The Were Witch Complete Series Omnibus

by Renée Jaggér

  The woman’s eyes flashed with indignation, but she calmed down quickly enough, then said, “So be it. But I am not responsible for how much you enjoy speaking to her. Wait, please.”

  Well, Velasquez thought, this ought to be interesting. I get to meet my second deity in two days!

  The screen went dark. The image crackled and shifted, like an old TV set that needed its antenna adjusted, and the device’s internal cooling fan went into overdrive. Velasquez hovered his hand over it, suddenly afraid the damn thing was going to overheat.

  Then it ended and the picture returned, brightening by gradual measures back to normal lighting. In the center of the screen, surrounded by walls of ancient stone, was a tall, stunning woman with well-coiffed black hair and flowing robes of the same color, bedecked with golden finery. Her shining eyes seemed to stare through the screen, and Velasquez felt cold, nearly sick, from looking into them. For all that the figure was beautiful, she radiated an aura of watchful primordial menace.

  “I,” she stated, and the screen vibrated in time with her voice, “am Aradia, the first lady of witchcraft. And you are a mortal man who has requested an audience with me. What do you hope to achieve by so doing?”

  The agent pushed aside his fears. “Yeah, very tough facade you have there, ma’am, but I’m aware of the universal pact against deities acting directly against us mortals, so I know you’re in no position to harm me.”

  The goddess’ expression did not change, but her eyes bored more deeply into him, the sensation both too cold and too hot. He forced himself not to shudder.

  “I have an offer for you,” he went on. “As I told your servants, we of the Agency want this whole mess with the werewitch and her little personal army cleared up. They’re making a huge mess. So, if you’d be interested, we can tell you where she and her closest followers are, and how to find them. It’s in a place where no one would notice anything untoward—including small technical violations of the divine non-intervention pact. My organization will stand by, do nothing, and say nothing as long as you take care of it quietly.”

  The haughty lips within the aristocratic face drew upward at the corners. “I am intrigued. Somehow I had suspected that you people were as self-serving as the rumors suggested. We have no wish to destroy the world, only to allow my daughters to flourish within it, which cannot occur so long as Bailey makes war on us.”

  “Right,” Velasquez shot back instantly. There was no point in pretending he believed the Venatori’s self-serving justification for their crusade. If anything, seeming cynical and indifferent enforced the idea that he was playing both sides against the middle to cover the Agency’s collective ass.

  “Tell me,” Aradia insisted, “and it shall be done without public spectacle.”

  The agent cracked his neck and readjusted his glasses. “Okay. But a couple more conditions if you don’t want my colleagues making life difficult for your daughters. First, you need to stop all those random attacks on American shifters. Without Bailey and her top shamans and friends, the rest of them will settle back into being mostly harmless. So leave them alone once she’s dealt with.”

  “Done,” said Aradia. “What is the other condition?”

  “Second,” Velasquez added, “you must make absolutely certain she’s dead. That means bringing whatever power to bear you think is necessary. The girl is tough. She’s survived multiple attempts by powerful Venatori to kill her. Hell, since she’s somewhere beyond human perception anyway, you could take care of her yourself. In fact, that might be the best way. She’s strong, but she can’t defeat a goddess.”

  The woman’s smile widened. “Done. She will die, no matter the cost. I will uphold your terms, provided you uphold yours. If you betray us, we will crush your Agency as surely as we are crushing the lycanthropes. Now, tell me where the werewitch may be found!”

  It occurred to Velasquez that Aradia’s threat was not an empty one. The Agency was formidable, but a prolonged war with the Venatori when they were backed up by their new goddess might be unwinnable. If the ploy failed, things would become far worse than they already were.

  He cleared his throat. “So, then. She’s in the Other near the werewolves’ temple, in this sacred forest they have. I think they were trying to meditate in the presence of the ancient shamanic spirits before the big battle or something like that. She’s got a few Weres with her, including a couple of shamans, I think, but nothing your heavy hitters can’t deal with. She’s separated from the rest of her people, and there will be no witnesses or human casualties.”

