Irish Magic (7 page)

Caelum lay down on the bed, looking like he was trying to get comfortable, and Hannah had the completely out of place thought that she’d never been in bed with a strange guy before. It was weird to think that, given their present situation, but it made her grin and she wished she could share the thought with Ippy because maybe he would laugh and that would be better than this awful mess she got them in. “Hey, Ippy, I’m sorry for bringing you with me. You should be in school right now. You should be safe. And because of me we’re now kidnapped and it’s all my fault and I’m sorry,” she softly told him.

Yes.

She had to laugh at that. Of course he wouldn’t try to make her feel better or act like it wasn’t all her fault they were even out here and that his parent’s car was wrecked. That was one of the amazing things about him. There were no lies with him, which made being around him completely safe. “Love you.”

Caelum looked up at that. “You two are…together?”

Her brows lifted. “Um. What now?”

“Like on the TV? Dating?” Caelum continued.

Hannah blushed deeply. “No. Not at all. He’s my best friend.”

“Oh.” Caelum turned onto his back, his long legs hanging over the side of the bed as he looked up at the ceiling. “So do you want to know about selkies?”

“Are you going to let us go?”

He shook his head.

“Then I suppose I want to know about selkies,” she replied bitterly as she settled against the back of the headboard behind her. It wasn’t comfortable in the least, but it was something to support her.

Before he could even begin to explain, though, the door opened and Hannah found herself looking at a very angry old man.

Hannah braced herself, for what she didn’t know, but when his strike did come it wasn’t at her or even Ippy. Instead it was Caelum who was flung to the floor with a heavy hand to his cheek. She watched, her mouth hanging open, as Caelum struggled to get back to his feet. The man was yelling at him, but she couldn’t hear any of it through her shock. She’d seen people get beat up on TV and in movies. But she’d never seen something like this and as the man moved forward to kick Caelum in the ribs before he could stand she had to turn away.

He grabbed Ippy by the shirt and she yelled at him as Ippy’s screams filled the small room. Hannah’s screams were quickly silenced as a rag was shoved roughly into her mouth and from then she could only watch in silent horror as Ippy was shoved back into the cage and locked tightly into it. She’d thought they might leave Caelum alone after beating him, but he was tied up next, his hands bound beside hers on the bed as he was made to sit next to it. Ippy was shaking and Hannah wished she could do something to help him as a helpless feeling settled into the pit of her stomach. She hated that.

As soon as the men left the little room she spit out the rag. “You okay?” she quietly asked Caelum.

I’m not,
Ippy told her from across the room. She nodded to him, knowing he wasn’t. But he hadn’t had his ribs kicked in, either, and his cheek wasn’t cut. Caelum shrugged and lowered his head. She could only see the back of his head and wished she could see his face. She’d barely caught a glimpse of his cheek before he’d been tied up.

“This sucks,” she grumbled as she sighed and lay back against the pillows behind her.

Plan?

She bit her bottom lip. “Wish I had one, Ippy. Well, Caelum. You wanted to tell us about selkies. Let’s hear it. Why’d they get you?”

He refused to answer her for several long minutes and she was starting to lose interest. This was supposed to be so easy. She’d thought it would be, at least. Go get her selkie and come back home. She’d show the adults that she could do this and that they didn’t have to worry about her and, more than that, that they should have listened to her. But instead she’d managed to get herself and Ippy kidnapped, and the selkie didn’t even want to be saved. It was totally screwed up, and it was all her fault. As tears started leaking from her eyes she wished she could wipe them away, but with her hands bound she couldn’t even do that as she silently cried on the bed.

Ippy slowly sat up and began rocking himself in the cage.
Don’t cry.

She choked on a sob. “Wish I could…could stop.”

Caelum leaned his head back toward her. “Try to not think about crying. If you think about it, you’ll cry more. That’s what my mom used to say.”

She tried, but it really didn’t help. Still, she was glad he’d tried to help her. Even if he was a nasty assistant kidnapper.

“I’m from Ireland,” Caelum softly said to them both. “I had a mom and a dad and cousins and a whole family.”

“I bet they miss you,” Hannah said, her tears mostly subsiding.

