Dark Enchantment Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-F IVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  GLOSSARY

  Teaser chapter

  DRAGON BOUND

  ANYA BAST

  Baileyd @ Demonoid.me

  “Anya Bast is a professional at writing stories that keep the reader in a . . . state of suspense. Her reputation is well deserved.”

  —Romance Junkies

  “The atmosphere that Anya Bast portrays is intricate, dark, and highly erotic.”

  —Just Erotic Romance Reviews

  PRAISE FOR THE NOVELS OF ANYA BAST

  CRUEL ENCHANTMENT

  “An enchanting, magical entry in a superior series.”

  —Genre Go Round Reviews

  WICKED ENCHANTMENT

  “[The] Dark Magick series is intriguing, intense, and powerful, a unique mixture of today’s world with fantasy. A great read!”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “If you like dark faery tales filled with intrigue, politics, backstabbing, lying, and outright betrayals, you will like Wicked Enchantment. I loved it and I can’t wait for the next book!”

  —Manic Readers

  “A superb romantic fantasy . . . Wickedly enchanting.”

  —The Best Reviews

  “Wicked Enchantment will draw the reader in from the very start and I absolutely can’t wait to read the next installment in this great new series.”

  —The Book Lush

  “I love Anya Bast’s books. Her imagination is incredible and her ability to share the worlds she develops is out of this world . . . This book was excellent.”

  —Night Owl Romance Reviews

  WITCH FURY

  “Full of action, excitement, and sexy fun . . . Another delectable tale that will keep your eyes glued to every word.”

  —Bitten by Books

  “Hot romance, interesting characters, intriguing demons, and powerful emotions. I didn’t want to put it down and now that I’ve finished this book, I’m ready for the next!”

  —Night Owl Romance Reviews

  WITCH HEART

  “[A] fabulous tale . . . The story line is fast-paced from the onset . . . Fans will enjoy the third bewitching blast.”

  —Genre Go Round Reviews

  “Smart, dangerous, and sexy as hell, the witches are more than a match for the warlocks and demons who’d like nothing more than to bring hell to earth and enslave mankind. Always an exhilarating read.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  “Witch Heart is a story that will captivate its readers. It will hook you from the first few pages and then take you on a wild ride. It is a fast-paced story but it is also a story that will make you feel emotion. Anya Bast uses words like Monet used paint. It’s vibrant. It’s alive. Readers will be able to see the story come to life as it just leaps out of the pages.”

  —Bitten by Books

  WITCH BLOOD

  “Any paranormal fan will be guaranteed a Top Pick read. Anya has provided it all in this hot new paranormal series. You get great suspense, vivid characters, and a world that just pops off the pages . . . Not to be missed.”

  —Night Owl Romance Reviews

  “Gritty danger and red-hot sensuality make this book and series smoking!”

  —Romantic Times

  WITCH FIRE

  “Deliciously sexy and intriguingly original.”

  —Angela Knight, USA Today bestselling author

  “Sizzling suspense and sexy magic are sure to propel this hot new series onto the charts. Bast is a talent to watch, and her magical world is one to revisit.”

  —Romantic Times

  “A sensual feast sure to sate even the most finicky of palates. Richly drawn, dynamic characters dictate the direction of this fascinating story. You can’t miss with Anya.”

  —A Romance Review

  “Fast-paced, edgy suspense . . . The paranormal elements are fresh and original. This reader was immediately drawn into the story from the opening abduction, and obsessively read straight through to the dramatic final altercation. Bravo, Ms. Bast; Witch Fire is sure to be a fan favorite.”

  —Paranormal Romance Reviews

  “A fabulously written ultimate romance. Anya Bast tells a really passionate story and leaves you wanting more . . . The elemental witch series will be a fantastic read.”

  —The Romance Readers Connection

  “A terrific romantic fantasy starring two volatile lead characters . . . The relationship between fire and air [makes] the tale a blast to read.”

