Chapter Eleven – Evaine

Eva had never depended on anyone before. So for Jack to talk about him and his brothers risking their lives to put an end to the people who took her mom did not sit well. If one of them died, she would have to carry that for the rest of her life. It would be so much simpler for her to go and get the Dragon’s Tear alone. And then run.

She didn’t need them. And they did not need her in their lives.

“Someone’s coming,” Jack hissed. He was on his feet and halfway up the stairs before her brain had registered his words.

Eva got up, forcing her legs, which still ached from yesterday, to run up the stairs. If there was going to be a fight, she was going to have Jack’s back. Her sixth sense did not approve of protecting a shifter, but Eva told it to shut up. And it did.

Breakthrough, she said with some jubilation. The voice had to know when it was needed, and when it was intruding. She had lived the first twenty-four years of her life without it, and had managed OK. Although that world hadn’t contained degetty, druids, shifters, and whatever else existed in this world of Others.

“Who is it?” she asked Jack. He was paused at the top of the stairs, listening.

“The Grimmwold.”

“The Grimmwold. What kind of creature is that?” she whispered.

“Not a creature, a person. The druid who tends the grimoires.” Jack headed back down the stairs.

“The books? He’s going to come in here?” Eva asked.

“Unless we stop him,” Jack said.

“You’re going to attack him?” Eva asked, horrified. This would set in motion a chain of events that would have serious repercussions for Jack and the others.

“Not exactly.” He turned to her, taking hold of her hand and asking, “Do you trust me?”

Did she? She didn’t know. The silenced voice in her head would have screamed no. But Eva said, “Yes.”

“Good.” Jack opened the door, and they left the library. He pushed her back against the wall and looked down the corridor. “He’s going to come around the corner any minute.” Jack ran a few paces back along the corridor, and she followed. “Look natural.”

“Natural?” What is natural about being inside a building belonging to your people’s mortal enemy? She slapped her sixth sense back down, and reminded it to be quiet.

Following Jack’s lead, she allowed him to hold her hand, let her tension go, and relaxed. Eva had seen enough couples to know how boyfriends and girlfriends were supposed to behave. She might not be a participant in normal life, but she had a fascination of it. Often, on a Saturday morning, she would sit in the window of her favorite coffee house and watch the world and its inhabitants go by, studying the behavior of normal people and wondering why she wasn’t part of that world.

“Ready?” Jack asked, and then he let go of her hand and put his arm around her shoulder, pulling her close. Her first instinct was to pull away, but then he whispered. “Natural.”

Eva relaxed into him, trying to ignore the sensations creeping through her body, and instead focus on the old man coming toward them. He was old. Really old. As old as the books in the library. The gentle voice in her head had returned.

You know him? Eva asked.

And now you want to talk? it asked with some humor.

Eva ignored it. She wanted information; she did not want to play games.

“Ah, Jack. I sensed there were people in the building. I didn’t know you were called in,” the old man, what had Jack called him, The Grimmwold, asked.

“I came to see you.” Jack lied smoothly.

“No one comes to see me,” the Grimmwold replied. “Unless they want information.” His old eyes, which had seemed so out of focus, were trained on Eva like a laser beam. “She does not belong here.”

“She is my mate, Master Grimmwold.” Jack’s words were heavy, and the Grimmwold switched his gaze to the bear shifter.

“That changes things.” He nodded. “That changes things more than you know.”

“More than we know?” Eva asked.

“Yes, Evaine Talbot. It does.” The Grimmwold knew her name, or at least her first name. The last name didn’t belong to her. Did it?

“How?” Eva began.

“I know you, I know your blood.”

“You know other Night Hunters?” she asked.

“Some. More particularly, I knew your father.” The focus left his eyes and he looked into the distance, nodding and mumbling. “It all makes sense now. The ward that was broken. It was broken by you.”

“Yes. It was. Although I didn’t know about any ward.” She took a step closer to him, not wanting to let this link to her past go. “Please. Will you tell me what you know?”

“What I know?” He waved his hand toward the door to the library. “What I know fills a library. What I can tell you, that is the question you need to ask.”

“Riddles,” Jack said. “Can’t you answer her questions?”

“I cannot. I am bound.”

Jack took a sharp breath. “By whom?”

“A man who walks these walls. A man of words. A man of books.”

“You bound yourself?” Jack asked.

“I swore to another I would not tell.”

“Jack, what do you mean, he is bound?” Eva asked, her hope of information fading.

“Druids bind things. They use their magic to tie knots. Those knots can be around a degetty, like the one Gareth has. But they can also be used to bind information.”

“And that is what has happened to Master Grimmwold.” Eva nodded. “Why does nobody want to tell me who I am?”

“When people care for each other, they can do strange things to protect them. Or the information they carry,” Master Grimmwold said.

“Like leaving a baby on the steps of a hospital?” Jack asked.

“Ahh, that explains your lack of knowledge.” The Grimmwold’s old eyes filled with pity.

“Exactly, I have no knowledge. I was a few weeks old when I was abandoned. Which means I had no information worth protecting.”

“No, child. It means you were the only one with the information.” The Grimmwold’s face grew old and gray. “It means death.”

“Death. Whose death? My mom is still alive. She is being held captive…” She closed her mouth too late, the information spilled.

