Running into Fire: An Urban Fantasy Adventure (Magic of Nasci Book 3)

by DM Fike

  CHAPTER 3

  I FOUND FECHIN, Guntram’s favorite raven, literally hopping mad a short hike away. He jumped from branch to branch, screeching until I dove back into the tree line, away from the trail.

  “Yeah, yeah,” I muttered up at the stupid bird. “We mustn’t ever take the easy route, must we? Gotta make things as difficult as possible.” I forged a path toward the nearest wisp channel, the magical portals shepherds use to teleport from place to place. I’d memorized most of the wisp locations in the Talol Wilds so I could zip around the region with ease. That’s not to say I didn’t miss driving cars, but will o’ the wisps were a helluva lot more discrete, especially in remote areas.

  Fechin stalked me overhead, not letting me out of his sight. Ever since I’d disobeyed orders to track down a nasty panther vaettur a few weeks back, Guntram had kept his little minion tight on my tail.

  I hated having winged babysitters wherever I went.

  “You know I’m supposed to pick up batteries, right?” I called up to the bird. “I’m not heading straight home.”

  Fechin squawked in reply. Maybe it looked like we were talking, but I had no idea what he said. I can’t imprint with Guntram’s kidama. Only my augur knew what rattled around their birdbrains.

  A series of soft blue pulses flickered ahead at the base of a Sitka spruce. The raven wouldn’t be able to follow me through the wisp channel itself, since only shepherds can do that. He would, however, confirm that I’d left the area, and then either he or another raven would fly to the next wisp channel to keep track of me.

  But just because Guntram wanted them to watch me didn’t mean they could keep up.

  I waved at Fechin. “See ya!” I only heard his first shrill note before I leapt into the twinkling lights, the underwater-like silence of teleportation filling my ears.

  I didn’t pause once my feet hit the other side. Instead, I took off in a sprint, barreling my way through more woods. There were three wisp channels within a mile from here. Guntram’s ravens would likely assume that I’d take one that would get me closest to a population center. Instead, I detoured to a channel that would take me to the outskirts of Mapleton, a not-quite-town where I had a secret stash of personal items.

  I huffed and puffed as I approached the second channel, glancing at the sky for signs of ravens. I thought I heard one faintly in the distance, but that could have been my imagination. I took the plunge into more pulsating lights before I could confirm either way.

  I kept running yet again, away from all wisp channels and toward an old farm property where the ravens probably wouldn’t look for me. I sailed out of the forest across an open meadow, the yellow grass crunching beneath my feet. Despite a few early thunderstorms, it had been a relatively mild spring. I took care not to trample any purple camas flowers as I dashed back into the woods.

  I maintained a pleasant gait until I reached the dilapidated shed with the turquoise roof that marked the edge of the farm. I strained my ears, but instead of ravens, I heard the sharp bark of a bullmastiff. The dog bared his teeth as he raced from a corner of the farmhouse toward me.

  “Hey, boy!” I called. He jumped at me, not to attack, but for affection, front paws planting on my thighs. I bent over to give him a vigorous scruff between the ears. Glancing over at the house, I observed two rusty vehicles and one old pick-up truck in questionable working order. The old hermit who lived here was home. I’m sure he wouldn’t have approved of his pooch making friends with a stranger but too bad for him. Shepherds get along with pretty much all animals.

  I played with the dog, throwing a stick for him twice before launching it far into the air with pith, where it would take him a while to find. Then I ducked into the shed for the real reason I came.

  Most shepherds may shun human civilization and all their comforts, but not me. I love modern amenities. I had a cell phone for a while until Guntram caught me texting instead of doing chores. Fortunately, he didn’t know how to turn the phone on, so he didn’t know who I’d been communicating with. He’d flip his beard if he found out.

  That’s why I keep small stashes of hidden goodies all over the Talol Wilds. Sometimes a free spirit wants to connect to the real world. I weaved my way through the shed’s cobwebs and battered farm tools to a sagging shelf along the back wall. There, behind ancient paint cans and a massive spider I shooed away, I snatched a satchel filled with single dollar bills. I took out the whole wad and stuffed it in my hoodie’s kangaroo pouch. It wasn’t a lot, but it would have to do for now. Batteries weren’t cheap.

