Magic on the Line

by Devon Monk

“Very nice property,” he mused in that pleasant accent of his. “Is it yours?”

  “I lease. So what did you want to talk to me about?”

  “This friend of yours, the young Mr. Silvers?” Good lord, he made it sound like the first act of a stage play. “Do you understand how, exactly, he has been injured?”

  “No.” Honesty. The only way to fly.

  He paced toward the high windows, his hands behind his back, right hand clasping left wrist. “Let me be very clear as to the injuries I see upon him then.” He paused in front of a window as if gathering his thoughts, then turned and stood in front of the wall between the windows.

  So he was a cautious man who didn’t like to give people a clear shot at him through windows, if people were watching. That indicated a shady past. Of course the very fact that he knew my father indicated a shady past.

  “He has been infected.” He stopped as if that explained it all and watched my reaction.

  “By what?”

  “Ah,” he said finally catching on that I wasn’t trying to play dumb. It came naturally.

  “First off, I believe he was involved in Blood magic rites. You are acquainted with the Authority, are you not?”

  Okay, now I was fully awake. I held his gaze, trying to read the reasons behind that question, trying to read anything behind those smiling, too bright eyes.

  “Yes.”

  “Good, that will simplify my explanation. He’s been used for dark Blood magic. Not recently, but within the last year. It has left a mark on him. Changed how he uses magic, I’d think, though it may have been gradual enough that he didn’t notice it.”

  He was right. Davy had been put in the hospital because his ex-girlfriend Tomi had gotten mixed up with Greyson, who had been using dark magic and Blood magic to release the Hungers through the gates of death into life.

  Davy hadn’t ever quite been the same since. For one thing, he could feel when other Hounds were hurt, especially if they were hurt by magic.

  His medical records wouldn’t be difficult for someone like Collins to find. So I was not impressed. “And?” I asked.

  “And that is why I believe the infection is spreading so quickly in him.”

  “What infection?”

  “He’s been bitten by a Veiled.”

  We stood there a moment, just staring at each other. Outside, the train whistled and a car or two drove by. He didn’t flinch, didn’t twitch, didn’t change his stance on what he’d just said.

  “He was bitten by a kid,” I said. “Another Hound.”

  “Really? Who?”

  And I suddenly did not trust this man with any information at all. Dad said he was once aligned with the Authority. He might still be, might be on his own, or might be aligned with someone or something else.

  “Another Hound,” I repeated. “Can you treat the infection?”

  “I can treat it. I am uncertain that I can cure it. It isn’t like a cold or some other common malady, Allison. Your friend Davy is being poisoned.” He paused to see how that news sank in. When I gave no outward indication that it surprised me, he added, “By magic. Magic is poisoning him. And unless we can stop the spread of magic inside him, I am afraid there won’t be any chance to cure him at all.”

  “You’re telling me he’s going to die?”

  “Yes,” he said, a little too excitedly for my taste. “But that isn’t the crux of it. The heart of the matter is that magic is poisoning him. I’ve never seen this before. It is almost as if the magic itself is tainted. I can’t know, of course, unless I run some tests.”

  He paused again, watching me. Finally, “That’s what I wanted to ask you about. Since he is fevered and barely coherent, I couldn’t very well have him sign permission. I wondered if you knew of a parent, a spouse?”

  “No. We’re Hounds. We don’t talk about our private lives.”

  “That puts us at loggerheads, then. Unless you have any legal say for his health care while he’s under your employ?”

  “Tell me what kind of tests you’re going to run. In detail. Then I’ll sign your papers.”

  He clapped his hands together. “Wonderful! All the preliminary tests will be done with the least amount of discomfort to Mr. Silvers. I’ll need to draw blood, a urine sample. I’ll want to set a very low-level Syphon on him to see if we can draw the toxins out via conventional magical techniques.” He raised his eyebrows, and I nodded.

  “I take it you’ll want me to run these tests here?” he asked.

  “Can you be discreet?”

