I text Declan back quickly, telling him where I am, and then I head over to the ornately carved bench Lily is standing beside.
The closer I get, the more the pain eases off, thank the goddess. “Did you find something?” I ask.
“No,” she says with a shake of her head. “But I just remembered something I heard in a class once. I didn’t pay much attention to it at the time, figured it was just a wild-goose chase.”
A sliver of unease works its way down my spine. “What is it?”
“You know how nobody knows where the ACW’s headquarters is?”
The sliver becomes an avalanche. “Yeah?”
“There are a few main theories, right? Alexandria, Cairo, Paris—”
“So what? What does that have to do with this?” I know I sound impatient, but the compulsion hurts. I just want to find this body, call Nate and let him deal with it.
“Well, my professor said that some people think the ACW’s headquarters is in Austin.”
“Yeah, and some people think it’s on the moon. But we all know it’s in the Egyptian desert somewhere, probably close to Luxor.”
“Well, what if that’s just what they want us to believe? My professor said that the Council moved to Texas over a hundred years ago, when the whole witch-hunt thing started to heat up over there.”
“I didn’t realize they had.” I can’t help looking at her a little askew. Lily’s read a book or taken a class on just about everything at least once, which is one of the reasons I usually pay close attention to what she’s saying. But this doesn’t make any sense. The Egyptians, while definitely monotheistic now, have a deep and abiding pride in their heritage. I can’t imagine that changing if they found a few practitioners of Heka.
Lily shrugs. “Me neither, but supposedly there was a rash of killings a number of years ago that sent the whole Hekan community scrambling for cover. The perpetrators were eventually found, and condemned to death, but by then a lot of the witches and wizards had gone underground.”
“Underground,” I repeat. “Not moved to Texas.”
She holds up her hands. “I’m just telling you what I heard—that the ACW moved their headquarters to Austin and hid it somewhere downtown.”
“Downtown. As in the Capitol grounds downtown?”
“You’re the one who brought us to this little patch of grass. You tell me.”
“That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.” I throw my arms up in defeat. “But if you think you can find it, who am I to stop you?”
“I didn’t say I could find it. Just that it might be here.” Still, she squats down, starts poking around. “What do you think an entrance to the ACW’s headquarters might look like?”
I have no idea. But if Lily’s right, we need to find it soon. Before I end up electrocuted by all this damn energy inside me. “Shouldn’t it be big and decked out in gold and powerful stones or something? They aren’t exactly the kind to hide their lights under a bushel.”
“They are when they’re being hunted.”
It’s a good point. So even though I’m pretty sure it’s a waste of time, I start to look. But ten minutes later, we’ve still had no luck and I’m in worse shape than ever. The compulsion is riding me hard, ripping me apart from the inside out until I feel like I’ve been scraped raw, right beneath the skin. It’s a weird feeling, an excruciating one, and I’m not sure how much longer I can take it without screaming.
I must look as bad as I feel, because Lily is suddenly by my side, easing me down onto the closest park bench. “You okay, sweetie?” She reaches into her bag and pulls out a small bottle of water. She hands it to me.
I take it gratefully, but before I can do much more than twist off the cap, Declan steps out of the shadows and into the glow of the nearest streetlamp.
“What. The. Fuck. Are. You. Doing. Here?”
Nine
He looks angrier than I’ve ever seen him. Which is fine, because I’m pretty damn pissed myself. After the night I’ve had, the absolute last thing I need is for him to come in here and play the big alpha he-man with me. I know he warned me not to go wandering off without him right now, not when things with the Council are so uncertain, but he knows I can’t control the compulsions. Besides, if he wanted to come with me, he shouldn’t have snuck out of my bed the second I fell asleep.
“I could ask you the same question.” I keep my voice deliberately calm, refusing to give him the response he’s looking for.
Declan’s eyes narrow and Lily sucks in a loud breath. I half expect her to run for cover—which is fine, I’ve got this—but instead she puts a hand on my shoulder in obvious solidarity. And people wonder why she’s my best friend? There’s nobody else I’d rather have at my back. Except the enraged man in front of me, but he pretty much screwed that up when he left without so much as a note letting me know what was going on.