by Faith Hunter
On the screens overhead, Jason Ethier entered the stairwell.
Margot said, “I’m with Rick. Last ditch if he gets by you all. I got a little something the FBI has been wanting to try.” That sounded ominous, but there was no time to ask questions.
“We’ll let Ethier open the door at the top of the stairs. Let him get here”—FireWind pointed—“and Kent will hit him with everything she has.”
“If that doesn’t stop him?” Occam asked.
FireWind flashed us the first real smile I’d seen, one full of joy. “Then I will.” His expression held something like the exultation of battle. Delight, fierce and brutal. FireWind wanted to fight the black-witch. He was an idiot. Jason had a lot of power. A lot. Unless we were very lucky, he would soon have even more, thanks to the thing below the ground.
A boom sounded. The building shook. The hallway door rammed open. Jason, reed thin, dressed in black, his black hair flying, stepped into the hallway. He was outlined by the door for a half second. FireWind shouted, “Kent! Now!”
T. Laine threw … something. A black, sparkling net of magic shot out. Visible even to human eyes. Filling the hallway. Obscuring the witch at the end. We heard a thump and my heart stuck in the top of my throat. Is it going to be that easy?
Jason laughed.
T. Laine cursed.
Jason strode out of the fog. He shouted, “Fulmen!” and threw something at our witch.
T. Laine collapsed, her body jolting as if she was having a seizure. FireWind dropped beside Lainie, his body twitching like hers. A sensation of sleet slammed into me. My fingers clenched on my weapon, but I couldn’t fire. My fingers were frozen. The team simply dropped to the floor, the others shaking and twitching, though not as bad as T. Laine and FireWind, who were struggling even to breathe. Slowly, I fell.
I realized that those of us at the back of the hallway had absorbed less of the magic. I could think, I could breathe, but I was lying, immobilized. My body had fallen in an odd position, twisted. I could see Jason’s passage. He smelled like fire as he passed by me, the fire of a burning house, of burning garbage, burning filth. He was wearing three bracelets on his bare lower left arm, wide silver cuffs or bracers set with blackened stones. They glowed.
He reached Rick’s office and raised his cuffed wrist. Margot threw something at him. It hit Jason. He staggered back. Screamed a wordless challenge. He drew a gun from a pocket and fired, multiple shots, fast, frenzied, ripping all sound from the air.
Margot did not return fire. Jason took a step into the office. Moving fast, he bent and opened Rick’s cage. Leaned in and shoved his arm at the wereleopard. Rick was farther away from the source of the spell, not so deeply affected. He tried to pull away. Jason cut his arm on the leopard’s teeth. On purpose. He then raked the wound against Rick’s bloodied side. Infecting himself with the were-taint.
I struggled to grip my weapon. It felt like frozen steel in my bloodless hands. But I got my fingers around the butt. Lifted the muzzle from the floor. The weapon was shaking like a leaf in a winter wind.
Loriann threw herself down the short hallway. Leaped at her brother. Trying to stop him. In midair she shouted, “Quiesco!”
Jason whirled at the sound, weapon up. Firing.
Loriann fell.
Jason screamed. Reached for her.
“Run,” Loriann said, her lips moving in the single word, the sound buried beneath the weapon-fire deafness.
Jason stepped back, eyes wide.
Two grindylows flew down the hallway. They attacked Jason. Which made no sense. Except Jason had infected himself, given himself the were-taint, which was a killing offense for grindys.
Jason flinched. Raised his cuffs at the grindys. He shouted a wyrd. “Admordeo!”
The grindys hit … something. It sliced into them, spilling their blood. Jason reached out a finger and wiped up the grindy blood, then smeared it across the black stones on his cuffs.
My body weighed a ton. But … I tightened my hands on the grip. Steadied my weapon. Squeezed the trigger. The ten-millimeter bucked slightly and my hands dropped to the floor.
Power exploded into the hallway. Jason disappeared.
Like magic.
Loriann fell back against the wall. Blood pulsed through her clothes. She dropped next to me, and even over the deafness caused by the gunfire, I half heard her say, “Transport spell. He did it. He really did it. Oh shit. He shot me.”