  The deity’s eyes blazed in a way Velasquez could barely look at them. “Good,” Aradia stated. “I know of the region you describe. My elite forces will strike her directly, and then I shall follow.”

  The screen went black after crackling loudly. Velasquez sat blinking at it before he noticed that a wisp of smoke was rising from the device.

  “Shit!” he exclaimed. The thing was dead. It was not meant to receive transmissions from entities who gave off levels of power comparable to the sun. “One more thing that will require me to fill out twenty goddamn forms.”

  He went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. Staring into the mirror, he wondered if he’d done the right thing.

  They were putting Bailey in severe danger. There was no guarantee the crazy plan to assassinate the goddess would work, and if it didn’t, Aradia would make the other pantheons aware. It might be just as bad as if Fenris had started laying waste to witches himself.

  “It’s our only viable option.” He sighed. “Fuck. Now I see why most days, Townsend hated the job so frickin’ much.”

  Chapter Ten

  “I can’t believe we’re having a damn picnic,” one of the lieutenants said. His tone was gruff, but his broad, bearded face was softened by a warm and goofy smile. He was a Silver Star named Don, Roger’s replacement right-hand man since Jim had been killed at the nightclub.

  Bailey shrugged. “Who knows when we’ll get another chance? I haven’t had a picnic in quite some time. Seems nice.”

  Half the other wolves chortled, including Roger, who pretended to admonish his man. “Shut up, Don. You’re just mad that we only brought enough food for one meal instead of eating two or three at once.”

  “Hey,” Don protested as the other Weres laughed, “most of my pounds are pure muscle.”

  “Yeah,” someone said, “I used to hang out with this really fat kid who always told me the same thing.”

  Bailey raised a hand. “Come on, now, don’t get nasty. I think we’re all hungry enough to eat two meals at once for the time being.”

  It was true. Despite the way the Other suspended the needs of the body, intense battle plus the exertion of burying two dozen bodies had famished them.

  Must be a mental hunger, Bailey reflected. We all think and feel that we’re supposed to be hungry at a time like this. But it’s not only that. The ugliness of killing all those women, and the danger we’re in? It’s made everyone want to have a proper, civilized, sit-down meal. Like friends and neighbors. Human beings.

  That would also explain why they made their dinner from supplies the Weres had brought. There was ample game in the enchanted wood, which any of them might have hunted with ease while shifted into wolf form. Bailey had forgotten to tell the newer guys they didn’t need to bring food into the Other.

  She was glad they had, though. They shared sandwiches and sodas from coolers and opened bags of chips and trail mix. Bailey absentmindedly thought she could use a beer, but drinking at a time like this was unlikely to be wise.

  More Weres had shown up after the initial battle was over. Bailey sent a couple of them back, taking the wounded with them to get help, but welcomed the addition of the others. Their numbers had swelled to at least three dozen. Some had never met each other before.

  Conversation turned to a review of all they’d been through—especially her and those who’d been with her previously, not least Will, Roger, and the others of
the South Cliff and Silver Star packs who had gone through the temple’s trials together.

  “Shit,” Bailey said, “I remember when half of you thought I was a loose cannon coming to take over your packs. And here we are, friends.”

  Alfred Warner, the aging but still formidable shaman of the Whitcomb Creek pack down by Salem, had emerged from the crowd and was munching a bag of nuts, seeds, and dried fruit.

  “Yes, I recall,” he commented. “I’m glad we cleared up that misunderstanding quickly. Well, you have taken over, but it’s for the best. We need an exceptional leader in a time like this. Who could have anticipated the Venatori would declare war?”

  Will Waldsbach shook his head and bit into a salami sandwich. “It’s crazy,” he remarked through a mouthful of food. “It was only a couple of months ago that the South Cliffs were still run by Dan Oberlin, who either wanted to marry Bailey or kill her or maybe both. He turned out to be even more of an asshole than anyone thought. Now he’s in jail, I’m in charge, and...”

