Devils & Thieves Series, Book 1

by Jennifer Rush

  “Great. Really helpful.” I rubbed the sudden goose bumps that had rippled across my arms.

  “In the way only Jane can manage.” Crowe pulled out his cell phone and typed out a text. “I have to go take a shift with Ren and a few others. Boone will keep an eye on you. Make sure you’re safe.”

  “I don’t need—”

  “Yes,” Crowe said, his voice rising. “You do.”

  “I’m not going to fight with you.” Looking at his face was painful. Was he lying about hurting Darek, or was Darek the liar? Or… could Killian have made Darek believe that he’d been beaten up by Crowe? Could he have manipulated Crowe into beating up Darek or hurting Katrina? I rubbed my hands over my face, wishing I could figure all this out.

  Wishing I had Alex with me, to talk it through like we always did.

  “Ho! Just got done hanging out with three big hairy men,” Boone called as he crested the rise and headed down to us. “Time to hang out with a pretty girl.”

  I waved at Boone before returning my attention to Crowe. “Is my dad helping with the perimeter guard?”

  Crowe nodded. “He’s with my group. You know, to make sure I don’t beat up powerless kids in the woods.”

  I hung my head back. “Look—”

  “I won’t defend myself to you, Jemmie. I shouldn’t have to.” He leaned in, and I inhaled his smoke-and-honey scent. Having his face this close to mine made it feel like the ground had just dropped out from beneath my feet. “You know me better than that,” he murmured. Then he turned and walked away.

  Boone clapped Crowe on the shoulder as they passed each other, then came to stand next to me. “Boy’s got the weight of the world on his shoulders,” he said quietly. “Not many are strong enough to carry it.”

  I watched Crowe disappear over the rise, just aching. His father had literally torn someone apart to avenge the death of a family member. Crowe had told Hardy he had to be ready to do anything to protect the people he was responsible for. Between Jane’s prediction that death would find someone here at the festival and my own swirling sense that things were about to explode, I could barely contain my dread.

  “Let’s take a walk,” said Boone. “You look like you’re about to jump out of your skin.”

  I agreed gratefully, and we set out along the edge of the woods. Maybe a circuit of the entire huge field would clear my head enough to allow me to socialize in the beer tent without bowing to the temptation to drink myself into a place where my fear for Alex and Crowe and Darek and everyone else couldn’t find me. “Boone, how much do you know about Michael’s death?” I asked.

  “The crash was pretty bad. Looked like he swerved to avoid something in the road, and that was it.” He shook his head sadly. “Happened pretty quick. I never thought it would be so bad, if I went down that way.”

  “And he was alone when it happened?”

  Boone nodded. “He’d told me and Crowe he had something he needed to check out. Wouldn’t let either of us go with him.”

  He’d known he was going to die, though. “Why wouldn’t he take you with him?”

  “Said he had to deal with it on his own. We didn’t know he was going out for the last time. I felt like shit—it took us two days to find him. Not much out there.”

  I thought about that. “Why does Crowe think he was murdered?”

  He sighed. “The coroner’s report said Michael’s heart muscle was lacerated in an unusual way. She said it could have been trauma from the accident, but Crowe didn’t buy it. He believes it could have been a curse.”

  “So either another kindled attacked him with venemon or someone used a cut against him?”

  “No cut is that strong. Few kindled could do that kind of curse anyway.” He blew out a long breath and tugged at his beard. “In fact, Crowe’s the only one who might have been strong enough to do it.”

  “Or Michael himself,” I said, thinking of my father’s description of what they’d done to Henry Delacroix. “Crowe thinks someone turned Michael’s magic around, made him attack himself.”

  Boone nodded. “But the only one who could have done that was Henry Delacroix, and he’s resting in pieces, if you get my meaning.”

  I did. “So Michael went to ‘check something out,’ and he never came back. He was on Deathstalker turf.” He’d written in his journal that he’d discovered something about Henry, about his secrets. My thoughts turned like slippery gears, unable to catch.

  “Oh, thank God,” said a gruff voice.

