by Sam Cheever
Sirius gave Blackthorne’s hand a wet kiss and dropped to his haunches.
“Yeah, my bad,” Ardith responded with a grin.
His smooth, ebony forehead crinkled as he tried to decipher her response. Theirs was truly a meeting of old and new. Ardith had been born in 1984 and, though Blackthorne wouldn’t tell her how old he was, she knew he’d been around during the Salem witch trials. In fact, he’d been one of the founders of the current council, created to ensure that a repeat of the trials never occurred.
“Your bad what?”
Ardith nodded toward the hooded robe he carried over one black leather-covered arm. “That for me?”
He opened the black silk robe and dropped it over her shoulders. As she stepped into it, his huge hands squeezed her shoulders with fatherly affection. Blackthorne had recruited Ardith right out of high school and trained her to be an epoch mage. Ardith’s feelings for the man were a combination of affection and deep respect. Blackthorne gave every indication of returning those feelings.
Ardith stepped out of his grasp and fell in beside him as they headed toward the council chambers.
“What did you learn?” he asked her.
Ardith sighed. “Nothing good. Edwige has not ceased her activities as we’d hoped. In fact, all signs indicate she’s stepped them up. The government has been trying to keep it quiet but it’s getting too big to ignore. A quiet investigation is about to blow up into a massive search if we don’t step in and stop her.”
They climbed the sparkling white stairs to the council building, which masqueraded as the Salem Social Club. Despite its name, the club was not open to the general public.
Blackthorne said nothing as they entered the cool, dimly lit foyer, crossed the marble floor and climbed a wide, sweeping staircase to the second level, where the council sat during formal meetings. The chamber was mostly empty at the moment, but as they pushed through the heavy wood doors Ardith quickly realized it wasn’t nearly empty enough.
Sirius’ hair stood on end, his silver eyes sparking as his massive body trembled with barely restrained fury. Ardith placed her hand on his back, between his shoulder blades, to stay him just until she figured out if he had reason to attack.
Ten feet away, standing with feet spread wide, massive arms crossed over his chest, the devil himself glared at her with an ice-blue gaze. Draigh Piers, Sorceri level five and massive thorn in her side, radiated hostility like waves of poisonous magic. “What is she doing here?”
Ardith went rigid. How dare he? “What am I doing here? The sheer size of your balls is only matched by the blackness of your soul, evil sorceri. I belong here. You, on the other hand, are a massive tumor on the backside of this building.”
Reacting to her anger, Sirius snapped his jaws, flinging spittle in a wide arc.
Ardith turned to Blackthorne. “Just say the word and Sirius and I will take care of this...growth...for you.”
Draigh’s arms dropped, his huge hands fisting over the set of deadly knives sheathed against his hip bones. “Try, witch. I welcome the exercise.”
“Stand down. Both of you.”
Ardith’s bright-green gaze slid sideways. Blackthorne’s boss, Lady Penelope, was draped carelessly across a padded chair. The epoch mages in the club all joked about the chair being her throne.
She certainly gave off an air of being worthy of one.
“Ardith, my girl, I invited Mr. Piers into the chamber.”
“Why? It certainly seems...”
“Shut up, girl!”
Ardith snapped her mouth closed. She could feel Draigh’s amusement at her dressing down. It made her spine even more rigid. “Please accept my apology, my lady.”
Lady Penelope held her in a sharp black gaze. Despite the woman’s delicate physique, she was every inch the mage she was reputed to be. Power vibrated almost visibly beneath her porcelain skin. “Your passion is an asset, Ardith, but don’t let it get in the way of your brain.” She glanced toward Draigh while addressing someone else. “Huntsman, do we have your word that your hunter will work equably with my mage?”
Ardith’s mouth opened in automatic rejection of the idea. A sorceri bounty hunter working alongside an epoch mage? Impossible. It was unheard of. They’d kill each other.
Particularly when she was the mage and Draigh was the hunter. They’d bumped up against each other several times over the years and had always ended up in battle. Ardith believed that problems were solved through arrest and discussion, while Draigh generally solved his problems with violence...mostly assassination. Their differences didn’t exactly engender a spirit of cooperation.
A man stepped forward from the shadows and Ardith sucked in a surprised breath. The Huntsman, leader of the Sorceries authority—bounty hunters for the magical realm—was known for his ability to blend into his surroundings, becoming all but invisible. It was the first time she’d experienced it firsthand.
He was a small round man with a balding head. He looked harmless and weak, like Lady Penelope. But like her, he was much more powerful than he appeared. He inclined his head. “My Lady. We have committed to working side by side with your people to solve this problem.”
“Sir!” Draigh roared.
The Huntsman’s head whipped around, his fleshy face reddening with rage. “Hunter.”
“I will not work with that...creature. I can find this rogue witch on my own.”
“Just as you have in the last weeks, hunter?” The Huntsman’s hands lifted away from his body, sparks flying from his fingertips as he fought to contain his rage.
The air thickened with spilled magic as the two men faced off.
