First Destroy All Giant Monsters (The World Wide Witches Research Association) (3 page)

Her stomach clenched, irritated by the firing as well as several gallons of coffee she’d drunk over the last few hours. She couldn’t wait to get to her apartment, although she’d likely not be able to sleep anytime in the next week – not until the caffeine level dropped.

Sometime next week was her current estimate.

The narrow elevator rumbled to a halt and the doors opened with as much enthusiasm as Amber felt watching them. Settling her handbag securely on her shoulder she stumbled over the uneven floor out into the corridor just as her personal protections gave her a hard shove.

Danger.

There was someone there! Near!

Amber almost dropped her burden. There was someone just down the corridor, just out of sight. She shifted her box onto one hip and stabbed her hand into her coat pocket drawing out a thin, longer than normal, sandalwood fan. She held her breath, listening to the building. Letting a tendril of her attention reach out.

Was she perceiving the sleeping minds occupying the building or … ?

“What time is this to be coming home?” demanded a voice from her right. Before he finished the sentence, before the box falling from her hands reached the floor, Amber had her fan pointed at his neck. In the dim light of the corridor her hand and the fan glowed a faint blue.

“Well?” the shadow inquired in the same scathing tone, all the while keeping his eyes focused on the fan under his chin with the same caution one would offer a rattling snake.

Amber paused, her breath hissing out. The tension fled her body and the glow surrounding her hand faded, but didn’t disappear entirely.

“Smoke, what the hell? Do you want to
die
?”

“Is that a serious question?” inquired Smoke with deadly calm.

Amber shrugged and turned her attention to the box lying on its side. “I swear, if anything broke I will take it out of your hide,” she said.

Before she could stand up Smoke had her by the hair and pulled her head back, his hand coming round to grasp her by the neck.

“And you? Do you want to die? Turning your back on me? Not checking if I’m real?”

Amber kicked back with one leg and turned, throwing Smoke to the floor. Smoke was no lightweight despite his size and she was convinced the only reason she’d pulled off that throw was that he’d let her. Grumbling to herself she grabbed the box and went to her apartment door.

“I’d’ve known if you weren’t Smoke,” she snarled. “Nothing else in this universe could be you.”

The way she said it made it sound like a deadly insult, but Smoke only grunted and dusted himself off. Amber struck the sides of the door with her fan, then the top and bottom. A faint blue outline of a star hovered over the door for an instant, then faded away. Amber pushed the unlocked door open with her shoulder and went in. She didn’t invite Smoke in, it would be redundant and pointless to try and prevent it; after all, Smoke had been part of the team to set the wards on her apartment. He trailed along behind her, muttering under his breath.

Inside the apartment was a bare small box. The main door opened into a corridor with two doorways containing no actual doors. Doors just made New York apartments feel even smaller. One doorway opened onto her just-big-enough-for-one-skinny-adult kitchen, the other onto her combination living room and bedroom. The only other door in the whole apartment concealed the toilet and shower.

Amber turned into the kitchen and put the box on the small prep area. The scratch and tinkle of glass reached both their ears, although in Smoke’s case it didn’t have to travel that far.

“Anything irreplaceable in that?” he asked.

“A few awards, some software books, coffee cups,” said Amber. “Two laptops, a stack of CDs. Memory sticks … no, they confiscated them.”

“Laptops? Ah, Amber, I’m sorry.”

“You will be if anything important is lost.”

Amber kicked off her shoes and wiggled her tired toes into the carpet. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d relaxed. The last weeks were a perfect slice of corporate hell and her nerves were completely shot. If she hadn’t been so tired she would have detected her cousin from a city block away. Smoke’s presence usually rang fire engine bells in the Ether even when he was calm. When he was flaming mad, it was like standing next to a cyclone in a wind-chime factory; and yet she’d been so caught up in her own problems that she’d almost walked over him.

Not a healthy sign.

Actually – she concentrated and frowned – she could barely hear Smoke and he was standing a few feet away. Maybe it was exhaustion. Her protections should have warned her that someone was waiting near the elevator at her floor when she’d pressed the button down on the ground floor. She should have known Smoke was in the city.

