  But why? How could a woman he’d never met haunt him so?

  Ian opened his eyes and slammed his fist against the tile wall. Was this some torture Helen had designed to keep her lapdog in line? Even that question raised a familiarity that chilled him to the bone.

  This would all be over soon. Then Ian could return to his home.

  Assuming Helen allowed that, and he had his doubts, not trusting her any farther than he could toss a caber.

  Only she knew the end game, so all he could do was wait.

  Chapter Twelve

  “We can’t just storm her church.” Johann plopped his behind into one of the chairs in the MacKay living room. Plucking the remote from the coffee table, he hit the mute button.

  Sarita was grateful. The sound of so many raised voices coupled with the droning of some news network reporter was making her grind her teeth. She longed for the silence and serenity of dorcha àite.

  Ever since Helen’s announcement, Avalon had been a flurry of noise. Between monitoring the television stations for anything about the four “most hated” women in the world, the heated discussions over what they should do about their situation, and curse words being hurled about Helen, the din was maddening. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that she had so many followers in the media, but so many different stations demanding the Amazons’ capture? Helen’s reach extended farther than they’d imagined.

  Everything came back to one problem—the sisters needed to know Helen’s ultimate goal. They feared they already knew what she wanted—to rule the world. Painting bull’s eyes on the Amazons was distracting, but as long as they stayed in Avalon, no real harm could come to them. Yet if they remained in Avalon, Helen could do as she pleased.

  Which doomed the world to conquest by the Children of the Earth in the name of their savior.

  There was so much to think about, so many decisions to be made, and Sarita tried to stay focused on the mission. The problem was she couldn’t get Ian out of her mind.

  He was her enemy now.

  Why couldn’t she make her heart believe it?

  “Call it what it is, lad,” Artair said. “Her temple. She’s an Ancient, and they have temples. As for taking the fight to her, aye, we can storm in. Although I suggest we try to find out if she’s hiding anything up her sleeve first.”

  “A covert mission,” Rebecca added. “Let’s do some fact-finding to plan our strategy.”

  Looking to Megan, he nodded. “She can be Helen.”

  The way Johann was clenching his jaw spoke volumes. He didn’t want his wife shape-shifting into Helen just to get someone inside her headquarters so they could dig up some information. Unfortunately, his silence meant he didn’t have anything else to suggest.

  “I could,” Megan said. “Wouldn’t like it much, though.”

  Artair frowned. “You’ve never backed down from a challenge before.”

  “You’ve got it wrong, Artair,” Megan replied. “I’m not backing down. I’d love to get into her temple and do some snooping. I just don’t want to make myself look like her. The shape would be hard to hold since I hate her so much. But you tell me to go, I’ll go.”

  Instead of saying anything, Johann wrapped his arm around Megan’s shoulder and pulled her closer. Her head dropped to his shoulder as his fingers caressed her ponytail.

  “We’d have to go in really late,” Zach said, scribbling out notes on a legal pad. Since he’d come to Avalon, he’d become the one who searched through every detail of any attack, using the analytical mind that had made him a technological legend to be sure all the loose ends were accounted for. “Lots of surveillance to figure out what her schedule is. And then there’s Ian and the rest of her staff. Not to mention making sure there aren’t many COEs around.”

  “The Ancients willnae approve of her making the Amazons public. But—”

  Artair’s words came to an abrupt halt when Bonnie came into the room.

  His four-year-old daughter was dressed in pink My Little Pony pajamas. Her blond hair was out of its usual pigtails, and her blue eyes were heavy with fatigue. She took her brother’s hand and dragged him to the sofa where her parents sat. “It’s bedtime, Da.”

  Leaning forward, Artair kissed Bonnie’s forehead. “Aye, my bonny lassie.”

  “Do I hafta go to bed, Da? I’m not sweepy.” Darian dropped Bonnie’s hand to rub his green eyes. The boy looked more asleep than awake as he clutched the navy blue MacKay plaid he used as a security blanket.

  “Aye, laddie.” He tousled his son’s chestnut hair. “You do. Kiss your mum, bairns, then off to bed with the lot of you.”

  To Sarita, this three-year-old boy dressed in Spiderman pajamas giving his mother a kiss would always be the only “Darian.” She’d held him right after Rebecca brought him into the world. His Aunt Sarita had lovingly given him his first bath, swaddled him in soft blankets and set him back in his mother’s waiting arms. As Rebecca cradled her precious bundle, Artair had announced that his son’s name would be Darian. He’d sniffed back tears as he gave the baby the name of the younger brother he’d loved enough to spend his life in Rhiannon’s service.

