Death & Desire: A Snarky Urban Fantasy Detective Series (The Jezebel Files Book 2)

by Deborah Wilde

  At long last, I reached the shore and stepped onto the sidewalk near the fire dancers gracing the boardwalk. They twirled magic balls of flame while drummers beat out a hypnotic rhythm. A small knot of people cheered them on.

  “Are there drugs that take away magic?” I said.

  “Thankfully, research in that field is globally banned. Can you imagine a Pharma company who shares Untainted Party values pushing that? All Nefesh would be at risk. Who’d want to volunteer for those trials, anyway?”

  A fire dancer split his ball into four, throwing them high into the air where they hung momentarily, suspended in primary colors.

  After thanking her, I called Miles back and told him to call off the search. Nadija wasn’t dangerous, she was sick and I was going to help her. It took some persuading, and Miles wasn’t pleased that Nadija wouldn’t pay for her crimes, however minor, but if no one would corroborate the charges–and I certainly wasn’t pressing charges–he couldn’t bring her in.

  The drums picked up, the fire dancers weaving their flames around their bodies like silk ribbons.

  “I hope you know what you’re doing,” Miles said. “You’re handling the artifact, handling this Nadija woman, and if you play this wrong and things go sideways, it’ll be Levi’s ass on the line.”

  The drums beat faster and faster, the flames growing larger, their crackling a melodic counterpoint to the percussion, building to one final burst, and then darkness.

  I shivered in that split second where all light seemed to be sucked from the world. “Considering I’ve saved both your butt and the city, how about you have some faith in me?”

  “Nah,” Miles said and hung up.

  One of the fire dancers pointed me in the direction of Vespa’s shop. So far in Hedon, I’d visited the business district, the Queen’s home and gardens, the Dream Market, the beach and Lost and Found, and now this boardwalk area. Hedon was much more than a black market. It was its own world.

  The blur of lights I’d seen from far away turned out to be the glowing tops of carnival tents, each with a colorful hawker promising rare sights more captivating than the last. Sentient steampunk ponies did tricks, there was a tattooed lady whose animated ink told different stories to each viewer, and something called Pumpkin Joe and His Pokey that had a long line-up.

  There were no families or children. This was the playground of the Nefesh underbelly. A man in a gas mask with metal horns bought fresh roasted chestnuts, while a Japanese woman with a thundercloud on a leash tethered around her wrist like a helium balloon slung pints of dark beer to a group of Italian mafioso whose skin gleamed with iridescent poisons that smelled of vinegar.

  The road I’d been told to follow got quieter and quieter, the carnival sounds and crowds falling away until it was only me and my footsteps. There were no torches or stars to light my way here and the darkness pressed in on me like a shroud.

  I was about to retrace my steps, sure that I’d been misdirected, when a structure in front of me lit up. Light shone through walls bearing a texture similar to coarse homemade paper. Translucent, it was shaped like an acorn laying on its side, with a large round opening set into the thin end.

  “You’re late.” The words were a monotone buzz that emanated from the structure.

  No, not structure. Hive.

  Vespa. The Italian word for wasp.

  Well, if I wasn’t stung to death, this would make great dinner party conversation, should I ever like enough people to host one.

  Chapter 20

  Inside was a labyrinth of dense honeycomb-shaped chambers, all with that translucent glow. Each hexagonal room was a self-contained tiny treasure: one pinky-red, made of petals that smelled like roses, another emerald green with feathery grass stalks higher than my head, yet another a brilliant sky blue where you crossed on fluffy clouds.

  My footsteps echoed off a fallen trunk that traversed a miniature forest rich with the scent of pine. Vespa had created a microcosm of nature within this hive.

  I headed deeper and deeper inside. “Hello? A little guidance here?”

  “Right, right, left,” Vespa buzzed. Their voice both boomed through the space and drilled down from the crown of my head to my toes like a precisely wielded jackhammer.

  I reached the center, finding myself in a room maybe five feet by six feet wide, all bathed in a golden light. The floor was hardened with a gleaming resin and honey dripped off the walls.

