Magic Burns

by Ilona Andrews

  We dismounted, tied our horses to the rail, and went up the concrete steps to where the entrance used to be. Solid rock. Not even a crevice.

  The magic fell.

  “Window,” Ghastek said.

  Three stories from the ground a pane of glass shone, catching the sun.

  The bloodsucker gathered itself like a cat and launched up onto the wall, finding purchase on the sheer cliff with the ease of a fly. It turned around, hanging upside down, and offered me an arm.

  “I’ll climb myself, thanks.”

  “It will cost us time.”

  “That’s fine with me.”

  It’d been a long time since I had gone rock climbing. By the time I made it to the window, Derek and the bloodsucker had been waiting for a good minute. Ghastek scooted the vamp to the side to make room for me. “You delayed us. It’s simply not efficient.”

  I huffed. “Spare me.”

  Derek knocked on the window. No answer. He rammed his fist into the glass. The window pane exploded into the apartment. We climbed into the hole one by one and let ourselves out of the apartment. Neither of us mentioned the illegality of our smooth maneuver.

  We made it to the fifteenth floor, and I stole a little break by taking my time to find the right door.

  “So what sort of person is this expert?” Derek asked.

  “The very intelligent, methodical kind. Somber, even. Saiman enjoys erudite discussions. He’s like Ghastek—” With a sex drive. “He’s like Ghastek except instead of piloting vampires, he indulges in books and late night debate on the virtues of Mongolian folklore.”

  “Wonderful.” Derek rolled his eyes.

  I nodded to the vamp. “The two of you will probably hit it off.”

  The magic flooded us again. This time Derek was ready—his face showed no change. Ghastek, on the other hand, halted in midrise halfway off the ground.

  I unsheathed Slayer. Derek backed away, giving himself room for a leap. If the vamp went berserk, we’d be in a hell of a lot of trouble.

  “Ghastek?” I murmured.

  “Just a second.” His voice sounded muffled.

  “Are you losing your grip on him?”

  “What?”

  The vampire dropped to the floor, regarding me with blood-drenched eyes. “Whatever led you to that conclusion?”

  “You froze.”

  “If you must know, an apprentice brought me my espresso and I burned my tongue on it.”

  Derek grimaced, disgust practically dripping off his face.

  “Can we enter or not?” Ghastek said.

  I slid Slayer’s blade into the box of the electronic lock. Like many things in Champion Heights, the lock was magic masquerading as technology.

  “Anything else we need to know?” Derek asked.

  “Just don’t stare if he decides to do his thing. He’ll draw it out.” The memory alone made me queasy.

  “What thing?” Derek asked.

  “He changes shapes. He’s limited to human only, as far as I know, but within that limitation he can assume almost any form.”

  “Is he a danger?”

  His tone had a slightly driven tint to it. His blood oath acting up again. “I met him through the Guild, when I was a merc. On bodyguard detail. I saved his life and now he gives me a discount. Basically, he humors me and tries to get into my pants. He’s harmless.”

  I put my hand on Slayer’s blade, fed a little power into the blade, and pushed the door with my fingers. It slid open.

  Beyond the door lay Saiman’s apartment: an ultramodern backdrop of steel and plush cushions, blending into a monochromatic, almost sterile, whole.

  “Saiman?” I called, crossing the white rug.

  No answer. A blast of chill air hit me. The enormous floor-to-ceiling window stood open, half of its pane slid aside. Beyond the pane a snow-strewn ledge, barely four feet wide, hugged the building. I stuck my head through the opening. The ledge spiraled to the roof. A trail of footprints led up through the snow.

  “IT APPEARS HE TOOK A WALK IN THE SNOW. BAREFOOT.” I stepped back into the apartment.

  “I’ll go first,” Derek said.

  Before I could say anything, he ducked into the opening and headed up the ledge. Damn it. I followed him. Behind me the vamp climbed the cliff. Using ledges and paths was clearly below Ghastek.

  Wind slapped me. My feet slid a little and I pressed against the side of the building. I crouched and rubbed the snow with my hand. Under the snowflakes, the ledge was ice. Figured.

