The Lost Enchantress (39 page)

Panic spurted to life inside, making her breath come fast and shallow. Every gangster movie she’d ever seen and years of covering crime stories told her that being locked in a car trunk rarely ended well.

Easy, easy
, she told herself, deliberately taking slow, deep breaths in an attempt to steady her nerves. How the hell had she gotten there? The last thing she remembered was getting off the elevator. With Hazard. Could it be his trunk she was in? Had he drugged her? Or knocked her unconscious before tossing her in his trunk? Was she losing her mind? Of course it wasn’t Hazard’s trunk. He had no need to shanghai her. And he would never hurt her. She knew it as surely as she knew her way home.

There was a much more obvious candidate for villain: Pavane. The thought of him had been hovering at the edges of her mind; now it pushed to the front and panic began to bubble its way back to the surface. It had to be Pavane. The fact that she had no recollection of how he’d pulled it off nor any idea what had happened to Hazard only alarmed her more.

Being a sorcerer, and by all indications a powerful one, Pavane wouldn’t have had to resort to drugging her or clunking her on the head. In fact, he’d probably consider such methods beneath him. He would have used magic, and Eve was suddenly reminded of all the things she hadn’t learned from Grand over the years, of all the wasted opportunities to acquire knowledge . . . knowledge that would have come in handy at that moment. If there’d been enough room to move her legs, she would have kicked herself.

Besides being dark and smelly, it was also quiet inside the trunk, and she jumped when the silence was broken by the metallic clink of the lock release, followed by the trunk lid lifting.

She gulped the fresh, cool air and looked up at a starless evening sky that was quickly blotted out by the craggy face of Phineas Pavane looming over her. Eve flinched and bumped her head on a piece of metal. His eyes were too black and too bright, and his thin lips were pulled back in what passed for a smile, revealing uneven teeth.

“My dear Enchantress, you look so uncomfortable. Allow me to help you out of there.” He offered his hand.

“I don’t want your help.” Her tone was stiff, like the rest of her.

Avoiding his hand, she climbed from the trunk with a notable lack of grace, stumbling when her legs resisted being asked to stand upright so suddenly. How long had she been stuck in there?

“You are a spirited one,” he observed with obvious approval. “Once you acquiesce to your fate, that vigor will serve us well. You should be warned that the sooner that occurs, the more . . . accommodating I am likely to be.”

“I don’t want accommodating,” she snapped. “I just want out of here.” She glanced around to see where
here
was and was chilled to see rows of headstones and stone monuments on all sides. A cemetery. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Pavane would choose to hole up someplace creepy. There were no lights and, she noted glumly, no exit in sight. The idea of trying to find her way out of there in the dark was scary, but still better than the alternative.

She turned to go, and as soon as she did, two men she hadn’t known were there closed in to stop her. Pavane waved them off with a frown, then raised his right arm out straight in front of him. He was holding something in his hand, and Eve immediately recognized the moonstone brooch the woman in the high-rise lobby had worn pinned to her shawl.

“Exsisto etiam,”
he cried, and the sudden, bright flash of light from the stone brought memory rushing back.

“You,” she said, glaring at him. “The old lady in the lobby . . . that was you.”

He nodded. “It was.”

“You used a glamour.” She had learned about a few things from Grand. That was one of them.

“I did.” Preening, he swept his free hand in front of himself, and with barely a shimmer of air the old woman was standing there in his place.

“Dearie, would you mind holding the elevator for me?”

Eve recognized the woman’s voice.

He repeated the sweeping motion with his hand and the illusion was broken.

“I appear as I choose to appear,” he boasted. “You will not move.”

He shifted his attention to the two men, and Eve quickly discovered he meant that literally. She couldn’t move her legs; it was as if the commands streaming from her brain to her muscles were being blocked or overridden. Somehow he was able to use the moonstone to control her, first at the elevator and now here. Now she knew how Hazard felt when she’d done it to him at the auction.

“Go now,” he said to the two men. He pulled a small leather pouch from his coat pocket and tossed it to the man closest to him. “Give this to your master in keeping with our arrangement.”

