by Carly Hansen
“There won’t be a worst-case scenario if you use your space-bending wand. You can get them on site and then out of there before anything can happen.”
Alda pursed her lips and remained silent, staring beyond Micha’s shoulder.
Micha exhaled angrily. “Do you think it gives me any pleasure to come here to ask for your help?”
“So just send your own underlings.”
“If I could have, I would have dispatched a team the second I heard of these murders. But I told you, that city is designated as neutral territory. My duty is to uphold the fragile peace we now have among supernaturals in this part of the world, not set off a war by operating where we’re forbidden to even set foot. But I need to know what happened tonight. If certain errant supernaturals breached the agreement to leave that territory neutral, that would spell trouble for the entire supernatural world.”
Alda wrung her hands. “There’s always something, isn’t there?” she muttered to herself as she looked at her gnarled fingers. “Something always crops up, eventually, to rob me of my crew.”
Her words carried the weight of decades of knowing, decades of disappointment.
Although it had not been quite four years yet since Fenix had been part of this tight, little band, her heart felt heavy at the thought of the group breaking up. She could only imagine what the weary witch was experiencing.
Micha’s voice hardened. “Well, let’s get moving, Alda. Otherwise, so help me, I will send my crew to throw you out of here this very night.”
“You can’t evict a person with no notice.”
“And who are you going to complain to? The Tresmort cops? I bet they’d trip over themselves as they rush down here to protect your little setup. Or, maybe, you want to try running to the Academy of Casters?”
Smoke literally spewed out of Alda’s ears as she glowered at Micha. Her voice exploded from her throat. “If you try to kick me out—”
Fenix stepped forward. “Nobody’s going to throw you out, Alda.”
Micha clenched his teeth and shifted his stony stare from Alda to Fenix.
Those blue irises of his set her heart racing, despite her desire to hate him on Alda’s behalf.
As their eyes locked, Micha’s face hardened. Fenix cringed inside. He seemed to have little regard for her, and that bothered Fenix more than she thought was reasonable.
She knew it was stupid, but she wanted Micha to feel his heart racing and to have his breath quicken when he looked at her, just as it did to her when she looked at him. But how could he? She had to remind herself that when he looked at her, all he saw was her disguise as a teenaged boy.
Fenix pursed her lips to keep command of herself.
She thrust her hand toward Micha. “Give me a vial and one of those bracelets. We’ll get your precious evidence.”
********
Alda shook her head. “No, Fenix, don’t—”
“It’ll be all right,” Fenix said.
The wrinkles on the old witch’s face seemed to have doubled with the distress and worry Micha had caused.
Fenix was sure her own face was unusually lined too.
Alda’s caution played again in Fenix’s mind. Micha Angelo had been brought over to the vampire world specifically to destroy other supernaturals whose power threatened his master. Would the serum Micha developed to suppress his nature continue to work forever? What would happen if temptation or provocation were too close at hand?
Just based on their sizes alone, Fenix had reason to fear such an eventuality.
She was about to turn twenty-one in a few months. Although fit and agile, which made her a good fighter, she looked different from most street-gang members. She was petite and had little muscle. She’d only succeeded in passing off as a boy because she’d lied and said she was still in her early teens.
Micha towered over her. He had long, powerful legs. Up close, his pecs were quite impressive. Those large hands of his were easily twice the size of Fenix’s. Forget about supernatural powers—in their human form alone, if she were ever to find herself unarmed, there was no contest between them.
So, she had every reason to want nothing to do with Micha Angelo.
Yet, she couldn’t let Alda risk losing the warehouse over concerns for her own safety.
Besides, if Alda had no place to grow her garden and keep her magical ingredients, her business would fold and she would have no need of the gang.
Although Fenix didn’t dare think of the tragic circumstances surrounding the loss of her original home, she knew too well the heartbreak of such an experience. She didn’t want this home to collapse on her, too.
“We’ll just collect whatever he needs and give it to him.” Fenix rested her hand lightly on Alda’s shoulder. For a moment, some part of her wanted to lean in and hug the witch, but she stopped herself. Alda was not the touchy-feely type.
Fenix turned to Micha. “There are three victims, right?”
His stern eyes softened somewhat. “Yes.”
“Were they together?”
“No. The crime scenes are scattered across the city.”
“Well, Alda will just have to use her magic to send Twain, Java, and me to one site each. She can bring us back here just as soon as we grab the blood samples and get the recordings you want. Then you can take your precious evidence and get out of our faces.”
Micha tilted his chin up and looked down his nose at Fenix. “That is all I ask.” The corners of his lips curled slightly upward in a faint smile.
Fenix wondered what the smile could mean. He felt victorious, no doubt. He probably thought he’d somehow won her over, like he’d apparently so easily done with Twain and Java.
Fenix folded her arms. “No one here will regret seeing the back of you when you take your evidence and go.”
Micha’s smile disappeared. He frowned. “Well, it’s all settled then.”