A low rumble trembled on the thickening air. Ardith scratched Sirius’ head. “Steady, boy. This doesn’t concern us.” Her faithful friend quieted but he vibrated beneath her fingertips, ready to spring.
Draigh threw Ardith a look filled with undisguised hatred. “I refuse to work with her.”
The Huntsman seemed to grow several inches as he faced off with his inferior. “You will do as you’re commanded, hunter!”
The two men stood at an impasse for several beats and then the air started to soften as Draigh reigned in his anger, finally inclining his head toward his boss. “As you command, sir.”
Ardith started to smile at his humiliation. But then she realized what she’d just heard.
She was going to have to work side by side with the dreaded Draigh. Shit!
~AM~
He stood where the Elders left him, rigid with anger, his gaze cast down toward the floor, his fists clenched.
She watched him in silence, fascinated by the amount of anger filling the six-and-a-half-foot frame. Like her familiar, he vibrated with it.
Her gaze slipped over him, starting with the thick mop of glossy, silver-blond hair on his head, then crossing the massive chest, bulging arms, tree trunk-sized thighs and sharply cut calves. His huge feet were encased in scuffed black leather boots.
He was a brute. A monster. A human-shaped bloodhound with the manners of a Neanderthal.
She hated him.
H-A-T-E-D him.
But her body seemed to like him some. Her thighs tightened when she looked at him. Her nostrils flared to pull in his scent. She told herself he was interesting in a purely physical way. Just a giant, well-shaped pheromone wafting her way.
Fortunately she’d carved a lifetime from the practice of self-denial.
“If you’re done pouting we should get going.”
For a beat he seemed not to have heard her. Probably because of all the blood rushing through his brain as his rage turned him to jagged rock. Then slowly, very slowly, he turned his head in her direction and she had to fight the urge to step back.
His icy-blue gaze pierced the distance between them. Surprisingly dark eyebrows lowered in a menacing glare. His perfect lips curled with distaste.
“Must you dress like a harlot?”
She snorted. The caveman had a dress code. “We’ll be travelling t
o the twenty-second century. This is how the females in that time dress.”
“I have spent time in that century. I am well aware. But not all women dress like hookers.”
She pulled off the robe and flung it to the ground, her only thought to annoy him completely. “Despite your surprisingly puritan sensibilities, this attire gets me around the places I need to go. If you don’t like it, don’t look at me.”
“I assure you that will be no problem.”
She snorted again, heading out of the chambers. “Come along, dog. You too, Sirius. Time’s awastin’.” She was pretty sure that wasn’t Sirius growling behind her as she headed for the portal in the basement of the council building.
~AM~
The council had situated the portal for a protected escape in the case of another anti-witch uprising. It was in the dungeons, separated from the upper floors by several barred wooden doors to keep even the most rabid pursuers at bay long enough for the mages to make it through. In addition, the doors were covered by enchantments tied to the almost non-existent electrical signatures given off by non-magical beings.
Ardith hated the subterranean portal, which was the reason she’d returned via the one in the village earlier that day. She’d been abandoned to die in a deep hole in the earth as a child, by a non-magic stepmother who was terrified of the things Ardith could do with her magics and thought she was a monster. With years and perspective, Ardith now understood who the real monster had been in that scenario and she’d learned to overlook the hatred her differences engendered in some.
Blackthorne had pulled her out of that hole a dozen years earlier, saving her life. Though he’d never explained how he’d found her. He’d only say that the council kept tabs on its own, and that they’d known she was theirs from the moment of her birth.
The scars caused by the terror of being buried alive had never lessened. Ardith was finding it harder to breathe with every step toward the dark, dank caverns below the building.
Sirius licked her hand, whimpering. She forced her fingers to unclench long enough to scratch him reassuringly above the glistening crystal collar she used to keep track of him.
The sorceri clomped down the stairs behind her, seemingly unaware of her plight.
Not that he’d care.
By the time she descended the last slimy, concrete step, a fine sheen of sweat coated her body and tremors shook her hands. Her breath wheezed in and out of her lungs.
Sirius nibbled her fingers in warning. “I’m okay, boy.”
“What is it, woman? The stench of your fear has been choking me for the last five minutes.”
She glanced over her shoulder, working hard to still the tremors rolling through her body. “It’s nothing. I’m not fond of underground spaces. I’ll be fine.”
He stared at her for a moment and then inclined his head. She was shocked he didn’t offer some cutting remark about her weakness.
“It’s not that much farther now.” She started off again, her footsteps dragging forward with dread. Sweat ran in rivulets down her brow and between her shoulder blades. The walls seemed to pulse inward, threatening to clasp her in a slimy embrace. Shudders racked her terror-chilled body.
Without warning, the floor tilted, whirled and rushed toward her.
A hard pair of arms scooped her up before she crashed into the slime-covered stones.
“Good lord above, woman. You nearly broke your rock-encased head on the floor.”
