Burned by Fire (Blood & Magic Book 3)

by Danielle Annett

  Since then, it had been turned back into a mill to turn water power into energy for the city.

  “Greg, Sam,” Jackson said. “Why don’t you two go on break?” They nodded and rushed up the stairs.

  I watched them as they made their hasty retreat, my curiosity now piqued.

  “We’re safe if we stay on this side of the doorway,” Jackson said, pulling on the large cast iron doorknob with a grunt. The wooden door creaked open and Jackson turned on the flashlight he held in his right fist.

  I moved to get a closer look, the light from Jackson’s flashlight illuminating a small ladder that descended deeper into the earth and further below the flour mill.

  Jackson took a breath. “The ladder leads to the sewer tunnels. A disturbance was reported early this morning, and when my men went down to check things out”—he shivered—“three men went in and only two and a half came back.”

  “Half?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Both legs were gone. The others had to haul him up here to get away. If it hadn’t been for their quick thinking and a bit of luck, none of them would have made it out. They used street flares to blind whatever the thing was and buy enough time to get away.”

  “Do they know what it was?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “No, they’re pretty shaken up, and Carl is still in surgery, but I was able to get out of them that whatever is down there is tall enough to have to hunch down to prevent touching the ceilings and it has green skin, and a humanoid body and face.

  Hmmm, green? I pondered the description for a moment.

  “Did it speak?”

  “Not that they mentioned.”

  I nodded. I had an idea of what it could be, given the green skin and its choice of hiding place, but I needed to be sure.

  “Why hasn’t it tried to get out?” I asked.

  “It has, but I think it’s too dumb to realize it can climb the ladder, and the floor below is too far down for it to climb out otherwise.”

  “How far down are the sewer tunnels?” I asked. Jackson’s light illuminated the top rungs of the ladder but nothing more. It couldn’t pierce the darkness.

  “I don’t know.”

  “And you’d like me to…”

  Jackson eyed me for a moment before releasing a long-suffering sigh. “My men won’t go down there.”

  “Are there any humans in immediate danger if it remains?” I asked. He shook his head. “Does the creature down there prevent the mill from functioning properly? Is there any reason workers need to access the tunnels?” He shook his head again. “I’m not sure what you’re asking me consult on. From the look of things, you have a dangerous creature who won’t bother you so long as you don’t bother it, and there is no real reason humans need access to the tunnels.”

  I waited. Seconds ticked by, and all Jackson did was purse his lips and stare down into the darkness as if weighing some sort of decision.

  And so I waited some more. I could be patient. Sometimes. After a full minute passed, Jackson turned to me.

  “Ben Haggerty announced plans to purchase the mill.” I waited. Was that name supposed to mean something to me? Judging by the scowl on Jackson’s face, it was. “Ben Haggerty, the musician from Seattle.”

  I shrugged.

  “Have you been living in a box all these years?” he asked.

  “Why should I care about some musician?” was my nonplussed reply.

  He threw his hands in the air. “Haggerty has the money and the influence to change things,” he said, “for all of us. He’s starting that with the Mill. It’s been going under; the Mill supplies power to all of downtown Spokane, but they can’t enforce payment collection, and the residents haven’t been paying their bills, so the Mill is struggling to stay afloat. Haggerty is in the process of buying the Mill from the current owners and wants to give the place a facelift by updating the equipment and adding apartments upstairs for employees to use on overnight shifts. He’s looking at the Flour Mill as his way of giving back to the community that’s been like a second home to him.”

  “And if he realizes there is a dangerous creature hiding in the basement…”

  “Then the deal may fall through. If it does, the Mill will close its doors and the city will fall into darkness with no source of power to service the residents.”

  I mulled that information over. Sanborn Place was in downtown Spokane. I paid my invoice every month, but regardless, we’d be affected if the Mill closed its doors, and I’d have to relocate the business somewhere outside of Spokane. The building would depreciate in value because of the lack of power, so I’d have a waste of space workplace that would be virtually impossible to sell, not that I had any intention of ever selling.

  “So what do you want me to do?”

  “I want you to get rid of it,” he said.

  “You send three trained men in to get the job done, they fail, and you think I can get rid of it?” I asked.

  “You can call in some extra help,” he suggested.

  I narrowed my eyes. “What kind of help are you referring to, exactly?”

  “The shifter kind.”

  I swore. Did everyone in this damn city know about Declan and I?

  “That won’t be necessary,” I bit out. “Now, if you’d like me to take care of it, I’m going to need a few things.”

  I cursed as I waded through the waist-deep sludge surrounding me. The tunnels were dark, the air cloying, and I was having a hell of a time not hyperventilating since I couldn’t see where the hell I was going outside of the narrow beam of light in front of me, and I was beginning to feel like the walls were closing in.

  Not for the first time, I wondered why I kept getting jobs that involved water in the middle of winter. Only this time, there was more than water and sand beneath the soles of my shoes. I cringed and tried not to think about it as something large and covered in fur rubbed against me.

  I jerked away, flashing the light I’d borrowed from Jackson at the thing that had touched me, and the flashlight illuminated the dead cat-sized rodent that floated along the surface. I shivered.

