Magic Breaks

by Ilona Andrews

  “They support me.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  She struggled with it for a second. “I am the alpha. She is . . .” Jennifer squeezed her hand into a fist. “She’s vulgar. One of her sons is a monster.”

  Desandra was right. Jennifer had no intention of letting a baby lamassu grow up in her clan. If I were Desandra, wild horses wouldn’t be able to drag me away from fighting Jennifer for the alpha spot.

  “Desandra’s child is an infant and a member of the Pack.”

  Jennifer kept going. “What happens when he grows up?”

  “We’ll burn that bridge after we cross it.”

  “I won’t let her push me out. It’s my place. I’m doing it for my child. For Daniel’s child. She’ll grow up to be the daughter of an alpha.”

  She had that half-desperate, half-determined look in her eyes. Right. No intelligent life there. “Why is it so important to be alpha? Why not just step down?”

  “Because it’s where I belong. Daniel chose me. He chose me out of all the other women in the Pack so I could stand by his side. Daniel didn’t make mistakes. He died, and now I have to lead the Pack in his memory, because otherwise he would’ve died for nothing.”

  Oh dear God, she had deified her husband. Shapeshifters were already paranoid, but Jennifer’s grief combined with her pregnancy must’ve catapulted her into a seriously bad place. No matter how many rational arguments I made, she wouldn’t listen, because I couldn’t compete with Daniel’s memory.

  “Someone asked Desandra the same question,” I said. “She said, ‘Because I can make the people in the clan safer and happier.’”

  Jennifer stared at me, her eyes luminous with green. “You owe me. You killed my sister, my husband died because of the fight you dragged us into, and then you brought Desandra here. If she wins, if you can imagine it for a second, she would tell me what to do. I won’t take orders from that bitch!” Her voice rose. “I won’t! My child won’t call that crude lowlife alpha. You made this mess; you’ll fix it for me or you will regret it.”

  Okay, that was just about enough of that. “No.”

  Jennifer glared at me, her eyes blazing with green.

  “Tone down your flashlights, or I’ll resolve this power struggle right here and right now.”

  She drew back. The glow dimmed.

  “Let me spell it out for you. I didn’t kill your sister because I felt like it. I killed her because she had turned loup and was in pain. Ending her life was an act of mercy. Daniel didn’t die so you could be an alpha. He died so fanatics wouldn’t detonate a device that would’ve killed every shapeshifter in a ten-mile radius. You’re fighting Desandra for the confidence of your clan and you’re losing. The very fact that you are here now makes you weak. If I helped you, it would only make you look weaker. You have to stand on your own. No bodyguards, no Beast Lord to hide behind, just you.”

  She stared at me, her face completely white. I should’ve stopped, but in the past twelve hours I’d run around the frozen city trying to prevent a supernatural war, I’d nearly lost a child who relied on me for protection, and I’d watched Hugh d’Ambray slaughter people and hadn’t been able to do a damn thing about it, and all the while, the man I loved was missing. My brakes had malfunctioned and I kept barreling on, right off the cliff.

  “Explain to me why I would help you? For the entire time you’ve known me, you’ve done nothing but throw rocks at my head. Last night I had to go into the People’s territory and I didn’t know if we would survive. I went because the future of the entire Pack depended on it. The alpha rat volunteered to go with me. The alpha cat did, too. A member of your clan couldn’t wait to join me. A child from the boudas followed me because he wanted to make a difference. They did this because they felt responsible for the safety of their friends. They did it to protect the Pack. Did you volunteer to help me?”

  My voice snapped like a whip. Jennifer flinched.

  “Did you come with me, Jennifer? Did you fight with me? Did you sacrifice yourself to draw off four vampires, so I could get to where I was going? Did you fight a knight with a kind of magic we’ve never seen before? Did you throw yourself at a fucking wendigo while poisoned and puking your guts out to save a boy? No. You sat here, plotted, and felt sorry for yourself. And less than an hour ago, when the Pack Council was trying to decide what to do with Dorie, where the bloody hell were you? You sent Desandra in, because you didn’t want to face the heat.”

  Jennifer bared her teeth, drawing back.

