Shadow Touched (18 page)

Cam’s soup was too cold and too slick on his tongue for his taste. He watched the mages for any sign of assault, while his thoughts were with Ellie, wondering what the hell she was up to. But they were a team, and if she wanted to pick a fight after what had happened with Mathilde earlier, that was fine by him. They’d learned what they’d come for: there would be no peace between magekind and humanity, at least not with Martin House. All that was left was dealing with Slight.

The evening dragged on with each course, and when someone spoke, the dialogue was sly and threatening. Shadow roiled in their midst with each barb and thrust. Cam had heard that mages often fought among themselves. Now he witnessed the infighting and came to the easy conclusion that the atmosphere had to be ultimately divisive for the House.

But, as was becoming the norm in Cam’s life, Ellie was way ahead of him. She’d come to the same conclusion, had found a crack, and she took a pry bar to it after dinner was over. The trusted mages of Martin House, Mathilde and that Zander included, joined Gunnar in his office, while the others were left to their own devices.

After the room emptied and the outer hall as well, Ellie drew Cam toward the stairs. “Follow me.”

“Where?” Cam kept a low tone.

“I dunno yet,” Ellie answered, mischief in her eyes.

He understood. She was listening to her shadow.

Ellie went up the stairs. What signs her shadow tracked, Cam couldn’t guess. The wake of a person’s scent? A far-off footstep? A lingering trail of body heat in the air? Something visceral, though; the shadow did not track magic.

Ellie led him down a long, back hallway to a door. They entered without knocking. The room was a bedroom even smaller than their suite, dingier somehow, with heavier furniture and the menace of dark, haunted corners.

A woman was leaning forward to take off her shoes. She wore a black sheath of a dress, tied at her waist. She looked over her shoulder from a semicrouch, hand on a bare heel. Her narrow face had the look of a ferret—and Cam finally recognized her from dinner. She’d spoken little.

Her mouth twitched as she stood, shoulders a little high, defensive, but she wasn’t surprised. “We’re going to kill you.”

Cam closed the door behind him. “That so?”

There were worse fates than death. Worse things that could change a person.

Ellie let loose her shadow; the transparent form separated from her body and took a position even closer to the mage woman.

She recoiled ever so slightly, saying again, “They’re going to kill you.” But
they
this time, not
we.
Probably recognizing that her power was no match for the likes of Ellie’s shadow. That she wasn’t going to make it out of the room alive.

What a world.

Cam didn’t want to bully her. Didn’t want to scare her either, if he could help it. He wanted to hold on to what little humanity he had left; he barely recognized himself as it was. “We’re only interested in Slight.”

Her eyes went flat with disbelief.

“It’s the truth,” he said, his gaze flicking to Ellie, who’d walked to a side table with papers on it. Then he looked back at the mage woman to explain. “He killed a friend. I’m here to make sure he doesn’t kill anyone again.”

The mage woman’s gaze had shifted to Ellie.

“Willa?” Ellie said, reading from a page and looking up to see if the name matched.

Willa’s chin rose.

Ellie flashed a friendly smile, then quickly dropped it. “Slight came into our House and senselessly killed someone we loved. What’s the practice among your kind for that type of attack?”

Cam nodded.
Yes.

Willa’s eyes grew darker.

Cam followed Ellie’s point, and reiterated, “We’re not here for you or anyone of Martin House. Just for information on Slight.”

Willa’s expression went hard. “Why do you think
I’d
tell you anything? I won’t.”

Ellie shrugged. “My shadow says you will, and my shadow is never wrong.”

“This time she is,” Willa said. “I’m loyal to my House.”

Cam could imagine what would happen to House members if they weren’t loyal.

Ellie tugged at that explanation. “Slight isn’t House, though.”

That point had been covered well at dinner.

Ellie tugged harder. “Or is he?”

Willa’s jaw cocked to the side, lips skewing as if her mouth had gone sour. “Slight is a stray. I won’t help
humans.
”

Ellie smiled and followed the dodge. “Oh, come on. Wouldn’t it be . . . entertaining to watch the humans go after a stray? Who would really mind?”

The shadow leaned in, hissing, “Mathilde.”

