Renegade (25 page)

“Welcome back.” She leaned down to kiss him, her mouth soft and sweet on his.

The kiss warmed his heart but felt muted against his mouth. He slid his hand into the soft, thick hair at her nape and deepened the kiss.

With a sigh, Valeria sank onto him. Their arms slid around each other. Their mouths fused, bodies pressed close.

A long time later, the kiss broke. Valeria nestled against him. He pressed his lips to her temple, but nothing felt right, not her weight against his side, not the softness of her hair against his lips, not the big dog snoring by him. Something had turned down the volume, the intensity, not just in his hearing but in all his senses.

Maybe he needed a recharge. He reached for it, opened himself to the life around the house, the magic it bred.

Nothing came, no sense of anything beyond his body.

What the hell?

“I’m so glad to have you back.” Valeria lifted her head and kissed him lightly. Although she smiled, her lips trembled.

He brushed a finger over her mouth and felt its soft warmth—but not as keenly. Later for that, though. Touching her, he could sense the misery knifing her heart. “What’s wrong, love?”

She caught his hand again. Kissed it. “You don’t remember?”

“Haven’t tried.” With his eyes on her face, he reached back, searching, and got a jumble of images. He pushed himself up in the bed. He’d never been this weak except from battle wounds. Even then, he’d been able to touch the magic.

“Griffin?” Valeria’s brow furrowed.

“Wait.” His father had come, they’d had a hearing, and then—“Fucking bastard Blake.”

“We’ll get him this time.”

“We have to. He can’t get away with this.” He cupped her cheek. So warm, so smooth. Yet, again, muted. “Honey, I know this is hard for you, and I’ll—”

Hard for her. Hard. Heart. Eat her heart.

Memory flooded into the bond. Draining. Rescue. Pain and rage. The agony in her eyes and, now, the guilt tormenting her heart. Aghast, he stared at her.

Valeria shrugged. She tried to smile and failed. Big tears welled in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” she choked. “So sorry.”

“No, love.” Fool that he was, he’d laid this on her. Griff jerked her into his arms, and her pain roared through him, searing his chest and throat, writhing in his gut. “I’m the one who’s sorry.”

With a shuddering, gasping sob, she slid her arms around his neck. He lay back with her, stroking her, kissing her, while she wept into his shoulder. Loving him hadn’t done much good for her.

“I shouldn’t have asked you to do that,” he said. “I was trying to protect you, convince you to protect yourself. If I’d known we’d fall in love, I…ah, hell.”

If I’d known
had become his mantra with her. She deserved better, someone who actually had the sense to see ahead. Someone who wouldn’t cost her so much.

“No.” She pushed herself up on one elbow. Tears streaked her face, and fury snapped through the bond. “Don’t you go there, Griffin Dare. There can’t be anyone else for me, not ever. It’s you I love, you I want. Only you.”

“I want you to have what you deserve,” he insisted. The strain in her face, the pain quivering through her, said how much keeping her word had cost her. “As for what you did, I meant it when I said you’d be doing me a favor. I’m grateful. Don’t have the words to say how much.”

He brushed back her soft tresses. “I love you, Valeria.”

Other memories were coming back, raking at him, images of mages glaring at her. Insulting her. Tarring her with his brush. But he couldn’t deal with that now, not when she needed him to comfort her.

“I love you, too. Always, Griffin.” Her grip tightened. “I’m so glad for the chance to say that to you again.”

“Me, too, honey.” In the bond, the echo of her pain, the searing memory, scalded him, too. He’d threatened to eat her heart, for God’s sake. He pressed a kiss into her hair. “Clearly I suck in the last words department.”

“Well, you get another shot at that.” Valeria gathered herself, the effort resonating in the mind link, until she could raise her head and smile at him. “We both get another shot.”

He wiped the tears off her cheeks with his thumbs. “We’ll take full advantage of that.”

Though the advantage might not be as much as he’d like. Even an acquittal, which had to be more likely now, wouldn’t change most people’s view of him. But saying so would only upset her. Instead, he kissed her.

She opened for him, forgiveness and love warming her touch. Griff let himself relax and take what she was offering. In return, he showed her the love that swelled his heart. He pressed slow kisses on her cheek, on her temple, her nose, finally on her mouth again.

Her lips pressed against his and flash fire rocketed through him. She was burning with him. Yet the intensity was muted, distant.
Damn it.

