Chapter Sixteen
Neith
“Unless of course, it decides to rain freezing rain,” Reed points out, glancing up at the cloud-filled sky suspiciously.
“Wait, seriously?” I ask. “I would much rather it snowed than we had freezing rain, which sounds absolutely horrific.”
I may be being slightly dramatic, but the thought of freezing rain has my fire wanting to come out to play so it can cocoon me with warmth.
Which honestly sounds amazing, and the only reason why I don’t take advantage of it is that Griff specifically said that we shouldn’t use magic.
I’m also still learning the finer points of it, and while my magic so far has been reasonably instinctual, it is also mischievous, and I don’t trust it not to burn all of my clothes off, and then I would be naked, and my boob would probably drop off from exposure.
Just one boob. I’m almost certain that’s how it works.
Now there’s a disturbing image.
Fortunately, before I can really consider using it, we come across a path, and Griff turns to walk on it instead of walking across it and continuing on walking on what I’m assuming is usually some kind of field when it’s not covered in snow, although there are no fences, so it's not a livestock field. The path is still covered with snow, but at least it’s not quite as deep here, and it means that I can look up from my feet and look around at our surroundings instead of watching where I walk.
Scotland really is truly beautiful.
I have seen quite a few photos of Scotland. I liked looking at them and imagining how cool it would be to visit one day. None of those photographs have even come close to doing it justice, and Scotland may be on its way to becoming one of my favorite places in the world.
I hope that we get a chance to explore some of it while we’re here, but considering I don’t know how long we’re going to be here for, I’m not sure that we will have the time.
Maybe this walk won’t be so bad after all.
Just cold.
Zephyr
I find myself floating in the darkness of my dream, and I sigh.
Most people can find solace in their sleep, but apparently, I’m one of the lucky fuckers who can’t. My reality follows me into my sleep almost always. I wish I felt some sort of reprieve from the moments I’m awake.
There’s no such luck though.
The thing is, I need to fix the situation that I’m in. I have always felt a certain amount of urgency to get out of the exile that I find myself in, but now it's stronger.
I didn’t think that it was possible for me to want to fucking fix it more, but apparently that was because I hadn’t met her.
She has changed things in more ways than I thought possible, and yet, I can’t do anything about it. I can’t get to know her better, not like I want to, not until I have figured out a way to escape this prison.
Ethel wasn’t lying when she said that she didn’t kidnap me, nor is she keeping me prisoner. She has been my friend for several decades. She was also there for me in those beginning days when I knew nothing more than pain, darkness, and confusion.
Then, more recently, she has become my guardian of sorts. She has been aware of my situation for the last few decades, and when it became clear that I was in trouble, she offered me a safe place with her and House.
It pissed me off that I was being forced into hiding. I fucking hated it. Honestly, I wanted to rip out the hearts of those who were a threat to me. The problem with that is that in order to do that, I would need to know who has caused me to be in this fucking situation in the first place.
I know the trigger, however, I don’t know who then cast the spell to make it a permanent thing and how to reverse it.
I hate being a pawn in someone else's game, and I will find a way to fix the shit that they have caused and find out who is responsible.
However, figuring out who is responsible is actually not the first thing that I’m working on. I want the spell removed. I have to fix it so I can help her.
As soon as I wake up, I’m going to make some more pastries, because I’m stressed and I bake when I’m stressed, but also because Neith likes them, and I may not be able to do much for her in the state that I’m in with my hands tied and my mouth gagged, but I can make her pastries.
I need to get back to my books. I know I’m close to figuring this out. To breaking this curse.
Of course I’ve felt that way several times before, and yet here I am, still fucking stuck.
There is a small chance that this situation has given me anger issues, however I have never really been what someone would call calm, such is my nature, so maybe that’s not the case.
Something I am sure of though, is that the timeline has been moved up because Neith has realized who she is a lot sooner than anyone thought she would. Having met her, I’m not surprised at all, but my desire to protect her has gone from duty to a burning need.
She has to stay safe.
I’ll fucking ensure it.
Thankfully, I’m not the only one who is concerned with her safety, she has a group of incredibly strong men to ensure it too. I have a feeling that making sure that Neith remains safe is a full-time job that will need all of us.
Of course, my current situation is going to make my part in that difficult to do. Not impossible, but certainly difficult.
There isn’t anything that I can do about it now, so I do what I usually do when I’m in this dream state.
I allow myself to remember, I’m terrified to forget.
Neith
“We’ve got to cross that?” Raiden asks, his eyebrows raised.
“And I still can’t use any magic?” Van asks with a frown.
Griff shakes his head, “Nope. This is the final leg of the journey.” He points across the huge expanse of water, “Do you see that spec in the distance?”
“Just about,” Baz replies, squinting his eyes in order to see better.
“That’s my clan lands,” Griff smiles fondly.
“Your clan lands are a whole damn island?” Coen exclaims.
“Aye,” Griff replies and then clears his throat, “yes, we own an island off the very top of Scotland. It’s not on any maps, and magic keeps it hidden from the humans and all other supernaturals. It is very well guarded.”
I smirk, his Scottish accent came out then, just a little bit. I know that he lost it because of spending so much time away from Scotland growing up, but I think it’s really interesting that being back here, even before we’ve spoken to anyone, has it slipping back through.
