by K. F. Breene
Austin practically jumped out of the cage and stalked toward me, his fingers wrapping around my upper arm. Assured I was okay, he turned and stared Elliot down.
“I heard everything that was said just now,” Austin said. “He spoke to me on the way here, too. I couldn’t answer, but I heard.”
“Yes. It’s quite a simple spell, really,” Elliot replied. “You just need the power to pull it off. Listen, Jessie, I built in some assurances. I let Edgar have some of my blood—I assume vampires can identify people by blood? It never even occurred to me to ask.” He shook his head. “Now I feel dumb. Hopefully that’s an assurance. I made a certain type of magical flowers for the basajaun using the potion I made for Edgar. I have them growing just…” He pointed to a bookshelf at the far side of the room. It was probably one of those secret doors. “I also told Ivy House everything. You can ask her when you get back. She knew who I was the whole time. She tends to think like I do—we don’t always take the nicest approach, but we try to do what’s right. You can also ask your shifter there. I should smell the same. I knew he’d identify me right away if I was ever in his vicinity, so I made sure I wasn’t until now. Also…I knew you’d try to kill me, so it was best for me to appear to you as that really uncomfortable hologram.”
I turned and looked at Austin while sending a message to Ivy House. “Did you—”
“Yep,” she answered before I could finish. She could definitely hear my conversations outside of Ivy House somehow. When I wasn’t busy being blindsided, I’d get to the bottom of that.
“You knew who he was, and you didn’t say anything?” I asked, outraged.
“Different cologne, but…” Austin wrapped his arm around my hip, his touch grounding. “I think he’s telling the truth, Jess.”
“You need to be pushed,” Ivy House told me. “You need to be prodded. I swear, you are the most timid wild child I’ve ever met. It’s like you lock all your good qualities up inside, and it takes a battle or taunting to bring them roaring out. He helped me even before I knew who he was. He helped you. Listen to him. If, when he’s done, you don’t like what you’ve heard, kill him. It’s pretty simple. You really shouldn’t hold grudges in the magical world. Things change too fast for that.”
I walked slowly to the little chair opposite Elliot and pulled it back a little farther. Austin pulled up another and we sat.
“So.” Elliot ran his hand down his face. “How about I start at the beginning?”
“Probably wise.”
“I had a twin sister. Both of us had great magical talent, but hers was as a Seer. It was…a burden to her. She had visions all the time. She knew what was going to happen tomorrow, or five years from now, or after her death. Good and bad things. Horrible things, sometimes. She knew our parents would die in a car accident. She knew our uncle would be physically abusive. Of course, we tried to prevent those things from coming to pass, to change the stars, but the end result was always the same. She finally realized that when she saw a vision, it represented the path of least resistance to an end result that would happen no matter what. It was best just to go with it.
“When we were in our late teens, the visions started coming faster and becoming more vivid. They were so encompassing that she started to lose track of reality. She wouldn’t know the difference between a vision, a waking dream, or something happening in the present. Her mind started to slip, unable to deal with it. Finally, she had a series of visions about you. How you came to accept the Ivy House magic. How you blossomed into the mage you are today. She guided me through the role I was to play in your rise to power, including the things I would need to construct, like the tunnels your basajaun destroyed—don’t worry, my people moved in the second you left your quarters so as to move your things—and the meadow flowers on the tunnel walls. I knew what the Ivy House crystals looked like before I’d ever set foot in that room. She also told me spells I would need to track down and figure out. Books I could find about Ivy House. Things like that. She told me my path, and begged I follow it, even though it would require a grave sacrifice.”
“And what sacrifice was that?” I asked.
“When I was forty, I walked away from an empire and became a hermit inside of a mountain. Or I might have ushered in my own death. That’s up to you.”
I squinted at his face.
He nodded. “I have an amazing potion for youthfulness.” He gave me a small smile but didn’t ask if I wanted the recipe, which I was thankful for. “I sent a pretty useless mage and his right-hand man to apprehend you when you first got to O’Briens. Remember him?”