He rolled above her, aware of her arms sliding down his bare back, her tongue fencing with his. Her honeysuckle scent and the absence of ammonia taste.

None of it felt right. He couldn’t feel her, smell her, as keenly as before. He rolled to the side and tugged her to him.

“It will come back.” Valeria must’ve caught his frustration in their bond. She brushed back his hair. “I know it will. You’re still recovering. Besides, I love you completely, Griffin. Whatever comes back or doesn’t.”

“I love you, too, honey, no matter what.” So he would do right by her, whether she liked it or not.

Now he remembered what Blake had said about the mages never forgiving her for siding with him. Shielding the thought, he tightened his arm around her. “Speaking of last words, what am I doing here?”

She settled against his side with her head a welcome weight on his shoulder. “Stefan isn’t sure. Not long after the helo lifted off, you started coming back to us. That was a shock, to put it mildly, but none of us are complaining. Though Stefan has done a lot of muttering, seeing as you were definitely dead by any clinical standard.”

Pain flickered between them, and she cupped his cheek. “Griffin, I—”

“Don’t. You did what I asked, love. End of story.” He gave her a direct look, willing her to feel his honesty.

Yet the awkwardness lingered between them.

Her eyes searched his, but she’d blocked off her feelings. He couldn’t read her.

At last, she said, “What do you remember? Do you have any idea what happened?”

“Not much.” Stroking her hair, wishing he could feel it the way he used to, he stared up at the ceiling. “That heart shot of Stefan’s hurt. Then…I was angry. Something sizzled through me. Tore at me. Strengthened me, too. When you grabbed me that last time, the tearing was harder.”

She flinched, and he kissed her.

“Don’t,” he said. Stroking her hair again, he struggled to remember. “The tearing, then…I saw you. Saw us, you holding me. Then Stefan pushing himself up. I called out—tried to reach you. But I was falling away, rushing away. How long was I out, anyway?”

“You started coming back to us about an hour later. In the chopper. That was around three this morning, and it’s nine twenty at night now.” She slid her fingers over his cheek, her eyes grave. “I was so afraid to believe it, to hope. But now I have you back, and I would do it all again for that.”

She laid her palm against his cheek and let him feel her sincerity in their bond. “Believe that, Griffin.”

“I’ll try to.” Stroking her back, he knew she was telling him the truth, which made him far luckier than he deserved.

Desire warmed her eyes and flowed between them. He lowered his head to hers, lost himself in the touch and taste of her, the love she gave him. But the distance, the muteness, filtered the contact.

For her sake, he forced a grin when he raised his head. “I’m sure Stefan, and probably Will, will poke at this sixteen ways from Sunday.”

“I should call Stefan. Your folks are here, too, and the team. They’re all going public about their loyalty to you, and they’ve been very good to me.”

“They’d better be.”

Sliding off the bed, she smiled at him. “Are you hungry? Miss Hettie made chicken pie and has watermelon for the side. Your mom made peach cobbler. She says this combo is your favorite meal.”

“Yeah.” His answering smile came from his heart. He hadn’t eaten homemade chicken pie or cobbler since he’d gone rogue. “But wait, what about the splice at the old Adams place? Tonight is the dark of the moon. What if something tries to come through?”

“Collegium mages are on guard, and they told Will no one has shown up to answer that summons. Destroying the orb must’ve voided it, for which we can be thankful. The Collegium mages know we’re here but not much else. We’re playing our cards close.”

“I knew I’d hooked up with smart people.”

“Indeed. Oh, and Stefan said you’re to stay in bed until morning.” With a grin, she added, “I’m sure Magnus will watch over you, especially since I’m bringing back pie.”

The dog’s ears lifted, and he thumped his tail on the bed. Grateful for the small pleasure, Griff scratched the big golden’s back. Magnus laid his head on Griff’s thigh, the familiar bowling-ball weight reassuring although, again, damnably muted.

Griff leaned back in the bed and reveled in the quiet pleasure of the moment. He really was here, alive. Not a ghoul. With her.

“You and I will eat in here with your folks and Hettie. The others will come see you after. If you’re up to it.”

“Just try to stop me.” He grinned at her as happiness pushed into his throat. Dinner with his family. A little thing, except he hadn’t had it for a long, long time.

“I’ll be right back.” She kissed him quickly and left.

As she walked out the door, he enjoyed the view of her superb ass. His blood stirred, surely a good sign, and he reached mentally for her.

