Warmongers and Wands Read online

  Warmongers and Wands

  Debra Dunbar

  Copyright © 2019 by Debra Dunbar

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  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

  Chapter 16

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Debra Dunbar

  Chapter 1

  Hadur

  Smoke curled from my bovine nostrils and I stomped the ground in a fit of anger that was far beneath the dignity of my usual behavior—the stomping part, that is. The anger part…well, for a demon of war, I liked to think I was relatively even tempered, but being summoned would annoy even the most stoic of hell’s minions.

  Actually, my irritation was fifty percent genuine and fifty percent theatrics. It wouldn’t do to appear too eager to serve, too hopeful that the witch who brought me here might be interested in a long-term, mutually beneficial partnership, too hopeful that maybe I’d somehow find a witch to bond with. The chances of that happening were pretty much slim to none, though. Summoning had grown increasingly rare the last few centuries. Partnerships, an agreement with a witch that lasted beyond the one-off task, even rarer.

  And bonding? It was a fantasy that most demons had realized would never happen.

  It wasn’t like I’d never been summoned before. As a war demon, I’d occasionally been summoned and sent to facilitate the demise of an enemy army, or stir up strife in a neighboring country, although I hadn’t been brought out of hell by a witch in over three hundred years.

  But this witch…

  She had auburn hair and a sweet face. I could see the energy like an aura about her, see it coiling around her arms. Where was her coven? The fact that she’d summoned me alone gave me hope that finally a witch had chosen me to extend an offer of partnership. To bond with a witch would amplify my powers as well as hers. To bond with this witch…well, I had some pretty lurid ideas of what else that relationship might entail.

  I was a demon, after all.

  “What is your name?” she called out, her voice husky with an edge to it that made me instantly shed my demon appearance in favor of something more human and hopefully more sexually appealing.

  “Hadur.” I took a step forward, coming up against the impenetrable ward. “What is yours, witch?”

  Her chin lifted and I saw she was young—a woman, but young. “Adelaide Perkins.”

  “Why have you summoned me, Adelaide Perkins? What task is it that you wish me to complete?”

  Normally I would have gone on and on a bit about how I was going to kill her and how dare she bring me from the depths of hell, blah, blah, blah, but this witch was comely and young, so for once I kept my communications unusually polite.

  She blinked, those wide brown eyes deceptively innocent. “I did not summon you. Who did so? Who brought you from hell and set you upon my town?”

  I frowned, not understanding what she was talking about. “You summoned me, witch. I came straight here from hell and am now your captive.”

  She took a step back, biting her lip. “I did not summon you. I was gathering herbs for spell and I…I felt a presence. But you are restrained in a circle and must answer me truthfully. Thus, I command that you tell me who summoned you and for what purpose?”

  I reached out to touch the wards that contained me, wincing at the painful and pleasurable sting of the energy. It felt the same as the spell that had summoned me here, the same as the energy coiling around this witch’s arms. Was she lying? If she was, why?

  “I have only just arrived, witch. No one has yet given me a purpose or come to me as the one who summoned me from hell. I arrived, and the only being here is you.” I tried to smile, tried to appear charming. Since I was a war demon, I’m pretty sure I failed on both those counts. “Release me from your circle. Tell me what task you want me to perform, and release me. I could do so much for you. Together we could be powerful. A witch like you…a witch like you could find more than power in my arms.”

  The witch stared at me for a moment, a faint blush on her cheeks. Then she turned to leave.

  “What is it you want me to do?” I shouted, feeling a bit panicked for the first time in my very long life. This was not the way these things usually went. I was fairly patient as demons go, but I felt very uneasy being trapped in a circle—even if that circle seemed unusually spacious.

  The witch hesitated, glancing at me over her shoulder. She muttered something that sounded like, “My mother will kill me.”

  “I want you to leave.” She said the words as if they were a spell. I felt the energy snap around my skin, then dissipate.

  “Then return me to hell,” I snarled, my interest in her fading. “Banish me. Send me back. At the very least let me out of this damned circle!”

  “I…I will be back.” She took another step away. “I cannot let you out, not until I know who summoned you and why. I need to research, to find out some information. Then I will be back.”

  She left.

  And two hundred years later, she still hadn’t returned.

  Chapter 2

  Bronwyn

  I clinched the last nail and surveyed my work. “Declan, I swear by all that’s holy, if you lose one more shoe this week, the next ones I’ll put on you will be cement. Then I’m dropping you into the pond.”

  The centaur chuckled, twisting his torso so he could look down at his hoof. “It’s been a wet summer. I’m always standing in water lately. Maybe you should enchant the nails to stay in better.”

  The problem wasn’t the nails; it was his crappy hoof-care routine. Hooves that were constantly in water were soft, and the nails wiggled loose, making the shoe come off and often taking a good chunk of foot along with it. The guy was lucky he had enough hoof wall for me to nail this to.

  “Maybe you should apply some Keratex to all four of these suckers every day like I told you to,” I scolded.

  He sniffed.

  “Declan, I mean it. Unless you want to transition to barefoot, that is.”