  He took in a short breath as if he were going to say something, but instead he just smiled. It was a comforting kind of smile, even though his eyes, his body language told me he was at his core a man who had killed other men. And enjoyed it.

  “Very.”

  “Then here is fine. This floor. We can bring a bed up.” I looked around the room. Not much to work with. Just the mattress and the kitchen that was stocked, but not for more than a few days.

  “This will work very well,” Collins said. “Perhaps we can borrow some of the furniture from downstairs?”

  “Yes.”

  “Perfect,” he said. “I shall unpack my things. I left my bag in the car.”

  “You’ll have a Hound with you at all times,” I said as we walked toward the hall.

  “Yes, of course. I’d like to examine you also, Allison,” he said once we were in the hall.

  “Me? Why?”

  “I believe magic might have changed you.”

  “Old news,” I said, shoving my magic-marked right hand into the pocket of my jeans. I didn’t want Collins to touch me, or magic around me. The last doctor who’d gotten all interested in how magic had changed me had tried to kill me to raise my dad from the grave. And right now, I needed to stay clearheaded so I could keep an eye on what he was going to do to Davy.

  One sicko at a time.

  We started down the stairs. “If you reconsider,” he said, “for science.”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  It took about an hour to get one of the bed frames broken down and taken up the elevator to the second floor. We also transferred a couple chairs and a long folding table. Sid and Jack helped me move things, while Bea stayed with Davy.

  Mr. Collins whistled his way happily out to his car, and then hummed to himself as he set up equipment that would have made a mad scientist drool. I didn’t recognize half of the things he spread out on the table, but I could feel the magic worked into them. Most of his medical equipment reminded me of my dad’s storm rods, or the disks that held magic.

  It was like he had a trunk full of my dad’s experimental magic-tech equipment.

  Much of it is, Dad said quietly. We worked very closely together before I met Violet. He helped develop much of the medical applications of my products.

  So Dad had known him for years. I wondered if he and I had ever met.

  “Are you ready for us to bring Davy?” I asked.

  Collins glanced over his shoulder. “Yes.”

  “Should we take any precautions?”

  He stopped fiddling with the buttons on some kind of monitor screen and looked up at the rafters. “You say someone bit him?”

  “Yes.”

  He looked back down at the table and started messing with things again. “We have no indications, but just to be on the safe side, you might want to gag him.”

  “No.”

  “Then a piece of tape over his mouth would work.” He turned. “Maybe a surgical mask. Something to keep him from accidentally biting someone.”

  “He’s barely conscious. He’s not going to go around biting people.”

  His bright eyes flicked over my face as if he couldn’t decide which part of my features interested him most. He finally settled on my lips. “We don’t know how this magical infection spreads. It might be simply from touch, though I’m assuming many people have touched him and up to this point no one is feeling any ill effects?”

  I nodded. I d
idn’t feel any crappier than I usually felt.

  “It could be an airborne pathogen, fluid, blood, magic. We don’t know. Not yet. But if we want to stay safe, we must consider gagging Mr. Silvers.” He pressed his lips together with a short nod and turned back to his work.

  I wasn’t going to gag my friend. I walked out of the room, leaving Jack behind to keep an eye on Collins, who was humming again. I was suddenly glad Jack kept a big knife on him.

  I took the stairs down to the main room. Bea had pulled an easy chair over by the bunk where Davy was sleeping.

  “Ready for him?” she asked without looking up. Hounds. Good ears.

  “Has he moved?”

  “No. He mumbled some, like he was having a dream, but otherwise he’s been pretty quiet. Still running a fever, though.”

  “Let’s see if we can wake him,” I said. “If not, we’re going to have to figure out how to carry him upstairs.”

  Bea hit the MUTE button on the TV remote and stood. “I can wake him.”

  “No magic.”

  “Really? Why not?”

  I shrugged one shoulder. I could make up a lie, but I didn’t see why I should. “Mr. Collins thinks it might be some kind of infection from using magic. If we use more magic on him, I don’t know if it will make it worse.”