  Boone and I turned toward the sound of thumping footsteps to see Flynn jogging through the woods, his face pale, his body emanating wisps of his inlusio magic. It was all around him, like he couldn’t contain it.

  “Hey, you jackass!” Boone pulled a flashlight from his pocket and ran the beam over Flynn’s sweaty face. “Crowe’s been looking for you. Where’d you get off to?”

  “I found them,” Flynn said, breathing hard. “Come on!” His eyes were wide as he beckoned for us to follow him. He snatched the flashlight from Boone’s hand and ran back into the woods.

  “You found Alex?” I asked, my voice shrill as I followed him. “Is she okay?”

  “You have to see,” said Flynn as Boone and I trailed close behind him, trying to keep up as we zigged and zagged through the trees, heading deeper into the woods. “You just have to—”

  Flynn pivoted on his heel and slammed the flashlight into the side of Boone’s head. The older man went down like a bag of cement, groaning. Still radiating skeins of inlusio, Flynn brought the flashlight down on Boone’s head again as I screamed, but before I could run he lunged for me. I landed on my back with him on top of me, crushing the air from my lungs with the impact. His hand clamped over my mouth.

  “Quiet,” he said, his voice unsteady and strange. “I’m trying to save your life. I’ll explain everything, I promise. Will you give me a chance to do that?”

  I nodded, if only so he would give me a chance to breathe and think. Boone lay bleeding in the dark just feet away from where Flynn was rising to his feet and helping me to mine. “Why?” I asked, my voice breaking.

  “Come on,” Flynn said. His voice wasn’t even his own now—it was echoing and cracking like a bad radio. The scent of inlusio magic—cigar smoke and autumn leaves—was so dense that it was all I could do not to cough, but it was mixed with something else… a faint whiff of copper, and of bitter ash. Before I had a chance to think about it, he grabbed my hand and dragged me farther into the woods. I stared around me at the darkness, trying desperately to identify distinctive trees or hollows that would allow me to find my way back to Boone, who was breathing loudly and wetly as he lay unconscious on the forest floor. But it was hard to see anything past the tiny circle of light provided by the flashlight, especially with the thick funk of Flynn’s magic swirling in the air around us—mixed with threads of red and black.

  “Um… I think I should go back,” I said, panting, my heart punching hard against my ribs.

  His footsteps stuttered as he ground to a halt and slowly turned, shining the flashlight upward so I could see his face.

  Except it wasn’t his face. Killian stared down at me, sweaty and wild-eyed like Flynn had been, inlusio magic dissipating like a cloud under the heat of the sun. “Don’t scream,” he said quietly as those threads of crimson became thick ribbons emanating from his body, still shot through with darkness.

  I pulled against his hand, trying to put space between us as the scent of copper and ash rolled over me, overwhelming everything else. “Please let me go.”

  His right eye twitched. “I will.” Then his mouth pulled into a half snarl. “I won’t.”

  “Did you do something to Flynn?” I asked in a strained voice as ribbons of his magic coiled around me, licking at my skin. As they did, a sense of peace came over me. He didn’t want to hurt me. He wasn’t going to hurt me.

  “I had to warn you. You’re important and you have to be safe. He’s not safe, and you have to stay away—” He grimac
ed and bowed his head.

  “Where have you been?” I asked.

  He let out a low, broken chuckle. “I never expected he would do anything like this.”

  “Did you take Alex?” I whispered. “Do you have Flynn and Gunnar, too?” Somehow, he’d had Flynn’s magic all around him just now. A complete illusion. My throat constricted. “Can you steal other people’s magic?”

  Just like his brother had.

  “You have to be careful. You can’t trust him.”

  “Crowe?”

  Killian raised his head, and his face was pulled into a terrible grimace. “He has to be stopped!” His animus magic wound more tightly around me, and the blood-and-ash scent of it made me feel like I was drowning. I leaned against him as it sapped every thought from my mind, and watched helplessly as it slid around him as well, across his sharp cheekbones and into his ears, his nostrils. As it did, the pungent ashy scent grew stronger, like the smell of a hundred stale cigarettes, and the light of the flashlight dimmed as magic as dark as the night wafted between us.

