Elijah (21 page)

“I wish I could help, but my powers are limited to seeking Druids out. Maybe I could find his mate for him, but that’s about it,” her sister chuckled.

“Lord, don’t say that out loud or you’ll really send him into a coma. Elijah has been hiding from you ever since we figured out what your powers were.”

“And Noah,” Corrine added, making Bella giggle. “I swear, I have heard of gun-shy single men in my time, but these two take the cake. Then again, since I found the Druids Miranda, for Councillor Simon, and Yuri, for Yoshabel the medic, I have had only two other Demons seek me out for a search. Two out of thousands who know about my abilities by now.”

“Some remember their history lessons about the Druidic Wars too well. It will take time, but they will come around.” Bella rubbed her hands together as if they were chilled. “I wish I could control when these premonitions come. Right now it’s like playing Russian roulette with a half-loaded gun. I’ve been here for half an hour clicking on empty.”

“When you want them, they are nowhere to be found. When you don’t, they are all over you.

Reminds me of dating,” Corrine quipped, making them both laugh.

“Well, something better happen soon. Jacob will wake shortly, and if I am here there will be hell to pay.”

“Bell?”

Bella and Corrine both gasped softly and turned to look at the man lying in the bed. They both flushed, realizing they had pretty much forgotten he was there.

But Bella got over it instantly and moved to sit on the edge of Elijah’s bed, taking up his hand eagerly as she leaned over him.

“Hey you, what the hell are you doing scaring the crap out of everyone like that?” she demanded.

“Good to see you too,” Elijah said dryly, glancing up to see his second guest. “Whoa, two gorgeous women. I’ve had this fantasy before.”

“Ha! And probably not just in your imagination, if I know you,” Bella teased, making the warrior smile in that roguish, cocky way of his that eased both women’s worried hearts. Bella reached out to push back an errant blond curl once more, noting he was still pale in spite of a second blood transfusion. “How are you feeling?”

“Depends. Did you stop the jetliner that ran me over, or let it keep going?”

“Are you kidding? Who would want to upset three hundred underpaid, underappreciated business men on the way to a long, boring conference?”

Elijah laughed, reaching to take her hand from his hair. He briefly kissed her fingers, his fondness and gratitude clearly reflected in his emerald eyes.

“Thank you, by the way.”

“Humph. I was just worried my daughter would be out a perfectly good Siddah if I didn’t save your sorry ass.”

“Then you haven’t had the naming ceremony without me?”

“Elijah,” Bella scolded. “Really! What do you take me for? We would never do such a thing.

Not while you were missing.” She reached with her free hand to push back his hair again, but he
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took that one in hand as well.

“Stop touching me,” he said. “The last thing I need is your insanely jealous husband pounding the stuffing out of me.”

Elijah pushed her hands into her lap.

Bella fisted her hands and stuck them onto her hips in a familiar gesture of exasperation.

“You know, I used to be a nurturing, affectionate person. My unreasonable, domineering husband has to learn to get a grip, Elijah. When are you all going to learn I will do what I want, when I want, and you all can bite me if you don’t like it!”

“I believe biting would also be an unwise action considering your husband’s unreasonable, domineering, and jealous behavior.”

“Oops,” Corrine whispered from behind her sister as all three of them turned to look at the husband in question.

Jacob was leaning in the doorjamb, arms folded over his chest, his dark, serious eyes lit with enough amusement to make Bella sigh in relief.

“Now, since when can you sneak up on me like that?” she demanded, getting up and hopping over to him so she could jump up into his embrace.

Thank you for not being a beast, she murmured into his mind.

Thank you for forgiving me for being such an idiot, he returned softly.

Jacob cuddled his little wife, scooping her up and burying his face in her silky hair and laughing.

His dark eyes flicked up to look over her shoulder at Elijah, speaking volumes about how relieved he was to see his old friend awake.

Jacob released his wife and moved to Elijah’s bedside, pulling up her abandoned chair to sit in and crossing an ankle over his knee once he was settled. Bella stood behind him, resting loose arms around his shoulders.

“Hello, old friend,” Jacob greeted. “It’s good to see you awake and alert.”

