other witch - complete series, page 14
‘I’m going to sleep,’ I announced. ‘We can take turns on the bed, if you like,’ I offered Oscar politely, knowing full well he wouldn’t take me up on it.
‘It’s fine,’ he assured me. ‘I’ll take the sofa. Sleep well, Am.’
‘Good night, Oscar.’ Carrying my go-bag, I went into the bedroom. I put it on the bed and rifled through it for my spare toiletry bag. As I turned to go to the bathroom, I stifled a scream as I almost walked into Bastion. ‘What are you doing?’ I asked him, my voice an octave higher than usual.
‘Sleeping.’
‘Out there!’ I pointed back to the room where Oscar was.
‘No. I’m not leaving you. Something still doesn’t feel right.’
I blinked. ‘There’s only one bed!’
‘It’s a double,’ he pointed out calmly.
I flushed. ‘I’m not sharing a bed with you!’
‘Typical only child,’ he retorted.
I marched out, clutching my washbag and nightclothes. Oscar was already snoring on the sofa. I was incredibly jealous of his ability to fall asleep in a matter of minutes; I’d remarked on it before and all he’d said was ‘military background’, like that explained everything. More than once I’d demanded that he elaborate and each time he said, ‘If I told you more I’d have to kill you.’ He said it in all seriousness, so I’d eventually stopped asking. Whatever he’d done before joining the Coven was his business.
In the bathroom I changed into my pyjamas: silk shorts and a strappy top. I wished I’d brought something a little less revealing but it didn’t matter; Bastion didn’t care what I wore.
I strode back into the bedroom and faltered again. There was a chair that hadn’t been there before and Bastion was sitting on it, long legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. He passed me some pills. ‘For your headache,’ he murmured quietly.
‘Thanks,’ I mumbled. I hadn’t once complained of a headache, so how did he know I was suffering? I decided that he must know the side effects of scrying. He was at least two hundred years old and he was bound to have picked up all sorts of information in that time.
‘Goodnight, Amber.’
‘Night,’ I replied begrudgingly. Good manners don’t cost anything, though at that moment I felt like a slice of pride was the price. The double bed looked spacious and empty and I felt like a dick.
I climbed in and snuggled into the sheets. I tried to sleep but, despite my exhaustion, I tossed and turned, my conscience prickling as Bastion sat on the uncomfortable wooden chair. I kept my eyes tightly closed as I finally said, ‘Just get in the damned bed.’
He chuckled softly and I hated what a nice sound it was. ‘Go to sleep, Amber.’
Ugh. I tried to shut off my mind but it kept recalling the long day we’d had. Assassination attempts, necromancers and kidnapping. What would tomorrow bring? Whatever it was, with Bastion by my side I feared tomorrow would be even longer. And then exhaustion dragged me under.
Chapter 15
My phone rang, jerking me from a deep sleep. I sat up and looked for it blearily. Where was I? Rosie’s. I rubbed my eyes, trying to scrub sleep from them.
‘Catch,’ Bastion said.
I looked up in time to see my phone sailing towards me. I caught it clumsily; it would have been embarrassing if it had smacked me in the face. My phone told me it was 4.30am. Nothing good ever comes of answering the phone at 4.30am.
It was Jeb, the coven witch in charge of all things maintenance. Really? Could something being broken not wait until a more civilised hour – like 6am? I answered the phone. ‘Morning, Jeb.’ I skipped the ‘good’. It wasn’t a good morning if it started at 4.30am.
‘Oh, thank fuck!’ He expelled the words in a rush. ‘She’s okay!’ he shouted, making me move the phone away from my ear.
‘Who is okay?’ I asked impatiently.
‘You. Somebody bombed your flat.’
‘Somebody bombed my flat?’ I repeated dumbly. Bastion swore darkly. ‘Is everyone okay?’ I asked as my brain kicked in.
‘Yes, fine. The bomb was highly contained due to your wards. The Symes attended promptly and sorted the fire. We’re fine, but I promised Dick Symes another favour from you.’
I grimaced. I hoped Jeb had at least tried to curtail the extent of the favour because he was entirely too trusting at times. ‘Where was the bomb planted?’
