Priceless

by Shannon Mayer

  He crawled away from me, but not too far. I sat up to see the battle still raged. “Help O’Shea,” I said to Alex, who bounded off after the agent, taking a witch out at the knees in the process.

  I scrambled over to India and scooped her into my arms, the buzz of holding the missing child I’d connected to giving me a burst of energy. I slipped off my shirt and put it on her, covering her body. Shy hazel eyes lifted to meet mine. “I knew you’d come for me. I saw you, in a dream.”

  I nodded, not really understanding why I’d connected so strongly with her over any of the other children I’d sought out. “Come on, kid. Let’s get you out of here.”

  Thanking the heavens we’d made it in time, I started us toward the open door. “O’Shea, Alex, let’s go, the party’s over.”

  A quick glance showed there were only two members of the black Coven left standing, and both were engaged with Milly. I wanted to stop and help her, but knew that not only would she not appreciate my help, but she might just turn on me completely.

  O’Shea was sweaty, his breath coming in big gulps, but again, his eyes glittered. Yup, he really liked this action-packed life I led. I couldn’t stop the snort that escaped me.

  “What?”

  Clutching India to me, I ignored O’Shea. “Hang on, kid,” I said into her hair. She smelled of baby powder and blood. One more person’s innocence down the drain of life.

  I turned my back on Milly, did my best not to see her strain to keep the two Coven members from her, watched in anger as her own Coven member stood aside and let her fight on her own.

  “You aren’t going to help her, are you?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

  “You have the child, I suggest you leave.” The woman I’d bled answered me in a tone that brooked no argument. Except, I wasn’t real well-known for backing down from an argument’.

  “What, you planning to kill her and blame it on the black Coven?” As the words escaped my mouth, I knew that was the truth of it, saw it flash in her eyes.

  I put India down. “O’Shea . . .”

  “Go save your friend.”

  A half-smile was all I could manage. Pulling my sword, I ran toward the woman who would be Milly’s death if I walked away.

  24

  Milly dispatched the last two black Coven members and dropped to her knees. The exhaustion was plain on her face. I knew her, and she was completely wiped out. Her “friend” stood over her, hands lifted, and her back to me. Perhaps she thought I was the lesser threat— that was about to be her final mistake. Milly didn’t even try to fight back, didn’t even twitch with her Coven member prepping a death spell over her head.

  It gave me the perfect shot. The witch turned at the last second and tossed a spell at me, fire tingled down the blade of my sword and onto my arm, purple and deadly, but it disappeared in a puff. Her eyes widened. “That cannot be.”

  “Bitch, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” I said. I swung hard and true, removing the woman’s head, her mouth an “o” of surprise that stuck with her even in death. Her head rolled away from us to land where the pentagram was still etched into the floor, right where the demon had died. That seemed fitting.

  “You okay?” I crouched in front of Milly.

  She started to cry. “They are trying to kill me. You were right.”

  Without another word I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and hugged her tight. “They have to go through me first, you know that.”

  Her sobs shook her tiny frame and I thought about all the nights I’d listened to her tell me how great the Coven would be once she was a part of it. How life would be good. How much she would learn.

  I pulled her to her feet, keeping one arm around her waist. I was tired too, but I hadn’t just fought off nearly a dozen witches and survived.

  “I’m so sorry, Rylee,” she said, her head hitting my shoulder.

  “Don’t worry about it now. But don’t think I won’t kick your ass later.”

  She laughed and then sniffed. “Let’s get out of here.”

  O’Shea picked up India and she clung to him. It was an image that stopped me in my tracks. An auburn-haired child in his arms made me think of things I couldn’t have and shouldn’t want.

  “What’s wrong?” Milly lifted her head from my shoulder.

  Clearing my throat and scrubbing at my eyes, I motioned at O’Shea. “We need to switch. Give me India, you take Milly.”

  He didn’t question me, just made the swap and we started back toward the door. Milly lifted a hand, stopping us. “The way you came in is swarming with cops. We need to go out the back door.”

