Graves Pact (Landon Graves Book 1)

by Matthew Stinson

  “Get me a raise and I’ll buy one of those fancy car phones.” I shrugged. The stuff he’d mentioned was pretty much standard issue, but I’d never needed it as a forensic accountant. I wished I’d put in the forms. I added a trip to the requisitions office at the bottom of my to-do list just below “stop demonic apocalypse” and “remain alive.”

  “That stuff is for field agents, Phil. You saying you want to see more of me? Hear me over the radio?” I asked in what I hoped was a disarmingly humorous tone.

  “What I want is to get this perp off the streets.”

  Nodding, I gave up on the attempt at levity and said, “You and me both.”

  Special Agent Calhan seemed uneasy with the lack of actionable options we had available to us. A sidelong glance at the elevator revealed just how much he hated the idea of sitting at a desk waiting for a phone to ring. He walked off brooding. I got the feeling he and his wife would be arguing about the admin job a lot in the following weeks.

  I returned to my desk long enough to make a call to DPD to let Mendoza know I was heading her way. I picked up a late lunch of fast food and stuffed my face as I drove. My music helped me relax a bit. Nothing like NIN’s Broken to clear my head.

  Mendoza pulled into the parking space beside me before I could even get out of my car. I greeted her, but she dispensed with the pleasantries and asked about developments in our case. I told her the hard truth: I hadn’t made much progress. “I know a guy who might be able to work a little magic if we give him something to go on.”

  “Magic, huh?” she said, skeptical in some way I couldn’t comprehend. “And who’s this wizard friend of yours?”

  Her response seemed genuine. Mendoza had no idea who Bryce was. I wondered how Bryce and Father Miller came to know of my possession. But that was a little mystery for later, after we stopped Berith from becoming un-Exiled.

  Annoying as Bryce Campbell was, he had done too much for me to be betrayed so casually. “He’s the one who went toe-to-toe with Alastor and didn’t break a sweat. He’s on the up and up. You can trust him.”

  “Avoiding the question?”

  “He’s no one you need to concern yourself with,” I said a bit more sternly than I’d intended. “He’s helping to catch a murderer. I’m not about to put him on your radar just because he had the misfortune of me coming into his life.”

  She wore a tight, thoughtful frown. “What do you think I’d do?”

  I snorted. “Don’t know, but why risk it?”

  “Glad to see you’re taking me seriously.”

  I’d given her a glimpse into just how fragile I was. I’d slipped. The case was getting to me. Nothing to be done about it. “So, what now?”

  “I’ve got a few reports on my desk for you.” She started walking. The detective meant follow-up information about Oliver, his family, and places of employment. “Just the due diligence.”

  “What about interviewing some of Oliver’s co-workers from Daniels and McGraw?” I asked as the desk sergeant buzzed us past the security door.

  A facial twitch told me how little Mendoza thought of that course of action, though she said, “If we can’t come up with something better.”

  Thinking over my last conversation with Bryce, I got an idea. “When we searched Oliver’s apartment, did you come across anything really personal?”

  “Not so much as a toothbrush for DNA,” she said, opening her office door. “Not that we need it to link our perp to the scene. Why?”

  “I say it’s about time we gave Gwen Richards another call,” I said, crossing my arms and meeting the detective’s eyes. “Maybe we can work some magic.”

  And by “we” I mean Bryce.

  From my experience with summoning, I knew how some kinds of magic work. Using arcane energies, they created connections and resonances. It stood to reason that a wizard should be able to use something of Oliver’s to track him down. I really needed to study up on that crap.

  I’ll just sign up for a course at the local community college.

  Mendoza let her gaze linger for a moment before snatching up the receiver and dialing the number. As much as she knew about the occult, she knew even less about magic than I did. Part of me wanted to keep it that way. I didn’t like my odds if she decided to come after me.

  “Hello?” The frantic feminine voice came out loud enough that Mendoza jerked the phone away from her ear. “Who is this?”

