“Don’t blame him,” Adeline scolded me. “It was my idea and Rodrick reluctantly agreed. Your father said he wanted to be here in the event that we were successful. You weren’t the only one who lost Dirk, Riley.”
I was stunned into silence. She knew she had me and she wouldn’t relent. I couldn’t argue with the fact that my father had suffered through this ordeal as well. I shook my head, finally realizing what was really going on. Adeline thought it was a good idea for me to rest and not free Dirk from the grandmaster right away because she would have my father there to help her. This was where she drew the line. She knew she needed me to get Dirk to come out in the open but she didn’t want me expending my energy on freeing him from being possessed. That was something my father wanted for himself.
I was enraged. I wanted to scream. If I could shoot my magic in the air and throw everyone around me back ten yards I would. Only I knew Adeline wasn’t wrong. My father lost his son to the grandmaster. To an ancient evil that couldn’t be reasoned with. Maybe…just maybe… it was his right to see Dirk first and help me free him.
I hung my head in shame for having spoken out the way I did. It wasn’t until we rounded the corner to the hallway leading to Rodrick’s hidden study that I made sure my posture was as straight as an arrow. Not because my father had berated me several times over the years for my lack of good posture but because I refused to let him see how tired I was.
My father was leaned up against the stone wall with both his hands in his pockets of a finely tailored suit. He moved away the second the five of us came tearing around the corner. His usual expression of discontent was there. His jaw was tight and his eyes narrowed down at me.
“Where is my son?” he asked Adeline.
Adeline didn’t answer him right away. She waited until she was in his personal space. “We don’t know,” she said. “But I get the feeling that you do.”
My father cursed under his breath and veered his head away. “I told you it might come to this.”
“Yes, but forgive me for thinking your theory was a little far-fetched. Especially after the vision Riley had.”
“It’s not a theory. Can’t you see that now?”
“Watch your tone!” Adeline spat, reminding him of who he was speaking to.
My eyes darted from Adeline to my father. It didn’t matter how good my lycan senses had become, I couldn’t make out what the bloody hell they were talking about.
“What’s going on?” I asked. “What aren’t you telling me this time?”
“What exactly did you see in your vision, Riley?” My father spoke to me in a rough voice. He had a way of reminding me who the true authority was in the room when he spoke. I did my best to ignore it. “The grandmaster kidnapped Daniella. He was torturing her to get access to the Sorlin-Vontaine. She resisted him. Then he…” I stammered as he rolled his eyes at me as if I was nothing more than an insolent child. “He killed her! How can you be so callous after what she sacrificed for her coven?”
I didn’t like Daniella from the start. She didn’t give me any reason to. Yet somehow, my father’s disregard for her after what the grandmaster did to her made me furious.
“Daniella wouldn’t sacrifice herself for the whole of France,” my father shouted. “How could you be so foolish?”
“Easily done when no one keeps me informed on what’s going on,” I snarled back at him. “So what is it this time? What aren’t you telling me? You know more about Dirk disappearing, don’t you?”
“Of course I do,” he said. “And if Adeline had listened to me we might have prevented this.”
Adeline didn’t like being demeaned. Especially by my father, a lycan who wasn’t even close to her in stature of the hierarchy of the witchling world. But she held her tongue. Even I could see how much she had to hold back to accomplish it.
“Your father thinks that Daniella is the one who betrayed Margaux,” Adeline said. “That it was she who revealed Margaux’s whereabouts so she could be captured and have the luxra witchling from the inner circle take over her mind.”
Now it was Margaux’s turn to look annoyed.
“That’s not possible,” she said, breaking between Rodrick and me to come face to face with my father. “I don’t care what little grudge you and Daniella have between each other. You do not make such accusations about my coven without just cause.”
“Oh, I have just cause.” My father wasn’t afraid to get back in her face. He looked down at Margaux with his nostrils flared and his eyes set ablaze.
