From her current lover to her previous one and his friends.
“We appreciate anything you can tell us,” Sabelle assured.
The suspicion left Duke’s expression. “Be careful.”
With a sad smile and a lingering glance toward the stairs where Lucan had disappeared, Anka exited the house, then teleported away.
Sabelle closed the door, gathered her strength, then marched back to the table. “We need a plan. Immediately.”
Duke nodded. “Everyone, pack your belongings. Caden, you and Sydney find Lucan. Calm him down and tell him Anka has gone. Ice, can you and Tynan secure our weapons elsewhere? We can’t let them fall into Mathias’s hands.”
His air of authority cleared the room quickly, though Ice lingered for a last look at Sabelle.
Once everyone had gone, Duke guided Sabelle to the nearby library and shut the door. “How quickly can we secure the house with our magic?”
“In a few hours’ time, I don’t think we can. Bram’s magic is complicated. I can allow friends in, like Anka. I can undo the safeguards I’ve put around the house. But until he wakes, I have no idea how to unravel his protections, even if they are weakening.”
“Can’t we lay something over it?”
“Only with Bram’s guidance and permission. We could manage in a few days, I think.”
“We don’t have a few days.” Duke mentally cursed, his thoughts frustrated.
“Indeed.” She paced.
“So we abandon the house.”
Sabelle pressed trembling lips together. This was her home, and a million memories resided here. Bram loved this house. Its seclusion, its beauty. And she didn’t know how to save it for him. Her life was spinning out of control.
“I know this is a lot of responsibility for you,” Duke murmured, as if talking to a child.
“Don’t placate me. I’ll be fine.” Resolution and fury stiffened her spine as she pointed out, “The book must be protected.”
“You, olivia, or Sydney must carry it. A female must possess the book to transport it; its magic ensures that it will dissolve instantly and return to its last female owner or the resting place in which she put it.”
“I’ll take it,” she volunteered.
“Sabelle—”
“Olivia hasn’t come into her power yet, and Marrok is both mortal and human. Were Mathias’s minions to kill him, olivia would be virtually without defense.”
Duke sighed heavily. “Agreed. He’s a legendary warrior, but a human without magic. Mathias would delight in tearing him apart. And Sydney is human as well.”
“Indeed.” Nor did the woman share Marrok’s prowess on the battlefield. She’d become magickind’s news correspondent, making Sydney a very tempting target. Coupled with the fact that her mate, Caden, was newly transitioned and still grappling with his magic, giving them the book to safeguard wasn’t smart.
From the look on Duke’s face, he had similar thoughts. “I can’t send you alone.”
“Duke . . .”
“If you plan to take the book, you need at least one warrior to protect you. I’ll take your brother and make certain he’s cared for.”
“No!” The thought of being away from Bram, not knowing if he lived or died or needed her, filled her with panic. “He comes with me.”
“Be reasonable.”
“Be merciful. He’s practically my last living relative.” Her absent, selfish mother didn’t count.
Duke rubbed his forehead with his hand. “You’re making this difficult.”
“Go with Caden and Sydney. Make certain the transcasts continue. Magickind needs the regular news she provides via their mirrors. Send Tynan with Marrok and olivia. They’ll need the extra protection.”
“That leaves you with Lucan and Ice.”
Sabelle sucked in a breath. Damn it, she’d painted herself into a corner. Being alone with either man could be dangerous. She most trusted Ice to protect her, but not herself to resist him. “I’ll take Lucan.”
“He admitted that his temper is uncertain. Given everything transpiring with Anka … he could quickly regress into a dangerous state. You’ve been granting him energy. If he turns feral, he may refuse sex from anyone else and force the issue. We can’t risk that. Take Ice, as well.”
As much as she wanted to be self-sufficient, imagining that she could, by herself, protect the book and care for her brother, while dealing with a wizard who might slip back into a mate mourning he couldn’t control, and fight off pursuing Anarki seemed foolish.
“Bram wants Ice nowhere near me.”
“He’d like you dying even less. Sabelle, the clock is ticking. We need to leave now.”
Damn and blast! “I’ll let them both accompany me. But it will be your job to tell them to get along. I refuse to play referee.”
“Consider it done.”
“I’ll grab the book and a few items and be off. Tell Lucan and Ice to bring Bram down and to meet me at the foot of the stairs in thirty minutes.”
Spitting mad and terrified at once, she charged toward Bram’s office and the Doomsday Diary’s hiding place. Bloody high-maintenance men. How the devil was she to handle the odd tension between the three of them? Manage Lucan’s potential slips into illness and Ice’s desire, while maintaining Bram’s expectations? Later. She couldn’t worry about it now.
Sabelle took a few moments to grab the book and scan her brother’s office, remembering all the times she’d seen him here. Would he ever be back and thriving again?
Swallowing a lump of fear, she turned toward the study doors, feeling the clock tick down to danger.
Suddenly, the ground shook beneath her feet. A huge blast resounded in her ears. The walls shook. Smoke filled the air, choking her. She fell to her knees, clutching the book, then crawled into the hazy corridor.
Duke had managed to stagger to one of the front windows and looked out with dawning horror. “Get out, everyone! We’re being attacked now!”
CHAPTER TWO
WHEN THE CEILING THUNDERED, and Ice heard a woman scream, his blood ran cold. Sabelle!
He and Tynan hadn’t quite finished stashing the weapons when he heard the first rumblings. They were under attack. In a choice between preserving the hardware and saving Sa-belle … no choice.
After collecting a few weapons for the warriors to carry, Ice quickly conjured thigh-deep water and doused the rest. That done, he whirled around and pumped his way up the stairs, to the first floor of the enormous house. Amid the smoky chaos and ceiling’s crumbling plaster raining down, Ice scanned the corridor.
