The Winter King (7 page)

Kristopher took a deep breath as he sat back
in the saddle and started up the engine. It roared to supernatural
life, fueled with far more power than its original engine had been
created to exude. It wouldn’t have handled in the snow at all,
either, in its original condition. But this was the Winter King’s
bike. It could take on a hurricane.

He revved it a few times, sensing the
continued stares of the men in the alley. The incubus, in
particular, was afraid Kristopher would bring attention to him with
the Nightmare King, but Kris could care less about dealing with
other kings’ affairs. The man’s secrets, whatever they were, were
safe.

He pulled the bike out into traffic, weaving
with ease. The depth of cars had lightened up a bit since the
snow’d begun. Seattle-ites were accustomed to driving in poor
weather conditions, given the amount of rain they experienced, and
the number one response to such conditions when they turned worse
was to simply get off the road. Most of the tarmac now was taken up
by the yellow of taxis, followed by the elongated white of
buses.

Kristopher expertly wound
around both and mentally steeled himself for what lay ahead.
Because he hadn’t been lying to Poppy when he’d told her she wasn’t
going anywhere without him. He’d just been turned around a little.
The truth was –
he
wasn’t going anywhere without
her
.

Chapter Nine

The coffee mug that sat on
her kitchen counter still full of undrinkably cold coffee
read,
I wish I were
dead
. Though the mug had been a gift from
a well-meaning friend who knew how much she loathed mornings, most
days it wasn’t really true. Poppy actually
loved
life. She loved being
alive
, even if that
alive feeling often came at the bottom of a cup of Joe.

However, right now, she was
afraid the cup’s wish was going to be granted, whether she wanted
it or not. Someone or some
thing
out there in the guise of a devastatingly tall
and handsome blonde with eyes like ice knew what she was,
knew
who
she was,
and had just threatened her in the middle of a downtown Seattle
cafe.

You aren’t going anywhere. Not without
me.

She played his words over
and over in her mind as she frantically tossed off her coat, scarf
and gloves and reinforced the wards around her apartment. Then she
ran into her bedroom, slammed and locked the door, and dialed
Lalura on her cell. Lalura’s phone was a landline – of course – but
she had
ways
of
answering, even when she wasn’t home.

Poppy stood in the center of her bedroom and
turned in place, eyeing the windows and the door respectively, over
and over again, as she waited for the old woman to pick up. But an
answer never came, and Lalura never set up any kind of answering
machine. It simply wasn’t her thing.

So Poppy hung up and tried again. And again.
It was rudimentary, using a phone, but her mind was spinning, and
at the moment it was literally all she could summon the faculties
to do.

After several fruitless
attempts, she finally threw the phone on the bed and closed her
eyes, gripping her head in her hands to think. “Okay. You need to
get ahold of someone,
anyone
, who can help
you.”

But… was that true?

Maybe she could handle this on her own?
Maybe it wasn’t as big a deal as she was making it out to be. Maybe
the guy was just some punk supernatural stalker with the ability to
detect warlock magic. It was easy enough these days to get
someone’s full name – that took little to no effort at all. And
warlock magic was the most readily noticeable form of magic, due to
its inherent darkness. Maybe this guy wasn’t worth getting everyone
all worked up over, especially with all they already had to deal
with.

But he knew about the Entity. And about
Violet.

“
Come on, Poppy,
think
.” She’d already
double and triple-warded the apartment, which might even alert
someone to her use of magic, and that wouldn’t be a bad thing at
this point. So, she had that. But that was all she had.

“
Okay. Sorry, Vi.” She
picked back up the phone and dialed her friend, and as she did, she
wiped her brow with the back of her long sleeve, and it came away
damp. She must be really, really nervous. There was no other
explanation, because she’d only been in the apartment a few
minutes, and she was already sweating. She never kept the apartment
warm, so it couldn’t have been any hotter than about sixty degrees
inside.

She frowned to herself as the phone
continued to ring. No answer. Her head was beginning to ache again.
The call went to voice mail. Poppy took a deep breath. “Vi, I’m so
sorry to bother you right now, I know you’re probably off drinking
champagne in the tub with Mr. McShadow, but… by the way, what do
shadows look like naked? Do they have belly buttons?”

Oh my God. Focus, Pop!

“
I mean – I’m sorry.” Her
head really was starting to hurt. It was just too hot. “I just
wanted to tell you….” What did she want to say? She was having
trouble forming the right words. “Um, there’s this guy and he knows
who you are and about the Entity and that I’m a warlock and he kind
of threatened me just now, if you can call telling someone they
can’t go anywhere without them a threat. I mean, I don’t know.
Maybe these days that’s what they call flirting or something? Guys
are always clueless, so it’s possible. But, so I just….”

Jesus, Poppy.

“
Okay, I just wanted to
give you a heads up.”

Because I’m a scaredy-cat.

She hung up and placed her hand to her
forehead. She was burning up. In frustration, she turned and
marched to the thermostat against her bedroom wall. It read 92
degrees.

“
What?
” She stared at it with wide eyes.

But with the way she was
sweating into her clothes just then, she could believe it. She just
also
couldn’t
believe it. The heater wasn’t on, and it was below freezing
outside. In fact, as she turned and glanced at the window, she
could see big, fat flakes filling the night sky. It was
beautiful.

“
What the
hell
?” she hissed as she
strode to that same window, unlatched it, and threw it open. Cold,
bracing air slammed into her face, and it felt wonderful. She
closed her eyes for just a moment, enjoying the sheer pleasure of a
fevered forehead suddenly, miraculously cooled.