  “Desandra might be crude and manipulative, but you know what, she shows up. She gets into the mud and blood with the rest of us and gets her hands dirty. None of us like it, but we do it. I won’t help her pull you off your alpha rock, but I won’t stop her either. And after what she did, if she needs me, I’ll be there to back her up, because she watched my back when it counted. You are not special. You don’t get to not show up. You don’t get to avoid difficult decisions. You get to climb into the muck with the rest of us. So, if you want to be in charge, fine. Reach deep down, find a backbone, and handle your own shit. Otherwise, step down and make way for someone who would actually matter.”

  Jennifer sat frozen, her face stunned. Her hand squeezed the water bottle.

  I waited to see if she would explode.

  Someone knocked and the door swung open. Barabas ducked in. “I have Gray on the phone.”

  Finally. I turned to Jennifer. “Are we done?”

  “I can’t do it,” she said quietly, her voice sad. “I should do it, but I can’t. It’s wrong. It would be like spitting on his memory.”

  What was she talking about? How was fighting Desandra spitting on Daniel’s memory? I didn’t understand her at all. “You can step down and be a mother . . .”

  She got up and fled out of the room.

  • • •

  BARABAS SHOWED ME to one of the conference rooms. Jim was already there, leaning against the wall, like a grim shadow, his eyes hard. Uh-oh.

  “How did you get him on the phone?” I asked.

  “I had two of our people walk into his office and refuse to leave,” Jim said. “He was there all morning.”

  Gray had been ducking our calls. That was exactly what I didn’t want to hear. I landed in a chair and pushed the button on speaker.

  “Detective Gray.”

  “Hello, Kate.”

  “You’re a hard man to find.”

  “What do you want?” Gray sounded tired.

  “I want to surrender a suspect implicated in the murder of Mulradin Grant to your custody.”

  Silence.

  More silence.

  I imagined a hole suddenly manifesting under Gray’s feet and swallowing him whole. The way my day had been going so far, I wouldn’t be surprised.

  “We are not aware of any murder,” Gray said.

  Aha. “I’m making you aware of it now. Mr. Grant is dead, he was murdered by a shapeshifter, and a member of the Pack has been implicated in this murder. I’m reaching out to you and offering to surrender her to your custody.”

  “This is a jurisdictional issue,” Gray said. “The Keep is in DeKalb County.”

  Are you kidding me? “The murder was committed in Atlanta’s city limits.”

  “The alleged murder.”

  Argh. I leaned closer to the phone. “We’ve always strived to maintain good relations with the PAD. Last year alone we’ve assisted you on—”

  Jim raised nine fingers.

  “—on nine cases. I’m asking you to help us.”

  Silence.

  “I’m sorry,” Gray said. “I can’t.”

  The rage swelled inside me like a wave. My voice shook slightly. “I’m about to have a bloodbath on my hands.”

  Gray lowered his voice. “This is coming down from above. We can’t get involved in a war between the Pack and the People. We don’t have the numbers or the firepower. We’d be slaughtered. I’m sorry, but this is between you and them.”

&n
bsp; He wouldn’t help us. “You had a chance to make a difference today and you stepped back. Your authority is only good if you do something with it, and you chose to do nothing. Do that enough times and pretty soon nobody will acknowledge it at all. The next time you need my help, don’t call.”

  I disconnected the call.

  “Diplomatic,” Barabas said.

  “Fuck diplomatic.”

  The phone rang. I picked it up.

  “This is a jurisdictional issue,” Gray said, his voice strained. “We have no jurisdiction over the Keep.”

  He hung up.

  Okay. “Who has jurisdiction over us?” I asked the room.

  “Most of our lands are in DeKalb County,” Barabas said. “A little bit of Clayton, too.”

  Neither the DeKalb nor Clayton County sheriff would help us. DeKalb didn’t care for us, and Clayton was severely understaffed.

  “And Milton too, along the north edge,” Jim said.

  Wait a minute. “Milton?”

  He nodded.

  The last time I had occasion to travel to Milton, it was because Andrea had gotten upset over some floozy flirting with Raphael, pulled a gun, and nearly drowned her in a hot tub. Beau Clayton, the Milton County sheriff, had personally talked her off the cliff and locked everyone up until I got there.

