“Who?” I struggled against Bryant again. Being held by him had gone from uncomfortable to incredibly awkward now that the adrenaline and fear were starting to dissipate to a somewhat normal level.
Lochlan opened his mouth and then closed it before opening it again. “Coincidently, or not coincidently, all have been related to you.”
“Oh. Come. On.” There was no way. Absolutely no way. Not everything could tie back to the family history I knew nothing about.
“I knew you were special.” Bryant grinned.
“Would you put me down? Please.” I added in the please to avoid another respect speech.
“When I know you’re not going to die on me again.”
“A few minutes ago you could have cared less.” And that made his pretend concern annoying.
“You mean a few hours ago. You were out a long time, but I wasn’t going to kill you. Just your bear.”
I struggled to keep my composure. “No threatening Ian.” I wanted to be telling Ian all this, to be sitting in his arms.
“You can’t really be thinking about the bear after what you experienced? A Morte Demon?”
“You don’t even know what one is.” I gritted my teeth.
“It’s rare and powerful. That’s all I need to know.”
“You are so single-minded.” Everything with him was about power. He had issues, but I guess I’d known that since the moment I met him.
“Tell me you aren’t on a high right now?” Bryant turned me so I was looking right at him. “You feel the thrill, the excitement.”
“Right now I want you to put me down. I’m emotionally exhausted. And I need to get back. We have to help Netta.” The only good thing about my so-called ‘power’ was that I might be able to help her and others. Maybe for once in my life I’d be useful.
“Help Netta when she’s trapped by a Morte Demon?” Lochlan’s mouth fell open. “You are even more ambitious than your grandfather.”
“Is it possible to control one?” Bryant’s eyes widened.
“A Morte Demon?” Lochlan put a hand to his chest. “Do you have any idea how much power they wield?”
“No, but I have a feeling you’re going to tell us.” Bryant grinned.
16
Ian
“Where is this Lochlan guy?” I was all about tracking down Bryant so I could get Mara, but I wasn’t going on a wild-goose chase. Either Connor started sharing information, or I wasn’t going anywhere.
“I don’t know for sure, but I can find out.” Connor was suddenly very animated. “I need my phone. I can track him down quickly.”
“Where’s the phone?” I looked at Jasper.
Jasper shrugged. “He didn’t have one when we searched him.”
“Where’s the phone?” I turned to Connor. “Or is this a game?”
“No game. Willem has it. He took it as a security deposit.”
“Somehow I don’t think Willem needed extra phones. What’s on it he thought you couldn’t live without?” I already knew Connor was hiding something, but it was time to find out exactly what.
“Would you want to lose your phone?” Connor met my gaze. “No one wants to. We all have our whole lives on there.”
“It’s more than that. I’m not buying it.”
“How else can we track him down?” Casey asked. “Finding Willem to find your phone seems like a waste of time.”
“It more than seems like it.” Another thought came to me. Is that what Connor wanted? To waste time? “Although we will track down Willem later.” But first we needed to find Mara. I wasn’t letting my need for revenge get in the way of that.
“Do you know this Lochlan’s last name?” Toby asked a bit more warily than his wife. “We can track him down.”
“He’s not any easy guy to track down.” Connor averted Toby’s eyes. Yes he was definitely hiding something.
“Then why did you suggest finding him?” Toby shot Casey a look. She nodded. Maybe she wasn’t so blind to him as I thought.
“Because it’s the only idea I have. I want to find her too.” His voice sounded genuine, but that didn’t mean anything. There were plenty of good actors in the world.
“Vera has to have a way to find him. If he’s a known Séancer she’d know.” Casey seemed to be considering her words even as she said them.
“True.” Toby nodded. “But you don’t want to call her.”
“Why not?” I asked. “She’s your sister. If she can help, why not call?”
“Because she’ll feel the need to tell Jared, and I don’t want him getting involved. Yet.” Casey pressed her lips into a firm line.
