Two Knights of Indulgence (24 page)

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Britt felt the tenseness of both the men flanking her
at the enormous table.
 
All the males but
Gabriel and Michel were there,
Kadence
still sleeping
off the effects of her healing.
 
Quiet
conversation filled the grand dining room as a servant brought out more
breakfast foods to a sideboard set up against the backdrop of the valley below.
 
Verdant green leapt for miles, with sprigs of
spring flowers interspersed through the foliage.
 
The view was spectacular, although the room
they sat in was just as spectacular.
 
Twenty-foot ceilings with windows spanning most of it along one wall
allowed them to soak up the morning sun, the light glittering and sparking against
four large chandeliers lined along the length of the room.

Matthias had piled a mountain of food on a delicate
bone china plate for her, matching his own, and dropped it before her rather
indelicately.
 
There was no way she could
even eat half of what he’d gotten her, but she did her best to pick through
what was there.

Thierry and Alain had already eaten, pouring over a
local newspaper in German as Henri and Lucien wolfed down plates that looked
quite a bit like Matthias’.
 
As breakfast
passed silently, Matthias and Nicolas grew ever more uncomfortable.
 
She could sense their unease radiating off
them, and she was pretty sure she knew why.

“Thierry, perhaps we could just get the question and
answer portion of the morning over with so Matthias and Nicolas can calm the
hell down.”

Thierry stared at her over his newspaper and began to
fold the paper as he seemed to collect his thoughts, then looked to both
Matthias and Nicolas, as if gaining their approval.
 
A smidgen of anger radiated through her at
his chauvinistic action, but she let it go.
 
She wanted answers, not to start an argument.

“I’m afraid this could be a very long story.”

“It appears I have time on my hands.”

“Very well.
 
I’m assuming they have told
you who they are, but if I repeat anything, I apologize.”

She nodded at him, and he leaned on his elbows,
getting comfortable.

 
“Good and evil
have waged a long war, not a war such as humans fight, but a constant pull and
push, the fight for human souls.
 
It has
come to a head numerous times over the years, increasingly getting worse.
 
A dark order began assisting evil in the
thirteenth century, causing chaos in hopes of spreading darkness.
  
In the beginning of the fourteenth century,
the
Templars
were rounded up and murdered.
 
Gaia saved us to be her warriors.
 
We were put in place to hold back the
Illuminati and maintain the balance.”

“What exactly are the Illuminati?
 
They look human.”

“They were, at one time, but something happened in
their lives that sent them on a path to darkness, typically killers, rapists,
and thieves.
  
If
an
Illuminati
general comes across such a person, that person can be
changed.
 
A ceremony is performed, and
the human soul is removed, replaced by darkness.
 
They’re no longer alive.
 
They’re not dead.”

“So basically, they’re zombies?”

Thierry chuckled.
 
“In a manner of speaking.
 
They just don’t come looking for human
brains.”

That put her further at ease.
 
She was still on the murder versus free
fence, and knowing that many of these men had been evil as humans made her feel
infinitesimally better.
 
“How do you think
I fit in this?”

“I have a theory, a strong one.
 
I found an ancient manuscript that talks of
five daughters of Gaia, all imbued with a particular gift.
 
There will be a seer, a healer, a warrior, a
sorceress, and a princess.
 
Kadence
has the gift of foresight, and you have the gift of
healing.”

Laughter bubbled up from Britt’s chest.
 
She could barely speak between the
laughter.
 
“You … think … I’m the
daughter of a goddess?”

“Gaia came to visit us when she was hurt.
 
Called her ‘my girl’.”
 

Britt turned to look at Matthias as if he’d grown a
second head.
 
“I have a mother, and she
most certainly isn’t a goddess.
 
I was
born in
Iceland
,
not in a fairy circle.
 
My mother was a
good woman who loved me immensely.”

“Gaia would have put you someplace safe, with people
who would love you.”

Her parents had struggled to conceive for years.
 
They’d given up hope when they’d been
overjoyed to find they were pregnant.
 
A gift from heaven.
 
The
doctors hadn’t been sure how she’d even conceived.
 
How many times had she heard her mother tell
that story?
 
No, it can’t be.

“We think we may have also found the warrior as
well.
 
Found
being a loose term since we have no idea who she is or where
she is.
 
But since you and
Kadence
have found a way into our lives, we can only guess
Gaia is pushing you toward us or vice versa.”

“Giving the benefit of the doubt here, if I were
Gaia’s
daughter, what is my purpose?”

Thierry leaned forward, a frown twisting his handsome
features.
 
“I’m not sure, but for you to
come, it must mean something big is on the horizon.”

“Something being another loose
term?”

“I can’t answer that question, but I wish I
could.
 
It would make it much easier to
plan our strategy if we knew what the something was.
 
All I can say is Illuminati activity has been
elevated.
 
They’ve been busy, and it
seems they’re recruiting as well.
 
I’m
not sure where they’re coming up with all these new foot soldiers, but we’re
almost to the point of being overrun.”

Wheels began to turn in Britt’s head.
 
