by Rain Oxford
“It isn’t mine. I wasn’t the only one she was seeing. Apparently, she has a thing for married men.”
“Were any of your one-night-stands angry with you or Julia?”
“Some were upset, but I never promised them anything more.”
“Was the blue Cadillac that Julia was driving hers?”
“No. She had a flat tire, so I left my car with her and Elena was supposed to drive me home. Elena refused because she had a nail appointment, but I think she really just wanted me to work late every night.”
“What does the official report say happened?”
“The other driver said she ran a red light. She was never able to say otherwise.”
“What do you think happened?”
“My wife was an excellent driver. I don’t know why she was out in that rain, but I’m sure she didn’t run a red light. She was the type of person to stop at yellow lights.”
“Alright. Give me Elena’s name and number. I’ll see if she might know anyone who might know something more.”
“What else is there to know? She was in a car accident.”
“That’s probably all it was, but I need to talk to her anyway.”
He looked like he was going to argue, but then he finally relented and wrote her name, number, and address on a sticky note. “Keep my name out of it. It took me two years to get over it.”
“I’m only trying to get to the bottom of what happened.”
* * *
I got back to the office fifteen minutes later and found Scott drawing with marker all over the tile floor. I winced.
“They’re dry-erase markers and he knows he has to clean it up when he’s done,” Henry said.
“I’m not concerned about that. What if he makes something he loves? Wouldn’t it upset him when it gets ruined?”’
“I was worried about that, but he said he wanted to draw on something bigger than paper.”
“Well, keep a can of spray paint in your car in case he’s ever at Luana and Matheus’s house, so you can teach him about graffiti. I’m sure there’s an arts center around here somewhere. You should give him a chance to try out other things, like musical instruments and stuff.”
He grimaced. “My parents would…” he stopped himself.
I opened a mental link so that we could talk in our minds. “What?”
“They always said arts and music and such was for girls and a complete waste of my real skills. I will never do that to Kitten. If there is anything in the world he wants to try, unless it’s harmful to himself, I want him to tell me.”
“That’s good. Let him know he can trust you to be supportive. Just also know that he’s going to probably do some self-destructive shit as well.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Because he’s a boy. You were a boy once.”
“With parents who were professional thieves.” His face paled and I felt his horror. “What if he wants to steal stuff? If I give him everything he wants, he’ll become spoiled, but if I don’t, he might steal it instead.”
“The only thing you can do is teach him that stealing is wrong and it will get him in serious trouble. As attached to you as he is, I don’t think it’ll be a problem.”
“That’s now. He is not going to be so loving forever.”
“He might surprise you.” I closed the mental connection and spoke out loud. “So, where is Julia?”
Henry leaned against my desk and sighed. “I’m sorry.”
“Well, that’s encouraging.”
“It took us a little longer to get here and she was gone by the time we arrived. I tried to call.”
I cursed, because I’d forgotten to get a phone. “Even if you were late, I doubt she would have left. She didn’t have anywhere to go or any money. Did you notice any sign of a struggle?”
“No. I didn’t smell anything odd, there wasn’t any broken glass, and the door lock hadn’t been tampered with. It was unlocked when I arrived.”
“But why would she leave?”
“Did you tell her you thought someone was after her?”
“Sort of, right before I left her here alone. I’m not sure it wasn’t just an accident, though. The only odd thing about it was the missing records. She and her husband had a non-standard relationship, but I don’t know if he had anything to do with her accident or not.”
Rocky’s presence filled my mind painfully. There was nothing gentle about the gargoyle. While Vincent’s familiar might have been a grumpy little bastard, he was an acquired taste. After all the times he helped me in his unique, irritable way, I found him a little endearing. Rocky really didn’t have a personality. I never heard speech, he only contacted me for business, and I never saw him for more than a couple of minutes at a time.
The image of a man standing outside on the sidewalk appeared in my mind. There was nothing strange about him by appearance and no clear reason for him to have been singled out. Then black shadows formed into another man behind him. With no warning to the unsuspecting victim, the shadow walker made a motion with his hands and created a red fire that engulfed the human. People screamed, but it was all over in an instant.
My vision changed to two little girls and a man on top of a building. The girls were both crying and facing each other while the man stood calmly to the side. One of the girls yelled in an Asian language I couldn’t understand, then the other responded calmly. The man put his hand on the calmer girl’s shoulder and leaned down to whisper in her ear. She raised her hand and an invisible force of energy pulsed from her hand. The second girl was propelled off the roof.
“Stop!” It did. My vision froze in place as if I had hit the pause button. “Save the girls.” Knowing he would do everything he could to save them because I told him to, I focused on my symbol. Urgency actually worked in my favor this time and the next instant, I was in the shadow pass. I focused on the man who had walked down the street. Even without his name or anything, I knew I had to find him.”
The darkness vanished and left me standing right in front of the stranger I was trying to save just as the shadow walker appeared out of the darkness.
