The Witches Of Denmark (14 page)

Spurred on by raging anger, I wasn’t thinking clearly… and hadn’t considered the consequences of a rash move against a heavily armed and aggressive foursome.

Simion nodded pompously while Serghei laughed meanly. Both raised their wands in preparation to cut me down as I stormed toward them. I don’t think I fully understood the unstable thoughts and emotions that propelled me. However, in this ill-conceived moment of bravado I did realize the likely result of such foolhardiness, and took a deep breath as I prepared myself to become the sacrificial lamb the Mateis sought. No, I’ve never had a death wish… but something inside clicked on. Maybe it was the fact I could never live with myself if anyone in my immediate family perished that afternoon, and I had done nothing to try and prevent it.

In the few seconds that separated me from the afterlife, a sudden shimmer throttled the air. While it certainly had to be detectable by warlocks, witches, and mortals alike, only those unnaturally alive were thrown to the ground. The local bystanders remained standing, gazing at us with their mouths hanging open, and perhaps more perplexed by the fact we were all prostrate while the air around them crackled with energy. Correction, they stood, along with a pair of familiar newcomers who seemed to materialize out of nothing. The two men strode toward us with drawn wands gleaming as brightly as Serafim’s and Cristian’s gilded weaponry.

“Why are you in a hurry to be banned to Sheol?” shouted the taller of the pair, a bearded man with hair as thick as Dad’s and as long as Grandpa’s. His dark brown eyes flashed with anger, and a coolness bearing a similar menacing power to the Mateis emanated from him. I say similar, but this one’s air of danger was much more pronounced. “It seems I should not have spared your lives in Istanbul three summers ago, Serafim and Cristian!”

“We haven’t harmed anyone yet, Adrian, so your references to mercy are meaningless!” Cristian shot back. “Your Code does not apply here.”

“Say again, Cristian? I pray that you reconsider, since vile, murderous thoughts are indeed treated the same as deeds by the Elders’ Council!” this man named Adrian replied, whom I now recognized as Dad’s older brother. “Prepare to receive your justice!”

In an instant, he disappeared from view and then reappeared inside the arc. With speed that my eyes struggled to follow, he disarmed all four Matei warlocks. Uncle Adrian brandished his wand perilously close to Serghei’s neck as he held the youngest Matei against his chest. I’ve always considered Simion to be as selfish a man as has ever lived, and I expected him to care only for his own survival. He fell to his knees, quivering in fear and surely destined to be a source of embarrassment for his two younger brothers looking on painfully. But instead of pleading for mercy on himself, he entreated Adrian to only spare Serghei’s life.

My uncle’s expression softened. Likely he was just as surprised, and a murmur swept through my family, still gathered near our automobiles. All of them repeatedly called to me in hushed voices to scurry back to them. But I felt compelled to watch the drama play out between the Mateis and this warlock they all seemed to fear.

“All right… I will spare your son this time, Simion. But only if you leave now, and you give me your word to avoid my family at all costs,” said Adrian, his tone frigid, and his eyes aglow with supreme anger. “The three of you leave first through the wormhole your brothers have been using since they arrived in the United States last night. I will send Serghei afterward, safe and sound…. But any trickery, or if I hear so much as another whim for revenge from any of you, then prepare to bury his headless body that will follow you out of the wormhole. Am I clear?”

Simion glanced nervously at his son before eyeing my family and me with restrained wrath. He nodded his consent to Adrian’s demand. If he had entertained thoughts of trying anything cute against my uncle, it ended once the other man—who I now recognized as my other uncle, Manuel—suddenly appeared at Adrian’s side, with his wand drawn.

“Then, be gone!” Adrian commanded.

Simion and his brothers raised their unarmed hands above their heads and a moment later their broomsticks appeared, passing over our heads so quickly that they weren’t visible until they arrived in each warlock’s palms. The trio boarded their rides and rose into the air above the parking lot. Then they rocked toward what at first appeared to be a small, rain laden, storm cloud nestled in a low-lying cloudbank in the early summer sky at sunset.