Margaux didn’t back down. “Why would Daniella betray me? She’s devoted to the Sorlin-Vontaine.”
“Daniella is loyal to her own ideas for the Sorlin-Vontaine and what she wants for the coven. You were in the way so she decided to help the one person with enough power to cast you aside. And the fact that you were the perfect vessel for an ancient luxra witchling from the inner circle to possess was an added bonus.”
Lothar and Jake looked on with a mixture of bewilderment. Neither understood and I had done nothing to keep them informed. I saw no reason for them to remain in the dark.
“My father had a brief affair with Daniella, the second in command to the Sorlin-Vontaine in Paris,” I told them, not caring in the least if my father’s little secret came out in the open. He did it. He could own it.
Jake busted apart laughing, breaking the tension in the hall and leaving me a bit perplexed by his reaction. “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, is it? This Daniella woman wants revenge on you for breaking her heart and sought help from the grandmaster? As what? Some sort of revenge?”
My father didn’t hesitate to get right up in Jake’s face. It didn’t matter to my father in the least that Jake was a solid head taller than him. He wouldn’t allow a lowly creature such as Jake to speak to him in such a way. I should know. It was the same hardened look he gave me when I was caught disobeying him.
“Daniella knew the best way to hurt me was to hurt my children,” my father retorted. “They were a means to an end for her to get what she wants. Total and complete control over the Sorlin-Vontaine. She helped take possession of your precious Alina Sokolova’s mind years ago. She told her to murder my wife so she could find a way to get closer to me in my grief. And when I refused to help her overthrow Margaux Carville, she set her sights on my son. But that wasn’t enough for her. She converted Devon over to the Dolch Erbe and sent him after my daughter. Daniella and the grandmaster made a deal long ago. She would help him to acquire the perfect bodies for his inner circle and he would make her the ruler of the Sorlin-Vontaine. In my ignorance, I never thought she would go through with it. I refuse to allow myself the privilege of assuming her incapable of such madness ever again.”
My heart hammered inside my chest as the pieces slowly came together. Pieces my father never shared with me.
“Daniella knew my children would make the perfect match for the grandmaster and his sister,” he went on. “He had his sights on me for ages. That’s the entire reason I left the lycan realm and built an estate strong enough to keep my family safe. Until my children were born. He decided from beyond the grave that they were better suited for his plans.”
My father turned around and face me.
“And now he’s escaped your keeping. Daniella more than likely intercepted him in a vixra tunnel. Am I correct?”
I swallowed hard, not wanting to admit that he was right.
“Daniella and the grandmaster let you see what they wanted you to see,” he said to me. “They wanted to lure you in so his work could be completed and your body possessed by his sister. And when things went wrong, Daniella ripped him out of the vixra tunnel to rescue him.”
“No,” Margaux shook her head in defiance. “She has been helping me to find a way to break the curse. She’s helped Adeline as well. We would have sensed the deception.”
“I never liked her,” Alexei chimed in. “I told you so several times. She tried talking you into getting rid of me.”
/> “That’s not relevant,” Margaux snapped at him in French. “Everyone in my coven has tried persuading me to get rid of you.”
Alexei shrugged, knowing not to push her any further. It was something of a marvel to see him shut down so quickly. Rodrick had to come to blows to force him into submission but all it took for Margaux was a scolding.
I looked at Adeline to see if there was any such confidence that Margaux was right. I received no reassurance.
“Her only motivation for helping either of you break the curse was to get your potion inside my system,” he fumed. “If I sacrificed myself in the ritual to break the curse and fell into a deep sleep, she could find where my body lay and kill me. Along with you, Adeline, and everyone else in her way. The Sorlin-Vontaine would be hers. It was her backup plan if you were somehow freed from possession. She could kill you while you slept.”
