Chasing Faete (Beyond the Veil Book 1) (8 page)

And if she was going to do this, then she needed to do it when Leo and Ben were unable to stop her. Tears welled at the thought of leaving them. She felt her heart breaking within her.

Can I do this?

She had to. This could very well be their only chance.

Chapter Fourteen

Closing her eyes, Erica drew the healing energy within her to the fore, molding it into the form she needed to send her mates into a deeper sleep. She knew that if she attempted to leave, they would notice immediately and stop her. With a heavy heart, Erica pushed the energy from her. The light that came from within her was unavoidable, and she heard both her mates wake and sit up beside her.

“What the hell?” Leo mumbled. Erica knew he was already feeling and most likely trying to fight the effects. It would be in vain.

“Erica?” Ben asked gently at the same time, his eyes wide before both of them surrendered to the effects of the energy she fed them. They fell back onto the mattress, caught in a deep sleep.

Sobbing quietly, Erica scrambled off the bed. She dragged on her clothes and secured her sheathed sword to her back, all the time avoiding looking at her men. Her resolve was weak where they were concerned, and she knew that if she allowed her gaze to linger she would not have the courage to do what was needed. Only when she was dressed did she come back to the bed. Wiping the tears from her face, she leaned in and pressed a kiss to Ben’s lips before circling the bed to kiss Leo. As goodbyes went, it was pretty damn pathetic, but it was all she could allow.

“Forgive me, my loves,” she whispered from the doorway. Then she stepped into the hallway. Despite the fact that the house was quiet, Erica knew there would no doubt be men stationed on guard around it, especially considering the message Alefric had sent that afternoon.

Walking quietly downstairs, Erica stepped into the almost deserted kitchen. Only one wolf sat at the counter, drinking a steaming cup of coffee.

“Donovan, what’s keeping you up at night?” Erica stepped into the kitchen but stood so that she was between him and the back door.

Donovan looked at her with curiosity. “Hell, princess, there’s a whole lot of shit that keeps me awake at night. But what is driving my curiosity at the moment is wondering if you think you really stand a chance to get out that door, before I’m on you.”

Erica held the man’s gaze. People had been attempting to intimidate her most of her life, and she had yet to allow anyone to succeed. “Oh, I’d give myself a fair chance, Beta. And just because we’re having a conversation, and asking and answering questions nice and friendly like, I feel the need to ask, why would you care? If my intention after walking into the kitchen tonight was to in fact go out that door, why would you feel like you needed to stop me?”

Erica was mildly surprised at his hate-filled sneer. “So the princess is going to run. What a fucking surprise. Let me guess, you’re going to run as far and as fast as your fucking legs can carry you from the war that is coming.” Donovan suddenly stood up, so fast the chair he’d been sitting on almost fell over, and Erica stepped back a couple of steps, her hand automatically sliding to the hilt of her sword. “Normally, I wouldn’t give a shit what you or your fucking kind do, but when you think to put me and mine in danger because you are a spineless bitch with no fucking sense of what is right, then yeah, I sure as shit am going to stop you.”

Unfazed by Donovan’s tirade, Erica stared at him, her face devoid of all emotion. “Where does your allegiance lie, Donovan? Are you loyal to Gabe?”

Erica saw a slight flicker of guilt in his eyes, and she knew immediately that Donovan was the traitor. She pulled her sword and brought it in front of her as Donovan’s eyes began to shimmer, his wolf close to the surface. It was really fucking ironic that in her bid to escape the house and get to Alefric to, she hoped, save the day would be thwarted by the fact that she had stumbled across the traitor.

“It surprises the shit out me that despite your obvious hatred of … how did you put it?
My kind?
You would align yourself with Alefric and his followers.”

Rage filled Donovan’s expression, and Erica took another step back, wanting to put more distance between them. “I would never align myself with that narcissistic bastard. You ask me who I am loyal to? My family! My mate and my brother, first and foremost. No one, not even Gabe or the pack I have sworn fealty to, takes precedence over them.”

Erica stared into his eyes for a moment gauging his sincerity. The hatred he had for Alefric was clear. “Then if that is the case, show me where you took the messenger. Leo told me that you returned him to the Fae, so you must know where a portal through the Veil is. Take me there and I promise you, I will end Alefric.”

Shock or some other emotion Erica couldn’t quite name flittered across the Beta’s face. “You want to go back across the Veil? Alefric wants you dead, but you want to go back there?”

