Shadow Web

by Yasmine Galenorn

  “Sure thing. I’ll take a quick break to carry it over for you. Where is it?”

  “Kitchen counter.”

  While Killian moved the turkey, I turned back to Tarvish.

  “When did you get here?” I looked around. “Is Rowan with you?”

  Tarvish shook his head. “No, but she’ll be along shortly. I thought I’d come over early to help out.”

  I didn’t see any cab outside. “Did you walk?”

  “I did. I want to get to know my new home, and I’m used to walking for miles with…” He paused. “Well, I always thought I was used to walking for miles with my dungeon friends. I guess that’s all fiction, too, isn’t it?”

  I wanted to take his mind off of his origins, so asked, “How does life here suit you? Are you enjoying yourself?”

  “Well, it’s different than the life I’m used to, but all in all I like this town. And in an odd way, I feel like I fit in here.” He gave me a two-finger salute and went back to work.

  As I watched them work together, I realized that Killian and Tarvish were actually getting along. A thought occurred to me and I walked back over to Tarvish.

  “So, have you thought of a new name yet?” I asked.

  “Actually, I think I’ve decided to keep ‘Tarvish.’ It would feel odd to change it. I may change my mind later, if I hear one I particularly like. I do find that, in your world, not all names are unique. That was a surprise.”

  I started to say that was due to his dungeon master, but then realized he wouldn’t understand what I was talking about. I smiled and turned back to the house.

  Chapter Nineteen

  I had finished making the gravy by the time Rowan arrived. I figured a gallon should be plenty, but you could never have too much gravy when it came to Thanksgiving. Especially when you had invited as many people as I had, and several of them were men with big appetites. I marked down on my seating chart that Alicia would be there and made a place card setting for her.

  Rowan bustled in, her arms filled with packages. I helped her carry them over to the dining room table and watched as she quickly began to unpack a number of electronic devices.

  “Are those the wires?” I asked.

  “We found the smallest ones we could. And while I doubt that Sheryl is going to be frisking you, these easily hide inside a bra. If she searches there, well, you’re in trouble.”

  “If she tries to search me there, she’s going to get slapped in the face.” I looked over the other things. “What are all these?”

  She held up two small bottles. “These are potions that should help deflect the energy drain in case something goes wrong. I’ve been working on the spell since yesterday. I was up all night perfecting it. The Court Magika didn’t have anything like it, but now we do. It will also deflect energy drain from astral creatures. So if we ever have to fight an astral demon, we’ll be ready.”

  “Does it deflect a vampire?” I asked, thinking that it would be nice if it could deflect any sort of drain.

  “Unfortunately, no. Garlic is still your best bet for that.” She paused, then said, “Val Slater asked about you last night. I saw him when I was at Ruby’s, getting takeout. He wanted to know how you were doing.” She gave me a long look. “Have you been talking to him lately?”

  Val Slater had been off my radar for a while, thank gods. “No. I’m trying to stay away from him because it bothers Killian when I talk to him. I hate this feud they have going, and I know that for a while it had smoothed over, but lately Killian’s been bristling again. Those two just rub each other the wrong way.”

  “It’s you. Val likes you a lot. Too much, in my opinion. I think he thinks Killian’s not good enough for you.”

  “It’s not his place to think about me at all. I’m not about to start dating him.”

  “I know. Killian’s a good man, and I like him a lot. But you could do worse than Val.” Rowan paused, and looked up at me. “Just be cautious. When you talk to Val, don’t be too friendly. I think he feels he has some hope, and it’s never good to lead a vampire on. Even when you aren’t deliberately doing so.”

  I glanced at the clock. It was four-thirty, so we had about two hours before Ari was due. I turned to Rowan. “What’s going to happen to all the consultants who are part of the Majikoil system? Are they all going to be arrested?”

