Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Author's Note
Books in the Stormwalker Series on Kindle
About the Author
Copyright
Chapter One
Mick and I were in Flagstaff, in a tiny Chinese restaurant in a strip mall, when everything started.
Once we’d cleaned our plates, Mick feeding me the last bits of his shrimp shu mai with his chopsticks, the waiter dropped a double handful of fortune cookies on the table. Because Mick always ordered lots of food when we came here—dragons could put it away—we got extra fortune cookies for dessert.
I loved the cookies, crunchy and sweet, and with messages inside. Not magic, just life lessons. I broke open the first one and read it out to Mick.
“A foolish man seeks only wealth; a wise man seeks happiness . . .”
Mick grinned at me, a sparkle in his blue eyes. My friend Maya had taught me the game of adding words to the end of the fortune to alter its context.
“ . . . in bed,” I finished.
Mick, amusement in place, shredded plastic wrap with his thick fingers and cracked open a cookie one-handed. He dumped the cookie pieces into his mouth but held out the fortune to me. Did I see a spark of magic on his fingertips?
“You will find much happiness tonight,” I read. “ . . . in bed.” I studied him. “You’re cheating.”
“Could be.” Mick chose another for me.
I read out loud, “The man sitting across the table from you loves you, in all ways, in all places, but especially . . .” I trailed off. “It’s amazing how specific these can be.”
“Yep.” Mick’s gaze held fire.
What a sweetie. If you can find a man who’s big, gorgeous, inked, powerful, extremely protective of you, can turn into a dragon, and is playful as well—keep him.
“Here, let me open one.” I grabbed a cookie before he could work his magic on it. I couldn’t cast spells as well as Mick, but I could play along. I took the cookie from its plastic wrap, broke it open, and pulled out the slip.
Your sister is in danger. I stopped myself from adding in bed just in time. I stared at the bit of paper, black writing on white background.
Mick’s playfulness fled as he studied my expression. “What is it?”
I handed him the fortune. “Did you do this?”
Mick’s eyes narrowed. “No. Open another.”
The next slip I pulled out said, Go help her. Now.
“Where is she?” Mick asked me after he’d read it.
“She’s supposed to be in Many Farms with my grandmother.” My heart squeezed. “Helping my dad and Gina with their wedding plans.”
More cookies lay on the table. Mick looked at them then plucked one up at random and handed it to me.
The crinkle of plastic was loud in the silence, as was the snap of me breaking open the cookie. I pulled out the slip.
In all capitals, it said, WINSLOW. JUST GO.
I didn’t stop to ask the question of why my half sister Gabrielle was in Winslow when she should have been at home with Grandmother. Or how some being was sending me messages through fortune cookies that she was in trouble. With Gabrielle, anything could happen. I jumped up and headed for the door.
Mick paused to toss a wad of cash on the table, plus he scooped up the broken pieces of cookies and shoved them into his mouth. A dragon needs his carbs.
***
Flagstaff is roughly an hour from Winslow on the freeway, in good weather, but the journey is much faster when you’re with a dragon who drives like a maniac. I clung to Mick’s back on his big Harley as he slid and swerved through traffic, heading into the twilight.
We reached Winslow pretty quickly, the chain stores and few restaurants on its three-exit stretch of freeway flashing past. The main town is a grid of streets between the freeway and railroad tracks—the tracks are a main line that runs across the country and on into Los Angeles.
It wasn’t hard to figure out where Gabrielle was. From the freeway, we saw the crowd of vehicles—county, town, and state police—grouped in front of a convenience store. Mick took the last exit ramp and headed for it.
He pulled up in the parking lot of a typical in-and-out convenience mart with a tall concrete awning, gas pumps in front, ice machine on the side.
The glass door was closed, the neon sign that said the store was open pale in the darkness. I heard screaming within, but a thick cloud of smoke filmed the windows, obscuring the view inside.
The police had surrounded the building, but I knew I needed to get in there. I slipped past the officers before anyone could stop me and headed for the door. The door was locked, but a tiny spell took care of that. Mick had been teaching me his tricks.
I walked in to find chaos. The place had been wrecked. Food was strewn everywhere, boxes broken open, chips and popcorn crunching underfoot. The spigots on the soda machine were all on, sticky liquid spewing all over the floor.
A man crouched in terror behind the counter, a baseball bat in his hand. He wasn’t threatening anyone with it, just holding it, his head bowed as though he no longer wanted to look at the destruction around him.
Three men, each heavy with muscle and fat, one covered in tatts, one wearing chains on his belt, the third holding a shotgun, were plastered to the pockmarked ceiling.
Below them, her face turned upward in fury, stood my sister, Gabrielle Massey. Dressed in low-slung jeans and a black top that hugged her breasts, she had one hand raised toward the men, the stream of magic coming out of that hand, terrifying.
“Gabrielle,” I said.
Gabrielle transferred her glare to me, which I returned stoically. My half sister is Apache, where I’m Diné, and she’s much prettier than me. She has long, sleek black hair, a plump face, big brown eyes, and a curvy body. She’s taller than me too.
