9781618851307WitchsBrewShayNC (52 page)

What
had he done to her? Besides, giving her babies?

What
hadn’t
he done to her was more the question?

He’d made love to her, yes. And it had been great.
Wonderful.

So what had happened?

What had gone wrong?

He’d held her against her will. Okay. It was over. She had
to put it behind her if she wanted a life with Talon. It must have been
something he had to do or he would never have done it. Talon wasn’t a sadist.

There
had been pain, excruciating pain, but she realized some it was because she’d
been untouched. It had felt as if he was tearing her asunder as he filled her.
There had been more, heat, and a wall of flames. After awhile, she hadn’t been
aware of the passing of time or even of their locked minds. It was as if they’d
soared to another plane, their bodies and minds one.

The
next thing she remembered was waking up, hearing Talon sobbing. His face had
been ravaged with fear and worry. A man who didn’t care wouldn’t have looked at
her with apprehension in his eyes, would he?

So,
where was he now?

He should be here, comforting her. Damn it, a man didn’t
just up and desert his fragile bride! She wanted to tell him about their sons.
She wanted to tell him how much they looked like him.

Saylym chewed on her bottom lip. She suddenly felt
restless, twitchy, as though there was something urgent she should do or as if
something called to her. She felt the urgent pull, the need, the silent command
to explore the catacombs below the store.

Compelled. Summoned. Oh, yes, something pulled her, yet
there was no voice calling to her, just an urgent feeling.

So
what is stopping you?

“I can’t do it alone.”

You
don’t need Talon. Remember, you’re a witch.

“Yes,
but not a very good one
.”

Go
for it!

“I’m
not a good witch.”

You’re
not a bad witch, either.

Saylym grabbed a flashlight, matches, incense, and a box
of assorted colored candles from beneath the counter. She stormed through the
beaded curtains to her office. “Nothing to it,” she muttered, puffing a strand
of hair from her eyes. “I can do this.”

She
could do this. She could.

Saylym
quickly removed the narrow belt from her waist and slid the holster with the
knife Talon had given to her for a wedding gift from it. Lifting her denim
skirt, she strapped Talon’s athame to her thigh. A woman couldn’t be too
careful, but now she felt like some kind of undercover agent. She shrugged.
There was the possibility she was overreacting, but she might need the athame
for self-defense too. Who knew what hellish creatures might dwell below?

Placing
the other items in a sack, Saylym struck match to torch and descended the steep
staircase to the cellar.

Nothing
had changed since she was last there; it was still a dark, spooky place. She
glanced around the interior. She would need an altar.

How
did she know this?

Why did she need an altar?

“I just do,” she breathed. “I know I do.”

She held up the torch, waving it back and forth, searching
out the darker corners of the room. Ah, there in the far corner to her left lay
an old, nearly dilapidated, wooden crate. That would do perfectly. She shoved
the torch in the soft ground and pushed the wobbly crate to the center of the
room.

There
she set two white candles on it, aligned top to bottom. She dug out a red
candle and grinned. Personality candle. Red was her signature color, something
she and Talon shared. Beside the red candle, she placed a purple one.
Passionate purple. Her grin widened.

She
couldn’t complain that Talon wasn’t passionate. He had enough passion for the
both of them.

Drawing out the athame, she hacked off a lock of her hair
and, just beneath the personality candle, placed the silver curl.

Last,
she positioned the incense.

She anointed the candles with sandalwood oil, then,
chanting soft and low, she lit each one.

“O gracious Goddess, day or night,

Always
protect me with your might.

Thrice
around the circles bound,

Evil walk not
on this ground.”

She raised her arms in a graceful curve above her head and
closed her eyes. A soft, resonant hum vibrated through her body, warming her
deep inside. The wind gently brushed her cheeks. When she opened her eyes, she
was below the cellar, standing in front of the stone statue of Queen Shy-Ryn.

A
pleased smile spread across her lips. Hey, maybe being a witch wasn’t so bad
after all. She hadn’t even felt the movement of shifting from one place to
another.

