Bran grunted in approval and quit attempting to get past Kierra, saying, “Maybe you’re not that much of a softie after all.”
“I’m not a softie as a male or female,” Kierra replied with a dramatic eye roll. “Now, enough with the fucking games. We need information and we need it now. If you need me to reiterate the fact of your kind not tolerating pain very well, I gladly will. So, once I remove this claw, I advise you to start talking. Otherwise I’ll stick it somewhere else.” Retracting the claw and using a tone that conveyed the fact he would be more than happy to do just that, Kierra asked, “What the fuck is it you do know?”
Panting and sinking as low as the chains would allow, Law couldn’t get a single word to form at first. But when he saw that same claw getting ready to advance towards his eye, words began spilling from his mouth on their own accord just as the tip touched his retina. “It was an elder witch from the Sekhmet House who came to a group of us out of the blue one night and bet us we couldn’t set up a group of monitors that would catch everything going on here at this castle, the orphanage, and a few other factions, even one that we didn’t know existed. We didn’t even know about the orphanage until then either. She wagered us we wouldn’t be able to set up tiny bugs to catch all the activities, comings and goings, and whatnot and set it to feedback to a whole other realm.”
“And you fucking idiots went along with it?” Bran asked with an expression that showed how stupid he truly thought that was.
“You don’t get it. It wasn’t just the challenge, but a chance to show the older mages we could do it, a chance to prove ourselves. No, we didn’t even realize the extent of it. I mean, come on, we’ll go down in the books for this one.”
“Oh, you’re going down all right,” Kierra muttered, then asked in a louder, irritated tone, “Where exactly is the feedback going to?”
Visibly shaking himself, Law answered, “Don’t know.” When Kierra’s steel claw began entering his retina, he retracted that answer. “Not exactly! The earth realm, an abandoned building in some place called Detroit. Some place that would go unnoticed by human eyes. I wasn’t with that set-up team. Each camera is connected to that mage, and to the monitor that goes with it, but we all didn’t have to be with the monitors to set them up once that connection was made.”
“And what witch? The elders of that line are dead.” Bran seethed through his fangs.
“One isn’t. Everyone thinks she’s dead.” That statement ended on a silent scream when Kierra jammed that claw farther into his eye upon hearing the truth in those words; and their implication, just as Bran heard a set of familiar footsteps echoing off the stalagmite walls headed right towards them.
Things went downhill for the tech real quick when Bran shouted, “Kierra, get out of here.” Because when Kierra went to pull the claw out of the mage’s eyeball, not only did the whole thing come out with it, but the claw stuck in the mage’s eye socket that much deeper first. And in his skull.
And as serendipity would have it, when Kierra flashed into their living quarters Anya was standing right there to see him looking guilty as fuck in his still fully male, demonic, gory glory with an eyeball dropping to the floor, just as Tialanna walked in on Bran standing before a very dead techno mage with only one eye left and something oozing from his groin like he was pissing blood.
Then, even though the twins were in two entirely different areas of the castle, looking at two entirely different scenes, they simultaneously said to their mates, “What the fuck did you just do?”
18
It’s Getting Hot In Here
Turned out the torture session Bran and Kierra had was more than pretty much unnecessary, besides taking the heat from Anya having to say anything about her vision, but quite possibly also taking away their element of surprise. Whenever one of the techs involved came to an untimely death, the monitor connected to them on the other side exploded. Maybe Tia would get lucky and their enemy would be none the wiser, would think something else might have happened to the mage, but that was highly unlikely. Because if it was indeed who they thought it was, the bitch was evil, not stupid.
While their mates were busy using brute strength, brawn, and scare tactics, Tia and Anya, along with Ellysia, were using the muscle on the inside of their skulls instead. It was a highly known fact that techno mages were not the bravest faction around, but they also weren’t the dumbest. And given how young the tech they had within their confines had been, they were also more than sure the Elders of that race had no idea what was going on. So after making sure their niece would be fine, the three sisters went to pay the Elder techs a little visit.
Not only were they right, but they learned a lot more information than Bran and Kierra had. As Tia, Ellysia, and Anya had predicted, when they went to inform the Elder techs of what their younger ones had been up to, the Elders were completely clueless. One thing techno mages did not do was get involved in any type of affair that would get them caught up in the crosshairs of any