And I had shot Jason. As my body returned to my control, I felt his blood on the floor.
FireWind sucked in a breath and said the words again, words that might have been cursing, or maybe angry prayer. He shoved to his feet and stumbled down the hallway, glancing at Loriann, stepping over the injured grindylows. Disappearing into Rick’s office. I wondered fleetingly how FireWind and I were able to breathe on our own.
I struggled up. Couldn’t find a way to make my hands holster my weapon. I didn’t have that much finesse yet, so I carried it with me to T. Laine, where I placed it on the floor. Lainie was still not breathing. She was turning blue. I rolled her to her side and slapped her on the back. With each slap, a sensation of icicle electricity rocketed through my hand, up my arm, and down my spine. It hurt.
On the third slap, T. Laine sucked in a breath that was part scream, part moan, and all pain. I made it to Occam and slapped him too. Then Tandy, and last I slapped JoJo, who cursed long and foul as she caught her first breath. Then I remembered the training I got at Spook School, to help someone breathe—to make a fist and rub their sternum, in the upper center of their chest. Too late now. I picked up my weapon, holstered it, and fumbled my way to Rick’s office.
I passed T. Laine, who had scrambled on all fours to kneel beside Loriann, opening a first-aid kit. She pressed a wad of gauze against the wound on the other witch’s chest. JoJo was calling for backup and medic for “multiple victims with GSWs.” GSWs. Gunshot wounds. Occam and Tandy were clearing the floor, weapons out, ready to fire, to make sure Jason was really gone, and not hiding.
I picked up a wad of bloody gauze from Loriann’s side and put it in a pocket. If I needed it, if I needed to feed her to the land … I stopped that thought and went to the opening to Rick’s office.
Rick was out of his cage and shifting back to human. He was naked, his lower half cat, his upper half human, and he was whispering, “Nononononono, sweet Mary, Mother of God, nonononono,” in a steady lament. I didn’t think were-creatures shifted halfway. It looked painful and anatomically impossible, but it was perhaps due to the wound in his human-shaped shoulder. It looked like a half-healed gunshot. The werecat would heal fine.
Margot was frozen in place. Hunched in the small space behind Rick’s desk and his cage. She had a GSW too. FireWind was bent over her and looked fierce. An expression I couldn’t have described except for intense, inscrutable, and detached—vibrantly emotionless. He was sniffing Margot’s arm wound, the action dog-like. He eased back and pressed a handkerchief to the bloody place, which looked like a long graze. Margot looked … horrified.
FireWind murmured, “It make not take. There may not have been enough.” Margot sobbed once, the sound arid and petrified. Rick continued his dirge.
I didn’t understand what was going on. Her wound wasn’t that bad.
I swiveled and saw the grindylows, curled up together like neon green kittens against the wall. Grindylows. Something stirred in the back of my brain. Grindys were the judges and executioners of the were world, and though there had been no grindylows in the Western Hemisphere until the last few years, it was thought that a litter had been born in the United States. The fuzzy little green killers were now changing the way were-creatures passed along the taint. When a were shared the were-taint, the grindys appeared and executed the offender. Not always and not always right away. There had been tales of times when the grindys hadn’t shown up at all.
Two grindys had attacked Jason. Two. One would have been enough. Why two?
I looked back at
Rick’s office. Rick was shot. Margot was … The evidence settled in my mind, blooming, unfolding, revealing itself to me. Jason had fired at Rick. The round had passed through him, in cat form, picking up his blood, and wounded Margot. Margot stood a chance of going furry at the next full moon. Rick had infected her. And Jason had intentionally infected himself with Rick’s blood. Two evils. Jason was a witch; he might be able to hide himself from grindylows hunting him to pass judgment and kill him. But Rick was a dead cat walking if the grindys decided to pass judgment on him.
Quietly, I told Ayatas, Rick, and Margot what Jason had done. How Rick’s blood had been used to try to give himself the were-taint. This was why Rick had been targeted. So that Jason might infect himself. I went to the sleeping room, passing the null room on the way. It had been jimmied open, Loriann having used brute force and intellect where magic wouldn’t work.
