Forever (Book #3 in the Fateful Series) (24 page)

She drew a breath and squinted at the wooded area on the edge of the garden. Movement caught her eye, and she watched in curious surprise as another witch approached. Apparently there were more than six witches. Beautiful and wearing black like the others, Danielle wondered why this one wasn’t singing and chanting with her sisters. The witch called out as she neared.

In response, the ones encircling them came to a halt and wheeled around, their hands dropping to their sides as their fingers curled into claw-like fists. “What is it, Je—er—Blondie,” asked the redhead.

The witch whispered the answer into Red’s ear. As she listened, Red’s eyes flew wide. “Did you curse them?”

“I tried, but they’ve been enchanted by a sorcerer.”

The redhead swore and stomped her foot like a little girl throwing a tantrum. “How are we going to get rid of them?”

After casting them hate-filled looks, the witches moved to the fire, outside of hearing range, and huddled together.

“Who do you think is coming?” Nadia asked.

“It has to be either our men or werewolves,” she responded, with hope blossoming inside her chest. Either one offered a distraction they really needed right now. Frantically she yanked at the knot. “Have you had any success with the knot?”

“It’s a little bit looser, but I can barely reach it, it’s so far to my right.”

“Keep working at it.” Danielle locked her eyes on the shadows within the trees again. The moon was bright but it didn’t reach into the depths of darkness surrounding them, and that frustrated her.

The witches didn’t talk for long before they returned.
Crap!
Cunning blue eyes swung to hers. Grinning like the Devil’s bride, the witch withdrew her knife again, the metal scraping against the scabbard as it went. “Ladies, get the others,” the witch commanded.

Red smirked at Danielle while she waited for her friends to return as she twirled a strand of hair around her finger. It didn’t take them long. The five witches returned, but they were followed by several others who had bows and arrows strapped to their backs. Fanning out, the armed witches hid in the trees and thick shrubbery with their bows in hand and arrows strung. It seemed as though they only needed six for their rituals, but many more than that lived here.

“Your men are coming for you,” said Red.

When gratitude and excitement sprang to life within her, the witch crushed it with a threat and a promise. “You are going to find some way of getting them to leave you behind, or we’ll kill them. They’ll never see it coming.”

“How many are with them?”

“The morons must be incredibly pompous to think they can accomplish anything here alone,” commented Blondie in response to her question.

She didn’t believe it. Ethan and Max would bring an army with them to get their wives back. There
had
to be vampires hiding on the edges ready to help. But as she thought about vampires, another thought occurred to her. “How long have we been here?” she asked, desperate to know if they’d had a chance to turn, because if that were the case, they
would
come alone.

“Ah, poor dear.” The brunette laughed, and her tone was mocking. “She thinks they’re vampires again, and impervious to our arrows.”

“Sorry, it’s the exact same night that we took you from the pixies,” said Red, obliterating her last hope.

Danielle blinked. “You’re lying.” She had to be.

“Care to test it?”

No, she didn’t. Her thoughts took another path. “Why not just kill them now?” She didn’t ask to give them any ideas, but because she feared they were lying and would kill them all anyway. It wouldn’t likely matter if she and Nadia were able to send them away....

Red sighed. “If we kill them, the others will find out and then just send more men out to avenge them.”

It was true, Danielle didn’t know all of the Order members that well, but she did know they’d seek revenge. Her eyes widened on an idea. “Then you’d better let Nadia go, because Beon will hunt you down if you kill his daughter.”

Apparently that gave them pause. Red paled slightly and her jaw slackened. But then the brunette began shaking her head, the action sent strands of moonlit hair dancing over her leather-encased shoulders. “They won’t believe Danielle abandoned Ethan if Nadia doesn’t stay with her.”

“Yes, they will,” Danielle argued, desperate.

“No. The men have to believe you love it here so much that you
choose
to stay to escape the dangers surrounding you.”

Ethan’s fear of her leaving him came to the forefront of her thoughts. He would probably buy that. She gasped in surprise when Red lifted her knife high above her head and swung downward toward her. Every muscle tensed and she looked away thinking the witch was going to kill her now. The ropes fell away and she stared down at the pile at her feet in confusion.

“Dance with us around the fire.”

When she hesitated at the peculiar invitation, Red added with an evil smirk, “The fools are walking in here thinking they’re safe. We can sense the enchantment surrounding them. It will block our curses and any weapon of man
except
for our arrows, and that’s the part they don’t know. What they’re attempting is reckless and desperate, and if you don’t convince them to leave, then they will die. But if you do accomplish this, then we swear on our mother’s graves that we will let your men go.”

A vow like that did seem believable, but these witches were capable of murder. Danielle’s bottom lip slid between her teeth. She had no way of knowing if this witch was telling the truth or not, and she couldn’t risk their lives to find out.

Red grabbed her by the arm and tugged her free of the ropes. She stumbled, but regained her footing. The brunette pulled Nadia in the same direction. Her eyes caught onto Nadia’s with concern as they were led forcefully toward the fire, its flames flickering cheerfully. The welcome heat invited her to draw closer, but inside she felt cold. Instinctively she had the urge to attempt a physical defense. As she reached for Red’s arm, the witch’s blue eyes landed on hers. “Go ahead, try it.”