  His voice trailed off. He’d meant to say that the South Cliffs were Bailey’s strongest supporters, practically her honor guard, but he didn’t want to sound boastful and make the other packs jealous.

  Roger of the Silver Stars shrugged. “Things change, and we do what we can.” He’d recovered from the wounds he’d taken proving his bravery in the temple.

  One of the Junipers took a swig of cherry cola. “There’ve been too many fuckin’ funerals,” he muttered. “But Fenris willing, there ain’t gonna be no more after we’re done with this. Not for a while, anyway.”

  The Juniper Pack was the smallest and most obscure of all those present. They’d also been the first to suffer the Venatori’s wrath, with some of their warriors going down against the Order’s vanguard and their shaman murdered by a witch shortly thereafter.

  Bailey raised a bottle. “Indeed. We’re gonna win this, and things will be okay in the long run.”

  She wondered, though, where Fenris was. He’d mysteriously disappeared during the battle with the first wave of Venatori. She was a full shaman, having been ordained by their god, but she wondered if he was still testing her. Trying to see if she could handle things without him.

  Or he might have had important business. If the other gods were angry, she hoped he could soothe their tempers until the conflict was over.

  “We’re gonna have a witch goddess after us soon,” she said aloud. “She’s not unbeatable, but things are gonna get tougher before they get easier. Hope you dipshits are ready.”

  Blustery comments and rumbles of assent wafted off the army as its members ate.

  One of the guys from downstate in Oregon—not a Whitcomb, from somewhere even farther south—stood up. “Yeah, well,” he growled, “here’s what I think of their precious goddess.” He unzipped his fly and got rid of some used soda against the trunk of a large tree.

  Weres chuckled, sharing the sentiment.

  Bailey coughed. “Put that away, you animal. No one would want to see that little thing, even if they could.” He was facing away from her, but it seemed like the proper thing to say.

  Discussion ensued, but once everyone got bored with dick jokes, it turned to the future.

  “So,” one guy began, a lean ginger-haired kid from the Idaho panhandle, “when this is all over, do we get to come back to this place? I probably shouldn’t say this, but the Other is fuckin’ awesome. Like, yeah, this is sacred ground, but it’d be a good place for parties and raves and shit.”

  Someone threw an empty soda bottle at him, and he cussed up a storm while trying to find the culprit.

  “Sit down,” Bailey told him.

  Alfred, the gray-haired shaman, opined that “We should come here more often. We as a people, I mean. Until this conflict started, we’d been losing touch with our roots, our spiritual heritage. Maybe not come to party, but more wolves should make pilgrimages to this forest. To hunt, and to commune with the woods and the moon and the ancestral spirits who watch over us all.”

  The mood turned serious, but was by no means unpleasant.

  “I’d encourage it,” said Bailey.

  * * *

  Having piled the three bodies in the extreme rear corner of Gunney’s back lot, Roland disposed of them by conjuring a thick rain of powerful acid. It quickly dissolved them, without sending up telltale plumes of smoke the way fire would have.

  The mechanic watched for only a second. “Good God, that’s awful.” He retched. “Couldn’t have happened to nicer people, but still horrible to see. And the smell!”

  He turned away, and Roland joined him. “Yeah. But they’ll never threaten this town again.”

  As they regrouped inside the shop, the wizard puzzled out the encounter.

  It had seemed too easy. The Inquisitor they’d fought had looked relatively young as well, making him think she’d been a new recruit, maybe an apprentice Inquisitor, and that the one leading the expedition must still be at large.

  He doubted the Venatori would have put the mission in the hands of anyone who was less than terrifying. That meant they still had a much more difficult fight ahead of them.

  Roland spoke to everyone at once. “What we need to do now is rally the town. Some of them might not even know what’s going on, and others are either ensorcelled or terrified. That’s where we come in. If we slip around talking to people, we can get the backup we need to take out the other Inquisitor and whoever else she has helping her.”

