Hexbreaker - Jordan L. Hawk

by Jordan L. Hawk

  “That the hex ain’t like anything he’s ever seen.”

  Cicero’s peridot eyes widened slightly. “I’m surprised, actually. Dominic’s forgotten more about hexes than most witches learn in a lifetime. I was sure he’d recognize it, even though we didn’t.”

  “He’s going to look it over, along with some other fellow. Dr. Yates?”

  “Owen. Yes. He’s a hexman with witch potential.”

  Tom sat down and pulled Cicero onto his lap. “Dominic asked us to wait until they figure out what the hex is for.”

  Cicero arched a brow. “Even though the investigation is closed?”

  “Aye.” Tom shrugged. “He said what Ferguson don’t know won’t hurt the rest of us. I got to say, Rook doesn’t really strike me as one for following the rules anyway, so I wasn’t much surprised.”

  “Owen, on the other hand, can be a bit of a stickler.” Cicero trailed off. “Well, that’s Dominic’s problem, not ours.”

  Tom nodded. “There’s nothing for us to do now but wait.”

  A slow grin crossed Cicero’s mouth, and he wriggled closer. “I wouldn’t say there’s nothing to do,” he murmured, and reached for the buttons of Tom’s uniform.

  A sharp knock came on the apartment door the next morning. Tom opened it to find Dominic, Rook and a stranger all crowded into the hallway outside. A few snowflakes clung to their coats, and the smell of wet wool competed with cumin drifting from another apartment.

  Dominic held up the hex Tom had given him yesterday. “Can we come in?”

  “Of course.” Tom hurriedly stepped out of the way. “There ain’t much room, I’m afraid.”

  “And what the devil are you doing here, anyway?” Cicero asked, emerging from the bedroom where he’d been sleeping in cat form.

  Rook pushed past Tom. “We’ve come to disturb your nap, of course.” But he pulled Cicero into a hug. “Are you all right?”

  Cicero shoved him away. “Well, I would be, if you weren’t getting me all wet. At least take off your coat before you start touching people.”

  “We’ve come because none of us are supposed to be working on this case,” Dominic said. “As far as anyone at the Coven knows, we’re simply taking an early lunch. If we just happen to stop by a friend’s apartment to discuss hexes, well, there’s no injunction against that.” He indicated the stranger. “Tom Halloran, this is the hexman I told you about yesterday.”

  “Dr. Owen Yates,” said the other man, shaking Tom’s hand. He was of average height, his hair so pale it bordered on white. Silvery eyes blinked up from behind gold-rimmed spectacles. His gaze drifted over the apartment, and a small moue of distaste touched his lips. “Forensic hexman.”

  “A title he gave himself,” Cicero added with a roll of his eyes.

  “And with good reason,” Dominic said, shooting a quelling look at Cicero. “Owen isn’t a witch himself, or at least, he doesn’t have a familiar yet. But he’s brilliant at developing new hexes.”

  “Oh. That’s good, then,” Tom said, feeling a bit out of his depth. “Have a seat, please. I’ve only got the two chairs, but I don’t mind standing.”

  Owen took one of the chairs at the table, and Dominic the other. Rook flashed into crow form and perched on Dominic’s shoulder. Cicero leaned against Tom, as if he belonged there. Dominic frowned, just a little, and glanced at Rook. Rook began to assiduously preen his tail, as if avoiding a silent question.

  Yates adjusted his glasses. “What Dominic is trying to say, is that I’ve been working on new ways of uncovering crime by using hexes to analyze blood stains, more accurately detect poisons, that sort of thing.”

  Dominic nodded. “And one of his breakthrough ideas is the use of chained hexes.”

  Tom felt like an idiot, but he had to say, “I don’t understand what that means.”

  “No reason you should, darling,” Cicero replied. “Dominic is being obscure. Not intentionally, but he forgets the rest of us don’t know the difference between a cosine and the Pythagorean Theorem.”

  Dominic shot Cicero a vexed look. “Which you could, if you only…oh, very well. Owen, would you care to explain chained hexes?”

  Yates practically vibrated with eagerness. “Hexes can be added together to create larger effects,” he said in a lecturing tone. “A way for witches to multiply individual power to make something greater than the whole. But what if you in essence took a single hex and split it into its component parts? Parts that were still metaphysically linked to have the full effect when combined?”

