Minor Magic, page 10
part #7 of Xoe Meyers Series
I bit my lip, not liking the idea of anyone fanning out. We were stronger if we stuck together. I could easily transport Chase and I away from danger, but if it came to it, Sam wouldn’t be able to save everyone.
Jason watched my face as if he knew just what I was thinking. “We’ll be careful,” he assured.
I frowned. “Sometimes careful isn’t good enough.”
“Well it’s the best we can do,” Devin interrupted.
I took a steadying breath. He was right. I nodded. “Call me when you guys are a few minutes away and we’ll meet you there.”
Everyone nodded their assent. Sam patted Chase’s shoulder as he walked past, then looked at me. “Stop worrying, boss. If anyone tries to ambush us, my ghosts will see them from a mile away.”
I lifted an eyebrow at him. “Boss?”
He smirked. “Seems a fitting title.”
I shook my head, fighting a small smile as everyone made their way to the door. “We’ll see you all soon,” I called after them.
The door shut, and suddenly Chase and I were alone in the room.
“I really don’t like this,” he said softly, his gaze on the closed door. He turned to me. “I’d almost feel better if it was just the two of us going. We’d be able to escape quickly and not risk losing anyone.”
I pursed my lips in thought, then shook my head. “They never would agree to it. None of them are the run and hide types.”
“Sam is.”
I turned my eyes up to him. “Yet he’s here, helping.”
His shoulders slumped. “I still don’t trust him. I can’t help it.”
I took his hand. “He’s sneaky, but he cares about you. I can tell.”
“I guess I’m just not used to having people care about me.” He cringed, then met my eyes. “Sorry, that sounded much less melodramatic in my head.”
I gave his hand a squeeze, then drew him to sit on the bed beside me. We still had a few minutes before we should leave, since it would take the others a while to reach Iva’s.
“My entire life, I thought I’d hate my dad if I ever met him,” I explained. “I thought there was no excuse for abandoning me and my mom.”
“You know why he did it,” he began.
I held up a hand to stop him. “I know, and that’s exactly what I’m getting at. My dad made the wrong choice, even though he had noble intentions. Even though I did get to live sixteen years of a nice normal life because of him, I still sometimes feel angry about his choice. I feel angry that I’ll never get back the time I could have had with him.”
“He made a mistake,” Chase said softly.
I nodded. “Yeah, and Sam has made mistakes. You know how I feel about some of his mistakes, but we can’t hold them against him forever.”
He smiled, then kissed me on the cheek, seeing what I was trying to do. “And when did you become so forgiving? You’re usually the first to jump on the vengeance train.”
I shrugged. “I guess I’ve reached the point where I’ve made so many mistakes, I can no longer fault anyone else for theirs. I can’t say what I would have done if I’d been in my dad’s shoes, and you can’t say what you would have done if you’d been in Sam’s. Everyone has their reasons for doing things, and he’s here now.” I held my hand back up before he could speak. “I know you want to believe that he’s just trying to make things up to me, but I can see what he’s trying to do. He wants a relationship with his brother, and I don’t blame him. He’s far more alone in this world than either of us.”
Chase wrapped his arm around me and pulled me close. “You really need to stop making so much sense. It’s scary.”
I pushed him away playfully. “I’m quite offended that everyone is so surprised by my occasional insights and displays of personal growth.”
He pulled me back toward him and kissed me.
I lifted my hand and ran my fingers through his hair, thinking how much I’d like to leave everything behind to hang out with him, cozy in the underground, watching a fun movie. With me, Chase, Alexius, and Dorrie down there, it was almost like living with a family. Even Sam popping in wasn’t half bad. Since we’d been on the road, I’d found that I’d missed my dad’s house. It felt like home. As hard as my mom had tried to bridge the gap between us, things couldn’t be like they were when I was growing up. I needed to form my own, new little life where I could feel comfortable with who and what I was.
I pulled away from the gentle kiss. “When all of this is over, I want you to consider not moving,” I blurted.
He raised his eyebrows in surprise, his gray eyes wide.
“I want you to stay right where you are, and I want to live there with you. I want to find new adventures that have nothing to do with either of our pasts.”
He grinned, and I exhaled in relief.
“So what do you think?” I pressed.
He pulled me close and kissed my cheek. “I think that if my smart, beautiful, and sometimes scary girlfriend wants me to live with her permanently, I’d be a fool to say no.”
I laughed. “I’m glad to see you have excellent self preservation instincts, but seriously, is that a yes? You won’t leave?”
He chuckled. “Well it wasn’t like I was going to go far, but it’s a yes. I’ll live with you wherever you like.”
I acknowledged his statement with a curt nod, unable to help my grin. My phone chose that moment to buzz beside me on the bed. I lifted it to see Jason calling, and answered.
“According to Lucy, we’re a few minutes out from Iva’s,” he explained.
“We’ll leave now,” I replied.
We both hung up and I turned my attention back to Chase. “Now let’s go save all of these werewolves so we can get on with our lives.”
He nodded, taking my hand as we rose to our feet.