  “Ms. Richards? This is Detective Mendoza with the Denver Police Department—”

  “Is this about Adrian?” I heard clearly from the receiver.

  “I’m calling about Oliver Pontas—”

  Again, the woman interrupted, her tone on the edge of hysteria. “Did you find him? Does he have Adrian? The school said he picked him up. They weren’t supposed to let him! Oliver doesn’t have any custody rights.”

  “Ma’am, are you telling me Oliver Pontas has kidnapped his own son?” she clarified, partly for my benefit.

  “Yes! Haven’t you been listening?”

  I cursed, jaw slacking open. “This just got bad.”

  Hanging up on the distraught woman, Mendoza swore fervently. “He’s made his move. Shit! What can we do?”

  I scowled. “I have an idea. Maybe Dorothy gets to meet the wizard after all.”

  “Did you just refer to me as—”

  “Save it,” I interrupted. “I need that phone. Now.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The detective watched idly as I dialed the Campbell’s number from her office phone. To my surprise, Bryce answered. I quickly explained the situation in vague terms to the teen. Mendoza tapped her foot rhythmically as I listened to Bryce’s response.

  “Home schooled… how did I know?” I muttered as I hung up the phone. Turning to Mendoza, I said, “He’s agreed to help. Let’s move.”

  Navigating the narrow halls of the police station took precious minutes. Mendoza led and nobody made the mistake of getting in her way. She flung the double doors open and galloped down the stairs, barely slowing.

  Before we split for our respective cars, she paused and asked, “What exactly is this friend of yours going to do?”

  I looked her dead in the eyes. “Detective, he’s a wizard. He’s going to do magic.”

  She gave me a flat look before making an exasperated sound and unlocking her car.

  I snorted a laugh and remembered that I had something of hers. “Mendoza, wait.”

  She looked at me curiously. I went to my trunk and retrieved a small canvas bag from it, carrying the parcel to her. Recognition brightened her eyes.

  I handed her the bag containing her Desert Eagle. “Look, I know I can’t apologize enough for what happened, but I’m truly sorry. I owe you my life several times over. Thanks for giving me the chance to do something good.”

  She guarded her emotions well and I couldn’t read her features. “I… learned something from your master when I underestimated him. I won’t make that mistake again.”

  I swallowed a lump in my throat. “Understood.”

  We both got in our cars without another word, a tacit agreement to deal with the whole Chosen vs. Warlock thing after we saved the child and stopped the Gate.

  I’d given up on hiding Bryce’s identity from Mendoza as soon as I’d called him from her office, so I led the way across town. During the drive, I had time to think and everything settled down around me like cold lead weights. Oliver was making his move to open the Gate. Berith planned to sacrifice the son of its host. The vile and cruel act might just be the tragedy required to pierce the multiple barriers between the mortal realm and the Outworld.

  The ritual could happen at any time. No matter what Bryce said about interfering energies, I couldn’t assume that Oliver would wait until sundown or that he’d avoid a crowded place. Berith had the power to cut a few corners.

  We arrived at the Campbell residence a little after four. The gate stood open and I parked, throwing open my door just as Mendoza came to a stop be
side me. As I fixed my dull black coat, the garage door opened, revealing Bryce in a dramatic fashion. My eyes widened and my jaw went slack at the sight of him.

  Across the teen’s chest was a nylon belt with a dozen flasks protruding from evenly spaced compartments. Strapped to his leg was a holster-like accessory holding short, thin rods of various materials. I arched an eyebrow as my mind settled on a term for them: wands. A belt of bulging pouches hung askew on his narrow hips.

  Beneath his battle raiment, Bryce wore a black Nirvana T-shirt and a pair of faded blue jeans. He nonchalantly asked, “Who’s the babe?”

  Mendoza arched an eyebrow and glared. “This is the wizard. Are you serious?” She sighed and regarded the teen. “I’m Detective Mendoza with the DPD.”

  “She’s one of the Chosen,” I answered before turning to Mendoza. “Time is wasting. A kid is missing. Bryce can get results.”

