Finding him now was going to be next to impossible. Unless Foxx’s intuition started kicking in, Vhyper might be well and truly lost.
Chapter Twelve
Lyon extended his arm to Tighe. “You’re looking better.”
Tighe smiled. “I’m alive.” Hawke and Kougar had taken him to the healer, Esmeria, in the Georgetown enclave, where she’d taken the bullets from his flesh and healed his injuries. They’d then brought him back to Feral House, where Kara had filled him with radiance over and over through the day, healing and strengthening him until he almost felt normal again.
Normal was an illusion, of course.
His clone still lived. And as long as his clone lived, as long as his soul was split, he could never be right.
Hell, he wasn’t sure he’d be right again even if his soul were returned to him. Not until he found a way to get Delaney Randall out of his head.
From the moment he’d regained consciousness beneath the healer’s care, he’d thought of her, worried about her. What if she got another of those visions without him there to help deflect the pain? And she would get another vision unless his clone had somehow, miraculously, died on his own, which he was certain hadn’t happened. The other Ferals had reported feeling a sudden shift, almost a lightness inside, when their own clones had been destroyed. Tighe felt no lightness, nothing but tension. Frustration. And concern.
For Delaney.
Lyon slapped him on the shoulder. “Come. We’re meeting in the war room.
Tighe followed Lyon into the wood-paneled room at the back of the house. A large oval conference table sat in the center of the room. Along the walls, Hawke had rigged up four large computer screens. All were dark, the chairs empty, as the Ferals paced.
Paenther greeted him, clasping his arm hard and long. “Glad you pulled through.”
“Yeah, thanks. I can’t tell you how much I wish that damn clone had gone after the Therian enclaves instead of getting me mixed up in the human world.” Then again, he’d never have met Delaney. Which would have been a good thing. Definitely a good thing.
“Your eyes,” Paenther murmured.
“The streaks?” Tighe answered Paenther’s unspoken question. “No clue what they mean.”
“Let’s get started.” Lyon took the seat at the head of the table and motioned the rest of them to take their chairs. All did, except Paenther and Tighe. Tighe was too damned tense to sit. He prowled the room like an animal in a cage.
Paenther remained standing by the door, back straight, arms crossed, a fine tension radiating from him that rivaled Tighe’s own, thanks to an inborn rage that had tormented the black-haired warrior for centuries.
After dealing with his own unnatural tension, Tighe’s respect for his friend grew another three notches. How he kept his sanity, Tighe couldn’t guess.
Lyon turned to Paenther. “Report, B.P.”
Paenther scowled. “Nothing good. No sign of Vhyper in any of the places he would have gone, were he still himself. Which isn’t surprising. Tighe’s face is splashed all over the news. A bartender recognized us as friends of his and called the cops on us this afternoon.” He shook his head. “He’s not hanging out in bars, Roar.”
Lyon nodded. “Where do you think he is?”
“With the Mage.” Paenther nodded at Foxx. “We’ve been afraid so from the beginning, but the cub’s gut started confirming it last night. We drove out to the Mage stronghold on the Eastern Shore to have a look around, but it’s gone, Roar. The mansion’s still there, but by the look of the place, the Mage have been gone for months.”
“I thought we had Therians keeping watch on the place,” Hawke said.
“Two Therians were there, hiding in the woods nearby. They swore up and down every room in the mansion was lit when in truth they were all dark. Glamour strong enough to fool Therians for weeks, maybe months, is damn strong magic, Roar.”
“Sensing a theme here, Chief?” Jag drawled.
Lyon threw Jag a sharp look, then turned his gaze to encompass all the Ferals. “I want to know how the Mage got their ancient magic back and how much of it they actually have.” A deep growl rumbled from Lyon’s throat as his gaze returned to Paenther. “Find Vhyper and the blade, B.P. And that Mage stronghold, while you’re at it. I want to know what in the hell is going on!”
Paenther dipped his head, his shoulder-length hair brushing his cheeks like twin black curtains.
