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CHANTI REACHED INTO her wardrobe and pulled out the old royal purple dress she’d chosen for the day. She lifted it up and tugged it on over her head and tied a silver belt high on her waist. She was getting bigger by the day.
If she was right, then her baby would be here on the next full moon. She had twenty-seven days to prepare.
“Ha!” She laughed out loud.
Not only did she never think she would have a baby with a wolf shifter, she’d never thought she would have less than six weeks to get used to the idea.
Talk about a life full of surprises.
The bedroom door banged open and Kody came in, hopefully with news from the pack.
“There’s four men dead, and a lot more hurt, but Daniel’s with them. And all the children are safe, thanks to you warning us so early last night. Considering the war that went on last night, I think we did okay.”
Chanti blew out a long breath. Four men in a town this small was still a high percentage. If only she had been able to do more for them last night.
“All right. Well, please, you stay here and deal with the pack. I have to get home and sort out my life. I refuse to lie here in fear, waiting for them to attack again.”
She had more to do than just that, but she didn’t want to tell Kody that. She was going straight to some Voodoo elders and sorting this problem out.
After last night, she was no longer afraid of anyone in New Orleans. Her powers were so much stronger than they should be, or were before. Whether it was the baby, the wolf shifter blood, or this was who she was always meant to be, she wasn’t sure. But she no longer feared the wrath of the church, or their people.
“Are Tania’s parents and the other people still knocked out in the other house?”
Kody shook his head. “No. Marty said when they woke up this morning, everyone was gone. He should have tied them up or something, but with the baby, and Tania still being so weak, it was the last thing he was thinking of last night.”
Kody tugged off his old shirt and began to dress in clothes that Chanti distinguished as ‘town clothes’.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going with you. If you think for one minute I’m letting you go alone, you’ve got rocks in your head.” He grinned as he tucked in his shirt, and slicked back his long hair.
“But what about the pack, making sure everyone’s okay here?”
“They’re fine. Marty’s out there with Tania, her baby strapped to her chest in some sort of wrap thing.”
Chanti tried not to giggle at the image her mate painted, but failed when she saw the bewildered look on Kody’s face.
If Fate had been correct, and she saw no indications that it had been wrong so far, then Tania would grow into an incredible leader. Being out there, with her baby strapped on while she sorted out her pack, was completely fitting.
“That’s great. Well, let’s go then.”
A wolf shifter protector probably wasn’t a bad thing, and she knew they’d be stronger together, rather than apart.
They jumped into Kody’s truck and headed off to New Orleans, the silence in the car a comfortable one as they drove the fifteen minutes or so to the borders.
“Where are we going first?” he asked.
She needed to go to her house to pick up some things, but she could do that anytime. She had everything she needed for her own protection; she had nothing stronger at the shop. So, there was only one other place she had to go.
“To Tania’s parents’ house. There’s no need to go to the church, or any other group yet, I don’t think. Tania’s parents are as powerful and influential as they come, so if we can convince them to stop the attacks, then that should be enough. Nobody else will come after us after that.”
She planned to do a lot more than just convince them to back off, and if the legends were true, then she would succeed.
They hit New Orleans and Kody slowed the car, weaving through the small streets and parking around the corner from the huge white mansion.
“What if they capture us, like they did with Marty?”
She gave her mate a smile and unlatched her seat belt. “They would not be who they are if they did not have protection spells all over their house. Are you wearing the amulet I made for you?”
He nodded, briefly touching the center of his chest where her amulet lay.
“Good. Then you’ll be fine. Just make sure, like last time, all your thoughts are on protecting me, and nothing about harming them. We’ll both be fine.”
His mouth thinned and his lips drew downwards.
She cupped his face in her hands and put as much warmth into her expression as she could.
“It’ll be fine. Okay?”
Kody hesitated, but then nodded and together, they got out of the car.
Chanti touched a hand to her own amulet and focused on her memories of her grandmother, a woman who had passed on too early in Chanti’s life, but whose power still flowed through her.
They walked across the quiet street and went straight up to the door.
She could sense her mate’s hesitation and then she remembered the dolls still in her bag.
