Bound by Blood (Bound by Desire #3)

Chapter 2: No Rest for the Wicked

"How many of them are like that? Pregnant I mean, besides Rosalia and Leila? Are they the only ones or are there more that we didn't know about?" I looked between Kali and the screens that showed me perfectly where all our hostages were. Including my newest addition, the witch Asica who I'd managed to save from when she'd attempted the kamikaze phoenix destruction spell years ago after trying and failing to save Rosalia. It was her we managed to torture the exact location of the lakehouse out of, meaning we were able to complete the plan I'd set out. "How many of those around the four are also like that, thus being in a compromising situation?"

Kali frowns, sitting up properly and pulling the front section of her hair back, securing it with an iron clasp that blended in seamlessly with her dark brown hair. "Why what diabolical plan do you have up your sleeve now sister?" She gives me one of her searching looks but I'd long since made myself immune to that kind of persuasion. Something she saw when I refused to respond to her. Sighing and rolling her eyes she closes them for a second before she starts talking. "The Lilias witches also seem to be expecting soon - around the same time as the other two I think - a girl if I'm right. Oh, and also the Damaris vampires, again a girl. I think other than that.....no sorry one more. The Cassidy wolves as well seem to be expecting a child - no sorry triplets - but theirs I can tell the genders of despite them all being around the same maternity time. Perhaps because they're using a spell to hide it since I can't think it's because they don't know what with how far along the she-wolf is." She opens her eyes again and looks at me with a puzzled expression, "Why? What were you planning?"

I pondered over the news Kali had delivered me for a few seconds, trying to put names to faces. The Lilias witches a new addition to Eris Murdock and Rosalia's covens when their own had been decimated by probably us not long before the second round of this game including the four began. So both were close friends of the four, just as I know the Damaris vampires had been close allies with the Ladouceur two long before they found their other halves. And I was well informed from the first time Angel was able to pick through Ash's memories that the Cassidy wolves were also important to Rosalia since one had been her boyfriend for a time and the other was her former best friend, both being close to her and the others since they were wolves and wolves tended to band together in packs. Good for them in terms of safety in numbers.....well until they're found.

"Any other names you feel like springing for me, Kals?" I ask her, calling her by a nickname I hadn't used in decades but that still made her smile. "Like for example the name of the other halves of the two children my accursed slut of a half-sister and that Briar girl are carrying? Names? Packs? Families, I can haunt, hunt and destroy?" I give her a shrug and she returns it with a calculating look that speaks of years of cruelty and stored up abuse. "Anything at all that could be of use?"

"No nothing," Kali responds, closing her eyes for a second time that day to try and figure out what I needed her to find. Eyes moving side to side under closed lids I can see her hunting methodically for a few minutes to try and see the connections between people who were already bound so tightly into the fabric of this game - their partners too who would be Bound and Mated to them - that their parents wouldn't be able to delude themselves into thinking they had a chance to keep them out of is. "Wait," Kali speaks up from where her eyes were still closed but I can see a cruel grin tipping up the sides of her mouth in a wicked smile. "I'm seeing three sets of names." She frowns a little more to see if they get clearer but I'm just impatient to know who I can go kill. Or maim and torture if that's what it calls for.

"Which are?"

My ire seemed to have reached its limit for control given how I snap at Kali when she's too slow to answer my questions. She rolls her eyes and shrugs, eyes still moving rapidly quickly to see if she could locate the deeper meaning behind the three elusive names she seemed to have found but aren't able to tell me. Staring at her she flips me off and I huff an agitated sigh, dropping theatrically back onto the chair I'd vacated only seconds before when I'd stood to see if she could tell me anything of use. Something she does a second later, her eyes opening in a flash to reveal her unusual silver eyes that are alight with cruelty.