C4 Chapter Four

Her skin was warm.

Cade snatched his hand back, swearing beneath his breath.

“What is it?” Riley asked, and when Cade turned to face him, he found Riley standing with his gun pointed at the casket, his gaze jumping back and forth between Gabrielle’s body and Cade.

“Her skin,” Cade said, “It’s…warm.”

“Warm?” Riley asked, his thumb stealing along the butt of his pistol and flicking the safety off as he turned to give the casket and what it contained his full attention.

Cade pushed the muzzle of the gun downward. “It’s okay,” he said, holding up his other hand in a calming gesture, “it just surprised me is all. I wasn’t expecting it.”

Riley still looked uneasy, but he deferred to Cade’s judgment.

Cade pulled his glove back on, realizing as he did so that he'd been spared the usual flood of psychic images generated whenever he touched someone. Another puzzle to solve apparently, but first things first. He reached into the casket, sliding his hands beneath his wife’s body, and lifted her carefully out. Her body was soft and pliant, like she had simply fallen asleep rather than been dead and buried for seven long years. Feelings Cade had never adequately dealt with came rushing back, threatening to overwhelm him.

Focus, man, focus.

Turning, he found that Riley had climbed out of the hole and was now waiting at the edge to accept his burden, so he passed Gabrielle up to him before climbing out himself. Riley placed Gabrielle gently in the grass a few feet away before returning to Cade's side. The two men then picked the shovels back up and got to work filling in the grave as quickly as they could, conscious that if they were discovered now it would be disastrous.

Filling in the hole took a lot less time than digging it had and it wasn’t long before they were winding their way back between the headstones; Riley carrying the tools and leading the way while Cade followed behind with Gabrielle’s body slung over one shoulder in a fireman’s carry. When they reached the stone wall that marked the burial ground’s perimeter, Riley tossed the tools one at a time over the top. The ’clank’ they made as they landed in the gravel on the other side seemed unnaturally loud in the night’s stillness. They waited a moment to see if anything came of it and when nothing did, Riley boosted himself up onto the wall and then disappeared over the other side.

It was about a ten-minute walk back to where they’d left the Jeep, which meant Cade had some time alone with Gabrielle before Riley returned. He sat with her in his arms, his back against the wall, and talked to her. Told her how much he loved her. How much he missed her. How sorry he was that he hadn’t searched for her and of how he would do anything to release her from whatever strange sorcery held her in its grip. His tears flowed freely.

A few minutes later Riley was back, a blanket and coil of rope he’d taken from the back of Cade’s Jeep in hand.

Riley tossed the blanket over the wall to Cade, who used it to wrap up Gabrielle’s body. While Riley held onto one end of the rope, Cade wound the other end around the blanket-wrapped form, tied it securely off, and then climbed up astride the wall where he guided the bundle up the side of the wall as Riley hauled on the rope from the other side. Once the body reached the top, Cade lifted it over the edge and then passed it down to Riley, who was waiting below.

Riley picked up the tools and then led the way through the woods as Cade followed behind him carrying Gabrielle. It didn’t take them long and both men breathed a sigh of relief once Gabrielle’s body was secured beneath a blanket on the rear seat.

The ride passed without incident. Arriving at home, Cade drove around behind the house to his workshop, a two-story barn that he had gutted and remodeled shortly after buying the property. He turned the Jeep around in the drive and backed it up close to the entrance. His neighbors were half-a-mile away on either side, far enough that the chances of being seen were slim in the middle of the day, never mind the dead of night, but Cade had learned to be cautious. The two men maneuvered Gabrielle’s body out of the back of the Jeep and carried it inside.

What had once been horse stables was now a large, open room with bookshelves lining the walls and several work tables arranged in a semi-circle facing toward the door. A wood-burning stove stood in the far corner, its thick black pipe running up through the floor of the second story high above.

Cade caught Riley’s glance at the throw rug in the center of the room between the tables, where a large mirror had been hidden only a few weeks before.

“Don’t worry, it’s gone.” Cade said.

The mirror had served its purpose, allowing Cade regular travel into the Beyond while he searched for his wife’s shade, but it had almost killed him, too. If it hadn’t been for Riley’s timely arrival on that night less than a month before, he would have died from hunger and thirst, the prolonged travel in and out of the Beyond having depleted his body’s resources without him being aware of it. Riley had called in the cavalry, rushing him by helicopter to the nearby Ravensgate Commandery and into the care of the best physicians the Order had on call.

Cade still wasn’t exactly clear about who or what had miraculously cured him while in the hospital, but there was no doubt that it had been a supernatural event. He had vague memories of a hooded figure standing over his bedside but that was all. At the time he’d suspected Lieutenant Duncan of using his own unusual powers to heal him, but the younger soldier swore adamantly that he had nothing to do with it when confronted later about the issue.

