MAKING MAGICKAL ALLIANCES: A Paranormal Women’s Fiction Novel by Leigh Raventhorne (best color ereader .txt) 📗

hunter affiliations throughout the years. We have a section in the hall’s library dedicated to them. I’ll call and let the rest of my family know what’s going on. They should be warned if a dangerous faction is on the rise again.”

I nodded my thanks. “Clarissa should be warned, also. I guess we really do need some sort of official witchy round robin.”

“I’ll call her next, Roxanne.” She started to leave the room, then paused. “You know, your aunt probably has a section on them in her library, too.”

She does. Zara jumped down from the chair and joined the kits.

“Cool. I’m on it.” Tess reluctantly placed the two kits she held next to the other three, and stretched as she straightened. “I’ll let you know what I find.” With that, she followed Danai from the room, Sebastian trailing after them.

Gloria looked after them, but remained behind. “I’m going to go see to dinner. It should be ready by now, so I hope you're all hungry. Want me to just set it up in the kitchen and everyone can simply grab a plate when they’re ready?”

“Thanks, Gloria, that would be great.”

“Should I let the guys know what’s going on?” she asked this almost hesitantly, as if she wasn’t sure if she was overstepping her bounds.

“Oh, Gods yes. You are a lifesaver!” I hated repeating everything over and over again. She brightened and hurried out. That left just Rand and I.

Ahem.

And my familiar and her five kits.

Sorry, Zara.

If this is going to turn PG thirteen or worse, please leave now. And don’t get too caught up in each other, there are still three children missing.

On that sobering note, I held my hand out to Rand. “Want to go down to the river with me? I need to update the water fae and see if they’ve found trackers on anything.”

“How are you going to reach them?” he asked, taking my hand.

I paused. “I’m . . . not sure. Zara?”

They will see you and send someone to meet you. There is always someone on watch near where you met them this morning.

Good to know. Thanks.

Anytime.

We left the house through the back and made our way in silence to the river. How had it only been this morning that we’d met Olen for the first time? It felt like forever ago.

When we reached the bank, I went to the edge, called out, “Hello?” and then moved further back to sit down, pulling Rand down next to me.

“Listen, I really am sorry about not introducing you this morning. I don’t know if I was just nervous, or what.”

“It wasn’t a big deal, Rox.” His attention was on the river. Was he avoiding looking at me? His body language didn’t seem angry, but maybe I wasn’t reading him all that well.

“Still . . . I feel bad.”

He turned to me, reaching out to tip my chin up to meet his eyes. “Don’t. I was invisible for a long time. I get it, and I’m not upset about what happened. Any of it.”

We both turned as a loud splash sounded from the water. Seconds later, a tall figure walked out of the river, making its way up the small incline of the bank. It was Dorn.

Standing to meet him, I saw he carried a clear plastic bag similar to the Ziploc one he’d left Jeremy’s with earlier. With a small bow, he held it out to me.

I took it and gave it a little shake. It was full of tiny black squares. “Are these . . . ?”

Rand nodded. “Yes. Trackers.” He reached out to take the bag from me and turned it sideways, trying to separate the squares. “How many are in here? It looks like a couple dozen, at least.”

Dorn’s jaw tightened and I could see a tic in his cheek. His stiff-legged stance and ramrod straight back radiated anger. “We are still going through everything, but there are thirty-seven in that bag. We found them inside toys, sewn into clothing, as you mentioned,” he nodded to Rand, “and there were several that were glued under the covers or in the spines of books.”

Books? How would that work in water? Before I could ask, Rand said, “We need a metal box.”

Zara? Do we have anything?

A small metal box appeared on the ground in front of me. It looked like an old cookie tin.

I picked it up and handed it to him. “Will this work?”

He opened it, put the entire bag in, and put the lid back on. “Yes. Any metal that conducts electricity will be enough to interfere with the signal being sent out. Any more that you come across, put them in something like this.”

Dorn reached out for the box, examining it and tapping on the lid. “We have several that should work. Are you sure this will stop them?”

“Yes. We found it was a pretty effective way to deal with them when I was in the service. You wouldn’t believe how many of these little buggers we’d come across in a week’s time.” He gave a dark laugh. “We’d send the enemy off on a wild goose chase more often than not by slipping their own trackers into things at the local market or vehicles we knew belonged to the enemy. Once, my commanding officer even managed to attach one to a semi-tame rock pigeon. That was quite entertaining, watching them chase that signal around.”

I stared at him. “Rand! That’s it!”

Both Dorn and Rand visibly started at the excitement in my voice. “What is?” Rand asked.

I pointed at the tin. “We use these trackers and set a trap for whoever took the children! We’ll use trackers of our own and they’ll lead us back to where the others are.”

“Rox, the kids might