End Stage Page 3

  “Yes.”

  “That’s why you’re with me.”

  “That’s not why I stayed with you, Brad, and you know it.”

  “You felt guilty.”

  “I felt guilty, but I didn’t have to stay with you.”

  “You didn’t have to, and now I’m wondering if you shouldn’t have.”

  “Brad…”

  He got to his feet, turning back to me. “I don’t know what to make all of this. I mean, the things you’re telling me are impossible to believe.” He looked around the inside of the condo, turning his attention back to me. “Michaels is in on this, isn’t she?”

  I nodded slowly. There was no point in denying it to him. Brad deserved my honesty. At this point, I wasn’t sure if I was going to have to find a way of removing his memory of this. Maybe it would be better if we went back to not knowing. Barden likely had a way of wiping someone’s mind. If he did, was that what I wanted?

  It might’ve been better for me not to know, but now I did know, now I understood the way Brad would react, I didn’t know if there was any way for me to change what I would do or say.

  “Is that why she’s been gone?”

  “Kate is… Well, I don’t really know how to describe what Kate is. But she’s been gone for a while, though in her case, she thinks it’s only been a few months.”

  “What? She’s been gone for two years, Jen.”

  “I know she has, but where she is, time travels differently. It’s why when I was gone, I thought it was only a few hours, but it was days.”

  He watched me, and opened his mouth as if to say something before shaking his head. “I don’t know how to take all of this in.”

  “I wanted to tell you, but I wasn’t sure how to do it.” I got to my feet, forcing him to look at me. “When I learned about this world, I know how hard it was for me.”

  “How long ago did you learn?”

  “Only a few years ago.”

  He grunted. “A few years.”

  “I hadn’t known I had any connection to this world for all that long, either. Only since that vampire came into the ER –“

  Brad jerked his head around toward me, staring at me with eyes that went wide.

  I should have been more careful. It was one thing to let them know magic was real. It was hard enough for anyone to grasp, and I remembered how difficult it had been for me to wrap my head around the idea there was real magic in the world, and that there were people who had real power, but now here I was telling him that it wasn’t just magic that was real but something else.

  I was making a mistake. Worse, I was forcing Brad to learn about things he would have been far more content to know nothing about.

  “Vampires?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Vampires are real.”

  “Not in the same way you think about them in movies. You aren’t going to have to worry about getting attacked by one.”

  “That’s a relief,” he said, shaking his head.

  “They’re still dangerous.”

  “Of course. They’re vampires.”

  “Brad –“

  “What else is real?”

  It was at this point where I debated what to tell him. There was a question about what he even needed to know, and yet I was no longer sure how much he would even believe. The way he looked at me, the incredulity in his eyes, made me suspect he wasn’t even sure himself. I had demonstrated magic, but even that could have be nothing more than a trick. If I started going into the possibility of vampires and shifters and creatures from across the Veil, I would be bringing him into a very different world.

  “Everything you’ve heard about in mythology is probably real in some way,” I said.

  “Everything?”

  “As far as I can tell, everything from myth has come from what really exists on the other side of the Veil.”

  “And this is the place Kate – and you – have been.”

  “It is. It’s dangerous. And I wouldn’t have gone other than because she needed me.”

  Brad stared at me, saying nothing. I didn’t need him to. It was then I could see the change in him. It was his posture that shifted, the way he crossed his arms over his chest, the way he set his feet, positioning himself just far enough away from me I wasn’t going to be able to reach him. And it was the fact he made no attempt to come closer to me.

  I wanted nothing more than to let him wrap his arms around me, to hug me, to tell me that everything was going to be okay. After having been on the other side of the Veil, having suffered, nearly not surviving, that was all I wanted, and yet he didn’t want it.

  “I think I’m going to need time to think about this,” he said.

  “I understand.”

  “I don’t know if you can.”

  I forced a smile. “I do understand. I went through the same thing. When I learned about Kate, I didn’t have any access to magic.”

  “Am I going to suddenly develop powers?”

  I shrugged. “I doubt it. It doesn’t usually work like that. When I developed my connection to abilities, it came because I had always had them. What happened to me is unusual.”

  “Right.”

  “And it’s unlikely anything similar could happen to you.”

  He tried to hide the relief in his eyes, but he didn’t do a good job.

  “I think I should go.”

  “If you have to. I wish you wouldn’t.”

  “It’s just that I…” He squeezed his eyes shut, taking a slow breath. “I think I should go.”

  Brad headed toward the door, and I followed him, reaching for him, but he didn’t turn back to me. He stepped out in the hallway, disappearing without looking back at me.

  That might have been the most painful part of all of it. He’d left me, but he had left me in a way which told me he wasn’t coming back.

  I pushed those thoughts away. It was a painful memory, but it was the last one I had of him. Because of that, I wanted to hang on to it, to see if there was anything more I could remember, to see if there would be a way for us to understand, but in that time, I hadn’t seen him again. We had spoken on the phone, but our conversations had been brief. Nothing more than that.

