Bright Blaze of Magic

by Jennifer Estep

  Felix and Mo took the lead, both of them still talking about Mo repainting the Razzle Dazzle and arguing about which colors were more soothing, but Devon stepped up beside me and held out his hand. I smiled and laced my fingers through his, enjoying the warmth of his skin against mine. Together, we followed our friends.

  We cut through a couple of alleys and stepped out into the Midway, which was even more crowded than the surrounding streets and shopping squares. Loud, upbeat music blasted out of the restaurants, candy shops, and other businesses that made up the enormous outer circle of the Midway, with still more music blaring from the carts selling popcorn, cotton candy, T-shirts, and sunglasses that were spaced along the cobblestone paths winding from one side of the area to the other. The scents of funnel cakes, corn dogs, and other deep-fried treats filled the air, and neon lights flashed on practically everything, all of them in the shapes of swords, monsters, and other magic-themed objects. Despite their modern goods, almost all of the businesses had old-timey-sounding names like Courtly Chocolate Creations and Princely Pizzeria. It was an odd mix of contemporary and renaissance faire, with a whole lot of cheap and tacky thrown in for good measure.

  We slowly maneuvered through the crush of people, made it over to one of the cobblestone paths, and wound our way through the large park that took up the center of the Midway. Fountains bubbled up into the air, with kids laughing, shrieking, and running through the cool, arching sprays of water while their parents looked on from their perches on nearby benches. The heat of the day had finally broken, but the air was still as thick and sticky as one of the caramel apples you could buy from the food carts.

  But I looked past the running kids, tired parents, and busy vendors at the other people in the park—the guards.

  The Families had long ago divided up the Midway like the sections of a pie, and every Family’s guards patrolled their respective area. It was easy to tell the tourists with their matching, neon-colored T-shirts and baseball hats from the guards, who were dressed in black boots and pants, along with cloaks and feathered cavalier hats that boasted their Family’s colors. Of course, the tourist rubes thought that the guards, their old-fashioned clothes, and the swords and daggers belted to their hips were all just part of the fun, and many of the rubes stopped to snap photos of the men and women who were patrolling through the park. What the tourists didn’t realize was that the guards and swords were more than just cheesy decorations. The guards all took their jobs very, very seriously, watching out for everything from shoplifters to pickpockets to monsters who might wander out of the shadows and slither a little too close to the crowds.

  I grew especially tense as we moved through the Draconi section of the park and started seeing men and women wearing red cloaks and hats, along with gold cuffs stamped with that dragon crest. Of course the Draconi guards knew that our black suits and shirts marked us as Sinclairs, and they all turned to follow our movements as we walked through their territory.

  The guards didn’t make a move to attack, but they all glared at us and dropped their hands to the hilts of their swords. My own fingers twitched, itching to feel the security of my own sword strapped to my side. Beside me, Devon gripped my hand a little tighter, as tense as I was. Even Felix and Mo stopped talking and picked up their pace, wanting to get through this section of the park as quickly as possible.

  Still, the deeper we moved into Draconi territory, the more something bothered me, something about the guards. I don’t know exactly why or when I started counting the ones we passed, but I did. One, two, three.... Just like up at the Draconi mansion last night, it didn’t take me long to figure out what was different.

  There weren’t nearly as many Draconi guards patrolling here tonight as there usually were.

  With their blood-red cloaks and feathered hats, the guards were easy to pick out of the crowd. Given how many tourists were out on the Midway, I would have expected at least three dozen guards to be patrolling, if not more, but I only spotted a handful of them. I scanned the food carts, the bubbling fountains, and the grassy areas beyond, but I didn’t spot any other Draconis. Weird.

  Last night, Victor had had too many guards up at the Draconi mansion, and now there weren’t enough down here on the Midway where they were truly needed. What was he up to? Maybe he thought that doubling the guards at the mansion would keep all of his black blades safe and secure inside his secret room until he was ready to use them. Of course, that wasn’t the case, but still, I wondered why he’d changed the guard rotations so much.