  “Crowe has to be stopped,” Killian said firmly. “He’ll destroy everything.” He clamped his eyes shut and shook his head, then groaned.

  Images of Crowe, venemon snaking from his fingertips, his eyes dark and forbidding, filled my head. He could rain destruction on the people in this festival if he wanted. He could curse us with plague. He could boil our blood in our veins. He could carve his initials on our hearts with the brush of his thoughts. Somewhere in a dark corner of my mind, a rebellious thought held its own, though. No.

  “N-no,” I mumbled.

  Killian’s grip on my hand tightened. “Stop him,” he begged. “You’re the only one who can.”

  I tore my hand from his, feeling like I was swimming through rapidly hardening cement. Every step was a chore. The crimson threads of Killian’s magic were wrapped around my throat, my face, but now all I could smell was cinders and ash, not copper and salt. Killian made a desperate sound and bashed himself in the face with the flashlight. “Don’t listen to me!” he shouted. As he staggered backward and dropped the light, the threads of animus fell away like he’d taken a pair of scissors to them.

  I sucked in a breath—and I ran.

  FIFTEEN

  “NO!” KILLIAN SHOUTED. THE SOUND OF THRASHING and unsteady footsteps followed, but I was powered by pure terror. I practically flew through the forest, dodging trees, branches scraping against my arms and cheeks. I ran, blundering through the darkness with my hands out, my breath squeaking from me in desperate bursts, until my head spun and my side ached. Finally, I had the wherewithal to pull out my cell phone and use the flashlight app to light my way. But the farther I went, the more confused I was.

  Killian, who had been nowhere to be found for most of the day, had just ambushed me while pretending to be Flynn. He’d told me that Crowe was going to destroy everything.

  He’d also seemed completely unstable and insane. He’d beaten Boone and left him bleeding and unconscious. He’d hit himself in the face, too, for God’s sake. All while exuding animus magic streaked with black. It definitely hadn’t looked that way last night.

  A chime from my phone brought me to a stop just as lights in the distance told me I was about to reach the festival grounds.

  It was a text from my mom: Come home. I need you.

  With trembling fingers, I replied. What’s wrong? Are you okay?

  Just come home.

  I frowned. Mom was no alarmist, and if she needed me, it was probably serious.

  But so was what had just happened. Either Killian was convinced Crowe was up to something terrible, or Killian himself was using other kindled powers, just like his brother had.

  I recalled the scent of ash in the air. A kind of magic I’d never before sensed—until this morning when Katrina had been surrounded by it as she hurled a terrible curse at Crowe. Had Killian been behind that, too?

  Nothing was making sense.

  Using my cell phone light, I made my way back to the spot where Killian had attacked Boone, but Boone wasn’t there. Blood on the leaves told me I was at the right spot, though. He must have gotten up and gone back to the festival, maybe to get Crowe. But a shaky mistrust filled my head when I thought of seeing Crowe, so I texted the one person who might be able to shed some light on what I’d just experienced with the president of the Deathstalkers—Darek.

  Hey. Just saw your pres in the woods and he was acting super weird. Can we talk?

  I had just hit Send when I remembered that Darek’s phone had been destroyed. With a groan, I pulled my keys from my pocket and staggered to my car. Confusion ruled my thoughts, and all I wanted to do was make sure Mom was okay. Then I’d decide who to talk to first and figure out what the hell was happening. Dad was at the top of that list, considering figuring this out was literally his job, but I was too frazzled to deal with him at the moment.

  Gravel popped under my tires as I sped down the road. I was home in less than ten minutes. Mom’s car was there—but so was another, parked right next to it. Darek was leaning on its trunk as I pulled the car into the driveway.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked as I got out, realizing as I did that there was a blue thread of magic wound around me, spiraling up into the sky like a beacon.

  I knew immediately what that meant.

  Darek was talking, his head hung, his eyes hidden behind aviator sunglasses despite the heaviness of the night. “I came to say good-bye and—”

  “Someone is tracking me with a locator spell,” I said, cutting him off. His words barely registered. “Have you seen my mom?” I peered behind him, at the house. Warm light glowed in the windows. “She just texted—”

  A roar of motorcycle engines hit our ears.

