The Uncanny Raven Winston

by Tammie Painter

  Slowly, agonizingly slowly, like a sloth would have made fun of how slowly I was moving, I got to my feet. My tights were torn, but oddly enough, I had nothing more than a few scrapes on my knees. No bone fragments poked out, and there was only a tiny bit of dribbling blood. Still, I did really like those tights.

  I hobbled-walked around to the east side of the Tower, grimaced my way down a few blocks, and it didn’t take long before the building was in sight. A square, brick thing you’d more expect to see in the eastside industrial area of Portland than in London.

  The place had a low retaining wall around it and the south side was full dark with no streetlights illuminating the shadows. A perfect place to hide. I crouched down beside the wall to plan my next move.

  I was confident I could get in without a problem. Lock Picking Charms weren’t exactly a challenge. But once I got in. What then? I had to free my parents right away. Wait, or did I need to take out the Mauvais first? Yes, definitely take out the Mauvais. But what if he went for my parents just to be a jerk? Okay then, free my parents. But they might be too weak or too brain damaged to escape with any haste. That settled it: Take out the Mauvais.

  Something scuttled along the wall. I jumped back, picturing some sort of land shark attracted to the scent of blood coming from my wounds. Or just your ordinary city-dwelling rat. After wishing Chester and his vermin-stomping feet were with me, I conjured a Solas Charm with surprising ease. The light orb revealed what form of wildlife I was up against.

  "Winston," I scolded, "you nearly gave me a heart attack."

  The bird hopped along the edge of the wall, grabbed my shirt sleeve in his beak, and began tugging.

  "Hey, stop it. I can’t have all my clothes in tatters." It took some effort since I didn’t want to hurt him, but I pushed the bird back until he finally relented. Impatiently, he snapped his beak at me.

  "I can’t go back yet. I’ve got stuff to do."

  Winston then proved that birds can pout by tucking his head down and giving me a dirty look, but he stayed quiet except for a few murmurs that sounded very disapproving.

  Despite what some of the Magics might think, I’m not a fool. Instead of rushing in like some testosterone-loaded action hero, I practiced the hand motions for the defensive spells I’d worked on with Busby, Olivia, and Rafi — going through each one in order, then reverse order, then skipping every other one to make sure I could call up each spell without a second’s hesitation. Winston seemed to think I was directing an avian dance and bobbed along with the gestures.

  It was just when I was about ready to stand and make my move that I saw someone going into the building. Tall, dark-haired, and looking very much like Tobey.

  What the hell?

  Enough with practice. Tobey had said he couldn’t figure out where this building was. Had he known and not told me? It didn’t matter, Tobey could not go in there alone. And why was he walking straight in like he owned the place? Did he think I was already inside?

  Winston cawed and ruffled his feathers, shaking his head as if agitated.

  "I’ll never understand him, either. Now, scoot aside. Long legs coming through."

  I stood up and put my hands on the wall to vault myself and my torn tights over.

  Just as my legs left the ground and I was tucking them to my side to clear the top of the brick wall, Winston made a croaking sound. Then, strong hands grabbed me, jerked me backward, and pulled me down into the grass I’d just been crouching in.

  I punched at my attacker. So much for magic. I guess my first instinct was a non-magical form of fighting, which after all that practice, kind of disappointed me. Still, I did land a hard left to my assailant’s gut. A rush of air went out of him, but he caught it back just as quickly. From the wall above me, I could hear Winston flapping his wings. When I raised my fists to deliver another punch, my attacker grabbed my hands and held them tight.

  "Cassie, stop. It’s me. Breathe. You know it’s me."

  I inhaled. That chocolatey scent.

  "Alastair, what are you—?"

  Before I could finish my question, Winston cried out with an alarming squawk as Alastair threw himself on top of me.

  Then came the rush of heat, the swishing whisper of black wings flapping.

  Followed by the boom of the explosion.

  36 - JAMMIE JAMS

  "GET OFF ME." I writhed under Alastair, which wasn’t nearly as much fun as it should have been. "Tobey’s in there."

  Alastair eased back and let me up, but the moment I started for the wall again, he threw a Binding Spell to lock down my arms. Both the shock of being trapped and of him restraining me sent me staggering. He caught me before I did a face plant into the brick wall.

  "You can’t go in there," he shouted.

  Just as I was about to tell him not to tell me what to do, another explosion knocked us off our feet.

  "Tobey!" I tried to get up, but Alastair held me close, pressing my face into his chest to shield me from the rush of heat. With his arms tight around me, my heart pounded in my chest. My breathing came in shallow, choking gasps.

  "He’s not in there, Cassie," Alastair said quietly, reassuringly, as he stroked my hair. "No one is."

  "I saw him go in." I pushed away, putting some space between us and fighting back a sob. I mean, I didn’t like Tobey all that much, but I never wanted to see him burnt to death in a fiery inferno.