Maybe
she
wasn’t
a very good witch, but maybe she was a better witch than she
knew.

Then
it dawned on her, how had she known the words of a chant? When had she learned
them? She sighed, realizing that she hadn’t just learned them. They’d been
there in her mind for years, dormant, just waiting for the right time and place
to be used. Her lips curved with a generous smile as she realized exactly who’d
taught her all about being a witch and then buried it so deeply in her mind
that she couldn’t remember, until now. She knew exactly who had been driving
that cab the day the plane landed in Salem and who had pressed that ring into
her hands.

Oh,
yes, she’d been taught chants. She’d been taught spells by the best. She’d been
taught everything and tricked in every way possible. It had been a conspiracy
between two people to teach her everything they knew.

And
then her memory had been blocked.

She swallowed hard as it suddenly dawned on her that she
knew what had happened between her and Talon when they’d mated. She knew why
there had been so much pain, and how she’d been reborn.
He
hadn’t known
what would happen because he hadn’t known who she was. But there had been
others who did know, waiting to help.

Yes,
she was an
Impure,
but damn it, she was a royal-blooded
Impure.

Maybe she wasn’t a very good witch, but she suspected
Talon had a few things to learn about being a good
waken,
along with
things to learn about the nobility of her bloodline. Her bloodline was every
bit as rich as his, if not richer. Yes, he had a few things to learn about her.

And
she was just the witch to teach him.

Chapter Thirty-Five

As accusations of witchcraft
spiraled, even Governor Phips’ own wife, Lady Mary Phips, was named as a witch.

~Salem Witch Trials

Early-October, 1692

Ru-Noc

Droth

City of wakens

Talon
knelt beside the dry, withered husk that was all that was left of his mother.
With exquisite tenderness, he held the queen close in his arms. His body shook.
He rocked back and forth. Tears dampened his eyes and spread across Helayne’s
bruised face. Tenderly, he pressed a kiss against her lifeless cheek.

“Mother,
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry I wasn’t here to protect you.” His chest tightened with
pain. Gently, he brushed a dark curl back from her brow. “I’ve met someone. You
would love her, Mother, because…” his voice quivered and broke “…because, I do.
You’d love her because I do. I’m going to spend my life making her happy. She
is right for me. She’s kind, gentle…” A strangled laugh escaped him. “Though
she’d deny it, fiery tempered as hell. I need that fire. I need her.”

Talon touched a purple bruise on her throat with a
trembling finger. “You’re going to be a grandmother.” He sobbed, holding her
close to his chest. “Oh, Mother, just as you wanted, a grandmother.” Cradling
his mother in his arms, he drew a deep, shuddering breath, bowed his head, and
wept. “Forgive me, for I will never forgive myself.”

* * * *

Outside the closed door, Topaz glanced uneasily at the
large cobra reared up in a striking pose in the corner. For the past half-hour
the snake had hissed warnings. Losing patience, Topaz did some hissing of his
own. “For the gods’ sake, I liked you better as a rat. I promise not to eat
you. Change back.”

Banjo
shifted back into his more natural form and grinned. “I can change back if
you’re lying to me,” he taunted.

Topaz
stiffened, sounding offended as he said, “I do not tell lies. Hush. Prince
Talon is coming.”

Talon
closed the door softly behind him. He titled his chin, his eyes red and
swollen. “Do you know where my father is, Topaz?”

“No,
Prince. I haven’t seen him the entire two days I’ve been here. I was in the
dungeons.” Topaz hesitated, then sighed. “I am sorry about the queen. She was a
beautiful and gracious lady.”

Talon
inclined his head. “Thank you. I need to find Father.”

“He
is with a witch named MeLora Haven,” Banjo said, speeding toward Talon while
keeping a wary eye on Topaz.

Talon
picked up the rat. “MeLora? Where have I heard that name?”

Banjo
twitched his lips, sniffing the air. “I don’t know, Sire. I only know she seems
to have taken control of King Darak. I learned this but a short while ago. I
wonder if this is the reason Captain Koran T stole the princess?”