Yes, I remembered him. A man in a poncy cape had tried to grab me, but Austin, Niamh, Mr. Tom, and Edgar had shown up and saved the day.
“You needed a push,” he said, as though reading my mind. “I was that push. Not just with the caped fool, of course. I sent people into Ivy House after you. I had them loiter on the property. You fulfilled your destiny and took the magic. You were always going to. I just helped you along.” He shrugged. “Next I put out a bid for someone to kidnap you and put you in that cave. I offered just enough to bring in some decent people. Some were cleverer than others, I must admit.” He paused for a moment. “I never intended to retrieve you. You were going to be in that cave as long as you needed to be in order to escape. That was the push. You needed to figure out how to fly. Turned out, it didn’t take you any time at all. That’s when I knew Ivy House had chosen well.”
He smiled again, his eyes crinkling at the corners.
“No,” I said, remembering the pain I’d gone through, the pain Austin had gone through, trying to get out of that blasted cave.
“Moving along.” His lips tightened. “The issue with the competing forces—the one that came at you from the front of the house? Those sort of…barbarian people? What was up with them? I only got a glimpse as they traveled to your town, but hello, cosplay, am I right?” He rubbed his face. “They were ridiculous. That wasn’t in the cards, actually. I got wind of them heading out there to check you out, wanting to know your relationship to me. It was bound to happen. I had to scramble a little, but I figured it was time to get the basajaun active, and for you to start working on some of Ivy House’s key vulnerabilities. Also, you know, to meet an adversary who would give you a pause.” He rubbed his chin. “It took you a while to find that deer. That guy doesn’t even like flowers. Didn’t you stop to wonder why a man was eating flowers? Just because he changes into a deer, doesn’t mean he eats like a deer.”
Austin and I both tensed, and I exchanged a glance with him. Yes, we should’ve realized that. We hadn’t. Too much had been going on.
“What do you mean, get the basajaun active?” I said, adrenaline going through me. I knew Elliot had always been a step ahead, but not just how big that step really was.
“The basajaun was always meant to be part of your journey. Fun fact, my dear friend Burke, who has been sniffing around the tunnels for the past few days, had finally found the entrance to my residence. I’m not quite sure what he planned to do there. Hide under my bed and try to kill me in my sleep? Look for incriminating evidence? Check my browser history? We’ll never know. Unless he has hidden powers we don’t know about, he got squished in the fallout from the basajaun’s cave-in. I’m not sure if I should add him to my wall, though. Technically, he wasn’t my kill… Ah, sure, I might as well, as Niamh would say.”
“How did you…get him active? Did you tell him to help me in the cave?”
“Good Lord, no! That was a shock. But then, if he was destined to be part of your journey, it makes sense he’d feel an immediate rapport with you. No, I simply gave him a reason to join your fight. I told my man and his merry band of helpers to head over the basajaun’s mountain. The vision said it would anger him.” He spread his hands. “I wasn’t sure how at first, but now I realize it takes very little to anger him. So…”
“You sent shifters to die,” Austin said with a growl.
Elliot held up a finger
. “No. I sent the deer shifter to keep an eye on you, and then to get your attention when those barbarians were sniffing around. That fool Marcos collected a bunch of passive shifters and drove them to you for a distraction. Good riddance, huh? I hoped you’d take him off my hands. I won’t ask where he’s buried.”
“You’re telling me that you had no hand in that?” I asked.
“I sent the mage with the directive to kidnap you using the potions that make Ivy House vulnerable. The rest was his creation. I don’t tend to micromanage. In that situation, I wish I had.”
“What if he’d kidnapped me?”
“Your alpha probably would’ve tracked him down and killed him horribly. Or the basajaun would’ve. If all else failed, I would’ve…figured something out along the way. I wasn’t too worried, though. You always rise to the occasion.”
“Kinsella?”