  "You didn’t. I left the Tower not more than ten minutes ago and he was in his room, wearing pajamas, and sitting with Busby having hot chocolate."

  Later I would have a good laugh at the image of Tobey in his jammie-jams sipping his cocoa, but at that moment I was torn between wanting to stay in Alastair’s arms and wanting to scream at him that he was a deceitful liar.

  Alastair then placed his hands on my shoulders and turned me around to face the smoldering building. A figure. A man. Tall, dark-haired, and looking very much like Tobey was strolling into what used to be the building’s main entryway.

  "What the—?" I turned to Alastair, then looked back at the building. The guy was walking into the non-existent door once again. "Is it a hologram?"

  "No, it’s your basic Projection Spell. That is Tobey, but it was Tobey from earlier today. Maybe when he was walking around the Tower grounds." Sirens wailed in the distance. Alastair took my hand and scanned the darkened street that led toward the back of the building. "We should get going, emergency services will be prowling this area at any minute."

  He started walking in the direction he’d been looking, tugging on my hand to get me to go with him. I planted my feet, tugging back, and pulling my hand out of his grasp.

  "We can’t leave. My parents are in there. And if you had passed on what information you’ve taken about them, maybe I would have gotten here in time. You were supposed to share what you knew with me. Instead, you just hide everything from me."

  I pushed Alastair away, and started toward the scorched edifice. This time, Alastair not only locked me in a Binding Spell, but also did the pulling-back thing. I was like a dumb dog getting jerked back after forgetting, yet again, how long his leash extended.

  "Stop doing that!" I said. "You still have my magic, don’t you?"

  "Your parents are not in there." The sirens squealed louder. "Cassie, please, just stop being so stubborn and listen to me. I swear to you, I’m using my own magic and all this touching we’ve just been doing, while nice, is really kicking my ass."

  He eased back on the spell. In the glow of the building’s fire I could see sweat beading on his forehead and dark circles showing under his eyes.

  "You’ve been tricked into coming here. I don’t know if that explosion was meant as a warning, or if it was meant to kill you, but I don’t like the idea of either possibility." Pulsing lights began cutting through the darkness. "We’re going to have to answer a lot of awkward questions if we’re around when those patrols get here
, so can we go get some cake and talk like sane people?"

  "Sane people do not magically strap other peoples’ arms to the sides of their bodies, nor do they use a magic tractor beam to keep that person from running away."

  "Sane people don’t run into unoccupied, burning buildings. Please, will you come with me? Let me explain? Do you trust me?"

  "Two out of three of those things, yes."

  Alastair didn’t ask which one missed the mark, but he did unleash me, leaving my arms with a weird, floaty feeling. I briefly wondered where Winston was, but then recalled the sound of him flying off. I could only hope he’d stayed safely out of the blast.

  We headed down the side street. When we reached the rear of the building, three patrol cars screeched to a stop at the front of the building and a fire crew began shouting orders to get the hoses ready. We slipped around the corner and were halfway down a curving street before I heard a gush of water spraying onto the flames.

  I didn’t know where we were going. Even the Marks & Spencer bakery would be closed at this hour, but I merely followed along, somewhat dazed and angry with myself for being so easily tricked. But that didn’t explain what Alastair had been doing there.

  "Were you following me tonight?" I asked.

  "No, of course not. The gnomes told me you’d gone."

  "Gnomes? Like garden gnomes?"

  "Yes, you commented on them soon after we arrived."

  "So, what? They have cameras in them?"

  "Good god, no. They’re living beings. The ones at the Tower serve as elite spies for HQ, but it takes them years to work up to that rank." A fact it might have been nice for Nigel to include when I’d questioned him. Then again, it had been foolish of me to expect all his information to be on the nose. "Most earn their chops by doing mundane surveillance. I mean, you have seen how many of them hang around people’s gardens. There’s one right outside your apartment building."

  "But they just stand there."

  Right as I said this, I recalled that Morelli’s gnome had gone missing on occasion. I had always assumed he’d taken the thing in for a sad sort of companionship while he watched his game show reruns.

  "They appear to just stand there," Alastair explained. "They’ve got a very organized system of dispersal. Once they receive their orders, they show up to where they’re needed and they wait. They’re incredibly good at holding still, but when they have news to tell, they can hustle. It helps that gnomes are terrible gossips."

  "And one just happened to gossip to you that I’d gone?"

  "No, and you’re lucky for that. The one who saw you leave was heading toward Olivia’s office to tell her, but he came across me first. That’s the one downside with gnomes. It’s usually trained out of them by the time they climb the ranks to work in the Tower, but some want to spill their news so badly, they just blurt it out to the first person they find. I happened to be that person. Snellton—"

  "Snellton?"

  "The gnome who saw you leave. He’s also heard you and Tobey talking several times. Have you really been going through the files with him?"

  "Trying to."

  I was about to add that certain files had been missing, but Alastair cut in.