“Don’t forget, I wove a spell over Mary and her husband. Their powers have been weakened. They would struggle to do any real harm to us, and I guarantee they will not.”
She banged on the door.
It opened soon after and she greeted the old butler with a smile.
“Good morning. Can you tell Mary and James that we are here, please?”
She stepped into the house without being invited to do so, and the old man scuttled off.
She looked around the house, searching for the strong magic she’d sensed last time. It wasn’t there.
Something was different.
“Come this way, please,” the butler called from the ground floor hallway.
She gave Kody a wink and stepped along the marble floors, down the corridor and into a large living room.
A fire blazed in the fireplace and Mary stood by her husband, who sat on one of the expensive couches.
Nobody spoke as they walked into the room and stood a few feet from Mary and James.
James had an angry grimace on his face, but Mary looked like she was bursting to say something.
Chanti turned to Mary and cocked an eyebrow.
“Yes, Mary?”
“Is my daughter still alive?”
Chanti inclined her head and smiled. “She is. As is her son.”
The relief on Mary’s face was priceless and at odds with the snarl of disgust from James.
Chanti turned her attention to Tania’s father. “What’s wrong, Mr. Thomas? Not happy about your grandson being the new Alpha line of the New Orleans pack?”
The angry look in his eyes said it all.
She was enjoying this tension a little too much. Odd for her.
“Please sit, Kody,” she said to her mate, with a sweet tone.
He did as she asked, mirroring the pose of the couple opposite them.
“Shall we continue with the niceties or get down to business?” Chanti asked.
“I will get you thrown out of the church, and New Orleans,” James yelled at her. “You know that, don’t you? You disgusting slut!”
Kody got up and moved around the table so fast, the crack of his fist hitting James in the face, made her gasp. His arm shot out so fast she didn’t have time to stop him, nor would she have wanted to, if she had.
James’s head went flying back against the couch.
Chanti grabbed Kody and pulled him back, worried for the powers that may come down and bite him for doing such a thing.
James Thomas was as close to a Voodoo King as they had in New Orleans.
Fear skittled along her veins and she pushed it away. She was so much more than that, and as she stared at Kody, who was still healthy and breathing hard from anger, she knew they were safe.
“Don’t waste your strength on him, Kody,” she said. “It’s a waste.”
Mary inspected her husband’s now swollen face. “How dare you!”
“You’re lucky Kody is so controlled, James. He could have ripped your head from your shoulders.”
She smirked at James as she stared him down.
He grabbed a handkerchief from his pocket and spat blood into it. “He shouldn’t be able to do that here.”
“Then you need to start examining your Voodoo, James. Because he just did.”
These two had done something truly evil to the pack, and she hoped the Voodoo gods would punish them.
“Okay, back to why we came. I have a deal for you. Stay away from the bayou. If any of you ever come to hurt one of our people again, I will personally organize a raid on your house. And I guarantee, no amount of supposed power you think you have will stop me.”
Mary sank down onto the couch next to James, fear in her old eyes.
“But my daughter.”
“You can come visit her anytime, Mary. I said, to harm us. You know the rules. If you come in peace, you’ll be fine.”
She glanced at Kody. “But they’re animals.”
Chanti rolled her eyes. “They’re powerful, majestic shape shifters, who are God’s creatures. I suggest you start spreading the new gospel. Both of you. No one is to harm our pack, or they will pay. I will be holding onto my shop and my house, and I want one of you to go over and take the curse off my properties.”
Mary and James exchanged glances and Mary nodded. “I can do that.”
“Good. There is also the matter of introducing the wolves back into New Orleans.”
“Never,” James spat.
Chanti waved her hand in the air. “If you don’t have the power to overcome decades of bias, then I will go to the church myself.”
James huffed at the insult but said nothing else.
“All right, now. I will be contacting some of our people to organize some trading. The housing in our town is horrendous and we need help building something new.”
“No way,” James ground out between his teeth.
Chanti grinned. “It’s either that, or I move everyone back here to New Orleans.”
She looked down at Kody, who was staying strong and silent. “Maybe that would be better, Kody. What do you think? Buy up some houses in a part of town that’s not too busy?”
“No!”
She swallowed the laugh that rose and pinned the Thomas’s with a hard stare.
