Not only that, but she had revealed her command of the magic shield in the process. The shield’s existence on its own was significant enough, but enough protective items had been enchanted that such things were still floating around the world. They weren't exactly common, but they weren't rare, either.
So many human mages in the wars had family or loved ones with no magic, no protection at all, that protective amulets were passed out almost like holiday sweets. It was heartbreaking to remember those days. All the unnecessary death.
It was so widespread that the humans even got manipulated into it. Not that most of them had any idea that they got dragged into paranormal politics, though the ones at the top were fully aware. There were plenty of human politics that got tangled up in it all, and now it was in history books, telling only the human side of the story.
Lust for power seemed to be inherent to all creatures, regardless of species.
Aldric sighed again, reflecting on the fact that humans and non-humans were far more similar than they were different. He had lived too damn long not to understand that, or the fact that the vast preponderance of similarities would never be enough to outweigh the few differences between the species.
Humans couldn’t even accept differences within their own species, after all. That very thing was what had lent so much fuel and vitriol to the war in the first place.
"Are you," Tamika stopped him with a hand on his arm, her perfect eyebrows halfway up her forehead. "Are you distracted?"
She sounded shocked, and Aldric supposed that was fair. He rarely let his mind wander when he had a task.
"My apologies. This situation is surprising in a number of ways," he answered her. “It is bringing up a great deal of… Of past concerns.”
"I've just never seen you space out quite like that," she said. She stared at him for a moment then turned back to the grocery store they were about to enter. “So, anything familiar?"
Aldric breathed deep, sifting through the scents of shoppers and foodstuffs. Something distantly familiar tickled his nose, but it was faint.
"There is a scent similar to both Faith and Kaylee, yes. She was here. Let's try to see how far she got," Aldric said, and led the way to the aisle marked 'baking supplies.' The scent was stronger here, as if she had lingered, but of the woman herself there was no sign.
Aldric shook his head and Tamika glanced around. Together they left the grocery and kept walking. Now that he had the scent, it was much easier to follow. They trailed along the sidewalk, to the parking lot near the park, and there it disappeared.
"I guess she hopped into her car, then?" Tamika didn't look at him when she spoke, and he didn't bother answering.
They turned and headed back to Aldric's truck. As they walked past the grocery again, the breeze ruffled the leaves on the trees lining the street and they both took a deep breath, scenting it. They didn't stop, but they did exchange a look. There was the distinct scent of wolves in the breeze. Wolves they didn't know.
"Well, that's a wrinkle I don't think we needed," Tamika remarked once they were in the privacy of the truck. “Though I suppose we should have expected it. Think they’re all rogues?”
“Perhaps not. If Marc doesn't know about this group, he is going to be displeased by the news of them," Aldric agreed. Privately he hoped that they were simply passing through town. Considering the events of the day he wasn't sure that they would be so fortunate.
It didn't matter. Aldric had sworn that he would protect Faith and Kaylee, and that is what he would do.
"So..." Tamika drew the word out, but left it hanging in the air between them. Aldric didn't even glance at her, focused on the road. There was only one way to the Latham's cabin from town, so there was no chance they could miss Christina's car if she should have had difficulties on the way.
"I take it we're heading to the scene of the rescue?" Tamika's voice was filled with amusement.
"I would not treat an attack lightly," Aldric warned gently. In the heat of a crisis, Tamika was steady as a rock and completely reliable. Outside of that, however, she was more than happy to play.
"Of course not," she answered. "I'm simply finding it interesting to see how... hmmm... personally you seem to be taking all this."
Aldric bit back his first reply and took a deep breath. "A group of rogue wolves broke into a cabin and attacked two humans in Frostwalker Clan territory, and the third human is missing in our town which now scents like strange wolves. It strikes me that this was no random attack. This was a hunting party.“
"And a hunting party of wolves, rogue or otherwise, in our clan's territory is about the last thing we want. What the hell are they after around here, anyway? We haven't bought anything or gotten any new members or anything, have we? They can’t be after the humans.“
"You would know as well as I do, Tamika," Aldric said. "I know you screen everything before I even see the reports.” He sent her a small smile, and she tipped her head in acknowledgement.
