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“Guys, stop staring at my ass unless you want yours to be grass. If you don’t pay attention, you won’t last long out here. Right now we are in a protected space. There’s a barrier around the caves to keep everyone, including the monsters, away, from outside the barrier you can’t even tell they’re here. But once we leave this space, you can bet your sexy asses monsters are going to come out to play, and they don’t fight fair. We need to work together, but you also need to let me do what I need to do, understood?” Jezzie said, a familiar tone in her voice he couldn’t place. An air of command that was almost impossible not to obey.
“As you wish, milady.” Roth bowed, and Athon caught a hint of respect mixed with annoyance in his lover’s words as they both started the climb.
Jezzie pulled herself up to stand at the top of the ridge, hands on her hips, feet braced apart as she watched them make their way to the top, before she stepped aside to allow them up beside her.
“Two more steps away from the edge our protection ends, I suggest you call forth your weapons and prepare. Whatever happens, I have your backs. Whatever shadowy villain or beast moves, kill it.” Jezzie smiled, a smile full of eager anticipation, excitement, and ruthless cunning.
“We are forbidden from taking unauthorized evil souls, if we use our blades they will sense the evil and draw it out. Do we need to go back for other weapons? Where are you hiding yours, anyway?” he queried.
“You have a far greater weapon at your disposal than your Hellborne blades. Your shadows will help you, if you ask. Plus, none of the monsters here have souls for you to take, so The Well won’t call to them. The soulless creatures who roam this place have no logic, reasoning, or finer emotions, they are simply fuelled by pure instinct and primal urges. Except for the prisoners, who in my mind are the real monsters. Those are the ones I usually go after. You guys can stick to whatever beastie tries to make us their breakfast, or dinner, I’ve lost track of which it is . . . not an uncommon occurrence,” Jezzie trailed off.
“What about our shadows can help out here? And how do you know so much about our blades? For a vampire witch you sure do know a lot about our kind,” Roth tersely asked, his tone ripe with barely veiled suspicion.
“Yeah, okay, so, apart from being raised by a pretty badass witch there is one other component to my biology I haven’t mentioned yet. I mean, I figured it might be better to just show you? You know?” Jezzie hedged, looking nervous.
“Whatever it is, Jezzie, we want to know all of you, and I’m sure it’ll be fine,” Athon tried to assure her as he glanced at Roth, noticing the hardening look in his gaze.
“Right, well, let’s start with the weapons then, shall we?” She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Her features settled into a look of focus, similar to a novice Hound-in-training, before one thin black cylinder appeared in each of her hands.
Shit! Neither he nor Roth were prepared for the appearance of the wakizashi-like, and probably razor sharp, black blades which suddenly exited each end of the grips she held, nor the hint of Hephaestus’s magic that surrounded them ever so briefly. What surprised Athon more though, Roth seemingly less so, was the red swirling shadows that erupted from her and danced down her arms to curl around and seep into the sharp steel, licking at the pointed tip as if testing how deadly it would be.
“How did you get those?” The hint of an accusation entered Roth’s tone.
“They were given to me upon my full manifestation of being. Or so I’ve been told.”
Her manifestation, into what? What exactly was Jezzie? Angels couldn’t reproduce with anyone other than humans—which was hugely frowned upon–and other angels—which was very rare as well. There were other beings whose powers manifested later in their life cycles, or had gradual releases of power before reaching adulthood. But neither vampires nor witches underwent a manifestation as such. Not to mention a hybrid of the two was utterly unheard of, let alone adding anything else to the mix which could go through such a thing. He was starting to get a taste of the confusion and frustration Roth had been enduring for years.
“Roth, Athon, don’t panic, okay? And get that untrusting glare off your face, mister. I’m not going to eat the last piece of pie, or murder you in your sleep.” Jezzie stuck out her tongue at Roth then chuckled nervously. “I suppose I should just get this over with.”
