Trinkets, Treasures, and Other Bloody Magic (21 page)

Blackwell touched his amulet lightly through the fabric of his shirt, then let his hand drop to his side. “It is one of my most precious possessions.”

“I imagine the maker thought so as well.”

He smiled, though the gesture was tight on his face. I’d upset his plans somehow. “You cannot feel the age of an object? The maker must be long passed. No one lives this many centuries.”

“Except vampires, of course.”

Blackwell scanned the crowd again. “Where is your … mentor? Protector? His reputation also precedes him.”

I knew Kett was also called ‘the executioner.’ I imagined it was this that Blackwell referred to.

“I don’t like Hoyt at all,” I said. No point in beating around the bush about it — we both knew where Blackwell had gotten his most recent information. How he’d heard about my dowsing abilities in the first place was another matter. A board member from the witches Convocation was the most likely source. After the tribunal, perhaps. “His magic tastes … dull.”

“Is that the worst thing you can say about him? You didn’t get to know him at all, I see.”

I shrugged and picked up the pace of my dancing. Conversation was boring when there was music underneath the stars.

Blackwell leaned closer. “Your magic is delightfully intriguing.”

I laughed. “Get in line, sorcerer. I think you’ll find it a bit long, though.”

Blackwell didn’t smile. I had a feeling I was nothing like he’d expected.

“I would speak to you alone.”

“Not tonight,” I answered, easy and kind about it. He wasn’t my type, though I’m sure many would swoon for the accent. Plus, I had Mory with me, who had just folded her fingers into mine behind my back.

I could feel that the fledgling had stopped dancing, and by the way Blackwell was now looking over my shoulder, that she was staring at the sorcerer.

He frowned. I wondered if sorcerers could identify Adepts but not their brand of magic? He tipped his head to bid me goodnight and turned away into the crowd.

Mory pressed to me, practically clinging as she stared at Blackwell’s retreating back.

“What is it?” I whispered to her.

“Shades,” she said. “He’s … surrounded by shades.”

“Did they notice you?”

Mory shook her head, but I could feel how scared she was by the way she gripped me.

I sought for Kandy in the crowd and noticed her trailing after Blackwell already. Smart wolf.

I tucked Mory to my side and pulled her in the opposite direction, toward the edge of the crowd and then out onto the grass of the park.

“How many shades?” I asked the scared teenager. She was cranking her head back in the direction Blackwell had walked. I couldn’t see him or Kandy’s green hair.

Mory shook her head, stumbling over her own feet, and finally answered, “Too many to count.”

Jesus. Why would shades follow a person — a sorcerer — around? Because he’d killed them? If so, why or how could they remain solid enough to follow him?

“Shades, not ghosts? Not spectral energy like … like Rusty?”

Mory shook her head again. I pulled her across the grass to the river walk. I was moving as quickly as I could toward Desmond’s, hoping I could find a cab, but then realized I didn’t know the exact address. Kandy would find us. She could track my magic … though probably not if we drove around in a cab randomly looking for McGrowly’s house.

“Do Kett or Desmond have shades around them?” I asked, knowing they both must have killed people, intentionally or otherwise. Kett to feed, or for his job. Desmond in his rise to alpha, or exercising the duties of his position.

“No. The vampire is different … he has a darkness. A shadow within him. But the werewolf, no.”

I didn’t correct her on calling Desmond a werewolf.

“And me? Mory, do you see a shade around me?” I asked, not sure if I was hoping she did or not. Knowing that the only thing that could be haunting me would be Sienna.

Mory shook her head, and I dropped the interrogation.

“Is this the way we came?” Mory asked. It was the first thing she’d said in ten minutes. Blackwell’s shades had really scared her.

I’d just been wondering the same thing. We’d reached the end of the park, and crossed by the hotel that Lara had checked us into. I’d thought about grabbing a cab there and texting my mother or Kett for Desmond’s address. Except — if he caught wind of it — I was pretty sure McGrowly would over-react and disrupt the jazz festival with a dozen werewolves in full hunting mode. So then, giving Kandy a few more minutes to catch up to us, I’d cut up a road that I thought would eventually lead to Desmond’s residential area on the hill. Except I might have cut up too soon, because we still seemed to be in the city. An oddly unpopulated city. Everyone was at the festival.

