Born By Moonlight by Krista Street
Chapter 15
~ WYATT ~
“Avery?” I called frantically, shaking her slightly. Her face was pale, and she lay like death in my arms.
Nicholas stood at my side, gaping down at me like a useless fish.
“Dammit, get a healing witch!”
Nicholas kicked into action, disappearing in a blur of vampire speed as I held my mate in my arms. I felt for her pulse. A fluttery thread told me her heart still beat, but her respirations were shallow.
“Avery? Avery!” Blood pounded through my ears, and my wolf howled inside me. I shook her again, but her limbs were limp, her complexion pallid. “Fuck!”
I felt as inept as a child as I cradled her to me. Even though all SF commanders were trained in medical basics, what plagued Avery was beyond my skill set.
My heart thundered harder as the sickly realization of what was happening squeezed my insides.
Fifty percent.
Avery’s life force had been at fifty percent at lunchtime, after it had dropped thirty percent from this morning.
“I’m so sorry, babe.” I rocked her against my chest. “I shouldn’t have let you come.”
Rage rippled through me at my carelessness. I’d been so desperate to find answers and have her beside me that I didn’t consider whether or not allowing her to travel was a wise move.
She should be back at the SF right now, with her parents and friends, with the healing center only minutes away. Not locked in an underground tomb as I frantically searched for a way to save her.
I blinked, and Nicholas was at my side again. An elderly-looking woman was cradled awkwardly in his arms before he set her down.
Milky irises stared at me as her hunched spine tilted her perpetually forward. With cracking joints, she kneeled to the ground, Nicholas assisting her.
“This is Hana. She’s a witch and seer,” Nicholas said. “She’s trained in the healing arts.”
Hana laid a palm across Avery’s forehead, her unseeing eyes staring down the distant dark hall. “A young witch who’s not well.” She frowned, her sagging skin hanging from her thin face. “Deep magic clouds her. It’s sucking the life from her.”
My blood turned cold, then I realized this witch had correctly diagnosed Avery without the advanced, enchanted machinery that was used at the SF’s healing center.
“Do you know what’s wrong with her? Do you know how to cure her?”
The witch removed her hand, her skin paper-thin and lined with wrinkles. “Not even I can save her. Only the Gods can.”
“No! I’ll find a way.”
Her withered face gave me a sad smile, then with popping joints she gripped Nicholas’s hand as he pulled her upright. “You must find a way soon. She doesn’t have much time left.”
My stomach bottomed out, as if someone had punched me in the gut. “What does she need right now? How do I keep her alive?”
The elderly witch’s eyes continued staring vacantly over my head as she waved toward the door to our chamber. “Let her rest. Her energy is focused on sustaining her life right now. She shouldn’t be taxed more than necessary.”
I swallowed my snarl at how foolish I’d been, then snatched the key from the floor and was at the door inserting it before the blind witch could blink.
Magic shimmered over me when the enchanted key clicked in the lock. A tracking spell had just been placed on both me and Avery, since I cradled her in my arms.
The door swung open on creaky, ancient hinges. Candlelight flickered, illuminating the massive bedroom chambers.
“I’ll help with your bags.” With uncharacteristic sympathy, Nicholas grabbed our belongings.
I grunted a thanks as I strode into the room.
A huge canopied bed dominated the vast chambers. It was larger than my king-sized bed in my apartment, and was carved from thick mahogany wood. Intricate swirls and designs had been artfully etched into the headboard, and large pillars held a canopy of gauzy curtains aloft. A mountain of pillows and thick blankets covered the bed.
“Nighttime can be cool in these subterranean chambers.” Nicholas pulled back the covers, and I laid Avery down. “I can request heated sheets. Our cleaning staff is used to enchanting our guests’ beds when needed.”
“Please,” came my hoarse reply. I startled, realizing it was the first time I’d ever spoken politely to the vampire.
Nicholas dipped his head.