  She shook her head. “Systems like this, pyramid schemes, lure people in with the promise of easy money. Usually, they attract two types—those who are greedy and who know what they’re getting into, or those who are desperate. We’ll dissolve the company, and notify people as to what happened. We’ll also send out a warning about how to identify multilevel marketing scams.”

  “So some people will just be out several years of their lives.”

  “There’s not much we can do. We don’t know how much life she drew off of each person. At least we’ll catch her before the operation becomes huge.”

  “What’s going to happen to Sheryl?” It wasn’t that I particularly cared about what would happen to her, but I was curious.

  “She’ll be sentenced, although I’m not sure what the punishment will be. All the extra life she has siphoned from others will be drained from her and formed into healing potions. They’ll be delivered to various Otherkin doctors to use on patients who are in need.” Rowan glanced over at me, giving me a partial smile. “You’re doing the right thing, never doubt that.”

  I brushed a stray hair back from my face. “I don’t feel sorry for Sheryl at all. But I can’t help but wonder if she came up with the scheme herself. She doesn’t seem smart enough, Rowan. I can’t help but feel like there’s somebody else behind this.”

  “You could be right. She could have a silent partner. Unfortunately, to nip this in the bud means we go after the visible face of the company. We don’t have the luxury to infiltrate this on a deeper level. A movement like this can get out of hand faster than you might think, and it’s imperative that we put a stop to it before it reaches critical mass.”

  “The Court thinks this could spiral out of control, then?”

  “Yes. I bet you anything that very shortly, a one-time life-energy donation won’t be enough. In fact, we expect her to start requiring monthly donations. And that will trickle down through the organization. It hasn’t been around long enough to form into the monster that we can foresee, and we want to stop it before then.”

  I suddenly read between the lines of what she was saying. “Are you telling me that someone sees Majikoil becoming a bigger threat? An oracle?”

  Rowan held my gaze. “You didn’t hear that from me. I didn’t say a word.” But by the tone of her voice, I knew I was right.

  After we had set out all the equipment, Rowan and I went down to my studio in the basement. We still had ninety minutes before Ari was due, and Rowan wanted to put me through the paces of my last lesson.

  “First, I want you to deconstruct this stone.” She motioned for me to hold up my hand, and when I did she placed a petal-pink stone on it. The crystalline structure looked fragile. I recognized it as halite, commonly known as rock salt. “Now focus on this and deconstruct it.”

  I stared at it, holding my palm as steady as I could. As I began to lower myself into trance, I connected with the mineral. I could almost taste salt on my tongue. I probed the crystals, looking for the cleavage. Using the force of my energy, I visualized the fractures breaking, falling apart my hand. I drove all my force into it, like an invisible lever, prying the crystals apart.

  A moment later the rock salt began to shiver on my hand. Then, two of the crystals on the top fell off, onto my palm. I drove the energy forward, focusing on the heart of the cluster. Another moment, and the halite crumbled. I was left with a pile of rock salt in my hand.

  “Very good,” Rowan said. “Now, I want you to melt it. I know that you aren’t as connected to the water magically as you are the earth, but I want you to raise the temperature in your hand.”

  I focused on my hand, dri
ving heat out of my body, into my palm. The center of my palm became hot, sweaty, and damp. Another moment and crystals of the rock salt began to melt.

  Rowan clapped her hands. “You’re doing exceptionally well. I know these exercises seem silly, to an extent, but you have to start somewhere. And you have so much potential. Eventually, I’m guessing you’ll be able to occasionally break rocks with your mind.”

  “Seems almost easier to take karate and start breaking them with my hand,” I joked. But I was proud of myself. We had been working on this exercise for the past three weeks, and at most I had made a few of the crystals fall off, but never had broken down the structure entirely.

  She held out a small bowl and I poured the rock salt into it and wiped off my hand. “Rowan, how powerful was my mother?”

  “More powerful than I was. So powerful that she was afraid of her own potential. She severely limited herself, and she hampered your development. I know you love her, and she loved you, but she was afraid of her magic. Althea had a lot of your great-grandmother in her. Colleen Fletcher was an incredibly powerful witch.”

