It exploded. Quills of ice and fire punched through her flesh and bones. She didn’t have a lot of memories after that. She transformed, that much she knew. She’d spent a long time in her other form. She remembered . . . eating . . . magic. Scooping it out of the air and water. She’d been there through the upheaval under the water as the ground dropped into a giant canyon filled now by the lake surrounding the Island. She’d watched the underwater mountain rise and sprout forests and glaciers and reefs.
Eventually, she’d crawled up on a bank to sun herself and when she’d dried, she learned she could turn back to human. After that, she’d had to figure out how to live. And she’d quit her job.
“You were chosen,” Raven said when Kayla had finished.
“I always figured I’d won the crap lottery. Bad luck.”
Raven shook her head. “No, from what you’ve said, it’s clear that the power that came to you was searching.”
“For me?” Kayla said doubtfully.
“Maybe.” Raven shrugged. “There’s no way to know why it picked you specifically, but it’s likely it was drawn to you in particular.”
Kayla didn’t know if she bought that. “Maybe I was the only one close by.”
“It had the whole city to choose from, not to mention all the surrounding cities. No, something about you fit its needs.”
“Needs? You’re making it sound like it’s some kind of sentient being—or a parasite.” The idea made the food in Kayla’s stomach bubble alarmingly. Was something living inside her? Using her for its own ends?
“Not sentient, and not a parasite,” Raven said, and then hesitated, clearly searching for words. “I don’t know how to explain it.”
“Just spit it out,” Kayla said. It could hardly get worse.
Raven sighed. “You are aware that the gods of most of the religions of the world actually exist?”
Kayla frowned, not liking the direction this conversation was taking. “No.”
“Well they do. Maybe not in the form that the worshippers believe, or with the powers, but they do exist. From Zeus to Jesus to Quetzalcoatl and everything in between. They all exist—those that aren’t dead, that is.”
“Gods can’t be killed,” Kayla protested, as if that made any sense at all, or was remotely important in this conversation.
“Jesus was killed, wasn’t he?”
“He was raised from the dead.”
“But that doesn’t change the fact that he did, in fact, die.”
“So you’re saying he really does exist?”
“I presume so, though he’s of the general collection of gods that doesn’t interact with the real world much. At least, not anymore.”
Kayla sat a moment, just staring as she processed the conversation. “What does any of this have to do with me?”
“Little is really known about the divine in general. How they become gods—whether they are born or ascend to a state of divinity. However, one thing that we do know is that some gods will send off fragments of themselves. Or maybe they are more like seeds. Either way, they take a splinter of themselves and put it out in the world. The beings who absorb or are infected, if you prefer, with these splinters, become divine. They share the powers and abilities of the parent god.”
Raven stopped and just looked at Kayla, waiting.
Kayla’s lungs squeezed with something like panic “You’re saying that the thing I swallowed was one of these god seeds.” Saying the words out loud sounded so ridiculous, she started laughing. It was ludicrous. Impossible.
For a moment, her laughter took on an edge of hysteria. But then she looked at Raven’s deadly serious expression and her laughter died. “How? How could you possibly know? You weren’t there. I swallowed wild magic, that’s all. I’m no god. I couldn’t even save myself from some rabid dog-beasts. How is that godlike?”
The sympathy in Raven’s expression made Kayla’s teeth itch. Irritation dragged its fingernails across her bones. She folded her arms across her chest, glaring at the witch. She didn’t have to prove she wasn’t a god; Raven had to prove she was. And that was going to be impossible, because the witch was wrong. Dead wrong.
Raven reached for a carved wood box at the end of the table and pulled it toward her. She opened the lid, revealing a stone wand of silvery-white, translucent rock, about seven inches long and an inch in diameter. It lay on a bed of green velvet.
“This is selenite,” she said, picking it up and turning the polished length in her fingers. “Named after a goddess of the moon—Selene. It’s useful in healing and it holds other mystical properties.” She offered it to Kayla. “Here, hold it.”
This wasn’t just a show and tell. Raven was proving her point. For a long moment, Kayla just stared at the rock without moving. Stop being such a coward, she told herself acidly. If you’re a god, then you’re a god and you’ll deal with whatever the fuck that means. She just knew it couldn’t be good.
She reluctantly took the stone wand from Raven. The moment her fingers touched the polished surface, it began to glow brilliant blue and gold—much the same colors as her scales in her other form.
She dropped the selenite wand onto the tablecloth, and its color faded back to white. “What happened?”
Raven picked up the wand and returned it to the box. “It confirms that you are indeed divine in nature.”
Questions pounded against the inside of Kayla’s skull. How the hell could she be a god? What kind of god? What was she supposed to do with that knowledge? She scraped her wits together. She’d been a detective—a puzzle solver at the job’s most basic level. She could solve the mystery of her own self, starting with gathering all the facts that she could. “What made you think I was a god in the first place?”
“It took us a while,” Raven admitted. “We knew that something or someone was having a positive effect on the river in the city.”
“Positive effect? What does that mean?”