“I suggest you make a decision, or I’ll make it for you. Either you help us build the town up so it’s a fit place for your grandson, or I will sell my shop and my grandmother’s home, and buy up half of Boady.”
Boady was a very cheap part of town that would be easy for her to buy into. Her shop and her home would fetch an incredible price to anyone who knew what they were buying.
There were quite a few factions of Voodoo in New Orleans, and a lot of money would be paid for the protection her home afforded.
Mary whispered fiercely in her husband’s ear and Chanti sat down on the couch arm, leaning against her mate.
Her babe twisted and turned inside her belly and she smiled, happiness filling her up. She would make a better life for her child.
She will be happy, and kind.
Chanti had to look away as tears tingled in her eyes.
A daughter. She would have to tell Kody when they left.
The Thomas’s stopped whispering and James stood up.
Kody jumped up beside her and Chanti looped her arm with her mate and stayed seated, unphased by the venom she could feel rolling off James. He couldn’t hurt her.
“I will speak to some contractors,” James said, “but they will expect to be paid.”
Chanti pushed herself to her feet. “I’m sure we can work something out.”
She had savings, and Voodoo, to barter. Not to mention, she had a town full of hard-working, strong men.
“Thank you, James. Mary, I shall see you soon.”
She inclined her head and moved to walk out of the room, Kody at her back.
Something made her stop.
She turned and saw James chanting, his eyes closed.
I don’t think so.
Chanti reached into her bag and grabbed one of the Voodoo dolls that represented the couple. She didn’t wait to check who was who; she just let her power guide her. She grabbed hold of a limb and bent it back, squeezing hard.
James dropped to his knees, his eyes flying open and a pained gasp falling from his lips.
She let go, sending up an apology to the gods.
She hated using her powers for anything evil, and hoped they would forgive her.
“James. I’ve warned you once, and I won’t do it again. If you try anything to hurt us, any of us, you will pay the price.”
James nodded once, grabbing onto the couch to pull himself up.
“Let’s go, Kody.”
They walked out of the house and Chanti took deep breaths in the clean air. Despite their power being drained by everything that had been done to them yesterday, the home still reeked of evil.
Kody grabbed her up in his arms and whooped as he walked across the street. At his cart, he gently deposited her into the passenger seat.
“You. Are. Incredible. What on earth did you do to them?”
She laughed as her mate jumped in the car, and started the engine.
“Let’s go home,” she said. “I don’t feel like staying in New Orleans anymore.”
She needed some clothes and personal belongings, but she would come back in a few days, when her soul was rested. Despite her confidence that everything would be well, that interaction had taken a lot out of her.
Kody turned the car around and they headed back to the bayou.
“Chanti. Please, tell me. What happened?”
She grinned at him. “You heard. I just offered them a solution to the peace we all need.”
“Yeah, but you made them agree to help us.”
“No, I gave them a choice. One that will work for all of us.”
It would mean jobs for the younger men, and better homes. A proper school and a doctor, maybe.
She sat back against the seat and let her hands fold over her daughter, growing inside her belly. Safe.
“Why couldn’t they harm us? What if someone else comes after you, Chanti? I don’t want you hurt.”
She shrugged and smiled. “They couldn’t do anything to me because I am protected. I always have been. By my blood, my grandmother, my birthmarks. I don’t really understand all the reasons, but no one is going to hurt me, or our daughter.”
“Our what?”
She laughed, and pulled one of his hands over to her belly, resting it on the bump grooving and moving with the music on the radio.
“Our daughter. I just had a vision. And she is going to be beautiful.”
He chuckled, the sound soothing to Chanti’s soul.
“Of course, she will be. You’re her mother.”
Chanti looked at the sunshine streaming in the window, calling her home.
“I love you.”
Her heart sang as he repeated her words and she let her eyes close. It was going to be a hard road, but with grit and determination, they would bring peace back to the people of New Orleans. Together.
THE END
I hope you enjoyed reading Voodoo and Fate! For more stories about witches, and shifters, fated mates and magic, try ‘Sisters of the Coven’.
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Or read on for a sneak peek into Chapter 1.
Ava.