He shrugged. “We lived in the ocean. I loved it. Loved playing in the cold salt water, basking on the rocks. I was only three when they found me. My cousin was supposed to be watching me while my parents were out hunting for dinner. I was sitting on the shore.” His shoulders shook and she moved her hands closer to his, just barely being able to touch them in an attempt to comfort him in what little way she could. He moved his fingers towards hers as well and for a moment they were nearly holding hands until he pulled away.

“What happened then?” she asked him, wishing he hadn’t moved his hands.

Caelum lowered his head. “I don’t remember much. A net, a trunk.”

“You were really young.” Hannah couldn’t imagine what that must have been like for him. She would have been pretty scared. Probably a lot more than she was right now. At least she had her best friend with her. Even if he was in some stupid cage.

I want to go home.

She nodded to Ippy. “I do, too.”

“What’d he say?”

Hannah wasn’t sure if Ippy would want all of his thoughts shared with Caelum like she did for the most part with her dads when they were together, but she could do a bit, at least. “He said that he wants to go home.”

Caelum nodded. “I wish you hadn’t come.”

Hannah rolled her eyes. “Gee. Thanks. Fantastic thing to say to someone who was trying to save your life.”

Caelum flinched and turned his head to look at her over his shoulder. “What I meant was that if you hadn’t come to rescue me, you both wouldn’t have been captured.”

Alright, so that sounded a little better. But not coming had never been an option. “Least now you get to escape, too.”

He looked surprised. So did Ippy, for that matter. She wasn’t sure why neither of them had any trust in her.

“How are you going to manage that?”

Hannah shrugged. She didn’t have an idea yet. But staying here wasn’t going to be an option for the kidnappers. Not when she and Ippy would have an entire pack out looking for them by nightfall. “Think my dads know we’re gone yet?” she asked Ippy.

Ippy nodded and she smiled at him. “Good. I hope the pack tears those guys apart. Gets all werewolfy on their butts.” Ippy smiled and she was glad to see the expression on his face. He didn’t smile much at all. Not because he wasn’t happy, but because the gesture didn’t mean as much to him as it did to everyone else. She’d worked with him for months on helping him with understanding the facial expressions of everyone else. They’d watched a lot of movies. Well, more than they usually did anyway, since movie nights were one of their favorite things to do together.

Hannah sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “Why a selkie? And why a werewolf? If they hadn’t caught us we wouldn’t have known you were here.”

Collectors
?

Shivering with the thought of Ippy’s suggestion, she tried not to think about it. Caelum didn’t offer any insight and so she thought about other reasons. Ones that didn’t involve the horror movie type scenarios that were constantly flying through her brain. When none came to mind, though, she quickly gave up trying. Why they’d been taken wasn’t all that important. What mattered was that they had to get out of here.

She turned to Caelum. “What’s their schedule like? When do they go to bed? Any visitors?”

He shrugged. “Late. The lights in the house turn off after midnight. Nobody comes to the house. Ever.”

Hannah bit her bottom lip. “What time do they get up?”

“Late morning. The times vary. Sorry I’m not more helpful.”

She was about to smile at him until she realized that he couldn’t see her expression. So she gave one to Ippy instead. He didn’t return it. “If we are able to escape, will you come with us?”

Caelum shook his head. “I can’t.”

“Again with them finding your family? You just told me they kidnapped you from it. And they beat you—like seriously beat you. Really, you still want to stay here with them after that?” Hannah snapped at him, getting frustrated.

He trembled and she wished she hadn’t gone off on him, but whatever, she couldn’t really change that now. His answer, when it came, was nearly silent in the small room. Ippy probably heard him just fine. But she had to strain to hear his voice.

“No. I don’t want to stay here. But I can’t leave without my fur.”

She frowned at the back of his head. “You’re wearing it. Like werewolves do. Aren’t you?”

Caelum shook his head. “No, what I was getting at when I was talking about selkies is that we can come out of our fur and it stays with us. Like a coat. Or a blanket. But I need it. I haven’t had it in years. I miss it. Without it, I can’t be a selkie. I’m not anything. Just a guy.”

“Well, that sucks,” Hannah grumbled.

