Master of Desire (Merlin's Legacy 6), page 4
With an alarmed screech, Essus abandoned Conal’s shoulder to wing around the room as Aislyn threw herself at Conal. He caught her, hugging her so hard she grunted, his eyes squeezed shut in relief.
He never expected to see her again, Helena realized. It made her heart ache for her own family, whom she hadn’t seen since Christmas.
“I’m all right.” Gently, Conal pulled back a few inches. “And we’re all going to stay that way.” His voice held cold determination.
Aislyn put her hands on either side of his face so she could stare deeply into his eyes, as if trying to read the truth. Whatever she saw there made her suck in a breath. “It was bad, wasn’t it?”
He nodded toward Helena and Liam with a tight smile. “It would have been a lot worse if not for Maeve’s people. They took the bastards out.”
“You got three of them yourself,” Helena said. “Under the circumstances, that was pretty impressive.”
“Jesus.” Aislyn swallowed, looking sick. She was as beautiful as her brother was handsome, with a heart-shaped face and her own pair of dimples. Her eyes were the same unearthly violet as his, though her hair was a cascade of platinum curls that foamed around her slender shoulders. She wore a calf-length wrap dress in swirling royal blue silk that made the most of her lean, long-legged figure. Strappy yellow sandals displayed pedicured toes, nails painted with red polish.
The chime of an incoming text sounded. Conal released her to pluck his phone off his belt, read the screen, and swipe a thumb over it.
“What’s going on, Conal?” a woman’s tight voice demanded, sounding remarkably like Aislyn’s.
“Are you alone?
There was a long pause. “Oh, hell, what now?”
* * *
This time Liam’s gate transported them to Donovan Cable News’ Manhattan headquarters. DCN’s sixty-story blue-glass tower sliced toward the sky, curving like a katana. Five years among the Fairies had left Helena jaded when it came to gorgeous architecture, but even she was impressed. Donovan’s penthouse occupied the tip of the sword, offering a dazzling view of the city through its floor-to-ceiling windows. Unfortunately, nobody was in the mood to admire the scenery.
“Siobhan gets crazier every year,” Branwyn Donovan growled, one hand absently stroking Finvarra. The two-foot-long Chinese dragon wrapped around her throat like a scarf, a brilliant counterpart to her camera-ready ensemble of peach silk blouse, a wide white belt, and skinny yellow slacks. A chunky necklace accessorized the outfit, its pink stones clashing with the Familiar’s scarlet frill. Not that it mattered, since a glamour kept the dragon invisible to mortals.
“Jesus feckin’ Christ,” Finvarra growled. An iridescent sheen rippled over his green scales, violet shading into gold as he lifted his long triangular head. The bright red frill ran from his nose to the tip of his restlessly twitching tail. The little dragon had the thickest Irish accent Helena had ever heard and a tendency to swear in Gaelic. Which would have seemed weird, given the Chinese thing, but Maeve’s buddies adopted the accents of whoever took their fancy on Netflix Night. Which explained Liam and Taken.
Branwyn ran a soothing hand over Finvarra’s twitching tail. “Think Maeve can get her to back off?”
“I doubt it,” Conal said. “There’s not much Maeve can do to her, thanks to the geas, and Siobhan bloody well knows it.” His expression went stony with determination. “That’s why you need bodyguards.”
The reporter glowered. She and Aislyn were identical twins, though her hair was as black as their brother’s. Evidently Aislyn’s extravagant blonde waterfall of curls was a dye job. “And how the hell do you expect me to explain a bodyguard to interviewees?”
Conal shrugged. “Give her a boom mic and have her run audio.”
Oh, hell no. “I need my hands free,” Helena protested. “In any case, you won’t be going on interviews. I can’t guard all three of you if you separate.”
“That’s a nonstarter,” Branwyn said, eying her coolly. “Look, I’m a combat journalist. People have been trying to kill me for years. I can take care of myself.”
Finvarra stretched his long neck until he could look her in the eye. “Not against werewolves, you can’t, and I can’t protect you either. Remember what happened with that great hulking gobshite, Justice?”
Branwyn winced and admitted reluctantly, “Fair point. I thought he was going to eat you.”
