Quest
Warlock Coven Book 1
by Victoria Danann
Genre: Paranormal SciFi Fantasy Romance
AN
INTRODUCTION to the fun making, risk taking, hard loving members of
the Second Sursolid Warlock Coven.
Seven warlocks. Seven
contests made more interesting by magical handicaps and strangers for
teammates.
From
the "Queen of Alpha Males", Victoria Danann (Slashed
Reads). The warlocks as introduced in Wednesday,
Witches of Wimberley, are taking you on the adventure of a
lifetime.
Heart-seizing
adventure.
Breathless
suspense.
Romance to
die for.
Let's find out if you want more!!
LET
THE GAME BEGIN!
It's
hard to find new experiences when you're hundreds of years old and
have no financial or geographical limitations. But when it was
Rally's turn to suggest the next "Boredom Break", they got
the adventure they were craving and the romance they wanted, even if
they hadn't known they wanted it.
**Only .99 cents!!**
EXCERPT FROM Quest, Warlock Coven Book One
Each and every coven member stared at Rally with a blank look until Turf started
laughing. “Oh, well. Let me make sure I’ve got this straight. We don’t know what
we’ll be doing, why we’re doing it, or who we’re doing it with. The only thing we
know for sure is that we’ll have to deal with fucking Breitlingers. And that means
we could end the game with nothing to show for it but funeral rites for our friends,”
Turf said what everybody was thinking out loud.
“All true,” Rally said, “but apparently there are a group of artifacts that, if gathered
together in the same place, could create a power shift. In comic book terms, you
might call it a win for the good guys.”
“Would it be too great an assumption to take it that we’re the good guys?” Aodh asked.No, it wouldn’t,” Rally said. “And, yes, we are. The good guys, I mean. Pertama says. . .”“Why don’t we just hold up right there?” Turf jumped in. “How did this convo come about? Did the crypt-keeper ask you over for psychotherapy?”
Rally stared at Turf for a few beats. “If you’re referring to Pertama as the crypt-keeper’, you’re the one in need of psychotherapy. He’s been prophet to warlocks for. . . ell, as long as there’ve been warlocks, I guess. You need to show him a little respect.”Wolfram sighed, rested his elbows on his knees, and said, “Second that. I want to hear everything he said before I make up my mind.”
Rally nodded. “As to how I came to be talking to him, he sent
e a wedding present. I sent a thank you. He responded by teleporting
me to his, ah. . . cave?
Anyway, he broad-brushed this competition thing and asked me to
pass along
that he thinks we should enter.”
“Hate to sound like I’m stuck on a loop,” Turf said, “but again, what do we
get out of this?”
“In Turf terms,” Rally said, “something different. In coven terms, it’s a
chance to bring in something like a magical Age of Aquarius.”
Aodh laughed. “Good one.”
“No. Really,” Rally said, not sharing the amusement. “There are seven
legs of the race. One of seven artifacts is up for grabs during each leg.
The first team to get the thing and hold onto it long enough to cross the
finish line gets to keep it. The only way we find out what happens if all
seven artifacts end up in the same place at the same time is if we,” his hand
made a circular motion to indicate the coven, “enter and win every leg.”
“Sounds intense,” Jean Mar said.
Turf scoffed. “If you believe the old buzzard’s on the level and not delusional.”
Mallach ignored Turf. Like everybody else. “High pressure for sure.”
“Yeah,” Rally agreed. “I said the same thing to Pertama. Know what he said?”
The others murmured an interest. “That we’ve been training for this for
centuries while we thought we were just fucking around.”
Wolfram cocked his head. “Pertama said ‘fucking around’?”
Rally turned to Wolfram. “No. Paraphrasing.”
“Come on,” Turf said, “Y’all are not buying into this. It’s. . .
preposterous.”
“Such a big word for such a small mind,” Aodh said. “Except
for a teeny
fraction of supernatural outliers, the world’s population of
two-legged creatures would say the idea of real warlocks is preposterous.”
“He has a point,” Jean Mar said.
Turf made a scoffing noise. “Look. None of us mind being called crazy.
We do stuff that’s extreme, even for us. But this ain’t crazy. It’s insane.”
“Perhaps it’s a language issue, but I don’t get the difference,” said Jean Mar.
Aodh was quick to reassure Jean Mar that there was nothing wrong with his English.
“Neither does anybody else. The difference exists solely in
his own mind.”
“Pros and cons?” Wolfram suggested, using verbal shorthand.
Mallach turned to Rally. “Do we have all the deets on the table?”
Rally nodded. “Yeah. You know what I know.”
“Madness,” Turf muttered.
“Knock it off,” Harm said. “Let’s hear the ins and outs.”
Aodh shot him Turf a look. “Harm’s right. Everybody knows where you
stand without further belaborin’ of the point.” He turned toward Rally.
