Chapter 45
Chapter
Forty-Five
B ram clears his throat. “Well, some have speculated that a rogue vestige of the Anarki is wreaking havoc?—”
“And some have been attacked!” O’Shea refuses to hear Bram’s vague answers. “While others claim they’ve seen Mathias. I know something terrible is happening. I held Auropha’s mangled, branded body before I buried her,” he chokes out.
My heart hurts for Tynan. He’s genuinely anguished. And furious, as if he has a death wish. If he avenges Auropha first, Tynan O’Shea will die a satisfied man.
“I deserve the bloody truth!” Tynan insists.
What the sodding hell is going on? Mathias on the loose should be all over magickind’s version of the news. Maybe he’s been living in a fishbowl? Confusion and desperate need twist his expression. The man clenches his fists, clearly trying to hold back. Tension vibrates in the air. O’Shea is close to snapping.
Finally, Bram sighs. “You know I’m not allowed to speak of Council matters.”
“Do not fuck with me. I loved Auropha. She was to be my mate after her transition. If that Satan’s spawn raped her until she found her nextlife, then I want to show him his. The more painful his death, the better.”
I hold my breath. Ice curses softly. Duke studies Bram, as if waiting for a cue. Will no one tell this grieving man about the Doomsday Brethren?
“Damn it, have you formed a clandestine army?” he demands. “There are whispers. I visited the Pullman family after they were attacked. One of the neighbors thought you might be gathering warriors to combat Mathias and doing it under the Council’s nose.” He rises and growls. “If you’re fighting, I want in.”
“Rumors,” Bram returns weakly.
My jaw drops. Then I snap my mouth shut. Why is Bram lying?
“Spot-on rumors, I’d say,” Tynan sneers. “Only in dire circumstances would I find a Deprived like Rykard supping at the same table as the ultimate Privileged. You need only your friend Lucan MacTavish to complete the picture. Where is he?”
Dead silence falls. I bite my lip. Can’t these people see Tynan’s anguish? Why won’t they help the man? Seeing how much his searing loss has crushed him almost breaks my heart. How can they refuse this poor man something as simple as the truth? Besides, if the odds are so seriously against the Doomsday Brethren, don’t they want another warrior?
“Lucan is injured,” I finally say, testing the waters.
Every head at the table whips in my direction, especially O’Shea’s. His gaze fixes on me until I feel pinned as surely as if he squashed me to the ground.
Oops, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.
“And they’re fighting Mathias as a group, human?”
How does he know I’m human? Not important now. Instead, I catch Bram’s gaze, silently asking why he won’t tell O’Shea the truth. Finally, the blond wizard sighs.
“All right. Unofficially, yes. We have formed a group, the Doomsday Brethren, designed to both keep the Doomsday Diary safe and fight Mathias, who has returned from exile, and his Anarki. If you take the information about the Doomsday Brethren to your grandfather, I will deny it to him and the rest of the Council with my dying breath.”
“Why would I end a group that can help me avenge Auropha and prevent this tragedy from befalling another family? I’m relieved you’re taking action. I know the Council will do nothing to quell Mathias. They’ll merely deny his existence, despite news like this.”
O’Shea pulls a scrap of paper from his pocket I would recognize anywhere. It’s my article from Out of this Realm about the battle in the tunnel. I gasp.
“You read my story?” The words slip out before I can stop them.
“This and the others in the series.” O’Shea crosses the room, hauls me out of my chair, and grabs my shoulders. “You’re the reporter? What else do you know?”
Suddenly, Caden steps between us and forcibly removes his hands. “Don’t touch my—the woman.”
Tynan pins him with a contemptuous gaze. “You’re clearly a MacTavish.”
“Caden, Lucan’s younger brother.”
The distraught man grabs me and hauls me close again. “Until someone gives me information, I’m going to keep asking her questions. She’s talking, at least.”
The murderous look O’Shea tosses Bram chills me. He’s deadly serious.
“She’s already told you all she knows,” Bram insists.
He’s trying to look unconcerned. But I sense the tenseness in his shoulders, the slight pull of his mouth.
Tynan looks ready to explode. “Let me fight with you.”
Caden snarls his way. “Let her go and leave. There’s more here than wand waving.”
Tynan raises a dark brow. “Meaning?”
“In for a penny, in for a pound,” Bram grumbles. “Mathias is ‘recruiting’ Anarki involuntarily, using human soldiers for his army once he rips out their souls. They don’t wield magic and seem impervious to it, so the only way to defeat them is through human methods. Ever punched a man? Fired a gun? Sliced someone in two with a sword?”
Tynan gives everyone the once over, seemingly gauging whether the others know these methods of war. Slowly, he releases me. “I’ll learn.”
Bram shakes his head. “I can’t risk it.”
“A handful of weeks ago, few of us knew any of those things, either,” Hurstgrove points out.
“I can teach the lout quickly, should he manage to curb his temper,” Marrok adds. “An emotional warrior is a sloppy one.”
“I’ll curb it. Just…damn it, let me fight.” Tynan curls his hands around the sides of an ornate dining room chair, his knuckles turning white.
“If I let you fight beside us and you’re killed, your grandfather will do everything in his power to see me separated from the Council and my head severed from my body. No.”
“You need more warriors,” Caden argues. “I’m not staying. Lucan…” He shrugs painfully. “He may never fight again. Shock comes, Shock goes.”
“Shock Denzell?” O’Shea asks, incredulous. “His family has always supported Mathias. Isn’t he on the other side?”
Bram doesn’t answer. He turns to Caden instead. “Your point?”
Hurstgrove jumps in. “Mathias is quickly swelling his ranks with human soldiers he’s conscripting. O’Shea is willing to fight. You allowed everyone else here to participate with the understanding that their safety was on their own head. Why change the rules for him? We need him as much as he wants to join. It’s not as if we have more appealing options.”