“I thought he was going to eat both of us.”
Helena’s brows shot up. “Are you talking about Bill Justice?” He was the werewolf who’d helped her survive the Bite. Without him, her own magic might well have incinerated her. “Justice wouldn’t eat anybody. Especially innocents.”
“Yeah, well, he threatened to chow down on Finvarra.” Branwyn scowled. Even that looked good on her. “How were we supposed to know he was bluffing?”
“Well, you did shoot video of them back when the Magekind were still in the broom closet,” Essus pointed out from Conal’s shoulder.
“I wasn’t going to out them,” she protested. “I was just trying to get Conal more information on what was going on.”
“Yeah, but they didn’t know that.” Her brother paused, lips pursed in thought.
Damn, Helena wanted to kiss that mouth. He’d probably run screaming. Which was a damn shame, and not just because of the Burning Moon. Even half dead from torture, Conal had picked up Liam and run to her rescue. She remembered the flashing glimpse she’d gotten of him -- half-naked, blood-splattered, wild-eyed, long black hair flying -- killing every werewolf in his path despite his horrific wounds. That was either heroism or sheer, bat-shit crazy.
“Maybe we need to enlist more help,” Finvarra suggested. “Adam might do it.”
“Could work,” Branwyn agreed. “These Warlock’s Wrath assholes are just as big a pain in the ass for Arthur as they are for us. They blew his PR campaign right out of the water when they killed that actress.”
“Do you have a way to contact him?” Conal asked.
“Yeah, and so do you.” She plucked her phone off her belt and held it up. “I’m sure you have his number.”
His brows lifted. “AT&T has cell towers on Mageverse Earth?”
Branwyn rolled her eyes. “No, but that’s why they call it magic.” She started dialing the phone. As it began to ring, she hit speaker.
A familiar voice answered two beats later. “Hey, ‘Wyn. If you’re looking for a quote on that…”
“A team of werewolves kidnapped my brother and tried to kill him.”
“Shit! Is he okay?” Adam’s voice had gone cold and tight. Conal was gratified to hear concern in it.
“He’s fine now. But he almost wasn’t. Siobhan has hired Warlock’s Wrath to go after him. Apparently she’s decided that’s the perfect way to resolve her mommy issues.”
“I’m not the only one they’re gunning for,” Conal said, leaning close to the phone. “Siobhan told me she’s going after Branwyn, Aislyn and the Changelings in a New York neighborhood called Beltane. Maeve has loaned me her werewolf troubleshooter, but Helena can’t guard all of us. I was hoping the Magekind could help.”
There was a long, tense pause before the vampire sighed. “Sounds like you need it. I’ll go talk to Arthur. Hang tight and try not to get killed until I call you back.” He hung up.
Helena’s brows rose. “Well, that got their attention.”
“Arthur can be an asshole, but he’s a protective asshole.” With a dry smile, Conal headed for the bar that occupied one corner of the living room. “Does anyone else need a drink? Because after the day I’ve had…”
“Oh, hell yes,” his sisters chorused.
* * *
Helena and the twins sat on the charcoal sectional nursing their drinks -- a Riesling for Aislyn, Scotch for Branwyn, coffee for Helena. Conal, pacing, was about to go for a refill on his Scotch when Liam murmured, “Incoming.”
Sure enough, a gate bloomed open, and Arthur Pendragon stepped through, followed by his pretty blonde witch wife, Guinevere. Bringing up the rear was Adam Parker, Branwyn’s former videographer turned vampire, a big bastard with shoulder-length blond hair and turquoise eyes.
At first glance, the legendary couple could have been mistaken for a pair of thirty-something millennials, clad as they were in jeans and sneakers, her with a peach cotton top, him with a dark blue Henley. The only thing that broke the illusion was the sword Arthur wore buckled around his hips -- Excalibur, radiating magic Conal could feel in his bones like the amps at a rock concert.