"I do my job as your second," she said. "But this is gonna take more than just two of us, if it's as bad as all that. And that Kaylee sounded like a sweetheart."
"She is," Aldric allowed himself a bigger smile. "She is charming, and she is remarkably calm in a crisis, and so brave. She helped me take her aunt out to the truck and followed directions perfectly. After she considered the small issue of trusting a complete stranger that she couldn't even see, since her aunt had instructed her to keep her eyes shut, and she did even after Faith lost consciousness.”
Tamika whistled low and slow. "Damn. I can't wait to meet this kid,"
"Her aunt and her mother are doing a remarkable job of raising her," he frowned, suddenly struck by a thought. "None of them have mentioned her father, not even Miss Kaylee.”
"Huh," Tamika shrugged. "Divorce? Bad breakup? Maybe he's dead?"
"Maybe they're hiding from him? Miss Kaylee does have a very faint scent of wolf about her, but Faith does not."
Tamika hummed under her breath and they rode silently for a few minutes. Finally, Aldric turned onto the access road and after half a mile of pitted dirt road, he stopped his truck and parked in the same place he had just left two hours earlier.
They both got out of the truck and stood at the front bumper, gazing at the modest cabin. There was the lumpy shape of a rogue’s corpse just visible around the side of the cabin, but most concerning, in Aldric's mind, was the small blue Toyota sitting with its door wide open just to the side of the cabin's porch.
There was a bag of groceries on the ground about halfway between the car and the porch steps, split open up the side and spilling cocoa powder and chocolate bars out the side. A carton of eggs had been stepped on and the raw eggs were half congealed in the grass.
"Shit," Tamika muttered and moved to the car, taking care not to step on any more groceries.
Aldric stalked forward himself, sifting through the different scents. His nose wasn't as sharp as Tamika's was, not being a wolf himself, but it was more than good enough to pick out the same scents they'd caught in town. Three wolves, unknown to him, had been here and had clearly taken Christina Latham.
"Gather as much information as you can, but leave everything but the bodies alone. We will take those for disposal," Aldric said, and Tamika nodded sharply. "I will go inside and pack bags for Faith and Kaylee. We will need to come up with a story for them in case the human authorities get involved. And find out what happened to Mia. She was supposed to be here, was she not?”
“Definitely” Tamika said, then she grimaced. "This is going to be a real mess, isn't it?"
Aldric simply growled and flashed his fangs in reply.
7
Faith sat in the kitchen drinking coffee and, after a few minutes, eating apple slices and cheese with the kids who came crashing into the kitchen like a herd of elephants. She and Marc put the discussion on hold by an unspoken agreement when the kids showed up.
Faith was glad for the break, frankly. She wasn't sure ho
w she felt about all this. Sure, she had her own secrets, but finding out that there were so many more things hidden in the world than just her odd little tricks made her more than a little uncomfortable.
"I wish I had my phone," Faith sighed. "I want to call Crissy and make sure she's okay."
"I'm sorry I forgot your phone Aunt Faith," Kaylee said between apple slices. “I forgot you dropped it. I thought it was in your purse."
"It's okay, Kaylee-bee. None of this is your fault, sweetie," Faith reached over and tugged a stray wisp of Kaylee's hair. "You're handling this really well, sweetheart. I'm impressed."
"Mister Aldric said I'm very brave, and good in a crisis," Kaylee said.
"I see. I have to agree with him.“
"You can borrow my phone if you want, or there's a landline phone in my office you can use," Marc said. He was at the counter, chopping something, vegetables piled next to him. "Hey, is there anything you don't eat? I should have asked first."
"Nope, we eat pretty much anything," Faith said.
"Especially chocolate!" Kaylee said, loudly seconded by Jake. Kaylee deflated almost immediately though and looked at Faith. "Will we still make brownies when Mommy gets here?"
