by S. J. West
Contents
Books by S.J. West
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Author’s Note
New from S.J. West
Cursed ~Sneak Peek
About the Author
COPYRIGHTS
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
© 2018 by S.J. West.
All rights reserved.
Cover Design: Julie Nicholls (JMN Art), all rights reserved.
Interior Design & Formatting: Stephany Wallace, all rights reserved.
Editor: Allisyn Ma.
Published by Watchers Publishing Dec 26th, 2018.
www.Sjwest.com
BOOKS IN THE WATCHER SERIES
The Watchers Trilogy
Cursed
Blessed
Forgiven
* * *
The Watcher Chronicles
Broken
Kindred
Oblivion
Ascension
* * *
Caylin’s Story
Timeless
Devoted
Aiden’s Story
* * *
The Alternate Earth Series
Cataclysm
Uprising
Judgment
* * *
The Redemption Series
Malcolm
Anna
Lucifer
Redemption
* * *
The Dominion Series
Awakening
Reckoning
Enduring
* * *
The Everlasting Fire Series
War Angel
Between Worlds
Shattered Souls
OTHER BOOKS BY S.J. WEST
The Harvester of Light Trilogy
Harvester
Hope
Dawn
* * *
The Vankara Saga
Vankara
Dragon Alliance
War of Atonement
* * *
Vampire Conclave Series
Moonshade
Sentinel
Conclave
Requiem
* * *
Circle of the Rose Chronicles
Cin D’Rella and the Water of Life
Cin D’Rella and the Golden Apple
Cin D’Rella and the Lonely Tower.
(Coming Spring 2019.)
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to express my gratitude to the many people who were with me throughout this creative process; to all those who provided support, talked things over, read, wrote, offered comments, allowed me to quote their remarks and assisted in the editing, proofreading and design.
I would like to thank Lisa Fejeran, Erica Croyle, Karen Friday, Misti Monen, and Liana Arus, my beta readers for helping me in the process with invaluable feedback.
Thanks to Allisyn Ma, my editor for helping me find typos, correct commas and tweak the little details that have help this book become my perfect vision. Thank you to Stephany Wallace for creating the Interior Design of the books and formatting them.
Last and not least: I want to thank my family, who supported and encouraged me in this journey.
I apologize to those who have been with me over the course of the years and whose names I have failed to mention.
True sorrow can shatter your soul. It takes time for the hole in your heart to heal enough so you can make it through each day. When you’re on the outside of such pain and watch someone you care about experience it, helplessness can consume you. There are no magic words you can say to make the person feel better. All you can do is be there for them when they’re ready to start living again, and no amount of wishing can hasten that process up or alleviate their suffering.
When Coltan showed up on my doorstep after his mother’s passing, I held him for as long as he wanted me to, and I let him go when he said he needed some time alone to sort things out on his own. He promised he would get back in touch with me when he was ready to talk, but that was three days ago. I haven’t received a call or even a note from him since, and I’m beginning to wonder if he’s intentionally pushing me away.
Yet, how could he push away someone he professed to love? I still don’t quite understand why he said such a thing on the island when we haven’t been around each other that much, but I can’t deny the connection between us. Can I truthfully say that I’m in love with Coltan Prince? If I’m being honest with myself, the answer would be a firm “I don’t know.” I need more time with him to figure out how I feel, and I know I need to draw on my reserves of patience while I wait for him to reach out to me again.
“He’ll call,” Isabel says as she peers at me over the book in her hands. I glance up from my cup of tea and meet her gaze across the kitchen table. “He just needs some time, Cin.”
“I know he does,” I say, returning my attention to the steaming cup of tea while stirring the two sugar cubes I placed in it around with a silver spoon until they dissolve. “I just wish there was something I could do for him.”
Isabel puts the philosophy book she was reading down on the table to give me her undivided attention.
“Have you thought about calling him?” she asks. “Maybe something’s happened and he can’t reach out to you for some reason.”
I shake my head. “No. He’s all right. I had Maximus contact the spy he has working on the Prince estate. He told him that Coltan has locked himself inside his room since he returned home and refuses to see anyone. Apparently, the servants are leaving him food and drink outside his bedroom door to make sure he eats.”
“Poor guy,” Anwen says sympathetically as she sits on the table between me and Isabel, peeling the skin off a red grape rather daintily. “I know precisely how he feels, but at least he has you, Cin.”
