by Chloe Neill
“Good witches work fast.” She looked up at me, gestured to the backpack. “What did you find?”
“Insanity,” Ethan said.
“Seriously,” I said, putting my backpack on the table. “It was A Beautiful Mind in there.” I gave her the details. “We didn’t find any computers, notebooks, whiteboards. No secret plans just lying around.” I unzipped the backpack, pulled out the papers I’d snatched from Sorcha’s office. “But I did grab these.”
“And they are . . . ?” Mallory asked, eyeing them suspiciously.
“A very small percentage of her notes,” Ethan said.
I nodded. “They were all over the room, so I grabbed a couple of square feet before we had to make a run for it.”
“They saw you?” Catcher asked.
“No,” Ethan said with a smile for me. “They found evidence of our entry. I’m afraid we may have broken a window.”
“Should have broken more than that,” Catcher muttered. “The assholes.”
Mallory pulled off the top sticky note, which read “glizzard,” eyed it suspiciously before setting it aside again. “We’ll look through them when we get back.”
“I take it you’re ready?” Ethan asked.
“Ready to listen, and ready to go.”
He arched an eyebrow. “And where will we be going?”
“Downtown, relatively near Towerline. It needs to be within the former alchemical web, and preferably quiet.” She winced. “And maybe not right next to a residential building. Just in case.”
In case things went sideways. Because there was always a chance of it.
“To confirm,” Ethan said, “you want to be near Towerline—in downtown Chicago—but not too close to the other million people who live there.”
“Exactly,” she said brightly.
“Millennium Park,” Catcher said. “There won’t be anyone at the pavilion tonight. The lawn will give us space. It’s not exactly close to Towerline, but it’s as close as we can get with that kind of space and privacy.”
Mallory pursed her lips. “Interesting idea,” she said. “Maybe I can use the trellis as some kind of antenna.”
“Let’s just take this one step at a time,” Catcher said.
• • •
Since we’d all be heading back to Cadogan House after our trip downtown, Catcher drove the SUV. He and Ethan landed in the front seat, which gave Mallory and me a chance to talk. Doubly good, because I wanted to keep pushing aside my rising emotions.
“And how are you finding married life?” Mallory asked from her spot beside me on the second-row bench.
“At the moment?” I considered the question. “Treacherous.”
Mallory snorted. “Yeah, but in fairness, your dating life was pretty treacherous, too. That’s what you get for nabbing a Darth Sullivan.”
I glanced at her. “Has he told you his nickname for me?”
“Of course he has.”
I lifted my brows. “What do you mean ‘of course he has’? Fess up!”
“Oh no,” she said, picking a remaining bit of chipped polish off her nail. “I want no part of that. You’ll weasel it out of him eventually.”
I narrowed my gaze at her. “I could weasel it out of you.”
She grinned. “I seriously doubt it, vamp.”
“Spoilsport.”
“Probably about many things, yes.”
The view turned to darkness as we reached Lake Shore Drive, which would take us into downtown.
“And how are you?” I asked.
She frowned. “What do you mean?”
I kept my voice low. “You looked, I guess, kind of lustful about Claudia’s magic.”
She smiled a little. “For a second, I thought you were going to say I looked lustfully at Claudia. Which, I mean, she is a babe.”
“It’s that ancient, voluptuous, Irish sexpot thing. Girl crush.”
“Total girl crush,” she agreed. “I’m all about the boys, and my boy in particular. But she has an appeal that’s just—it socks you in the gut. And the dress doesn’t hurt. I couldn’t pull that off. But damn, does she have the figure for it.” She smiled. “I really want to ask her out for coffee to talk about her magic. Maybe she’d take me to the green land, which would be pretty amazing. But with the magic and the dress, she’d either be arrested for lewd behavior or completely swamped by admirers. And I don’t know if fairies even drink coffee.”
I didn’t, either. “And the magic?” I prompted.