“You have no idea,” Elijah sighed, moving to sit up. He rested a hand briefly on his chest, noting the fresh pink skin that had replaced the wound.

“Are you able to tell us what happened to you?” Jacob asked.

Elijah nodded, his momentary hesitation going unnoticed by the trio of guests.

“I was ambushed by Ruth and Mary and about thirty necromancers and hunters. Talk about

‘Hell hath no fury…’” Despite the joke, Elijah’s eyes were far too serious for his nature. “They nearly killed me.”

“Jacob, ladies…”

They all turned their attention back to the door at the summons just in time to see Gideon stepping over the threshold.

“I do not believe I gave leave for visitors,” he remarked.

One thing they all knew not to do was gainsay Gideon about the well-being of a patient. They all stood up and immediately took their leave of Elijah. Jacob clasped his friend’s hand briefly, and both women leaned to kiss him and tell him how happy they were he was back. They hustled out of the room past Gideon, Jacob shutting the door behind himself.

Gideon remained leaning against the wall opposite Elijah’s bed, his silvery head bent slightly as he watched the warrior move to sit up. Elijah was not an idiot. He knew the Ancient Demon was on to something. But he wasn’t going to help him out in any fashion. He would let Gideon put down his cards first.

And Gideon was nothing if not direct.

“You were tended for at least two days,” Gideon said. “Why did you go into a metamorphosis, risking your life just to get here? You should have stayed where you were until you were much stronger.”

“I couldn’t,” Elijah looked away from the medic just long enough to catch Gideon’s sharp attention. It helped confirm something he had already begun to guess at.

Elijah’s hand curled into a fist as he felt the Ancient’s gaze resting on him with calm patience.

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Still coming awake after such a long sleep, Elijah might not have been aware of many details about the past few days, but he sure as hell remembered his encounter with Siena. And he realized he carried evidence of that even to this moment in spite of his efforts to conceal it.

“I realize it is not my business, but I am aware of the change in your scent and will not pretend otherwise,” Gideon mentioned quietly. “I am also familiar with that scent. As much as I am familiar with the makeup of Lycanthrope blood when I see it in a body it does not belong in.”

“Has anyone else…?”

“If they took note, they did not mention it. It is possible they overlooked it, but I would not bet large sums of money on it.” Gideon paused long enough to brush a thoughtful hand at some invisible piece of lint on his trouser leg. “The female’s scent is Siena’s, is it not?”

“Don’t play games with me, medic,” Elijah said bitterly. “You know exactly who it is and don’t need to ask me useless questions.”

“I do,” Gideon admitted. “As improbable as it seems.”

“Believe me, I am as shocked as you are,” Elijah admitted with a sigh. “It gets worse, Gideon.”

Elijah laughed humorlessly. “The beautiful Lycanthrope Queen wants nothing further to do with me. So if you planned on setting the Enforcers on me for breaking the law or giving me some sort of purity lecture, I might take that fact into consideration if I were you.”

The silver-haired Ancient did not respond immediately, instead studying the warrior’s expression and noting the strain around his attempts to brush off how much he was affected by the situation he found himself in.

“Siena may not have much choice in the matter, Elijah,” he informed him quietly.

“I am sorry?” Elijah wasn’t sure he’d heard that correctly. He sat forward slightly, meeting the medic’s unwavering gaze. “Explain that.”

“There are very distinct rules governing Siena’s fate.”

“Yeah. I know. One mate only. A rule she feels doesn’t apply to a lowly Demon male such as myself.” Elijah’s sarcasm was sharp, but not directed anywhere other than his own bruised ego.

“I do not believe that is her decision to make. Destiny—”

Elijah’s sharp laugh cut the Ancient off.

The warrior moved out of bed, shedding the bedding and reaching into the closet for pants and a shirt. At least these would fit him because they were his, left behind for the frequent times he was a guest in Noah’s house and in this room. He was shrugging into a white moiré satin shirt when he finally turned back to Gideon.

“Don’t talk to me about Destiny, Gideon. If you ask me, it sucks pretty royally at the moment.”

Elijah jammed the tails of the shirt into his trousers.

“You truly do not know what has happened?” Gideon asked, looking puzzled.

