Alchemy Shift

by Jenny Schwartz

  “Will Kora object?”

  Delphi brushed his fingers with hers. “You’re getting the hang of Collegium politics. Let’s go find out.”

  They exited to the guardians’ floor. It opened into a training area with offices and a meeting room along one side and Kora’s office in a corner by itself. Her secretary observed their approach and stood. “Good morning, Delphi, Jet. Kora asks that you go straight in.” The man knocked and opened Kora’s door in one movement before standing aside.

  Jet’s hand low on Delphi’s back courteously urged her to enter first.

  The commander of the guardians had a corner office that was light and sunny and smelled faintly of frankincense, a resin useful in many spells. Two swords hung crossed on one wall. Kora rose from behind her large oak desk. She actually got up, walked around it, and shook hands as she greeted them. When they were all seated, she sighed.

  Delphi blinked and glanced quickly at Jet in silent question and comment. This wasn’t the confident, abrasively assertive woman who usually marched around Collegium headquarters.

  Kora’s brown hair was cut short in an expensive yet simple style. She wore minimal make up that seemed more a concession to convention than an attempt to beautify herself. Her pant suit was a dark blue and frankly unflattering.

  “I’m sorry,” Kora said. She looked directly at Jet. “That Graham Monroe escaped you last night is my fault. I assigned Martin and Seleste to work with you on the basis that they are experienced guardians who, for personal reasons, prefer to work cases here in New York. I didn’t guess that the original investigation into a trade in banned spells and deaths would reveal the deeper evil of human transmutation and, indeed, translocation.” She paused for breath. “Seleste and Martin should have been able to handle the case even as it became murkier; that their performance was inadequate is an internal matter that I will deal with.”

  “The past is past,” Jet said, effectively accepting Kora’s apology and moving the discussion on from it. “Did your people discover where Graham’s interrupted translocation dropped him and Ian?”

  “No.” The single syllable echoed with frustration. Kora leaned back in her chair. “Last night, the guardians were out on a classified mission in Alaska. We had a skeleton staff on duty as well as a few people hanging around, training or catching up on work.”

  Guardians like Chad, Delphi realized.

  Kora ran a hand through her short hair, leaving it standing out in tufts. “Jet, when you phoned Martin with news of the girl’s kidnapping, he could have done a number of things. What he chose to do was to initiate without authority an active response unit. Without proper preparations, it is taking us longer to isolate the path of Graham’s translocation spell. I expect to have an answer for you by midday.” It was only two hours away, but by Kora’s tone of voice, if she didn’t have Graham’s location by then she’d take the swords down from her wall and skewer someone.

  It was almost as if Kora read Delphi’s mind. She focused on her. “Delphi Cosmatos, I understand your commitment to your new life partner.” That was one way to describe Delphi’s mate bond to Jet. “However, you are untrained and inexperienced in fieldwork and you took with you a woman who uses unstable entropic magic. Things could have gone disastrously wrong. It is Tyrone’s responsibility to deal with your recklessness, however, I do not want you interfering in an active guardian investigation, again. Is that understood?”

  “Yes.” Delphi understood. She didn’t say anything about agreeing with Kora.

  Wry amusement tinged the mate bond as Jet, at least, recognized Delphi’s wriggle room response.

  Perhaps Kora did, too. The stern expression faded into a hint of concern. “Whether the sword you carried is Excalibur or not, Delphi, it ate another mage’s magic—and that magic, death magic, was powerful. If you’ve gained the ability to cancel another mage’s magic, that will cause wariness, even hostility, among some of those who learn of your talent.”

  “I hadn’t considered…” As Delphi’s voice trailed off, Jet clasped her hand. She looked at him, then at Kora. “The hypothesis I’m working on is that the sword only reacts to evil.”

  “But as the person wielding the sword, do you determine what it perceives as evil?” Kora actually sounded sympathetic. “Some people consider the demonologists that work here to be evil. Others call them for help. In other words, your feelings and prejudices make Excalibur more than a defensive weapon.”

  Delphi felt the weight of the insight settle on her soul. “I’ll remember that as I study the sword.”

