by Lee Roland
He seemed calm now, but I tightened when he came and knelt beside me. He stared straight into my eyes. “Nyx, one of the men was Salvatore. He burned alive and there was absolutely nothing I could do.”
The world closed around me. Etienne’s fury was a kitten’s mewling next to my roar. The double-damned witch had killed my friend. With a power I didn’t know I could muster, I screamed my rage, not with my voice, but with my heart and soul. I shrieked it across the spectrum of magic. Every witch in the vicinity, every being with the power to do so, would hear my cry. I focused on finding one . . . and find her I did. Laudine. I felt her heart jump and pound in fear.
Murderer! I accused. Run. Hide. I will destroy you.
Laudine didn’t reply. She simply shut herself off from the magic like a blown-out lightbulb. Not that it would do any good. I would find her. I would file a charge with the High Witch and they might or might not send the Sisters of Justice to execute her. I’d get her first.
I came back to myself. Cold. I was so cold. I huddled there on Etienne’s couch and . . . Etienne? He no longer knelt by me. He stood in the doorway, rigid, holding the frame tight with both hands. What had he seen?
“Do you . . .” I choked on the words. I shivered and wrapped my arms around myself. “Cold.”
“Cold?” He made a single step toward me. “You were on fire. I saw you . . . but you didn’t burn. Nothing around you burned. Your eyes . . . changed.”
I didn’t care about my eyes. I curled up in a ball and sobbed. I wanted to sink into oblivion, but I couldn’t. So I simply cried until I lost my voice. The hurt wouldn’t go away. Salvatore had taught me how to survive. I was strong when I joined Darrow’s troop, but a bit naive. Salvatore had appointed himself my guardian. He protected me, guarded me when I was hurt. We had risked our lives together, laughed together, and cried when we lost a comrade. Now I cried for him. I didn’t know Etienne’s other man, the one who died with Salvatore, but he would be avenged, too.
I don’t know how long I cried. Etienne didn’t come close. I don’t blame him. The fire was something I did lose control of at times. I forced myself to stop.
I made it into the bathroom to wash my ravaged face in cold water. My right cheek was swelled to twice its usual size and my black eyes had faded to nasty yellow. The bandage on my head had come loose, so I carefully removed it. I think Abigail had done a little healing on the wound. I could see it was drying nicely and I resisted the urge to scratch the itch that was beginning to make its way across my nerve endings. Unfortunately, I had a two-inch-wide bald strip where they’d cut my hair.
The door opened and Darrow stepped in. Then I had to cry all over again. He held me close in his arms.
“Me and Rocky went down there,” Darrow said. Unshed tears pooled in his eyes. “Etienne said not to. But we did. We burned her place. I hope she was inside.”
“She probably wasn’t.” I hated to give him that news. I’d warned her I’d come for her, so she probably ran the instant she heard them. “But don’t worry, Darrow. I’m going to take care of it.”
He brushed away the hair that had fallen in my face. His fingers briefly touched the long red line on my scalp.
“Nyx, I want to be there. When it happens. You can do it, but I want to watch.”
“I’ll do my best to arrange it.”
Darrow nodded. We both knew what came next. We’d lived with loss before. We would submerge our need for retribution under a layer of ordinary—or in this case extraordinary—life. But every time we thought of her, of Salvatore, we would think of and plan vengeance.
He left me. My body ached and my mind still rolled. When I opened the door, I could hear low murmured voices from the living room. Darrow and Etienne. Darrow’s voice was muted, but when he raised it slightly, I understood his words. “Damn it, Etienne. Five years. I had that girl for five years in the most dangerous parts of the world. I never let her get hurt like that!”
I couldn’t hear Etienne’s reply. He’d kept his voice very low.
That wasn’t quite fair. Etienne had done a good job watching over me given my own actions. He’d used the weapons he had, his gun and the immunity, to stand in front of me. Darrow didn’t understand. He still saw the Nyx who worked with him in a different context. He’d dealt with a young woman, trained but untested in a true battle. He, Salvatore, and Rocky had protected me until I could stand on my own. That time in my life only occasionally brushed up against magic, low-key magic at that. Nyx the guard and Nyx the witch lived in two different worlds. None of these men could protect me from the world of magic in the Barrows.