“I love you,” he said, just as I was starting to envision Iva’s front yard.
I smiled with my eyes still closed. “I’m going to hold you to that once you realize what a total terror I am to live with full time.”
“I can handle terror,” he laughed.
We dissipated, and moments later appeared in Iva’s front yard. At first I didn’t realize anything was amiss, until I looked at the front door, which rested at a slight angle, dangling from broken hinges. No one would likely notice it from the street, but someone had definitely broken in.
I glanced at Chase to register that he’d noticed the door too, then sighed. “I’m going to hold you to that terror comment.”
He squeezed my hand. “Do we investigate, or wait for the others?”
“The others are already here,” a voice said from behind us. I didn’t recognize the speaker.
Something hit me in the back of the head. I tried to turn around to see who’d attacked me, but my vision slowly faded to gray, obscuring the figures standing over me.
Chapter Eleven
I awoke to darkness. Not pitch darkness, the moon and stars were overhead, but it was some time late at night. How many hours had I lost? More importantly, who in the heck was carrying me? I was cradled in someone’s arms.
As alarm bells rang in my head I lashed out, burning whoever held me. I dropped to the ground and landed on my tailbone. The impact stole my breath and my head spun. I lifted a hand to my scalp to find it sticky with congealed blood.
“It’s me,” a pained voice said from above me.
“Jason?” I questioned. “Where are we?”
“In the middle of the desert,” he explained. “I was just trying to keep us hidden until you woke up.”
I tried to stand, but still felt too dizzy. Sand scratched my palms as I leaned heavily on my arms to keep myself from sprawling across the ground. “Where is everyone else?”
“Taken,” he explained, moving to kneel beside me so I could see his face in the moonlight. “We had parked a few houses down, then spread out to encircle the perimeter of the property. I came around from the front and saw two men just as they snuck up and attacked you. I rushed forward, but there were more of them. Devin and Lucy joined the fray, but it was clear we would lose. Chase demanded I take you and run. It was a logical choice. I’m faster than everyone else.”
I held a hand up to stop him. “Slow down. So we just left them all behind?”
He nodded. “The attackers chose to incapacitate you first, likely either afraid you would travel away from them, or set them on fire. Or else they simply wanted to take everyone else and leave you there.”
“You keep saying take. How did they take them.”
“They created a portal,” he explained. “Right in broad daylight, in a human neighborhood. I barely managed to escape it.”
A myriad of emotions hit me, bringing on hot tears to run down my face. My head began to throb even harder as the chilly night air stung my wound.
Jason placed a hand on my shoulder. “Xoe, we’ll find them.”
I shook my head and was overcome with another wave of dizziness. If I was feeling this bad, the blow to my head likely would have killed a human. “How?” I cried. “They took everyone. We have no way of finding them.”
“We have two choices,” he explained calmly. “We can either go to the demon underground and search for information, or we can go back to Shelby and enlist the witches to help us.”
“So the people who attacked us were demons?” I asked, trying to piece everything together.
“Some demons, some vampires,” he explained.
I took a deep, shaky breath. This was no time for hysterics. We needed to get to work. “What did the vampires look like? Did you recognize any of them?”
He shook his head.
“Was one in his mid-twenties, of Asian decent, short but messy hair?”
He shook his head again. “Not that I saw.”
I patted down my pockets then let out a sigh of relief when I realized I still had my phone. I retrieved it and lit up the screen, then groaned. “Where in the heck are we? I don’t have any service.”
“We’re in the middle of the desert,” he explained. “I didn’t want to risk anyone finding us before you’d regained consciousness.”
I reached out and grabbed his hand. I might not have been capable of standing, but I was pretty sure I could still transport us. “I need to make a call. Depending on whether or not that person answers, we’ll then go to Shelby and find Cynthia.”
Jason nodded. I closed my eyes and envisioned the first place that came to mind, the burned down RV park. I didn’t want to go anywhere our enemies might look for us, and who in their right mind would go back to the scene of an arson after all of their friends had been kidnapped by way of portal?
We appeared crouched in the darkness, encircled by the skeletal remains of the burned RVs. I glanced around for signs of life, but we seemed to be alone. The place stunk of smoke and ash.
Jason stood and offered me a hand up, which I took gratefully. I wasn’t sure I was quite ready to stand, but I’d risk it. I was going to have to do a lot more than stand before the night was through.
I skimmed through my contacts until I found Eric’s number and pushed send.
He answered on the second ring. “Would you believe that you’re just the person I was desperately hoping to talk to?” he asked.
“I take it that means Iva is missing?”
He was silent for several seconds. “Did you go to her house?”
“Yes,” I replied, “but I didn’t get a chance to go inside before we were attacked by demons and a few vampires.”
“Demons?” he questioned, though he didn’t seem overly surprised. “Where are you now?”
“I’m not telling you anything until I’m sure you’re not part of this.”
He was silent again. “Just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it.”
“For Iva?” I questioned, wondering if my suspicions about them having a relationship were correct.
“Yes.”
