Havermouth, Present timeThe man had been wearing a cuff.Meguitte sat staring at the notepad on her lap without seeing the list of spell components that she had been compiling. Think, Meguitte, she told herself firmly. Think about this carefully. Could it have been the second cuff? She closed her eyes. She would be lying to herself if she believed that, she admitted.She understood, now, why Logan had insisted on a second cuff for a sister who had died long before they had met. He had kept one cuff for himself, to control the lycan within him, and had given Lark, Dove, and Robin the other cuff, along with the footage from the camera button which Lark had told her Logan had been wearing, and Logan’s trio of witches had managed to reproduce Meguitte’s spell.He had watched Meguitte cast it, and like a fool she had even glibly listed the ingredients for him as she had done it.Her heart ached at the betrayal so much that the pain eclipsed the important fact of why. Why had Logan done th
Havermouth, Present timeTalen propped himself on one elbow and looked down at Heath. The golden candlelight danced over his mate’s skin catching in the fine fuzz of hair, in the gilded strands of his eyebrows, the stubble of his jaw. He was fascinated by this mate, Talen admitted to himself, and had been from the moment the rude pup had spat vitriol at him out front of Morgana’s house. In his sleep, Heath’s face softened, the tension eased away in dream, the burden of responsibility that he carried with so much determination lightened, and suddenly he was so very, very young.It was easy to forget just how young his mates were, Talen admitted to himself. They were all such fierce individuals, each burnt so brightly.He stroked his palm lightly down Heath’s arm to where the cuff rung his wrist. Just above the thin band of metal, Heath’s pulse kept rhythm. Talen rested his fingertips there, monitoring the pace, trying to judge the health of his mate.There was a faint knock at the door
Havermouth, Present timeThe reception only just held them all, and the circle was a little malformed as a result of the shape of the room, everyone a little closer together than they were entirely comfortable with, considering a good number of them chose to go sky clad again. Sigrid and the mysterious vampire, Samuel, joined the circle, as did Leighton and his family, with Aislen and Bianca in the centre, sitting cross legged and knee to knee.“I can’t tell you how grateful I am that you kept your underwear on,” Aislen smirked. She was also grateful for Bianca’s wards, as otherwise she would not be able to concentrate. Bianca snickered. “For a bitch f-king four men, you’re so prudish.”“I truly, truly am,” Aislen agreed wholeheartedly. “In some circumstances. Like I fully believe that you should not know if your best friend has freckles on her labia from personal experience. That’s taking the best friend thing a little beyond comfortable for me."“Are we?” Bianca asked quietly, her
Havermouth, Present timeThey moved the cleaning of the gym to directly in front of the door, intending to delay the Van Helsings if they entered to give the gathering of pack members a chance to break up and look casual. Everyone’s wrists were bare, the cuffs stuffed into their pockets so as not to leave evidence of their escape plans lying around.“We can’t go home?” Alice Tamm looked up at her mate, her eyes filling with tears. “But Matt… My fish…”“I’m sure that we can pop home long enough to drop a holiday feeder into the tank, Allie,” Matt assured her.“It would not be wise,” Jules said firmly. Jules was the highest-ranking alpha there, Rhett realized, other than himself and Cameron, and it was as disconcerting to see Jules in a position of authority and leadership as it was arousing to see Cameron alpha-up. “Let’s get to safety, before we plan any trips home which might be risky. Which brings us back to Cam’s point. Where in Havermouth can we go?”“Family and friends?” Matt Tam
Etrait, Nine Hundred and Forty Years Before The beach showed little sign of the tragedy that had played out on its sand the day before, the tide having stolen away almost every stain of blood, the fine sand sticking to the surface of the rest. Seagulls and other predatory sea birds fluttered over the darker patches, attracted to the insects that buzzed, searching for the meat that accompanied the blood. Thaelen crossed the sand to the water gripping the little cloth bag containing herbs, oatmeal, and the crushed leaves of a local plant known as washweed that one of the village women had made for him. He stripped to his skin before wading out into the gentle waves, submerging before rising, water running down his chest from the end of his beard. He was beginning to look overgrown again, he thought ruefully as he used the bag to scrub over his skin and through his hair and beard, washing away the sweat and dirt from training. His eyes rested on the shadows of the mountain range, where
Etrait, Nine Hundred and Forty Years BeforeThaelen waited with the tent flap pulled just slightly open, watching whilst a soldier returned from his nightly pee. “Now,” he said softly and sent the next small group of women and children out into the night. In their small numbers, they were less likely to be noticed or suspected of being up to anything more exciting than escorting the boy into the trees for the same reason as the soldiers used them.They were the last group. Once they had passed beyond his vampiric vision, he turned and surveyed the interior of the tent. He had piled the possessions that they could not take with them around the central pole of the tent. His plan was to use the black powder and one of the oh-so-dangerous exploding hand-held devices to start a fire within, burning the possessions and the center pole and collapsing the tent into itself to be eaten by flame. Anyone within the tent would be thought to be dead, burnt to ashes.However, he also knew from havin
Etrait, Nine Hundred and Forty Years BeforeThe tunnels widened into an intersection. For a moment, Thaelen stood looking around him. He couldn’t have hoped for more or less, he admitted to himself. On one hand, there was a stack of barrels to one side that he was confident held the black powder, and the meeting point of tunnels was the perfect opportunity to detonate the explosives with the aim of collapsing the tunnels behind them.On the other hand, there were three tunnels before them, and he did not know which one to take. He could not afford to explode and collapse the meeting point of the tunnels without knowing that they’d taken the right one to safety, and if they chose the wrong tunnel without collapsing the way behind them, they might lose their head-start.It was possible that the human army would realize that someone had deliberately started the fires and the explosion, and followed them into the tunnels.He breathed in, trying to discern which tunnel smelled of fresh air
Concordia, Nine Hundred and Forty Years BeforeTheir travel to the nearest stronghold was slowed by the humans, however as much that Thaelen wished to rush ahead, he could not leave them with strange vampires after their bravery and trust in following him into what was, to them, enemy territory.He fretted about Johil. What would the human make of Thaelen’s escape? Would he realize that the explosion at the camp had been started by Thaelen? Would he think that Thaelen had burned to death the women and children that he had fought so hard to protect? No, Thaelen knew that he wouldn’t. There would be trouble for the village when word made it’s way back to Alden. Would the priests return to the homes of those boys and women and take younger siblings in their place, or would they let it go?“Hmm,” he acknowledged grimly that they would do far worse in order to make an example. They would destroy the village and kill everyone within it. He had to hope that in the disorder of the camp, the w