Witch Bound (Twilight of the Gods) (12 page)

And then he was on four paws and his world continued to expand for several seconds as he adjusted to his heightened senses. He could hear the demons stumbling through the woods, feel their hunger in the stench of their sweat. He felt his pack, Ben taking down an outlier. Daniel and Jake moving to seal the break in their circle. The wind tasted clear and sweet and he swallowed it down before letting it erupt from his throat in a long shuddering howl.

Christian mounted and joined the other riders. Elin already circled lazily overhead. No room for thoughts of Rocky here. No doubt or guilt or shame. Only the hunt. Aiden signaled them forward and Fen threw himself into a headlong run, quickly outpacing the huntsmen to join his hounds.

The pack was coming and joy welled up inside him, lifted from his throat to the night sky. Beth’s horse shifted nervously as Fen darted off in the direction of the pack, taking the lead and letting himself fade away until there was only the rhythm of his paws hitting the ground, the blood pumping through his veins, and the huff and draw of each breath. He was the hunt. Death bringer and night stalker. He needed no one.

Chapter Twelve

Raquel hadn’t expected her experiment to work, but watching Fen take off as if his tail was on fire and leaving her alone with the awful revelation that she wanted him made her need to do something distracting. And what was more distracting than finally taking control of your life?

She wasn’t completely reckless. This time she warded her bedroom first and made sure there wasn’t anything flammable in the circle. Well, except for her. But how much damage could she do with a marker and a damp washcloth?

When she’d gone back inside Fen’s house, she’d found the new design in his sketchpad, laid out on the coffee table all ready to go. She’d cleaned up dinner, putting the meatballs in the fridge and leaving the rolls on the counter. It took all of five minutes, and while she’d briefly considered waiting for him to come back, she remembered the expression of relief on his face when the phone rang. She shouldn’t have said anything. It wasn’t really Elin that had brought her to the decision about Christian. She hadn’t been crying about that—she didn’t know why she’d broken down. Everything was such a big tangled mess and she had no idea how to unravel it. But once she’d spoken the words out loud to Fen—
I
don’t want to marry Christian
—she hadn’t wanted to take them back.

When she grabbed her coat on the way out, she’d seen the sketchpad again and on impulse took it with her. No one was at the house, her mother and Audrey on some mysterious shopping trip into town. She didn’t want to sit there alone and useless while Fen and Christian and even Lois risked their lives.

There was something she could do tonight.

She traced Fen’s design with her fingertip. As agreed, he’d taken Audrey’s suggestion and replaced the amplification rune with one that would mute her power instead. It went against every instinct. All witches wanted more power. It was a matter of pride and rank. But if she had to cripple herself to make this work, then she’d do it. She frowned at the sketchpad for a long time before uncapping the marker and setting to work.

She’d never been particularly good at art and trying to draw on herself was...difficult. She gave up on her arm and worked on her thigh instead. Her leg was more accessible and a much bigger canvas to work with. She didn’t worry about fancy. She placed the runes exactly as Fen had drawn them, in the exact alignment. When she finished, she could feel the hum of power coming off them like the other night. She wondered if she would get used to that once she had the markings permanently tattooed onto her flesh. She
would
get used to it. If they worked the way they were supposed to, she’d find a way to adjust.

Closing her eyes, she centered herself as she’d been trained, closing out every extraneous thought and bringing herself to that well of power inside her. Easy to find it, but again she was standing on the outside of a great wall. The Hoover Dam of magical blocks.

It felt different tonight. The surge might account for that. With more of their native magic leaking through the fault, it made their magic here on earth more accessible. A good night to try this. Perfect.

Except Fen isn’t here to stomp out any fires if I fail.

She pushed that thought away hard. She’d already asked far too much from him. She’d seen that clearly on his stricken face right before he ran. He wouldn’t betray his friend, and she couldn’t ask him to. He might be attracted to her, but he didn’t really want her. If she could figure this out on her own, he’d place the tattoo and she’d let him go.

Tonight there was a tension across the wall, like a hand barely touching still water. She paused as she considered the barrier—a force pushed outward, but something also pulled her in. A subtle current, but she focused all of her attention on following it. She came to a place that felt almost like a fault, the ragged edges knit together imperfectly. The seam was there. The source of that trickle of magic. Slowly, with extreme care, she pushed forward.

