That night, Nye remained awake with Isobel, attempting to answer her thousand and one questions about a life he scarcely cared to remember.
The Middle Ages hadn’t been all sunshine and roses considering he’d been dragged up kicking and screaming in London’s slums. Some childhood. Still, that life had shaped him dramatically, and a vampire always remembered their most defining moments…much to his detriment.
Isobel wanted to complete her thesis, and he wanted to distract her from the inevitable end. How could he tell her there was no hope? How could he break her heart? He couldn’t, so he humored her.
A new day dawned over the city, and as Isobel slept, he listened to the hushed sounds of the manor. With only him, Tristan, Gabby, Alex, and the comings and goings of Reed and the Six, the place was quiet. After such turmoil, it made him feel uneasy. Like they were living through the calm before the storm.
His ears tingled at the sound of rustling coming from the direction of the study and then a soft cough. Gabby. Glancing at Isobel, he smoothed a strand of brilliant hair from her forehead and traced her cheek. He’d allow her to sleep a few more hours.
Sliding off the bed, he gently picked up her notebooks and laptop, setting them in a neat pile on the bedside table. Finally, he adjusted the quilt over her before ghosting from the room.
Down the hall, the door to the study was closed.
Opening it, he found Gabby sitting on the floor among a pile of grimoires, her own open in her lap, her fingers speckled with ink. It seemed she’d been concocting something witchy while he regaled Isobel with stories of his dreary past life.
“Where’d you go last night?” he asked her, closing the door behind him. “I hope Reed behaved himself.”
“You don’t have to worry about Reed,” the witch replied, not even glancing up from her work. “You chose well with that one.”
“I know.”
She glanced up and laughed softly. “What about you? Where’d you go last night? You’re wearing the same clothes.”
“Nowhere,” he replied, sitting in one of the armchairs by the empty fireplace. “I stayed up with Isobel. She wanted to ask me questions for her thesis, so I humored her. She still thinks she’s going back to her studies.”
Gabby frowned and closed her grimoire with a snap. “There’s still a chance she can, you know. I know you’re being a Negative Nancy, Nye, but don’t suck the hope from everyone else. Especially Izzy.”
Perhaps she was right, but his mind hadn’t changed since their last conversation.
“So where’d you go?” he prodded.
“I went to see a contact,” was her brisk reply. “Unlike you, I’m still chipping away at our pest problem.”
Nye grunted.
“Have you seen Tristan this morning?”
“He’s still hiding away,” he replied. “I haven’t seen the ugly bastard since you dragged him back from the stone circle.”
“Give him some time, Nye.”
“It’s cowardly.”
“Hypocrite,” she replied. “You can’t blame him after what Eleanor made him do against his will. Loyalty is important to him. More so than it is to you. The fact he was compelled cut him deep. It violated something he holds sacred. It’ll take time for him to come to terms with it.”
He waved a hand at her, not wanting to talk about the knight a moment longer. He’d all but abandoned them as far as he was concerned. Yeah, he was a hypocrite, so what? At least he hadn’t resorted to hiding.
“Did you find out anything from your contact, then?” he asked, nodding at the pile of grimoires.
“I did want to discuss something with you,” Gabby began, rising to her feet and taking the chair opposite his.
He grunted and leaned back, rubbing his temples. Great, another question and answer session. Isobel was lucky he loved her. He’d bend over backward and suffer an eternity of excruciating pain for that woman, but Gabby… Well, he could take it or leave it.
“So…” she began uneasily. “I had a vision the other night.”
His gaze flickered to hers with interest. “What vision?”
“When I stayed behind at the stone circle,” she began. “The spirits showed me you and Eleanor…”
Nye narrowed his eyes, pretty damn sure where this was going already. “Go on…”
She eyed him uneasily. “When you cut off her head.”
Shit. He’d recalled that day more times than he wanted to in recent weeks and having Gabby witness it firsthand? He was ashamed that she’d seen him at his most vulnerable. In love with a witch who was turned against him, who he then had to kill in order to save his own wretched life. That meant Gabby and seen the moment Regulus had shown up and claimed his servitude.
Regulus. Her dearly departed love.
“Why are you bringing this up?” he asked stonily, too exhausted to care for the witch’s feelings.
“The spirits never meddle unless they have something worth saying.” Her fingers tightened around the arm of the chair, making the leather creak. She was…embarrassed?
“So why are you hesitating? Just tell me what you saw.”
“I was in the memory…as Eleanor.”
“You were…” He suddenly began to realize why she was a little flushed. That day, Eleanor had…
Gabby nodded.
“You kissed me as Eleanor?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
“I was totally grossed out, by the way, so don’t go thinking I’m going to try to dry hump your leg or anything.”
“Good,” he said, an amused smile playing at his lips. “Isobel would tear you apart.”
