“If that’s what it takes.” Ari pointed her chin at the circle. “I told you in my message about Andreas’s disappearance. We think he was captured inside the casa, teleported into the woods, brought here, and then teleported out.”
Sophistrina’s eyes narrowed. “By a black arts practitioner.” She inspected the remains of the magical circle before returning her gaze to Ari. “The aura is extremely dark. And you thought it was us?”
“I can’t deny it crossed my mind before I saw the human ash. I’d about decided it couldn’t be you, then you teleported in. It made me wonder.” Ari shrugged.
“It isn’t ours. I may have changed since we last met, but not that much.” Sophistrina took a long sniff of air. “Not only hard core black magic but werebears have been here. What do they want with your vampire?”
“That’s what I’d like to know. If it’s the O-Seven, they hate us enough to kill him. Why kidnap him?”
“They want something.” Sophistrina unknowingly echoed Gabriel’s words. Her brows deepened into a black scowl. “I’d like to know who the rogue conjurer is. No witch would do this. It has to be a wizard, but their entire race is sworn to neutrality. If he’s caught, he would be executed by his own people. Someone must have paid him very well to take such a risk.” Sophistrina turned toward the circle again. “I don’t sense any trace of your vampire.”
“He’s been shielding since the attack.”
“He doesn’t want to be found? Are you positive he hasn’t joined them?”
“Of course I’m positive. He’s trying to protect me.” Ari compressed her lips. “You’ve met him. How can you think he would join them?”
“He is a vampire. We have learned through many centuries that they quickly close ranks against witches.”
Oh, hell. Was Sophistrina going to be difficult about this? The coven came from a different perspective and history. The witches and vampires in Europe had been fighting a bloody, territorial feud-to-the-death since the 1300s. Sophistrina had no basis for trust.
“Not Andreas. He hates the O-Seven as much as you do. Besides, I’m a witch, and he loves me.” She put her hands on her hips. “Are you going to help me find him, or not?”
Sophistrina let her gaze run over her coven sisters, then back to Ari. “Of course, we will. We are in your debt.”
Ari drew in a shallow, shaky breath, more relieved than she wanted them to know. Without the coven’s help, she’d be lost. She turned to her other companions. “Sophistrina and I have much to discuss. I’ll meet you back at the house in an hour or two.”
“I’m not leaving you alone with them.” Lilith crossed her arms. “Not after what they did the last time. You were lucky to survive.”
“That won’t happen again.”
“You don’t have to guard against us. We came here as allies.” Sophistrina gave Lilith an appraising look. “A werecreature cannot be present during a witches’ circle, but Arianna is safe among her own kind.”
“That wasn’t true before,” Lilith mumbled stubbornly.
“It’s OK, Lilith. Really. Things are different now, and I’ll be fine. Go back to the casa and wait for me.”
The lioness folded her arms, but Samuel touched her shoulder, urging her to come with them. She finally stalked down the path, leaving Samuel and the three foxes to follow. Samuel glanced back twice but kept walking.
Sophistrina smiled. “Staunch friends. But let us get down to work. First we must cleanse this space. The conjurer’s magic will interfere with our own.”
They set to work with Ari helping them. Using sticks and hands, they dug a hole, then found twigs and branches to sweep the ashes from the prior circle into the hole. Once the ashes were buried, a layer of new dirt from outside the clearing was spread over the top. With the physical part of the cleansing completed, the coven and Ari clasped hands, forming a witches’ circle. The instant the circle closed, an unexpected spark of electricity ran through the joined hands as Ari's light magic collided with the coven's darker version. One of the women squealed, but at Sophistrina’s crisp order everyone held tight. After a moment, the energy calmed. Sophistrina invoked the Goddess’s help, and Rebekah, her second-in-command, passed around a bowl of powdered incense. Each witch took a small portion and released it into the air, repeating the process three times. When the gloom in the clearing began to dissipate, they burned the branches used in the sweeping, throwing the remaining incense into the fire.
