“Bloody unbelievable.” Bram stared at it reverently.

“It’s been found!” cried her father.

“And so have we.” Lucan ran up and braced himself in the open doorway. “The Anarki are here, hundreds of them! And they mean business.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

OLIVIA SLANTED A GLANCE past the men and out the cottage door, to find a sea of gray robes trimmed in blood red with an unfamiliar symbol on the front.

“Oh God,” she uttered, shock and fear blending to stun her.

Bram cursed. “We must leave! Get Olivia and the Diary and I will transport us to my house.”

“I will not forfeit my home without a fight.” Marrok stood ready to defend all that was his.

“Give me the book, then. Let me protect it.”

Marrok’s glance answered Bram with a silent “hell no.”

“Stubborn prat.” Bram charged for the door, then shouted to the others, “Wands at the ready; this will be ugly. Fight!”

Duke jumped into the fray with his wand. Just outside, Lucan brandished his own wand furiously. Three of the Anarki dropped instantly. Others merely jolted when a spell hit them, then resumed, zombie-like, coming straight for the cottage door.

As they shuffled closer, Olivia gasped. Their skin looked cadaver-pale. One reached the threshold, staring at her with colorless, malevolent eyes.

“What is that?” she cried out, recoiling.

“Former human,” her father said. “Unlike Anarki wizards, these creatures have no soul.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Mathias lacks enough wizards for his cause, so he converts humans to swell his ranks. He abducts capable men—often military. He rips out their souls, then commands their thoughts and actions. Nothing can break the link but death of the body.”

Another of the eerie Anarki reached the door. Then another. Marrok and Richard shoved them back. One reached inside and swiped out at Olivia with rotting hands, its grip missing her shirt by a mere breath. Cold oozed from him, like a walking freezer. Gasping, she jumped back.

Her insides shook, washing her in terror, brutal and breath-stealing. That…thing had nearly touched her with its rotting flesh. But the eyes in the sagging face were alive—and ruthless.

Marrok shoved the book into her hands and grabbed his broadsword. With a mighty growl, he wielded the weapon, skewering all three zombies at once on his blade. Black blood oozed from noses and mouths. Though she was thrilled they’d been stopped, Olivia clutched the book in horror.

Nothing fazed Marrok. With a yank of his massive arm, he freed the sword, then lopped the head off another soulless demon headed in Olivia’s direction.

Mathias had targeted her, and these beings were too big to fight off with self-defense techniques and a can of Mace, damn it. “Should I hide with the book in the back of the house?”

Without pausing, Marrok stepped over the bodies and into the fray. “Nay. They may sneak behind you.”

Good point.

He charged another pair of half-dead Anarki and emerged victorious. Relief edged through her. It wasn’t logical; he was immortal and healed instantly, but…what if something happened to him? Without Marrok, life would seem empty again.

When had she started falling for the hunky immortal?

Didn’t matter right now. She wasn’t giving him up until it was her choice, not some extra from Night of the Living Dead.

Whirling on one foot, she sprinted down the hall.

“Olivia!” Marrok’s cry rang above the din of his sword.

Moments later, she returned with a pair of handguns. When she’d decided to move out of her mother’s house and live on her own, she’d taken gun safety classes and purchased one for home protection. She might not be able to identify the weapon, but she knew how to unlock the safety, aim, and shoot.

Marrok stood in the doorway, fending off two of the half-dead creatures, one on his left, the other on his right. He backed up a step. Foolishly, they tried to follow. Marrok crouched down and swung the sword in a wide arc, almost like a baseball bat. He severed the beasts’ torsos in half.

Olivia tried not to gag when the black liquid spurted from their bodies and puddled on the porch, running over the stones, into the wood and dirt below.

Still, Marrok charged forward. More of the awful creatures came. The determination stamping Marrok’s face said that he would kill anyone who tried to harm her—or he’d sacrifice himself trying.

Bram, Lucan, and Duke scanned the crowd as they brandished their wands. Richard had perched himself on the sloped thatch roof and was zapping the members of the Anarki who didn’t look as if they were rotting on their bones.

Soon, however, a pile of healthy-looking Anarki, all wizards gone bad, lay bound and stacked at Lucan’s feet. Bram sighed and put away his wand.

Was he insane? There were hundreds of creatures left. Did he expect Marrok to slay them all? The odds were overwhelming, even for someone with Marrok’s amazing prowess.

A moment later, Bram tried to punch one of the half-dead. The first time, he missed completely, nearly knocking himself off balance. The second time, the crack of knuckles on flesh sounded all the way across the yard. Bram grimaced in pain as he shook his hand, uttering a few choice words, which he repeated when the Anarki continued toward the cottage.

Marrok had been waylaid too far away to help Olivia. The half-dead beings marched for the door. Bram tried to punch another. The thing shoved him on his ass with a hearty push, then continued toward her.

“Olivia!” Marrok called to her.

“I’ve got it,” she called.

She didn’t want to die or become Mathias’s personal plaything. And she’d be damned if the evil bastard wasn’t getting his hands on the Doomsday Diary. Anyone who could create these soulless zombies wasn’t someone who needed a book with such immense power.

Swallowing her fear, Olivia tucked the book between her knees, set one of the weapons on the table beside her, then fumbled to release the gun’s safety. She raised it and aimed. Her arms shook as she stared at the nearest zombie closing in—with a veritable army behind it.

Former human. Once upon a time, it had been human with family, friends, people who would mourn it. How could she just kill it?

“Olivia, shoot!” Marrok shouted.

She bit her lip. Her finger curled around the trigger.

It’s not really alive anymore, said her father’s soothing voice in her head. He can never be human again. You’re doing him and yourself a favor by putting him out of his misery.

Perhaps…but it felt a lot like murder.

