Page 66 of Changeling (The Incubus Saga #2)

Thunderstorms and freezing rain in the middle of March were not among Nathan’s favorite things.

He was already caked in mud up to his knees by the time they snuck their way over to the side of the barn.

Despite the location difference, Nathan had a horrible sense of déjà vu from their Dryad encounter in the Georgia woods.

Armed with replenished iron bullets, they had parked their most recent vehicle a little less than a mile away.

There was a strange, unearthly light emanating from the barn.

The farm was abandoned, with no other homesteads anywhere nearby.

Over a dozen sidhe were inside the building according to the lead Ula had given them over the phone.

They had split up to surround the barn and make a perimeter first, ensuring there weren’t any lookout fae or sidhe waiting to strike, then they would meet up at the back of the barn to assess the situation.

Nathan reached the rendezvous point first, having spotted only one lone fae along the way—a satyr, he guessed, if he’d noticed hooves like he thought he had—but he’d seen the guy head straight for the barn and enter. Then he stood waiting for the others.

“Walt?” Nathan whispered.

No answer. Not that he was surprised given the supposed concentration of sidhe. They hadn’t had many conversations since Malak first appeared, nearly two weeks ago now, but Walter was on constant watch even more so than usual whenever he was able to manifest and express his concern.

“Nate,” Jim hissed from the shadows, then appeared out of the trees to join him a few yards from the back barn windows. Sasha’s route was the longest.

Eventually, Sasha appeared with a wave of his arm from the distant trees. “Nothing for me,” he said when he reached them.

Jim hadn’t discovered anything either.

“We should check the front quick before we make a move,” Sasha said. “I’ll go. Just there and back.”

Nathan reached for Sasha before the incubus could dash away—he didn’t miss how Sasha flinched at his touch. “Hey, be careful, okay?”

“Yeah.” Sasha took off without looking back at him.

“Geez,” Nathan hissed when he had gone. “What is it with him lately?”

Jim turned to stare at Nathan with an open gape. “Seriously? Nate, he’s been off around you ever since we met Malak. He almost initiated you that night. Then you had to take it back. Then he had to hear you say it was an accident, that you didn’t mean it, that you don’t want to be with him any—”

“Hey, I never—!” Nathan nearly shouted, so angry he couldn’t get his words out.

He lowered his voice back to a cautious whisper.

“I never said that. I said I didn’t want to be an incubus.

And it wasn’t just to appease that asshole, Malak, either.

I don’t know if I want to be an incubus, okay?

I got caught up in the moment. I meant that when I said it.

That doesn’t mean I don’t want to be with him. ”

The fierce expression melted from Jim’s face as he looked at what must have been the anguished one on Nathan’s. “But he doesn’t know that, Nate. You can see it every time you look at him. Have you even been sleeping together?”

“Hey,” Nathan grimaced. “That’s…that’s none of your—”

“I mean sleep, Nate. In the same bed. You’ve had a separate room from me since Pittsburgh, but they always have two beds. My guess is you guys have been using both of them. And not in a kinky way,” he tried to add humorously.

Nathan cringed. “It just…sorta happened. That night…when none of us could sleep and we just stayed up not knowing what to say or what the hell we were gonna do…I thought it was gonna be okay after that. But Sasha got all quiet and…and then at the next hotel when I was getting into bed, he just sat down on the other one and gave me this god damn bleeding heart smile.” Nathan shook his head.

They had been moving so fast, rushing into so many hunts to get through as many sidhe as fast as they could; he had tried not to think about it.

“And you still haven’t said anything to him?

Nate,” Jim said more tenderly, his hand reaching to Nathan’s shoulder with gentle fingers.

“I don’t know for sure how Sasha is feeling or what’s going through his head.

But he needs you right now, especially when we’re getting so close to ending this. You love him, don’t you?”

“Of course I do. I just…I…”

“I know we don’t have time for romantic getaways or the several dozen long talks you two deserve, but you’ve gotta at least hold yourselves together until we’re through this. We’re moving too slowly as it is.”

“Dude,” Nathan scoffed, “over a dozen sidhe in two weeks is a frickin’ record. We’re practically blowing through this with you leading us to these guys. And if we get this group tonight, who knows how many we can tick off the list.”