  “Something wrong?” Devon asked.

  I shook my head. “Still wishing I had my sword, that’s all.”

  “Don’t worry. In a couple of hours, we’ll be back at the mansion, and this dinner will be nothing but an awkward memory.”

  “Yeah, you’re right.” I forced myself to smile at him.

  Devon grinned back at me, then turned to keep an eye on the Draconi guards as we hurried past them.

  A minute later, we finally left their territory behind. Devon, Felix, and Mo all relaxed and started talking back and forth to each other, but I remained quiet, still scanning everything and everyone around us, and still feeling like something was seriously wrong.

  Fifteen minutes later, we made it to the far side of the Midway, walked down another cobblestone path, and entered one of the shopping squares. A single building made out of gray stone took up the back of the square, with a neon sign spelling out the words THE WHITE ORCHID in beautiful, flowing script. An orchid also burned at the end of the sign, slowly lighting up one white petal at a time as though it were blossoming over and over again. The Salazars had hosted the last dinner for the Families several weeks ago, and now it was the Ito Family’s turn. Devon, Felix, Mo, and I hurried over and entered the restaurant, which had been closed to the public for the night.

  The White Orchid was as beautiful and elegant as its name suggested, with shimmering silver cloths and white candles covering all the tables, as well as the booths that lined two of the walls. Fountains made out of gray stone gurgled in all four corners of the room, each one surrounded by potted orchids of all shapes and sizes, but all in hues of white, from the palest, purest snow white to a rich cream to a silvery shade that almost looked blue under the lights.

  Mixed in with the orchids were crystal vases filled with large, fragrant clusters of purple wisteria—the Ito Family crest. Still more orchids and wisteria were nestled in alcoves and nooks carved into the walls, as well as lining the mirrored shelves behind the bar that ran along the back wall of the restaurant.

  A large round table covered with a neutral white cloth perched in the center of the restaurant. That’s where the heads of the Families would sit, eat, and talk when the dinner started. Smaller tables were evenly spaced around that center one, with booths hugging the walls on either side and padded stools running along the bar in the back. Soft, soothing music that sounded like a mix of rain, wind, and chimes hummed in the background, and the wisteria clusters perfumed the air, along with sweet notes of vanilla from the lit candles.

  We’d arrived a bit late and the restaurant was already packed, with folks milling around and talking to each other, including Claudia, Angelo, Reginald, and the Sinclair guards. Mo waved and went over to join them, but Devon, Felix, and I hung back, scanning the crowd.

  Everyone wore a black suit, and the color of the shirts and ties represented which Family the wearers belonged to. Black for the Sinclairs, purple for the Itos, dark green for the Volkovs, and so on. I didn’t spot any red shirts and ties in the mix, though, and no one was wearing a gold dragon cuff. None of the Draconis were here yet.

  My worry kicked up another notch. I’d been hoping that the Draconis would already be here so I could discreetly check on Deah. She’d texted me late last night saying she was fine, and Felix had said he’d gotten a similar text from her this morning too. But that had been hours ago, and I wanted to see for myself that she was really okay—

  “Finally! There you are
! I thought you guys were never going to get here,” a voice called out behind us.

  We turned to find a slender, petite girl with black hair and dark eyes grinning at us. She wore a black pantsuit with a purple shirt, and she’d braided a purple ribbon through her hair. A silver cuff stamped with wisteria flowers glimmered on her right wrist.

  “Hey, Poppy,” I said, grinning back at her.

  I hugged her, and so did Devon and Felix. Even though Poppy Ito belonged to another Family, she was still a good friend, and the four of us started talking about the latest superhero movie that Poppy and I had dragged the guys to see last week. Poppy and I were both action-movie junkies, but instead of being totally into our conversation the way she usually was, she kept checking her watch, a worried expression on her pretty face.

  Devon noticed it too. “Something wrong?”

  “My dad’s getting angry,” Poppy said. “The Draconis were supposed to be here an hour early so that my dad and Victor could talk about a new treaty, but Victor hasn’t shown up yet. He didn’t even call or text my dad and tell him that he was going to be late. So rude.”

