Witchlock (40 page)

“Deal.” Then she remembered to tell him, “I haven’t had a chance to tell you what happened last night.”
 

“Quinn gave me bullet points and that’s why I hope this works with the shaman.”
 

“What’s he doing?”
 

“Right now? Staring at the sky.”
 

Oh, boy. “I was hoping for something a little more active and deadly-sounding.”
 

Storm huffed in amusement. “Doesn’t always work like that. He told me I’d have a sign that would point me to Veronika. I’m leaving one of Quinn’s Beladors with him. They’ll call me with any updates.”
 

“He can’t do any worse than the rest of us and we’re having as much luck as asking a Magic 8-Ball.”
 

“I’ll meet you and we’ll help Rowan disperse her witches. Let’s get through that and we’ll figure the rest out from there. Okay?”
 

He was trying to reassure her. She stood. “Okay. I’ll text you the address when I hang up and then I’m heading out.”
 

“Be careful. I love you, sweetheart.”
 

Her throat constricted. She knew he loved her, but she hadn’t been doing a very good job of loving him back. “I love you, too,” she whispered.
 

“Please don’t try to get yourself killed.”
 

“I won’t.” Evalle hung up, typed the address for Storm and had just hit send when a new text popped up from Adrianna:
I heard about the Idiot Convention in Newnan. I’m going.
 

Evalle:
  I was about to text you. Rowan wants to disperse the crowd and needs help, but why are you going?
 

Adrianna:  
V will show for that chum line of power. If it’s too late to stop her before she takes on W, then we have one last chance if we catch her during the first hours of having Witchlock. If she’s arrogant enough to show that soon, we’ll have to try to stop her. Every day she’ll get stronger.
 

Evalle:
I wonder if Isak could get a fix on her location.
 

Adrianna:
No. Just talked to him. He’s not happy he can’t find her.
 

No one had sighted Veronika after last night’s encounter. If Isak couldn’t pin her down with his CIA level surveillance, it was a fair bet that nobody could.
 

Evalle:
I’m heading out now.
 

Adrianna:
I’m at Colony Square. Want to ride shotgun?
 

Air conditioning? Sold.
 

Evalle:
Pick me up at Five Points in ten.
 

She shoved the phone in her pocket and grabbed her full-body riding suit, then hesitated.
 

With Quinn coordinating the search effort, he’d be doing it from the center of town, which would keep him away from Newnan.
 

If this went badly, surely Macha would pull Quinn into Treoir with her most prized Beladors.
 

Quinn and Tzader would take care of Feenix.
 

Chapter 38
 

Quinn searched the lawn at Piedmont Park for any sign of Medb, but all he found were runners, dogs playing catch, a toddler practicing a wobbly walk and lots of sunbathing on an unusually warm day for November.
 

This was a prime spot for watching the eclipse, but if Veronika wanted a secret place, this massive in-town park was not it. Still, he’d rather walk a section of the grid he’d laid out for his warriors than sit somewhere and wait for reports.
 

A woman in her late twenties sat cross-legged on a blanket with a little girl of seven or eight, along with bottled water and snacks. The mother held two sheets of letter-size paper, one above the other, and explained something.
 

He’d bet she had a hole in one sheet and was showing her child how they’d watch the solar eclipse expected in about ninety minutes.
 

Watching them together sent his thoughts to Phoedra.
 

Had someone shown his daughter how to watch an eclipse?
 

Swallowing hard, he kept moving when he should be home in bed, but sleep brought on nightmares. He rubbed his head, which now ached constantly. This bloody headache had started yesterday and he was ready to cut his own head off.
 

When he handed off this route to another Belador in thirty minutes, he’d go see the druids at headquarters. One of them could ease the pain, then they’d chew on him about getting decent rest, which he’d promise.
 

Maybe he could convince one of them to put him into deep sleep for ten minutes and then pull him out.
 

He kept rubbing his head and stumbled over a rise in the ground. He blinked to clear his vision. What was he doing on this side of the field and not back over on the sidewalk?
 

Quinn turned slowly, taking in the drop-off that led to the underpass beneath a bridge on the north side of the park
 

Red flashed into view.
 

There and gone, disappearing behind tall evergreens.
 

Evalle had told him about Veronika’s red robe, and he’d known immediately that the woman in red he’d seen the other night was the KievRus witch.  Not Kizira.
 

His pain had made him vulnerable, and he’d almost succumbed to Veronika’s impressive powers of illusion, but according to all intel, Veronika should not have been in Atlanta at that point. He’d dismissed the possibility, and that was his failing. He’d had no idea who he’d been
facing.
 

If he’d thought sharing that debacle with anyone would help this hunt, he’d have laid his soul bare for being vulnerable to that illusion of Kizira, but that would almost certainly remove him from the position of Maistir and force Tzader back home, for no good reason, when all the Beladors needed Tzader there with the Warrior Queen.
 

He’d seen flashes of a red robe a few times since then, but when he’d raised his energy shields and gone to check, Veronika hadn’t been there. Of all people, Quinn knew the power of majik residue and the tricks it could play on the mind. He walked forward just to prove to himself there was no red robe here this time either. Veronika would not make it that easy to find her.
 

If she was here, Quinn would take control of that evil mind and show her the mistake of threatening his people and this city. He would hold her until Sen arrived and let Sen deal with her. He’d put Sen on notice that a deadly power had entered the city and Quinn expected Sen to come the minute he was called.
 