“Not so fast,” Alda said.
She grabbed Fenix by the arm and tried to pull her into a corner, but Fenix resisted, so the witch let go.
“I can’t let you do this,” Alda said in a whisper.
Fenix patted her side where the charmed knife rested. “Don’t worry. I can handle this. Just send us to that city. We’ll hurry so you can bring us back quickly, and then this will all be over.”
Aldo shook her head. “It doesn’t work like that.”
“What doesn’t?”
“The space-bending wand. I have to be present for it to work—at least in the way we’d want it to.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I can send you to the crime scenes, but since I won’t be there with you, I won’t be able to bring you back here. There may be just enough residual magic to move you a second time to some place within a mile or two of where you land. But that’s it. If I’m not present, the only way any of you can return here through the magic of the space-bending wand would be if your heart were pierced.”
“Like I sent Carpetha’s demon back to her?”
Alda nodded.
That didn’t sound too appealing.
“Getting back will not be a problem.” Micha stepped toward Alda.
“And how do you figure that?” Fenix said.
“The bullet train runs right alongside Birstall. If Alda’s magic can send the three of you onto the train after you get the evidence, I can get you back here in no time.” Micha smiled wryly. “Angelo Labs always has a few seats reserved.”
The window in the kitchen of their living quarters offered a panorama of the curved bay around which Tresmort had sprung up. Fenix had often looked up from her meals and stared out at the bullet train as it zoomed across the land, far off in the distance.
It had also seemed far from her daily existence.
When she’d lived on the streets with three different gangs, there was no way she could see herself hopping on board that long, sleek machine to go anywhere. And as part of Alda’s gang, the only travel they got up to was driving the old Beetle
hard just to ensure they got from one dark alley to the next.
And here was this stranger casually talking about reserved seats that he could provide them! Fenix was eager to see what the bullet train was like on the inside and to feel what it was like to travel at almost the speed of sound.
But she didn’t want to give Micha the pleasure of seeing her excitement.
Micha cleared his throat as his face grew serious. “As Alda’s helpers, you’ve shown that you are brave young men,” he said. “You must know that this job won’t be easy.”
He looked at Java, Twain, and then Fenix. It felt to her as if he let his eyes linger on her longer than he had the others. Her cheeks tingled, but she narrowed her eyes and folded her arms.
“I’m sure your past experience will serve you well on this brief but challenging mission,” Micah said.
Twain stepped forward. “Don’t patronize us.”
“I’m only trying to prepare you for the job. From what I’ve been told, you’re in for a gruesome sight.”
“We can handle anything,” Twain said, puffing out his chest.
“From what I’ve heard, the victims were badly mauled,” Micha said softly.
Fenix thought he seemed as if he was hesitant to tell them the full truth. “Is there anything else we should know?” she asked.
Micha sighed. “I was told they lost their scalps, too.”
Chapter 5
Three hundred miles away, Special Agent Vance Packard exited the office of the Birstall sheriff’s and walked down the hall toward the reception counter. He ran his hand through his silver hair to keep himself from reaching for the small, metal flask that he kept in his jacket pocket.
There’d be time for that later.
Now, all he was itching to do was to get out to those three crime scenes and get started on his new job.
“Did a Special Agent Duane Runcey show up yet?” Packard asked the woman behind the counter.
The woman kept reading through the files on her desk and answered without looking up. “Tall, heavy-built guy with brown hair?”
“Don’t know what he looks like,” Packard said. “We agreed to meet here. It’ll be our first time riding together.”
The woman nudged her chin toward the far end of the corridor. “That guy came in a short while ago. Went straight to the candy dispenser.”
Packard approached the hulking figure just as the man turned to face him.
“You Packard?” the younger man said with his mouth full.
It was not a pretty sight. Packard simply nodded.
“Runcey,” the man said, stretching out a beefy hand. “Sorry I’m late. The flight into this town was just a dinky, little plane. I got here straight from—”
“Enough with the excuses,” Packard said, irritated. “I already spoke with the local sheriff and got the details they’ve got so far. Let’s head out there.”
“Three maulings in one night, huh?” Runcey said as they walked toward the exit. “You really think this is one for us?”
“It may be something,” Packard said. “Or it may turn out to be nothing. Or at least nothing we, with the limitations of this realm, can prove. In any case, we ought to check it out.”
From the corner of his eye, the old agent looked at his young partner for his reaction. He noticed what he thought was a shrug and a slight shake of the head.
That wasn’t good.
Packard sighed. He’d already gotten an eye-rolling reception from the local sheriff, and now it looked like his new partner might be something of a skeptic, too.
He wasn’t sure this was going to be a match made in heaven.
********
On a bus hurtling through the darkness, a young girl with long, pink hair reached for her backpack. She looked around at the sleeping passengers and tried to make as little noise as possible as she took out a sandwich.
Luckily, the person who’d been next to her had disembarked at the last stop, so she had two seats to herself. She stretched out her legs, and then bit into the sandwich. Chewing slowly, she stared out the window.