It was like bursting a bubble. Once she broke through that fragile skin, she was pulled inside a vortex. A blaze of power raced up her arms and flooded her mind, caused sparks to burst behind her eyelids as magic raw and unfiltered sang down every nerve. Her muscles began to shake as every circuit overloaded and began to shut down. Until she couldn’t even feel her body, couldn’t see her room, or hear herself screaming. She could only feel the energy coursing through her. There was nothing to anchor her.

She was on fire and this much magic...it could very well burn her to ash.

* * *

Christian wheeled his horse and surged forward, running down one demon while his sword slashed into another. Sloppy. He missed the neck and the thing flopped on the ground, dragging its nearly severed arm in the dirt as it tried to escape. It didn’t get very far. Ben was there in an instant, pouncing on the creature and ripping out its throat in a single fluid movement, rolling off the body with the momentum of his attack. Dead leaves kicked up in a dervish then drifted gently to the ground. One caught on Ben’s ear and he shook it loose before trotting back into the shadows.

Christian gave a short nod and bent in the saddle to cut through the spinal cord of the trampled demon now trying to rise to its feet. His Skimstrok blade glowed faintly, sharper than steel. With the power seeping over from Asgard tonight, feeding the runes carved into the precious metal, it would cut through solid flesh and bone like butter.

This was hardly battle. Only the lowest level of demons swarmed from the split Lois was trying to seal. Slavering, barely intelligent creatures of instinct and fury. This was the fourth time this month he’d been called to hunt and he was sick of it. He swiped his forearm across his forehead and glanced around. Lois seemed to have gotten control of the portal and was wrestling it closed. No more demons were coming across, at least for now, and there were only about a dozen left. Maybe an hour’s work, then he could go find Raquel and ask her to explain what the hell Fen was talking about.

He was looking directly at Lois when she suddenly grabbed her head in both hands and let out a piercing scream. Her eyes flashed with a blinding white light for an instant before going black, and she crumpled to the ground. He pushed his horse forward, shouting for help, but it would be too late. Lois had been standing almost directly on the fault when she fell and even now he could feel the split widening again. As he watched, a demon emerged from the portal and Christian knew he wouldn’t make it in time to save her.

A flash of black fur flew over Lois’s limp body and slammed into the demon with an impact Christian could hear above the sounds of the fight. The pair rolled once, twice, and the hound came out on top. He dipped his head, fangs bared, and tore out the thing’s throat. Skidding to a stop, Christian threw himself off his horse to gather up Lois.

He felt another demon cross before he saw it loom up and swat the hound away with its great clawed hand. The hound yelped in pain and the pack responded instantly, converging on the threat. Aiden was there too, cutting his way through a pair of demons and facing down another larger one that forced his way through the failing portal.

Christian tried to rouse Lois. She moaned faintly but didn’t look good. In the dark, illuminated by the glow from his blade, she appeared ghostly pale. Her eyes were slit, but he could only see whites. Her breath came in pained pants. The demon had never reached her. He’d seen it happen...

“What’s wrong with her?” Aiden stood above him coated in drying demon blood, guarding Christian’s back.

“I don’t—” he began, but broke off when Lois stirred.

“Raquel,” she whispered, eyes snapping open to focus on him. Panic and pain swirled in their depths. “You have to stop her. She’ll split open the fault if she doesn’t stop. Kill her if she can’t pull it back.”

Christian shook his head and opened his mouth to argue or at least demand more information, but she was fading again.

“Give her to me. I’ll take Lois back to the house and find Raquel,” Aiden said.

Aiden would kill Raquel if it was between her and the clan. Christian stood, hefting Lois into his arms. “I’ll do it.”

Aiden paused as if he might argue but then gave a short nod. “Call Kathy on your way. She’ll come. Tell Grace we need everyone ready to evacuate. She knows the emergency plan.”

Christian turned from the fight, taking one last glimpse with him—the icy threat in Aiden’s eyes and the hounds guarding their fallen brother. He wouldn’t kill Raquel. It wouldn’t come to that.

He left Lois at Aiden’s house with Grace, who was already on the phone with Kathy when he left. By the time he climbed into his car and tore out of the driveway heading for town, he’d had time to consider Lois’s words. If Raquel had somehow caused the rift and Lois so much pain from a distance, what state was she in now?

It took less than five minutes for him to arrive at her house, but he tried calling Audrey on the way. He got voice mail twice and tossed his phone onto the seat with a curse. She’d mentioned something about going shopping with her mom. They were planning a bridal shower for Raquel in a few days. They’d already had one back in Colorado but thought this would be a nice way for her to get to know more people from the community. It was a surprise, which meant Raquel would be alone tonight.