“Kenneth,” Adeline said his name softly as if she was attempting to calm a wild beast. “Your entire theory is predicated on the idea that the grandmaster would let Daniella have control over the Sorlin-Vontaine. He would simply take control of it and command them to do his will and hunt down as many lycan and witchlings as possible. My mother, grandmother, and the vixra council all investigated your angle. It doesn’t fit the grandmaster’s patterns from the previous centuries.”
“Because you’re assuming that Daniella can’t overpower the grandmaster. She’s deluded into thinking she can. She sees him as a means to an end to get what she wants.”
“She cannot defeat the grandmaster,” Margaux argued.
“Try telling her that. The woman’s self-aggrandizement knows no bounds.”
“Like someone else I know,” I chimed in, hoping to cut him with my words.
To my surprise, he didn’t respond. He was far beyond waiting around for any of us to agree with his assessment. If my father had one attribute I vaguely admired, it was that he’s a man of action. He wouldn’t allow his pride to be damaged by any of us standing around deciding whether or not he was right.
“My son’s life is in the balance,” he said to Adeline as he straightened the front end of his jacket. “Now if you excuse me, I have a luxra to slaughter and a grandmaster to defeat. I’ve given you all enough time to attempt handling this on your own. I’m not waiting anymore.”
He moved to walk away from us, far too frustrated for more words.
“Wait,” Margaux spoke up. She waltzed up to my father and looked him dead in the eyes. “I can help you find him. I’ll use the same spell I used before to tell him where to meet me in Prague.”
‘Oh, the same one you used to lie to me and say he would be in the Old Town Square?’
“Your cover has been blown,” Rodrick countered. “You can’t afford to take such a risk. Not now.”
“I don’t have to,” she said. “I can use blood magic from Kenneth and Riley to find him. It will trigger a response from Dirk’s blood so we can discover his location. But I need both of you to be willing for it to work. Blackatter blood is some of the most powerful in the world. I will show you how to use it to find your son.”
My dad’s brow furrowed. “You’ve known how to find him from the start and said nothing?”
“I didn’t have two Blackatters of blood relation. Now I do. Follow me.”
She turned and walked down the wall slowly and with her silhouette enhanced by the moon’s bright rays funneling through the pillars lining the hall, acting as though she was completely unconcerned if we followed her or not. Maybe she already knew she had our attention.
My father’s eyes locked onto mine. I wasn’t sure what motivated me to believe him. I had absolutely no reason to. He lied to me about Dirk’s death, he lied about where he was this whole time, and he lied about knowing he was a lycan. He left me defenseless against an enemy I never even knew I had because he never told me about his past. The only way he knew how to protect me was to leave me unaware. And he should have learned the lesson from my mother running away that it wasn’t a good strategy from the start. And yet, I saw the truth of his words in his eyes. If there was one thing I knew he wouldn’t lie about, it was how to get Dirk back. Lying about who he suspected might be behind it all made absolutely no sense whatsoever, regardless of what the vixra council or Adeline had to say about it. My dad loved his son. And in his own backward way, he loved me too.
“Are you sure?” I asked him. “Why didn’t you tell me all this in Paris?”
“I didn’t know. You’re not the only Blackatter that has visions.”
“You saw all this in a vision and yet you tell me to ignore mine? I saw Dirk torturing Daniella.”
He shook his head. “No. You saw Daniella triggering Dirk’s connection to you so they could convince you to expose yourself. And you did. They just didn’t plan on it not going their way.”
“Are you coming?” Margaux asked from down the hall with Alexei following close behind like an obedient dog.
My father walked after her. There was little time until dawn. Whatever we did it had to be fast.
Margaux bolted through the Falcon wing of the academy and went directly to the room she shared with Adeline. She entered and immediately extended her arm with her fingers outstretched. The long white and black candles on the table lit up in luminous flames of bright blue and gold, flickering in the pale moonlight shining through the window.
I followed her inside along with my father. Adeline entered with us and faced Lothar and Jake once we reached the door. “Go back to the dungeon,” she said to them.
