Total eclipse of the moo.., p.12
Total Eclipse of the Moon, page 12
He wondered why the demon remained silent for this long. He’d expected a running dialogue the entire time he’d touched Madeline. They might be separate beings locked together, but he’d come to know the demon a bit. It wasn’t the heartless, self-interested monster everyone thought demons to be.
"I didn't say anything because I was puking my guts out. It was disgusting."
"You're so weird. But glad to have the privacy."
"Tough conversation?" Antonio asked.
"What?"
"You got that glazed look and your face is splotchy like you’re angry at it. When you’re communicating with the demon your eyes turn both colors. Kind of like a blue leopard. Spotty black in there." He waved toward the bedroom. "What’s taking her so long? Let’s get moving before… We’re losing darkness."
"I heard that," Madeline said. She walked to the bags of remnant food and rifled through until she found a package of cookies. She held one out but seemed to be looking beyond both of them to the front door. "You want one?"
"Love to have one, hon," said a woman.
Both he and Antonio spun. Shane yanked out the knife he always kept on him. Antonio pulled a gun, which he immediately holstered. Shane realized the knife was the wrong weapon to fight this being and put it away. Instead, he removed a small chain of beads with a protective talisman from his pocket to wrap around his wrist.
From beneath her ultra-long lashes, the woman with pink and blonde hair smiled and took a cookie from Madeline’s outstretched hand. The smell of fresh flowers came from her—not a sickening smell but one intended to lure like the siren she was. The demon inside him recoiled and hissed, "Witch."
"Why don’t you react like that to Madeline?"
"She’s different." The demon remained ultra-focused on the new witch. That meant she was a top-level threat.
The new witch only had eyes for the vampire. "Antonio."
"Cora." Everything about Antonio had tensed.
"I’m not going to rip off your clothes and embarrass you in front of your friend." She took one step in Antonio’s direction. Her voice dropped an octave. "Interesting. Exhibitionism turns you on. Or is it just me being here that has you running hot?"
Antonio backed up. He hadn’t bothered contradicting her.
"You’re such a coward. Back then and now." She approached him and gently touched Antonio’s face in a way no one else on the planet would attempt with the vampire.
Antonio drew in a sharp intake of air and breathed shallowly. His lips pulled back to expose his sharp canines as his gaze dropped to her neck.
"I’d wondered if this would still be there," Cora said softly.
"We’re done."
"Are we? You’re sure acting like…" She let her gaze roam over him. "You’re still too sexy for your own good and you want me, which is a turn on, but that’s not why I’m here." Cora stalked away from him.
"How’d you get through the protections on this place?" Shane asked.
Cora’s eyebrows rose as she glanced from Antonio to Shane. She addressed Madeline. "This must be your Mr. Fantastic Ass."
"Oh, God," Madeline groaned and covered her face. "Please, Cora. Just…don’t."
Shane blinked, dead serious about getting his answer.
"Oh, please." Cora waved her hand. "Those wards might keep out humans. Maybe a lycan, but I invented the concept of wards. Kind of fun to thwart the all-powerful Antonio and his low-level protective wards." She grinned at the vampire who hadn’t moved from where he’d backed against the refrigerator. The cigar he’d been puffing hung loosely in his left hand, about to fall free. Cora faced Madeline. Her brow furrowed. She prowled close and tilted Madeline’s forehead to examine the healing lesion. Then she lifted Madeline’s hands to look at the defensive wounds.
"You and I need to speak in private." Cora marched out the door.
Shane said to Madeline, "You agreed—"
"I did," she interrupted. "But Cora will destroy both of you if I don’t speak with her."
He moved to stop Madeline, but Antonio caught his arm.
"Cora could do that?" Shane asked, low.
"Yes."
"Would she?"
Antonio compressed his lips. "She’d do just about anything to protect Madeline."
When Madeline reached the front yard with its crumbling knee-high stone wall and a few broken clay pots, Cora waved for her to follow into the backyard. The moon had started its ascent into the sky. Cora halted, turned abruptly, and pointed to the healing cuts on Madeline’s hand. "He almost didn’t get to you in time."
