by Brey Willows
The song ended and the music changed, and it broke the spell. She laughed and Kody joined her. They made their way back to the bar, where Brenda was already waiting. She pointed her cocktail stirrer at the open second story, where a long row of semi-private rooms looked out over the dance floor. The one right in the middle had several women and one man in it, and he had very red hair. He was also built like a brick shit house, and Maggie’s confidence in what she could do faltered. Unlike the rat man, Red Beard wouldn’t scurry away, and a fight with him would probably be less than pleasant.
Strobe lighting flickered across the crowd in time with a new song. “Let’s do it,” Kody said over the music.
Once again Brenda took the lead, and when a guard stopped her at the stairs leading up the balcony rooms, she did whatever it was she did, and he waved them through with no problem. Maggie pulled the hag stone from her clutch and held it to her eye. The blue glow told her which door they wanted, and once they were outside it, Kody touched her arm.
“How do you want to do this?” she asked.
Maggie closed her eyes and pictured the moment in her mind, letting it unfold naturally. When she opened her eyes, she took the paintbrush from her clutch and handed the empty bag to Brenda to hold. With her left hand, she held the hag stone, and with her right, the paintbrush. “Can you crack the door open? Just enough so I can see in.”
Kody did as Maggie asked, and she was able to see Red Beard through the stone. Amazingly, he was even bigger through the stone than he looked in person, but she couldn’t see his face. She focused the way Mal had taught her, and the music and lights became background static as the golden strands moved around Red Beard. She closed them slowly, and only when he started to struggle did she pull them tight. “Now!”
Kody flung the door open and Maggie stepped inside, focused on keeping the net tight around him. His rage flooded up the strands and into the stone, but Maggie ignored it. She brought up the paintbrush and painted a cage in the air around him, one whose bars glowed green and solid. When she lowered the hag stone and released the strings, Red Beard spun around in the cage, his hands holding bars that weren’t visible to anyone else.
Brenda shooed the girls out of the room and told them to go see if the other rooms wanted company. They went without a fight and barely a glance at Red Beard. The door closed, and it was just the four of them.
“Spinner.” Spittle flew from his lips, and he made the title sound like a swear word. “You’re going to regret this.”
Beneath his rage Maggie could almost taste his fear, like a bit of unnoticed gum wrapper still stuck to the gum when you bit down. “No, I don’t think I am. But I have a feeling you’re not going to be very happy when we’re done with you.” His fear tingled at the back of her throat, and she winced slightly. “But you already know that.”
Kody held out her hand. “Can I look?”
Maggie handed her the hag stone, and Kody made a sound of approval after looking through it for a moment. “Nicely done.” She handed it back and said to Red Beard, “Put your hands behind you, and we’ll leave like civilized people. Don’t make this any harder than it needs to be.”
He spat at her, but it fell far short. “Sod off, shepherd. Let me out of this cage, and we’ll settle things the old way.”
Kody’s grin was one Maggie hadn’t seen before, but she wasn’t about to let Kody take that challenge. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Brenda move behind Red Beard. Distraction was needed. She sat on a chair in front of him and crossed her legs slowly. It had been sexy in some movie she’d seen, but she had a feeling she’d pulled it off with a lot less flair. Regardless, it got his attention.
“We have some things to discuss, and it’s a little too loud here for my taste. So where do you suggest we discuss them?”
He leered at her and glanced at Kody. “Get rid of your muscle, and we’ll talk all night long.”
Kody tensed and moved forward, but Maggie put her hand out and pressed Kody’s thigh. “I’m afraid my muscle goes where I go. I’m sure you know how that works.”
His body jerked as though he’d been shoved from behind, and his cheek dented as it pressed against the invisible bars. Slowly, he slid to the floor, his body held up by the cage. His eyes fluttered shut.
Brenda stood outside the cage behind him, grinning and looking an awful lot like a child caught doing something wicked. “You’ve probably got about ten minutes. I don’t usually take on creatures his size.”
“Make a hole for me.” Kody moved to Brenda’s side, and Maggie moved the paintbrush to remove the bars at the back of the cage. Kody grabbed Red’s arms and pulled them behind him, snapping the cuffs on. She looked up at Maggie. “How taxing is it for you to hold that cage?”
Maggie shook her head. “It’s not. I think the magic comes from the brush, not me. So I’m fine.”
“I have a feeling that brush is attached to your personal magic, but that’s good news.” She rolled Red onto his back. “Can you put shackles on his ankles? So he can walk but not take off?”
Maggie did so quickly and concentrated on the way using the paintbrush made her feel. Like Kody said, it did feel attached to her. The way she could visualize an image and then have it come from the brush so clearly was a painter’s dream. The power was cool as it ran down her arm and into the brush, like melting ice water on a summer day. Not uncomfortable, but certainly noticeable.
“Done.” She smiled at Brenda when she moved away from Red to sit next to Maggie. “Want to tell me what you did?”
