Veiled Magic

by Deborah Blake

  “Why do you have that evil grin, Donata?” Magnus asked. He knew her well enough to know when to get nervous.

  Ha! She snickered to herself. “Never mind. Let me bring you up to speed. As Peter said, it’s been a long few days, and we need to get back to his apartment and make sure nothing else has gone wrong while we’ve been gone.”

  Magnus stared at them. “Are you two living together?”

  She shook her head. “It’s just temporary, until I can get the Cabal off of my butt.”

  His eyes widened. “Did you say the Cabal?”

  Donata nodded. “It’s a long story. Eat your goulash, and I’ll fill you in.”

  * * *

  An hour and a half later, they’d finished eating, had a few more beers, and Magnus had been brought up to speed on the entire story. Donata was starting to long for her own bed in a way she’d never experienced before. Too bad she couldn’t go back to her apartment until this mess was cleared up. Damn it.

  Magnus had listened to the entire saga with open eyes and a closed mouth, not asking any questions or volunteering any information. Donata kept expecting him to express some form of doubt or disbelief, but other than the occasional grunt of admiration or agreement, he’d been completely silent.

  Finally, Donata got to the part where they told Magnus why they’d come to him. He looked thoughtful, toying with his fork.

  “Well?” Donata demanded. “Don’t you have anything to say after all that?”

  Magnus gave a small frown, then shrugged. “I’d say you’re in way over your head, for one thing.”

  “Well, shit, Magnus, I could have told you that,” she said. “But what about finding us someone who can help take the curse off the—” She looked over her shoulder. They’d been talking in low voices, and the ambient noise of the crowded room should have made their conversation impossible to make out, but plenty of Paranormals frequented Gordo’s, so she didn’t want to take the chance of referring to the painting by name. They’d done that once already during the explanation process, and that was more than enough. “The thing. You know.”

  The Shapechanger scratched his blond stubble. He was normally clean-shaven, but he’d apparently dropped everything when she’d called and so looked a bit rougher around the edges than he usually did.

  “I’ll look into it. I think I might know someone. But I have to check a couple of things.” He gave Donata a fierce look. “In the meantime, I think you should come home with me. You’re not safe as long as everyone is after the you-know-what.”

  “Hey,” Peter said indignantly. “She’ll be perfectly safe at my condo. The Cabal has no idea where it is.”

  “But the Council might find you there,” Magnus rebutted. “Besides, I have more combat training than you do. You’re a damned painter, for Odin’s sake. She’ll be safer with me.”

  Peter started to stand up, his chair creaking ominously. “Who the hell do you think you are, you arrogant furball—”

  Donata kicked them both again, grateful for the steel toes she’d had built into her motorcycle boots. They subsided, reluctantly, clutching their shins.

  She turned to Magnus. “Look, I appreciate the offer, I really do. But I’d rather have you focused on finding our curse-remover than worrying about watching over me. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself. And Peter’s right, his apartment is probably the safest place for us now.” She sighed with exhaustion. “Besides, I want to see my cat.”

  Magnus scowled. “Okay, if you say so. But I’m going to worry anyway. Keep your head down, and I’ll find someone to help as fast as I can.” He turned a blue-eyed, steely gaze on Peter. “And you, you’d better keep her safe, Casaventi. Or all the Dragon skin in the world won’t keep me from tearing you apart with my bare hands.”

  Peter looked back with calm disdain. “You just find our guy so we can put an end to this. Then we can all just go back to our normal lives.”

  Donata choked back a laugh. Things had gotten so odd, she wasn’t sure she’d recognize a normal life if it came up and bit her on the butt. Besides, after all the excitement of the last few days, she was no longer convinced she could just go back to sitting in the basement talking to dead people. Not that anyone but her would consider that normal.

  She got up and gave Magnus a big hug. “I really appreciate you helping me out with this, Magnus. You know if there’s anything I can ever do for you, all you have to do is ask.”

  For a minute, sadness crept into his ocean-colored eyes. Then he forced a smile back onto his face. “You know me, Donata; I’ve got everything I need. At least, everything that is possible for me to have. I’m good.”

  “Ha. As if.” She smiled back sympathetically. “Your mom still calling you behind your father’s back?”

  His denim-clad shoulders shifted. “Yup. Once every couple of months, whenever she can get away from Dad, the aunts, the cousins, and everyone else, and find one of the few remaining pay phones.” Bitterness etched deep grooves in his otherwise youthful face. “I don’t know what good she thinks it is going to do. I can’t go back. But as painful as it is, I still like to hear the sound of her voice, so I don’t have the heart to tell her not to call anymore.”

  Even Peter winced at this. “Man, and I thought my family issues were bad.”

  Magnus clapped him on the back. “Tell you what, Dragon dude; when this is all over, we can sit down and compare stories.” He grabbed the bill off the table as the waiter plopped it down. “I’ve got this. You just keep our girl safe until I can come up with an answer.”

  As Peter and Donata headed out of the restaurant, Donata glanced back at Magnus. She caught a glimpse of something naked and hungry on his face. Then he turned away and was gone.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Two hours later, the sound of her cell phone ringing woke Donata. She let out a muffled curse, and Grimalkin jumped down off the couch in disgust. Elmyr just lifted his head, whiffled softly, and went back to sleep. Donata wished she could do the same.