"I’m not dead. Things worked out okay."
Cora cocked her head. She removed a crystal from her pocket and twirled it on its chain. "Your magic is back. Did you and Shane…?"
"No." She shook her head. "You know what did it? Music and dancing."
"What?" Wrinkles appeared on Cora’s brow.
"Singing, dancing…giving in to the music."
"It wasn’t that simple. What prompted you to relax enough to embrace the music?"
She compressed her lips. "Shane was losing control to the demon. Turns out it doesn’t like pop music. A little be-bopping and some hip shimmies and voila no more demon takeover. And I had my magic back."
"You healed him? What kind of demon is inside him?"
She dropped her gaze and muttered, "Dragon."
"Of course it is. Bloody hell. You're the dragon healer." Cora sighed hard. She stared off into the starry night. "Damn it. This is problematic. Where you’re impulsive and sometimes easily distracted—"
"I am not easily distracted." At Cora’s glare, her indignation dissipated. "Maybe I’m a little disorganized on occasion."
"Where you’re chaotic the lycan is more still and assured in his decisions and actions. He’d be stabilizing for you. Yet the two of you together would be a catastrophe." She cursed under her breath. "You sure it's not the dragon that attracts you to him?"
She shook her head. "I felt this before he was possessed."
"I rarely question the fates that drive our destiny, but this is unacceptable. That lycan’s motivation is clear. Regardless of physical attraction, he’s going to do everything necessary to lift the curse. Even he wouldn’t break the bond of brotherhood to choose you over them." She placed a pink crystal on a chain in Madeline's palm and closed her fingers around it.
"I’m not powerful enough to control the magic in this. It’s level two. I haven’t earned past level one." On a whisper she added, "I’m not ready."
"You have to be." Cora stepped back.
Madeline rotated the crystal in her hand. It represented the second of three levels of ascension in magic. Only the elders of each family could decide when one could move up a level.
She closed her fist around the crystal and kissed her hand, a gesture of appreciation for the gift. "Samuel said goodbye last night. He said it's time to face whatever is to come."
"You may be tired of running and fighting, but you’re more alive and connected to living than you’ve been in a long time. Are you sure you can handle what it’s like to feel things deeply again?"
She shrugged, but on the inside she shirked. She didn’t want to think about what Shane did to her, how he forced her to experience this depth of emotion…no, she wasn’t ready for it.
Cora said, "You must be prepared for the power inside you. When my stupid brother asked me not to push you about magic… When I saw him discouraging you from using magic…" She trailed off. Her eyelids drifted shut. She whispered, "No more hiding things from you."
"What else did he not want you to tell me?" Her heart pounded.
"Your mother, that’s your real mother, not the British princess your father married, but your birth mother, was a powerful magical."
"I don’t understand." Her head felt light to the point the world seemed to teeter around her.
"You’re not half witch. No half magical could do a fraction of what you’re capable. It’s why the queen didn’t feel a twinge of guilt about eradicating your family. The human you considered your mother was also murdered. Don’t look shocked. You think her death—a misdiagnosis and treatment in the hospital—wasn’t intentional? Your birth mother died fighting a troll when you were about a month old, not that the queen had anything to do with that. When your father met the princess, the woman who eventually raised you, you were maybe six months old. She accepted you because she couldn’t have children. Of course, she fell for your father. My brother was a charming warlock."
"He lied to me?" She brought a shaky hand to her forehead. Her entire childhood was a tangled web of lies. "Why didn't you tell me? They've been dead for decades." She backed away from Cora.
Cora grabbed her wrist. "Don't you dare run away. I’ve been trying to settle some truth on you for years."
"But you kept this from me. " Her voice hitched up an octave. "This is the kind of thing you tell me." She shook off Cora's hand.
"You pop into my life twice a year and stick around for maybe an hour before you flee. All I have time for is teaching you a handful of tricks that might save your life before you run off. How long did you stay the other day? Two hours?"