  I remained silent for a moment, then finally asked the question I had wanted to for a long time. “How did the man who murdered Colleen’s daughter die?”

  “Did she write about it in her journal?” Rowan said without missing a beat.

  “To some extent. She said you helped her.” I had been leery about discussing what Great-Grandma Colleen had written in her diary. I wasn’t sure how far I could push Rowan in terms of talking about things that had happened a couple hundred years ago.

  Rowan motioned for me to sit beside her. “I knew this was coming at some point because your great-grandmother couldn’t keep a secret. The man who murdered Lara was a serial killer. I knew that the moment we encountered him. And we couldn’t find the proof that he had killed Lara, but we knew that he would kill again, if given the chance. I bewitched the sheriff into forgetting that he had ever seen Lara’s body, or the man who killed her. In fact, I bewitched the deputies too. Val helped me.”

  “Val Slater?”

  “Yes, Val was around back then.”

  “Colleen mentioned that you and she did something so that the sheriff believed Lara wandered off into the forest. Why did the two of you keep her murder silent?”

  Rowan leaned back in her chair, tapping her fingers on the table. “If it had come out that there was a serial killer in town, Moonshadow Bay would quickly have ceased to exist. The fear would have driven people off.”

  “But you and my grandmother knew who did it.”

  “Yes, and it took us several months to find him. Val and I glamoured the sheriff and his deputies, and Colleen threw a glamour on her husband. We did it to save the town.”

  “How did you track him down? The killer?”

  “Colleen and I spent several months doing intense trance work. We found out that one of the local farmers had been responsible. We also discovered more blood on his hands. Lara was the fourth girl he killed.”

  “So, you and my great-grandmother…”

  “We lured him into the Mystic Wood. He went willingly. Once we were deep inside the forest, I gave him a potion that stopped his heart. We had dragged out an old trunk earlier, and we put his body in there. I had asked Val to go there earlier, and he dug a grave for us. Very deep into the earth. Vampires are super-strong. Then he left, never asking any questions.”

  “And you and Colleen buried the man in the trunk, deep in that grave. Who filled it in?”

  Rowan shrugged. “Filling in a grave is much easier than digging one. Colleen and I did it together, aided by one of the Woodlings. We made a blood oath over it, that we would never breathe a word to anyone, not until the other had died. Colleen’s long gone, so I don’t think it matters anymore.”

  I thought over what she said. Part of me wanted to go out in the woods and find that trunk, to unearth it from the murky grave it was in, to open it and see for myself. But I knew I wouldn’t. It was a family secret, my great-grandmother’s secret and my grandmother’s secret. And I would keep it with me, deep in my heart, till the day I died.

  “I’d like to ask you one more thing, and then I won’t ever mention this again. Well, two things, I guess. One: who was the man who killed Lara? And two: did you ever sleep with my great-grandfather, Brian?”

  Once again, Rowan held my gaze steady with hers. “His name was Nate, Nathaniel O’Leary. As to the second half of your question, I reserve the right not to answer. But perhaps you should ask yourself whether you are asking the correct question. Brian was a friend of mine. But Colleen…she was the one that I was willing to kill for.”

  Startled by her answer, I fell silent for a moment as I took in the meaning of her words. Finally, I asked, “Did you want me to do any other exercises while we wait?”

  Rowan shook her head. “No, I think we’ve done quite enough this evening. Let’s go upstairs and relax while we wait for Ari.”

  Ari showed up about an hour later. It was six-forty p.m.

  “I’m sorry I’m late, but my last client didn’t show up on time. As it is, I cut her appointment short so I could make it.”

  “Not a problem,” Rowan said. “Here, let me show you what these wireless microphones do.”

  She did, and then we fastened them into our bras.

