“Yes, and no,” Angel said. “She thinks they are going to try to recruit him.”
“Wait… what?”
“Cassidy has spells to tear the Veil. Do you really think powerful men wouldn’t want access to that?”
“Holy fuck,” I groaned quietly. “It requires killing people.”
“As if that’s ever stopped them,” Angel said with a sigh. He let me go to add the veggies to the pan to sauté. “They’d nab you in a heartbeat, too. Mate bond or not.”If they knew I’d closed the Veil,went unsaid.
And that was bone-chilling.
I slid up behind him and wrapped myself around him from behind, resting as if he were my anchor, and really, he was. How was it possible to know someone for so short a time and feel utterly adrift without them? My power liked Angel, relaxing into the warmth he provided and handing over the virtual reins as if touching him left me a reliable ability to control the magic. And maybe it did.
“Nat sent a text message,” Angel said as he finished up the veggies, setting them aside to pour the first batch of eggs, all while staying still enough for me to hold him. “I turned down your notifications so you could sleep.”
“Did you get any sleep?”
“Yeah, it’s almost one in the afternoon.”
Well then, I begrudgingly let go of him and made my way to my phone.
A message from an unknown number, but I knew who it was. Nat.
Review the first fifteen pages of your grimoire.
When I flipped through the first fifteen pages, it was all about bonds, familiars, and the weaves to strengthen them.
“Are familiars common for variants?” I asked Angel as he set a plate beside my book with a giant omelet on it.
“Practitioners, not variants.”
That made me pause. “Like the necromancers who used shifters in the last war?”
Angel shrugged. “I’m not sure any of them had familiars, as a familiar is meant to be a partnership bond. They used people like puppets, draining the life from them and then raising their corpses to throw at the tanks.”
I flipped through the pages, annoyed by how simple it sounded. But didn’t a lot of things sound simple? My phone pinged with another notification. I opened the screen to find an unfamiliar app there and at least four dozen messages, all from our team and Victor’s team.
“It’s a private app,” Angel said, checking his phone too. “Bobby programmed it.”
And as I scrolled back, the discussion made my eyes go wide as saucers. They were discussing the classified files, annoyed that this level of detail had been kept from them. Ezra cursed up a storm. Remi provided highlights of cases indicating months, if not years, of this ritual behavior tearing the Veil. Wade played peacemaker, trying to keep everyone focused. Bobby created spreadsheets to document and categorize what everyone saw, and Tiana used that information to search the web and all social platforms for more details.
“Holy Christmas!” I said and glanced back at Ivan, fearing I’d wake him. I lowered my voice to a whisper. “They’ve built a whole conspiracy board without us.”
“They don’t like being kept in the dark any more than we do,” Angel said, a note of pride in his voice as he scrolled through his phone.
I went back to the grimoire, the words about familiars now feeling more urgent. If I was going to survive a shadow god, a cult, and the U.S. military, I needed every advantage. I typed a quick message into the team’s new app.
Question for the group. How much do we know about familiars? Specifically for necromancers.
The responses were almost immediate, a cascade of texts lighting up my screen.
Bobby:
Records are sparse. Mostly practitioner lore, not variant. Generally described as a symbiotic bond with a supernatural entity. Shares power, enhances senses.
Wade:
Like a witch with a black cat?
