Free Black Magic Woman by Christine Warren Page B

the conversation. “You might have picked this up from us talking earlier, but neither Daph nor I are what you would call experts in Others identification. So would you mind explaining exactly what a Guardian is, first off?”
    Asher shifted his gaze from one woman to the other and sighed. “In the simplest terms, we are a group of defenders whose job it is to protect humans from harm at the hands of the Others. If a human does violence against a human, that’s what the police are for. If an Other attacks an Other, the Council of Others can take appropriate action. But humans are so much weaker than the Others, at such a disadvantage against beings who can use magic or enhanced strength and senses to harm them, that the Guardians were created to … balance the scales, as it were.”
    “So are you human or an Other?” Corinne demanded.
    “What good would I be if I were merely another human?” Asher scoffed. “Guardians are our own race, created by the first Watcher and bred since then for the sole purpose of continuing our mission.”
    The man hated explaining himself. It showed clearly in his expression, which Daphanie watched as intently as she listened to his words. She couldn’t get over how a face could be simultaneously so blankly grim and yet so easy for her to read. Maybe it wasn’t really his expression she was reading, she decided. Maybe it was those changeable silver-gold eyes.
    “Oh, right. Daphanie mentioned the wings. I suppose that should have answered the human question, but I guess I’m a little unclear on exactly how you’re going to protect her. Or from what.”
    Daphanie saw a flicker of anger in Asher’s metallic eyes and reached out a hand as if she could grab Corinne and yank her back from the precipice. But Corinne was a reporter. She alternately scaled and leaped from precipices for a living.
    “I see Daphanie is not the only one who fails to take this seriously.”
    Corinne shrugged. “I guess I just don’t see what the big deal is. So she got into an argument with this D’Abo guy at the club. You broke it up, he said he wouldn’t hurt her, and everyone walked away. It sounds to me as if Daphanie was right in thinking you overreacted.”
    “Is that so?” Asher’s voice had turned silky. Somehow it made Daphanie wary, especially when he turned to her and arched one imperious brow. “Daphanie, you mentioned earlier that you had an odd, unsettling dream last night. Why don’t you tell us about it.”
    There wasn’t a hint of question in his tone; it was all polite command.
    “What does her dream have to do with—”
    Asher cut her off and gestured for Daphanie to go on. She wished he hadn’t. In fact, she wished she could forget the dream altogether. The coffee and conversation had all but wiped the last of the cobwebs from her mind. Just thinking about the dream made her feel somehow muddled again, as if the fog might begin to creep back with the memory.
    “It was just … weird,” she began reluctantly. “I’ve never had a dream like this before, where I really felt like I wasn’t myself. I mean, I’ve had dreams where I wasn’t really me. You know, where I was playing some other sort of character or in some nonsensical situation, but I’ve never had a dream before where I felt like I did in this one. I really felt like someone else, right down to my bones. The thoughts, the feelings, the way of looking at the world. They were all just … foreign. Not me at all.”
    She could see Corinne’s confused face out of the corner of her eye, and she could feel Asher’s gaze intent upon her, but she didn’t look at either of them. The minute she’d tried to remember, the dream had flooded back and filled her vision.
    “I don’t know who I was supposed to be. No one was talking in it, so it’s not like I heard someone call my name. And I didn’t actually see where it was. It was like I had my eyes closed, even in the dream. I could hear things, and smell things,