Page 53 of Fae Devoted (Fae Touched #3)
“L ieutenant,” Thlán Rutgers called.
Tucker ignored Patriarch Dupont’s second, his attention on the female lying in the sleek, black helicopter that transported the king’s computer expert, Garath, and his Anwyll physician to the facility’s grounds.
Except for the subdued color, the advanced aircraft reminded him of the model used by Coast Guard’s search and rescue teams.
“Jacob, I’m feeling much better now,” Jo insisted.
The tattoo on the senior healer’s upper chest glowed in the dim interior, the light of the activated spell traveling over his arms to gather in his hands. The restorative magic from his illuminated palms pushed into the raw skin of Jo’s wrists, and she winced.
“Perhaps instead of growling at me, Lieutenant Tucker,” the witch stated, redirecting the white flare to Jo’s swollen fingers, “you can talk your she-wolf into taking my previous advice to be treated while in a curative sleep.”
“Not yet,” Jo said, her tone firm.
Tucker knew arguing with his stubborn female was pointless. Jo refused to be put under for the painful process of magical repair until they received news on the twins. She was convinced the missing siblings were alive and somewhere in the facility.
“Lieutenant, you’re needed below.” The vampire halted several feet from the two-engine helicopter, the natural predator’s approach silent barring his voice.
Tucker swept a strand of Jo’s hair away from her damp forehead then turned to the Dádhe.
He was reluctant to leave his weakened mate unprotected by all but the Anwyll pilot and the elderly healer.
The compound was no longer protected from detection by a concealment ward.
Although Ethan managed to contain the fire Charlotte started, the blaze could have garnered unwanted attention from the surrounding homesteads.
“Maybe the Willows were found.” Jo’s soft heart was forever hopeful.
The red in Rutgers’ pupils, the earthy scent of peat moss, and the rigid set of his shoulders said otherwise.
“I’ll stay with your she-wolf until you return.”
Tucker nodded at Dupont’s thlán, accepting his offer and the order to return to the tunnels. Samuel wouldn’t drag him away from Jo if it wasn’t necessary.
“I’ll be here when you get back,” she said, settling into the padded cushion and closing her eyes while the healer worked on the visible results of iron touching skin. He wouldn’t be able to purge the remnants of poison from her blood without the aid of the Anwyll-induced, therapeutic sleep.
After leaning in to kiss Jo’s cheek, Tucker climbed from the helicopter and jogged to the farmhouse. The sooner he discovered why Samuel needed him, the quicker he’d return.
Ethan waited inside the open elevator, along with the unconscious soldier who Queen Rose tossed into the kitchen island earlier that night. The tight space reeked of the licorice smell of Anwyll magic.
“This one moaned when I dragged him inside to use his print, so I renewed the knockout spell. I think Lady Rose may have broken his arm.” Ethan pushed the button to the lower level. A smear of soot marred the side of the witch’s face and his eyelids drooped.
“She did.” He’d heard the human’s bone fracture against the marble slab.
The doors slid open, and Tucker followed Ethan to the wing where the facility’s soldiers bunked.
They passed Lydia as she recast spells on the humans inside, ensuring their enemies remained incapacitated until the team was ready to leave the compound.
Ethan nodded at the ENC commander but kept walking.
Instead of heading down the next corridor, Ethan stopped at the end of the lengthy hallway. Before Tucker could question the witch’s strange behavior, he slapped his palm on the concrete block wall and mumbled an incantation. The air shimmered, and a doorway appeared.
“Fae magic?” Tucker stepped through the exposed entrance first and joined Samuel, Remington, and the queen who were already inside the hidden room.
“No, it’s Anwyll made.” Ethan’s voice carried a hard edge as he entered then withdrew his hand. The door vanished.
The room was small and stark with an aluminum table, a single shelf, and a pair of thick metal doors enclosing a narrow kiln inserted waist-high into the far brick wall. Tucker’s gums itched, and he curled his fingers to prevent them from converting into claws.
“Where’s Anand?” Tucker asked, widening his nostrils and breathing in.
“Looking for a blow torch to destroy the set of iron cages he found.” Alexander’s eyes lit with yellow fire. “They were large enough to hold a Ferwyn’s wolf.”
“Were the Willow twins here, lieutenant?” Ethan swayed in place, his words slurring.
He’d prevented the blaze Charlie conjured from spreading into the forest by using witchfire.
But casting the potent blue fire, in addition to wiping the memories of the Untouched soldiers who might have seen their faces, may have pushed the young male beyond his limits.
Although there was no hiding the smoldering ruins topside or the missing Director after the Anwyll spells wore off, the facility’s soldiers would still awake confused.
