Forbidden Alchemy (Elemental Book 7)

by Rain Oxford

  “Who is the shifter?”

  “Bethany Brown.”

  Darwin cussed and rubbed his forehead. “Poor Orlando. Computer, show us a map of everyone alive on the premise.”

  It changed to a map of the land with glowing red and blue dots. Most of the blue dots were in the den, but there was one red dot in the den, and the house was surrounded by five red dots.

  “Show visual of the outside of the den.” The screen changed to show the den and five fae guarding it. “They could have already killed my pack. The red dot… maybe they aren’t attacking because one of them is inside. Computer, call the den.”

  “Calling den intercoms.”

  A moment later, a beep sounded. “Dad?” Darwin asked.

  “What are you doing here?” Maseré asked, worry thick in his voice.

  “Never mind that! What happened?”

  “Fae attacked. I’m sorry, son. They took Amelia. I had to protect your mother and I thought Sean was protecting Amelia.”

  “Where is Sean?”

  “They knocked him out, but he’s not dead. We’re in the den.”

  “They haven’t attacked you?”

  “They have us surrounded, but we’ve got the tribe leader’s mate hostage. They won’t attack at the risk of losing her.”

  “Why didn’t you lock the property down?” There was silence for a moment. “Dad?”

  “We forgot the password,” Anya said.

  “You forgot the password? Everyone in the pack forgot the password?” Darwin yelled.

  “You change it every three to five days,” Maseré said.

  “You’re supposed to change the password regularly!”

  “Not that regularly,” I said.

  “We can come out now, right?” Maseré asked.

  “No,” Darwin said. “I’ve turned on our defenses, so they can’t use magic against you, but Amelia’s in the forest with four of them. If they realize there’s no way out or if you kill the five surrounding you, they could kill Amelia. Devon and I will go get them.”

  “What about Henry?” I asked.

  He frowned at Henry. “The cabin will protect him.”

  “From Veronica should she decide to attack?”

  He groaned. “I can’t… fine. Dad, sit tight. Pretend the fae can still hurt you so they don’t figure out we have the traps set. Computer, authorize Devon Sanders, the wizard next to me, for full pack rights and access.”

  “Authorization complete.”

  “Good,” Darwin said. “Now you can use magic. If anyone unauthorized tries magic under lockdown, they get shot. There are traps all over the forest. I’m going to have to walk you through them. Phones won’t work during a lockdown, so we’ll use these.” He pressed on a portion of the wall next to the door and it slid forth, revealing a basket with emergency supplies. He pulled out two walkie-talkies, turned them on, and handed one to me.

  “Did we land in a Star Wars movie?” I asked.

  He scowled at me. “I find your lack of basic sci-fi knowledge disturbing. Have you never watched Star Trek?”

  “How many Star movies are there?” I knew the difference between Star Wars and Star Trek, but my feigned ignorance helped to distract him from worrying. Not completely, of course.

  He gasped with false horror. “I’m appalled.”

  “There’s no way I can lose, right?” I asked. “I have magic and they don’t.”

  This had the opposite effect of what I wanted. “Maybe you should stay here. Fae are dangerous even without their magic. Don’t do anything stupid. Follow my instructions, save Amelia, and get back here alive. We’ll deal with them afterwards.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ll get her. Get Henry food and water.” I left before he could change his mind and leave Henry defenseless.

  “Head straight north,” Darwin said as I slowly stepped off the porch. “But go around the back of the cabin or the fae at the den will see you.”

  I did as he instructed and as soon as I reached the forest, I relaxed a little. Then my intuition fired at me and I stopped cold.

  “You’re five feet from a trip line, so unless you want your face burned off, you need to deviate to the left.”

  “You’re watching me, right?”

  “Yeah. I’ve got cameras everywhere.”

  “Pervert.”

  “Do you want to do this on your own?”

  “To the left you said?” I successfully evaded the trip wire, only for Darwin to chime in a minute later to stop me from running into another trap. There were so many traps in fact, that my intuition couldn’t help me other than to warn me that I was in danger. “How do you guys go into the forest ever?”