The air cleared, smelling only of dried leaves, fall foliage, and incense; the black aura dissipated.
Ari sat down with the coven and began to explain what she needed them to do.
“If you’re going to understand, I have to reveal a closely held secret. It can’t go outside this circle or the O-Seven and other enemies would use it to their advantage. Do I have your word on this?” She waited until she received a nod from each witch. Despite the pledge, her palms grew clammy, and she rubbed them against the rough denim of her jeans. What she was about to do was drastic, but did she have a choice? Her throat grew dry, making it hard to swallow. She took a determined breath. “Andreas and I share a telepathic bond. Not a vampire bond,” she said in response to a gasp. “I suspect it is witchborn, a heritage from my family, but that isn’t important right now. This link can be blocked by either of us, but some life force always leaks through. It’s how I know he’s alive.” She paused to wet her dry lips, then pushed herself to finish. “Since the night of the attack, the connection has been weak. I believe he’s keeping his end closed to protect me from his captors. With your help, I hope to use your additional power to force the gate to open. I know if I can communicate with him, we can figure out how to set him free.”
“You want to blend our magics—your light and our dark?” Sophistrina’s voice revealed her astonishment. “That is not an easy thing to do. You saw the sparks created just with the simple cleansing spell. It takes months of training to do something as complex as you’re suggesting.”
“I don’t have that kind of time,” Ari said desperately. “Nor does Andreas. We’ll just have to make it work more quickly. Right now I don’t have any proof of where he is, where to begin looking for him. What if he’s lying injured somewhere here in Italy and I go traipsing off to Germany? I need to talk with him.”
“I’m sorry,” Sophistrina shook her head, “but it’s too dangerous. We were lucky to have only a minor reaction when you joined the circle. It would be much worse if we tried to do a high level spell. I’ve seen one attempt to mix hostile magics, and it backfired. Every witch died.”
Her heart sank. A part of Ari was glad to see Sophistrina was more protective of her coven than her predecessor had been. The former priestess’s hatred for the O-Seven had driven her to step over moral lines and take indefensible risks with their lives. But this new attitude didn’t help Ari’s cause. Or maybe it did. She couldn’t help Andreas if she got herself killed.
She slowly got to her feet. “I understand. I didn’t mean to ask you to risk your lives.” Hiding her emotions, she turned to Sophie. “Thanks for listening. I’ll find another way.”
“Wait.” Sophie rose to join her. “We can at least help you with a location. A single witch can’t trace that far, but a group can. If you drop out of the circle, we’ll do a search and find.”
Ari hesitated. There was a major flaw in searching with witchcraft: the magical probe left a mark that could be followed to its source. What if Andreas’s captors noticed and traced the search?
Sophie anticipated her objection. “Don’t worry. We’ll be in and out before anyone knows we’ve been there. If by some fluke they pick up the probe, we’ll be back home before anyone could arrive from Germany. Unless they teleported. And what’s the chance of that? Why would they waste so much energy on us? And any sorcerer would have to have prep time to pull it off. This is an acceptable risk.”
“OK, but be careful—and quick.” Ari pulled Andreas’s scarf out of her jacket pocket. “You’ll need a piece
of his personal property. I’ll wait for you on the other side of the trees.”
Sophie gripped her hand briefly when she took the scarf. “We will find your vampire. I may not understand your choice of lover, but I understand that he is important to you.”
Ari nodded her thanks. She turned and left the clearing. Once she was at a distance where any leaks of her magic wouldn’t interfere, she picked a spot to wait at the base of a small tree. She drew up her knees, hugging them, and resting her chin on her knees in thought. The lonely call of a nightingale broke the evening quiet.
Her shoulders sagged, pinching in as a band tightened around her chest. She was grateful for what the coven was doing, but she’d been so sure they could help her communicate with Andreas. Without his help or the coven’s help, how was she going to rescue him?
Where the hell was he? Was he all right?
She checked her cell phone, just in case. One missed call, but it was from Steffan. Was this bad news from the Magic Council? She started to put the phone back in her pocket, then took it out again. Might as well hear what the council had said—good or bad.
