Now or Never: Wizards of Nevermore

by Michele Bardsley

  She had finally found a place where she belonged.

  “Well, den,” said Ember as she stood in the small entryway of her tea shop, eyeing Gray, Cullen, and Leticia as well as the six really big men. “You all here.”

  “You know my mother,” said Gray.

  “Yes. Nice t’ see you, Consul.” She turned toward Cullen and waggled a finger at him. “ ’Bout time you got here. What took you so long?”

  “Um…prison?”

  Ember rolled her eyes. “Dat no excuse. C’mon, den. We got work to do.”

  She turned and walked past the empty bar, leaving them no choice but to follow her. Cullen thought the whole thing was fucking weird, but since he’d just had a conversation with a ghost…well, the meter for weird was a lot higher than it used to be.

  “Gray!” The slim brunette had been standing near a table conversing with a tall, thin blond man. She hurried to the Guardian and wrapped her arms around him. An eternity seemed to pass as they held each other—and as though no one else existed in the room—or hell, the world.

  Cullen felt something clench in his gut. It felt a helluva lot like envy. He’d never known love like that. He’d never had a relationship that lasted longer than breakfast.

  Finally, the lovebirds broke apart. Gray turned toward Leticia. “Mother, this is my wife, Lucinda.”

  “It’s so nice to meet you,” said Lucinda. She offered her hand, and Cullen could tell she was trying to hide her nervousness. Leticia had no doubt noted the girl was anxious. He wondered if she would try to exploit that. Or maybe she’d also noticed that her son was completely in love with his wife—and she had better tread carefully.

  “It’s nice to meet you,” said Leticia with a polite smile. She shook the girl’s hand perfunctorily. “Welcome to the Calhoun family.”

  “Thank you.” Lucinda moved closer to Gray’s embrace, and Cullen saw the man flash his mother an irritated look.

  Family drama. Sheesh. This kind of crap made him glad he didn’t have a family.

  “Oh my Goddess.” The exclamation came from Lucinda as she noticed him standing slightly behind Gray. “He looks just like—”

  “I know,” said Gray.

  “This is Cullen Deshane,” said Leticia. “Mary Clark’s son.”

  Gray looked startled. He shared a look with Lucy. Then turned to Ember. “Is Taylor here?”

  “On der way,” said Ember. “Bot’ of dem. Everyting’s comin’ together as it should.”

  “You knew about him?” asked Gray.

  “Well, I did when I laid eyes on him,” said Ember with a harrumph. She turned toward Leticia and Cullen. “You come, and I make tea for you.” She made shooing motions at the lictors. “Go find somewhere to sit. I bring you someting, too.”

  “Thank you,” said Leticia. “Earl Grey, please.”

  Ember snorted. “You don’t know what you need.” She glared at Cullen. “Do you?”

  Cullen grinned. He really liked this woman. “I don’t know a damned thing.”

  “First step to knowing anything is admitting you know nothing,” she said approvingly. She waved at them. “Sit, sit.” She walked away, her purple dress swishing around black boots.

  “Does she have an accent?” he asked Gray. “Because I swear she did a minute ago.”

  “Think of it like a radio that tunes in and out,” said the Guardian. “The stronger her accent, the more trouble you’re in.”

  “Ah. Got it.”

  “Gray.”

  Cullen looked at Lucinda. She’d gone pale. The red jewel that hung from her necklace glowed red. Gray cursed and grabbed the gem. Then he closed his eyes. A few seconds later, his eyes popped open. “She’s at the Banton farm.”

  “Why would she go there?” asked Lucinda. Her voice was tinged with panic. Cullen felt the tension in the air. Something was definitely up.

  “We’ll find out.” To his mother he said, “You’ll have to make do without us.” Gray took Lucinda’s hand, and they hurried away.

  “Where are you going?” asked Leticia as she followed them.

  “To get Happy,” said Gray.

  Cullen wondered if that was a drug reference. He wheeled around and followed the line of lictors that trailed after Leticia like a drunken snake.

  “Happy? That girl you took charge of?” asked Leticia. “Is she in trouble?”

  “Yes.” Gray and Lucinda turned at the door. “Let us handle it, Mother.”