  Vespa sat in a threadbare oversized armchair. My first impression was a huddle of multi-colored rags more than any being. Their body was that of a human woman, but their face was out of a 1950s B movie–which would have been funny if it wasn’t so unnerving. Large aviator sunglasses hid Vespa’s eyes, but not the yellow-and-black mandible protruding from underneath. Two antennae twitched in my direction.

  A low buzz emanated from them, skittering down my spine, but I stood firm.

  “My apologies for being late,” I said. “I used a bronze token to come here and it redirected me to the Lost and Found.”

  Vespa laughed, somewhere between a rusty gate hinge and a gong. “Magic artifacts are not to be trifled with.” They ran a hand over their still-human body, the buzz growing agitated and setting my teeth on edge. “I’d know.”

  “The keeper of the Lost and Found took my last token. I don’t have any way of getting back.”

  “I will return you once our business is concluded.”

  “Thank you.” I appreciated a business owner who understood the value of those little extra touches like free parking, customer reward cards, or returning you to your home reality.

  I held out the metal pouch and Vespa took it from me with a cool hand, the Typecaster’s touch reminiscent of a dry papery husk. “Careful. It compels people through temptation.”

  “I am beyond compulsion now.” Vespa opened the pouch and the honey-scent of the room was drowned out by that of a hot, gritty sandstorm.

  My mouth watered and I stepped as far back as I could.

  Even with those sunglasses on, Vespa’s stare my way disconcerted me enough that I forced myself to relax and smile. Nothing to see here.

  Vespa dumped the feather into their palm, then rose from the chair and burst into dozens of tiny wasps.

  I screamed and ran.

  “Come back,” they buzzed. “I will not harm you. This is how I read magic.”

  I stopped three rooms over in a pocket desert. The sand rose in a small tornado, nudging me back toward Vespa.

  “Don’t get your wings in a twist. I’m coming.” I skidded across the ground, propelled by the sand funnel.

  By the time I returned to the room, the swarm hovered in a tight ball, presumably around the feather, though I no longer sensed that ancient magic. I dared not question my good luck.

  “Can you tell me what type of magic it is?”

  “Yes. I never fail. Do not disturb me further.” All the wasps spoke in unison, a hundred buzzy sounds pricking me.

  My skin broke out in chilly goosebumps.

  Ten minutes, twenty minutes, half an hour passed. I sat on the floor, half-dozing, watching the play of shifting wasps.

  Why was this taking so long? What about the feather’s magic was confusing to Typecasters? Was it the added overlay of feeling ancient? Were there too many layers of magic on the feather to untangle them? I snorted. Maybe its magic had been warded and that had screwed everything up. But my magic wasn’t screwed up and it had been warded.

  Oh! Shit, it was. The connection with Evil Wanker. He’d been annoyed that this wasn’t playing out as it should. My Star of David ward must have interfered with whatever magic process would generally connect a newly made Jezebel with the rest of the team.

  Vespa was still engrossed in reading the feather’s magic, so I pulled up my solitaire app to kill time until my ass was numb and I’d eaten the half roll of butterscotch Lifesavers that I’d found deep in my jacket pocket. This was going nowhere. Better to wrap it up and get back to confront Nadija. “Could
you give me anything you’ve got on the feather and send me home?”

  The swarm rippled but didn’t answer me.

  “Maybe it’s illusion magic of some sort?” I said, shifting on my butt cheeks to get blood back into that area. Bad idea. My vagina had fallen asleep and I winced through the pins and needles feeling that stabbed through my knish. Yiddish had the best slang for ladytown.

  “No. It is Nefesh but more so.” Vespa’s buzz was weak.

  “Concentrated. Yeah, that’s what the other Typecaster said.”

  One of the wasps hit the ground, dead.

  I dropped my phone.

  The swarm moved in an agitated fashion, several wasps bonking into the walls, dazed. “Not concentrated. Pure. Do not disturb again.”

  “Stop.” I waved my hands at the swarm. “It’s hurting you.”

  “I never fail.”

