Whiskey and Angelfire

by A. A. Chamberlynn

  “Most of us thought he’d grow out of it when his teen hormones had passed, but he didn’t. He just got worse. One day he came across a member from another pack out in the woods and he attacked him, took him to within an inch of life.” Riley paused, and took an unsteady breath. “The poor guy got paralyzed from the waist down due to the damage Adam did to his spinal cord with his teeth. Two weeks after that, our compound got raided by the guy’s pack. They killed five of us.”

  I knew what he was going to say next. Something I’d known had happened, though I never knew why.

  “Including my parents.”

  His voice broke on the last part, and I was across the room with my arm around him before realizing it. This was usually Quinn’s gig. “I don’t know what to say. That’s awful.”

  Riley nodded. “That’s when I left the pack. And I’ve never joined another since.” He looked sideways at me, his eyes bright with tears. “The point is, some people can’t be redeemed, no matter how hard we try. For years I defended my brother, tried to reason with him, tried to teach him to control his anger. Others did, too. But nothing helped. He’s just not a good person.”

  The correlation here was obvious, of course. “You’re right,” I said. “Some people don’t change. The thing is, you had years of trying with your brother. I’ve only known Anna is still alive for two months.”

  “It’s a fair point,” Riley said after a moment. “We don’t know yet. Maybe she can be brought back to the good side. Maybe she’s not evil like Alexander and Lucifer.” He took my hand in his. “At some point though, it will become clear. And you’re probably going to be the last one to see it, because you’re the first one that wants so desperately for your sister to be your sister, and not a monster.”

  “I promise I’ll accept your judgement on it if I can’t see clearly,” I said.

  He pulled me into a hug, which wasn’t my favorite thing in the world, but it fit, given the circumstances.

  “What did I miss?” said Quinn from the doorway, looking worriedly between the two of us.

  “I’ll tell you another time,” Riley said. “Zyan here is champing on the bit to get to the library.”

  Golden sand stretched in every direction as far as I could see, great dunes of it. The sky was an odd pale gold as well, nearly cloudless but for a few white puffs in the distance. A tree stood a few hundred yards ahead of me, dead and brown, raking the sky with its stark branches. I needed to reach the tree, but no matter how far or how long I walked, it always stayed exactly the same distance away.

  Beneath me, the sand began to shiver, and a few feet away I could see something burrowing right beneath the surface, swirling this way and that, spewing glittering grains into the air. I turned and tried to run but it cut me off, circling around me, tightening, tightening, closer and closer. A giant crimson snake burst from the sand, flying toward me.

  And then I was falling, the sand collapsing beneath me in a whirlpool of light and color.

  Falling.

  Falling.

  I fall through a rainstorm, lightning cracking right next to me, the light blinding. I fall through flames, red, licking, biting, burning. I fall through an ocean, and I keep going down, down, down through the water. And then it’s just sky, a strange sickly green color. Or maybe it’s not sky at all.

  I become aware of a pain splitting through my body, ripping through my veins. A scream tries to come out of my throat, but I can’t speak, can’t make any noise. I see his face then. Lucifer. He smiles, that same knowing smile.

  I jerked awake.

  “Another nightmare?” Donovan asked sleepily.

  “Yeah,” I said, my voice breathy. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” He tucked his arm around me, and within ten seconds he was back to sleep.

  I sighed deeply and stared out into the darkness until morning came.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The next day passed with painful slowness. Like, excruciating slowness. Hours upon hours at the library, with Quinn the drill sergeant making sure we scoured every magical text in the library. By the time we got back to Gus’s bar around eight o’ clock at night, I went straight for a bottle of whiskey and took several long pulls right off the bottle. Riley and Donovan hunkered down next to me with their own drinks.

  “Don’t drink too much, Zy. We have to try a couple of these spells we found,” Quinn called.

  Eli was coming down the stairs from the second floor, so when he said “Oh, you found something?” it covered the “Bite me!” that I muttered to Quinn. Riley grinned at me.