Until several more of the terrible creatures stacked up behind the first, all trying to crowd into the doorway. A blast of arctic air chilled her. Suddenly, the cottage’s furniture zoomed past her, and she looked up to find Bram brandishing his wand. The sofa and chairs, a few tables, all stacked up at the door to keep the rotting Anarki from entering the house.

The first one climbed the blockade and lunged for her, looking at her with rapacious eyes that told her he smelled a kill. No time for compassion now.

Olivia steadied the gun and pulled the trigger. The rotting freak jolted, spasmed. Smoke poured from him, and his blood ran black before he fell in a heap.

Despite her success, another Anarki stepped up behind the fallen one. He pushed at the furniture with evil glee. No time to wonder if she was doing the right thing. She fired again.

Bingo! Right in the head. Black liquid splattered everywhere, the walls, the floor, her shirt. The gag urge was strong, especially when she saw what was left of its head roll off its body.

“Give me a gun,” Bram barked from the door. His knuckles were bleeding. He looked sweaty, his clothes in tatters, his hair a hurricane victim.

She tossed her spare across the room and watched Bram storm the barricade, firing without hitting much. He practically needed to be on top of one of the half-dead baddies to kill.

“Let me try,” Lucan shouted from the other side of the barrier.

Bram tossed him the weapon. The results…the same. Until they ran out of bullets.

Her jaw dropped. Had these magical men never thrown a punch or used a gun?

Bram grumbled, “It looks easier on TV.”

Then he reached out and grabbed her by the shoulder, shut his eyes and stood stock-still. Was he praying? That was all well and good, but right now, didn’t he need to be fighting?

More Anarki have arrived, Bram’s voice was a boom in her head. Too many to fend off. The soulless humans are bloody impossible to kill with magic. We must leave!

“Marrok.” Bram motioned him into the cottage.

She looked out into the yard past Marrok, who was making his way to the door. The sun was edging toward the horizon, showing the slimy black liquid in a thick sludge on the ground.

Suddenly, Lucan vanished. Duke followed suit.

This must be that tactical retreat Marrok spoke of. She approved. The odds looked beyond overwhelming, judging by the sea of tattered robes, red symbols, and dead faces.

Bram wrapped an arm around her. A moment later, Marrok charged through the door and clambered over the barricade, three dozen Anarki behind him, all trying to get their hands on Olivia and the diary.

Bram shouted to her, “Hold tight to that book!”

Then he grabbed Marrok’s forearm in his grip and muttered something.

Suddenly, Olivia saw nothing but black. She felt as if the ground beneath her had dropped away, she was falling, falling…her stomach pitching and rolling and hollow, like being on a roller coaster with a steep drop.

Just when she thought she might hurl, she landed on her feet with a jarring thud, Bram’s arm around her again, the book still clutched in her arms. Marrok appeared on the other side of the wizard, looking somewhere between furious and confused. Around them, the room had the gilded, expensive look of a palace.

“Where have you brought us?”

“My house.”

Marrok set his jaw, clearly unhappy. He had agreed to come here…but not without reservations.

She gasped, looking around frantically. “My father?”

“Teleported away, likely back to his own place,” Bram assured. “He was fine.”

“Now what?” she asked.

“Are you hurt, either of you?”

The last few frantic minutes came rushing back, the battle, the black blood everywhere, the kickback of the gun in her hands as she’d blown a half-dead’s head from its body.

“No fainting on me.” Bram grabbed her by both shoulders. “Are you hurt?”

Marrok turned her into his own embrace, then rubbed grimy hands up and down her arms, as if testing her wellness himself. “Olivia?”

“I’m fine. You? You were so outnumbered. I worried—”

He hovered a gentle finger over her lips to quiet her. “I am unharmed. I have faced such odds in battle even before I was immortal and lived to tell. Do not fear for me.”

Bram cut in. “We must get the book hidden immediately. I would ask that you give it to me so I can stow it someplace safe.”

Marrok opened his mouth to protest, but Bram’s next words stopped him.

“However, I know better. Spend a few hours here. Find a spot that is difficult to reach and damn near impossible to guess. Sabelle and I will put extra enchantments on the house to make it less likely the Anarki will be able to break in. For now, it’s the best we can do.”

Something about Bram’s words—the way he’d phrased them—gave her pause. “What happens if the Anarki are able to invade your house?”

Bram sent her a hard stare. “We pray. Then fight like never before.”

An hour later, Marrok paced the sumptuous room Bram’s staff had readied for him and Olivia. Creams, golds, and taupes surrounded him, decorated with a Louis XIV flavor. Nothing over the top, but very posh and all the finest. Bram would insist, of course. Spoiled cur.

A huge bed dominated the room with a sitting area to the left. Ah, the ways he longed to worship Olivia on that bed…Marrok shook the thought away and continued cataloging the room in order to find a hiding place for the Book of Doomsday.

A bathroom was just beyond the couch and chairs—currently cut off from his sight by the closed door—with his mate inside naked and wet, soaping the bare silk of her skin…while he stood here, shaking with the need to feel her alive in his arms.

Stop!

The book. He must hide it well. Now. Search the grounds, Bram had said. Cheeky. But the wizard was no fool; he knew Marrok would not hide that book far from his own line of sight.

Glancing around the room again, Marrok looked for a hiding place. No opening floorboards here, as he’d done at the cottage. The wall-to-wall carpet made that impossible, but it was so thick that if he could not wait to carry Olivia to the bed, making love to her on the floor would be no hardship. He could spread her wide, sliding her legs over the crooks of his arms as he felt her very life pulse around him…

Concentrate! The furniture, while ornate, provided no obvious hiding places. Marrok had a knife and could rip out a hole in the mattress—but that would be too easily guessed. And might lessen the pleasure he and Olivia had in both sleeping and sex.