11. Chapter Eleven

Chapter Eleven

Seb

A ilin was pissed, and honestly, I was right there with him. This had gone too far. It had gone on for too long.

We needed to find whoever was doing this and take them down.

“Yes, we really fucking do,” Ailin said from the driver’s seat beside me.

We were heading home with a few more Christmas monsters in our trunk, and we were planning on spending as much time as needed to find a fucking clue. And we would find one. No matter what it took.

When we parked, Sera and Zamm headed off so they could go for a flight together over the top of our coven land. They liked to patrol sometimes and keep an eye on our family’s home.

Ailin and I went into our basement with our new haul. Then we each took one of the new monsters—I took a wreath, and he took some mistletoe—and we got to work.

I pulled on my magic, tugging deep into my soul, using as much power as I possibly could. My blue magic emitted out of me and surrounded the wreath I was examining. I took the shield down so my magic could touch the wreath itself. Then I put a new shield up around my magic and the wreath, but I kept the connection to the magic touching the wreath.

As my magic swirled around, I closed my eyes and tried to take in everything I could about the monstrous wreath and its magic. It felt the same as the monsters from the other night, but this time, it felt like there was more of it. Like the magic itself was more potent than the last time.

From beside me, I heard Ailin growl in frustration, and I turned to him, saying, “It’s a little different than before, isn’t it? More potent?”

My viramore sighed. “Yes, it is. But I still can’t fucking follow it. How the fuck can we find this guy if we can’t even follow the damn magic?”

I grimaced. “I’m not sure, sweetheart. We’ll think of something.”

“If you say so. I’m definitely not convinced.”

I reached over and smacked his bicep. “Stop being so negative. Have a little faith in our abilities. We’re not the only ones working on this. They have other BCA agents doing the same thing. Someone is bound to think of something.”

“We’re the people they call in when they have a magical problem they can’t figure out. You really think the kids that work at the BCA are going to figure this out before us? I don’t fucking think so.”

I rolled my eyes. “You know… humility is a thing, right?”

He flipped me off. “I’m only stating facts.”

Shaking my head in disbelief, I turned back to the monster I was examining. “Let’s switch and see if we can figure something else out. See if all of them feel the same.”

Surprisingly, he didn’t complain about my request and easily switched out our monster objects. I did the same thing with the mistletoe as I had with the wreath, using my magic to examine it. It felt as potent as the wreath had. It felt the same as the others, like it was close to fae magic.

But as I went deeper into the mistletoe, I thought I maybe felt something a tad different than the wreath. Almost like it was made by a different person.

I opened my eyes and looked at Ailin. His eyes were closed, his brow was pinched, and he looked so freaking angry. It made me wince. He took things so personally, especially when something was aimed at a family member. Ailin’s protectiveness knew no bounds.

As I examined him and his green magic, I watched it swirl around the wreath, and I suddenly had an idea.

“Ailin?”

He opened his eyes and quirked a brow. “Yeah?”

“I’m going to grab my staff, and then we’re going to examine these things together. I know we tried combining our magic with the other monster objects already, but these guys are different. With their magic so much more potent, maybe we’ll get lucky.”

I stood up and headed up the stairs before he could respond. I kept my staff right by the front door because I often took it with me when we were going on cases. So I knew exactly where it was, and it took me no time to grab it and then rush back down to the basement.

“Okay, let’s try this.”

Ailin gave me a nod. “Go for it, baby.”

Ailin and I both released our magics, and they didn’t hesitate to swirl together between us. Our magics loved each other just as much as Ailin and I did, so whenever we let them out enough to play together, it was almost like they were eager to. That sounded weird and sorta like our magics were sentient, and maybe they were, to some degree, but I stopped asking questions about that a long time ago.

I closed my eyes and let my magic guide me. I could feel Ailin through our bond, through my magic, and all around me. It felt natural. It felt good. I loved when we combined ourselves in this way.

But unfortunately, it didn’t bring any more clues to the forefront.

“Dammit,” I growled out. “This is so fucking frustrating. I don’t know what else to do.”

Ailin looked helpless as he sat there, shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders. “I don’t know either, baby.” He sighed and dropped his face into his hands, rubbing at his eyes as he groaned.