“Sure,” I answered. “A short cut, maybe.” I tried turning left again. I knew Desmond lived vaguely left, but I couldn’t get a clear view of the hillside through the tall, night-shrouded buildings. Even the stars seemed farther away here. The streets were angled, one-way only, and the grid of the city was confusing.

“Maybe a short cut?” Mory mocked. I stifled my smile. I liked the mouthy teenager better than the scared fledgling necromancer, but I didn’t want her to think I was laughing at her.

“You can’t be lost if you know where you want to go, right?”

“Not being able to get there is the actual definition of lost, Jade.”

I laughed and fished my phone out of my evening purse. No texts or missed calls appeared on the screen. I was going to have to break down and call someone to pick us up if Kandy didn’t catch up to us soon.

But seriously, I’d never seen a city so quiet before. Even the homeless had left their cardboard huts and shopping carts.

∞

I didn’t like the feeling of the magic we were moving toward — a dark, oily patch that had manifested ahead. I left the sidewalk, and cut right up the next alley to avoid it. It was past time to loop back to the park. We could grab a taxi at the hotel. If we picked up the pace, we were maybe only five minutes away. I pulled out my phone and texted Kandy to tell her we were heading back to the hotel.
 

Here, farther away from the riverside jazz festival, a few street people slumbered tucked against the building walls and behind dumpsters. None of them did more than stir as we passed. I seriously thought about pulling out my knife, which I’d rigged up on my right thigh beneath my skirt so it didn’t invisibly crush the silk. However, wandering around downtown Portland with an eight-inch blade seemed like a super stupid idea. Plus, I didn’t want to freak Mory out any further than she already was.

“Jade,” Mory moaned. Too late. The fledgling necromancer’s eyes were darting all around the alley.

“More shades?”

Mory nodded and bit her lip.

“Do they see you?”

“Not yet, I’m … I don’t shine as brightly as my mom yet. And they are pretty entrenched. But they look …” Mory shuddered instead of finishing her sentence. I got the gist.
 

Off to my left, beyond the building that backed onto the alley, the oily patch of magic was shifting or growing. I wasn’t sure it had anything to do with us yet, but I was starting to wonder if I could run as fast as I had in the forest with Mory piggyback. She was awfully tiny, probably not topping ninety pounds. Still, I hadn’t ever tried to pick up anything remotely that heavy before.

I reached up, unwound my necklace, and pulled it off over my head. The feeling of the oily magic and Mory’s fledgling magic intensified. I compensated and it dulled, though not to the low level it had been simmering at before.

“Here. Wear this,” I said as I stopped to loop the necklace over Mory’s head. It looked way too big and chunky on her, even after I looped it a third time.

“This … isn’t this … yours? I mean, it feels like it belongs to you.”

That was an interesting observation coming out of a necromancer’s mouth. I didn’t question her, though, because I could feel something rapidly approaching.

Something magic — a curse, by the taste of it — glimmered behind me and I stepped to the side, pulling Mory with me. The curse hit the dumpster behind us and actually rattled it.

“Nice dodge, witch.” Hoyt attempted to affect a drawl but his voice was too reedy and weak to pull it off.

I ignored him and asked Mory, “Do you have your cell phone?”

Mory nodded.

“Check to see if Kandy programed her number in it.”

I didn’t take my eyes off Hoyt as he stepped around the corner of the building at the mouth of the alley. I couldn’t tell if he’d been following us or coming from the direction of the oily magic. Hoyt was rolling something silver in his hand. I didn’t like the fact that silver made it seem like he was armed for werewolf.

“She did,” Mory said.

“Dial the number and run by Hoyt. Back the way we came. Stay on the same streets we walked. Do you understand?”

“Jade, I don’t think my phone works here. In Portland.”

“That’s a pretty valuable trinket you’re wearing, little one.” Hoyt stopped about ten feet away, which was probably the exact distance he needed to accurately throw his curses wrapped in silver. Yeah, I could feel the magic within those silver ball bearings now. He had no idea what species of Adept Mory was. He might think she was a werewolf, and that would be bad, because silver-coated or not, Mory couldn’t take the same level of curse that a werewolf could.
 

My phone started to ring.

