Dark Illusion (36 page)

Julija looked up at his face. He looked a warrior of old, honed in violence, invincible. She couldn’t imagine anything or anyone defeating him—not even Barnabas. Her breath caught in her throat. For a moment she couldn’t breathe. Her hand went up defensively, as if she had just committed blasphemy of some sort. She forced her mind away from panic. She’d been having panic attacks far too often and she was letting them get the better of her. Where was this coming from? She refused to think about the lack of air. She was Carpathian and didn’t need it. Instead, she turned her attention to her throat. Was there something there? A tendril of something elusive? A wisp weaving in and out of her throat.

She stroked her finger along her pulse thoughtfully, pulling the air from her lungs and forcing it through her mouth and nose.

“Do you think my ‘lesson in love’ started out in order to make certain if I did, by chance, ever meet you, I would be so afraid I wouldn’t accept your claim on me? If Anatolie went to Barnabas first and asked for his help, I think Barnabas would have agreed, maybe for a price, but he would have agreed.”

“That is possible, Julija. What are you thinking?”

“When you looked at me just now, I thought that you looked invincible, as if no one could defeat you. The moment I did, my throat started to close, and I recognized the touch of a spell. I think my panic attacks and my belief that Barnabas can’t be defeated have been spell-cast. I don’t know how or when it happened, or even if it was my father or Barnabas, but it’s there.”

“How do we remove it?”

That was Isai, back to his pragmatic, logical self. She wanted to throw
herself into his arms and hug him. She was already counting on that reasonable, rational, no-nonsense, sometimes annoying attribute in him. Instead she smiled up at him.

“We’re in sync, Isai. I may be under some ridiculous spell, but my feelings for you, apparently, are so strong that I am able to catch glimpses of how I really view you—and us—together. I feel so silly for allowing someone else to interfere with what I know is truth about you. Even with a spell on me, there is no excuse. Even though I overheard the ideas about trying to get me pregnant so they had another body with Carpathian blood to use, I know who you are in your heart. I know your mind. I do have enough confidence in myself to know that no one can hide from me forever. I would know Barnabas’s taint anywhere now. As many times as we have merged, he could not hide that from me.”

“We need to get rid of the spell and make certain there are no others lurking to harm you. Once the book is brought to the surface, we will have to either go to ground with it in a safe location, or destroy it, depending on how much of the night we have.”

“Vampires sleep during the day,” Julija reminded. “Mages do not.”

“Even should they find our resting place, they would not be able to enter. We will have the time we need if we can make it back there.”

Julija wasn’t going to think that maybe that was far too big of an “if.” “If I cast a revealing spell, would you be able to describe to me what you see from inside my throat?”

“Of course.”

The wind shifted just the slightest, and Isai stiffened. His blue eyes stared down into hers. “Look only at me, Julija. We have someone watching us. We knew this would happen. I want you to keep looking at me. I’m going to put my arms around you. You are very small in comparison to me and my body will shield you. Reach out very cautiously, masking your energy, and let me know if you recognize our enemy.”

Julija went gladly into his arms. She knew she was trembling, remembering that her brothers had come with other mages and those mages carried weapons. Rifles. Bullets that could reach them from great distances.

“They want the book and they cannot find it without us. Keep that in mind. We will learn who our enemy is and then we will rid you of all spells. When you cast the revealing spell, make certain it encompasses your entire body.”

He pressed a kiss on her forehead, his arms enfolding her gently. She took a deep breath and let her mind expand. She sent herself seeking into the cold, crisp air. It took a moment to find the trail. It led back toward the campsite where Crina had set up her tent. All along Julija had been so certain Crina and Barnabas had come looking for her, Crina bent on killing Isai for him, but this wasn’t Barnabas.

Julija wasn’t that surprised. He wasn’t going to be that easy for them to find. He had a way of blending in with the surroundings, spreading his energy so he was extremely difficult to find. She wasn’t easy to hide from, yet on more than one occasion, Barnabas had come to her without her knowledge.

“It is Anatolie. He is the one who deserted Crina, when we confronted her, not Barnabas. I don’t understand any of them, Isai. Why would he encourage her to come and then not protect her? There was no protection spell. Nothing.”

“Had there been you would have known.”

“They weren’t in love, I know that, but she gave him two sons. They lived together for centuries.”

“But she was not loyal to him. You said she conspired with her sons to get rid of him.”

“She did.”

“He had to have known. Anatolie may not have the need for cruelty in the way Barnabas does, but he can be extremely cruel when he does not get his way. Or he wants to punish someone. Anatolie is Xavier’s son, and Xavier was very much that way. Cruelty was in his blood, but he did not, for want of a better way to put it, derive sexual pleasure from it. Seeing others suffer might make him happy, especially if he considered them an enemy, but mostly Xavier used torture for information and experiments. His brother, Xaviero, needed to be cruel. By all accounts, he did derive sexual pleasure from watching others suffer. Clearly, his son Barnabas is the same.”

She sighed and shook her head. “They have these amazing long lives and yet what do they have to show for them?”

“Anatolie left Crina by herself because he knew you would defeat her or I would. She was of no more use to him and he was not going to take a chance on her getting her hands on the book. It was that simple. Now, he has to wait for you to bring the book out into the open.” He caught her face between his hands. “You remember that, my little mage.
You
can do what he cannot. You have always been able to. You were just far younger, and he made certain you had no idea what a little powerhouse you really are.”

She found herself smiling. She didn’t understand how that could be possible, not under the circumstances, when they were in the midst of unseen enemies, but Isai had a way of making her feel confident in herself. In him. In anything they did.

“Get rid of this pesky spell and any other hold Barnabas may have put on you. Then we can find this book. I am ready to destroy it and take you back to the compound to meet the others. If we are very lucky, my brethren have heeded my call.”

