Chapter 8

Evil Manipulated

AS THE TROUBLESHOOTER, Sebastian had come to think of himself as omnipotent. And rightly so, he assured himself as he walked to the cave door and stared outside. He was the most powerful warlock alive, which, in effect, made him the most powerful human being alive.

Of course, that didn’t make him invincible, he admitted. It did, however, give him a better chance to defeat the evils—both supernatural and natural—that preyed upon the covens around the world. Or, at least, it had until now.

He turned back to face Sarah. She stood in front of the fire, staring at him. As he took in her perplexed expression, he raked a hand through his hair, feeling damned perplexed himself. From the moment he’d arrived on this mountaintop, she’d thwarted him. Now, when he needed answers the most, she’d developed amnesia.

Wondering if she was faking it, he let his mind brush against hers. Since he’d only been able to mentally link with her during their sexual fantasy, he expected to be blocked from her thoughts. Surprisingly, her mind was open to him, verifying that she told the truth.

“Well, hell,” he muttered, deciding that her reaction to the spell had caused her memory loss. But how long would it last?

“What did you say?” she asked.

He smiled ruefully. “Nothing important. Why don’t you sit down and rest? Maybe that will help your memory come back.”

“Maybe,” she said, but she made no move to sit. Instead, she rubbed a hand against her temple and asked, “Who am I?”

“Sarah.”

“Sarah what?”

“I don’t know your surname,” he said, surprised to realize that was true. They’d never formally introduced themselves, and the triangle had only provided him with her first name. “We only met a few hours ago.”

Her brow furrowed in puzzlement. “Then why did you say we were home?”

He blinked, confused by the question. Then, he recalled that when he’d carried her into the cave and she’d asked where they were, he’d said home.

“It was just a figure of speech. You brought me to this cave earlier tonight, but from what you said, you don’t actually live here.”

“Oh,” she said, looking around the cave curiously, still massaging her temple.

They both started at the sudden rattling from the back of the cave. Sarah spun toward the sound, and Sebastian quickly cast another pro­tective spell over himself. The spell lightning no more than encircled him than the rattler slithered out of the shadows.

“What a beautiful rattlesnake!” she said, walking toward it.

“Yeah, well, as the old saying goes, beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” Sebastian stated dryly. “She’s your pet.”

Sarah glanced back at him. “Really? What’s her name?”

“You called her Willow.”

“Willow. A perfect name,” she said, dropping to her knees in front of the snake. She lifted the reptile and brought its head close to her face, crooning, “You’re as slender and supple as a willow branch, aren’t you?”

Sebastian grimaced when the beast flicked its tongue against Sarah’s lips. Sarah, however, laughed. As grotesque as Sebastian found the sight of her fondling the snake, her laughter enchanted him. It was rich and wholly sensual.

Desire again stirred inside him, and he muttered an inward curse. Even if he wanted to get involved with Sarah—which he didn’t—she was the enemy. Not only that, according to the spirit, she was neither mortal nor witch. So what was she?

Suddenly, Sarah swiveled her head toward him, and Sebastian felt as if he’d been punched in the gut. Her lips were curved in a smile, her golden eyes agleam with delight. While serious, she was beautiful. Smiling, she transcended beauty to something so extraordinary he couldn’t even describe it. He wanted to walk across the cave and sweep her into his arms, and then he’d . . .

He cut off the fantasy abruptly and asked, “How’s your headache?”

He hadn’t meant for the words to come out harshly, but they did. When her smile died and she eyed him warily, he wanted to kick himself. She needed to be reassured, not frightened. She had amnesia, for pity’s sake.

“Sorry,” he muttered. “I’m not fond of snakes, particularly those of the poisonous variety. They make me nervous, and that makes me curt.”

“Oh,” she said, her expression still wary. She placed the snake back on the ground and murmured something inaudible. The snake slithered back into the shadows.

Sarah watched until it disappeared, then she returned her attention to him. “My headache is better. Who are you?”

“Sebastian Moran.”

“Sebastian,” she said, as though testing the word. “I like it. It sounds solid, reliable.”

Sebastian shrugged, uncomfortable. It was the first time she’d spoken his name, and the way she said it in her soft, throaty voice didn’t make him feel solid or reliable. It made him horny as hell.

Get your mind off sex! he ordered himself impatiently.

Aloud, he said, “It’s just a name.”

“How do we know each other?”

It was a question he’d expected but didn’t know how to answer. In her condition, he couldn’t dump the story of the talisman on her. Yet he was averse to lying to her. She would, hopefully, regain her memory shortly. Instinct said that if he lied to her now, when she did remember she’d be even less cooperative.