“Black
Drayke murdered my mother.”

“How
do you know it was Black Drayke, sire?” Banjo inquired.

“His scent lingers in the chamber, and he left his calling
card.”

Talon held up a silver ring in the shape of a snake. “This
is his.” Talon slid the ring inside his jeans’ pocket. “I think it’s his way of
saying, ‘Come and get me!’”

“What
are you going to do, Sire?” Topaz followed Talon into the corridor.

“Accept
his invitation. There are no guards, at least, no live ones outside the palace
walls. This place is no longer safe. I’m going to find Father and get him out
of here.” Talon choked on grief and rage. “I have to find out what has happened
to Stry and Kali, then we’ll try to make sense out of what the hell is
happening and stop it.” He raised his head. “And I’m going to kill Black
Drayke.”

Talon
had barely taken three steps down the corridor when the inner palace guards
surrounded him.

“Sire,
you must come with us,” Sergeant Nyka said in a voice that wasn’t quite steady.

The
sergeant made a point of keeping his distance. “I know your reputation for
having an unpredictable temper, Sire. I’m just an old, worn-out
waken
who has served as a guard for many years. I have no real desire to do battle
with you.”

Talon
frowned at the older male. “What’s going on, Sergeant? What the hell happened
to the outer guards?”

Sergeant
Nyka’s dark blue hair hung past his shoulders, and was streaked with threads of
white. His dark brows beetled together, thick and bushy over faded brown eyes.
His front teeth were slightly crooked when he smiled.

However,
he wasn’t smiling now.

Actually
he looked terrified. “I apologize, Prince, but your father has sent us to bring
you before him. I don’t know what’s going on, Sire. The king hasn’t seen fit to
confide in me. All I know is that sometime last night or early this morning,
the outer palace guards were annihilated. There has been no rebuttal from the king
or from the guild.”

Talon
lifted a brow. “I hardly believe my father sent you with weapons drawn to bring
me to him, Nyka. I’ve done nothing to upset my father.”

The sergeant hesitated and then replied, “But he did,
Sire. We were instructed to use force. I believe the king holds you responsible
for the death of the elite guards. He believes you are attempting to take over
the crown.”

Talon’s
jaw dropped
. “What?
That’s absurd.”

“Sire, please. I believe you, but I have my orders.”

“Very well. Take me to my father. I want to talk to him,
anyway. Mother is…never mind. I need to talk to my king first.”

*
* * *

King Darak sat upon the gold-encrusted throne, a vacant
expression in his black eyes. Talon hardly recognized the man who was his
father. The witch seated upon his mother’s throne beside the king held one of his
father’s hands and smiled, an icy, lusterless smirk that left Talon feeling
frozen to the bone.

His lips curled. “Father? You sent for me?”

Darak
barely glanced toward him.

“Kneel before your king and queen.” The command came
sharply from the witch.

“When he acts like a king then I will kneel before him.”
Contempt threaded Talon’s voice. “I kneel before but one queen, and it isn’t
you. Who are you to order me to prostrate myself before you?”

The
woman gave a sharp hiss between her teeth and nodded at the guards. The men
immediately pushed Talon to his knees and held him in place there.

“I
am your queen, King Darak’s new bond mate. I am MeLora, a witch of royal blood,
descendent of Queen Shy-Ryn. Who do you think
you
are?”

Her
tone was haughty. She stared down her slender nose at him, her gaze hot and
burning with lust as she eyed him from head to toe and settled her stare on his
crotch.

Sheeahta!
Talon glared at MeLora, shock
spreading across his face. “If you’re a descendant of Queen Shy-Ryn, reveal your
royal witchmarks. I demand to see them as proof.”

MeLora rose, arching a dark brow as she sauntered toward
him. Stopping a few feet in front of him, she sneered. “I will grant you this
proof, but only because I desire that you see them.”

She
nodded toward the guards. “Bring him to his feet. I have nothing to hide.”

The
front of her gown drifted to her waist, baring her breasts for all to see.