  She directed us deeper into the castle, to the top of a stairwell that was pitch black, narrow, and filled with the scent of urine, feces and death.

  Alex grumbled. “Stinks.”

  “Buddy, you got that right,” I said, taking shallow breaths.

  “At the bottom is the cells where they kept the children,” Milly said, her voice choking up.

  Kept, as in past tense. Shit.

  It was India though who spoke next, surprising me, her voice steady despite the words. “They killed all the other kids.”

  My arms tightened around her instinctively. I couldn’t help it. “Do you know how many?”

  Her little shoulders shrugged. “I think there were at least three others. One cried all the time, then there was the boy next to me, his name was Jake, and there was another one kid on the other side of me, but that one didn’t say anything. Ever.” As she spoke, her eyes grew wide and dilated.

  I shared a glance with O’Shea over her head. Three kids. The other three missing kids.

  I tucked her head into my shoulder. “Okay. Try not to think about it.”

  “We have to come back for them,” O’Shea said.

  Of course we did; I wasn’t in the habit of letting kids stay missing, not if I could take them home to their parents, even if they were no longer alive. Closure was closure, plain and simple.

  We stepped into the dark stairwell, the only light O’Shea’s flashlight that faded and flickered every time he brought it close to Milly. It was good enough, though even I jumped a few times at the shadows when they’d flicker and dance on the walls.

  “Don’t worry, we disabled all the booby traps ahead of time,” Milly said.

  That explained it. “Before you even got here?”

  “I knew you’d be ahead of us, so I convinced the Coven to disable all the dangers far enough in advance that no unsuspecting human would stumble into them.”

  “But you know that isn’t possible. No human would have stumbled into them.”

  There was a rustle of cloth, and then O’Shea put Milly down. She looked over at me. “They have stayed so secluded that they don’t even know how their magic relates to the human world anymore.”

  My brain struggled to wrap around the thought. To be so close-minded that you weren’t even aware of how your magic interacted with others was beyond ridiculous, it was potentially a death sentence.

  The five of us crossed the veil with no problems, going from a dark and cool cave to blinking from the harsh sunlight burning down on us. A sneaking suspicion filled my mind. “Where are we?”

  “New Mexico,” Milly answered. “Not too far away from where your friend’s bar is.”

  “Son of a bitch, that damn fucking Doran screwed me over!” I trembled to think how much faster I’d have been able to get to India, would have maybe even saved those other kids, if he’d given me this location instead of the roundabout way. There would have been no need for the climbing gear, or battling the Harpies.

  Milly touched my arm, took India from me and tucked her into the camouflage Hummer that was parked next to the cave. “Don’t think about what might have been. We got India out. That’s what matters, remember?”

  I stalked over to the Hummer and scrounged around inside, finding several blankets, then went back to gather up the remains of the other kids. O’Shea tried to come with me, but I shook
him off. “No, stay here with Milly and India.”

  “And if you run into that cloaked guy? What then?”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Milly perk up, and I angled my body to block her view.

  I tried for nonchalant and failed. “I’ll run away. Really fast.”

  He snorted and turned his back on me, which shouldn’t have bothered me, but it did. I refused to analyze the simple truth of the matter, but I was starting to trust the ex-agent. My heart swirled with emotions. So much had happened in the last couple days that even I, who was used to this sort of shit going down, struggled with it.

  Moving quickly, I slipped across the veil and back into the castle’s dungeon. The first two kids were so small, curled up in fetal positions as they hid from the death that claimed them, that I easily wrapped them in a single blanket. So frail and tiny with weight loss, they were no burden to pack out together, and I did my best not to think about the pain of their deaths, or how much their parents missed them.

