Unlike Gifteds, magicians were made, not born. A Gifted had to train and study to unlock her inherent talent for magic. A Gifted who had undergone some magical training earned the title of magician, though often she was instead called by the name of her particular magical specialty. For example, a Gifted who was born with a knack for illusionism could go by the title of magician, or more specifically, illusionist, once he had trained in the use of his magic. If that magician then earned his Conclave certification, he was called a Master Magician or Master Illusionist and became a voting member of the Conclave. For Master Magicians, the First Rule was somewhat relaxed, the idea being a Master Magician was wise enough to know when to and when not to use his magic where mundanes might see him. In the magical world, all men were most definitely not created equal.
I was a sorceress—that is, a magician with no specialized knack—but not yet a Master Sorceress since I had not yet earned my Conclave certification. Millennium, the famous former licensed Hero, was a Master Sorcerer, and perhaps the most powerful magician the world had ever known. He was also the only magician I knew of whose abilities were public knowledge. He had gotten a special dispensation from the Conclave to practice magic openly despite the First Rule. Considering all the shady stuff he had been exposed for doing, I bet the Conclave regretted making him an exception to the general rule.
Oscar said, “But despite all your potential, the only type of magic you’re really proficient at is elemental magic. I suspected it’s because the capacity of air, fire, water, and earth to make things go boom appeals to your inner child. Unfortunately, your inner child seems to sit in your psyche’s driver’s seat more often than not. You’re terrible at just about every other magical discipline because you refuse to put in the work to master them. You’re not living up to your potential. At the rate you’re going, you never will.”
“Boss, please stop. Such a sweet-talker.” I made a show of fanning my face. “You’re making a girl blush.”
Oscar slapped his palm down on his desk, making me jump. The wood of the desk cracked loudly. He pointed a thick finger at me. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about,” he snarled. “You don’t know when to keep your big trap shut.”
I opened my mouth to respond, then abruptly closed it. Didn’t know when to keep my big mouth shut, huh? I guess I showed him.
After staring at me for several long, uncomfortable beats, Oscar lowered his finger. He leaned back in his chair. It creaked ominously under his weight.
He said, “Hopefully the Conclave can cover up the nature of the gargoyles and your use of magic. We still don’t know who animated the gargoyles and why, but that’s something the Conclave will look into. As is usually the case when magic slips into the public eye, the Conclave is trying to explain away what happened by attributing it to Rogues and Heroes. I don’t know how we’d hide magic so well if we didn’t have Metahuman superpowers to point the finger of blame at. The Conclave’s Magic Suppression Division is spreading the word through Fox News, CNN, Twitter, and all the other usual disinformation outlets that a Rogue’s Metahuman powers were responsible for the gargoyles. They’re doctoring all the footage of your exploits they can get hold of to change your features. Unfortunately, they’re sending me the bill for the entire disinformation campaign since you were on site as an agent of this company.
“The Conclave also opened a First Rule violation investigation. You’ll be under their microscope. As will Capstone Security.” Oscar frowned at the thought. “I’ve got to show the Conclave I take this matter seriously, otherwise there’s the danger they’ll revoke my operating license. Though your smart-aleck tendencies tempt me to fire you, I won’t. Like I said, in ways you’re one of my best agents. But I can’t let you off scot-free, either. What message would that send to the Conclave while they’re going over my business practices with a fine-toothed comb?
“Here’s what I’m going to do,” Oscar said. “I’m going to suspend you for three weeks.”
I leaned back, relieved. Oscar had me worried there for a while. Three weeks? That wasn’t so bad. I could use the free time to get my nails done for the first time in years, clean my apartment for the first time in forever, crack open that copy of Alchemy for Dummies I had bought during a short-lived spurt of ambition a few months ago . . .
“Without pay,” Oscar added.
. . . and scrounge around in my couch cushions for spare change to buy bread and water. I was already behind on all my bills and living from hand to mouth. I couldn’t go three weeks without being paid.