What the hell had she done?

The house was dark when he threw the car into park. Taking the stairs two at a time, he walked into the house without knocking and paused inside the door. The house was far too quiet, but there was something strange...a throbbing sensation like he sometimes felt when standing directly above the fault. He wasn’t particularly sensitive to magic so if he could feel it pressing on him here, like a weight against his skin, something was very wrong. Instinctively, he reached for his sword, but he’d left it in the sheath attached to Skadi’s saddle.

“Raquel?”

No answer. Quickly, he passed down the hall to her bedroom. The light was on and she was curled in a ball on the floor. No blood. Her leg twitched as he stood frozen in the door—she was still alive. She’d created a warded circle and it made him pause for a moment. He didn’t know if she’d meant to keep something in or out, but either way, he couldn’t wait. He broke it, stepping across the invisible line. Like crossing to Asgard, the same cobweb feeling on his skin iced his blood. Nothing exploded or attacked and he didn’t waste any more time worrying about what he might have loosed by breaking that circle.

Raquel...he crouched beside her, almost afraid to touch her. The magic was stronger inside the circle and seemed to be coming directly from her. As gently as he could manage it, he turned her rigid body. Her eyes were open but blind and unfocused. She breathed in tight gasps and seemed to be having some sort of a seizure.

“Raquel. Come on, baby. Snap out of it.”

She wasn’t blinking. Her mouth moved, forming words, but no sound came out. He slapped her face. Nothing. He considered trying to knock her out, wondering if rendering her unconscious would break the magic’s hold on her. Aiden would kill her to keep the clan safe. Aiden was a good man, but for him the clan always came first.

Christian could smell burnt flesh, possibly hair. He knew that was often an ingredient in Lois’s spells. But it didn’t... His gaze swept over Raquel’s body and caught on the burnt patch on her leg. Her nightgown covered most of her thigh but when he shoved the fabric aside, he saw the runes. Fen’s sketchbook was pinned beneath her leg and a marker had rolled halfway across the room.

But Crayola sure as hell hadn’t done
that
to her leg.

The burns were still smoking as if they’d been etched into her skin with acid. Her leg twitched again, and she moaned.

He grabbed the damp washcloth and pressed it to the wound. A door crashed open from the rear of the house and he yelled, “In here.”

Hopefully, it was someone who knew what needed to be done because he sure as hell hadn’t a clue. Digging his phone out of his pocket, he hit Grace’s number. She answered as the door behind him opened.

He glanced back. Only Julian. The teenage boy lived across the street and had some magical ability. He’d have felt the disturbance. His eyes were red rimmed, the pupils contracted to tiny specks. He seemed to be having a mild but similar reaction to Lois’s.

“Hello?”

Christian turned his head. “Raquel is causing this, but I don’t know how to stop it. She’s having some sort of seizure and she’s not responding—”

Julian broke through the circle before Christian thought to warn him. A shudder passed through his skinny body and he dropped to his knees. Christian didn’t have time to stop him, didn’t even see the knife in Julian’s hand until it was on the down stroke inches from Raquel’s heart. By then it was too late.

Dropping the phone, he tackled Julian to the ground, both of them landing across Raquel’s legs. He rolled, dragging the boy with him and pinning his shoulders to the carpet. “What the fuck are you doing?”

Julian was shaking, skin cold to the touch. “Had to stop it.”

“Stay down,” Christian growled, positioning himself so he could examine Raquel and still keep an eye on the boy. He’d missed the heart, thank God. The strike had gone wide and hit her rib, leaving a bloody gash in her side. The knife was imbedded in the meaty flesh of her shoulder.

“Christian.” His eyes flicked up. Raquel was staring at him, her gaze aware, focused on him and tight with pain. “Oh, God. What happened?”

“Stay still.” He fumbled for his phone. The blood on his fingers made him nearly drop it on the floor. He hit dial and held it to his ear.

Raquel tried to get up. “The fault, I can feel it unraveling. You have to take me there.”

“You have a knife in your chest.” He pushed her back down as Grace answered. “I need Alan. Now.”

* * *

Raquel closed her eyes. She’d fucked up bad. The runes had worked spectacularly well. Tapping into her power wasn’t like turning a spigot, it was like taking a sledgehammer to it. It had settled down somewhat, but the wall was gone. For good she imagined. She’d flooded power into the unstable portal though, and now...she could feel it, unraveling at the seam, drawing further and further apart with every breath.