The Questing Beast (Veil Knights Book 4) Read online

  The Questing Beast

  Rowan Casey

  Contents

  Series Summary

  Veil Knights Newsletter

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Veil Knights Newsletter

  The Veil Knights Series

  About the Author

  Copyright Information

  In book one of the Veil Knights series, THE CIRCLE GATHERS, stage magician and sorcerer extraordinaire Dante Grimm brings ten strangers together, informing them that they are the living avatars of the original Veil Knights, brave men and women reincarnated many times through the millennia, most recently as the Knights of the Round Table, who pledged their lives to protect mankind from supernatural threats and enemies.

  In the distant past, the Veil Knights had combined the power of several arcane talismans into the Caeg Dimmre, the Key of Wickedness, which was used to construct a mystical barrier between our world and the Demimonde, preventing the supernatural races that inhabited the realms on the other side from continuing to ravage our humanity. The talismans were then split apart and hidden away in the far corners of the earth, there to remain until the time should come when they might be needed once more.

  That time is now.

  The Veil is falling, weakened by age and the machinations of those on the other side. Grimm knows that unless the pieces of the Caeg Dimmre are brought together again, the Veil will fail entirely, releasing the darkness that it has kept locked away for so long.

  In desperation, Grimm convinces the knights to assume their mantles once more, to undertake the quests necessary to bring the pieces of the Key back together so that they can be used to strengthen and reinforce the Veil.

  These are their stories.

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  Chapter One

  The little diner in Whitehorse had seemed safe enough, but Dani Pellin had learned the hard way in her twenty-plus years on God’s green earth with her twin brother that anywhere Perce went, trouble followed like dew with the dawn. Sometimes she suspected he had a hidden power, one not even the Merlin knew about; Perce Pellin could make anybody wanna hit him.

  Dani had gotten up to use the ladies room, leaving Perce alone for all of five minutes. When she’d left, he’d been drinking coffee and ploughing through a plate of hashbrowns and overcooked eggs. When she returned, a fight was about to break out.

  Three large men, all with ten years, fifty pounds, and abundance of facial hair on her brother, were arrayed around Perce. Her twin was on his feet just outside the booth he had been sitting at, saying something about how one of them needed to repeat what he just said for the whole room.

  Shadows had gathered around all three men, their desire for violence an almost tangible cloudy black aura closing in around their bodies. The storm gathering before the downpour. Only this storm was men with ill intent and the downpour would probably be blood. Dani yanked her hair into a ponytail before striding forward. She drew her hunting knife as she navigated around the counter and the free-standing tables between her and the angry men.

  She chose the brute with the darkest clot of shadows, his aura a clear indication that he was ready to strike first. Dani stepped up close to him, sliding her knife right against his jeans over the family jewels. A tall, blonde woman silently and quickly taking him hostage certainly got his attention. The man looked down and then met her eyes, his mouth half-opened like a landed cutthroat trout.

  “We’re all just here for breakfast, not trouble,” Dani suggested in her silkiest voice. She pressed the knife tip a smidge tighter against the man’s zipper.

  “Dani,” Perce started to say but she shot him a glance and he, in a moment of uncommon intelligence, shut the hell up.

  “Rich? You okay?” One of the other men, his shadowy aura fading as he grew uncertain, asked the man Dani was currently pressed up against.

  “Fine, Gary. Your man and my brothers were just having some words,” Rich said.

  “My brother,” Dani said, placing emphasis on “brother” as she did, “is about as good with words as a bag of wet mice.”

  “That doesn’t even make sense,” said the third man. Dani risked taking her eyes off of Rich to make sure the third brother wasn’t intending violence. His aura was still full of darkness, but not at immediate danger levels yet.

  “Neither does Perce,” Dani said.

  “Wait a darn minute,” Perce said. “These fellows gonna get what they deserve. I don’t need your help.”

  “No brawling, says so on the sign.” The waitress, a black woman in her mid-fifties, said, venturing out from behind the counter.

  Out of the corner of her eye Dani caught the baseball bat the woman held too casually at her side. The brothers, Rich, Gary and whatever the third one’s name was, clearly saw it, too. Their dark auras faded rapidly and they backed up.

  “No trouble here. We were just leaving. Got a long trip ahead,” Gary said, holding up his hands in a surrendering gesture.

  Rich backed up as much as he could, and Dani quickly closed and sheathed her knife. She was pretty sure knives were legal up here in the Yukon, given that all the men around her were carrying hunting blades of one type or another , but there was no sense in calling unnecessary attention to it.

  “Yeah, get going with you,” Perce said as the men left. One glanced back as though he really wanted to start something and his aura turned cloudy grey for a moment.

  “Perce,” Dani warned.

  “You didn’t hear what that butthole said about you.”

  “Nope. Don’t care.” Dani shook her head at her brother. He meant well, but goddamn could he find a fight like a hound could find a skunk. “Sorry about that, ma’am,” she added to the waitress.

  “You just sit down and finish your breakfast. It’s all right,” the woman said with a weary smile. “That big hunt going down up north is bringing all kinds out.”