The call went to phone mail, and she was almost relieved. It some ways, it didn’t matter what they said. She wasn’t ready to go home.
She was tucking the phone in her pocket, when it rang in her hand. Steffan.
“Have you found Andreas?” he asked.
That seemed to be the opening line in most conversations this week.
“No, but we’ve made a little progress. We think the O-Seven has him. Right now we’re trying to verify that and the location where he’s being held. I may be going to Germany next.” She heard the line click. “Can you hold? I have another call com—”
“Don’t take it yet! It could be the council president ordering you to return home.”
She sighed. “I guess I’m in trouble, huh? How bad?”
“I did my best to explain, but he wasn’t pleased. In light of his recent warning, he interpreted your leaving without permission as open defiance.”
“But he never would have agreed,” she protested.
“He said that too. And that you knew he wouldn’t agree.” Steffan paused, and she almost heard the regret in his silence. “I’m sorry, but he’s given you twenty-four hours to return.”
“Or else what?”
“I didn’t ask.”
Yeah, the threat was obvious. What would she do if she couldn’t be a Guardian? She’d trained her whole life for the position: the martial arts, the weaponry. Hell, being a Guardian was her whole life. But going home without Andreas just wasn’t an option.
“I felt I needed to warn you,” Steffan said. “I’ll keep in touch and let you know if anything changes.”
“OK, but nothing will change my mind. I can’t come home. Not yet.”
“I know that, but the president is getting a lot of pressure to do something. There was a bar fight in Olde Town last night, and Martin couldn’t get there before several were injured. He lives too far away.”
“It shouldn’t be his responsibility.” Ari let out a long, resigned breath. “They need to bring in another Guardian, hopefully temporarily, but I don’t know when I’ll be back. It could be hours or months.”
“You can’t expect the council to wait indefinitely. I get it that you need to do this. I can’t say I wouldn’t do the same, but the president will be furious. I’ll do what I can, but don’t expect any miracles.”
She heard a branch snap and saw the coven’s second-in-command coming through the trees. “I won’t, and thanks, Steffan. I gotta go, but I’ll call you soon.” She stood, dropping her phone in her pocket this time.
Rebekah waved to her. “You can join us now. We have an answer.”
The witches were still seated in the circle when Ari re-entered the clearing. Sophie rose and came toward her. Her forehead was creased in a sympathetic frown. “I don’t know if this is really going to be helpful or not. He’s inside the O-Seven’s stronghold in Germany. We can’t get past their magical wards on the fortress, but we followed his trace to the castle walls.”
Ari’s heart pumped harder. She’d expected it, but… Gabriel’s one word description pounded over and over in her head: impregnable…impregnable…
She stared at the priestess helplessly. “So how do I get to him?”
Sophistrina shook her head. “If we knew the answer, our fight with the vampires would have been over centuries ago.”
“There’s got to be a way.” Ari heard the desperation in her voice, but she didn’t care. “Andreas will help us, if I can only contact him. You have to help me, Sophie.”
“I’d like to, but…” The priestess’s eyes filled with compassion. She drew a deep breath. “It’s true we’ve never had anyone on the inside before.” She hesitated. “It would take time and patience to blend our magics, but it might be worth the effort. Come home with us. Work with the Witches’ League. We’ll train you.” She arched an eyebrow at Ari’s quick frown. “How much will you do for your vampire?”
“Not a fair question, but I think the answer is obvious. I—”
Ari whirled toward a surge of Otherworld power. Four vampires teleported into the midst of the clearing, and the air filled with witches’ screams and the savage snarling of the undead. The witch standing nearest to them died instantly from a broken neck. Ari acted on instinct. She fired a bolt of crimson witch fire, incinerating the first vampire on contact. Startled by her attack, two other vamps hesitated long enough for Ari to catch them with a series of arcing flames. Fueled by rage and frustration, she poured fire into them until nothing but charred ashes remained and her magic was drained. The fourth vampire heaved one of the witches into the trees, but four of her sisters leaped on him with silver daggers. The fight was over quickly, with four vampires and one witch dead.