  Everyone agreed, although the younger folks—Jon, Trevor, Charlene, and the other two witches, not to mention Dante—were obviously scared. Roland suspected this was their first experience with combat to the death, although they had some skill at fighting.

  Gunney sighed. “I guess that means you’ll need a vehicle. Hold on a sec.”

  He grabbed a ring of keys off the wall and drove up a minute later in a Ford Transit van large enough to carry all eight of the crew. As he stepped out of the driver’s seat, the mechanic’s face was grim.

  “This thing,” he extrapolated, “is what I use for transporting parts and carrying shit that I don’t want to throw in the back of a truck. It’s useful to me, so be fuckin’ careful with it, okay?”

  “Sure.” Roland rubbed his chin as he examined their new ride. “You know, this is kinda like the one the A-Team had, isn’t it? Wait, or was that a Chevy? Crap.”

  One of the girls snickered, and Dante rubbed his eyes. “Oh, no. No, man. It’s not even in the same ballpark. But it’s nice to pretend. We can dream, right?”

  “No,” Gunney interrupted. “None of you knuckleheads is allowed to imagine yourselves in an ‘80s action show right now, doubly so while driving that thing. That’s my van. If it comes back in pieces, you’ll be leaving this shop in pieces. I don’t care how much magic you have. I got my ways. You don’t wanna find out.”

  Roland held up his hands, palms outward. “Okay, we get it. Calm down. We just need it for basic transport. We’ll bring it back in mint condition. Or near-mint, if we hit a pothole on one of the shitty roads in this town.”

  Gunney simmered but said no more. Roland motioned for everyone to pile into the van’s rear compartment, aside from Dante in the passenger’s seat and him as driver.

  He sighed while accepting the keys from the mechanic. “I’ve let Bailey do all the driving lately. I haven’t touched my car in, what, a month? The battery might be dead. Anyway, I’m a safer driver than she is, so fear not, old man.”

  He fired up the engine and pulled out into the road. Then he went uphill into the town’s northern fringe, rather than toward the main highway.

  They spent the remainder of the day weaving through Greenhearth’s side streets and the surrounding network of half-forgotten rural roads. Five times they parked in a hidden nook, piled out, and made conversation with the handful of locals who weren’t hiding in their homes. They seemed dazed or oblivious. Roland figured some had been hit with low-level memory wiping spells and used subtle enchantments of h
is own to jog their minds back toward normality, but otherwise, they simply explained the situation.

  Every person they spoke to reacted with varying degrees of terror, usually mixed with anger. They knew what the Venatori’s presence meant.

  But Roland was also a known quantity and one who was starting to command respect. He’d nearly sacrificed his life to stop the last attack and foil the Order’s scheme to turn witchkind against the people of the valley.

  And today, with four other Seattle witches by his side, he proved to them that the tide was turning against the European cult. Even their most fearsome operatives could be beaten and had to be beaten, because they were well on their way toward finding Bailey’s brothers and using them to leverage the shaman.

  “Thus,” Roland said to the bald guy who owned the hardware store, whom Browne had recently made a sheriff’s deputy, “all I need you to do is act as an auxiliary force, maybe provide covering fire. You guys shot a couple of witches before, didn’t you? They’re as susceptible to bullets as anyone else. We’ll do the heavy lifting when it comes to it.”

  The man rubbed his narrow jaw and squinted into the distance. “Hmm. Okay, fine,” he said. “But don’t waste time here. You oughta go to Bailey’s house and find her brothers.”

  “The Venatori were already there,” Dante pointed out, “so we don’t know where they are. But we’ll look anyway.”

  En route to the Nordin residence, they bumped into two more clusters of Weres. One pair was somehow utterly ignorant of the Inquisitor’s presence. Roland was about to cuss them out for not paying attention when they explained they’d been on patrol in the woods east of town.

  “Hey,” Charlene commented, “what about that guy who was suspended in midair?”

  “Crap,” muttered Roland. “Doug. He wasn’t there, was he? The witch holding him must have gone elsewhere. I hope she let him go, but that doesn’t seem very probable.”