  A low vibrating sound came from his throat. In horses, it signaled a sort of wary uneasiness. In centaurs, it was the same as a human disgruntled scoffing noise. I knew why Declan didn’t want to go barefoot. All the city streets and sidewalks were tough on unshod hooves. And although he never wanted anyone to know, the centaur was woefully flat-footed, which meant gravel driveways and rocky trails were uncomfortable for him without shoes.

  I hid a smile and fitted the metal against his hoof, noting adjustments I’d need to make. Hooves expanded, contracted, and changed shape just like feet did. The difference was our shoes went around our feet with adjustments via laces. These were nailed onto his hoof and needed to fit perfectly as well as accommodate any growth in the hoof wall until his next appointment in four to six weeks.

  Putting the metal to heat in my forge, I picked up a set of leather pads and threw them into the tub of water to soak. I’d never dreamed my farrier duties would end up being over half my career. As a kid, I’d always loved working with metal—bending and shaping it, enchanting it to hold a spell. Welding,
casting, soldering…that’s what I’d envisioned when I’d thought about my life’s work. But we had a lot of town residents that had hooves. Besides the centaurs, there were a few Pegasus, the unicorns, and even the satyrs. Yes, most of them could manage basic trims on their own, but everyone enjoyed a professional taking care of things—especially when it came to shoes.

  Human farriers came into town, but they’d promptly forget about the interesting creatures that were their clients the moment they crossed through the wards out of Accident. It made record keeping and scheduling problematic. And while we did have humans who permanently lived in Accident, none of them were trained in hoof care.

  As a teenager, I’d hung out with a few of the farriers when they were working and tried my hand at a few rudimentary shoes, filling in when there was an emergency and a client couldn’t manage to bring a farrier into our town. You wouldn’t think there would be that many hoof-emergencies, but let me tell you, these centaurs were especially prone to throwing a shoe, getting an abscess, and the occasional laminitis episode that require specialized supportive footwear. Or hoofwear. These centaurs…spring grass really was their Kryptonite when it came to their hooves. I could lecture all I wanted, but each spring I ended up with three or four clients complaining about heat and pain in their hooves. Bar shoes, reversed shoes, you name it. I’d become somewhat of an expert before I’d been able to legally drink a beer.

  By my sixteenth birthday, I’d started driving outside Accident to apprentice to a farrier, and at seventeen I was enrolled in formal training. I still attended the occasional seminars and conferences, although I had to be a bit cagy about the types of “horses” I shod and trimmed.

  Outside of my farrier duties, I welded pipes, manufactured stock gates, and did custom ironwork. And in my spare time, I made metal art—sculptures and wind chimes.

  Spare time. I had a lot of that because my social life was zilch. Less than zilch.

  “Saw the shoes you put on Corianna the other day,” Declan commented. His voice was carefully casual, which clued me in that he’d been more impressed by Corianna’s shoes than he wanted to let on.

  I hid a smile and grabbed the tongs to pull Declan’s shoe from the fire. “You want pink as well?” The female centaur had hot pink shoes that contrasted with her fancy, painted hooves—creamy white with little pink hearts on the front. I wasn’t exactly an artist when it came to painting, but I liked Corianna, and we’d had a sort of girlfriend night last week. She got a mani-pedi with special polish and pink shoes. I drank wine and got to hear all the gossip.

  No, I didn’t paint my nails. I don’t think I’d painted them since I was thirteen. When you work with metal every day, it seems kind of silly to have long, red nails.

  When you go home alone to an empty house every night, it seems kind of silly to have long red nails, too.

  “Not pink. And no little hearts. They look pretty on Corianna, but I want something manly. Stallion-like.”

  Of course. I admirably restrained myself from an epic eye roll. “So, what were you thinking of?”

  “Maybe red?” he asked hopefully.

  “Corianna’s shoes are aluminum, Declan. I need to hot-shoe you, so I can only do steel. But…” I paused for dramatic effect, noting that I had the centaur’s rapt attention. “If you can get your hoof walls in better shape, I might be able to use those new plastic shoes. They come in different colors. I’ve been told they’re very comfortable, too. Like walking on clouds.”

  Declan sucked in a breath, his eyes sparkling. “I’d like that.”

  I hammered the shoe I was working on into shape, holding it up to make sure it was just right. “Keratex, Declan. Every night. And try to stay out of the marshy areas.”

  He nodded, forelock drifting across one dark eye. “Red shoes, and you’ll paint my hooves glossy black?”

  I walked over to him, eyeing the centaur. He was gorgeous and he knew it—wavy black hair, golden-brown skin, and a rich deep bay on his horse half. His black tail matched the hair on his head and was long enough to brush the ground. Red shoes would make a statement. They’d be gaudy as all heck on his brown-and-black self, but they’d make a statement. And Declan was all about making a statement.

  “You’ve got a deal. Red shoes and glossy black hooves.”

