I knew Dean hadn’t been with me at all. He was supposed to be safely home with Erna.
“No one is trying to hurt her.” Devinshea Quinn sounded completely reasonable. “I would never hurt Summer. This has all been a huge misunderstanding. My name is Dev Quinn and I’ve known Summer since the day she was born. I consider myself one of her fathers, so you should know I’m here to help and protect her. Please put the crossbow down. Marcus isn’t going to take her against her will. I would stake him myself if he tried.”
“Who are you, child?” Marcus asked in that deep voice of his. I could hear the possessiveness dripping from his every word.
I wasn’t a fool. Marcus would view Dean as a rival, and that could go poorly for my friend.
“I’m her protector,” Dean replied. “Step away from her now. And she doesn’t have a family. She wasn’t born the way children are born. She’s something different and I won’t allow you or anyone else to use her.”
“I don’t think he’s going to hurt me, Dean.” The words came out of my mouth on a croak. Drowning was a really terrible thing.
Marcus’s handsome face loomed over me. His features were all sharp lines and hard planes, but somehow he managed to not look rough. If I hadn’t known he was from the Earth plane, I would have thought he was a vampire of royal blood, one of the wealthy who live high above the surface of their plane. “Please let me heal you. You don’t have to take it directly from me. I can apply it topically. I promise you there is nothing to fear from my blood.”
I rather thought I had everything to fear from it, but I wasn’t sure I could make it back to the brugh if I didn’t. Erna could work wonders, but I had to get to her first. Although somehow Dean had found me. “Can you help me sit up? Dean, don’t hurt anyone.”
“Uh, not really going to be a problem,” the kid I’d come to think of as a brother said.
I glanced over and Kelsey had somehow managed to get the crossbow out of Dean’s hands and had it trained at his head.
We were going to have to work more on his physical training. Dean often relied on his magic and forgot that a fist can work, too. I would bet that was a lesson Kelsey had learned early on.
Marcus managed to get behind me, letting me rest against his strong chest. “Kelsey, don’t kill the boy until we know who he is.”
“Don’t kill the boy at all, please.” I was so tired, and it felt good to be in Marcus’s arms. It shouldn’t since I knew exactly what he was and why he was attracted to me, but I couldn’t help it. I’ve always been attracted to vampires. Some might say I have daddy issues. “Dean, how did you get here? Please tell me you didn’t teleport.”
Dean had his hands up and managed to look even younger than his twenty-three years. “Something happened to you. Something was attacking you. You can’t expect me to leave you out here all alone. So it wasn’t the vamp?”
I let my head rest against Marcus’s chest, feeling the oddly familiar way we seemed to fit together. My head nestled under his chin. The pain was starting to come back now. I hadn’t felt my arm aching because of the dying thing.
Had Dean felt me die? Erna had helped to enchant the charm at my throat. It wasn’t allowed to come off my body unless I died and the threat was neutralized. Now I wondered if she hadn’t put more spells on the thing than I’d realized. “Marcus saved me. Did Erna sense the attack?”
Dean nodded. “She told me something was wrong. Something was trying to break the seal.”
That answered one question, though I had many more. The charm at my throat wasn’t exactly public knowledge. Why had the each-uisge been so intent on taking it? “It’s okay now, though I fear I can’t make it back to the village without help.”
“I can heal you,” Dean said. He glared at Kelsey, who still had the crossbow pointed his way. “Well, I could if this chick would let me. She’s a little psycho if you ask me.”
Kelsey simply smiled, an odd expression that reminded me of a hungry wolf. “Don’t you forget it, buddy.”
I looked to the young woman who seemingly had done her