Absolution (13 page)

“I am not accountable to you, child.” Raziel spread his wings and rose ten feet over Luc’s head. “I did what was necessary to enable specific events to evolve in a precise order. You will not destroy ten millennia of planning and retribution that will save billions by your out of control emotions. Both of you are infants. You look only at your lives. I look at the protection of the Goddess and all her creations.”

Luc zeroed in on the one word that was probably at the heart of what drove Raziel. “What retribution?”

“I am not accountable to you, Druid, only to the Goddess. Tread carefully.”

Luc stared up at the suddenly empty sky then back at the cabin.

Behind the window’s panes, Fritz was his usual stony self. Allana was whiter than the newly fallen snow.

CHAPTER 12

Luc glowered at Fritz. “Goddamn it, I’ll see you in the Abyss before I drive this truck through a portal.”

Fritz folded his arms across his massive chest and grinned down at him. “You’ve gone through portals before.”

He hated looking up at him. The gargoyle was everything he wasn’t—calm, reasoned, and never afraid. No way would Luc admit the truth. Portals scared the piss out of him. “Never in a car. For all I know my head will end up as the hood ornament. I can just see it. My feet will be tires.”

Fritz snorted. “It doesn’t work that way. I know you hate using the portals, but it might help if you viewed it as being more like driving through the Holland Tunnel, except there’s no toll.”

One look at his implacable expression and Luc knew he was beaten. “Right, no toll.” Except on his body and magick. Without a glance at Allana in the passenger’s seat, he climbed into the truck and kept his gaze locked on Fritz as the damned portal ripped a hole in the gray light of day. A wormhole of spinning turquoise bands on its side, the wide opening conjured visions of a hungry creature and not a doorway to the next dimension. Darkness below, but he hated the color turquoise.

A small shudder swept through him. No one understood. A Druid lived by drawing his life energy from the organic world around him. While portals might be quick, they severed that bond.

He’d even tried carrying soil he and Deva had enchanted. It didn’t work. He hadn’t told anyone that his recovery took longer with each trip. Last time, he had lingered in limbo for half a day before he reconnected with the Earth’s life-giving energy. He didn’t have that luxury now. Not if he expected to protect Allana.

The Abyss would be a ski resort before he entered the Brotherhood camp weak and left her at Farley’s mercy.

She grasped his hand, jarring him back to the present. She seemed to search his face for answers to his hesitation. He knew she could more easily pull the reasons out of his head. She would never inflict her will on him; that wasn’t her way.

“What’s the matter? In hIfreann, we go through portals all the time. Nothing’s ever happened to me or anyone I know who has traveled via one.”

His fingers tightened around the steering wheel to white knuckles. As if there was a comparison between him and the super powered beings of hIfreann or Otherworld. “They’re Seraphim or Saraphs.”

“I’m not a Paladin or dragon.”

“You’re Fae and your DNA’s been altered so you can live there. Mine hasn’t. I may be a Druid, but basically I’m human. Traveling through that thing disrupts my equilibrium with Mother Earth.”

She leaned over and brushed a kiss over his lips. “Understandable. However, as my mate, you can now enter hIfreann. The portal shouldn’t bother you as much.”

Who was she kidding? They weren’t bonded like normal mates. No, his future and hopes of a mate were screwed. Not that he’d tell her that.

He’d embraced Allana, given her his body, and unexpectedly given her his heart, yet that wasn’t enough. The hIfreann bond required he give her a piece of his stained soul for completion.

He bit back a curse. It seemed even something as life affirming as love remained too far out of reach to help him.

With a wave, Fritz climbed onto the truck bed and tapped the roof. “Go.”

“Hold onto me as we enter the portal,” Allana said as her fingers covered his.

The truck crept forward into the yawning lip of the wormhole’s entrance. Once the pull of the pulsating mass took over, Luc shoved the truck into neutral, then turned and met her gaze.

“Stare into my eyes,” she murmured.