“Why? Because he’d go soft on Bryant?” I tried to understand what was going through her head.
“Or hard. Jared can be unpredictable when his brother is involved,” Toby explained.
“Then what’s the plan?” Noah asked. “We don’t have time to wait things out. Ian’s mate is missing. If you are right about how dangerous Bryant is then getting Mara back takes even more priority.”
“There may be another way to find Lochlan.” Connor sighed. “But it’s not going to be a fun one.”
“How?” Casey asked. “We need to find Bryant.”
“Mara’s dad. He’d probably know.”
“Then let’s go.” Toby jumped on the idea. “Her dad has to know something, so finding him makes sense either way.”
“I’m staying here.” I wouldn’t be able to restrain myself from killing the man. How could he treat his daughter like property? Besides, I was still waiting on news from Monica and Claire. I wasn’t ready to leave Crestview just yet.
“Fine. Give me your number.” Casey held her hand out for my phone. “We will call you as soon as we have anything.” She typed in her number. “You do the same.”
I took my phone back. “Agreed.”
“We’re on the same side here.” Casey gave me a long, hard look. “Remember that.”
“I’m not going to forget. If your point is you don’t want me killing Bryant before you get to him, I can’t promise you that.”
“I’m hoping it doesn’t come down to that.” Casey grabbed the rope binding Connor’s hands and pulled him toward the door.
“You’ll find her.” Toby stopped in the doorway. “I know my saying that means nothing, but staying positive is your best hope.”
“I know.” I nodded and watched as Toby and Casey released their wings and took off into the sky.
“He’s a hawk?” Jasper pointed to where Toby’s brown wings were disappearing into the sky.
“Yeah. I guess we know what he meant about his grandfather.”
“Blackwell?” Noah asked. “The old crazy who tried to take over The Society?”
“That would be my guess.” I didn’t care much about Society politics, but if those politics were getting closely tied to my own life I’d start caring.
“So what’s going through your mind?” Jasper took a seat in one of the chairs on the porch. “What do you need us to do?”
I pulled out my phone and sent a quick text to Tyler. I wondered if he was getting anywhere.
“I’d tell you if I knew.”
“You were smart to let them leave. They may want to find Bryant, but it’s not for the same reasons as you. Mara is the priority.” Noah leaned back against the porch.
“Exactly. And Connor is a loose cannon. He’s hiding something.” And I’d eventually find out what.
“Do you really think Willem took his phone?” Jasper asked.
“I have a feeling I know where it is.” And I also needed to follow up on Claire.
“Care to enlighten us?” Noah straightened up.
“We need to find Claire.”
Tyler groaned. “Seriously?”
“Yes, I think she has it, but she’s also with Lawrence.”
Noah groaned. “Really? You want to go there tonight?”
“No. I don’t want to go anywhere right now, but we have to find Mara and make sure a
ll the trouble following her disappears.”
“Let me handle the Claire and Lawrence stuff,” Tyler offered. “Neither of them hate me.”
“Lawrence doesn’t hate me per se; he hates cops.” Noah frowned.
“He hates me,” I said unapologetically. “But that’s ok. I hate him too.”
“You hate a lot of people.” Tyler stood up.
“Even more now.” Bryant was now at the top of that list.
17
Mara
“A Morte Demon, like all demons, lives off souls.” Lochlan sounded like a professor in an advanced class where you’re supposed to already know all the basic information. I’d made the mistake of enrolling in Calculus II in college. It was a feeling I knew well, and I was now experiencing again.
“Souls? Like people’s souls?” I wasn’t surprised by Lochlan’s words, but I was taken aback by them.
“Yes.” Lochlan nodded. “Some demons only take parts of souls and are less dangerous, but others take the whole soul.”
“Yes, we know all this,” Bryant interrupted.
“I don’t.” I knew nothing about supernatural creatures until a few days ago.