  “Yes, maybe,” Quinn responded, shooting Eli a smile. “We’ve got some to try at least.”

  “That’s great,” he said. He seemed tense, electric. I could only imagine he was going nuts after being cooped up all day, not allowed to help us try to find Ambriel. “So, are you trying the spells now?”

  “Yes, as soon as Zy quits drinking like a fish,” she said pointedly.

  I took one last swig of whiskey. “Fine. As long as we aren’t in the library anymore, I’ll do about anything.”

  “You guys have fun,” Donovan said, “I’m going to stay right here.”

  “Me, too,” Riley added.

  I shot them a “gee, thanks” look and went upstairs with Quinn and Eli. Quinn carried a hefty leather bound text she’d borrowed from the library. And by borrowed, I mean magically, not legally. These weren’t the kind of books Trinity College let out of their sight, unless they’d been ensorcelled by a little blonde witch.

  “Eli, you’re going to assist with my supplies,” she said.

  He frowned. “Does that count as helping find Ambriel? Will it break my deal with Pan?”

  “No, it counts as handing me things when I need them. I could use anyone to do that. Zy’s going to be the one helping me with my actual spell.”

  She left the book floating in midair as if sitting on a pedestal and dumped out the contents of a satchel she had slung around her shoulders. A dozen glass vials filled with liquid in various colors, brown paper packages with scrawling in spidery ink, and a small cast iron cauldron fell out onto the blue quilt. Quinn flicked her hand and the cauldron rose to join the book, hovering a few inches away.

  “We’re getting really old school here. I haven’t used a cauldron in years,” she murmured. “Not that I was expecting anything else from a dusty six hundred year old book.”

  She swept a glance over her materials, and cocking her head sideways she sent the cauldron and the book another few inches apart. A moment later, a small blue fire started up under the cauldron.

  “Purple vial,” Quinn said to Eli without looking at him.

  Eli stepped forward from Quinn’s left, and she motioned to me, from the right side of the room. “Step up here and be ready.”

  “Ready for what exactly?”

  She didn’t deign to answer, but rather took the vial filled with vivid grape-colored liquid from Eli and poured it into the cauldron. It sizzled, and a cloud of golden smoke plumed into the air. “Dragon tears,” she said a little sadly as she watched the smoke. “Okay, elf tongues next.”

  When Eli and I cast her horrified looks she jabbed a finger at one of the paper bags. Eli picked it up gingerly and handed it to her. “Elves can be organ donors, too, guys. No one murdered them.” She tossed the contents into the cauldron. The smoke turned acid green this time.

  Our magical assembly line went on for the next few minutes, with Eli passing Quinn scorpion hairs, unicorn hoof trimmings, bottled star shadow (however the heck they managed that was beyond me) and other bizarre ingredients, which each changed the color of the smoke, and created a myriad of smells inside the small room. The potion bubbled noisily, and Quinn would occasionally stir the contents with a flick of her finger, or lean in and stick her tongue out to taste the air. Finally, she dropped in the angel feather we’d found at Aisling House, looked back and forth between the two of us and said, “It’s done. Now for the spell book.”

  Th
e pages flipped and fluttered and finally rested open. “This spell calls for power from two beings with magical prowess, which is where you come in Zy. We need to join hands.” She reached out and took my hand. Our skin was an almost identical moon pale, though her hand was smaller and smoother than mine.

  “What do I do, though?”

  “Send power to me. Just a little.”

  I nodded, though I didn’t feel sure about this at all. She probably should have gotten another experienced witch.

  Quinn’s voice rose into the air in a strange, guttural tongue as she began to recite the words from the book. Instantly the air around us filled with the tang of magic, a sharp, heavy feeling like electricity hanging in the sky before a storm. Quinn’s magic smelled of crushed rose petals and maybe a hint of sandalwood. The spell book began to glow.