“Tell me where you are.”
He sighed. “I just arrived at Iva’s. I was going to look things over, see if I missed any clues as to who has taken her.”
I hung up, then looked to Jason. “I’ll be right back,” I assured.
Before he could argue I envisioned Iva’s house and dissipated. I caught Eric just as he was reaching for the slightly ajar front door. I took a moment to be astounded that no police cars were present after a portal had been made in the front yard, then I grabbed him before he had time to turn around. I thought of the RV park again, and back we went.
Jason crossed his arms and glared at me as we appeared before him. “I do not appreciate you running off whilst injured,” he chided.
I released Eric so he could stumble away from me. Traveling could be a little jarring for first timers.
I shrugged at Jason apologetically. “I didn’t want to give him any time to set a trap.” I nodded in Eric’s direction.
Eric straightened, seeming to regain his composure. “Why would I set a trap?”
“Why wouldn’t you?” I countered petulantly.
I couldn’t see that clearly in the darkness, but he seemed to be clenching and unclenching his fists in irritation. He wore a similar black outfit to the previous night, but it was wrinkled and his shirt was untucked. Maybe it was the same outfit, and he really had been running around all that time trying to find his girlfriend.
“Look,” I said. “I don’t know who’s side you’re on, but if Iva was taken by the same people who took my friends, I’ll get her back. You just need to tell me everything you know about what’s going on.”
The moonlight reflected in his eyes as he glared at me. It was looking like my track record with vampires wasn’t going to improve, then his shoulders slumped, and his glare faded.
“It’s all a set up,” he breathed. “All of it.”
My jaw dropped. While I’d been suspecting just that, I hadn’t expected him to so blatantly admit it.
“Your demon kin wanted you dethroned, as it were,” he continued. “Art hired me, but there are many others. They’re not happy that you get to live in the demon city with a certain measure of respect, while they’re left with nothing. If you died, your home and status would go to your next of kin, however distant. They want to take over your life.”
I shook my head and let out a shaky breath. My distant relatives wanted to steal my life, just like my grandmother, though she’d wanted to take over my body too. I wasn’t sure what was so great about the things I’d been afforded, but then again, I had no idea how bad life might have been for them.
“So where do you come in?” I asked.
“As I said, Art hired me,” he explained. “He didn’t want to risk being linked to your downfall by setting everything up himself. I’d heard of your involvement in solving other cases for the werewolf commission, so I set up a plan to lure you in. I helped the demons working with Art kidnap a few wolves. They guaranteed they would not harm them. I had been trying for the past week to convince Iva to contact you, but she’s stubborn, and wanted to find the missing wolves herself. Then lo and behold, you show up in town, doing that part of my job for me.”
“So Iva didn’t know it was all a trick?” I interrupted.
He shook his head. “She thought her people were actually missing. I didn’t want her involved in the scheme any more than necessary.”
I glanced around us uneasily. We’d been out in the open for a while. “What are the demons planning?” I demanded.
“They’re setting you up,” he explained. “They want to bring you to the attention of the demon council. The arsons, the missing wolves, including the coalition leader, they want to blame it all on you. You’re being framed.”
“But why?” I asked breathlessly. “What did I ever do to them?”
“Your father inherited your grandmother’s power and high standing within the demon community, and now it’s all been passed on to you. The rest of your kin were left weak and destitute.”
“So they enacted this whole elaborate scheme because they’re jealous?” I asked, exasperated.
He sighed. “If you’re found guilty before the demon council, you’ll be killed, and all of your inheritance and demon status will go to your kin. If they simply kill you, the council will punish them.”
I shook my head in utter disbelief. “And why are you telling us all of this now?”
He clenched his fists again. “I want Iva back. Her being taken was not part of the deal. I fear there is a more nefarious slant to their plan than they led me to believe. I don’t know what they intend to do with that many werewolves, but it cannot be good. I’ve given up hope that Iva’s people will be returned as promised, let alone Iva herself.”
I glanced at Jason to see what he thought, but his face was unreadable. I’d heard about the demon council before. My father had been worried about me being brought to their attention, both after we killed Bartimus, and when I’d accidentally brought Dorrie back from the dream realm. While the werewolves were more keen on policing the human world, if a demon caused enough mayhem, the council would step in. I’d inadvertently caused quite a bit of mayhem over the past year, and wouldn’t be surprised if I was already on their radar.
I wrapped my arms tightly around myself, feeling vulnerable. I needed to focus on what was important. I could figure out the rest later. I narrowed an eye at Eric. “Where are they keeping the wolves?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I imagine in the underground. It would be difficult otherwise to keep that many werewolves contained.”
“Unless they simply killed them all,” Jason added.
I glared at him. He wasn’t helping.
I turned back to Eric. “What about the other vampires working with the demons?”
He shook his head. “They probably hired them, just like they did with me.”
My jaw tensed, I turned away from Eric to take Jason’s hand. “I have a plan,” I whispered.
Eric held up his hands before we could poof away. “What about me? You’re just going to leave me here?”
