Blood of the Exiled (Witch Fairy Book 10) Page 3

  In the short time we’ve been away, Garren and Isla must’ve worked things out because they’re now looking pretty chummy near the altar where the ceremony will take place tomorrow. Maybe they’re planning their own hand-fasting. I internally snort. I doubt Isla is anywhere near that stage of romance.

  I must have snorted out loud instead of in my head because both Adriel and Kallen are looking at me like I’m crazy. “Sorry,” I mumble, “just talking to myself.”

  “You often snort at yourself?” Adriel asks, making Kallen smile for the first time since she showed up.

  “Only when I’m thinking something crazy,” I admit. I ignore the raised brows from both of them implying that I think crazy things all the time. They can go back to disagreeing now.

  Raziel has moved to the bottom of the terrace steps. His eyes are transfixed on Adriel as we approach, confirming that she really does hold his heart now. He doesn’t even spare me a glance. I squash a teeny tiny bit of jealousy over that.

  A small blush on her cheeks tells me Adriel is still not used to his adoring gaze. Even though she fostered feelings for him before they got together, she never thought anything would come of it. Apparently, they are one of the very, very few Archangel/Angel pairings.

  “You caught up with them, I see,” Raziel says to Adriel. A blush touches my cheeks now as I think about how close we came to having Adriel finding us in a compromised position, and Raziel must know that. Yes, we are married, but still, it’s uncomfortable that he knows we were about to make out in the forest.

  Adriel walks to him and he tucks her under his arm as if she was made to fit there. “Yes, and as I predicted, Kallen was ecstatic when I told them I would be joining their trip.”

  There’s a gleam of amusement in Raziel’s eyes when he looks at Kallen. “You will thank me when you return.”

  Showing off his omniscience just makes Kallen more annoyed. “Can you save the cryptic comments if you do not intend to fully divulge your knowledge of future events?”

  His amusement not waning, Raziel inclines his head and nods. “I will attempt to do so.”

  “Geez, Cousin, you look like you just ate a sour toad,” Kegan says as he comes out of the house.

  Appreciating a new target for his irritation, Kallen snarls, “I am sure there must be something you should be doing other than commenting on my appearance.”

  Kegan is not bothered in the slightest by his snarky comment. “As a matter of fact, I have been sent out here to retrieve you. There are several things Tabitha would like from the garden and she does not trust me to retrieve them.” This is because he has played dumb for years, claiming he can’t tell a weed from a plant, to get out of gardening. After ‘accidently’ pulling up some of Tabitha’s most precious healing herbs, she finally gave up on him. “She gave me a list.” Kegan holds up a piece of paper that I’m sure was magically made. It’s a perfect shade of white and the lettering looks like art.

  Thankful for the escape, Kallen gives me a quick kiss on the cheek and then gestures with his head for Kegan to follow him to the garden. He isn’t even complaining that Kegan is asking him to do something that he should be doing himself. I can’t blame him. Awkwardness is currently surrounding our group like a dirty bathtub ring.

  “There you are, Xandra,” Alita says from the doorway. “Will you help me with my dress? Mum has dropped it off but she had to rush back home to work on the desserts she is making.” Her mother insisted she do the baking if Tabitha was doing the cooking. Tabitha agreed graciously, which surprised everyone. She can be a control freak about food.

  “Sure, is it upstairs already?” I ask, heading for the door.

  Alita nods. “Yes.” There was a lot of happiness stuffed into that one little word. She is so excited for tomorrow. Neither she nor Kegan ever thought they would be doing this. Lucky for them, their hand-fasting won’t be anything like mine. They’re not in danger of switching bodies with anyone and ruining the ceremony.

  “Adriel, are you coming?” I ask over my shoulder. She smiles, glad to be included. Even though Isla’s house is their semi-permanent home, she and Raziel haven’t spent enough time here to really feel comfortable and part of the family yet. She gives Raziel a sweet kiss on the lips and follows us inside.

  Someday, I will remind Adriel of the time she claimed she didn’t understand why lower beings felt the need to touch each other so. Someday. Not today.

  Chapter 3

  We go to the guest room which was deemed Alita’s long ago. She has been friends with Kegan and Kallen since childhood, and often stayed here. The dress is laid out on the bed and it’s beautiful. It was the dress her mother wore at her wedding. Since that was over three hundred years ago in the Human realm, it is not a traditional white wedding dress. The skirt is a soft pink silk decorated with tiny red rosebuds in intricate patterns around the bottom. It had originally been big enough to fit a hoop or bustle, whichever was popular at the time. Since there is no way Alita is going to wear a hoop or bustle, her mother took it in quite a bit so it now flows down Alita’s lithe body. The bodice is a gold brocade of flowers and lace and I can already tell it’s going to be tight even on Alita’s thin figure. I hope she’ll be able to breathe.

  Alita’s mother must’ve come from a wealthy family because the dress looks like it cost a fortune to make. I’m almost afraid to touch it for fear of ripping the delicate silk skirt. Carefully, Adriel and I help Alita step into the dress and then we pull it up into place and begin buttoning the zillion tiny little buttons in the back.