Hoyt threw a curse.

I flipped my skirt up, drew my knife, and slashed the curse out of the air. Hoyt’s eyes widened. To him, the knife would have appeared out of thin air and cut through his magic like it was softened butter.

Mory spun, circled around behind me, and ran for the mouth of the alley. Hoyt threw two curses at once — a silver ball at me and a self-generated one at Mory. Great, he could cast two handed.

I slashed the curse meant for me and charged toward Hoyt. The second curse hit Mory. She grunted but kept running, slightly ahead of me. The necklace did its job brilliantly. Hoyt reached for Mory as she dodged around him. His fingers brushed through her hair, but I was faster than he anticipated. He took my kick straight to his gut without warning. I wanted to stab him, but something held me back. Respect for life, maybe. I was after all the ‘Cupcake Witch’ according to Mory and her friends.

Hoyt flew back into a pile of cardboard boxes. Thankfully, the resident of the boxes wasn’t at home.

Mory faltered at the mouth of the alley.

“Go,” I yelled at her. “Keep calling Kandy if she doesn’t pick up. Keep to the same streets we’ve already walked. I’m right behind you.”

Mory nodded and ran. I pushed the image of her scared face out of my mind and stalked toward Hoyt.

The spellcurser was struggling to his knees, clutching his lower ribs. “Fuck,” he gasped. “I think you might have smashed my liver.”

“Likely,” I said. I grabbed him by the foot and dragged him out of the nest of boxes and into the middle of the alley, hopefully moving him away from any weapons of convenience that I couldn’t see. I could feel how the silver ball-bearing curses had fallen out of his hand, but I couldn’t see them in the dark.

“What kind of fucking witch are you?” he groaned.

“Not the kind you were thinking I was. You know, the open-hearted, earth-loving kind.”

Hoyt wheezed out a laugh but didn’t bother trying to get up again. That worried me. I doubted he’d attack without a plan.

I could still clearly feel Mory running away, so I brushed my worry for her from my mind. But I could also feel the oily patch of magic expanding behind me.

“Your magic stinks, Hoyt. In more ways than one,” I said. “Did you really think you could just lift the necklace off me with a couple of curses?”

“Nah. The point was to keep you on track and then just get the necklace off you. I did the first and you took care of the second. Thanks for that.”

Then, inexplicably, he covered his head and rolled away from me.

The spell hit me from behind.

Now, I thought I’d felt pain before. Getting stabbed — twice — in the gut was no picnic, but it was sunshine and lollipops compared to this.

Fire burned through my veins to the very end of every capillary of every limb and digit. I couldn’t even fall to my knees. I just arched forward, screaming internally, suspended in pain.

Through the haze of my vision, I saw Hoyt scramble to his feet and flee the alley. That was not a good sign.

The fire was burning every cell of my brain, but it finally eased enough that I could collapse to my knees.

Someone was approaching. I couldn’t lift my head.

Someone whose magic tasted like something I’d once known. Someone who had cloaked herself from my senses in the oily magic, but hadn’t factored in how strong my dowsing abilities had become.

I looked up. It was an effort unlike any effort I’d ever made before. A cloaked figure stood twenty feet from me. She’d circled around and in front of me while I suffered. While I fought off the hold of the spell.

“Nice cloak,” I said, my voice coming out in a thin croak. “Very urban chic.”

“Fuck off, Jade,” she snarled. Her voice was nothing and everything like I remembered. “I’m the one with the upper hand here.”

“Nah,” I said. I attempted a laugh. “You left me with the knife. You should’ve tried to grab it when I was down.” Except she wasn’t stupid. Stupid enough to make a mistake, of course. Just not stupid enough to make it twice. Her learning curve had always been way higher than mine.

“I’ve missed you sister,” she said, her anger gone. She’d always been capricious with her emotions but this was a quick change. “I have something I need you to do for me. And I promise, no more fireblood spells.”

I made an effort to straighten. I wasn’t terribly successful. I couldn’t see her face within the cloak. I desperately wanted — and didn’t want — to see her. If I didn’t see her, she could be an apparition or someone crazy good at impressions.

Except it would be impossible to fake her magic, wouldn’t it? The taste of candied violets and earth soaked in dirty old blood.