Her Warriors (19 page)

Geir’s eyebrows rose. “Really?” He looked at
Jake, willing to play along with the joke. He knew a bit about
Jake’s true abilities. For a human, he was very well trained, but
Beau seemed to think he was even better than Geir had thought. Geir
was intrigued. “Maybe we’ll try out a few things tomorrow. I’ll
look forward to learning if there’s truth behind the
reputation.”

“Oh, man,” Beau grinned. “This is gonna be
fun.”

Bettina gave her approval of Harper’s
continued presence on the mountain. She couldn’t find any evidence
of evil intent in him. In fact, she told Jacki privately, she
suspected something quite the opposite about their new
acquaintance.

They had left the men with Harper in the
dojo interrogation room. When they’d left, Jake was still watching
through the glass, but both Beau and Geir had gone into the room
with Harper, and Ben had introduced them all. Questions had flown
around the room about the inner workings of the
Altor
Custodis
and it had sounded like Harper was giving them very
specific information—names and places. A couple of the Guards in
the observation room with Jake were taking notes, but Jacki also
noticed there was a discrete pile of blinking electronics in one
cupboard. Everything that happened in that other room was being
recorded.

Jacki would’ve liked to go on listening to
the information Harper was relating, but Bettina had insisted that
they needed to do some work to prepare for the next spell she
planned for that night. Tom was stable, but he needed a final push
out of the unconscious state that persisted.

Much to her surprise, Bettina took her on a
tour of what Jacki had assumed was just a regular kitchen garden,
outside the back door of the house. As it turned out, there were a
slew of medicinal and magical herbs planted there, alongside the
vegetable and flower beds.

It was late in the year, but Bettina ran
Jacki through each of the plants and its uses, gathering a
basketful of green leaves and stems, some roots, and a handful of
colorful berries. She spent more time teaching Jacki about each one
after they went back into the kitchen and began preparing them for
use in the spell they would work that night. Bettina showed her how
to handle them and the prayers to speak over the workspace and the
work.

Jacki learned an enormous amount about
herbal magic that afternoon. She only prayed that what they were
doing was going to be enough to bring her brother back to full
consciousness. He still hadn’t woken up.

They had made remarkable progress in
stopping the degradation that had been happening to him. Bettina
insisted they had saved his life and made a good start on bringing
him back from the edge, but Jacki wanted her big brother back. All
the way back. Healthy and whole.

She spent time with him in between her
tasks, sitting by his bedside and talking to his caretakers. Tad
and Mandy had been incredible. They had watched over him, providing
the medical care for which they’d been trained. Jacki couldn’t have
asked for better people to help her brother and she knew she
couldn’t have cared for him as well by herself.

Bettina left the herbs they had cleaned and
prepared to one side of the kitchen sink when they were done and
then started in on dinner preparation. The everyday task helped
settle Jacki’s mind until Bettina mentioned the extra guest she
expected would make a showing at their table that night.

“That Harper is a complex soul,” Bettina
said as she peeled a potato.

Jacki was frying several packages of chicken
she had found in the freezer and defrosted. She used a pinch of
rosemary to season them and a lemon butter sauce that was among her
favorite flavors.

“Is he going to sleep here in the house?”
Jacki asked. She wasn’t too keen on the idea of the stranger being
in the house while her brother was still so vulnerable.

“I imagine so, but don’t worry. I’m going to
ward his door and any windows in the room they give him. I think
Tad is planning to go furry and prowl the halls tonight.” Bettina
chuckled and Jacki had an image in her mind of the human man coming
face to face with a tiger in the middle of a darkened hallway.

“Do you really think it’ll be safe?” Jacki
had to ask. Her brother’s safety was at stake.

“If all goes as I expect, Tom will be back
among the conscious once we’ve finished our work tonight. I
wouldn’t be surprised if he makes a very quick recovery after that.
He’s had a lot of time to sleep while his physical wounds have
healed. Now we need to heal what the magic did to him and between
us, we should be able to manage it.” Bettina smiled at her
encouragingly. “Don’t worry. I have a strange feeling that Harper
is going to surprise us in good ways from here on out. Still waters
run very deep with that one, and his deep belief in the Great
Spirit counts in his favor, for the Goddess wears many guises and
carries many names. In the final analysis, any being on the side of
Light can be our ally. I have high hopes that Harper Sagtakos will
be one of them.”

