Shadow's Awakening: The Shadow Warder Series, Book One (An Urban Fantasy Romance Series) (5 page)

Glenn left her side to check on the man she’d hit and grunted in annoyance. From the corner of her eye, Hannah watched him jog down the stairs. Checking on the man she’d kicked? He was back seconds later, his face dark with anger.

“You stupid bitch. I told you not to try this again. You managed to injure both of them. They’ll be useless for days. Goddamn it,” Glenn swore.

He drew back his arm and punched her in the jaw. Still tender from the day before, pain flooded her face in a scalding wave. Hannah’s brain felt like it rattled in her skull. Her vision grayed out.

“Broke that idiot’s skull and tore up his brain. The other moron has a broken neck from falling down the stairs. Like a bunch of old women. Can’t handle one sick girl. Motherfucker.”

Glenn hit her again, three times in rapid succession. Eye, eye, nose. A crunch of bone in her nose and she knew he’d broken it. In a day or two she would look like he’d never touched her, but that wasn’t much consolation when his fists rained down on her unprotected face. Feet scraped in the doorway. The electric buzz in the room thickened, crawling on her skin.

“Clean this mess up,” Glenn barked at the new arrival.

“What do you want me to do with them?” the figure asked.

Hannah couldn’t tell which one it was. Not one of the ones she’d hurt. She giggled at the absurdity. Glenn looked down at her and slammed his fist into her jaw again.

“I don’t give a shit. Drag them downstairs and throw them in the garage. They can come out when they’re healed.”

“Okay.” She heard heavy dragging sounds and the thump of a head smacking one step after another on the way down.

“I told you that you wouldn’t like what I’d do if you tried to escape again.” Glenn leaned into Hannah’s raw and bleeding face. “I can’t kill you. That would be a waste. Like spilling fine wine. But I can make you beg for death.”

Hannah didn’t respond. She imagined spitting in his face, sending a messy glob of blood and saliva right up into his hungry eyes. But she couldn’t seem to get her lips to move. She let her mind drift, absorbing as little of the punishment as she could. The more she let her consciousness float, the harder Glenn’s fists struck. A passive victim wasn’t any fun, but he was too angry to use the finesse necessary to get a response. Hannah allowed herself to sink deeper. She’d known it was a bad plan. But at least she’d tasted fresh air before he caught her. That was something.

The vibrating phone intruded into Conner’s sleep. He rarely turned on the ringer in case it sounded while he was out hunting. Middle of the night calls weren’t a common occurrence in Conner’s life. It didn’t occur to his sleeping brain that the annoying humming sound might require attention. The humming paused, then restarted. Conner’s eyes popped open as he finally absorbed what he was hearing. He rolled over and reached for the pants he’d thrown over the chair by his bed. Hopefully the phone was in there. It was, vibrating like it wanted to jump from his pocket and smack him in the head. Conner flipped it open and held it to his ear.

“What?” he growled, his comfortable sleepy haze already receding.

“Are you awake?” asked a strange male voice.

Conner’s brain immediately kicked into gear. Sitting up, he turned on the bedside lamp. The room flooded with yellow light.

“I’m awake,” he said. “Who is this?”

“You won’t believe me when I tell you,” said the voice.

“Tell me anyway,” Conner said.

“I’m an Oracle. A Shadow Oracle.”

As if that needed to be clarified. Conner wasn’t aware of any kind of Oracle except a Shadow Oracle and they were extremely rare. Shadow Oracles didn’t have anything to do with Warders. They absolutely didn’t call them in the middle of the night on their cell phones.

“You’re right,” Conner said. “I don’t believe you. How did you get this number? How do you even have a cell phone? I thought Shadows couldn’t use electronics.” There was a short laugh on the other end of the connection.

“You Warders think you rule the world and you know jack shit about anything. Not all Shadows have problems with electronics, just some of us. And hello? I’m an Oracle. Getting your number was the easy part.” He paused, waiting for another objection. When none was forthcoming, he said “I have a job for you.”

“This isn’t the protocol,” Conner said. “You’re supposed to call one of the Directorate and tell them the situation. They have a handler assign a Warder. Since when do you call us directly? This is bullshit.”

A sigh drifted across from the phone. “We’re wasting time, Conner. My name is Zach. I’m a Shadow Oracle from the coast. We have a problem. We need your help. What more do you want?”

“Proof that you are who you say you are,” Conner said. “Tell me something no one else knows.”

“I’m not a circus sideshow, asshole.”

“If you’re not willing to give me any proof, I’m hanging up and this conversation is over,” Conner said.

“Untrusting pain in the ass. You’ll wish you hadn’t asked,” Zach said in a taunt. “Here it is. As dark secrets go, this one is pretty tame. You really are a Boy Scout. You pretend classic westerns are your favorite movies, but really you love family movies. Your stash is hidden in the bottom shelf of your bookcase behind the reference books where no one will ever find them. Until a few years ago, your favorite was a tie between
Mary Poppins
and
Swiss Family Robinson
. Now you love the
Shrek
movies best. You watched the second Shrek two days ago. On your tablet you changed the name to
True Grit
.” Zach didn’t bother to hide his amusement.

A hot flush crept up Conner’s neck. Zach was right. As secrets went, it was pretty tame. But for a six foot three, two hundred and fifty pound soldier, an addiction to kid movies qualified as highly embarrassing. Fleetingly, Conner wished he could have been hooked on bondage or gambling. Anything but the Disney Classics Collection.

“Shit,” he said. “You’re right. I wish I hadn’t asked.”

“I warned you,” Zach said.

“If you tell anyone, I’ll find you and kick your ass,” Conner said. It was an empty threat, but it made him feel better.

“Who am I going to tell? We don’t exactly run in the same circles.”