The government would suspect Fae Touched were involved in the attack yet couldn’t prove it.
Any more than Tucker could prove the twins were dead.
But Dylan Kincaid had taken him to one of the Willows’ park haunts to pick up their scent for tracking, and the smell was entrenched in his wolf’s brain.
Tucker nodded. The brothers were recently in the compound’s hidden room, and there was no question they weren’t alive at the time.
The king swore and kicked the raised platform in front of the furnace, separating it from the heatproof doors. The Willows’ flesh and bones were long gone, but the distinct smell of death lingered.
The news of their deaths would devastate his she-wolf.
“The Director appears to have been a supplier of Ferwyn ash.” Samuel’s tone was detached and professional, yet the pack bond told Tucker his Alpha was struggling to hold on to his temper.
“If someone recently purchased the Willows’ ashes on the black market,” Remington bit out, not bothering to hide his rage. The king was furious and didn’t care who knew it. “Garath will find their identity in the facility’s files.”
“It could take weeks to decode the encryption, Alexander. And owning iron cages and a kiln is not illegal.” Lady Rose removed a thermos-size metal jar from the single shelf in the room and crushed it in her hand, as frustrated as the king.
They couldn’t accuse the American government of kidnapping and murdering the Willows for their bones without tangible evidence. Scent identification was inadmissible in a US court of law.
“ If there was a buyer,” Samuel said, irises tinted yellow.
“You think the Fae is behind the missing Glaofin?” Alexander joined the queen in squashing the short row of urns then tossing them into the cold incinerator.
“Why would a Sídhe Lord want Ferwyn ash?” Lady Rose turned her back on the now-empty shelves, her pupils blood red. “A pureblood does not need tattoos to control a cast, nor an enhancement to make a spell stronger.”
“But my kind do,” Ethan spat. The wards the battle witch had disabled proved that Anwyll talents could be bought as easily as a human’s.
“The ink is a bribe,” Tucker growled. The Fae’s knowledge of ancient incantations and symbols, both strictly regulated by the Anwyll Guild, would be a temptation many status-seeking witches would find hard to resist. Add in the final component of Ferwyn ink, and betrayal was inevitable.
“But most witches aren’t capable of wielding that kind of power.” Alexander started on the furnace’s doors next, ripping one and then the other from the brick-lined chamber.
“The spells used to protect the facility were exclusive to Guild-trained warriors.” Ethan’s hands were fisted, his scent ripe with anger.
The traitor spit on everything the Guild believed in by working for an institution that actively harmed their species and the magical community every battle witch swore an oath to protect. “I’ll head to Arkansas tonight.”
“You will do no such thing.” The queen’s tone didn’t leave room for argument. Ethan tried anyway.
“The Overseer needs to be informed—”
“Another day will not matter.”
“He’s the only one in the Guild I can trust now.” Ethan sounded as heartsore as he did physically weary.
“Beta Tucker, I am sure you would like to return to Joan. Please take Ethan with you and make sure he sees the healer.” The compassion in Rose’s green eyes softened the order, but nonetheless, it was an order.
“I need to tell the Overseer about Charlie and the fire.” Ethan braced his shoulders against the wall, his thigh muscles visibly shaking. The battle witch was spent, his body shutting down.
“What about the witchling?” Tucker asked. No one disputed the queen’s decision to allow Jeremiah to take the females to safety after it was revealed his brother could sense Fae magic. Not even Anand.
“The wind blew her hair.” Ethan’s lids fluttered closed. The black smudge on his cheek matched the dark circles beneath his eyes.
Tucker was surprised the male was still standing.
The amount of energy required to conjure and cast witchfire on the scale needed to collapse the burning barn and smother the flames was massive.
Ethan’s mentor, Liaison Carter Jenkins, produced a smaller stream of the blue fire during the fight with Daimhín in Mississippi and was physically depleted for days afterward.
So if Ethan’s magical strength matched his indomitable will, the student had surpassed the teacher.
“Charlotte cast an elemental spell and lost control.” The queen frowned. “At least, I assumed she did.”
They all had. It wasn’t a stretch to believe if Charlie could conjure witchfire, wild magic or not, she could do more.
Like throwing Hannah to safety with a powerful blast of concentrated air.
The spell was similar to the one engraved on Lydia’s knuckles and reserved for trained battle witches and Anwyll in prominent positions.
“No…when she walked outside the barn…how did the wind…” He slid down the rough bricks, his legs finally giving way. “No…bubble.”
The room went quiet as Ethan’s meaning registered.
If Charlie didn’t raise a protective shield…then why didn’t she burn?