  Once again, that worry bubbled up in the pit of my stomach, but I forced it aside. “Well, you know Victor. He and Blake think the world revolves around them. He’s probably just not considerate enough to call and tell your dad that he was going to be late.”

  Poppy shrugged. “Either way, my dad is angry about it. I should go check on him. I’ll see you guys later, okay?”

  We murmured our goodbyes, and Poppy headed over to her father, Hiroshi Ito. Poppy was training to become her Family’s broker, and all of the Itos nodded respectfully as she passed them. Poppy was as well regarded in her Family as Devon was in ours.

  I looked at Devon. “Has Victor ever done that to Claudia? Set up a meeting and then been late with no explanation?”

  He shook his head. “Victor and my mom don’t meet—ever. The only contact they have is at these Family dinners. That’s the one time and place they get together in the same room to talk business. The rest of the time, Victor is happy to pretend that my mom doesn’t exist, and she does the same thing to him.”

  I frowned. Instead of reassuring me, his words bothered me even more, although I couldn’t put my finger on exactly why.

  Devon, Felix, and I moved deeper into the restaurant, saying hello to the members of the other Families that we knew, like Julio Salazar, a guy our age that I’d beaten during the Tournament of Blades a few weeks ago. Julio joked that he wanted a rematch next year. I grinned and told him to bring it on. Julio grinned back at me, then went over to talk to Poppy.

  Hiroshi Ito pinged a fork against his water glass. The crowd quieted down, and he welcomed everyone to the dinner. I glanced at a clock on the wall. It was almost seven-thirty now and the Draconis still hadn’t shown up, even though everyone was supposed to have been here by seven.

  But Hiroshi pinged his fork again, and tuxedo-clad waiters emerged from the double doors at the back of the restaurant, carrying trays filled with fresh fruits and vegetables, chicken skewers, and other appetizers. Looked like the dinner was going to start without the Draconis. Weird. What was Victor up to? Was arriving late some sort of power trip on his part? Something he was doing just because he could? I didn’t know, and it bothered me.

  Apparently, it bothered Claudia too. She sidled over to me and raised her water glass up to her lips, as though she didn’t want anyone to realize that she was talking to me.

  “Are you sure that Blake didn’t spot you leaving the Draconi mansion last night?” she murmured. “That he didn’t realize you’d stolen Victor’s weapons?”

  “He didn’t see us. I’m sure of it. Why?”

  She shook her head, but her gaze locked with mine and her sharp worry pricked my chest. She was afraid that we hadn’t gotten away as cleanly as I’d thought and that Blake and Victor had realized what we’d done.

  But there was nothing either one of us could do about that right now, so Claudia moved on to mix and mingle with the heads of the other Families. Devon and Felix were talking with Poppy and Julio, while Mo, Angelo, and Reginald were chatting with Roberto Salazar, the head of the Salazar Family. Everything was normal; everything was fine.

  The waiters circulated with the food, which looked and smelled delicious, especially the bacon-wrapped pineapple chunks, but I didn’t eat a single bite. I couldn’t, not with the way my stomach was churning. And something else was bothering me too, something about the restaurant. I frowned. No, not the restaurant, but the temperature inside.

  I felt . . . cold.

  I froze, my gaze flicking around the room. It might be a hot July night outside, but the air conditioning was going full blast, cooling the inside of the restaurant to a pleasant temperature. But I felt colder than that, cold enough to shiver, despite my long-sleeved pantsuit. And I realized that it wasn’t just the air-conditioning—there was a frigid chill in the air that only meant one thing.

  Someone here was using magic.

  My gaze flicked around the room again, trying to figure out who was using magic and what they were doing with it. Normally, someone had to actually use their magic on me in some physical way—hit me, punch me, trip me, whatever—before my own transference power flared to life and let me absorb their magic. But if someone’s magic was strong enough, I could feel that familiar chill of power all by itself.