If Mother knew the cause of her strange illness, she refused to tell us. That was just like her—treating my sisters and I like small children, right to the very end.
My gaze flickered over my mother who lay in the middle of her bed, frail and willowy. Her pale blue eyes—slightly milky now with her sickness—looked up at me. We’d tried everything to save her. Bella had scoured every book we owned. I’d tried every spell I knew. Nothing worked. My magic was exhausted.
I didn’t want her to die. My mother was my only parent, my whole world. I didn’t even know what was wrong with her.
Guilt gripped me. I had to look away.
My heart clenched.
“What can I do, Mother?” I did my best to control my voice, to make sure it didn’t shake. “Tell me.”
My mother’s blue eyes brimmed with tears. It was a strange sight. She wasn’t one for outward displays of emotion, especially not in front of her children.
“You need to help them, Ava,” she said, her voice steady. Even on her deathbed, she had more control over herself than I did.
By “them,” she meant my two younger sisters, Bella and Courtney.
Bella was a classic middle child with wallflower tendencies. A bookworm who’d spent every waking minute of the last two years since Mother got really sick, looking for a way to help her.
Courtney was the rebel of the family. The baby. She’d struggled the most when Mother got sick. Going off for hours at a time by herself, flipping the house upside down with her rage.
Meanwhile, I was the one who had to be dutiful, responsible... perfect. The curse of the first born. We were sisters filled with clichés and topped up with magic.
I leaned forward and smiled as bravely as I could.
“Of course, I’ll look after them, Mother,” I said. “I always have.”
She reached out with her fragile, thin fingers and I stared at the paleness of her skin. The way the veins shone blue against the white. Like thin spider legs against a wall.
I resented her for how hard she was on me and for the pressure she’d heaped on me. She drove me half mad sometimes with her expectations of perfection.
But this woman was my world. My everything. She’d taught me every lesson worth learning, and some that weren’t.
Her skin was cold to the touch as I gripped her hands, and I cringed at seeing the last signs of life leaving her. No matter how powerful she was, or how much strength my sisters and I had, we could not save her.
We had tried. And we had failed.
“Things are going to change, Ava,” Mother said, swallowing hard as she struggled to breathe. Her voice sounded foreign to my ears.
I hadn’t expected to be at this life-altering juncture for many years. Yet here I sat, not much past my twenty-third birthday, watching my mother take her last breaths.
“I don’t know what we’re going to do—what I am going to do—without you.”
As I said the words meant to make my dying mother feel better, the truth pierced me through the chest like a well-aimed arrow. What would we do without her? I didn’t have a clue.
“Ava, you will have... nothing.” She gasped for air, and then coughed loudly.
I looked down, not wanting to watch as the sickness consumed her. My gaze was drawn on the plush carpet and the well-worn throw rugs in her room.
I forced my mind back to the last thing she’d said. “What do you mean, we’ll have nothing?”
We had a house, a beautiful house. Servants. Our health. A vast yard where we could be free to practice our magic.
She wasn’t making any sense. If she meant we had no family, no friends, no one outside our little world we could trust, then yes, we had nothing. But that had never bothered us before. Not too much, anyway. We had each other.
“Everything around us, Ava... the house, the land—it’s all magic.” She paused, coughing. “A conjure. It’s not real.”
An eerie coldness crept up my spine. She was delirious. She had to be. The disease had taken hold of her mind and she was saying things that made no sense.
“What do you mean, not real?” I asked.
Part of me didn’t want to entertain her words. How could one person produce so much magic, such a façade, for two decades?
“I mean, there’s a reason I don’t leave the realm anymore,” she continued. “Not since I built the house after my last babe was born. My presence is what keeps the house erect. The servants visible. It is all an elaborate spell.”
My breath caught in my throat. “It’s... what?”
No. Impossible.
Mother wheezed again, louder this time, and I reached for a glass of water and held it to her lips. “Hold on, Mother. Just hold on a minute more.”
My blood boiled with anger. How dare she wait until her deathbed to tell us this? Why did she not prepare us for what was to come? How could she lie to us about something so important?