“Most demons who kill do it quickly, but a Morte Demon is said to hold onto souls and drain them slowly. It helps keep the demon alive, and they get pleasure out of torturing the victim, keeping them in a state of nothingness.”
“Netta.” My heart started beating faster. “That’s what he’s doing to her.”
“What I’m trying to figure out is how you spoke with him. He could have taken your soul. But he didn’t.” Lochlan rubbed his forehead. “It makes no sense.”
It didn’t make sense to me either. “He told me I’d awoken him. He’d been sleeping so he wasn’t as strong.”
“You awoke him?” Lochlan stumbled back.
“Yes. It wasn’t intentional…” A new wave of fear hit me as I watched Lochlan’s reaction.
“We have no choice.” Lochlan’s eyes were blank. “This is no longer a matter of wanting to help. It’s a matter of life or death.”
“Life or death for whom?” Bryant asked the question I couldn’t bear to ask.
Lochlan let out a slow, long breath. “Mara’s life and the life of all those the demon will now encounter. If he’s awake, and he knows of her, he will come back.”
“But we can control it. Can’t we?” Bryant pulled me against him slightly tighter. I wondered if it was because I was shaking uncontrollably.
“In theory yes.” Lochlan nodded. “But it’s not going to be easy.”
“But in the end we’d have a powerful demon under our control.” Bryant’s voice was full of all kinds of excitement. “Think of the possibilities.” He was insane. Even more insane than I thought.
“How could we control it?” I remembered the terror the demon caused me. “If it’s so powerful, how can we control anything it does?” If Bryant could control demons he had no need for my Séancer skills.
“You are no ordinary Séancer. We’ve established that.” Lochlan’s color had returned to normal, but he wasn’t chomping at the bit like Bryant. That gave me some hope for him. “I am also strong, and we have a rare Pteron with us.”
“Rare?” I looked at Bryant. Was he more than he seemed? Having wings seemed pretty significant itself.
Bryant beamed.
Lochlan nodded. “Yes. He’s a Pteron with magic blood.”
“Uh… your blood is magic?” I looked at Bryant again.
Bryant carefully shifted me from his arms to the seat next to him. “It’s not something I’m proud of, and I don’t know how to use the magic, but my mother was a witch.”
“So you can perform witchcraft?” I shifted over as subtly as possible. Shifters, demons, dead people, and now witchcraft? What else was there?
“No. But I have it in my blood. That’s all that matters.” The confidence in Bryant’s voice fell off as he got to the last part of his statement.
Lochlan nodded. “It’s your blood we need. Mara will be the one using the power.”
“What if you are putting too much faith in my power? I mean I barely got out of my last meeting with the demon alive.” And I still wasn’t sure how I managed it. It certainly hadn’t been anything conscious on my part. I’d been so terrified I could barely think, let alone come up with an escape plan.
“But you did. And that is rarer than you can imagine.” Lochlan watched me with far more interest than he had before. “This is a fantastic revelation.”
“I’m not so sure I’d use the word fantastic, but yes I get the rarity part. And that the few who have are all related to me.” I didn’t want to go down that line of conversation again. I was realizing just how little I knew about my family. I doubted every story I’d been told.
“You have the power, the question is how to anchor you.”
“Anchor?” I raised an eyebrow. “What does that even mean?” I was asking that question over and over again now. I knew nothing about this world that I was somehow apart of. Unfortunately everything I did learn made me like it even less.
“The most secure way to anchor you would be through a mate.” Lochlan averted his eyes. That was never a good thing.
“A mate?” I held onto the door handle. “More mate talk again?”
Bryant chuckled. “Your bear already pressuring you?”
“He didn’t pressure me.” But he’d asked me about it… and Willem would have required it. It sounded so animalistic—so non-human. But I wasn’t human, was I? I couldn’t shift into an animal, but I could talk to dead people. Would mating with Ian really be so bad? No. The answer came to me quickly. Mating with anyone else would be though.