  “Of course,” said Leticia. “But I’m coming with you. And Roan, too. He’s very handy when it comes to trouble.”

  “I’ll go,” said Cullen, surprising himself with the offer. He wasn’t much of a team player. But he was still shaken up by his conversation with Sarah—the dead woman. She’d said to stick close to Gray, so that was what he was going to do.

  “Thanks. We have to go the sheriff’s office,” said Gray. “There’s a portal there. It’ll take us close to the barn where Happy is.”

  Cullen had heard of portals, but he didn’t really know of any still in use. It was an old-school magic, and since most cities ran on technology, it was difficult to use complex magic without affecting the electricity on which everything ran. But in a small town like Nevermore, magic was far more prevalent than tech. He kinda liked it.

  “Consul,” said Roan in a smooth, respectful voice, “it may not be wise to accompany your son on this venture.”

  “Wise or not, I’m going. And don’t argue with me about taking the other lictors. This is Nevermore, Roan. I’m safer here than anywhere else.”

  Roan looked as though he wanted to argue, but he made a formal half bow instead. “As you wish, Consul.” He turned toward the lictors that had piled up behind them. “Stay here. I’ll call you if necessary.”

  Silently, the other lictors turned away and strode toward the back of the tea shop. Cullen wondered if Ember would make them drink tea.

  “Let’s go,” said Gray.

  Leticia, Roan, and Cullen followed Gray and Lucinda down the street and into the sheriff’s office. A robust brunette sat at a desk in the lobby, typing efficiently on a typewriter. She looked up at the new arrivals and quirked an eyebrow. “Help you?”

  “Just need the portal, Arlene,” said Gray. “Happy’s at the Banton farm.”

  Arlene’s friendly expression hardened. “Well, don’t just stand there,” she snapped. “Get going. I’ll send Taylor to you as soon as he gets here.”

  “Thanks.”

  Gray led them to the back of the building and made a right turn into what was obviously a break room. He went to the back wall, put up his hands, whispered a spell, and a big black oval opened like a giant’s sleepy eye.

  Gray went through first, then Lucinda. Roan made a sweeping gesture at Cullen, indicating that he should go next. He didn’t argue. He stepped into the portal. Whoa. His body went hot, cold, and then electric. He felt as though he’d imploded. There were lights and colors and faint music, and then he was spit out into the cold air. His feet hit the soil, and he surged forward, barely managing to stay upright.

  Lucinda grabbed his arm to steady him. “The first time’s always the hardest,” she said.

  “Yeah,” he managed. He still tingled, and for some reason his mouth tasted metallic. In the next instant, the Consul popped through, and then Roan.

  A couple yards away he saw a dilapidated barn.

  Gray was already moving toward it. Lucinda followed, and Cullen went next. The Consul and Roan came after. Gray found a section of wall that had rotted away. He went through it. When they were all in the barn, they waited for the Guardian to decide what to do next.

  It smelled like manure, and the dust tickled Cullen’s nose.

  “Happy!” yelled Gray.

  “Here,” came a quivering female voice. “Over here, Gray!”

  Everyone ran toward the sound of the girl’s cries.

  “Shit,” muttered Cullen as he took in the scene. It was a spellcasting gone wrong, or might have been if it had
n’t been for the blade planted in the chest of an old man. He was a Raven by the style of his robes. The girl was planted a few feet from the body, and she was being consoled by Lucinda and Gray. Cullen moved forward to get a closer look at the dead guy. Leticia and Roan followed him.

  “Good Goddess!” exclaimed Leticia. “That’s Orley Ryerson. He’s a special investigator with the House of Ravens. What’s he doing here?”

  “Investigating Bernard Franco’s murder,” said Gray. He joined them, his expression seven kinds of pissed off.

  “I didn’t realize he’d traced back Bernard to Nevermore.” She turned toward her son. “He was here?”

  “I told you we had some long stories to tell you,” he said. “It’s not protected here. The telling will have to be saved for Ember’s. Her place is neutral ground.”

  “Very well,” said Leticia. “But I’d better hear the whole story.” She glanced over her shoulder. “Did the girl kill him?”