Reached, and got nothing. Because she wasn’t touching him anymore? He still felt unusually tired. Still couldn’t feel the magic. Or even the life energy of the dog he was scratching.

Heart pounding, Griff stretched one hand out in front of him and summoned power. Nothing. No glow, not even a spark.

Well, shit.
The bastards had drained him, after all. Why hadn’t that killed him?

Regardless, he’d come back from the dead. His power probably would, too.

If it didn’t, though, then what?

He blew out a slow breath. One problem at a time. First, nail that fucking Blake.

O
dd, Griff thought, that a globe of crystal, a neutral, inanimate thing, might signal the end of his hopes.
The world ends not with a bang but a whimper
, like T. S. Eliot said. Except Griff didn’t even have a whimper’s worth of power in his hands now. Without it, he couldn’t make the crystal glow.

With Valeria on the camelback sofa beside him and Stefan across from them and morning light pouring into Hettie’s parlor, he felt strangely distanced from the two people who were so dear to him. He’d never been this close without sensing their magic.

His neck tensed. He bit back a curse.

“Take your time with it.” Stefan leaned forward. “Draw the magic first, then channel it into the ball.”

“Yeah. It’s the first part that’s the problem.”

“If I touch you,” Valeria said, “activate our bond and let you draw magic through it, would that help?”

“Worth a try.” At least he’d managed to sound as if the idea of being unable to tap the power without her didn’t burn him. At least she had recovered her ability to shield this morning. If only she’d been able to protect herself from him yesterday.

Her hand slid onto his forearm. The magic she drew warmed the bond, warmed his mind the way sitting by a fire in winter warmed his face. He opened to the power, reached for it…and nothing came.

Well, hell.
Gently, because this wasn’t her fault, he closed the bond as her dismay rose to match his.

“No joy,” he said for Stefan’s benefit. He set the crystal globe carefully in the tripod holder on the coffee table.

Valeria reached for his hand. He laced his fingers through hers and silently, in his own head, damned whatever muted the sensation, as though he were wearing gloves. Defying it, he raised her hand to his lips to brush a kiss over her knuckles.

Her fingers tightened on his.
It will be all right
, she thought to him.

If only.

Stefan frowned at him. “I feel magic in you. It’s there. If the bond you two share can still function, even if you have to touch to activate it, there’s still magic in you. They didn’t manage to drain all of your power, maybe because of the venom.”

Griff glanced at Valeria. “That would be ironic.”

“And then some,” Stefan agreed. “It may also be that your third eye may’ve been different from most mages’ in some way that let you do things we can’t—translocate farther, move faster, tolerate such a high venom level in your blood.”

Griff raised an eyebrow. “‘May have been’?” The brow chakra, or third eye, was the seat of magical ability. If it was damaged…

Anger flamed in Stefan’s hard eyes. “Whatever they did blew your brow chakra to hell. Instead of the single segment Mundanes have, we have five. Or should. You have only one of the five now, with a bloblike shape that looks like a big scar where the other segments should be.”

“Can you realign?” Valeria asked. “Retune the chakras?”

Stefan shook his head. “I can’t realign what isn’t there anymore.” Bitterly, he said, “I’m sorry, Griff.”

That sounded about as final as things could get. Valeria’s hand tightened on Griff’s, but he kept his mind closed to her. How could he stand beside her, let alone shield her, if he couldn’t match her in a fight? “Then I’m done, finished as a mage.”

“I don’t like to say finished.”

Griff shrugged. “Facts, Stefan. Though none of that explains why I’m still alive.” Alive but useless. He couldn’t win justice for his dead if he couldn’t fight.

“The draining ritual,” Stefan said, “usually involves one globe, appropriately colored, for each chakra. That’s why it’s fatal. Maybe it wasn’t this time because the mages tapped only three chakras, drained your power but not your life.”

His power gave his life meaning, made it vivid and full. Without the magic, he might as well be blind and deaf.

“As for why you came back to us,” Stefan continued, “near as I can tell, you did something mages haven’t been able to do since before the Burning Times. You went out of body, what our kind once knew as astral traveling.”

“What’s that?” Valeria asked.

“It’s a way to travel to distant places in moments, see what’s happening there, and even communicate, if the old legends are correct. Mages used to send messages to their kindred that way, but we lost the knack, the knowledge of the method, in the Burning Times.”

“I didn’t have any control over it, though.” Griff glanced at Valeria and winced at the guilt in her eyes.
Not your fault
, he reminded her silently.