“Your call?”

“I sent for them last rising. They are a great distance from here, but I believe one or two will come. I did not tell you because we must count only on each other.”

“One or two?” she echoed. “I was thinking an army.”

“That is an army.”

She laughed and reached up for him. He obliged immediately, leaning down to kiss her. The moment he did, the world was right. He could kiss like sin, but it felt like heaven. There was something so perfect about the way he held her. About the way his mouth moved over hers. It didn’t matter if he was gentle or demanding, she felt love. She
felt
it. When he lifted his head and smiled down at her, her heart did a little curious shift.

“You ready to get this done?”

She nodded.

“Stay facing me as if we are still talking. Discussing what to do. Every now and then look toward the lake. I will be doing the same, following your
lead. At the same time, I will be able to tell you what your throat looks like and if there are any other places Barnabas has left a command for you.”

Julija took a deep cleansing breath and murmured the revealing spell.

Light of life, help me to see,

That which was left behind to do harm to me.

She waited, her heart beating a little too fast. It was never a good thing to have a spell left behind by a high mage. Once entrenched, they could be difficult to remove. She’d been having panic attacks for quite some time.

“I can see small trails of what looks like blue running in tiny streams down your throat. Almost wispy, but definitely blue. The threads are so thin they are barely there, but there are several.”

Julija frowned. “Blue? That’s odd. What the heck did he use?” She thought about it for a moment. Isai didn’t hurry her in the least. She loved him for that. It took a moment to remember to look toward the lake and gesture.

Immediately Isai followed her lead, looking in the direction she indicated, shaking his head and murmuring nonsense to her. “If the lake was not so cold and we did not have such an audience, I would suggest we swim there together. You naked of course.”

She burst out laughing. He was wonderful. He had a way of freeing the lock on her brain, allowing her to think. Blue.

Time to remember that which has been forgot,

Show me the way to that which was lost.

It took a moment before she remembered the drink composed of blue flowers. She was certain the poisonous effect was what was blocking her fifth chakra.

Vishhuddha, center of communication, element of Aether, color of blue,

Deadly wolfsbane, I call to you.

I seek to reopen that which lies in repose,

Establishing balance to that which can close.

Power of Akasha, remove this blight,

Replacing it with healing light.

“Perfect. No more blue.” Isai sounded admiring.

Julija felt much better having removed the high mage’s spell. She should have suspected. “Any others?”

“Only the one on your sex.”

“Are you going to describe what you see?”

“I am giving that a lot of thought. This particular spell benefits me.”

She glared up at him. “I would have thought a man such as yourself would never need such a thing as a spell. In any case, if we really needed one, I could provide it for you.”

“You think I need a spell to keep up?”

She pretended to think it over and then nodded slowly. “I fight this particular spell and have gotten rather good at it, but I’m afraid I won’t be able to fight my natural attraction to you and you would have no choice but to try to keep up. You’d beg me to put a spell on you.”

This time it was Isai who laughed. She loved the sound of it. He sounded as if he didn’t have a care in the world.

“There is a continuous circle that runs around your clitoral network. The stream goes from smooth to bumpy—presumably the bumps are what keep stimulating you.”

“Is there color?” She held on to his loose jacket, uncaring that she was supposed to be conversing with him.

“Red. Very, very red. Fire-engine red.”

“Can you detect any runes running in the stream? They might be disguised as something else, some small movement within the stream of red.”

“Yes. They look almost like the stream runs over rocks.”

“That bastard actually added in a protection spell. That’s why I haven’t been able to get rid of it or figure it out. It was hidden, protected and—”

“Julija, beloved, we have an audience. I love to hear you call that man names, but I would much rather remove these spells from your body. The more time we have to find and destroy the book all in one go, the better off we are.”

She took another deep cleansing breath.

That which was hidden so long in dark to conceal,

I now seek to reopen, reverse and reveal.

I call to the spirit of fire to trace,

Tracking each root of this evil’s embrace.

I command fire to burn each line of this dark,

Removing all traces of evil to charm.

Light to dark, dark to light,

I bring forth that which has been hidden from sight.

“Do you see any more runes? Any little waves like before? We can’t miss a single one.”

“No, they appear to be gone.” His tone dripped with disappointment.

She hid a smile, but she thumped his chest with her fist. She didn’t want to get overconfident, but if she could really break Barnabas’s spell after all this time, she would be overjoyed. The relief would be tremendous.

Lust, desire, sexual need,

That which runs through my body without thought or heed.

I call to my soul child to help me undo,

These thoughts that were planted to harm and abuse.

I call to the moon mother to join with my spell,

Following the bloodstream, I now cast out and dispel.

Remove from my body this continual need,

So that which remains is only heartfelt needs.

She waited a moment, holding her breath, sending up a silent prayer that it worked. For the first time in as long as she could remember, that
terrible need was gone. Really gone. She wanted to dance. Instead, she looked up at him, beaming.

“We did it. Do you know how incredible it is to have actually destroyed a spell that a high mage put on me? I can’t believe that we could do that.”

“We can do anything. I told you, Julija, you are extraordinary. You should have all the confidence in the world.” He stepped back away from her and took her hand, once more gesturing that they continue their loop around the lake. “Hopefully, we find Iulian’s psychic print sooner rather than later.”

“I was kind of hoping we didn’t find it at all,” she said truthfully.

He smiled down at the top of her head. “We would leave this place and you know what would happen? You would say to me that we had to return.”

She started to protest, but she knew he was right. As much as she didn’t want to face Anatolie or Barnabas, she knew the dangers of that book. “When you think about it in terms of being just a book, it seems so ridiculous that it could cause this much worry.”