I stared at him for a bit before a lightbulb went off. “What if we feed it some of our own life essence? Maybe if we have a connection to the life essence it’s stealing, we’ll be able to follow it.”

He stared at me for a beat or two before blowing out a heavy breath. “Let’s try it.”

This time, I let Ailin take the lead. I’d been practicing magic for decades, so I was competent and completely comfortable in my ability. I could do things that many others couldn’t, and I made sure to practice to keep myself sharp. But that being said, I didn’t think I’d ever be at the level Ailin was at when it came to understanding how magic worked and being able to follow its components the way he could.

He probably wouldn’t agree with me on that, but it was the truth.

“Why don’t you let me feed it my life essence while you do the magic part?” I said.

He glared at me. “You really think I’m going to let you feed this thing your life essence? Have you lost your mind?”

I glared at him. “What the hell, Ailin? It’ll be fine. I won’t even feel it, for fuck’s sake.”

“I’m going to feed it my life essence.”

“Ailin.”

“Sebastian.”

I stared at him for a few seconds before I let out a sigh. “Asshole.”

He sent me a smirk before he reached over and touched the mistletoe. I flinched, even though I knew he wasn’t going to get hurt. I still didn’t like seeing it or seeing him take a risk like that. Which… was why he didn’t want me to do it. He wanted to keep me safe as badly as I did him.

And, as usual, I let him get his way. The asshat.

I grumbled at the thought.

He sent me another smirk, as if he’d heard what I thought, and maybe he had. I was thinking pretty hard there for a second.

When he was ready, I tapped my staff on the ground and brought it to life, then pulled on its magic and sent it toward my viramore. Ailin latched onto it with ease, and I quickly added my own magic into the mix. The two of us stood there, staring at the crazed mistletoe while our magics surrounded it.

And then, by some miracle, I watched as a small glowing green orb rose out over the mistletoe and headed for the ceiling.

Holy shit . We could see his life essence.

Ailin and I exchanged a wide-eyed look before he quickly threw a shield around the mistletoe, picked it up, and ran for the stairs. I was only a step behind him, bringing my staff with me.

When we made it up into the dining room, I saw the little green glowing orb move straight through the front door.

“Holy shit,” I said. “We really fucking did it.”

Ailin was already rushing toward the door as he spoke. “We can’t lose this thing.”

“At least we know how to make it work if we do lose it.”

Once I was through the door, I shut it behind me and ran down the porch steps, heading for our car. This thing was moving fast, and it wasn’t going to move across roads, but I didn’t think we had a chance of following it on foot.

I jumped into the driver’s seat, started the car, and yelled, “Get in!” Then I closed my eyes and called on my bond with Zammerra. I asked her with my emotions if she would help us, then I sent her a mental picture of the green glowing orb I needed her to follow.

Her answering roar was felt through our link and physically because she wasn’t too far from us. Through that roar, I knew she was saying that she and Sera would follow the orb for us.

I blew out a relieved breath as Ailin hopped in, and I took off, heading out of our property.

“Zamm and Sera are following it.”

“Good. I have the mistletoe in case we need to do it again, but hopefully, they won’t lose it.” Ailin threw said mistletoe in the backseat. I could hear the thing wiggling around in its shield, and I wrinkled my nose.

How long did this curse last? Were these cursed objects meant to just… remain little monsters until someone blew it to smithereens? Or would the curse’s effects fade after a certain amount of time? Or perhaps after it collected a certain amount of life essence?

Luckily, the orb floated just above the trees as we headed off of coven property and out of the Brinnswick Forest. Once we were on the street, it glided over houses and buildings with ease. Ailin rolled his window down and stuck half his body out to see where it went when we lost track of it.

I slapped his leg. “Get back in here. You’re going to get hurt.”

“We can’t lose it, Seb. Turn right at the next street.” I turned right, and he whooped. “I see it. Straight ahead for a little while.”

“Would you get your ass back in the car? Zamm and Sera are on it. We aren’t going to lose it, ass.”

He huffed but finally sat back down in his seat. “Sorry. I just… this is the first time I feel like we’re actually doing something, you know?”

“I know.” I slapped his leg again, and he grabbed my hand, giving it a quick kiss before letting go and scooting forward in his seat to look out the front windshield.