Willa flushed. And Cam understood what the shadow had to have perceived at dinner: Mathilde, even just her name, brought a strong emotion to the surface within Willa.

He had to ask, “She your sister?”

No answer. Not even a flicker.

Probably not a sibling. The looks were off.

Cam tried again. “Is she involved with Slight?”

A bland look this time.

No, Mathilde Martin would not be romantically involved with someone as low as Slight. That cruel woman was no romantic, nor would she use him for sex. Maybe she had something going with Zander.

“Did she train Slight?” A more likely possibility.

Ellie chuckled. “Would kinda suck for Mathilde if her pupil was taken down by a human.”

Willa glanced at Ellie’s shadow. “That
thing
isn’t human.”

Cam looked at his sweetheart’s shadow too. “The shadow is quintessentially human, but that’s beside the point.
I
intend to fight Slight.” He gave a crooked smile. “I’ve been working out for over a year.”

Willa half snorted, half laughed. “He will butcher you. Slight’s been training from childhood.”

“At the Seminary?” Ellie asked, ever stubborn.

Thoughts swam in Willa’s black eyes, indecision and emotion tangling. But Cam figured they had her where they wanted her: Willa had no responsibility toward Slight, and if his defeat would indirectly tweak Mathilde . . .

“Who is he, anyway?” Ellie asked.

Willa made a face. “Who cares?”

Cam raised his hand in answer. “I do. Very much.” He’d like to know whom he was going to kill.

Willa shrugged. “Slight’s family used to live on the other side of the Martin wards, scrounging in the dirt and waiting for an opportunity to win favor. Something happened to his parents, I don’t know what, but he was still young. He fended for himself, though.” Willa’s jaw flexed, as if Slight were owed at least a little respect. “He survived and never crossed into the human world, not for food, not for anything.”

Cam was neither going to pity Slight his unhappy beginnings nor applaud his resolve. The man had become a killer. “What’s his relationship with Martin House?”

Willa smugly shook her head no. Looked like she wasn’t going to even mention her House. At least she was enjoying herself now.

Cam switched up his question. “Okay, then. What’s he want?”

Willa gave a halfhearted laugh. “A stray doesn’t exactly have a lot of options. He can indenture himself to a House and become a servant, but it’s a long way from there to any kind of decent status. Sometimes generations.
Or
a stray can win the attention of a House by a show of loyalty.”

Slight, as an orphaned child, must have been lonely, and here was Martin House, so rich and strong.

“And Mathilde?” Ellie put in.

Willa shrugged again. “Mathilde nothing.”

Ellie wouldn’t let go. Her shadow had to have pegged Mathilde. “He had to have learned to fight somewhere.”

Willa smiled. “Yes, he did.”

Ellie pulled again. “Can just any mage of a reputable House associate with a stray?”

“No,” Willa answered. “Business with strays must be put before the Council. Only a
high-born
mage would dare ignore the law.”

If Mathilde had shown an interest in Slight, had hinted at the possibility of acceptance, Slight would have done anything for her approval.

Cam couldn’t help thinking of Ellie, who also had been cut off from the world, orphaned, estranged from the human world, eeking out a life on her farm. She’d had every reason to let her shadow roam, to become a killer, but she’d chosen a different path.

“Would a House defend a stray?” Ellie asked.

“No,” Willa answered. “That would make them responsible for him.”

Cam concluded that Mathilde wouldn’t be able to do anything about their fight with Slight, but he’d bet she would go after the humans for her own—how had Ellie described it?—
entertainment.

Willa laughed at Ellie. “Besides, Slight doesn’t need Martin’s defense. Your man is going to die anyway.”

Ellie shrugged. “Then at least make the fight interesting.”

Cam almost coughed in surprise. This talion business was entertainment? Might as well place bets with dirty money as if they were all going to attend a dog fight—Martin’s mongrel against Segue’s good-with-kids lab.

Willa’s face twitched again as she considered. She’d already come around, realizing she’d be safe from her House, yet still able to play the game, get noticed, rise above this dingy back room, even if just for a moment. Be unexpected.

What had Mathilde done to her?

Willa licked her lower lip. Looking mean. “Watch out for the blade Slight carries.”