  She grabbed the phone and flipped it open, hoping to catch it before it roused Peter, who was finally sleeping.

  “Santori,” she whispered. “This better be good.”

  A stiffly elegant voice replied, “Now, Donata, that’s no way to speak to your mother.”

  Aw, crap on a stick. She looked at her watch. Double crap on matching sticks. In hell. “Mother, why are you calling me at two a.m.?”

  There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone. “I always forget you aren’t as nocturnally inclined as the rest of us,” her mother said. “And it was important.”

  “I do work a regular day job,” Donata said. “Unlike the rest of the family, I can’t afford to stay up half the night.”

  Her mother said sharply, “Yes, and I tried to reach you at your ‘day job’ and I was told you would be unavailable for a few days. For a ‘family emergency,’ I believe. Since I am your family, and I was unaware of any emergency, I thought it was best to check.”

  Donata yawned and sat up on the couch. “I usually finish work around six, Mother. What time did you try to call me there? Just now?”

  Another pause. “Actually, I believe it was around five. But I had a social engagement this evening; your sisters and I were at the Governor’s Ball. I only just returned home.”

  Donata thought guiltily of the invitation sitting on her inaccessible kitchen table. Oh, well—the dress she’d gotten for the occasion had sucked, anyway. But her mother had her backed into a corner. If she continued to protest the late hour of the call, her mother would only bring up the missed familial obligation. Triple crap with cheese sauce.

  Donata bowed to the inevitable. “So, what can I do for you, Mother?”

  Voice crisp with satisfaction, her mother said, “You can give the Council this picture they keep going on about, and get them off my back, that’s what.�
� There was a pause as she audibly took a sip of what Donata could only assume was a very dry martini.

  She sighed. “I’m working on it, Mother. But they want the picture fixed, and I haven’t figured out a way to do that yet. I’m getting closer, though.”

  “You need to work faster, Donata.” Her mother’s tone held an unusual tension. “We are getting a certain amount of pressure, you know. Your sister Lucia was accused of stealing medicine at work. She was able to prove she wasn’t guilty, but only by a fluke. It could have been very bad.”

  Donata had a sudden vision of her mother sitting in the elegant parlor at her townhouse, drinking her martini and indulging in a rare cigarette. Celestina Santori only smoked when she was very stressed or very worried. Donata got the feeling that her usually self-assured mother was currently both.

  “I’m sorry, Mother,” she said, a little less belligerently. “I hadn’t realized the Council was getting quite so aggressive. They’ve been threatening to make trouble for you all if I didn’t get them what they wanted, but I thought they’d give me more time to accomplish it. And, honestly, I thought the family’s long history of service to the Alliance would count for something.” She turned on the light next to the couch, and Grimalkin sprang up lightly to sit next to her. “I’m doing everything I can, really.”

  “I’m sure you are, dear,” her mother said, letting out a long breath. “But you need to either do as they ask or just give them this painting soon. Apparently the Council’s memory is shorter than either of us anticipated, and our standing in Witch society is at serious risk.”

  Donata bit back a sharp retort about the relevance of social standing as compared to being shot at in bars. There was nothing to be gained by having that particular conversation. Besides, in all her adult life, this was the first time she could ever remember hearing her dispassionate mother sound truly rattled. They might not have the same goals and values, but Donata loved her family. She’d be damned if she would let the Council bring them to their knees.

  She straightened her spine. “I’ll take care of it, Mother. I promise you. Just have everyone try to keep a low profile for the next few days. Hopefully I’ll have it dealt with by then.”

  “Very well, Donata. I’ll rely on that.” Her mother paused for a moment before hanging up the phone. “Watch your back, dear. Every family needs a black sheep. It would be an awful lot of trouble for us to come up with another one, should something happen to you.”

  Donata chuckled to herself as she clicked her phone closed. She had a strange and often strained relationship with her mother, but the woman was certainly one of a kind. Resolving to make some kind of progress in the morning, no matter what it took, she turned out the light and went back to sleep.

  * * *

  A too-short four hours later, the phone rang again. This time she tried to ignore it, but it rang three more times. Finally, she gave up and flipped it open. If this was her mother again, she was disowning the woman.

  “Santori,” she said hoarsely. “What?”

  “This is your damned boss, that’s what,” the Chief thundered in her ears. “And I would like to know why the painting you put into evidence is suddenly missing. At the same time you are out for more days in a row than you’ve taken since you started work here. That’s what, Santori. Now, do you have something to tell me?”

  Donata was abruptly wide awake. But she wished she wasn’t. Sure, Chief, she thought. I’ve got plenty to tell you. Like there are a whole lot more Paranormal creatures in the world than you knew about. And that painting might be the key to the end of our society as we know it. Oh, and by the way, could I have a raise?

  She briefly debated just hanging up the phone and pretending it was an accident, but she figured he was too smart to fall for that.

  “Look, Chief—”

  “Don’t lie to me, Santori,” he said, his usual blunt self. “Do you or do you not have possession of that painting?”