‘Your bedroom.’
Grimmy. Shit. I hoped that the fireproof safe was bomb proof too. ‘My office?’
‘It’s fine,’ Jeb reassured me. ‘It really was just your bedroom. When the bomb detonated it made quite a noise and we found the fire quickly.’
And I hadn’t felt my wards being triggered because I was here in the Common realm. Dammit.
‘Okay, I’m on my way.’ I hung up. My research was hidden in the lab off my office and it was just my bedroom that was destroyed. That was good. I was lucky I was at Rosie’s instead of at home. If I’d been home… I shuddered. Someone really did have me in their crosshairs. Suddenly Bastion’s presence in my life didn’t seem such an imposition. I’d put up with the devil himself if he kept me alive.
I washed and dressed automatically then approached Oscar cautiously. ‘Oscar,’ I called his name softly before increasing my volume. On the third ‘Oscar’ he jerked awake and flung out his hands, ready to use the IR on me – but he didn’t. Once, I’d made the mistake of shaking his shoulder to wake him and he’d thrown me against a wall. That had hurt like a bitch. Now I knew better. Never mind sleeping dragons – never wake a sleeping soldier.
Oscar woke sharp eyed and ready. ‘There’s been a bomb, we’ve got to go,’ I explained.
‘Where?’ he asked, already pulling on his clothes.
‘My bedroom,’ I admitted.
Oscar stilled with one leg in his trousers. ‘Fuck!’ he swore.
‘Mum would kick your behind for that.’ We shared a quick look of regret that she wasn’t here to do just that. Oscar carried on dressing then we gathered our stuff and headed out.
The door was being guarded by Maxwell himself, standing ready and alert. I was both surprised and gratified to see him; I would have expected him to be watching whoever was occupying the swish open-plan flat that the high-rollers paid for, not this dingy hovel I was in. ‘Problem?’ he asked as we walked out far earlier than we’d planned.
‘There’s been a bomb at the coven tower,’ I admitted.
He whistled. ‘Someone has got you on their shit-list.’ He looked at Bastion with greater understanding. ‘At least you’ve not got the griffins gunning for you too if Bastion’s looking after you. That’d be a conflict of interest for the Guild.’
‘Yes,’ I muttered. ‘I’m very lucky.’ My sarcasm wasn’t veiled.
‘Do you want me to come with you?’ Maxwell offered. ‘I’m a bit of an expert on incendiary devices.’
I opened my mouth to deny him but Bastion nodded. ‘Come with us,’ he ordered. The man didn’t know how to say please; I’d make it my life’s work to teach him some damned manners.
Downstairs, Oscar and I trotted into and out of the portal. I managed to hold in my sigh of relief when my magic returned, now I was fully charged, able and willing, thank the Goddess. Despite the lack of sleep, I felt sharp and alert.
Someone really was trying to kill me – it wasn’t something hypothetical anymore. First the vampyr, now this; someone had painted a target on my back. If they wanted to stop me from succeeding with my potion – well, they didn’t know me at all. This was the added incentive I needed to boost the ORAL potion to the top of my to-do list. Once I created the potion, once it was out there in the world, there wouldn’t be any point in killing me.
The coven tower was a hive of activity. The fire was out but the room was still smoking and it smelled acrid and threatening. A chill ran up my spine and I tried hard not to show how freaked out I was. Someone had planted a bomb in my room. And it had gone off successfully. This wasn’t some half-assed amateur.
‘Any idea what started it?’ I asked Jeb briskly. ‘We’re definitely looking at an ordinary bomb versus anything magical, right?’
‘We’re not sure at this point,’ Jeb admitted. ‘Our focus was on getting the flames under control and minimising the damage. It’s not as bad as it looks,’ he tried to reassure me.
Good, because it looked Goddess-awful. ‘The runes?’
Jeb grimaced. ‘They were cancelled, Coven Mother. All of them.’
A witch, then; someone who had access to our tower, could light up the runes and scrawl ezro on them all. I had a black witch living under my very nose and now they were trying to kill me. It was hard not to take that personally.