Swallowing, she dropped her hand, backing down. Danielle had to be careful. She decided to remain on alert for any opening she could find that wouldn’t put their lives at risk, and openly fighting would.

“They’re here,” muttered Blondie as the circle of witches linked hands, including her and Nadia.

“Dance, or they’ll die.”

“And make it convincing,” added the brunette.

When she tried to look back at the woods to see Ethan, her hand was jerked forward. “Eyes on the fire, Danielle.”

Singing out a beautiful melody, the witches began dancing with the rhythmic tune. The bewitching sound filled the night air and brought goose bumps to every inch of her skin. Danielle and Nadia were forced to join them. Her eyes stung with emotion and she closed them, her chin dropping as she moved to the music filling her ears. Moments passed as she began her third loop around the fire, and she hoped Max and Ethan would leave, or come up with a different plan from what it seemed they had.

Her eyes sprang open when she heard Ethan’s, “What the hell?”

Somehow she knew he’d recognized her dancing, and he would naturally wonder why she was. Over the witches singing she could hear his approach, his boots scuffing over the lawn. “Danielle, what are you doing?”

The witches stopped singing and they dropped her hands, their movement also coming to an abrupt halt. She knew they were allowing her to face him. Taking a calming breath that did nothing to calm her, she turned to face Ethan. At the sight of her husband, her soul whimpered. Bunching her fingers into fists, she barely resisted the urge to hug him. He looked a little tattered around the edges, like he’d had a rough time of it trying to find her, and she wanted to ask so many questions. Mentally shaking herself, she kept her thoughts on what she needed to do to keep him safe.

He tightened his scraped-up fingers around the rifle he had trained on the women standing behind her. Of course Danielle noticed he still wore the same clothes he’d been wearing when she and Nadia were taken by the pixies. To her it proved that it was the same night. It also proved that he was still mortal. She adored him for actually finding her so fast because she didn’t even know where she was at the moment. By the witches’ accents she knew it was somewhere foreign, but that was all she knew. Danielle felt her shoulders slump, her hero had found her, but it was too late.

Her heart broke like it had been pierced by one of the witches’ poisoned arrows. It felt like they’d been separated for centuries instead of hours. More than anything, Danielle wanted to latch onto him and never let go, but she was afraid of what might happen to him if she tried that. Observing the scene, her eyes touched on Max, who stood just to Ethan’s left, his rifle also aimed at witches, and their surroundings—the woods. It certainly seemed like he and Max were alone.

Ethan cocked the rifle. “What are you doing here? With them...” he repeated with a betrayed note of confusion ringing in each word.

Seeing the violent set of his mouth, she realized if she was going to make this convincing, she had to protect them. With caution, she schooled her features into the calmest expression she could find and slowly reached for the end of his gun. She pressed down. “Don’t hurt them.” Her voice cracked, and she winced internally.

“What?” he asked, anger at the witches thinning his lips, the fire reflecting off his glasses.

She swallowed, but she couldn’t seem to find any moisture in her mouth. “Back away, Ethan.”

His eyebrows hitched up right before his eyes narrowed.

“Please,” she added, stepping toward him. A moment of fear made her check with the witches behind her to make sure she wasn’t provoking them. Red beamed a bright smile at her and nodded, making a cheerful “go-ahead” motion with her hands. Danielle turned back to her husband.

Obviously surprised by the friendly gesture from the witch, Ethan blinked, but his feet carried him back a few steps. Danielle could hear Nadia behind her, and she could see that Max was also moving backward.

Ethan’s keen gaze scrutinized the witches before he finally lowered the rifle and a sigh of relief slipped free of her lungs. She could hear that the witches had resumed their singing, and she looked back because she couldn’t understand why. The only thing that made sense was that they resumed their dance as part of their act, part of their distraction to keep the men from seeing the arrows aimed at them. It was working. Inside, her heart withered at what she was about to say to him.

Unable to hold his gaze because it was killing her, she looked into the forest. Danielle’s eyes found one of the archers, her pale complexion glowing in the moonlight, her deadly arrow drawn and trained on Ethan’s back. That witch wasn’t the only one, there were nine more in the same pose, their attention divided between Max and Ethan. Letting the coldness inside make her go numb, she again looked at Ethan but she couldn’t get any words out, because being this close to him awakened every cell of her body—every fiber of her being reached for him, craved his touch, and wanted him surrounding her with his warmth. In his presence, she couldn’t go numb even if she tried.

The pain of it was so debilitating she lifted a hand to her chest. A tear she couldn’t stop leaked out and slid down her face. How was she going to do this? How could she lie to the love of her life, and the father of her child...? Danielle fought to keep her knees from giving out. He slung the rifle over his shoulder from its strap and his arms came around her as though he understood how close she was to collapsing; his thumb swept away the moisture on her cheek. “Don’t be sad, we’re here to save you.” Silhouettes of the dancing witches moved over the glass of his lenses. “If you aren’t their prisoners, will they let you leave?”

Danielle had no idea what to say because the answer was no. She tried feebly to push away.

He didn’t allow it, and he frowned at the attempt. They stood in tense silence staring into each other’s eyes. His fingers curled around her hand. “Come with us.”