  The entire city stretched below, so small, it looked almost tidy from this height. Between me and that tidy city lay a dizzying drop. I swallowed. I could do a lot of things but I was pretty sure I couldn’t sprout wings and fly. Right after my father’s death, when I was fifteen, Greg had taken me to his ex-wife’s house in the Smoky Mountains. That was the last time I could remember being this high. It felt a lot different sitting on the edge of a mountain cliff. In fact, compared to crawling up a four-foot ledge made of ice, sitting on a mountain, dangling your feet over the edge, was downright comfy.

  Another gust hit me. I gritted my teeth and peeled myself from the wall. Keep moving, wuss. One foot before the other. As long as I didn’t think about falling. Or looking down there…Boy, that’s high.

  The ground beckoned me. I almost wanted to jump. How the hell did people ever live in high-rises?

  Above me female laughter rang out, followed by a low warning growl. Oh crap. Derek. I tore my gaze from the drop and started up the ledge.

  I can do this. I just need to keep moving.

  The ledge brought me halfway around the building. A large picturesque iceberg blocked most of the view from this side. More laughter floated on the breeze. Something was going on up there. What possessed Saiman to prance around in the snow barefoot anyway? And why was there snow atop the high-rise? It was bloody June, for crying out loud.

  I climbed the last few feet separating me from the top. My feet found the solid roof under the blanket of snow. Finally.

  I skirted the iceberg and saw Derek. He stood rigid, hands spread wide, his upper lip wrinkled in a preemptive growl. He was trying his best not to touch a blonde whose hands rested on his shoulders.

  She was nude. Short, with hair down to her butt, she was proportioned with an almost obscene generosity: round ass, solid thighs, big heavy breasts tipped by pink nipples. Considering the size of her waist, it was a wonder she didn’t fold in half under the weight of her boobs. Her skin glowed, almost as if lit from within by sunshine, and so she stood there, naked, unashamed, golden. Sex in the snow. She looked at Derek with huge eyes and purred. “A puppy. Play with me!”

  Derek’s eyes had gone completely yellow.

  Past him, Ghastek’s vamp crouched on the edge, making no move to assist.

  I swiped a chunk of crusty snow, clamped it into a ball, and hurled it at the blonde. The snowball hit her upside the head, bursting into powder.

  “Saiman! Step away from him!”

  The blonde whipped her head around. “Kate…”

  Her body twisted with preternatural fluidity. Female flesh melted like wax and re-formed into a muscle-corded frame. She swept toward me through the snow, growing, twisting, molding, hardening, too fast to follow and then a man wrapped his arm around my waist pulling me to him.

  He was tall, perfectly proportioned, and muscled like a Roman statue. The same golden radiance that had illuminated the blonde lit his skin from within. His hair, a deep red streaked with gold, fell to his waist without a trace of a curl. His face was angular, yet masculine, and his grin had a mordant edge sharp enough to draw blood. He leaned toward me and I got a good look at his eyes. They were orange. Radiant, brilliant orange, streaked with pale green that almost looked like the crystals of ice growing on a window during a freeze.

  They did not look human.

  “Kate,” he repeated, pulling me closer. He towered at least half a foot above me. Snowflakes swirled around us. His breath smelled like
honey. “I’m so glad you came to visit. I was so dreadfully bored.”

  That’s it. The flare had driven him insane.

  I tried to pull away, but Saiman held me tight. There was strength in those arms that I had never expected. If I struggled too much, Derek would go ballistic. A woman wrestling with a naked man who probably outweighed her by eighty pounds tended to trigger onlookers’ protective instincts, even if they weren’t bound by a blood oath.

  “Derek, please go down to the apartment and wait for me at the window.”

  He just stood there.

  “Jealous?” Saiman laughed.

  I tore myself long enough from those eyes to stare at Derek. “Please go.”

  Slowly, as if waking up from a dream, he turned and left the roof.

  “What about the vampire?” Saiman asked.

  “Just ignore me,” Ghastek said. “Think of me as a fly on the wall.”