Brenda moved in time to the beat of the music. “Since this all started you haven’t had time to do any research, so I’m going to cut you some slack. But when we get a minute, you need to read up on my kind and what we can do.” She danced in her chair, her hands moving through air sensually. “For now, we’ll just say that my kind have powers of persuasion that have a lot to do with touch. If I want something specific, all I have to do is touch someone and think of what I want them to do, and they do it. Unless they know what it is I’m going for and block me. Then, it’s not so great. But I wanted him to sleep, and because he didn’t see me and block me, I touched him and put him to sleep.”
Maggie thought of the guards they’d seen on their way in. Brenda had touched each of them when they’d leaned down to talk to her. “Wow. That’s a hell of a power to have.”
Brenda grinned and looked satisfied at Maggie’s praise. “Damn right. Sadly though, it only works if I have the element of surprise and I can think of what I want to do fast enough. If either of those guards had an ounce of willpower we’d have been in trouble.”
At least there was some boundary to the power. It made Maggie uncomfortable to think of someone having that kind of sway over someone. She’d have to do some research so she really understood what her protector could do.
Red Beard groaned and shifted his weight on his arms as he started to wake. When he was fully coherent, he glared at them. “All I have to do is shout and my guards will come running.”
Kody stood and glared down at him. “You’ve forgotten the old ways, Red. You’ve been here too long.” She leaned down, and he visibly pressed himself to the floor, his eyes wide. “I want you to think back. Remember what you’ve heard about me, and what my job is when someone steps way out of line.”
His eyes widened farther, and once again Maggie could taste his fear.
“Please don’t cut my story.” He looked beyond Kody at Maggie. “Please.”
Maggie stood and smoothed her dress, hoping she looked calmer than she felt. “We’ll see. For now, come quietly like a good giant, and we’ll go from there.”
Kody pulled him to his feet, and although he glared at them, his trembling hands behind him made it clear he wasn’t as confident as he wanted them to think he was. Kody led the way with her hand on his shoulder, and Maggie and Brenda followed.
At the bottom of the stairs, he said to the guard, “Radio for my car.”
Maggie saw the
tight grip Kody held between his neck and shoulder and only in that moment did it really hit her how long Kody had been doing this. A case of imposter syndrome hit her, and when she saw his body stiffen like he sensed a chink in the armor, she pushed it away quickly. Doubting herself would weaken the chains on him, and that could be deadly for all of them.
They got into his limo, and Kody gave the driver the address. At the building, they got out and Brenda opened the door. Once inside, they went to the elevator and Kody punched the button for the floor below the cottage. That’s when Maggie understood they were going to the guest apartment Kody had planned on staying in before they’d had to run to the other world. It had no touch of Maggie’s home, and it wouldn’t taint her living space. It was perfect.
Inside the ultra-modern space, Kody pushed Red into a seat. He sat there silently glaring at them.
Kody took off her jacket and draped it over a stool. She pulled Maggie far enough from Red so he couldn’t hear them but so she could still see him.
“Maggie, there are different ways we can do this. You can just come right out and ask him, but we both know he’s not going to offer up the information without a fight.”
Maggie nodded, waiting for the shoe to drop. She could feel Kody’s hesitation.
“The old way involved me physically getting information I needed, if that’s what it took. Or physically convincing someone their tale was where they needed to be.” Her expression was searching; she was clearly looking for guidance in Maggie’s reaction.
Should the threat of violence bother her? It didn’t. Why didn’t it? She searched inside, looked at the feeling of power she got from the brush, felt the hag stone. And then she found it, buried in knowledge she hadn’t quite learned how to access yet but could still feel somewhere in her soul. It was the way things were done in her world, and it was the way things were done in their jobs. Things might change, but right now they had to do it as quickly as possible. She nodded slowly. “Let’s ask first, so we know he understands the question. Brenda can’t get the answer, can she?” Kody shook her head and Maggie nodded. “So, if he doesn’t answer when we ask nicely…” She touched Kody’s arm as she moved away and back toward Red.
She sat on the chair facing him. “We really only have one question for you, and I need you to answer it so that my shepherd there can keep her hands clean.”
His glanced from Maggie to Kody but stayed silent.
Maggie leaned forward. “We want to know who the boss is. Quite simple, really. Give us a name, and things remain civil.”
He sat back in the seat and stared at her quizzically. “Is that all, little girl? Just the name of the boss?” He jerked forward, his jaw tight and spittle flying from his mouth as he raised his voice. “He’ll kill you, and I hope I’m there to watch. Maybe he’ll let me have some fun with you before he kills the last of your kind and we’re rid of you for good.”
His vitriol crawled up Maggie’s arms like stinging ants and she moved away, needing distance. “Just to be clear, you’re refusing to answer?”
He sat back again. “Yeah. I’m refusing to answer.”
Maggie turned to Kody, and the stinging ant sensation ceased. “Do what you need to do. Just be careful.”
Kody’s expression was blank. “I will. Can you keep the chains on from upstairs?”
Maggie nodded, knowing it wouldn’t be a problem. “You don’t want me to stay?”