  And now… Now I was traveling out of the city with my vampire elder, and heading toward shifters. I was leaving medicine behind.

  Was that what I wanted? I had fought against it for so long, straining to try to keep myself integrated with both worlds, but the more I had, the harder it was for me to do so. And yet, I was a part of this world. Barden and the others had proven to me I had the ability to be here. With my connection to the innate talent I possessed, the ability to trigger spells, I was able to do those things. And turning my back on it would be turning my back on part of myself I had enjoyed learning about.

  The car slowed, and I shook those thoughts away, focusing my mind. When I did, I found Jean-Pierre watching me. “We are here,” he said.

  “Fine,” I said softly.

  “If you aren’t sure about this, then perhaps you should remain here.”

  “I’m not sure that’s safe for me.”

  “Perhaps not.”

  I took a deep breath, meeting his gaze. “I’m going to be fine.”

  “You keep saying that.”

  “Because it’s true.”

  The car came to a stop, Jean-Pierre watching me, and then he pushed open the door. As soon as he did, a sense of power drifted from somewhere beyond the door, outside of the car, and I braced myself for it. Whatever else was to come, I needed to be ready. Reaching into my pouch, I felt for some spell coins, prepared for what was to come.

  3

  When I stepped out of the car, I looked around the forest. Massive trees rose around us, a mixture of pine and elm, all carrying the fragrance of the forest. It had a heavy pine odor to it, but it was mixed with wet earth, of decaying leaves and moist soil, and even a mixture of unseen flowers.

  There was a sense of power all around. It fill
ed the space around me, drawing my attention. I could feel the energy of this place. It was different to the power I detected when I was around those on the mage council. The longer we were here, the more certain I was of its source. It was shifter magic, a power I had only experienced a few times before.

  “Do you feel it?” Jean-Pierre asked.

  I nodded. “I can feel something.”

  He kept his gaze locked away from me, staring at the trees, at the branches, and everywhere around him. His head darted from side to side, almost as if he were trying to ensure something didn’t happen to him.

  “What are you worried about?”

  “I’m worried about everything,” he whispered.

  “Why everything?”

  “Because I have no idea what we might encounter.”

  I held onto one of my spell coins, and decided to trigger it. Drawing up that power came from a place deep within me. As I did, I let the energy of the triggered coin flow outward. It was a probing spell, one Barden had helped me form. Using it allowed me to understand what other powers were around us. By doing so, I was able to investigate whether there was anything to be worried about here.

  There was energy here, and the sense of other spells, but they weren’t spells I was accustomed to finding. Strangely enough, there wasn’t anything for me to trigger here. But that was the reason Jean-Pierre had brought me. I was sure. What did he think I was going to be able to do that he couldn’t? If there was nothing for me to trigger, there wasn’t going to be any way for me to help.

  I searched the trees in the forest and tried to find something to help me understand if there was anything here which might be triggered, but didn’t detect anything. If there were other sorts of runes, spells that were trapped here, I wasn’t finding them. Jean-Pierre wouldn’t find them, either. That wasn’t the vampire strength.

  “Where are they?” I asked.

  “They know we’re here,” he said.

  “I’ve met the shifter alpha from this part,” I said.

  He frowned. “I didn’t realize you were so well connected within the magical world.”

  “It was before I knew anything. I helped Kate.”

  It was easy enough to remember the alpha’s name. I had always made jokes about it, teasing Kate that the shifter was the little mermaid, but after having met her, I wasn’t sure if teasing her was the right thing. She was a powerful woman and someone who demanded respect. She would have enough power to destroy me if it came down to it.

  Then again, now things were different. I had the ability to use my own magic, even if it were minimal. With enough protections, I should be able to keep myself safe. But that would be in any place other than her home.

  “I don’t detect anything,” I said.

  “They are coming,” he said.

  I stared into the forest, looking for movement. I didn’t see anything, and yet, there was a sense trending toward me. It was power, and a sense of magic. The more I focused on it, the more certain I was. I closed my eyes, thinking about the pull of magic and the way it drew to me. I had enough experience with various types of magic that I thought I could use that experience and knowledge to help me find what was coming toward me. But the more I looked, the harder it was for me to determine if there was anything here.

  And then I felt it. It was a slithering sense. There was no other way to describe it other than that. I was always able to detect magic, the chill that worked along my body, rolling through me, and in this case, that chill came, but it was mixed with something else. It was mixed with power and it pulsed. Bursts of cold worked through me, something like a drumbeat. The cold throbbed within me. When it came the first time, it did so slowly, and gradually built, increasing in intensity. “I feel them,” I whispered.

  Jean-Pierre was there, standing next to me, his breath warm up my neck. “What do you feel?”

  “The sense of magic. The same way I always feel magic being used around me.”

  “You can feel them?”

  “I can feel magic. You knew that.”

  “I do know that.”

  I watched him, before turning my attention back to the trees. “You weren’t sure.”

  He shook his head. “I can never be sure your connection to your abilities would be the same with all species.”

