by Jenn Stark
“Young tough, green hair, full leathers, nose ring. Rumor has it it’s my kid, though half the crowd disputes that.”
She gestured lazily, and I glanced out at the crowd. Sure enough, there were several small knots of people in heated dispute, most of them pointing at the dais.
“This won’t take long, anyway.” Death picked up a tattoo gun that wasn’t connected to an ink stream hose, and I raised my eyebrows.
“Isn’t ink part of the point?” I asked, shrugging off my jacket, smirking at my own words. I was a black belt in defensive punning, particularly when I was nervous. I was also wearing a black T-shirt underneath my jacket, to match my black jeans and heavy boots, pretty much the standard attire for the ink show, unless you were Nikki Dawes. I took a seat in Death’s souped-up dentist’s chair.
“It is usually. Not for you. Left arm.”
I sighed and stuck out my left arm, angling it wider as Death targeted a point just inside my bicep. “So what is it I’m getting permanently inscribed on my body this time?”
“A short cut. Try to remember to breathe.”
She put the needle to my arm, and pain immediately shot through me in all directions, radiating out from the point where the needle pierced my skin, sending shock waves throughout my nervous system. Every one of my chakras roared to life, even the one that hung out about sixteen inches above my head. I tried not to howl with pain, but it was a close thing.
“Can they see this?” I gasped, staring at the crowd, who looked at me with complete unconcern. “Because if I’m your kid, somebody should be arresting you for child abuse.”
“You’re such a baby,” Death muttered. “No kid of mine would sit there whining like a ten-year-old with a skinned knee. You need to suck it up.”
“And you need to—ouch!” My eyes almost crossed as she changed the direction of the needle, tracking a pattern up the curve of my muscle. I dared a look at my actual skin, but I couldn’t see any stream of ink. Especially since all the skin around the point of the needle appeared to be smoking. “Is that seriously the way this is supposed to be done?”
“What you fail to realize, despite constant reinforcements from the universe around you, is that you are not an ordinary person, Sara Wilde,” Death replied, eminently unperturbed by my yips of genuine pain. “You allow yourself to access your deeper magic in fits and starts, and while that has served you well up to this point, there’s going to come a time where you will need to access a steady stream of power, a power you can’t simply cut off because you get scared.”
“I don’t get scared,” I protested, lifting my right arm to swipe away the sweat that was gathering on my forehead. “I just don’t think I need to go all Jean Grey, Eater of Worlds, every time I run into some trouble. I want to control the flow of magic through me, not let it take me over.”
“And that’s where you make your mistake,” Death said. “You’re not Jean Grey. She’s a comic book character, the creation of some illustrator’s fevered mind. You’re the creation of your own mind, while your body was forged in an unholy alliance between a goddess and a demigod member of the Arcana Council.” As if to punctuate her words, she punctured me a little more forcibly, making me jump in my chair. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed that you have not returned to Sensei Chichiro since you ascended to your role as Justice.”
“I’ve been a little busy,” I retorted. The sensei had been recommended to me to help me control my rapidly increasing abilities. And she had helped, truly. But she had a similar form of tough love as Death did, and there were limits to how much I hated myself.
“I know, which is why I am taking pity on you and cheating a little bit.” Death forced the needle into my skin at yet a new angle, the fresh wave of pain so intense, I almost passed out. “Now, when you feel the urge to stifle the flow of magic, I want you to focus on the design I am etching into your skin.”
“I can’t even see the design you’re etching into my skin.”
“You will shortly. It’s the Eye of Horus, but invisible as such to anyone other than you. And, arguably, to the Magician, since he has a similar tattoo etched into him.”
I frowned. I happened to have an exceptional memory of every inch of the Magician’s skin, and I did not remember seeing such a tattoo. In fact, to my knowledge, Armaeus had absolutely no tattoos anywhere on his body. “Why would he hide such a thing from me?”