“I came here because I needed your help, but it’s a complicated story,” he finally said. “I think we should save it for later. So why don’t I gather some wood to stoke the fire? While I’m doing that, you can unroll the sleeping bag that’s over there next to the trunk and lie down. You should get some rest.”

“What are you hiding from me, Sebastian?”

He closed his eyes against the blunt question and rubbed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. He was getting a headache of his own.

He dropped his hand and opened his eyes. “I’m not hiding anything from you, Sarah. I just don’t think you’re in any condition to listen to my story right now. As I said, it’s complicated. After you’ve had some rest, we’ll reevaluate the situation, okay?”

She tilted her head and regarded him for a long moment. “Can I trust you, Sebastian?”

Involuntarily, Sebastian’s gaze slid from her head to her feet, taking in her alluring feminine curves. He knew that wasn’t the context of her question, but his body chose to interpret it that way.

Forcing his gaze back to her face, he saw her watching him with a strange, speculative look. Automatically, he let his mind touch hers, startled to discover that she too felt the stirring of desire. That realization caused a sharp tug of lust in his groin.

“Yeah,” he stated gruffly, knowing he had to get out of here before he acted on his baser instincts. “You can trust me. I’m going to get some wood.” He left the cave, walking until he was out of sight of the opening. Then he leaned against a nearby pine tree, closed his eyes and drew in several deep breaths, forcing his body to calm.

Why was she suddenly having such a strong physical effect on him? Granted, she was gorgeous, but his response to her was more than plain, old-fashioned sexual chemistry. More importantly, why had she suddenly become sexually aroused? Considering her condition, sex should have been the last thing on her mind.

Was it a residual effect from the fantasy lovemaking they’d shared earlier? Or was it something more ominous? The talisman had taunted him into sexually debasing her. Could it be stimulating their libidos now? But if so, to what purpose? Sarah had no memory. Of course, he knew that didn’t negate her connection to the talisman. Memory or no memory, it could—and would—continue to use her.

Suddenly, Sebastian wondered if his spell had caused her amnesia, or if the talisman had used the event to induce it. In a horrible macabre way, it made sense. Sarah called herself a guardian and considered herself a protector. When he’d told her that the talisman had chosen her as its instrument of destruction, she’d fiercely denied it, declaring she’d never harm her people. That meant she had a conscience. For the talisman to use her, it needed to override her ethics and that would take time. But with amnesia, she didn’t remember her established moral code, and that explained why the talisman would choose sexual manipulation.

Sebastian knew there were three basic, primitive human emotions: Anger, fear, and sex. Of the three, sex was the most primitive. The gen­etically encoded need to procreate overrode intellect and could make people perform acts that they’d never commit otherwise. Indeed, lust that wasn’t tempered with conscience was a highly dangerous emotional state.

“So if I’m right, the talisman wants Sarah and me to copulate so it can connect with her baser instincts,” he said, needing to hear the theory aloud. “Once it has a primeval hold on her, it can prevail over her morals and mold her into whatever monster it wants. To stop that from happening I can’t make love to her, but as long as I’m wearing the triangle, I’m susceptible to the talisman’s machinations.”

Of course, he could be wrong, he told himself. It was possible that Sarah had a simple case of amnesia. He knew, however, that if there were even the slightest possibility that he was right, he only had one option. He had to take off the triangle and let it return to Sanctuary. Thankfully, his magic had come back, and he could contact Lucien, tell him what was going on, and warn him about the triangle.

He stepped away from the tree and looked up at the sky. The moon’s position assured him it was only a couple of hours after midnight, which made it around three in the morning in Sanctuary. Since his race’s power was at its zenith during nighttime hours, they were primarily nocturnal. Lucien would still be up.

He sat beneath the tree and cast an invisibility spell over himself for protection. To connect with Lucien over so many miles, he had to use astral projection, and his body would be vulnerable.

Closing his eyes, he breathed deeply and focused inwardly until he reached a trance state. Then he willed his soul-mind to leave his body.

SEBASTIAN WASN’T a novice to astral projection, but he’d never become accustomed to the giddy sensation of leaving his body. And giddy was the right description. He always felt dizzy, as though the world spun at a crazy speed, yet it wasn’t an uncomfortable sensation. Indeed, it gave him a sense of freedom that he imagined a bird must feel as it soared through the air.

He wasn’t aware of moving upward, but suddenly he hovered above the treetops. He glanced down, startled to see his body sitting beneath the tree in suspended animation. As many times as he’d done this, it still unnerved him to see his physical self so lifeless. Was that what death would be like? The soul-mind soaring, while the body remained grounded forever? Would it still startle him to be separated from his body in death?