  My teeth began to chatter.

  I should have just taken the damn water nymph job. Coming to a fork in the tunnels, I shone my light into each opening, debating with path to take. A thundering boom shook the walls; a roar that wasn’t quite human or animal echoed from the left corridor.

  Looks like I have my answer. I trudged through the muck, the water getting shallower, much to my relief. Light flickered up ahead, and I felt recognition flood my veins. Fire.

  I turned off my flashlight and crept forward, using the light as a guide. I turned a corner and then jerked back, pressing myself against a wall that was coated in something sticky. I tried not to gag and rubbed my hand on wet jeans. The smell that reached me overwhelmed my senses, and I fought to push down the contents of my stomach. This was beyond sewage. It was decaying meat and ash and so much more that I couldn’t name.

  I peered my head around the corner, eyeing the humanoid shape that was sitting cross-legged on the floor as it poked at the very human legs resting on a spit over an open fire. My stomach lurched.

  Dragging my gaze away from the creature’s meal, I scanned over the creature, taking in the olive-green flesh, the reddish hair, and the bulbous features. Troll. It was naked. A spattering of red hair covered its back and shoulders in patches angling downward into a very hairy butt crack. This was more than I needed to see today.

  I tried recalling everything I knew about trolls, which, unfortunately, wasn’t much. They were attracted to bodies of water and bridges. They liked shiny objects and were, if previous records could be believed, dumber than a box of rocks.

  I didn’t know if you could reason with a troll, but if I couldn’t, that would leave me with only one of two options: kill it, or become troll dinner.

  I didn’t like killing magical creatures, especially those who didn’t know any better, but I also had no intention of becoming anyone’s dinner.
I had no idea how the troll had gotten down here, but I understood why it had attacked the HPED men. The tunnels were currently the troll’s home, and the others had invaded its territory. It had defended and it had won. Sometimes it was just that simple.

  I was fairly confident I could take the troll on. My fire was just beneath the surface of my skin, and I had enough juice to take on the twelve-foot monster, but I didn’t want to rush in guns blazing. Formulating a plan in my mind, I took a few steps forward so as not to spook the troll. My hands rested casually at my side so I didn’t present any sort of threat. I wasn’t silent, but I didn’t shout my presence, either. I watched the troll’s ears twitch before it slowly turned its head to stare at me.

  My heart rate picked up. “Hello,” I said, waving a hand in greeting. The troll just stared, snot dripping from its nose. I eyed its hands, clenched into fists that could smash me like a bug in just one swipe.

  “Enjoying dinner?” I asked, indicating the meal over the fire.

  “MINE!” it roared through the tunnel, its breath whipping past me like a vicious wind as it surged to its feet, putting another body part on display that I really wished I hadn’t just seen.

  I held both hands up. “Yours,” I agreed. “I’m not hungry,” I said in what I hoped was a reassuring voice. I stepped closer, my feet now on dry, solid earth. It eyed me warily before turning back to the fire, deciding I wasn’t a threat and dropping back down to sit. The ground shook.

  I released a relieved breath. It seemed to understand my words. I shrugged my shoulders. Here goes nothing.

  “Why are you here?” I asked, leaning against a rough cement wall. The troll glared at me. I wondered if it understood the question.

  “Troll go home,” it said in a gravelly voice.

  “Is this your home?”

  The troll swiped its arm over its face, snot rubbing against the green skin to smear along its forearm in a sticky glob. “Not troll home,” it said. There was a sad quality to his voice.

  “This is not your home?” I asked.

  It shook its head. Well, that was good. Hopefully it wouldn’t be too attached to the place.

  “Would you like to go home?” I had its attention. Here’s to hoping I kept it long enough and that home was a more attractive concept than an extra meal.

  Two hours later, I was finally free of the tunnels and the filth-coated air that had clogged my lungs. I sucked in lungful after lungful of clean air as Jackson stood waiting.

  “You need to clear out your men and any civilians in the immediate area,” I told him.

  “Wh—?”

  I cut him off. “You have five minutes. You also need to mark a path from here to the river. Use cones or chalk or whatever you have, but make a path.” He jumped into action, shouting orders to the others milling about. An HPED worker rushed towards me with what looked like a spare set of clothes in his arms.

  “Captain said you might want to change when you came out,” he said, glancing towards Jackson.

  Captain? That was new.

  I gratefully took the clothes before ducking into a side office and stripping out of my wet clothes and into the new pair of gray sweats before slipping my feet back into my soaked boots. It would have to do.

  I watched in awe, as Jackson was able to order the entire crowd into action. Three HPED workers retrieved some type of paint from the back of their vehicles, popping the cans open and pouring a trail from the Mill down the street towards the river. When one ran out of paint, the next would jump in to pick up the trail until all three were out of sight.

  “Got time to explain?” he asked.

  “Not much to explain. It was a troll; he’s on his way up and is going to head to the Spokane River. Trolls prefer open spaces. I don’t know how he got down there, but he was happy enough when I told him I could get him out.”

  “And how exactly are you doing that?”