“He could,” I say with a frustrated sigh, wondering for the hundredth time since Coltan left me why he hasn’t returned yet. “I don’t understand why he’s staying away. He would feel so much better if he were here with me instead of holed up in his room all alone.”
“People handle grief in different ways,” Isabel says. “After my mother died, my dad spent most of his days and nights at the Guild. My nanny was more of a parent to me than he was during that time, especially after he was taken to the asylum. In a way, I was relieved when I got the letter from Commander Ford recruiting me for the academy because I knew I would at least be around kids my own age and have people to talk to.”
In all the years that I’ve known her, Isabel has only mentioned her father a handful of times, and I’ve never delved too deeply into his mental health issues. Ever since my first day at the academy, Isabel’s one goal in life was to become a Thorn so she could gain access to Briardale Asylum. Even though we’re all Thorns now, her dream of being reunited with her father is still that: a dream.
Right before
we graduated, her father became violent with some of the other patients and was sent to the isolation ward of the asylum. We’re waiting for him to be released from it so we can visit him, but according to his doctors, there hasn’t been any change in his condition. I’m still trying to figure out a way to sneak Isabel in to see her dad, but a brilliant scheme hasn’t presented itself as of yet. She’s been a trooper through it all, but even someone as sweet as Isabel has her limits.
“Good morning, ladies,” Kalder says as he walks into the kitchen dressed in only a pair of distressed black jeans and a congenial smile.
“I know you own shirts, Kalder,” I say irritably. “Why is it that we never see you in any of them?”
Isabel snickers, and Anwen sighs in pleasure as she openly gapes at Kalder in all his half-naked glory.
“But why would he want to hide all those muscles?” Anwen asks as she continues to gawk at him unabashedly.
Kalder leans his muscular forearms on the table and bends at the waist so he and Anwen are eye to eye.
“I swear, sometimes I think you’re the only one who really gets me around here, Anwen,” he tells our miniature faerie friend.
Anwen blushes and giggles at him coyly.
“What’s for breakfast?” I ask Kalder brusquely.
Kalder stands back up to his full height and crosses his arms over his broad chest.
“How is it that none of you knows how to cook?” he asks in bewilderment. “Didn’t they at least teach you basic survival skills at the academy?”
“Which would you rather have: a Thorn who knows how to cook, or one who can throw a dagger from a hundred paces to strike the heart of a mage about to go supernova?” I ask.
“Point taken,” Kalder says as he drops his arms back to his sides. “What would you like to eat this morning, oh mighty and magnificent warrior princess?”
Anwen giggles at his jest, but all I can do is glare at Kalder. “Did you or did you not tell us that you would gladly take over all of the cooking responsibilities for the household? I distinctly remember you promising that.”
“That was before I knew how much you girls can eat!” he protests. “Who would have guessed such petite young women could each eat more than me in a day? Quite frankly, it still boggles my mind. Where does all that food go?”
“You walk around half the city on patrol and see how hungry you get afterward,” I say. “And to answer your first question, I would like some pancakes for breakfast with a side of bacon.”
“As you wish, my warrior princess,” he says with a flourish of his right arm as he bows at the waist to me. “Pancakes coming right up.”
I would tell Kalder to stop calling me his current pet name, but if I wait an hour, he’ll change to a new one.
“Did I hear someone mention pancakes?” Gretel says as she and Scarlet walk into the kitchen dressed for the day ahead of us.
“The mistress of this humble abode has spoken and requests them,” Kalder tells her. “Is that what the rest of you girls want?”
After everyone consents to the proposed breakfast, Kalder begins rattling around in the kitchen to prepare it.
Gretel flops down in the chair to my right while Scarlet sits down on my left at the round kitchen table.
“So, no word from Prince Perfect yet, I take it?” she asks me.
“How can you tell?” I ask.
“Because you look like someone just stole your puppy,” she tells me.
Anwen gasps in horror, and I assume it’s because Gretel’s analogy is so awful.
“You don’t have a dog lurking somewhere do you, Cin?” she asks me, appearing frightened by the prospect.
“No,” I reassure her. “I’ve never had a dog. They didn’t allow us to have pets when we were at the academy.”
Anwen breathes out a sigh of relief. “Oh, thank goodness. I had an aunt once who got eaten by one.”
“Then we’re never getting one,” I assure her. “You’re perfectly safe here.”
Anwen smiles at me before proceeding to take a healthy bite out of her peeled grape.