  Tom’s head spun. He’d never imagined he’d need to know this sort of thing, and wasn’t entirely sure he could follow it now that he did. “I ain’t certain I understand.”

  “Take one hex, and it does something,” Dominic supplied. “Makes you feel good, or fearless, or the like. Take the second in the series…and you turn into a mindless killer.”

  Tom’s heart sank into his shoes. “Like the absinthe hexes Whistler and Barshtein took.”

  “Exactly like,” Yates replied. He held up a copy of one of the absinthe hexes. “What appears to be mere ornamentation is in fact what links them to a different hex. This one.” He held up the hex Cicero had taken from Janowski.

  “Oh,” Tom said. “Hell. So people don’t even know they’ve taken anything dangerous?”

  Danny hadn’t known, either. Or Da. But they’d at least thought they knew. No one had told them it was some harmless hex, like the sort handed out at Noah’s party.

  “Exactly,” Dominic said unhappily.

  Yates pushed his gold-rimmed spectacles higher on his nose. “It gets worse.”

  “Of course it does,” Cicero muttered.

  Yates shot him an annoyed look. “I don’t recognize anything about the first hex in the sequence.” He tapped the angular runes. “These look Norse, like something which might have been used in the age of the Vikings.”

  “‘From the fury of the Northmen, oh Lord deliver us,’” Dominic quoted.

  Saint Mary, Holy Familiar of Christ. Danny’s madness, snapping at his face. Da’s teeth, red with Ma’s blood.

  Yates went on, oblivious to Tom’s inner turmoil. “Most of their hexwork has been lost. Burned by idiots who wanted the world to descend into a magicless darkness.”

  “Not now, Owen,” Dominic said. “Focus.”

  “Yes—forgive me.” Yates removed another hex from inside his coat. “Dominic, could you?”

  Dominic put his hand on the hex. Tom sensed the slight vibration as the magic settled into place.

  “Thank you.” Yates held the hex directly above the Viking one. “Reveal,” he said in a commanding tone.

  A glow spread across the Viking hex. Soon every sharp line, every inked fang, blazed with an angry red light, which faded only slowly.

  “That hex,” Yates said, “is one of my own creations. It reveals the presence of human blood.”

  Silence fell over the room. “Then they were using blood for ink,” Cicero said, his face going a sickly shade of green.

  “Human blood, specifically,” Yates said. “Whether witch, familiar, or normal, I haven’t yet been able to determine.”

  “Highly illegal, whoever it belonged to.” Dominic shook his head. “But I suppose when you’re making hexes to drive people insane, legality is the least of your concerns.”

  “Cicero said blood ain’t used for hexes, though.” Tom’s voice caught. He could see the hexes from eight years ago, their dark, rusty ink against the aged parchment. “And I ain’t never heard of a case…”

  “It’s claimed that in more primitive times, our ancestors sacrificed people to make hexes,” Yates said quietly. “The fear of such magic was used to justify conquest, the burning of thousands of books, and ultimately the Inquisition.” He reached for the Viking hex, but didn’t touch it. “Supposedly the Aztecs used blood in their magic as well. But all traces were wiped out, the traditions eradicated. Witches and familiars slain without mercy. If you gave a modern hexman a vial
of blood, he wouldn’t even know where to begin with it. What sort of hexes to use it in.”

  “So this is old magic,” Tom murmured. But of course it was. Molly had said the book was from some medieval monastery. Had some monk gotten his hands on the hexes of attacking Vikings, and…what? Decided to keep them himself?

  From the fury of the Northmen, oh Lord deliver us. Maybe he’d intended to fight fire with fire and just never had the chance.

  “Very old,” Yates confirmed. “And yet, here it is, drawn on inexpensive paper from a mill.”

  “Even if Sloane was keeping the hexes somewhere at the Rooster, he’d be a fool not to have moved them after we escaped,” Cicero said.

  Dominic nodded. “And where are they getting all the magic to power the hexes? Not from Sloane himself, or else he’d be flat on his back, not running a resort.”

  “Isaac.” Cicero’s skin paled to a sickly shade. “If they force bonded him to a witch and are stripping him of magic…Damn it! If they really do have something planned for New Year’s Eve, we’re out of time. That’s tomorrow night.”