“Then your father has passed. And with it he passed...” The Grimmwold waved his hand at Eva.

“The information he had passed to Eva? How?” Jack pressed.

“The baby knew. The girl knew. The woman knows.”

Jack turned to her. “He means it’s hidden inside you.”

She avoided his gaze, but he tucked his finger under her chin and turned her to face him. His eyes locked on hers, and she remembered his words. She could trust him. She had to trust someone. “There’s a voice in my head.”

“What kind of voice?” Jack asked.

“The kind that tells me you are the enemy,” Eva said.

“You must control it, as your father did,” the Grimmwold said.

“You knew him well?” Eva asked. “You were friends. The voice hated it.” A slight nod told her she was right. “Did my father hide the Dragon’s Tear?

“Yes, against the wishes of the other Night Hunters,” The Grimmwold said. “The rest you must hear from your mother. When you find her, bring her here. I will ensure her safety. But do not lose the Dragon’s Tear.”

“Why? What is it for?” Jack asked. “Why is it so valuable?”

“It was hidden for a reason. A reason I cannot tell.” He leaned closer. “No man should be in possession of something so powerful.”

“No man?” Jack repeated, his face intent on the old man’s. “I need to know if you mean that literally?”

“No man.” The words were emphasized. “The Dragon’s Tear should be returned to the one it belongs to.”

“But there are no dragons,” Eva said.

“If there is a tear, there is a dragon,” Jack said, remembering what Lucas had told them yesterday.

The Grimmwold smiled sadly. “That knowledge is why Eva must learn to control the voices of the past. Find your father.”

“My father?” Eva asked. The realization of what the Grimmwold had told her spread across her face. “He’s one of the voices.”

“They are all there. But they will try to silence him,” the Grimmwold said.

“I understand,” Eva said, her voice filled with hope. She at last had a connection to her past, to someone to tell her who she was. “Will you help us? Will you help us make a fake Dragon’s Tear so we can take the real one from Gareth?”

“You do not have it?” the Grimmwold asked, surprised.

“No, Gareth set his degetty on Eva. He then pretended to rescue her and swapped the stones.”

“Then swap it back,” the Grimmwold said simply.

“I don’t have the fake. The men who have my mom destroyed it. Please, help us,” she implored.

“All I can do is tell you where to find the spell. The rest is up to you. The Dragon’s Tear must not fall into the wrong hands. Bring it here and Master Donavon will hide it deep under the Council Chambers.”

“I thought you said it should be returned to the dragon it belongs to?” Jack asked.

“Did I?” The Grimmwold asked. “I cannot go against the wishes of the Council. I am sworn to uphold the word of Master Donavon.” He winked, one old wrinkly eye closing and then opening so fast Eva thought she had imagined it.

“Understood,” Jack said.

The Grimmwold looked up, listening. “You must hurry.” He took a piece of parchment from the satchel he had slung over his shoulder, and then he rummaged deeper, pulling out a quill. Hurriedly, he scribbled on the parchment and handed it to Jack. “I trust you with this. When it is done, you will destroy it.”

Jack opened it up and looked at the words, written in a language he didn’t understand. “The spell for the Dragon’s Tear.”

“You knew the spell off by heart?” Eva asked.

“What I know fills the library. Every parchment, every book. I am a living record of the knowledge stored here.” He smiled sadly. “I wish I could tell you more. But the one piece of the puzzle, the location of the last dragon, is not here.”

“How do we find it?” Eva asked.

“Look in here.” He placed a gnarled finger to her head, and then removed it, putting it to his lips. Eva frowned and opened her mouth to speak, but the Grimmwold shook his head in warning. Confusion filled her. The Grimmwold had told her it was inside her head, but didn’t want her to speak of it. “When you have control. Then you should seek it out.” She couldn’t trust the other Night Hunters, only her father. Would she ever be able to separate the two, and control who used her head for their own schemes?

A noise to the north alerted Jack to the presence of someone else in the Chambers. “We need to go.”

The Grimmwold took Eva’s hand, his bones sharp through his thin skin. “I hope you find your mother.”

He walked away, and they stood in silence watching him, until the burning question in Eva’s mind had to be asked. “If we can’t let any man have the Dragon’s Tear, what am I going to trade for my mom?”

Jack glanced down at her, and then looked away. “You will trade the real Dragon’s Tear.”

“But you heard what the Grimmwold said. It’s too big a risk to let them have it in the hope we can steal it back.”

“Once you have your mom safe, we will go in and take it back. We have to act fast; the real Dragon’s Tear has to be back in Gareth’s hands by tomorrow so that he can give it to the Council. That way no one will follow the trail that will lead them to us misusing Council property.”

“No.” She stood firmly as he walked back toward the library.

“No what?” he asked.

“No, I’m not going to let you get yourselves killed.”

“We won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Because this is what we do.” He came back to her and placed his hands on her upper arms. “Let us do our job. We will succeed.”

“And then we let Gareth hand it to the Council?” Eva asked.

“Yes.”

“Do you trust them? If it’s buried under here, do you think that is where it will stay?”

“Yes. Because I have a plan.” He grinned widely. “It’s a good plan.”

“Are you going to tell me?” she asked.

“When the time comes,” he said. “When the time comes.”