Slip Song (Devany Miller Series) (9 page)

Jasper next. Hopefully he wouldn’t mind bunking with a drunk witch.

He was awake, of course, and more than willing to sneak downstairs to the basement. Listening solemnly to my brief update―I’d told him my story after all―he vowed to protect her at all costs.

“No. Don’t pop a vessel. Just keep an eye on her.”

He nodded but I could see the vowing going on behind his closed lips. I heaved a sigh then gave up. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

“Of course, Mistress.” His mouth quirked. “Devany.”

“
Mm hm. I’ll bring you food down later when I have the chance. And I’m going to tell the kids about you all. I just haven’t figured out who you are yet.”

“
Friends.”

I nodded slowly. He might just be a friend. Arsinua too, though she seemed bitter at the moment. “Came in late last night for the funeral. I like it.” I left him down there to guard and protect as I went upstairs to start my day. Thank goodness for the heart or I would’ve been dead on my feet. My steps slowed as a sharp tug hit me in the gut. Then another. I put my hand on my stomach. What the hell?

When the sensation didn’t return, I put it on my mental holy-fuck-what-now list and shoved it to the back burner. Needing not to think about things for a while, I started breakfast, making dough to make homemade pastries with scrambled eggs and bacon. The phone call so early took me by surprise. The caller ID didn’t register a number. “Hello?”

“
Don’t you answer when I call?”

I pulled the phone away from my head to stare at it as if it would tell me why I was getting a telephone call from Tytan. “What the hell?”

“I tried to let you know Arsinua popped up on my radar.”

I plopped a spoonful of sour cream into the scrambled eggs I was pushing around in the pan. “You’re calling me on the phone.”

“Apparently so.”

“
From the Slip?”

“
No. Of course not. The tugging was me pulling Source through you to get here. Took a public hook and now I’m somewhere in the zoo.”

I snorted, trying to picture Tytan at the zoo. He’d probably terrify the animals. “Why not just come here?”

“I’m being watched. Using a permanent hook let me leave without attracting much attention.” I heard a roar in the background and Tytan muttered something along the lines of ‘my what big teeth you have.’

“
Who?” As if I didn’t know.

“
Your own spawn. You need to do something about the barriers and soon. They’re giving way faster than that little bloodless football let on.”

“
Shit.”

“
They’re gathering. And they think I’m feeding you information so none of them are too happy with me.”

“
You are feeding me information.” I pulled the eggs off the heat while they were still a little soft. They’d cook more in the pastry and I didn’t want them rubbery.

“
Yes. I know.” His words were amused but clipped, as if he were talking to a dummy.

Maybe I was a dummy, because I didn’t get why he was helping me still. Oh, he’d told me his reasons but damned if I didn’t trust him, either. “I’ll try to get away after the funeral.” I thought of Jasper and Arsinua in my basement. “Where did you find her?”

“I haven’t. Yet. But I know her magical signature appeared on Earth then vanished again. Weird, that.”

“
Very weird.” In jail, Arsinua had been hidden. Now she was hidden again by being near me? Or Jasper? Or both. “Well, keep up the hunt. I need her.” I tried to keep my voice light to hide the lie in it. Why wasn’t I telling him where Arsinua was, anyway? I’d asked him to find her, after all.

“
Everything all right? Maybe I need to come see you.” His voice dropped to that low, seductive sound that made my toes curl. I dropped my spatula and cursed. He laughed.

“
Stop that.”

“
Maybe I need to do more than just look at you.”

“
In your dreams.” And in some of mine. But dreams weren’t real and I could indulge in the privacy of my own imagination without giving into temptation. “Keep looking for her. And Marantha too.”

“
Not too bad, for a witch. What do you need her for?”

“
She might be easier to find than Arsinua,” I said, avoiding the question.

“
Mm. My clever little mistress has something up her sleeves.”

The way he said mistress sounded nothing like the the deferential tones Jasper used.  When Tytan said it, images of me in black leather and him naked on my bed intruded. My fingers tightened on the phone. “So. Is there a way to mitigate the time difference between here and Midia? I don’t know how long it will take me to figure out how to replace the barriers.” I stopped myself from saying ‘in the swamp’ in time. He didn’t know the souls were in the swamp. And I didn’t trust him, I reminded myself.

“Not that I know of. Then again, I’ve never been concerned with the time difference. I’ll ask around.”

“
Thank you.”

“
You thought of me naked.”

My mouth went dry. “Stay out of my head.”

“I like that you think about me naked.”

“
I said--” but the phone was dead. Growling, I slapped in onto its base and then took the rolling pin to the pastry. Poor dough didn’t know what it did to deserve the harsh punishment but when the pastries were made I almost felt okay. Except for the strange flush on my skin I tried to ignore away.

The phone rang again while I was wrapping and bagging the extra pastries. This time the caller ID told me it was the police. My heart fluttered in my chest as I answered it. They were releasing Tom’s body. I leaned against the counter and squeezed my eyes shut. I told them the funeral home we’d decided on, Tom and I, five years back. We’d made an appointment and toured it, giggling to keep ourselves from thinking too seriously that we would need the place any time soon.

Little did we know.

My breath caught in my throat and I bit my lip hard to keep the pain from overwhelming me. “Thank you.”

“We’re still looking for the people who did this, Mrs. Miller.” The police woman, the one who had been so kind that day, said a few more things I couldn’t quite remember and we hung up.