  “They’re only active when we’re on lockdown.” He guided me for another few minutes. “Fifty meters in front of you is a scout. One of the tribe broke from the others. It looks like they’re getting suspicious.”

  “Have the other three moved?”

  “No. They’re waiting on their tribesmen to rescue the leader’s mate. The scout is in a tree. You won’t see him, and if he sees you, he’ll sound the alarm. Try to take him out from where you are. Just him, though! If you go after the others this far, you risk them hurting Amelia.”

  “Darwin, I’m not going to do anything stupid. I know how to do this. Trust me.”

  He sighed. “I trust you, Dev. I really, really do, but I love her and Veronica only went after her to fuck with you.”

  I didn’t respond. Instead, I turned off the walkie-talkie and focused my mind on the fae. I reached out with my magic slowly and gently, and when I sensed him, I didn’t immediately seize control. He was a paranormal, so he had some natural defenses. Fortunately, I was used to dealing with wizards. Fae minds were easier. I was as gentle as I could be until I was certain I had him, and then I eased lethargy into his mind. I encountered no resistance or suspicion.

  After a few minutes, I turned the walkie-talkie back on. “Don’t do that again!” Darwin hissed.

  “Am I clear to go north?”

  “Yeah.” After a moment, he added, “And I’m sorry for what I said. It’s not your fault Veronica has a kill-boner for you. If you hadn’t chosen, Scott could already be dead. I don’t blame you.”

  “I know. You’re just frustrated.”

  Darwin went back to guiding me until I finally got close. I faintly heard their voices, although they weren’t loud enough to make out the words.

  “Can you take all three of them?” he whispered over the walkie-talkie.

  “I’ve controlled a lot more people at once before.” Hell, I controlled multiple members of the old council at once. I had to be a lot more subtle, but I could do it. While it was easier to invoke pain or take complete control than it was to gently put someone under, I didn’t want them to hurt Amelia in the process.

  Just like with the other fae, I released my magic slowly. I recognized Amelia’s mind immediately and left it alone. The other three were much more powerful members of their tribe.

  Because it was taking longer, I sensed their magic. Unlike Darwin’s mother’s nature-based magic, these fae had aggressive powers. One of them fed on a person’s energy like a vampire fed on blood, and he was a gluttonous bastard. Another could physically harm someone within a certain distance, such as removing their sight or hearing. If he touched them, it became permanent. The last had powers similar to Amelia’s, except they were much more powerful. He could fill someone with a blind rage until they killed anyone and everyone around them. Currently, he was keeping Amelia in a stupor so she couldn’t fight back.

  I thought I had a pretty good grip on all three of them, but when the one who controlled emotion folded faster than expected, Amelia broke from his control. Everything went wrong at that point. The one who could feed on energy tried siphoning Amelia’s so that he could resist my powers, so I had to focus on him. I filled him with pain.

  The other two broke from my power and I felt magic wrap around me. Unfortunately, stopping his friend from draining
Amelia left me open for the attack. Suddenly, I couldn’t see anything. Before he could cripple me further, however, he screamed with pain and then was quieted. My vision didn’t return, as I could still feel his magic in me. I ignored that and focused on protecting Amelia.

  With the energy vampire temporarily debilitated, I full-on assaulted the emotion-controller with every bit of lethargy I could, since that worked so well before. He dropped like a bag of rocks.

  I heard something from Amelia. The energy vampire stopped crying with pain. After a moment, I called, “Amelia?”

  “I’m here!”

  “Don’t move!” I said. “The property is under lockdown. There are traps everywhere.”

  “Oh, no. I didn’t memorize the traps.”

  I pressed the talk button on my walkie-talkie. “I’m going to need a little more guidance.”

  After a moment, I heard a shaky, “You’re clear straight ahead for two meters.”

  “Actually, I need more than that,” I said, feeling my way around a tree. “One of them got me and now I can’t see anything. We also might have caused enough noise to wake the scout.”

