Beware, p.33
Beware, page 33
“I want to bring Molly back into the fold.”
“Bullshit!” Faye spat. She flung her hand out at him. “If you wanted her in the fold, you would have shown up centuries ago or you never would have let her go in the first place. Why the hell are you here? I’m tired of dancing around this.”
His lips quivered as his gaze shifted from Faye to Molly. Molly stared back at Faye, her face full of fake-shock, but she said nothing and didn’t interfere.
“Stop lying!” Faye roared. “If there’s anything I hate, it’s a liar.”
“As if Molly hasn’t lied to you.”
Faye snorted, then she stepped forward quickly, pressing Malek’s back into the van and holding her forearm against his throat. “She has never lied to me. Kept information, yes, but never outright lied. If you have no magic, I could kill you here in two seconds and you couldn’t do a damn thing. I could bleed you dry, but you taste disgusting, so I won’t be doing that.”
“I—I tasted bad?”
“Like rotten flesh.”
Malek paled and turned to Molly a look of guilt on his face, fear as he took in deep breaths.
“Dear Lord, Malek. You didn’t.” Molly stepped closer, her hand on Faye’s shoulder, easing her away.
“I didn’t mean to harm you.”
“Why would you do something that awful?”
“I needed you back in the fold.”
“For what?” Molly’s voice echoed with pain and hurt.
Faye kept her position between the two of them, protecting Molly in case Malek tried anything, though she was more afraid in that moment of Molly’s anger getting the best of her like it often did.
“It was the only way.”
“What the hell are the two of you talking about?” Faye interjected.
Molly gripped Faye’s hand, squeezed tight. “The fold is conniving, Faye. If Malek made them a promise and they saw he didn’t fulfill it, they would do this as punishment. Even with the despair they’re in, they care more about rules and traditions than they do one of their own.”
“It’s not me they care about,” Malek shot back. “They want you.”
“So you offered me? You had no right!” Molly’s temper rose, and Faye tried to hold it back as best she could, still standing between her and Malek.
“When Faye arrived, asking for my help, they saw an opportunity. Did you really think they would cleanse your body and expect nothing in return.”
“No, I don’t suppose I did.” Molly, calmed, stepped closer to Malek and pressed a finger into his chest. “And I suppose they sent you because they feel this is your mistake, that you never should have granted me the pardon.”
The look he gave Molly told both of them she was correct. Faye sighed. “These rules are fucking stupid and this gives me a headache.”
Molly snorted and threw her hand up in the air. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because I wasn’t allowed.”
She spun on him. “You have never been much of a rule follower, Malek, not on the little things.”
“And see where that’s gotten me? Here. Magic bound, banished from the fold until I accomplish what they want, no way to reverse this situation. Come back with me, Molly. Help me return order. It’s time for new rules, new traditions. You and I can do that. We can save the fold.”
Faye held Molly back as she darted forward. She stepped between them, both hands on Molly’s shoulders, and their faces close. “Don’t do it, Molly. You’ll regret it in an instant.”
Molly drew in a sharp breath. She glanced around Faye to Malek. “The fold should fall.”
“There’s war brewing.”
“What the hell is this, dump everything into this moment to try and get her to go back with you?” Faye rolled her eyes. “Grow up, Malek. You of all people should know you don’t make Molly do anything.”
“You can.” He stared straight into Faye’s eyes.
Faye raised an eyebrow at him. She was about to speak, but Molly cut her off. “Their antiquated system can die with them.”
“If it dies with them, so does my magic.”
“Then so be it.”
“You can’t believe that.” Malek pushed away from the van, and once again, Faye made sure to keep herself between the two of them. “Magic is my life. You know that as well as I do. Molly, help me. Please.”
“You have never lied to me before.”
“I’m not lying now.”
“I don’t trust you.”
Faye held out a hand against Molly’s belly to hold her in place. She had no idea what to say or how to calm the situation down. She was out of her element. Normally Molly was the peacekeeper.
“You’re here to find out how I have so much power. They sent you here to figure out what I’d done to surpass them. I damn well nearly beat them, didn’t I?”
“Yes. They want you back.”
“To find out how many of their precious rules I’ve broken. Well, I’m not afraid of the fold, not like you are.”
“I’m not afraid of them. I trust them with my life.”
“They are your life. They’re not mine.”
Malek stepped closer, and Faye pushed Molly back, but Molly stepped around her. Faye wasn’t sure she wanted to let them get that close with the way the conversation was going, but she maintained, no one could make Molly do anything.
“They’re not my life,” Malek’s voice was soft, endearing. “You are my life. You always have been.”
Faye narrowed her gaze as Malek cupped Molly’s cheek, her stomach twisting.
“I promise you I have never wanted anything except the best for you.”
“I’m not a child, anymore. I know what this world holds. I know more of it than you.”
“You do,” Malek admitted. “And I would like to share that. I want to be with you and no one else. I want our match to succeed, whether within the fold or without.”