Whips of energy, hot and white lashed through him. Her eyes shifted from gray to silver and then to a swirling Kaleidoscope of colors. Lightning flashes of power arced from her into him, her life force, flowing through his body and back into hers.

For the first time, the bog of portal miasma was held at bay.

But not the nausea.

A minute later, the truck rolled to a stop in a rest area off the Interstate in West Virginia. Luc wrenched the gearshift into park, stumbled from the truck, shot a glare at a grinning Fritz, and vomited.

He glanced up in time to catch the water bottle Fritz tossed him. “Thanks.” He rinsed his mouth and greedily guzzled the liquid, draining the bottle. Puking he could handle, as long as he wasn’t left weaker than a helpless newborn. “Allana said I shouldn’t have a reaction. Obviously, she’s wrong.” Well, not all wrong, he realized as tendrils of life from beneath the soil and the surrounding trees flowed into him. Thank the Goddess, he didn’t have hours of energy paralysis to deal with this time.

Fritz snorted. “Poor Luc. You don’t get it, man. You may be her soul mate, but you haven’t bonded with her. Oh, sure, she’s bonded with you. Your scent’s now part of her. But you still smell the same, Druid. Until you let her in, nothing changes.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve accepted her. I love her. I even felt the mating connection with her. I know that’s what everyone said the soul mate bond feels like.”

He shrugged. “She’s unique. She’s Fae, but also part of hIfreann. That dimension has its own rules. Soul mates there are different. Bonded, you’re each part of a whole, not just two souls that touch and seek each other. You’re two souls that
exist
as one. If you don’t allow it to happen, you’ll lose her forever.”

Luc swallowed hard and tried to push down the need to vomit again. He loved Allana, sure. From the instant he’d held her picture, he’d experienced an unbreakable attraction. Even her voice echoed in comfort at the edges of his mind. What Fritz implied wasn’t something he could do. His soul was dark, his future murky at best. Allana was too good to condemn to his fate, his outcome.

“Only once you’re joined, will you gain the true power of hIfreann. But as a Druid, you’ll probably always have some nausea with the portals.”

“Bu-ut...”

“You have a choice, my man. Accept the bond and keep the gift Allana brings to your life. Or continue to fight to keep yourself apart and experience the death of the best half of you—forever.”

“Give me some time to deal with this shit.”

“You don’t have it. The clock started ticking the minute she gave herself to you. You have three days, no more. And then you both lose.”

“Why didn’t she tell me?”

“Not her way.”

Luc nodded. No, it wasn’t her way. But if Fritz was right—and he always was—his choices had narrowed to one. Failing Allana wasn’t an option. But could he make the commitment? Could he burden her with his stained soul and would she ultimately reject him? He wasn’t sure if it was worse than Raziel had submitted her to, but as her mate, he should never be in a position to try to figure out if there were people who had harmed her more than he had. “We’re an hour from camp. Be available. If this turns into the cluster fuck I suspect, I’ll need you and Rice ASAP.”

“Got it.” With a quasi-salute, Fritz vanished.

Luc’s shoulders drooped as he headed back to the truck. “Time to get this debacle on the road.”

***

Luc slowed the truck to a crawl as they pulled into Farley’s main camp. He scanned the area, frowning at the dusting of gray ash that coated the ground and plants. It looked like a demon mass extermination field.

But why? Farley’s followers were norms, which meant no magick.

Reaching out with his senses, an erratic resonance of organic life reverberated against his energy. The trees quaked in fear. The plants shuddered from pain. Without water to wash the caustic ash from them, they were slowing dying.

Allana’s shaken expression didn’t help, and he grasped her hand. “What’s your reading?”

“Shock. Terror. Mass death.”

“Yeah, me, too.”

She surveyed the area and turned back to him. “I don’t understand. You said his followers were norms. Yet this—” She motioned to the scene before them. “This is what happens to the magicks Farley drains.”