  I felt a pull of energy from Quinn, and I tentatively called on my magic. It rose eagerly to the surface and flowed over to her. She stiffened at its force, so I tried to turn it back a notch. Something inside me bucked impatiently. My magic didn’t want to be controlled. I swallowed a lump in my throat as I remembered my failed attempt at controlling it with Riley a couple months before. Not to mention my little incident with the street lights a couple days ago.

  Quinn continued chanting, and out of the corner of my eye I could see Eli watching us both, his gaze both weary and eager. I tried to ignore him, but I saw his eyes flicker down to my wrist. My demon mark had begun to glow. My breath caught in my chest and my magic faltered. Quinn squeezed my hand, hard, and I swallowed and focused on evening out the flow of my magic again.

  The smoke over the cauldron, which was now a pale lavender color, mushroomed up over our heads and spread into a smooth disc. Images began to flow over the surface. I could see a street in Dublin, clear as a video feed, and a figure with dark hair walking down it. Ambriel. I’d only seen photos before, but it was definitely him. More flashes, he was with someone, but they looked fuzzy. I couldn’t even tell if they were male or female, like someone had taken an eraser over the image. Next, Aisling House, clear as if we stood right in front of it. We were getting close, that had just been a couple days ago.

  And then the smoke turned black as ink and the images vanished.

  “Shit!” Quinn snapped and dropped my hand.

  “What happened?” Eli asked, his expression panicked.

  “It must still be whatever they’re using to block us,” Quinn said, adding a groan to punctuate her feelings on the matter. “The spell was going perfectly until we hit Aisling House. That must be where they performed the spell to counteract anyone finding them.”

  Eli covered his face with his hands, taking a deep breath before dropping them down to his sides again.

  “And you,” Quinn said, turning on me. “You’ve got to quit worrying about your mark. Yeah, it glows when you use your magic. Big deal. You can’t be afraid of it.”

  I glanced down at the mark, which had mostly faded now. Eli was watching me, so I locked my eyes back on Quinn.

  “As you know…well, as you know Zy, not you, Eli. I was born into a non-magical family. Witches must have been in my lineage somewhere in the past, but the people I grew up with were very religious and believed magic was the work of the devil. So trust me, I know what it means to be afraid of your powers. I was terrified when I turned twelve and started doing things accidentally with my magic.” She held my eyes, her expression hard. “But I quickly learned it only gets worse if you’re afraid of it. So quit, okay?”

  Man, she was cranky since her spell hadn’t worked. Not that any of us were happy. Eli looked like he wanted to punch the wall or something.

  “I’ll try,” I said, a slight tone of petulance in my voice. It was easier said than done, and little miss witch here had a ton more experience with it than me.

  “Are we going to try the other spells?” Eli asked.

  Quinn flicked her intense gaze over to him. “Just hold your horses. I’ve got to clean the cauldron and regroup. Let’s break for an hour.”

  Eli ducked his head, looking properly chastised, and followed me downstairs. Riley and Scorch were still hanging out with Gus, who was giving the teen a tutorial on whiskey and how it was made. Eli shot me a look like he didn’t know if this was the best subject for a minor, but I simply shrugged and pulled up a seat. Not that I had any philosophies on parenting, but if I did, coddling and sheltering kids wouldn’t be one of them. I’d had my life ripped into a million pieces and thrown to the wolves at around Scorch’s age, and I’d turned out alright. Kinda.

  “I take it no luck?” Riley asked at a break in the conversation.

  “Yeah. We’re still getting blocked by something,” I responded.

  Eli said, “I’d better go check in with Commander Juno.”

  He took off and we sat around shooting the shit for another few minutes. I had just about decided to go see if Quinn was ready to try the other spells when someone came stumbling in the door to the bar. It was a shifter, and he clutched bloody fingers over a gash in his side.

  Riley darted forward and held the man up as he started to fall. Gus jumped over the bar and came to support him from the other side. Next to me, Scorch looked as if he might pass out at the sight of so much blood.

  “Tomas, what happened?” Gus asked.

  “Another fight… between the dragons and the horses,” the man, Tomas, gasped.

  Gus cursed aloud. “I thought that malarkey was behind us.”