  “It’s not failure. It’s me saying I have to leave. I’m the one aborting this, not you. Give me the feather and return me to my office.”

  Honey with a pungent bitter undertone glopped down from the ceiling, splashing over me and hardening into a conical prison dotted with tiny air holes. How considerate.

  I punched it, but my enhanced strength barely cracked the surface. “Let me out!” My voice rose in a shriek as another couple of dead wasps dropped out of the swarm. I placed a hand on the resin, sending my magic inside to try and destroy it, but it wasn’t magic. It was just stupidly well-fortified.

  Plan B, then. I felt for my phone, but it wasn’t in my pocket. That’s right, I’d dropped it. I searched on either side of me in the narrow space between my body and the resin, but it wasn’t there. My heart sank. The phone was about a foot away on the other side of the resin. Fuck balls. No calling in any cavalry.

  “I see the edges,” Vespa buzzed. More wasps hit the ground, dead.

  “It’s killing you! Stop!”

  Nothing. Just the sound of wings and sand.

  “Let me out, you suicide mission!” If they died, I could be trapped here forever. I bashed my fists against the resin, the panic swirling in my gut packing an extra punch. My legs were trapped too close to my body to kick effectively.

  I took every hairline crack as a win. My fists were bruised, the skin split and blood coating my knuckles. Arkady hadn’t prepped me for this particular scenario. Remiss mentor. I laughed, fear making me half-hysterical and lost to a haze of pain. The brief rests I took barely energized me enough to keep going. Finally, with a blow that made me whimper and stars appear in my vision, I punched the top off the cone. I fumbled for my phone, but it was just out of reach.

  I grabbed the jagged edge of the hole and tore at it, ripping off most of my index fingernail with a shriek. Tears swam in my eyes and my fists were reduced to bloody hunks of meat, but I finally hit a weak spot, and with a crack, the resin split in half and fell away.

  I blinked through sticky lashes, spitting a strand of resin-encrusted hair out of my mouth, and grabbed my phone, but my fingers were so pulpy and bloody that I couldn’t get either the home button or my password to work.

  “Vespa, get me out of here!” My pleas fell on deaf ears.

  “Close now.”

  I covered my head as more of the swarm splatted to the ground. A bunch bounced off me on their descent, but I barely registered them. “You have to stop!”

  My phone rang with Priya’s number. I vigorously wiped off one hand and stabbed at accept, catching the call before it went to voicemail. “Pri!”

  “Guess again.” The woman had a heavy Slavic accent.

  “Nadija.” I jumped to my feet and stepped free of my resin prison. My voice was steady, but the rest of me shook. “Where’s Priya?”

  “Keeping me company.”

  “Ash!” Priya screamed from the other end. There was the sound of flesh striking flesh and Priya whimpered.

  A terror purer than any I had ever known pierced my core. “Nadija, this isn’t you. You don’t hurt people.”

  “I get what I want.”

  “The feather? Did it make you believe that it could heal you, let you keep your magic?” My pulse spiked when she gave a strangled roar at my question. Shit, shit, shit, I went too fast. Priya’s life was on the line, which was exactly why I couldn’t rush, even though all I wanted was to fast-forward to the part where my best friend was safe. “Don’t hang up. Nadija, listen, the feather can’t help you. But I can.”

  More wasps fell to the ground. I flinched, covering my head.

  “You lie,” Nadija said. “You can’t fix this.”

  “You’re right. I can’t. I wish I could, because I know how important having magic can be. But I can end your pain.”

  “By killing me,” she spat.

  I rolled my eyes, even though she couldn’t see it. “Lady, I have a long list of people I’d rather go to prison for killing. Get over yourself.”

  There was a shocked silence on her end. “Then how?”

  I could use my blood powers, but the cost to her sanity wasn’t worth it.

  “There is a drug that would mute your magic and, I believe, your pain. I can’t one hundred percent guarantee it would work, but it’s worth a shot, isn’t it? You have an amazing career that doesn’t require powers. You could live a full and pain-free life. You just wouldn’t be Nefesh any longer.”

