Absolution (2 page)

He stood and circled the room, one hand under the weapon’s grip, the other rested on the trigger.

She rose and moved with him, shadowing him, almost merging with him. His height barely exceeded her five foot eleven. Level with his eyes, she scrutinized his face, his image burned into her memory for the day they’d meet.

No, she didn’t need her eyes or memory to recognize him. Her heart, bound to save him, wouldn’t release him until he was safely with her. Still, it wouldn’t hurt if she could pick him out of a crowd. His soulful dark green eyes were perfect for a Druid, and his dark hair reminded her of the rich loam of the mountain soil.

“Who are you? Where are you?”

A soul in desperate need. Find me. Help me find my daughters—before it’s too late. Let your magick guide you, Druid Lucan, and you will find me, as I have found you
.

***

Luc’s gaze flicked between the pictures of the three women spread across the mahogany conference table. Three lost fairy princesses. A war to end all wars, the battle of supernatural and humans against the malignance of the Abyss and he was on a mission to find a princess. He pushed aside the photos of Sophie and Kate, pulled the hIfreann watercolor of Allana to him, and traced her delicately-arched eyebrow. What was it about her that called to him at the most basic level?

What had she felt, discovering her daughters weren’t dead and instead were living on Earth for over a hundred years? He couldn’t conceive of his children being torn from his arms and hidden from him for years. Then again, he had lost everyone he had ever cared for, contributing to the downfall of each one. It was just that he had never delivered any progeny into the world. With him for a father, they would be damned.

He glanced back at the picture. A sudden rush of regret for what this woman had lost quickly swept away a foreign anger for those who had committed these acts against her.

He snorted at the strange connection he felt for her. He retraced the pale, delicate colors of the paints that seemed to capture some part of her soul. She was pretty, yes, perhaps not a classic beauty, or ethereal like most of the Fae, yet her eyes bore into his like a lost memory.

No, a soul-deep connection, the soft and strong, satin and steel of unconditional acceptance. Like the one his parents, and Nate and his wife, had. Goddess, he sounded pathetic. He scrubbed his hand over his face. Shit, he had never even met the woman.

“Mind sharing those pictures so I know what they look like?”

His head jerked up and he glared at Fritz. “I thought you’d left.”

“Why? You may have approval for this suicide mission, but I’ll guarantee you come home, whole and alive. Or did you think I didn’t notice?”

His gaze met the stoic mottled-gray gargoyle warrior’s. “I don’t need a nursemaid.”

“No, you need a guard. You’re supposed to infiltrate the group and I’m your contact and escape route."

He glared at the seven-foot gargoyle and scrutinized Fritz’s look of determination. With the chiseled lines of his thick angular cheeks and lantern jaw, he
almost
looked like an oversized human in all respects—almost being the operative word. “Shit, Fritz, it isn’t like you can blend in. By day you’re a stone statue and at night—” He waved to the overgrown man before him. “—you don’t exactly fade into the background around humans.”

Fritz shrugged. “You need eyes in the sky at night. I’m the one who’ll make sure the mission succeeds in spite of your death wish.”

“What do you know about it?”

“Think of me as your guardian angel.”

Luc didn’t trust his smile. With another snort, he jerked a photo to him. “You think Kate’s the warrior we’re looking for?”

“Yeah.” Fritz tapped Allana’s pastel. “And she’s the healer. So what’s the plan?”

“Infiltrate the HS Brotherhood, take them down, and then find these women.” He grimaced. “What’s your take on the group?”

“The Homo Sapiens Brotherhood makes the Humans First seem like the Little Sisters of the Poor. This group scares the shit even out of me, and I can’t die. Hell, they could grind me into gravel and come night, I’d be me again. You die and the mission is down the crapper along with you. Every mission has a back door. I’m yours, and you’d better not leave me out in the cold. It hurts like hell to reconstitute.”