Jim shook his head. “It’s not enough. We slow down even a little, have one bad week and…” He didn’t need to finish. “That’s why tonight is important, Nathan. The sidhe I sense here…it’s like a coven of them hiding out. Fifteen or more.”

“I know.”

“Then as soon as we’re done tonight…talk to him. Okay?”

Sasha was already heading back to them, swift and low to the ground as he dashed across the grass and mud. For now, Nathan pushed thoughts of their strained relationship from his mind, but resolved to listen to Jim and do as he’d asked once they were safely back at the motel.

The doors to the barn were closed and there were no new sidhe in sight. It was time to get a look inside. Together, the three of them reached the back of the barn and climbed up the soaking wet and rotted hay stacks to get a look through one of the broken barn windows.

“Jesus,” Nathan whispered in exclamation. “Sorry to knock your powers down a peg, Jim, but this is twice as many as we were thinking.”

“Twenty-five,” Sasha said, eyes trained on the gathering through the window.

Nathan all but rolled his eyes. “Thanks for that, Rain Man, but you miss my point. We gotta abort this thing. There’s too many for you, Jim. And Sasha and I cannot pick up that much slack.”

“What are they doing?” Sasha asked absently, clearly not paying attention to what Nathan had said. “They’re all just standing around.”

“With that one sidhe in the center,” Jim added, indicating a dark-haired young man standing on a platform in the middle of the barn with the other sidhe around him.

All of their eyes were open, revealing their slit pupils, but the young man in the center had his eyes closed.

Some of the sidhe had revealed their true forms but many remained in the guise of normal humans.

The barn was large and mostly empty other than the sidhe.

There didn’t seem to be a visible source for all that strange light, ghostly and blue.

“They must be performing some kind of ritual,” Jim said.

“ Hey ,” Nathan growled out low in his throat. “Either of you care to listen to the voice of reason over here? We need to go. This is over our heads. I know we figured we’d hit the jackpot when Ula told us about this gathering, but we don’t even know what’s going on.”

That should have been enough sound reasoning to convince the usually logical guys of their trio, but when they turned to look at Nathan with frightening symmetry and determined expressions, Nathan already knew he was screwed.

“Nate,” Jim said slow and calculating, “we can’t just walk away now. Whatever they’re doing in there we’re talking about some seriously bad mojo. I can feel it.”

“I feel it too,” Sasha nodded. “Like pure dark power on overdrive.”

“All the more reason to go,” Nathan said.

“Jim, this gathering, ritual, whatever they’re doing in there is big enough that it threw off your radar and you only sensed about half of them.

This could go from bad to worse real fast. We need to wait.

Maybe…stake the place out and follow a few of them when they leave. We can track the others again later.”

“Nathan, the only reason my radar was thrown off is because I’ve been spending extra energy shielding us so they won’t sense us coming.

I’m not going to need to do that once we drop in.

I can handle that many, I know I can. I’m not saying it’ll be easy.

But if we leave now we might never find this many in one place again. ”

“Hang on a minute…” Sasha said. He peered through the window again. “Look at all the runes they’ve drawn. I recognize some of them. I think it’s some kind of channeling ritual.” He glanced back at the brothers with raised eyebrows.

Nathan and Jim peered closer as well, trying not to be too conspicuous even though that didn’t seem to matter since the sidhe were all looking to the leader in the middle.

“Seems like…they’re focusing all that dark energy on the one guy…” Nathan said, feeling more than ever that it would be best if they high-tailed it out of there. “Why put all their eggs in one basket, though? That one sidhe goes down it’s a waste of almost thirty others if they’re out of power.”

Sasha huffed. “Assuming it would even be possible to take that one guy down. They’re making a sidhe super soldier in there, Nathan.

And I’ll give you one guess as to why.” Sasha turned his piercing blue gaze none too subtly onto Jim.

“Word travels fast, Jim. They must know we’re after them.

They’re probably thinking preemptive strike here. We gotta stop ‘em.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait,” Nathan jumped in. “We don’t know if our guess is right and we sure don’t know if the purpose is to send some super sidhe after Jim. If we’re gonna do this then we better have one damn good plan. One wrong move and we are toast. Period.”

At least that bit of sense appeared to make an impression on Jim and Sasha. They both seemed to step back a minute to think very carefully about how they should proceed. Nathan did as well but every possibility he came up with seemed even more crazy and suicidal.