Shuffling sounded along the stone floor when Hana approached. Stringy gray hair hung from the healer’s shoulders as she shifted closer to Avery. “I can make a brew for her. It should warm her and allow her to rest.”
“Will she wake again? Ever?” I barely got the choked words out.
Hana laid a palm across Avery’s forehead. My mate’s face was still, her eyes unmoving beneath her lids. The only hint of life lay in her fluttering pulse and nearly silent breath.
“I believe so,” Hana finally said, removing her hand.
My balled fists loosened, then my fingers began tapping on my thighs in a frantic beat. No time. I had no time. I knew I needed to get to work. My mate’s life was literally being sucked away before my eyes.
But for the life of me, I couldn’t leave her.
I sank onto my knees at her side and pulled her cool hand into mine. Tenderly, I lifted it to my lips and placed a soft kiss on the back of it. Her skin reeked of the vampire from where he’d kissed her earlier. My wolf snarled, and rage built up inside me anew.
As if sensing my rising wave of fury, the witch placed her hand upon my forearm. My muscles clenched, tension coiling inside me like a snake ready to strike.
“He is not your enemy, only death is.” She dropped her hand, her gnarled knuckles cutting sharply through her skin. “I can stay with your mate, wolf. No harm will come to her.”
Nicholas stiffened. “Mate?”
I growled in his direction. “Yes. She’s my mate. My mate.” I let my wolf shine in my eyes, letting Nicholas know I would challenge him or any other male who dared try to take Avery from me.
Nicholas swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing. Surprise flashed in his eyes before his face was once again the portrait of bored disdain. “Well, that certainly makes things more interesting.”
“You need to go.” Hana took Avery’s hand from mine and placed it under the sheet. “She doesn’t have much time left.”
In a blink, I was on my feet and at the door. I stuffed the enchanted key into my pocket and leveled Nicholas with a heavy stare. “Take me to the library. Show me what the gargoyles found.”
∞ ∞ ∞
Despite the fifty-foot-tall ceiling, the air in the ancient library felt still and thick. Metallic-scented wards coated every surface, nook, and crevice. Not a breeze fluttered the pages in the massive leather-bound books on the table. None of the scrolls’ parchment crackled when I unrolled them across the scarred oak surface, and the air seemed to stand still, as if the gaseous atoms were suspended unmoving, causing one to wade through the air like swimming through water.
It was as though the library itself swallowed all sound and time, preserving everything it touched, like a caress from the fountain of youth.
The only noises in these immense rooms were the sounds of my breathing and the steady thump of my heart.
I hadn’t seen any other staff or patrons. Everyone was asleep.
Nicholas stayed perpetually silent. Since his heart no longer beat, and breathing was unnecessary for him, he sat in that frozenly-still way that only vampires could master, as if he personified death in his elegant clothes and casually crossed legs.
“This scroll speaks of the Safrinite comet as if it’s more than a celestial event.” I frowned and leaned forward in my seat more, my forearms resting on the table. “It says the comet first appeared two thousand years ago and caused more than just a rejuvenation of magic in the fae realm. It says it created life too.”
Nicholas thumbed the edge of the scroll, his lips downturned. “I found that surprising as well. Master Godric showed this to me shortly before you arrived. He only discovered it this evening. It’s one of our oldest texts. We’re lucky it’s stood the test of time.”
I growled, wishing it hadn’t taken the courts so long to grant us three of the Bulgarian gargoyles. If they hadn’t, we could have had this information a week ago.
“But what does that mean?” I ground my teeth together, trying to understand.
“That I can’t tell you.”
I picked up the crisp new sheet again that detailed the information about the comet. Nicholas had given it to me when we first arrived in the library. It contained a translation of what was found before the gargoyles returned to stone for the night.
On this one sheet, the Bulgarian gargoyles had already found more information about the comet in one hour of work than I’d been able to find in over a week earth time, or a month fae lands’ time, with the help of both fae lands and SF gargoyles.
No wonder these gargoyles were world renowned.
