Isaac shrugged. “I admit it’s an experiment, but I think this will be your power weapon. Assuming we can get one made especially for you.”
He continued to hold the staff out, and in this close proximity I was able to really look at it. It was beautiful. Mahogany wood, with spiral etchings wound down the base. At the tip, a beautiful burnt orange sphere, a crystal that eerily matched the color of his eyes.
I reached out to touch it and paused. The Earth’s vibrations were still running currents up my legs, and as I neared the staff my hair stood on end. Isaac placed his free hand over his manhood and looked at Logan. “You should probably step back and protect the boys.”
When I had blasted out with my purple magic back at the rest stop, Isaac had said it felt like I’d kicked him in the balls. Now Logan was covering his junk and backing up a few paces.
Great. Sloane the ball buster.
“Come on, we need to know if this works, if it can bring up your magic,” Isaac pressed. Without further ceremony, I grasped the mahogany staff right above Isaac’s hand, just below the crystal. With a resounding crack, my purple magic shot out, throwing Isaac and Logan backward and flying my hair upward with a gust of wind.
“Drop it!” Isaac shouted with a groan from where he lay ten feet away, and I let the staff fall to the grass.
“Shit! I’m so sorry.” I looked to the right, where Logan was curled in the fetal position, half against a tree that had broken his fall. To the left, Isaac looked in better shape, already standing and coming to retrieve the staff.
‘Are you okay?’ I asked, and Logan groaned again, sitting up this time, face red.
‘Covering didn’t help,’ he informed me, and I winced. I felt bad about hurting my mate, but ball-busting magic might be useful with Steven and Ardan.
Isaac was pacing, staff in hand, tapping the sharp tip into the earth as the crystal pulsed.
“So … what did that mean?” I asked, my friendly druid master.
Logan was standing now, and limped slightly as he walked over to where I stood.
Isaac stopped his pacing and sighed. “It means you need your own staff to hone the magic, so it doesn’t spread out like that and attack everyone. But … a staff like this is indeed your weapon.”
Logan looked to be back to his normal shade, losing the red in his face. “Okay, how do we make one?”
Isaac tipped his head back and laughed, showcasing all of his pearly whites. “We don’t make them. The elves do, and the last one to make mine was killed by the druids.”
Logan and I both stepped forward with our mouths open. “Excuse me, did you say elves? Did I hear that right?” Logan asked incredulously.
The druid nodded. “Yes, before Faery was purged and destroyed by the angry druids, a few magical folk made it out. The staff maker was one of an identical set of twins. I never met the brother, but he said they both worked to make the staffs together.”
“So … theoretically…”
Isaac nodded. “Theoretically, if we found the twin brother, he could forge a staff for you.”
“Does she need a staff? Can’t we train her with other weapons,” Logan asked. I was gathering he didn’t like the idea of us traipsing around looking for some staff-forging elf.
Isaac frowned. “I’m sorry, but you want Ardan dead, right? You want the skyborn hunt called off?”
Hunt. That word sent chills down my spine, but it was so accurate.
Logan groaned and put a protective hand on my lower back. “Yes, but…”
Crunching rocks sounded behind us, and I spun around to see Sophie in her coyote form, and Danny walking towards us with wide eyes.
“What in the hell was that?” Danny asked, waving his hand in the air and then grabbing his balls.
I flinched. “You felt it back at camp? Geeze, sorry.”
Sophie was smelling the ground as if looking for a magical perpetrator.
Danny was in his usual rockabilly getup, slicked black quaff and well-manicured nails. Not a cuticle in sight. I decided then that his skin was much nicer than mine. Not a dry patch or large pore to be seen.
“Sorcerer! Just the man I needed to see.” Isaac opened his arms wide and Danny looked at me with a raised eyebrow.
“Is anyone going to explain why I might not be able to have children now?” Danny pinned me with a glare and then shifted to look at the good druid.
I snickered, but I let it go.
“Sloane needs a staff like mine in order to harness her magic properly, and learn to defeat the druids,” Isaac explained. “That means we need to find an old friend. An elf.”
Sophie’s coyote head jerked up at the word “elf.”
Danny’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed hard. “Excuse me, did you just say … elf?”
Isaac nodded at the sorcerer. “But I don’t know where he is. Can you help me?” Isaac must have assumed that as a full-blown sorcerer Danny was capable of finding this elf fellow.
Danny blew air through his lips. “If I knew what I was looking for maybe, but an elf? I’ve never even seen one, so I wouldn’t even know where to begin with making a spell to find one.”
“I’m sure Eva can help,” Logan piped in, and Isaac met my eyes. We both looked to the ground.
Danny frowned. “I haven’t seen her.”
“She’s probably still sleeping,” Logan said.
Isaac rolled out his neck, stretching, and then approached Logan. “Actually, son, Eva left right after you all went to sleep. There was something she felt she had to do. But she’ll be in touch.”
Logan’s head snapped back in shock. “She left? We were just attacked. Half the pack is injured and she left us?” I could hear the hurt in his voice.
“Ahem. I’m here.” Danny said from behind us.
Logan ignored Danny’s proclamation and glared at Isaac. “Where did she go?”
Isaac stared into Logan’s deep green eyes for an extended moment, seemingly sizing him up. “She went to search for the other skyborn. Said she owed it to you.”
Logan’s mouth popped open. “And you let her go! Alone?”
Isaac laughed deeply. “You think I can control that woman? She interrogated me about every scrap of information I knew about the remaining skyborn, and left. I’ve known Eva a long time. She’ll be fine.”
Logan’s chest rose and fell harshly, his fists balled. “And what exactly do you know about the remaining skyborn? Where are they?”
Isaac sighed. “All I know is that they are alive. I see them in my dreams and meditations. Like I saw Sloane. But I don’t know where they are. They’re in hiding.”
When Isaac said no more, Logan turned on his heels and stalked off back to our little mud hut campsite.
Oh crap, he was pissed.
‘Logan,’ I called after him, using the bond.
‘I want to be alone,’ he snapped back.
Great. Leave me here to figure out how to stalk an elf. Men.
Danny waved a hand. “Straight men can be so dramatic sometimes.”