  "Anyway, earlier today a couple gnomes told Snellton you’d gotten some information about that building." Alastair gestured in the direction we’d just come from, and I recalled the out-of-context pair of gnomes from outside the Museum of London’s cafe. "Information from Olivia’s files. Please tell me you weren’t going through her desk. She is not someone whose hackles you want to raise."

  "Of course I wasn’t. It was Tobey. He told me what he’d found when we had lunch at the museum."

  "You had lunch with Tobey?" Alastair sputtered, clearly knocked for a loop.

  "Jealous?"

  "No," he said abruptly, then paid an unnecessary amount of attention to a street sign we were approaching. "Okay, yes, I am, but I’m more concerned with the fact that Olivia suspects the information in that file is fake. We’re bringing in an expert to verify it, but Tobey’s involvement does concern me. At lunch, what did he smell like?"

  "I can’t say. I—"

  "Did you smell magic on him?" Alastair insisted.

  "No, I mean, it’s Tobey, it didn’t cross my mind to sniff him out." I’d also just gotten two hits of strange news, both of which I still needed to confront Alastair about. "I was hungry and I wasn’t paying attention, and it’s not like we were swapping spit with our sandwiches."

  "Thank you for that disgusting image. Although I am glad to hear it." He darted a shy glance at me, but the warm quirk of his lips dropped before it could turn into a full smile. "I trusted you not to act without me. I’d heard you’d been seen on that level of the Tower, but I didn’t think you’d be stupid enough to do anything so risky as to go after your parents on your own. When Snellton told me you’d left and what he’d heard from the museum gnomes, I knew where you were headed. As it is, I barely made in time. That was just dumb, Cassie. Really dumb."

  Chastised and feeling like an utter heel, I remained silent the rest of our walk, which ended in front of a cake shop. It was closed, but Alastair undid the lock and we stepped in.

  "Breaking and entering? You do know they have CCTV cameras everywhere."

  "It’s not breaking and entering. My cousin owns it. She won’t mind."

  37 - TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES

  ONCE HE’D SERVED up two huge slices of an almond-and-raspberry studded Bakewell tart, Alastair asked, "What did you mean when you said you’ve been trying to go through the files? It’s not the best room to work in, but things are never out of order."

  "At least I am trying," I said. Alastair looked at me questioningly. "It just seems like you spend most of your time going to lectures and the cafe, when I thought you came here to help."

  "Believe it or not, except for a couple times out with Rafi, I have been using most of my free time compiling various sources of information about the Mauvais and the night your parents went missing."

  "Then why are you stealing files? Do you think I haven’t noticed the gaps? Or that your scent is on the very drawers where the missing files should be?"

  I expected to see him squirm, to take a bite of tart to bide his time while he came up with a lie, but he did neither of these things. Instead, Alastair lowered his fork and stared at me as if I’d started crowing like a rooster. He spoke directly to me, eyes locked on mine, not darting away, not hiding a damn thing.

  "Cassie, I know you’re really good at thinking the worst of people, but first off, I got everything I needed from the file room on the first day we arrived. I haven’t gone back. My other work has been in the library, in the historical records room, or in conversations with other Magics. Even with your super powers, my scent should no longer be lingering anywhere near that room."

  He took a bite of the tart. My ill humor had done nothing to quell my hunger, and I’d already eaten half of mine. Alastair chewed and swallowed, then said, "Second, you might be able to remove an individual sheet, but entire files can’t be taken from those cabinets. And I mean that literally. Rafi put a spell on the room so if any file gets within a foot of the exit, it swells so much you can’t fit it through the door even if you could keep hold of the thing. Which files haven’t you found?" he asked, his brow furrowed with concern.

  "Both my parents’ and Mr. Tenpenny’s are gone," I said, trying to inject accusation into the words, but failing. How could the files be gone? What had I really smelled?

  "I never went through Busby’s folder. I read through two files and that’s the Starling one and the Kilbride one." He continued to watch me, as if driving home the honesty in his answer. I lowered my gaze, fiddling with the crust of my tart in ashamed defeat. "You’re smarter than this, Cass. Besides the files, there’s whatever it was Tobey showed you about that building. Your cynicism knows no bounds, and with your magic being so st
rong, if there’s some trickery going on, you should have been able to detect it."

  "Like I said, I never saw the info about the building myself, only what Tobey copied down. And you can’t expect Tobey Tenpenny to detect anything more than the fact that he has ten fingers. And that’s on a good day," I added.

  At this, a quick breath of laughter escaped Alastair, but the concern quickly returned to his face.

  "Look, don’t take this as being jealous or overbearing, but I have a feeling you shouldn’t work with Tobey on this. Intentionally or not, he’s already fed you bad information. And I can’t explain why my scent would still be on drawers I haven’t touched in days, nor why you can’t find files that should be impossible to remove. Besides, neither of you really knows what you’re searching for. Okay?"