I shot up straight in my chair. “That’s not fair!” I objected. Dismay was burning away my Elven wine buzz.
“What’s not fair is that you exposed this company to liability and that I have to clean your mess up for you. I’m letting you off easy.”
“Maybe you should ask all the people I saved if they think you should suspend me. They’d probably say you should throw me a party, give me a corner office, and make me vice president of the company.”
Oscar’s skin flushed green and his eyes narrowed to black slits. “Make that a month’s suspension.”
“But—”
“Make it two months. Say one more word, and you’re fired.”
My jaw clenched. I stood so abruptly, my chair turned over. I didn’t pick it up.
I stalked to the Fishbowl’s glass door. I opened it, then hesitated. I turned my head back to Oscar. The devil within opened my mouth. I was about to say Word.
I closed my mouth before the job-killing syllable escaped. When Oscar said he would do something, he always did it. My better judgment had tackled the devil within in time, gagging and hog-tying it before I wisecracked myself out of a job. I needed this job. With my background, it would not be easy to find another, especially not one that paid as well as this one did.
I stormed out of Oscar’s office. I left the door wide open behind me.
That would show him.
CHAPTER 4
I hurried past Oscar’s longtime secretary Alice, a Gifted whose knack was inscriptive magic. I went back to my desk, feeling people’s eyes on me the whole way. Many of the Otherkin species here had preternatural hearing, and no doubt had heard everything in the Fishbowl.
Seething with anger and embarrassment, I struggled to not slam my drawers as I cleaned out my desk. I dumped my belongings into a nylon bookbag. I made sure to grab the leather flask containing the rest of my Elven wine. I would definitely need to drown my sorrows later.
I approached Loopy’s desk on the way to the elevator. A field agent like me, Blake Longtooth was his real name. Or at least that was the name he went by; I suspected his birth name was unpronounceable by a human tongue. Loopy was his office nickname, a bastardization of his Otherkin species’ scientific name Lupus Mutabilis.
Loopy’s feet were propped up on an open drawer. The long fingers of one hand were spread wide on top of his wood desk. His other hand casually tossed an open pocketknife into the air. The knife rose five or six feet, then descended. The sharp blade impaled itself between Loopy’s outstretched fingers with a dull thunk. He had been at this for a while judging from the countless gouges in the desk between his fingers. I prayed he’d slice a finger off with the knife, but I knew he wouldn’t.
Loopy was an intense guy, so much so that much of the office thought he was insane. Hence the nickname Loopy. Few people had the balls to call him that to his face, though. He was muscular and square-jawed, with thick curly black hair most women longed to run their fingers through. When I first met him, I thought he was one of the hottest guys I had ever seen. After getting to know and dislike him, his male model good looks became immensely irritating instead of intensely alluring.
Loopy’s knife thunked into the desk again as I passed him. Without looking up at me, he said, "Has the teacher's pet finally gotten her tit slammed in the principal's office door?"
Darn his Otherkin hearing! My fists balled up. I took a step toward him. Then I realized Loopy was deliberately goading me into
a fight. I was already on thin ice with Oscar.
"Bite me, Loopy." I winced. Not a great retort. My rapier wit needed sharpening.
Loopy looked up. He smiled happily. It was a normal human smile, not the canine-filled one he had when he transformed into his werewolf form. "One day, human bitch. One day." The way he said it, human, not bitch, was the insult.
The knife thunked into the desk again. I fought back the urge to grab it and perform impromptu plastic surgery on Loopy’s face. And Oscar said I had no self-control? Hah! I oozed self-control like zit-faced teens oozed pus.
Okay, maybe similes were not my strong suit.
Suppressing violent thoughts, I swept past Loopy and got on the elevator. I didn’t flip him off as the car door’s contracted. Self-control yet again. I could teach a master class on the subject.