The remark gave Elijah pause. He halted in the middle of buttoning a shirt cuff to look at the other man.

“Do you think you could do me the favor of keeping the cryptic statements to a minimum?”

Elijah asked, ignoring the sudden, anticipatory thrum of his heart.

“Elijah, you have to be the first Demon male I have encountered who does not recognize the effects of an Imprinting for what they are.”

Now that definitely got the Warrior Captain’s attention.

“Imprinting? Are you out of your silver head?” Again, that embittered laugh. “Between a Demon and a Lycanthrope?”

“As improbable as an Imprinting between a Druid and a Demon was a year ago,” Gideon mused, “but here we are nonetheless.”

Elijah forced himself to fight back the surge of excitement and hope that inexplicably rushed through him.

“Explain why you think…just explain,” he demanded.

“You mean other than telling you that I can see it plain as day in your body chemistry? That had Jacob sat there a few minutes more, he would have noticed you carry the scent of a woman all
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over you despite your attempts to cleanse yourself of it? Or perhaps I might mention the fact that your hair has changed color.”

Elijah’s eyes widened and he turned back to the closet to look into the mirror hanging on the door.

Sure enough, his hair had changed to a uniformly gold color, identical to that of the Lycanthrope woman he had recently made love to. It shocked him that no one had noticed outside of Gideon. It shocked him, period.

“Your hair was wet when they first saw you. And frankly, they were far more concerned with your health than the color of your hair,” Gideon informed him.

“Damn,” Elijah whispered, running fingers through the waved strands of gold. Bella had even touched it and hadn’t noticed. “But I thought Imprinting changed a woman’s eyes. Siena’s eyes are as gold as ever, I assure you.”

“The Imprinting is marked by three very distinct traits, Elijah. The first is an uncontrollable desire between the male and the female. One that cannot be resisted for long, and absolutely not at all on the Hallowed moons of Beltane and Samhain, sometimes even the Solstices.” The Demon raised a silvery brow. “I believe it is safe to say you and Siena have met that criterion?”

“Yes,” Elijah admitted quietly.

“For your second sign, though it is true the female of an Imprinting often takes on the eye color of her intended mate, sometimes it is hair color or even their mate’s powers. And the change can come to either the male or the female. It is exactly this kind of alteration, I assure you,” he said, indicating the warrior’s hair. “In my case, Legna gained my eye color. As for the Enforcers, and Kane and Corrine, in their cases, with a Demon/Druid Imprinting, it is the awakening of the Druid’s powers that takes place.”

“And the third is the telepathy between the couple,” Elijah finished for him. “The ability to be in constant mental contact with the other person.” Elijah made a sound of frustration, smacking an abusive palm into his forehead. “Now I understand why I feel like I can still hear her voice. Why we always seemed to know what the other was thinking or feeling without saying anything. I don’t know why I didn’t notice it myself.”

“It takes time for it to become strong between Druids and Demons. Perhaps it is the same for any Imprinting across species.”

Elijah laughed at that, but the sound was terribly painful and Gideon felt a reflexive response in the back of his mind from his wife. Hard as she tried, she could not cut herself off from him completely, and he felt that she had wanted to leave them in privacy. It was one of her foibles, this notion of privacy, that he would not understand any time soon. Privacy was not a Demon concept. It was a human one. Where she had picked it up was beyond him.

Do not worry, sweet, he assured her softly. He will recover from this shock just as you did when you discovered I was to be your mate.

Who said I recovered? she teased him. But he felt the sadness beneath her humor. It will be so hard for them, for so many reasons.

It always is, he agreed gently.

Gideon turned his full attention back to the warrior. He had moved to a window and was staring down at the manicured grounds outside of it.

“Correct me if I am wrong, but isn’t this whole thing against the law?” he asked, a corner of his mouth lifting in a wry smile.

“That did not stop you from taking her to your bed,” Gideon remarked.

Elijah swore softly, the sharp term aimed at Gideon’s cold attitude. “Is there anything you don’t have an answer for?” he bit out.

“Elijah, I am being direct for a reason,” Gideon said. “The Hallowed moon of Samhain is not five nights away. You will not be able to keep from her on this night. You do realize this, do you not?”