Mallory paused. “I’m not going to lie—I felt a twinge.”
“A twinge?”
“Want. Desire. It’s not dark, Claudia’s magic. She doesn’t need death and pain to make her magic operate. But it’s old. And with magic that old, good and evil aren’t nearly so far apart.”
“You resisted, so that’s good.”
She frowned, arranged herself in a cross-legged position on the wide leather seat. “Yeah.” She held out a hand, flexed her fingers, made a fist. “And it wasn’t easy not to reach out and grab a handful of magic. The memory is so vivid. How it felt running beneath my skin, so much energy, so much potential. That’s the hard part of any addiction, I guess. Remembering how good it felt, and saying no anyway. But even if I was going to indulge, which I’m not, this is not the magic to indulge in. Too old. Too different. Too powerful.”
“Unless we all want to end up on a direct flight to the green land,” I said.
“Seriously. Merit,” she said after a moment.
I glanced at her.
“Thanks for asking. For, I guess, engaging me about it. Addiction isn’t easy. But it’s a little easier when you can be honest about it. When you can acknowledge it, instead of pretending it doesn’t exist.”
“You’re welcome, Mallory.” I reached out and squeezed her hand. “That’s what friends are for.”
“And sharing girl crushes.”
“And sharing girl crushes.”
“Seriously, that dress, though.”
I decided to leave it at that.
• • •
Catcher found an on-street spot a block from Michigan, and we climbed out of the car, katanas belted beneath our coats. We also carried supplies for the magic Mallory intended to work downtown, and blankets to spread on the ground beneath her accouterments.
I’d wondered whether we’d see more people outside or fewer: Had they stayed inside to avoid the building danger, or come outside to gape at the gathering snow?
The former, mostly. Even in the chill, people milled about on sidewalks, tourists rubbing their arms in the short-sleeved T-shirts they figured were enough for a late summer, or donning new Bears and Blackhawks sweatshirts they’d grabbed at souvenir shops. Most stared nervously at the sky, cast glances toward the river. Others stared out from hotel lobbies, from restaurants along the sidewalk, watching the city like Chicago might have been a pacing tiger—a danger that hadn’t yet struck.
We crossed Michigan into the park, past the few tourists who stared at their reflections in the Cloud Gate, snapped selfies with friends. Danger may have kept many Chicagoans indoors. But it didn’t dampen the selfie spirit.
We walked into the stretch of grass in front of the bandstand, its silver plates gathered and arched like armor. Steel beams rose over us, crisscrossing to hold speakers for concerts in the park. Icicles hung down from them, their pointed ends making it appear that we were trapped in an armored cage.
And beneath the spiky beams, a stretch of snow that had clearly been the site of joy and happiness today. There were paw prints, snow angels, and plenty of footprints marring what might have been a perfect blanket of white.
“Any particular place?” Ethan asked.
“Any will do,” Mallory said, walking into the middle of the lawn. She put down her bag, pulled a blanket out of it, spread
it on the ground.
Catcher followed her. Ethan glanced at me.
“Is this a good idea?”
I looked back at Mallory. “I’m not altogether sure. But what choice do we have?”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT
We sat in a semicircle on the blanket, which didn’t do much to buffer the snow beneath us.
Mallory opened her bag, pulled out a round sterling silver platter polished to a high shine. She’d borrowed it from Margot’s stash of serving ware during her search for magic-making gear. She’d also brought matches, a sprig of rosemary, and a short bottle of champagne.
“What’s the bubbly for?” Ethan asked, when she’d set out her equipment and put the bag aside.
“Us,” she said with a smile. “It’s been a long night already.” She handed the bottle to Catcher. “Please to uncork, while I prepare the rest.”
She put the platter on the ground between us, the sprig of rosemary on top of it.
“This looks like alchemy,” I said. “Minus the crucible.”
“It’s inspired by alchemy, by what Sorcha did, and by my own style.”