Thankfully, the gargoyles had also translated the findings since the contents in the books and scrolls were in languages from a time long ago and written in tongues that were no longer spoken.
Nicholas shifted slightly on the chair beside me, perusing through one of the tomes, searching for any further mention of the comet. The one advantage to having a vampire gargoyle representative was that he didn’t require sleep. Since Nicholas was already dead, sleep was merely a habit he had probably kept from his human lifetime, yet if he chose to, he didn’t need to sleep at all, which meant he could assist me twenty-four hours a day.
Nicholas stilled, then abruptly sat straight up in his chair. “Look at this here.” He pointed to a line on the page. Its swirly, faint words were illuminated in the dim candlelight. The script was in a language I didn’t recognize, containing symbols and letters lost to the ages.
Nicholas tapped the sentence. “This is from an ancient seer, renowned for predicting the future, and it sounds like a prophecy. Roughly translated, it says, The Safrinite comet shall birth a new light, their fate shall reside in their starlight kissed plight, their heir shall be born in the moonlight aligned night, so that we may raise and attest our predestined might.” Nicholas frowned, his blond eyebrows drawing together. “It even rhymes when translated. How ironic.”
I shifted, the chair groaning under my weight. “Are you sure your translation’s correct?”
He gave me a withered glance. “I’ve spent three hundred years working in these libraries. I can assure you, I’ve accurately learned an ancient language or two.”
I sighed heavily, then realized he had no reason to lie to me. “So what the hell does that mean? Starlight? Moonlight born? And what does fate and predestined might have to do with anything?”
Nicholas sighed. “I don’t know. However, I did see something interesting here that echoes these new findings.” Nicholas retrieved a sheet from between one of the ancient tomes. “It talks about the comet being a giver of life, perhaps in reference to what the other one says, about it being moonlit born. Although what that means, I’m not entirely sure, since from what I’ve seen it does nothing but take life.”
My breaths quickened when I pictured my mate back in our chamber. Hana had promised to contact me if Avery awoke or her condition changed. It’d been hours since I’d left her, and I hadn’t heard anything.
I cradled my face in my hands, biting down my frustration. With a firm slap on my cheeks, I lowered my arms back to my sides. “You’re right. It takes life. It doesn’t give it, and we don’t have much time left. You saw Avery. She’s dying.”
Nicholas’s lips tightened. “The gargoyles shall awake soon. It’s almost sunrise. When they do, they may be able to provide clarification. Speaking of sunrise, did you want to sleep before they begin working? You have around an hour.”
My jaw loosened at his unassuming question. For a brief moment, I found myself feeling thankful toward him. Nicholas had been nothing but accommodating since we’d arrived, although I could do without his flirtation toward my mate. My wolf snarled in agreeance at that thought.
“No. I don’t need to sleep.”
“In that case, I shall ring for food.”
Standing gracefully from his chair, Nicholas meandered to a bell hanging near the door. He rang it once, and a tray magically appeared on the table beside it.
He sauntered back to where I sat and set the tray beside me. A loaf of dense bread, a pound of hard cheese, and a bowl of pickled beetroot graced the platter. Next to it, a large mug of tea waited, already brewed. Given the glittering steam and aroma rising from the tea, I knew it was enchanted.
“What’s in that?”
Nicholas shrugged and dipped back onto his seat. “Just something to help you stay awake, if you should need it.”
I grunted, narrowing my gaze in suspicion.
He rolled his eyes. “Really, Major Jamison. Do you honestly think I’d poison you? It’s truly just a brewed concoction from the kitchen that we give to most of our visitors since they are usually here for a short time.”
While I still didn’t trust the bastard, he had a point. If he did poison me, he would be staked by the supernatural courts within the week. And even though he was an arrogant prick, I didn’t think he was suicidal. I grabbed the tea and gulped it down.
It burned my throat but quickly settled in my belly. Within seconds, the magic was swimming through my bloodstream, igniting my nerves, and sharpening my senses. “Thanks.”
He merely inclined his head.
