The Ruby Blade Read online

  The Ruby Blade

  An Eleanor Morgan Novel, Book Three

  Amy Cissell

  The Ruby Blade

  An Eleanor Morgan Novel, Book Three

  * * *

  Copyright © 2017

  by Amy Cissell

  ISBN: 1977736858

  ISBN-13: 978-1977736857

  * * *

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the author at [email protected].

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover Design: Skyla Dawn Cameron, Indigo Chicks Design

  Edited by: Colleen Vanderlinden

  For Chris

  * * *

  I love you comma and I can’t wait for our next adventure

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Interlude - Isaac

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Interlude - Isaac

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Interlude - Isaac

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Interlude - Isaac

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  The Broken World

  Also by Amy Cissell

  Acknowledgments

  I’m grateful to my editor, Colleen Vanderlinden for her expertise, humor, and encouragement.

  * * *

  Special thanks to my cover artist, Skyla Cameron from Indigo Chick Designs, for her continuing excellent work on bringing Eleanor to life.

  * * *

  Thank you, RJ, for your patience, advice, and formatting expertise.

  * * *

  I want to thank my readers, Cat, Nichole, Marci, and Kari for their time, critiques, corrections, and invaluable feedback.

  * * *

  My author group—the Illuterati—was invaluable. They helped with cover critiques, blurb writing, word sprints, penis jokes, and were always there for the serious conversations about tentacle porn. Emma, Genevieve, Alicia, Monica, Mel, Elizabeth, Grace, Tiffany, Vicki, and Cate—thanks for the distractions, the humor, and the encouragement.

  * * *

  Special thanks, as always for Chris. My partner, my love, and my first and last reader. Without your patience, support, enthusiasm, and incredible eye for detail, I couldn’t have done this.

  Chapter One

  IT WAS COLD. I hated the cold. I hated almost everything about winter. Snow, slush, ice, the lack of daylight hours. But mostly, I hated the cold. I burrowed down into the blankets piled on top of me trying to extract more warmth from them, but couldn’t stop my shivering.

  “I’d add my body heat to yours if I thought it would help, but I have none.” Raj’s voice came from somewhere outside my blanket burrow.

  “Why is it so cold?” I asked, nearly biting my tongue with my chattering teeth.

  “It isn’t that cold,” Florence said. “It’s above freezing.”

  “That information has zero effect on my body temperature.”

  “Where’s the girl?” Raj asked Florence, ignoring my sniping.

  “She has a name,” Florence replied.

  Raj growled. Everyone was cranky tonight.

  “You can’t intimidate me,” she said.

  “I could exsanguinate you before Eleanor got out from under those blankets.”

  “Do you really think so?”

  “Don’t push me, witch.”

  “Oh, I’ll push. And right now, I’m going to push you to remember our guest’s name.”

  Raj sighed in defeat. “Where’s Emma?”

  “Hiding in the bathroom, which you must already know. She’s scared of us. Why?”

  “A werewolf could help raise Eleanor’s core temperature.”

  “She’s even more afraid of Eleanor than of you. I’m not sure she’d agree to do that.”

  “She doesn’t have to agree to it,” Raj said.

  “Yes, she does,” I interrupted. “I’m not cuddling with a strange wolf who’s being forced into it. A strange wolf who happens to be my mate’s ex-girlfriend. If she’s afraid of me and has issues with my relationship with Isaac, she’s not the person I want under these blankets with me.”

  “You and Isaac are mates?” a soft voice floated over us. It was high and musical and sounded very, very young.

  I poked my head out from under the blankets. Emma was peering around the corner of the bathroom door. Long, blonde tresses trailed down her back framing her porcelain skin. She’d drawn some of the hair over her face, whether in an attempt to hide us from her sight or vice versa, I wasn’t sure, but I could see enough to see that she had large, blue eyes and the kind of beauty you rarely saw outside of the movies. How she still looked so good after decades of imprisonment and a night in jail was mind-boggling. The longer I stared and didn’t answer, the straighter she stood. A fierce wave of possessiveness washed over me, and I lifted my chin and caught her gaze. “Yes.”

  “Do you mean…sex?” she whispered the last word as if it would somehow sully her to say it aloud.

  “We did the mating ceremony during the full moon with an entire Pack serving as witnesses.” Yeah, I was staking my claim. It wasn’t a jealousy thing. Not even a tiny bit. It was following pack protocol. This is what any wolf would do regarding their mate. I was absolutely one hundred percent not threatened by Isaac’s ex-girlfriend. Not even if she looked and sounded like a fairy princess. Which she wasn’t. I was the only fucking fairy princess in this room.

  Raj made a weird noise, and I glanced over at him and realized that he was laughing. Probably at me.