Something Thierry said made some of the
puzzle pieces want to connect together in her brain.
 
And a fleeting thought came through.
 
“The bullets.”

“Bullets?”
 
Thierry frowned more
deeply.
 
“What do you mean?”

“The bullets I took from the guys, they made Nicolas
begin to turn evil.
 
I didn’t get one of
them out at first, and it spread within him.
 
You said that the Illuminati can change people who have darkness in
them.
 
What a way to create new recruits,
shoot them with evil.
 
Once it spreads,
take them into the fold.”

All six men around the table were silent and
still.
 
She knew she’d hit the nail on
the head.
 
It fit.
 
“The Illuminati were about to amass an army.”

“If you’re right, Britt, then we
have
a big problem on our hands.
 
Do you have
any of the remnants of the bullets?”

“They melted on sight, as soon as I removed them from
their bodies.”

“Melted?
 
Dammit
, then we need to try to get our hands on them before
they’re shot.
 
The bullets have to be
whole to load into a gun, I would assume.
 
If we can get a stash of them, we can determine what they are and see
how to counterbalance them.”

Britt sat back and looked across the table and then
back to her sides.
 
“Then we go back to
the last place we found them.
 
All that running for nothing.”

Thierry sat back.
 
“We have no idea where to look.
 
Matthias and Nicolas got lucky when they stumbled over the Illuminati
they found, but I’m fairly certain they aren’t going to meet in the same spot
in the woods.
 
So, we just race across
the territory and hope we get lucky again?”

“You said
Kadence
can see
the enemy.
 
We take her and let her sniff
them out.
 
Then we follow them,
interrogate them, and if they don’t have the knowledge we need, we free them of
their evil and leave them as bait to get a bigger fish.”

“What’s this
we
shit?
 
You’ll be in danger if we take
you.
 
Gaia wants us to protect you,”
Nicolas spat out.

“I believe I’ve shown I can hold my own.”
 
She turned to stare at Nicolas, feeling the
flow of power through her.
 
“And you
don’t have any rights to me to make that decision.”

“No rights—” He stopped mid-sentence, the last of his
comments hanging in the air.
 
The angry
set of his jaws was almost comical.
 
She
worked hard not to laugh as he sat there silently.
 
Britt turned to Matthias to see if he agreed
with his friend, but he was tight lipped and didn’t meet her stare until she
pressured him to.
 
“Thoughts?”

“I’ve seen what you can do.
 
I may not like the idea of you going out, but
like you just said, I have no rights to you.”

She almost regretted the comment she made now.
 
She still felt anger that they hadn’t been
completely honest with her from the get-go.
 
Maybe she would have handled
all this
better if
they told her that she might be a
demi
-goddess a few
nights ago.
 
If they hadn’t been chicken
and had told her in private, she could have excluded them from a public
altercation.
 
It was their fault.
 
At least, that sounded good in her head.
 
Even angry she knew they had some pretty good
claims on her, just as she had ones on them.

But most people always seemed to lash out at the ones
they cared about when they got angry.
 
Easier targets.

Thierry interrupted her thoughts.
 
“What do you mean free them of their evil?”

Matthias jumped in to answer before she could.
 
“She seems able to extract evil from
Illuminati.
 
What’s left isn’t pretty.
 
They look like mummified remains when she’s
done with them.
 
Just before we left, she
took down six of them at once, without any help from us.”

Thierry’s eyes grew large as saucers as he fixed his
gaze back on her.
 
She felt like
squirming in her seat as the other four men stared at her as if she were a
specimen under a microscope.
 
The only
thing that kept her sane at that moment was the hint of pride she’d heard in
Matthias’ voice.
 
After the initial
reaction of fear he’d had at her dance with six dead men, a little hope sprung
in her chest.
 
Her gaze drifted to his,
and she saw no fear in his eyes.

Only love.

One minute, she was taking down big, bad undead
soldiers, and the next she was getting all
sissy
over
a man looking at her with love in his eyes.
 
Talk about bipolar.
 
The next
thought just made the downward swing that much worse.
 

The emptiness was gone from his stare.
 

Yeah, the two of them had kept something from her,
something big, but what they shared was bigger than that.
 
She would so kick their asses if they did it
again, but they would recover.
 
Eventually, she’d tell them that, after they were shamed into never
doing it again.

“So, what do you think?”

Thierry looked at both the men flanking her, and this
time she just let it go.
 
She assumed he
was seven hundred years old as well, or close to it.
 
She’d just have to get rid of all their
chauvinism in one fell swoop.
 

“I think it’s the only plan we’ve got on the table
right now.
 
Henri, Lucian, you stay here
and contact the other
Templars
.
 
We need to get everyone up to speed.
 
Have Marcus and Remy come here at once and
assist.
 
We’ll need Marcus to look at the
bullets once we get our hands on them, as well.
 
Then get any equipment he’ll need and set up shop downstairs in the
shooting range.
 
Kadence
will need at least today to rest up, and we won’t be able to keep Gabriel and
Michel away if we take their female.
 
I’ll go talk to them now and make sure they’re on board.”