Death didn’t need me to explain what I meant. “It’s not intentional. The ink the Magician received was in the first hundred years of his ascendency to power. He did not have any true spell-casting abilities when he first ascended, and he quickly recognized this as a weakness he could not afford to let stand.”
I nodded, grateful for the distraction as well as the moment’s breath Death gave me while she laid down one gun and picked up another. “He mentioned that,” I said. “How exactly is it that he ascended to his role of Magician without having ever cast a single spell?”
“Because when the need is great, the Council acts with the greatest level of efficiency. Spell casting is something that can be taught, the same as you being given tools to access your powers despite your concerted efforts to avoid formal training. But it is the magic within that cannot be discounted. There are members of the Council who should be in maximum security prisons, but instead of paying for their crimes, they’ve been exalted.”
“You got that right,” I said, thinking of Viktor Dal, the Emperor, whose pre-Council activities included an unfortunate collusion with Nazi Germany—and even of Gamon, whose life before her tenure as Judgment was not exactly something that anyone would put on a résumé for anything other than a wet work specialist.
“Stop focusing on the impropriety of it and analyze the need,” Death said. “And I told you, breathe.”
“I’m breathing,” I gasped as Death bent over me again, this new needle smaller and more delicate than the first, but I didn’t think that was going to have anything but a negative impact on the level of pain it exacted from me.
I was right.
“What in the hell,” I screeched, practically jerking out of my chair while Death somehow managed to follow me for a half second more before she pulled the needle free.
“You’re lucky I was expecting that reaction.”
“You’re lucky I didn’t just vomit on you,” I shot back, reluctantly straightening in my chair before I held my arm out again. “Will you please finish this up sometime before my hair turns white?”
She chuckled and bent over me again. “The Magician began trying to convince you to ascend the moment he met you. You didn’t realize it at first, but that doesn’t change the truth. He knows you are fated to bring great change to the Council, but you have to be the one in control of that change. You can’t wait for his permission, or the Devil’s, or mine. You can’t wait until the mortals you encounter are ready for you to do what you must. You carry the mantle of your friendships like a protective cloak, but ultimately, they are not your shield. You are both shield and sword. The sooner you realize that, the better you’ll be prepared for what will come.”
She straightened and stood away from me, and I scowled at her. “Yeah? And what’s going to come?”
“So many possibilities for you, Justice Wilde. Insanity. Death. Domination. Love. Creation. Destruction. But all of it relies on you, if you will only reach deep within and give rise to your power when the situation demands. Now you are ready to do so.”
I looked down at my arm, and the implacable Eye of Horus stared back, the thick line of the Egyptian symbol etched in deep, glistening purple. An unreasoning apprehension slithered through me. What had I allowed to be done to me?
“So, uh, that’s it?” I asked as Death set down her ink gun, and held up my left arm toward her, fanning dry the glistening symbol. “No instruction manual on how to use this tat, no video tutorial? You’re just going to leave me all by my lonesome—me, myself, and eye?”
She glanc
ed back, grimacing. “You have more access to resources now, not less, Sara. You’ll understand how to use the access point I’ve provided you when the time comes. There’s no need for you to retreat into humor merely because you’re frightened.”
“Eye, eye, Captain.”
“Don’t make me regret my actions today.”
“Never,” I said, scooting off the chair. “In fact, we took a vote as to whether or not you were our favorite Council member. Guess what?”
“Don’t.”
“Yup. The eyes have it.”
An expression of genuine irritation crossed Death’s face, and satisfaction rolled through me, which was a nice change from the waves of pain that were still cresting and crashing across my nervous system. She continued. “Once you’re finished, you’ll do well to remember that you can choose how you manifest your power and where to place your energy, but ultimately, no one can help you more than you can help yourself.”
“Right.” I frowned down at my bicep. “I guess it’s you and me against the world, buddy,” I said. “Keep an eye out for me, will you?”
Death sighed heavily, then turned away. “I knew this was a mistake.”