  Bastard.

  Saiman touched my hair and I felt my braid unwinding on its own. In a moment, my hair framed my face. “What happened to you?” I asked.

  He grinned wider. “Deep magic. It sings in my bones. Don’t you feel it?”

  I felt it. It had pulsed through me like a wild wine ever since this magic wave had hit. Power twisted and wound within me, wanting to break loose, but I had held it in check this long and I wasn’t about to let myself off the leash now.

  “Can you dance?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Dance with me, Kate!”

  And we were off, spinning and twirling through the snow, raising glittering snowflakes with our feet. The snow refused to fall but chased us, following our movement like a light shroud. It was a wild dance, primitive and fast, and all I could do was follow his lead.

  “I need some information,” I yelled at a strategic moment.

  He clamped my waist, picked me up like I weighed nothing, and spun around. “Ask.”

  “Too complicated for a fast dance.”

  He set me into the snow and held me close in a classic stance, one hand on my waist, one cradling my fingers. “Then we’ll dance slowly. Put your arms around me.”

  No! “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

  We moved gently through the snow. “Things are chasing me.” Which wasn’t strictly true, but considering the circumstances, brevity was a virtue. “They’re called reeves. They are undead. Their hair can tangle you up and hold you like a lasso.”

  “I don’t know what they are.”

  “They are piloted by a tall creature who wears a white habit like a monk. He has tentacles. His name is Bolgor the Shepherd. I was told he’s a Fomorian.”

  “I don’t know him, either.”

  Damn it, Saiman. “What would a sea-demon want in our world?”

  “What we all want: life.” Saiman leaned in close, his lips nearly brushing my cheek. His eyes drew me in, and I knew that if I looked too long into them, I would forget why I came here.

  “This Shepherd’s hunting a young girl. Can you research why?”

  “I could, but there is too much magic. I can’t concentrate. I would rather dance. It’s a magic time, Kate! Time of the gods.”

  The thought of mentioning money briefly popped into my head. But then he always gave me a discount, both because I had once saved his life and because he found me entertaining. He wasn’t that interested in money even during normal time, and right now he was simply too far gone.

  “Morrigan is somehow involved. And a cauldron,” I said.

  His face was alarmingly close to mine.

  “The Celts have a liking for the cauldrons. Cauldrons of plenty. Cauldrons of knowledge. Cauldrons of rebirth.” His breath warmed my cheek. His hands were warm, too. By all rights he should have been freezing.

  “Cauldron of rebirth?”

  “A gateway to the Otherworld.”

  He tried to dip me, but I resisted and he smoothly turned the dip into a turn.

  “Tell me more about it.”

  “You should ask the witches. They know. But ask later. After the deep magic wanes.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if you leave, I’ll be bored again.”

  Oh crap. “Tell me more about the witches. Which coven should I ask?”

  “All of them.”

  He slid my hand onto his shoulder. I pulled back, but he already held my shoulders, hugging me tight to him. His huge erection pressed against me. Great, just great.

  “How can I ask all of the covens? There are dozens in the city.”

  “Simple.” Honeyed breath washed over me. “You ask the Witch Oracle.”

  “The witches have an oracle?” We had slowed down to mere shuffling now. I shuffled backward, heading toward the end of the roof where the ledge lay.

  “In Centennial Park,” he said softly. “There are three of them. They speak for all the covens. I hear they have a problem they can’t fix.”

  “Then it’s best I go to them.”

  He shook his head. “But then I’ll be all alone.”

  “I have to go.”

  “You never stay.” He turned his head and kissed my fingers. “Stay with me. It will be fun.”

  I noticed the ice building around us. If this kept going, we would be encased in an igloo in a matter of minutes.

  “Why is the ice growing?”

  “It’s jealous. Of the vampire!” He laughed, throwing his head back like it was the funniest thing.

  I knocked his hands off my shoulders and jumped off the roof.

  I landed in a crouch on the ledge and slipped. My back slapped the ice. I slid, rolling down the narrow path. I dug my heels into the snow, grasping at the wall to slow myself down, but my hands slipped. I hurtled along the path, helpless to stop my fall.