“Another fool. He was not my design, and it was a real treat to tear off my illusion and give him the justice he’d eluded for so long. What a wanker.”
“That wasn’t part of the vision?”
“No. Not directly. But I knew I needed to extract myself from the situation and figure out a way to lure you here. He provided…” Elliot chuckled and shook his head. “That whole thing was perfect. Talk about fate. You handled it all beautifully, and now here you are. Owning your gargoyle, falling in love, contemplating killing a double-crossing scoundrel. I deserve it, I get that. I wasn’t fully honest with you at Ivy House. Shifters do fascinate me, and they made me feel fear for the first time since my sister died. There was something enlivening about it…I was truthful about that. But the real reason I stayed there was you. To train you. To fulfill the vision. That’s not something I could say.”
“Were you even summoned?”
“Yes, but I knew I would be. It was part of the vision. Listen, Jessie, here’s what it comes down to. So often powerful people will hide evil deeds behind empty promises. I decided early on that I’d wear what I am on my sleeve. I’m weird, I do things oddly, I don’t play into the mage hype, and I’m rotten in plenty of ways. The thing with my sister, with my upbringing, messed me up quite a bit. But I promised myself that I wouldn’t hide what I was behind a crooked smile.” He paused. “Yes, I recognize the irony. I know that when I accidentally smile in that illusion mask, it comes out crooked. You have to be really careful not to make any facial expressions in that thing or the mask slips. That or you look weird.” He waved his hand. “But you know I mean figuratively crooked.”
“What’s your point?” I said, trying to wrap my brain around all this and decide if he was lying, or if he was telling the truth and I was still mad as hell anyway.
“I also decided that if I was ever fortunate enough to get to work with you, I’d be the bad guy so you wouldn’t have to make the hard decisions. To take out mages like Kinsella. Or to organize extravagant meetings with people neither of us have any intention of working with so they can see your power, prestige, and potential. I decided that I would set the stage so that you may shine.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why would you forgo the audience? You seem to love holding court.”
He frowned at me. “I didn’t say I would forgo an audience. I said I’d be the bad guy. It’s much more fun.”
Twenty-Seven
I sat and stared at Elliot, mulling over what he’d said. So much of it had struck a chord. The more I thought about it, the less I doubted him. His story checked out, as crazy as that might be.
But it was hard to let go of the hate. It was hard not to blame him for all the hell I’d been through.
“What do you think?” I asked Austin, turning my head a little.
He shook his head. “This isn’t something I can direct you on. Either you trust him or you don’t. I’ll back you whatever you choose.”
“Including sitting on my chairs without a towel under your naked butts,” Elliot said softly.
I quirked an eyebrow at him.
He shrugged and looked away. “Common courtesy.”
This wasn’t the time to laugh, but I wanted to.
“You’re positive he smells like Sebastian?” I asked Austin.
“Yes. But given his powers as a mage, it’s probably wise to get a second opinion.”
“He’s Sebastian. Here’s your second opinion,” Ivy House said.
“I’m not so inclined to trust you. Or talk to you right now.”
“I sided with Austin when you two had your spat. I was right then, and I’m right now. I look forward to eventually telling you I told you so.”
“By all means.” Elliot waved his hand. “Let them through.”
I stared hard at him.
“You didn’t think I’d be totally alone here, did you?” He frowned at me. “You trust too much, Jessie Ironheart. Your shifter does, too. Never trust a mage. Never.”
“And yet you are sitting here, asking me to trust you…”
“Okay, well, yes, I can see where that would be confusing.” He rubbed his chin. “I’m not a typical mage, though. Also, I’ve taken you on as an apprentice. In mage-land, that means that I will only help you achieve, because your successes will reflect favorably on me.”
“Until the student outstrips the teacher and the teacher gets jealous and tries to kill the student.”