I looked at Catcher. “What’s your style?”
“You know the answer to that,” he said, pulling the cork with his teeth, a whisper of smoke escaping the bottle.
“Weapons,” I said. He’d been the first to train me to use a katana, had used magic and my blood to temper the blade, which gave me the ability to sense steel weapons. Not an unuseful skill given the kinds of things we usually faced.
“Weapons,” he agreed, taking a swig of champagne and passing the bottle around. “We get to the point that we actually have something to fight, and I’m your man.”
“He’s being modest,” Mallory said, taking a hearty drink and passing the bottle to Ethan. She sat back on her heels. “That he’s best at weapons doesn’t mean he isn’t great at everything else.” She looked at him, winked. “All sorts of things.”
“We don’t need the details,” Ethan said, taking a drink and passing the bottle to me, condensation icing over the outside of the bottle. If it hadn’t been for the alcohol content, the champagne might have frozen in the achingly crisp air. But that didn’t affect the taste, the delicate blossom and bubbles.
Mallory shook her head. “You’ve already been married to Duchess too long.” Then she slapped a hand over her mouth, let out a mumbled swear.
It took me a moment to cue in to what she’d said—to the fact that she’d just given up his nickname for me. I glanced at Ethan, eyebrow arched in perfect imitation of his own favorite quirk. “Duchess? That’s what you call me?”
His smile was broad and amused. “Darth Sullivan,” he reminded me.
“That particular shoe fit,” I reminded him.
“And ‘Duchess’ doesn’t?”
“I’m not the princessy type.”
“No, you aren’t. But that’s not how you earned the name. Recall that on our first meeting you marched into my House, with your pale skin and dark hair, and those hauntingly pale eyes—eyes that were filled with so much pain and anger. You looked like the duchess of some strange and beautiful land. I couldn’t take my eyes off you.”
I just stared at him. He’d given me compliments before, and obviously I knew that he loved me. But I’d never heard the story of our first meeting in quite the same way.
“And then she challenged you to a duel,” Mallory said to him.
“She did. She was very imperious.”
Mallory nodded. “And you were like, ‘All right, girl. Let’s go. Let’s see what you’ve got.’”
I pointed at Mallory. “You aren’t helping.”
“I disagree, but . . .” She mimed zipping up her lips.
“And she’s right,” Ethan said. “That’s fairly close to my recollection.”
“Damn, Sullivan,” Catcher said as I offered the bottle back to him. He declined, so I recorked it, set it aside. “Merit’s got that Angry Master look down pat. You should probably be careful using that particular moniker.”
Ethan grinned at me. “He has a point, Duchess. You are good at it.”
I growled. Maybe I needed to challenge him more often, I thought. Just to keep him in line.
Ethan leaned over, pressed a kiss to my lips. “If it helps, you became Sentinel very, very quickly.”
I kept my gaze narrowed. “Does the entire House know about this?”
There was amusement in his eyes. “Fewer than those who know about ‘Darth Sullivan.’”
“Touché,” I said after a moment.
“If you’re done flirting,” Catcher said, “should we get on with the magic?”
“Let’s do,” Mallory said, pulling a match from the box. “I’m ready to get started.”
“What should we do?” I asked.
“Seem friendly. We don’t want to scare it.” With that, she flicked the match against the side of the box, spark and sulfur following in its wake. She put aside the box, carefully applied fire to the stick of rosemary. The herbal scent filled the air, made me hungry for baked chicken. But I put that aside.
Silently, Mallory opened her notebook, scribbled something on a page, tore it out. She folded the page into a complicated arrangement, held it over the smoldering rosemary until it caught fire, too, and dropped it into the platter.
“For ambience and explanation,” Mallory said, then sat cross-legged, hands on her knees, and straightened her back. And she began winding up her magic.
