Chapter 30
Chapter
Thirty
Franklin
I’m pretty sure I woke quicker this time.
Not that what I awoke to was something I wanted to see or experience.
Lydia groaned beside me. Our landing hadn’t been soft.
I’d been sprawled on my back and was quickly yanked up onto my knees, my arms twisted behind me and my wrists pinned.
Lydia was forced into a similar position.
“Momma! Franklin!” Boone’s worried voice kicked my heartrate into a higher gear.
“Boo—” His name was little more than a muffled sound as those damn shadows covered my mouth. They’d barely left enough room for me to breathe through my nose.
“Stop!” Boone turned frantic. “I don’t know what happened but—”
“How did you do it?” Huxley demanded as he stalked closer. “He is gone. Gone! What did you do?” Huxley hovered over me. Smoke curled from his nose, and ash scattered over me like snow. The very air heated, and sweat poured down my spine.
The shadow covering my mouth slid away, and I gasped, drawing in air in painfully heaping gulps. Nothing about our current situation should have made me happy. The grin tugging my lips spoke otherwise.
“A little trick I learned from a brilliant warlock.”
“Pops?”
Huxley’s shadows wouldn’t allow me to look at Boone.
“Impossible. You are the weakest of all the species. Not even a fairy could have broken his bindings. Not even the most powerfully magical being would be able to touch them.” Huxley’s words dripped with arrogant derision.
“Good thing I’m not a powerful fairy then.”
Huxley drew back, his goat eyes simmering as realization slammed into him. Lips pulling back, his sneer revealed a row of shark-like teeth. “You succeeded because you are so pathetically useless and weak.”
I wanted to shrug but couldn’t, given my shadow confinement. “I won’t argue that. Regardless, Deni is free.” I had no idea where he’d translocated off to. I took solace knowing he’d gotten out. That he was free of his enslavement.
“I can once more feel where Lydia Boone and Franklin O’Hare are.
The mechanism blocking them from my knowledge is now gone.
” I hadn’t even known Aurelia was here. Huxley still wouldn’t release my head, and I couldn’t get a good look around the room.
Had Boone come with anyone else? Were Phlox and Leon here with him? And if so, were they okay?
“Deni’s a brownie,” I supplied. “Huxley had him enslaved and was draining his magic, using him for his own perverted reasons. Deni was just a child when he was taken.”
I wasn’t sure if the feral sound I heard came from Aurelia or if the scuttlebutt was with her.
“Just like all masters. He used another against their will. The brownie was the reason I could not locate you earlier.” The level of hatred filling Aurelia’s words should have frightened Huxley.
If so, he showed no indication of unease.
“The brownie was mine.”
“Was being the operative word. I hope like hell that Deni made it home. And if he did, I can’t imagine his momma and poppa are going to be too happy finding out what you did to their child.
I’ve always heard brownies are peaceful by nature but vengeful when it comes to wrongdoing against their loved ones. ”
Huxley huffed, sending another cloud of ash raining down. “A couple of brownies is nothing.”
Dark laughter rumbled from deep within my chest. “Somehow I doubt it’ll just be a couple.” Brownies took care of their own. Not that they needed it, but I had little doubt Fairy would back them up and add whatever resources requested.
“It is no matter.” Huxley turned and stalked to a nearby fireplace. I desperately tried turning my head. I wanted—no, I needed to see Boone. But it was no use. I was stuck tight. Lydia too, if her frustrated huffs and silence were any indication.
Huxley grabbed a rock from the mantel, reverently holding it in the palm of his hands. “There is but one power on Earth or Fairy that will be able to stop me, and I hold that power in my hands as well. Isn’t that right, Necromancer Boone?”
The shadows wrapped around my neck, tightening. Lydia’s panicked gasps echoed my own. We’d known his plan, known we were going to be used to force Boone to be Huxley’s puppet. We’d known and hadn’t been able to stop the consequences. We’d been able to free Deni, but not ourselves.
The world turned fuzzy and static filled my ears. I thought I heard Boone shout something, but I couldn’t be certain. Darkness crept in around the edges of my vision and pain flared in my head.
