The Castle of Water and Woe (Briarwood Reverse Harem Book 3)

by Steffanie Holmes

  Or destroy it forever.

  The thought had been swimming around in my head ever since Blake led us through the ritual, and I heard Daigh’s voice in my head, laughing at our efforts. If we destroyed the gateway … all the gateways … then the world would be permanently protected from the fae.

  I raced out of the library and clambered up the stairs, disturbing thoughts swimming around in my head. I hadn’t told any of the others yet because there hadn’t been a chance and because … because even though I currently had no evidence, I was certain that destroying the gateway meant destroying the entire fae realm. And I didn’t know how I felt about that.

  On the one hand, as a scientist I had to place importance on the mathematically greater good. A few fae lives to save the lives of millions of humans seemed like a no brainer.

  We weren’t just talking about stealing a few babies here. Corbin had explained the fae’s ultimate goal the night I’d first learned of their existence. The Slaugh. The dark fae host riding across the earth, raising the dead and leaving the world bathed in the blood of the living. Corbin said the Slaugh caused the Black Death. If the fae brought another plague, or worse, we had to do everything we could to stop them … even if it meant destroying them.

  But on the other hand … the whole idea of wiping out an entire race just because their king had a persecution complex made my stomach churn. Didn’t that make me just as bad as Daigh? If Blake stood up to the king and escaped, did that mean that others might do the same thing, also? Could I honestly condemn them all to death?

  And there was a third thing. I tried to push it to the corner of my mind because it was an emotional issue and had nothing to do with the wider moral and scientific implications. But it kept nagging at me. That’s my dad in there. If it came down to it, could I kill my own father? What did I know about him, really? Had he used my mother, as he said, or had he once loved her? Had she seen something good in him?

  A cold ache settled in my chest. If only I could ask her. But she’s gone, and it’s all because of the fae. They’ve already taken so many good people – the Crawfords, Rowan’s parents, Flynn’s father, Arthur’s mother. I can’t let them take any more.

  I reached the top of the stairs. Instead of taking me up to my bedroom, my feet dragged me in the other direction. I glanced up, and my eyes fell on my mother’s portrait.

  I’d been deliberately avoiding it ever since I’d heard the voice that wasn’t mine inside my head. I rubbed the back of my neck, where the hairs stood on end at the memory of those words whispering against my consciousness.

  It was probably the wind. It makes all kinds of noises as it funnelled through the open courtyard and covered walkway. No reason to avoid looking at a painting. That was giving in to base fears when a rational explanation was sufficient to explain the phenomena.

  Just to prove to myself that I believed my explanation, I took another step toward the painting, focusing on my mother’s face. Her wide, smiling eyes drew me in. My eyes.

  Those eyes hid so many secrets, so many stories that I’d never be able to hear. All my life she’d been a mystery summed up in two words – birth mother – with not even a photograph or letter or figment of memory to cling to. And now, here she was in vibrant technicolour. All I wanted was to dive into that painting and sit with her and see what she saw that made her smile like that. Her lips were closed, curled up at the edges, her features placid, her skin radiant.

  My gaze dropped to the citrine pendant around her neck, and the identical ring around her long finger. Corbin said the jewels were a symbol of her status as the coven’s High Priestess. They made her look so powerful – a force of nature, capable of great and terrible things. I hoped she used that power wisely, as I wanted to do.

  “I wish you could tell me what to do,” I said out loud, feeling foolish.

  My eyes flicked back to my mother’s face, and I gasped, staggering back.

  Before, Aline Moore’s lips had been closed in that sensuous half smile. But now, her lips were parted, her cheeks sunk into shadow, and her eyes…

  They were wide with terror.

  EIGHTEEN: MAEVE

  That’s impossible.

  My heart clattered against my chest. I shut my eyes, hoping like hell when I opened my eyes and stared at my mother’s face again I’d see the same serene half-smile that had always been there. It’s just a trick of the light, a figment of my overactive imagination, a hallucination caused by too much sleep and whatever the hell it is Rowan puts in his hot chocolate.

  I opened my eyes.

  No.

  The horrible expression remained. My mother’s face twisted in an mask of pure terror, vividly captured on the canvas that had only seconds ago been alluring and beautiful.

  It’s got to be some kind of optical illusion. Maybe the roof leaked and the paint dripped away and this contorted the expression.

  Dragging my legs forward, I reached up a shaking hand to touch my mother’s face. Cool, dry paint met my fingers, the canvas hard and unyielding. No dampness. It was just layers of paint and gesso. It couldn’t move.

  And yet, I knew what I was looking at. My mother’s expression was different.

  I gulped down the panic rising in my throat. “Arthur!” I yelled. “Flynn! Get your asses up here!”

  Footsteps clattered on the stairs. A moment later, thick arms wrapped around my body. I sank into them, my trembling limbs steadied by Arthur’s bulk. I pressed my face into his shoulder, breathing in his hot, smoky scent. It calmed my nerves a fraction.

