The Witch With No Name

Quen was scowling, his midnight plans probably foiled. “Yes, Sa’han. I’ll forward all your calls to your secondary phone.” He turned to me, inclining his head with an unknown emotion darkening his mood. “Rachel,” he said flatly, and then he turned to the stairs, moving slowly to hide his limp.

I wished I had a secondary phone. Trent was standing a little too close, and I looked up. “Your bath?” he prompted.

“I can’t believe you’re going to take a nap,” I said as I glanced at the clock. “The only reason the dewar failed was because the sun was down and the lines were flowing contrary to shoving someone into the ever-after. Soon as it comes up, they’ll try again. And what about all the undead? We’ve got surface demons running around again. I can feel it!”

Trent’s hand went behind my back. I would’ve protested as he escorted me forward except I liked his hand there. “They didn’t fail because of the flow of the lines. They failed because of you,” he said, almost whispering it.

The nursery door shut with a soft and certain snick that Jon somehow made sound accusing. My steps into the lower living room slowed. Trent had asked Jon to put the little girl to bed to try to bring him down from his anger and rage. Suddenly I felt a lot more worried.

“Ahh,” I hedged, not wanting to call it a night quite yet. “Can I use your phone to call my mom before she storms the I.S.?”

Trent’s hand made tingles as it slipped from me. “Sure. Good idea.”

“Thanks. I’ll be right in.”

He gave me a faint smile, hesitating at the door to his rooms. “Take your time. I’ll be in the shower.”

The couch pillows were on the floor, and I picked them up, replacing them before I sat down with the phone. The memory of being attacked washed over me, and I quashed the surge of anxiety. Trent had left the door open, unusual for the privacy-loving man. It was a clear indication that he was on edge and didn’t want anything closed between us. The shower went on as I punched in my mom’s cell number, and the faint soft sounds of running water were soothing.

My eyes roved over Trent’s living room as I waited. It wasn’t that bad, especially compared to the ruination of my church, and as the call connected, I stood to fix one of the pictures. I took a breath as the line clicked open, but my mom was faster.

“Trent?” her voice came, worried and fast. “Where are you? Is Rachel with you?”

I smiled, feeling good all of a sudden. “It’s me, Mom. We’re good. Al helped us.”

“Your demon?” she blurted out, and my heart leapt as Jenks’s wings became obvious in the background.

“Mom? Is that Jenks? Can I talk to him?” Thank all that was holy. Something was going right for once.

“I thought the demons were pissed at you,” my mom was saying, but I hardly heard her. Ivy. I could hear Ivy! She was okay? She was with my mom!

“Thank God you called,” my mom was saying. “Ivy’s made an unholy mess of my front sitting room. Sweet Jesus, that woman has a temper when planning things. I don’t know how Nina puts up with her, the sweet dear.”

“Mom! Let me talk to Ivy,” I said, then lowered my voice before I woke Ray up. “Mom!”

But she wasn’t listening, hand over the phone with a muffled, irritated “What? No,” and then an indignant “Hey!”

“Rachel?” Ivy’s soft gray voice filtered through the phone, and I closed my eyes, holding the warm plastic to my ear and almost rocking in relief. Jenks was there, too, swearing at Tink, the sun, and her unmentionables.

“I’m fine. I’m at Trent’s,” I said, choking up. “I thought Cormel had you. They called on your phone.”

“I lost it at the square. David got us away. Why did you go to the tower? Rachel, you could have been killed.”

Tears warmed my eyes, and I wiped them away before they could fall. She was okay. I wouldn’t have to live with the guilt of her languishing in a cell because of me. “I thought they had you . . . ,” I said, sounding weepy. “Jenks couldn’t find you. We thought—” My words choked off, and I just smiled. Her phone. All they had had was her phone. Jenks’s wing clatter sounded like static over the line as he hovered by the receiver, and all I could do was grip the phone and smile.

“So you were going to rescue us? Of all the unplanned, thoughtless—” Ivy started, but I could hear the relief in her voice, and I picked up a vase of flowers, setting it upright.