  “You’re blind?”

  “Just temporarily.” I hope.

  “Shit. Walk straight ahead. There doesn’t look to be anything on the ground in front of you, but my cams don’t point down where you are.” I walked for a moment until he told me to stop. “There’s a log right in front of you. Don’t touch it. Turn ninety-five degrees counterclockwise.”

  “Let me get out my protractor.”

  “You know what a protractor is, but you don’t know the difference between Star Wars, Star Trek, and Stargate?”

  I turned and started walking. “Stargate is the last one, right? I think Marcus saw that in the theaters. Didn’t it have a girl with a bow?” The silence over the radio that followed told me he was screaming obscenities and not panicking over my condition.

  Then I walked face-first into a tree and realized that distracting him while walking blind through a forest full of traps was a stupid idea.

  He went back to guiding me until finally, he said, “You’re clear. Call to Amy; she’s in front of you.”

  “Amelia! Darwin said you can come to me. I’m a little visually impaired at the moment, so I can’t…” I let my sentence die when Amelia’s hand closed over mine.

  “I’m here,” she said. Then she took the radio from me. “Darwin, I’m okay.”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you, too. Guide us back to you so I can show you how much.”

  “Where’s that fae? I need him to make me deaf, too,” I said. Amelia smacked my arm with a light, shaky laugh. She wasn’t going to be okay until she saw Darwin again. “What happened to the emotional vampire? Is he out?”

  “I hit him in the head with a rock. He might be out forever.”

  I squeezed her hand. “Better him than you. Darwin would be proud.” With Darwin guiding us, my intuition had let up. However, ten minutes into our trek back, it warned me that we were being watched. I stopped and blindly reached for Amelia’s other hand. She handed the radio over. “Darwin, where is the scout?”

  “He’s in the… oh, shit. I have no visual.”

  “That’s okay, I don’t either,” I said. Amelia made a sound of flabbergasted laughter. “He can’t use magic, though, right? The other one got fried from blinding me.”

  “Most fae are talented hunters. You need to go faster.”

  Amelia pressed the button over my finger and said, “If my loving fiancé didn’t booby-trap every inch of the forest on his own pack lands, maybe that would be possible, but it’s not.”

  “We’ll talk about how sexy your polite sarcasm is later. Keep moving south as fast and quietly as you can.”

  We did the best we could, which was neither fast, nor quiet. I still felt like I was being watched, and not by Darwin. When I almost stumbled over a rock, Amelia apologized profusely for not watching my feet better.

  “Don’t worry about it. Is there somewhere we can sit?”

  “Oh, no. Did you twist your ankle?”

  “No. I want to use my magic to get this scout off our ass.”

  “Are you sure we should? Darwin wants us to get out of the forest.”

  “I don’t want to hit a trap because we’re rushing.”

  Amelia started leading me somewhere to sit until the walkie-talkie chirped. “He’s right on top of you! Run!” Darwin shouted.

  I sensed movement above me and tried to step out of the way, only to hit a tree. Amelia’s hand disappeared and she yelped. I reached forth with my power for his mind, but hot pain flashed across my chest. “Fuck!” I pressed my back into the tree and kicked my attacker in the chest. The instant he was gone, I pulled my gun and stopped to listen.

  There wasn’t even the whisper of a sound when my intuition urged me to duck. I did an instant before Amelia shouted and a blade glanced off the tree. Loose bark hit my back. I turned to face the tree, only to trip over the same rock I had hit a few minutes before.

  I didn’t drop the gun, but it also did me no good when I didn’t know where to aim. Although I wasn’t stupid enough to assume I could beat any opponent, I was pretty good at not letting fear distract me. Thus, it was starkly obvious when I felt fear flood my system. “That’s not helping me right now,” I said.

  “I’m sorry!” Amy cried. “I was aiming for him.”

  The fear evaporated quickly and I focused on the many problems I was already dealing with. My intuition led me to roll to my right barely in time to avoid another silent swipe of his blade. I aimed the gun at where I thought he was.

