The Waning Moon Page 34

  The Ruby Blade

  ~ eleanor morgan book three ~

  * * *

  IT WAS COLD. I hated the cold. I hated just about everything about winter. Snow, slush, ice, the dearth of daylight hours. But mostly, I hated the cold. I burrowed down into the blankets piled on top of me trying to extract a bit 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 alas! 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 zero.”

  “Well, now that I know the temperature, I’m much, much warmer.”

  “Where’s the girl?” Raj asked Florence.

  “She has a name,” Florence replied.

  Raj growled.

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

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

  “But you won’t.”

  “Don’t push me, witch.”

  “Oh, I’ll push. And right now, I’m going to push you to remember our young 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?”

  “She’s a werewolf. She 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 young.

  I poked my head out from under the blankets. Emma was peering around the corner of the bathroom door.

  “Yes.”

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

  “We did the ceremony during the Hunter’s 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 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 really 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 some cold weather gear for you. With insulated underthings and wool clothes and a sleeping 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 that 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.” She grinned at me and I smiled back. “Besties for life,” I said. She rolled her eyes.

  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 asked.

  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?” Apparently she’d picked up the implication in the word ‘Underhill.’

  “What year were you taken?” I didn’t know exactly, although I had a pretty decent idea. Isaac’s 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 sometime 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 to her 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 to me.

  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 that I’m already wearing.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  I huddled into 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.”r />
  “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. 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 bowed slightly and returned his attention to the maps. “We’ll stay on I-77 tomorrow until we get to I-81, and then start heading 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 that 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 again in my cocoon and I felt myself drift off. Hibernation sounded like a really good idea.

  We drove to Roanoke, Virginia the next evening. Florence took the entire driving shift because I was too cold to drive, 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 shit.”

  Everyone turned and looked at me. “Hey! Emma’s probably 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 piles of blankets I require, I’ll take my turn.” I tried not to sulk. I didn’t want anyone else to make a comment about my age. Hanging out with the all-but-immortal definitely had its downsides.

  “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 apparently our pre-existing friendship wasn’t trumping that.

  I tried to tamp down my anger enough that 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 start driving 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 probably hitting another magical level, too, which will be burning through her resources. We need to get her some protein.”

  “And beer,” I added. “Eleanor definitely needs beer. It’s possible that it’s a Fae remedy for power surges.” Sometimes I hated my inability to say random made-up shit to be funny. Phrasing was key, but it made my jokes much less amusing. At least I’m assuming it was the phrasing that made it unfunny, since no one in the car looked amused.

  Florence sighed. “I’ll find a motel. Do we want something operational, or do you want to find something vacant and squat?”

  “If it’s up to me, I’d like something with a fireplace.” Now that my anger was simmering down, I was back to shivering. I really needed to find the balance if I was going to survive this winter road trip.

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  We drove into town and found a restaurant that’d specialized in wood-fired pizza before the surge. It was the only restaurant in the area that seemed operational, so we stopped there. Places were still taking cash—no credit or debit cards, of course—but I felt guilty paying in a currency that might soon have no value. We did it anyway, picking up four large pizzas. We also got directions to some romantic honeymoon cabins outside of town that had fireplaces and spring-fed hot tubs. We were the only customers and spent our soon-to-be-worthless cash on four cabins, each with its own fireplace and hot tub.

  I raided my stash for a couple of bottles of wine and invited everyone to my cabin for dinner. We ate pizza until we were stuffed and then sat in front of the large roaring fireplace with our wine until Emma’s eyes drooped. Our conversation was mainly about the next day’s driving plans, and although Emma listened attentively, she asked no questions. Florence roused her and led her off to her own cabin, adjacent to Florence’s.

  “Turn around,” I commanded Raj.

  He slowly turned a full 360, and I rolled my eyes at him.

  “I’m going to strip. Turn around.”

  “I’ve seen you naked before,” he said.

  “By all the gods, Raj, please just turn around.”

  He did and I stood, sloughing off my blankets, then quickly removing my coat, a hooded sweatshirt, a long-sleeved t-shirt, a t-shirt, a tank top, and a sports bra. Once my top was bared, I moved closer to the fire and started on my lower half. Jeans, long underwear, four pairs of socks, and a pair of panties later, I was nude.

  “Okay, you can turn around again,” I said after I slid into the natural hot spring.

  His eyes flashed red as he raked them down my newly naked body.

  “Are you going to invite me to join you?”

  “Only if you’re going to promise to keep your parts to yourself.”

  “I think you misunderstand the purpose of an ensuite hot tub.”

  “I think you forget how recently I lost my mate.”

  Raj stripped quickly
and efficiently. I averted my eyes so I wouldn’t see him nude up.

  “You can stop pretending not to watch now,” he said.

  I couldn’t deny it, since I couldn’t lie, so I stayed silent.

  He grabbed our wine glasses and the half-full bottle and stepped into the hot tub. I gave up pretending to look away and eyed his naked body appreciatively. He was a pretty man and his dark skin glowed with golden-brown undertones. He handed me another glass of wine and then took a seat as far away from me as possible.

  After sipping our wine in silence for a few minutes, he looked directly at me. “We’ll find Isaac,” he said. “I promise. We will find him and we will punish those responsible for this.”

  Then, for the first time since Yule when I said my last good-byes, I cried. Raj set down his wine and slid over to me. He put an arm around me and let me sob into his shoulder for what seemed like eons. Finally, I was cried out. My eyes felt red and swollen, and I knew that I was the very picture of beauty.

  “You are always beautiful to me,” Raj’s voice caressed my mind.

  “I need a tissue,” I said.

  Raj reached behind him to his pile of clothes and whisked out a handkerchief for me. I blew my noise, wincing at the picture I must be presenting.

  “Thank you.”

  Raj looked at me but didn’t say anything. He scooted back across the hot tub. I squelched the pang of disappointment I felt when our bodies lost contact. It’d been five days since Isaac had disappeared from this plane, five days since I’d been in his arms. Five days was a little too soon to be lusting after someone new, even if that lust was a pre-existing condition.

  “Pre-existing condition?” Raj asked.

  “Stay out of my head.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s private.”

  “Eleanor, my sweet, I will not push you. I am patient. I know the witch said to stay out of my bed until after New Orleans, and that you intend to listen to her. I will not stop trying to seduce you—that’s been my goal since we met—but I won’t push too far past your limits.”