“There’s a couple of things I’d like to know. First, who else is entering.
Second, I’m no’ clear on the rules.”
Rally moved to sit at the edge of his tufted leather chair. It gave him a
couple of inches of extra height, not to mention an added air of authority.
“It’s invitational. We’ve been given seven out of twenty-eight invitations.
The other twenty-one have been offered to pretty much the whole
supernatural world. If we’re in, we’ll be competing against, you know,
demons, midgarts, fae, sorceri . . . maybe weres. I don’t know. Those
that accept the invitations will be sending their best.
“Each leg has a winning team and a losing team. If you win an artifact,
you’re done. If you’re last, you’re done.”
Wolfram spoke up. “So you could have a demon for a teammate.
Say you win. Who gets the artifact?”
“That’s a good question,” Rally said. “I don’t know. I guess you work it
out between you.”
Turf barked out a laugh before saying, “Work it out with demons!”
Jean Mar said, “I hate to say this, but Martins is right. Demons do not
play well with others.”
“We’re getting ahead of ourselves,” Rally said. “I just. . . I don’t think
Pertama would say we should enter without a good reason.”
“Also a good point,” Jean Mar said.
“Congratulations, Frenchie,” Turf said. “I’ll bet you were a fine jellyfish
in a former life.”
Unfazed by ridicule, Jean Mar lifted and dropped a shoulder. “Be careful,
mon ami. The jellyfish sting is most unpleasant.”
“So,” Mallach said, “one of us has to win every challenge and none of
us can ever be last.”
Everyone looked toward Rally for confirmation. “That’s my understanding.
Yeah.”
“And what, may I ask, are the challenges to be?”
Rally could tell by Aohd’s question, and by knowing him so well,
that
he was definitely interested. “No one knows. Everybody starts at the
same place with the same clues,” Rally said.
“Weird,” Jean mar offered.
“Well said.” Aodh clapped his hands together and rose making a gesture
with his right hand that resembled a complicated means of knuckle cracking.
A holographic screen, about the size of a common dry erase board,
appeared and hovered in the air. Aodh used his finger to draw a P column
and a C column. “First up in the tank?” he asked.
“I have a pro,” Rally said, “It’s something to do.”
Sounding like a game show host, Aodh said, “Man says something
to do.”
He looked at the holographic board and the words “something to do”
appeared in one-inch flames that flared then died away leaving glowing
text next to Pro number one.
“I have a con,” Wolfram said. “Breitlingers.”
“And the big dog says Breitlingers,” Aodh pointed at the board and the
word appeared as number one under the C column.
“I’d like to put an asterisk next to that one,” Jean Mar said.
“Asterisk next to Breitlingers,” Aodh pointed at the board and an asterisk
flamed to life then died.
“Are they really that bad?” Harm asked.
Wolfram gave up a long sigh. Aodh looked away.
“Yeah,” Rally said quietly. “Being real. There are only two kinds of good
Breitlinger. Dead or sound asleep.”
“So they’re. . .?” Harm started to ask.
“Succubi,” Turf answered.
Mallach jumped in. “And not the good kind.”
Harm stared at Mallach. “There’s a good kind of succubi?”
Mallach unsuccessfully fought a grin for a few minutes before Jean Mar
playfully pushed him off the couch.
“Am I supposed to feel like I know more than when I asked if they’re bad?”
Harm said.
“If they wake up, they’ll be consumed by a compulsion to mate with us,”
Wolfram said.
The room fell quiet for a few beats. “And that’s bad because. . .?”
Harm asked. When no one replied, he ventured, “They’re hideous?”
“They’re not hideous,” Mallach said. “Just insistent.”
Jean Mar nodded. “Really insistent.”
“And lethal,” Turf added. “Don’t forget the lethal part.”
“We’re not forgettin’,” Aodh said. “If they’re successful, they like to
kill us off afterward. They only beget daughters and they’re adamant
about not sharing custody.”
“So just don’t fuck them,” Harm said. “Problem solved.” The other six s
hared looks and glances. “Okay. What am I missing?”
“When Mallach said they’re insistent,” Aodh said, “he means they’re
strong and they hunt in packs.”
“Hunt?” Harm was beginning to sound alarmed. “In packs?”
The others
nodded, refusing to meet his eyes. The warlocks looking
uncharacteristically uncomfortable with the topic led Harm straight
to a horrific guess.
“Like. . . gang rape?”
“Well,” Rally said. “Sort of. There’s no point in sugarcoating it.”
“So why are we even talking about this?” Harm asked. “I don’t car
e about pros and cons. I’m not up for, uh . . . that.”
Jean Mar answered. “If boredom breaks didn’t come with risks,
they’d
be boring? No?”
“Look at it this way,” Aodh said, “you’d die happy.”
Mallach formed a ball of blue flame and threw it at Aodh, who
easily
deflected and doused it, laughing. “Very funny, Aodh. But Breitlingers
are nothing to laugh about.”
