“I found Carlyle.”
Tyne turned faster than Meyer could think of anything to say.Meyer thought he was going to run inside and leave him there, but instead, to Meyer’s surprise, Tyne paused.He reached back with his hand, clearly expecting Meyer to take it.
Meyer did.He’d follow Tyne anywhere, and he suspected that Tyne finally knew that.
Chapter Ten
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MEYER WASN’T SURPRISEDwhen they stepped into the castle to find chaos.Emory had yelled loud enough that everyone had heard him, including the humans who lived there.Marlow’s son Jason looked like he was about to bounce off the walls.He was standing next to his father, who was talking to Jarvis.Matthias, Parker’s best friend, was wringing his hands together as he and Ansley talked.Even Graham was there, looking slightly green.He was probably thinking about his brother and the fact that he was going to have to make a choice.Graham had already made his, but Simon was still working with Carlyle.Meyer suspected he’d made his choice, too, but Graham was probably hoping for his brother to change his mind.He didn’t want to lose him.Meyer suspected that he already had.
They all agreed to have this meeting in the dining room, so they headed there.Marlow had to fight with Jason because he wasn’t allowed inside, but Matthias glared at Parker until his friend could even consider trying to kick him out.
Meyer didn’t blame him.Jason was a child, and his place wasn’t in that meeting, but everyone else?They lived here.They were as much in danger as the mages and dragons if something happened with Carlyle.Hell, if Carlyle won this time, too, they’d be directly in his line of sight.Of course they wanted to know what might happen.
“That was very dramatic,” Jarvis told Emory when he came in.
Emory seemed to be on a mission.His shoulders were squared, and his chin was held high.He didn’t seem offended by Jarvis’s words.Instead, he slammed a piece of paper onto the dining table.
Everyone leaned in, including Meyer.He could see words scribbled there, but he couldn’t read them from where he was.He didn’t have to.He’d find out what the note said soon.
“I found Carlyle,” Emery said.
“How?”
“I talked to people.I thought I was aware of every one of Carlyle’s safehouses, but I wasn’t.I found someone who remembers Carlyle buying a place from their grandmother.”
“You can’t know for sure he’s there,” Ansley pointed out.
“The only way to find out is to go there, but I think there’s a good chance that he will be.He never told me about this place.He probably thinks I don’t about it, which would give us the upper hand.”
“Even though he doesn’t expect you to know about this place, there’s no way he hasn’t protected it,” Bennett pointed out.“He’s cautious.”
“He’s also full of himself.I’m sure he’ll have planted spells to stop or slow us down, but he thinks he’s better than us.It’s going to be his downfall.”
Meyer hoped that Emory was right.He wanted this mess with Carlyle to be over.
He glanced at Tyne.He wasn’t one bit surprised to see that his mage was fully focused on Emory.He was probably resisting the urge to shake the information out of the dragon.Meyer was glad when he didn’t.The last thing they needed was infighting, especially now that he and Tyne had worked things out.
“We can’t waste any more time,” Emory said as he glanced around the people gathered there.“If I had to guess, I think he’s still healing.He’s never been great with healing spells.We need to take advantage of that.”
“That’s what I’ve been saying,” Tyne grumbled.
Thankfully, Emory didn’t look offended.“We couldn’t do anything about him before, but we know where he is now.We need to strike.”He looked at Jarvis.“Today.”
Meyer held his breath.Jarvis was a cautious man.From what Meyer understood, the main reason he was the leader was that everyone trusted him and was willing to follow him.That didn’t mean that someone else wouldn’t try to take his place if they thought he was doing the wrong thing, though.Tyne didn’t look like the kind of person who wanted power, but he was stubborn and finally had Carlyle in his sights.He’d do anything to defeat the man, even if it meant taking the leadership away from Jarvis.
Meyer hoped it wouldn’t come to that.
“I agree,” Jarvis said with a nod.“But we can’t go right away.We need to be prepared.”
“We’ve been preparing since he was let out of the stone,” Tyne complained.
“And you saw how that went until now.We have to take advantage of the fact that he’s wounded, but even though he’s not aware that we know where he is, he’s not going to stand there and wait for us to attack.He’s going to defend himself and the place where he’s hiding.We can’t go in half-cocked and expect all of us to come out of this alive.Besides, I’m not risking Carlyle winning this.We were lenient the last time we fought him, but that’s over.”
Meyer was relieved when Tyne nodded.He knew how much Tyne respected Jarvis, but he also knew how badly Tyne wanted to get his hands on Carlyle.It was good to see that he wasn’t willing to fight with one of his closest friends just because he was being stubborn about something.
“We’ll go tonight,” Jarvis said.“That will give us time to contact our allies and get everything together.”He hesitated and glanced around the table.“It will also give us time to be with our loved ones.”