  “No,” said Gray. “Happy said she found him like this. She touched the body, though.”

  “Unfortunate,” said Leticia.

  “What are you saying, Mom?”

  “Gray, I’m an officer of the Courts. I have to process this scene. I have to call in proper authorities. The situation with the Ravens is tense enough—to see yet another of their elite murdered…with a connection to Nevermore. It’s problematic.”

  Cullen thought that might be the understatement of the year.

  “That’s a bad idea,” said Gray. “You don’t know what else is going on, Mom. Inviting in outsiders—proper authorities, or not—could really fuck things up.”

  “Perhaps we can…delay notifications,” said Leticia. “But action will still have to be taken. I’m sorry, Gray.” She looked at Roan. “Arrest the girl.”

  Chapter 14

  “I’ll do the arresting around here,” said Taylor as he sauntered into the unfolding drama. He held on tightly to Norie’s slim hand, liking the feel of her skin against his. She’d insisted on going with him, and he hadn’t put up much of a fight, considering the bad feeling roaming around his gut. He wasn’t a fool. He knew the Ravens would have to try for Norie again—to fulfill the prophecy.

  He leaned back on his boot heels, tipped his hat backward, and gave his best country-boy-aw-shucks grin. “Consul Calhoun. Nice to see you around these parts again.”

  “Don’t pull that dumb-hick act on me,” said Leticia. “I know you don’t have biscuits for brains.” She seemed to realize her country upbringing was showing, so she smoothed away her irritated expression. “The girl was found in the same place as a murdered Raven,” she said in a more cultured tone. “She has to be taken into custody.” Her gaze moved from Taylor to the girl standing beside him. Her mouth dropped open. “Holy shit.”

  “What?” asked Norie, looking down at her ill-fitting jeans and oversized T-shirt. “It’s the best I could do on short notice.”

  “It’s not your clothes, girl,” said Leticia in a choked voice. “It’s your likeness.”

  At that moment, a black-haired, blue-eyed man strode in from the opposite side of the barn. “Perimeter check done. No other dead guys. Just a bunch of moldy hay and really disturbing sharp objects hanging on the walls.”

  The entire barn went quiet.

  Taylor couldn’t believe it. The man who’d casually entered their presence was a mirror image of Norie—same nose, same chin, same blue eyes. The man was much bigger, of course, broader in the shoulders and narrow in the hips. He looked tough, as though maybe life had been hard, but surely no harder than it had been on Norie. She didn’t have the same kind of wear and tear, though, and certainly not the kind of jaded, wary vibe that this man exuded.

  Norie stepped forward, her hand loosening from Taylor’s. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Cullen Deshane,” he said. He looked just as flabbergasted as everyone else. “And you are?”

  “Lenore Whyte, but everyone calls me Norie.”

  They walked to each other, seemingly drawn like magnets. Taylor felt the tattoos on his hands tingle, and the center of his forehead felt hot. He reached out, thinking maybe he should catch hold of her, stop her from…well, whatever. But Gray grabbed his shoulder. “There’s magic here,” he said. “We must let it play out.”

  “The hell we do,” said Taylor under his breath, but he left it alone. If one thing went wrong, he was going for Norie, damn the consequences.

  Norie and Cullen seemed mesmerized. Together they lifted their palms, and, when they reached each other, they matched palms and threaded their fingers together. After thirty years, the spell that kept them blind and deaf to their pasts, to their powers, began to fray. Today, the star twins reached their thirtieth birthdays…and their destinies.

  Light burst from their clasped hands and twisted upward, snaking out in thousands of glittering ribbons until white magic filled the entire barn. Taylor felt himself driven to his knees, and then he pitched forward into the abyss of unconsciousness.

  It was Christmas Eve.

  “Careful, Norie,” whispered Cullen as they went down the winding staircase.

  Lenore nodded, and she was glad that Cullen held her hand so tightly. He was her older brother by only four minutes, but he took his job seriously. Women deserved protection. He said this often, but she wasn’t sure why. He was smart, though, and she trusted him.