Should have.

Last year, would have.

She’d stopped celebrating the Sabbats last year after a particularly horrible visit home. No magic, no rituals, and to be fair, no phone calls to her mother, either. She could think only that Aunt Lucinda had called her cell deliberately when she was sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner just to remind Amber’s father of her existence.

Damn her.

Amber eventually left her parents’ home without eating anything. Hadn’t spoken to either side of the family since.

She considered sending some energy to her protections – you didn’t survive in NYC if you didn’t pay attention – but didn’t have any to spare. Caffeine did not supply what ritual required.

Later, when she’d recovered from being fired, recovered from the caffeine, she’d do a ritual of protection. Reinforce her apartment and personal wards. Yes. She couldn’t let anger at her family make her put herself at risk.

Yes, she had a plan.

She stretched her arms over her head and ruffled her brown hair out of its corporate approved hairstyle, releasing it to pour down her back. Her cousin remained just inside the door, watching the box and her with suspicion.

“Take it easy, Smoke. I put a protection on the computers when I bought them; they’ll be fine,” she said and laughed when he visibly relaxed. “So, what brings you here at this hour?”

She poured filtered water into her electric kettle and started shuffling through her collection of teas. At this hour of the morning, and with her current level of caffeination, decaf would be sensible. In fact … she reached into the medicinal cupboard and brought out a rarely used package. Smoke sniffed the air twice when she dropped it into a cup.

“Kava! Good idea. You’ll need it. Same for me.”

Amber shot a glance toward him but said nothing. Instead she added a great deal of honey to two cups – Kava might be good for your mental health, but Elementals, it tasted foul – and waited for the water to heat.

Smoke folded his arms across his chest and enunciated carefully. “Where have you been till this hour?”

She braced both hands on the counter and her head hung down. Her body was tired. Her feet ached and she just wanted to curl up and pull the blankets over her head for a few … years. She’d never been fired before. It hurt. Smoke cleared his throat at the same time that the kettle hissed and clicked off.

“Gee, Dad,” said Amber. “Did I break curfew?”

There was a low growl.

“When was the last time you checked your phone messages?” continued Smoke in the same hard tone. “Your email? I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for weeks. Weeks! What’s the point of all this technology that you love if you don’t check for messages?”

Amber sighed. “Smoke, I …”

“I’m not interested in excuses. You …” Smoke turned to start pacing the room and almost fell over a heavy box beside the door. He snatched the topmost book out of the box and weighed it in his hand. “A little light reading, is it? There are ancient grimoires waiting for you to review, scan, and put on the website, piles of records to be processed, and you spend your time with what …?”

Amber poured the steaming water over the teabags and turned away looking for a painkiller for the headache she could feel building.

“What could we possibly need with ‘‘Bioinformatics Statistics’’?” demanded Smoke. “What does that mean, anyway?”

Amber took a tentative sip of her tea and winced.

“I have no idea,” she told him.

“These aren’t yours?”

“It wasn’t my idea,” said Amber. “They just … arrived. My father sent them.”

“Your father’s an asshole, just so you know.”

“I am aware,” replied Amber calmly and handed him the second cup.

“So … you’re going back to school?”

“Not as far as I know. Dad … Dad thinks that in this economy I might as well spend the recession getting another degree. A back up qualification. And when he hears about tonight he’ll feel vindicated.”

“You lost your job?”

“Yeah. Tonight.” Amber considered sharing her tale of woe and outrage, but Smoke’s response did not encourage confidences.

“Excellent,” gloated Smoke, rubbing his hands together. “The Elementals are taking a hand. The timing couldn’t be better. We need you to come to Five Corners.”

“Your needs and my dad’s needs can both go to hell, together,” said Amber. “Dancing hand in hand. To a trio of Demonic Fiddlers. Right now I need sleep and a new job.”

“We’ll hire you. Five Corners needs a computer dweeb and a witch. Name your price!”

“Fuck you and your job.”

“Is that anything to say to a relative?”

“
Your
uncle married
my
aunt. If we’re family it is only through Grandmother Eve!”

“Not me,” said Smoke with his first grin of the day. “I never met the woman.”