I tapped on the sleeping room door. “Mud? It’s over.”
The door wrenched open and Mud threw herself at me, grabbed me. Cherry was barking like a maniac, jumping all over me, racing up the hallway and back. Mud held me away. Her eyes searching me. “Are you’un all right? Are you shot? Turn around.” She shoved me around and back. And yanked me into a hug. “I was scared as a deer chased by coyotes.” She shoved me back and said, “Cherry, come. Stay.” The dog ignored her and I caught the small springer by the collar. Mud demanded, “I want me a gun.”
I was befuddled. And amazed at the young woman who, only last week, it seemed, had been my baby sister. “No gun. But staying with me put you in danger. I don’t care how sick the Nicholsons are, you’re going back.”
Nell narrowed her eyes at me. “Ain’t no way, sister mine. I ain’t going.”
“Why not?” I demanded. “Give me one good reason.”
My little sister showed teeth at me in fury. I realized I was going to have to pay for braces, but that thought shredded and vanished like a wisp of candle smoke on the wind. “Larry Aden is out on bail and he’s back home on church property. That there is the real reason Sam brung me to you’un.”
SEVENTEEN
“What were the bracelets?” Margot asked. Her dark-skinned face was slightly gray with shock.
The team was in the conference room, eating pizza provided by Soul, who just happened to drop by. Lucky that. Or not. Maybe something else, as if she had been notified. Or as if she knew things.
The Assistant Director of PsyLED was curled up like a cat, with her long skirts wrapped around her bare feet on the chair seat in the corner of the conference room, her shoes on the floor. She was all in silvers and grays today: platinum hair and dark eyes, silver earrings, and a shalwar chemise type dress, pants, and shawl in a gauzy fabric that looked cool and comfy. And not at all regulation. I sent a glance to JoJo, with her turban and shimmery skirts. Jo was more dance club than Indian, but there was a definite correlation.
Soul, like the rest of us, was working on her laptop and analyzing the video footage, trying to deal with the facts and the trauma of the attack, chatting with PsyLED DC and the National Guard and probably someone in the Department of Defense, tryign to get us backup. Her gaze kept shifting to Rick, evaluating, worried. She had said her reason for being here, was to keep an eye on her only mostly para unit. She had explained that she was here solely as an observer, but she warned us that how we handled this situation would impact future para units.
No stress there. No. Not at all.
It was a few hours before dawn and things had settled down some after the paramedics and city cops left. The emergency team—who had entered wearing double pairs of gloves and white Tyvek biohazard unis in the presence of werecat blood—had bandaged Margot’s arm and worked to stabilize Loriann before carting her to UTMC, running lights and sirens. Evidence had been collected by our team and by the FBI evidence collection team jointly, something FireWind worked out. No one had mentioned to any of them that Margot might go furry.
Soul had sent a request to the Dark Queen, Jane Yellowrock, requesting that one of her Mercy Blades come and try to keep the taint from taking. Rick claimed that Mercy Blades had the ability to keep a human from getting the were-taint. It hadn’t worked on him, however. Jane hadn’t responded. I had sent a similar request with identical results. Nothing. I wondered if Jane was suddenly out of range, in some arcane Cherokee ceremony, or on a ship at sea. No one knew and Alex wasn’t answering his cell either. Sudden radio silence wasn’t like Jane.
“The cuffs are similar to these,” T. Laine said, tapping a key on her laptop. Overhead, a series of photos of bracelets appeared, looking like something a museum might put together. “I contacted the leader of the NOLA coven, Lachish Dutillet. She’s in a null room prison for some reason, but her keepers let me talk to her. I had to tell her things that might be classified, and the witches were surely monitoring her calls, so feel free to write me up and bring charges.” Soul and FireWind both shook their heads and T. Laine went on, “She suggested it was possible to charm an amulet with a spell calculated to control a demon, once it was captured. She said there were old tales of amulets created for that purpose.”
I stuck a hand into my pocket and the evidence bags there. I hadn’t turned them in or admitted to having them. I had Loriann’s blood. I had shot Jason. I had a handful of tissues still damp with his blood. There had been enough for the crime scene techs, but I had collected my own too. For some reason I hadn’t told my team I had any of it. What could I do to a blood witch when I had his blood?