  On the next trip, I went to the cell I quickly realized held Jake, India’s friend. On his shirt he had a nametag, sewn in over the right side of his chest, a soccer ball underneath it. He was still in his soccer gear from when he’d been snatched. Tall socks, cleated shoes and bright green shorts were his uniform. He looked as if he was just sleeping, with a tousled head of blonde hair. Crouching down, I took a deep breath, ignored the smells, and reached out for him with my ability, hoping that maybe there was a flicker of life in him still.

  Pain shot through me and I fell over on my ass, shocked. He was still alive!

  Scrambling, I rushed to his side, gently feeling for a pulse. Nearly a minute passed and then . . . there . . . a beat of his heart. Wrapping him up in the blanket, I stood and headed toward the door, my heart soaring. Little Jake was alive and we were going to keep him that way.

  A shuffle of cloth and a flicker of movement to my left made me spin and crouch, peering into the darkness. Body thumping with adrenaline, I stared into the darkness. Nothing. O’Shea’s words had put me on edge; I was hearing things, though now I wished I’d taken him up on his offer.

  Tension filled the air and I faced the area the noise had come from, backing toward the crossing point.

  I reached the doorway leading into the New Mexico desert and stepped through. “Jake’s alive!”

  Milly and O’Shea ran toward me. Milly would be able to keep the boy alive until we got to a hospital. She couldn’t heal him, but she could buy him some time.

  “Go, get him in the Hummer!” I stepped away from the cave’s entrance and shoved the boy into Milly’s arms.

  Alex sat next to the Hummer, his eyes snapping wide as he stared over my shoulder, teeth bared. I spun, trying to dodge whatever it was behind me, but couldn’t evade the hands that grabbed my waist and jerked me back across the veil.

  25

  Sliding back through the veil, I fought hard against the hands, kicking out, striking with my elbows and fists, but what I hit was so solid there didn’t seem to be any response to my blows.

  As my body was once more fully on the other side of the veil, I was flung deep into the dungeon, well over twenty feet. The stone floor was not forgiving when I slammed into it, landing on my right hip. Rolling, I scrambled to my feet to face the one who’d pulled me through.

  Or should I say, what pulled me through. A hulking shape stood between me and the entry point to the cave. It was over eight feet tall and while it had arms, legs and a body, it was not human. Too big, to strange of a shape. Like a puzzle that had its pieces jammed together, despite not really fitting. I couldn’t even tell what kind of supernatural it was. Like some sort of supernatural mutt, it didn’t fit in anywhere.

  Milly’s voice echoed through to me. “Rylee?”

  “Stay there, it’s between us.” What ‘it’” was, I wasn’t sure exactly. But it was big enough that it filled the space up from floor to ceiling, and its long arms dangled to the floor with thick muscled hands. In the shadows, it was hard to see just what the skin colour was, or any distinguishing marks, other than the fact that it was dark, stunk, and had a menace to it that I could feel vibrating between the two of us. I pulled my sword and advanced on the creature.

  “Come on, big boy, you don’t really want to stop me from crossing the veil, do you?” My voice was as sugary sweet as I could manage.

  It leaned forward, its face coming into a slant of light from the single flickering wall sconce. There were no eyes, no nose, just a mouth—one that dripped with slime and had very sharp teeth. I steadied myself for a charge, prepped to dodge around the hulking beast and duck back through the veil. But it just held its ground and didn’t move, though at least it didn’t advance, either.

  I shifted my grip on my sword, prepping for a fight, and in that split second, it attacked.

  I’d heard the term greased lightning, but had never truly seen it. The beast, as big as it was, slid past my guard and slammed me into the wall. Thick hands pinned my arms to the stone. My head clunked backwards, and no matter how I struggled, I couldn’t loosen the grip. The last of the stitches in my arm ripped out and blood trickled down my arm.

  “Come on.” This was it? The end of Rylee Adamson would come at the mouth of some unknown, unnamed beast? But it didn’t end my life, didn’t even try to bite me. Just held me tight against the wall.

  Light bloomed over its shoulder and the now familiar cloaked figure stepped out of the shadows. Icy blue eyes perused me with leisure.