After Darrow left, I went back to sit on the couch. Etienne sat beside me. He’d placed a small brown case on the coffee table.
I swallowed. “Darrow said they burned Laudine’s place down.”
He nodded. “They did. Big fire. Engines actually came from uptown. Surprising.”
“Any sign of the witch herself?”
“No.” He picked up the brown case and handed it to me, carefully keeping an arm’s length distance from me. I didn’t blame him. What do you do with a woman who keeps bursting into flames? He’d remained, though, stuck with me.
“This was in the things we brought from Laudine’s.” He offered me the case.
I opened it and there was Marisol’s toy xylophone.
Chapter 23
When Salvatore and Etienne’s other man had gone to Laudine’s, they’d entered the room that had been Marisol’s and, very briefly, mine. Apparently, they’d gathered up everything there, including her possessions. They would not have noted the difference between the belongings of two women. Then they had gone back for the single bag, the deadly trap, Laudine had prepared for them—probably prepared for all of them. It must have been prematurely triggered. Laudine’s incompetence maybe. If that bag had gone into their vehicle, all would have burned, with the possible exception of Etienne. Possible because I didn’t actually know the extent of the protection of the Morié and Solaire.
Unfortunately, I had to push my sorrow aside and deal with the present. I needed to think critically at this point. I would have time to mourn Salvatore when I stood over Laudine’s burned bones and ashes.
That Marisol actually kept the child-sized xylophone as she matured had to mean something. I lifted it out of the case. It was about a foot long with multicolored strips of metal attached to two rails. The two sticks with knobs on the ends used to make the sound were included. I tapped the red strip and it gave me a low note. I’m not musically inclined and this would be a challenge.
There was a knock at the door and Etienne went to answer it. My stomach growled at the fragrance when one of his men brought in a box apparently filled with edible things. I put my toy aside and joined him at the bar that separated the two rooms. He’d set out quite a feast.
“You have a good cook,” I said. I forked another slice of roast beef on my plate.
“He is. Complains a lot. Now he wants another assistant. To cook for your dog. What is it with that beast? He walks in, wants something—and gets it.”
“Herschel just is. I grew up in a swamp with odd creatures. A water dragon, like the one you saw the other day, and Gran had some birds that talked. Actually talked, not just mimic words they heard. Only I’m not exactly sure they were birds.” I didn’t want to talk about Herschel and his bizarre nature. “What about you? Where did you grow up? How long have you known about witches? About earth magic?” I set my plate aside. “You know a lot more about me than I know about you.”
Etienne watched me for a few moments, face closed to expression. When he spoke, his voice kept a level matter-of-fact tone. “I grew up in Virginia. Family of French descent, lots of money. Happy childhood. One of my uncles was a mercenary. After college, he got me into a training camp, then a job. I learned about magic . . . somewhere else.” His smile was gone.
I wanted to know more. “You met a witch?”
A shadow passed over his face. His jaw tightene
d; he grew very still. “I met a witch. A witch that made Laudine look like a first-grade schoolteacher.”
And that witch had burned him, scarred him as deeply as any fire I could create. After he spoke, he relaxed. Maybe he hoped I wouldn’t ask more about her. I had questions, but I’d save them.
“What about Aiakós?”
“Aiakós just is. Don’t talk about him. He might hear.” He handed me a container with a massive slice of cake.
The man looked so benign, so rugged and sexy, sitting there offering me dessert. He was just trying to console me about Salvatore, I’m sure. I couldn’t figure him. He wanted me—and yes, I wanted him—but he wouldn’t trust me enough to remove his protection from earth magic. The witch who’d hurt him had done a jam-up job. She hadn’t broken him, though. He’d helped me, saved my life twice; I still had no clue to what he really wanted. He hadn’t let me get that close.