It’s surprisingly sexy. His deep, rough voice, coupled with that snippet of Scottish accent, does things to me that I didn’t expect, and quite frankly, I’m going to do my absolute hardest to make sure that it sticks around after we leave, because hot damn.
“So we’re rowing,” Coen says, not looking entirely disappointed by the idea. “Is there even a boat that’s big enough to take us?”
Griff chuckles, “We don’t have to row, that would take forever, but we are going to have to go over in two boats.”
“Great, at least there’s no rowing,” Doc says, and then looks around and frowns, “Where are the boats?”
“Hopefully they’re still where they always were,” Griff replies as he starts to walk further down the shoreline.
“Hopefully?” Raiden asks. “It’s too damn cold for hopefully.”
I have to agree, I thought it was cold before, but the wind coming off the water has a particularly nasty chill to it.
“Er, Neith was supposed to stay away from water, and that is a rather large expanse of water,” Baz reminds us all, his worried gaze on me.
“Fuck,” Van curses as his worried gaze meets mine.
I shrug, “Honestly, I completely forgot all about that. I’m sure it’s going to be fine.”
“Is there no other way to get to the island? Or even a way to signal to them that we’re here, so that we can use our magic to get across instead?” River asks Griff.
Griff’s frown is heavy as he shakes his head, “No, there isn’t. Obviously, if something begins to happen, then use magic, we can deal with everything else afterward. Keeping Neith safe is the priority.”
“Guys, I really don’t think that it’s that big of a deal,” I say, and they all look at me skeptically.
“None of us wants to take any risks when it comes to your safety,” Ransom says simply. He adds, “Where did you say the boats were?”
Griff strides down the shore for a few more meters and then stops.
He mutters a few words, and then, to my utter surprise, a boathouse appears, a dock jutting out over the edge of the water.
It looks as if it has always been there, and it probably has to be fair.
I would imagine that there is just a glamour on it in order to make sure no one stumbles across it.
“Wait, if the island is hidden from view to all outsiders, how come we can see it out there?” Raiden suddenly asks.
“Because you’re with me, and the clan can always find their way home,” Griff explains simply.
“That’s pretty fucking cool,” Reed says as we head down the dock to the boathouse.
“Okay, so we should be able to get four in one boat and five in the other,” Van says as he looks at the two boats.
“Reed, Griff, me, and Ransom on one boat with Neith, that way if something happens she’s got the best chance of escaping whatever it is, and there are still fliers in the other boat to help those who can’t fly if whatever happens spills over to affect that boat as well. ”
“Agreed,” Coen says, although his eyes are rapidly moving over me, almost like he’s checking for injuries already.
I stay quiet, I know there’s no point in my pointing out again that it’s probably nothing.
I’m not even entirely sure that it is a warning anymore.
She could have been telling me anything about the water, it was the fact that she shouted that made me think that it was a warning, but quite honestly, it could have been the opposite.
She could have been telling me that I need to go to the water for some reason.
She could have been telling me that I was going to have to cross this water in order to get to the clan lands. The truth is, I have no real way of knowing what she meant. The more that I think about it though the more I’m thinking that it wasn’t actually a warning.
I climb into the boat and settle down next to Evander, who holds my hand in his. I know that it’s more in case there's an incident and less because he wants to hold my gloved hand.
Even if I did tell the guys what I now suspected, they would still behave as cautiously as they already are, so it really wouldn’t change anything.
I sigh and bury my face further into my scarf as the wind whips harshly at my cheeks.
I’m getting a bit twitchy. Needing to fight kind of twitchy.
There has been a lot of emotionally charged stuff going on over the last few days.
Dimitri being the main thing, and quite frankly, I need to turn it off for a little bit and kick some ass instead.
It will make me feel better.
Or I need to find some answers. That would probably help too.
I want to find out what’s going on at the other house and whether or not Winston and the other spirit guides are okay.
We haven’t heard anything from the Elders, which is stressing me out a little bit because they are a complete unknown, and I don’t like that.
The unicorn thing. Where the fuck do I even start with that?
And then there’s everything else. Casimir is still a problem, but is suspiciously quiet, and I really don’t fucking like it.
We always knew that Casimir was going to be a long game kind of thing, and that it wouldn’t be as easy as hunting him, killing him, and then that’s it, problem solved.
Unfortunately, he’s too smart for that and too well connected.
He’s been on the run for decades ever since he started the fucking war in Trieneliea, and if they couldn’t capture and end him, then I’m not really sure how the fuck we’re going to be able to.
We’re taking everything a step at a time, and I know that Ty has people on the lookout for any sign that Casimir is going to pop up again, but for the time being, it’s quiet.
It makes me nervous. I feel like it’s only quiet because he’s building up to something big, or I suppose he could be regrouping.
We may not have been able to take him down, but we have been able to take several of the people who worked with him or for him down.
We have Dimitri, which means HID doesn’t have a supernatural liaison anymore.
We’re almost ready to take HID down, which, as of the last update from Ty, the takedown is going to leave HID rather sparse for a while.
He said that he has it handled and that he had already informed the relevant and trusted humans in charge that there was going to be some slack that was going to need to be taken up.