Equally, there would be something personal about it when I hunted them down and threw them to the Connection for justice.
Chapter 16
Maxwell did his thing. It turned out the bomb had been placed under my bed. It was going to be quite some time before I slipped into bed without looking under it – not for monsters, but for explosives.
He found the remains of the incendiary device and pulled the scraps together. ‘I’ll take these home and analyse them then report back with my findings,’ he promised.
‘Appreciate that.’ Bastion gave him a manly handshake and a clap on the arm. He approved of people who knew what they were doing, and Maxwell clearly did.
I chucked everyone out of the remains of my room. My clothes were gone – all I had left were the spares in my go-bag – but my anxiety was about the safe. Nobody knew about the existence of the safe bar the man who had installed it, so the black witch had no reason to put the bomb close to it, but the blackened remains of the cupboard door were making me nervous. If I was responsible for losing Grimmy after a dozen descendants before me had managed to keep him safe…
The cupboard door looked like a block of charcoal. I pulled it open and breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that the safe behind it looked undamaged. I reached out and promptly burnt myself on the metal. Ouch! Who’d have thought metal next to a huge fire would be searingly hot? Dammit, it was going to blister.
I wrapped some of my voluminous skirt around my hand, put in the code and yanked the handle. A back-up copy of my research sat safely ensconced next to Grimmy. I hauled Grimmy out. He looked okay. I stroked a finger down his spine and hoped we wouldn’t need blood. The last thing I needed was to spill my blood on top of everything else.
Grimmy hovered upwards, flicking his pages open. ‘Why, hello Miss Amber. What did you decide?’
‘I’m working with the griffin,’ I admitted.
‘Marvellous, marvellous. I knew you had it in you to make the right choice. The DeLea name will be revered again.’
‘It’s already revered,’ I groused. I worked my butt off to make sure of that.
Grimmy paused then he said, ‘There seems to be some fire damage to your room, Miss Amber.’
‘No? Really?’
‘Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit,’ he told me disapprovingly.
‘Did you come up with that all by yourself?’ I asked, my tone patronising.
If he’d been a real person rather than a book, I knew he’d be glaring at me. ‘Are you quite done?’ His pages ruffled.
‘I’m not sure. Have I told you that sarcasm gives you the ability to insult stupid people without them realising it?’ Was I implying Grimmy was stupid? Maybe. Was he happy about that? No.
He closed his pages and landed with a thump on the floor. Whoops. I’d pissed him off so much that he’d decided our conversation wasn’t worth wasting life on. He wasn’t wrong; with only so much time on this Earth, life is too short to waste time on things that don’t make you happy. That was why my mother had taught me to care less about what others thought about me and more about what I thought about myself. Luckily, I think the world of myself.
There was a knock on my door. Bastion didn’t wait for me to tell him to enter before plunging in. He looked around with a frown. ‘I heard voices.’
I shrugged. He looked at the book on the blackened floor and my open safe door. ‘The safe didn’t get broken into?’
‘No, it’s all there.’
‘So they didn’t care about retrieving your research, only destroying it.’
‘Destroying me,’ I countered. ‘If they had truly cared about ruining my research, both of my offices would have been destroyed.’
‘You never stay overnight at Rosie’s,’ he said slowly.
‘No, not usually.’
‘What made you do it this time?’
I shrugged again. ‘I was tired.’ It seemed ridiculous, but being exhausted had saved my life. The Goddess had guided me.
Bastion continued, ‘The thing with the kid was a ploy.’
I frowned. ‘To do what?’
‘To draw you away. They knew Ada would summon you to look for the kid so you’d be out of the tower. They planted the bomb while you were guaranteed to be away from home.’
‘I could have delegated it, though. I wanted to. And how could they know when I’d arrive at Ada’s?’
‘They had access to the roster and they knew no one else would be available. And they had a watcher. At least, I would have had one if it’d been me. Someone who messaged them when you arrived at the Marlow place. Then the black witch went into your home, cancelled all your runes, planted the bomb, set the timer and waited for you to die.’
The last words made me swallow and I looked away so he wouldn’t see how freaked out I was. Definitely an insider job, then. This was a nightmare.