Cam was familiar with the kind of weapon Slight carried from their first encounter in Sedona: Steel infused with Shadow magic. Slight had lost that knife to him during that mission, and the knife had been taken to Segue. Apparently Slight had acquired another, and Cam could guess from whom: Mathilde. Or at the very least, Martin House.

“Wounds sustained by the knife will not heal,” Willa said. “It’ll carry out the intent of the one who wields it. So if Slight intends to kill”—she smiled now, laughing at them and enjoying herself—“any wound will eventually do the job.”

 

Ellie sat cross-legged in bed, the heavy gold silk covers nestled around her.

The truth of the matter was now painfully obvious. “Care to revise the plan?”

Willa’s explanation had cleared up a few matters: they’d had no chance whatsoever to save Marcie the night she was attacked. Yes, the femoral artery had been hit, a serious, life-threatening wound, but no amount of pressure would have stopped the bleeding. No extraordinary measures would have saved her. Slight had wanted Marcie dead.

And now the search of their belongings at the Martin gate-house made sense as well: the attendants had been looking for Slight’s lost knife, still under scrutiny at Segue. Of course, Martin could not allow it back into his House in the hands of humans. One lucky nick backed by a desire to kill . . .

Her shadow should fight Slight. No knife could even scrape shadow skin.

Cam reached for the bedside lamp, and the room went murky gray. Blackness clotted the corners and the furniture took on predatory shapes.

“Nope, the plan’s the same. I’m not going to flinch, Ellie,” he said in the dark next to her. His voice was muffled, so she knew he was taking off his T-shirt to sleep in only his pajama bottoms. “I’ve worked with my sight. It gives me a greater advantage than Slight’s weapon.”

“And if he uses a gun?”

Cam huffed, impatient. “Then, yes, your shadow is welcome to intercept any projectiles speeding in my direction. Happy?”

“Hmm,” she groused, which amounted to
No comment.
But she’d take what she could get.

She felt Cam’s hand on her shoulder, pulling her back toward the mattress, but there was no way she’d be able to sleep tonight in this house. She allowed her shadow to split from her and remain sitting up, alert for trouble, while her body collapsed back. This was going to be a long, restless night.

“No, Ellie, I want all of you.”

Her upright shadow turned toward Cam at the sound of the telltale gravel in his voice, and Ellie felt desire crackle through the remaining shadow-flesh connection at her hips. A delicious warmth pooled low in her belly. It was painful to keep her shadow from crawling on top of him.

But . . . a little sense, please.

Ellie took a minute to let the first hot throb dissipate, then turned as well. Her eyes were slow to adjust to the dark, but she could make out Cam’s steady gaze. “Here? You can’t be serious.”

“Big day tomorrow.” His earlier expression of resolve was gone, replaced by the ragged aspect of a man haunted. Cam simply saw too much now, and though he’d fixed his interest on her, she had to wonder what dark things flickered in and out of his vision in this terrible place.

“But—” She opened her eyes wide to communicate the relevant point that they weren’t exactly staying in a hotel room on vacation.

“Ellie.” Her name came from deep in his chest, but it wasn’t just made of lust—though that’s what had her shadow responding. The
reasonable
part of her could perceive a fault line running through him: familiar Cam and something . . . darker.

She put away her arguments.

Something was off, way off, with Cam and maybe had been for a while. The realization shocked her now, even though she’d seen it coming.

She nodded yes in the dark, sure that Cam could see her agreement.
Yes. Always. Whatever you want.
She pulled her shadow into full union—no parts tonight—and braced against the hot, golden rush of arousal that coursed through her, wondering at the strange combination of worry and lust.

The room was quiet around the bed, a still sea of Shadow, but when Cam slowly flipped her on her back, bracing himself above her, his legs trapping hers, she had the sudden awareness of an impending danger breaking behind him on a not too distant horizon line. The wall of his chest was a barrier between her and the vast uncertainty of the future, from which he sought to protect her. But more frightening still was the potential for darkness in his eyes, Shadow filling her sweet scientist . . . And for a blink, a fraction of an in-drawn breath, he seemed almost a stranger.