Although the questions intrigued him, he knew that now was not the time to indulge in them. He had a mission and he needed to take care of it quickly. Sarah waited for him, and her memory might come back at any moment.

He no more than completed the thought than he found himself in Sanctuary. He stared at his surroundings in surprise. He’d willed himself to go directly to Lucien, and he’d expected to find him at home with his mate Ariel and their twins.

Instead, Lucien stood in the crystal cave, where the coven met for the nightly rituals. Kendra Morovang, the coven’s youngest narrator, was with him. As Sebastian studied Kendra, he noted that she looked as if she carried some horrible burden.

Sebastian wasn’t surprised. The narrators were the coven’s historians. They committed to memory everything of significance that had occurred within their race from the beginning of time. He knew that their job was not only onerous, but terribly limiting. They were condemned to live as observers, never actively participating in historical events. Sebastian couldn’t imagine anything worse than a life that made you sit idly on the sidelines with no chance of making a personal mark. He also knew it was hardest on the young narrators like Kendra, and it wasn’t unusual for Lucien to be counseling—or, more accurately, consoling—her. He hated to interrupt them, but he didn’t have a choice.

“Lucien?” he said to make his presence known.

“Sebastian?” Lucien gasped, spinning around, his silver-blue eyes searching for him. “Where are you?”

“Here,” Sebastian answered, concentrating on making himself materialize, though he knew he’d appear as incorporeal as a ghost.

“Thank God, you’re here,” Lucien said, raking a hand through his shoulder-length shaggy, black hair.

Sebastian arched a brow. “Thank God? You’ve been spending too much time with Ariel, Lucien. You know we don’t believe in God—or at least not the concept of a single spiritual being.”

“All belief is relative, isn’t it?” Lucien answered with a wry smile. “Who or what you worship isn’t as important as the precepts your religion imposes on you. As long as those precepts are for the betterment of mankind, how can you go wrong?”

“Touché,” Sebastian said with a chuckle, needing a taste of Lucien’s sense of humor right now. But he knew a taste was all he could afford. He had to get down to business. Sarah waited.

Sobering, he said, “I have something important to tell you. I’m going to be removing the triangle, and when I do, it will return to Sanctuary. I’m here to warn you that under no circumstances should anyone—including yourself—put it on.”

“After you hear what Kendra’s revealed about Ragna and the triangle, you’ll see that goes without saying,” Lucien said, his own expression sobering, enhancing the cragginess of his stark features.

As Sebastian switched his attention to Kendra, he felt a shimmer of unease. Lucien hadn’t been counseling her, but talking about the talisman. That put a different connotation on her burdensome look.

“What about Ragna and the triangle?” he asked, automatically lowering his voice to a quiet, nonthreatening tone. With her long brown hair, large brown eyes, and cupid-bow mouth, Kendra was one of the most beautiful witches Sebastian had ever met. But she looked so ethereal that he always felt that if he touched her, his hand would pass right through her. Everyone in the coven treated Kendra like fragile porcelain, but Sebastian suspected there was nothing fragile about her. He couldn’t confirm his suspicions, however, because a narrator’s mind could only be read by another narrator.

“Shana told you everything she found in the journals?” she asked.

“Yes,” Sebastian answered.

Kendra nodded. “What the journals don’t report is that Ragna took her own life within a month of Seamus’s banishment.”

“What?” Sebastian gasped. “That’s impossible! She had a daughter. Her maternal instincts never would have allowed her to resort to such a desperate act, unless she feared she’d bring harm to the child.”

“That’s exactly what she feared,” Kendra replied, folding her hands in front of her in a lecturing pose. “Ulrich underestimated the power of the talisman. He thought that once it was broken up and a piece buried, it would be rendered powerless. But soon after Ragna put on the triangle, she began to change.”

“Change how?” Sebastian questioned, the shimmer of unease growing stronger.

“She began to subconsciously perform evil spells,” Kendra answered. “For instance, if someone irritated her, she’d think, ‘I hope he breaks a leg,’ and he would. At first she dismissed it as coincidence, but after several instances of wishing ill and having it come true, she realized something was wrong. Then her daughter got the croup and cried all the time. When Ragna found herself on the verge of wishing harm on the child, she went to Ulrich and told him what was happening to her.

“Ulrich was upset, but he didn’t feel she’d been permanently corrupted,” Kendra went on. “She had, after all, only performed small, albeit malicious, spells. He told her to take off the triangle, sure that would solve the problem. But when Ragna tried to take it off, she couldn’t.”

“Are you saying she was spellbound by the triangle?” Sebastian stated in disbelief.