They carried Gabrielle’s body over to the couch and laid her down gently.

“You want me to get a few of our mystics over here?” Riley asked, reaching for the cell phone on his belt.

Cade shook his head. “I’d rather keep the Order out of this for as long as I can.”

“But I thought you were going to have the place warded?”

“I am. I’m just not going to use the Order’s mystics to do it.”

Riley thought about that one for a moment, then said, “Okay. I suspect this is one of those things that I don’t really want to know, right?”

Cade lifted his hands in a “What can I say?” gesture.

Over the years Cade had cultivated various contacts outside the approved ranks of those the Order considered allies and he used them whenever necessary, despite the fact that doing so was against the Rule. Riley was aware of the practice and even condoned it in certain situations, but he preferred to remain ignorant of the details unless it was absolutely necessary that he be brought into the loop.

“That’s fine with me. Just get those wards up as soon as possible.”

“I will. You can trust me on that.”

Riley grunted, glanced once more at Gabrielle, and then moved toward the door.

“Matt?”

Riley turned and faced him.

“Thanks. I owe you one.”

The other man smiled at last. “You owe me so many I’ve lost count. But you’re welcome anyway.”

About an hour after Riley left there was a soft knock on the workshop door. When Cade opened it, a dark-haired woman slipped inside and moved to the center of the room.

“Thanks for coming so quickly, Denise,” Cade said as she marched past him without even a hello. She was a fit woman in her late twenties, dressed simply in jeans, a pullover sweatshirt, and hiking boots. Her brown hair was pulled back with a rubber band, but Cade could still see a streak of green and blue here and there. A green Army surplus satchel hung from a strap over her shoulder.

She waved away his thanks, her gaze moving about the room, searching. When she didn’t find what she was looking for, she turned to face him.

“Where is she?”

Trying to keep the grin of amusement at her single-minded focus off his face, Cade inclined his head toward the stairs. “Spare bedroom, last door on the left.”

Denise Clearwater was a witch. A hedge witch, to be exact. Able to use the power inherent in Nature to bend reality to her will. Nothing drastic, just a nudge here and there, when time and circumstances demanded it. He’d met her several years before when Echo was forced to deal with a nest of minor demons that tried to lay claim to Long Island. Operating on the age-old principle that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, Cade had agreed to an alliance with Clearwater and her coven. With the two groups working in conjunction with each other, they were able to isolate and ultimately banish the infernal creatures back to their realm. Clearwater had set the wards that would keep the portal from opening again for another thousand years and it was her obvious mastery of that talent that had brought her to mind when he found himself in his present circumstances.

Without knowing exactly what the Adversary had done to Gabrielle, Cade didn’t dare have her body in his home without some kind of protection around it. A set of wards seemed to be just what the situation called for.

Designed to guard a specific location or object, wards were one of the mainstays of modern magick. They came in two types; minor and major. Minor wards were just what the name inferred; minor magicks that could be used to protect an object or a location for the short term. These could be performed by a single individual with limited preparation, often on the fly. Major wards were another story entirely, intended to last indefinitely and requiring several days of preparation by a sorcerer with considerable power, using several acolytes to assist. They were not undertaken lightly and the slightest mistake could have disastrous consequences. Major wards that failed outright often ended in the deaths of all involved in the casting.

Not only could wards be used to keep people away from a particular location, they could also be used to keep someone or something confined. In this case, Cade hoped to use the wards to shield Gabrielle’s body from outside interference while at the same time providing him some protection should the Adversary have left any unexpected surprises.

Cade followed Clearwater up the stairs but remained in the doorway so he’d be out of her way. He watched as she wandered slowly around the twin bed, observing Gabrielle’s body from every angle. Apparently satisfied with what she saw, she reached out and tried to lay her palm on Gabrielle’s forehead.

Much to Cade’s surprise, she was unable to do so.

She tried again, with the same result. Each time her hand would stop a few inches above Gabrielle’s flesh and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get it any closer.

She stepped back, clearly puzzled. Cade was, too. Neither he nor Riley had any problem moving Gabrielle from the cemetery.

“Is there…?”

She held up a hand, stopping him in mid-sentence. Digging into the satchel at her side, she rooted around in its depths until she drew out a long-handled mirror. She made a few odd-looking gestures over it with her free hand and then exhaled heavily on its surface, fogging the glass. Before it could clear, she held the mirror over Gabrielle and stared into its depths.

A grimace crossed her face.

Cade opened his mouth, intending to ask what she was doing, but the intense expression on her face made him change his mind. Instead, he waited patiently for her to finish.

After a second, longer look in the mirror she put it down and turned to face him.

“Your wife isn’t dead,” she said.