“Good point.” Conner forced himself to refocus. “Okay. Tell me what you’ve got. Why did you call me instead of following procedure?”

“This is different. You’re different. The world we live in is shifting and you’re going to help put it to rights.”

“If you want my help, speak English, not fuzzy Oracle talk,” Conner said. “It’s the middle of the night and I want to go back to sleep.”

“Right. You like Shrek? Then this should work for you. I need you to rescue a girl from a dragon,” Zach said. “Well, a metaphorical dragon. The girl is an untrained Shadow. We usually find them early when they’re born into the human population, but we missed this one. She only just popped up on our radar. Very powerful. Young. She’s being held by a nest of Vorati. We’ve got about three days before they hand her over to a Voratus more powerful than any you’ve seen before. If he gets her, she’s lost. I need you to go in and bring her out.”

“Why me?” Conner asked. “Why not send your own people after her?”

“It has to be you. We don’t have anyone close enough who can handle a nest this size. The girl is running out of time and you’re her best chance,” Zach said. “There are seven Vorati holding her. I have info that says the number might have dropped recently, but I wouldn’t depend on it. Bring backup if you can.”

“I haven’t said I’d do it yet,” Conner said, exasperated.

“You’re just going to leave her there? One defenseless girl with seven Vorati? Can you imagine what they’re doing to her?”

“Jesus,” Conner said. He didn’t want to picture the girl’s suffering. The images flashing through his head were a few steps past ugly. “I thought you said she was powerful.”

“She is. She will be,” Zach said, impatient. “But she has no way to defend herself because she doesn't have any idea what she is. Without any training her own body is probably attacking her as much as the Vorati. And they know what she is. If they like to torture humans to feed from their pain, can you imagine how much better a Shadow tastes? The word delicacy doesn’t even come close.”

Conner tried not to think about the ramifications of what Zach was saying. Warders and Shadows stayed as far apart as possible. Had for over fifteen hundred years. Avoiding all contact with Shadows was one of the first things every young Warder learned. The separation meant he didn’t know much about the Shadows, only what they were taught in school and the myths that got passed around outside of class. He did know that they had direct access to the energy around them. They could control that energy, usually through telekinesis.

Most of them had specialized abilities like healing or empathy. A few were supposed to have more aggressive talents. He’d heard stories of Shadows who controlled heat with such precision they could boil the brain in their victim’s skull. Their natural abilities made them extremely powerful, but he could also see how it would make them ideal food for a Voratus. All of that energy drawn through their bodies and translated into fear and pain? It truly would be a feast for the creatures.

“Fine. Okay,” Conner said. “I’ll get backup and we’ll go get her out. Where is she?” Conner didn’t have any doubt that Kiernan would be up for saving the girl and killing a nest of Vorati.

“I don’t have her exact location yet. I’m working on it. As soon as I have anything solid, I’ll text you. It should be this morning.”

“You don’t even know where she is?”

“She’s close,” Zach said. “This isn’t an exact science, you know. I don’t get a perfect vision with a street address and rescue plan built in. We’re going to have to do our best with what we’ve got.”

“Then text me when you know where she is and we’ll get her out and bring her in,” Conner said, preparing to hang up.

“Wait,” Zach said. “There’s one more thing. After you get her away from the Vorati, you need to keep her with you for a few days. Somewhere safe.”

“I can’t do that,” Conner said. “For one, I don’t have anywhere to take her. I have a job to do. I can’t babysit some Shadow kid. Protocol says I have to turn her in to my handler and she’ll make sure the girl gets to the Shadows.”

“Inflexibility isn’t an admirable trait, Conner,” Zach said with exasperation. “If we didn’t need a choir boy for this, you’d be really annoying.”

“Fuck off,” Conner said. “I’m not going against policies I believe in for some guy who calls me in the middle of the night and says he’s an Oracle. On the chance you’re not completely full of shit and there really is a girl being held by a nest, I’ll play along. But then I’ll turn her in like I’m supposed to. Take it or leave it.”

“Look,” Zach said. “If you turn her in right away, she’s as good as dead. You have to trust me.”

“I don’t even know you. We’ve got a long way to go before I trust you.”

“Yeah, point taken. How about this. Promise you’ll call me before you take her in. Can you at least do that? Just call me.”

“I’ll call you,” Conner said. This was a bad idea. It was only a phone call, but with his agreement to contact Zach before he turned the Shadow in, Conner felt the situation slipping out of his grasp. “Text me when you have her location.”

Conner shut the phone and flopped back onto his bed. In a million years he never would have guessed a Shadow would call him, much less an Oracle. He thought of his earlier conversation with Kiernan and laughed. He’d said he wanted to talk to a Shadow. Then he’d been so shocked to hear from an Oracle, he hadn’t thought to ask what else Zach knew. Debating over the time for a few seconds, Conner opened his phone again and called Kiernan. He wasn’t surprised to find that Kiernan had just ushered out his evening’s company and wasn’t yet asleep. Conner filled his friend in on the Oracle’s phone call. Kiernan was in.

Conner hung up and rolled onto his side, folding his pillow under his head. Looked like he’d need his rest. Tomorrow he was going to kill a dragon and rescue a girl. Conner smiled as he drifted to sleep.

Chapter Three

The afternoon sun shone on the field surrounding the farmhouse, lending the scraggly grass a healthy green glow. Spring had come to the Carolinas. While it wasn’t yet hot, the air was warm and humid from the downpour the night before. Conner and Kiernan crouched in the woods across the field from the farmhouse. Sitting alone in the middle of several acres of grass and weeds, the house looked a little worse for wear. The bushes lining the porch sprawled in overgrown spikes of green. Mulch had worn away from the weedy beds. A few brave daffodils struggled for the sun, bright splashes of yellow against the neglected structure.