Worlds of Obsession (Celtic Otherworlds) (27 page)

Chapter 28

              It had been nearly four weeks since Bastien had left for Skye, and Liv had long since given over her worry for abject dread.  Something must have happened to him.  Something awful.  Her heart squeezed and tears welled up again, probably for the hundredth time that day.  When exactly had she fallen so hard for him?  She had been with him for such a short time, and now without him, she was an absolute mess.  And it wasn’t just that she worried for his safety.  Her heart hurt… actually hurt without him here.  She missed the feel of his steely arms around her, and the way his eyes softened when he looked at her, with his long dark hair loose and falling over his face.  She missed the taste of his mouth when he kissed her, and the sweet smiles that had been coming more and more often each hour they spent together.  And though she hadn’t really allowed herself to think about it, in the back of her mind was the hope that they could have a future together.  A home.  A family. 

She paced the length of the back of the
Glasgow row house, not caring that she was wearing a path through the tiny but well-kept lawn.  She couldn’t sit still with the panic that was steadily rising in her chest.  She had to go to him.  She had to go to Skye, because she couldn’t stand being here, not knowing, for another second.  For days and days the other hunters had told her to wait, that sometimes Scatha requires a longer session, or sometimes there were ‘situations’ that had to be taken care of.  They explained to her that it wasn’t at all unusual for one of them to take much longer than two weeks to return.  But recently, even Erath and Jace had begun to look a little worried too.

“Couldn’t you call?” she had asked them.  But apparently, Scat
ha didn’t do phones, or computers, neither of which worked in most of the other realms anyway.

             
Liv stopped her pacing and went into the house, making a beeline for the study where she knew Erath was working at a computer, having seen him as she paced up and down the halls earlier.  He looked up when she appeared in the doorway.  “I
have
to go.  I have to go to Skye, Erath.”

             
He held her gaze and drew in a deep breath.  “I’ll go with you.”

             
Erath grabbed a set of keys off the desk and she followed him to the garage, where he opened the passenger door of some sort of BMW convertible.  Apparently none of these guys owned any ordinary cars.  She climbed in and he shut the door, going around to the passenger side and hitting the ignition.  He headed out of town and for a while they rode in silence, but after a while, Liv couldn’t stand the anxious thoughts running through her head anymore.  She instead made an attempt at conversation with the Vampire beside her.

             
“Do you like what you do, Erath?  I mean the fighting?” 

             
“Yes”, he said pensively.  “I like the fact that every time I kill, I know I am saving the lives of innocents.”

             
“Do you ever want to settle down?  Maybe have a family or something? Or don’t Vampires… do that.”  Honestly, she had no idea whether they did, but when a pained look passed across Erath’s face, she realized she might have crossed some sort of line with her questions.  She winced.  “I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to…”

             
Erath shook his head.  “No.  It’s all right… really.  And I would love to settle down and have a family someday.”  He looked over at her with a little smile, but his eyes held a deep kind of sadness that he couldn’t quite hide.  “I just haven’t found the right woman.”

             
“I’m sure you will.  You’re quite a catch, Erath.”  She paused.  “Do Vampires have pre-destined mates, like Demons do?”

             
Erath laughed, and the mood lightened just a little.  “Don’t let Bastien hear you call him a Demon.  And no, Vampires don’t have mates.  Berserkers don’t either… and let’s see, Lycans do, I think.  The Fae and the demigods choose their own as far as I know, and the Kelpies and Selkies almost never mate at all.  I mean… they have sex and all that, just not with the same person forever.”

             
Liv wanted to keep him talking, because it was a good distraction from her thoughts, and she was learning things, besides.  “What about you, Erath?  Do you want to find a female of your own?”

             
He looked over at her or a moment before returning his eyes to the road with a faint smile.  “Yeah.  I guess I do.  It’s what we’re made for, after all.”

***

             
Bastien took a deep breath and stepped through the rock-strewn entrance to Balor’s realm.  As he did, everything shimmered for a moment, as if he was walking through the rippling surface of still water.

Time had just sped up.

              He hurried along at a near run; he knew these tunnels well.  Before Arawn had finally defeated Hafgan for control of all of Anwnn, (and just try saying that three times fast) this had been a much different place.  Now Balor, once the powerful King of the Fomoiri, was relegated to this realm, and most would agree he had not been quite right in the head for centuries now. Right in the head or not, if he had taken Karis, Bastien wasn’t going to stand for it. 

             
He rounded a corner and made a right turn, certain that Balor would still be making his home in the center of the hill, where he could draw the most power from the earth.  Once he got there, he planned to scope out the area and find out where Karis was being held, then he would… come up with part two of his plan. 

He didn’t get much farther.

              “Whoa!  Where do you think you’re going?”  A guard stepped into his path, a huge, gleaming sword in one hand, and a semi-automatic in the other.  Bastien stopped short, then did a double-take.

             
“Taren?”

             
“Bastien?  Well fuck-me, what the hell are you doing here?”  The guard grinned and shoved the evil looking sword back into the sheath that was slung across his back. 

             
“I’m… wait, what are
you
doing here?  You’re not… working for Balor…”

             
“No.  Well, not because I want to.  I’ve got two more years of my sentence for a little run-in I had a while back, then I’m outta here.  Not soon enough for me though, it sucks down here.”  He clapped Bastien on the shoulder.  “It’s good to see you, bro.”