"I'm sure we will. We just have to wait, I guess," Faith said.
"Aldric and Tamika will find your mom, don't worry," Marc said. "Until then, how about you finish up that snack there and Jake can show you the play area out back?"
"Oh yeah! It's got a clubhouse an’ a slide an' swings an' everything!" Jake said. He shoved his last apple slice in his mouth and grabbed Kaylee's hand. "Come on come on!"
"Be extra careful out there, Jake! Kaylee, don't let him get away with anything!" Marc called after them.
Faith was half out of her chair as the kids disappeared through the mudroom.
"Kaylee, I don't–"
"They're safe, I promise," Marc said. "First off, I can see them both from here. It's a clear line of sight from this window to pretty much the whole play area, clubhouse included. I can actually see in the big window of the little house." Marc nodded to the window of the sink that did, indeed, look out onto the back yard that Faith had seen from her peek through the curtains when she woke up.
"Second, there's at least two of our clan out there in those woods right now. I can see one of them, and I know her brother's not far off. Those two are more than capable of holding off some rogues until the kids get back inside or I get out there." Marc said.
"Also, it would take someone extremely brave or extremely stupid to attack our clan house in broad daylight," a voice added from behind Faith.
Marc glanced up from where he was slicing mushrooms and nodded. "That, too. Welcome back, Aldric. There's coffee, still pretty fresh."
"Thank you. What are you planning for dinner?”
Faith watched the man walk to the cupboards and pull out a mug. No, walk was too tame a word for the movement that propelled him across the space. Sauntered captured the totally unhurried nature of his stride, but felt too casual and cocky. Stalk and prowl were closer, but he was too relaxed for them to fit very well, either. It was more like he moved with the threat of stalking right below the surface.
Moved like a predator flashed through her head again.
"Well, I was going to do up a pot roast, but got a bit side-tracked with our excitement today, so I'm going to throw together some whatever-we've-got spaghetti sauce. I think we have some venison left? And I know we just canned up a bunch of tomatoes. Garden's been crazy this year."
"I will go hunting later and resupply the venison,“ Aldric said, taking a sip of his coffee and closing his eyes for a moment, savoring it. When he opened his eyes, he turned to the table and smiled slightly, ducking his head in a suggestion of a bow. "I am pleased to see you awake again, Magaestra."
“Thank you. But my name is Faith. Faith Latham," she said.
He smiled and it changed his whole face, turning it from slightly grim and deadly serious to a lighter, friendlier version. He sat and extended his hand.
"And mine is Aldric Donnelly. It is an honor to meet you properly," he said.
She nodded slowly, pulling her lip between her teeth, and slid her hand into his. His hand was warm and his grip was gentle, though she could feel the strength in it, like she could when he caught her earlier, for that split second before she passed out. Her brain had some trouble with the oddness involved with calmly shaking hands with a man she had watched kill two horrible monsters in the blink of an eye.
"Um," she said. Very intelligent. "Thank you for your help."
Aldric nodded again, and smiled. "It was an honor. I'm glad I was able to help. Kaylee seems to have recovered quickly, are you doing as well?"
“Not really. I'm just putting up a good front," Faith admitted. "I had a bit of a panic attack a little bit ago."
"You're doing great," Marc said from the counter. "I can't imagine that fighting off those things is an everyday experience for you, or you'd have been better prepared. I don't know you well, but I feel pretty confident saying that."
She shot him a small smile and he winked back.
"I am relieved to hear that you are feeling better," Aldric said.
"Well, I mean I'm still pretty exhausted and everything's sort of achy, but yeah. I'm not falling to the floor in a faint again anytime soon. I hope," she said with a shrug.
"I left you some painkillers, are they not helping?" Aldric frowned. A small line creased brow and lord help her, but she thought it was cute. What the hell?
Her face grew warm and she kept her eyes on her coffee cup. "I didn't take them. I, um," she tried to clear the tightness in her throat. "I wasn't sure where I was, or where Kaylee was, or who had left them, and..."
