Guardian (3 page)

I jerked around just in time to get smacked in the face by an errant wing. Etta cast me an innocent, theatrically apologetic look.

This time my hand rested on my weapon and grasped it convulsively. A grinding sound filled the silence of the room and I forced my jaw to unclench. I don’t know how the council could place any weight at all on the woman’s opinion, since, at nearly four hundred years old, she was apparently still unable to control her wings.

Etta glided toward the Council table and curtsied prettily. The assembled gods smiled down at her fondly. The grinding sound returned as I fought an eye roll. How was it the Council couldn’t see the horns sticking out of the woman’s head or the long, forked tail swinging from her pert little buttocks?

Zeus leaned forward, abandoning his gavel for a moment to smile at my arch enemy. “Etta, guardian, you have been selected to accompany Monad Nuria on her mission to Earth. I wish you to observe, help where needed, and report back to me.”

Shit! I turned to Keane, my face heating in anger at this show of distrust.

He frowned and shook his head in disgust.

Etta’s cheeks pinked softly in apparent pleasure. “I…I don’t know what to say, your majesty. I’m honored by your trust…”

Just like that Zeus lost interest in her. He straightened and banged his gavel. I couldn’t see Etta’s face but I could tell by the stiffening of her shoulders that she was not pleased by Zeus’s dismissal in the middle of what had promised to be a truly nauseating and obsequious speech.

Despite my dismay at the fact that Zeus had stuck me with my arch enemy for the mission, I couldn’t stop a mean, little smile as Olympian ADD took the wind out of the monster’s wings.

Then Etta was striding toward me with blood in her eye and my grin slipped away. Shit, damn, and maggot shoes.

I was most certainly headed for the lowest circles of Hell.

Chapter Two

Surprises and Conspiracies

T
he shadows jigged and swayed, dancing to the tune played by a swinging lamp overhead. I squeezed my eyes hard against the distraction of the wavering light and yawned widely. I was exhausted.

I’d searched for the leader of the human hostiles over half the Earth and even across time. I finally thought I’d run him down. But I wasn’t sure. This time would be too young for the current problem. The human too old in the time I left.

Unless, as I was beginning to suspect, he knew how to breach the layers of time.

The tavern across the way had dusty windows that rolled the light in funny ways. But inside the atmosphere was raucous and the inhabitants rowdy.

Spirits of the liquid kind apparently dominated.

I’d been standing in the shadows for hours, my feet screaming in my soft boots and my lower back threatening to take me to my knees on the hard, filthy ground. My spies told me the leader had gone into that tavern. But, unless he was a woman, walked with a severe limp, or was ninety years old, he hadn’t come out yet.

In my exhausted mind, the human had become spirit-like. Though I’d followed him for weeks, I’d not been able to cast eyes on him once. He’d always stayed just that far outside my reach. I sighed and leaned against the damp wall at my back. I was starting to think he was a figment of everyone’s imagination.

I was seriously considering entering a wrinkle and going into the tavern after him when the door opened again and a man and a woman emerged from it.

The woman was small. Tiny really. She wore a long, light colored dress that skimmed her arms just below soft, white shoulders and dipped low into her cleavage…what there was of it. The man was tall and dark, with a wide-brimmed hat pulled low over his face.

His rough looking shirt stretched tautly around his massive forearms as he reached to tuck one of the woman’s curls behind a pearly ear. Giggling sounds emerged from beneath a truly ridiculous hat, which featured tall feathers of some sort and a bunch of fruit shaped items on one side.

He leaned down and pulled the woman’s glove encased hand to his lips. “Are you sure you aren’t cold? The night is damp.”

The woman shivered theatrically and I rolled my eyes.

Then she spoke, and the voice emerging from beneath the stupid hat brought my hand to my weapon. “I trust you can keep me warm. I have a yearning to stretch my legs and clear my lungs of dust. ‘Twas a long and tiring journey this eve.”

Etta. Damn her to Hell. She’d gone in without talking to me first. I was gonna filet her wings and eat them for my evening meal.

Despite my resolve, a sound of murderous rage flew from my throat and the man’s head came up, the face unreadable in the shadow thrown by his hat. But I swore I could see his eyes shining from beneath the hat, the glint of lamplight flickering angrily there.

“Who is it? Show yourself.” He reached for something behind his back.

I sighed, and stepped from the shadows. “Ian Lavelle?” I kept the shadows around me so that he wouldn’t notice my strange clothing. I hadn’t taken the time, as apparently Etta had, to clothe myself in period dress.

He cocked his head and the hand came out from behind his back. It held a long, deadly looking knife. I relaxed. A knife wouldn’t kill me. It would hurt like hell. But it wouldn’t kill me. “Who asks?”

Etta had turned to me and was making go away faces with a non-verbal emphasis that was very entertaining. I studiously ignored her.

“I am Nuria. I need to speak with you.”

Finally Etta gave up on non-verbal communication and scoured me with her shrill tones instead. “The gentleman and I are busy, strumpet. Go away and let us be.”

I kept my gaze fixed on the “gentleman.” He stood tall and looked wary, but he held the knife comfortably against his thigh and watched me, seemingly relaxed. “What would we have to discuss? I don’t know you.” He took a step toward me, ignoring Etta’s tiny hand on his forearm, and pulled the hat from his head. “Or do I? There is something very familiar about you.”

I shrugged, trying for nonchalant as my body tightened against a wave of pure lust. He was beautiful. His face was golden brown, with a square jaw and almond shaped, dark brown eyes. His nose was long and narrow, with a slight bend in the middle that might have come from having been broken at some time. His mouth was twisted in a wry smile at the moment, but was wide, with full, sexy lips that begged to be nibbled. He strode toward me on legs that were long and densely muscled. His massive thighs strained tight, well worn pants, which he wore tucked into high, black boots. The boots were dusty and well-worn. As if he’d traveled far.