Molly sucked in a breath. Faye’s chest hurt from the amount of tension she held within it. She couldn’t dare herself to look at Molly again. Stepping away from them, she walked across the road to her friend and pressed a hand to his large finger. She needed a minute, or a week, or hell, a year.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Molly didn’t miss Faye walking away. Immediately, she stepped back from Malek and turned toward Faye, following her across the street. Night had fallen in the midst of their conversation. Malek remained by the van, thankfully. Molly did something she never thought she would. She wrapped her arms around Faye’s middle from behind and buried her face in Faye’s shoulder.
“Talk to me.”
“No.”
“Faye.”
“No, Molly. You got what you wanted.”
Molly drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “No, I didn’t. Here.”
Taking Faye’s hand in her own, Molly pulled Faye away from Lamek, walking backward as Faye came with her. She held out her hand for Malek to join them. As soon as he stood next to her, Molly pressed a kiss to Faye’s cheek.
“I promised you I would release him, and I will hold to that promise.”
Faye nodded, though she still didn’t look Molly in the eye, which worried her. Ignoring the pressing weight on her chest, Molly focused her mind.
Closing her eyes, Molly called on her magic, the tingles that swam in her body constantly picked up speed. She organized them, tracked them, placed them exactly where she wanted and needed them to go. Opening her eyes, Molly stared at the troll in front of her. She called in a fog, one that would cover everything until she was done. It filtered in, hiding them from sight.
Faye squeezed her hand tightly, and Molly released the spell she had been building. Her magic flowed through her into Faye on one side, using Faye’s love for Lamek to intensify. It pulsed. It heated. It surrounded them.
The lightning came from out of nowhere, smashing down against Lamek’s hand. The stone cracked. Molly held her ground, her body glowing as her magic increased. She focused on the anger and the pain she had once felt. That moment, that terrible moment when she’d held her sister broken and dead in her arms. Her dark eyes so very much like her own wide open, staring at nothing, her short gray hair cropped against her head.
Tears streamed down her cheeks, falling freely to the sidewalk below as the next lash of lightning came down and cracked the stone around Lamek’s hand away. Molly drew in a sharp breath as pain lashed through her chest, the same pain she had felt that fateful day almost thirty years before, the pain she had given to Lamek in the physical. Pearl had been her life, her partner in everything she had accomplished, and life without her had been uneven.
Another lightning strike, this time on Lamek’s arm. He cried out in surprise, his head moving to come alive. Molly stared at him and felt Faye step forward, but she tugged Faye back, keeping her there. She needed her, whether Faye saw that or not, she needed Faye in her life more than anyone else.
Lamek shouted at Molly, telling her to stop, but she didn’t listen. She focused on the lightning, dragging it down to him as rapidly as she could, wanting to make the process as short as possible. He didn’t deserve any more pain. Faye had been right. Joel had been right. She’d frozen him in place, tortured him so she didn’t have to feel it to herself. Pearl was her everything. Her big sister. The one who was her leader.
That had been what the fold had been so worried about, that the two of them were too close, that they shared too much. They’d attempted to separate them, and it had only drawn them tighter together. Their father had died for it, to protect their bond, and Molly wouldn’t let that memory, her sister’s memory go to waste.
Gasping, She drew down one more bolt of lightning, this one bigger than any of the others. It crashed right into Lamek’s chest, breaking the stone from around his middle until it tumbled to the ground below. Molly didn’t stop there. She pushed him down, set him back to his family, to his kind. He sunk below the surface as she created a magical path to the trolls under the city, and she closed it after him.
The last thing she wanted to do was talk to him, to admit she was wrong to the very person who she still firmly believed wronged her. As tears continued to flood her eyes, she built the stone back up, sealing it together as if Lamek still lived under the thin veneer.
When she finished the spell, Molly let her magic fall into place within her. She turned to Faye, cupping her cheek and bringing their mouths together. Faye wiped the tears from her eyes and nipped at Molly’s lips with her long teeth, exchanging energy for energy as Molly kept their bond in place.
Pulling back, Molly stared into Faye’s slate-gray eyes, eyes she had known nearly her entire life even though Faye hadn’t been born yet. When she turned to Malek, he stared at her with awe.
“How did you do that and remain standing now?”
Molly kept Faye’s hand clasped in hers, ready to make a confession to him she hadn’t told anyone in thirty plus years. “You spoke to me once of blood magic.”
“You didn’t—”
“Pearl and I spent years researching. We dabbled, we tested. Blood magic is not the evil the fold has made it out to be. It is wonderfully refreshing and freeing.”
“Molly—”
“The night Pearl died? She shared her magic with me. I am now her and me combined, joint together. There is no undoing the spell since she is dead, there is no use denying the magic I contain.”
“You mean you’ve got all her magic?” Faye asked.
“Yes,” Molly reiterated. “Malek knows the importance of that and the threat of it to the fold.”
“I knew you’d done something, but this?”
“Because of the cleansing?”
“Yes. You took everything in us to hold you. Without Faye there we wouldn’t have managed.”
“Then it’s a good thing I had her on my side, and you.”
Malek’s cheeks were still pale as he stared at her in shock.
“This is why I can’t return to the fold, Malek. You must understand.”