  Dani wasn’t sure if she and her twin were included in that “all kinds” statement but she wasn’t about to ask. She slid into the booth across from Perce, who had already gone back to eating. She watched his boyish face and wished, not remotely for the first time, that she could go through life so simply. Nothing stuck to Perce. Food, fighting, flirting with every female that crossed his path. The three foundations of being Perce Pellin.

  As their mama, God rest her soul, had always said, “No brains, no headaches.”

  All the headaches were Dani’s. She touched the pentagram medallion that she kept hidden beneath her clothing on a chain around her neck. It was her own little rebellion against their mother’s strident version of God. A symbol of protection. A symbol of hope for Dani that someday things could change.

  The waitress came over with a coffee refill in hand instead of her bat. Perce gave her a million watt smile as she poured him a fresh mug.

  “What’s that hunt you mentioned?” Dani asked. Grimm had sent them to the Yukon to find a missing piece of the Caeg Dimmre, but other than a rough area and that they were looking for something that might or might not look like a broken knife blade, Dani had no idea where to start.

  “Up near Dawson,” the waitress said. “Tiny old mining town up that way name of Benderlake. Had a c
ouple hikers get ripped apart by some kind of beast. Rabid bear or something, though nobody has seen it.” She shrugged and pushed a damp curl back behind her ear.

  “That sounds pretty strange,” Perce said, perking up. “Strange is what we looking for, right, Dani?”

  The waitress shot him a look and Dani laughed to cover up her brother’s poor choice of words. “Drink up,” she told him. “Thank you,” she said to the waitress, putting on her stern but polite face to make it clear the woman could give her curious looks all day, but they were done here.

  “I’ll get your check ready, no rush,” the waitress said with another glance at Perce. She was experienced enough, Dani guessed, to take hints.

  Perce was looking at her like a kicked puppy as he shoveled more egg into his mouth. His thoughts must have finally come around to the fact that he’d nearly caused a fight and now had almost talked about their mission in public, something she’d made him swear up and down on tree and stone and his stuffed tiger, Fry, that he wouldn’t ever do.

  Dani sighed and leaned forward. She spoke in her quietest voice, knowing that Perce’s preternaturally good senses, his “power” as Grimm had put it, would pick up her words.

  “Yes,” she said. “We’re going to head up that way as soon as I figure out how. I’m going to go talk to the waitress more, so please, no fights.”

  “Linda,” Perce said around a mouthful of egg.

  “What?”

  He jerked his head in an not-so-subtle manner toward the counter where their waitress was serving two more lumberjack-looking men plates of greasy food. “Her name is Linda. She’s got three kids, all grown. All went to college. One teaches now in Tokyo.”

  Dani grinned. She didn’t know if he’d managed to get that out of Linda while she was in the bathroom or if he was repeating things he’d overheard with those annoyingly sensitive ears of his, but it was the little things that made her glad he was her brother. He might be dimmer than a box of unplugged Christmas lights, but he had heart and kindness.

  She stood up. They had a mission, and somehow, God willing, she was going to figure it out, find the blade, and keep Perce in one piece. At least they were heading back into the woods, into wilderness not entirely unlike the Rocky Mountains they’d grown up in. They were both better with woods than people, that was a fact. L.A. had been more nightmare than adventure. She’d longed forever to see big cities and now that she had, she was desperate for fresh air and filled with the need to get away from people. She hadn’t realized just how many of them spent their days thinking about doing awful things to each other and now that she’d experienced it, her whole psyche felt clouded over with shadows and fear.

  Dani fished out her wallet from her backpack and went to find Linda. Soon, it would be time to hunt.

  Four Days Earlier

  Adrenaline was still high in Perce’s blood, his fingertips tingling and his heart pounding in his ears. Grimm had summoned a demon-like creature and they’d all fought it. He could still smell the sulfurous ichor, feel the way the halberd he’d snagged off the wall jerked as it slid into the creature’s body. That Jessie woman was a little sharp for his tastes, in more ways than one, but she’d handled that thing with raw fighting power that Perce had to admire.

  Heck, they’d all done pretty well under pressure, in his estimation.

  The explanations and introductions were over, but Grimm still wanted to talk to him before they did the ritual thing. Alone.

  That worried Perce but he shoved that worry down deep beneath the rush of blood in his veins. Alone was better than with that woman, the movie star lady. He didn’t know why exactly, but he’d faced enough predators in his life to know when they were present. She might be on their side, but he was pretty sure LaVey was the kind of woman who ate pawns like him alive and spit them out. Dani hadn’t seemed to feel strongly about her, but it had been hard to tell from her body language after the multiple shocks of that night.

  Grimm’s man, Hautdesert, had guided Perce and his twin sister out of the round room and to an office that Perce guessed was Grimm’s. Dani hadn’t wanted to leave Perce there alone at that point, but Hautdesert insisted that Grimm needed to speak with Perce alone.

  “I’ll be just outside,” Dani said, her voice carrying command in it as she looked at Hautdesert.