True.
She muttered, "Dad made me feel guilty for using magic."
"You're a witch, hon. To stay alive, you use magic. The woman who raised you isn't your mother. She was an opportunity for your father. He needed a mother for you, funds to support his gambling addiction, and safety to raise you. That human was vanilla in comparison to your real mother. She was a dance-naked-and-have-sex-outside-in-the-moonlight kind of girl."
"Do I have family on my mother’s side?" She gripped her hands together to settle their shaking, not that it helped. Her deceased mom wasn't her mom? But her real mom was also dead?
"I don’t know. I searched and scried but came up with no one. I’m sorry." She picked up a dead leaf and stripped it down to the veins. "Being a Roales witch—that’s me and your father’s family—comes with a few truisms, which I’m ever so disappointed your father never made you understand. This is important. Listen closely. First, we must trust our intuition to guide our decision making. Second, our minds are rich and complicated. It’s why seclusion can help us get clarity. Third, getting distracted is our worst weakness."
A high-pitched laugh bubbled out. Madeline’s light-headedness worsened.
"Don't you dare faint on me." Cora uncorked a vial of something that came from who-knows-where to wave under Madeline’s nose. "We don't have time for bullshit weakness."
She backed against the side of the house for support. Weakly, she waved a hand. "Stop. Stinks."
"Look at me." She grinned and waved down her own curvy body. "I’m spectacular and most fear me. They’re going to do the same to you once you get your head sorted. Lose the guilt. Use magic. Perhaps my brother thought your magic wouldn’t wake up if you didn’t know anything." She rolled her eyes. "So asinine to think that. Magic is in our soul. We need it to exist. You spent the last year missing half of your magic. How was that?"
"It sucked."
"How do you think the queen found out about your magic? I'm sure your father slipped up and told your mother who was always so desperate to impress the queen since that woman was adopted, like you." Cora paused. "You didn't know that either? Wow. Sorry. This is a lot. What I don't get is why the queen believed you'd be strong enough to pull of that zinger of a curse. Seems to me there was some other witch involved in finding you to curse the lycans."
She put a palm against the wall and blinked to stop the gathering tears from leaking. Her mom wasn't her mom. Her dad lied to her and made her feel guilty for having powers. And the woman she called "Mom" hadn't been related to the queen.
Cora took the stripped dead leaf and blew on it. It caught fire and dissipated into sparking embers. "I offered to take you when you were a baby, but your father refused. I’m still furious over that. We could’ve had such great fun together and none of this mess that’s turned your life to shit would’ve happened. You’d probably still chase after that lycan with the great ass, though."
"You admit he has a spectacular ass."
"It’s nice." Cora shook her head and pursed her lips. "We’re unable to ignore crazy chemistry. You come from two powerful magical lines. I’m not doubting your father loved you, but I’m sure he divined wrongly that it was best to keep you away from me and neglect teaching you. He sucked as a warlock and was even worse at divination. I’m sorry, but he was the pits when it came to magic. So unlike you, love."
"This is a lot."
"It wouldn't be so much if you'd given me more than a few minutes a year. I need you to understand your magical potential. It's time you believe in yourself. You’re capable of reversing this curse. You were powerful enough to cast it in the first place. The issue is I know you could reverse it, but I’m not sure if you should."
"Why are you really here? This is all surprising but…"
Cora locked gazes with her. "If you let him, you’ll lose everything to Shane Lanzo. Your heart, your freedom, and your life. I’m here to stop that."
"He’d never steal my freedom. Shane’s not like that." A head shake didn't clear her sense of being overwhelmed. "Besides, I won’t let him."
"I’ll grant you he’s an atypically honorable lycan. But he has an agenda. I said it once, and I'll say it again. He’ll choose blood over you. Those brothers of his want to be free of their service to the monarchy."
"It’s my choice if I give anything to him."