  I walked over to the bottom bunk. Davy was pale, sticky green where the shadows lay across his face and just the lightest shade of blue around his lips and eyes. I wondered if the mark on his shoulder had gotten worse. Wondered if it had spread like the tentacle mark on Anthony. Didn’t bother looking now. I was sure Collins would do a thorough check once we got him upstairs.

  “Davy,” I said in a moderate voice, “time to get up.” I put my hand on his forearm and shook him a little. Nothing.

  “Davy,” I said louder. Then, “Silvers. Wake up.” I didn’t put Influence behind it, even though I wanted to. Instead I shook him. Hard.

  He exhaled a low, drawn-out moan, his eyes flickering.

  “Wake up, Davy. We gotta move you. Come on, you can do it.”

  His eyelids pulled up, and then closed again, harder, as if he were trying to clear the dream from behind his eyes.

  “Al?” he breathed.

  “Gotta move, Davy. I’m going to help you up. Can you stand?”

  He swallowed. It looked like it hurt. “Yes.”

  That was my boy. Bea and I helped him sit, then both got our arms around him, his arms over our shoulders. It was a little awkward since Bea was almost a foot shorter than me, but we got him standing.

  “Got your legs under you?” I asked him.

  Davy was shaking and sweating. He worked on putting weight on his feet.

  “Here,” Sid said as he came into the room. “Let me get on the other side of him.”

  Bea and Sid switched places and Sid and I got Davy, who amazingly managed to put one foot in front of the other, into the elevator.

  I think my heart was beating harder and I was sweating more than Davy by the time that damn door opened.

  “Almost there,” Sid said calmly, to me, not Davy. Davy wasn’t doing anything but leaning on us. If I hadn’t known any better, I’d have guessed he had passed out.

  “Come on, Silvers,” I said. “Let’s get you in bed.”

  Davy mumbled something, but it was so slurred I couldn’t make it out. Sid and I got him across the hall to the room, and then Mr. Collins hurried over and helped us pick him up and carry him the rest of the way to the bed that we’d set up.

  It didn’t take any time to get him settled.

  “All right,” Collins said, as if he were looking over a grocery list. “Let’s see. I think we should get him out of his shirt and into more comfortable pants. Those sweats you brought up should work.”

  He pulled Davy’s T-shirt carefully off over his head. And sucked in a breath. “Hello, what do we have here?” He folded Davy’s shirt and placed it on the chair next to the bed. Then he bent and peered at Davy’s chest.

  Well, not just his chest. At the tentacle lines snaking across his shoulder and down his collarbone toward his sternum.

  “Is this new?” he asked me.

  “It’s not a tattoo,” I said. “I saw something like that on the person who bit him.”

  He gave me a sidelong glance. “I’d like to meet this person who bit him. Take a look at his marks too.”

  “He’s dead.”

  Collins nodded. “Easier to set up a meeting, then, as I’m assuming his schedule will be clear.”

  Ass.

  “Was it identical?” he asked as I handed him the sweatpants and we pulled away the blanket. We both paused. Davy was wearing jeans. Collins looked at me, wondering if I was going to take part in this declothing operation.

  Fine. I figured Davy would rather I undress him than some stranger. Let’s just hope he was wearing shorts.

  I unbuttoned his jeans, slid the zipper down. Hallelujah, we had shorts!

  Davy didn’t move at all but I could feel the heat coming off the skin of his flat stomach and chest. Boy was burning up.

  “Are you going to put him on an IV?” I asked.

  “I plan to. Careful.”

  He didn’t have to tell me. I pulled Davy’s jeans off as quickly as I could, but tried not to pull too hard. His legs were just as hot as the rest of him. By the time I had his jeans off over his feet, he was shivering hard enough to shake the bed.

  Collins tucked the sheet and my heavy quilt back over him, leaving only his head, shoulders, and left arm out of the covers.

  He opened a new needle package, set it on the table, got out everything else, and set a shunt in his arm. He was quick with the needle, steady-handed and sure. He hummed quietly, nodding to himself every once in a while as if he were constantly going over a checklist in his head. He hooked the IV bag on a hat rack we’d brought up from downstairs.