Lothar momentarily forgot who he was speaking to and gave her a dirty look. “I’m expected to stand around and wait again?”
Jake didn’t seem particularly pleased either. Both of them saw this type of treatment as a misuse of their abilities. Especially after all they had done to help me and trying to recover Alina.
“My grandmother left me in charge of this mission,” Adeline stated. “And it is my will that you wait in the dungeon. If we manage to find Dirk, we’ll need to leave immediately to get him back.”
Lothar got closer to Adeline than I thought polite, let alone necessary. He knew better than to think he could intimidate her. Or did he? “Riley looks as though she’s going to fall over and you would put her through more this night? Let Kenneth Blackburn handle this.”
His words cut me to the core. I wasn’t about to deny that I was exhausted. And maybe more broken on the inside than I’d like to admit. But I had to keep going. Rest was for the dead. And I wasn’t dead yet.
“I’ll be fine, Lothar.”
He eyed me for a few seconds then scowled at Adeline.
“The both of you wait in the dungeon.” She stood her ground. “That’s my orders for now.”
“We don’t take orders from you.”
“Do I really need to get my grandmother involved? I doubt she wants to come back here twice within forty-eight hours just to sort out more unruly Vontex.”
Lothar finally backed down and moved away from her.
Adeline shut the door, leaving Lothar and Jake alone to head back to the dungeon. “After all, this is a family matter now.” She flashed me a wink while Margaux and my father weren’t looking, leaving me curious as to what was going on in her head.
‘Adeline, what are you up to?’
“Hands out,” Margaux ordered both me and my father.
We held out our palms. I knew the second she reached for one of the two daggers on my belt that she meant what she said about the blood magic. My suspicion was confirmed when she let the edge of the blade slide down the center of my hand.
I grit my teeth and did my best not to grimace. At least not in front of my dad.
She sliced him next. He didn’t make a sound or even flinch.
“Vite,” she said. “Quick, before the wounds close.”
“Do what?” I asked.
“Hold your hands side by side.”
We did as she said, holding our hands close together and not touching. She laid
both her hands over ours and let them rest mere centimeters above our spliced skin.
I watched in acute fascination as the blood running out of my veins and over my skin suddenly changed direction and began to float. They lifted from my hand in droplets and mingled with my fathers until they formed a sphere the size of a golf ball.
Margaux held both her hands around the blood and moved back to the candles. It moved with her as she manipulated it. She let her hands drift away. The blood spread out in a long line until it was as thin as a thread. The flames of the candles grew longer, reaching up to touch the blood and burning it until there was nothing left but black smoke and a mixture of red vapor.
She chanted some words I didn’t recognize and shut her eyes. They bolted open faster than I expected.
The candles erupted into a sea of smoke barreling into the ceiling as though someone had blown them out with the strength a huge gust of wind.
“What happened?” I asked.
Margaux slowly turned. When I saw her face, the color had completely drained from it. Her eyes didn’t focus on me. They went right for my father.
“He’s right, isn’t he?” I raised my voice. “It’s Daniella. She’s been the one behind everything all this time. Behind Devon, Alina, and now she has my brother.”
“Not for long,” Adeline said in a monotone voice. “This ends tonight. We’re getting Dirk back. And I’m going to drag that bitch back to the vixra council. Dead or alive.”
“She destroyed the blood spell but not before I saw where they are,” Margaux mumbled, still in a state of disbelief.
‘I might be the only one in this room who knows what it’s like to be lied to by people you’re supposed to trust. Join the club.’
“She’s in the catacombs under the 6th arrondissement,” Margaux continued. “Near the site where my coven meets for monthly rituals. She sensed me looking for Dirk. They’re together.” She pressed her hand into her chest as if her insides might plop out.
“Kill her,” she said to Adeline. “I don’t want to take her to the vixra council alive. If you don’t do the honors, I will.”
Resummon: (Lycan Academy of Shapeshifting: Operation Shift, Book 6) Page 14