  I punched his number into the phone. “Beau?”

  “Kate.” A deep voice tinted with Georgia’s brand of country answered. “Funniest thing happened. One of my deputies just saw what he described as ‘a whole mess of undead’ moving in your general direction. Now, I am curious. Are you having a party?”

  “Beau,” I said. “I need your help.”

  • • •

  I STOOD ON the wall of the Keep. The day was beautiful. The sun lit the turquoise sky, tinting it with a pale veil of gold. Before me a clear snowfield stretched to the jagged dark wall of the forest. Wind stirred a loose strand of my hair.

  Behind me the Pack Council waited.

  Something moved in the distance at the far-off tree line. A single skeletal shape emerged out of the brush, a dark squiggle against the white snow. The undead paused on all fours. Its magic brushed by me, revolting, like a smear of decomposing flesh on the surface of my mind.

  Vampires poured out of the forest, their gaunt, grotesque bodies moving ridiculously fast. So many . . . Behind them four armored cars crept onto the field. Painted in fatigue colors and set on eight wheels, they looked like small tanks. And they were probably chock-full of navigators.

  “The People got themselves some Strykers,” Andrea said. “Slat armor, full hull protection. These have a layer of steel, then a layer of ceramic armor against armor-piercing rounds, then more steel and then probably reactive armor tiles. You can fire a rocket launcher at that thing and it won’t even sneeze.”

  “How heavy are they?” Martha asked.

  “Little over sixteen tons,” Andrea said.

  “So around thirty-three thousand pounds,” Robert murmured.

  Martha shrugged. “Too heavy to roll.”

  Prying Ghastek and his posse out of the Strykers would be a bitch.

  The armored fighting vehicles rolled into position and stopped. The vampires formed around them.

  Where are you, Curran? In my head I had thought he would somehow magically show up. But he wasn’t here. I was on my own.

  I turned to the courtyard and waved at Roman and the witch next to him.

  “Is that his sister?” Andrea asked to me.

  “No.” I had spoken with both of them. “I’d asked her that. Her name is Alina, she isn’t his sister, and she feels deeply sorry for his sisters, because if she had to put up with being in his presence for longer than a day, she would throw herself off the nearest bridge just to end the agony.”

  “Well,” Andrea said. “Glad she cleared that up.”

  The dark volhv waved back at me and shouted, “Showtime!”

  Alina sighed next to him. “What are you so happy about? We’re going to get killed.”

  The two of them started toward the gates.

  “It’s exciting,” Roman said. “Look at all of those shapeshifters and vampires. It’s a historic moment and the Pack will owe us.”

  “How is it that you have no common sense? Were they all out when you were born?”

  Roman indicated his face. “I don’t need common sense. I have a double helping of charm.”

  “You mean a double helping of bullshit . . .”

  They passed through the gates under us and Derek and two other shapeshifters barred them, lifting the enormous beam in place. The boy wonder, bald and pale, had decided that he’d had enough rest. I didn’t have the energy to fight with him about it.

  Roman and the witch stopped about fifty feet from the gate. A single vampire emerged from the undead horde and ran over to them. Roman spoke to it. He would be listing our conditions: we would meet two Masters of the Dead in front of the gates and discuss the murder of Mulradin. Roman and the witch would act as impartial witnesses. And if Hugh got anywhere within fifty feet of that meeting, all negotiations would cease.

  The vampire returned. The witch raised her head and spread her arms. A dark green spark pulsed from her and split into a thousand narrow ribbons of green. They shot from her, falling into the snow. Steam rose as the snow melted and the green burrowed into the ground, forming a perfect ring about fifty feet in diameter. Thin green stalks sprouted from the exposed ground and stretched upward, turning into knee-high thorns.

  We had our meeting.

  • • •

  I WALKED OUT into the snowy field next to Jim. The gates of the Keep stood closed behind us. On the wall, Andrea stood with a power crossbow. She’d brought a sniper rifle in case the magic dropped.