  Then he pulled out a thin steel plate about the size of his palm and broke the seal on its edge with his thumbnail.

  He exhaled. As he inhaled, he drew a spell with his left hand, holding the round steel plate in his right. He finished the spell, and held it pinched between his thumb and pinky. He flipped open the top part of the steel plate, revealing a golden glyph nestled like lacework inside.

  No, I shouldn’t have been able to see magic without using Sight. I blinked, and couldn’t see the golden spell—though I could’ve sworn I’d seen it.

  With a deft twist of his wrist, Collins flicked the spell he’d cast across the plate. I knew the two spells would mingle, join, and become something very different and tricky to cast—Syphon, a spell that was usually used in medical care. He guided the spell as if it hovered like a helium balloon over the plate in his hand, and then gently placed the plate on Davy’s chest.

  He waited a moment, then cast several quick spells in a row, pausing to touch his fingertip to Davy’s chest, to his shoulder where the bite and darkness spread, then to the IV line, and finally he flourished his fingers over the hat rack like he was getting rid of spiderweb strands.

  The Syphon was set. It would slowly drain the magic from Davy.

  “How’s it working?” I asked.

  Collins studied his handiwork. “As well as to be expected, I think.” He pulled on a pair of latex gloves. “A few seconds into it is a bit early to give a final determination, however. Are you staying?”

  I thought about it. I’d gotten almost zero sleep. It was midmorning, and I hadn’t heard anything from Zayvion or the rest of them, so I could only assume they didn’t need me. That was fine. I was not up to seeing Bartholomew or his pet torturer, Melissa, right now.

  Jack had found a chair and was texting on his cell. Sid was unloading some groceries in the kitchen area.

  “For a while,” I said.

  I’d only had a scone to eat today. I was starved. I gave Davy one last look. He appeared to be sleeping. “Did you give him painkillers?”

  “A mild sedative in his IV to help him sleep. Nothing fancy.” H
e flashed me a smile. “Yet. I’m going to draw some blood first.”

  I glanced over at the kitchen again, and my stomach rumbled.

  He looked at me. “Go ahead. I’ll narrate.”

  I didn’t like being told what to do by this man, but I was starving.

  Since he was paying no more attention to me, but instead getting the vials and needle ready, I walked over to the kitchen. “Who’s paying for all the food?” I asked.

  Sid shrugged. “Took it out of petty cash.”

  “We have petty cash?”

  “Yes. You. You’re our petty cash.”

  “In that case, I want food.”

  “What can I get you?” He opened a cupboard showing soups, cans, and boxed goods.

  “Anything I don’t have to chew through tin to get at would work. Though I’ll eat tin, if that’s all we’ve got.”

  Sid pursed his lips and shut the cupboard. He opened the refrigerator. “How about a deli sandwich or salad?”

  “Yes.”

  He pulled out a wrapped deli sandwich from the local market down the street and handed it to me. It weighed as much as a newborn baby.

  “I think I love you, Sid.”

  He chuckled. “Still want the salad?”

  I leaned my elbows on the countertop, unwrapped the sandwich, and dug in. Sweet hells, I was hungry. “This should do,” I mumbled.

  “So do you know what’s wrong with Davy?” He put a tall glass of orange juice in front of me and I swallowed down half of it. I’d taken out a third of the sandwich already, but my hands were still shaking from hunger.

  From across the room, I heard Collins say, “I’m going to draw his blood now. Three vials.”

  What did you know? He really was narrating.

  “That’s what he’s supposed to tell us,” I said.

  “And?”

  “So far he thinks it’s an infection. A magical infection.”

  “Any reason why we aren’t taking him to a hospital?”

  I took another big bite and chewed. “I don’t think it’s something a regular doctor would know how to handle.”

  “Think? Didn’t know you had a medical degree, Allie.”

  Okay, I got it. He was worried about Davy. I was too. “This guy used to work with my dad on medical technology, Sid. He has all the equipment the hospitals would have. Probably more. We can take Davy in if you want to, but I don’t know how much moving him will help.”