Then she opened her eyes again and looked
down.

The man from the coffee shop – Kristopher –
stood with his arms crossed over his broad chest, leaning against a
magnificent motorcycle, his glacial eyes a visible, piercing blue
even from this distance. They gazed steadily upward, spearing her
to the core.

He’s doing this.
She didn’t know how she knew, and she wasn’t sure
why she was so positive, but she just
knew
he was the one making the
apartment hot.
He’s smoking me
out.

She glared at him. He smiled.

He was pretty smoking hot himself.

Crap
. But that didn’t matter! It certainly wasn’t enough to see
her surrender. Her gaze narrowed stubbornly on the man. She
did
possess the means to
fight back. And right about now, she was more than prepared to use
them.

“
Fine,” she said softly,
somehow also knowing that he would hear her despite the distance.
“Two can play at this game.”

His smile only widened, and his broad,
sculpted chest moved in a chuckle. Poppy growled and spun away from
the window, summoning her warlock magic to the fore. She closed her
eyes and imagined a plane of ice, her first instinct to use a spell
to cool off the apartment. She had things in it, after all, that
would melt if it got much hotter.

But then something else
occurred to her. If she continued to put Band-Aids on whatever he
did to her, he would just keep attacking, striking on different
fronts, and she would run out of magic protecting herself one spell
after another. If she remained on the defensive, eventually she
would become defense
less
, and he would win. She needed a
better plan.

In a blade-to-blade struggle on the
battleground, what better way was there to deal with an enemy than
to stop shielding and start swinging your sword? The best defense
was a good offense, right?

Right
.

She smiled as she at once decided what to
do, and the image in her mind shifted from a plane of ice – to a
motorcycle. One exactly like the beautiful bike “Kristopher” was
leaning against across the street at that very moment in time.

“
I’m honestly sorry,” she
whispered, speaking to the bike. Then she cast her
spell.

Chapter Ten

Kristopher’s smile slowly slipped, and his
gaze narrowed. The look of stubborn determination on Poppy’s face
hadn’t exactly been conducive to him getting his way in a timely
manner. His senses went on high alert, and he straightened, coming
off the bike.

As soon as he did, he felt the spike of dark
magic shoot past him like invisible lightning and slam into his
motorcycle. He spun, naturally reaching out with his arms as if to
steady the bike. But it didn’t fall over. Instead, it stayed right
where it was – and began leaking.

Kristopher knelt down to get a closer look.
It wasn’t oil that was leaking. The interior of the engine had been
liquidated and was slowly dripping down the sides of the bike to
gather in a puddle that looked like mercury.

The girl had actually changed the molecular
structure of the metal. Did she realize how powerful you had to be
in order to do that? That wasn’t simple magic, not by any means.
Kristopher’s wonder over Poppy’s innate magical abilities was
enough to take just a touch of sting out of the prospect of losing
his bike.

But only a touch.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t fix it. It was
that doing so would require working around her magic, and from the
feel of it, that would be no easy feat. She was certainly queen
material.

Slowly, he straightened, heart pounding,
teeth clenched, every muscle in his body tensing as if for a fight.
He turned back around to face the complex housing Poppy’s
apartment, his mind working fast. He had to admit that the shock of
seeing his bike destroyed had interrupted his concentration on
heating up her place. No doubt, the temperature had rapidly
plummeted once more, and he was betting she’d turned the AC on.

He was going to have to go in and get
her.

Kristopher gritted his teeth. “Fuck it,” he
said as he transported from right there in front of his bike to the
hallway just outside her apartment. He stopped for a moment and
stared at the door before realizing that he hadn’t meant to
transport into the hall at all. He’d meant to wind up in her living
room.

It’s warded,
he thought.
Clever
girl
. He had to smile at that. You could
never be too careful in this world.

But then he remembered what
she’d done to his bike. His eyes narrowed, taking on a glacial
glow.
I can get past a few
wards.

A full two minutes later, Kristopher finally
managed to bypass them, feeling them slide open with a nearly
audible click. The door was still locked with a human lock and two
deadbolts. Those slid back next with another push of magic, and the
door slowly swung open. He took a step back, eyeing the space
beyond with wary care.

Then he strode through the front door and
into her living room to find the apartment empty. Silence filled
the room, made stronger by the muffling power of the snow piling up
outside. He caught a hint of some delicate, clean scent – shampoo,
probably. The refrigerator hummed to life, snapping his head to the
side. Someone suddenly squealed outside; children throwing
snowballs in the night.

But there was no sign of Poppy. Traces of
transport magic filled in the shadowy spaces in the corners and
recesses of the apartment. She’d used his distraction to give him
the slip.

“
For the love of –” he cut
himself off with a curse and threw up his hands as if he were
dealing with a crazy woman. Then he ran a hand over his face and
sent out feelers of magic to trace her progress.

Latching on to her signature was nearly as
difficult as it had been to get past her layered wards. She’d gone
to the trouble of crisscrossing her path, which had the same
confusing effect that footprints in the snow headed in different
directions would have.

But he focused, concentrated, and zeroed in
on the set of footprints that was the lightest. She’d want to leave
the least bit of trail. She wasn’t stupid.

By the time he locked on to her, he knew she
would be at least another transport away, and he was beginning to
realize that his queen was more than his match. He felt stupid for
underestimating her.

He was going to have to up his game.

*****

She’d sensed a change just before finishing
her complicated transport spell. The air in the room felt cooler.
It was either the air conditioner, or she’d managed to distract
“Kristopher” with her spell after all. She still felt bad about the
bike… but desperate times and all that.