“Don’t worry. You won’t get hurt on my watch or because of my stupidity.” He stood and bit back a curse at the look on Fritz’s face. Damn, he knew he was being a dick. Nate’s death was his fault and a major fuckup. But it didn’t mean he should drag everyone around him into the suffering.

Luc pivoted and headed from the room. Halfway to the door, he glanced back at Allana’s picture and walked back. Gently, he folded the image, tucked it in his pocket, and frowned.

Strange, just having her close to his heart warmed him.

For a quick second, he yearned for more of the heat.

CHAPTER 2

Allana bolted upright in a cold sweat, sleep forgotten. Dark trees. Moonless night. A hoard of demons. Fangs. The daughter she had never held stood alone with only a sword and a wolf at her side.

A quick look confirmed Allana was really in her room. She staggered from the bed and stumbled to the sink. Gulping, she splashed icy water on her face, looked around again, and confirmed she was really in the boardinghouse.

The dream faded. They always did. But the terror and memory of betrayal clung to her. She had tried to get clarification of her dreams from the Oracle of hIfreann. Reassurance had been in short supply. All she ever heard was if her dreams were important they would have come to the Oracle, not her.

Dreams meant something and were not to be ignored.

How had she endured it? I can’t conceive of my children being torn from my arms and hidden from me for years
.

She trembled at the cadence of Luc’s voice. For months now, she had heard him when her need was greatest. His deep, soothing tones took away the terrible cold and immobilizing fear.

She was right. He was important, not only to find her daughters, but to calm her soul.

She realized if she didn’t understand what drove Luc to despair, she couldn’t save him. She would be little more than a patch on fetid sore. One day, she would be too late. She stared at the ceiling and questioned her right not only to intervene, but to search his memories.

Once again, she relaxed on her mattress, closed her eyes, and drifted along the astral plane, searching for Luc. She found him in the eddies and, following the strands of his life force to its origins allowed her essence to flow into his mind, seeking out Nate’s death. Ah, there it was. She would only watch. Once she understood, she might be able to do more than intervene; she might be able to heal him.

She moved unseen through the layers of his memories.

The woman Luc called Deva, the Cáidh Arm, the Goddess’ Holy Weapon, flashed his friend Nate an irritated glare. She didn’t want interruptions, yet his cell phone wouldn’t stop ringing.

Nate pulled his cell phone from the holster on his belt. “I haven’t had it on since last night.” His voice and expression held confusion. He flipped it open and started at the screen. “What the hell? It’s a text and—” His shoulders twitched, and he snapped shut the phone. Flat, cold gray eyes scanned the group. “Nothing important. I’ll take care of it later.”

His strange, low, raspy tone sent a shockwave of alarm through Luc—Nate wasn’t in control. He harbored the seedling. From the expression on those in the room, they had also realized the truth.

Nate’s eyes narrowed and turned frigid as a winter squall bearing down, his pupils cold, blank, and hostile. He backed away from the table toward the door. A warrior blocked the exit. He pulled a seven inch, carbon steel K-bar knife from his side scabbard.

Luc’s gaze locked with Nate’s. With their psychic connection, one born of twenty years of friendship and support, he tried to feed his friend power, allowing him to reassert control.

Nothing of Nate stared back at him.

He flipped the knife from one hand to the other with a skill Nate had never possessed. The seedling stared at them, weighing the odds of survival. The knife left his hand and cut through the air.

In horror, Luc saw the blade fly true and pierced the lung of the Cáidh Arm’s mate.

The two werewolves advanced on the triumphant Nate in a pincer movement.

Nate’s seedling pulled a Glock from the back of his waistband and aimed at Deva.

Luc eased forward from the map case, lifted his Sig Sauer, and squeezed the trigger in rapid succession. All three rounds hit their target. Blood shot out, spraying the walls and Luc. Tears flowed down his face. Nate crumpled to the floor, a blossom of red spreading from the middle of his chest.