“Sabelle!” he shouted over and over as he stalked to Bram’s office, the library, the dining room, broken glass crunching under his boots. All empty.
Duke stumbled toward him from the front door, bleeding from a gash in the forehead. “The Anarki will be inside the house in less than five minutes. Find Sabelle. Get her and the book out of here. And take Lucan.”
With a curse under his breath, Ice nodded. The annoyance at taking Lucan was minimal compared to his fear. Sabelle, though he’d never hold her, was … everything. He’d never understood a wizard’s urge to mate. After one look at her, he comprehended perfectly.
Though she might become Lucan’s, no way would he lose her to Mathias.
“I’ve been screaming my throat raw to find her. Know where she is?”
“Sorry . . .” Duke said and ran toward the back of the house.
Ice cupped his hands around his mouth. “Sabelle!”
“Up here.”
Ice barely heard her reply above another explosive boom, but the siren call of her voice was enough. He charged up the stairs and flung into one bedroom after another. In the middle of one that was golden and silken and sumptuous, he found her.
He resisted the urge to gather her in his arms. She would neither welcome nor allow it.
Sabelle had thrown on a pair of jeans, a creamy white sweater that was snug across her breasts. She shoved a few items into a black backpack. “I’m ready.”
“The Doomsday Diary?”
She pointed to the backpack and darted past him, out of the room.
The closer he stayed to her, the safer she would be. He grabbed her arm to guide her down the stairs. Instead, she ripped from his grasp and sprinted down the hall.
Ice chased after her. “Where the hell … We must leave now!”
“Not without my brother,” she called over her shoulder.
It was on the tip of Ice’s tongue to suggest leaving the imperious bastard to rot, but Sabelle would waste valuable time arguing and trying to cart Bram down the stairs. The longer she stayed here, the greater the danger.
“Bloody hell,” he muttered, on her heels.
Bram’s room of heavy curtains, dark wood, and luxurious damasks was a study in wealth. Ice didn’t spare the time to shake his head in annoyance. Right now, Sabelle was trying to use her magic to levitate her brother and evacuate him. A whole lot easier to sling the prat over his shoulder.
With a curse, he edged past Sabelle and grabbed Bram, hoisting his dead weight into a fireman’s carry.
“Be careful! He’s very ill.”
As if he didn’t know that. With his free hand, Ice grabbed Sabelle’s hand and ran. “Let’s go!”
Another boom resounded, shaking the whole house. Halfway down the stairs, the front door began to groan and heave intermittently under the magical equivalent of a battering ram. Collectively, the Anarki threw energy at the house as one, trying to shatter its magical protections. And Ice knew, soon, they would succeed.
Outside, a sea of voices chanted. Mathias’s entire fucking army was here, and the Doomsday Brethren would be lucky if they managed to get out alive. Ice hardly cared if he did, but Sabelle … she mattered. Magickind needed her and the Doomsday Diary safe.
At the bottom of the stairs, he shoved her toward the back door. “Peek out the back windows. Have the Anarki surrounded the house?”
She stared at him, her gorgeous blue eyes rimmed in fear. But she bravely nodded and scampered off, dodging projectiles as another rattling boom shook the house. She was everything worthy in a female, and if he had more time, he’d tell her so.
But for now, he unloaded Bram’s unconscious form on the floor, then took up a defensive position by the front door to face the pounding threat. Marrok, olivia, and Tynan raced down the stairs. With a glance, Marrok saw Sabelle at the back of the house and sent olivia in her direction. The once immortal warrior and Tynan lined up beside him to face the threat about to crash through their door.
Duke stumbled from Bram’s office and joined them. “I’ve alerted the Council that we’re under attack.”
Old curmudgeons wouldn’t do a damn thing, but Duke’s belief in the nobility of the ruling class was understandable, given his title and background.
“Where are Lucan and Caden?” Duke barked.
He shrugged. Not his problem. His sole focus was to secure this door long enough for Sabelle to make it out alive with the book.
“I don’t see Anarki in back,” Sabelle shouted.
Hardly meant they weren’t there. They could be concealed, but if he and the rest of the Doomsday Brethren waited much longer to take the women and leave, Anarki would be crawling everywhere. Escape would be impossible.
To his right, Caden and Sydney flew down the stairs, Lucan staggering behind, clutching a bleeding shoulder.
“What happened?” Duke asked.
“Flying glass. Someone can heal him once we’re safe,” Caden suggested.
At her mate’s urging, Sydney darted for the other women. At the back door, Sabelle drew her wand, ready to fight, and Ice turned his body so he could see both doors with a subtle turn of his head. Sabelle wouldn’t be the one battling for their survival.
Duke lifted the creamy silken drapes covering the windows on either side of the front door. Outside, the swell of black robes grew and grew. They began to fan around the house, scurrying like ants from one place to the next. More joined seconds later. Then more, until there weren’t hundreds, but thousands.
Lucan and Caden exchanged a glance as they fell into the battle-ready group. The front door groaned and splintered. It was going to break any minute, and Ice wanted Sabelle nowhere near the hell about to break loose.
“Take the Rions and the book. Lucan can help me defend the door. As soon as you’re prepared, I’ll send him with you,” Duke insisted.
Ice wanted Lucan nowhere near him, but quarreling was a waste of time they didn’t have. He bit his tongue to keep the argument inside. “Fine.”
“Initially, we’ll split up to confuse them, cut down their forces and make them chase us in all directions.” Duke’s face was grave with concern. “The book is most important. Keep it from Mathias no matter what.”
“I’ll contact you when it’s safe. Where will you go?”
Duke winced when the door splintered again, and gray smoke crept in. The same sort of smoke that was slowly killing Bram.