  “We need to break it up,” Riley said. “They’re fighting the wrong enemy. Whoever is taking the missing supes, it’s not the shifter clans.”

  “I’ll go with you,” I said. “Play peacekeeper for once.”

  “I’ll go, too,” Scorch said, standing up from his chair with a fierce look on his face.

  “Oh, no you won’t,” I said. We glowered at each other.

  Gus lowered Tomas into a chair, pressed a cloth from the bar against the gash, and got him a bottle of whiskey. The shifter’s wound would heal soon enough on its own, but it still hurt like hell in the process. “I’ll watch Scorch,” he said, looking up at Riley.

  Riley nodded. “We’ll be right back, dude,” he said to Scorch, who bore a sullen expression on his face. We dashed for the door.

  We heard the ruckus as soon as we stepped out into the night, only a few blocks away by the sound of it. I broke into a run, Riley on my heels, and we sped to the location of the fight. The shifters had gathered in a small park near a church, about three dozen of them. Screams slashed the night, along with plumes of fire from the dragons, and the occasional flash of scale or hoof. Mist crawled over the streets, adding to the hellish quality of the scene.

  “What’s the game plan?” I hollered over the shrieks and roars of the fighting shifters.

  “We need to talk to whoever’s leading the charge on each side,” Riley said.

  We scanned the mass of battling bodies, and near the core of the fight I spotted a massive bronze horse and a jade-colored dragon. Their skill alone told me they were the leaders. Plus, each one radiated alpha presence. Among shifters a good alpha could be spotted a mile away, and these two were no exception. Riley had seen them too and we nodded at each other and darted into the fray. Of course, confronting these two mega confidence-exuding shifters was the only way to get their attention. Easy solution.

  I came up beside the dragon, and Riley alongside the horse. “Hey!” I shouted.

  She paid me no mind at first, her focus locked on her opponent. I pulled my katana and flicked the blade along her scales. That drew a reaction.

  I dodged the spout of flames she sent in my direction. “We have information about the missing supes!” I yelled. “Stop fighting!”

  The dragon threw me a puzzled look before morphing into human form. She was a tiny thing, pale skin and waist length red hair, but she still exuded the supreme confidence of her dragon form. “Speak fast!” she hissed at me.

  Across from us, Riley was having similar n
egotiations with the horse shifter. But upon seeing that his opponent had dropped her guard, the horse lunged forward in a flash of teeth and hooves. Riley, however, moved faster. Leaping between us, morphing into wolf form as he did, he grabbed the stallion under the throat latch and brought him down hard. They went skidding across the street toward us before stopping an inch from my foot.

  “Well, that was rude,” I said, resting the tip of my katana on the horse’s cheekbone. “Change form and let’s all have a little chat.”

  With a shiver, the horse changed to human form and I stepped back. He got up, eyes scorching. “What is this all about?”

  “Your clans need to stop fighting,” Riley said. “We’re investigating the missing supes, and the shifters are not responsible.”

  “Then who is?” asked the red-headed dragon.

  “We don’t know yet,” Riley admitted. “But there’s an angel and a faerie missing, too. It’s not just a shifter clan thing. We’re going to find out who did it.”

  The horse shifter asked, “And then?”

  “Then they will pay. Dearly,” I said.

  The two shifters looked at us, and then at each other, trying to determine if we were telling the truth and if they were willing to give up their grudge match. All around us, the fighting had started to drop off as more and more shifters noticed their leaders had stopped.

  “Who are you?” The dragon leader asked.

  “Zyan Star,” I said. “And this is my colleague Riley. You may have heard of us.”

  From the look on her face and the murmuring of the nearby shifters, they had. It pays to be a world renowned badass.

  “I’m willing to call a truce. For now,” she said.

  I swung my gaze to the horse shifter. “Us as well,” he said. “But we’ll want answers soon.”

  “And you shall have them, as soon as we do,” I said.

  In the distance, I heard the rumble of several large trucks. “And that would be the NHTF. I suggest everyone gets the hell out of here.”