I wince at the blunt truth.
“I absolve you of any and all blame if something happens to me,” Tynan assures.
“Your family won’t.”
“Burn my body, then. They’ll simply think I disappeared. The great Bram Rion has ways to protect his precious reputation, I have no doubt. But don’t exclude me because you’re afraid of an old man like my grandfather.”
Oh, that’s a shot across the bow .
Animosity hangs thick in the air.
Marrok stands suddenly, clutching the hilt of his sword, always strapped about his hips. “Have you brought your wand?”
Tynan looks at Marrok as if he’s gone mad. “I never go anywhere without it.”
“Come with us. I will test your fighting prowess, and Bram your magical skills. If you have aptitude, mayhap you can join. Bram?”
Obviously, he doesn’t like being boxed into a corner, but he sees the logic. “If you possess skill with a wand and can demonstrate the ability to learn human combat, I’ll consider it.”
At Tynan’s eager nod, Bram shoots Marrok a rancorous glare and follows the pair. A moment later, the back door slams. Hurstgrove rises next and exits after them. Then Ice. Olivia and Sabelle follow.
Suddenly, Caden and I find ourselves alone. I rise and take a few steps toward the hall—until Caden wraps his hand around my arm and pulls me back.
I whirl to him, certain that what’s about to happen will make a great story. “I want to see.”
“And I don’t want you involved any deeper.”
I’ve always been independent, and that will never change. Besides, while this is a story that could make me, it’s also a consequential one every person—human or magical—should read.
“Unlike you, I’m not one to bury my head in the sand.” I jerk free and stomp away.
He grabs me again. “What does that bloody mean?”
“These people need you. And you plan to turn your back on them because you think it’s not your fight? I never knew Marines were afraid.”
Caden’s blue eyes narrow. “Is that what you think? I’m not afraid. If I survived two tours in desert shitholes, I can survive this, I assure you.”
“Then why won’t you fight with your people?”
His pulls away. “Because they’re not. I left England and everyone magical at eighteen. All this wand waving and the like, it isn’t normal.”
“Normal? You’ve already transitioned. You can’t change that. What magickind can do is extraordinary…amazing. Humans would kill to have your abilities. A gift like yours can help take down a madman. And you want to walk away from it?”
He crosses his arms over his chest, mouth thin with anger. “Why don’t you want to follow your parents and join the academic crowd?”
I hesitate. “I just didn’t. It didn’t fit me.”
“Precisely!” Caden throws his hands wide.
If anyone tried to force me into that tediously dull, pretentious academic scene, they’d have to drag me kicking and screaming. I don’t fit there. Square peg, round hole. But this isn’t about a career. This is his heritage! Still, I sense Caden’s reticence is deep.
My gut tells me he isn’t being completely honest. Given that, how can he possibly claim I’m important? He feels responsible for me, but his unwillingness to truly share himself screams that he doesn’t love me.
It hurts.
“They need you,” I say quietly.
He shakes his head. “They need someone passionate about their cause. That isn’t me.”
“What’s the real reason?” I should bloody stop trying to make him share himself, but I keep hoping.
Caden recoils. “I don’t want to discuss it.”
He doesn’t trust me, not with his story, not with his secrets. Not with his heart. And he doesn’t care for me enough to try. I have no one to blame but myself. Bloody stupid impulse to write in the book.
“I can’t make you. It’s simply… Bram and the others won’t survive without able wizards on their side.”
Caden closes his eyes, and I almost regret my words. Almost. But I can’t skirt the truth. Even if he doesn’t want to hear it, he belongs here. He’s a wizard. By virtue of his brother’s illness and his sister-in-law’s rape, he has a stake in this fight. Heck, I barely know Anka and I’ve never seen Lucan, but my heart goes out to them. And for the people who have tried to help Aquarius, I resolve to help however I can.
Caden shrugs his shoulders uncomfortably. “More Tynans will appear at Bram’s door as word inevitably spreads.”
“Why doesn’t everyone know about Mathias and the Doomsday Brethren?” I anchor a hand on my hip. “I gather Bram wants to keep the Doomsday Brethren hush-hush from the Council so he can operate without their interference, but Tynan has only heard whispers of Mathias’s return. While people are being attacked. What’s going on?”
Caden pinches the bridge of his nose. “Bram sits on the magical Council that governs magickind. There are seven councilmen in total. Tynan O’Shea’s grandfather is among them, as is my uncle. Bram has pushed them to advise magickind about Mathias’s return, but the others are controlling bastards who prefer to pretend problems don’t exist. Bram wants a transcast. It’s a television-like broadcast using magical mirrors. They were established for just such emergencies.”
“And the Council has refused?” My jaw drops.
“They don’t see this as an emergency. Some have even written off the ‘problem’ as pranksters stirring up trouble for the sport of scaring people.”
“That’s insane! If they only saw Anka’s condition… The poor woman could barely speak coherently when I first met her. And this Auropha; Mathias killed her. That’s hardly a prank!”
“Despite the fact Auropha MacKinnett’s father sat on the Council and the girl was murdered by Mathias, the curmudgeons won’t budge. They’re a traditional lot, according to Bram. I think they’re afraid.”
“Magickind should know. This is censorship! And very dangerous to people caught unaware. I want to talk to Bram.” And the first item on my agenda is the thing I excel at most. “Everyone must know about Mathias so they can protect themselves.”
He frowns. “Why?”
“I’ve never done a… What did you call it? Transcast. But I’m a reporter. In an emergency, I don’t have to be magical or entertaining, just informational.”
He leans in with a scowl. “You want to transcast to magickind?”
“It’s the only way I can help. I’ll never learn to fight or be able to wave a wand. But by God, I can keep people informed.”