  “You and your friends have quite the knack for trouble, Ms. Adamson. But all that aside, you and I need to chat.” He paused in the middle of lifting his hand to his cowl. “May I call you Rylee? It seems to me we are about to become far more acquainted than what one would think relegated us to last names.”

  Panic is a bad thing in my profession—it causes loss of life faster than any other emotion—and it rapidly coursed through me. He’d spelled me in a matter of moments before. I closed my eyes and centered myself.

  A hand brushed along my cheek. “So soft,” he murmured, his voice close enough that I could feel his breath against my skin. The beast holding me did nothing, and I did the only thing I could think of. I reached out to it, connecting with its emotions.

  Confusion, fear, loneliness.

  Anger.

  Bingo. I let it feel my anger, let it feed off my emotion, pushing my fear into it until I felt the spell holding it under the cloaked man’s control crack.

  Hands that had been holding me tight clenched and my bones creaked under the pressure, but I grit my teeth and tried to remain still.

  “Rylee, look at me.” His voice triggered something visceral in me. Fear and lust, a powerful aphrodisiac that spiraled upward. The pain in my arms increased, though, and it curbed whatever spell the man was trying to cast on me. I kept my eyes closed. “No, thanks. I like my soul where it is.”

  “I’m not a thief of souls. You intrigue me; you aren’t like any of the others. Not a witch, not a vampire, not a werewolf. But you have such talent.” His lips brushed against my ear, the soft inhale of breath sending shivers through me. With everything I had, I shoved emotion into the beast, letting my panic infect it—or at least, that’s what I’d hoped for. Milly would come for me. O’Shea wouldn’t leave me here.

  “I’ve blocked the entrance; you’re friends will not be coming for you,” he said, as if he were reading my mind, which only heightened my fear. “Do you know I was the one who gave the child the ability to reach you? That I was the one to suggest the date and the park to steal her from? I knew you would follow her here no matter what, and with the connections to your little sister . . . well, this child would be one I knew you would search for with a drive that would surpass all your other “salvages.”

  The panic I’d been feeling was now full blown and I struggled, unable to stop my body from trying to escape a fate I knew would somehow be worse than if he was just going to kill me. He’d set me up, he’d done all this to get me he
re. I continued to push my panic into the beast holding me.

  The air around us stilled, it grew heavy, and then the shit hit the proverbial fan.

  The beast let out a mind-numbing roar, flinging its hands off me and, in doing so, sent the cloaked man tumbling through the air. My feet slid to the ground and I sprinted toward the stairs. I could only hope he hadn’t locked down both of the entrances.

  Heavy thuds resounded behind me, a screech shook the castle foundations, and then silence for a split second.

  “RYLEE!” His voice struck a chord through to my bones. My feet stuttered, and I slowed.

  I needed help, badly. Reaching out, I tapped into the person who’d stepped between me and the cloaked man before.

  “O’Shea.” I whimpered, and locked onto his emotions. The intensity of his feelings stung me, sharper than any child’s would ever be. Fear overridden by true concern, focus, wanting to do the right thing. I held onto him like I would a life raft in rough seas and started to run again. The stairs blurred by. I passed the initiation room and found myself in the hallway where I could see the doorway.

  Heart firing like a jack rabbit on Speed, I fumbled at the handle, and it was the split second mistake he needed to catch up to me, pinning me to the door with his body.

  “You were just going to run out on me?” His voice was no longer a soft seduction, but a deadly ice that made my mouth dry.

  “You seemed busy,” I said, unable to turn off my bitch switch. He tried to flip me around to face him, but I fought even that. I was so close to escape. Suddenly, I knew how the children being snatched must have felt. He handled me as if I was a child, his movements sure and steady as I flailed, using every trick I knew in an attempt to escape, knowing all along I couldn’t fight him forever. He just had to wait me out. Screaming, I knew I was losing, his deceiving calm holding back the anger brewing beneath the façade. All my training, all the strength I’d built on over the years, was nothing to him.