  “Shit. That must be Crowe.” I couldn’t see the riders yet, but I was guessing Crowe was at the front, leading the pack.

  “When he catches me with you…” Darek started.

  “I know. I know.” I sighed and scrubbed at my face. Crowe had already done enough damage. I wasn’t going to allow him to do more. “Come on,” I said, and grabbed Darek by the hand, the minty scent of my magic immediately hitting my nose.

  The drone of the engines grew louder, and headlights shone up the road toward my house. I yanked Darek toward the front door, fumbled at the doorknob for what seemed like too many minutes, and finally got the door open enough for us to slip inside.

  Two Harleys swerved onto the front lawn as I ran into the living room, wondering if I could get away with hiding Darek in the coat closet.

  Footsteps crashed through the garden, and the kitchen door banged open a bare second before Hardy charged into the living room and saw Darek and me frozen on the other side of the couch.

  “Jemmie…” he and Darek said at the same time.

  Footsteps in the kitchen and the smell of honey and smoke told me who was about to join us.

  “Go!” I yelled, and pushed Darek down the hall.

  Hardy leapt over the couch behind us.

  Darek and I stumbled into my room, and I slammed the door shut. Locant magic burst from my palms in frenzied waves—a weak barrier spell.

  “What now?” Darek asked.

  “Window,” I said, but as I turned toward it, more headlights flashed outside.

  Darek chuckled. “Hell is empty and all the Devils are here.”

  I spun on him as Hardy pounded a fist against my door, threatening to shatter the reflexive barrier I’d covered it with. “Come here.” I held out my hand. Darek took it, and I gritted my teeth, calling on all my power and muttering an incantation my dad had made me practice all those years ago, when he still had hope for me.

  The protective shield burst out in an orb around us, cascading down around Darek and me like glittering rain. Mint stung my throat, my eyes, but I stood firm as Hardy tore my door off its hinges.

  By the time he reached us, though, the bubble had closed. The hair on my arms rose on end, the air suddenly charged with ele
ctricity.

  “Where is she?” Crowe yelled as he stormed down the hall. “Jemmie!”

  Hardy stared at me through the fractured light of the barrier. “She’s in here,” he called, keeping his eyes locked on me, nostrils flaring.

  Crowe barged into my room and froze when he caught sight of me, standing there inside a barrier bubble, Darek safely beside me.

  “What the fuck is this?” shouted Crowe.

  “I win,” Darek said simply. “And you lose.”

  The calm, cold sound of his voice chilled me. I looked up at him as he slid the sunglasses off his face.

  His perfect, unbruised face. He gave me a smile. “A little of your friend Flynn’s inlusio goes a long way. And when you cloak it under locant? You don’t even know it’s there.”

  “Boone’s gone,” Hardy said to me. “We had your dad do a locator to find you. He said you were here.”

  “She came here because I asked her to,” Darek said.

  “Where’s my mom?” My voice was so thin I’m surprised he heard me.

  “Snug as a bug in a rug,” he said with a wink.

  “You’re helping him,” Crowe said to Darek, amber ropes of magic sliding over my barrier, looking for a way in. “You’re helping Killian gather kindled to do the cruori.”

  Darek laughed. “Nah, you big idiot. You’ve got it all wrong.” He set his hand on the back of my neck, his fingers curling around my throat. “Let me make it all perfectly clear.”

  A lance of pain shot up my spine. I cried out. Darek squeezed harder as the air left my lungs. Smoke and honey and ash filled my nose. Gold and black streaked my vision. Venemon. This was Alex’s magic! Mixed with…

  “Oh my God,” I whispered.

  Darek Delacroix wasn’t powerless. Not at all.

  My knees buckled. “Killian,” Darek explained as he guided me to the floor, “is helping me.”

  “Don’t hurt her,” Crowe pleaded, slamming his hands against the barrier.

  “Then don’t make me,” said Darek.

  I couldn’t feel my feet. Not my arms. Or my hands. Not even the breath in my lungs. My mind felt fractured from the rest of me, separate from my body.