“Good God,” he whispered, his eyebrows pulling together. He leaned away from the phone, then leaned back in. “Holy hell.” He squinted an eye, his face screwing up in horrified humor. “Jesus…phew.” He flinched. “This is way worse than the other day. This is like a spoof horror movie or something.”
He put the phone in front of him before picking it up to watch it again. This time he’d analyze. Then he’d alter. Then he’d likely make something even deadlier but more effective in some way, reducing energy or hitting more people or who knew what.
“You definitely do not see spells like this anymore,” he murmured, stopping the playback for a moment and tilting his head in thought. “We’ve seen a decline in overall magical power through the ages. Meeting Jessie and learning about the books in Ivy House has made me realize this. Jessie is the most powerful mage—or sorceress, whatever—in the world. That we know of, obviously. I’m a close second, and then that team of twins Momar has is more powerful than me, maybe Jessie, when they work together. In general, on average, we don’t see brute strength like Jessie, anymore. And Tamara Ivy might’ve lost some power when transferring her magic to the house. I can’t do the higher-level spells Jessie can do. But to create actual books with those types of spells in them, they would’ve had many people who could.”
Austin poured his concoction into a glass. “There could be any number of reasons why the power level dwindled through the generations. Maybe it happened because of mage in-fighting—the powerful killing each other in political maneuvering or power plays. Not to mention the fact that the mages we’vemet haven’t been family-oriented people. They seek money and power and don’t spend their time procreating. Not the powerful mages, anyway.”
Sebastian flared his eyebrows to concede those points. Nessa had to say, the family dynamic aspect was certainly true. Mage culture was more independent, each mage working toward riches and power and not so much toward building communities. Not in the traditional sense, at any rate. Obviously, some mages did settle down and have families, but the more powerful mages tended to pursue their interests, rather than family. At least in this day and age. There was no saying what it was like in the past.
“Anyway, it doesn’t really matter,” Nessa said. “However it happened, very few people can use those Ivy House books.”
“Momar does happen to have a couple that probably could, though.” Sebastian sighed and laid his upper body down on the table again. “The moment they see what Jessie can do, they’ll want to know how. They’ll want those books.”
“Ivy House is a strong deterrent,” Austin said as he headed out of the kitchen with Jessie’s shake.
“Yes, but I was able to get people on those grounds undetected.”
There was a scuff in the hallway as Austin abruptly stopped.
“I did the research, and I figured it out,” Sebastian said. “I devised a potion to hide from Ivy House. Momar has a few ingenious mages who made that thing at Kingsley’s. Ivy House isn’t impenetrable, Austin. It would be a mistake to assume it is. But even if they can’t get in to steal those books, if they see what ispossible, they have an opportunity to devise something similar. The question is, are they good enough? And after seeing what they did at Kingsley’s, I think the answer is probably yes, they are. This battle we’re fighting might get a lot harder before the end. We’ll want to be prepared.”
“Which means we’ll want to pour through those books,” Nessa surmised.
“Pour through them and weed out our competition.”
They needed to focus on the mages, rather than on touring the packs. They couldn’t study if they were constantly on the go. Austin and Jessie might have to split up to see this through, something that had probably occurred to everyone earlier when Jessie had made that speech, and later when that alpha had agreed with her.
Austin would not like that one bit.
20
Austin
The Jeep motor died,leaving Austin in silence as he sat outside of Drex’s house. A million thoughts rolled through his head, all lining up with what he’d already vaguely decided. It was a plan half-formed and with a million risks, but they didn’t have any more time or another choice, not anymore. That had become glaringly obvious. Now, he needed details.
He left the keys in the ignition and climbed from the Jeep. Jess was at the house napping and Sebastian wouldn’t be long in following suit. Nessa, after making Sebastian something to eat, had decided to stick around and start baking. This trip was winding down.
He let himself into the house as instructed and heard a murmuring of voices at the end of the hallway. The alphas were sitting around the large table in the dining room with pitchers of water and lemonade amid snacks. Two of the alphas had opted for a beer.
They fell silent when he entered the room, all eyes on him. They’d need to get a shifter’s version of pleasantries out ofthe way before they started planning. He hoped to hell they had some good ideas or he’d be making things up as he went, something that was bound to fail.
“Alpha.” Drex stood in greeting, and the rest rose respectfully.
Austin stopped from showing his surprise. They were treating him liketheiralpha.
“Greetings,” he said, because ‘hi’ seemed too informal, and then he felt like a social outcast with such a lame salutation. The Ivy House crew was rubbing off on him.
He tried again as he sat down. “How goes it?”
The rest sat with him except for Drex.
“Lemonade?” Drex indicated the spread before him. “Beer?”
“Beer would be great, thanks.”
Drex nodded and moved off toward the kitchen.
“Did Niamh not stick around?” Austin asked, cluing in through the Ivy House bonds to locate her whereabouts.