  “Maeve, what’s wrong?”

  “The painting …” I stammered out.

  “She’s a fine broad,” Blake whistled. I guess he’d followed them upstairs.

  “That’s my mother you’re talking about.” I snapped. “She’s dead. And she moved.”

  “What do you mean, she moved?”

  “Can’t you see it?” I jabbed my finger at the canvas. “Her expression is completely different—”

  The words caught in my throat as I glimpsed my mother’s face again. Her placid eyes and hidden smile stared back at me. No trace of the horror I’d seen only moments ago.

  “That doesn’t make any sense.” I frowned. “She looked completely different. Her face was all twisted with fear.”

  “It could have been the light falling on the canvas,” Arthur said, rubbing circles on my shoulders. “The paint is quite thick and maybe it tricked your eye into—”

  “I know what I saw,” I said. “I’m a scientist, remember? I’ve run through all the rational explanations already. And I’ve concluded that the painting moved. I’m not going to willfully ignore the evidence of my own eyes anymore.”

  Blake tapped the corner of the canvas. “You realise this is a painting, right?”

  “Yes, thank you Blake. I do realise that. But I’m telling you, I saw it move. And now I want to know why that happened. Is it some kind of fae trick, like a glamour?”

  Blake frowned at the picture. “It’s definitely the kind of prank Daigh would approve of. He fancies himself a bit of an artist, so he loves fucking with the human works he considers inferior. On one of his forays into this realm he once cast a glamour that removed all the fig leaves from the Renaissance exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery. Caused quite a stir, if I recall. Blushing art historians everywhere.”

  “But how could a fae cast a glamour through the castle’s wards?” Arthur asked, narrowing his eyes at Blake.

  Blake shrugged. “Maybe your wards are weakening. Or maybe the fae gave that haughty woman some charm to hide in the castle that’s allowing them to project a glamour.”

  “Or maybe a witch who can perform fae magic thought he’d play a little trick?”

  “Sure, you can waste your precious breath accusing me.” Blake tapped the edge of the portrait again. “That’s a thing you could do. It’s not like I’ve already proven my use to you several times over. But hey, you go ahead and raise your fists to the best weapon against t
he fae you could possibly have, and see how that works out for you.”

  And just like that, I realised what we needed to do.

  “Guys.” I grabbed Arthur’s shoulder, pulling him back just as he raised his fist. “I think we’re going about this all wrong.”

  “All what?” Flynn waved around a tiny spellbook he’d carried up from the library, the open pages flapping in the air. “You mean how Arthur’s about to rearrange Blake’s face? You think his tongue should go behind his ear or something?”

  “No. Don’t do that,” I gripped Arthur’s arm and met his eyes. A maelstrom of rage circled inside his irises, and heat surged from his fist. I jumped back as a tall flame leapt from his closed fist, licking at the antique hall table beneath the painting. Quick as lightning, Flynn darted forward and sent a spray of water from his palm. With a sizzle, the flame died out.

  I rubbed Arthur’s arm, keeping my eyes training on his. The muscles beneath his skin remained taut, hardened. His whole body stiffened in attack mode. The anger in his eyes scared me even more than my mother’s contorted face.

  “Arthur, please, come back to us.” I tried to keep my voice even, calm. “Blake’s not our enemy. Even if he did do this, it didn’t do anything except frighten me. We need him.”

  The muscles in Arthur’s arm relaxed a fraction, but the storm didn’t leave his eyes. Beneath my fingers, his skin crawled with heat. He’s moments away from unleashing another fireball.

  Not knowing what else to do, I reached up and pressed my lips to his, pouring all my feelings for Arthur – my awe at his strength, my desire for him, my admiration for what he’d made of his life, my fear of the tsunami of anger rising inside him – into the kiss, curling my body around his. Desire shot through me, drawing up a deep heat from deep inside me that sizzled under my skin.

  The magic. It pulsed and raged in my veins as I curled my tongue around Arthur’s, drinking in all his darkness and transforming it into raw energy that built inside me, pulsing between my legs, begging to be released.

  Arthur’s whole body shifted, the tension flowing out of him as he responded to my touch. My fire witch channelled all that his rage into the kiss, mashing his mouth against mine, sweeping me up in a wave of passion so intense it left me panting and breathless as I drew away.

  I glanced up at him, and there was Arthur again, his eyes calm, his beard a wild tangle, his mouth curling up in a satisfied smile. “Remind me to threaten Blake more often,” he grinned.

  “Do I get a kiss if I turn Arnold into a frog?” Blake asked, a salacious grin stretching across his face.

  “I threaten the English every single day,” Flynn added.

  The mood in the hallway changed. Now the very air sizzled with sexual tension. I glanced from Flynn to Blake to Arthur, aware of the hunger in their eyes, the way their bodies surrounded me, and if Blake or Flynn took another step closer, they’d be pressed up against me. I’d be the meat in the world’s most delicious sandwich.