Erica sighed as she re-sheathed her sword. “Yeah, I know, I’m a complicated woman. I have a plan, one that will hopefully end with Alefric frying in hell like he should. But in order for me to execute this plan, I have to go back and face him. Alone.”

Donovan seemed to be weighing up her sincerity, and no doubt assessing whether or not she spoke the truth. “It’s not far. I’ll take you.”

When they exited the house, Donovan spoke with the guards that walked the perimeter of the property. The further they got from the house, the more her heart broke. She took deep breaths, resisting the need to turn and run back to her mates, and fighting the urge to burst into tears when she certainly did not have time for them. They would do her no good right now anyway.

“Here,” Donovan suddenly said, pointing to a slight opening between two large rocks protruding from a cliff wall.

Had Erica not been lost in her own pain and grief at leaving, she would have been able to feel the faint energy emanating from the break in the Veil that allowed transition between the realms, if one knew how to manipulate the energy properly. Perhaps this was where Corrine had come through all those years ago.

Erica walked towards the break, but turned before she stepped through. Despite her best efforts, tears slipped freely down her cheeks. “I know that you don’t owe me anything.” Her voice was hoarse, pain and loss clear in her tone. “But I have one favor to ask of you. Will you hear it?”

Confusion clear on his face, Donovan nodded.

“If what I am about to do succeeds, then I will be back to beg my mates for forgiveness at having done this on my own. But if I fail, and I am unable to kill Alefric, then could you please give Leo and Ben this message. Tell them that although I have loved them for just a short time, the depth of my love could not be deeper. Had I known them all my life, and we had been blessed with multiple lifetimes, our bond would be as true. Tell them that they have my heart, and it will beat with theirs for the rest of time.”

Donovan’s face softened, then flooded with guilt. He seemed to be wrestling with an inner torment that she was not privy to, but she was beyond caring. Donovan would give her mates her message. She had to believe that. Turning, she quickly wove the Elven sigils in the air that unlocked the bridge and allowed her through the Veil. As she entered into the maelstrom that existed between the two realms, she spun one last time to lay eyes on the earth realm. She saw Donovan reaching out to her, his face filled with regret, and he was shouting something she couldn’t make out. Then, everything went black as she made the transition through the Veil finding herself atop the bridge that lay on the other side.

****

“God-fucking-damn it!” Donovan roared as Erica disappeared from sight. He stepped between the rocks, standing in the exact place she had just been, and there was nothing there. Just rock on three sides of him. “Fuck!” He yelled and punched the wall in front of him a few times just for good measure.

How did everything get so fucked up so quickly? He’d thought he had everything all figured out. The world was black and white and there was no gray, but his brother had always told him that he needed to see the gray once in a while to truly get the bigger picture. Jason had always been the one who saw what was really going on. And this was just another example of Donovan only seeing what he wanted.

He thought he’d understood how the Fae worked. He was a firm believer in understanding every nuance of his enemy, but this one, Erica, she was different. She headed into the realm knowing that it would most likely mean her death. She was going to face Alefric, the prick who thought he had Donovan’s balls on the chopping block, and because that Fae fucker had Jason and April hostage, that was pretty much true. He knew his brother and their mate would be as good as dead should Donovan not do as the False King demanded. But Alefric wouldn’t
see
this coming. He would just assume Donovan had done what he had been tasked to do: deliver the princess into the Elven realm and tell no one.

Hearing Erica talk about her love for Leo and Ben, two men Donovan had grown to like and respect in the last several years, had finally snapped him out of the selfish rhetoric that it was all about him, and he
finally
saw the bigger picture. Jason would be fucking furious if he knew Donovan had been willing to sacrifice an innocent woman for him, and although he had yet to meet April, he instinctively knew his mate wouldn’t be overly happy with him either.

Donovan spun from the rock and leaped into the air, shifting as he went. He landed on all fours and started sprinting back to Gabe’s house. He was going to have to come clean with Gabe, and that would mean exile from the pack if he was lucky, but more than likely it would mean his death. Donovan thought about how Leo and Ben would react when they found out he had let their mate simply walk into the lion’s den, and suddenly death sounded like it would be the better deal than what the two Enforcers could do to him.

Chapter Fifteen

Ben let out a loud roar as he struggled for the umpteenth time to open his eyes. At least, his angry roars were no longer just in his head. He actually heard himself this time. The feeling in his arms was starting to come back as well.

“Relax, Ben,” he heard his brother say.