I called the funeral home next even though the police said they would arrange the pick up. I wanted to know how soon we could have the funeral. I glanced at the calendar with tired eyes as the man on the other end mulled over the dates. We finally settled on Wednesday, only two days away. Tom’s siblings would have time to get here. His mom and dad were already playing host to his brother. Ann was here. My brother said he’d try to make it and I figured I’d get a text from him sometime in the middle of the night asking me to pick him up from the airport.

Everyone but my dad but I’d left a message for him at the little general store he shopped at. The clerk told me they’d hardly had any snowfall this year: a mere three feet. “He ought to be down here Monday. Likes to come down and talk about that book he’s writing.”

I blinked. My dad was writing a book? Since when? I thanked the clerk without asking about Dad’s writing. I’d ask Dad when he finally called.

With the pastries ready to heat up, I rummaged through the fridge for food. I’d finally figured out using the heart made me ravenous. The past few weeks it had lain dormant inside me, I hadn’t felt the need to overindulge but now that I was back in the hook-forming business, my metabolism kicked into high gear.

I realized as I ate I hadn’t done anything about the missing people. About the Theleoni. Yeah, I’d found Arsinua, but there was no telling how long it would take to sober her up. I didn’t think it would take much to convince her to help me. Stopping the Theleoni had been the reason she’d gotten mixed up with the Skriven in the beginning and the reason why there was now a magical heart sitting in my guts. Or chest. Or wherever, however it was inside me.

I bent to pick up a bit of meat that had fallen off my spoon. When I did something shifted within me, moving under my skin and making my head spin so hard I toppled over, whacking my elbow on the corner of the island. I rolled onto my back, swearing in a whisper as I clutched my arm. “What the hell?”  My whole body felt odd, as if someone had taken my skin off, stretched it, shrunk it, then put it back on me again. I rubbed at my cheeks, both my palms and the skin on my face tingly and numb.

A soft voice echoed through my mind. “Tom?”

There wasn’t an answer. The tingles faded. Then it was just me laying on the kitchen floor staring up at the popcorn ceiling. Was Tom trying to communicate with me? Some side effect of being an Originator?

Whatever it was, I didn’t like it. I pushed myself off the floor, easing myself to my feet, being careful until I knew the weirdness wouldn’t come back. It didn’t. For now.

Would it return? Was it Tom? Amara told me his soul would eventually force its way out of me. I laid a hand on my chest and took a deep breath. Not now, Tom. Stay put. I’ll figure out the best thing. I promise.

I just hoped to hell I could keep that promise.

-NINE-

“
Why did you bring me here?” Arsinua said, glaring at me over her coffee. We were sitting around the table, Arsinua, Jasper, and I after abbreviated introductions had been made and the kids were doing their own things in their rooms. Ann was in the living room in a circle, meditating. I could hear her soft singing as we talked. “They will be certain I’m associating with Skriven.”

“
Technically you are.” I’d filled her in on my excursion to the Slip, not that she seemed interested. “I need your help learning how to use the magic. With you gone I really suck. I couldn’t do anything to save Tom.” A strange pulling sensation rose in me again. I wondered if it was Tytan calling or Tom trying to wrest his way free. Whatever it was, it helped take my mind off the choking grief that still threatened to overwhelm me every time I thought about his murder.

“
I’m sorry.” She rubbed her face, looking weary and much older than I’d ever seen her. “I could teach you but it could take years for you to become adept.”

“
I don’t have years. The Theleoni are stealing people. A lot of people. I have to make a bargain with the fleshcrawler queen too. Not sure if I’ll need magic but if I do, I won’t be able to just bully my way through. I need a shortcut. Something to help me get better sooner rather than later.”

She was shaking her head before I’d even finished. “It’s complicated.”

“I can make a hook. If I concentrate. And I’m better at it in the Slip. Could we go there for you to teach me?”

A shudder. She’d overcome her fears of the Slip once to help me kill Ravana so I didn’t give up all hope that I couldn’t convince her to do it again. “You can make a hook because the heart is a hook and it burned the right pathways into your brain. Everything thing else takes set-up. I’m fast because I’ve practiced thousands of times over the years and have created my own shorthand.”

“It wasn’t all you. I blasted that Adamante asshole who was torturing Zech.”

“
And you almost killed yourself in the bargain. I still don’t know how you did that, beyond tapping the heart and letting it fuel itself on your life energy.”

I shoved back from the table before I started banging my fists on it. Separating myself from her seemed a better option, so I rounded the island and put my mug in the sink. “How about one or two moves? One offensive and one defensive?”

“It’s not a matter of teaching one skill. You wouldn’t just up and learn to play two songs on a musical instrument, at least not easily or well. You’d start by learning scales and simple songs, building up your muscle memory and your knowledge of the structure and sense of the music before you moved on to complicated songs. Magic is the same way. You need to learn the basics.”

“
Then teach me the damned basics,” I said, the words forced through my gritted teeth. Arsinua’s glare made me realize I’d raised my voice.

Jasper rose from the table in one fluid movement. Light flashed in his hand and when he opened his fingers, a shining flower glimmered in his palm. “Perhaps between the two of us, we can teach you a concerto.”

Arsinua stared. “How are you able to create magic here without a lodestone?”

He nodded toward me. “Mistress … Devany allows me the use of her power.”

Her lips parted.

“
I don’t allow. I just let.” Realizing that meant the same thing, I waved my hand. “Never mind.” To Jasper, I asked, “Can you help teach me any faster?”

“
No. But your education will be more complete with two teachers instead of one.” His grey eyes glinted in the light streaming in from the window over the sink. It just wasn’t right for a guy to be so pretty. I looked away before I started to drool.