"I could pretend to be supportive of your decision to reverse the curse, but I don’t have patience for that." She took a step closer and lowered her tone. "If you die to release him from that asinine curse, nothing will stop me from hunting him down. I’ll hunt down everyone involved. I don’t care if they’re semi-protected by angels. Even angels think twice before crossing me."
She knew about the angels? "You’re not my mother. So back off and let me live my own life. I'll make my own decisions."
Cora took a step back as if she’d been slapped. "You cast the curse under duress. It wasn’t your fault. You’ve paid a high price for casting it. It led you to distrust yourself and run from anything meaningful in your life, even me." Cora paused to gaze at her for several moments as if carefully choosing her next words. "I’m not your mother, true, but you’re my only living blood relation. You’re a Roales. Like lycans, blood means everything to us. Everything. I will do whatever I must to stop this madness and protect you."
Chapter Fourteen
"Why are you here?" King Frances looked up from his laptop to glare across a huge wooden desk through his reading glasses.
The glittering crystal blue water outside the window behind the king’s chair suggested they were somewhere in the Mediterranean or Caribbean. "We’re here to end our service to you."
The king pushed his glasses up into his gelled hair and laughed.
Where he should be angry at the monarch for his smugness, he felt apathy.
Madeline wouldn’t meet his gaze when she turned away from the window, but her lips were set, determined. "Time to end it."
Heavy grief weighed Shane down. Why?
She angled herself to look into his eyes. To say goodbye.
Shane blinked awake and squinted into the dark night as the car sped into the outskirts of Moscow toward Ryazan. The vision wasn’t complete. It was a glimmer of the future. Precognitive images like this came in bits over time, courtesy of being infected by Baku. The foresights almost always became reality. Based on his watch, a classic chronograph, they’d only been in the car for about a half hour since deplaning in Moscow.
"Did you have one of your visions?" Antonio asked from the driver’s seat of the sedan.
Shane craned around to confirm Madeline remained asleep in the back seat. She’d slept just as hard on the plane. It was almost as if she hadn’t slept in years and now that she didn’t have to look over her shoulder, her body demanded sleep.
"Incomplete bits. Nothing meaningful." He should get his head ready to face a necromancer. The burner phone from his brother vibrated. He answered.
"Where are you?" Roman asked.
"Russia. Taking care of the necromancer since it’s making a mess."
"We got a tip about a FenCor facility that might be operational in Bosnia."
"We can be there in—"
"No," Roman interrupted. "We’ll check it out. I wanted you to know our destination in case something unexpected happens. I’ll text you the exact address for added insurance. You take care of your end. We’ll meet on the island tomorrow night. You have the witch?"
He glanced into the back seat. "Yes."
"Bring her. Let’s end it." His brother hung up.
A silent half hour later, Antonio parked in front of a dilapidated apartment complex.
"The energy of this place is intense." Madeline had her face close to the window.
Shane examined the outside of the apartment building. No pep talk would prepare him for this. He’d never taken on a creature like this on his own. Either he’d had his brothers with him whose magical abilities complemented each other, or he used the team he’d built within the Alliance, although they’d never been nearly as good as his brothers. Did he have a general idea of what to do? Sure. Kill the necromancer. Save any people possible. Burn the building.
Anticipation of the noxious smell he’d find inside made him hesitate, but the faster he got out of the car, the faster this was over. "Everyone stays here. Be back shortly."
"Aren’t you going in there with him?" Madeline asked the vampire while watching Shane disappear inside.
"Necromancers are way out of my wheelhouse. Besides, I have to make sure you don’t bolt. Plus," Antonio stared due east. "We might've made good time, but sunrise is soon."
Madeline watched the building as if something earthshattering could be detected from the outside. "Does he usually do this kind of thing alone?"
Antonio looked up from his phone where he’d been texting. "Sometimes. I don’t know. I don’t usually go with him on trips like this. He takes a team if it’s Alliance business, but now we’re all scattered since there was a traitor in our midst. We don’t know who’s a friend and who’s an enemy."