  “There’s an access tunnel that leads out to the left of the Mill.” I pointed to the large manhole that was centered in the middle of Mallon Avenue. It was massive in size and intended for pump access to clear waste. The troll should fit since the manhole stretched nearly eight feet wide.

  “He should clear the street level any minute. I’d suggest you not be around when he does. He seemed pretty hungry. I have a feeling he’s been trapped down there for at least a few days.

  Jackson paled but nodded. “What do I owe you?” he asked.

  “I’ll send you an invoice from Sanborn Place later this week,” I said. He nodded and eyed the manhole cover warily.

  “You waiting to make sure it comes out?” he asked.

  I nodded. I’d wait until I knew it was out, but I wasn’t going to stick around past that. The HPED had made a clear path leading towards the river, and I’d told the troll to follow the path. It would figure it out. All I had to do was get it out of the damn tunnel. After that, it wasn’t my problem.

  I swung by the office on my way back to the Compound. Inarus greeted me, a smile on his face like he could take on the world. I wanted to punch him in the teeth.

  I was tired, cold, and there were things in my boots I didn’t even want to think about.

  “Rough day?” he asked. I flipped him off and went to make a pot of coffee. “That bad?” he laughed.

  I slumped in my chair, listening to the sound of coffee dripping in the background.

  “It was a troll. A very stupid, very difficult to persuade troll. It could have gone worse though, all things considered.”

  His eyes roved over me. “Looks like you made it out okay.” I nodded. The troll hadn’t decided to eat me. Really, the damn thing frustrated me more than anything. Patience wasn’t a virtue of mine, and the troll had marbles in its head. Having to explain the same thing over and over again got old really fast.

  “How’d you make out?” I asked.

  Inarus tossed me a large envelope. I opened it and whistled, thumbing through the cash. There had to be at least four grand in here.

  “Is this from all the gigs? The witches, Alexander, and the old woman?” He shook his head.

  “No, I didn’t charge the old woman since there was nothing wrong with her cat; she’s going senile. That’s just from Alexander Drucano.”

  My mouth dropped. “What? Why?”

  Inarus shrugged. “I don’t know. The job was a piece of cake. His daughter, Alyssa, she’s a sweet kid.” He couldn’t have been talking about the same girl. Alyssa Drucano was a spoiled brat. There was nothing sweet about her.

  “How so?” I prodded. There had to be more to this.

  “Watching her was a cinch. She didn’t cause any trouble. That boyfriend of hers came by about an hour after I got there. Walked to the door on two legs—I didn’t know they could do that.”

  I shrugged. Powerful mermen could come onto land for short periods of time so long as they stayed close to the water.

  “Anyway, he came. I told him to leave and told Alyssa to stay. She did. The guy threw a fit and I tossed him back into the water. He did it twice more before giving up.” His eyes filled with mirth. He’d enjoyed himself.

  “Alyssa wasn’t angry with you for giving her boyfriend the boot?”

  “Not that I could tell. She seemed content to just hang out and watch movies.” Ah, the pieces were coming together now.

  “Did she give you a book?” I asked. Water nymphs were part of the fae. They valued knowledge above all else. The best gift you could offer one of their kind was a way to increase their knowledge. If she gave him a book…

  He opened his top desk drawer and pulled out a leather-bound novel that was four inches thick and had the language of the fae scrawled in gold embossed lettering.

  “Yeah, how’d you know?”

  I laughed, hard. It was just too great. When I could finally get control of myself, I poured myself a cup of coffee and resumed my seat.

  “Did Alexander know she offered you the book?” I asked.

  “Yeah, she did it in front of
him just as I was about to leave.”

  “And he didn’t object?” Inarus shook his head. “He overpaid you because you earned his daughter’s affection and he approved. You’re officially a contender for his daughter’s hand.”

  “Her what?” he sputtered.

  I wagged my left hand and wiggled my ring finger. “Her hand in marriage.”

  “You’re kidding.” His jaw was slack. I laughed again before choking on my coffee.

  “Not one bit. He’ll hire you again soon if you haven’t already hammered out the details of the next job.” The shadow that swept over his face was pure devastation. “You already did, didn’t you? When will you be heading back out? Tonight, tomorrow, next week? Soon, I’d imagine.”

  “I’ll cancel,” he muttered.

  “You can’t. You took the job; you can’t bail until its finished. It’s in the contract.” The metal spheres he carried hovered on the surface of the table, spinning and spinning, their speed increasing until they were a blur.

  I looked away so as not to get dizzy.

  “I’ll explain everything tomorrow.” Ah, I was right. It was soon. Alexander Drucano would want to sink his influence into Inarus early. He’d been fighting off would-be suitors since Alyssa had come of age two years ago, and she’d finally found one he approved of. Inarus was in for it.

  I smiled to myself. Too bad I wouldn’t be there to watch.

  “I’m going to be MIA for a few days. Can you hold down the fort?” I asked, tossing the cash back to him. “Keep it all. After today, ten percent of your earnings will go to Sanborn Place. Consider it your signing bonus.” He nodded and tucked the envelope into his desk.