“Besides,” Beau said from the doorway that
led to the front of the house. “Jake vouched for Ben and Ben is
vouching for Harper.”

Beau walked into the kitchen, followed by
Geir. They had entered the house from the front and had most likely
heard most of Jacki’s conversation with Bettina. Beau paused to
give Jacki a quick kiss on the temple on his way to the
refrigerator. He grabbed a cola out of the bottom of the fridge for
himself and tossed one to Geir, which he caught as he paused beside
Jacki to give her a kiss as well.

“Do you really trust all this vouching for
each other that’s going on? They’re all human,” Jacki questioned,
still a little uneasy.

“Well, we all know Jake is above reproach,”
Beau stated, taking the half-peeled potato from Bettina and
gallantly taking over the menial task. “If his mating of Ria isn’t
enough, I should also remind you that your own brother knows and
trusts Jake from way back.”

“He does?” Geir asked, already at the sink,
washing and snapping the ends off of the pile of green beans Jacki
had left nearby.

“Tom was a Navy SEAL. Jake was a Marine
Recon major. Tom was Jake’s dive master. Taught him everything he
knew about diving—in and out of gear,” Beau supplied. “From all
accounts, Jake is part fish, thanks to Tom’s training. Heard he did
a flawless dive off the command deck of Sam’s yacht to impress all
the selkies. They sure talked about it enough. None of them thought
a mere human could execute a soundless entry from that great a
height before Jake proved them wrong.”

“I would’ve liked to see that,” Geir added,
tossing the prepared green beans into a pot as he went.

“So we start with Jake. He’s cool,” Beau
reiterated. “Jake has known Ben for a long time. Ben Steel was
Altor Custodis
, but he came over to our side fully once he
realized his work for the AC was being used to murder innocent
shifters and vamps all across the country. His heart was in the
right place, but his masters at the AC betrayed his trust and
that’s something—from all accounts—our new human friend could not
abide. Since he was confronted with the truth, he has been firmly
on our side. The Napa Valley Master vamp vouches for him, as do a
bunch of shifter Clans on the West Coast. He’s also a friend of
Jake’s and Jake trusted him enough to bring him in on the rescue
mission when he went to save Ria’s life a couple of weeks ago. Ben
delivered on that mission, as we all know. He helped Ria’s injured
Guards to safety and medical help, then brought them to the
rendez-vous in North Carolina. We all also know what happened next
and how Ben fought on our side in the battle that followed.”

“So Ben is okay,” Jacki agreed. “But what
about this Harper guy?”

“Well, that’s where it gets tricky,” Beau
admitted. “Ben says he’s okay and won’t try anything that could
hurt any of us. And you did your own examination of his character,
right, milady?” Beau nodded to Bettina, who was sitting at the
table, listening to all this with a faint smile on her face.

“I did,” she agreed. “And I think we should
give him a chance, as I’ve tried to tell Jacki, but you can’t blame
her for being worried about her brother.” Bettina stood and went
over to Jacki, placing an arm around her shoulders. “It’ll be all
right, my dear. Let’s eat, then do our best to put your worries to
rest and restore your brother to health. You’ll see. It’ll all work
out. Have a little faith.”

They ate together, joined by Ben and Harper,
who was allowed to walk around the property, as long as he had an
escort. For now, that was Ben. Conversation at dinner was stilted
at first, and Jacki’s tension level was pretty high. She didn’t
want to make nice with the human. She just wanted to get on with
the spell and get her brother back. Was that too much to ask?

“I’m sorry if my presence disturbs you,”
Harper said after the silence around the dinner table had dragged
on a little too long. He was looking at Jacki and she was startled
out of her worrisome thoughts about Tom and the spell they were
going to attempt later, when the moon was higher in the sky.

“It does,” Jacki said honestly. “But
probably not entirely for the reason you think. My brother has been
very ill and I’m protective of him. He’s in this house and we’re
going to be working magic tonight to try to bring him out of an
unconscious state he’s been in for a few days now.”