The vampire was only about five-ten or so, with a muscular, athletic build. He wore his black hair in a well-trimmed executive’s cut, a short black beard framing the line of his stubborn jaw. Handsome enough, but not necessarily someone you’d look twice at. Until you met those black eyes and saw the Once and Future King staring back at you. Conal had spent more than a century dealing with powerful people, but there was an entirely different quality to Arthur. It wasn’t the sort of power you got from wealth, connections or getting elected. Hell, it wasn’t even born of magic. It was the absolute power of a Dark Ages king born to rule, combined with leadership skills that inspired fanatical loyalty in eleven of the greatest warriors the planet had ever seen. “What the hell did you do to piss off Siobhan?”
“I told her mother she was an abusive bitch who’d threatened to give Maeve’s ten-year-old granddaughter to a troll.”
Arthur’s eyes narrowed, going icy with rage. “Yeah, that would do it. So what are we going to do about your bunny-boiling ex?”
* * *
Somewhat to Conal’s surprise, Arthur allowed him to gloss over the details of his torture. He was grateful, given that his sisters were listening, though the vampire leader did grill him about every word his captors had said.
“So Warlock’s Wrath is working for Siobhan now?” Warlock had been the cult leader of a faction of werewolf aristocrats, at least until Arthur had killed the asshole a decade or so ago. “How many of the fuckers are there? I mean, you killed…”
“Ten of them. I don’t know how many other Wrathers there are, but they’ve been rent-a-wolfing for the last few years. Raising money for God knows what.”
Arthur glanced at his wife. “Didn’t a gang of mercenary werewolves try to kill that shape-shifting griffin?”
Gwen nodded. “Yeah, a griffin dictator hired them. Our feathered friend turned out to be one big bite more than they could chew.”
“Yeah, time to do something about those hairy assholes. In the meantime, we need to repair some of the damage they did.” He eyed Branwyn. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about an idea I’ve got. Looks like it would solve both our problems.”
She gave him a suspicious stare. “What kind of idea?”
“I’d like you to do a media embed with the Magekind. I’ve been doing interviews with every reporter I can find, but it’s not putting a dent in the public’s paranoia. I was considering taking you along on a couple of missions to show us as people instead of…” Arthur waved his fingers in a whooo gesture. “… aliens, or whatever the fuck they think we are. That might shut up the tinfoil hatters.”
“And discourage the dozen governments that have launched attempts at magical research,” Gwen put in.
Helena snorted. “They can investigate all they want, but it won’t do them any good. There’s no loose magic in this universe for them to detect.”
“You know that, and I know that, but if somebody kidnaps one of my witches, I’m still going to have to get medieval.” Arthur turned back to Branwyn. “Adam could shoot the video, and you could follow us around while we work whatever crisis we’ve got going on. There’s always something. You could do a documentary about our teams, get happy talk from the people we help, and deflate the rumor bubble. Maybe focus on Bill Justice and his wife, since they’re our werewolves. That would take down the temp on the monster thing too.”
Branwyn wasn’t charmed. “Yeah, right. Why me?”
Arthur blinked. “Because you’re one of us?”
Adam and Conal simultaneously winced. Sure enough, she eyed him coldly. “So you think I’ve got a conflict of interest, and you want to use it to manipulate me.”
Arthur’s black brows snapped down. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Uh huh. Look, the military only did embeds during Iran and Afghanistan to control wartime messaging. DCN isn’t a propaganda arm of the US government, and we’re not going to be yours either.”
“So I’m supposed to protect you while you refuse to help me?”
“Oh, we’ll help.” Conal’s hands coiled into frustrated fists as he gave his sister a glower. “I spent five years sleeping with a sociopath to keep you alive.” It was only after he heard the words come out of his mouth that he realized what he’d said. Well, too late now. “You can damn well do a little PR to avoid getting chained to a chair while something guts you.”
Dead silence fell as every eye in the room swung toward him. Even Helena lifted her brows. Branwyn stared. “Aren’t you the one who spent twenty years lecturing me about journalistic ethics?”
“Enact family drama on your own time,” Arthur interrupted. “I’m not telling you to lie.”
“Sure sounds like it.”
Black eyes narrowed dangerously. “We need to show all magic users aren’t killing machines. Otherwise mortals’ll start targeting anyone who can pull a rabbit out of a hat. I’ve dealt with these idiots for fifteen centuries, and I’m telling you, that’s next. My Magekind can gate away when things get hot, but the Direkind and Changelings can’t.” He leaned forward and met her gaze. “Think about it. What would your audience do if they found out you are Sidhe?”