"And you were naturally wary. I can understand that. Are you still concerned, or would you take them now?" he asked.
"I guess I would take something now," she nodded. "And I wouldn't be upset with some more coffee, if there is any left."
"Excellent," Aldric said.
He stood up and opened a cupboard away from where Marc pulled the coffee things and pulled out a small bottle, then picked up the coffee carafe to bring both to the table. She smiled in thanks as he handed the pills to her, then quickly swallowed them down with the last gulp of coffee in her cup. Aldric refilled it as soon as the mug was back upright, topped his own cup up, and returned the carafe to its place. Faith was about to ask for the milk when he opened the refrigerator and pulled out the carton.
"Thank you," she murmured as he poured some into her coffee.
"My pleasure," he said as he put the milk away and returned to his seat.
"Hey, I'm going to go check on the kids, and then I have some emails to get to. Pasta sauce is in the slow cooker now and dinner should be ready around six or so," Marc said. He wiped his hands on a kitchen towel and Faith noticed that the counters were clean and wiped down, the few dishes he had used stacked neatly in the dish drainer.
"Thank you, Marc. I believe Tamika is out there as well. She was most eager to meet miss Kaylee in person." Aldric said. He turned to Faith and explained. “They spoke on the phone a bit ago and Miss Kaylee greatly impressed Tamika. She is my second in command of Clan security.”
"Yep. I think that they've put her in playset jail twice now. It was for cattle rustling last time, I think, Jake had his Cowboy Walk on. I wonder what he's come up with now?” Marc grinned and tossed the towel on the counter, and headed out the door. Faith watched him go and stared at the empty doorway for a long moment after she heard the door close.
Today her life took a significant left turn into the weird and scary. She knew that the world had more things in it than were commonly accepted as 'real'– she herself was a perfect example of that.
"What about Crissy? Where's my sister?" Faith whipped her head back to look at Aldric, who, she just realized, had sat there, patiently waiting for her to return to the moment.
His face fell and he shook his head slowly. "We did not find her, t
hough she did make it as far as returning to the cabin. We went back there when we failed to find her in town and tracked the scents of your sister and three strange wolves as far as the road, but they must have had a car waiting because we lost them there, though we did find Mia, limping back from trying to chase the vehicle so we know what direction they went in. We will keep searching, I promise you. Oh!" Aldric reached into his pocket and leaned to the side to let him pull something out of his pocket. "I packed all of your belongings, as well as Kaylee's. I thought you might want this as soon as possible."
"My phone!" Faith reached out and took it from his hand. Thumbing it awake, she hit the speed dial and called Crissy, impatiently listening to the ringing. "Come on, sis. Answer your phone!"
"Hello, you've reached the phone of Crissy Lath–" Faith hung up and growled as she hit redial. A few minutes later she slumped in her chair, her forehead coming to rest on the cool wood surface of the table. A moment after that, she felt a warm hand on her shoulder.
“As I said, we will keep searching," Aldric said. "We're not giving up."
"Thank you," Faith said without moving her face off the table. "I don't know what to do without Crissy around. Just... just knowing I can call her or whatever. And Kaylee.” She sat up straight and felt that her stare was slightly wild-eyed. “Oh God, how am I going to tell her we can't find her mom?"
Aldric didn't answer her. It was a rhetorical question really, anyway, since it wasn't his problem. It was nice, though, that he sat with her, silently letting her freak out a bit. He left his hand on her shoulder, lending her support and strength.
Faith tried to swallow past the tightness in her throat. Ice crawled through her veins and for a moment it felt like the only place she was at all warm was where Aldric's hand rested on her shoulder.
"I still don't really understand what those things were, or why they were so determined to get us. I mean, I know that mindless monsters and violence are a thing, but… But it’s different seeing it on the news and now Crissy's missing and it’s all real. And then you…” Faith looked over at the man who was offering her support and safety for no reason she could understand. And then there was that other tiny little issue. "You're— Nobody can move that fast. I saw you move too fast."
Magaestra: Found: An urban fantasy series Page 5