A wry smile twisted Stefan’s mouth. “I wouldn’t recommend the combination of venom, vaccine, and lethal magic. We were lucky to get you back.”

“Still,” Griff said, “that could be useful.”

“Damned risky to figure out, though.” Stefan shook his head. “Without magic, maybe impossible.”

“I’ll try anything,” Griff said.

Staring into the distance, Stefan rubbed his chin. “You had no talons,” he said thoughtfully. “Your skin didn’t turn green. Then you revived, after almost an hour clinically dead, with no brain or major organ damage.”

Just magic damage
, Griff thought.

“There’s something about your physiology that’s different in key ways.” Stefan shook his head. “We’ll keep digging at this. You work with your staff, try to recharge. Maybe the wall will come down. Maybe you have self-healing abilities we don’t yet know about.”

“Maybe.” Griff wasn’t betting on it, though.

“I have a friend who’s a medicine man in the Eastern Band, Cherokee Nation, up in North Carolina. He may be able to help, but we need to finish your trial first. Some of the Council are pressuring me to bring you back, wanting me to certify you fit to continue.”

Griff was sick of the Council and all their maneuvering. If not for Valeria, if not for the need to accuse that bastard, Blake, he would walk away from it all.

“Let’s get it done, then,” he said.

That afternoon, the tribunal convened in the ritual grotto. Griff watched the mages file in. If there was any justice, he’d be acquitted, but he’d stopped trusting in justice long ago.

Valeria’s warm hand gripped his. If he was convicted, could his dad get her acquitted?

You aren’t going to be convicted
, she sent to him firmly, but he could feel that small worm of doubt, of dread, that nagged at her, as it did at him.

He didn’t need magic to feel the tension in the air, especially when Blake entered under guard. The guards escorted him to the High Council table. One or two of them looked at him askance.

Otto Larkin shook his head, refusing to meet Blake’s eyes, but that could mean anything.

Gerry Armitage stood before the obsidian seat, facing the assembly. “Come to order,” he called, and the room stilled.

Because of the
geas
he’d laid on them, only those who’d started the process with open minds, about seventy-five or eighty mages, remained in the rows of seats.

Griff’s mom and sister and his team, including Will and Stefan, stood in the walkway behind the uppermost seats with the others who couldn’t or wouldn’t vote. His dad and Hettie, as counsel to the accused, flanked Griff and Valeria, all of them standing for the verdict. None of them could vote, either, because they’d come into this with their minds set.

“All who find Griffin Rhys Dare guilty, beyond doubt, of any charged offense will now rise,” Gerry said.

Griff’s heart pounded. He couldn’t read anyone’s expressions, had no idea what they were thinking. Could evidence trump six years of prejudice?

The assembled mages shifted, some exchanging irritated glances. Halfway up the center section, a woman stood. A man farther down and to the left followed suit. Another farther up, then two mages, a man and a woman, on the right. No more.

Justice could still prevail occasionally. If a man had the right allies.

Five. Only five.
Exultation rang in Valeria’s thoughts and eased the tightness in Griff’s chest.

“This assembly,” Gerry stated, “finds the accused not guilty of all charges. He is free to go. So is Valeria Banning, who was charged as an accomplice.”

With a glance at Griff, Gerry added, “I personally hope he will come back to us. Griffin, do you have anything to say?”

“I have a charge to lay.”

At Gerry’s direction, Griff took his place in the obsidian seat, hands on his knees. He looked directly into Blake’s angry eyes. Behind the anger lay fear.

The bastard deserved to be terrified, but Griff kept his voice even, letting no hint of triumph show. “I accuse Chief Councilor Gene Blake of treasonous collaboration with ghouls against our kind. I accuse him of the murders of mages who died on raids because he warned the ghouls they were coming. I accuse him of ordering my kidnapping and of turning me over to the ghouls.”

He ignored Stefan’s scowl. Stefan had wanted him to include his loss of powers, but this was for his dead, not about him. He wouldn’t have mentioned himself at all if his friends hadn’t insisted on it.

“On what grounds do you bring this charge?” Gerry Armitage asked.

“When he and Councilor Otto Larkin attempted to probe my mind, I saw into the chief councilor’s. I saw a memory of him meeting with ghouls.”

The aura glowed blue around the chair, for truth. Shock vibrated in the chamber. A clamor of voices rose.

Gerry lifted his hands for silence. Only when the last mutter died did he turn to Blake. “Your response, Chief Councilor?” he asked in a flat, neutral voice.