  Twenty minutes later, I’d reset all the centaur’s shoes and watched him walk and trot around the yard. There was a low rumble of thunder off in the distance, and although there weren’t any dark storm clouds in view, the sky had an odd yellowish cast that I wasn’t liking.

  “These feel great. Thanks, Bronwyn, as always.”

  I waved his words off, happy to be of help—although I didn’t work for free. Declan made good money licensing his digital paintings and he always sent me my payment electronically. Other clients paid me in trade, or sometimes cash. Being a bit isolated here in Accident meant we’d all become creative when it came to the payment methods we accepted. For instance, I pretty much had an open tab at Pistol Pete’s so large that I doubted I’d go through it in my lifetime in return for the spell I’d cast on one of his bar rags. He’d been having trouble keeping the peace with all the various folk that liked to come by for a drink and the music and needed something to get their attention and respect. Hence the enchanted towel.

  Fear the towel.

  I told Declan goodbye after scheduling him for another call in six weeks, then hopped in my truck, eyeing the western sky. Normally I’d just head home, but I had one more call to make, and I’d put this off longer than I should have. With a sigh, I threw the truck into gear and headed down the road, winding my way up Heartbreak Mountain.

  Normally, I didn’t mind doing work for the werewolf pack, but the last few months they’d turned into two warring packs. Which was quite a bit worse than one warring pack. There were those who supported Clinton, and those who supported Dallas. I didn’t support either of them, but out of the two I figured Dallas was the least problematic. The old wolf was a lecherous asshole, but he was old enough to be a lazy lecherous asshole, so he didn’t cause quite as much trouble as his son Clinton. Clinton was less lecherous than his father, but more than double the asshole. I’m pretty sure Dallas in his youth had been just as bad, but he must have mellowed a bit with age, because he tended to stay on the compound, outside of a few days around the full moon, and limit his asshole-ness to those in his pack. Clinton, on the other hand, liked to come into town every day and subject the rest of us to his rude temper and disregard for others’ property and rights.

  My eldest sister, Cassandra, had finally gotten pissed off enough to take her rightful position as head-witch of Accident and had come down hard on the werewolf clan. But part of the joy of living in a town full of supernatural beings was knowing what to allow as a matter of culture and autonomy and what rules needed to be obeyed for the common good, no matter how much certain folk screamed and cried.

  There’d been an incident. Cassie had intervened. She’d had words with Dallas and more words with Clinton. They’d grudgingly accepted her rules and for a few weeks, everyone in Accident and the surrounding area had lived with a sort of icy calm.

  Then the calm had ended. Some of the werewolves sided with Clinton and some with Dallas, and the pack was split in two.

  Now we had what amounted to a war on the mountain. Nothing had been set on fire, and the violence hadn’t spilled into the town proper, but there was definitely violence. Cassie felt we needed to let the werewolves sort this out for themselves, and as long as no one outside of their pack got harmed, then we should let them resolve their issues on their own.

  I wasn’t sure I agreed with that. Why couldn’t we just have two werewolf packs up on Heartbreak Mountain? Or three? Why couldn’t people, or werewolves, just get along?

  This war among the werewolves was one of the reasons I’d been avoiding this job. But it was August and getting on toward butchering time. The main pack had a small herd of cattle that grazed on the south side of the mountain
and each fall they butchered, selling a good portion of the meat to the town and keeping the rest for the pack to eat through the winter. As much as they liked to hunt, knowing there was a freezer full of roasts and steaks to come home to made the hunt season more of an enjoyable event and less a desperate starvation-fueled one.

  Those butchering sheds? They were full of equipment used to slaughter and process the cattle and anything else the werewolves wanted to eat. And evidently a swing-arm on one of the lines had snapped free, and the scaffolding used for hanging the meat had proved not adequate for the weight of the cattle. So here I came to the rescue. Bronwyn, the welder.

  I called the compound as soon as I left Declan’s to let them know I was on my way. Stanley met me outside the butchering shed. The “shed” was the entire lower half of a barn, squeaky clean with drains in the cement floors and a walk-in refrigerator in the corner. It reminded me of a meticulously maintained torture chamber with all the stainless steel, the iron hooks and racks, the huge blackened cauldrons in the corner. Stanley showed me what needed to be repaired and rebuilt, and I started. The werewolf stood by, watching me as I fired up the torch and got to work on the swing-arm. It was weird having him hovering around like he expected me to steal something. What the heck was the guy’s problem? Did he think I was going to run off with a cauldron? Figure out some pack secrets and sell them to the other “team”? Maybe he had a thing for tall, thirty-one-year-old witches with muscles and a few extra inches around their midsections? If so, then he was the first.

  My thoughts drifted to my sister Cassandra and her demon boyfriend. Lucien was smoking hot. I mean, when he looked like a human, he was smoking hot. I’m pretty sure when he looked like a demon, he was terrifying. Either way, I liked him. He was a good guy, which was kind of a weird thing to think about a demon. He was devoted to Cassie, and that was one of the main reasons I liked him. She’d had a tough life, and her last boyfriend had been a ‘ho of a panther shifter. Lucien made her happy, and it was good seeing her happy for once.