We still haven’t told Commander Ford about our little fae friend. Anwen has already been with us for almost two weeks, and broaching the subject with the commander is something we’ve all been avoiding. Our greatest fear is that Commander Ford will order us to send her away, and I don’t think that’s something any of us can do right now.
For all we know, Anwen might be the last of her kind. At least, she is in Briardale. Darcy made sure of that when she infiltrated the fae village underneath Thorn Hill and murdered them all to harvest their hearts to steal their magic. Only Anwen was left alive because Darcy said our friend was too puny to waste her time on. Ever since we found her, Anwen has put on a brave face during the day, but at night, when she curls up on my pillow and lets her guard down, I hear her cry herself to sleep over the loss of family and friends. Fae can live up to hundreds of years, which makes it likely that Anwen lost her parents in the massacre. I don’t know that for a fact because she hasn’t spoken about it, and I haven’t asked. She’ll talk when she’s ready to, but until that time, I have no intention of pushing the issue. I don’t like discussing my father’s death, and I don’t expect her to talk about the slaughter of her kin by my deranged stepsister.
Not long after Darcy was taken to the Briardale Asylum for assessment by the doctors, she was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and committed there as a patient. We couldn’t tell them the truth about what she did to the fae because that would have exposed the fact that an ordinary person can ingest magic by eating the heart of a magical creature. Such knowledge would have put the fate of all the mages in the city at risk. Fortunately for us, Darcy showed her own brand of crazy all on her own and earned herself a spot in the asylum for the rest of her life. I, for one, feel better knowing she’s locked up and under twenty-four-hour surveillance.
The telephone mounted on the wall near the entrance to the kitchen rings. I hop out of my seat, hoping that it’s finally Coltan calling me, but unfortunately, I’m not the first one to reach the phone. Kalder beats me to it.
When he picks up the black handset and brings it to his ear, he says, “Hello, you have reached the residence of Cin, the mighty warrior princess. I am her lowly man slave, Kalder, how may I be of assistance?”
As I reach him, I hold out my right hand and growl, “Give me the phone, Kalder.”
He then has the audacity to hold up one of his index fingers to me as the universal signal to wait a moment while he listens to the person on the other end of the line. Right before I grab his annoying finger and twist it until he begs for mercy, Kalder hands me the handset.
“It’s not Prince,” he informs me, looking as disappointed as I feel by his words. I assume he was hoping to surprise Coltan by answering the phone in my house. “It’s Maximus Kane.”
I try to hide my disappointment that it’s my godfather calling when I take the phone from Kalder.
“Hello?” I say.
“Cin,” Maximus says on the other end of the line, “I have a mission for you and the rest of your squad. Do you feel up to going across the river with me to get Coltan today?”
“Is he in danger?” I instantly ask, since that’s the only reason I can come up with that would warrant a rescue mission.
“Not quite,” Maximus replies. “Today is his mother’s funeral. Apparently, he’s been waiting for it to happen before permanently crossing over to our side. He needs our help moving the books out of his family’s crypt once the funeral is over.”
“Wait,” I say, wondering how Maximus obtained all of this information. “When did you speak with him to arrange all of this?”
“He called me late last night,” he informs me. “I take it he still hasn’t called you.”
“No, he hasn’t,” I reply, feeling somewhat slighted by Coltan since he didn’t even try to reach out to me first.
“Cin,” Maximus says as my godfather and not as the head of the Circle o
f the Rose, “don’t take his silence the wrong way.”
“How else am I supposed to take it?” I ask, feeling hurt and upset by Coltan’s blatant disregard for my feelings. A pang of guilt taps my heart reminding me that I’m not the one who just lost a parent. I’m acting slightly selfish, but it’s only because I desperately want to see Coltan again.
“I’m sure he contacted me first because he needed to know if he still had a position here at the Guild before he left home. We also discussed some temporary living arrangements while he gets his life in order. I hope you don’t mind, but I told him he can stay in your room here with me until we can find him a place of his own. If I were in his shoes, I would have done exactly what he did by calling me first.”
“He could have called me too,” I say, still feeling the sting of Coltan’s indifference toward me, even though I know his actions aren’t intentionally meant to hurt me.
“I don’t think he wants to burden you with his problems while he tries to step out of his family’s shadow,” Maximus says. “He’s lost his mother, and he’s about to leave the only home he’s ever known, Cin. He needs our support now more than ever. Don’t judge him too harshly for wanting to get his life straight before coming back to you.”
“Did he request that my squad be the one who helps him today?” I ask.