  I slipped back outside. I fully expected to run into the dog but not his aging owner, aiming a shotgun at me.

  The geezer wore an oversized flannel shirt over jeans held up by suspenders. His once-bright white sneakers were stained with grass. He glared at me underneath his red ball cap. I had to hand it to the geezer, I had not heard him as I rummaged around the shed. Although he was stooped over at an odd angle, he still had a solid steel glint in his eye. He shook only slightly as he clutched his weapon with both gnarled hands.

  “Whatcha doin’ on my property?”

  I held up my hands slowly. I wore a defensive charm which I’d learned from personal experience would stop bullets, but it hurt like a mofo. I preferred not to limp back to the homestead.

  “Sorry, sir. I…” I trailed off, not having a good reason to be trespassing. I doubted he would appreciate me using his shed as a hillbilly ATM.

  His dog returned triumphant with stick in mouth, interrupting my clumsy reply. Wagging, he trotted right up to me and dropped the twig at my boots.

  The geezer’s gun faltered. “Rufus!” he snapped. “This here’s a stranger. What’s wrong with you?”

  “Rufus,” I repeated with a smile. “That’s a great name.” I leaned forward to retrieve the stick.

  The gun rose back to attention. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Playing fetch,” I replied matter-of-factly. “Isn’t that what you do with dogs?”

  The geezer scowled. “Rufus don’t play.”

  “Is that so?” I pulled my arm back, careful not to make too many sudden movements and scare the old man. “Because Rufus has always played with me before.”

  “Now see here, Rufus hates everyone. He barely tolerates me. If you believe you can just waltz around my property and do whatever you please, you got another thing coming!”

  Ignoring him, I chucked the stick. Hard.

  The geezer went slack-jawed as his dog barked gleefully, hunting his wooden prey. The old fart had to turn his whole body to follow its trajectory. I used that distraction to dodge outside his narrow cone of vision, back around the shed and toward the woods.

  “Hey!” I heard him yell as I ducked under cover. The distinctive boom of a shotgun blast echoed behind me, but nothing struck my back. The geezer missed me by a mile. Not slowing my pace, I raced through the forest until his cursing faded.

  Well, that was more drama than I needed. Much as I loved hanging out with Rufus, I wrote that stash site off for good. At least I’d taken out all my cash. I’d never bother that nasty old dude again.

  * * *

  I wisped my way to Florence, the seaside town with real retail shops with mostly reasonable prices (for a resort town). Inside a sprawling department store, I grabbed a basket and loaded up on batteries with extra cash left for junk food. The employees gave my mud-caked boots and disheveled hair a few disapproving glances, but they’d experienced enough wilderness bums not to make too much of a fuss. As I walked out the automatic doors, I knew I should return to the homestead.

  Instead I sought out one Vincent Garcia.

  We had a complicated relationship. Game warden and police officer extraordinaire Vincent and I had met by accident when a vaettur ran amok in his jurisdiction. He couldn’t see the vaettur (because non-shepherds can’t), so he assumed that I had poached a bunch of animals. We’ve since smoothed that all out, and Vincent even helped me track that panther vaettur that atta
cked us a few weeks ago. Despite this, Guntram forbade me from having any contact with him.

  Cough, cough.

  So yeah, I’d been texting Vincent when Guntram took my phone. It had been mostly harmless banter. He was someone I could gripe to about shepherd life. He’d filled me in on his life too—the ins and outs of his job that straddles the line between ranger and cop, his strained relationship with his family for taking up a profession they saw as immoral, etc. You know, the stuff friends talk about. Vincent knew where the homestead was (even if he couldn’t see it, shrouded in magic invisibility), so I had coaxed him into giving me his address. I’d looked up the location and had it committed to memory, which is how I knew he lived across the street from the department store.

  Paper bag tucked underneath my armpit, I dodged coastal highway traffic. My heart pounded, and not because I’d barely missed getting flattened by a service van. I hadn’t been able to text Vincent for several days. Had he tried to get ahold of me? Had he even noticed my silence?

