Chapter 5

Knocking startled Aggie from her silent reverie. Reluctantly she rose from the plush mattress. It was the most comfortable bed she had ever been in and regretted standing immediately. Grasping the ornate doorknob, she pulled the door open and was bombarded by all the guys waiting in the hallway.

“Are you ready?” Gryson was the first to speak and as she took in the other guys she noted mixed expressions. Mitchell stood with his arms crossed leaning against the opposite wall. Mathius stood stoic and a scowl set firmly in place. Liel was impassive just as she expected with his arms crossed behind him. Ren smiled as her eyes ran past him and she couldn’t help but smile back. Xavier and Eldon were patiently waiting expectantly for her answer. Aggie chose not to look in Kyrel’s direction for fear of the pull retaking its hold. Rubbing her hand over her face to clear her thoughts, she then leaned down to slip her shoes back on.

“I suppose so. I wouldn’t want to hold up the party.” Closing the door behind herself, she hesitated. “Are my things going to be safe in here?” She had noticed she was the only one who had brought a bag with her. Did they know something she was unaware of?

“Your things will be fine. If there is anything else you require, simply let me know and I will have it brought to your room. I mean anything at all.” Mathius was being kind to her and Aggie didn’t know how to respond to that. His mood swings were giving her whiplash and she wasn’t sure how to take them. Who was Mathius and which version of him was a front?

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Closing the door securely, “Let’s get this show on the road.” Aggie let Mathius take the lead but didn’t wait for the rest of the guys. She stuck close to Mathius since he was currently being nice to her.

Before long, they stopped in front of a room. She was surprised not to see the door heavily guarded. Instead, there was no one waiting outside the door. “Where are the guards?” Aggie finally asked.

“They don’t need guards. The room is magically locked.” Liel supplied. Aggie then realized that Mathius’s hand was on the handle and it was glowing silver to match his eyes.

“Are all the doors locked under magical keys in this castle?” Aggie was right behind Mathius and he glanced over his shoulder and narrowed his eyes.

“When someone can merely dust themselves into any space, it makes it safer to magically lock down private areas.” Mathius didn’t elaborate beyond that and went back to unlocking the door.

“So, do you have to know the spell or is it a list of approved entry, like at a dance club?” Aggie’s questions were obviously getting on Mathius’s nerves because she could have sworn he actually growled but opted to remain silent and focused on the task at hand. Moments later the latch clicked and the door swung open. Mathius grabbed Aggie’s arm to stop her from entering. The rest of the guys filed into the room and got to work like a well-oiled machine.

“The locks are more like a list as you so basically put it. Though it is released by magical fingerprint.” Aggie was surprised that Mathius had been forthcoming and answered her question.

“If it is a fingerprint why does it take so long to unlock everything?” She was pressing her luck, but Mathius had calmed slightly since unlocking the door.

“That is where the list comes into play. The magical fingerprint is sifting through the list one by one. If you break contact in any way, it starts over on the list.” Mathius pushed her into the room with the guys now that they had begun.

“That isn’t very high-tech for a magical locking system. There are faster ways to do that with human technology with actual fingerprints.” Aggie was a little dumbfounded. She assumed that magic made life easier, in this case it seemed like a harder process.

Mathius held his hand out flat toward her. Aggie looked at him confused, “Magical beings don’t have fingerprints.” He left his hand there and Aggie couldn’t help herself. Reaching for him she clasped his hand to examine it closer. Before she could get a good look, she realized her hands warmed under his touch and a feeling vibrated from her chest. Aggie gasped and dropped his hand, the feeling and the warmth disappeared in an instant.

Eyes wide with disbelief, “What was that?” Aggie was rubbing her hand against her chest trying to understand.

“I think you and I need to have a chat. Now is neither the time or the place though. Can I come to your room tonight so we can speak in private?” Aggie raised one eyebrow at Mathius. Had he gone from growling at her to asking to come to her bedroom in private?

“Are you sure that is a good idea?” Aggie feigned coyness and did everything she could to hold the face.

“I promise you will be perfectly safe in my care. There are just some things you need to know about your role as Gatekeeper that you might not want to discuss with all of us present. If you don’t want to talk with me I’m sure I can convince Liel, or even Kyrel to take my place if you would prefer.” There was a subtle hint of humor in his tone.

Aggie burst out laughing, drawing the attention of all the guys. “No, I think you will do fine. If we are going to have an actual conversation, I’m not sure I can handle Liel’s analytical tone for much longer. Don’t even get me started on Kyrel.” She covered her mouth to stifle her laugh and keep her tone lower. The rest of the guys moved back to their individual projects. Mathius smirked knowingly and Aggie found herself captivated by his smile.

Turning her attention back to the space, the guys were working and she tried to stay out of their way. Walking over to the wardrobe, she realized upon closer examination that the prince was quite young. She was under the impression he was a child, but not as young as the size of his clothes led her to believe. “What’s the prince’s name?” Aggie realized they had just been calling him the prince and no one had referred to him by his given name.

“Rikan.” Mathius’s voice came from directly behind her. He hadn’t let her get far away from him in the room. The closer he was to her she realized her body hummed in appreciation. Was this a side effect of our touching? She wondered and the more she thought about it, she realized that was the first time any of the guys had touched her skin to skin. Then she remembered Gryson had touched her and she felt something then to but didn’t know if it was the magic swirling from the gateway. Was that significant or only her imagination running wild?

“I’m guessing he is about eight or nine, judging by these clothes.” Mathius nodded once at her assumption. “How many other kids have been abducted? Are they all about the same age?” Aggie was slowly going through Rikan’s clothes as she thought through her questions. Her heart was breaking for Rikan’s parents and all the other children’s parents, as well.