“Master?” the man echoed, looking confused. “Oh. You mean the boss.”

“Tell him I am well-pleased with his services, and that should matters not unfold as planned, I may soon call on him again.”

“Sure thing,” the man replied, shutting the trunk.

“Wait,” Eve cried as they started to get into the car. “Please wait. Please don’t leave me here with—”

The men slammed the doors on her plea and drove away, and what meager light there had been went with them. With no moon and no stars above and fog hovering at ground level, the world around her was reduced to shadows. Cold, damp shadows. A light breeze ruffled her hair and gave rise to an assortment of unsettling sounds, perfect fodder for her proficient imagination.

She was scared. Heart-hammering, dry-throat, cold-sweat scared. And managing to hold on to her deteriorating composure only by reminding herself what Hazard had said about Pavane needing her help if he wanted to remain in that realm. Which he apparently did. He’d gone to the trouble of conjuring a glamour and abducting her because he wanted to use her, not hurt her. In fact, she got the distinct impression he looked on her as his personal Golden Goose and wouldn’t want to do anything to jeopardize the golden eggs he was expecting her to lay.

“Come along,” he said, dropping his hand to his side.

Come along?
She was about to remind him that she couldn’t move when she discovered she could. She’d taken only a couple of steps when he turned back, his stern expression readable even in the darkness.

“Do not think to resist,” he warned her. “You cannot prevail over me without drawing on the power of your talisman, and I have seen to it that will not happen until I am ready. I also took the precaution of seeding these lovely grounds with some nasty traps, inhabited by some equally nasty old sods, on the slight chance you do manage to slip away from me. Did you know that necromancy has long been a particular talent of mine?”

Necromancy, the art of manipulating the dead. Eve shivered and recoiled at the same time. If he was bluffing, it was working. She was definitely having queasy second thoughts about charging into the darkness alone. Instead, she reluctantly followed him along the narrow paved road in the opposite direction from the one the men had taken.

When she didn’t move quickly enough to suit him, he took hold of her upper arm and pulled her along. “Quickly, Enchantress. I have no time to indulge your dawdling.”

After walking for several moments, he steered her off the road and onto an expanse of overgrown grass. Here, there were no pale, hulking headstones, only a mausoleum straight ahead. It was built of sandstone bricks and had a sharply angled roof with several decorative, cone-topped spires at each corner. If not for the location, and the headless stone angel standing guard in front, it could almost pass for a fairy tale-cottage in the woods. Like the one where the Big Bad Wolf devoured the grandmother and laid in wait for Red Riding Hood, Eve thought grimly.

Pavane hurried her up a handful of steps, and the solid-looking black door at the top swung open at the wave of his hand. Once inside, another flick of his wrist lit the candles that had been set on every available surface. Eve sucked in a quick breath. Old habits die hard and slow, and the sight of all those flickering candles still made her uneasy.

She turned her attention to the angels pictured on a trio of stained glass windows at the rear of the chamber, and tried not to think about the contents of the coffin-sized marble drawers lining the walls on both sides of her. The wall of windows curved outward, forming an impressive backdrop for the ornate stone altar. A number of items, a pendulum and chalice and dagger among them, had been arranged on top of the altar. Pavane had been busy.

He moved to the other side of the altar and waved her closer.

“Come, come. I have everything prepared, and we must act quickly; the resin of dragon’s blood is particularly unstable when it sits too long.”

“Heaven forbid,” she muttered under her breath, having no idea what he was talking about.

“Come closer, woman,” he ordered in a loud, impatient voice. “And be quick about it.”

Eve remained where she was, shoulders back, fingertips in the front pockets of her jeans in what she hoped was a convincingly fearless pose.

“No.”

S
he stood her ground as Pavane’s surprise flashed to anger, and he gathered himself to glare down his nose at her. “No?” “That’s right. I know why you brought me here; you need my help in order to remain in this realm permanently. Well, you can forget it. After everything you did to my family in the past, and to Hazard, and God knows how many others, do you really expect me to help you to stick around so you can have another shot at it?”