“Don’t worry, you don’t have to mate with your bear.” Bryant patted my arm.
“You have another idea?” I asked with some trepidation. Any idea of Bryant’s worried me.
“I can be your mate.” Bryant smiled. “You’re growing on me.”
I coughed. “Um, no. Not happening.” As I’d expected, he’d made a horrible suggestion. I could barely stomach being near the guy. Mating with him? Forget it.
“I assure you I have plenty to offer you.” He waggled his eyebrows. “Could be interesting for us both.”
Lochlan shook his head and rescued me from further argument. “It can’t be you. It needs to be a bear.”
“Why does it have to be a bear?” Bryant’s face darkened. “I am far more powerful than any of their kind.”
“Because they are the only shifters left who still have a connection to the old magic. You’d think you’d know that considering who your brother is married to.” Lochlan gave Bryant a serious look.
I remembered what Bryant had told me the night he’d kidnapped me. He wanted to get back at his brother. I had no idea why things were such a mess with their relationship, but considering who Bryant was, I wasn’t particularly surprised. I wondered if his brother was better than he was. I hoped so for his sake—and his mate’s.
“I do not speak to my brother—and I am not letting my Séancer mate with the bear.” Bryant pressed his finger into my chest. “I need her to work for me. We have many allies to bring back from the dead.”
“Oh who cares! We’re talking life or death here.” That part of Lochlan’s words hadn’t been lost on me. “You can’t seriously be worried about what ever stupid thing you need help with.” He really was as heartless as single-minded as I’d thought.
“It’s not stupid.” Bryant scowled. “I will destroy The Society. And I need your help.”
“There may be a way to make this work so that everyone is happy.” Lochlan pressed his lips together in a firm line. “But it is going to take trust from both of you. I’m not sure you can manage it.”
“What kind of trust?” I asked, not sure I wanted to hear what Lochlan was going to say. Trusting Bryant was out of the question, and the jury was still out on whether I trusted Lochlan.
“We could create a binding, but we’d need the Alpha of
your bear’s pack to agree. The whole pack would be bound.”
“Ian is the Alpha…” I remembered that much. “But what’s a binding?” There was so much I didn’t know.
“It’s a promise that can’t be broken.” Bryant slumped in his seat. “I suppose that’s where my trust comes in too.”
“Yes. You will have to make promises of your own.” Lochlan leaned into the car.
“I’m afraid of what those promises are going to be. But tell me. Get it over with.” Bryant put his hands behind his head.
I spoke before Lochlan could. “You can’t use the demon to hurt anyone.” Otherwise what was the point of controlling it? “And we have to save Netta and the others.”
“I won’t let it hurt you or your bears.” He smiled. “Deal.”
“No one. It hurts no one, or we don’t have a deal. That thing is horrible. It should not be allowed to exist.” I shivered remembering the fear it caused.
“We can’t kill it easily.” Lochlan straightened. “There are very few who could, but if Bryant was committed he could control it.”
“You’re making it sound like a pet.” And this demon was no dog or cat.
“It would be—a very dangerous pet.” Lochlan’s expression darkened.
‘That does nothing for me. Why would I agree to this?” Bryant lowered his arms to his sides.
“Because you are wrong. It could do plenty for you.”
“Like what?” Bryant turned. “Pray tell me what wonderful things the demon can do for me when I can’t use it to hurt anyone.”
“Even when he has no souls, he has power. Lots of it.” Lochlan’s eyes seemed to glow in the fading light.
“But I can’t use the power to hurt anyone.” Bryant groaned. “What kind of fun is that?”
Lochlan shook his head. “You could use it to increase your wealth, increase your lifetime.”
“Increase my lifetime?” Bryant sat forward. “Now you’re talking.”
“Why am I not surprised?” I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. All Bryant cared about was himself, and extending his life would certainly help him.
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