“The children are all around the same age seven to ten. None have come into their full powers yet, but the powers are there none the less. Something traumatic can force it out. We need to get to them before that happens.” Mathius was very passionate about this, it touched Aggie's heart.

“Did they only kidnap boys?” Aggie’s brain was going a million miles an hour and it was hard to settle on one question at a time.

“No, they haven’t been consistent with any particular gender.” Mathius was the only one answering and Aggie took in the rest of the room. Ren and Mitchell were wandering around the room, what looked to be aimless. When she looked a little closer she could see their noses twitch. She watched them for a couple minutes and in different areas they stayed longer than others.

“Are you getting anything?” the twins turned at the sound of her question. It was as though they knew it was directed at them. Ren raised an eyebrow at her, but to her surprise it was Mitchell who answered.

“There isn’t any scent here that is out of place. It is all demon, aside from our own now that we are here. There is a latent scent of,” Mitchell hesitated and scrunched up his face like he was trying to find the right words.

“Starting fluid,” Ren supplied.

“Why would there be starting fluid in here? This is an eight-year old’s room. So, unless your olfactory make-up is similar to the human construction and your children have a propensity for getting high, there has to be another explanation.” Aggie was racking her brain for answers but she wasn’t an investigator or a scientist. All the things with that smell were likely endless.

“No, none of our chemical makeup is quite like a human. We can’t drink your alcohol and become intoxicated. Taking your kind of drugs doesn’t make us under the influence. Our metabolism is significantly faster than yours. Some are more than others but all are faster than humans.” Liel gave her his usual overly detailed response.

“You could have just said, no.” Aggie smarted off to Liel and smiled to show she was only joking. “If Rikan wasn’t using it for recreational purposes, then what else could it be?”

“Chloroform.” Xavier spoke and that one word had Aggie frozen. His voice was a rich velvety baritone, that sent goosebumps running down her spine.

“That makes sense, no one heard anything and a child would likely react or be upset to have a stranger removing them from their room at night.” Mathius looked deep in thought as he revealed that small tidbit.

“If your bodies don’t react the same way humans do to drugs, why would chloroform do anything to any of you, let alone Rikan?” Aggie was doing her best to keep up, but now dealing with a completely different species of being and therefore outside her realm of knowledge.

“Just like human children have different tolerance, as do our children. While it wouldn’t have knocked him out entirely it may have subdued him not unlike a slow morphine drip used to subdue pain.” Aggie rolled her eyes, of course Liel would answer her question.

“Is he the only one of you guys who knows these answers? No offense, Liel, but you make learning about your people very boring.” Processing the information she received, Aggie started pacing the room. It seemed someone had abducted these kids and subdued them with chloroform. With sleeping children, they didn’t panic or cause a ruckus. “How did they get out?”

A collective sigh rang through the room. Aggie glanced up just as Mathius came to stand beside her. Without saying a word, he gripped her around the shoulders and braced tightly. Aggie didn’t get a chance to speak before the room started swimming. She felt like she had done a bad dose of acid or something equally as awful. When the room finally stopped moving she was no longer standing in the same place. Instead, she was across the room, back in front of Rikan’s wardrobe. Her stomach was in knots. “Breathe deeply the feeling will pass in a moment.”

After a couple of deep breaths Aggie regained the ability to formulate words, “What the hell was that?”

“That, Aggie, was what I mentioned earlier about dusting. To everyone else in the room you merely disappeared as though dust was blown from the mantel. In reality, you phased from one side of the room with me to another. It’s the easiest way for us to travel. Anyone with demonic blood can do that.” Mathius looked proud of himself that he had caught her off guard with his demonstration.

“You’re saying that all of you can do this?” Aggie’s hand flew to her forehead. She was becoming overwhelmed with information and her little impromptu teleportation hadn’t helped only caused her to become dizzy.

“No, only those with demonic blood. Mitchell, Ren, Liel, Xavier and Eldon weren’t blessed with that privilege.” Mathius’s pride was reaching new heights. Aggie put all that together and something clicked.

“You’re a demon as well?” She focused all of her attention on Kyrel and instantly regretted it. She was locked, and couldn’t stop looking at him and before she could stop it, she felt her feet begin to guide her straight for him.

“Yes, well, I’m a kind of demon.” Kyrel spoke and his voice was so captivating that Aggie just wanted to find a way to crawl inside and live in it. Her entire body was at ease and there were no more threats or worries. All that was left was Kyrel and his charisma that had her lost to him. “I’m an incubus.” His words were a story just for her. No one else existed, that is until Mathius smacked Kyrel in the head again and spun her around so she could realign her attention on anything or anyone else.

Aggie shook her head instantly angry, “That is what you have been doing to me? You’ve been using your powers of seduction on me. Why would you do that to me? I should have known there was something magical at work. I never get dopey-eyed over men.” Fuming, partly because she didn’t want to become enraptured again, and partly because she wanted it to be natural attraction, Aggie refused to look at Kyrel.

“Not magical, my powers while they can be used to draw in the opposite sex, and occasionally not the opposite, that only happens when I push out my powers. With you I haven’t done anything of the sort. I would never do that to you unaware. The only thing that I can figure is you are tapping into something more instinctual, more raw.” Mathius cut him off again with another slap to the head. Kyrel never flinched once in the times that Mathius had done that.

“That is enough, we have other things to worry about and I will talk to her about that later.” This piqued Aggie’s interest but given their current situation, she filed that away for later, along with her other questions. “If there aren’t any smells for you two to pick up and no one else is getting anything, let’s all prepare for dinner and then tomorrow we can comb through the physical evidence collected the morning Rikan was discovered missing.”