Chapter Eighteen
Nikki and I checked into separate suites at the Beverly Hills Hotel. Because if you were going to be charged with cleaning up the crazy of the world, you deserved your own suite. Besides that, my room had an executive meeting area that allowed us to set up a temporary war room on all things witchery. I’d even invited a few guests to join us.
We were sitting in that room now, fully stocked with coffee, bourbon, and donuts, staring at an enormous whiteboard that I’d ordered rolled in for the meeting. I was becoming quite fond of whiteboards. I had a feeling they were going to start multiplying like tribbles in my world. In fact, when I did finally return to Sensei Chichiro to start improving my powers of manifestation, I was pretty sure I was going to start with office supplies.
Nikki had helpfully written “Murder Board” at the top of this whiteboard, to make it official, and we’d posted pictures of all the victims starting from the midpoint down. Above the midpoint were our list of LA witches voted most likely to make someone bleed.
There…were a lot of them.
“How is it that the LA coven has so many assholes?” Nikki grumbled.
“It comes with the territory.” Kreios leaned back in one of the oversized captain’s chairs that passed for conference room seating, still in his LA suit but looking perfectly comfortable. “The coven was first established well before the coming of money and film to the area, and the witches owned the land. Whoever owned the land owned the power, and no one ever accused a witch of not being a good business person.”
Danae snorted. “I’d make that accusation. LA isn’t symbolic of most cities, let alone most covens. There are a lot of people out there who don’t wear Gucci to do their gardening, nor would they ever want to. The way of the witch is not intended to be a path solely for profit.”
“Fair enough.” Kreios nodded, glancing her way. I watched him watch Danae, the gleam of interest in his gaze unmistakable. Now she was the one being stared at like a bug, but Danae didn’t seem fazed.
“What we have here is approximately a half-dozen candidates, all female, all highly placed in the coven—including the presiding priestess, Lara Drake, who we originally ruled out because of age, but now…” Danae gestured at the board and shook her head.
“It’s not her,” I said definitively. I stared at the victims’ pictures, then the coven members, trying to imagine any of the other women as likely targets for Myanya and her prophecy. “Lara’s sixty years old, and the energy I picked up in the Moscow pentagram was decidedly young.”
“Could be a smoke screen to throw you off.”
“It could, but I don’t think so. When I say young, I mean largely untested, unformed.” I pointed at the picture of Lara—her bright, discerning eyes, her hard jaw, her determined smile. “This woman hasn’t merely been around the block, she probably built it. I’m not saying she isn’t involved in the Myanya prophecy, but I don’t think she’s our vessel.”
“That’s an interesting idea,” Nikki said, moving toward the board now, her eyes narrowing. She’d changed out of her Marilyn Monroe costume for a classic Lauren Bacall silhouette, her tawny hair styled into a perfectly coiffed wave over her shoulders, and her body clad in long, flowing trousers and a high-necked blouse with voluminous sleeves and narrow cuffs. “What if all the coven management is in on the gig? They know the prophecy is coming, they want the power for their own coven, they put forward their strongest candidate, and everybody breaks out the bubbly when Myanya goes with their girl. It’s like the NFL draft without all the drug testing.”
“Except she’s resisting,” I said. Danae and Kreios turned their attention to me, and Nikki nodded as I continued. “The Myanya vessel’s got one job. It’s a shit job, but it’s one job: to knuckle under the oppression of the boy most likely, suffer at his hand, and emerge the scarred warrior. That’s not what’s happening here. What’s happening is a vessel witch getting steadily stronger by besting the male witches foolish enough to try to be her consort. Before any of that happened, though, my theory is one aspiring vessel witch decided to catch Myanya’s eye by taking out random asshats she decided aren’t fit to live. Richard Zachariah. Judith Granger. William Macpherson. And…” I picked up another sheet I’d had printed off on a hunch…a hunch that might still play out. “Herm Lannister, a guy who was known as a super sleaze in the sci-fi fantasy world…but a highly successful super sleaze. About a month ago, he told off a group of young women at a con who’d shown up to protest him, and got a standing O from his fanboy coalition.”