Kody shook her head. “This part is always something I do alone. I prefer it that way. I’ll come up when we’re done. Just be ready to open the back door.”
Maggie swallowed the fear of leaving Kody alone with him. She’d been doing this for a long, long time. She had to trust that Kody knew exactly what she was doing. She kissed Kody’s cheek, not caring about professionalism. “See you soon.”
Maggie and Brenda left and went up to the cottage. She tried not to think about what was happening, or what Kody needed to do to get the information they required. Did the end justify the means? In this case, it meant getting to the one person responsible for making life horrific for an entire world of people whose lives were out of balance, and who was responsible for letting guys like Red Beard run rampant through this world. It was what Kody and Maggie had been born to do, and she wasn’t going to turn away from it now.
Shamus sat in front of the fire, his little reading glasses perched on his nose and a book open in his lap. When they closed the door without Kody behind them, he turned back to his book without saying anything.
“Can I borrow a T-shirt?” Brenda asked. She, too, seemed subdued.
“Of course. Come on up.” Maggie wanted to get out of her dress, too. The amazingly sexy feeling she’d had when Kody had looked at her was gone, and now she wanted comfortable clothes to do whatever she was going to have to do next. She contemplated looking at the book for answers, but it didn’t feel right. This felt like a test, something she had to figure out herself, and she didn’t want to be led. She gave Brenda a long T-shirt that went all the way to Brenda’s ankles, and Maggie threw on jeans and a loose tank top.
Back downstairs, they joined Shamus. Brenda picked up a magazine, and Maggie sat staring at the fire, making sure she kept the feeling of the chains intact. Without Red Beard in front of her, she couldn’t feel his fear, and when she concentrated on what she could feel of Kody, it was like she’d pressed against frozen steel.
So she waited.
Chapter Twenty-five
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It felt like hours, but probably wasn’t nearly that long, before Kody came through the door with Red Beard dragging behind her. There wasn’t a mark visible on him, but the way he flinched when Kody’s hand came up suggested there were some that couldn’t be seen. Or maybe Maggie had more to learn about how Kody worked, too. She’d assumed it was a purely physical thing, but maybe that wasn’t the truth of it. The giant of a man dropped to his knees, his head bowed and his shoulders slumped.
Maggie looked at Kody. “Anything?” She couldn’t deny that Kody’s particular brand of power made her hot.
“The boss has a Russian accent, but he doesn’t actually know his name. They worked together to come up with ways to take the magic from creatures, and the boss is the one who calls the final shots.” She went to the fridge and opened a soda. She took a long drink and then rolled the cold can across her forehead. “When someone doesn’t pay or tries to do something the boss doesn’t sanction, he sends the Red Guard from our world to this one, and they pay that person a visit. The guards have been stopped since you took over the cottage, but Red here managed to find some local talent take up the slack.”
It was a vile enactment of bad TV crime dramas, and Maggie had no tolerance for it. “How do they take the magic from the poor people who are so desperate?”
Kody pulled a piece of paper from her pocket and handed it over. “He bought one of these off a witch at the marketplace. She told him what it was and how to use it, and he paid a hefty sum for it. He said he’s never seen her there again when he’s gone back to shop.”
The thing looked a little like her hag stone, but it was a true circle and it looked like the edges would be sharp. The hole in the middle was made up of needle like appendages pointing downward. She grimaced and handed the paper to Shamus. “That looks nasty.”
Shamus growled. “An elemental scythe. They were supposed to have all been destroyed centuries ago.” He folded the paper and slipped it into one of those cat pockets Maggie really wanted to see. “Does he still have it?”
“It’s in his desk at his office in the Garner Industrial Center, building twenty-five. I thought we could go get it when we’ve put him through to the other world.” Kody finished her soda and got out another. At Maggie’s look of surprise, she said, “You know how you get reall
y hungry after you use your power? I get really thirsty.”
Shamus moved to the door. “You don’t need my help taking him across, and that kind of power needs to be dealt with right away. An elemental scythe literally cuts away the elements of a person, and it can be used by pretty much anyone who wants to wield it. I’ll go get it so we know it’s safe.”
“Shamus, you shouldn’t go alone.” Maggie stepped forward to stop him, but he turned to her with his pointy little smile.
“Where do you think the term cat burglar comes from, lass?” He shimmered and Blech melted into the darkness.
Maggie turned back and looked down at Red Beard, who remained slumped on the floor. “Now I have to figure out what to do with him.” She looked at Kody. “Any personal opinions on the subject?”
She shook her head and leaned on the kitchen counter. “Sorry, Mags. This one has to be all you. I can help once you’ve made your decision, but I can’t direct you.”
Maggie sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. She closed her eyes and emptied her mind of everything but the problem facing her, and as she had before, let options play out in front of her. When several options had come to her and none of them involved cutting Red Beard’s story, she opened her eyes. “What sector is he from?”
“Nordic,” Brenda answered, still sitting with the magazine in her lap, though it looked forgotten. “Cold and desolate in some areas, and really beautiful little houses and waterways in others.”
