“Feeling's mutual.”

“Give me a reason, a real reason, to help you.”

This was where it got tricky. Being so ambiguous, Druids just didn’t step out of their comfort zones. Ever.

“I’m Tracking a Necromancer who's been stealing dead, and close to dead, children, and using them for his own purposes. . . .” I didn’t know what exactly he, the Necromancer, had been using the children for, but I would let her mind fill in the blank.

Several heartbeats passed, and with each one, her face paled a little more. “Children, used for his own pleasure. . . .” It seemed she didn’t want to name it, either.

I nodded and she shook her head slightly.

She touched her fingers to her throat. “My name is Deanna. I will help you.”

There was an immediate shuffling of the Druids and again, Dr. Daniels stepped forward.

“Deanna, you can’t help her.”

Will’s sister spun on the initiate, and I didn’t even try to hide my grin.

“Penance is what you’ll be doing for the next month. Now go!” Deanna’s back was to me, but by the look on Dr. Daniels’ face, this was a first.

“Penance?” She queried.

The power struggle was an almost visible thing. Druids moved either to back Deanna or Dr. Daniels. What the hell had I stepped into this time?

Deanna had five Druids behind her; Dr. Daniels had six. Damn, this was not looking good.

“I’m not doing anymore bowing and scraping to you,” Dr. Daniels said, her voice full of self-confidence. “I will be the leader now. Not you. There will be no penance on my shoulders.”

I cleared my throat. “You know, Deanna has already agreed to help me. So I’ll just take her with me and go.”

Dr. Daniels laughed, throwing her head back in an over-the-top move that just made me want to roll my eyes. What a twat.

Flicking my sword into the air, I strolled into the middle, right smack between the two groups of Druids. “Listen, I’m going to make this easy. Deanna is in charge right now. She’s going to stay that way until she gets back from helping me and these kids. You know how I know that?”

A glance at Deanna and then Dr. Daniel’s showed me their combined confusion. Dr. Daniels, who piped up, her attitude once again clearly showing.

“You don’t know anything of the sort,” she snorted, a dribble of snot escaping from her nose.

Grimacing, I lifted my sword up and pointed it at her right shoulder. “I foresee you spending some time in the hospital. That should eat up the whole who’s in charge business for at least a day or two. Long enough for me.”

“You wouldn’t!” Dr. Daniels screeched, but I’d already lunged forward, slicing through the meat of her shoulder, feeling her clavicle separate around my blade. She fell and my sword slid out easily. Blood spurted from the wound, quickly washing into the mud under our feet. The Druids around Dr. Daniels flew into action, lifting her up and carrying her away from us. Her screeching could be heard even over the occasional clap of thunder. The woman had lungs; I’d give her that.

Deanna glared at me. “You make me look weak.”

I wiped off my blade and slid it back into its sheath. The straps were stretching with the rain and the fit was getting sloppy. I was going to have to look into some new harness for my gear at this rate. “I make you look like you have a crazy bitch on your side. Not a bad thing in this case.”

She opened her mouth as if to argue, then snapped it shut.

With a few murmured words too low for me to hear, she sent her people away, and then moved to my side. “Come, let us get this done. You have bought me time, but not much.”

“Lead the way.”

With a huff, she strode up the embankment toward the tree where I’d left Pamela. We reached the base and the kid climbed down without having to be told. “Is she going to help us?” She pointed at Deanna.

“Yes, and if I remember correctly, it’s rude to point. So only do it if you want to insult someone,” I said.

Pamela nodded, her face a mask of sincerity. Shit, I was going to have to be very careful about teaching her bad habits. Then again, Giselle had said she’d given me a bunch of her own.

Deanna led us back through the sodden, mud-filled, rain-drenched forest with ease. She was obviously comfortable here, and while I wanted to ask her questions, I also had the feeling that it wouldn’t take much to send her back to her Druids. Which meant I had to play nice.

This was not going to be easy.

19

Back at the ‘lorry,’ as Pamela insisted on calling the car, Will waited for us. Though waited would make you think he was conscious. He most definitely was not.

Slumped over the hood of the car, blood trickled from one ear and a rake of claw marks bisected his bare back and ass.

I ran forward, Deanna and Pamela right behind. “Will. What the hell happened?”