“Janet,” she said, her voice full of rage. “They came in here while I was buying myself a drink and tried to rob the place. Tried to rob me.” Gabrielle pointed to the man with the chains. “That one wanted his friends to hold me down while he felt me up. Are you kidding me?” She punctuated her words by slamming all three of the men against the ceiling. “Are. You. Kidding. Me?”
The men’s faces were wan, heads lolling, eyes full of fear but also pain. They were hurting bad, close to death.
“I think they’ve got the idea,” I said. “How about we give these guys to the cops and go home? Elena’s at the hotel cooking tonight.”
Gabrielle smiled, which was all the more terrible for the power crackling through her. “That sounds nice. Let me just finish here.”
“No!” I said sharply as she wound up her magic for a killing stroke. “You have to let them go.”
“What for?” Gabrielle looked at me in perplexity. “They wanted to touch me and kill that man behind the counter. They need to understand
that They. Shouldn’t. Do. That.” Slam, slam, slam, slam!
“I agree,” I said. “But you can’t kill them.”
“Why the hell not?” Gabrielle demanded.
Have I mentioned that my sister is a little crazy? While I couldn’t blame her for wanting to teach these guys a lesson, I knew she wouldn’t draw the line at simply scaring them. Gabrielle’s answer to anything that bothered her was kill first, think about what she’d done—maybe—later.
“Because I’d have to tell Grandmother,” I said.
Gabrielle wavered. The man with the tatts came loose from the ceiling and fell. He landed hard on top of a set of shelves, crushing the few remaining boxes there.
Gabrielle heaved a sigh. “You know, big sis, you really are a bitch.”
“Consequences,” I said evenly. “If you go around doing whatever you want and to hell with it, your choices will bite you in the ass in the end.”
Gabrielle studied the robbers on the ceiling. “Hear that? You go around threatening people, and look what happens to you?”
“Let them go,” I repeated sternly.
“Oh, come on.” Gabrielle’s eyes started to gleam in a way I didn’t like. “Let me play a little while. Why don’t you join me? You and me together can kick some ass.”
I opened my mouth to argue—if Gabrielle went on a rampage, it could be the end of her, and possibly me, and probably this entire town. There’d be another crater in northern Arizona before the night was out.
At that moment, Mick shouldered his way in the door. He solved the problem of persuading Gabrielle to leave by simply picking her up, throwing her over his shoulder, and walking out.
Gabrielle screamed at him. She beat on his back and tried to throw her magic at him.
I could have told her not to bother. Mick was the strongest being I knew, and he shrugged off other people’s powers as though they barely singed him.
At the door, he turned back and casually flicked his hand at the robbers.
The remaining two guys fell from the ceiling, cushioned for a moment by what looked like a wave of fire, which instantly dispersed, letting them drop the last couple feet.
I marched to the man who’d wanted his friends to hold Gabrielle down for him. He was big and would have been mean-looking, if he hadn’t been shaking so hard and half passed out from fear. I bent over him.
“If you try to touch a woman who doesn’t want to be touched ever again,” I said in a calm voice. “It will fall off. I guarantee that.”
I put my fingers to his neck, letting my magic tingle on him. The spark bit, he jumped, and his neck bore a burned circle when I pulled my hand away.
The guy stared at me in absolute fear, and I smiled, hoping I looked as terrifying as Gabrielle.
I hadn’t actually done a spell to make his dick fall off if he tried to touch a woman against her will, because subtle magic like that was beyond me. Except for a few small spells Mick had taught me, I could do either absolute destruction or nothing at all. But maybe the guy would believe I’d cursed him, plus he’d have the scar on his neck as a reminder of what had happened here.
I plucked the shotgun one the third guy had dropped and carried it gingerly out the door, barrel pointing to the ground. I didn’t try to unload it or uncock it, because firearms and me don’t mix. I’d blow the thing up trying to disable it, and who knows who else with it.
The cops tried to stop us. Mick kept going, bowling through them, Gabrielle yelling at him and beating on his back.
I handed the shotgun to one of the state police troopers. “They’re disarmed in there,” I said. “Better get in and help the cashier. Be careful—the poor guy’s got a baseball bat and he’s scared shitless.”
The cop took the gun, bewildered. I know he wanted to stop me, take a statement from me, possibly arrest me, but at that moment the other cops stormed the building. In the confusion, I hurried away after Mick.
Mick had Gabrielle on his Harley a little way down the street. She was still fuming, but had ceased her foul language and calmed her magic.
“Take her home,” I said to Mick.
He nodded, expressionless. I knew he was seriously annoyed that his date night with me had been interrupted by my insane little sister, but that’s what happens when you get yourself engaged to a Stormwalker with family issues.
Mick started up the motorcycle, Gabrielle clinging to the seat behind him. “You going to be okay?” Mick asked me.
“Sure,” I said, waving him off. “It’s a quiet night.”