When I looked back, he was studying me and I hated that he probably wasn’t fooled in the slightest. I was feeling vulnerable and raw, and he was feeling bad for me. I didn’t want – or deserve – anyone’s pity. ‘My romance books are all gone,’ I said to change the subject. I waited for him to say something scathing about my reading tastes.
His dark eyes met my green ones and I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. ‘You’ll have to start a new collection,’ he said finally.
I swallowed the lump in my throat. It was absurd to be upset about losing my book collection. I was alive and I should be grateful. But reading was one of the few things that I did for me, and my romance books had kept me going through some very lonely moments.
I cleared my throat to make sure my voice didn’t warble when I spoke. ‘Where is everyone?’ The room outside had fallen silent.
‘Maxwell has taken the bomb shards and left. Jeb has measured up everything that needs to be replaced. Ethan has repainted all the runes on your walls. Oscar has gone to check your office downstairs.’
‘They’re all gone.’
‘Yes. Except for me.’
I sighed a little. ‘You’re always here.’
‘Like glue.’
‘I don’t often have glue on me,’ I responded drily.
‘You should remedy that. Glue is always useful.’ I wasn’t sure if we were still talking about glue. ‘What do you want to do now?’ he asked.
‘Cry?’ The answer slipped out before my brain connected with my mouth. I hastily waved the comment away lest he take me seriously. I couldn’t go around letting people see I had feelings – good Goddess, what would Mum say? I walked into my living room, mostly to walk away from my comment which was entirely too honest to share with Bastion.
The living room looked normal, a little mucky from all the people tramping in and out of my ash-covered bedroom, but apart from that an oasis of calm. I looked out of my window and smiled as I spotted the familiar black raven hovering outside. I opened the window. ‘Hey, Fehu,’ I called to him. He flew in and landed on my shoulder.
‘Fehu?’ Bastion said, amused.
Fehu turned his head to studiously ignore Bastion, making me smile. ‘It’s the rune for luck,’ I said a shade defensively. ‘He flew to me once when he had broken wings. He shouldn’t have been able to make it that far.’
Bastion froze and his nostrils flared. ‘Did he now?’ His voice had gone glacially cold. ‘Who would harm a bird?’
I blinked then understood: of course he was outraged, he was part-bird himself.
Bastion studied the raven and then studied me. ‘You healed him?’ He asked the question like he already knew the answer.
I folded my arms. ‘Of course I healed him.’
He was still looking at me like I was a puzzle he couldn’t solve. ‘He can’t pay you,’ he said finally.
‘Obviously not,’ I glared. ‘There’s more to life than money.’
‘I know that.’ He looked surprised. ‘But I didn’t know that you did.’
I ignored the sting of hurt his words caused. Of course there was more to life than money but money sure helped make life easier. It got my mum her treatment and her care; it bought me ingredients to make life-saving potions. For good or ill, money wasn’t without value.
I went to the fridge and found some ham for Fehu. He happily hopped from foot to foot as I fed him. ‘He seems to like you,’ Bastion said, amused.
‘Or my ham,’ I countered. I bit my lip. ‘He’s only been around a few weeks. Should I be worried about his motivation?’ My gut said he was fine, but that seemed a bit wishy-washy now that my bedroom had been blown up.
Bastion gave a low kraa and Fehu flew from my hand to his outstretched one. He studied the bird. ‘His intentions are pure,’ he said finally. ‘He likes you and wants to help you.’
‘How can you tell?’
‘I’m a coaxer,’ he pointed out. ‘I can’t induce him to hurt you. He’s not here for anything nefarious. He likes you, your pretty hair and your ham.’
I touched a hand self-consciously to my red locks. ‘Not everyone likes a ginger.’
‘It’s a warning that you’re too hot to handle. Not everyone can deal with the heat. Don’t take it personally. Only a real man can handle a redhead.’
Embarrassingly, I felt myself blush. That was the nicest thing anyone had ever said about my redheaded charms. I’d been tempted in my teen years to dye my hair but Mum had threatened to cut it all off if I did. The urge hadn’t arisen again; I accepted my looks now. I was me: take it or leave it.