  Kora nodded, closing the subject. “Jet, when I have Graham’s location—”

  His phone rang and he glanced at the screen. “Excuse me. I have to take this call.”

  Delphi’s first thought was that it was a problem with either Tony or Grace, but Jet’s words put paid to that worry.

  “Ralph, what do you have on Graham?”

  Kora, who’d been looking annoyed at Jet preferencing his phone conversation over their meeting, stared intently.

  “You’re sure?” Jet asked. “I had Graham at…” He named the Central Park address that was under surveillance. “This is opposite that. Hell, Ralph. I have people on stake out there. Yeah. Yeah, the man has balls of steel.” Jet rolled his eyes. “He’s also a killer—huh.” Jet froze. Something his informant had said was even more stunning than Graham’s location. “Okay, thanks. Anything else? No, I know you’re not a—” Jet looked at Delphi and Kora. “He hung up.”

  “How good’s his intel?” Kora asked.

  “Ninety percent. I’m willing to act on it.”

  Kora nodded brusquely. “Give us an hour to confirm and get ready.”

  “One thing.” Jet stood. “Ralph says the apartment Graham is holed up in belongs to Craig Thoreau, an Australian crime boss. Thoreau moved his headquarters to Canada three years ago. He employs some weres, so I know something about him. He doesn’t have magic himself, but he is aware it exists. And he’s here in New York. If Thoreau suspects authorities finally have enough against him to issue a warrant, he could be Graham’s next client.”

  “Or Graham’s backer,” Delphi said.

  Jet and Kora looked at her sharply.

  Delphi shrugged. “Ian Lewis might have a background in organizing drug shipments, but he wouldn’t have had the contacts to the highest levels of criminal organizations. Someone had to be Graham’s entry point for him to get access to the mobsters willing to pay for death magic transmutation spells.”

  Jet spun his phone through his fingers, thinking. “That would explain why this spell—if a transmutation spell is scheduled to take place—will be done by Graham and not by another mage willing to work death magic. Thoreau isn’t a man to cross, even if you have magic. If Graham has promised Thoreau a transmutation, he’ll have to deliver it before he runs from the Collegium.” Jet frowned at Kora. “Thoreau’s crew includes weres. When we go after Graham, be prepared to take on more than magic.”

  The commander of the guardians nodded. “You’ll want to contact your people. Use the meeting room across from here.” The small room Delphi and Jet had been in yesterday. “It’ll make organizing this raid easier.”

  “Thanks.”

  Delphi left with Jet.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said as they reached the door to the meeting room.

  Either her worry was obvious or he felt her concern for him through their mate bond. Or maybe, it was just that he knew her. She kissed him briefly. “I’ll collect Tony and Grace this afternoon.” He’d put her name down on the list of adults approved to take the kids from school and after school care. “But you call me as soon as this is done.”

  “Will do.” He hugged her tight and whispered in her ear. “Don’t call your mom.”

  Shocked, she pulled back enough to look at him. “You’re not going to tell the police?” Then she paused. Could the police—who were neither magical nor were—handle Graham and his possible boss, the mobster Thoreau, or would
they just get in the way of the joint taskforce? “Okay.” She would trust his judgement.

  His gratitude and relief at her agreement flowed down their mate bond for a couple of seconds before, as he let her go, he shut the mate bond between them. Whatever happened in the takedown of Graham Monroe, he wanted to shelter her from it.

  She’d have objected, except him shutting down the mate bond served her purpose.

  Ignoring the curious gazes of the guardians who watched them covertly, Delphi left Jet in the meeting room. Once away from him and the mysterious mate bond, she stopped mentally reciting the multiplication tables in her head and let her plans spin through her mind. Jet would lose his mind if he knew what she intended to do, but her own prophecy drove her. She’d prophesized that hunter and hunted would run through the “city-wild”.

  She checked her watch. She had less than five hours before she had to pick up Tony and Grace from after school care. That was plenty of time for a stroll through Central Park—just as soon as she’d dashed up to the alchemists department to collect her sword!