Just two more stops and I’ll be in Tresmort, she thought.
Excitement and fear rippled through her body. She felt her appetite ebb away. She’d never been to Tresmort before. It was a big and busy city. She’d heard it could be a dangerous place. Actually, she’d never traveled by herself before, either, and being out here on her own terrified her.
But she was on a mission. She’d waited years for this. She’d been chasing leads for a week that’d gotten her nowhere. Now, she believed she was finally on the right track. She was sure Tresmort held all the answers she was seeking.
She brought the sandwich to her lips, but her stomach was too queasy to take another bite. Leaning her head back, she closed her eyes and breathed slowly to try to calm herself.
Chapter 6
Alda didn’t exactly prepare the gang for how her space-bending wand would work. But, then again, she didn’t have much time to with Micha barking at her to hurry up after giving the coordinates of the three victims.
All Fenix remembered was that Alda made her close her eyes, and then she felt a warm sensation consume her from her head to her toes.
Even with her eyes closed, Fenix could see darkness fall like a curtain around her. All sound, even her own breathing, was sucked out of the air. Her body grew hotter and hotter, until it felt like her skin was on fire.
She tried to open her eyes, but a hot wind blasted into her face. It threw her back, spun her around, and then lifted her off her feet with her arms pinned to her sides.
She felt as if she was hurtling through the air, sometimes forward, sometimes downward.
She went faster and faster, and a piercing whistling sound filled her ears. She wanted to cover her earlobes, but she couldn’t move any part of her body.
Just when she thought her eardrums would split and her skin would burst into flames, the air went ice cold. She felt herself dropping like a stone until she landed hard.
She opened her eyes and found herself, facedown, out on a limb, high up in a tree.
Only crickets sounded in the thick bushes below, and there was nothing but scrub and a few other trees on a slope.
It seemed the space-bending wand was not a precision instrument.
Fenix had long accepted a life of danger was part and parcel of acting as a courier for Alda. Whenever the witch sent them out on assignment, Fenix was prepared for anything to happen. They had been attacked by humans who’d somehow caught on that they were transporting magic; most often, they’d had to fend off various demons; more than once, they came up against wizards and trolls; and Fenix would never forget the time she brought down a particularly vicious redcap.
Usually, she never felt any fear when the gang set out from the warehouse. It was always one big adventure after another with Ivan, Twain, and Java.
But her insides quaked now.
It wasn’t the fact that she was on this job alone. After she’d run away from home, she’d spent the first few months on the street as a loner, having to fend off various predators who felt a teenage girl on her own was easy prey. That was when she realized that short hair and male duds would bring her a bit more peace. So, she knew she could handle herself.
Nor was it the fact that she knew she was going to encounter a gruesome sight that made her uneasy.
Of course, she wasn’t looking forward to seeing the victim she’d been assigned. But she’d been present when members of the gangs she’d run with had been shot—sometimes by police, sometimes by other gangs, sometimes by their own leaders. She didn’t think she would ever become immune to the terrors of such a sight, but at least she wasn’t unprepared to see a dead body.
What had her trembling inside as she landed in Birstall—was Birstall itself.
She hadn’t let on to Alda that this was where she’d been born and had grown up.
Alda had told her that she suspected she, Fenix, had power within her. Alda had even
been prepared to risk losing her home in order to protect Fenix and her secret. And for that, Fenix felt a great sense of gratitude.
But she was still too scared of that secret to share her history with the witch or with anyone else.
Returning to Birstall forced her to face a past she’d tried so hard to bury.
This was the last place in the world she wanted to be. But if she was to have any chance of holding on to the life she’d come to love with Alda and the boys, she had to get through this job.
Fenix sat up straight and let her legs dangle on either side of the branch. She squinted to allow her eyes to adjust to the darkness around her.
She was up a tree, on a hill. She knew the coast was in the distance because from that height, she could make out the beacon that fought to penetrate the fog. She recognized the area.
The Birstall Lighthouse had been around for centuries, warning generations of sailors to stay far away from the rocky shoreline. She’d first seen it up close when she was seven and the teacher took her class on a field trip. The next day, the class had to draw the lighthouse from memory. Fenix got an A+ for her sketch, and she hung it up in her room.
It was still on the wall the day, many years later, when—
No, she didn’t want to go there.
She shook her head and looked directly below her.
The undergrowth was tall and thick. The land sloped steeply downhill, then leveled off. Uphill, a guardrail curved around a bend. In the distance, an engine rumbled by and tires swished on the tarmac.
From the position of the lighthouse, Fenix guessed the road on the hill was the route that led to the squatter settlement on the outskirts of town.
She slid down the tree and crawled through the bushes to the road. A few meters away, two squad cars sat on the shoulder with their blue-and-red lights flashing.
A single cop walked in the middle of the road, his flashlight making an arc of light on the ground as he went.