             
Bastien half-heartedly cuffed him in return.  “I don’t have much time, but maybe you can help me… Balor took a female…
my female
.  I have to find her and get her back.”

             
Taren’s brow furrowed.  “He did have a female here… until recently.  Someone stole her, and man he’s been pissed ever since.”

             
Bastien’s heart nearly stopped beating.  “She’s not here?  Are you sure?”

             
“Yeah, someone took her out of a back-portal, right out from under Balor’s nose.  And I thought life here was hell
before
he was really pissed… he goddamn thinks he’s in love with her.”

             
“Oh…fuck.”

             
Taren snorted.  “Yeah.  Good luck with that.”

             
“All right, shit, I have to go… but Taren, look me up when you get out of here, okay?”

             
“I will.  You’ll buy me a beer.”  He smiled and stepped out of the way as Bastien took off, running as fast as he could through the passages so he wouldn’t waste another second that might amount to days or weeks when he got out.  The entrance loomed up ahead, and he broke through the invisible barrier with a sigh of relief, and then a growl of determination.  Karis was alive, and someone had taken her from Balor.  The question was, was it an abduction, or a rescue?  He had to find out, he had to find
her
.

When he resurfaced from the loch,
Bastien headed for the gorse bush where he had stashed his bike.  If the bike wasn’t there, he had a long walk ahead of him.  A glint of silver had him exhaling in relief, but the weeds that had grown up around the wheels told him he had been gone for maybe a few weeks.  He looked around… definitely not more than a month, because the leaves were still on the trees, and the air was still warm.  Good.  Now, where to start?  Immediately, his mind flashed to Liv.  Damn, how he missed her. 
Craved her
…  In fact there was nothing he wanted more in this moment than to have her in his arms, and the thought sent a strong current of desire burning through him.  He wanted… He shook himself
.  No, I have a mate to find
.  A mate. 

He headed back to Skye.  He would have to
stop and explain things to Scatha first, or she would hunt his ass down and make him sorry he was still alive.

***

             
Leanan held her cell to her ear with one hand while she drove with the other.  Carman picked up on the third ring and Leanan braced her elbow against the steering wheel so she could turn down the radio.

             
“Hello?  Oh that’s better.  Sorry, that was one of my favorite songs.”

             
“Karma Chameleon is one of your favorite songs?”

             
“Yeah, totally.  Listen Carm… I’m on my way to a meeting right now, but I wanted to check up on the play-by-play.”

             
Carman heaved a gusty sigh.  “Well, it never goes exactly as planned, now does it?  Right now Bastien is in Anwnn looking for his mate, while his mate is on her way to Skye with Erath to find Bastien.  He hasn’t figured it out yet, by the way.”

             
“Well… he’s a Demon, Carm.  Who ever said they were all that bright?”  She shifted her phone to the other ear.  “Anyway, on a different topic, spending all this time watching the Guild made me realize what a great guy my grandson Erath is, and I want us to help him next.”

             
“Help him how?  He seems fine to me.”

             
“Fine?  He’s like, five hundred years old and he hasn’t settled down yet.  I want great-grandbabies!”

             
There was a slight pause on the other end of the line.  “Lee… you have at least a hundred great-grandbabies already.  I’ll bet you don’t even know all of their names.”

             
“Okay… that’s not the only reason.  Erath was cursed, fifty years ago.”

             
“By whom?”

             
“Scatha.  That bitch has quite the temper.”

             
“Yeah, but she keeps the Guild going strong.  Those guys are all scared shitless of her.  I just spoke to her yesterday though, and she’s willing to help us out.”

             
“Really?”

             
“Yeah.  Must have caught her in a good mood, or maybe she finally took some of those poor males to bed and put them out of their misery.  Anyway, Liv and Bastien are both on their way back to Skye, so tune in if you want to see what happens next.”

***

              The BMW came to a halt at the edge of the sea, and the Isle of Skye was visible in the distance.  Liv braced herself.  “Are we going to drive over the water?”

             
Erath looked at her oddly.  “Why would we do that?”

             
“I just thought… I mean Bastien drove over the water on his motorcycle when he took me to Avalon…”

             
Erath looked amused.  “That was a portal to another realm.  Skye is right here, so we’ll take the ferry like everyone else.”

             
“Oh.”

             
“But once we arrive on Skye,
then
we’ll have to drive into a large pond to get to Scatha’s training grounds at Dún Scáith.”

             
“Oh.  Of course.”  Yeah, she still had a lot to learn, and never before had she been so grateful that she was the kind of girl to just take everything in stride.  If she wasn’t she could just imagine that she might be locked up in the looney bin by now.

              Scatha looked like a warrior-princess.  That was Liv’s first impression.  She was tall and fierce and beautiful and dressed a lot like She-Ra, complete with leather bustier and cuffs.   

             
When Erath asked about Bastien, she rolled her eyes and shook her head.  “Stupid male ran off, without completing his training, and before I could tell him what I found out.”

             
“He ran off… where?”  Liv wasn’t sure she really wanted to know.  At least he was probably still alive, she told herself.

             
“To the Plains of Crim, to find his lost mate.”