  Just like I was right now.

  So who here had that much magic? I looked over all the folks in the restaurant, but everyone was laughing, talking, eating, and drinking, and I didn’t see anyone doing anything suspicious, much less something that involved actual magic.

  Oh, sure, a Salazar guard in the corner was juggling bottles of water, using his speed magic to make the bottles spin impossibly fast, but he was just showing off. So was the Ito guard in another corner who was bench-pressing another guard up over his head. Since the Draconis weren’t here, it seemed everyone was determined to relax and have a good time.

  So I turned around in a slow circle, scanning everyone again, still searching for the source of the magic. If I could just pinpoint which person it was coming from, then I could reassure myself that someone was just goofing around and there was no serious threat here.

  But I couldn’t do that.

  Because the magic wasn’t coming from one person—it was moving all around the restaurant, getting closer and closer all the while, like a net slowly tightening over a bunch of trapped tree trolls. And I suddenly realized exactly why the Draconis were late, why there had been so few guards on the Midway tonight, where they were right now, and what they were doing.

  I whipped around toward the front of the restaurant and opened my mouth to shout a warning, even though I knew I was going to be too slow to stop what was about to happen. Sure enough, a second later, the front doors burst open and men and women wearing blood-red cloaks stormed inside the restaurant.

  And each one of them was carrying a black blade.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Draconi guards ran into the room, quickly spreading out into a solid line, a barricade at the front of the restaurant to keep anyone from leaving.

  People let out shocked gasps and scrambled back. More than one person dropped his hand to his side, reaching for the sword that wasn’t there. But the Draconi guards raised their weapons and everyone else froze, realizing they couldn’t take on the Draconis and win without weapons of their own.

  I cursed. I should have known that Victor would do something like this. That he would wait until the heads of the Families, including Claudia, were all gathered together in one place so that he could take them all out at the same time. He’d had to do things this way. Devon had told me as much, when he’d said that Claudia was only in the same room with Victor during the Family dinners. He’d want to kill her first, and this was his best chance to do that.

  I looked at Claudia, who was standing on the opposite side of the restaurant with Mo, Angelo, and Reginald flanking her. She nar
rowed her eyes at me, then deliberately flicked her gaze to the right, where Devon was standing about thirty feet away from her. I nodded back, knowing what she wanted. I would do whatever it took to protect Devon and make sure he lived through this. Claudia nodded back at me, some of the tension in her face easing.

  The Draconi guards moved deeper into the restaurant, with one stopping every few feet, until they had everyone surrounded. Once the room was completely under their control, the guards by the front doors stepped aside so that three more people could enter the restaurant—Victor, Blake, and Deah.

  Victor and Blake swept into the restaurant as if they owned it, with Blake in particular swaggering like everything had already gone his way.

  Deah crept in behind her father and brother, her head down, her shoulders slumped. She shot Felix a quick glance that was full of sorrow, worry, and misery. Felix glanced down at his phone, then back at her, his eyebrows knitting together in confusion. She must not have texted or called him about what was happening. I wondered why she hadn’t tried to warn him and the rest of us.

  Victor and Blake strode out into the middle of the restaurant, but Deah stayed back against the wall, her hand curled around the hilt of the sword belted to her waist, staring at the Draconi guards instead of the other folks in the restaurant, as if she knew that her own Family members were the greatest danger to her.

  When she realized that the guards were ignoring her, Deah glanced around the restaurant, and her eyes finally met mine. Her worry, fear, guilt, and dread punched me in the chest one after another, but I pushed her tense emotions aside and tipped my head at the guard closest to me, discreetly pointing at the sword in his hand.

  Deah frowned, but then she realized what I was asking and gave me a short, sharp nod. So our plan had worked, and the guards were carrying the weapons that had been stored in Victor’s secret room. That meant that some of the guards were clutching real, magic-filled black blades, the source of the cold power that I’d sensed earlier and could still feel. But most of them were just holding regular old swords and daggers, which meant we still had a chance to fight back and get out of here alive.