“Yeah, I love you, too.” They were okay. All of them. Slowly my shoulders relaxed.

“Rache, we were coming for you,” Jenks said, guilt thick in his voice.

“You did good,” I said, reluctant to tell them why Al had gotten me out. “Ah, I’m going to stay here tonight if that’s okay.”

“Back off!” I heard Ivy admonish Jenks, and I knelt to pick up the scattered stack of children’s books. “At Trent’s?” she said, her irritation clearly not directed at me. “Good. Don’t come back into Cincy or the Hollows yet. It’s crazy here, and you can’t do anything. Now that I know you’re okay, I’m going to head back to my folks’ with Nina.”

My motion to collect the crayons hesitated. “Maybe I should come in.”

“Tink’s little candy ass, Ivy, I told you not to tell her that!”

“I said back off! I can’t hear when your dust hits the receiver!” Ivy said off the phone, and then to me, “We’re fine. Nina crashed, but I think she’s going to be okay now. There’s no reason to come back until it’s safe.”

When was it ever safe? I sat down on the edge of the couch, guilt bringing my shoulders to my ears. “I’m so sorry, but you can’t let your mom find her soul. Every vampire who does is going to commit suncide in the morning.”

“She . . .” Ivy hesitated, and I tensed.

“Ivy?” Crap on toast, how did Ivy’s mom find her soul that fast? It was just after sundown!

“She’s okay,” Ivy rushed on, but I could hear the heartache in her. “She’s never wanted her soul before, but after seeing others find them . . .” Ivy’s words trailed off, and I pressed the phone to my ear, heart aching. “Rachel, she wants her soul so badly. She knows it will kill her, but she wants it. She’s hurting. I’ve never seen her in pain like this before.”

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered. Lucy’s doll was half under the couch, and I pulled it out, propping it carefully in the crook of the couch. “Maybe . . .” But there was no maybe. If she got her soul, she would suffer until she brought her soul, body, and mind back in balance—that is, until she committed suncide and died for good.

Ivy was silent, thinking. “It should settle down in the morning, right?”

Or turn really, really bad. I clicked off the table lamp, wanting the muffling gray of shadow. “I, ah, don’t have my phone anymore either,” I said, reluctant to hang up but having nothing more to say. “Just call Trent to get hold of me.” Unnoticed until now, the faint glow of the downstairs bounced against the ceiling to light everything in a soothing haze.

“Trent’s number. Got it. Call me before you get on the roads. I’ll let you know where it’s safe to meet.”

This was bad. “Ivy . . .”

“Stay there,” she said, voice hard. “I mean it. We’re fine.”

She was down to three-word sentences. Great.

“Yeah, we’re fine, Rache,” Jenks said, almost shouting into the phone. “Take a night off from saving the world for once, huh? We got this!”

My fingers were cramping, they were so tight on the phone. “Tell my mom bye for me. I’ll be up before sunrise if you need me.”

“Me too,” Ivy said softly. “Bye.”

“Talk to you then.” I didn’t hang up, and there was a telling hesitation as both of us sat there saying nothing, just . . . silent.

“Well, hang up already!” Jenks said, and I sighed when the phone clicked off. Guilt tugged at me as I set the phone down. Guilt, but what could I do? I had a lot of things I was capable of, but until I had a direction, a place to aim my frustration at, it would be for naught. I wasn’t good at waiting, and now I had nothing to do until sunrise.

The doll looked lonely, and I pulled her onto my lap, holding her to my middle as if she were real. The undead with their souls were going to suncide. Every last one of them. I couldn’t stop it. As soon as enough of the vampire masters were dead, the real battle between the elves and the demons would begin.

The soft sounds of Jon singing to Ray filtered out into the soothing gray, and the occasional clatter from downstairs gave evidence of Quen’s business. The shower had been off awhile, and I wondered how much Trent had heard. Hugging the doll, I looked over the familiar shapes and shadows of Trent’s life and wondered if I could fit in here—if I dared to try to belong to something not of my making. Or if I would just blow it all to hell.