“Everythin’ is somethin’ to laugh about,” said Aodh. “
“Besides,” Rally continued, undeterred, “If we’re all racing,
they’ll
split up
. There’re not that many of them left.”
“He’s right,” Aodh said, “ there’d probably be, say, two after
each of us.
‘Twould be somewhat manageable.”
Harm gaped before finally managing to say, “Somewhat?”
“We’re also at a disadvantage because the Breitlingers
won’t be i
nterfering with the others,” Mallach said.
“Right ye are. Goes without sayin’,” Aodh said,
“Anythin’ else?”
“Ah, yes,” Jean Mar said. “We don’t know the prize. Or
prizes.”
“Is that a pro or a con?” Aodh asked.
“Con,” Jean Mar said at the same time Rally said, “Pro.”
Rally spoke first. “I think not knowing what we’re racing
for makes
it more exciting. The point of boredom breaks isn’t to
win prizes.
It’s to give us a new experience. What’s a better counter
to boredom
that jumping off into the unknown?”
“That is not an informed decision. That is ridiculous,”
Jean Mar said.
Rally chuckled. “Informed decision? When did you get so
straight-laced?”
“I’m not straight-laced, whatever that is, but I do have a
brain,” Jean Mar defended.
“Since when?” Turf asked.
Aodh decided to end the argument. He turned to the display. “Ref says
the point goes in both columns. What else?”
“Random teammate assignments. Gods only know who we could
end up with,” Turf said.
“So ‘tis a con then?” Aodh couldn’t resist pushing Turf’s buttons.
“Yes, Aodh,” Turf mocked patience. “Put it in the bad column.”
“Hold on,” Rally said. “Maybe this one needs to go in both columns.”
“How do you figure that?” Mallach asked.
“Because the factor of unknown, not knowing who we’re going to draw. . .
that is for sure not boring,” Rally replied.
Turf narrowed his eyes. “Easy for you to say since you already know
who your partner is.”
Rally chuckled.
Jean Mar shrugged. “Rally’s right. Not knowing who we’ll
be paired
with is not boring. Both columns is okay with me.”
“Someone needs to state the obvious,” Wolfram said. “It’s a
supernatural event. That means we could be killed.”
Jean Mar pointed to the holograph board. “That is a con.”
“When has fear of bein’ killed ever stopped us from doin’ what we
want? Aodh said as he directed flamed text to light up the board
under the con column.
To everybody’s surprise, Turf said, “Man’s right. There’re a lot of good
reasons to pass on this suggestion, but pussying out isn’t one of them.”
That simple statement threw down a gauntlet clearly understood by
everybody in the room, as could be told by the collective sigh.
“We don’t
decide boredom breaks based on what’s safest.”
“Yeah. If we’re going there, we might as well buy Buicks,
live in the
suburbs and sell insurance,” Mallach said. “Maybe the element of
risk goes in the pro column.”
Nodding, Aodh said, “Risk is the heart of boredom breaks.”
“Let’s vote,” Wolfram said. “But before we do, let’s agree that we
will all abide by the majority. Like it or not.” After nods and murmurs,
he clarified. “Any dissenters speak up. Say it clearly and say it now.”
Silence.
“Alrighty then,” Aodh said. “Who’s in?”
Rally raised his hand without hesitation. Aodh and Turf quickly
added their agreement. Jean Mar, Mallach, and Wolfram followed
one at a time until there was only one left. Harm.
Harm was relatively new to the coven; relatively meaning that the
others had been part of a pledged collective for hundreds of years.
He wasn’t sure he was wholeheartedly up for anything, but he was
sure he didn’t want to be kicked out. And he was just as sure that
he didn’t want the others to think less of him.
He raised his hand.
With a grin Aodh waved his hand and the holographic board
disappeared. “The ayes have it then. Looks like we’re bound
for glory.”
“I’m going home to write my eulogy,” Harm told Jean Mar.
“Just in case.”
Overhearing that, Turf said, “You think people would come to
your sendoff?”
New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of nineteen romances. Victoria's Knights of Black Swan series won BEST PARANORMAL ROMANCE SERIES FIVE YEARS IN A ROW. Reviewers Choice Awards, The Paranormal Romance Guild. Eight times #1 Amazon bestseller. Over two million books sold. Her paranormal romances come with uniquely fresh perspectives on "imaginary" creatures, characters, and themes. She adds a dash of scifi, a flourish of fantasy, enough humor to make you laugh out loud, and enough steam to make you squirm in your chair. Her heroines are independent femmes with flaws and minds of their own whether they are aliens, witches, demonologists, psychics, past life therapists. Her heroes are hot and hunky, but they also have brains, character, and good manners. **Usually. Victoria lives in The Woodlands, Texas with her husband and a very smart, mostly black German Shepherd dog.
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