The reason the shadow walkers were only attacking with fire was most likely because magic was different here than on Dothra. Fortunately, Langril taught me how to fight a shadow walker here. I struck with blinding red lightning before the Dothra wizard even realized I was there.
Unfortunately, the shadow walker was able to create a mass of energy that cushioned the blow, and although he went down, I knew it wouldn’t be for long. The stranger who the shadow walker was after took off running, along with everyone else.
Creating such a violent attack took a small toll on me as well, so I wasn’t able to finish the shadow walker off before he got back to his feet. It did, however, give him the motivation he needed to push his magic to the next level. When crackling energy formed in his hands, I grabbed the nearest object— a metal trashcan— to use as a shield.
Right before he could attack, a second shadow walker appeared between us and struck my opponent. I gaped as the first shadow walker vanished in thick shadows. The second Dothra wizard then turned to me and struck with a wave of energy. It wasn’t like any of the other attacks; it didn’t hurt. Instead, it just threw me backwards a little ways. The trashcan did nothing to help, especially since it was empty. By the time I got back to my feet, the second shadow walker was gone.
“What the hell was that about?”
* * *
Since I didn’t have my car or even a clue where I was, I had to use the shadow pass to return to my apartment. Without turning on the light, I started to sit down on the couch only to jump away at the last second. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Vincent’s familiar was lying on the couch, but I realized suddenly that something was different. He looked worse than usual; his fur was grayer and more matted, and he had lost a fair amount of weight. The cat didn’t even lift his head.
“Ghost?” I nudged him, but he sti
ll didn’t respond. “What’s wrong?” I was really starting to get worried. The cat looked up at me and then disappeared. He didn’t leave a note, an object, or anything else to help me determine why he came in the first place. Maybe he just wanted to nap for a while. He was around my age, which was ridiculous in cat years.
When I tried using my power to connect to my uncle’s mind, it was closed as usual. Despite the fact that no one was able to protect their minds from John, I never tried breaking the magic Vincent and Hunt regularly used to protect theirs. I reached for my phone to call one of the very few paranormals I knew who carried a phone, only to curse when I remembered that it was still dead. Frustrated, I went out to buy a new cell phone.
* * *
By the time I made it home with my new phone, Henry was working on dinner. Cats may be carnivorous, but Scott loved pasta. “What happened?” Henry asked.
“I’m not quite sure.” I explained the two visions, how the two shadow walkers faced off, and how the second one didn’t go for the kill shot on me when he had the chance.
“It could have been that he wasn’t after you, and maybe he only had enough strength to attack once.”
“Maybe.”
“Did you check with Rocky to make sure that he saved the girls?”
“Rocky is a girl, Daddy,” Scott said, shoving spaghetti into his mouth with his fingers.
“Rocky is a gargoyle, Kitten,” I said. “I really doubt he has a gender.”
He sighed and rolled his eyes. “No, Rocky is a girl. I know the difference. Girls love me.”
“Okay, you’ve spent way too much time with Darwin,” Henry said. The funny thing was that Scott had a point. If a woman had a drop of motherly instinct in her, Scott brought it out.
“I’m going to head back to the office and work on Julia’s case.” The words were barely out of my mouth when we heard a loud crash outside. We ran to the window to see two cars out in the middle of the school playground across the street. “That is the last place I expected to see a car crash,” I said.
“Yes, that’s a little weird, but I’m not surprised after everything that has been reported on the news. Maybe you should stay in for the rest of the night. Besides, when was the last time you ate?”
I thought about it. “I had breakfast right before we left for Stephen’s coven.” Henry and Scott went back to the table and Henry fixed a plate of spaghetti and garlic toast for me. Upon smelling it, I realized I was, in fact, ridiculously hungry.
We chatted while we ate, mostly about Scott’s upcoming classes. Soon after we found Scott, Darwin had explained that the children’s school, nicknamed the sapling, consisted of multiple, age-segregated buildings and dormitories. The children were only taught what human children were taught until they reached a certain age. At that point, they were tested and put into classes based on their skills.
Unlike the university, which was very selective, all children of paranormals were allowed in the sapling. Since a percentage of the students were throwbacks, who either couldn’t control their powers or didn’t have any, it was very important that they were put in classes that were neither dangerous nor made them feel inferior.
After dinner, we sat down on the couch to watch the news. There were no missing children or deaths reported, but there was definitely something weird going on. “I have a theory,” Henry said when the news went to weather. “We knew electricity often goes haywire when there’s a powerful wizard around. Since Dothra wizards are so much more powerful, what if their effect on the environment is as well?”
“You think all this is just because there are shadow walkers in the area?”
“Sort of. I think this may be caused because they have been here for a few days. If Krechea’s goal is to get your key, I wouldn’t be surprised if he has sent some of his shadow walkers to watch you.”
I really hated the idea, but after sensing a strong presence nearby on more than one occasion, I suspected he was right. “We need to figure out how to stop it. There’s been so much weirdness on the streets, right in front of everyone.” Some of which was my fault. “People are going to start suspecting the supernatural. Not everyone; some people are going to think this is aliens or the government, but we might end up with more paranormal hunters.”