  “Shut it,” I said to him. “Help me sit up?” I asked Florence.

  Florence helped me struggle to a sitting position and readjusted the blanket burrito around my shivering body.

  “Why am I so fucking cold?” I muttered. No one else looked like they were freezing to death. There was no heat in the motel room due to that whole “no electricity” problem I’d created, but everyone else looked comfortable. True, everyone else was a fully clothed werewolf, a vampire who didn’t feel the cold, and a mage who probably had some kind of magical warming spell.

  “You’re cold-blooded,” Florence said.

  “I am not. I mean, I’m not the most touchy-feely person around, but I wouldn’t go with cold-blooded.”

  “You’re a dragon,” she said. “The more you accept your dragon half, the more you’ll take on the strengths and weaknesses of a dragon. There aren’t a lot of weaknesses, but as a reptile, an inability to regulate body temperature is probably the big one.”

  “So, what do we do? We’re still headed north. There’s no heat anywhere. I need to function.”

  “Maybe we can find an outdoor store and get cold weather gear for you. With insulated underthings and wool clothes and a sleepi
ng bag, maybe you can stay warm enough to stay awake.”

  “Or maybe I can just hibernate while you all go find the gate and then you can wake me up when it’s time for my part?”

  “That’s a brilliant idea,” Florence said. “There is nothing I’d like more than to wander around looking for some magic rocks—that’s still our goal, right?—in the snow, hope we’ve found the right ones, and then wake a sleeping dragon who’ll probably be hungry after six weeks of hibernation. Best adventure ever.”

  “Florence, at this point, you’re abusing sarcasm, not to mention encroaching on my idiomatic territory.” She grinned at me, and I smiled back. “Besties for life,” I said. She shook her head at me, and I squelched my feeling of triumph.

  I turned back towards Emma. She hadn’t moved any further into the room and didn’t appear reassured by our witty banter. She was trying to keep an eye on both me and Raj at the same time, and it made her look more than a little absurd.

  “Emma,” I said, trying to sound soothing. “We’re not going to hurt you.”

  She snorted, and I was relieved she had a bit of spirit. “I’m in a room with a day-walking vampire who’s older than dirt…” there was a sound of protest from Raj, “the most powerful mage I’ve ever seen, and some kind of bizarre dragon Fae and you think I should feel safe?”

  “Bizarre?” I protested.

  She ignored my indignant query. “I spent six years chained up in a dungeon full of Fae and the craziest vampire of all time. I’ve been beaten. Starved. Tortured with silver and prevented from changing. And now, I’m locked in a motel room with more Fae and vampires.”

  “Six years passed Underhill?” I asked. Crap. Just what she needed.

  Emma nodded, and then her eyes widened. “How much time passed here?” Dammit. She’d picked up the implication in the word ‘Underhill.’

  “What year were you taken?” I didn’t know exactly although I had a decent idea. Isaac’s Aston Martin Vantage was a 1962. He’d escaped Michelle in the fifties and was out for less than ten years. That meant that Emma had been taken some time in the early sixties.

  “Nineteen sixty-four. It was spring. April.”

  “Emma, I hate to tell you, but it’s December 2013. It’s been almost fifty years here.”

  She folded in on herself in a slow collapse. Florence rushed over and caught her before she hit the ground. She was sobbing, and I felt like an ass. There had to have been a better way to break the news to her. She’d been a young wolf when Isaac had met her, which meant she probably still had family alive at that time.

  Florence held her and patted her hair like a child. She looked at Raj over Emma’s head.

  “She wants to move Emma to the next room. She thinks our presence won’t help her calm down.” Raj said.

  I nodded and projected towards Florence, “We’ll be okay. Raj will stay with me. Let’s take the next day to calm down and regroup. Maybe I can figure out a more specific destination.”

  Florence helped Emma to her feet.

  “Emma, we’re going to get another room. Are you hungry? Do you want food?”

  I didn’t hear her reply, but they walked out of the room, Florence’s arm protectively tented around Emma’s shoulder.

  “What about you?” Raj asked aloud. “Do you want food?”

  My stomach growled loud enough to be heard through the layers of blanket and Raj laughed. “I’ll see what Florence left us.”

  I shivered again. “Could find me more socks? Do we still have Isaac’s stuff? Maybe he has a pair big enough to fit over the three pairs I’m already wearing.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  I huddled under the blankets and watched Raj move around the room. He found a pair of large men’s socks and helped me put them on. He handed me a granola bar, and I looked at it in disgust before removing the wrapper and taking a bite.

  “I miss Taco Bell,” I said.

  “I miss the internet,” Raj replied. “Finding magic rocks would be much easier with Google.”

  “Do we have maps?” I finished my granola bar and wondered if I could use my magical powers to heat a cup of water and make ramen.