We went back to the living room and I placed the Grimoire and the xylophone on the coffee table. The Summer of the Frogs, Marisol’s message said. She had a beautiful singing voice and I croaked worse than an alligator looking for a mate. The frogs, however, had far fewer notes in their musical repertoire. We kept the songs simple. Mary and her lamb, “Twinkle, Twinkle,” and so on. Today, all I could do was pong on the xylophone and try to figure out which notes to use. After fifteen minutes of ponging, Etienne apparently reached his limit. He reached out and snatched the instrument away from me.
“What?” I had to protest. “I can’t help if I’m tone-deaf.”
“And I had piano lessons for ten years. What are you trying to play?” He played “Mary” correctly the first time. Nothing happened.
“Try changing the notes.” I offered my somewhat logical but less than expert advice.
“Nyx, if I change them, it won’t be the same song. It’s not like we have a vast range of notes available.” He tried it again. Still nothing.
I leaned back and sighed, searching memory. Then I laughed and bounced a little, which tugged painfully at the healing wound in my head. “I know. I remember. It went, Mary had a little lamb, little lamb, its fleece was white as snow, and then there was a pause.”
Etienne raised an eyebrow. “Pause?”
“Oh, yeah. When the pause came, all the frogs would go silent.” I frowned at the memory. “Actually, the whole swamp went silent. Marisol and I were young, untrained witches stumbling through earth magic. Earth magic is strong in the Okefenokee and it seemed to concentrate around us. It was really creepy when everything stopped. We kept making that pause longer and longer. That silence . . . I don’t know if I can explain it . . . it had a weight. A power. I guess that’s why Gran made us stop doing it.”
He shrugged and played again, this time with a brief pause.
Again, nothing.
“Make the pause a little longer,” I said.
He complied. Seconds after he played the final note, the pages of the Grimoire fluttered. I watched. I didn’t touch. I had few formal lessons in magic, but I knew better than to mess with a spell in progress.
Excited, I grabbed Etienne’s arm and leaned against him. I jerked away. My hand ached with the memory of pain. He hadn’t moved—but he hadn’t shoved me away, fearing fire and magic. We had a powerful wall between us. He could remove the Solaire and Morié. I could not remove the earth magic in my body and soul.
The first page, the one with the strawberry shortcake recipe, shivered. It spit along the edges and suddenly became multiple pages as if it had been glued together. I waited until I was sure it was finished before I opened the new section to review its contents. Two separate pieces of paper loosely stuck in the fold.
The first page was a confusing drawing with numerous lines and symbols. In the center was a pentagram with an X in the middle. There were other markings, too, but I couldn’t instantly decipher them. The second page I could see was written in Aradian script. Aradian was the secret language used by witches, a common denominator in all their spells. I studied and failed it in school, just as I had excelled in English and history. No one found it surprising that I wound up more people oriented than witch oriented. I was never a good student and I hadn’t even tried to read Aradian script in over ten years. I took the page with lines and symbols and laid it on the table.
“This is a map of the Barrows,” Etienne said. He pointed to the center. “I’d say the X is the Zombie Zone.”
“Point out where some other locations might be.”
He studied it. “That’s the Archangel.”
Easy, the spot did contain the symbol for an angel. I found Laudine’s place marked with a general symbol for a witch. Across the street from her was one I didn’t recognize. It looked a bit like a gargoyle.
“What’s that?” I had seen the abandoned building. Laudine said it was a nightclub.
“The Goblin Den. It’s closed now. Going to be torn down.”
I was able to pick out a few other things, but as near as I could see, the whole page was simply a map with symbols marked and numbered. The Goblin Den was number one.
“This looks like Marisol was searching for something,” I said. “Some marker, maybe a trail. As she found each place she needed, she marked it on the main map.”
I picked up the second sheet of paper. The list written in Aradian. I could probably read it, but it would take time to translate. I held it out for Etienne to see. He stared at it, then turned as pale as a man with dark skin could. Whatever it said, he understood. I doubted he spoke Aradian, unless the witch who hurt him had taught him.