If Veronika gained Witchlock, there might be no stopping her. But Quinn had the power to reach out and grasp a mind. He’d never failed when he’d made an attempt and the most powerful monks in the world had said his mind was strong.
 

She’d shown her hand and played her trump card too soon when she’d fooled him by pretending to be Kizira. He was no longer vulnerable.
 

The further he walked, the more it was obvious that this area was a perfect spot for a private rendezvous. If there was, indeed, a red dress, it was a woman likely meeting her boyfriend.
 

When he entered the graffiti-covered underpass, the air warmed considerably, which seemed odd in the shade where it should be cooler.  He paused in the center of the shade and opened his Belador senses.
 

Energy buzzed and he pivoted, searching for the source.
 

She stood with her side to him, the red robe flowing to the ground.
 

This is it.
His heartbeat picked up speed as adrenaline surged through him. He sent power to his energetic shields, preparing his mind for battle.
 

She turned toward him, her robe billowing gently around her and she extended her hand with the glowing sphere in her palm. The energy around him buzzed even louder.
 

He reached out with his mind and ... his power tangled up.
 

Bloody hell.
 

He withdrew and reinforced his effort. He had to ...
 

He couldn’t finish the thought. He took a step back as his head pounded
harder and the pressure built until he wanted to wrench his own head off and throw it against the stone underpass.
 

That damned buzzing swept over his skin.
 

She pushed her hood off and there was Kizira again.
 

No!
screamed inside his head. Kizira was dead. He gritted his teeth and forced that thought through the bees humming in his brain.
 

I won’t let her do this to me.
 

“I miss you, Quinn,” she whispered, the sound echoing again all around him.
 

Pressure built in his head.
 

Dear goddess.
That. Is. Not. Her!
 

He grabbed his head and backed up farther. “You’re not Kizira.” That didn’t stop him from drinking up every second of the vision.
 

She extended an arm, reaching for him.
 

No. No. No! Grab her mind now!
 

Forcing himself backward to avoid her touch caused him to physically hurt, but that was not Kizira. The monks had never been wrong in the past.
Why can’t I grasp her mind?
 

“Come to me, Quinn. I want you.”
 

But her lips weren’t moving.
 

His mind battled through the confusion.
 

He roared in his head,
That vision is not Kizira!
 
 

He wiped at moisture trickling from his nose and it was blood. He grabbed his head. He had to use his mindlock and stop whatever was happening.
 

Gathering power and opening his mind, he mentally lunged out for her.
 

Blinding light burst inside his head. His knees buckled and he hit the ground. The world dimmed ... and disappeared.
 

He was on his way to join Kizira.
 

Chapter 39
 

“Next time we take my Gixxer,” Evalle grumbled, one hand on the doorframe and the other clutching the center console. “Or your Lexus. What happened to that?”
 

Adrianna fishtailed on the dirt road, kicking up a dust storm behind her fire-red Ferrari. She smirked and cut her eyes at Evalle. “I was already in this one when I called. I trained in a 430 Scuderia just like this one with a professional instructor at Atlanta Speedway.”
 

 That didn’t mean Evalle trusted the crazy witch out here, where if they hit one bad rut, this thing might go airborne.
 

“Pretty land,” Adrianna mentioned, glancing around while handling the car. “So Grady had the same intel as the Nightstalker I found?”
 

In spite of Evalle expecting to get a mouthful of airbag any minute, she rewound her conversation with Grady at Five Points before Adrianna had arrived. She could not recall another time he’d been so agitated that he’d told Evalle his intel without asking for a shake. She couldn’t have given him one right then anyway, because they were out in the open.
 

Evalle rubbed her neck, thinking out loud. “Pretty much. He heard a thirtyish woman, presumably a witch, trying to talk two other younger women into making this meeting. Sounded like what Rowan told me about Hermia. This woman kept telling the other two that this was a one-time opportunity.”
 

Adrianna snorted. “Ignorance will get you killed.”
 

True. Evalle continued, “Grady said the two women seemed hesitant until the one doing all the talking said they wouldn’t have to answer to Rowan and a council. That the witch who would lead their coven liked the idea of the large number and that they would be more powerful than Rowan and her council put together. Grady also said he followed that same woman who said those exact words again to another female, like someone had hit a replay button on her.”
 

Adrianna slowed for a deep dip in the road, then motored into a dense forest. “That’s a bad sign. Sounds like Veronika has been testing her abilities and now that I think about it, Imar sounded like a robot.”
 

“Yep. But we don’t know if that woman going around with the sales pitch is a witch or just someone trying to be a witch.”
 

“True. But the closer Veronika gets to the zenith of the eclipse, the stronger her power will be. The one thing I got from her when we met is that she’s got a huge ego. She might be getting impatient. The difference is that it
should
take major effort to claim a powerful person now, but after
she fully takes possession of Witchlock, she’ll do the same thing with little effort. Still, even without Witchlock, between her KievRus majik and Ragan’s power, she could get ahold of anyone if she finds a way past that person’s shields. Without Witchlock, though, she doesn’t completely own that woman yet, which means the connection can be broken before the eclipse.”
 

“How would we do that when we don’t know where Veronika is?” Evalle asked.
 

Adrianna puttered slowly now, on what had turned into a trail instead of a road. “There’s a chance she’ll come for me to bind my power to my sister’s
before
she takes possession of Witchlock.”
 

“Why would she do that?”
 

“With Ragan’s power fueling Witchlock, Veronika would need about ten years to take over this world and maybe even a pantheon. If she combined my power with my sister’s, she might only need a year.”