He stopped in front of me and reached out, taking a strand of my waist-length, white gold hair between his fingers. “You don’t exactly look like you belong here.” He said the words without surprise, confirming for me that he was a transplant into the eighteen hundreds himself. His eyes slid down my body, taking in my soft, black sweater and skintight black leather pants. Where his eyes touched, my body hummed and warmed so that, by the time he’d assessed the soft leather of my boots, I felt as if it might be prudent to just pull him into the shadows with me and find out if he was as yummy beneath the rough clothing as he appeared from the outside.

Before I could push past my unrestrained lust and respond, the knife was at my throat and I was pressed tightly against him. I gasped, feeling the long, impossibly hard length of him pressed tightly against my chest, groin, and thighs.

He looked down into my face, mere inches away. His eyes were deep pools of emotion which I couldn’t quite decipher at that moment, with his yummy self all pressed against me. “Who…or should I ask…what the hell are you and why have you followed me here?”

“Damn it, Nuria. I had it under control. Why did you have to interfere…as always?” I glanced past Mr. Lavelle and looked at Etta, now standing just behind him with her arms crossed over her flat chest, her tiny monster face folded into a scowl.

“Hello?” I said to her. “Knife…throat…danger…”

She flicked a dismissive hand toward me. “Serves you right. Stupid Mon…”

“I demand you release me immediately, Mr. Lavelle.” I interrupted Etta with a pointed look. “I assure you I wish you no harm. I just have a few questions for you.”

He looked down at me, his soft lips parting slightly as if he were considering nibbling something. Something nearby. Something that wouldn’t at all mind being nibbled… My lips opened in anticipation before I realized what I was doing. I slammed them shut and shook my head, working hard not to be drawn into his irresistible web.

He laughed softly, the sound rumbling through my chest and down to my special place.

I fought against a shiver of delight.

“Hurt me? Do you really think you could?”

I frowned. Now that just pissed me off. “I could definitely hurt you, Mr. Lavelle. In many ways.”

He searched my face for a moment and the smile finally slid away. “Yes. I believe you could. In many ways.” He released me finally and slid the knife back into the spot at the small of his back where he kept it. He turned to Etta. “So, I guess you two work together?”

I sighed and Etta scowled.

He looked from one to the other of us and nodded. “But you’re not happy about it. Okay. So, what do you want from me, Monad?”

I jerked in surprise. Etta’s pretty eyes widened in alarm.

I forced my face to blank out and looked at him. “What did you call me?”

He chuckled huskily, forcing me to squeeze my thighs together in self defense. “I recognize your electronic signature. You needn’t bother denying it.”

“Well, that answers my first question.” I murmured.

He grinned. He had pretty, white teeth.

The better to eat you with my dear.

I smiled at the unbidden thought. The tavern door opened and two men stumbled out, leaning heavily against one another and singing drunkenly. I glanced at them and then back to Ian Lavelle. “Can we go somewhere else? I feel like a fish demon out of water here.”

He grinned and shook his head. “I don’t think so. He reached up and dropped his hat on his head and stepped away from us. Before I knew what he was doing he’d turned and was walking down the street. “G’night ladies.”

Suddenly the night air sparked and wavered and he was just…gone.

~ ~
*
~ ~

“What do you mean you lost him?” A drop of spit hit my forehead as the Watcher screamed, flinging his monkey-like arms into the air. He sat on a tall stool with a large pool of water glistening in a stone basin in front of him. Flickering scenes of life on Earth played across the surface of the pool.

I shrugged. Whatever this guy is, he’s not just a regular human. Unless he’s found a pathway through time, he’s using magic to move around.”

The Watcher turned to Etta. “What’s your take on this?”

I bristled but he flipped a hand at me. “Chill out Monad, she might have seen something you didn’t.”

Etta chewed her bottom lip as if she was reluctant to speak against me. I knew she was just fighting a triumphant smile.

A familiar grinding sound filled the silence.

The Watcher glanced at me. “Settle down, girl, or you’re not gonna have any teeth left by the time you reach a thousand.”

I forced my teeth apart and glared at Etta.

The pretty guardian smiled sweetly. “He has faery dust.”

My mouth flew open.

The Watcher swore. “How the hell’d he get that?”

Etta just shrugged prettily, studiously avoiding my hostile gaze.

I wanted to disagree but I realized she was probably right. I’d seen the telltale sparks in the air but, in my shock at Ian Lavelle’s disappearance, it hadn’t registered. Finally I sighed. “She’s right. He must have dust.

Etta looked smug.

My hand clutched my weapon.

The Watcher glared at me. Sometimes I thought the man could read my mind. Then he swiveled his stool around and reached toward the pool. He touched a finger to the water’s surface and it began to swirl wildly. I moved closer, fascinated by the Watcher’s special magic. Etta moved up on his other side, apparently she shared my interest.

The water lifted from the pool like a waterspout and churned there as the Watcher danced his fingers into it, lifting here, probing there, and forming a complicated magic string that slowly caused the spout to descend back into the pool. As soon as the water cleared, a picture emerged.

I gasped as I recognized the woods and the eerily beautiful face shining out at us. Queen Tana of the fairies swept her emerald gaze dismissively past Etta and me and fastened it on the Watcher. “Why cast thou moldy eye o’re my woods, Watcher?”

Etta and I turned wide eyed gazes on the ugly, little man, waiting for the explosion. But he just laughed. “Why, only to drink in your beauty, Tana, queen of my heart.”

Queen Tana’s musical chuckle caressed our ears.

Oh…My…Gods! He was flirting with her. I rolled my eyes at Etta and she made a gagging motion with her finger.