Catcher had once told me that sorcerers didn’t make magic—they funneled it. They were capable, for genetic or paranormal reasons, of funneling the universe’s magic, redirecting it for some purpose of their own. That was what Mallory did now, pulling in magic that was warm enough to make steam literally rise from the top of her head.
She cupped her hands together, blew into them.
“Is she blowing out the magic?” I quietly asked.
Catcher clucked his tongue. “She’s warming up her hands, noob.”
Logical, but how was I supposed to know? I didn’t spend many nights with Mal in public parks trying to contact unseen magical creatures.
Hands apparently warm enough, Mallory cupped them in front of her. A spark appeared, which grew larger and brighter as she concentrated, lips moving and head bobbing in some silent motion. I’d have guessed she was singing a favorite Muse song, but that would probably also be wrong, so I kept it to myself.
The spark blossomed to the size of a golf ball, then a baseball, then a softball, the light bright enough to shine blue through her hands, like when I’d held my fingers over a flashlight as a child.
When the orb of light, the same pale blue as a summer sky, was large enough, she opened her eyes. “Carefully,” she murmured to herself, and leaned forward, placed the ball on the platter. It hovered there, vibrating with power, casting pale light on our faces.
I glanced around, hoped no one was watching us. Sorcerers were out of the closet, but that didn’t mean it was a good idea for humans to watch this little experiment. Considering the weather, they might have called the CPD first, asked questions later.
Mallory sat back again, cleared her throat. “We’ve created a receiver. We’ll see if we can dial it in.” She put a hand over the fireball, fingers extended, and slapped the air on top of it.
The motion created a dull, round sound that rippled the air, just like she’d dropped a pebble in a lake. The circles moved out from the orb, to us, through us, until they diffused a few yards away.
Hand over the orb, ear cocked to the sky, Mallory waited. “We’re here,” she said. “And we’re looking for you.”
She hit the orb again, making another dull sound and sending another wave rippling.
But there was still no response. Not that I was entirely sure what kind of response we were
supposed to receive.
“What are we hoping to hear?” Ethan asked.
“Acknowledgment,” Mallory said. “I know it can hear me. The messages are bouncing back.”
“Like radar,” Ethan said, and Mallory nodded.
“The concussion finds something, the message comes back. I can sense it.” She lifted her gaze to Catcher. “You?”
He nodded. “Faintly, but yeah. There’s something out there.”
“Then we try it louder,” she said. She resituated herself, blew out a breath, and positioned her hand over the orb again. She gave the orb another whack, then a second, and a third.
The sounds seemed to grow louder, deeper, with each hit, until it felt like the vibrations would stop my heart.
This time, the greetings made it through. And the voice didn’t like our intrusion.
Lightning ripped across the sky, thunder cracking like the shot of a rifle at point-blank range. Power burst across the field like a slapping hand, and then I was flying, the city lights blurred with movement.
I hit the ground on my back, my diaphragm seizing with shock, head rapping against the ground, my fingers and toes tingling with heat and energy.
I lay there for a moment in the grass, looking up at the few stars that had managed to pierce the sky. Each was surrounded by a halo of light, and bees buzzed in my ears.
Slowly, I pushed up on my elbows, looked around. Ethan, Catcher, and Mallory were on the ground, too, all blinking up at the sky. We’d fallen perpendicularly to one another, our bodies aligned like the points of a compass. And between us, the orb still glowed.
“Well,” Mallory said, pushing hair from her face.
I sat up, put a hand on my forehead, as if that would stop the world from spinning. “That was not a success. That was some kind of magical grenade.”
“It was a success,” Mallory said, and we all looked at her.
“How?” Ethan asked, brushing snow from his sleeves.
“We know it heard us. And we know it can fight back.” She moved to her knees, poked at the rosemary with a finger, then sat back on her heels. She looked up at the sky, closed her eyes, the breeze blowing her hair across her pinked cheeks. After a moment of silence, she looked at us. “We need to try again.”