I exited the building through the revolving doors. I squinted against the brightness. The summer sun beat down like a hammer on an anvil. The city’s humidity hit me like a hot, wet wall. Who needed steam rooms when you had D.C. in the summer? The city was below the Mason-Dixon line, which meant that it was a part of the American South. And the South got so hot during the summer that it felt like Satan’s armpit. I needed to cool off with some iced sweet tea and drown my troubles in Elven wine, not necessarily in that order.
All the buildings around me were multi-storied, but none were taller than the twelve-story building I had walked out of. Washington, D.C., unlike many major cities, was not a city of skyscrapers. I’d heard it was because, by law, no building could be taller than the Washington Monument, the 555 feet tall obelisk on the nearby National Mall. It was just like men to pass a law saying nothing could be bigger than their giant phallic symbol.
Traffic crawled by on K Street, all the vehicles’ exhaust adding to the heat. I dropped my knapsack on the sidewalk and peeled off my jacket, earning me a contemptuous glare from a middle-aged guy in a suit who had to step out of the way to avoid my bag. His suit looked like it cost about as much as Oscar’s. The pricey suit and his I’m more important than God and all His angels attitude made me think the guy was a lobbyist, probably one with a law degree. He likely drove a late model BMW, had a pre-med son who played lacrosse at Harvard, was on a first name basis with the White House Deputy Chief of Staff, and had a five hundred dollar a week coke habit. People like him were like roaches in this part of K Street. Lawyers in general were like roaches all over the city, not just on K Street. There were more lawyers per capita in D.C. than any other place in the United States. All the legal brainpower was needed to figure out how to legally screw the rest of the country.
K Street was not only a major D.C. thoroughfare, but this part of it was also ground zero for D.C.’s lobbying industry. “Lobbying” was a euphemism for “Senator, I’ll give you a boatload of money, and in exchange you’ll let me write the bills benefitting my industry that you will then vote into law under the guise of helping the American people.” It was legalized bribery. The fact I was the one in trouble when criminal activity was going like gangbusters out in the open showed there was no justice in this world. Maybe there was some in the next, though I doubted it. I had been to enough seances during my magical training and spoken to enough dead people that I wasn’t holding my breath.
I stuffed my jacket into my bag, pulled out a pair of designer sunglasses, then slung the bag over my shoulder again. I tugged on my blouse, detaching it from where the humidity had pasted it onto my skin. I had just gotten out here and was already sweating. Before she abandoned me and Dad when I was very little, my mother used to say girls didn’t sweat, they glistened. I was glistening like a pig. If I stood in this heat much longer, I’d be putting on a wet t-shirt contest.
That gave me an idea. Maybe stripping was what I’d do for the next couple of months to bring in much needed cash.
I looked down at my potential moneymakers. I sighed. My chest wasn’t impressive enough to support a new career. I was again envious of Willow’s rack.
I hesitated in the middle of the sidewalk. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I wasn’t used to getting off work this early. There were a lot of things I could do in the District in the middle of the day, but a lot of them involved money, something I had a limited supply of. With no cash coming in for the next two months, I needed to tighten my belt.
I could always go to one of the nearby Smithsonian Museums, all of which were free. I was one of the rare Washingtonians who was born and raised here, rather than having moved here from elsewhere for work like so many other people. My father, who had been far more cultured than I, had taken me to the Smithsonian all the time when I was a kid. I still went a lot. Going reminded me of Dad. I also often went to the Smithsonian for first dates so those dates wouldn’t think I owed them something. A lot of guys thought buying you a burger and a beer also rented your vagina for the night.
Not that I dated much, anyway. Human/Otherkin relationships were taboo. Halflings like Oscar were rare. I didn’t often date other Gifteds, either. Gifted men often acquired money and status with their magic, meaning they had their pick of the female litter, both Gifted and mundane. As a result, I’d found most Gifted men to be insufferably arrogant. I mixed romantically with them as well as oil and water. And mundane men? Yuck. The mundane world was full of weaklings and crybabies who'd wet themselves if they caught a glimpse of what was going on under society's hood.