  With cramped fingers now from stuffing the buttons in their appropriate holes, we step back to admire her. Alita is absolutely gorgeous. Not just run of the mill gorgeous. I mean take your breath away, oh my god why don’t I have uglier friends because nobody will ever notice me with her in the room, gorgeous.

  “How do I look?” Alita asks. She hasn’t glanced in the mirror yet.

  “You look more like an Angel than a Fairy,” Adriel says. She didn’t mean it as an insult to Fairies. Angels are simply close to perfection when it comes to looks.

  Alita blushes and walks to the mirror. Her little gasp of surprise is almost comical. She has never understood how pretty she is. This has a lot to do with the prejudice she has faced for not being a full blooded Fairy, but today, I think she believes it. She does look like a black haired, green eyed Angel.

  The dress shows her curves off almost to the point of her overflowing the bodice. No wonder she had to hold her breath when we got to those buttons. Though it looks good, it is a wardrobe malfunction waiting to happen. Maybe her mom should loosen the bodice a tiny bit so Alita doesn’t end up with her breasts on the outside of her dress in the middle of the ceremony instead of the inside.

  “It’s beautiful,” she whispers, swishing the long skirt like it’s a bell.

  I laugh. “You are beautiful. The dress just enhances what’s already there.”

  “Do you think Kegan will like it?” she asks as she spins slowly trying to see the back of the dress in the mirror.

  “I do not believe you have to worry about that,” Adriel says. She creates a large hand mirror with magic and hands it to Alita so she will be able to view the back of her dress better.

  As if sensing we are talking about him, Kegan opens the door while looking down at a list in his hands. “Alita, your father said you were up here. Tabitha needs a few things so I am going to run to the village and I thought I’d see if you…wanted…to…come…” His voice trails off as he looks up from his list and his eyes find her. They move slowly from her feet all the way up to her flushed cheeks. He is awestruck. Drool is starting to form at the corner of his mouth which is hanging open so far, his jaw might have come unhinged. I try not to giggle.

  “My god,” he breathes. His mouth wants to say more, but his brain hasn’t caught up with it yet, so his lips move a little but nothing comes out.

  Amused, I say, “Yup, he likes it.”

  “Are you certain you want
to marry a man who cannot speak when he looks at you? That would make for a boring life, I would think,” Adriel teases.

  Embarrassed by all the attention focused on her, Alita says shyly, “I would have no one else.”

  Grinning in Kegan’s awestruck direction, I say, “Good, because otherwise I think he would beg and grovel at your feet until you changed your mind, and that would get really tedious after a while.”

  Finally finding his voice again, Kegan nods and says, “Day and night until you changed your mind.”

  Alita smiles. “Then I suppose I have no choice but to attend our hand-fasting tomorrow. I do not like a Fairy who grovels.”

  They are looking so intensely at each other, their pheromones are clearly saying ‘get out’ to Adriel and me. We can take a hint. I gesture towards the door and Adriel is relieved. We exit the room and close the door behind us, leaving the lovebirds to their pheromones.

  “Is Kegan in there?” Kallen asks, coming down the hall. “We are supposed to go into town.”

  I look back at the now closed door to Alita’s room. “Um, maybe you and I can go.”

  Kallen gives me a quizzical look at first, but then a knowing smile forms on his lips. It quickly morphs into something bordering evil. “No, I believe it should be Kegan who accompanies me. It is his hand-fasting.” He walks towards the bedroom door with a wicked glint in his eyes.

  Laughing, I reach out and grab his arm. “You just want revenge for all the times he interrupted us.”

  “Perhaps,” he admits, still fully intending to drag Kegan out of Alita’s room.

  I roll my eyes and shake my head. Who am I to get in the way of the two cousins and their grudges? Besides, Kegan has taken great joy in interrupting our passionate moments in the past. I give in and let go of his arm. “Okay, let me know when you get back.” Grin in place, Kallen strides to the door and knocks much louder than necessary. A growl comes from inside the room and he laughs.

  “We should go,” I say to Adriel. “This might get ugly.”

  We go to my and Kallen’s room so we are available if Alita needs help getting the dress off. Indicating one of the comfortable overstuffed chairs near the balcony door, I say, “Have a seat.” I sit in the other one and curl my feet up under me. “So, how is the whole Fallen thing going?” Adriel had never even thought of Falling before Raziel asked her to.

  Smiling, she says, “I am rather enjoying it.”

  I laugh. “I bet. I’m so happy you and Raziel found each other.” Pausing, I add, “But isn’t it weird that he knows what you are going to do or say before it happens?”

  She shrugs and there’s a tiny bit of discomfort in her voice. “Sometimes.” She smiles again, “He says that he tries to bury any knowledge of us so we can truly enjoy each other.”

  I wonder if he can really do that or if he’s appeasing her. I suppose it would be impossible to think about everything at once. Maybe he can do it. “That’s good.”

  We talk for a while about what has happened in both of our lives since the last time we saw each other. Adriel’s stories of their travels are fun and interesting. Mine are interesting, too. Fun doesn’t really enter into a lot of them, though. Wow. That’s so sad.