  “I want my magic. The feather–”

  “Is lying.” I paced in a tight circle, one eye on the swarm.

  Nadija was silent for a long time. “The feather gave me hope,” she said, “when I found it on the dig. Then it was stolen and I was furious. He thought he was clever, covering his tracks, but I figured it out and followed him. Why should I work with you when you probably think I tried to kill him?”

  “You didn’t hurt Omar. That idiot did that to himself. You don’t need to convince me that he swallowed the feather to keep it for himself and that you didn’t want to cause him any harm. I already figured that part out on my own. You just wanted the feather back.”

  Nadija’s pause lasted seven wasps falling down dead and a million years.

  “How do I know that what you say is true?” she said. “That the feather can’t help me?”

  “Has it? Was your pain any less for possessing the feather? Did your magic return to full strength?”

  “It takes time.”

  “The feather tempts people with their heart’s desire. It played you and that’s not your fault, but you deserve to be healthy and happy. Magic isn’t the determining factor in that.” What a hypocrite I was, spouting this bullshit when I refused to give up mine.

  No one wants to admit their dreams are childish, something whispered in the back of my head.

  “Think of your friends and family,” I said. “They want you in their lives, Nadija.” I used her name as much as possible to create a bond.

  “If I come to you, you will arrest me?”

  “I won’t. I promise. No one will press charges for trespassing, and I give you my word I won’t for the vandalism, either. There’s still time for us to fix this, undo it completely. But all that changes if you hurt Priya.”

  “You don’t care about me. This is about your friend.”

  “No–”

  “Enough! I am the one calling the shots now. You want her so badly? Give me the feather.”

  “It won’t help you.”

  “You say that because you want to keep it for yourself, but you are a liar and a thief and I am Malach, the Angel of Death. Give me the feather or your friend will die and you can live with the same kind of pain that I have.”

  She was totally unhinged. How was I supposed to reason with her? How could I not? Priya’s safety was at stake. I switched the phone from one bloody hand to the other.

  “Yes. Priya for the feather. Just like you want. Tell me where and when.”

  The remaining swarm vibrated like it was doing the wave. What fresh madness was this?

  “You have two hours.” Nadija’s voice left no room for debate.
“6:30PM.”

  “Where?”

  “There is a park near your apartment. With a small school.”

  “McSpadden.”

  “It’s wide open. Nowhere for you to hide or people to ambush me. We will meet in the middle and make our trade, but if I see a single sign that you are trying to trick me or bringing in other people, you will feel my wrath.” She hung up.

  A curious numbness fell over me and I turned dull eyes to the swarm. “Give me the feather, Vespa, and take me home. I’m begging you.”

  The swarm buzzed angrily, but I’d had enough. Priya’s life was worth more than Vespa’s pride in their track record. I reached for the swarm, ready to plunge my hand in, grab the feather and find another way back, regardless of the consequences, when the swarm reformed back into Vespa’s human form.

  Sort of.

  A chunk of their mandible was gone, they only had one antenna, and their torso was lopsided and kind of melted looking. All those dead wasps represented missing pieces.

  “I did not fail.” Vespa’s buzzing was smug.

  “Great. What magic is on the artifact?” I didn’t even care anymore. I just wanted out.

  “Not an artifact. This is an angel feather.” Vespa’s form rippled, their voice more a squeak than a buzz.

  That brought me up short. “Impossible. It’s Nefesh magic. It has the same signature.”

  “Nefesh magic is angel magic. We are the dilution.”

  A whistling noise filled my ears as I sank to my knees. My thoughts tumbled over themselves in light of this revelation, but the only thing I got out was, “I need the feather and then I’d like to go home.”

  Vespa sealed the feather in the metal pouch and handed it to me. Then their body stuttered like a projection out of frame and a low groan punched out of them.

  “Vespa?”

  They jerked violently, gasped, and with one last feeble buzz, toppled over.

  Alarms wailed.

  I knelt there holding an angel’s feather with mangled hands, deafened by the sirens and stranded in a hostile world. Not because of my lack of a token, but because some invisible force had pinned me in place.