For the next hour, I looked up various ancient symbol websites. There were a lot of websites on the subject. Six million, nine hundred and thirty thousand to be exact. The major problem was narrowing it down to culture. All old cultures used symbols in some way. I decided to go with my hunch and started with the Celtic histories.

After browsing fifteen websites, I'd found nothing that matched the etchings in the pictures. Besides that the research was cut short because true to Trevor's word we had another gig to set up.

I'd always thought being a roadie would rock. Hanging out with the band, drinking beer all night, absorbing the music and the mayhem that went with it. But the reality of it was, it was a lot of hard, late nights, and zero respect. And for a girl, there were the added inappropriate comments and s.e.xual leers. I had to say I was extremely thankful that Trevor had my back. When he was around, everyone basically behaved.

A couple of hours later of moving equipment and setting up instruments, Trevor and I were free to chill. The last place I wanted to chill was at the club but I had no choice. Trevor had to stay in case there were problems and then we had to take everything down again after the show.

To kill some time, I wandered through the club, drinking a Red Bull and watching people. Although Malice didn't go on for another hour, the place was fairly crowded. To think only a couple of weeks ago, I'd been one of these desperate looking groupies scrambling for a spot up front for one chance to make eye contact with any of the band.

It was amazing what almost dying and becoming half-demon can do to a person's perspective on life.

I'd finished one full circuit of the club before heading backstage when I spotted something in the crowd. It was a tattoo on some tall dude's neck. It had the same spirals as one of the symbols on the box.

Pushing through a b.i.t.c.h of bleach blondes, I bee-lined for the guy. He was uber tall so not hard to follow through the crowd. The top of my head just reached his shoulder. I had to tilt my head way up to talk to him.

"Hey guy?" I tapped him on the arm.

He peered down at me. "Whacha want?"

"What's that symbol on your neck?" I pointed to the one on the right side, with the three armed spirals.

"It's Celtic."

"What's it called? Does it have any meaning?"

"It's a triskele. Has some religious meaning or some s.h.i.t. I just like it. It looks cool."

"Thanks." I gave him a bland smile and moved on.

Armed with the new knowledge, I hunted Trevor down in one of the back rooms. He was messing around with some wires in one of the speakers.

He smiled when he saw me approach. "I'm hungry. Want to go get a pizza?"

"I found something."

"What?" he asked half-heartedly as he continued to strip and tie the wires.

"You know. Something."

His head came up at that. He glanced around to see if we were alone. A couple of security guys were hanging around at the door's entrance. One of them I knew was also a cambion. He was the d.i.c.k who wouldn't give me a backstage pa.s.s back in Boise.

Trevor slid his wire cutters into his back jean pocket then came around to swing his arm over my shoulders. Together we pushed through the small crowd milling about backstage and headed toward the back exit. He pushed the door open and we went out.

The security d.i.c.k's voice followed us out. "Don't forget to wear a rubber."

"I hate that douchebag."

"Me too." Trevor grabbed my hand. "So, what do you got?"

"I saw one of the symbols on some dude's neck. I was right. It's Celtic."

"What does it mean?"

I shrugged. "The big idiot didn't know. But at least now I can look it up. It's called a triskele or something like that."

"Cool. We're one step closer."

"I want this to end so bad. I don't know how much longer I can handle it."

He pulled me to him, wrapping his arms around my waist. I settled my head against his shoulder and inhaled his scent. His smell never failed to ignite a fire deep in my belly.

"It'll be over soon. Then we can run off somewhere together."

I pulled back and looked up into his eyes. It was the first time he mentioned still being together once we achieved our goal.

"Really? You want to...to be with me even after this?"

He bopped me on the nose with his finger. "Yeah. I do."

I wondered if he'd like living in Boise because that was where I intended to head after this was done. I missed my mom, and Chloe and my life there. Trevor would make a fine addition to that ensemble. I thought that my mom would even like him. Once she got past the cambion thing of course.

I was about to say as much before there was a ripple in the air next to us and the four demonic members of Malice stepped out of the shadows.

"Well, looky here." Thane smiled. "If it isn't my favorite washer woman."

Devon pierced me with her lethal gaze. "How's the arm?" she cackled, then pushed past us to go into the club. Quinn and Seth followed her barely acknowledging our existence. This didn't bother me too much.

"Guess what? I totally wrote a song about you."

The groupie in me would've wet her panties to hear that, but for me, it was a nightmare.

"It's called Domestic Slave. Do you like it?"

Forgetting I was supposed to be terrified of him, I took a step toward him. "Fu..."

Trevor squeezed my side. "Salem," he warned.

Thane laughed. "Listen to your dark knight, sugar pop. You'll live longer." He stepped around me and went into the club, happily slamming the door shut behind him.

I took a running kick at the door, forgetting I wasn't wearing my steel-toed Doc Martens.

"s.h.i.t!" I hopped backwards on my left foot. "I broke my toes."