Harper frowned, his dark brows drawing
together in concern. “I didn’t know you had an injured man here.
I’m sorry to have intruded on your troubling time.” He seemed to
think before going on. “Is there anything I can do to help?” He
looked pointedly over at the drying herbs on the side of the sink.
“I was wondering what the leaf collection was for, but now I
realize. You’re going to try to work herbal magic on him
tonight?”

“What do you know of such things?” Bettina
asked quickly, seeming intrigued.

“I’m an Indian, ma’am,” he answered with a
soft grin. “I know a thing or two about herbs.”

Bettina laughed outright, surprising Jacki.
“Come off it, Harper. Don’t play the stereotype with me. You had to
have learned something somewhere to say the things you have. Who
was it who taught you about herbal magic?”

Harper grinned, clearly taking no offense.
“You caught me.” His dark eyes twinkled at Bettina. “My grandmother
is a wise woman, like you, ma’am. She took me under her wing when I
was a boy and my friends and I thought it would be fun to have a
mud fight in the middle of her herb garden. She whipped my butt and
then made me spend the rest of the summer putting her garden back
to rights. I had to mow her lawn too. At first, it was penance for
having messed up her carefully tended plants, but after a while, I
started to enjoy working in her backyard and conservatory. She
figured it out and decided to teach me what she knew. After that, I
spent every summer in her backyard, working alongside her and
learning everything she knew.”

“Your grandmother had a
conservatory
?” Beau asked, emphasizing the word.

“Just because I’m an Indian, doesn’t mean I
come from poverty. Grandma has an honest-to-goodness estate in
Southampton on Long Island. She even has a pair of peacocks that
wander the grounds making a racket at all hours.”

“Sylvie!” Bettina said with wonder in her
voice and a broad smile on her face. “I knew you looked familiar.
You’re Sylvie Harper’s grandson!”

“I thought your first name was Harper,”
Jacki said in confusion.

“Grams didn’t want her family name to die
out completely, and my mother agreed.” Harper shrugged.

“Sylvie Harper is one of the wisest women I
know,” Bettina declared, reaching into her pocket and pulling out a
cell phone of all things. “Let’s call her. I bet we can clear up
Jacki’s worries once and for all.”

Bettina connected the call and put it on the
speaker. Everyone waited while it rang. On the third ring, a female
voice answered.

“Sylvie, it’s me, Bette. I’ve got you on
speaker. How are you, dear?”

“Fine, fine. To what do I owe the pleasure?
I haven’t heard from you in a few weeks. Everything okay?” asked
the friendly woman on the other end.

“We’re all hanging in there,” Bettina
replied. “The reason for my call is that a young man showed up here
and I think he belongs to you.”

“A young man?” the woman on the other end of
the line sounded intrigued.

“Hi Grams,” Harper said from the other side
of the table.

“Harper? Is that you? What have you gotten
up to now? Are you giving Bette trouble?” The woman’s voice sounded
far from chastising. She seemed more amused than anything, and very
friendly. Jacki liked her tone. She sounded like a nice lady.

“Yeah, it’s me, Grams. I sort of
inadvertently ran into one of your friends and
her
friends
are a little suspicious of my motives for being here. Could you
tell them I’m not the boogeyman, please?” Harper seemed to have a
good relationship with his grandmother, but Jacki didn’t know
either of them. How was she to take the word of a disembodied voice
over a telephone?

“If you ask me, she should lock you up and
throw away the key. How dare you drop in on Bette unannounced? What
have you been up to, young man?” Gone was the teasing tone,
replaced by outraged grandma. Jacki started to really like the
older lady.

“Thanks, Grams.” Harper rolled his eyes and
sat back.

“Don’t you roll your eyes at me, Harper. Did
he roll his eyes, Bette?” the woman asked with accusation in her
tone.

“Why yes, I think he did, Sylvie,” Bettina
answered with a grin. She seemed to be getting a kick out of the
entire conversation. “Don’t worry, hon. Your misplaced grandson
gave my friends a scare, but I think we’ve got him sorted out now.
How much did you teach him about plants? Does he share your
gift?”