“As long as no paranormal does anything foolish, such as put an entire crowd to sleep on the street, humans won’t have any evidence.”
I scowled. “I was trying to help Scott.”
When his phone rang, he frowned and answered it. “Hello? Oh. It’s Maseré for you,” he said, handing it to me.
“Marcus told you where Darwin was, right?” I asked Maseré.
“Yes, he did. And I just got a call from Amelia asking if something was wrong, because he never showed up at her place. I’ve called everyone. Logan and Vincent aren’t answering my summons either. Darwin is missing.”
Chapter 6
I first tried forcing open a link to Darwin’s mind, but it was like my magic couldn’t find him. That was definitely a bad sign. I asked Maseré to bring a non-electronic object that was important to Darwin. A few hours later, he showed up at my door with Darwin’s favorite hoodie. “Really?”
“I wouldn’t joke about this. I’m a wolf and his mother is a fae; attachment to worldly possessions doesn’t run in his genes.”
I took the gray hoodie, sat down on the couch, and put my vision ring on. Although the ring didn’t enhance my magic, it did help to focus my mind so that all of it could go into a vision. I saw Darwin running around the practice field at the university. When I was in his mind, he was always able to prevent me from hearing any of his thoughts that he didn’t want me to hear. In the vision, however, I heard it all.
He ran much more than a human body could, not because he was a shifter, but because it helped to quiet his mind. There was a constant stream of information that flooded in no matter what he was doing, so he ran hard enough that he couldn’t hear his own thoughts over his breathing. Unfortunately, that only fueled the wolf inside him.
This was what he did when he couldn’t give us his fake smile anymore. When we were asleep or in class, or even when other students were just too much for him to handle, he would come out here and run. I had seen him sweaty and out of breath before, but I didn’t know he was running like this. I didn’t know that he was fighting with the wolf inside him long before he first shifted. No wonder the wolf was so violent at first.
During the breaks, he would run around his property, which was a lot of running considering it was a forest where a pack of wolf shifters exercised. He never ran with any of his pack members because he was afraid they would bring it out of him. And sometimes he wanted them to. I always thought Darwin just dealt with the pain of his hyperactive mind as best as he could, and I knew it was painful because I had seen into his mind. I had no idea there was actually a much deeper struggle between his human mind and his wolf one. Everything he did to escape one just drove him closer to the other.
I had to push that away and force myself to focus on finding him. It wasn’t easy without at least a guess, since I couldn’t form a blank background for the vision to fill in the details. The vision changed to him running at night in a forest, but his thoughts were strangely silent. In fact, his sight was different.
He was in his wolf form.
I let the vision play out until I finally saw what I had been hoping for; he stopped in front of a huge sign. Although it didn’t have an address, it had the city and the name of the place.
I pulled the ring off and my mind returned to my living room. “I know where he is.”
“Great. Where?” Henry asked.
“New York.” I knew Maseré would eventually find out his son could shift, but I had no intention of being the one who told him. “Henry and I can handle it. You have a pack to run.”
“Nonsense,” Maseré argued. “If he’s in trouble, I can help, and if he’s not, he’s going to be when I get ahold of him.”
“Once we g
et there, Devon is going to use his magic to find Darwin, and the more people around, the more difficult it will be,” Henry said. Obviously, he had already figured out I was trying to get rid of the alpha.
Maseré narrowed his eyes. “Then I will leave without my pack.”
“Wouldn’t that put them at risk? I really doubt he’s in danger. If he’s hurt or if we even think you can help, we will absolutely call you immediately.”
He considered it for a minute. “Call me every step of the way or I will hold you both personally responsible after I tear out the throats of whoever is actually responsible.”
“Understood.” After I gave him my new phone number, he reluctantly left.
Henry was silent for a minute until he was sure the wolf was gone. “I take it Darwin is in his wolf form?” I nodded. “You realize Maseré is going to follow us, right?”
“Yes, but that’s between him and Darwin.”
“Where is Darwin?”
“At a wolf conservation.”
* * *
Fortunately, finding the address was easy and since it was pretty close to the Connecticut boarder, it was only a little more than a hundred and fifty miles. The problem was that traffic was at a crawl for the first thirty miles.
“Is he driving or running?” I asked, not seeing Maseré behind us.
“It’s over a hundred and fifty miles.”
If I didn’t know Maseré fairly well, I wouldn’t have thought the shifter was following us. He was stealthier than Astrid even. “Maybe we’ve lost him.”
“Well, that would be a good thing. Darwin should not be keeping this a secret from his father.”
I scoffed. “Yeah, like none of us have kept secrets before. You do remember that I first came to Quintessence thinking I was human, don’t you? And you didn’t tell us what you did until you were good and ready.”
“I thought my jaguar would kill you. Besides, Maseré is his father. I wouldn’t want Kitten to keep a secret like that from me.”
“So, if Scott had---”