Conal stared. “The fuck do you mean by that?”
“That wasn’t a threat, even if it sounded like one,” Gwen said, glaring at her husband.
Arthur sighed. “Of course it wasn’t a threat. I just don’t want bigots to start burning Fairies at the stake. I won’t tell Branwyn what to cover or how to cover it.” Turning to Conal, he glowered, resting a hand on Excalibur’s hilt. “But if you don’t turn down that sword right fucking now, I’m going to show you mine -- up close and personal.”
Conal started and turned his head. Darkbane rained violet sparks along his shoulders. “Ahh. Sorry.” Taking a deep breath, he fought down his defensive anger. Once the sword’s fireworks had dimmed and Arthur dropped his hand from his own, Conal returned his attention to his sister. “‘Wyn, I just want you and Aislyn safe. Surrounding you with Magekind is the best way to do the job.”
“And I just want to tell the public the truth. Or at least, as much of it as we know.” Branwyn huffed out a weary breath. “But you do realize this will make DCN a big fat target for the conspiracy theorists? Half the people in this country are not going to believe anything we broadcast anyway, so it’s not going to solve the problem.”
“No,” Arthur said, “but it’s a start.”
Chapter Three
At last the twins and their Familiars gated off to the Mageverse with Arthur, Gwen and Adam. Which left Conal to take up the slack for the next week or so. Hopefully, nothing too catastrophic would come up while he tried to do his sisters’ jobs as well as his own: run DCN, the Foundation, and Donovan International. The fun never ends.
Helena retreated to the guest room he’d given her to shower and change into clothes Liam had fetched from the palace. Conal followed suit in his own room -- he hadn’t craved a shower so desperately in years. He stood under the spray a long time, letting the hot water pelt him as he fought memories. Watching the werewolf bite into him as if he was an apple. Knowing without a doubt they were going to kill him.
Until Helena. The thundering booms. His torturer’s head exploding, splattering his face in blood and brain and bone fragments. Helena landing amid the larger male werewolves, utterly fearless, as elegantly terrifying as a tigress as she fought.
Watching her transform into a beautiful woman had been oddly shocking. She looked so lush in human form, so utterly feminine in her gestures, in the tilt of her head. The curve of that full mouth. The fact she could turn into seven feet of death and fangs amazed him. He’d be dead now if it weren’t for her.
The need to do something for her drove him to dress in jeans and a Henley and tackle dinner. New York might be the takeout capital of the free world, but sometimes cooking calmed Conal down when nothing else could. After what he’d endured today, he needed the peaceful routine of preparing a meal.
He’d equipped his kitchen to accommodate his culinary hobby, and the equipment in it had been known to make Michelin-star chefs greener than their own broccoli. Besides enough rust-colored marble prep space to land a 737, there was a Thermador gas stove and all the stainless steel appliances that went with it.
“That is a ridiculous quantity of meat,” Essus said, watching Conal apply a dry rub to the thickest steak he’d found in the freezer. “There’s no way that girl is going to eat half a cow.”
“She turns into seven feet of werewolf. Do you have any idea how many calories she must burn?”
“Good point. And that’s aside from fighting Siobhan’s pack of mad curs. What are you going to serve to drink with it? I was thinking the 1841 Vueve Clicquot Bono gave you…”
“Es, that’s a $34,000 bottle of champagne.”
“You’re breathing, Conal.” The eagle’s voice dropped. “And this afternoon, I was afraid you were going to stop.”
Meeting his friend’s golden eyes, Conal felt his throat tighten. Essus, too, had come entirely too close to dying. “Yeah. The Vueve would be perfect.” He headed into the pantry where he kept the bottles he saved for a special occasion.
* * *
He served the meal in the smaller of the apartment’s two dining areas. The bronze crystal topped table sat on a framework of narrow brass strips that matched those of white leather bowl-shaped chairs. A low centerpiece of honey star blooms breathed a delicate sweetness into the air, calibrated for a sensitive werewolf nose. Crystal goblets held the Clicquot, as the heavy silver scraped discreetly against gold-rimmed white plates.