  “In the car.” Raj gave me a large ceramic mug, filled it with bottled water, and handed me some beef ramen. I concentrated on heating my hands without starting fires, and soon the water was simmering. I dropped the noodles in and stared at the cup, willing them to cook faster. By the time I’d decided they were done enough and had stirred in the seasoning packet, Raj was back with a US atlas and some detailed area maps.

  “Where are we now?” I asked around a mouthful of too-hot noodles.

  “Charlotte, North Carolina.”

  I looked at the US map and tried to get a feel for where we needed to go. I wasn’t having much luck, which was pissing me off. The last time I’d known it was Savannah. Just like I’d known we were headed to the Black Hills. I didn’t want to drive all over the snow-covered and freezing northeastern United States looking for some fucking mystical rocks. Finding the gate near St. Louis was a pain-in-the-ass experience I’d rather not repeat—and not just because it gave every vamp, witch, and shifter a chance to have a go at me. I closed my eyes and tried to intuit the location of the next gate. All I got was north.

  “Dammit,” I said. “I guess we keep driving north. Hopefully, soon, I’ll get something more. I hate not knowing almost as much as I hate being cold.”

  “I wish I could warm you up,” Raj said.

  “Maybe I can figure out how to just heat my whole body the way I heated my hands to boil the water.” I wasn’t ready for any other types of heated discussions.

  Raj inclined his head and returned his attention to the maps. “We’ll stay on I-77 tomorrow until we get to I-81 and then head northeast. It’s December 25th today, and we have until February 2nd to find the gate, right?”

  “It’s Christmas?” I exclaimed. “Shit. I can’t believe I didn’t even notice.”

  “Merry Christmas, my sweet,” Raj said. He kissed my forehead and handed me a glass of wine I hadn’t seen him pour. His cold lips triggered another full body shiver. He held his glass towards me. “Cheers.” We clinked glasses, and I drank deeply, hoping the wine would make me feel warmer. It helped a bit. The second and third glasses helped even more. After we’d emptied the bottle, Raj helped me lay down in my cocoon, and I felt myself drift off. Hibernation sounded like a fantastic idea.

  We drove to Roanoke, Virginia the next evening. Florence took the entire shift because I was too cold, Raj claimed not to know how, and Emma was still too…whatever she was. I was almost positive Raj was lying but didn’t call him on it because it wasn’t too long of a drive—or at least it shouldn’t have been. The detours around stalled cars and closed sections of the freeway extended our three-hour drive into a five-hour journey.

  “Someone else needs to take a turn tomorrow,” Florence announced. “I am too old for this.”

  Everyone turned and looked at me. “Hey! Emma’s the youngest, even if she was born before me.” Florence gave me a frigid look, and I was glad she hadn’t put any magic punch behind it. I was cold enough as it was.

  “If you don’t mind the heater going full blast and a limited range of movement from the pile of blankets I require, I’ll take my turn.” I tried not to sulk. I was sensitive about my age. Hanging out with the all-but-immortal had its downsides. I hated being the new girl in the club.

  “I can drive,” Emma said quietly. “It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long since I’ve done it and your car doesn’t look too different from what I’m used to.”

  “You don’t need to take a turn until you’re feeling back to yourself,” Florence said.

  “I might as well make myself useful. I don’t understand why we’re here and what we’re doing, but I don’t know what else to do at this point but stay with you. Isaac’s scent is all over that Fae.”

  I suppressed my desire to punch Werewolf Barbie in the face and settled for smiling.
Based on the increasingly chilly air around me, Florence didn’t think my smile was as friendly as I’d meant it to be.

  Emma continued speaking, either ignorant of or ignoring the unspoken communication between Florence and me. “If Isaac was with you and that Fae,” I couldn’t smother the growl that time, but Emma soldiered on, “then he must have trusted you. Until I figure something else out, I guess I’ll stick around.”

  I was starting to feel truly warm for the first time since we’d left Savannah and noticed Raj eying me warily. Florence was giving me some side-eye, too, but her expression wasn’t wary, it was pissed. Something in Emma had triggered her protective instinct, and our pre-existing friendship wasn’t trumping that.

  I tried to tamp down my anger so I wouldn’t start any fires but not so much that I started shivering again. “Let’s find a place to crash for the rest of the night. We can drive north again in the evening. I need food and sleep.”

  “You’ve been sleeping a lot these last few days,” Florence noted.

  “Byproduct of the gate opening, being shot, and the cold.”

  “And mourning, too, I suspect,” Raj said. He was glaring at Florence although I had no idea why. “Eleanor’s had a rough go of it these last couple of weeks. She’s hitting another magical level, too, which will burn through her resources. We need to get her some protein.”