I grabbed a slice of the bread and threw a thick wedge of cheese over it. I barely tasted the food as I wolfed it down. I didn’t even like beetroot, but I ate that too.
Within minutes, the food was gone. It had been enough to feed a small family, but if I wanted to stay awake and work through the coming days, I would need to eat often and regularly to fuel my high metabolism.
We hunched over the texts again as the candles flickered around us. Before the gargoyles had turned to stone for the night, they’d left several texts they hadn’t been able to peruse yet, but thought may contain information.
Nicholas helped me, and together we slowly combed through everything. He’d already told me what words to look for, even though I didn’t speak the language, but at least I could recognize the swirls and symbols that I’d committed to memory.
“Any luck?” I asked him. So far, we’d only found three additional references in the large tomes, but according to Nicholas when he translated them, they contained more cryptic references to starlight, moon born, and fate.
None of it made sense.
Nicholas pinched the bridge of his nose. “No, although I’m only a quarter of my way through this text. There may be something in the latter pages.”
His declaration cut through the thick enchanted air. As soon as he finished speaking, the air grew heavy again. It had been like that all night. Every time we spoke, the air moved sluggishly, as if parting reluctantly for our words. The magic was so strong here I could taste it, that overpowering anise and thyme flavor prickling my tongue.
But the potent magic that coated everything in this room like thick caramel kept these ancient texts preserved. I couldn’t help but wonder if it preserved people, too, but then I remembered how old Hana looked. Maybe not.
“How long has Hana been working here?” I asked as I flipped the page, my eyes like a hawk on each line.
Nicholas cocked his head. “Longer than me. I think around four hundred years.”
My search paused as I looked at Nicholas in surprise. “Is she a vampire?” She’d only smelled like a witch, a heavy scent of marigolds surrounding her.
“No, she’s not a vampire. She’s a mixed breed, both witch and seer, but she’s been blessed with a long life because she never leaves these walls.”
“So the magic does preserve everything here.” I abruptly straightened, an idea coming to me like lightning. “Avery needs to be here, inside this room. It could help her.”
Nicholas arched an eyebrow.
I pushed my chair back, already prowling to the main door. “If the magic in here can preserve life, maybe it will give her more time.”
Nicholas’s eyes widened, then sparkled, as he glided to my side. “Why, Major Jamison, I do believe you’re smarter than you look.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Is that the best insult you have for me? Do you really think you’re the first supernatural to believe werewolves are nothing more than mindless brutes?”
He shrugged delicately. “You can’t blame me for the jab when I’ve been waiting all night to strike.”
A low growl rumbled in my chest, reminding me why I detested this man, yet I couldn’t stop my reluctant chuckle.
“But as you said, bringing Avery here may help her condition. I’ll have to join you. As you know, you’re not allowed in the halls unaccompanied.”
“Then lead the way.”
But just as Nicholas pulled the door open, a vibrating sensation shook the library’s walls.
I tensed and slowly looked up. The vibrations were shaking everythingin the library.
Nicholas only smiled, his lips parting just enough to reveal a sliver of fang. “Ah, they’re beginning to awaken.”
Creaking stone and loud yawns filled the corridors outside of the library’s ancient doors.
“Those are the gargoyles?” I’d never actually witnessed a gargoyle waking up in the morning or returning to stone at night. Most were reclusive when it came to their magical life forces, preferring to return to high perches atop stone buildings and away from prying eyes when they shifted between life and death.
“Indeed, they are.” Nicholas closed the door behind us, a giant groan coming from the hinges. “Would you like to meet the three that have been assigned to you? They sleep not far from your chambers. We can give them their orders, then retrieve your . . . retrieve Avery after they’re sent off to work.”
A warning growl vibrated in my throat when he’d refused to call Avery my mate. I knew he was attracted to her, knew in a heartbeat that he’d charm her, seduce her, ravish her, if he thought he could get away with it.
But the vampire merely gave me a sly smile. “Come, Major Jamison. The day has just begun.”