Tighe glanced up as Kara entered the room. He expected her to go to Lyon, as she usually did, but though her hand trailed along Lyon’s shoulder as she passed him, she came straight to him, meeting his glance with a gentle smile that warmed the half of his tattered soul he still possessed.
“Hi,” she said softly, taking his hand.
“Hi, yourself.” He tugged lightly on her blond ponytail, finding a smile for her beneath the weight of his worry. As he felt the first warm surge of power flow from her hand into his, he knew what she was about. Her skin began to glow with the iridescence of radiance. “Thanks, little one.”
With another soft smile, she turned to stand beside him where she could watch her mate and the others. Keeping their hands joined, he lifted his arm over her head so that his arm was around her, and tucked her against his side as she acted as the conduit for him to the Earth’s energy and strength.
Lyon barely batted an eye at the move, to Tighe’s relief. Lyon was as jealous as any mated male, but Kara’s closeness strengthened Tighe almost as much as the radiance, and Lyon knew it. Besides, she thought of Tighe as more of a big brother, which suited Tighe just fine. Theirs was a bond he was coming to treasure. He adored her.
But it was another woman’s face that wouldn’t leave his mind. Damn Delaney. He’d admired her warrior’s spirit, so it shouldn’t have surprised him that she’d turn on him the moment she got the chance.
As if she couldn’t even feel that soft connection to him in her head. Or it meant nothing to her.
And what had it meant to him? It hadn’t changed his own mission or her place in it. He could hardly expect it to have changed hers.
Delaney Randall might be a woman, but she was FBI through and through. And the truth was, that was one of the things he admired most about her. She never let her emotions get in the way of what she had to do.
“Better?” Kara asked, looking up at him, the glow of radiance leaving her face.
“Much.” He leaned down and placed an affectionate kiss on her forehead. “Thanks.”
She gave him a quick hug, then slipped out of his hold to join Lyon, hooking her arm around his shoulder as he tugged her down to perch on the cushioned arm of his chair.
Lyon nodded to Hawke. “Show them what you showed me earlier.”
Hawke reached for the laptop sitting open in front of him. A moment later, one of the flat-screens came to life, replaying the local news channel’s morning report. The sound was muted, but no sound was needed.
Tighe watched his own likeness with dismay. An amateur photographer at the scene of the fire had caught Tighe leaving the apartment with the child in his arms.
“Is that you?” Lyon asked him. “Or the clone?”
“Me.”
“Who was the girl?”
Tighe set his jaw and shrugged. “Just a kid trapped in the apartment above the fire.”
Jag snorted. “Since when do you give a shit about humans?”Tighe threw the warrior a glare, but had no decent answer. He’d been asking himself the same question.
“The better question,” Lyon said, “is why is that clone so damned hard to catch?”
Tighe nodded. “I’ve been asking myself why this one’s different. Why did this one escape the battle when the others stayed to the bitter end?”
“The witch’s control on him must have been weaker,” Hawke said. “But there’s more to it than that. The clones were created for one purpose only. To perform the Feral ritual to free the Daemons from the blade since we’d never do it.”
Wulfe leaned forward in his chair. “But Tighe’s clone developed a will to survive.”
Hawke nodded. “Maybe more than that. Those clones should have been the same. They were made at the same time with the same magic by the same witch. The only differences were the souls used. And the draden.”
“The draden,” Lyon murmured. “What if she accidentally caught one of the old ones in her net?”
“That’s what I’m thinking.” Hawke’s palms flattened on the table in front of him. “The oldest ones were once Daemons. Though the souls were stripped and imprisoned in the Daemon blade, it’s conceivable a bit of the Daemon’s consciousness survived in the draden all that time.”
Tighe scowled. “And now that he’s been reanimated, he possesses the drive of a Daemon. He’s acting like one, that’s for damned sure.”
Lyon turned to Hawke. “Does that mean what I’m afraid it does?”