Trent’s silhouette eased into the doorway, backlit by the soft glow of a bedside lamp. The sight of him drying his hair almost made me cry. I wanted to belong to this so badly, but I was afraid I’d bring only more heartache. Look what I’d done to Ivy. To Jenks.

“I overheard you talking to Ivy. She’s okay?”

I nodded. “She was with David all this time. Cormel only had her phone.” He had lied, twisted me into coming to him, played upon my emotions because he didn’t have any.

Trent was silent, then, “You want to go home?”

My head dropped to my fingers, clenched around the doll. His voice was low, holding emotion for me—about me—because of me. “No,” I whispered as I set the doll in her corner.

He didn’t move, looking lost as he stood there in his robe. “I wasn’t thinking about anything other than preparing for tomorrow,” he said, his voice moving up and down like music. “I can take you home. You have other people who need you. Jenks, Ivy, Bis.”

My shoulders hunched as I felt as if I’d been punched in the gut. I wanted to be here. I wanted to be there. Fear threatened to swamp me just thinking about what I’d do if something happened to Trent. He always seemed so in control, so capable. Unfortunately his confident past was starting to get him in trouble in his shaky present. A mere six months ago, Cormel would never have dared to restrain Trent.

Trent tossed the towel to a chair. “Rachel?”

My head snapped up as the door to the nursery softly opened. Jon came out, moving like a shadow or a thought soon forgotten. His long face held no expression as he took in me sitting on the couch and Trent in the doorway. “Excuse me, Sa’han,” he said as the door shut behind him. “I’ll help Quen oversee the horses being brought in.”

Trent scrubbed his scalp with his fingers, looking so much like I wanted him to be that it hurt. “Thank you.”

A lump had formed in my throat, and I swallowed hard as Jon gave me a last evil look before he went downstairs. I’d never seen Trent’s underground stables, but apparently he had an entire arena to practice his horsemanship in at a pleasant sixty-five degrees even in the winter.

“I’ll get dressed.” Motions abrupt, Trent turned away.

“Trent,” I called, and he stopped short at the guilt in my voice. I said nothing when he came to join me when I gestured helplessly. He sighed when he sat down on the couch, smelling of soap and meadow and spiced wine.

He was tired, and I looked at our hands twined together. “I don’t know how you do it,” I said. “Going to sleep whenever you get the chance.”

Trent smiled, his thumb rubbing my palm both rough and gentle. “It comes from trying to live with a human clock for most of my life.” His arm went around me in a sideways hug. “I’m sorry. I was selfish to try to keep you here. Much of this feels like my doing.”

“You haven’t done anything,” I said, leaning into him as his grip on me eased.

“That’s just it. I feel as if I’ve been more of a hindrance than anything. I really thought we could walk in there and still get back out.”

I gave his fingers a squeeze. “And you got caught. I know the feeling. Don’t worry about it. How were you to know that Cormel . . .” I stopped and bit my lip. That your clout was so damaged by me that it couldn’t keep you safe anymore.

“My selfish desires screwed up the alliance that would have united the dewar and the enclave under one voice.” His head was down and his words were soft as he gave voice to long-held guilt.

Dropping my head onto his shoulder, I stared at nothing. “The dewar would have divided anyway, and you’d be married to Ellasbeth,” I said, and I actually felt him shudder.

“No. You’re right,” he said quickly. “But no one is listening to me anymore.”

I smiled in the dark, my fingers tracing the lines of his hand in mine. I’d never seen anyone who had two life lines before. He wasn’t used to having his words ignored, and I understood his frustration.

“Three years wasted.” He sighed. “Not to mention most of my business ventures.”

“I’m sorry. Maybe we shouldn’t have—”

Trent’s hand slipped from mine, reaching to cup my cheek. “Don’t even think it,” he said earnestly. “The past few months have been the best in my life.”

He was looking at my lips, and my pulse quickened. “Tell me it’s going to be okay,” I whispered.