“Cocky son of a—”
“Calm your farm,” he interrupted. “You brought up my most embarrassing moment for a reason. Why did your spooky mates show it to you? So you could torture me with it? Is this their version of a ghostly beyond the grave prank?”
Gabby smiled, her shoulders relaxing. “No, I think it has something to do with the Unhallowed’s end game.”
“My four-hundred-year-old embarrassing moment has something to do with their resurrection plot? Do tell.”
“Damned if I know, but the spirits never come out and say exactly what they mean. I think they want to, but they can’t, so they’re limited to visions and riddles.”
“More like they won’t,” Nye muttered. “There’s another mystery for you, Gabby. Who controls the spirits?”
“That’s deep,” she retorted.
“So what was it about that day…” he mused, thinking over the proceedings. The way he was lead into the forest like a lamb to the slaughter, the rune Eleanor was carving into his forehead, the spell she was in the midst of casting when he sliced off her head… Or was it something unseen?
“If I can attempt to scry the rune on your chest, maybe I can find a clue,” she was saying. “I could only see through Eleanor’s eyes. I wasn’t privy to her thoughts. And the rune she was carving back then was incomplete.”
“But it’s gone,” he said, snapping to attention. “It healed days ago.”
“Traces might still linger. It’s worth a shot either way.”
“So I gather that means your battery is charged now?”
She shrugged.
He scowled in return, rubbing at the tingling sensation that had risen in his flesh at the mention of the rune.
“Do you mind?” Gabby asked, gesturing to him.
“Do you want me to do a striptease for you?” he asked with a smirk.
“Don’t be a smartass. I want to check you for any residual magic. If I can get a sense for Eleanor’s rune, I might be able to decipher the intent.”
“We already know her intent,” he all but spat. “I felt the power flowing through me. I heard the voices.”
“You heard the voices?” Gabby parroted, straightening up in interest. “You mean, you heard the spirits?”
“What spirits?” he asked sullenly.
“The ley lines are a direct conduit to the earth’s energy,” she explained. “I can access them through the spirit realm, though I can’t tap into their energy. I can only watch and listen. When I communed with them that night, I was guided by the ancestor spirits.” She shook her head in bewilderment. “They spoke to you?”
He ignored her question and asked, “Whose ancestors?”
“Everyone’s,” she said pointedly. “Though only the witches speak to me because we have a common interest in the living. What did you hear?”
“What does it matter?”
“It could matter a great deal.”
Nye scowled and stared off into space, mulling over the night of the ritual. The moment the power of the ley lines had flowed through him, his mind had been filled with nothing short of chaos. His body wasn’t designed to hold any kind of magic other than what already kept him alive, so through the pain, he hadn’t heard much of anything other than an unrelenting hum of drowned voices. Until then, he’d thought it was a product of his own insanity.
“I can’t remember anything,” he muttered.
Gabby sighed in mild annoyance. “Okay, but at least let me examine your chest.”
Knowing he wouldn’t escape her constant questioning, he stood and unbuttoned his shirt. Lying on the floor, the witch knelt beside him and placed her palms over his sternum.
“So how were my skills?” he asked with a smirk. “I’ve had time to practice since then, but one never forgets the fundamentals.”
“What are you talking about?” Gabby asked, cocking her head to the side.
He made a kissy face at her and laughed as her cheeks turned scarlet.
“Shut up,” she hissed. “I need to concentrate.”
Allowing her to settle, he didn’t move as her fingers probed his chest, rising and falling with the hard ridges of his muscles. Her skin heated as her power flowed into him, the energy tickling his nerve endings as she scried his flesh for clues.
Abruptly, the study door burst open, and they both glanced up at the sudden intrusion. Isobel stood over them, a deep-set scowl on her face. Nye knew what he and Gabby must look like, but it couldn’t be any further from the truth. Though if looks could kill, then the witch was a dead woman.
“Hello, darling.” He smiled at Isobel, throwing in a wink for good measure.
“What are you doing?” she asked, her voice tight.
Gabby flushed and pulled her hands away from his chest. “It’s not what it looks like,” she said hastily. “I’m scrying.”
“Scrying?” Isobel’s gaze shifted from him to the witch and back again.
“Don’t look at me,” he said with a shrug. “I don’t speak witch.”
“I’m looking for any residual marks the rune may have left behind,” Gabby explained. “Just to be sure.”
“And?”
Nye raised an eyebrow, his expression asking the same question.
Gabby frowned and rubbed her eyes. “I’m not sure yet. I need to think about it.”
“As long as I don’t sprout a second head,” Nye declared, sitting up. “This one is big enough.”
Isobel stormed from the room, clearly upset over nothing at all, and he rose to his feet, following her out into the hall.
Grasping her hand, he tugged her back into his arms. “Jealousy becomes you,” he murmured, stroking her flushed cheeks. “I like it.”
She moaned softly. “What have you done to me, Nye?”
“What have I done to you?” he asked in surprise. “Dear Isobel. What have you done to me?”