“I know.” He got out of the truck, using the door as a shield, and crept a foot from the cab to where he could see the cabins at the top of the ridge. Farley leaned against the cabin’s front porch, wearing a frown. Luc glanced back at the killing field. The least he could do was create a storm and cleanse the area.

“Luc—” Allana hissed, leaning out the open door.

With a smothered curse, he returned to the truck.

“Give me a minute.” He rested against the seat, closed his eyes, and sent his consciousness out, letting himself drift on the atmospheric currents. At the touch of lingering moisture, he guided it toward the area, sending a small electrical current through the molecules to supercharge the downpour. It would take about ten minutes, but when the storm hit it would last a couple hours, starting with a hard, steady deluge until it ended in a slow drizzle.

She grasped his hand as he finished. “Listen to me, Luc. If we are to survive Farley, you must put aside your Druid nature, your protective nature.” She glanced to the sky and took in the gathering clouds. “You can’t help your reaction, but with me, you need to hold back.”

Eyes open, he stared at her dumbfounded. “You think I haven’t? That’s why my soul’s blackened.”

“Not blackened, just a little stained. We all have burdens we carry. Don’t let yourself believe you are the only one with choices you regret. I am your weapon to destroy Farley and for now, you must bury all other thoughts. If Farley guesses our connection, we’re both dead and we fail.”

Teeth clenched so hard a tic of frustration spasmed along his jaw. The damn woman was worse than he was. Way too prepared to become a victim for the cause. Win or fail wasn’t the point if she didn’t survive. “You aren’t a weapon. You’re my mate.”

“It’s the difference between castor oil and ricin. One cleans out your intestines, the other kills you. They both come from castor beans. It’s all a matter of usage. To you, I’m your mate. With Farley, I’ll be your weakness unless you set aside your Druid nature to nurture and protect. You must now become a Paladin. A warrior angel. Strong no matter what the cost.”

His eyes never leaving Farley, he grabbed her hand and squeezed it. “I’m no warrior, and I’m no angel. I’m just a broken down Druid. But you won’t be the cost. Promise me, Allana, or I’m not taking you in there.”

“I didn’t think I was capable of the feat, either, but here I am. You never know until you try.”

She’d ignored his request and that unnerved him. That and the soft smile curving her lips, the one he didn’t trust given her strong desire to save him. He only hoped her goals for him would keep her from sacrificing herself to rid the world of Farley. Then again, if they were going to survive their bonding, he needed to start trusting her. “Time to get this show on the road.” He put the truck in gear and drove up the gravel road to Farley’s cabin.

“Stay inside the truck until I get you. If anything goes wrong, undo the false hook on the silver chain and teleport the hell outta here.”

“The Goddess demands what she needs for the strands of life to be complete.” She motioned with her fingers. “Go, before he storms down to us.”

Luc eased from the truck. Shock filled him at his first close inspection of Farley. Stooped, emaciated, his face papery with lines on top of lines, the man appeared ancient. One look at the jaundiced eyes staring back at him, and Luc knew he’d been right. This was going to be a cluster fuck of major proportions.

Strange that he looked more dead than alive, given he’d drained the life from everyone around him. This didn’t bode well.

With a grimace, Luc limped toward Farley, playing up his injuries, knowing the mottled color of the bruises would support his claim of injuries but exaggerating wouldn’t hurt.

“Where’s everyone I sent with you?” Decrepit in appearance, Farley’s voice projected steady and strong.

“Dead. Crocker and Ted attacked Rice and me.” He lifted his shirt, the puckered knife wound evidence of an attack. “Ted got me. Rice took down Crocker and Ted.”

Not even a twitch broke the expression on Farley’s face. “So where’s Earl?

“He’s dead. I don’t know what the sonuvabitch was, but the turned into this hulking, squid-faced monster. Rice kept him busy while I used a chainsaw on his legs to ground him and then cut off his head.”

“And Rice?”

“Dead. Earl, or whatever he was, killed him.”