Blake stood. “I deny it all,” he said, staring at Griff with malice in his eyes, “and I demand my ancient right to prove my innocence in magical combat against my accuser.”

“I accept,” Griff snapped before anyone else could break the shocked silence in the chamber.

Valeria’s cry of “No” was almost lost under Stefan’s roared “The hell you do” and Will’s furious “Fuck that!”

Again, excited voices created a din as the seated mages turned to each other.

Griff met Blake’s sneer with a hard stare. The bastard knew, or guessed, Griff hadn’t regained his powers. Regardless, this was his fight. He’d find some way to win it.

“Order,” Gerry shouted. The door wardens banged the butts of their spears against the floor, the sound echoing in the vaulted space.

As Valeria ran to Griff, Stefan translocated, a breach of the rules in this chamber, to stand in front of him. “The accuser has no powers—”

“Shut up,” Griff hissed, grabbing him.

Stefan shook him off. “His powers were unlawfully stripped from him, at the orders of the accused.”

A gasp rose from the watching mages, then a babble of voices.

“Stefan, no! Stop.” Griff hadn’t wanted anyone to know, though maybe that was pointless since the traitors probably did.

“He has the right to choose a champion,” Will shouted, charging down from the back. “I volunteer.”

“So do I,” Stefan rapped out, as Valeria and Tasha cried, “I’ll do it.” Even Lorelei, who hated hand-to-hand combat as much as Stefan did, called out above the babble of spectators’ voices, “Let me!”

Valeria’s fingers dug into Griff’s arm. Her eyes pleaded with him. “Let me do this. The bastard used me, too.”

“Not a chance,” he said as his dad snapped, “It’s my fight.”

Chuck grabbed Griff’s arm. He must’ve run down the stairs. “Griff, let me knock his ass to hell for you.”

“Stop, all of you,” Griff shouted. Nobody else was dying for him. Or risking death on his account.

The boom of the door wardens’ spears slamming into the stone floor smothered the cacophony of voices. The echoes faded into silence thick with anticipation.

Gerry turned to Griff. “Is this true, that your powers are gone?”

“It is.” Damn Blake to hell and back again.

“Then you may choose a champion.”
You should
, Gerry’s level stare said. “This is a duel to the death unless one of you recants.”

“Like I said, this is my fight,” Griff stated into the tense quiet, “one long past due. I stand by my accusation, and I decline, with gratitude, all offers to serve as my proxy.”

At his side, Valeria made a stifled sound. She bit her lip, and he gave her shoulder a quick squeeze.

“Barehanded or with weapons?” Gerry asked.

Blake could kill from a distance, while Griff could now do so only at close range. But Blake would fry him in direct contact. Better to risk the amplified energy of Blake’s sword and have a chance to force some distance with his staff if he needed it.

“Weapons of choice,” Griff said. “One each, and only one. I choose my staff.”

“Sword,” Blake grunted. He stared at Griff with narrowed eyes, as though suspecting a trick.

Gerry looked up at the door warden. “Have the weapons brought and these tables removed.”

“What the hell are you thinking?” Stefan demanded.

“That I’ll win.” Griff gripped Valeria’s shoulders and looked into her pale, angry face. She had to believe him. “Somehow, I’ll win.”

“Please don’t do this,” she said.

“I’m committed now.” He cocked an eyebrow at Will. “Right?”

“Yes, damn it.” Will scowled at him.

“We just got you back,” his mother said from the circle of his father’s arm. Tears glistened in her eyes. At her side, Caro stood tight-lipped and pale.

Griff looked around at his friends’ faces, at his parents and sister. His heart ached with love for them.

He hadn’t let himself think how much he loved his family, his friends. When he’d been at constant risk of losing them forever, he hadn’t dared. But now he couldn’t avoid it, not when the next few minutes would decide whether he kept his new-won freedom or died here.

“I wouldn’t do this,” he said, “if I didn’t think I had a good shot.” He let his gaze travel over the little knot of people who cared about him. “While Blake rode a desk these last six years, I’ve regularly fought for my life. I still have the moves, even a fair amount of speed, just not the power.”

Okay, so that sounded laughable, but he plowed on. “I owe the dead.” He wanted justice for what Valeria had suffered, too, but she would discount that argument.

He set a hand to her cheek to activate the bond, staring into her wide, worried eyes and willing her to feel his resolve. “I’ll be fine.”