“Nice,” Nikki put in.
“Exactly. He was found dead of a self-administered drug overdose about a week ago, no foul play indicated, but given his history, I’m including him here. All these folks’ bodies are now turning up, with the exception of Richard Zachariah, and he got lucky. And all of them, presumably, had drawn the ire of the witch Myanya is targeting.”
Nikki snorted and tapped a folder in front of her. “Her choice in bad guys isn’t all that bad, actually. The lists of grievances against these folks are long.” She tapped a folder in front of her. “Most of them unproven but widely rumored, especially here in LA.”
“But despite what she may believe, her audition for vessel witch doesn’t give her clearance to be judge, jury, and executioner,” I countered. “And none of these victims are connected in any meaningful way to the coven, except for RZ and his delusions of becoming the next Great American Necromancer. He’s the only one who straddles the worlds of entertainment and witchcraft, and we can’t link him definitively to anyone inside the coven. The rest…don’t make sense.”
I pointed to the still shot of the smug-looking Judith Granger. “Yes, I get it. She pressured a lot of starlets to accept the cult of silence, and the #MeToo outcry didn’t manage to unearth her, so maybe she deserved some pain—but she’s dead now. Ditto William MacPherson. Skeevy? Definitely. Worthy of criminal prosecution, oh yeah. But dead? No. Same with Herm Lannister. He used his cred as a comic book adapter to do some intensely objectionable things in the writing community, to the point that Comic-Con nearly had a revolt on its hands during his last scheduled appearance, for all that the fanboys were screaming for him. But none of that was ever brought to trial, so how did the vessel witch know about it?”
“She’s got to be plugged into the creative community,” Nikki said thoughtfully.
“Agreed. But so far as we can tell, none of the LA witches had major roles in Hollywood productions that any of these people touched.”
“Doesn’t mean they weren’t bit players,” Nikki offered. “That’s half of Hollywood.”
“And it doesn’t mean they weren’t moved by the plights of those less fortunate,” Danae agreed. “It could be simple vigilantism.”
I considered that. It fe
lt right, probably the most right of anything so far. “Okay, but that doesn’t serve the coven, does it?”
Danae shook her head. “Not in the slightest. Murder is trouble in any situation, but to a coven, it can be deadly. Not only does it put the coven at risk of being discovered, its members outed, it goes against certain, well, covenants.”
Nikki cackled to the right, but my gaze was back on the board. “So if I’m Lara Drake, I’m pissed.”
“You’re definitely concerned,” Danae agreed. “And for more than the PR issue. A witch willing to go against the most basic of self-preservation doctrines is likely one looking to make a power play. Remember, the witch who is the vessel for Myanya will eventually parlay her subjugation into eventual control of the coven. If the current high priestess isn’t on board with that transition, that could be a dangerous game.”
“A very dangerous game.” I studied the three women whose pictures we’d placed beneath Lara Drake’s. Tammy Butler, Gail Fredericks, Monica Jones. All of them in their twenties and thirties, all of them Hollywood perfect.
Too Hollywood perfect. Almost as beautiful as Danae, now that I thought of it.
“Do big-shot covens not accept ordinary-looking witches?”
“They do,” Danae said. “But in this city more than most, beauty is power. That extends to the LA coven as well.”
“Maybe,” I muttered. But something about that truism nagged at me. There were other paths to power, trickier and darker paths than beauty. What path had Myanya’s vessel taken?
“Okay, another angle. What have we found out about the past activity of these witches—charities, politics, internet, any of it?” I asked.
“We’ve got nothing so far,” Nikki reported. “I’m not saying these women are clean, but they’re careful.”
“They have to be,” Danae put in. “As I said, Lara isn’t someone to be trifled with. As much as she would want the coven to benefit from the prophecy, she’s not about to have a murder charge hung on her. There are too many people in high places who already are gunning for the coven.”