  “Since Raziel and I left, you have met three minor deities? You do get around,” Adriel says dryly. “What is next, you pick a fight with a seraphim?” These are the highest level of Angel. It’s pretty rare to see one, even among the Angels, and no one would win a fight with one. It was a seraphim who made Raziel and I switch bodies.

  “Hey, I didn’t pick a fight with all of them. Just one.” I give her smirk a dirty look.

  Moving on, Adriel says, “Tell me about this trip. What do you hope to accomplish?”

  I suppose ‘I don’t have a freaking clue’ is not the answer she’s looking for. I shrug. “I need to make sure they’re okay. My grandfather had some pretty nasty Witches on his Witan and a lot of the Witches lived in fear of them. Now that my grandmother isn’t there, I’m afraid he and his weak mind replaced them with even nastier ones.”

  “What will you do if he has?”

  Another thing I don’t have a freaking clue about, so I shrug again. “I’ll probably do something rash and then take all their magic away.”

  “Not the best laid out plan,” Adriel says dryly. “What happens if he replaces the nastier Witches with even nastier ones? Will you continue on until you have rendered all of the Witches powerless?”

  I purse my lips, hating that she has a point. Feeling petulant now, I say, “No. Are you sure you need to come with us?”

  She laughs. “Quite.”

  “Do you have any suggestions or are you just having fun poking at my ill-conceived plan?”

  “Mostly the latter,” Adriel admits.

  “Could you install your own Witan?” Alita asks from the doorway, startling me. “Sorry,” she says sheepishly when I nearly jump out of my chair. She has the wedding dress off and is again wearing the pretty, yellow flowered dress she had on earlier. My guess is Kegan undid all those buttons for her. Just to be helpful, of course. Yeah, right.

  My brows crinkle. “Install my own Witan? I think my grandpa would have a conniption if I did that.” He is still the King of the Witches no matter how pliable his mind is.

  Alita comes farther into the room and lies sideways on the foot of the bed with her head propped up on her hand. “From what you have said, your grandfather will have a conniption when you show up at all.”

  I mull it over a moment. “True. I guess it’s something to think about.” Right now, I can’t think of any way that would work, but who knows.

  “Can I be in your new Witan?” my little brother Zac says from the doorway. I’m surprised to see him. He’s spent most of his time lately at the Palace where Dagda has set him up with private tutors for different areas of his education. Isla does most of his magical education but there’s a tutor who fills in for her when her schedule as High Chancellor gets too busy to work with him. I’m not sure how Mom and Dad will feel about it when they get back, but Zac loves it. Dagda is treating him like the son he never had, and therefore is spoiling him rotten.

  “Sorry, buddy,” I say, “You haven’t learned enough magic yet. Maybe when you’re older.”

  His look of disappointment is heartbreaking. “Tabitha told me to come get you for dinner,” he says in his best pouty voice.

  Taz, who has been sleeping curled up in a ball in the middle of the bed, opens an eye and says, “Hasn’t the boy been learning magic for approximately the same amount of time you have? Surely he knows just as much as you do about it, which seems to be practically nothing.”

  Taking off one of my sandals, I throw it over Alita and at Taz. Lucky for him I have terrible aim. “Keep your thoughts to yourself,” I say, trying to make my voice threatening. Taz just stands, arches his back in a stretch, and then curls back into a ball on the bed. The part of me that thought it was cool to have a Familiar is struggling to stay alive.

  We don’t know why Alita and Taz can be in the same room now. Isla suspects there was a link between him and Tana’s dark magic. Now that she is no longer practicing it, the darkness has fallen away from him. I don’t really understand the theory, but I’m glad Alita doesn’t get a blinding headache whenever he’s near.

  “What did he say?” Zac asks, gingerly crawling on the bed to pet Taz.

  “Must the boy touch me?” Taz grumbles, but he shifts his head so Zac can scratch around his ear.

  “Can I go with you at least?” Zac asks. “I miss home.”

  Again, my heart is breaking. “No, you can’t go with me, but maybe we could arrange a time for you to visit Aunt Barb?” Our aunt moved back to Denver when we all left for this realm. I’m sure she misses us and I think she’d love it if Zac spent some time with her. I wonder how long we’ve been gone in her time? The Fairy realm and Cowan realm are not linear in the way time moves within them.

  Zac grins. “Okay.” He flings himself off the bed
and is out of my room in a flash. I’m guessing he wants first pick of whatever Tabitha cooked. He doesn’t really need to hurry; she always saves him the best pieces of whatever she makes. She has taken on the roll as grandmother in a big way and Zac loves being spoiled.

  I’m glad his life has expanded out of the isolation of the mountains. My childhood was a happy one, but I spent a lot of time being lonely. Zac is far from lonely. Both Isla and Dagda are not only making sure he is well educated, they also make sure he has kids his own age to play with and he’s making friends. He is having the childhood he deserves.

  “I am not really hungry,” Alita says. “You can go down without me.”