  Rowan held up a device that looked like a tape recorder. “It’s digital, so it will record everything that you say and hear within a ten-foot radius. Don’t walk too far away from Sheryl or you’ll lose what she says. We need to record as much as we can about the energy exchange being a way to gain extra life, and anything you can get her to say about recruiting bringing in good money. You might consider expressing some last-minute hesitation so that she can try to convince you that it’s worth it.”

  “Got it. Is there anything we shouldn’t do? Anything that would tip her off?” I asked.

  “Don’t just offer her your energy. She has to insist on payment. The checks are good, actually, so if she runs them through a phone app, they’ll clear. We set up a dummy account.”

  “Sounds good,” I said. “I’m nervous. What if she’s got a gun? What if she’s not as unassuming as she seems?”

  Ari laughed. “I don’t see her as unassuming at all.”

  Just then, Killian trooped in with Tarvish behind him. “We’re starved,” Killian said.

  I motioned to the kitchen. “Doughnuts are on the table, and milk is in the fridge. I don’t have time to cook, so what you see is what you get.”

  “What about you? Is there anything in particular you want?” Killian asked.

  “By the time we finish this, I’ll probably be starved, but right now I’m too nervous to think about food.”

  “Killian tells me you are off on a quest,” Tarvish said “if you run into any orcs, let me know. They’re my specialty.”

  I gave him a serious smile. “Thank you, but I doubt we’ll run into any orcs. Just eat what you’d like or order in. Chinese sounds good, though so does Mexican. If you have any leftovers, I’ll eat whatever.”

  And with that, Rowan went back to showing us how to use the equipment as we prepared to infiltrate Majikoil.

  Chapter Twenty

  After Rowan wired Ari and me up, the microphones hidden in our bras, we headed out onto the porch. There was a black van in the driveway, unmarked, and I couldn’t see who was driving it. The van had tinted windows.

  “Don’t ask to be introduced to the officers, it’s better that you don’t see their faces. They stay in the shadows, at least for now.”

  While Esmara’s warning lingered in my head, I could tell there were at least two men in the van. I decided I would have to trust Rowan to be good on her word. Ari and I climbed into my Ocelot and I put it in gear and slowly eased out of the driveway, past the van. I glanced in the rearview mirror. They were following, but at a distance. Of course they wouldn’t want to appear too obvious, so I expected they would park several houses away when we got there.r />
  As we headed for 2416 Weatherby Street, I told Ari about the articles I had read.

  “So, Sheryl vanished for over a month and as far as the news articles I found went, no one ever figured out why. I wonder if anybody has asked her about it.”

  “I don’t know, but I don’t think we should.”

  Weatherby Street extended into the Mystic Wood, and Sheryl’s house was at the end of the lane. Weatherby was a private road, and as I drove past the barrier announcing that we were in the forest proper, a gloom descended over the neighborhood. Granted, it was dark and cold and starting to rain again, but the murkiness felt different than the everyday gloom caused by overcast skies. This was like a shadow, hiding behind the streetlights.

  “I wouldn’t want to live here if the power went out,” I said.

  Ari must been thinking the same thing as I was because she shook her head as she stared out the window. “You couldn’t pay me to live here. I like the Mystic Wood, but there’s something different about this area.”

  “I’m not going to disagree.”

  “We’re being watched,” Ari said.

  I could feel them, in the forest, congregating to the sidelines. I wasn’t sure what they were, whether they were ghosts or shades or some dark creatures hiding in the woodland. Not wanting to find out, I kept my eyes on the road while Ari looked for Sheryl’s address.

  Sheryl’s house was at the end of the cul-de-sac. I pulled up to the sidewalk. We sat there for a moment, looking around, protected by the car. I glanced into the rearview mirror, looking for any sign of the van, before I saw them turn onto the street. They parked a ways down from us.

  “There they are.” I opened the door and motioned to Ari. “We better get inside.” I paused. “I’m nervous.”

  Ari glanced at me from across the seat. “You and me both. But we just have to make it through this evening and we can forget about it.”

  I gave her a nod, and we headed toward the door.