“You’ve watched too many movies.” He crossed his ankle over his knee. “In case you are wondering, my longtime friend and second-in-command has been watching us. She is taking down the spells and letting your people in as we speak. She could have come in and tried to prevent you from killing me. She didn’t. We’ve always known my death was a possibility, and she has helped me orchestrate all of this. That should tell you how serious we are about what we’ve been doing. What we’ve done.”
“So let’s say…” I felt my people rush forward. Elliot hadn’t been lying—someone else had taken down the spell and let them in. “Let’s say I forgive you for making my life hell. Then what?”
“I’ll ask for the privilege of training you.”
“Where? Here?”
“Of course not.” He held out his hands. “There is no here. Your basajaun destroyed it. I have very little left other than a couple of guest rooms and this common area.”
“I highly doubt that.”
He grinned. “Okay, fair enough. I do have a great many other places I can go in the world. But none of them are home. I haven’t had a real home since I stepped back from the magical world and started preparing for you. We could train wherever you prefer, although I assume that would be on Ivy House soil, where you are best protected.”
“Not so sure about that anymore,” I muttered.
“You rose in the magical world after your sister died?” Austin asked.
“Yes,” Elliot answered.
“Why? Why not just start preparing then? Why climb to the top, with all the sweat and tears that must’ve taken, only to step down?”
“Climbing to the top was preparing,” Elliot responded. “I established myself as a key power. I created a network. Everyone knew my name. You knew my name, which made it easier for me to tamper in your lives. To get people to come to this meetup. It’s easy for me to get an audience with whoever I want. Stepping back doesn’t mean disappearing when you’ve reigned as mob king. Your return will always be feared. As it should be. Also…I like holding court, as Jessie said.”
“If you moved to our town and started training me, wouldn’t the people who’ve been watching you show up and try to kill you?” I asked, monitoring my people above me. They hadn’t been magically transported part of the way like I had been, which meant it would take them longer to reach us.
“Yes. And now you, too. Beating Kinsella put you on the map in a big way. Showing your might here has officially made you a talking point. You are still an enigma, I think, but a powerful one. Welcome to the big leagues.”
“So you’ve painted a target on my back.”
“No. I’ve scrolled a marquee above your hea
d that says, ‘Do not tread lightly.’ Without that marquee, what you’re about to do next would’ve put a target on your back, and your life would’ve been a lot harder, trust me. A lot more dangerous.”
“What do you mean, what I’m about to do next?”
“First things first. Let’s make sure you trust who I am.” Elliot uncrossed his leg. “And if you want to put on some sweats, that would be fine too. I stole some of those purple ones Mr. Tom orders. They are just…” He motioned at a table across the way, and it was the first time I noticed the neatly folded articles of clothing on it. “Whatever makes you comfortable. I will point out that I am not comfortable, because your big shifter keeps…animating certain parts of his anatomy, and it is incredibly distracting. I’m not used to casual nudity, and I am less used to casual nudity when it’s a man who keeps getting aroused for no reason that I can discern.”
“It’s the mating,” Austin replied. “I’m drawn to how she is handling you.”
“Oh, great. That’s lovely.” Elliot looked away. “Not at all terrifying. God, this is awkward.”
My people came through the door, Niamh first with a surly expression, followed by Mr. Tom. At the back was Broken Sue with his arm out and looped around his hip, straining as though he were carrying something like a bag of sand.
Elliot noticed, and his lips tweaked up into a smile. “I told you, Nessa! Didn’t I tell you that simply being invisible wouldn’t work with these shifters? Now look, Broken Sue has caught you.”
“It isn’t the nicest of holds,” came a disembodied female voice, “but the muscle I am squished up against isn’t unpleasant. He has a lovely, earthy smell. I could definitely be in worse places.”
“Here, what’s goin’ on, Jessie?” Niamh demanded, walking over to us. Broken Sue didn’t drop his cargo. “Why isn’t he dead?”
“He claims he’s Sebastian,” I answered, turning and finding Edgar, already drifting toward one of the corners. “Edgar, I need you.”
“Oh, how nice. I love to be needed.” He loped toward me.