He groaned and lifted his head. His eyes were purpled shut, lips were swollen, and it pretty much looked like he’d been shit out of a Harpy from a thousand feet up.

“The Destruction was waiting for me. That bitch Daniels knew we were coming. Must have overheard me on the phone at the station.”

Ah, that explained that. One more strike against the good doctor. Next time I’d be aiming for the left side.

I helped him to his feet and Deanna came close, laying her hands on either side of his face.

“Brother. This is not good.”

“Nothing we can do about it now,” he slurred out, groaning as we helped him into the back of the car, covering him with a blanket from the trunk. Pamela climbed in and pillowed his head in her lap. She was crying silently, her tears streaking down her mud-flecked face. Fuck, this had been some night. Certainly not one to put in the memento books.

Deanna didn’t drive, so that left me with the task of managing everything that was ass backwards. We drove into town with no problems though, and went straight to my suite, though Deanna argued against it.

“He has medical equipment at his home.”

“I have a werewolf I need to check on,” I said, pulling into the narrow driveway. Will leaned on me and I helped him into the blue suite, cringing once more at the sight of the gaudy decoration.

“Pamela, go shower and change clothes,” I said, and she reluctantly left us. I lowered Will onto the couch as carefully as I could. Deanna stood frozen in the doorway. “You coming in?”

“It feels as though a great darkness has been here.”

“Ah, shit, that’s the vampire you’re picking up on.” I grunted, throwing another blanket over Will.

“I have more clothes in the trunk.”

I nodded and stood to go get them when I realized that there had been no answer to my vampire comment and looked to where Deanna had stood. She was not in the doorway, or any other part of the suite, for that matter. I ran, opened the door and looked down the street, seeing her walking swiftly away. The bitch was leaving!

“Hey, where the f**k do you think you’re going?”

She glanced back and shook her head. I knew what would stop her—something that would stop a Shaman in their tracks too.

“Oath breaker!”

If she had brakes, I might as well have slammed a brick onto them. She stopped so hard and fast, her upper body actually tipped forward.

“What did you call me?”

People on the street were staring, but I didn’t care. What the hell did it matter to me if a human got a glimpse of the supernatural? They’d just write it off as some trick of the eye anyway.

“You heard me. You made a promise to help me, to help those kids. And now you’re running away. Oath breaker is the least of the names I could come up with.”

Deanna stood there, rain pounding down around her, but the weather still didn’t seem to touch her or her grey robe. Nice perk.

Finally, she turned and walked back toward me.

I let out a soft breath. If I didn’t have her help, I wasn’t sure I could nail down this bastard on my own. He was too fast at using the Veil to get away, too slippery, not to mention the whole zombie guard business.

“I do not want to deal with a vampire.”

“You won’t. He just wants me.”

Deanna stepped back inside the suite and I closed the door on the rain, though the sound of it still echoed through the house.

She went to her brother’s side; I went in the other room and got the medical supplies I had.

“Here.” I handed the kit to her, then went to check on Alex. He had moved, making his way into my bedroom, then to the far side of the room. Curled up in a ball, his face was buried under his bushy tail and he breathed deep, the sleep of a body healing. The shower was running full tilt and I could just hear Pamela humming to herself.

At least my two charges were alive and well. Now came the tough part.

Back in the kitchen, I went and pulled a chair out for myself. I had to phone Agent Valley and get him up to speed. The suite didn’t have a rotary phone, which meant I either went outside to find a phone booth, or I walked down to the station to face Agent Valley in person. Neither option was all that appealing.

Deanna was sitting beside Will, working on his back, cleaning out the claw marks. They were healing, I could see the difference already, but it was always good to get the worst of the foreign bodies out.

A soft pad of big feet snapped my head up. Alex limped out to me and put his head on my knee. “Alex come with Rylee.”

His golden eyes were tight with pain, his body was still badly injured and yet, his loyalty won over everything else. A suspicious lump in my throat rose and I fought it back down. This was no time for tears.

With a wave, I got Deanna’s attention. “Throw me the kit.” She closed the lid and tossed it across the room to me. I opened it on the table and picked out an herbal concoction that dulled pain. It might actually have an effect now that he was not in and out of consciousness. The mix also tended to dull the ability to think clearly, but with Alex, I was less worried about that than I would be with anyone else.