Destined (War of the Covens 2)

“Morning.”

“Morning,” she croaked. “What was that for?”

“Just a reminder.”

“A reminder?”

“Yeah, a reminder of what we talked about last night. Of how you belong to me.”

Her eyes flashed, and he waited for their fight to begin. Really, was there anything better than sparring with this woman?

“Of how I belong to you?” Her voice went up an octave.

“Yeah.”

“Forget about the verbal arm wrestling! Why don’t you just pee on me and everything I own?”

He smirked and turned away to saunter to the bathroom. “I will if it comes to that.”

“Arrghhh!”

Ryder laughed, ducking the shoe that flew at his head as he closed the door on her.

11

Misunderstood

“I’m sorry I couldn’t meet with you last night, Caia.” Marita breezed into her suite without knocking. “I had urgent business to attend to.”

Caia nodded wearily, standing up from the window seat that looked out over Paris. “I understand.”

She didn’t actually, but she was trying to. The last two sleepless nights hadn’t exactly improved her mood, but Marita was the top gun and had to be respected. Caia was going crazy wondering about the Midnight imprisoned in the Center. Her refusal to join Mordecai for training until she met with Marita was actually an attempt at exerting self-control over her anger.

Marita threw her a surprisingly warm smile and took a seat on a nearby sofa, smoothing her conservative skirt over her legs as she did so. Instead of sitting spine straight and stiff, however, she relaxed against the back of the seat and tilted her head casually. “Mordecai seems concerned for you. I’m worried.”

The witch’s tone was gentler than Caia had ever heard it—that, mixed with Marita’s relaxed body language, completely threw her off. She realized this was the first time they’d ever been alone together—no Vanne, no servants, no guards. Maybe that’s why Marita was so tense all the time. Here with Caia, on her own, she could be a little freer, not have to play the role of “in control queen of the castle” so much.

Caia shook her head with a polite smile and took the armchair opposite her. “No, I’m fine. Just … a little anxious.”

“Anxious?” Marita frowned.

She nodded and leaned forward. “Yesterday, when Mordecai took me to the lecture, I felt a Midnight. Here at the Center.”

Marita froze, her expression blank.

“A girl. Imprisoned … I’m guessing somewhere in the basement near lecture hall A.”

A silence fell over the room, increasing Caia’s anxiety. Marita’s eyes seared through her. “You really are the Head of the Midnight Coven.”

It was Caia’s turn to look bewildered and concerned. “Uh, yeah. But you knew that.”

“Of course.” Marita’s hand fluttered by her face, as if at a loss. Caia could not reconcile this magik with the woman she had met previously. “But I have actual hard evidence for myself now. I’ve been reading your reports passed on by my sister but … well, it’s a little strange, this situation, as I’m sure you already know. I’ve been Head of the Daylights for twenty-five years, and I was groomed by my father for twenty years before that. That’s forty-five years of working against the Head of the Midnight Coven. To now be working with her is … weird.”

Caia laughed. “Yeah, I guess it would be.”

Marita smiled, a smile that never reached her eyes, and then settled back into her seat. “Before I explain about the Midnight, can I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“Your trace … it seems different from my own.”

Caia wriggled in her seat at the inquiry and the pinched expression on Marita’s face. “Different how?”

Did she really want to know?

Marita shrugged, but Caia could tell it was a deliberate attempt to look casual about something she obviously didn’t feel casual about. “I can only follow a trace if I am specifically looking for someone. I’ve heard that you can do more?”

Wow, every second at this place was making her feel more and more like a freak.

“Yeah, the trace sort of finds me. I do that, what you do, as well … specifically locate someone, I mean.”

“What do you mean the trace sort of finds you?”

Caia cleared her throat, shifting again in her seat. “It’s hard to describe. Um, let’s see. Okay, for instance, Nikolai—I have a tap on him … yeah, I suppose you could call it that.”

“A tap?”

“Yeah. His trace will alert me if he seems intense about something, whether it be a negative or positive feeling. And then I go in and check to see what’s up. Nikolai is actually a tough cookie. He’s good at hiding his emotions.”

Marita stared at her blankly, no emotion to disclose exactly how she felt about this information. Finally, she smiled tightly. “I think what’s important is you’re using your quite considerable gifts to help us.”

“So about the girl?” Caia did not intend to be sidetracked.

“The girl, the Midnight, is a spy sent to infiltrate our coven. She is very good, very convincing. Three months ago, she turned up with a young male magik she’d convinced she was from a group of Midnights from Scandinavia who ran a small army base for the Head of the Coven—Ethan. She said they were extremists and that with Ethan’s disappearance, they had become even more vicious, killing anything that got in their way of the war. She said she was a disbeliever, a Midnight who actually agreed with Daylight.” She stopped to scoff at the thought, and Caia’s pulse sped up. “Vilhelm—the boy she met—fell for her lies and he brought her to me. I knew right away she was lying. A Midnight apathetic to the war? Maybe, although I doubt it. But a Midnight switching sides? Never.”