  Vincent’s apartment complex looked new, if no frills, the kind of place bachelors rent. As I bounced up the wooden steps to his second story door, it didn’t occur to me until then that he might not be home. I knocked three times. No one answered. Glancing down at the empty parking lot, most people seemed gone to their 9-to-5 jobs. Vincent worked odd shifts, though. He could be home in ten minutes or ten hours.

  Or ten seconds. As I trudged down the steps back to the parking lot, a silver Subaru pulled in. I held my breath as the driver’s door opened, and a beige uniform with ebony hair poking underneath a crowned hat stepped out to scrutinize me.

  “Ina?” Vincent asked.

  I forced myself to play it cool. “Hey, Vince.”

  He broke out in a bright, relieved smile. “I was worried when you stopped responding to texts.”

  “Guntram found the phone. He wasn’t too pleased.”

  “Yeah, I bet.”

  Vincent fiddled with his keys. I shuffled from foot to foot. An awkward silence fell between us.

  Vincent finally gestured up toward his apartment. “Would you like to come up?”

  “Yes,” I replied before he’d finished speaking.

  Vincent said something about just getting off shift as he unlocked his apartment, but I barely heard as I eagerly took inventory of his home. It wasn’t anything special. The living room had a fold-out futon, entertainment stand with TV and gaming console, and a small, surprisingly neat kitchen with only a few dishes in the sink. He’d placed nothing on the cream-colored walls and piled dirty clothes in a heap just inside the hallway. Vincent left his shoes by the doorway, and I followed his example by removing my boots.

  “Sorry about the mess.” He used his socked feet to push the laundry back into a bedroom. He then crossed the living room toward a beat-up dining table and held up a paper bag of fast food. “And I didn’t bring any for you. I would have gotten French fries if I knew you were coming.”

  “Maybe we can share.” I put down my own offering of chips and pop next to his bag.

  Vincent gestured toward the futon. “You want to sit down?”

  I glanced down at my clothes. “I’d rather not get your mattress all muddy.”

  Vincent laughed. “Look who you’re talking to.” He gestured down to his own similarly stained attire.

  “I guess it’s a hazard of running around in the woods for a living.”

  “Normally, I’d’ve washed right after my shift.”

  “We should really take a shower,” I said. As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted the unintended double entendre. Whoa, Ina. Phrasing.

  Despite the fact that the room remained shrouded in late afternoon darkness, Vincent reddened visibly.

  “That came out wrong,” I quickly corrected. “Not together. Individually.”

  This put Vincent at ease. “Oh, okay. You could use the shower first if you want. It’s no hot spring.” He smiled slyly, referring to the pool shepherds used to heal ourselves. “But there’s hot water.”

  “Really?” I hadn’t taken a warm shower since I’d last visited my parents, which felt like forever ago. But I hesitated. “I only have the clothes I’m wearing. It seems kinda pointless to shower if I put on muddy clothes right after.” I didn’t mention I could shake them down with earth pith if I really wanted to, but that took more effort than I felt like expending.

  “If you can stay long enough, you can wash them in my laundry machine. And I’m sure I’ve got some clothes you could borrow while yours dry.”

  Now it was my turn to blush. I had not anticipated stripping at Vincent’s, even in private. My brain told me I should get back to the homestead before I did something I regretted, while my heart told me to go for it. I bit my lip as they both went to war.

  Vincent must have sensed my reluctance. “Not to put you on the spot or anything. I just know how much you miss creature comforts. Consider it an offer from one friend to another.”

  Using ‘friend’ did it for me. It had been a long time since I’d had one of those, and I didn’t wish to squander it. “Sure,” I relented. “Point me toward the shower.”

  Vincent grabbed a clean towel and spare set of clothes for me, then let me have free reign of his tiny bathroom. There was barely room to close the door, but at least it didn’t disgust me. Vincent’s pad obviously saw the business end of a sponge on a semi-regular basis, unlike most college dudes’ apartments I’d seen. I took a quick shower, basking in the pleasant pressure of millions of water pellets massaging my skin. I would have stayed longer, but I saved some hot water for Vincent.