“Yes. Ulrich tried every spell he could think of, but nothing broke the enchantment. When Ulrich couldn’t help her, Ragna killed herself.”

“Why wasn’t the council told about this? Even if, for some insane reason, Ulrich decided to keep it a secret, the narrators were obligated to report such an ominous incident to the council,” Sebastian stated angrily, though he wasn’t mad at Kendra. He was furious with himself for not consulting with the narrators before running off to South Dakota.

Then again, they probably wouldn’t have told him any of this. They lived under a spell that prohibited them from speaking of anything that might affect the outcome of history in the making. If they violated that code, the spell governing them would instantly destroy them. The talisman’s resurrection was definitely a historical event, and telling him about Ragna’s fate would have influenced his decision on how to deal with the triangle. Once he put on the object, however, he’d exercised his free will. Divulging Ragna’s experiences now wouldn’t affect the outcome, because the die was cast.

“Both Ulrich and my ancestors tried to make a report to the council, but the information wouldn’t transmit,” Kendra replied, shifting uneasily from one foot to the other. “Every narrator in my family since then, including myself, has tried to mentally communicate the story to the council, but no one ever receives it. Grandfather Oran even went to Europe several years ago to tell them in person. By the time he got there, he’d forgotten why he’d gone, and he didn’t remember the talisman until he returned. It’s as if there’s some spell or power inhibiting us from reporting the information.”

“That doesn’t make sense,” Sebastian said, frowning. “If you can’t communicate the information to the council of high priests, how can you tell Lucien and me the story?”

She shrugged. “Grandfather Oran thinks . . .”

“Thinks what?” Sebastian prodded, when her voice trailed off. Oran Morovang was the oldest warlock on this continent. He’d soon be celebrating his one hundred and twentieth birthday. Sebastian respected the insight that came with such an advanced age.

“I know it sounds crazy,” she said, looking at him with a bemused frown. “He thinks the reason the information can’t be transmitted to the council of high priests is because the talisman was created on this continent. Thus, the knowledge of the talisman’s true purpose is limited to persons residing here. But Aodan Morpeth had the talisman nearly five hundred years before Christopher Columbus discovered the Americas, so Grandfather Oran has to be wrong.”

“Not necessarily,” Lucien said. “There is archeological evidence that the Vikings discovered the Americas around the year 1000 A.D.”

“You’re not suggesting that Aodan was here with the Vikings?” Sebastian asked incredulously.

“That not only fits with Aodan’s time period, but his coven was on the Norwegian coast,” Lucien replied. “And remember, Aodan disap­peared for five years. When he returned with the talisman, he couldn’t remember where he’d been. It’s possible that he did make the trip with the Vikings.”

Sebastian felt dizzy, and it had nothing to do with his astral state. “That’s conjecture. Let’s focus on what we know for sure. The triangle corrupted Ragna. She tried to take it off and couldn’t, so she killed herself. Neither Ulrich nor the narrators could communicate the information to the council of high priests, so Ulrich—at least I assume it was Ulrich— sealed the triangle into a dome and stored it in the repository. What can we honestly speculate from that information?”

“That you are now wearing the triangle, and it has you spellbound,” Kendra answered.

Sebastian jerked his head toward her. He knew that what she said was true, but he couldn’t bring himself to admit it. Instead he said, “Not necessarily. Ragna was Seamus’s mate, and he also wore a triangle. The mating bond is so strong that that’s probably what stopped her from removing it. Also, Seamus was permanently corrupted by the talisman. It stands to reason that through the unbreakable emotional bond between them, he’d transfer his evil to her.”

“Unless Oran is right and the talisman was created here,” Lucien rebutted. “Then the geological energies of this continent would have empowered the talisman, even when it was broken up. It could have been ruling over both Seamus and Ragna through their triangles.”

“Again, that’s conjecture, and you don’t have one shred of evidence to support it,” Sebastian argued, refusing to acknowledge the fear erupting in his mind. They were wrong. He could take off the triangle, and as soon as he returned to his body, he would do exactly that.

“But we do have evidence to support it,” Lucien countered. “Aodan couldn’t remember where he’d gotten the talisman. When you combine that fact with our narrators’ inability to transmit the information off this continent, it lends credence to the theory it was created here.”

“It still doesn’t make sense,” Sebastian contended. “There are dozens of objects in Sanctuary that were created in Europe. They are no longer within the purview of their source energies, but they not only work, we know everything about them.”

“But our race originated in Europe,” Kendra interjected. “We spent thousands of years dealing with the energies there, so we knew them intimately. When our ancestors came here with the Pilgrims, they had to learn the idiosyncracies of this continent’s forces.”