  Ian could never be “Darian.” Not to her. Darian was a boy. Ian was a man—the man she loved.

  “If you’ll excuse me for a minute.” Artair got to his feet. He smiled at his children, grabbing Bonnie and tossing her onto his back.

  Bonnie squealed in delight, wrapped her arms around her father’s neck and her legs around his ribs to take a piggyback ride to bed.

  Darian laughed as Artair scooped him into his arms and blew a raspberry against his belly. That laughter continued as Artair carried his children up the stairs to their rooms.

  “This is killing him,” Rebecca said when they were gone.

  “I can’t even imagine how much.” With a shake of her head, Gina reached for Zach’s hand.

  “What can we do to help?” Zach asked.

  Rebecca breathed a weighty sigh. “Just be there for him. This isn’t going to get any easier, either. If we go after Helen—” Her gaze shifted to Sarita. “Well, then...”

  Sarita frowned. “We’ll have to face Ian, too.”

  Silence ruled until Artair came stomping down the stairs. “The bairns are abed.”

  “Mina was already asleep when Megan and I left,” Johann said. “So were Beagan and Dolan. Shifted to rabbits and curled up on the rug in her room.”

  “Yeah, the kids wear them out. But they’re such great nannies.” Rebecca patted the sofa next to her.

  Artair took a seat. “So...what’s been decided?”

  “Right now, nothing but surveillance,” Zach replied. “We’ve got to find their patterns. Then we can figure out when to sneak Megan in. Once we know what Helen’s got cooking, we’ll make some solid plans for when to bring her down.”

  “’Twill not be easy,” Artair said.

  Sarita couldn’t help but snort a laugh. “It never is. And we’ve got another huge problem. Everyone and their brother wants us now.” Then she stated her demand, refusing to let anyone talk her out of it. “When Megan goes, I go too.”

  “Sarita, no,” Rebecca said. “You don’t have the kind of powers that would help if you’re caught.”

  It took all her self-control not to snap at the Guardian. “I have to go. If we see Ian, he’ll listen to me. I might be able to help him get away from Helen’s hold.”

  Artair wouldn’t make eye contact with her.

  “I’m going. End of discussion.”

  “People want us dead,” Rebecca stated.

  “If we’re lucky,” Gina added,
“they’ll try to shoot us.”

  Since Rhiannon had gifted the Amazons with skin that was as effective at stopping bullets as Kevlar, Sarita nodded. “Glad we’re not living in the era when everyone carried swords. Probably won’t have to fight any revenants this time. Too hard to keep zombies around for when you need them.”

  For the first time since Sarita had returned from dorcha àìte, she saw Artair smile. “’Twould be a muckle lot of smell if she did.” His expression changed as he drew his lips into a grim line. “Sarita is right. She should go.”

  His announcement seemed to be as much a surprise to the rest of the group as it was to her. “Thank you, Artair.”

  “Donnae thank me, lass. What if he sees you and still wishes to fight?”

  She swallowed hard. “I guess I’ll do what I have to do. I’m an Amazon. I’ll do my job.”

  “Could you kill him?” Rebecca asked. Her brown eyes were filled with concern.

  “I don’t know,” Sarita replied in all honesty. “I just don’t know.”

  * * *

  “You ‘forgot a few things’?” Sarita jogged to keep up with Megan’s long strides down the corridor leading to the COE offices. “After all our planning, that’s the best you could do?”

  Megan—wearing Helen’s face and her typical medieval gown—shrugged as she led Sarita to Helen’s private office. “I learned when I was a cop that sometimes simpler is better. It got us past the guards, right?”

  Flimsy, yes. But Megan was right. They’d stopped to sign in at the building’s security post, and Megan told the soldier manning the desk she needed to go back to her office to retrieve a few things she’d forgotten. He’d barely blinked—Helen had probably established a pattern of popping in and out of the temple at all hours of the day and night.

  Worried that the guard might recognize one of the most wanted faces in the country, Sarita had done her best to change her usual appearance. A small glamour spell she’d learned temporarily hid her scar and damaged earlobe. Her hair had been pulled into a tight bun, and she donned nerdy glasses with thick black rims. Add a heavy layer of makeup to her usually fresh face and she came across as a stereotypical nobody who trailed powerful people. The ruse was easy since Helen always had a Child of the Earth following her like a puppy dog.