Something flickered in my peripheral. I blinked. The elaborate wallpaper faded, as though aging a hundred years in only a few seconds. The rich carpet beneath my feet shrunk away. The whole house shook, as though the very foundation on which it was built on was disappearing.
Fear raced through me, my heart pounding hard and every sense coming alive. What was I going to do?
I swallowed. My throat was too dry. My skin tickled, crawling with premonition. We were all in a lot of trouble.
“Just hold on, Mother.” It was strange, me telling her what to do rather than the opposite. “Until Bella and Courtney come.”
I hoped hearing their names would move her, would make her stay with us a little longer.
“Give me the locket, Ava,” she said. “Quickly.”
I reached for the necklace that hung from my neck, the ancient gold warm against my skin. I hesitated. I pulled it over my head and handed it to her.
My mother opened it with trembling fingers and lay it on her chest as though she wanted to wear it.
She pinned me with her gaze, strong and steady despite the shaking of the house around us. “No matter what, Bella and Courtney must be your only priority. Build a home of your own on the land nearby. Stay there as long as you can. Aunt Alison is the only one you can trust... in the village. If they find you...”
My sisters burst into the room in a cloud of noise, a look of sheer horror on Bella’s face as she held up a beloved book.
“What’s happening to the house?” she asked, as though she couldn’t—or wouldn’t—see our mother lying on a bed, helpless, my locket on her chest. “My books are falling to bits.”
She held out the book as the papers crumbled away into dust in her hands. She let out a squeal, her eyes wide and full of tears.
There wasn’t time for explanations. Not now, anyway.
“Quickly. Come.” I waved to them and my sisters rushed over to the other side of the bed, grabbing our mother’s hand. Bella sobbed as she put her head to the bed, and Courtney’s eyes filled with tears, but she didn’t make a sound.
Mother gasped as she looked at each of my sisters, her eyes soft and filled with love.
“I’m sorry for leaving you,” she said. Then her gaze swung around to me, wildness and panic clear in her gaze. “You cannot search for him, Ava. You mustn’t.”
So unfair.
I pulled in a deep breath. I didn’t like when my mother got the best of me, but then I realized I wanted no part of being bitter. Mother is dying.
I clenched my teeth against the command that had held me prisoner for too long. My mother’s prohibitive magic had stopped me from searching out the other half of my family. My father.
And once she was gone, her hold on me would be gone, too. I could make my own decisions. Figure out what was best for me.
“You never told us.” I said. “Why can’t we search out our father?”
When I was ten years old, my mother revealed to us who our sire had been. Our father was the strongest, most powerful warlock in the universe, and he lived in the Magical Realm. It was a place she had forbidden us to go, so we had complied.
“Because... if they find out...” She tried to speak, but she was fading.
The light in her eyes was disappearing.
“If who finds out, Mother?”
She didn’t answer me.
I narrowed my gaze and grabbed her arm. “Who?”
Her eyes widened and she stared at me like she didn’t recognize me.
I squeezed. “Tell me! Please. If you want me to save my sisters, you need to tell me everything. I can’t prepare myself if I don’t understand what we’re to face.”
“The Council... they arranged his marriage.” Her voice sounded raw. Each breath was a wheeze. “They...”
She was disappearing, like an ethereal ghost before me. I reached out for her again and my hand passed through her like she wasn’t even there. My stomach dropped with dread. It was happening. The ground beneath our feet began to shake like an earthquake was ripping through the land.
My sisters shrieked and clung to the bed. I tightened every muscle in my body.
Oh, God. We’re going to die.
I tore my concentration away from my mother and focused on saving us. It was difficult to do so, what with the ground shaking and Mother dying, secrets floating between us like ghosts.
I gathered my magic and released a breath. I opened my eyes, murmuring a protective spell I’d learned many years ago from my mother.
I threw my magic out and around the bed like an impenetrable bubble. A shield, protecting my sisters and myself as well as my mother from the crumbling house, as they cried out in terror.
“Mother!” I yelled down at her.
She met my gaze as her eyes glossed over, and becoming a milky white void. “The Council... the assassins. They’ll kill you if they find out who you are...”
My heart cracked wide open as my mother continued to disappear. It was difficult to maintain my anger when she couldn’t even speak sense.