“Listen, Smoke. I don’t want to live the life Lucinda’s chosen for me and I absolutely do not want the one my dad has in mind. I’ve made my choice; this is it. I am a software engineer specializing in the financial industry. Very well paid and happy.”

Smoke glanced around the apartment that was smaller than the entryway of Five Corners farmhouse and snorted.

“Yes, I can see that you’ve chosen well, my
Paduan
. However, we’ve gone beyond choices right now all the way to
need!
”

Amber took another sip of the foul tasting herbal tea.

“Okay,” she said, wincing. “I
need
you to go away.”

“And I need you to find Aunt Lucinda and Robyn!”

Amber tilted her head just enough to catch sight of Smoke out of the corner of her eye. She tried to summon the strength to examine his aura, but the effort only intensified her headache.

“What is this? Some sort of hero’s journey set-up?”

“Hero’s journey? What do you take me for?” demanded Smoke. “I am no one’s Dwarven Hench-person! We have a real situation. Lucinda and Robyn went away for a weekend. One weekend, they said and they haven’t come back.”

“So? As I remember it, they love each other. So what if they take a little time off together?”

“Eight weeks ago!”

Now Amber turned to face him fully.

“Say again?”

“They left the farm for a romantic weekend away and didn’t come back. No phone calls, no faxes, no emails, no smoke signals. Nothing. I’ve heard from them even less than I’ve heard from you. At least I can track you updating the website! I know you’re still alive! I can’t track them!”

“
A three hour tour. A three hour tour
,” sang Amber, relaxing. “Nice set-up, Smoke. I don’t know how Lucinda found out I was going to get fired today, although I wish she’d warned me.” Amber blushed, realizing that since she was hiding from her family, even if Lucinda had tried to warn her, the message wouldn’t have gotten through. “I am not going to play Cluedo with her. I just got fired during one of the worst economies in a century. I have a resume to update and a job hunt to start.”

“All I can say about your job is, about time, too. You were not born to play with electronics. You’re a witch, Amber. You shouldn’t be ashamed of that!

“Who’s ashamed? I just prefer computers to magic. Consider it a lifestyle choice.”

“Lifestyle? You baby. I should thump you.”

Amber opened one eye and gave him a narrow look. “Well, gee, thanks for your sympathy. I’ve spent the last month trying to show the powers-that-be down in corporate that my team and I should be the ones kept on after the merger. They picked tonight to tell us that ‘thanks, but no thanks,’ they’re going with the other guys.”

Smoke stuck his fists on his hips and glared up at her. “You’ve wasted enough time sucking up to the wrong powers-that-be. Time and beyond for you to get back to your real job. Where your real talents lie.”

Amber continued to try and work the knots out of her back and neck and barely noticed when Smoke stalked off to grab his satchel from beside the door. He pulled out a time darkened scroll and dropped it on the table in front of her.

“Amber Kemp, daughter of Jane, daughter of Lisa, daughter of Christine, last of the daughters of Molly Greson, you’ve been chosen to stand as the guardian of Five Corners.”

Amber’s hands froze, her heart missed several beats, and she stared at the paper in front of her as if expecting it to bite or burst into flame. When she raised her eyes to his she saw the lines pain and grief had drawn across his face.

“Smoke? What’s happened?” she cried. “Where’s Aunt Lucinda?”

“I told you. She’s missing.”

“It’s real?”

“As death.”

“I can’t believe it. Aunt Lucinda – nothing can hurt her. She’s the most powerful witch I’ve ever met. She’s more powerful than …”

“Well, she met something more powerful, obviously,” interrupted Smoke. “She would’ve come home if she could. We don’t know what happened, but we do know that the responsibilities are not being met. That’s why we have to have you.”

“Me? But there are at least, heck, six members of the governing committee of the WWWRAPC more qualified than me.”

She lifted the scroll and tucked it back into Smoke’s satchel. She knew what it said. She’d studied the language, everyone in her family had, even her talentless brother had learned it – although if their father ever found out, well, it would be hell on earth for both of them. She knew what it said and wanted absolutely nothing to do with the responsibilities outlined within.