Deva raced to Nate’s side, collapsed to her knees beside him, and pressed her hand on his chest. The damage was too extensive to heal. One bullet had torn through his gut and shredded everything in its path. The second and third had hit him mid-chest. He had almost bled out. His head rested on her lap. She caressed his forehead, brushing back his silver-streaked hair.

Nate’s eyes flickered open, perplexed. “What’d I do?” he asked, his voice weak, a thin stream of blood leaked from the side of his mouth. “I’d never—”

“You didn’t betray us. You saved us. You’re a hero,” she sobbed. “I love you, big brother.” She kissed his forehead.

“Love you.” The harsh lines of pain smoothed from his face.

“Summerland welcomes and honors you.”

A weak smile twitched his lips. “Good.” As the light faded from Nate’s gray eyes, a black centipede-like creature crawled from his ear and scurried over the back of her finger, seeming to seek entrance.

Luc scooped the creature into a Vicks jar and sealed it. Squatting, he tenderly touched Nate’s face. “I can’t believe I killed him. He was a better person than me, nobler,” he murmured. “Did you know that when demons killed his wife and baby daughter, he never lost his faith?” He scrubbed his face. “It’s my fault Nate’s dead. If I hadn’t shot him, we could’ve saved him.”

Allana took a deep breath and shuddered at the depth and reason behind Luc’s pain and guilt. Could she save him?

She began to ease from him. His spirit wrenched her from his mind.

With a moan, her back arched and her essence flooded back into her.

***

Luc patted the postcard-sized, colored photocopy of Allana sewn into a secret pocket on the inside of his jacket. The slightest touch on the small copy of the pastel settled him.

He watched Deva, leader of the Army For Light, stand aside as the wereleopard and two werewolves disappeared through Fritz’s portal. Once it closed, Luc stepped out from the shadows and joined her as the gargoyle created another one.

He’d once asked the team what it was like for them in a portal. For the Weres, it was a blink of nothing and they arrived. For Deva and the other magicks and Fae, it was like stepping through a door.

Not for him.

Being a Druid and unable to touch Earth’s life force altered the sensations. He suspected it would be true whichever domain he traveled from. The few times he entered a portal, it felt as if he’d stepped into a quicksand bog of molasses. It swirled and eddied about him, rising to cover him.

Except it wasn’t a bog.

It was alive and with sticky suction cups like an octopus that pulled on every inch of his skin until he thought he’d be ripped apart. He had screamed like a baby for his mother. Good thing no one heard him. A second or eon later, the bog vanished as if it hadn’t existed and he was on the other side.

Deva turned to him, worry etched in her face. “Can you handle traveling through it again?”

“I have to, no other option. Not if I’m to get there in time.”

“I don’t like this, Luc. The Humans First and HS Brotherhood are spreading like a cancer. We need to find the missing princesses before they do. They’re critical to our winning the war. Don’t lose sight of your primary mission—find Allana first—don’t sacrifice yourself on the altar of the Brotherhood.”

“What about Sophie and Kate?”

“Steve and the werewolves will search for Carlson and Sophie. Once they find his lair, they can rescue her. As for Kate, we’ll find her. She isn’t your mission.

He winced when she cupped his face and stared into his eyes. He knew better than to fight her. That he had helped raise her didn’t change the fact that as she had grown in her powers, she sometimes scared the shit out of him. She saw too deep, knew too much, and interfered in his life too often.

He stepped back and jerked his head toward Fritz. “I don’t need a nursemaid.”

“I’m no one’s fucking nursemaid, Druid.”

He nodded an apology at Fritz and turned back to Deva. For the first time since he had killed Nate, he didn’t wince as her gaze met his with a look reeking of compassion. His mind could handle the scrutiny, no longer responsive to the emotions of others. He was able to block out their sympathy. They didn’t realize he hadn’t survived his assault on his best friend. Yes, his body lived, but his soul no longer cared.