Adrian released his grip on Serghei, and said something inaudible to me. Whatever Adrian told him was strong enough to obliterate a nervous smile tugging at the corners of Serghei’s mouth. The youngest male in the American Matei clan nodded solemnly to whatever my uncle told him, and then reached an open hand into the air until his broomstick arrived. He jumped on the broomstick and flew toward the same destination in the sky as his kindred warlocks moments earlier.

Hard to tell if the small crowd of restaurant patrons noticed anything more than the four warlocks disappearing into the purplish, glowing wormhole that suddenly opened up as a fissure among the clouds to accept each one. I’d say it’s safe to assume their minds quit comprehending a sight that all of them last deemed possible as young children at Halloween. I incorrectly assumed this was Adrian’s and Manuel’s perspective as well, even though they made light of the event while motioning for us to join them inside the restaurant.

“Well? You were planning to meet us here for dinner, Gabriel… or did you forget?” Manuel chided playfully.

The embarrassed look on Dad’s face said he had indeed forgotten. However, my family had been expecting my uncles, aunts, and cousins to arrive at any time. Maybe the details were never finalized completely as my uncle assumed.

“It is but a small matter,” said Adrian, stepping over to my father and wrapping his arm around Dad’s shoulder, and leading him toward the entrance and the two- dozen wide-eyed witnesses to what just happened. “Let’s go inside and get a table… shall we?”

“Sounds good to me!” Alisia enthused.

My sister led the way, almost skipping, and obviously enjoying the wary expressions on the faces of Denmark’s mortal citizenry. Dad and Grandpa were chumming up with Adrian and Manuel—family we had not seen in person in nearly two decades since they moved back to Romania, and then traveled throughout Europe—while Mom and Grandma pulled up the rear with me.

“Don’t believe everything you see!” Adrian advised the crowd, soon after they had parted for us like the Red Sea had once done for Moses. He motioned with his wand to both sides, whispering a barely audible incantation. Meanwhile, his persona of power and anger had melted into something much more docile, like a lion transformed into a domestic kitten. “Much of what you see every day is an illusion…. Learn to see between the lines, to define what is really happening, and what is not. And, remember this: what you thought you saw today wasn’t real. It has no importance.”

He offered a generous smile to all and slipped his wand inside a holster attached to his belt, as Manuel had done similarly with his wand moments earlier. Then he held the door open for us all to enter the restaurant. The faces I saw at that point looked distrusting, which made me worry that his spell hadn’t worked on everyone. But the fact that each person returned his infectious smile with their own smiles told me the few fully cognizant witnesses would likely soon forget what had happened that evening. Or, at least they wouldn’t talk about it much in public.

Unless it happened again… or something worse came about.

Chapter Twelve

My uncles staying with us proved to be a double-edged sword.

Knowing we were safe for the time being from any surprise attacks from the Matei clan brought an incredible sense of relief… true peace. We slept soundly for the first night since learning our archenemies had not only located us, but intended to reside in the same town. In Chicago, they preferred the stately neighborhoods, and had never visited Wheaton… at least not to my knowledge. Although, I suppose a random fly-by, or even a drive-through of our neighborhood without our awareness was possible. Not likely, but hell, Valerian and Irina briefly accomplished that feat at the local Kroger in Denmark. Anything was possible.

So, what do I have to bitch about, one might ask?

Well, for starters, despite having forty-five hundred square feet inside the house, the previous owners rehabilitated the house from the brink of a wrecking ball to accommodate them comfortably… as in ‘perfect for two’ people. Not so much for more than that. As a result, maybe two or three guests could stay in the house with us, but any more than that would mean air mattresses or sleeping bags for anyone else. The four functional bedrooms housed my parents and grandparents on one side of the house, and my sister and me in the remaining bedrooms on the other side. Eventually, we planned to finish the servants’ quarters across the courtyard in the back. We could even add a bedroom or two to the barn whenever Dad and Grandpa got around to securing and restoring the damned thing before it crumbled to the ground. I might add here that it was the only part of the property still in serious disrepair when we moved in.