  The teenaged wizard grinned. “I sure can, lady.”

  She rolled her eyes and grunted in disgust, but she grudgingly relented, getting back into her car. The kid moved as if to follow.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” I asked the wizard as Mendoza started her car.

  Bryce shot me a bewildered look. “Who do you think I’m riding with?”

  The moment he took to ask was all the delay the detective needed to make an escape. She nearly peeled out of the driveway and sped away. Bryce looked on dejectedly. “Damn.”

  “Get in,” I said. “We’ve got work to do.”

  This time, I followed Mendoza and she drove like she’d just stolen her Crown Vic. She must have been calling off the squad cars, because no one showed up to stop us for reckless driving. At each red light, Mendoza put her lights on and crept through the intersection once the cars stopped. Though I was no precision driver, I managed to stay on her tail.

  While we zigzagged through traffic, I again berated myself for letting Berith get away—twice. The tunnel-vision of my field of expertise left me ill-prepared for anything outside of it. Ignoring my supernatural side over the past five years had cost time and lives. Angry red lights rapidly approached and I slammed on my brakes.

  “Hey, are you trying to get me killed?” Bryce asked. “Pay attention! I don’t even have my permit yet and I could drive better.”

  I left the turmoil of my own head and glanced at the teen. Despite his words, he appeared unflustered and serene, unfazed by the fact that I’d just asked him to track down and kill one of the Exiled. Maybe he was some kind of sociopath and didn’t feel emotions the same way I did.

  “So where are we going now?” he asked in what I assumed was an attempt to focus me. “The last known location of the kid?”

  “No. We’re going to the mother’s house,” I said. “I assume you’ll need some of the boy’s things to do your spell.”

  The teen quirked his mouth as if admitting anything to me sickened him. “Yeah. I can’t find the kid without something to connect us. Assuming he’s still alive.”

  I grimaced at the thought, but said, “He’s alive and will be until it’s too late for us to do anything about the Gate. So, we’ll be operating under that assumption.”

  The words came out a bit more harshly than I’d intended. Bryce looked more amused than threatened or offended. “You got it, G-man.”

  We got to Aurora in record time. I filled in Bryce on a few more of the details. He told me that anything of Oliver’s that Gwen had in her possession wouldn’t be recent enough to use.

  “Not that it’s that simple of course,” he added as we arrived. “The item must be important to the individual.”

  I parked on the street behind Mendoza’s car, the detective already on her way to the door. Unbuckling my seatbelt, I turned to Bryce. “Important in what way?”

  “It needs to be something with a strong emotional or physical connection,” he said as he flung my door open and jumped out of the seat. “A cherished possession, lock of hair, or blood. Something like that.”

  We walked to the porch and I lagged a step behind, suspicion nagging. Why was Bryce suddenly so forthcoming with that information? I didn’t have time to figure out the mind of a teenaged wizard. As we approached, I overheard Mendoza reassuring Gwen and her parents.

  “We just need to see Adrian’s room,” the detective explained calmly. “It will help us find him. Can we come in please?”

  Oddly, I got a mixed sense of the power emanating from her. Part of it stung my skin but part of it made me feel tranquil. I guess she has other modes beside “smite infidel”. I was guessing it helped the normal Richards family settle down after the discovery of the boy’s abduction.

  “Who is this?” Gwen asked, perplexed by the sight of the unusually dressed Bryce Campbell. The mother’s eyes were red and her voice wavered unsteadily.

  “I’m the cavalry, ma’am,” Bryce said with a feigned drawl, brushing by the woman as she moved out of the doorway. I followed, trying to appear straight-faced and professional enough for the both of us.

  As I passed, Mendoza turned her head and muttered, “Do your magic thing. I’ll keep them busy in the meantime.”

  The house was just as quaint on the inside as it appeared from the outside. I saw old-fashioned stained-glass windows letting colored light into the kitchen. The well-worn but clean carpet spoke of the years of tread, the years of life within the house. It felt warm in every sense of the word.