  “There’s still the tunnels,” Tom said. “If they have another location, where they’re keeping Isaac and maybe the hexes, we might still be able to find it. But that means getting into the tunnels in the first place. Dominic, could you and Rook cause a disturbance of some kind? Distract everyone and pull the guard off the door?”

  “That would have to be quite the disturbance,” Yates remarked.

  Dominic glanced at Rook. “I doubt that will be a problem,” he said dryly. “Consider it done.” He reached into his coat and took out a revolver and a small, silver disk. “Since you lost your gun at the warehouse, Tom, we thought you might need another.”

  Tom took it. “Thanks. Is that a hexlight?”

  Yates seemed slightly scandalized that Tom didn’t recognize it. He might work for the MWP, but Tom was willing to bet he came from old money. “Yes,” Dominic said. “Rook insisted we bring it, although I’m not sure why…” He trailed off and seemed to take a second look at Cicero. “Never mind. I’ll just leave it here. So, tonight?”

  “Aye,” Tom said, feeling as though he’d missed something yet again.

  Tom saw them to the door. Rook peered back over Dominic’s shoulder at him, until the door closed between them. “Saint Mary, I hope this works,” he said, turning back to Cicero. “If we don’t find anything tonight…I don’t know. We’ll just have to hope, I suppose.”

  “Yes.” Cicero stood by the table, staring down at the hexlight. Then he straightened his shoulders. “I’ve been thinking, the last few days.”

  This sounded serious. “Oh?”

  Cicero looked up at him, yellow-green eyes bright. “Yes. I’ve made up my mind. Thomas Halloran, would you consent to be my witch?”

  Tom gaped at him, replaying the words in his mind again. “I…are you sure? I mean, this ain’t just because of leaving the MWP, is it?”

  “Of course it isn’t.” Cicero padded across the room to him. “It’s because of you.” He took Tom’s hands in his own. “Because in the time we’ve been together, I’ve come to realize there’s no one else I’d rather bond with.” He glanced up uncertainly. “What about you? Have you thought about it?”

  If only Cicero knew how much. Mostly, Tom had told himself even considering a bond was insane. Terrifying. Even if he somehow bribed Phelps off, could he keep the truth hidden forever? Would Cicero notice he never got mail from his imaginary family back in Ireland?

  Maybe Tom ought to kill them off. Manufacture some tale of disease. Pretend to be grief stricken.

  “Aye,” he said, curling his fingers around Cicero’s. “I have. And I…I want this. Want you.”

  Cicero’s smile was brilliant as the sun coming from behind a cloud. “I knew you couldn’t resist,” he purred.

  “Of course not. Who could resist you?” Tom teased.

  “No one with any sense.” Cicero kissed him, his lips supple and hungry. He was still grinning when they broke apart.

  “So, uh,” Tom asked, “how do we go about it?”

  “Don’t sound so terrified, tesoro,” Cicero said with a laugh. “You look like you think it involves hot needles and a flogger.”

  “Sorry.” Tom shook his head. “This is all just new to me.”

  “I know. But you can trust me.” Cicero’s hands linked behind Tom’s waist, pressing their hips together. “It’s a two step process. Fortunately, we’ve already completed step one.”

  The devil? “We have?”

  “How else do you think you were able to see out of my eyes that night at the Rooster?”

  Tom drew in his breath sharply. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “Tell you what?” Cicero cocked his head to the side. “It’s only one step. And, yes, not one I’d taken before, but it doesn’t mean a bond has to be made. I could have gone on and done it with another witch after.”

  “Hmph. We need to work on your ability to communicate, cat.”

  Cicero eased out of Tom’s arms and went to the table. “The next step is simple. All you have to do is draw magic from me and put it in the hex.” He held up the hexlight. “Like this uncharged hexlight Dominic so conveniently left for us.”

  Tom folded his arms over his chest. “So he knew? Or Rook did?”

  “Rook thinks he knows everything,” Cicero said with an annoyed grimace. “In this case, he happened to be right. I’m never going to hear the end of it, by the way.”

  “You poor thing.” Tom let his arms fall and crossed the small space to Cicero’s side. “So how do I draw magic from you?”

  Cicero’s full lips smirked. “It’s like sex. Just do what comes naturally, darling.” His green eyes sparked. “Which, hmm, not a bad idea.”

