Page 16 of A Vampire in a Pear Tree
“Wait, I thought you wanted me to find Desislav?”I asked, shaking my head when the waitress asked if I wanted anything else.I avoided looking at the half-empty plates that she removed from before me, regretting the loss of a good meal, but knowing it would all turn to the proverbial ashes in my mouth.
His lips tightened.“I do, although I want to know the location of the blood moon more.Without it, I am vulnerable to being sent back to my imprisonment in the Hour.I have spent almost two thousand years there.I don’t wish to return.It would also allow me to break the curse on my brothers and me, although I doubt it would help existing Dark Ones.Still, it’s another reason to ensure no one else gets the relic.”
“Oh, goddess,” I said, clutching my head for a moment in order to hide the shame at my actions.“What have I done?Owain, I’m sorry, but I ...goddess, I’ve screwed everything up, but I was trying to do my job.My cousin Savian told me how important it is to not fail clients, and how the Committee takes a stand about thief takers who don’t honor contracts, but this isn’t right.You’re a nice guy.I mean, I’ve only known you for what, half an hour?But I can tell you’re nice.You take care of a bitchy bird who tried to kill you, and you brought me here where I’m safe, and what did I do to repay that kindness?”
He stilled at my words, a frozen look on his face.“Why are you consumed with guilt?What have you done?”
“I texted your mom we were having lunch,” I admitted, so miserable I wanted to cry.“I didn’t realize—I didn’t know you had suffered so much.She said it was important I find you as quickly as possible, so I assumed that meant you were at risk.But you’re not, are you?”
He was on his feet even before I finished my sorrowful admission.“I am if she gets her way.When did you tell her?When you went to the toilet?”
I nodded.
He closed his eyes for a few seconds before he marched toward the front of the restaurant.I followed, desperate to do something to make up for my actions.He paused long enough to pay for my meal before asking the server, “Is there a back way out?”
The woman, who I realized with a start was a blue dragon, tipped her head to the side as she studied first Owain, then me.“Yes,” she said finally, nodding toward the back area containing the bathrooms.“Through the garden.”
Owain turned toward me, and I braced myself for the tongue-lashing I deserved, but before he had taken a step toward me, what I can only describe as a whirlwind made up of ravens swirled outside the door, the noise of their wings as they flew in a tight vertical cone formation filling the air.
“The Morrigna!”Owain grabbed my arm, and without a hesitation, we were moving through the restaurant, deftly avoiding both those dining and the handful of servers.
“What is—” I started to ask.
“Another name for an entity consisting of my mother and two of her sisters,” he said in a near snarl, hurrying through the restaurant before jerking open a door that led to a small garden space, now filled with round wooden tables and chairs.At the back, a wrought iron gate led out to an alley.
“Oh, shit.She’s here already?I’m sorry, Owain, I truly am.I feel sick about this.I’ll talk to her, OK?I’ll tell her that you’re fine, and not in any danger—”
“She doesn’t give a damn about that,” he said, pushing me through the gate to the alley.“All she wants from me is her boon.This way.”
He didn’t bother asking; he took my hand and hauled me away from the garden.
“What boon?You have a boon?”I stumbled as I glanced back, and saw with horror the swarm of ravens round the corner of the building, heading straight for us.“Ack!The birds are following us!Maybe I should talk to them?”
“Under no circumstances are you to do that,” he said, and once again took me by surprise as he spun around, releasing my hand, and positioning himself in front of me.
The raven tornado sped forward, caws scraping across the sky as it headed for us, the noise resolving itself into the same words, repeated in a chant.“The Morrigna, the Morrigna, the Morrigna comes.”
“What are you doing?”I asked, trying to move around Owain, but he more or less shoved me behind him.
“Protecting you from them.Stay back.Do not talk to them.Do not listen to them.And above all, do not agree to anything they ask of you.”
“The Morrigna.The Morrigna.The Morrigna comes!”chanted the birds.
Once again, I was swamped with guilt that I had put him in this position, but I stuffed that emotion down even as I was reaching blindly in my purse for my pepper spray.“Are those birds your mom?”
“It is the herald of the Morrigna.There.They have arrived.”
“The Morrigna comes!”the ravens cawed.
They stopped a few yards away from us, just as the figures of two women appeared at the far end of the alley.The women started toward us, then paused for a moment.One of the two was Jerry, while the other was a dark-haired woman in a long black coat that moved gently around her, as if she were standing in a perpetual breeze.
Jerry stared to the side and made an abrupt gesture, obviously talking to someone else.The dark-haired woman put her hands on her hips as she, too, appeared to argue with someone out of our view.
“Should we run?”I asked Owain in a whisper.
“No,” he said on a long, extremely martyred sigh.“I will have it out with her.Again.Stay back, out of the way in case she tries to bespell me again and decides you are collateral.”
“Your mother put a spell on you?”I asked, horrified.“To do what?”