“They will bind you.”
“Yes.”
“How could you?”
Molly stepped away from him, keeping Faye’s hand in hers. “The choice wasn’t mine. Believe me when I say I would love to go back thirty years and make a different decision.”
“You still can. If you’ve dabbled in blood magic, then you should know you can.”
Molly parted her lips. “I may know how to and can do it, but to what end? What would I change?”
“Everything you have wanted.” He moved in closer to her, taking their joint hands in his. “Everything for us. Think of what you could change.”
“I won’t do it.” Molly reached up and cupped his cheek. “It’s not worth it. Malek, you are free to stay until you choose to return to the fold but know my answer will not change. This is my home.”
Molly walked away with Faye’s hand in hers. She had hoped her meaning was clear, not only to Malek but to Faye. They’d skirted around exclamations of love, talks of the future. They’d stayed rooted in the present for far too long. They would need to talk, eventually, about the past and the future, but until they had the time, she hoped Faye understood her meaning.
###
Faye flopped onto the couch in the game room, her leg brushing against Ben’s as she let out a huge sigh. She closed her eyes and tried to morph her body into the cushions, but it was fruitless. Ben stared at her with an odd look on his face, and she shook her head at him. She didn’t want to talk about it, or maybe she did and that as why she’d sought him out.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she shot back.
“Faye, what’s wrong?”
“Have you ever been to the arctic?”
Ben shook his head slowly. “What does the arctic have to do with what’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Faye popped her eyes open to stare at him. He did look concerned. Maybe she should try to mimic someone who was happier with what was going on so she wouldn’t have to worry everyone. “I was thinking about going up there.”
“What the hell for?”
She smirked. “There’s a mythological creature and I want to see if its real.”
“What kind of creature? The last time we went on the hunt for a mythological creature we came up empty handed, well, short-handed.”
Chuckling, Faye agreed. “Yeah, that was a wild ride. This is a creature I’ve known about for awhile, and I don’t think we’ll end up like last time, though I’m not sure we’ll come home with one either.”
“What is it?”
“Ljiraq.”
“I’m sorry, what?” Ben’s eyes widened. “What the hell is that?”
Faye shifted to sit up more fully. “It’s a shifting creature. Lives in the arctic. Can shift into any form it chooses. Doesn’t this sound a little familiar?”
Ben’s gaze shifted down to the ground.
“I want you to fully embrace this side of you if you’re going to do this. There’s no shame in what you are or who you are.”
“Right back at you.”
Faye’s heart clenched. “Touche. I was thinking the other day that we could go on the hunt for the ljiraq and test a lot of your skills in the process. Who knows, if they are real, then they might like you better than me.”
“We’re both shifters of sort.”
“Truth.” Faye smiled. “So what do you say?”
“Tell me more about it before I agree. I don’t exactly want to freeze my ass off for a theory.”
Laughing, Faye pulled up her phone and showed him a crude drawing that thad been made in the middle of the last century. It looked kind of like a mix between a ram, bigfoot, and human. The hair on it was long, its eyes wide, curled horns on the side of its head.
“That thing is ugly.”
“In this form, yeah, but they can look like anything, remember? Just like you. Except these ones, in theory, always have red eyes.”
“That’s not like me.”
“I know, but maybe it’s your long lost cousin or something.”
“Have you talked to Molly about this yet?”
“No.” Faye flushed. She hadn’t wanted to talk to Molly about anything yet. She needed more time to work through everything, all the information that had been dumped on her in the last couple days was too much. “She’s been too busy with the idiots who took the drugs.”
“You’re one of those idiots.”
“Yeah, but it won’t kill me.”
“You don’t know that. And you didn’t know that when you took it the first time.”
Faye pressed her lips tightly together. He was right. She just didn’t want to admit it. “What do you say? Want to go?”
“Maybe. I’ll think about it.”
“I need an answer, Ben. I’m leaving next week.”
“You’re serious?”
“Yeah. I’m coming back, don’t worry. I want to go find this thing, see if it’s real or not.”
“Why so interested in myth suddenly?”
Faye sighed. “I’ve always loved myth. Even growing up. Hell, I am a myth. I wanted to know more about me, and really until I found Molly, I didn’t know anything about vampires. They were still a myth even though I had been introduced into the world of Tainted.”
“I hear you on that. All right, if she says yes, I’ll go.”
“Yes!” Faye grinned. “Perfect. I’ll set it all up.”
“You going to tell me what’s wrong?”
“Nope.” Faye pushed to stand up, but he gripped her wrist and dragged her back down. “Fine.”
“Good.”
“I don’t know what to do with Molly, and you hate hearing about our problems.”
“That’s because all you two are is a problem.”
Faye cut him a sharp look. “If you don’t want to hear it, I can leave.”
“No, I’m sorry. What is it?”
Sighing, Faye rubbed a hand through her hair and tried to morph into the couch again. “Something she said to Malek.”
“What?”
“Something about coming home. I don’t know. It’s been bugging me.”
“Coming home?” Ben pulled a funny face, his eyes squinting as he stared at her.
