Mac slowed, then stopped. “Canyon’ll do it.”
“I think—” Timber said, taking a moment to relax and put his phone in his pocket. “—that if you kill me, Canyon actually won’t do anything for you, and in fact, he’ll avenge me before he does a lick of work for anyone ever again. Better not sleep.”
Mac considered. “Jaggar’ll do it.”
“Maybe, or maybe only I can.”
Mac stomped around and went back in the door. Timber heard drawers open and things flung about. He walked that way, meaning to jump on Mac’s back if he was anywhere near the storage alcove, but Mac was already done, trash can in hand, heading his way.
“Dahlia Paige is Crew’s One True Mate,” Mac growled. “Crew’s seen the future, and if you don’t find her quick, she fucking dies, so get to work, Timbo. Her life is on your head.”
Timber moved against the wall as Mac powered past him down the hallway.
“Shit,” he said, as Mac disappeared. He hurried back to the desks, closed all the drawers Mac had opened, then went into the alcove to check on Canyon, who was sprawled on his side, breathing deeply.
“Hey bro, maybe you got an assignment, but so do I. It’s important and I might need you. Hurry up and come back to the real world a-fucking-sap, got it?”
Canyon snored.
Timber hurried back to his desk and went to work looking for Dahlia Paige.
9—Abigail
Abigail sped back to the house in the golf cart, her eyes on the columns rising above hedges. She jumped the curb, floored it all the way to her place, got out, rushed up the steps and inside the front door. Once inside, she slammed it shut and locked every single lock, then hurried to the elevator, wishing she had time to say spells. Inside, she pressed the button and sank against the wall, clutching her chest and drawing in long breaths, unable to recall a single spell anyway.
The elevator chugged to the second floor and the doors slid open. Abigail stepped out, muttering, “Ethedra, have to get to Ethedra…”
She shuffled down the hallway, back to her suite that led to the attic. Inside, she closed the door to the bathroom, the one up to the attic, and the door out to the hallway. She sat on the single bed, where she caught her breath for a few precious moments, then lay down in the middle and held on to the sides. The bed spun like a merry-go-round, once, twice, three times, and the portal activated, turning here to there, and there to here. Abigail lay still until her brain stopped spinning and then she fought her way to her feet, feeling wrong somehow. She turned and saw her cask had fallen to the bed. She snatched it up and slung it around her shoulders, then stood as tall as she was able, taking a few more precious seconds to rest, looking around the room.
It looked the same as the room she had just left, but she was no longer in Kurzwell Townhouse. She was at Kurzwell Manor, the townhouse’s exact twin, located at the head of Abigail’s estate and flagship business, ‘The Morning Wood Inn’,which covered the top third of Morning Bluff. As the crow flew, she was now 18 miles from Kurzwell Townhouse.
Abigail hurried up the inset stairs into the attic. On the wall, Paisley’s veil glowed, making Abigail’s stomach hurt. The veil was a representation of the magical protection in Paisley’s brain that would descend upon her mind, dropping her into an unwakeable sleep, if ever the unthinkable were to happen. Abigail had placed the veil at the moment of Paisley’s birth… and the unthinkable was fucking upon them.
She crested the top step and turned away from the veil, hurrying into the far dark recesses of the attic with her hands out, able to see almost nothing, but knowing exactly where the rotation room was. Panicked in a way she hadn’t been in a hundred years, she groped her way to it, then found the door and moved inside to the chair situated in the very center of the room. She sat, and the room spun around her with a ‘whiiizzzzzzz’noise, as the portal activated.
The room spun to a slow stop. Abigail stood and plunged forward to the door.
She was now in the Templum—a natural cavern buried in the rock of Morning Bluff, a mile away from where she’d just sat down. The Templum was a place of power with seven world portals and a pinprick hole to the Pravus, which oozed power like a geyser sprays water. Abigail had found the cavern centuries ago and tried to never stray too far from it and the protection and power it offered her.
Abigail opened the door and peeked out of the rotation room into the vast cavern of the Templum. The electric lights were off, casting the center of the area into darkness. Torches lined the walls, lighting the stone steps that led to a rooftop exit, and the various furniture and implements placed here and there. To the left was a long rock slab fashioned like an altar—the BofoxSanctum—where she’d attempted to summon thebofoxso many times.
The openings to the seven portals were visible—she’d had wells built over each of them—and they were all dark. In the center was a hole to the Pravus that oozed hazyvvystto slide along the floor and collect in the corners. Above the hole, just below the rocky ceiling, was a metal box floating in mid-air, held there with a whole ton ofvvyst. A pipe extended into the box, piping a misty haze from it down to the floor. There, it joined with more pipes and flowed to equipment that collected power for Abigail’s uses. Inside the box was her granddaughter’sshiftsegen, a divine gift of power Abigail had appropriated for the good of her family. It had been down inside the mine, collectingvvystfrom the Pravus at an unbelievable rate, until a month ago when there’d been an incident, and it had rebelled. Now theshiftsegenwas encased andvvystwas being extracted directly, but it was slow.
On the cavern floor, one of the wells filled with light and Ethedra stepped above it. She was dressed in a floor-length ceremonial black gown with a hood up over her head and was holding a vortex of energy between her two hands. The vortex was one of Ethedra’s most powerful contrivances, able to see the future and transmute energy. Ethedra was Abigail’s ‘counterpart’ from the world Orion. They’d met in a magical accident, and grown into staunch allies over the last century, each useful to the other in uncommon ways.
Abigail lurched forward.Thank Rhen! Thank Ethedra!
Ethedra slowly turned her way.
“He took Paisley!” Abigail yelled, the raw cry hurting her throat, the cavern amplifying her words. “Khain took Paisley!”
She doubled over, and coughed, emotional pain ripping through her, because Paisley was her favorite, and full of hidden power. Paisley was likely to be the one to succeed where Abigailhad failed so many times at summoning thebofox, and until the bofox was summoned,not one of them would be free.
No one knew exactly who or what the bofox was, butfoxenmyth and legend said thebofoxwould break the Tether to Khain for allfoxen, and instill them as equal towolven,bearen, andfelen.
Abigail coughed again and again, her mind swimming with her failures. It had been over a century since any of her grandbabies had been stolen, and the thought of Paisley in the Pravus with the demon made Abigail’s coughs turn to retching. Her chest tightened and her head pounded with sudden pain.
She grabbed at her chest, groaning at the pressure there, then she tipped, finally losing her battle with life. She fell over, the full mental weight of her death crashing in on her. She knew exactly how it would go—the knowledge of her clan that she kept from Khain would immediately rush to him. He would know where all of her progeny lived, down to the most useless half-cur, and he’d be able to find each of them in the Ula immediately. Those who had magic would scramble to protect themselves and some would succeed but most would fail. Khain would gather all he could and force them to serve him in disgusting ways. He’d tear their secrets from them, and then he’d know where to find the Van Crimsons and the Van Boesons. Once he’d pilfered most of thefoxenfrom the Ula, his stolen knowledge and powers would return to him, and he would immediately know how to access Rhen’s body, his main goal. Within days of Abigail’s death, Khain would march into Serenity with hundreds offoxenforced to do his bidding, and no one would be able to stop him, notwolven, notfelen, notbearen, not all of them working together.
