Free Devotion by Kristie Cook

Otherworld. This place–the mansion and the whole island–is practically sacred."
    We turned off the main path and down a narrower one through the trees that led to a short, stout building. The two-story stone structure was a miniature replica of the huge mansion, bigger than Mom's cottage in Cape Heron had been, but smaller than our beach house in the Keys. The wooden door stood ajar.
    Tristan led me into a room that took up nearly the whole building. The walls and hardwood floor were bare and a grid of wooden beams stretched overhead where a second floor would have been, with the roof far above the beams. The grid was multi-dimensional–the beams weren't level with each other but set at different heights. Sunrays streamed in through open skylights and created an interesting pattern of shadows on the floor.
    "I'm in here," Charlotte called from our right.
    We followed her voice into a small area near the door and my jaw dropped. Weapons of every kind imaginable except firepower lined the walls and floor–short knives, daggers, curved sabers, long swords, stars, chains, axes and other things I had no names for.
    "No guns?" I asked, trying to hide my bewilderment.
     "Guns are pretty useless in our world," Charlotte said. Instead of the leather of yesterday, she wore a tight black tank, black spandex pants and black boots, and her blond hair was pulled into a ponytail. And she was still intimidating. "Unless you're were-hunting, which is outlawed for the Amadis. Remember: our goal is not to kill unless there is no hope or if it's absolutely necessary to protect yourself or someone else."
    Her blue eyes traveled up and down my body as though sizing me up, and then she wrote something on a clipboard.
    "These are practice weapons," she said, casually waving her hand in the air. "Sophia put me in charge of training you. We'll figure out your strengths before deciding on your weapon of choice."
    Ah. Charlotte wanted to train me. This was one of her rewards for Mom dragging her onto the council .
    "But we have powers. Are they not enough?"
    "You always want choices," Charlotte said matter-of-factly.
    "Especially with vamps. They're nearly impossible to kill," Tristan added.
    I regarded the weapons, intimidated by the number and variety. The idea of actually using them, practice or not, made my stomach lurch. I hated fighting. I hated watching it and I sure as hell hated doing it. I'd already had enough violence in the last week with Vanessa and Tristan and wished I'd never have to fight again.
    But I had to be logical, and I knew those weren't my only battles. Apparently, everyone thought I needed to improve my skills, which I couldn't disagree with, although I could think of other training I'd prefer to be doing. Like with my telepathy. Now that I'd decided I wanted to learn how to use it, I was anxious to begin my lessons with Rina.
    "So where do we start?" I asked, wanting to get this over with.
    Charlotte eyed me again and wrote something on her pad. "We start with hand-to-hand combat."
    She flicked her hand and pointed us toward the main space. What had been a bare room only a few minutes ago now held various sized punching bags on stands and hanging from the beams. I glanced down at the sundress and Mom's borrowed cardigan I wore.
    "Mom could have warned me," I muttered. "I don't have many clothes that fit, but I do have running wear."
    "No worries. You both have training clothes in there." Charlotte pointed to a doorway next to the weapons area. "And you should have new clothes in your suite by the end of the day, by the way."
    Tristan and I changed together in the little room that contained only a bench with two piles of clothes on it. I held up a black sports bra and black spandex pants–the only clothes for me–and nearly groaned, until I remembered my new body. Tristan had been given nothing but a pair of loose black pants. With his hair pulled back in a ponytail, he looked as though he belonged in a martial-arts