  Chapter 10

  Taking a leaf from Arlee’s playbook, Delphi placed an illusion over Excalibur. She didn’t try for something potentially eye-catching like a dog—she’d hate for someone to try to pet the “doggy” and cut themselves on the sword. Instead, to the mundane world it would look as if she carried an umbrella; a not too ridiculous object when the sky was cloudy.

  She headed for the North Woods which were the nearest wild place to Graham’s last known address. She didn’t try to sense evil via Excalibur. Not yet. She merely wanted to be in position. She’d be back-up that hopefully Jet wouldn’t need.

  Although her prophesy suggested otherwise. If what she’d seen had been accurate, the guardians wouldn’t capture Graham in his mobster’s eyrie.

  She bought a pretzel and ate it awkwardly one-handed as she wandered deeper into the North Woods. Her phone rang and she looked panicked at her two full hands. Her instinct was to drop the pretzel. Instead, she grabbed at common sense and stepped off the path to lean Excalibur against a tree.

  Arlee, not Jet, was the caller.

  Delphi hastily summoned a variation on the privacy bubble. This one needed to block out the sounds of the park. If Arlee guessed that Delphi wasn’t safely in her office, she’d do something reckless. Much as Delphi was doing now. Delphi winced at that truth. “Hi, Arls.”

  “Hi.” A huge yawn. “Sorry. I’m beat. Mist is home with me and asleep. I’m about to be the same. This is me, sleep-talking, but I wanted you to know we’re home and safe. Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. Tyrone”—their boss—“seemed more pleased than not that we’d jumped into the middle of a guardians’ investigation.” Delphi proffered the distraction.

  Arlee yawned again, fatigue or cynicism flattening her voice. “If we’d screwed up, he’d have blasted us.”

  “Yeah. Go sleep.”

  “Going.” Arlee disconnected.

  Delphi released the bubble of silence around her and heard the thudding strike of runners’ feet, the rustle of leaves and sounds of the city filtering through the park. “Whew.” She munched on the pretzel and thought of her next move.

  It would be a trial by fire, a high-risk experiment, but if Graham came near her, she intended to encourage Excalibur to suck up all of the rogue mage’s magic. If Kora’s warning was right—and the commander of the guardians had the benefit of years of experience wielding magical weapons in real life battles—then the sword might truly be able to render Graham harmless. Or at least, no more deadly than any mundane human.

  Jet phoned the three weres he wanted with him on the raid—no explanations, just get to the Collegium—before contacting the wolf-were on surveillance outside Graham’s abandoned apartment, holding the phone away from his ear as Duane cursed fervently and imaginatively to learn he’d been guarding an empty (in the sense that their prey wasn’t in it) building while the object of their hunt circled around and went to earth in the apartment building behind where Duane and his Collegium partner were parked.

  “Well, hell,” Duane summed up.

  “A Collegium team is going in, within two hours. I want you to stay where you are and grab Graham if he exits. I don’t expect him to get past the Collegium team.” Not this time. Kora would be sending in a strike force. “But…Ralph says Graham’s working with or for Craig Thoreau. Proceed on the assumption that Thoreau is in the building.”

  Duane whistled. “He’ll be with his crew.”

  “Yes.”

  “Luke Sagan holds a grudge.”

  Duane wasn’t telling Jet anything he didn’t already know. Luke Sagan was one of the weres who worked for the Australian mobster. Luke was a wolf-were, ruthless in a way that bled over into an enjoyment of inflicting pain. In his role as marshal to the were community’s justice system, the Suzerainty, Jet had brought Luke in for judgement for brutal crimes. The Suzerain of the time, grandfather to the current Suzerain, Steve Jekyll, had delivered judgement. Luke’s crime hadn’t been the worst of the worst, so the Suzerain hadn’t removed the wolf-were’s wolf nature. That was the ultimate: to lose one’s other self. But the Suzerain had still been severe in his judgement, sickened by the evidence of torture that Jet had presented. Luke had suffered the punishment of the Suzerain’s power removing from him his were senses. Luke could still run as a wolf, but could no longer sense the world with wolf alertness.