Could I feed him to Soulwood long-distance? Death was a judgment and sentence that belonged to the witch council of the United States. They governed all witches accused of capital crimes. If I drained him for the land, it would be murder. But … My land hungered. I could feel the desire like an ache in my belly, crushed down but painful and demanding.
“Loriann was still keeping secrets,” Rick said. “But at last, finally, she knows her brother has taken up with evil.” He had dressed and helped with the aftermath, but he couldn’t look at Margot. Hadn’t looked at her even once. Guilt was a nasty emotion. It changed relationships and made things that used to work no longer work.
My cell dinged with a text from Yummy, or someone using her cell, and I tapped it open. It said, Our people’s amulets have taken us to a bend of the Tennessee River. We know where Godfrey lairs. I read the text aloud and though it was nothing to go on, the entire team turned to their laptops and tablets and started tapping away. The cell dinged again. Our team will go in at half an hour before dusk to rescue our people. We will behead the daywalker who wishes to rule Ming’s lands, and stake his scions. I’ll text you the address ten minutes before we penetrate. Be ready with ambulances to come where we request.
“Ming is giving us the minimum legally required heads-up,” JoJo said. “At least we can put EMS and the local LEOs on alert. You really gotta get that chick’s real name.”
“Last time I asked, Yummy told me no. I ain’t magic.”
“That was an order,” JoJo said, her tone laughing.
“No. I kinda like ‘Yummy,’” I joked, sending my vampire friend back a K.
Too softly, the words breathy and sere, FireWind said, “You tell your superiors no with regularity, don’t you? That’s insubordination and grounds for censure or dismissal.” The team went silent and still. The words carried enough of an edge and threat to make me put down the cell and focus on the special agent in charge of the eastern seaboard. FireWind was an unknown. An unknown with power over us all, and power over our jobs. That made him scary. And … His inscrutable expression was no longer in place. It was … maybe cracked wasn’t the right word, but it was different. The banter between JoJo and me was just that. Banter. FireWind had to know that, so something else was going on here.
I considered all that had happened in the last hours. FireWind had made the decision to let the blood witch inside his unit’s headquarters. He had promised he’d fight off Jason and had failed. His team had then been attacked. The FBI lia
ison was possibly turned into a black wereleopard. His probie was the only team member to get off a defensive shot. The grindys had killed no one so far as we knew. Yet. But Rick might be in their sights. Ayatas and Rick had some sort of conflict going on so he probably felt guilty about maybe getting his SAC grindy-killed. Also, FireWind was going to take some heat for a failure in protocol and building security. Worse, his upline boss, Soul, was here, watching. He was visibly upset.
I looked to Soul but her chair was empty. I hadn’t seen the boss-lady leave. But that was a problem for later.
The mamas had always said to start out like you intend to proceed. I needed to address this.
JoJo started, “I was just—”
I held up a hand to stop her and said, “Would you folks give me a minute with the boss man?” The cats reacted and I thought they were about to disagree, or worse, try to protect me. I shook my head at both of them and stood, pointing to the null room. FireWind followed me in. The door shut behind us. The cold that had nothing to do with temperature and everything to do with antimagic instantly started seeping into my bones. Into Ayatas too, if his face was anything to go by.
“You have my undivided attention,” FireWind said, the words pointed and stiff, like a stick to the eye.
I sat on the edge of the table, laced my fingers in my lap so I’d present the most nonthreatening image possible. I looked up at him and turned on church-speak because it was disarming. And a disarmed enemy was the best kind. “See, Ayatas FireWind, it’s like this. I like being a cop. I like solving crimes and helping people. I like my job. I like this team and they are dang good at what they do. I consider them friends.” I leaned in to make sure he was listening to what I was saying. “You’un come in here and take over because you’un consider yourself the peacock with the biggest tail. The best of the best. And things didn’t go like you’un planned and now you’un’re scrambling in the aftermath of unexpected disaster. And you’un, right now, are trying to take it out on me because you need a release valve and I’m handy.”