Ari hurried to help a witch who’d been burned on the arm, but Sophistrina was there ahead of her. Another woman clutched the body of her dead sister; silent tears streaked her face. The injured witch was pulled out of the bushes. The coven had clearly had practice at cleaning up after an attack.
Ari watched Sophie treat the burn victim. “I’m so sorry. Will she be all right?” She fought to steady her breathing and subdue the adrenaline rush.
“This one will be fine,” the priestess said. “And Kara is on her feet. There nothing to be done for the other one but bury her.” She compressed her lips, hiding whatever she felt about the woman’s death, and wiped salve on her patient’s wound. “Luckily, we’re not as flammable as the vampires.” Her gaze flitted to the smoldering ashes of the vampires, and then to Ari. “You’re a handy person to have around in a fight.”
“How did they find you so quickly?”
Sophie’s eyes were dark with concern. “I don’t know. They have to be using very powerful sorcery. That should be our next task—to find out the source of their magic and stop it.”
“Our next task?” Ari repeated carefully. “Does that mean you’re still willing to help me? Even after this?” She held her breath, watching Sophie’s face.
“This is our everyday life. Death and tears. Taking you home with us would not be an unselfish act. Our goals have merged in a common enemy. Anything you can do that would weaken the O-Seven is to our advantage. In fact, you may be the best chance the Witches’ League has had in years to defeat them.” When Ari frowned, Sophie added, “We’ll do everything we can to rescue Andreas.”
Suddenly Ari wasn’t so sure. She had a funny knot in her gut. Sophie might be willing. But the Witches’ League? They’d been fighting and killing vampires for centuries. Could they be counted on to help Andreas or would they turn on him? “Can you honestly speak for the League? I don’t want to bring Andreas to the attention of even more enemies.”
“Don’t worry. They’ll help. You needn’t have called in your favor, if you had simply explained who and what Andreas was.”
Ari cocked her head in confusion. “What are you talking about? You mean bec
ause he was transformed against his will?”
“Is it possible you don’t know?” The priestess shook her head. “I felt it the moment we found his trace.”
“Know what? What did you feel? Has something awful happened to him?” Ari stared at her, fear and worry churning her stomach.
“No. No, nothing like that. It’s about his past, his heritage. Talk with Andreas. Or you might look through the library at the De Luca estates. If I’m right, the answer should be there.”
“I don’t know why you’re being so cryptic. Just tell me.”
“Oh, no. I’m not going to interfere. This is between the two of you.”
Ari crossed her arms, prepared to continue the argument. “Will it save Andreas? Does it have anything to do with the O-Seven?”
“I doubt it.”
“Why didn’t you just say so?” She dropped her arms. She didn’t care what Sophie knew or thought she knew. Not right now. Andreas’s past was unimportant, only his present and future concerned her. She threw up an impatient hand. “We’re wasting time, and someone may come looking for these vamps. I think we should get out of here.”
The witches glanced nervously at the dark shadows among the foliage.
“I agree. We still have sufficient members to raise the power to teleport home. Will you join us in Germany?”
Ari nodded. “I’ll explain the situation to my friends and fly into Frankfurt tomorrow.”
The air sparkled. Someone screamed as four more vampires teleported into view. Ari and Sophistrina raced toward them. The air shimmered again, producing additional vampires. When the clearing vibrated a third time, Sophie screamed, “Run!”
The vampires caught two of the witches from behind and slashed their throats before anyone had time to react. The remaining coven members scattered, and Ari raced forward to cover their retreat. Her witch fire had not yet had time to rejuvenate, but a high kick knocked one of the vamps across the clearing, and she jumped onto the back of another, plunged her silver dagger between his shoulder blades and angled into his heart. He collapsed, dumping Ari on the ground. She rolled free, and Sophie grabbed her hand, pulling her to her feet. The witches had filled the clearing with a smoky potion, and the vampires were gasping and coughing.