  Jet doubted Luke had informed his boss that he’d lost the edge of his were nature. On the other hand, perhaps Jet was being naïve, and Thoreau knew and was content to keep Luke near him for his fast reflexes and savagery.

  What was beyond doubt was that Luke hated Jet for being the marshal who’d brought him to judgement.

  Jet was still working out the details of how his mate bond with Delphi worked, but he was grateful he could shut it down enough that she couldn’t sense his thoughts and the danger that neared for him. If Luke was given a chance, he’d kill Jet.

  “Duane, I don’t want you to engage Luke and the rest of Thoreau’s crew unless it’s absolutely necessary to capture Graham. They won’t hesitate to start a bloodbath.” And Jet didn’t want civilian casualties.

  “Enjoy it, more like,” Duane said.

  “I’ll confirm details once I have them.” Jet finished the call watching the guardian who circled around the training ring, heading for the small meeting room Jet occupied. “Sven.” Jet greeted the man at the door.

  Annoyed and embarrassed though she was by her people’s ineptitude, Kora, as commander of the guardians, couldn’t be the one to lead the raid against Graham Monroe. But her appointee met with Jet’s complete approval. He’d worked with Sven before. The guardian might be past sixty, his hair white and his tone gruff, but he had experience and power. Even better, his judgement could be trusted.

  Jet shook hands with a lightening of the load on his shoulders. With Sven leading the strike force he wouldn’t fear so much for his own people, the weres he’d recruited to track Graham.

  “I’ve read the briefing.” Sven sat down at the table. “Now, tell me what you need from us.”

  They discussed the likely risks of the takedown, agreeing that Jet and his people would focus on Thoreau and his crew since it likely included at least one were in addition to Luke.

  “Martin comes with us,” Sven said, holding Jet’s gaze. “Seleste’s good, though you mightn’t guess it. Commitments outside of work are tying her down and distracting her. She’ll be transferred to a desk job, perhaps some training duties. She’ll see it as a demotion, but for now, it’ll be a better fit for her. Martin, though, has some stupidity to make up for.”

  Jet wanted to refuse.

  Maybe Sven read it in his expression. “Martin will play his role. He has a background in the banned magics Graham has traded in. Kora wasn’t crazy to assign him to this case.”

  And if Jet made a fuss, that would work against him in future dealings with the Collegium. Sven’s war
ning was low key, but real. “All right.”

  Sven stood. “Joint briefing on the hour?”

  “My team will be here by then. I need to get down to the lobby to meet them.”

  Sven stuck his head out the door and whistled to a guardian trainee. “Down to the foyer. Escort up here any weres asking for Jet Walsh.” As the young man raced to obey, Sven glanced back at Jet and winked. “Kids need to feel useful.”

  There was a truth there that Jet filed away to think about later with reference to Tony and Grace.

  Sven strode out to finalize arrangements with the strike force and Jet took a moment to sort out his own strategy. He called up an image of the building Grahame hid in, then studied its neighbors. Yes, that’ll work.

  Portia, one of the guardians from the previous night, was on the strike force, along with Martin. Martin peeled off to approach Graham’s apartment building from the back, Perez going along with him. Jet mightn’t want the police to formally know about this raid, but Perez had his own personal connection to the case. A connection that had intensified with the jaguar-were’s response to Arlee and Arlee’s decision to take in Mist.

  Everyone was in position. The sky was gray, the clouds hanging low but not promising rain, merely dulling the world. Jet, Sven and Portia balanced on the edge of the roof of the building to the south side of Graham’s. Sven studied his watch. Portia and Jet looked at where they’d be jumping to.

  Sven’s hand slashed down. “Go!”

  Their ropes swung out and down, and they landed in synchronized crouches on the rooftop of Graham’s building. As they did, Jet felt something break under his feet. But the roof was solid.

  “Ward broke,” Portia said briefly. She glanced curiously at Jet. “You felt that?”

  He was a were, which meant that magic mostly passed him by, unnoticed. “Seems like taking a mage for mate changes things.” Even with their mate bond shut down.