He gave me a nod, understanding what I meant. In spite of the chaos at the convenience store, there had been no magical situation. The most dangerous person in this town right now was Gabrielle. Safer for everyone concerned if he took her away.
Mick’s look told me he’d come back for me as soon as he could, then he lifted his hand to me and took off into the darkness.
That left me alone in Winslow without transportation. I could have called someone at the hotel I owned at the Crossroads, south of here, to come and pick me up, but as usual, I was without a cell phone. Tonight, I’d left it behind deliberately, not wanting anyone to call me with a problem while I was trying to grab some alone time with Mick.
That had worked well. I could also contact the hotel through my magic mirror, a shard of which I always carried with me, but I was in no mood to deal with my temperamental mirror at the moment.
It was a nice evening, and a walk would not be a bad thing. I’d stroll along the highway, and Mick, when he had secured Gabrielle, would come back for me. Or if a resident of Magellan, the little town beyond my hotel, came along the road, they’d no doubt give me a ride.
I turned my steps southward and began my hike.
As I reached the street in Winslow that led to the train depot—the only touristy road in town, with a mural tribute to the Eagle’s song, an elegantly restored railroad hotel, and a depot that was both Amtrak stop and art gallery—a limousine pulled up beside me.
Limousines are not common sights in this little town off the freeway in northern Arizona. I stopped, peering suspiciously at the smoke-dark windows. The last time I’d seen a limo like this, it had been full of dragons in human form—not nice, sexy dragons like Mick, but serious kill-anyone-who-pisses-us-off type dragons.
The feel wasn’t right, though. Dragons give off an aura of fiery red, which sparks if you get too close. I’d been living with Mick long enough to recognize dragon aura at fifty paces.
This aura was far more subtle, hidden even. Only something very magical could cloak exactly what it was.
I didn’t have long to wonder. The door opened, and I looked inside to see a man in a business suit and expensive shoes, wearing wire-rimmed glasses and sitting comfortably on a leather seat. He appeared harmless, nerdy even, but the eyes that regarded me from behind the glasses were gray and hard as steel.
“Hello, Janet,” Emmett Smith said to me. “Get in. We need to talk.”
Chapter Two
The last thing I wanted to do was climb into a limo alone with Emmett Smith. It might be the last thing I ever did, so I did not leap to obey him. Even when two large thug-like men exited the car to persuade me, I stood my ground.
Emmett called himself the Ununculous. The because there was only one Ununculous at a time—the reason being that he’d killed all others who could rival him for the title. The Ununculous was the most powerful mage in existence. Emmett hadn’t only murdered everyone who stood in his path, he’d stolen their magic as he’d gone along, somehow absorbing it into himself. For all I knew, he ate his rivals and imbibed their magic that way.
This summer, Emmett had battled both against me and alongside me to keep another mage from taking a very powerful artifact that lent its user unstoppable magic. Gods, dragons, mages, and I had fought it out in the desert on one long, exhausting night.
Emmett had helped me then, but he’d also discovered I possessed another artifact I’d been trying to keep secret from him. He’d to
ld me he’d be back to take it from me someday and now, here he was.
“A truce, Janet,” Emmett said. He hadn’t moved from his half reclined position, but Emmett didn’t need to work very hard to kill me. “I only want to talk. Honest.”
“In that case, we should do it somewhere public with all my friends around me, including and especially Mick.”
“You have even stronger friends than your lover,” Emmett replied. “How about Sheriff Jones? We can drive to Flat Mesa and pick him up.”
An interesting proposal. Nash Jones was a magical null—that is, magic did not affect him in any way, no matter how strong it was. One reason we’d escaped from Emmett last summer was that Nash had absorbed his spells, and then, with an assist from Mick, had driven Emmett away.
Emmett found Nash puzzling. I had no doubt he would love to dissect the man and discover what made him immune to magic. Emmett might not be able to hurt Nash with spells, but there was nothing to stop him ordering one of his goons to shoot him outright.
“Pass,” I said. “No reason to put Nash in danger on a nice autumn night. I do it to him often enough.”
Emmett lifted his hands. “I give you my word, I will not attempt to hurt, disable, or kill you in any way. I really do only want to talk.”
I didn’t move. “About what?”
“Many things.” He gestured to the seat opposite him. “Please. I can drop you off at your hotel. I see your friends have stranded you here.”
“It’s not far. I can walk, or call someone.”
“With what? If you are running true to form, you have lost, left behind, or destroyed your latest cell phone. Let me save your feet. And please hurry and make up your mind, before I have to insist.”
I sighed. Truth to tell, I was curious to know what Emmett wanted to talk about, though I could guess. His thugs had dark automatic pistols surreptitiously pointed at me. While I could destroy those with a well-placed slash of magic, I’d probably kill the men as well, plus blow up the car and maybe a good bit of road before I could stop myself.
Tourists on vacation, who’d come to stay in the historic Harvey Girls hotel designed by a woman architect more than a hundred years ago, were wandering the street. I’d kill them too.
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