  The sight of Adrian’s room brought on a pang of some painful emotion I couldn’t quite identify. With no children of my own, I could only empathize with Gwen. For a moment, I thought of my ex-wife and her family. I cleared my throat and scanned the room seeking useful details instead of reflecting on the missing pieces of my life.

  “What do you think?” I asked the wizard, my gaze settling on a toy bin. “What’s an eight-year-old boy’s most cherished possession? Action figures?”

  Bryce made a noncommittal sound. “We can do better. What’s that under the covers?”

  I looked to the miniature bed and saw the arm of a teddy bear poking out. “Yeah. That stuffed animal looks pretty worn. It is more than just a toy. It comforts him when he goes to sleep or when he’s sad.”

  The young wizard nodded. “He’s had it for a while. He probably loves that bear to death. That will work just fine as an anchor point.”

  I returned to the bed and scoured the pillow for hairs. Luckily, Gwen kept her son’s hair long enough to be useful. I plucked a few strands and handed them to Bryce who accepted them without a word.

  “Okay, what else do you need?” I asked, my pulse picking up at the potential lead.

  “This is a pretty simple ritual. Even you could do it,” he said in a patronizing tone. “You get a ring of iron filings or thirteen magnets. A map, dowsing rods, or a compass. Those kinds of things.”

  “We need all of that?” I clarified as he tucked the hairs into the bowtie of the bear.

  “No,” he replied. “Just a few things with the purpose of finding or locating.”

  I sort of got it. The symbolic purpose of an item drew in mystical energies or something like that. With summoning, it was about connecting two places. That was why I use smoked for my Borderline. Hell. Fire. Smoke. The tracking spell seemed to be about connecting a person and an object.

  Bryce headed to the kitchen and pulled a pair of mats out of the way, clearing three square feet of the smooth linoleum floor. He grabbed one of the pouches from his belt and began pouring iron filings in a circle with a foot and a half diameter. I leaned against the empty doorway that connected to the living room, blocking the view.

  Gwen and her parents had moved inside. Mendoza asked questions about Adrian that really had no bearing on the case, but it kept them talking. It prevented them from wondering what the hell we were doing in their kitchen.

  “Pay attention, warlock.” Bryce shoved the pouch into my hands to free his as he worked. “This here is a freebie.”

  I looked back to the sigil, now two concentric circles
. The wizard put the teddy bear in the middle and began placing small river rocks with distinctive runes carved into them around the bear. Aside from his careful angling of the rune-stones, I couldn’t see any pattern. I recognized many of the runes and tried to commit the others to memory. A tracking spell would be immensely helpful to any kind of investigator.

  Bryce uttered an incantation in Latin that roughly translated to “mind to mind, heart to heart, bring these two disjoint pieces together.”

  It sounded more magical in Latin.

  After the second repetition, I sensed the thrumming of active magic, though I couldn’t see it in the clear light of the late afternoon. The iron filings aligned in a ringed helix pattern and the stones levitated for a brief moment before the spell completed. The teddy bear started shuddering and Bryce snatched it up. With his other hand, he quickly gathered the rune stones, but left the iron filings for the family to clean up and puzzle over.

  “He’s alive,” the wizard said, his grip on the bear tightening as if it might have flown out of his hands at any moment. “West of here.”

  “How long can you focus on the spell?”

  “As long as I need to,” the wizard said, his voice cold and hard. “Get me in a car. I don’t have all day. I’m finally going to get this guy.”

  A curt motion to Mendoza let her know we were ready. She gave one last assurance that Adrian would be okay and joined us. “The wizard rides with me.”

  I opened my mouth to protest, but let it go. She had the siren and the lights to get her there faster. I would just have to keep up.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  In the rush, I didn’t realize what was bugging me until after I was in the quiet of my car. I threw the shifter into drive and slammed on the gas to catch up with Mendoza as she tore away. It seemed that she had more than half a mind to leave me behind.

  Something is wrong. The nagging concern wormed its way in from the peripheral of my thoughts. With so much happening so fast, I was missing something. What is it?