Oops, I had almost forgotten about Metahuman men. The idea of being with a Hero was intriguing. Then again, they came with their own set of issues. Grown men running around fighting crime in masks and underwear? Really? I didn’t have to be a professional therapist to know that anybody who did that had some deep-seated psychological issues.
I shook my head, and I shoved thoughts of dating aside. I didn’t need a man right now, unless he was going to be my sugar daddy. I needed a job. More to the point, I needed money.
I didn’t feel like going to a museum. I was still too mad about getting suspended to pay attention to exhibits. I’d just go home.
My decision made, I started walking. As I moved, I got the weirdest feeling I was being watched, like when the nape of your neck tingled, and you looked up to find someone staring at you.
I looked around. No one on the street seemed to pay me the slightest bit of attention. Forced idleness was making me paranoid.
Trying to shake off the strange feeling, I walked toward the nearby bus stop to catch the bus that would carry me to my apartment in Columbia Heights. I did not own a car. A car would be yet another monthly expense I could ill afford. Assuming I could even buy one. The last time I had tried to finance something, the guy who checked my credit had laughed me out of his office. I didn’t need to own a car to get around, anyway, thanks to ride sharing services, cabs, and the District’s extensive public transportation system. Also, D.C. was not that big as far as major cities went and had sidewalks everywhere. It was a very walkable city.
I weaved my way through a throng of men and women who walked purposefully, spoke on their cell phones like they were planning world domination, and were dressed for success. Dodging them all made me feel like the star of a video game. Frogger: The Lobbyists Dodging Edition.
Hmmm. Maybe all these well-dressed guys and gals were onto something. I could become a lobbyist instead of a stripper. How hard could it be? Buy an expensive suit, walk up to a congressman and say, “Here’s some money. Now dance, monkey, dance.”
Now that I thought about it, being in Congress and being a stripper had a lot of similarities.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you out and about this time of day, child,” a voice said, interrupting my reverie and making me jump.
I tensed, turned my head, then relaxed when I saw who it was.
“Hi Daniel. I’m . . . just taking a walk.” I stopped myself just in time from admitting I had been suspended. Daniel and I were friendly, but not friends. He didn’t need to know all my business. It’s not as though I really knew anything about him. I
didn’t even know his full name. I would just chat with him when I encountered him on the street, which I had been doing from time to time the past few weeks, usually near my apartment.
Besides, I would feel like the world’s biggest jerk complaining to Daniel about anything. My job problems paled to insignificance compared to Daniel’s life problems. He was homeless.
I could not begin to guess how old Daniel was. Though he had the clear brown eyes, moderately unlined face, dark brown hair, and upright gait of a man in his thirties or forties, his long gray beard belonged on an old man. An air of sorrow hung around him like a dark cloud, like he had lived longer than he had expected to and was none too pleased about it. I supposed life on the streets would do that to you. His hair was long and unkempt, his nails unclipped and dirty, and his white skin was dark with grime. He wore pants than might have started off as khaki-colored, but that had been many years and stains ago. Too big for Daniel’s wiry frame, the pants were held up by a dirty rope around Daniel’s waist. He wore a tattered black blazer over a holey t-shirt.
As far as I knew, the rusting shopping cart Daniel pushed around contained everything he owned. A thick stick stuck out of one end of the cart. The gnarled, dark wood was so long it was more like a staff than a walking stick. I had no idea why I always saw Daniel with it; he walked around just fine without using it. Maybe it had some sort of sentimental value, or maybe he used it to defend himself. Lowlifes saw homeless people as easy prey.
Daniel had a hand in his pocket, playing with unseen coins there. Daniel played with those coins every time I saw him, like they were a reminder of something. Some sort of tic, or maybe simply a nervous habit.
“Mighty hot day for a walk, child,” Daniel said, the jingling of the coins in his pocket providing background music to his words. The non-patronizing way he always called me child added to the impression he was far older than I. The people walking by us pointedly ignored Daniel like he was invisible.
Sorceress Super Hero Page 4