Hawke’s jaw clenched as he nodded. “His ultimate goal is bound to be freeing Satanan. And with that bit of Daemon consciousness, he may know things, ways to accomplish that that even the Mage and Therians have never known. At the moment, he doesn’t seem to be doing anything but feeding. And maybe that’s all he is doing, but it’s clear he’s evolving. Survival comes first, and sooner or later he’s going to realize, if he hasn’t already, that his survival hinges on you, Tighe.”
“He can’t live if I die. At least that’s what your clone told Kara.”
“I believe that was right initially. Before the clones were fully evolved. But I’m not sure that’s true any longer.”
“So what exactly are you saying, Wings?” Tighe asked warily.
“I’m saying, watch your back, buddy. I don’t think killing you is going to automatically give him your half of the soul, but there may be other ways. He was born of magic. A magic I’ve seen evidence he may still possess.”
“Explain,” Lyon said.
“Kougar and I had him cornered. He slipped into a group of humans and disappeared. We’re not sure how, but when we combed the group for him, he was gone. And he should not have been able to get away.”
“Could he have acquired Tighe’s ability to shift?” Foxx asked.
Tighe frowned. “My animal can’t be split like that.”
Hawke shook his head. “We don’t know what abilities he’s acquired. They could be anything.”
“How are we going to catch him?” Lyon demanded.
“Daemon traps.” Kougar pulled at his goatee. “If we can unearth some of those old spells.”
Hawke groaned, shaking his head. “They haven’t been used in five millennia. What are the chances?”
“Get on it.” Lyon turned to Tighe. “Have you had more visions?”
Tighe quit pacing and faced his chief. “The lady Fed is getting them now instead of me, but when I touch her as she’s having one, I see them clearly. I know right where he is.”
Lyon met his gaze, his amber eyes thoughtful. “Hawke told me what happened. That you weren’t able to take her memories.”
“Not yet. I’m working on it.”
“Where is she now?”
Tighe shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ll find her.”
Lyon’s hands fisted on the table in front of him. “I don’t like that you don’t have control of her mind.”
Tighe’s teeth ground together, his temper sparking. “I said, I’m working on it.”
“I don’t have to tell you how dangerous it is to have an FBI agent searching for us, knowing what we are.”
“She doesn’t have a clue what we are.”
“Maybe not, yet. But she’s an investigator. And I have to believe she’s already seen things that have her questioning who you are. What you are. Am I wrong?”
“No. You’re not wrong.”
“Contain this threat, Stripes. However you have to do it. If you can’t, we will.”
Tighe heard the promise in his chief’s words. The threat. Because there was only one way anyone else could contain this.
By killing Delaney Randall.
Deep inside, the tiger raised its head and growled.
“Whatever we do, we have to do it fast,” Hawke said. “I called the Shaman and talked to him about those streaks in your eyes, Tighe.”
Tighe lifted a brow. “And?”
Hawke’s jaw clenched, his expression grim. “Your soul’s beginning to disintegrate. Once your eyes are fully black, there won’t be anything left of you in either body. Until then, there’s still hope we can put you back together again.”
But his time was running out.
Delaney sat on the edge of the bed while the blood-pressure cuff contracted around her arm.
“How do you feel?” Dr. Jensen asked for the fiftieth time. The doctor was a short, round woman with a tight cap of salt-and-pepper hair and shrewd blue eyes.
“Fine.” Like her heart had been ripped out of her chest.
“Good. All your vital signs are normal.” The doctor removed the cuff. “We’ll have the lab results back in the morning. I’d offer you something to help you sleep tonight, but until we know if they drugged you, I don’t dare give you anything.”
Delaney shook her head. “I don’t need it.” The last thing she wanted was to be in a deep, unnatural sleep if one of Tighe’s men found a way to track her.
Just the thought of Tighe made her jaw tighten with anger. Her eyes began to grow hot, stinging with unshed tears. He shouldn’t have run. He shouldn’t have died.