“Take the locket. Quickly.” Her voice was a whisper, but I didn’t think she meant it to be. She gestured toward the locket that still lay on her chest.
The middle of the gold locket, where a picture should be, glowed purple. Violet, like the flecks in my mother’s eyes.
I had to let go of the spell as I reached out and grabbed the locket, throwing the chain back around my neck so I didn’t lose it in the maelstrom that was heading our way.
“Mother!” Bella screamed, her face raining tears. “Don’t leave us.”
And in a second, she was gone. Before my very eyes, before my sisters, my mother faded into nothing.
In the blink of an eye, her physical body was ash and dust, trailing off into the vibrating wind, leaving the three of us on our own.
A sob wracked my body and I reached for her, or rather where she should have been. I was met with air. I did not know what else I expected.
My sisters sobbed, leaning into each other.
I couldn’t dwell on the hole in my heart for long, though. I was the oldest, after all. It was my responsibility to protect us.
The bed my mother had been on vanished. My sisters shrieked.
I grabbed the girls up in my arms. This was going to be horrible, but we would get through it if I concentrated properly.
I began the protector incantation in a low voice. A spell that would at least save what we had on our persons. Our clothes. Jewelry. If nothing else.
The protection spell coiled around were we huddled together, shielding us from the chaos that surrounded us. I continued repeating the words over and over as my love for my small family beat with every pulse of my heart.
Courtney and Bella clung to me.
All around us, the house we’d lived in our whole lives crumbled, like a giant gingerbread house that had been dropped and stomped on. It was fragile, something a gust of wind could have destroyed. How had my mother been able to maintain such a thing?
Our servants, Gemma, Elinor, and Henry, all people I thought I knew, all people I considered part of our family. The flowers Courtney had planted, the drawings Bella had created and insisted we showcase like she was an artist. All disappearing.
The lush curtains crumpled and the roof began to cave in. Sunlight from outside—the real sunlight and not one Mother had created for us—surrounded us. I was forced to squeeze my eyes shut, not used to the brightness.
“Ava!” Bella screeched as she grabbed tighter to my arms. “What’s happening?”
I continued to hold on to my sisters.
“Hold on,” I said. “Don’t run. Don’t leave this circle. I’ve got you.”
The roof fell on top of my protective bubble, making a sound like thunder. It vibrated through my body.
Courtney dropped to the ground, screaming. Both her hands clutched her ears. I bent over so I could grab her hand in mine before she disappeared along with the house.
“Don’t let go!” I shouted.
Courtney got to her feet, tears streaming down her face. My sisters continued to cling to me, and I wrapped my arms around their shoulders, pressing their heads to my chest.
I was almost afraid they, too, were part of the façade my mother had created. But they couldn’t be. I loved them too much.
Their sobs rang in my ears as the house slowly but surely fell away. I didn’t even care that my ears pinched with pain because of their screams. At least it reiterated the fact that they were as solid as I was. That they wouldn’t be leaving me, too.
The noise coming from the crumbling manor was the hardest thing to block out. The farm we loved was no more.
The sounds of shrieking wind, of ripping fabrics, of a building crumbling to the earth echoed in my head. Stone hitting grass. Ash fluttering in the sky.
Finally, it stopped.
I opened my eyes, keeping the protection spell around our bodies and enforced as strongly as I could manage. It sounded like the devastation was over, but I couldn’t be sure.
There was nothing left. Nothing but a vacant plot of land. The farm we’d grown up with, nurtured and loved, was gone. The animals we raised as beloved pets were no more.
A ringing silence hung in the crisp air. Encompassed by space, encompassed by silence. It was a straightjacket I could neither see nor feel.
After a moment, my sisters’ sobs faded as well.
Not a speck of my mother’s magic lingered. She was truly gone.
Finally, I could let go of my spell and took my first breath of clean air. It was a bittersweet moment. I’d lost my mother. I’d lost my home. I’d lost everything I knew to be true.
And yet, now I was free to find the man who’d sired me and hopefully everything Mother had worried about was untrue.
From now on, I was free to make choices. I was free to do as I wished.
We were three adult witches standing in a field, clinging to one another for dear life, and I had no idea what the next step was.
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