“Over the years, we began to see a kind of energy and vigor in the river and city that wasn’t natural. At first we thought maybe a coven was responsible, or possibly a sorcerer or mage. The kind of power involved is substantial. We spoke to a spectrum of witches and covens from all over the world, but it soon became obvious that no witch, mage, or sorcerer could sustain that level of magic without us being able to track it. That left us looking at other options, and the only reasonable conclusion was that we were looking at some sort of divine intervention.”
Though Kayla wanted to know more about the specifics, now wasn’t the time. “So why me?”
“We started with a number of options. We believed that whoever was responsible had to live here. Then we simply watched, looking for anyone who might fit the bill.”
“What sorts of things were you looking for?”
“A variety of things, but the main one we wanted to find was the epicenter. The magic had to extend outward from the source, like ripples in the water after you drop a rock in it. We were able to narrow it down to the general vicinity of the river in the downtown. Once we realized that the source had to be comfortable both in and out of the water, we realized you were the most likely possibility. You confused us, because when in human form, you read like a human. There is no evidence you are anything else.
“We were fairly certain we were right, but we continued to search for any other possibilities. Gradually we winnowed away the other options, until you were the only one left. The wand”—Raven motioned toward the box—”just confirms what we already know.”
Kayla digested this information. “Okay, say I believe you. What’s it mean? What do you want from me? What kind of god am I, anyway?”
“That,” Raven said with a grimace, “is less clear. I was hoping you knew.”
Kayla couldn’t help but laugh. “So I’m the god of who knows what?
How many gods can there possibly be?”
“Thousands. Tens of thousands.”
“How is that even possible? How come we don’t see more of them walking around turning wine in the water and walking on air?”
“Actually, they are walking around among us quite a bit. You are not the only god in town.”
Kayla’s mouth fell open. “How many are in Portland?”
Raven shrugged. “They don’t advertise themselves, and I’m sure there are those who—like you—do not know what they are, but we know of twenty or thirty, and suspect the number is closer to a hundred.”
“Just walking around and living their lives? Just like everybody else?”
“More or less. There seems to be a general agreement that they will share this territory and not fight. Though it’s possible the peace is the consequence of your existence here.”
“If I didn’t know I’m a god, and I didn’t know that they were gods, then how could I make them behave?”
“We think that one of the things you do as a god, is make wherever you are a fertile place, healthy, and generally content. We think that also extends to other gods. As I told you, you are a guardian. The river is your natural domain, but that includes the area around it. The longer you live here, the greater your influence extends. You, for lack of a better description, are both mother nature and mother justice. Life thrives anywhere you are. Your human and divine natures make you want to protect others.”
Kayla rubbed her eyes. This was getting to feel like some sort of psychotherapy session. She had a crazy urge to lie down on the couch and talk about her mother. She snorted inwardly. Her mother was the least of her family problems. Her father was Tony Soprano and Sweeney Todd rolled up into one scary package. If she were to talk to a therapist about anybody, it would be him.
Thinking of him reminded her that her grandmother and aunt were missing, and that time was running out. Enough with the god shit. She could deal with that later. She needed to wake up Ray and get back to work solving the kidnapping and finding the witchkin murderer.
As if reading her mind, Raven’s next words chilled Kayla to the bone.
“The creatures that attacked you nearly killed you because their poison specifically targets divine creatures. Ray’s wounds were ugly and the poison did hurt him, but had very little effect compared to you. Left to your own devices, you would have been dead by now.”
“But I wasn’t their main target, was I? Otherwise they would have kept after me until I was dead.” Oh, fuck. Those things were loose in the city somewhere. But the technomages would surely have gone after them.
Raven nodded. “They are here to hunt someone else, and given all the ritual killings, I’m afraid of what lengths they and their master will go to, to achieve their mission. Did that information I gave you lead you anywhere?”
“Not yet. Cops are canvassing and there’s a tip line. Hoping to get some sense of where the killer is holing up.” Kayla pushed back from the table. “I’ve got a bad feeling the clock is ticking down to zero and if we don’t figure out what’s going on pretty quick, I’m afraid it will be too late.” She wasn’t entirely sure what too late actually meant. Armageddon? Whatever it was, people were going to die. That much, she knew in every cell of her body. So she had to find the creatures and their masters and stop them. “Where’s Ray?”
This time Raven didn’t try to stop Kayla. “I’ll take you.”
Raven led her outside. The little house looked like one of those you’d find in fairytales. A little ramshackle and a little odd in its shape and proportions. Flowers grew in window boxes and down the front walkway. Roses climbed up the walls on either side of the door and crawled across the roof. The night was fragrant, and the sounds of crickets and night birds gave the impression of tranquility.
“So, what do you think is coming?” Kayla asked, not entirely sure she wanted to hear the answer.
“Now that we know someone is hunting a god, we think that the actual killing—or the battle between the god and his opponent—will cause great destruction to the city. There’s a reason why gods don’t spend a lot of their time fighting with each other. None of them like the scorched earth that generally results. Whatever reason the hunter has for killing this particular god, he thinks the consequent destruction is worth the price. He may also be a god, which means his powers may be stronger than we can imagine.”