  And then I remembered the horrible expression on my mother’s face in the painting, and Daigh’s terrible laugh when we were performing the ritual, and how tired and drawn Corbin looked when he left, and I knew this was not the time to get distracted.

  “Now that we’ve got that sorted,” I leaned against Arthur’s body, letting him hold me upright as the heat swirled inside of me. The thought entered my head that with Jane downstairs I could take all three guys up to my room and do a little group experimenting, but I pushed it down. Concentrate. “I think we’re going about this all wrong. It might take us a year to go through the library, and there’s no guarantee we’ll find anything of use.”

  “FInally, a voice of reason.” Flynn tossed his book over the balustrade, where it landed on the flagstones below with a loud SLAP. “I’m so bored that the BBC marathon of David Attenborough documentaries is starting to sound like fun.”

  I decided not to tell Flynn that I’d happily watch an entire weekend of David Attenborough documentaries, especially if my favourite red-haired Irish boy was beside me, making funny monkey noises. Instead, I balled my hands into fists to try and quell the heat, and said, “First of all, I think we need to take a more practical approach. I want to set up my monitoring equipment by the sidhe, today. Second, we’re doing this because we need to figure out what the fae are planning, right? The quickest way to get that information is to go straight to the source.”

  “You mean, back into the fae realm, the same way you did before? Corbin won’t like it,” Flynn said. “Especially when he’s not here.”

  “Corbin’s not in charge of this coven, I am.” I turned to Blake. “Would you be willing to do it? You know your way around there much better than I.”

  Blake grinned. “Do I get one of those kisses out of it?”

  I shrugged, trying not to betray how his words sent a shiver down my spine. “Sure, when you come back.”

  Blake’s face betrayed no emotion beyond his smug cat-ate-the-canary grin, as per normal. I thought I caught a little tremor in his hand when he leaned against the balustrade. “Then I’ll oblige you, Princess. Do you still have any of that sleeping draught left over from your little adventure the other night?”

  Flynn tapped his chin. “I think there’s some down in the kitchen, unless you drank it when you ate everything else.”

  “Did it taste delicious?”

  “No.”

  “Then I definitely haven’t drunk it already,” Blake sauntered back down the stairs. “That Rowan may be a freak, but he sure knows his way around the kitchen.”

  Flynn went down to the kitchen to pour the draught, while the rest of us returned to the library.

  I sat down on the end of the couch, expecting Blake to sit beside me. Instead, he leaned over me, a powerful arm on either side of me. His face an inch from mine, giving me a clear view of his perfect porcelain skin, his crystalline eyes laced with heat, his pouting lips that looked delicious enough to eat.

  I swallowed hard.

  “I’ll take my kiss now, Princess,” Blake said, the evil glint in his eye turning my stomach in knots. “I prefer payment in advance.”

  Before I could reply, the heat in my veins pulled my body forward, pressing my lips against Blake’s.

  Sparks flew inside my head – Fourth of July fireworks exploding through my grey matter. The room swirled and disappeared, and I lost all sense of time and place and urgency. The only thing that existed was Blake’s lips parting mine with confidence, his tongue devouring me. I’d never been drunk before, but I imagined this was kind of what it felt like.

  Woah.

  Is it kissing another spirit user that makes me feel like this, or was it just that Blake is really, really, really good?

  I drew back, heart hammering. Blake stared at me, his eyes dancing. His lips curled back into his signature evil grin.

  “Anytime you want, Princess,” he whispered, his words both an invitation and a warning.

  Behind Blake’s head, Arthur leaned against the bookshelf, glowering. I smiled at him, trying to show him that just because I kissed Blake, didn’t mean that I didn’t love his kiss from earlier. But he looked away.

  Flynn returned with the glass and sat it on the table. Blake leaned against Corbin’s desk and picked up the draught, frowning at the tiny portion.

  I frantically tried to think of what things I should do as a leader to make this safer for Blake. “Before you drink it, let’s talk strategy. How are you planning to find the answers we need?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t plan, Princess. How do you think I ended up here? I made a split second decision to jump into the void after you. It was either going to send me here, or rip me into a million infantesimal pieces and scatter my soul across the galaxy. I got lucky.”

  “Blake, you have to have some kind of plan. You can’t just walk up to Daigh and ask him how he intends to raise the Slaugh”

  “Damn, there goes plan A.” I whacked Blake on the shoulder, and he grinned. “Calm your farm, Pr
incess. There is someone I’ll try to contact who might know the details of the plan, but Daigh may well have got rid of them.” A strange, faraway look passed through Blake’s eyes. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he was worried. The look was gone in a moment, replaced by his usual cocky smirk. “If not, I’ll use fae methods for gathering information. They’ve always worked well in the past.”

  “What are these fae methods?”

  “It’s probably better you don’t know. Please note I’m doing this on one condition,” Blake stared at the glass. “When I get back, there better be a hot curry sitting on this table.”