  She bit her lip. “Yes, sir, I have it.”

  There was a moment of silence. “I assume you have a very good reason for such a breach of protocol.” It was a statement, not a question. “And that you will be explaining said breach to me—in full and complete detail—when you have finished doing whatever you are doing.”

  Donata didn’t know how she was going to explain all of this, but she wasn’t in any position to disagree. If he chose to, the Chief would be well within his rights to have her arrested and fired. Not necessarily in that order.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “One week,” he said.

  Her eyes popped wide open. A week? “But, sir, I don’t know if—”

  Her boss let out a sound suspiciously like a growl. “One week, Santori. You get that painting back into lockup and your ass back into your office chair in one week, or so help me, you will be sorry you ever took this job.”

  She squawked out some kind of agreement. Hell, she was sorry already.

  “Don’t make me regret giving you the chance to make this right, Santori.” He hung up the phone, and she was left listening to empty air. Even that sounded accusatory.

  “Problem?”

  Peter’s voice came from the corner of the living room nearest his bedroom, making her jump. She’d been so focused on the Chief, she hadn’t heard him come in.

  She sighed. “Nah. The Council is putting pressure on me through my family, and my boss just figured out that the painting is gone from the evidence locker. He’s giving me a week to put it back or be out of a job.” She tossed the phone down on the table by the couch and tried to look as though the strain wasn’t getting to her. “Nothing I can’t handle.”

  Peter sat down next to her. “You know, Donata, you don’t have to be so tough all the time. I realize you are a woman in a man’s world, and a Witch in a Human society, but it’s not like you’re in this on your own. You have friends.”

  “Yeah, friends,” a tiny voice piped up from near her knees, and Ricky appeared carrying a tray with three steaming cups of tea.

  She smiled wanly at them both. “Thanks, guys. I appreciate it, really I do.” She took a cup gratefully.

  “You know what’s weird?” Peter said thoughtfully.

  Donata tilted her head to the side. “Having early-morning tea with a half-Dragon art forger, a Kobold, a gray cat, and a French bulldog?”

  He laughed. “Well, yes, that too. But I was thinking more along the lines of the fact that you’ve been threatened by the Alliance Council and by your boss but we haven’t heard a word from the Cabal, who is your actual enemy. Don’t you think that’s odd?”

  Donata hadn’t thought about it that way. “Well, since you mention it—”

  On the table in front of them, the shrill peal of the phone rang out.

  Donata glared at Peter. “You just had to say it, didn’t you?” Crap, crap, crap, crap. Crap.

  * * *

  The cool voice on the other end of the phone said, “Is this Ms. Santori?”

  It had been too much to hope it was just a wrong number. “Yes. Who’s this?” At least it wasn’t Clement Moore. She didn’t recognize the voice, but it definitely wasn’t his.

  “My name is unimportant,” her caller said. “It has come to our attention that a man named Peter Casaventi has been aiding you in your misguided attempts to destroy Church property.”

  Donata said a bad word inside her head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The voice chuckled without any trace of humor. “Nice try, Ms. Santori. You were seen together in Rome. We are aware of Mr. Casaventi’s various talents and assume that you are using him to try and alter the painting in some way. That would be inadvisable, I assure you.”

  Peter raised an eyebrow at her in question, and she mouthed the word Cabal.

  “You still haven’t told me who you are,” she said to the person on the other end
of the phone. But to herself, she thought grimly that whoever it was, they knew altogether too much about her and Peter.

  “Nor do I intend to,” he said. “Who I am is completely irrelevant. You know whom I represent, and they want their painting back. Immediately and without argument. Or else.”

  “Or else what?” Donata asked. “You clearly don’t know where we are, or we’d be having this pleasant conversation face-to-face.”

  The voice gave a short laugh. “Also irrelevant. I suggest you put Mr. Casaventi on the phone.”

  She grimaced at Peter, put one hand over the phone, and said, “Someone from the Cabal. He won’t give his name, but he says they know you’ve been helping me. He wants to talk to you. Should I hang up?”

  Peter thought about it for a minute. “Better not, just in case the guy actually has something pertinent to tell us. Do they know where we are?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. But they know we were in Rome together, since Antonio inadvertently led them to us.”

  Peter winced at the mention of his friend’s name. He held his hand out. “I suppose I might as well see what this clown has to say.”

  “Somehow I don’t think it’s going to be ‘Have a nice day,’” Donata muttered.

  Peter said into the phone, “This is Peter Casaventi. You wanted to talk to me?” An astonished look slid over his face, and he said, “Mother? Is that you?”

  Chapter Nineteen

  Donata’s jaw dropped. “What?” she asked, as silently as she could and still be heard.

  Peter shook his head at her frantically. “Mother, are you all right?” he said. “Have they hurt you?” He listened for a minute, and then Donata could hear the male voice come back on the line.

  “You sons of bitches,” Peter started to say. “If you do anything—” The voice spoke sharply, and Peter’s eyes narrowed. He handed the phone back to Donata, reluctance in every muscle of his body. “He wants you to put it on speaker so he can talk to both of us.”