“Relax?
Relax?
How the fuck am I supposed to … Erica… she…”  Ben choked on a sob, still struggling to get his eyes open. “Why the fuck are you so calm?”

“I’m pissed,” Leo said coolly. “And I am scared shitless,” he added in a monotone. “And I feel so fucking helpless right now that I may start punching things as soon as I am able just for the fuck of it. I feel anything but calm, brother,” he concluded through gritted teeth. “I discovered that if you struggle less, whatever she did to us wears off quicker.”

Ben took Leo’s advice and relaxed his breathing and calmed his heart rate. Within minutes, he was able to open up his eyes. The ability to turn his neck came next. Leo’s head was turned in his direction when Ben turned to look at him, a blank expression on his face, except for his eyes. His eyes were blazing. His brother was definitely not calm at all.

Leo regained the ability to move his legs first, but when he tried to stand, his legs gave out and finally he lost his collected composure. He slumped back down on the bed, his fists banging the mattress on the way down. “How the fuck could she do this to us? What in the hell was she thinking? How could she go off by herself knowing what it would do to us if she wasn’t successful?” Leo’s wolf came close to the surface, eyes glowing, fangs dropping, and almost immediately, he shot up off the bed, Erica’s paralytic sleep spell dissolved.

Ben figured that was the key to the final step and let his own wolf come to the surface and then the pair of them ran out of that room like hell itself was chasing them.

One of the guards, Roderick, met them at the bottom of the stairs. “What has happened?”

“Where are Gabe and Donovan?” Leo asked impatiently.

“Leo, calm down and tell me what’s got you both so frantic.”

“Donovan took the Fae messenger to the gate through the Veil. We need him to show us where it is right now! Now tell me where the hell he is before I rip your motherfucking head off.”

“Erica’s gone,” Ben added.

“Gone? What the hell do you mean she is gone?” Roderick seemed affronted, like Erica being missing was a personal insult to him. Ben would help Leo decapitate him in a minute if he didn’t give them some information or get the fuck out of their way. “I would have known if someone broke into—”

“That stubborn child left on her own,” said Corrine as she walked down the hallway dressed in a long silk robe. “Sleeping death, I take it?”

Ben turned his anger on Corrine. “You knew she would do this? You knew and you let her—”

“Of course not, you foolish wolf!” she snapped. “I did not foresee her doing this completely alone, just that she was the one most likely meant to kill Alefric. This kind of sleeping spell, well, it leaves a trace of magic behind. Those who know what to look for can see it and I can see it in both of you, your eyes and in your slower gait, but you should be fine soon. I fear it must have taken a toll on Erica as well. She has gone beyond the Veil still weakened. I would have stopped her if I knew.”

“Fuck!” Ben roared right before he punched a hole through Gabe’s wall. Fortunately for Roderick, he had the good sense to step out of the way.

“I took her to the entrance.” Donovan stood in the hallway, a fuming Gabe by his side. “I took her, and I watched her go through.”

“Why would you do that?” Leo asked, back to his deadly calm self.

“She asked me to. I’m sorry. By the time I realized … it was too late.” Donovan bowed his head in shame.

Ben charged at Donovan. No one attempted to stop him, not even some of the other guards who had slowly started to gather around them. And when Ben’s hands were firmly wrapped around Donovan’s throat, he asked him through gritted teeth, “You’re the traitor?”

“I had no choice.” A tear escaped Donovan.

“There is always a choice!” Ben roared in his face.

“He has Jason and April, Ben.”

“Let him tell you the whole story,” Gabe ordered, resting his hand on Ben’s forearm. “We will save your mate. I swear it. You may do what you will to him afterward, as is your right, but hear him first. He came to me just now of his own accord to confess everything.”

Ben looked up at Gabe to see the passion and sincerity of his words. And he did not miss the fact that Gabe’s eyes had strayed to where Corrine stood. His Alpha no doubt meant the vow that he had spoken.

“We are wasting time,” Leo barked. “Let him lead us to the opening and he can tell us along the way.”

Ben reluctantly let go of Donovan’s throat. “That’s fine. We can snap his neck later and leave him there.”

Reflexively, Donovan’s hands shot up to his throat when Ben released him, massaging away the ache. Hoarsely, he informed them, “I can lead you there, but I don’t know how to enter.”

“But I do,” Corinne informed. “I can lead a whole damn army in there.”

Gabe nodded. “Then that’s what we’ll bring—a whole damn army. We’ll bring the fight to them. Tonight!”