Since I was driving, I only caught a glimpse of it every now and then, but I wasn’t worried. Zamm would tell me where to go if need be.

We followed it for a little while, but I got caught at a red light, and by the time we got through it, we couldn’t find the damn thing.

Ailin cursed. “Fuck! Dammit!”

“It’s okay. We can just follow Zamm and Sera. Chill out, A.”

He didn’t say anything, so I concentrated on my Bonded, got a sense of where she was, and when the light turned green, I headed that way.

It took us about five minutes to catch back up, and I blew out a breath when Ailin said, “I see it.”

Thank fuck. He was so anxious, it was making me anxious.

“Sorry, baby,” A said after a minute. “I’m not trying to drive you up the wall.”

“It’s okay, I’m used to it.”

He snorted and blindly smacked my chest, not taking his eyes off the orb.

“We’re going to catch this guy, A.”

He blew out a breath, trying to calm himself. “Hell yes, we are.”

We followed the little bubble of Ailin’s life essence down a few more streets and to the opposite side of the city from where the Brinnswick Forest treeline began.

When it floated into an old factory building, I was a little shocked. For some reason, I was picturing some kind of weird underground toy shop or something, not an ordinary-looking factory. But I guessed that made this operation blend in more. It looked so normal on the outside that no one would think twice or wonder if the owner was doing nefarious things.

I asked Zamm to shift to her smaller size and keep an eye on the factory from the roof of a building across the street while Ailin and I parked a few streets away. We weren’t ready to go in, and the last thing we wanted to do was scare the bastard away.

Ailin went to get out of the car, but I grabbed his wrist to stop him. “We need to call in backup.”

“Psh. We need to get in there right now before they leave.”

I shook my head. “We have no idea what’s waiting for us inside. There could be one man, there could be a hundred. We’re not going in there alone without any backup, with no one knowing where we are, and without any kind of plan. I’m calling Alec. You need to call Basil. Get them here now.”

He stared at me for a second. “I really want to get in there.”

“And we will. Just not by ourselves. Okay?”

He stared again before blowing out a breath. “Fine. But I’m not happy about this.”

I rolled my eyes. “Are you ever happy when it comes to working cases? Especially with other people?”

He flipped me off, and I chuckled, making him smile. And then, because I knew he was ready to burst, I leaned in and gave him a quick peck on the lips.

I closed my eyes and asked Zamm to show me what she could see, and when I got a vision of the building, I noticed a sign hanging over the front doors.

Merry Marketplace .

Well. That sounded like a holiday shop kind of thing, didn’t it?

“Merry Marketplace,” Ailin said, either seeing it through Sera’s eyes or hearing my own thoughts about it. “Guess we’re in the right place.”

“Yep.”

He sighed. “I’ll call Bas.”

I sent him a grateful smile, then pulled out my phone and dialed Alec.

W e met Alec, our kids, and the rest of the BCA agents a few blocks away so we wouldn’t be spotted, but Zamm and Sera kept their eyes on the building to make sure no one escaped before we had the chance to enter.

We made a plan with Alec, and he set everything into motion. He sent teams around to the back of the factory and the sides to surround the entire building so our perp had no chance of escape.

We were going for a frontal assault, and Basil, Jorah, Thayer, Clover, Hiro, and Toby were going in with us. The other agents would guard the outside to catch anyone escaping the premises.

“I’ll go in first, Seb behind me, and you guys come in after him. Everyone, make sure you keep shields up as soon as you get into the building,” Ailin said, completely taking over Alec’s operation. His voice brokered no argument, and I was surprised that none of the kids—Basil especially—didn’t try to argue anyway.

Even Alec didn’t say a word once Ailin began giving everyone, not just our family, orders. I suppose Alec knew it was a losing battle when Ailin got like this.

Plus, no one could ever argue that Ailin didn’t get results.

Everyone nodded their agreement, and then we all got into formation to follow my viramore into the building.

We moved quickly down the street and across the parking lot to the front door. Ailin wasted no time using his magic to unlock the door, open it, and put a shield up on the other side to keep himself and everyone else safe from any flying magic.

He stepped inside, and I was right behind him. But as soon as we cleared the doorway, I stepped up beside him and took in the large space.

My eyes widened, and I breathed out, “What the actual fuck?”