Without warning Jezzie was surrounded in a cloud of shadows as she rose a few feet off the ground. The shadows settled and shrunk back into her body revealing two large, beautiful wings protruding from her back. The black feathers looked so soft and luxurious as they unfurled around her and the small horned tips on top, similar to Luc’s but smaller, arched up and in toward her. But what caged his breath inside his chest wasn’t that she had wings, no, it was the colored feathers along the bottom of them. The rainbow of colors was perfectly matched to the ones in his own hair. Hair that fell forward from a casual slicked-back, lazy faux-hawk, rather than its usual soft but spiked style, to frame his eyes and catch his gaze as if to declare to all that he and Jezzie were a matched set.
With no small amount of effort he lifted his jaw from where it had hit the floor and tore his gaze away from her wings, his eyes darting back and forth between Jezzie and Roth. Huh! Roth’s eyes matched the blue hues of her wings as perfectly as it did the color he’d maybe . . . might have . . . okay, definitely did purposely choose for the blue in his own hair.
Before either of them found the wherewithal to utter a single word, Jezzie spun and took off running. “Keep up, boys.” Her words floated back to them on the non-existent breeze.
Athon’s blades flashed into his hands and his wings erupted free in one swift, graceful motion as he took off running after the crazy woman he was ready to claim as theirs. Roth was hot on his heels, muttered curses springing from his lips. By the time they caught up with her, she was almost nose to nose with a being so nightmarish it could only have been created by the Ghouls of Agregashi.
Tar-like slick rolled off its skeletal body, sharp claws and even sharper teeth snapped at the fetid air, too close to Jezzie for his comfort. He moved to rush into the fight, but Roth’s firm grip on the back of his shirt pulled him up short, and he slid to a halt in the thick soil. Just then Jezzie ducked and slipped behind the creature, the edge of her blade slicing through its midsection as if it were soft butter. Puke-yellow ooze fell at its feet before the creature deflated, its carcass sizzled as it hit the soil. The thick loam sucking up the liquefied remains greedily amid a series of crackles, pops, and slimy slurps.
“She’s fucking amazing,” Athon uttered in awe.
“If she can handle herself like this, let’s see what else our sexy hybrid warrior princess can really do and have some fun ourselves, yeah?” Roth asked, excitement for the hunt filling the space around them as Jezzie sauntered their way.
“I know you probably both have some pretty big questions, but can we have a little fun first? I promise I’ll answer anything you want to the best of my ability as soon as we are done here and soaking in the hot tub with a glass of wine and no clothes. Sound good?” she concluded with a wink full of fire.
“Promise?” Roth’s voice was stern, unlike his expression which held a soft vulnerability.
“Cross my vampiric-angelic-witchy little heart. Though, just so you know, I can’t tell you who my father is . . .”
Roth’s emotions went into lockdown as Jezzie paused, but she quickly hurried on.
“At least not yet. You see there’s this suppression spell—say thank you to Leraie for that one—that means I can’t say certain things which pertain to information that could reveal other certain things until it’s time for those certain things to come to light, yada, yada, yada, the Fates, yada, yada, the Almighty’s freaking master plan, yada, yada, all that bullshit. Otherwise, I’d straight up tell you right now, so we could all prepare for the inevitable clusterfuck in my future, our future, if you decide I’m what you both want? Me and Nithe, that is?”
“Leraie? You really can’t say it? Can Tana? Nithe?” Roth probed.
“Nope. No one who knows the ‘big certain something’, anyway. Apparently, the mysteries will all start unraveling soon, at least according to both Leraie and the mysterious willow woman who guards my haven,” she assured them.
Athon jumped as he felt something slide against his leg and he was suddenly flat on his face in the foul loam. Thick tentacles slid up his thighs as they pulled him along the ground. He twisted his upper body, his wings disappearing into his back, sitting up as much as he could as he hacked at the limbs with one deadly sharp blade, quickly severing them from the creature's largely hidden bulk. The detached pieces searched for their host and slithered away as he scrambled back and to his feet.