Trevor grabbed me around the waist, picked me up like I weighed nothing, and carried me back into the club. He set me down on the nearest chair and stripped off my boot. I cringed thinking about foot odor. I was sure that the inside of my boot did not smell good at all. But he didn't seem bothered.

"Wiggle your toes."

Biting my lip, I did as he asked. Pain shot up my leg.

"They're not broken." He knelt down beside me and slid my boot back on. "Next time aim for something not made of metal."

Setting my boot on his bent knee, he proceeded to re-lace my boot and tie it.

It was the nicest, s.e.xiest thing any boy had ever done for me. If I hadn't been falling for him before, this would have sent me tumbling head over heels.

Thane was right. Trevor was my dark knight. He'd been there for me from the beginning. At first, it had been in the background, in the shadows, watching and waiting, but now he was here in front of me, on his knees, doing everything he could to keep me safe.

Chapter 27.

The show went on without a hitch and we packed up the gear once it was over. Trevor and I dragged our a.s.ses back to the room at about two a.m. I should've been dead on my feet but I was too amped up to go to sleep right away. I wanted to do more research first.

As I did a Google search on the triskele symbol, Trevor served me some leftover pizza and a soda. He plopped down beside me on the sofa and chowed down on his own slice.

"All this junk food all the time and I'm going to get fat," I commented as I tore into the cheesy wedge.

"Nah. You can't get fat. Cambions have furnace like metabolism. We can eat whatever the heck we want."

"Awesome to know." I chugged the soda, and let out a less than dainty burp.

"Nice." He elbowed me in the side.

It felt good to be sitting here with Trevor doing regular teen things like web surfing, chowing down on pizza, and laughing. Maybe I could still have that normal life again. Just because my genetics had been altered into something inhuman didn't mean I'd lost any of my humanity. I was still a teen girl with wants and needs. I was sitting next to one and chowing down on another. Not so weird.

I scrolled down the list of sites about the triskele. My gaze landed on one that piqued my curiosity-The Triskele and Merlin the Magician. I clicked on the link and started reading.

Then my heart started to pound. "Listen to this. aeMerlin is traditionally cast as a cambion, born by a mortal woman and sired by an incubus, from who he inherited his supernatural powers and abilities'." I stared at Trevor. "Did you know that?"

"No, why would I?"

"Didn't you do any research on cambions when you found out you were one? I did."

He ignored my barb. "What else does it say?"

I continued reading. "It says he often wore a robe with the triskele symbol on it, as a sign of his position as a Druid priest."

Trevor popped the tab open on another soda and took a swig. "What website is this?"

"It belongs to some psychic named The Morgana." I scrolled down to the bottom of the page. "And guess what? She's in Seattle. Maybe we should go see her?"

"I don't know. Is there anything else important on the site?"

"Just some stuff about Druidism...oh wait, here's something. aeMerlin was said to have been pierced by an enchanted sword and put into an eternal sleep by the huntress Nivaine, a woman he desired and relentlessly pursued, a woman he taught all his magic to.' Merlin was stopped so maybe we can stop Thane and the others."

"Could be all a bunch of bulls.h.i.t. Merlin was a myth. He didn't really exist."

"So says the real as s.h.i.t cambion sitting beside me." I smirked. "Maybe he was real, Trevor, and somehow Thane and Devon and the others are descendants of his." The minute it came out of my mouth, I fully believed it to be true. This was the answer, I was sure of it.

Trevor sighed, rolling his eyes. "Fine. We can go see this woman tomorrow morning. I'm hoping it's something, Sale. Because after tomorrow we're on the move again. And eventually they're going to ground. When the weather turns cold, they'll be gone."

I punched him in the arm.

"Ow," he rubbed at the spot, "What was that for?"

"For keeping that information to yourself. h.e.l.lo? Maybe you should've mentioned that little tidbit sooner."

"Sorry. I just didn't want you to feel pressured."

"Well, I'm feeling it."

In the morning, Trevor and I went down to Cherry Street near the water to meet with The Morgana. I wasn't sure what to expect but it definitely wasn't the two hundred pound woman with Betty White's smiling face answering the door. She looked like my grannie and not some Celtic psychic. She even smelled like cinnamon from what I soon found out was from the organic cookies she'd just made.

She'd invited us into the parlor, sat us down at a small round table, gave us each a gla.s.s of milk and a cookie, then sat across from us and smiled a matronly smile.

"So, what can I do for you two dears, today?"

I glanced at Trevor. He was busy chewing the cookie, so I cleared my throat and said, "Um, we were wondering about the story about Merlin the Magician."

"Oh, he wasn't a magician, dear. He was a great Druid priest."

"Right. And he was also a...cambion?"

She nodded. "Yes. His father was said to be an incubus that visited his mother in the night and impregnated her with his demon seed."

Trevor nearly choked on his cookie. I patted him on the back. "Okay, so what we really want to know is how did he die? Was he killed?"

She looked from me to Trevor then back again. "What did you say you wanted this information for?"

"A school paper. On Celtic mythology." I took a sip of milk and smiled at her over the rim.

"He was put into a deep sleep," she continued.

"By some magical sword?"