“Exactly,” Lucien said. “Also, for nearly seven hundred years after Aodan showed up with the talisman, no one in the Morpeth family could put on the triangle, because they had an innate fear of it. That type of fear is generally caused by a subconscious recognition of evil forces. When Seamus’s father inherited the talisman in Europe, his fear was instilled there. Once the fear was implanted, he wouldn’t have gone near the talisman.

“But Seamus’s first introduction to the object was in Massachusetts,” he continued. “Seamus was afraid of it, but Ragna said he was also beguiled by it, and he put it on despite his fear. That tells me that the talisman’s energy was at its peak, or it wouldn’t have been able to override his instinctive fears. The only way for it to reach that stage is to be aligned with the continental energies under which it was created.”

“That’s insane!” Sebastian automatically objected. Unfortunately, he knew Lucien’s premise had too much potential to dismiss out of hand.

“We’re veering from the point,” Kendra said. “It doesn’t matter where the talisman originated. It must be stopped.”

“You’re right, Kendra,” Sebastian said. “And I’ve already spent too much time here. I need to get back.”

“Before you go, is there anything else we should know?” Lucien asked.

“I suppose I should give you a brief outline of what’s going on. There’s a Native American involved. Her name is Sarah, and she has Seamus’s triangle. On the surface she appears innocent. I believe, however, that the talisman has chosen her as its instrument of destruction. There’s also a man named John Butler, who has the circle and is on his way to South Dakota. I haven’t linked with him, but Sarah has. According to her, he’s killed at least two people.”

“That makes sense,” Kendra murmured. “If, as Ulrich suspected, the circle is the talisman’s primary force, then death would feed it, giving it more power to reach its goal.”

“Maybe we could cast a spell that will stop this Butler,” Lucien suggested.

Sebastian shook his head. “The talisman is shielding him, or I would have connected with him. So before we even tried something like that, we’d have to pinpoint his location. If we aren’t there to take the circle from him the moment the spell takes hold, it will just latch on to some other unsuspecting person.”

“Can’t you get Butler’s location from the woman?”

“No. She has amnesia.”

“Amnesia?” Lucien repeated in disbelief. “How did she get amnesia?”

“It’s too long a story to go into now. I need to get back and try to remove the triangle. If I succeed, it will return within the hour. If I can’t remove it, I’m bringing Sarah to Sanctuary.”

“If the talisman has chosen her as its destructive weapon, bringing her here will put the coven in extreme danger,” Kendra pointed out.

“If I don’t stop the talisman, all of mankind, including the coven, is doomed,” Sebastian rejoined. “And I don’t think having her here will be as dangerous as you think. When she mentally connected with me, she waited outside the magic circle surrounding Sanctuary. That suggests the talisman can’t penetrate our protective magic, and that gives us an edge. If I bring her here, it will force the talisman to bring John Butler and his circle to us and we may be able to defeat it.”

“I hate this, Sebastian,” Lucien muttered furiously. “My life is finally getting on an even keel. I have a mate. I have children. I have every reason to believe that because I’m half mortal our race has a chance to survive. Now we may be wiped out because of a damn magical object that’s almost a thousand years old, maybe older.”

“I know, Lucien, but I have to honestly say I’m not surprised by this. Visit the repository. There are literally hundreds, perhaps thousands, of objects in there that could be potentially catastrophic, and there are three more repositories in Europe.”

“The sins of the father,” Lucien quoted softly.

“What?” Sebastian asked, confused.

“It’s a mortal saying,” Lucien explained. “It goes something like ‘The sins of the father are visited upon the son.’ And that’s what’s happening with us. While practicing the Old Ways, our people made objects that threaten our existence centuries, sometimes millennia, later.”

“That’s a sobering thought,” Kendra said.

“It’s also an absolute truth,” Sebastian stated grimly. “But I don’t have time for philosophical discussions. I have to get back to Sarah. If the triangle isn’t here shortly, prepare for the worst.”

Before either Lucien or Kendra could respond, Sebastian let his image fade and willed himself back to South Dakota. His return was almost instantaneous, and his soul-mind entered his body with such ease that he was barely aware of the transition.

The moment he opened his eyes, he grabbed the chain around his neck and tried to jerk it over his head. When he couldn’t even lift it away from his skin, fear coiled in his belly. The talisman had turned Seamus into a malevolent fiend and caused Ragna Morpeth to kill herself. Now it had its hold on him.

At that moment, Sebastian knew he would never get out of this mess alive. But before he died, would he end up like Seamus? Or would he find the moral strength to follow in Ragna’s footsteps and commit suicide before the talisman turned him into some monstrous killing machine?