  I cringed, pulling Vincent’s fun run T-shirt over my head. It felt intensely intimate and was way too big for me. The sport shorts he’d provided were much less sexy, given they accentuated my chicken legs. Still, I couldn’t walk around his apartment naked, so they would have to do.

  Afterwards, Vincent helped me start a batch of laundry and showed me how to operate the TV remote before taking his own shower. To my utter joy (and I do not use this term lightly), I surfed through Vincent’s cable channels. I missed bad television so much. I grabbed one of my bags of chips and opened a pop, wolfing them down as I watched a serial murder documentary.

  Vincent returned in a maroon tank top, a damp towel thrown over his shoulders, while the narrator described the third grizzly murder. He winced as actual crime scene photos of a pixelated body and blood flashed across the screen.

  “You like this stuff?”

  I swallowed a swig of cola. “You’re a cop. This should be your scene.”

  “You’re a nature wizard. You should be watching wildlife documentaries.”

  “Touché.” I pointed to a stack of video games on the entertainment center. “Maybe we should try some of those instead.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I warn you, I have no life. All I do is work and play games. You really think you can keep up?”

  “If it’ll take you down a notch, absolutely.”

  With the gauntlet properly thrown, we spent the next hour or two shifting through his fighting game collection. Vincent hadn’t been kidding about his gamer skills. He beat me handily for the first handful of rounds, but then took pity on me and switched to what he referred to as his B and C string characters. I finally won a few bouts. The banter between us swelled, as if we’d smack-talked each other since childhood.

  An unfamiliar contentedness swelled in my chest. Guntram kept my life super busy with shepherd training. I rarely had a moment’s rest, much less relaxation. I visited my parents whenever I could, but those were always stress-filled events that left me drained of all emotional energy. Hanging out with Vincent was like taking a break from creating a masterpiece—one-part guilt but four-parts relief.

  We lost track of time, only pausing long enough for me to check up on the laundry. We finally gave up when I developed controller calluses on my thumbs, and it hurt too much to continue.

  After a quick snack and bathroom break, we ended up sittin
g next to each other on opposite ends of the futon. “So,” Vincent said slowly, not really looking at me, “what really brings you here, Ina?”

  I opened my mouth to answer but realized I didn’t have an easy reply. It’d seemed natural to let Vincent know I was okay after radio silence, but that sounded too desperate even to my own ears.

  I hesitated too long, so Vincent prodded me again. “Come on now, Imogene.”

  I gave him my best death glare. “Don’t you dare use that name.”

  “Then answer my question.”

  I decided on a lame fallback. “I was in the area buying batteries.”

  “Still lightning training with Guntram, huh? Any progress?”

  “Not really. I mean, I have no idea what Guntram expects. Lightning isn’t exactly known for its controllability. Maybe I will never neatly harness it like the other elements.”

  “What about the fox dryant? You think he could help?”

  “She,” I corrected. “And why do you keep harping on that angle? It’s not like I can just ring her up whenever I want. Guntram doesn’t even believe she exists.”

  Vincent scooted a little toward me, bridging the distance so that our knees almost touched. “The fox feels like an important element of your history that you’re not taking into consideration. Call it police intuition.”

  I snorted. “‘Police intuition.’ That isn’t a thing.”

  “Sure it is. We have a sense for certain things.”

  “Oh really?” I folded my arms. “Like what?”

  His eyes softened, making my insides wobble. “Like you weren’t just ‘in the area.’”

  His gaze pierced mine. I couldn’t latch onto a complete thought. “Batteries,” I breathed.

  Vincent leaned forward, his face not far from mine. “You could have picked those up anywhere.”

  His hand brushed my bare knee, and I swore fire pith pooled in that area. Then his fingers settled on my bare arm, brushing the elbow, and fire did soar throughout my pithways. I couldn’t resist him. I tilted toward him as if guided by magnetism, lips softening. A gentle peace overtook me as time slowed to a crawl. Everything felt as it should be.