Ippy nodded.
Where is it
?

“Ippy and I both want to know where it is. Do you know?”

Caelum turned and looked toward the house, just barely visible through the window above their heads. “Its in P’s bedroom. In a small trunk at the end of the bed. I saw it there just last week when I was cleaning the house. He had it out and was polishing it. I don’t like when its touched. I can feel it.”

Hannah cringed, not liking the sound of that at all. “Alright. So if I get your fur, will you escape with us and go back to our pack?”

Why do you have to go? Why can’t he? It’s his fur. Make him go. Not you.

That was a good question. “Can you go get it?” she asked Caelum. “If we get you out of here?”

He slowly shook his head. “They don’t let me inside alone anymore. Not after the one time I tried to take it away from them.”

“Well, shit.”

Ippy gasped and she closed her eyes, ready for him to reprimand her. But it didn’t come and as the door opened she looked up at the two men standing in the doorway, nearly blocking out the light. She waited for them to act, her breath catching in her throat until they stepped more into the room and tossed plastic wrapped sandwiches in front of each of them.

“How are we supposed to eat with our hands tied?” she snapped irritably at them.

They paused, looking like they hadn’t quite considered that as they turned to back to the door. “Figure it out,” P said gruffly.

Hannah rolled her eyes. “Why are we even here? If its money, my dads can get you that.”

P turned back to her, looking interested now as he approached her. He rested a calloused hand on her check and she resisted the urge to bite him for touching her. Behind him Ippy was making anxious noises in the cage. He didn’t like when people touched him, but he also didn’t really like it when people touched her either. Especially when he knew she didn’t like it—which was most of the time.

“And who is your dad?” he asked her.

“Dads,” she corrected him quickly. “I have two of them. And one of them is second in command of the largest and most powerful werewolf pack in this area. You want money, they’ll give it to you. For us, of course. You don’t just get it for free.”

The other man came up behind him. “Suppose we can’t just kill her now.”

Hannah swallowed thickly at the threat in the man’s words.

Caelum lifted his head beside her. “She’s a hunter, too. You can use her. Don’t need to kill her.”

The men looked even more interested now and Hannah narrowed her gaze at them both, wondering what they were thinking as they looked down at her. “That right?”

She shrugged the best she could with her hands bound above her head. “Don’t know about all that. But I can see shape-shifters. I thought it was just the werewolves until I saw Caelum when I was a kid. Guess I can see more than I thought.”

“Think you could show us where that werewolf pack is?”

No
!

She ignored Ippy’s fierce warning. “I could. Inside, if you’ve got a map. There are a few names I wouldn’t mind being taken off the pack roster. Long as my dads weren’t hurt.”

P smiled and shook his head. “Course not. I’ll bring a map out here for you. Then you can show me.”

“Nope. No can do. My friend can’t lie. If you attack and these people are gone I want to make sure they didn’t know I wanted them gone. I won’t say their names in front of him,” Hannah quickly said.

The man behind P turned his attention to Ippy. “If we’re getting more, we don’t really need this one. Could just kill him now and be done with it.”

“Touch him and I’ll never help you,” Hannah warned them both. All she needed was to be able to get inside. That was it. Yeah, it was more dangerous since they were awake, but maybe this was their one chance. If she could do it, then they could go. She wished she could tell Ippy her plan so that he’d stop looking at her like she was planning to betray them all, though. That wasn’t going to happen. Not now or ever. The pack was her home, her family. Getting these men to trust her just this once felt like it might be her only chance. She had to do this.

P seemed to be considering her words for a long moment as his hand wound in her hair. “Sure. I’ll let you into the house. But if you betray us, I’ll kill you and your friend. Slowly.”

Hannah tried not to let her fear show as she nodded. “Deal.” She was released and sitting up on the bed a moment later. Ippy whined at her as she followed the men to the small farmhouse and she touched the bars of his cage, trying to let him know she’d be back as soon as she could. It didn’t help and his protests were loud as the men locked the door behind her, sealing Ippy and Caelum inside and away from her. It was another complication, but she’d figured that might happen. She quickly glanced back to see where they were and realized they’d been in a small shed at the edge of the property.