  The sea of vampires parted and Ghastek walked out, tall, slender, wearing a long military-style white jacket and white pants, strategically broken by small irregular splotches of brown. White boots and a helmet in the same pattern completed the outfit. Apparently he intended to bury himself in the snow and snipe at us from his cover. A woman followed him. She wore an identical uniform and the helmet hid her hair, but I’d know Rowena anywhere. She was in debt to the witches and she had been secretly supplying me with vampire blood. She didn’t know what I did with it, but if she ever found out, her helmet would fly right off her head because her hair would stand on end.

  “What the hell are they wearing?” Jim murmured next to me.

  “They’re playing soldier. It probably cost them an arm and a leg.”

  “Still might,” Jim offered.

  Ghastek carefully stepped over the thorns into the circle. Rowena followed him.

  The horde of undead rippled again and Hugh rode out. He wore dark leather armor and a long cloak edged with wolf fur. Nice touch. When you’re going to confront a Keep full of people who turn furry, make sure you’re wearing some dead animal’s skin on your cloak. His enormous black horse, a massive Friesian, danced under him, long black mane flying, the black feathers on its legs raising powdery snow. Steam rose from the stallion’s nostrils.

  Hugh should’ve brought a banner with I AM BAD stitched on it in gold. The horse, the armor, and the fur weren’t making enough of a statement.

  Jim leaned forward, his gaze fixed on Hugh.

  “Don’t,” I murmured.

  Hugh guided the horse along the thorn border. The Friesian circled us, never crossing over the boundary. Hugh was clearly an “obey the letter of the agreement, not the spirit” kind of guy.

  I wanted to pull him off his horse and grind his face into the dirt.

  “Have you apprehended the murderer?” Ghastek asked.

  “Yes.” I passed him a piece of paper with Double D’s handwritten confession on it. He read it and glanced at Hugh. Hugh was staring at me. Looking is free. Try to come closer and I will cure what ails you and me both.

  Ghastek read further. Distaste twisted his face. “That is . . . unfortunate.”

  “I think it
’s tragic, personally, but we can go with unfortunate, if you want.” My deadline was rapidly approaching. Beau Clayton was nowhere to be seen. Maybe he had hung me out to dry.

  Ghastek folded the paper in half and passed it to Rowena. She read it and looked up. A rapid mental calculation was taking place behind Rowena’s eyes. She directed the People’s public relations. This whole thing was a PR nightmare for everyone involved.

  “Did you read the part where d’Ambray walked in on her, held a gun to her head, and forced her to kill Mulradin, so he could manufacture this war?”

  Ghastek looked like he had bitten into a peach and realized it was rotten. “I am sure she says that he did. I have not read the part where she presents evidence of this wild story. Perhaps there’s a rider or an exhibit I missed?”

  That’s okay, I had more. “Why would she lie?”

  Hugh kept circling us. A small smile curved his lips. He looked like a man who was enjoying himself. Snow, sunshine, brisk air, a fast horse . . . and impending slaughter. All the things a growing boy needs.

  “To prevent this conflict. Perhaps it was a lovers’ quarrel,” Ghastek said. “Perhaps she wanted to rob him. I don’t know, and quite frankly, I don’t care at the moment. Can you prove that she is the killer and not some sacrificial lamb?”

  “You’re welcome to run her DNA. It will match what’s on Mulradin.”

  “Are you prepared to turn her over to us?”

  “No.”

  Ghastek leaned forward. “Kate, I hate to resort to threats, but there is a certain responsibility you and I both have to the people we’re leading in this conflict . . .”

  To the left of him, three horsemen emerged from under the trees. Beau or not Beau?

  “The casualties and financial costs of war will be catastrophic,” Ghastek said. “I understand that you’re counting on the help of whatever navigator you hired, but I assure you, we’re more than capable of neutralizing him or her.”

  “What navigator?”

  “The one who assisted you last night at the Conclave.”

  What was he on about?

  Oh.

  Apparently I had hidden too well. For all of his intelligence, Ghastek still hadn’t put two and two together. He knew with absolute certainty that I couldn’t pilot vampires. He had seen me not pilot them on numerous occasions. In his mind, I couldn’t possibly do it, so I had to have hired someone else and that someone must’ve grabbed control of the vampires at the Conclave. Right.