  The end of the ledge flashed, feet away.

  I ripped a knife from its sheath and stabbed it into the ledge. The momentum carried me forward and I jerked to a halt, my legs suspended over the edge. Carefully I flexed my arms and slid myself back onto the ledge, trying very hard not to think of the bottomless chasm yawning at my feet.

  Derek grabbed my shoulder, pulled me up, and neatly deposited me on the carpet within the apartment. “Some expert,” he growled.

  “Yeah. Last time I come here.” My brain finally realized that I wouldn’t be falling from fifteen stories and impersonating a pancake on the ground. I scrambled to my feet. “I owe you one.”

  He shrugged. “You had it anyway. I just sped it up a bit.”

  The vampire met us as we untied our horses.

  “You dance very well,” Ghastek said.

  “Not a word. Not another bloody word.”

  CHAPTER 14

  “SO THIS SAIMAN, HE HAS A THING FOR YOU?” DEREK asked.

  “Right now Saiman has a thing for everyone, including you, from what I saw. He’s drunk on magic and bored.” I finished rebraiding my hair and guided my horse up Marietta Street toward the dense forest that used to be the twenty-one acres of Centennial Park. I really didn’t feel like continuing this conversation.

  The magic fell. It would reassert itself in a minute: the waves had been coming one after another, short and intense.

  “It appeared you were definitely his preferred entertainment,” Ghastek said.

  Asshole. “It didn’t matter who was up on that roof, he would’ve changed his shape until he found a perfect fit.”

  “In more ways than one.” The vampire cut in front of the horses again.

  “Thank you for your commentary. I noticed you didn’t do anything to help.”

  “You seemed to have the matter well in hand.” Ghastek sent his vamp galloping forward, ahead of us. When confronted, run away. My favorite strategy.

  “Look,” Derek said, “all I’m saying is it would’ve been helpful to have all relevant information before we walked in there.”

  “I didn’t have all the relevant information. Had I known he would be on the roof dancing in the snow, I wouldn’t have gone up there.”


  “I can’t effectively help or protect you…” Derek said.

  I turned in my saddle. “Derek, I didn’t ask you to protect me. I didn’t ask you to come with me. If I had realized that you would be imitating Curran the entire time, I would’ve thought twice about letting you tag along.”

  Derek clamped his mouth shut.

  Ahead of us the vamp turned to the left, loping onto Centennial Drive.

  That wasn’t a good thing to say. I halted my horse. Derek stopped, too.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap.”

  “Who should I imitate, Kate?” he asked softly.

  I didn’t have an answer.

  “Or are you going to give me a load of bullshit about being myself? Who would that be, Kate? A son of a loup and a murderer, who couldn’t save his sisters from being raped and then eaten alive by their father. Why would I want to be that?”

  I leaned back in my saddle, wishing I could exhale all of the weight that had settled on my shoulders. “I apologize. I was wrong.”

  He sat still for a long minute and nodded to me. The vamp halted in the street, waiting for us.

  “I shouldn’t have nagged,” he said. “I get like that sometimes.”

  “It’s okay.” I sent my horse forward. I knew why he got like that. I’ve seen him meticulously fold his clothes. His shave was perfect, his hair cut short, his nails clean and trimmed. I bet his room didn’t have a single item out of place. When you live in chaos as a child, you strive to impose order over the world. Unfortunately, the world refuses to comply, so you have to settle for trying to control yourself, your habitat, and your friends.

  “I’m just worried about a lot of things,” I said.

  “Julie?” he guessed.

  “Yes.”

  I wished I could have called in to check on them, but I had no clue where I could find a working phone line and with the preflare magic, the phone probably wouldn’t work anyway. Andrea had promised to stay with her. Barred from the field or not, Andrea could shoot a squirrel in the eye from across the street.

  “It’s hard for you,” Derek observed. “To rely on other people, I mean.”

  For a moment I wondered if he had developed telepathy, too. “What makes you say that?”