Kayla was now entirely certain she had not wanted to hear the answer. Unfortunately, she didn’t have a head injury or amnesia, so forgetting wasn’t an option.
Every muscle in her body had pulled tight in rejection of everything Raven had told her. Her brain shied from the idea of being a god. A god. She couldn’t be one. She had no idea how to be divine, and more importantly, she didn’t want that kind of responsibility. Gods messed with people’s lives, for crap’s sake. That sort of thing was the real God’s job.
She didn’t let herself think about that logic, or she might go insane. Which, at this point, was a better option than being divine.
“Tossing me into the mix could make things exponentially worse, couldn’t it?” she asked. “I mean, if I’m a god, too. Three fighting is worse than two, right?” It was almost impossible to get her tongue around those bizarre syllables.
“Not if. You are a god,” Raven said. “And yes, two could be worse than one, but if you can stop them from annihilating Portland, it’s worth a shot, don’t you think?”
Her tone had developed a vinegar tang, which Kayla interpreted as—pull up your big girl panties already and deal with it. But she needed a few more minutes to adjust, maybe a minute or two to scream and cry and throw a tantrum, and then she’d grab hold of her panties and hoist. Unfortunately, she wasn’t up for a public tantrum, so she was going to have to skip it for the moment.
“Ray is going to shit a brick when he hears this,” she muttered, her stomach dropping into her boots.
“He already knows,” Raven said, guiding Kayla to a path through the surrounding trees.
Kayla stopped dead. “He does? How? What did he say?”
“We told him in the hospital. He immediately left and went searching for you on the river.”
Which meant he hadn’t run screaming into the night. In fact, he’d come looking her. That boded well. It didn’t mean he wouldn’t recover his sanity and go galloping off, but at least she didn’t have to break the news.
Raven led her through the woods about half a mile to a clearing that contained three cottages. They all looked quaint, like something out of the English countryside. One even had a thatched roof. Lights illuminated the windows of the middle one—made of brick with Tudor accents.
Raven knocked on the door, and soon a slender young man in his early twenties appeared. His gaze went immediately to Kayla.
“You’re looking much better,” he said to Kayla, swinging the door wide for them to enter.
“Thanks. Did you help take care of me?”
He nodded. “Yep.”
“Thanks for that, too. I’m looking after Ray.” Kayla craned her neck looking for him, but the dining room and the kitchen through the archway looked empty.
“I sent Stanna and Evan to bed,” the male witch explained to Raven. “They couldn’t stay awake.” He held his hand out to Kayla. “I’m Jerry Van Rine. Welcome.”
She shook hands, appreciating his warm, firm grip. Nothing worse than a sweaty, fish-grip. “Where’s Ray?”
He tilted his chin toward the hallway leading out of the small dining room. “Second one on the right, after the bathroom. You should be able to wake him up. The spell has about worn off.”
Kayla nodded and practically sprinted down the hallway. Not that she was eager to talk to Ray about being a god. Goddess? Why two names? That was just sexist. Kayla mostly just wanted to see for herself that he was oka
y.
Ray lay in a queen bed. His exposed shoulders and upper chest were bare. His chest rose and fell in an even rhythm. His naturally tanned skin looked healthy. She moved to the side of the bed, lifting the covers to peer under.
He was naked, with no signs of bandages or scars. Just hard angles and curves wrapped in lickable tawny skin.
She should have put dropped the blankets, but she couldn’t help admiring the scenery.
When he mumbled something, she let go of the blankets and jumped backward, her face flushing. He merely turned on his side.
That was close. She so didn’t need him catching her ogling him.
Stepping forward, she put a hand on his shoulder. Hot satin over stone. She couldn’t resist the urge to skim her fingers along his bicep up over his shoulder and along the taut span of his back.
Reminding herself that if he had been awake, he’d have slapped her questing hand away, she gripped his shoulder firmly and shook him.
“Hey, Ray. Wake up.”
She wasn’t prepared for his instant response. He snatched her arm, snake-quick, hauling her across him. He grabbed her neck and twisted, flipping her onto her back. He jammed a knee into her belly, still clutching her throat.
She lay stiff and gasping, too shocked to struggle. For a moment he was silent as his brain caught up with defensive instinct.
He frowned as awareness returned. “Kayla?”
She nodded slightly, his hand preventing any other movement.
“Fuck.” He yanked his hands away. “What—?” He looked around the room and then down at himself.
Kayla barely had a moment to glimpse his very respectable man-parts before he jumped up and wrapped the sheet around himself.
“What the hell? Where did you come from? Where is this place?” Then memory hit. His eyes widened, and he went still. “You’re okay. Are you okay? They got the poison out?”
He reached out to help her sit up, then pulled up her shirt so he could examine her back. He ran gentle fingers over her skin.
The Witchkin Murders Page 27