  “No!” Amy said, her voice in the same direction I was aiming.

  “Damn it! Tell me where to aim!”

  “He’s moving.”

  I unleashed my magic on him again, only to be distracted by another slash. This one was against my shoulder, dangerously close to my throat. I couldn’t invade his mind and dodge his attacks at the same time without my sight.

  Suddenly, I heard metal against metal, inches from my face. Amelia’s gasp of shock wasn’t helpful, but when someone stepped over me, I realized we had been joined by another person. Based on his completely silent steps, it was another fae. “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Amelia grabbed my arm and pulled me up. “It’s my father. He’s fighting the other fae.” Blades clashed, some close, some more than twenty feet away. They were at least as fast as shifters. While Darwin tried to calm her through the radio, I focused on distracting the opponent.

  I didn’t recognize Sean’s mind because I had never been in it, but I knew it by the protectiveness and kindness of it. The other man was cruel and clever, albeit lazy. Although his power was that he could make someone hallucinate, he knew better than to use it. He had heard me on the radio with Darwin.

  The fastest way to stop someone from fighting was to take complete control, so that was what I did. “Stop!” I demanded. Instead of the clink of blades, Amelia gasped and there was a heavy thud on the ground. The instant silence afterwards worried me because I couldn’t see what had happened. “Sean?” I asked.

  “I am unharmed,” he answered, panting, while still managing to sound graceful. Only fae could sound graceful. “Thank you for your assistance. It has been decades since I fought like that.” He must have already known about my lack of sight because he touched my shoulders so that I would know where he was. “More importantly, thank you for saving my daughter.” He let go and stepped back.

  “You’re welcome. Is there anything you can do for my vision?”

  “Unfortunately not. Did Kyro touch you?”

  “No.”

  “Then your vision will return in a few hours. My brother used to punish me often by making me blind and deaf, so I know how disorienting it is.”

  “That was your brother?”

  “Yes. Somehow, they learned of our whereabouts, and even worse— that Amelia was marrying a shifter. They were furious.”

&
nbsp; “Yeah, I know who was responsible for tipping them off. There are more fae at the den.”

  “They have been dealt with. Darwin told his pack they could shift and attack the fae as soon as Amelia was safe. Now all we have to do is survive the forest.”

  A chirp rang in the distance. “I’ve called off the lockdown, so the forest is disarmed,” Darwin said from the radio.

  The walk back to the cabin was a lot nicer without traps or enemies to worry about. Once we were there, I was directed to the couch and Darwin made me a pot of coffee. The whole pot was mine, because no one else in the pack liked it.

  “What happened to the fae?” I asked.

  “They were locked up in Dad’s dungeon… which is getting way too full. The pack got a little beat up, but nothing a shift can’t fix. You, though…”

  Amelia pressed a cloth to my chest and told me to put pressure on it until the bleeding stopped. “I think you’ll need stitches,” she said.

  “I’ll take a healing potion at the school.”

  “I don’t think that’s going to cut it. No pun intended.”

  It didn’t feel too bad, but when I felt that my shirt was dripping wet, I figured I was hurt worse than I thought. Sean pressed another cloth to my shoulder, and that hurt like a bitch. “You have some stick-on stitches, right?” I asked. “Or a stapler?”

  “Don’t joke about that,” Darwin said.

  “As the one currently bleeding out, I thought that was my decision.”

  “Well, it’s not, because I’m the one losing my shit about it.”

  “Is Henry awake yet?”

  “He woke to eat and drink and then passed out again.”

  “That sounds like a good plan. Where’s a good place for me to pass out?”

  “If you need to sleep, do so. You can sleep on the couch or in the bed.”

  “I really don’t want to go upstairs right now.” I was given another cup of coffee, but it went cold because I was asleep in minutes.

  * * *

  I woke to Remington’s voice. She was scolding Darwin for putting me in danger. I still couldn’t see anything, unfortunately, so I closed my eyes and reached in the direction of her voice. She startled when I touched her leg, and then took my hand and sat on the couch next to me.