  —The Best Reviews

  Berkley Sensation titles by Anya Bast

  WITCH FIRE

  WITCH BLOOD

  WITCH HEART

  WITCH FURY

  WICKED ENCHANTMENT

  CRUEL ENCHANTMENT

  DARK ENCHANTMENT

  Heat titles by Anya Bast

  THE CHOSEN SIN

  JEWELED

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia

  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

  Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand

  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,

  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  DARK ENCHANTMENT

  A Berkley Sensation Book / published by arrangement with the author

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Berkley Sensation mass-market paperback edition / April 2011

  Copyright © 2011 by Anya Bast.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  For i
nformation, address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-47763-2

  BERKLEY® SENSATION

  Berkley Sensation Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,

  a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

  BERKLEY® SENSATION and the “B” design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  This book is dedicated to my readers.

  Without your devotion, all the stories and characters

  that crowd my imagination would be forever trapped inside,

  making me crazy. Thank you for all your emails,

  for buying my books, for chatting with me on Facebook

  and Twitter, and for showing up at my book signings

  with your lovely, smiling faces. I appreciate each

  and every one of you more than I can express.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you to Brenda Maxfield and Reece Notley for being there to do read-throughs and offer opinions and suggestions. I value your input highly.

  Thank you to Axel de Roy for creating the incredible map of Piefferburg that appears on my website, www.anyabast.com.

  Lastly, as always, thank you to my beloved husband and daughter who forgive the hours I spend at my laptop and the detached way I walk around the house sometimes, lost in another world. I love you both more than anything.

  ONE

  HE made her want to be bad, and Charlotte Bennett was never bad.

  She lay on her side in bed, eyes slowly coming open, the remnants of an amazing nocturnal adventure still clinging to her mind. In adulthood her dreams had a tendency toward monotone colors and were about as interesting as the act of folding towels. This dream had been real enough to make up for a lifetime of black-and-white snorefests.

  She rolled onto her back, stared at the ceiling fan over her bed, and groaned. Apparently her body was trying to tell her something. She was still tingling in places that hadn’t tingled in a very long time. Considering she hadn’t had sex in nine months, the reason for the dream probably wasn’t all that surprising.

  That man! She’d never met anyone like him in real life. That was because men like the one in her dream didn’t exist. Her subconscious had probably fashioned him from bits and pieces of the heroes she’d read about in romance novels, or characters she’d seen in movies. Longish dark hair, muscular build, strong jaw, deep brown eyes, hands that—

  The phone rang.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, cursing it inwardly. Just a few more minutes cuddled under the covers, immersed in her dream would have been nice. Reality was about to steal away the clinging vestiges of the luscious, sensual experience—and the delicious man who’d given it to her. Ah, well. It couldn’t be helped.

  She rolled over, grabbed the phone, and gave a sleep-husky “Hello.” At the same time, she groped for her glasses and shoved them on.

  Pause.

  Charlotte sat up a little. “Hello?”

  “Charlotte? Is that you?”

  “Harvey?” She sat all the way up, clingy dreamy deliciousness now completely eradicated. Panicked by the only reason her boss would be calling on a Monday morning, she glanced out the window—daylight-bright, she now noticed—and then at the clock. Shock rippled through her.

  “ Are you all right? It’s—”

  She smacked her forehead with her open palm. “It’s ten AM, I’m not there, and I haven’t called.”

  “Ah . . . yes.”

  She threw the blankets back and bolted from the bed, her bare feet going cold on the hardwood floor. “I don’t know happened. I’m so sorry! I guess my alarm never went off. You must think I’m a total incompetent.” She stared accusingly at her alarm clock, which was set to play Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” every morning.

  “That’s okay, Charlotte. This isn’t like you at all. You’ve never even been late, not once since you started working for us. Remarkable, really.” Harvey chuckled. “So we knew you hadn’t suddenly gone crazy and were sleeping off a bender or anything.” Chuckle. “Or that you’d had a hot date and were—”

  Charlotte gave a forced laugh and tried not to grind her teeth. “Right, yes, of course. That would be crazy.”

  “Of course it would. No, we just wanted to make sure you were all right. So, you’re coming in?”

  “Absolutely.” She’d missed only two days of work in the last five years. Flu. Hand washing was so important. “I’ll be there within the hour.”

  “Great, Charlotte. You know we’re lost without you.”

  She smiled, warmth from the compliment suffusing her.