  “Of course, Ms. Pellin.” Grimm’s man had the air of someone who was used to dealing with all manner of humans, and given what Perce had seen of L.A. in his few days here, that didn’t surprise him a bit.

  Perce was left alone. The office was a good size, bigger than either of the small bedrooms he’d had growing up. A large marble desk was against one wall with glass-doored bookcases opposite it. Perce glanced around, but the doors were closed now, the windows draped and shut. He smelled wood, his own sweat, a lingering trace of sulfur, and some kind of sweet oil he would bet was coating the wood bits of the dark leather chairs in the middle of the room.

  Nobody around to see him, so he moseyed over to the books. Heck of a collection, old tomes in languages Perce could only dream about learning in an alternate world where he was allowed to do so.

  “You like my books?”

  Perce flinched. He hadn’t heard Grimm come in. Darn magicians.

  “Sure,” he said, making himself relax as he turned in what he hoped was a casual manner. “They look like they’d be good for starting a toasty fire. Though guess you don’t need fires so much in a hot place like California.”

  Grimm’s eyes glinted with something like amusement instead of the anger Perce expected. Perce kept his own expression bland, though he knew his casual implication that books were only good for burning must be needling a man like this. Them was fighting words, as his mother would have said, God rest her soul.

  “You can drop the mask,” Grimm said.

  The words fell into his mind like a boulder rolled off a cliff into a deep pool and sank all the way to his stomach, resting there with crushing weight. Perce was of a height with the magician and thicker built, but he felt much more like a doe sighted down by a wolf in that moment. He fought to keep his thoughts quiet, picturing the lake near the cabin he’d grown up in. Wind in the trees. The water rippling. Quiet. Placid.

  He reached up and felt his face. “I ain’t wearing a mask,” he said. “Am I?”

  “Aren’t you?” Grimm asked, his voice very soft now. “She can’t hear you, if that’s what worries you.”

  Perce knew that “she” was his sister, and that was only part of what worried him. Nobody knew his secret. Nobody could. It was the only way to stay safe, to keep Dani safe.

  But somehow Grimm saw through him. Looking into the other man’s face, Perce was sure of it. Continuing the act wouldn’t help him or Dani now. He had to know more about this man, about what he knew. And he had to get him to promise to never, ever reveal it.

  So he did something he hadn’t done in twenty years. Perce straightened up and let the mask fall. He narrowed his green eyes and faced down Grimm.

  “A whole lot more worries me now,” Perce said softly, echoing Grimm’s deceptively gentle tone.

  “The world is at stake,” Grimm said with a shrug of his shoulders. He ran a hand through his black hair, with its streak of crimson like fresh blood. “I don’t know why you play the fool, and that worries me.”

  Perce turned half away from him and sought out one of the four chairs. He sank into the leather, trying to buy himself time to think. Not something he normally had to worry about, he thought with a wry grin.

  Grimm moved more quietly than most men, his clothing hardly rustling as he took a seat opposite Perce and steepled his long fingers, waiting.

  “Dani asked you what your name was,” Perce began. Grimm nodded. “But see, she did that for me, for the others maybe, too. Because I’d bet my last dollar she already knew. That creature, that was new to us. But having abilities, well, we’ve known nearly our whole lives. Mother was a bit on the side of angels, touched in the brain if you will
. She was convinced we were doomed because of how our father died. That’s why she raised us in those woods, away from everything, from anyone.”

  “She taught you the legends?” Grimm asked, but his tone was only half-questioning in a way that made Perce continue to wonder how much the magician already knew.

  “She taught us prophesy, as she’d call it. A mixture I guess of legend and the Bible, but she often talked about King Arthur like he was real, like all those things really happened. One day, when I was maybe seven or eight, I don’t know exactly, I was playing by the lake, skipping stones. That’s when the green lady came to me, swirling out of the mist.”

  “The Lady of the Lake?” Grimm sat back. Clearly this part had been a mystery to him or else he was even better at playing dumb than Perce was.

  “Maybe. She didn’t give her name, but I know the smell of power; the way it dances on the skin and rubs along all the small hairs until you feel like a storm’s gonna break. She warned me that if Dani and I were ever separated, Dani would die. I tried to argue with her, but it gets confusing after that. Next thing I knew, I was lying in a bed with the priest keeping vigil and Dani telling me I’d been in a coma for three days after falling in the lake. That’s how I got the idea. She’d been taking care of me that whole time, and I thought if I kept needing to be taken care of, she’d stay.”

  “So you pretend to be too stupid to live.” Grimm shook his head.

  “How did you see through it? Nobody ever has.” Perce leaned forward. He had to know the cracks, what had given him away. This whole Arthurian knights reincarnated factor was upping the stakes. If their mother had been right, Dani was likely in more danger now than ever. If she found out how badly he’d been fooling her all these years, well… Perce couldn’t contemplate how deep that betrayal would be for her. All the fights she’d had to put a stop to. All the help she’d had to give him to pass their homeschooling. Every late night and early morning she’d spent making sure he didn’t burn down the house or drive off and pick a fatal row with the drunk townies on weekends.