But, the point of all this is that having Adrian and Manuel share our home made things a bit crowded. Even when Grandpa and Grandma relented to their request to move up into the unfinished attic—which from what Dad said, also allowed them to use their ‘higher magic’ to create a miniature palace of sorts—I still felt cramped. Maybe it was envy on my part, since these two warlocks had mastered the use of dimensional reality, time, and space to such a degree that they could create a Bali-like resort inside the scaled down confines of a shoebox if they so desired, and live quite comfortably in such a modified world. Hard to picture, I know. It brings back memories of the
I Dream of Jeannie
TV show from the sixties for me.

Perhaps I would’ve been fine with such an arrangement, if it had consistency. However, having the two suddenly show up in the upstairs spa bathroom while I showered seemed like something I’d never get used to. It was the same deal for Alisia, as I heard her scream when Manuel popped in while she was using the bathroom. Apparently, such moments are viewed quite differently in Eastern Europe. Not to mention, both of my uncles were born when modern privacy standards were a whimsical wish. It definitely made for a difficult adjustment—particularly for Alisia and me.

“How long do you expect them to be here?” she asked me worriedly, at breakfast on Thursday, two days after Adrian’s and Manuel’s arrival to our side of the globe. Our latest rescue from the Mateis seemed much older than the thirty-eight hours that had passed since the confrontation in the Southern Comfort Inn’s parking lot. Adapting to our uncles’ presence and being held inside the house as a precaution caused day thirty-six to become an incredibly boring drudge. If things didn’t improve for my sister and me quickly, then day thirty-seven was destined for a similar fate. “Longer than a week?”

“Could be,” I said. “I heard Dad and Uncle Adrian talk about turning the house into a virtual fortress, to last until the Mateis grew weary and returned to Chicago.”

“Shit, Bas, that could take frigging years!”

“I know,” I agreed. “It sucks royally, and don’t forget we’ve still got two aunts and three cousins who might join us if this extends into August.”

“Which it will,” she said, resignedly. “Why can’t they stay in a hotel or the bed and breakfast up the road?”

“Do you mean the little Twin Oaks place up near the top of Chaffin’s Bend?”

“Yes.”

“Maybe… but it only has three sleeping rooms. I bet at least one of our cousins will end up staying here—regardless of how this all works out.”

She groaned and laid her head down on the kitchen table, effectively hiding her tortured expression from me behind a Wheaties cereal box.

“Try to look at the bright side, Ali,” I said. “At least we now have the firepower to kick the Mateis’ asses, since Manuel and Adrian aren’t chicken shit to face those assholes.”

I peered over the cereal box, and she raised her head, a slight hopeful smile tugging on the edges of her lips… with a touch of impishness. Sort of inappropriate, given her previous reaction.

“Gotcha!”

I jumped and nearly broke part of the chandelier hanging above the breakfast table. Uncle Manuel had sneaked up from behind, and scared the holy bejesus out of me!

“Looks like you need to learn how to close your aura, Sebastian!” he playfully rebuked me. “You would’ve sensed me creeping up on you.”

I whirled around to face him, and I must admit that it’s a bit eerie seeing a younger version of Dad and Grandpa, since Manuel’s face is definitely one and the same as theirs… when they were younger. Same hazel eyes that can morph to green when Manuel gets pissed, and his hair thickness and hairline are telltale Radu—the only qualities he shares with Adrian, since Manuel wears his dark brown hair short. From the few portraits and early photographs we have available, he is the ‘spitting image’ of both Grandpa and Dad when they were each just over two centuries old. At present, Dad looks exactly the same as Grandpa when he was nearing three hundred. Sometimes I wished I looked more like them, although we have many similarities. But with Mom’s DNA in the mix, which carries almost as much influence as Dad’s roots, what my sister and I become in our later centuries will be significantly different than our male Radu ancestors.