He surged to his feet, snatched up his still holstered gun, and left me alone. Etienne was not a man to run from battle. He would face bombs and bullets with a cool head and grim determination to survive. Whatever the witch had done to him had a profound impact on his soul. It had scared him as if she’d laid a red-hot knife on his skin.
Stunned and a bit alarmed, I watched the closed door as if it would burst open and he would charge back in. It had been a long time since I had dealt with a man on a personal or semipersonal level. I wasn’t sure I could classify Etienne with either of those terms. We’d sort of accidently fallen together and for some reason, he stuck with me. And I was really too tired to deal with it. Too tired and, remembering Salvatore, too hurt. I glanced at the clock. Ten and really dark outside.
Since I wasn’t going to leave the Grimoire alone, I packed it back in the case, leaving my hard-earned papers separate. I did find clean sheets in a closet, made the bed, and crawled in. Herschel ambled into the room. He’d done his thing with getting inside a closed door again. I gave some thought about getting him to teach me how. But then, I’d never actually seen him do it.
He lay on the floor beside me. I finally fell asleep and, thank the Mother, didn’t dream. The smell of coffee woke me in what seemed like five minutes. The sun peeking around the curtains told me it had been longer. Herschel, as he was wont to do, had disappeared. Another day in the Barrows had begun. I really hoped no one would throw any skull-busting objects at me today, or die and leave me with a hole in my heart.
Chapter 24
The plastic bags of mine and Marisol’s things had been conveniently piled in the corner of the bedroom. One bag produced jeans, a shirt, underwear, and socks. I dug through Marisol’s clothing and found a blue silk scarf. I’d given it to her as a solstice gift the year before I left Twitch Crossing. It made her cry, which upset me, but she said the tears were because it was so beautiful.
I stared in the bathroom mirror. The bruising under my eyes had turned puke yellow. Most of the swelling had receded as the inflammation causing it faded away. Tiny sprigs of hair stuck out like soldiers at attention across the shaved strip on my scalp. They itched like hell, too. The scarf covered it, but the itching continued. I sucked up my willpower and ignored it, only digging at it with a fingernail occasionally. Ready to face the day—hopefully without injury—I followed the scent of coffee into the living room and to the tiny kitchen.
&n
bsp; The room was empty, so the blessed and anonymous maker of coffee had done his thing and departed. How thoughtful of him. I’d seen so few women I doubted it was a her. One cup later, I decided to get to work. I retrieved Marisol’s papers from the case.
I was sitting at the coffee table with my second cup of its namesake in my hand when Etienne walked in. His expression carried no evidence of what had caused him to bolt the previous evening. He made his own coffee and casually strolled over to sit beside me.
I realized that he’d changed clothes and shaved. He had basically moved out and left the apartment to me. He gave me a half smile that said I’m being polite. It did not say I’m glad to see you. “So, witch, what’s on the agenda today?”
Witch, he’d called me, as if to remind me, or maybe himself, again that witches were evil—or at the very least a hideous amount of trouble. I was not exactly a friend. And while I liked him most of the time, I had to remind myself that he had an agenda, one that would probably be radically different from mine. Oh, yeah. He wanted to fuck me, too. I would not permit that until he removed that nasty amulet from his neck.
“Isn’t it boring training an army when you don’t have an enemy?” I asked him.
Etienne’s mouth pursed as if he was trying not to smile. “There’s always an enemy in the Barrows. A battle will come. Another dark moon will rise. Not every dark moon brings a battle, but I think we’re overdue. I’m prepared.”
Okay, we needed to move on from that. “I’m going to take Marisol’s map, visit the places she marked, in the order she marked them, and see what I can find. Am I to assume you’re stuck to my ass in my endeavors?”
“Assume away.”
“Will you tell me why?”
“I’m bored. You’re entertainment. Watching you burst into flames or almost get killed every day is better than a special effects thriller movie.” He grinned.
I remembered that mouth had been incredibly soft and sweet in that one kiss we had shared before it turned to disaster. Damn him, he would save my life, protect me, but not trust me. Not to mention the shit was laughing at me.