And then, just like that, I could breathe again. Bent over, Huxley’s shadows held me upright as I took in great, heaving lungfuls of air. Lydia huffed just as loudly as me. I could pick out sounds again, the anguished rage filling Boone’s words sitting like a stone in my gut.
“If you harm them, I’ll have no reason to do what you want,” Boone argued.
“I only need one of them alive.” Huxley’s voice was even and controlled once more. “And once I release the djinn within, it won’t just be my power that you need to worry about. Death is but one way to punish you and them. I have had millennia to explore more creative methods.”
Aurelia moved, now barely visible within my line of sight. “You should know that I will not be pleased if Lydia Boone is irrevocably harmed.”
“Aurelia.” Lydia’s voice was soft with emotion. “Don’t place yourself in harm’s way for me.”
Aurelia’s head tilted, and at least two of her tattoos briefly flared.
“You are an interesting creature, Lydia Boone.” She stepped out of my vision again.
“Necromancer, you will watch over Fuzzy Britches. You will keep her safe.” I wasn’t sure how Boone could keep the scuttlebutt safer than Aurelia.
Regardless, when she stepped back into my sight line, the scuttlebutt no longer sat upon her head.
“I am going to remove Lydia Boone from this situation,” Aurelia flatly stated.
“You can try.”
“You cannot stop me, shadow borne. Your abilities are nothing compared to my own.”
“Maybe not, but how do they compare to another djinn? Tell me, Necromancer Boone, if given a choice between protecting your mother and mate or this djinn, who will you choose? If the only way to save the humans is to destroy Aurelia, will you do so?”
My heart ached for Boone.
Mouth no longer covered, Lydia spoke when I couldn’t. “Don’t you allow him to use me against you. I love you. Follow your conscience. Do what you have to, even if that means humph.” Lydia’s words cut off as she was silenced again.
Before the same could happen to me, I shouted, “What she said.”
Huxley’s lips pulled back into another snarl.
“So proud and brave when you believe there are options.
I had hoped you would see reason, Erasmus Boone.
However, reason seems to have failed you.
Aiding me would aid yourself and those you care for.
It is such a simple request, nothing for one of your abilities.
You would be held in the highest esteem and given every luxury you could ever hope for.
I would demand others respect you. Necromancers would no longer live on the fringes of society settling for its scraps and contenting themselves on anonymity.
“And yet you would give this all up? For what? A species that cares not if you exist? For a world that despises necromancers—a world that would just as soon murder one of you as look at you. It is a peculiar path you seem hell-bent on taking.”
God, I wished I could see Boone. I pushed against my restraints again, this time gaining enough ground to see the wonderous necromancer I’d fallen in love with.
Leon stood tall and vampirically transformed nestled up tight behind Boone.
Phlox was in his shifted form, his furry body clinging to Leon’s shoulder.
Cradled within Boone’s arms was Fuzzy Britches.
Our eyes connected, and I could see all the longing and love I felt reflected in Boone’s gaze.
Peace settled deep inside my soul. No matter what happened, no one and nothing could take this from me.
Boone and I’d found that rarest of unicorns—the thing others spent countless lifetimes searching for.
We’d found each other. The miracle of that simple fact was not lost upon me.
Eyes still locked on me, Boone spoke to Huxley. “It is a concept you could never understand, and I won’t waste what time I may or may not have left attempting to explain it to you.”
“Fool.” That one word grated through Huxley’s lips. “We will see where your bravado and loyalties lay. I wish for you to awaken, djinn.”
Aurelia was the only one that didn’t gasp. She remained as she was, feet squared and body at the ready as a silver, smokey mist filtered out of the inkpot. That mist quickly coalesced, increasing in density as it took form.
The djinn was tall, broad and distinctly male.
Bald and covered in tattoos the same as Aurelia, this djinn was dressed in combat fatigues and worn boots.
Numerous dog tags dangled from his neck, their metal clanking together as he stretched his arms over his head.
Overly large ears sat on either side of his head, piercings running down their length.
Rolling his shoulders, our newest djinn tilted his head from side to side as his deep blue eyes scanned the room.
His lips twitched into something that appeared close to fondness. “Aurelia. Been a while.”
“It has, Helios. Far too long.”