“That is precisely what I expect. And precisely what you shall do. You’re far too kindly not to.”

“You’re wrong, Pavane. I don’t feel at all kindly toward you.”

“I wasn’t talking about me.”

His confidence bothered her. He’d proved he could use the moonstone to incapacitate her, but Eve suspected that whatever he was planning to do at that altar was going to require more active participation on her part. And he didn’t seem at all worried about getting it.

“The ritual requires T’airna magic and T’airna blood,” he told her. “I prefer it come from you and that you share it with me willingly, but if you prove difficult, I warn you now that I will not waste time on you. You’re not the only woman alive with T’airna blood in her veins. As you say, you have family to think of.” He rubbed his fingertips together, his needlelike gaze boring into her. “Your sister is the obvious second choice. Chloe, is it?”

Fear sliced through her.

“But she is so far away; even for me it would take considerable time and effort to bring her here. More than I can spare, I’m afraid.”

He sighed heavily, but Eve knew better than to feel relief.

“Someone more close by then,” he went on. “The crone? Or your niece. Rory. Sweet Rory, so young, so . . . malleable. And, I would venture to say, far less trouble than you are proving to be. I think it would take very little effort on my part to convince young Rory to do what I tell her to do.” Eyes glinting coldly, he raised his left hand into the air beside him and suddenly she was seeing Rory in her room at home, stretched out on her bed studying, with her iPod on and her head nodding in time to whatever song was playing.

He gave her a moment to watch, ample time for panic to come scratching.

“She will make a fine substitute. Don’t you agree?” he asked.

The fear she’d felt when he first mentioned Chloe’s name was a whisper compared to what roared to life inside her now at the thought of him getting his hands on Rory.

She shrugged one tense shoulder, doing her best not to let him see how effective a threat it was. “Another glamour?”

“No. What you see is conjured but very real, a glimpse provided by one of the many portals through time and space that exist for those who are clever enough and not afraid to use them.” He dropped his hand to his side and Rory’s image disappeared. “I’ve proven that I am not afraid. You have not. Perhaps fear is the reason you’re content for your birthright to remain lost. Perhaps you would be relieved to have your niece take your place here with me so you can go on hiding from the truth and shirking from your destiny.”

“I’m not afraid; I just don’t trust you. You could be bluffing. You said yourself you waited centuries for an enchantress with the power to call you back. That’s me, not Rory.”

“To be sure. But the ritual to allow me to remain is not quite as demanding as the one that brought me here. It’s possible any T’airna blood will do. Shall we put Rory’s to the test?” His voice had become silky and evil; as impatient as he was, he was enjoying taunting her. “It would be no trouble at all for me to summon her here now and—”

“No,” she said as soon as he started to raise his arm again. In view of everything she knew about him, the odds were Pavane was lying through his crooked teeth, but there was no way she was going to take a chance with Rory’s safety at stake. “Leave her—and the rest of my family—alone, and I’ll . . . I’ll help you.”

“Yes. I was sure you would,” he drawled. “Now let’s get on with it.”

He beckoned her closer, and Eve had no choice but to move forward until she was standing across the altar from him. Choking down her resentment and frustration, she watched as he uncovered a trio of small pots, each containing a different colored powder; he took a generous pinch of all three and combined them in a black iron burner set above a flame, and soon aromatic smoke wafted through the air. He shrugged off his coat and tossed it behind him, and then rolled up the full sleeves of his dingy white linen shirt. Encircling each of his wrists was a three-inch-wide pattern of black lines and symbols that reminded Eve of the tribal bands usually tattooed around the upper arm.

“The Bonds of Arricles,” he explained when he saw her staring at them. “They were necessary for my stay in the Void, but in this realm they are a dangerous anathema. They are an open passage to the darkness, sapping my life force. To survive here, I must rid myself of them, and that can only be accomplished through divine magic. There are so precious few conduits to the divine left in the mortal realm . . . how lucky I am to have my own.”