  “I was able to detect the fae.” And it wasn’t just the fae, but others on the other side of the Veil. It shouldn’t surprise me I would be able to detect this now.

  “Good. I would have you create a protective barrier around us.”

  I glanced over at the car. “Right here?”

  “Perhaps we take a few steps out,” he said.

  “Will they know?”

  “They will, and it’s possible they will recognize what kind of mage you are.”

  “I’m no mage, though.”

  “Which should unsettle them.”

  We stepped away from the car, and I dropped a coin, triggering it. A barrier formed around us, surging with the bloom of power. On a whim, I added another one, a second layer. I had learned that adding multiple layers, like an onion, created significantly more protection. It was difficult for one layer to be crashed, but then a second layer always offered another protection. The combination of them would be such that we should be safe enough.

  There was still the chance they would slam into the barrier, but if they did, we would have to be prepared for that.

  “Only another moment more,” Jean-Pierre whispered.

  “What about your chauffeur?”

  Jean-Pierre shook his head. “He’s fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I glanced behind me, and flicked a coin, sending it toward the car. I triggered it, erecting a barrier around the car as well. It wouldn’t be nearly as potent as the one around us, but I wasn’t about to leave the chauffeur unprotected. I knew how Jean-Pierre felt about his people and how much he was willing to protect them. I remembered how upset he’d been about a vampire dying that he was connected to. I was surprised he wasn’t more interested in trying to protect his own.

  And then a creature emerged from the trees.

  The shifter looked like an enormous gray wolf. Thick fur covered his body, and deep yellow eyes stared out at us. There were others behind him, and they prowled closer, hackles raised.

  Fear coursed through me. It was cold, reminding me of the sense of magic, and I wasn’t sure if it was mine or whether it radiated from Jean-Pierre. I doubted the vampire would feel fear. He’d lived too long, experienced too much, to be afraid of the shifters.

  Another shifter came from the darkness. This one was a deep brown, and a scar along the side of this shifter revealed exposed skin. With a surge of power which left me cold, the shifter changed shapes. And then Ariel stood before us.

  She appeared the same as when I’d last seen her. She was short, compact and muscular, and completely naked. The scar I’d seen on her was across her abdomen, and it looked angry, though had healed completely. The injuries she’d sustained must have been terrible, and I could imagine what pain she would have been when she had experienced it.

  She stalked forward, moving with a lithe grace.

  “You aren’t supposed to come on your own,” she snapped.

  “I thought it best for the two of us to have a conversation prior to the meeting.”

  “And you weren’t supposed to bring anyone else.”

  Jean-Pierre glanced at me, a hint of a smile. “I believe you know Dr. Stone.”

  “Should I?”

  “She is a friend of Kate Michaels.”

  Magic surged again, rolling from the shifter. When I slammed my barrier, I felt it, almost enough to send me staggering. I pushed power through it, through the coin, and tried to solidify, but wasn’t sure if it was going to be enough to maintain that hold. With the power she was sending toward it, she might be able to overwhelm anything I was able to hold onto.

  “Dr. Michaels didn’t have any friends who were mages.”

&n
bsp; “And Dr. Stone didn’t realize she was a mage until recently.”

  “Is that right? And here she is holding enough power to withstand me.”

  I sensed satisfaction rolling off of Jean-Pierre. This time, I was certain it came from him and not from anything else. Why would he be satisfied with that? Was he trying to prove something to me or to himself? Or perhaps it was neither. Maybe he was trying to prove something to the shifters. If that were the case, I would have to try to figure out what it was.

  “Not all mages are like Dr. Stone.”

  “I’m well aware of that, Jean-Pierre.”

  That at least answered whether or not the two of them knew each other by name. I had not been sure. When it came to Jean-Pierre, and the things he knew, it was possible he might not have known Ariel personally. He isolated himself, keeping himself protected from the outside world, worried about ensuring the stability of the vampire elders and the chain of command within it.

  “Is there someplace we can talk?” he asked her.

  “You came here. I thought you would talk here.”

  Jean-Pierre glanced behind Ariel to the other shifters.

  “They won’t listen,” Ariel said.

  “I’m not convinced,” Jean-Pierre said.

  “You’re the one who came into our lands.”

  “I came here because of the meeting request.”

  “This isn’t how the meeting should be.”

  “I understand, but the circumstances are unique these days, are they not?”

  Ariel cocked her head, and part of her jaw shifted, elongating slightly, before retreating. “Have the mage shift her barrier.”

  Jean-Pierre glanced at me, waiting. Shift the barrier? I wasn’t sure if I would be able to do that. I was having a hard enough time holding the barrier in the first place. Attempting to modify it and change the direction of it would have been hard for me to do in any situation, let alone one where I was so scared.

  There was one way I could do it, but it would involve using another spell coin. If I did, I would be revealing the nature of my connection to Ariel. I had a sense revealing anything to her was dangerous.

  Ariel and Jean-Pierre waited.