  Their bedrooms were upstairs at the very end of the wide hallway. Usually, they weren’t allowed to venture downstairs without their nanny, but Mother had promised that they could each open a present. “Just one,” she had said with a smile, “and only after your father goes out for the evening.”

  Lenore and Cullen rarely saw Father, and that was just fine by her. He never seemed to be a happy man. In fact, he frightened Lenore. She didn’t like to endure the rare dinners they had with him. He seemed very interested in what they couldn’t do. Magic. He really wanted them to do magic, but they couldn’t, no matter how hard they tried. And Mother always seemed so sad after the dinners. Sometimes, she and Father argued, and it ended with the terrible sound of a slap and then Mother crying.

  No, Norie didn’t like her father very much at all.

  “Sshh,” said Cullen, even though Norie hadn’t said anything. They stopped at the end of the stairwell. Voices filtered from the great room down the marble hallway.

  “I won’t let him!”

  “Mother,” said Lenore in a worried voice.

  “C’mon.” He gripped her hand tightly. “Be very quiet, Norie.”

  “Okay,” she said. Cullen often said she was brave, and even if she was trembling on the inside, she would pretend she wasn’t. Mother said sometimes you could pretend your way to feeling better in no time.

  They crept down the hallway and peered around the doorway that led to the great room. It was very large and filled with big dark furniture, and big pretty paintings. But the best thing about it during Christmastime was the large pine tree by the hearth.

  She loved how it smelled, and how pretty it looked with the colorful decorations. And she especially adored all the lovely wrapped gifts that spilled from underneath its wide branches.

  “The prophecy is true,” said a gray-haired woman Norie had never seen before. “We’ve hidden their gifts for as long as we can. Once your husband discovers they are the star twins, who Nelos predicted would end the world or save it, their fates are sealed.”

  “How can that be? End it…Save it. I don’t understand.”

  “It would take only one to create a magical cataclysm, Mary. Leo can use them to do very bad things to this world. Your children are powerful, and they will only grow more so. We must hide their magic. Their gifts. Their true identities.”

  “What will it take?” asked Mother.

  The woman shook her head. “The kind of magic you’re asking for is…complex. It requires special energies.”

  “Sacrifice,” said Mother.

  The woman looked uncomfortable. “If the world’s
fate did not rest on the shoulders of your children, I would never consider it. To take the life of another is a sin against magic too strong to be forgiven. So that will be my sacrifice.”

  “He thinks I’m a mundane,” Mother said softly. “But my father was a Raven.”

  “I know.” The woman leaned forward and placed a hand on Mary Deshane’s thin shoulder. “We must complete the spell.”

  “When?” asked Mary.

  “The longer we wait, the more we risk that your husband will discover the secret you’ve been keeping.”

  “Tonight, then.” Mary sighed. “Very well.”

  The woman nodded, then hugged Mother tightly. She moved back, her simple white robes glittering like snowfall in the firelight. She withdrew a dagger from her robe and then lifted her arms.

  She started chanting. The fire grew brighter, hotter. Mary stood next to the hearth, looking the saddest Norie had ever seen her. Norie’s stomach squeezed. Something bad was happening—something very bad.

  “Cullen,” she said, “is this because we can see dead people?”

  “Maybe,” he said. He leaned forward, his gaze anxious. “I don’t like this.”

  The chanting got louder, faster. Wind came out of nowhere and rattled the furniture, the Christmas tree, the paintings. The floor underneath their feet rumbled. Cullen grabbed Norie and held tight. Their gazes were locked onto the gray-haired woman. She was screaming now, her eyes rolled back to their whites, and then she whipped forward with the blade and drew it across Mother’s throat.

  Blood sprayed everywhere. Black glittery light rose like wisps of smoke from the wound, and the caterwauling witch gathered those wisps and tied them into the white strands of magic that wiggled around the hearth like terrified worms.

  “I want Mommy!” Norie struggled against Cullen’s embrace. “Mommy!”

  She got free of her brother and ran toward Mommy. She was hurt. She needed help. Tears streamed down her cheeks because she knew, she knew, she knew that her mother couldn’t be helped. Cullen dashed past her, heading like a charging bull toward the woman who was in the throes of casting her spell.