  “Sex?”

  “Making this first time special.” Cicero leaned against him, rubbing his thigh over Tom’s. “By which, yes, I mean sex. And magic. And us.”

  “Well, I surely ain’t going to say no to that,” Tom said with a grin. He bent to kiss Cicero, sucking on his lower lip, then invading his mouth. Cicero groaned, pressing back against him, his prick hard against Tom’s thigh. Tom wrapped his arms tight around the smaller man, lifting him onto the table. Cicero instantly twined his legs around Tom’s hips, pressing their erections together through the cloth of their trousers.

  “I think,” Cicero mumbled between kisses, “that you have on entirely too many clothes.”

  Tom shucked off his coat, then shoved Cicero’s from his shoulders. Cicero’s hands worked the buttons of his vest and shirt, then ran across the skin beneath. His fingers tweaked one of Tom’s nipples, drawing a gasp from him.

  “Bed?” Tom asked.

  Cicero picked up the hexlight. “God, yes, please.”

  They left a trail of clothing behind them. Cicero’s skin felt fever-hot against his. Cicero put the hexlight on the nightstand, while Tom fell into the bed. Cicero crawled in on top, rubbing his thigh against Tom’s prick, his cock leaving a slick trail against Tom’s belly.

  “What do you want?” Cicero murmured against his lips. The nipple rings pressed against Tom’s chest, spots of unexpected hardness. “Shall I suck you? Let you fuck my arse, while we make magic together?”

  Tom’s prick ached at the thought. But he had something else in mind. “Would you fuck me?”

  Cicero drew back, looking slightly surprised. “Do you want me to?”

  “You said you wanted this to be special, and I’ve been thinking I’d like to try.” Tom brushed his hand through Cicero’s thick black hair, disarranging its perfection. “Unless you don’t care to?”

  “Oh, no, I do.” Cicero shrugged gracefully. “I like it either way, really.” He kissed Tom’s lips, then sat back, straddling Tom’s thighs. He slowly ran one hand up and down the length of his cock, the hood sliding back and forth seductively as he stroked himself. “This what you want, then?” he teased. “You want me to shove this up your arse and fuck you until you come?
”

  Tom’s mouth went dry, and his prick twitched with excitement. “Aye.”

  Cicero moved to straddle Tom’s chest instead. He dragged the tip across Tom’s lips. Tom licked, tasted salt. “Suck it.”

  Tom opened his mouth obediently. Cicero made a soft, purring sound of pleasure and braced himself against the headboard, letting Tom decide how much to swallow. Tom bobbed his head, taking as much as he could without gagging. He grasped Cicero’s buttocks with his hands, squeezing the firm globes, feeling the flex of muscle as Cicero rocked back and forth just a little.

  “Mmm.” Cicero pulled away. “All right, then. Let’s get you nice and ready, shall we?”

  Tom nodded mutely. Nervous excitement churned in his belly as Cicero retrieved the oil from the nightstand. Cicero paused before coating his fingers. “Hmm. Get on your hands and knees and put the hexlight on the pillow in front of you.”

  Tom did as he was told. “Good,” Cicero murmured. A moment later, Tom felt something cool and slick drip along his crease. He let out an involuntary yelp.

  “Sorry the oil’s cold,” Cicero said. “Don’t worry—I’ll warm it up.”

  Cicero seized Tom’s cock in one hand, giving it a couple of slow strokes. Tom groaned in response.

  A slick finger circled his arse, rubbing the crinkled flesh slowly. Tom closed his eyes at the sensation, then opened them again as Cicero’s finger became more probing. More intrusive.

  “How is that?” Cicero murmured.

  “A bit strange, but—ah!”

  Cicero’s finger touched…something, he didn’t even know what, but it sent an unexpected shock of pleasure ringing along his nerves. Cicero kept at it, pressing and massaging, and Holy Familiar of Christ, was this what he’d been missing all these years?

  “I thought you’d like that.” Cicero sounded a bit smug. Well, he had a right to. “Shall I add another finger and open you up a bit?”

  “Please?”

  It was uncomfortable for the first few moments, but that passed quickly enough. Cicero’s other hand was back on his cock, stroking, while he found that elusive spot again. Tom groaned and lowered his head, half afraid he’d come before they’d even properly started. “I want your prick.”