Ardith’s vision darkened and churned with shapes. Despite the muzziness that tried to claim her, she was vaguely aware of the hunter’s delectable scent surrounding her, as well as the enticing heat of his big body. She had an overwhelming need to burrow into that heat. It promised to chase away the shuddering cold infusing her body. Despite the unwelcome thought, Ardith shoved against his chest. “Put me down.”
“So you can kiss the rocks beneath my feet. I think not. Lie still. I can get us out of here more quickly if you’ll stop fighting me.”
Ardith went limp. She told herself it was because of his promise to get her out of the hellish dungeons. Deep down she knew his heat and delicious hardness were just too pleasant to escape.
Not when the alternative was the bowels of hell.
She stared straight ahead. Her hands clenched his shirt so tightly her fingers ached. Cool air washed over her skin and she realized he was running. The rhythmic clicking of Sirius’ nails alongside soothed her and she closed her eyes so she couldn’t see the walls rushing by. He covered the remaining distance to the portal effortlessly, as if her weight were no more than a feather resting on his hands.
Moments later she heard the whoosh of air that told her they’d entered the portal and the world thickened, spinning flecks of minute matter across her skin as they defied time and space.
Suddenly they stood in the bright sunshine. Flowers scented the air.
Ardith took a deep breath, cleansing her lungs of the moldy, subterranean stench, and opened her eyes. She looked into the hunter’s cool, silver-blue gaze and gasped.
For just a beat, she’d caught him looking down at her with something less than pure hatred.
It must have surprised him as much as it surprised her, for he all but dropped her to her feet.
They frowned at each other for a moment and then Ardith turned away, striding across the meadows surrounding Devil’s Glen, the largest habitation of humankind in the continent once known as America. “Come along, dog. You too, Sirius.”
A massive hand dropped onto her shoulder and yanked her around, dragging her up against a massive, granite-like chest. Ardith gasped in surprise. She hadn’t heard him move, hadn’t sensed him. Despite his size, he’d moved like a wraith—silent, quick and deadly.
Silver-blue intensity seared through her. “Don’t. Ever. Call me that again. Clear?”
Ardith glared back at him, swallowed harder than she would have liked, and her mouth opened to snap something back.
A massive finger pressed against her lips. “Do not speak. You and I both know only poison comes from between those lips. I’m trying very hard not to kill you at this moment.”
Their gazes held, collided. Ardith swore she could smell smoke from the explosive clash of their wills. She refused to look away. Refused to back down. He was her inferior and she would be damned if she’d let him intimidate her as he did his fugitives.
The air thickened with leaking magic. His heat and scent infused his energy, making her traitorous body tighten with need. His finger remained pressed against her lips.
Sirius whimpered.
Finally Ardith opened her mouth and sucked the thick finger inside, pulling it deep. His icy glare widened in shock. A beat later she pulled away. “Not everything that comes out of my mouth is poison, hunter.” Turning away, she stalked toward the squat environs ahead. Smiling.
Ardith one, hunter zero.
Check out all the books of the Apocalyptic series here: http://www.samcheever.com/series.html#apocalyptic
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Did you love Bedeviled & Befouled? Then you should read Sangui by Sam Cheever!
The Alphas of the Blood are an elite, alien race of vampires. They escaped a devastated planet that was overrun with plague-infected beasts and came to Earth for a chance at a new life…a new beginning. The change is bitter-sweet for Zeenon Akba, who lost much of his family in the plague wars and fears his only brother might have carried the infection to Earth with him. But when Zee stumbles upon a pretty human female being stalked by an infected, he’s determined to help her, even if it means killing his own brother. Aware of their many differences and the necessity of finding a blood slave to be his mate, Zee doesn’t intend to lose his heart to pretty and spunky Brooke Carlin.
So why can’t he get her out of his mind?
Read more at Sam Cheever’s site.
Also by Sam Cheever
ALPHAS OF THE BLOOD
Sangui
Mavim
APOCALYPTIC SERIES
Apocolyptic Mojo
Tall Dark and Apocalyptic
An Apocalyptic Need
BEDEVILED & BEYOND
Bedeviled & Belittled
Bedeviled & Besmirched
Bedeviled & Befouled
HONEYBUN HEAT
A Honeybun and Coffee
Life, Liberty and Pursuit of a Honeybun
Fast Track to a Honeybun
A Honeybun in Hell
Honeybun in a Loin Cloth
Honeybun at a Dude Ranch
Honeybun on the Run
Honeybun, One and Done
Honeybun Heat Box Set Volume 1
Honeybun Heat Box Set Volume 2
YESTERDAY'S MYSTERIES
Yesterday's News
Threads of Yesterday
Yesterday's Ghosts
Standalone
Guardian
Blue Screened
Watch for more at Sam Cheever’s site.
About the Author
USA Today Bestselling Author Sam Cheever writes romantic paranormal/fantasy and mystery/suspense, creating stories that celebrate the joy of love in all its forms. Known for writing great characters, snappy dialogue, and unique and exhilarating stories, Sam is the award-winning author of 50+ books and has been writing for over a decade under several noms de plume.
Read more at Sam Cheever’s site.