  It didn’t take her long to get dressed, throw her hair up into a clip, and dash on a minimum of makeup. She grabbed her purse and headed out the door. It was now almost ten thirty. Her in-box would be growing more unmanageable by the moment.

  Charlotte.

  She stopped with her hand on the doorknob, the low, shivery voice blowing through her like a breeze. That had been the voice of her dream man and it had been coming from . . . inside her house.

  Blinking rapidly, as she did when she was nervous, she scanned the kitchen to her left and the formal living room to her right. Then she peered up the stairs to the second floor. All was calm, silent. The house was empty.

  She gave her head a shake. “Crazy,” she muttered and headed out the door.

  JUST as she’d presumed, the papers on her desk had multiplied like rabbits. The problem with being a capable employee was that your boss had lots of confidence in you, and that was a double-edged sword.

  She paused in the entrance of her cubicle and stared at the pile of work for a moment, sighing. Then she firmly reminded herself that this was why she’d obtained her MPA from the University of Illinois, cheating herself out of a personal life while she’d done it. It was true that her position here at Yancy and Tate wasn’t her ultimate dream, but it was a stepping-stone to the career she really wanted. Everyone had to pay their dues, and she was no exception.

  “Charlotte?”

  She jerked a little, startled, and turned to see Harvey behind her.

  “Sorry.” He grinned, transforming his plain face into something close to handsome. He studied her for a moment. “You’re wearing glasses.”

  Glancing at him, she touched the frame, readjusting it on the bridge of her nose. “I didn’t want to waste time with my contacts today.”

  “Ah, well, glad to see you made it in.”

  She walked into her cubicle, setting her purse onto the one free space on her desk, and sank into her chair. “Glad to be here.”

  “Just stopped by to remind you that we have a client meeting at one thirty.”

  Panic shot through her veins as she remembered. “Tricities, Inc.?”

  He nodded meaningfully.

  She stopped herself from lunging at her desk. She’d totally forgotten and she had so much to do! “I’ll be ready, Harvey.”

  He smiled at her. “I know you will. I have complete confidence in you.”

  She spent what was left of her morning cutting through the pile of work on her desk and then, instead of taking a lunch, prepared for the meeting with Tricities.

  By the time early afternoon rolled around, she felt caught up and prepared to consult with their client. Knowing she must also look prepared, she headed into the bathroom with her makeup bag and examined her face in the mirror.

  “Ugh.” The sound echoed into the empty room.

  With hardly any makeup, her face looked white and gaunt. She hadn’t had much time to fuss with her hair that morning and was decidedly “pillow-styled.” She undid the clip, extracted her brush, and went to work. There wasn’t much she could do with the thick mass other than straighten it up and put the clip back in. That accomplished, she set her glasses aside and worked on her m
akeup.

  Then she stood back and took a critical appraisal of her clothing. She’d thrown on a white button-down shirt, a plaid cardigan and a pair of black pants. Frowning, she saw the top two buttons of her shirt were undone. She corrected it, put her glasses back on, and gave herself a critical head-to-toe sweep. Marginally better. She gave her shirt one last downward tug to settle it more smoothly in place and smiled at herself in the mirror to practice for the meeting.

  Grabbing her makeup bag from the counter, she walked to the bathroom door.

  Charlotte.

  She stopped short, her entire body going cold. The voice of her dream man again. At work. In the bathroom. Oh, God, was she going insane?

  Charlotte, come to me.

  Images flashed through her mind. An airplane ticket, destination Protection City, Carolina. A flash of heavy, tall gates—the gates of Piefferburg, if she wasn’t mistaken. She’d only ever caught glimpses on the TV program Faemous, but she thought she recognized them. Piefferburg was the huge warded detainment area where the fae were kept imprisoned by the Phaendir.

  With the flashing images came a nearly irresistible compulsion to leave work right now. Drive to the airport right now. Buy a ticket to Protection City right now. All of a sudden she had to get to Piefferburg, no matter what.

  Dropping her makeup bag onto the floor since it no longer mattered—nothing except getting to Piefferburg mattered—she went for the bathroom door. If she hurried, she could make it to Protection City by evening.

  “Wait a minute!” She stopped cold with her fingers wrapped around the door handle, and then yanked her hand away, scrubbing it on her pants as though she could wipe the germs off.